When I am really into a problem it is close to 24 hours. Its not that I don't sleep, but the dreams come and I find myself thinking of code, then when I am awake I am thinking of sleep (and the code in my dreams, and whether or not it will actually work). Yes I am serious about this, and yes I have actually solved problems this way. But no I doubt anybody cares, or will read the ~500th post anyway.
I have long realized that one must be passionate about a job to truely succeed in the long term. I recently had my first oppurtunity to hire someone, and the number one thing I looked for was passion. The person I chose had much less of a resume, but showed their interest through their "extra-curricular" projects.
The cliche of the day, "find a job you love and you will never have to work again", I think that everyday. I used to think that athletes and porn stars were lucky (ok they maybe still lucky) but I honestly cannot think of another job I would like more than programming. (may a few i would like equally. . . )
WHen I worked for a large auto supplier most of the IT staff were secretaries, that when a real it person left were drafted to take their place. I believe they chose the particular individuals for a couple of reasons:
First the IT mangers looked around the office to see who was basically doing nothing and therefore would not be missed for several weeks of training.
Then if that person was dumb enough, and lacked motivation they were deemed a "good" investment because they figure these people were not as likely to leave for greener pastures.
They also knew that there stupidity would mean they would generally be good "yes-men" so when management wanted to impose stupid policies they would havethe support of the "trained" techs.
I was a programmer and wrote cust MRP software and interfaces for the myriad proprietary systems hanging around. Programmers were treated like dirt because most of us had more inherent knowledge in our pinky fingers than the entire IT department. Hence we were a threat. If IT spent half the time actually implemeting and doing IT type tasks (it took over three weeks for one new hire to get an email address and an account on the NOVELL server) rather than the time they spent lobbying the higher up suits, on all the wonderful things they could do with more money, and lobbying for buying more proprietary canned apps, and lobbyingn against giving the inhouse devlopers anything, because its "much cheaper to buy packaged apps, yada yada yada blah blah blah.
I want to rant more but I digress. As I am sure many of you know it sucks working of rpointy haired bosses, or having stupid IT departments would have the ear of the execs. . .
Calling PHP "PERL on training wheels" is a bit misleading. Yes we should compare apples to apples, and IMHO PHP vs. mod PERL PHP wins hands down not only in preformance, but also in usability.
Languages truely are tools, and just like out in the shop you have to make choices. ..Would I rather use my leatherman or do I want to use a a regular screw driver. Most of you who own leatherman tools know that as pliers they are probably 95% as good as a regular pair of pliers and maybe 50% as good as dedicated screwdriver. (some times they hurt your hands, and the screwdriver would be better if it were magnetic, but I digress. . . ) They also cost considerably more than a single dedicated tool, but can preform a multitutde more functions.
PERL doesn't cost any more than PHP in terms of monetary amount, but I dare say it costs more in terms of speed, and in time invested in learning. I would also guess it costs more in terms of maintainablity because it more complex syntax means people need to be more more profiecient at it to maintain it reliably.
PHP was designed for the web, and excels at that. Now that it is maturing it has been drafted into a wider range of tasks, but at its core it is a web language, and its focus is fast web sites. In that respect, it is much like my proverbial screwdriver. The screwdriver can be used for a few auxilary tasks, but it generally isn't nearly as flexible as a leatherman.
So its pretty clear. PERL users like leatherman tools, PHP users prefer traditional single purpose tools. Or maybe not.
I guess I be a little more patient next timewith waiting for the preview to finish loading.
-- REPOST FOLLOWS: ---
I work for WebshowHost.com, I am basically the chief architect for our web-based control panel system. In other words I have pretty much wrote a control panel from scratch. It is not
done yet, which is why you won't see to much mention of it on our site. I have jsut got farenough to start beta testing it with some local developers, however if anyone is interested in
checking it out and offering suggestions please drop me a line at
bphillips@webshowhost.com
The system is built using PHP 4.0 for the front-end, several MySQL Databases and several PERL based daemons that do the actual system level work. The Control panel handles an
intitial customer bill, then lets our home-grown accounting package track the billing from then on.
WebSHowHost is very open-source friendly, and I have already had discussions about releasing our package as GPL with the partners who thus far have been very open to the idea.
I like building this application to building my dream house. I have tried to put in all the "extras" to make it well suited for me, and other developers like me.
I hope to have a demo on-line within the next week or so. Visually it is pretty spartan now, and the navigation isn't as intuitive as I'd like. So in other words it needs some polish. I also
need to make it a bit more generalized, so it more flexible in other situations.
The neat thing about the aritecture is the "auto-form" code I worte to provide an abstract method of generating HTML forms for mySQL databases. Each form is defined by a n
assoiciative array so visible fields can be turned on and off ddepending on the situation. Updating and Insert is as easy as passing the array to a specific function, so adding field to the
database the html form automatically reflects the change, making the tool very easy to customize, because you don't have to change a lot of static forms or modify any sql statements
to add fields. I have been meaning to release the auto form code for a while (since I orginally developed it for another independent project, but have been to usy to get to it.) Anyway
please feel free to drop me a line if your interested in talking about this.
I work for WebshowHost.com, I am basically the chief architect for our web-based control panel system. In other words I have pretty much wrote a control panel from scratch. It is not done yet, which is why you won't see to much mention of it on our site. I have jsut got farenough to start beta testing it with some local developers, however if anyone is interested in checking it out and offering suggestions please drop me a line at
The system is built using PHP 4.0 for the front-end, several MySQL Databases and several PERL based daemons that do the actual system level work. The Control panel handles an intitial customer bill, then lets our home-grown accounting package track the billing from then on.
WebSHowHost is very open-source friendly, and I have already had discussions about releasing our package as GPL with the partners who thus far have been very open to the idea.
I like building this application to building my dream house. I have tried to put in all the "extras" to make it well suited for me, and other developers like me.
I hope to have a demo on-line within the next week or so. Visually it is pretty spartan now, and the navigation isn't as intuitive as I'd like. So in other words it needs some polish. I also need to make it a bit more generalized, so it more flexible in other situations.
The neat thing about the aritecture is the "auto-form" code I worte to provide an abstract method of generating HTML forms for mySQL databases. Each form is defined by a n assoiciative array so visible fields can be turned on and off ddepending on the situation. Updating and Insert is as easy as passing the array to a specific function, so adding field to the database the html form automatically reflects the change, making the tool very easy to customize, because you don't have to change a lot of static forms or modify any sql statements to add fields. I have been meaning to release the auto form code for a while (since I orginally developed it for another independent project, but have been to usy to get to it.) Anyway please feel free to drop me a line if your interested in talking about this.
Isn't having one session with the ability to bring it up on another terminal exactly what VNC does? It would be great to get a couple of cheap sun rays at home, withj a linux box and VNC. . .
I have had a similar setup for a while with an old P75 laptop, using remote X displays, and VNC, but the thing finally died. I would like to experiment with a more robust, scalable solution that I can use elsewhere (as part of my consulting). . .
Please forgive my ignorance of these topics, I am a bit green when it comes to the administration side of things. . . -MS2k
Who needs a plug in? All you need to do is setup your own names server, a simple caching names server will do, and add the new.net DNS servers to your root list, and viola you should see the new domains.
I have several of my own TLDS on my local network.
Anyway, I think the new TLDs are great, especially because I think ICANN sucks, but that is another rant. . .
I don't know about you all, but the Oracle Ad in the sharp story must be one of the mega-ads referenced a bit earlier on slashdot (Banner Ads Could Soon Be Bigger)
It did its job, as far as grabbing my eyeballs, it was so big and ugly, an distracting. Kinda of like the new Pontiac Azteks, but I'll save that rant for another day.
Big banners suck big time. . . I am glad I'm running 1600x1280.
C|NET has a spot reserved on my shit list, that seems tobe growing longer every day.
I agree it seems like it should be easy to jam. Which would then make these little jamming devices (which would probably be programmable for any area) ubiquitous. That would then cause a lot of havoc for the ever more legitimate uses of GPS, which in turn, would lead to the knee-jerk reaction by government, to outlaw the GPS jammers. So we would end up criminals again, just for trying to use legitimately purchased electronic equipment. Sucks to be us.
Definately not a pretty scenerio.
My guess is that the regional encodeing will not be integrated into larger chips (at least at first) so it may be possible to by-pass them on the circuit board, without having broadcasting a pirate GPS signal.
Also isn't there some type of encryption/error checking, etc involved with the sign itself? Otherwise what is to prevent a rogue nation from intercepting/jamming/spoofing our GPS signals?
I image a scenerio where the little broadcast chip is taped onto a watch battery, and put into some type of "buckshot" arrangemnt dropped over urban areas, or some other strategic place.
I cannot image the engineers who built the system would have made it so vulnerable. But since I know abosultely nothing at all about how GPS works, I am just speculating, and so I am probably way off base. So if someone more knowledgable would enlighten me I would be gratefule.
Any good site, (government or not) should identify who their audience is and what their audience is likely to want. By default government sites are going to have to cater to a lower specification so that more users will be able to view the pages.
In my opion that means government sites should be viewable by 640x480 low color computers, and preferably text based browers as well. The text based browser serves to fold first for us geeky users who like lynx, and second for visually impaired visitors who need the pages dictated to them.
The pages should also avoid "bells and whistles" that add little real content. This does not mean that advanced technologies do not have a place, it just means the merits need to be carefully weighed.
For example flash animations could be used for demonstrative purposes to show tthe right way to fill in a form, etc. The point is that technology should be used for a good reason, not merely for the sake of "looking" good. whitehouse.gov in the early years was particularly bad for its tacky use of web design elements.
Moving beyond the basic concepts is the content its self. Government should take the take to develop its documentation to be net-centric. Instead of wasting time printing up thousands of forms and guides and the like, that quickly become outdated, it should create everything in generic markup languages that can easily be spit out in html, pdf, word, plain text, etc.
Given that the above is more or less a pipe dream at this stage, governments should design their sites to be data centric. And provide various means of accessing the information they need to share. By this there pages need to be fully searchable, and preferably using advanced search strings. The content should also be categorized as much as possible (kinda like Yahoo!) so visitors can choose to either search, or "drill-down" to find the content they need. The data should also be x-linked extensively. Crosslinked data is probably the biggest problem I see now. I can usually find a document, but the document is often a small piece of a much larger process. And since I have an incomplete view I go into the office thinking I have everything only to find out I need to fill out 3 other forms and jump through a few more hoops before I can be helped.
Though the most important issue in my mind is knowing your audience and designing to suit their needs. If you have a large audince like a national government would have, then you may need to break down your site and offer differnet versions for different audiences.
Local governments have an easier go of it because they will have a better idea of the demographics of their constituents and will therefore be able to design to an appropriate level. I.e an inner city government where most of teh users are coming from publuic computers in libraries and schools will likely want a different interface than an affluent suburbs city government. I'm sure the rationalizations and implements on geo-political web designs would make an excellent graduate thesis. If anyone has already written one on this topic I'd like to read it. . .
Please remeber these are just my $0.02 Your milage and opinions will certainly vary.
What about looking at getting a job in a large US company with overseas offices/facilities. I'm in Michigan and most of the larger autocompanies and the suppliers have large organizations in Europe, and the Pacific. The companies I worked at seemed willing to help relocate people on occasion. I also have known several IT/Programmers who spent months overseas for various projects.
You would have the advantage of keeping US salary, the language barrier would be less of an issue, and the company would take care of all the nasty legal red-tape. You would also not have to worry about getting a job when you get back.
I imagine you would miss out on foriegn business culture to a certain degree. . .
This is just my assumptions I have only been to Europe once and it was a personal vacation. I have never seriously looked into transfering or anything like that so please take my comments with a grain of salt or two.
Saw the old slashdot article, and the users talking about the wall, but has anyone just gotten a pair of 14 or 15" panel running with Xfree 4.0 or else with one of the commercial Xservers.
I check buy.com every now and then and saw at one point 14" panel that do 1024x768 for about $550. 2048x768 would be pretty good for me, and for less than $1500 (includeing the extra video card) you are saving quite a bit off the cost of a large single panel.
Anybody have recommendations on this type of setup?
We've been there and determined all that we needed to know.
That statement reminds me of the statement in the early fifties that the total world market for computers is seven. Or perhaps another short-sighted pronouncement in the 1800's when some believed teh US should close the Patent office, because everything useful had already been invented.
Of course now we want to close the patent office for other reasons. . .
I ahve worked at both very large companies, very small companies, and mid-sized companies as a technical worker.
I agrre management is definately a large problem. In my experience managment is too focused on the process of how things get done, rather than the end result.
So they are constantly wanting updates and reports as to what I did along the way. Instead of consentrating mainly on the final output.
This management style often prompts them to interject in the middle of the process and leads to scope creep and rewrites, etc.
Part of the need to manage in this style is the lack of a clear specifications. They don't understand enough up front to design what they want, and cannot anticipate the end result well enough so they have to keep "peeking over the should". Eventually the direction becomes clearer to them and they then jump in with changes.
It is very frustrating. Obvisously part of the blame is on the technical side, I am not communicating enough information up front. Part of the problem also comes from the upper levels by not sharing enough information with my dorect managers.
Another part of the problem is communication. Having all the communications tools doesn't do anyone any good if they are not used. My experience has been managers don't like tools. We have a web based forum to discuss adminitrative and technical issues. I post major milestones, and anything I think others would benefit from knowing there. The managers never look at it. They insist upon face to face meetings. I would not mind the meetings i they were asking for clarification and additional information, but they ask simple questions all of which are answered in the forum.
I used to work from home, but can't even do that now that we've grown and have added managers (not added techies though. . . ) since now I have to be in the office daily so I am accessible to all the managers. ARGHH!!!
This is more a rant than anything I guess, I don't even remember the original topic anymore. I hope it is at least close. . .
My problem usually stems not from hard architecture problems, but instead from bad specs. I design web applications using PHP. I will often go on binges where I work 15-20 hours straight take a nap and go back at it. Those are the time when I am told to go and "just do it". But if I am given a handful of poor specs, and then somebody is looking over my shoulder asking me to redo every other feature or function I have a tough time gaining momentum to get any productive programming done.
For me its all about momentum. The more I code the more I want to code. If I have to keep shifting gears, by attending meetings, writing reports, etc I can't shift my brain into gear. Then I am left in limbo, usually checking my email every couple of minutes and making sure slashdot hasn't posted a new story.
Fortunately for me I work at home, so I can avoid most distractions, but it usually takes me at least a day to recover from a day in the real office.
Does anyone have any case studies of large installations of linux as a desktop system? I remember a while back Burlington supposedly roled out a large Linux installation.
Plenty of people have said 'do it this way' or 'do it like that', etc. For something as large as 2500 machines I think it would be better to have a few real-experiences. Maybe get in touch with Google, to see how they manage their thousands of machines. (granted they don't have the burden of endusers at each machine, but the task of administering thousands of seperate boxes has certainly given them knowledge that most of us do not have first hand.)
I imagine a lot of large univeristies use it in a deskto role as well. Anyway, some documented real-world installations would be very useful for many of us out there.
(I am in the pre-embronic stages of setting up a company to install Linux/BSD for small businesses. It would be very nice to have some success stories to show my first customers.)
This is probably obvisous to most, but it took me a while to track down (mainly because blizzard sites has been sllloowww!
If your getting tired of battlenet crashes, "private" games can be set up on the net, if you have a NAT box you need to open/redirect PORT 4000 to the "host" computer. We played till 5am without a single crash! For hosting a game on battle.net you'll need to also open up 6112 through 6119 (both TCP/UDP). This info is from the FAQ on blizzards site.
Negative, is our characters don't show up on the ladder, but it was nice quality time with my brothers. . .
BTW, Necromancers rule. I love having a clay thug to beat up evil demons while I watch.
What's more interesting to me is seeing a big software comapny like Progress, who has made enterprise class databse systems for years, adopt MySQL as its "Open Source" databse product rather than release its own existing tools as Open Source.
In case you missed it the press release I am refering to is at LinuxToday and talks about Progress software's new company NuSphere.
The company I work for has been a Progress shop for years, it would sure be nice to see MySQL be more compatible with many of our old databases. It would be even better if through this relationship Progress will support other open source endevauors (most notably PHP).
This "sharing software" (i.e. napster, gnutella, etc) is quickly turning into an arms race. The folks at HavenCo have one possible solution. But Freenet (slashdot interview) Sounds like a good way to protect the freedom of data. Once we come up with a way to anonomously post data to the net, and have it live there independent of the server/ISP and other "real world" associations. It can be free.
Obviously, big media industry is already scared of this, given the attacks on napster and gnutella; however, if true data freedom is achieved it will be much more than big companies who will be cheesed off, it will be big COUNTRIES, who have a lot more to lose.
Imagine people blowing the whistle on governemnt coverups. It could open the world to new forms of esionage and the like, but itstead of stealing secrets to hide them, people will post the anonomously and freely to the world.
Imagine today's political campaigns being "mud slinging pissing contests" magnified about a thousand times. If data lives freely people will abuse the system, especially those who are most threaten by it. (Govern't, Big Industry, etc)
Imagine the FUD appearing. This will spurn a whole new filtering x-referencing technology to screen potential lies and unsubstanciated rumors. And another round will take off.
I'm not sure where I really stand on this isssue. I believe information, should be free. I don't believe in National Security, when it cost so much in terms of unaccounted black budgets, and the overhead associated with those secrets, but then again, I don't think nukes in every country is a good idea either.
In this context spreading a few pirated MP3's seems like a rather small issue. I think we need to look at the big picture and think how to best protect our freedoms.
Even if XML sucks, if M$ uses it for its primary document format, it will be MUCH easier to get alternative WordProcessors, Spreadsheets, etc, to be compatible. Because even if they extend and embrace the format they use is plainly available for all to see. It will be great to have full Office2000.net compatibility across platforms.
Though knowing M$ they will probably only let you save XML to their servers, if you want to save local it has to be proprietary binary format as always . . . Or some other stupid ploy to thwart all that good.
I've not done too much with IDE's but another example of a different kinda of codeing is the crap that WYIWYG HTML editors. Just like the IDEs they produce such clunky extraneous code that makes it nearly impossible to hand maintain an exant project. It sometimes seems simpler to start over, with a new page (or new objects, classes etc when your in the IDE.) I suspect that it is the IDE that has caused WIN2K and the rest of the bloated packages MS produces to get that way. Every time they add a new developer, he/she adds their own set of specialized functions, and leaves the existing ones there so as not to "break" anything (as if the program is not inherently broken. . . ).
IANA (Oceanographer) but I cannot believe it is possible for the exant water to be cotrolled by sigificant tidal forces. Since the moons of mars are very tiny. Even if the moons had enough mass the body of water would bee too small to have a noticable tide (Lake Superior the largest lake on earth only has a tide of a few inches. ..) the volume of water believed to be on mars cannot be anywhere near the size of on of the great lakes.
Every time a discussion like this comes up everybody always talks about wordProcessor X or Spreadsheet Y vs. MS equivalents. We usually bringup KDE and GNOME and X in general as well. We keep rehashing the wrong things. Free/Open Source tools are developed enough on the desktop to accomodate the vast amjority of business users, more reliably and efficiently than the current MS equivalent.
But good desktop software *IS NOT* the problem with businesses adopting open source software for the desktop. Every business I have come across has one or two crappy little applications that they depend on, that are only available on the Windows platform. I am talking about shitty little applications devloped by a key vendor/supplier or even large customer, that they must run. Of of my clients (a credit union) must use a DG DASHER terminal emulator to connect with their service bureau. They also have propreitary applications to order checks, track ATM data, pull credit reports, and about four to produce various audit reports for the government. Most of these applications are very simple, I would guess a proficient programmer (with help for the other side) could port these or clone the functionality in less than a week.
The point here is it would be stupid for me to try to migrate there desktop over to Linux or BSD because the hoops they would have to jump through just for the 5% of the time when they need these silly little applications.
I also have a client that does direct mailings (and depends on proprietary softawre to control address printers, maillist sorters/correctors), a tree farm who depends on proprietary label making software. The list goes on. . .
If we want to dethrone MS on the desktop it is these millions of crappy apps that need to come over to Linux. Developing and maintaining them will be a huge chore, and will likely face opposition from the small companies that develop the software who do not understand the concept of open-source.
I have been preparing a business plan to deal with this issue, and put together a repository and a team of developers to port/clone these applications. So far I have only outlined the plan, and began documenting business cases and researched the feasibility. I am looking for help with this. I would love to here from anyone with comments or ideas on the subject. Please email me at brandon_phillips@hotmail.com if you are interested in helping launch my effort, or if you know of anyone that has a similar project already started.
Slashdot Mirror
When I am really into a problem it is close to 24 hours. Its not that I don't sleep, but the dreams come and I find myself thinking of code, then when I am awake I am thinking of sleep (and the code in my dreams, and whether or not it will actually work). Yes I am serious about this, and yes I have actually solved problems this way. But no I doubt anybody cares, or will read the ~500th post anyway.
MS2k
I have long realized that one must be passionate about a job to truely succeed in the long term. I recently had my first oppurtunity to hire someone, and the number one thing I looked for was passion. The person I chose had much less of a resume, but showed their interest through their "extra-curricular" projects.
The cliche of the day, "find a job you love and you will never have to work again", I think that everyday. I used to think that athletes and porn stars were lucky (ok they maybe still lucky) but I honestly cannot think of another job I would like more than programming. (may a few i would like equally. . . )
WHen I worked for a large auto supplier most of the IT staff were secretaries, that when a real it person left were drafted to take their place. I believe they chose the particular individuals for a couple of reasons:
First the IT mangers looked around the office to see who was basically doing nothing and therefore would not be missed for several weeks of training.
Then if that person was dumb enough, and lacked motivation they were deemed a "good" investment because they figure these people were not as likely to leave for greener pastures.
They also knew that there stupidity would mean they would generally be good "yes-men" so when management wanted to impose stupid policies they would havethe support of the "trained" techs.
I was a programmer and wrote cust MRP software and interfaces for the myriad proprietary systems hanging around. Programmers were treated like dirt because most of us had more inherent knowledge in our pinky fingers than the entire IT department. Hence we were a threat. If IT spent half the time actually implemeting and doing IT type tasks (it took over three weeks for one new hire to get an email address and an account on the NOVELL server) rather than the time they spent lobbying the higher up suits, on all the wonderful things they could do with more money, and lobbying for buying more proprietary canned apps, and lobbyingn against giving the inhouse devlopers anything, because its "much cheaper to buy packaged apps, yada yada yada blah blah blah.
I want to rant more but I digress. As I am sure many of you know it sucks working of rpointy haired bosses, or having stupid IT departments would have the ear of the execs. . .
-ms2k
Calling PHP "PERL on training wheels" is a bit misleading. Yes we should compare apples to apples, and IMHO PHP vs. mod PERL PHP wins hands down not only in preformance, but also in usability.
.Would I rather use my leatherman or do I want to use a a regular screw driver. Most of you who own leatherman tools know that as pliers they are probably 95% as good as a regular pair of pliers and maybe 50% as good as dedicated screwdriver. (some times they hurt your hands, and the screwdriver would be better if it were magnetic, but I digress. . . ) They also cost considerably more than a single dedicated tool, but can preform a multitutde more functions.
Languages truely are tools, and just like out in the shop you have to make choices. .
PERL doesn't cost any more than PHP in terms of monetary amount, but I dare say it costs more in terms of speed, and in time invested in learning. I would also guess it costs more in terms of maintainablity because it more complex syntax means people need to be more more profiecient at it to maintain it reliably.
PHP was designed for the web, and excels at that. Now that it is maturing it has been drafted into a wider range of tasks, but at its core it is a web language, and its focus is fast web sites. In that respect, it is much like my proverbial screwdriver. The screwdriver can be used for a few auxilary tasks, but it generally isn't nearly as flexible as a leatherman.
So its pretty clear. PERL users like leatherman tools, PHP users prefer traditional single purpose tools. Or maybe not.
MS2k
Also, my correct e-mail is bphillips@webshowhost.com
I guess I be a little more patient next timewith waiting for the preview to finish loading.
-- REPOST FOLLOWS: ---
I work for WebshowHost.com, I am basically the chief architect for our web-based control panel system. In other words I have pretty much wrote a control panel from scratch. It is not done yet, which is why you won't see to much mention of it on our site. I have jsut got farenough to start beta testing it with some local developers, however if anyone is interested in checking it out and offering suggestions please drop me a line at
bphillips@webshowhost.com
The system is built using PHP 4.0 for the front-end, several MySQL Databases and several PERL based daemons that do the actual system level work. The Control panel handles an intitial customer bill, then lets our home-grown accounting package track the billing from then on.
WebSHowHost is very open-source friendly, and I have already had discussions about releasing our package as GPL with the partners who thus far have been very open to the idea.
I like building this application to building my dream house. I have tried to put in all the "extras" to make it well suited for me, and other developers like me.
I hope to have a demo on-line within the next week or so. Visually it is pretty spartan now, and the navigation isn't as intuitive as I'd like. So in other words it needs some polish. I also need to make it a bit more generalized, so it more flexible in other situations.
The neat thing about the aritecture is the "auto-form" code I worte to provide an abstract method of generating HTML forms for mySQL databases. Each form is defined by a n assoiciative array so visible fields can be turned on and off ddepending on the situation. Updating and Insert is as easy as passing the array to a specific function, so adding field to the database the html form automatically reflects the change, making the tool very easy to customize, because you don't have to change a lot of static forms or modify any sql statements to add fields. I have been meaning to release the auto form code for a while (since I orginally developed it for another independent project, but have been to usy to get to it.) Anyway please feel free to drop me a line if your interested in talking about this.
-Brandon (MS2K)
The system is built using PHP 4.0 for the front-end, several MySQL Databases and several PERL based daemons that do the actual system level work. The Control panel handles an intitial customer bill, then lets our home-grown accounting package track the billing from then on.
WebSHowHost is very open-source friendly, and I have already had discussions about releasing our package as GPL with the partners who thus far have been very open to the idea.
I like building this application to building my dream house. I have tried to put in all the "extras" to make it well suited for me, and other developers like me.
I hope to have a demo on-line within the next week or so. Visually it is pretty spartan now, and the navigation isn't as intuitive as I'd like. So in other words it needs some polish. I also need to make it a bit more generalized, so it more flexible in other situations.
The neat thing about the aritecture is the "auto-form" code I worte to provide an abstract method of generating HTML forms for mySQL databases. Each form is defined by a n assoiciative array so visible fields can be turned on and off ddepending on the situation. Updating and Insert is as easy as passing the array to a specific function, so adding field to the database the html form automatically reflects the change, making the tool very easy to customize, because you don't have to change a lot of static forms or modify any sql statements to add fields. I have been meaning to release the auto form code for a while (since I orginally developed it for another independent project, but have been to usy to get to it.) Anyway please feel free to drop me a line if your interested in talking about this.
-Brandon (MS2K)
Isn't having one session with the ability to bring it up on another terminal exactly what VNC does? It would be great to get a couple of cheap sun rays at home, withj a linux box and VNC. . .
I have had a similar setup for a while with an old P75 laptop, using remote X displays, and VNC, but the thing finally died. I would like to experiment with a more robust, scalable solution that I can use elsewhere (as part of my consulting). . .
Please forgive my ignorance of these topics, I am a bit green when it comes to the administration side of things. . .
-MS2k
Who needs a plug in? All you need to do is setup your own names server, a simple caching names server will do, and add the new.net DNS servers to your root list, and viola you should see the new domains.
I have several of my own TLDS on my local network.
Anyway, I think the new TLDs are great, especially because I think ICANN sucks, but that is another rant. . .
ms2k
It did its job, as far as grabbing my eyeballs, it was so big and ugly, an distracting. Kinda of like the new Pontiac Azteks, but I'll save that rant for another day.
Big banners suck big time. . . I am glad I'm running 1600x1280.
C|NET has a spot reserved on my shit list, that seems tobe growing longer every day.
-ms2k
I agree it seems like it should be easy to jam. Which would then make these little jamming devices (which would probably be programmable for any area) ubiquitous. That would then cause a lot of havoc for the ever more legitimate uses of GPS, which in turn, would lead to the knee-jerk reaction by government, to outlaw the GPS jammers. So we would end up criminals again, just for trying to use legitimately purchased electronic equipment. Sucks to be us.
Definately not a pretty scenerio.
My guess is that the regional encodeing will not be integrated into larger chips (at least at first) so it may be possible to by-pass them on the circuit board, without having broadcasting a pirate GPS signal.
Also isn't there some type of encryption/error checking, etc involved with the sign itself? Otherwise what is to prevent a rogue nation from intercepting/jamming/spoofing our GPS signals?
I image a scenerio where the little broadcast chip is taped onto a watch battery, and put into some type of "buckshot" arrangemnt dropped over urban areas, or some other strategic place.
I cannot image the engineers who built the system would have made it so vulnerable. But since I know abosultely nothing at all about how GPS works, I am just speculating, and so I am probably way off base. So if someone more knowledgable would enlighten me I would be gratefule.
Thanks,
MS2k
In my opion that means government sites should be viewable by 640x480 low color computers, and preferably text based browers as well. The text based browser serves to fold first for us geeky users who like lynx, and second for visually impaired visitors who need the pages dictated to them.
The pages should also avoid "bells and whistles" that add little real content. This does not mean that advanced technologies do not have a place, it just means the merits need to be carefully weighed.
For example flash animations could be used for demonstrative purposes to show tthe right way to fill in a form, etc. The point is that technology should be used for a good reason, not merely for the sake of "looking" good. whitehouse.gov in the early years was particularly bad for its tacky use of web design elements.
Moving beyond the basic concepts is the content its self. Government should take the take to develop its documentation to be net-centric. Instead of wasting time printing up thousands of forms and guides and the like, that quickly become outdated, it should create everything in generic markup languages that can easily be spit out in html, pdf, word, plain text, etc.
Given that the above is more or less a pipe dream at this stage, governments should design their sites to be data centric. And provide various means of accessing the information they need to share. By this there pages need to be fully searchable, and preferably using advanced search strings. The content should also be categorized as much as possible (kinda like Yahoo!) so visitors can choose to either search, or "drill-down" to find the content they need. The data should also be x-linked extensively. Crosslinked data is probably the biggest problem I see now. I can usually find a document, but the document is often a small piece of a much larger process. And since I have an incomplete view I go into the office thinking I have everything only to find out I need to fill out 3 other forms and jump through a few more hoops before I can be helped.
Though the most important issue in my mind is knowing your audience and designing to suit their needs. If you have a large audince like a national government would have, then you may need to break down your site and offer differnet versions for different audiences.
Local governments have an easier go of it because they will have a better idea of the demographics of their constituents and will therefore be able to design to an appropriate level. I.e an inner city government where most of teh users are coming from publuic computers in libraries and schools will likely want a different interface than an affluent suburbs city government. I'm sure the rationalizations and implements on geo-political web designs would make an excellent graduate thesis. If anyone has already written one on this topic I'd like to read it. . .
Please remeber these are just my $0.02 Your milage and opinions will certainly vary.
-MS2k
What about looking at getting a job in a large US company with overseas offices/facilities. I'm in Michigan and most of the larger autocompanies and the suppliers have large organizations in Europe, and the Pacific. The companies I worked at seemed willing to help relocate people on occasion. I also have known several IT/Programmers who spent months overseas for various projects.
You would have the advantage of keeping US salary, the language barrier would be less of an issue, and the company would take care of all the nasty legal red-tape. You would also not have to worry about getting a job when you get back.
I imagine you would miss out on foriegn business culture to a certain degree. . .
This is just my assumptions I have only been to Europe once and it was a personal vacation. I have never seriously looked into transfering or anything like that so please take my comments with a grain of salt or two.
-MS2k
Saw the old slashdot article, and the users talking about the wall, but has anyone just gotten a pair of 14 or 15" panel running with Xfree 4.0 or else with one of the commercial Xservers.
I check buy.com every now and then and saw at one point 14" panel that do 1024x768 for about $550. 2048x768 would be pretty good for me, and for less than $1500 (includeing the extra video card) you are saving quite a bit off the cost of a large single panel.
Anybody have recommendations on this type of setup?
-MS2k
That statement reminds me of the statement in the early fifties that the total world market for computers is seven. Or perhaps another short-sighted pronouncement in the 1800's when some believed teh US should close the Patent office, because everything useful had already been invented.
Of course now we want to close the patent office for other reasons. . .
-MS2K
I ahve worked at both very large companies, very small companies, and mid-sized companies as a technical worker.
I agrre management is definately a large problem. In my experience managment is too focused on the process of how things get done, rather than the end result.
So they are constantly wanting updates and reports as to what I did along the way. Instead of consentrating mainly on the final output.
This management style often prompts them to interject in the middle of the process and leads to scope creep and rewrites, etc.
Part of the need to manage in this style is the lack of a clear specifications. They don't understand enough up front to design what they want, and cannot anticipate the end result well enough so they have to keep "peeking over the should". Eventually the direction becomes clearer to them and they then jump in with changes.
It is very frustrating. Obvisously part of the blame is on the technical side, I am not communicating enough information up front. Part of the problem also comes from the upper levels by not sharing enough information with my dorect managers.
Another part of the problem is communication. Having all the communications tools doesn't do anyone any good if they are not used. My experience has been managers don't like tools. We have a web based forum to discuss adminitrative and technical issues. I post major milestones, and anything I think others would benefit from knowing there. The managers never look at it. They insist upon face to face meetings. I would not mind the meetings i they were asking for clarification and additional information, but they ask simple questions all of which are answered in the forum.
I used to work from home, but can't even do that now that we've grown and have added managers (not added techies though. . . ) since now I have to be in the office daily so I am accessible to all the managers. ARGHH!!!
This is more a rant than anything I guess, I don't even remember the original topic anymore. I hope it is at least close. . .
-MS2k
My problem usually stems not from hard architecture problems, but instead from bad specs. I design web applications using PHP. I will often go on binges where I work 15-20 hours straight take a nap and go back at it. Those are the time when I am told to go and "just do it". But if I am given a handful of poor specs, and then somebody is looking over my shoulder asking me to redo every other feature or function I have a tough time gaining momentum to get any productive programming done.
For me its all about momentum. The more I code the more I want to code. If I have to keep shifting gears, by attending meetings, writing reports, etc I can't shift my brain into gear. Then I am left in limbo, usually checking my email every couple of minutes and making sure slashdot hasn't posted a new story.
Fortunately for me I work at home, so I can avoid most distractions, but it usually takes me at least a day to recover from a day in the real office.
just my $.02
-MS2K
Does anyone have any case studies of large installations of linux as a desktop system? I remember a while back Burlington supposedly roled out a large Linux installation.
Plenty of people have said 'do it this way' or 'do it like that', etc. For something as large as 2500 machines I think it would be better to have a few real-experiences. Maybe get in touch with Google, to see how they manage their thousands of machines. (granted they don't have the burden of endusers at each machine, but the task of administering thousands of seperate boxes has certainly given them knowledge that most of us do not have first hand.)
I imagine a lot of large univeristies use it in a deskto role as well. Anyway, some documented real-world installations would be very useful for many of us out there.
(I am in the pre-embronic stages of setting up a company to install Linux/BSD for small businesses. It would be very nice to have some success stories to show my first customers.)
-MS2k
This is probably obvisous to most, but it took me a while to track down (mainly because blizzard sites has been sllloowww!
If your getting tired of battlenet crashes, "private" games can be set up on the net, if you have a NAT box you need to open/redirect PORT 4000 to the "host" computer. We played till 5am without a single crash! For hosting a game on battle.net you'll need to also open up 6112 through 6119 (both TCP/UDP). This info is from the FAQ on blizzards site.
Negative, is our characters don't show up on the ladder, but it was nice quality time with my brothers. . .
BTW, Necromancers rule. I love having a clay thug to beat up evil demons while I watch.
-MS2k
What's more interesting to me is seeing a big software comapny like Progress, who has made enterprise class databse systems for years, adopt MySQL as its "Open Source" databse product rather than release its own existing tools as Open Source.
In case you missed it the press release I am refering to is at LinuxToday and talks about Progress software's new company NuSphere.
The company I work for has been a Progress shop for years, it would sure be nice to see MySQL be more compatible with many of our old databases. It would be even better if through this relationship Progress will support other open source endevauors (most notably PHP).
-MS2k
This "sharing software" (i.e. napster, gnutella, etc) is quickly turning into an arms race. The folks at HavenCo have one possible solution. But Freenet (slashdot interview) Sounds like a good way to protect the freedom of data. Once we come up with a way to anonomously post data to the net, and have it live there independent of the server/ISP and other "real world" associations. It can be free.
Obviously, big media industry is already scared of this, given the attacks on napster and gnutella; however, if true data freedom is achieved it will be much more than big companies who will be cheesed off, it will be big COUNTRIES, who have a lot more to lose.
Imagine people blowing the whistle on governemnt coverups. It could open the world to new forms of esionage and the like, but itstead of stealing secrets to hide them, people will post the anonomously and freely to the world.
Imagine today's political campaigns being "mud slinging pissing contests" magnified about a thousand times. If data lives freely people will abuse the system, especially those who are most threaten by it. (Govern't, Big Industry, etc)
Imagine the FUD appearing. This will spurn a whole new filtering x-referencing technology to screen potential lies and unsubstanciated rumors.
And another round will take off.
I'm not sure where I really stand on this isssue. I believe information, should be free. I don't believe in National Security, when it cost so much in terms of unaccounted black budgets, and the overhead associated with those secrets, but then again, I don't think nukes in every country is a good idea either.
In this context spreading a few pirated MP3's seems like a rather small issue. I think we need to look at the big picture and think how to best protect our freedoms.
-MS2k
Even if XML sucks, if M$ uses it for its primary document format, it will be MUCH easier to get alternative WordProcessors, Spreadsheets, etc, to be compatible. Because even if they extend and embrace the format they use is plainly available for all to see. It will be great to have full Office2000.net compatibility across platforms.
Though knowing M$ they will probably only let you save XML to their servers, if you want to save local it has to be proprietary binary format as always . . . Or some other stupid ploy to thwart all that good.
-MS2K
I've not done too much with IDE's but another example of a different kinda of codeing is the crap that WYIWYG HTML editors. Just like the IDEs they produce such clunky extraneous code that makes it nearly impossible to hand maintain an exant project. It sometimes seems simpler to start over, with a new page (or new objects, classes etc when your in the IDE.) I suspect that it is the IDE that has caused WIN2K and the rest of the bloated packages MS produces to get that way. Every time they add a new developer, he/she adds their own set of specialized functions, and leaves the existing ones there so as not to "break" anything (as if the program is not inherently broken. . . ).
-MS2k
IANA (Oceanographer) but I cannot believe it is possible for the exant water to be cotrolled by sigificant tidal forces. Since the moons of mars are very tiny. Even if the moons had enough mass the body of water would bee too small to have a noticable tide (Lake Superior the largest lake on earth only has a tide of a few inches. . .) the volume of water believed to be on mars cannot be anywhere near the size of on of the great lakes.
-ms2k
Every time a discussion like this comes up everybody always talks about wordProcessor X or Spreadsheet Y vs. MS equivalents. We usually bringup KDE and GNOME and X in general as well. We keep rehashing the wrong things. Free/Open Source tools are developed enough on the desktop to accomodate the vast amjority of business users, more reliably and efficiently than the current MS equivalent.
But good desktop software *IS NOT* the problem with businesses adopting open source software for the desktop. Every business I have come across has one or two crappy little applications that they depend on, that are only available on the Windows platform. I am talking about shitty little applications devloped by a key vendor/supplier or even large customer, that they must run. Of of my clients (a credit union) must use a DG DASHER terminal emulator to connect with their service bureau. They also have propreitary applications to order checks, track ATM data, pull credit reports, and about four to produce various audit reports for the government. Most of these applications are very simple, I would guess a proficient programmer (with help for the other side) could port these or clone the functionality in less than a week.
The point here is it would be stupid for me to try to migrate there desktop over to Linux or BSD because the hoops they would have to jump through just for the 5% of the time when they need these silly little applications.
I also have a client that does direct mailings (and depends on proprietary softawre to control address printers, maillist sorters/correctors), a tree farm who depends on proprietary label making software. The list goes on. . .
If we want to dethrone MS on the desktop it is these millions of crappy apps that need to come over to Linux. Developing and maintaining them will be a huge chore, and will likely face opposition from the small companies that develop the software who do not understand the concept of open-source.
I have been preparing a business plan to deal with this issue, and put together a repository and a team of developers to port/clone these applications. So far I have only outlined the plan, and began documenting business cases and researched the feasibility. I am looking for help with this. I would love to here from anyone with comments or ideas on the subject. Please email me at brandon_phillips@hotmail.com if you are interested in helping launch my effort, or if you know of anyone that has a similar project already started.
Thanks,
Brandon
Maybe I will be able to share MP3's via the my Sprint PCS cell phone, by playing music-on-hold.
then again maybe not.
Plugging into a TV is nice, but VGA ut would be much better. . .