But what's so special about that - I can hook up my computer's G400 to a TV display, too. The really cool thing is the power of the Dreamcast is hidden from the user.
Actually, that's only part of the cool thing. The other is that a Dreamcast costs between 10% and 20% of a good "gaming" PC, and somewhat less than a more basic model. If Sega is on the ball, this could be a huge selling point with parents: "Buy the Dreamcast. It's cheaper than a PC, your kid can browse the web with it, and it's at least a US$1000 less than a computer that'll play the same games." Sounds like a winning pitch to me.
So the people who actually own the property don't have the right to put terms into leases now?
Don't deliberately overlook daw's point. Yes, movie theatres do have an interest in determining what movies they run. Yes, landlords have the right to put terms into leases. Does this mean that landlords have the right to determine what kind of movies are shown in a given area?
I also think your use of the term "pandering" is kind of insulting. Some people use their right to picket and to free speach and you disapprove?
I can remember a handful of companies over the past couple of years putting up Mac web servers and issuing a challenge to crackers (just in case you thought Microsoft and LinuxPPC invented the whole idea).
The first contest I saw along these lines took place some time ago - I'm thinking as far back as '96, IIRC. However, every once in a while, you'll see one pop up. (Although, I have to admit I haven't seen one for Macs recently.)
In the end, this comes down to the classic bugaboo of functionality vs. security. Any system that provides for remote administration is going to be subject to attacks. Moreso if it's an unencrypted channel. And the more services you run that listen to ports, the liklier it is that one of them will be exploitable.
By the way - in one instance, the web server was cracked due to a configuration mistake. Only goes to show - it doesn't matter how good the system is if you don't take the time to configure it correctly.
...is for people to learn the correct acronyms. It's CORBA. Common Object Request Broker Architecture. And you're right - it won't be on your wristwatch anytime soon. Then again, it was designed to be a solution to a problem much more complex than this one.
Personally, I'd love to have a little linux box to do network troubleshooting. Take it wherever I go, run a tcpdump, look for odd stuff. It'd be ridiculously useful. I could even run sendmail off of it to demonstrate to my more annoying clients that their firewalls were misconfigured. (In general, they assume that it's a routing problem before they look at their own logfiles.)
The following quotes are from the article. They range from technical mis-statements to syntax quibbles.
But mention Red Hat and Linux to Aubrey Edwards, group product manager for Microsoft's forthcoming Windows NT upgrade Windows 2000, and he seems almost on the verge of stifling a yawn. ''When you look at the hype versus the reality today,'' says Edwards, ''there is a big disconnect.''
Never trust a man who uses the word "disconnect" inappropriately. It's a variety of corporate slang common to PHBs.
Discrepancy. Difference. Not disconnect.
For example, Java was originally designed to prevent users from saving files to a computer's hard drive - a good security precaution, but worse than useless for word processing.
Once again, a journalist who can't differentiate between Java and Applets. Java applications have always been able to read from hard drives. Say what you want about the language, but it's not a toy. (It may not be possible to make this statement of applets.)
Talk to Microsoft executives and they'll tell you that a similar fate awaits Linux. Charles Fitzgerald, director of business development in Microsoft's software development unit, says the Linux hype has already peaked. ''Cold hard reality is coming to bear,'' he says.
>sarcasm< If I were looking for a good source of unbiased Linux coverage, I'd look to IT professionals. Hey, the director of business development for Microsoft looks like a good choice! >/sarcasm<
Seriously - doesn't anyone find it odd that Troan's comments only address the comparison of Linux to Java, and not allegations by Microsoft executives? I'd like to see a little bit more balance in this story.
Fitzgerald points to recent benchmark tests by the research firm Mindcraft Inc., which found Windows NT performs a variety of tasks faster than Linux.
anyone who has actually used it knows that Windows definitely knows it is the better desktop system currently.
One of the side effects of having Linux hyped so much in the media lately is that people expect it to be the be-all, end-all, when in fact it's a work in progress. The technically savvy know that an operating system isn't the same as its GUI, or its browser, but when you're actually deploying Linux as a desktop OS, who cares? The bottom line is that the GUI, browser, apps, and underlying OS are all part of a system. Like it are not, some parts of the system just aren't as robust as the competing alternatives.
If development continues apace, I'd wager that Linux becomes a viable Windows alternative for the masses in less than two years (probably less than one). My fingers remain crossed.
Okay - first, someone moderate this post up right now. (No, not mine, dummy. Morgaine's.)
That said, here's a quick question. Morgaine says:
A process scheduler implemented in hardware (an outer loop outside the usual inner instruction fetch and execute loop), which allowed transputers to implement concurrency with very fine granularity because the context switch time was exceptionally low.
Meanwhile, the Register article claims:
Real time versions of Tru64 might be used in a high end arcade game console, with workstations using a more "normal" Tru64 Unix with OpenGL.
Quake and Quake 2 are native on Alpha Linux platforms.
Is the Register just blowing smoke here? Hardware process control would require major tweaks to the Linux kernel (wouldn't it?). And that's not even considering variable length numeric literals. The Register can speculate about gaming consoles all they want, but I want to know if they know that Compaq means to release documentation on this.
I can't believe that/. uses wired news as an authoritative source! Come on guys! That's like getting your international news from Reader's Digest!
Sorry if you didn't care for my choice in attribution. I chose Wired News for three reasons:
I have found them to be more or less reliable in their reporting.
Wired News cited its sources in the article I referenced.
I actually read the story in Wired News.
It is my opinion that reading a news article, then copying the article's sources and passing the information on without credit, is essentially plagurism. Citing the Wired News article documented my submission to my satisfaction, to Roblimo's satisfaction, and to the satisfaction of a couple hundred respondents to this topic.
His point being that he's not going to go out and re-install the OS on 80 boxes on the simble say-so of a BSD advocate. If some guy from Microsoft walked in saying, "NT is better. Here's a hundred copies. Go put it on all your servers," would you do it?
I would assume that Diamond would be quick to jump on this. They've been partners with nVidia for some time, and this chip looks to big to pass up, epecially with 3dfx out of the picture.
You'll need to find the jumper settings, first. They're located near the second and vertebrae, but the effect of flipping them can be reproduced through ingestion of massive amounts of coffee.
You expect me to believe the $23K number? Even here in Alabama, experienced teachers with a PhE can make over $50K, and new teachers can make almost $30K in most districts. The only people I see making that little are teaching assistants who aren't certified.
Teacher's salaries vary wildly depending on what state and county you're in. My mother in law, who taught in PG County, MD for something on the order of 30 years, was making less than $50K when she retired. Meanwhile, where I grew up in PA, it wasn't entirely unusual to meet public school teachers who's salaries topped out near the six-figure range.
This is a particuarly bad area on which to apply anecdotal evidence. Public schools get the teachers they can afford, using the money from the property taxes the district residents can afford, allocated by whichever boneheads with delusions of grandeur can manage to get elected to the school board. IMHO, the wild variance of teacher salaries, competency, and school quality is an argument for more federal involvement in the school system, not less.
Then again, I'm a commie pinko liberal. What the hell do I know?
There's no way to have a well tuned system here if the db isn't well tuned, especially as the db grows in size. Make sure that all of your queries are as efficient as possible. Check to make sure that queries are against indexed columns whenever possible. Use the "explain" feature of the server to check the complexity of the queries you're passing.
Compared to static page delivery, just about any parsed HTML is Evil and Bad for your performance. Limit db lookups to pages that truly need it. IIRC, Slashdot handles this problem by having the front page re-generated by a cron job every so often. Once created by the script, it's just a plain ol' static page.
Eliminate the use of directory overrides (via.htaccess) wherever possible. They're usually not worth it.
At this stage, you've probably heard all this advice before, but one repitition of the obvious never hurt anyone. Hope it's helpful.
It's certainly true that Windows is way more fragmented than anyone cares to admit, but I'm not sure it's fair to throw too many stones here. How different is Windows 95, 95A & B, OSR 2-2.5 different from various incarnations of RedHat, or Debian?
Note - arbitrarily qualitative answers ("their diffrent cause M$ sux and Linux RULZ!") don't count.
On August 23, 1999 Compaq decided it would terminate Alpha support for the current versions of the Windows NT operating systems... Compaq also decided that it does not plan to support future Alpha versions of Windows® and BackOffice® including Windows 2000.
According to the Netcenter article:
The controversy over commitment to Alpha started late last week when Compaq informed about 100 engineers at its Bellevue, Washington, facility of impending layoffs. Many of the engineers were involved in the development of Windows NT and Windows 2000 on Alpha... "Compaq failed to communicate clearly within, with Microsoft, industry analysts, customers, and the media," said one source, who asked not to be identified
I dunno, this sounds more like it signifies big trouble for Compaq than Microsoft.
As for the Merced announcement, I have to plead ignorance. Is this really late enough in the game to signify big trouble for MS? Or is it a normal kind of problem we should be expecting here? (I guess I'm assuming the two aren't mutually exclusive...)
So, I think Apple is doing something wrong here. They are wasting stockholder's money trying to establish a legal monopoly on a particlar, vaguely-defined product look.
You can call the look "vaguely defined" if you like, but don't tell me that you couldn't pick an iMac out of a lineup with six other consumer level desktop computers. The iMacs have a very distinctive appearance. A representative of the company in question came right out and said that they were trying to trade off Apple's success.
If you want to argue that the law sucks here, that's one thing. However, as far as the law is concerned, it seems to me that they have the grounds for a pretty good case.
I'm saying at a loss, and you're saying for cost, but we're pretty much saying the same thing here, I think. The idea is that it's when a company sells a product so cheap that it can't make any money off it, just for the sake of driving someone else out of business.
That statistic really doesn't jazz me one way or the other. Assume that of the 1500 users, only 1000 are actually working with documents. That means that on a given day, there's a 1/500 chance that your document will be hosed.
To further descend into the realm of meaningless statistics, assume that Joe Shmoe will also produce/edit 500 documents in a year - that's MS Word, or PowerPoint, or any other type of document which gets saved, at the rate of around 2 per day. If you fall on the statistical average, you'll need one document restored a year.
Certainly, this is not good. On the other hand, it's not nearly bad enough to say that this is where all the putative lost productivity is going.
Sorry, I'm just not buying the idea that the reasons we aren't seeing more productivity out of computer users is because Windows keeps crashing. It's ludicrous: I'm by no means a MS fan, but Windows isn't so bad (on any of the installs I've done, anyway) that it crashes too much to get any work done.
<speculation type="rampant"> The main reason that most people aren't able to point to solid gains in productivity all across the board is because the nature of the work we do has changed. For example: in a retail environment - let's say, a clothing store with only one or two locations - people still want to do the same things they always have. Clients want to buy clothes, vendors want to take money and keep inventory. The things that have changed is that all the steps either faster or easier. I don't need to be carrying cash if I have plastic, and vendors can get near instantaneous reports on inventory and sales, rather than having to count by hand. This is all great, but it doesn't mean that they're actually going to be selling any more clothes.
There's a rule in economics called "The Agricultural Treadmill." Basically, it means that even though modern production techniques may improve so much that you can farm thousands of acres with only a couple of guys, it doesn't mean that people are magically going to get hungrier and want to buy all that food. I think the same thing applies here. There's a point of diminishing returns in how fast you can get information critical to your business, because you get information much faster than your business actually needs it.
The folks at Oracle, MS, Lotus - none of 'em will tell you this. Who loves ya?;) </speculation>
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, that's only part of the cool thing. The other is that a Dreamcast costs between 10% and 20% of a good "gaming" PC, and somewhat less than a more basic model. If Sega is on the ball, this could be a huge selling point with parents: "Buy the Dreamcast. It's cheaper than a PC, your kid can browse the web with it, and it's at least a US$1000 less than a computer that'll play the same games." Sounds like a winning pitch to me.
I think use of the word "pander" to describe theatres choosing films with an eye to avoiding protests was consistent with its usual usage.
The first contest I saw along these lines took place some time ago - I'm thinking as far back as '96, IIRC. However, every once in a while, you'll see one pop up. (Although, I have to admit I haven't seen one for Macs recently.)
In the end, this comes down to the classic bugaboo of functionality vs. security. Any system that provides for remote administration is going to be subject to attacks. Moreso if it's an unencrypted channel. And the more services you run that listen to ports, the liklier it is that one of them will be exploitable.
By the way - in one instance, the web server was cracked due to a configuration mistake. Only goes to show - it doesn't matter how good the system is if you don't take the time to configure it correctly.
...is for people to learn the correct acronyms. It's CORBA. Common Object Request Broker Architecture. And you're right - it won't be on your wristwatch anytime soon. Then again, it was designed to be a solution to a problem much more complex than this one.
I think it was the implied sarcasm. A la, "Which part of 'no' don't you understand?"
I don't think it was intended as a slight.
Can I get a hell yeah?
Personally, I'd love to have a little linux box to do network troubleshooting. Take it wherever I go, run a tcpdump, look for odd stuff. It'd be ridiculously useful. I could even run sendmail off of it to demonstrate to my more annoying clients that their firewalls were misconfigured. (In general, they assume that it's a routing problem before they look at their own logfiles.)
Never trust a man who uses the word "disconnect" inappropriately. It's a variety of corporate slang common to PHBs.
Discrepancy. Difference. Not disconnect.
Once again, a journalist who can't differentiate between Java and Applets. Java applications have always been able to read from hard drives. Say what you want about the language, but it's not a toy. (It may not be possible to make this statement of applets.)
>sarcasm<
If I were looking for a good source of unbiased Linux coverage, I'd look to IT professionals. Hey, the director of business development for Microsoft looks like a good choice!
>/sarcasm<
Seriously - doesn't anyone find it odd that Troan's comments only address the comparison of Linux to Java, and not allegations by Microsoft executives? I'd like to see a little bit more balance in this story.
What more needs to be said about this?
One of the side effects of having Linux hyped so much in the media lately is that people expect it to be the be-all, end-all, when in fact it's a work in progress. The technically savvy know that an operating system isn't the same as its GUI, or its browser, but when you're actually deploying Linux as a desktop OS, who cares? The bottom line is that the GUI, browser, apps, and underlying OS are all part of a system. Like it are not, some parts of the system just aren't as robust as the competing alternatives.
If development continues apace, I'd wager that Linux becomes a viable Windows alternative for the masses in less than two years (probably less than one). My fingers remain crossed.
Okay - first, someone moderate this post up right now. (No, not mine, dummy. Morgaine's.)
That said, here's a quick question. Morgaine says:
Meanwhile, the Register article claims:
Is the Register just blowing smoke here? Hardware process control would require major tweaks to the Linux kernel (wouldn't it?). And that's not even considering variable length numeric literals. The Register can speculate about gaming consoles all they want, but I want to know if they know that Compaq means to release documentation on this.
- I have found them to be more or less reliable in their reporting.
- Wired News cited its sources in the article I referenced.
- I actually read the story in Wired News.
It is my opinion that reading a news article, then copying the article's sources and passing the information on without credit, is essentially plagurism. Citing the Wired News article documented my submission to my satisfaction, to Roblimo's satisfaction, and to the satisfaction of a couple hundred respondents to this topic.Boy. I bet this guy must have been pissed when he realized he could leave the country after all.
His point being that he's not going to go out and re-install the OS on 80 boxes on the simble say-so of a BSD advocate. If some guy from Microsoft walked in saying, "NT is better. Here's a hundred copies. Go put it on all your servers," would you do it?
I would assume that Diamond would be quick to jump on this. They've been partners with nVidia for some time, and this chip looks to big to pass up, epecially with 3dfx out of the picture.
You'll need to find the jumper settings, first. They're located near the second and vertebrae, but the effect of flipping them can be reproduced through ingestion of massive amounts of coffee.
Teacher's salaries vary wildly depending on what state and county you're in. My mother in law, who taught in PG County, MD for something on the order of 30 years, was making less than $50K when she retired. Meanwhile, where I grew up in PA, it wasn't entirely unusual to meet public school teachers who's salaries topped out near the six-figure range.
This is a particuarly bad area on which to apply anecdotal evidence. Public schools get the teachers they can afford, using the money from the property taxes the district residents can afford, allocated by whichever boneheads with delusions of grandeur can manage to get elected to the school board. IMHO, the wild variance of teacher salaries, competency, and school quality is an argument for more federal involvement in the school system, not less.
Then again, I'm a commie pinko liberal. What the hell do I know?
- There's no way to have a well tuned system here if the db isn't well tuned, especially as the db grows in size. Make sure that all of your queries are as efficient as possible. Check to make sure that queries are against indexed columns whenever possible. Use the "explain" feature of the server to check the complexity of the queries you're passing.
- Compared to static page delivery, just about any parsed HTML is Evil and Bad for your performance. Limit db lookups to pages that truly need it. IIRC, Slashdot handles this problem by having the front page re-generated by a cron job every so often. Once created by the script, it's just a plain ol' static page.
- Eliminate the use of directory overrides (via
.htaccess) wherever possible. They're usually not worth it.
At this stage, you've probably heard all this advice before, but one repitition of the obvious never hurt anyone. Hope it's helpful.It's certainly true that Windows is way more fragmented than anyone cares to admit, but I'm not sure it's fair to throw too many stones here. How different is Windows 95, 95A & B, OSR 2-2.5 different from various incarnations of RedHat, or Debian?
Note - arbitrarily qualitative answers ("their diffrent cause M$ sux and Linux RULZ!") don't count.
As for the Merced announcement, I have to plead ignorance. Is this really late enough in the game to signify big trouble for MS? Or is it a normal kind of problem we should be expecting here? (I guess I'm assuming the two aren't mutually exclusive...)
Not "even" in the same league? How many people can say they are? Chomsky is no lightweight.
If you want to argue that the law sucks here, that's one thing. However, as far as the law is concerned, it seems to me that they have the grounds for a pretty good case.
I'm saying at a loss, and you're saying for cost, but we're pretty much saying the same thing here, I think. The idea is that it's when a company sells a product so cheap that it can't make any money off it, just for the sake of driving someone else out of business.
That statistic really doesn't jazz me one way or the other. Assume that of the 1500 users, only 1000 are actually working with documents. That means that on a given day, there's a 1/500 chance that your document will be hosed.
To further descend into the realm of meaningless statistics, assume that Joe Shmoe will also produce/edit 500 documents in a year - that's MS Word, or PowerPoint, or any other type of document which gets saved, at the rate of around 2 per day. If you fall on the statistical average, you'll need one document restored a year.
Certainly, this is not good. On the other hand, it's not nearly bad enough to say that this is where all the putative lost productivity is going.
<speculation type="rampant">
The main reason that most people aren't able to point to solid gains in productivity all across the board is because the nature of the work we do has changed. For example: in a retail environment - let's say, a clothing store with only one or two locations - people still want to do the same things they always have. Clients want to buy clothes, vendors want to take money and keep inventory. The things that have changed is that all the steps either faster or easier. I don't need to be carrying cash if I have plastic, and vendors can get near instantaneous reports on inventory and sales, rather than having to count by hand. This is all great, but it doesn't mean that they're actually going to be selling any more clothes.
There's a rule in economics called "The Agricultural Treadmill." Basically, it means that even though modern production techniques may improve so much that you can farm thousands of acres with only a couple of guys, it doesn't mean that people are magically going to get hungrier and want to buy all that food. I think the same thing applies here. There's a point of diminishing returns in how fast you can get information critical to your business, because you get information much faster than your business actually needs it.
The folks at Oracle, MS, Lotus - none of 'em will tell you this. Who loves ya? ;) </speculation>
Actually, it's "C'est la vie."
"Ce la vie" no verb.
:)