I'd have to vehemontly disagree, here. When I was in college (about 3 years ago), EVERYONE would stop what they were doing to sit around the TV to watch the Simpsons. Furutama didn't attract as many people (probably because its more techy/sci-fi oriented), but it had the same effect. I think both shows particularly attract the 18-24 crowd.
I think it is pretty clear to all Simpsons fans that the last 3 or 4 seasons of The Simpsons show signs of aging.
I'd have to say that there are one or two episodes each season that I don't find funny (the recent one where Moe changes his bar to a post-modern bar is one that comes to mind), but I still think the Simpsons is as funny (or funnier) than when it started. The writing has changed somewhat, since they hire a new writer every few seasons (anyone remember 89-91 when Conan O'Brian used to write for them?)
What I'm surprised about is that Futurama has lasted so long. Don't get me wrong, I love the show, but it targets a smaller audience - namely, the technology/sci-fi savvy. The Simpsons has survived so long because the show targets a wider audience. As kids, we found it funny because we could relate to Bart. As we've grown up, he show has changed its focus to Homer, and now that we've all got jobs, we can better relate to him. After all, Homer is a big slob who's family doesn't respect him, he hates his job, and loves beer. My parents (who are almost 50) watch the Simpsons and find it just as funny as I do, but I don't think they feel the same about Futurama.
Of course, the crappy timeslot Fox had it running in last season didn't help either. What genius schedules a show for 7pm, expecting a football game to end on time, and then comes in to the show IN THE MIDDLE of the NEW episode. Fscking genius scheduling.
Like many, I have to vigorously disagree with Apple on this one. If they did NOT want it to be installable, they should have done a good job preventing it (or not releasing enough to allow it to be a full install - duh!). After all, providing ONLY the updated packages instead of the ENTIRE OS seems like it would have been smarter.
Does this make it illegal for me to walk into the Apple store at the mall and tell people they can do this? If there was code being disseminated which would break the protection (DeCSS for instance), then *maybe* I could see it as a violation of the DMCA (Note: I *disagree* with the DMCA, but from a judge's point of view, I could still see it as a violation). But, simply stating how to do it seems like it should be protected as free speech.
How come printed newspapers get more lienency than electronic sites? If the NYT or Washington Post print Top Secret classified information which could KILL people, it's protected under the First Amendment. But, if someone even thinks of explaining how to circumvent a piece of software, it's not protected? Perhaps if it was printed in the newspaper?
Hard to use != more secure (perhaps just the opposite)
Easy to use does not necessarily mean there are flaws in security, or that you only need to point and click. It DOES, however, mean that someone like me who knows DHCP or DNS doesn't need to look up the man page every time I need to add an option, or forget to add an important security setting that isn't in a default configuration file. It also means that, by restricting _what_ can be modified, there is far less chance of an error. Ever use a # sign as a comment in a DNS zone file? It's terrible that Bind will keep on going without an error messages, but resolution (particularly of MX records) will fail miserably
Commented config files are easier to use than non-commented ones which require you to read a man page. Similarly, GUI tools are easier to use than config files (generally) - especially when they include good help functions. GUI admin tools SHOULD NOT replace an admin or be a substitute for stupidity, but they SHOULD be there to make our lives easier.
Yes, the kernel is ready, mostly depending on which kernel you use. There are a number of people (myself included) that think the kernels aren't necessarily getting enough testing before release, but if you stay a stable revision or two behind, you're probably in good shape. 2.4.10 is stable, and so far 2.4.16 has been (though I'm sure there will be revisions to it). If you REALLY want something stable, use an -ac kernel - Alan has done an excellent job of making sure these ARE production ready.
There are still a few things lacking in Linux distributions to make it fully "enterprise-ready" (I hate that term). For anyone who has truly spent time with other Unices, the following is obvious - Better Package Management! The ability to test out packages without "commiting" them so, if something breaks, you can immediately roll back to the prior state. Yes, I know you can uninstall and reinstall old packages, but it's NOT the same. Use HP-UX for a while and you'll understand - you can install, remove, commit, rollback, and test packages. In a production environment, it is critical that a newly installed patch or program doesn't break existing systems!
As far as the kernel goes, I think Linux is there. I DON'T think Linux is necessarily ready to compete with NT or 2000 (though I give it 18 more months), since it is still lacking quite a few easy to use admin tools (think of the NT print manager or DHCP admin and you'll understand what I mean), but it is coming along.
In other news the sun rose today, and fire is still hot...
Seriously, why is this necessarily an unexpected event? In order to prove libel, I believe you must show that the person knew what they were presenting was false, and that they intended to cause harm. I think there's some additional requirements, too, like they must be identifiable to someone else and the material needs to be published/disseminated.
If I have a bad experience with Microsoft software and post my problems to a web site, that is NOT libel. If I say "Oracle sucks", well, I suppose Oracle could sue, but "sucks" is obviously my opinion. If I published a report on the web showing MS SQL Server as being 50% faster than Oracle, despite having results showing otherwise, then I probably *would* be guilty of libel.
Venting your frustration with a company on/. or fsckedcompany.com or some other venue is NOT libel, unless you're intentionally lying about a company, and even then, there may be a level of subjectiveness.
The idea of rating based on user "votes" is one I see bound to failure. Google would need an enormous trusted user base, and logins would be required ('cause I could spoof any IP out there for votes). Talk about unnecessary complexity for a search engine.
What is more interesting is what a few companies have been doing recently in the search engine world (there really still is business after the dot-com fallout, even if it isn't profitable). At my work, we recently looked into a product by a company called Recommind. Their search engine was able to find similar words in documents, and could give you related documents that didn't have key words. It could even distinguish between java (the coffee), java (the language), and Java (the island near Jakarta)! Pretty cool stuff. Combine that type of "concept matching" instead of "keyword matching" with Google's technology, and you've got the next generation search engine.
Keystroke logging software has been around for quite a while. A simple search on Security Focus pulls up a number of programs which will perform the operation.
Check out http://www.securityfocus.com/cgi-bin/products.pl?c at=191 for a sample list.
Add to that even the most basic of Windows e-mail viruses and you'll recognize that this may already be installed and operational on existing machines. How many desktop users would even notice a little extra traffic now and then?
I don't doubt that the FBI can already do this - what they are doing is slowly "leaking" the idea to the public and the press to see how citizens will react. The police/gov't can obtain anything they want by illegal means, it's just not admissible in court. That doesn't prevent them from using what they found and following those leads, then claiming "intuition" or "encryption cracking farms" as an excuse as to HOW they broke the encryption.
Prior to 9/11, U.S. citizens would've fought the idea, but now many people feel that complacency will yield security. The FBI hopes that both the government and its citizens will allow this when, in reality we all recognize that it shows a blatant disregard for our constitutional rights.
Just the $0.02 of the paranoid. Let me put my tin foil hat back on...
This is precisely the sort of thing that will help ALL Linux-related companies. IBM wants to dethrone Microsoft. IBM still supports NT/2k/whatever for their customer base, but they increasingly recognize they can't win at this alone. RedHat wants to sell software - not just RedHat Linux, but things like Interchange and Stronghold. Being able to sell hardware with packages like Stronghold ready to roll right out of the box is a major boon for IBM and RedHat. It also helps IBM because they don't have to roll their own Linux distribution to sell their hardware. Big Blue has finally seen the light.
Does anyone else READ the science category anymore, except for me!?!?
I'm not sure that any legislation not directed at "terrorist" activities will even be bothered with this session. Now, if someone could find an anti-terrorism use for the facility, it might be snapped up in a heartbeat.
I just picked up a Shuttle AK31 v3.1 board a week and a half ago along with an Athlon 1600+ XP (old motherboard just died, so it was upgrade time). It's good to see these kinds of review, but I've found that the performance difference is becoming truly negligable. The Shuttle board was one of the cheapest (I got it for $107) and one of the "lowest" performing in Tom's ratings, yet the difference between it and the best performing boards is generally about 2%. Similar KT266A boards at the recent computer show (where I bought mine) were $122-175 - much more than 2% higher cost. I think I found my price point.
What's even better is that it will overclock from 1.4GHz to 1.575GHz, effectively pushing it to an XP 1900+ with no stability issues. It's got 4 DDR slots, 6 PCI, and it's rock solid stable. I know all the true overclockers in the crowd will rant about the performance difference, but I think if a comparison was done, you'd find that an Athlon 1900+ XP chip on one of the slower boards (like the Shuttle) would probably both outperform and cost less than an Athlon 1800+ XP chip on the fastest board. Besides, at this point, the biggest bottleneck in most systems is still disk I/O.
In the US, the FCC allows anyone to broadcast an AM signal under Part 15 of the FCC rules, so long as it doesn't exceed something like 47 microvolts at 100 meters from the property line. Unfortunately, most AM receivers need at least 300 microvolts to detect a signal and the signal degrades logrithmically, so unless you have a very large piece of property, AM broadcast will probably be illegal for you.
Disclaimer: I'm not an RF engineer, but I have worked with several in attempting to obtain an AM broadcast license for our college radio station a few years back. Take it for what you will, and understand that the FCC *probably* won't come after you unless people complain. But, if people complain, you can expect them to triangulate your position, take your equipment, and fine you heavily.
If I get one of the larger ones (512MB-1GB), could I just install Linux on it and boot from it. It would make trying out different Linux distributions a lot easier.
Not yet. Presently, you can't boot from a USB device, but you *could* create a boot CD/floppy that supports USB, then work from the USB device after you boot.
Now a firewire keychain would absolutely rock. Sooooo faaaaast.
I don't know that it will directly affect whether or not you would be hired by a future employer, but it may indirectly affect your chances (either good or bad), particularly if a future employer (or manager) is for/against those sorts of things.
Lets look at resume-type questions: Would you be going in as an employee or contractor? What is the official name of the company (suicidegirls.com or "Digital Entertainment Network" for instance)? What work will you specifically perform?
In all seriousness, if you're a contractor working for another company, you may be able to get away with only naming you contract company and some general terms of your employment (eg "manage 50,000 user accounts using PHP and MySQL" rather than "manage 50,000 adult memberships").
I don't think most employers would necessarily look at it as a black mark, but people are people, especially when it comes to those management types, and sometimes obvious "flags" on your resume like that might have a impact.
I'll make an obvious recommendation here - go pick up some used RAM at a local computer show or on ebay. RAM is ridiculously cheap right now (you could probably get four 16 meg 72-pin EDO chips for under $20), and you'll have a much better time running KDE/Gnome/etc on 64 megs.
Linux in console mode will run great on almost anything, but GUIs eat a lot of CPU/RAM. FWIW, I built my mother-in-law a P100 w/ 32 MB RAM and Mandrake 7.2 from spare parts many months ago. The system used a lot of swap, and I ended up upgrading her to 64 MB, but it otherwise works fine (if you don't mind a little tedious boot time - about 60 seconds). It's no Quake machine, but it allows her to surf the web, write e-mail, and use KOffice without any complaints.
Most people should wait a day or so to grab the latest kernel. As I'm finding (most of the US mirrors at least), 2.4.16 hasn't been mirrored to many of the mirrors yet:-)
Why does everyone feel this is good? I thought the internet was supposed to bring about globalization - where your location didn't matter for you to do business. Country-specific TLDs such as.us,.uk,.fr, etc might seem reasonable for companies which are specific only to that country, but will only muddy things more.
Suppose someone registers ibm.com.ru who isn't IBM. Suppose that country doesn't care about that person infringing on IBM's trademark? Now suppose someone in that country assumes ibm.com.ru is the country-specific site for IBM. What is IBM's country specific site is ru.ibm.com (which is how I think it SHOULD be). I can definitely see a problem here.
Does IBM register EVERY IBM.com.TLD as well as IBM.com? Should they have to do so? Seems ridiculous to me. TLDs should say something about the type/business of a company (which they no longer do) instead of stressing location. Furthermore, things will get muddier as the managing bodies decide to do force stupid things later on for "more organization" like "company.businesstype.city.state.country". Type rather than location isn't perfect, but it's BETTER than what is being proposed.
What we need are BETTER TLDs..com,.net, and.org are obviously too cluttered, and domains like.tv are just plain dumb (how about.media anyone?) A better TLD structure would be something like:
.media - for TV, Radio, Newspapers, and the like
.isp - for ISPs, since the.net domain is now meaningless
.retail - for retail businesses like Amazon, Sears, B&N, etc.
.pr0n - you get the idea
.linux - of course!
and, of course, some sort of governing body which FORCES the general business of the company to be related to the domain, or else forfeit their domain name (after a reasonable appeals process, of course). The existing.com,.net,.org, etc domains could be left, or phased out over the course of several years.
Isn't the only way that it could be of any use to them is if it was linked to some sort of national database?
No. Your prints are on paper, and no one cares about them unless you don't return your rental car. When that happens, Dollar can go to the police, and (assuming your drivers license and credit card were fake), they at least have something to go on. Sure, at *that* point they may be cross checked against the national FBI fingerprint database, but only if you don't return the car.
I can see potential usefulness and potential problems. It all depends on how its used. If it saves me $10 a day on a rental car, I'll submit to it (of course, at this point my fingerprints are already in the FBI database, since I applied for a security clearance a few years back).
Frankly, I kind of like the idea. I really don't see how Dollar having your finger print poses any personal security threat, and if it will in fact deter thieves, then I'm all for it. Think of it this way, if you're renting they already have your Drivers License info and probably a major credit card. Unless this gets linked into a federal database which the gov't could use to track your whereabouts, I don't see a problem (and frankly, if you're using a drivers license and credit card, they ALREADY have everything they need to track you).
What I DO disagree with is the section in the article that says "One agency, Acme Car Rental in Connecticut, went so far as to surreptitiously install GPS in its fleet. The tracking system was only discovered when a man was fined by Acme for speeding, in violation of the agency's rules." Now that bothers me, simply because I don't believe it's any of their damn business where I go. So long as their car gets returned in good shape, they should butt out.
And you should, normally. If you system installs binutils as an RPM, DEB, Sun/HP/SGI package, well, you _should_ use the package manage to upgrade/remove. After all, if you don't, you're going to start breaking your dependencies for other packages. That's why package managers exist!
In some respects, Linux is better than many commercial unices. SGI uses/usr/freeware for GNU software. Solaris created/opt for "optional" packages (what the hell is an optional package? isn't that what/usr/local is for?!?!) At least all your system software gets installed in/usr/bin (well, unless you're using Caldera, which puts KDE in/opt... go figure), and if you use a package manager like they were intended, it's easy to clean them up. The difference between Windows and Linux/Unix is that the Linux/Unix package managers ARE SMART ENOUGH not to remove shared libraries unless NOTHING ELSE IS DEPENDING ON THEM! In Windows (and I haven't used it since 98 and NT 4), if you remove a package and there's a shared library (DLL), you have the option of removing it or leaving it - but you never KNOW if you can safely remove it, overwrite it, etc.
I agree that there should be a new, standard directory structure, but I disagree that every package in the world should have its own directory. If you're using a decent package manager, included with ANY distro or commercial/free Unix variant, there's little need to do so.
As far as DirectX video acceleration goes, usinf the Linux kernel framebuffer and XFree86 4.1 can get you very close. Direct support exists for Matrox, ATI, etc cards, and unsupported cards can still use the standard VGA framebuffer. Using the included DRI support with X and the kernel framebuffer allows the X server to directly access the framebuffer, which accesses the hardware, bypassing some of the slower, intermediate X calls. It's not perfect, but its a heck of an improvement in performance, and still allows the kernel to control video access, rather than letting your programs stomp all over the OS/kernel/video hardware.
The software packages, including 400,000 units of Microsoft's new Office XP program, are valued at $900 million by the company, although others peg their price tag even higher. The one million refurbished laptops and desktop computers to be donated to schools are worth between $500 and $600 apiece, one source said. The firm would also set aside as much as $90 million for teacher training and establish a foundation to dispense a possible $250 million in grants. A federal judge would retain authority over the agreement for five years.
So, $900,000,000 for software,
plus $500 x 1,000,000 laptops/desktops,
plus $90,000,000, for training
and $250,000,000 in grants
= $1.74 billion (though the $250 million is mentioned as "possible").
Of course, as EVERYONE has mentioned, the retail "value" of the the software is NOT what it costs Microsoft to give it away.
Slashdot Mirror
I'd have to vehemontly disagree, here. When I was in college (about 3 years ago), EVERYONE would stop what they were doing to sit around the TV to watch the Simpsons. Furutama didn't attract as many people (probably because its more techy/sci-fi oriented), but it had the same effect. I think both shows particularly attract the 18-24 crowd.
I'd have to say that there are one or two episodes each season that I don't find funny (the recent one where Moe changes his bar to a post-modern bar is one that comes to mind), but I still think the Simpsons is as funny (or funnier) than when it started. The writing has changed somewhat, since they hire a new writer every few seasons (anyone remember 89-91 when Conan O'Brian used to write for them?)
What I'm surprised about is that Futurama has lasted so long. Don't get me wrong, I love the show, but it targets a smaller audience - namely, the technology/sci-fi savvy. The Simpsons has survived so long because the show targets a wider audience. As kids, we found it funny because we could relate to Bart. As we've grown up, he show has changed its focus to Homer, and now that we've all got jobs, we can better relate to him. After all, Homer is a big slob who's family doesn't respect him, he hates his job, and loves beer. My parents (who are almost 50) watch the Simpsons and find it just as funny as I do, but I don't think they feel the same about Futurama.
Of course, the crappy timeslot Fox had it running in last season didn't help either. What genius schedules a show for 7pm, expecting a football game to end on time, and then comes in to the show IN THE MIDDLE of the NEW episode. Fscking genius scheduling.
Heh. When we shut off our service, please use your nonfunctioning cable modem to check our nonfunctioning web page for updates.
-@Home
Like many, I have to vigorously disagree with Apple on this one. If they did NOT want it to be installable, they should have done a good job preventing it (or not releasing enough to allow it to be a full install - duh!). After all, providing ONLY the updated packages instead of the ENTIRE OS seems like it would have been smarter.
Does this make it illegal for me to walk into the Apple store at the mall and tell people they can do this? If there was code being disseminated which would break the protection (DeCSS for instance), then *maybe* I could see it as a violation of the DMCA (Note: I *disagree* with the DMCA, but from a judge's point of view, I could still see it as a violation). But, simply stating how to do it seems like it should be protected as free speech.
How come printed newspapers get more lienency than electronic sites? If the NYT or Washington Post print Top Secret classified information which could KILL people, it's protected under the First Amendment. But, if someone even thinks of explaining how to circumvent a piece of software, it's not protected? Perhaps if it was printed in the newspaper?
Hard to use != more secure (perhaps just the opposite)
Easy to use does not necessarily mean there are flaws in security, or that you only need to point and click. It DOES, however, mean that someone like me who knows DHCP or DNS doesn't need to look up the man page every time I need to add an option, or forget to add an important security setting that isn't in a default configuration file. It also means that, by restricting _what_ can be modified, there is far less chance of an error. Ever use a # sign as a comment in a DNS zone file? It's terrible that Bind will keep on going without an error messages, but resolution (particularly of MX records) will fail miserably
Commented config files are easier to use than non-commented ones which require you to read a man page. Similarly, GUI tools are easier to use than config files (generally) - especially when they include good help functions. GUI admin tools SHOULD NOT replace an admin or be a substitute for stupidity, but they SHOULD be there to make our lives easier.
Yes, the kernel is ready, mostly depending on which kernel you use. There are a number of people (myself included) that think the kernels aren't necessarily getting enough testing before release, but if you stay a stable revision or two behind, you're probably in good shape. 2.4.10 is stable, and so far 2.4.16 has been (though I'm sure there will be revisions to it). If you REALLY want something stable, use an -ac kernel - Alan has done an excellent job of making sure these ARE production ready.
As far as the kernel goes, I think Linux is there. I DON'T think Linux is necessarily ready to compete with NT or 2000 (though I give it 18 more months), since it is still lacking quite a few easy to use admin tools (think of the NT print manager or DHCP admin and you'll understand what I mean), but it is coming along.
In other news the sun rose today, and fire is still hot...
/. or fsckedcompany.com or some other venue is NOT libel, unless you're intentionally lying about a company, and even then, there may be a level of subjectiveness.
Seriously, why is this necessarily an unexpected event? In order to prove libel, I believe you must show that the person knew what they were presenting was false, and that they intended to cause harm. I think there's some additional requirements, too, like they must be identifiable to someone else and the material needs to be published/disseminated.
If I have a bad experience with Microsoft software and post my problems to a web site, that is NOT libel. If I say "Oracle sucks", well, I suppose Oracle could sue, but "sucks" is obviously my opinion. If I published a report on the web showing MS SQL Server as being 50% faster than Oracle, despite having results showing otherwise, then I probably *would* be guilty of libel.
Venting your frustration with a company on
BTW, IANAL, but I play one on TV.
The idea of rating based on user "votes" is one I see bound to failure. Google would need an enormous trusted user base, and logins would be required ('cause I could spoof any IP out there for votes). Talk about unnecessary complexity for a search engine.
What is more interesting is what a few companies have been doing recently in the search engine world (there really still is business after the dot-com fallout, even if it isn't profitable). At my work, we recently looked into a product by a company called Recommind. Their search engine was able to find similar words in documents, and could give you related documents that didn't have key words. It could even distinguish between java (the coffee), java (the language), and Java (the island near Jakarta)! Pretty cool stuff. Combine that type of "concept matching" instead of "keyword matching" with Google's technology, and you've got the next generation search engine.
All very cool stuff. I hope they don't kill it.
Add to that even the most basic of Windows e-mail viruses and you'll recognize that this may already be installed and operational on existing machines. How many desktop users would even notice a little extra traffic now and then?
I don't doubt that the FBI can already do this - what they are doing is slowly "leaking" the idea to the public and the press to see how citizens will react. The police/gov't can obtain anything they want by illegal means, it's just not admissible in court. That doesn't prevent them from using what they found and following those leads, then claiming "intuition" or "encryption cracking farms" as an excuse as to HOW they broke the encryption.
Prior to 9/11, U.S. citizens would've fought the idea, but now many people feel that complacency will yield security. The FBI hopes that both the government and its citizens will allow this when, in reality we all recognize that it shows a blatant disregard for our constitutional rights.
Just the $0.02 of the paranoid. Let me put my tin foil hat back on...
This is precisely the sort of thing that will help ALL Linux-related companies. IBM wants to dethrone Microsoft. IBM still supports NT/2k/whatever for their customer base, but they increasingly recognize they can't win at this alone. RedHat wants to sell software - not just RedHat Linux, but things like Interchange and Stronghold. Being able to sell hardware with packages like Stronghold ready to roll right out of the box is a major boon for IBM and RedHat. It also helps IBM because they don't have to roll their own Linux distribution to sell their hardware. Big Blue has finally seen the light.
Does anyone else READ the science category anymore, except for me!?!?
I'm not sure that any legislation not directed at "terrorist" activities will even be bothered with this session. Now, if someone could find an anti-terrorism use for the facility, it might be snapped up in a heartbeat.
I just picked up a Shuttle AK31 v3.1 board a week and a half ago along with an Athlon 1600+ XP (old motherboard just died, so it was upgrade time). It's good to see these kinds of review, but I've found that the performance difference is becoming truly negligable. The Shuttle board was one of the cheapest (I got it for $107) and one of the "lowest" performing in Tom's ratings, yet the difference between it and the best performing boards is generally about 2%. Similar KT266A boards at the recent computer show (where I bought mine) were $122-175 - much more than 2% higher cost. I think I found my price point.
What's even better is that it will overclock from 1.4GHz to 1.575GHz, effectively pushing it to an XP 1900+ with no stability issues. It's got 4 DDR slots, 6 PCI, and it's rock solid stable. I know all the true overclockers in the crowd will rant about the performance difference, but I think if a comparison was done, you'd find that an Athlon 1900+ XP chip on one of the slower boards (like the Shuttle) would probably both outperform and cost less than an Athlon 1800+ XP chip on the fastest board. Besides, at this point, the biggest bottleneck in most systems is still disk I/O.
Disclaimer: I'm not an RF engineer, but I have worked with several in attempting to obtain an AM broadcast license for our college radio station a few years back. Take it for what you will, and understand that the FCC *probably* won't come after you unless people complain. But, if people complain, you can expect them to triangulate your position, take your equipment, and fine you heavily.
Not yet. Presently, you can't boot from a USB device, but you *could* create a boot CD/floppy that supports USB, then work from the USB device after you boot.
Now a firewire keychain would absolutely rock. Sooooo faaaaast.
I don't know that it will directly affect whether or not you would be hired by a future employer, but it may indirectly affect your chances (either good or bad), particularly if a future employer (or manager) is for/against those sorts of things.
Lets look at resume-type questions: Would you be going in as an employee or contractor? What is the official name of the company (suicidegirls.com or "Digital Entertainment Network" for instance)? What work will you specifically perform?
In all seriousness, if you're a contractor working for another company, you may be able to get away with only naming you contract company and some general terms of your employment (eg "manage 50,000 user accounts using PHP and MySQL" rather than "manage 50,000 adult memberships").
I don't think most employers would necessarily look at it as a black mark, but people are people, especially when it comes to those management types, and sometimes obvious "flags" on your resume like that might have a impact.
I'll make an obvious recommendation here - go pick up some used RAM at a local computer show or on ebay. RAM is ridiculously cheap right now (you could probably get four 16 meg 72-pin EDO chips for under $20), and you'll have a much better time running KDE/Gnome/etc on 64 megs.
Linux in console mode will run great on almost anything, but GUIs eat a lot of CPU/RAM. FWIW, I built my mother-in-law a P100 w/ 32 MB RAM and Mandrake 7.2 from spare parts many months ago. The system used a lot of swap, and I ended up upgrading her to 64 MB, but it otherwise works fine (if you don't mind a little tedious boot time - about 60 seconds). It's no Quake machine, but it allows her to surf the web, write e-mail, and use KOffice without any complaints.
Most people should wait a day or so to grab the latest kernel. As I'm finding (most of the US mirrors at least), 2.4.16 hasn't been mirrored to many of the mirrors yet :-)
Why does everyone feel this is good? I thought the internet was supposed to bring about globalization - where your location didn't matter for you to do business. Country-specific TLDs such as .us, .uk, .fr, etc might seem reasonable for companies which are specific only to that country, but will only muddy things more.
.com, .net, and .org are obviously too cluttered, and domains like .tv are just plain dumb (how about .media anyone?) A better TLD structure would be something like:
.net domain is now meaningless
.com, .net, .org, etc domains could be left, or phased out over the course of several years.
Suppose someone registers ibm.com.ru who isn't IBM. Suppose that country doesn't care about that person infringing on IBM's trademark? Now suppose someone in that country assumes ibm.com.ru is the country-specific site for IBM. What is IBM's country specific site is ru.ibm.com (which is how I think it SHOULD be). I can definitely see a problem here.
Does IBM register EVERY IBM.com.TLD as well as IBM.com? Should they have to do so? Seems ridiculous to me. TLDs should say something about the type/business of a company (which they no longer do) instead of stressing location. Furthermore, things will get muddier as the managing bodies decide to do force stupid things later on for "more organization" like "company.businesstype.city.state.country". Type rather than location isn't perfect, but it's BETTER than what is being proposed.
What we need are BETTER TLDs.
.media - for TV, Radio, Newspapers, and the like
.isp - for ISPs, since the
.retail - for retail businesses like Amazon, Sears, B&N, etc.
.pr0n - you get the idea
.linux - of course!
and, of course, some sort of governing body which FORCES the general business of the company to be related to the domain, or else forfeit their domain name (after a reasonable appeals process, of course). The existing
No. Your prints are on paper, and no one cares about them unless you don't return your rental car. When that happens, Dollar can go to the police, and (assuming your drivers license and credit card were fake), they at least have something to go on. Sure, at *that* point they may be cross checked against the national FBI fingerprint database, but only if you don't return the car.
I can see potential usefulness and potential problems. It all depends on how its used. If it saves me $10 a day on a rental car, I'll submit to it (of course, at this point my fingerprints are already in the FBI database, since I applied for a security clearance a few years back).
Frankly, I kind of like the idea. I really don't see how Dollar having your finger print poses any personal security threat, and if it will in fact deter thieves, then I'm all for it. Think of it this way, if you're renting they already have your Drivers License info and probably a major credit card. Unless this gets linked into a federal database which the gov't could use to track your whereabouts, I don't see a problem (and frankly, if you're using a drivers license and credit card, they ALREADY have everything they need to track you).
What I DO disagree with is the section in the article that says "One agency, Acme Car Rental in Connecticut, went so far as to surreptitiously install GPS in its fleet. The tracking system was only discovered when a man was fined by Acme for speeding, in violation of the agency's rules." Now that bothers me, simply because I don't believe it's any of their damn business where I go. So long as their car gets returned in good shape, they should butt out.
And you should, normally. If you system installs binutils as an RPM, DEB, Sun/HP/SGI package, well, you _should_ use the package manage to upgrade/remove. After all, if you don't, you're going to start breaking your dependencies for other packages. That's why package managers exist!
In some respects, Linux is better than many commercial unices. SGI uses
I agree that there should be a new, standard directory structure, but I disagree that every package in the world should have its own directory. If you're using a decent package manager, included with ANY distro or commercial/free Unix variant, there's little need to do so.
Quick, somebody with hellacious bandwidth and storage capacity mirror it before it gets /.ed!
As far as DirectX video acceleration goes, usinf the Linux kernel framebuffer and XFree86 4.1 can get you very close. Direct support exists for Matrox, ATI, etc cards, and unsupported cards can still use the standard VGA framebuffer. Using the included DRI support with X and the kernel framebuffer allows the X server to directly access the framebuffer, which accesses the hardware, bypassing some of the slower, intermediate X calls. It's not perfect, but its a heck of an improvement in performance, and still allows the kernel to control video access, rather than letting your programs stomp all over the OS/kernel/video hardware.
The software packages, including 400,000 units of Microsoft's new Office XP program, are valued at $900 million by the company, although others peg their price tag even higher. The one million refurbished laptops and desktop computers to be donated to schools are worth between $500 and $600 apiece, one source said. The firm would also set aside as much as $90 million for teacher training and establish a foundation to dispense a possible $250 million in grants. A federal judge would retain authority over the agreement for five years.
So, $900,000,000 for software,
plus $500 x 1,000,000 laptops/desktops,
plus $90,000,000, for training
and $250,000,000 in grants
= $1.74 billion (though the $250 million is mentioned as "possible").
Of course, as EVERYONE has mentioned, the retail "value" of the the software is NOT what it costs Microsoft to give it away.