The principle reason to put 2560x1440 pixels on a phone is to further the embarrassment of monitor manufacturers who can only manage to get 1/4 of the pixels into a 19" screen.
Damn right... when will I be able to buy a laptop with 2560x1440 resolution?
What do you mean, I can buy one today? Shut yo mouf!
I see your 2560x1400 and the cough, cough, only 4GB of RAM...seriously? Why have the better resolution and limit the amount of RAM (or disk space)?
Instead I would rather have either 16GB (or 32GB) of triple channel memory (RAM) with only 1920x1080 pixels (here) granted it would be best to have both, my guess is companies like ZaReason will when customers clamor for it. The Verix-545 is one heck of a sweet laptop, especially for the price, works with your preferred version of Linux out of the box, everything, it just works. Love having 2 TB of storage too. No more limitations, except resolution, if you consider HD at 1920x1080 to be a limitiation that is.
My only regret is that it does not have a 17", 19" or 21" laptop screen size. Granted I hook it to larger monitors to do work anyway. My future monitor will be a 60" LED 300hz LG TV. Have seen them in the stores on sale for $680, which is phenominal. My last LG was an LCD, 42" and cost over $1,000 on sale years ago.
Best of all, by buying from a Linux vendor only, you are not limited to only MS Win8 via the proprietary hardware...no more blind alleys.
With a LInux vendor, you can always buy a copy of Windows and run it, however the converse is not true, any hardware sold today that is meant for Windows 8 or 9, will *not* run Linux without paying for a Windows license, whether you need it or not.
The only reason not to purchase from a Linux vendor is if you want to run Macintosh OS X, of course that Macbook Pro will cost you considerablly more for less bang...good machines those Apple Macs, just always expensive.
I don't want anything to do with the cellular companies.
What I want is a wifi touchscreen that connects to my desktop computer. Something thin, light, that has great battery life, has a cam and mic and speaker so i can use voip wireless around the house/office if I want to.
Could not agree more. Give me Wifi, allow me to configure and use as I need. No need for Cellular. Of course I need something better than Skype as Linux is not well supported in Skype. Sure it works, but you never know when it might not and new features take a year or more to filter down to the Linux version of Skype.
I would add, don't force me into any app that requires bandwidth use to use, not backups, not cloud, not anything.
Auto updates are a huge FAIL for me. This would be enough for me to say no.
I am in the process of determining how to reinstall my Linux 10" tablet from scratch. Figure I better be able to do that before I do anything meaningful with the device. Years ago I learned that if you are going to depend on a tool, you better be able to fully control that tool.
By full control, back it up, back up data, reinstall from scratch, etc.... if you can't, its a disaster waiting to happen.
In the same category would be allowing remote wipes or erasures of my device. No thank you. If the software did that and I could not turn it off to prevent it, I would not buy the device.
The first MS OS to ignore my settings was Windows 2000, told it not to reboot or install anything without prompting me first, which worked fine until a major\ update, than my settings were ignored. I checked after the auto update, it was still set to not do it without my approval, just ignored that setting after the update. Been a loyal Linux user ever since.
Full disclosure, I still have a Windows 7 box for testing, do not plan to ever buy a Windows 8 or higher OS again. No thank you.
If you control a tool, it should obey your wishes period. If it does not, its simply not reliable and will let you down at the worst possible time.
The mere fact of requiring an auto update, violates this law for many of us.
Don't try to convince me that updating my device without my permission somehow keeps me safe from exploits that require local access to my device either, as I don't plan to give the keys of my house to anyone, thus they will NEVER gain local access to the device. Ever notice how 99% of exploits require 'local' access. Well I have noticed...no thank you.
Besides if that was a concern, there is an app agnostic tool for Linux that auto encrypts everything on the hard disk, data wise, so I would go there first anyway.
The idea of waking up and my device not working, merely because someone else in their infinite wisdom decided to do something without consulting me first, leaves me cold. No thank you. Is it my device or isn't it?
Having to reboot multiple times to finish would be frustrating as all get out....what a waste of time. At offices, it always seems to happen at the most inopportune times.
You think they would learn...if they force you into an 'auto update' scenario, you are one instant away from a useless paper weight, why even go there.
It's the way I work. I have no interest in 10" or larger tablets. The 7" tablet seems the absolutely perfect size for me. I had a chance to play with an iPad 2 and I just thought it was way too large.
By the same token, when I use a laptop, I feel 15" is absolute perfect. Big enough screen to do serious work, and providing it has a decent keyboard, I'm a happy guy.
The Surface Pro 3 doesn't hit any of my buttons. Too big for what I use a tablet for. Too small for what I use a notebook for. Worst of all, it's price so high I can buy a 7" tablet AND a 15" notebook and still be ahead money wise at the end of the day.
Great response. The last point would kill it for most people. You first point is significant based on experience for me.
Pre Microsoft buying Skype, I 86ed my over $100 per month cellular plan/phone and moved to a Linux handheld + Wifi solution for less than $9 per month. Ran with that for almost 4 years, however Microsofts lack of support for Linux made me say goodbye to Skype.
My first handheld 'full' computer (Linux) had a small 4" screen. No way it could replace a laptop or desktop. As others have stated, need that keyboard. My biggest use was as a Skype phone via Wifi, never got into the geo capabilities with it, though it had two micro SD slots, which I notice no new devices have. Loved that and strongly believe it is a good reason to buy one tablet over another...does it have 2 micro SD slots. You will use them if it does. Also had 512MB of RAM and could play HD content as of 2006. We have come a long way baby!
My second handheld, a 10" Android from ZaReason (ZaTAb ZT2) is great, love it, but still would not want to do coding, word processing, spreadsheets, database work etc...for the same reason, like that Keyboard. Sadly only one micro SD slot. While I find Android a bit more limiting than a full Linux laptop, it is less limiting than any Apple or Microsoft tablet would be.
I see a tablet as a plus if you can do some things on it, but never as a laptop/desktop replacement. I think we are in agreement there.
The screen size of the new Microsoft tablet is too large and I just know it would get sat on, bent, cracked. If I went above my 10" android, I would get one of those Two-screen Linux tablets that opens like a book, that way each side can help protect the other when the tablet 'book' is closed. Heck I got a touch screen protector and case for my 10" ZtTAb as it was. Also having two screens is pretty important in order to do something on one screen while referencing another. Or when interrupted, to handle the interruption and move back to the task at hand with minimal interruption.
For laptops, I like my 17" Zareason Verix 530, would not mind the 15.6" screen being bigger, heck I would get a 21" screen if ZaReason made a laptop with one. At least I have 16GB of triple channel memory and two harddrives, so my laptop can be used to do 100% of what I did with a desktop. At work and/or home office I always have a second monitor anyway. Its become my primary device and I plan to turn my desktop (Breeze 4220, w/ 4 cores) into a glorified server + TV Wall when I get a 60" LG TV. There is linux software that lets you control the cores independently of each other....very cool.
When I use my tablet now, I do miss a keyboard, have not bothered to add one yet, I find myself reading a book, learning a new language (Italian), playing a game, etc... Hope to use it buy and sell stocks down the road, but have not attempted that yet. Also use the micro SD slot with a 64GB micro SD card...can search, review, look up information on documents, both those created by me and those downloaded as reference, but would not want to edit them on that tablet.
If I get PHP successfully running as I believe I can, than I will really want a second micro SD slot. Don't like the idea of needing a hub to do work, though that would be a work around. Imagine running any PHP applicati
Municipal fiber is the way to go. It would change the world and give the US economy a badly needed shot in the arm.
ISP costs have risen four times faster than inflation. We're on the road to having just two national providers. When that happens, costs will go up even faster.
1) Designate ISPs as common carriers.
2) Break up any ISP that provides content.
3) Take a bow for having brought about the digital revolution part 2.
Unfortunately, our elected jackoffs are too beholden to corporate money to do anything like this. Obama, who was supposed to be the first president who "got" the Internet, turned out to be the worst of the bunch, appointing telecom lobbyist Tom Wheeler has head of the FCC, and they're not poised to put the last nail in the Net Neutrality coffin. Obama is a failed president on that count alone.
I would add that muni symmetrical FTTH is the ONLY viable solution for the future of any community. Don't settle for less, it can only hurt your communities economnic viability and small business job creation moving forward.
I think you're right about items 1 2 and 3, but not necessarily municipal fiber. There are some good examples out there, but only because the alternatives are so incompetent/complacent/debt-ridden. If we had a more healthy telecom environment in the USA, nobody would give a damn about Municipal fiber, or Google fiber for that matter. Including Google.
If one of your muni examples is incompetent/complacent/debt-ridden, there is an extremely good chance that the local oligarchy passed legislation to make it so. You need to do more homework as I have plenty of examples of this type of oligarchy legal pestilence.
Sadly the only way to get a "more healthy telecom environment in the USA" will be through de-regulation as in Japan, that gave Japanese consumers 100Mb/100Mb (unthrottled upstream) for $56 per month in the year 2000. The Japanese de-regulated NTT to accomplish this. A few years later, thanks to the investment in Fiber To The Home (FTTH), those same Japanese consumers could get more for less, 1Gb/1GB for $52 per month, again unthrottled upstream.
Did you know that it costs pennies for an ISP to provie 1 GB of bandwidth? To charge us more, they attempt to make it appear scarce.
Here in the USA, the oligarchy successfully changed the 1996 Telecomunications Act to the point it had no teeth, could not be enforced and is useless. The same thing is happening today at the FCC by hiring a Telecom Lobbyist to run the organization, thus net neutrality is in jeapoardy yet again. First they attack the government agencies that are responsible for enforcement, next they attack that agencies budget to prevent enforcement. This is true in every area, not just FTTH and muni Fiber.
Companies only do the right thing that costs more expensive when they are forced too. Markets are coopted to prevent market economics from having a balanced impact.
In some states, the oligarchy successfully legislated laws to prevent competition. In most states this happens after a city municpality first asks the local telco/cable ISPs to provide FTTH, of course the Oligarchy says NO. When the city goes it alone, (ie. in 100% of the cases, Chattanooga, TN) the olicarchy unsuccessively sues to prevent the roleout of FTTH. Of course if the city does not give in and stop, what the oligarchy is hoping for, the FTTH rollout goes through and those American Citizens are finally FREE. They have choices, economic activity, prosperity, unfettered bandwidth, etc... Of course after this the oligarchy pushes through law suits to prevent other cities from obtaining FTTH. In 100% of Republican and Tea Party controlled states, these laws pass successfully. Thus competition is thwarted along with the FTTH. I am not a Democrat, just stating the facts. Such was the case in Wilson, North Carolina after Greenlight built out FTTH.
Having read through all the comments so far, I could not help but laugh.
The only reason for Nuclear power is weapons, period. Once you come to that conclusion, once you follow the money, its easy to understand why the plants are not being shutdown.
Nulcear power is not cheap.
If the government did not insure them, they would not get built. Depleted Uranium weapons cost millions per shell, a very profitable business.
Even if a company could justify the cost and build them, there is no way to store the radioactive waste.
How much does re-casking cost? How many reading this understand that the current casks (old nuclear waste) have a life of only 100 years, and in reality start cracking and releasing radiation after only 50 years. Have you ever looked at satellite and or pictures of planes and counted the number of casks in each state of the USA? How much does it cost to re-cask? Did you figure in this cost? For how long?
Even if you take isotopes that have a half life of 240,000 years and just focus on say Cesium 137 (massive amounts released in both Chernobyl and Fukushima) which has a half life of 30 years. It takes a minimum of 10 half lifes to get 'close' to inert (near background radiation before the disaster/spill) 10 half lifes X 30 years = 300 years. Re-casking the waste, assuming it could be contained, its not in Fukushima nor can it be, every 50 years (when it starts cracking) costs how much per cask? That's at least 6 times for Fukushima. Still think its cheaper...than you are not being realistic.
Now consider that scientists went back to Chernobyl in year 29 and measured that the levels of Cesium 137 had not dropped by half as expected. Every half life the radiation should drop by half...but in Chernobyl it has not.
Within the first week of the Fukushima disaster/spill it was reported that not only does the technology NOT exist to stop the Cesium leaks and make the reactors safe, that no company would possess the technology for the next 10 years. Until they can check the leaks, remember all the water being sprayed on to cool is highly Cesium 137 laced and radioactive and what can not be contained, leaks into the ocean, the Cesium 137 being leaked into the environment will do so unabated. Think of that, for the next 10 years...
If you counter that there is no radiation in the containment area, that is not a good thing. It only means that its in the ground water already. Its leaking into the ocean, its being sucked up in the trees, bushes and folliage, Cesium laden pollen, yummy, not.
A normal geiger counter does not register Cesium-137. You need a special dectector designed to register radioactive Cesium-137.
Cesium-137 gets asorbed by the heart muscle.
Baby doctors from Ohio to Pensylvania reported an increase in the holes in hearts of infants, post Fukushima.
Plants that pull up Cesium-137 laden ground waters release the pollen into the air that re-impacts areas previously cleaned.
Pine Trees on mountains high enough for the pollen to get pulled up to the upper atmosphere, not just through evaporation, have been tested and their pine cones have been found to be laden with Cesium-137.
It takes only 48 hours for anything that gets into the jet stream in Japan to find its way to North America and get rained down.
This will occur for the next 10 years, or longer until a method of containment is invented, remember it does not exist today. Nor will it exist in the next 8 years. How much water are they spraying, where are they holding it for 300+ years? Their not holding it for that long...well there you go.
Radioactive debris has already started to reach the West coast of North America.
Everything in the food chain will get its share of Cesium-137, just as some fish are high in mercury, the same rules and principals apply. Bigger feeders eat smaller feeders that eat yet smaller feeders, some of which are bottom feeders. There is no escaping Cesium-137 exposure in the future.
Of course stop using any part of Java that Oracle is claiming a copyright on. Heck I thought it was 9 lines of code, now it might be 37 APIs, come on now...enough already.
If this really pisses you off, especially if you are in a decision making position for IT in your company, seriously look at mariaDB and if possible switch out Oracle's SQL database for mariaDB. If you are considering Atlassian (JIRA, Confluence, Fisheye, Crucible, Bamboo) than use MariaDB instead. The first thing they did when they wrote MariaDB is get rid of all the things wrong with MySQL.
If you are the CEO of a company, did your VP of IT even consider the savings to the company that maridb would mean vs Oracle's SQL database solution? If not, perhaps its time to find a VP of IT that will put your company first.
Do you buy stock in companies? Do they use SQL databases? Do they use Oracle? Perhaps its not the best solution. Any company that does not control its cost effectively will take a hit one day, not a matter of if, only when.
Java is a PITA for overhead anyway, ask yourself, can I accomplish my goal without Java when developing applications...you might be surprised at how much faster and customer responsive your app is if you can 86 Java.
If its the entire API and not just 9 lines of code, everyone needs to re-evaluate their use of Java in development and especially in Cloud applications. No more Service As A Dis-service (SAAD vs SAAS)!
If you are reading this, you are a developer, time to think outside the Java / Oracle box!
Good post, will add your points to a list to look at when I have more time.
Since you claim to have an open source preference, I will accept that.
I do not believe Windows is cheaper to run than Linux, period. I do believe that people think it is and this false economy is perpetuated by the FUD MS keeps in the news.
At the sites I have been involved with, when Linux scales, they have fewer IT support and Systems Administrators than much smaller Windows sites. Granted Windows salaries are often less than equivalent Linux salaries for the same job.
As a Master Console Operator on IBM mainframes, I experience first hand how they segregated the jobs, creating 'print operators' in order to lower salaries...when I started an operator did it all. So paying less by segregating jobs is nothing new, that started in the late 70s and early 80s. Same with Microsoft Windows today.
I would suggest that the only reason there are not more Linux sites in the range you specify compared to Windows is strictly because of the FUD continuously spread since the 1970s about costs. In the 70s and early 80s we were told you were 'safe' if you picked IBM. Than Novell LANs took the dominant role between PCs and mainframes. In the mid to late 80s, 90s and 00s the FUD was you were 'safe' if you picked Microsoft.
Thanks to the outright hate of Windows 8, perhaps more sites will realize that opensource can be scaled correctly and when it is, ends up being much, much cheaper than the equivalent Windows environment. It will be interesting to watch, though I doubt the FUD concerning Windows will diminish in the least.
I will apply your questions to the last place I worked, though it would be the same for most of the large sites with hardened NOCs where I have worked:
How do you deploy the operating system? A ghost-like system, where an image exists for each desktop/laptop, etc...
How do you deploy software to the operating system? Back in the 90s, it was easy. Before Microsoft when nuts with registration per app, I could pkzip everything, except for Powerpoint, and simply download the zipped file, unzip it and be done with it. Powerpoint had to be loaded individually. At my last site, after an image was put on the system, over the network remotely, updates and patches were handled by a team that did nothing else. Each member of the team would patch over 1000 MS Window PCs. To be honest, I do not see a difference here between Windows and Linux.
How do you re-image the operating system when the user hoses it? Just as you do, wipe it and reload. In some instances a token effort might be made to get out of the problem and/or fix it, but as time went on, seems the only solution that would un-hose a Windows PC/laptop was a wipe and refresh. This does not make Windows look better to me. While this happens by users with Linux, its more widespread with Windows users, perhaps Linux users tend to become more proficient, for me the jury is out here, so am unsure
And when you re-image, how do you make sure that all the software that they should have is deployed to them with the new image? See you knew we re-imaged, didn't you. Why you test or have them test, though at my last site, they would check a few things and leave it to the user to test the rest.
How do many IT support calls do you take on the operating system? I don't have an answer to this one, I was providing cloud support to an Agile/Java setting and mosgt of my support was remote...but assume you are focusing that most problems are about apps, not the OS. While I agree with you, with all the hooks (registry) into the OS by the apps, you pretty much insure that you have to wipe and reinstall to fix.
How do you remote control these operating systems? I was not responsible for the remote control software, just knew it was there, so can not answer this. For support we used a secure VPN tunnel and C
*If* that is true -- and I'm seeing conflicting information as to whether or not it is -- expect FL to close that loophole to prevent fascist states like MD from targeting FL motorists on interstate highways. FL probably permits database access to allow for CCW reciprocity checks in other Shall-Issue states, and its legislators definitely won't allow abuse of its data by rogue police units like MDTAP.
If only that were true.
Used to live in Florida, not any more, its gone crazy conservative Republican / Tea Party leaning with legislation and thinking. Creating a fake crisis and giving public contracts created from the uproar, to their own businesses for personal gain for example (Gov's wife owned his testing company on paper.). As such, Business interests take priority over privacy and they will *not* close that loophole as the lobbying for the businesses that feed the those political coffers will prevent it.
Wishful thinking on your part, but alas, far from reality given the current political climate in Florida.
Full Disclosure, I am no Democrat, they abuse the system also, just at a lesser degree than Republicans and Tea Party candidates who always abuse the system for their donors benefit. Thanks to Citizens United vs FEC and their prevention of judges getting seated (at all levels, esp Federal Courts that feed into the Supreme Court), they intend for their style of cronie-ism to continue for the foreseeable future. They want only a Republican to appoint judges.
The Tea Party was 100% co-opted by the Koch brothers and their ilk within a month of its inception, in the beginning it was idealist and good, just quickly and easily corrupted... the news reports are there to prove it to anyone willing to look, many don't want to, they have ulterior motives. The Citizens United vs FEC court decision opened the flood gates for massive amounts of money to flood each and every election in the USA, as such most elections are controlled by those with the most money, not the best ideas anymore...thus the loophole is well funded politically.
While there are many examples, one that readily comes to mind by its frequency in the news over the last few days are the tax cutting in Kansas and now Missouri. While Missouri's will not take effect for two years, obfuscating the true cause of the problem when it occurs in 2016, in Kansas, the promised new revenue from economic development did not materialize and they are running a deficit (tax revenue) of over $580M ($480M + 92M was reported on TV news...msnbc I believe, I watch CNN and Fox some too, but I believe that number came from MSNBC) up to $1.3B per this article (Kansas is on track for a nearly 1.3B tax shortfall this year, and in April we endured an unprecedented income drop of over 45%. That's right. The state economy lost 45% of its tax income.). Because of the deficit the Conservative state government (100% Rep controlled) did not fund the school system effectively. In fact it was so poorly funded that judges had to step in and order the state legislature to fund the schools. (this is still playing out and will be interesting to see what the Republicans say to the courts)
In Missouri, the Gov either has or will veto the legislation, forcing them to over-ride his veto and take full responsibility for the tax cutting legislation that will hurt Missouri...Gov points to Kansas deficit as reason for his veto (Article: MO Gov. Jay Nixon points to Kansas, Shuts down Legislative Republicans) If you watch the embedded video, toward the
I too have tried this with text files and other methods (ie. SQL databases) only to come up way short. I know you cellphone users don't like that as anything more complex than text is going to present allot of problems for an itty bitty display surface.
With LibreOffice Writer, I can save pretty much anything, except perhaps binary blobs, instead I can 'refer' to that blob's subdirectory path within LibreOffice. By referencing other documents, even images stored elsewhere, you can keep the file size of your journal from growing larger than your journal editor can handle. Wile 'hackedit' (h.exe) would let you edit a file larger than memory, like other text editors, to not have links to content and the ability to include graphics is too limiting. For windows OS I found WordPad to be adequate as it could handle pretty large files, however ultimately too limiting.
Forget about MS Office Word, if the data format is not changed on you, there will be some quirk introduced in a later version to make it more difficult to include other content.
LibreOffice Writer works very well for saving URLs in a format that you can click on to get back to the original source. If you need the material for future reference, you should store a copy of the web content in a local directory. Down the road if your source gets deleted, you can put the saved copy on your own website and call it a 'cached copy'. At least you have the source. Not much you can not download with FireFox + the DownloadHelper Plugin.
Nothing worse than trying to back up information with sources only to have those sources disappear...biggest problem on Google's Youtube IMO. (If someone does not like what you are saying, they will say you are infringing on a copyright, Google automatically pulls the content and you are required to prove that its not infriging before you can load it back...by the time you load it back, the gain of immediacy for your content is lost, thus the value of Youtube for that is diminished.)
Some Positives . ..
~ Can copy/paste working URLs / links and click on them to see and/or use, just can not do this with text editors.
~ Ability to save images and graphics.
~ Ability to save portions of spreadsheets, though I would recommend storing in a separate.ods file and have LibreOffice Calc execute and load the spreadsheet.
~ Flexibility, while you can save lots of stuff in a.odt file, often it might be smarter to save in a separate file and reference from your journal OpenOffice Writer document. Yes we can copy/paste it, but should we...?
~ Avoid complications of SQL for average users. If you need database information, store in a separate directory, document the/directory/file location within your "'journal' LibreOffice Writer file" and if it will not load automatically (when you click on it), leave instructions so information can be referenced.
~ Anything that can NOT be stored in LibreOffice Writer, can be stored separately in a directory with a reference to the file saved in Writer. Videos, binary blobs, database files, etc...
~ Libreoffice will let me 'export' as a PDF file that can be read on a tablet or handheld. As long as the device has a micro-usb and/or usb slot, I can store allot of information on a 64GB or bigger micro SD card and access it via USB. This is how I reference and read my content on my Android tablet...works great.
~ No Adobe professional (expensive) writer tools are required to create a.PDF file.
~ No Adobe is needed to read.PDF files. With Linux/Android, use Evince Document Viewer.
~ Since application runs on the device locally, no bandwidth or bandwidth cap concerns. Don't kid yourself, with the loss of net neutraily, you do not want to depend on anything that eats bandwidth...no matter what the providers pro
I would like a game that does not penalize a player for having a life away from the computer.
Imagine a game where someone who logs in a few times per week, can still enjoy as much as someone who has no life and plays for 8 hours (or more) straight and you get the idea.
Also prefer games where you have a mission and are flying/driving a tank, plane and/or spaceship more than the personal shooter games. The Activision Battlezone and Wing Commander games for the PC come to mind, they were excellent! Would love to get those running on my Linux boxes, even if I had to slow down (or ignore) clock cycles to get it to run right. Loved those.
They will lose many customers over this especially since they didn't even warm their paying customers. We are US military living overseas. Not having access to my prime time shows isn't the end of the world but it was nice to have some things from home. I hate Japan and those shows helped me escape once in a while. Netflix still works with VPN but only has out dates reruns.
I do see a class-action suit in their future due to the way they handled their customers. I am paying for a service I can't use and their tech support wouldn't own up to the change so I didn't cancel right away. I am just glad I found out now so I can cancel. I see a huge downsizing of Hulu employees on the horizon as well unless vpn companies work fast to get some new ip addresses out there!
Another valid post, a valid reaction, for some reason was modded down.
The article referenced mentions that you can purchase your own private IP address and run the VPN tunnel from it, since no one else can register that IP address with Hulu, it will work with a VPN tunnel from your home.
Granted we should not have to do this, way to blow it entertainment industry through Hulu, a huge fail!
Someone mod this one back up, as a valid response to this type of stupid FUD is to cancel the service and take your money elsewhere.
As others have mentioned, a good use of 'the cloud' to constantly change an IP address to obsfucate and anonymize, which of course the advertising industry does not want.
1. Rent a cheap VPS
2. Tunnel connection through it (e.g. via a SOCKS proxy) or set up your own VPN
3. Keep the IP to yourself so you don't get flagged
That's how I get to watch BBC's premiers at the same time people in London do, and if I care about something in the US, I just switch to another VPS.
Why was this modded down, unless some shill does not want others to know how to do it, perhaps?
Seems that if you 'mask' the VPN IP Address, as 'your IP address', while it would no longer be anonymous, your VPN should not get flagged as being either a service or from a foreign country.
Man, what country do you live in? Here in the US, you have two choices: The local cable internet monopoly, or nothing. Unless you seriously consider wireless phone data an option.
I agree that anyone with a house paid offand a job in their area is not going to move. However, that same person, with a house paid off, but no job, better move or have investments paying a livable wage or the property taxes will eventually cost their heirs the home.
Those looking for a job, should seriously consider making the jump to a Symmetrical FTTH community sooner rather than later.
Of course you can always get DSL, dd-WRT on a supported firewall/router, has shown me that unthrottled DSL is faster than over 80% of throttled cable service. Remember, 100% of cable internet service is throttled, its only a matter of how much, not if. In a few areas where symmetrical FTTH competition exists and the oligopoly has not been able to pass legislation (see red states especially) at the state level to prevent competition, they actually throttle less than normal, thus only there is Cable internet faster than DSL.
If you are shopping for internet access and can not get symmetrical FTTH, than go DSL for Internet. If you want cable for TV and movies, so be it, but never package anything else with it. No phone, no Internet with Cable TV & movies unless you want to be gouged forever. As that will cost you much, much more over time, then getting them separately. Better just to go straight to DSL for internet, if you can not get FTTH.
30 Symmetrical FTTH communities Re:Choose an area
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You may not want to move from a home you own, but I'm surprised that people don't consider these types of things when they are moving. During my last move, I determined I wanted better internet than Comcast provides and specifically limited my search for a place to live to somewhere where that was the case. Now I'm enjoying 100mbit symmetric internet for under $40/mo and really enjoying the fact that none of my money goes to those greedy bastards.
As a bonus, when I travel overseas, I can use my own home connection as my VPN service. I can completely sidestep the regional blocking done by the streaming providers.
Intelligent and smart, why on earth were you rated down? Amazing what you can get for less than $50 per month if you move to a FTTH community.
Perhaps some Cable shills with moderation powers....
Everyone can do this if you are looking to move. Look for Fiber To The Home (FTTH) like the less than 30 communities on this map.
The secret to look for is that the Fiber connection offers the same bandwidth upstream as downstream. So there advertised bandwidths are the same, ie. 10Mb/10Mb, 15Mb/15Mb, 20Mb/20Mb, 30Mb/30Mb, 50Mb/50Mb, 100Mb/100Mb, 1000Mb/1000Mb (1TB/1TB), unlike services that call themselves fiber but are not symmetrical and advertise 50Mb/5Mb - - - wrong, 50Mb downstream and 5 Mb upstream tells you they limit, restrict, censor, throttle their bandwidth. Move somewhere else.
With true FTTH, there is no business incentive to throttle, limit, restrict, etc... for bandwidth reasons.
Added bonus, having FTTH adds $5,000 to the price of the home, costs between $1,500 ~ $3,000 to run the fiber link from the switching service to your home and once run, that FIBER link is sold with the home, its property of the home-owner, not any other company, period.
Anything less than this is a wrong, a mistake and prepetuates the failed scarcity myth / increased monthly prices to perpetuity, which is the only reason to restrict bandwidth. To make you think its scarce, when its not, to get customers to pay more.
In the right circles, the Cable company CFOs will admit this scarcity myth fact to investors as a reason investing in cable companies makes more sense. We have a great business model, we can increase our customers rates anytime we want for as much as we want, thus we are always going to be profitable, invest in us
Another added plus, the communities with FTTH, are growing small business and jobs with livable wages faster than all other communities in the USA! Small businesses are thriving and actively looking to relocate to these areas for the bandwidth that only true FTTH can provide. Big data demands symmetrical FTTH.
In terms of power dynamics in politics, we are likely to see geritocracy in the US as our population ages. We *need* to increase the retirement age and reduce the amount of spending on pensions. How is this going to happen when the majority of the population is old and is willing to express their displeasure in the voting booth?
We *need* to do things smarter, differently, better and not be insane!
Totally agree with your first paragraph, as we have seen since 1980, those with money, will always act in their own self interest to the detriment of the rest of society. Yes they control the money, thanks to Citizens United vs FEC they control politics via their aggressive political contributions and yes they most certainly can control who does and who does not get money. What you would expect when 10% have 90% of the wealth in this country.
And lets not get started with the pollution created by those 10%, google Coal Ash in Detriot, Duke Industires in NC and the Nuclear Power industry...hint if you have to re-cask every 50 - 100 years, no way in heck is it ever going to be cheaper.
As weather control scientist have always warned us, 'there will be winners and their will be losers', this thought actually applies to all industries. And those industries have no incentive to police themselves, therefore lack of funding for government agencies that do police them, can only hurt the majority of any population. Oh could I go one, but enough, as many refuse to admit how all these factors are inter-related. Quantitative Methods baby, its all inter-related, you are cheated when they convince you that somehow these many things are not related.
I have to take issue with your last paragraph, quoted above, not with the first statement, we see that today in politics...so the first sentence I agree with you.
Rather I take issue with the next sentence. Current retirement age is already too high, specifically to reduce the likelihood that one collects on their retirement. Think outside the box, if the 10% can prevent you from collecting on your promised/guarranteed retirement long enough, they will find a way to rob you of it...or better yet, let you die off so that they can get at it later once you are gone. Of course if you control your retirement yourself, that is smart and prevents this.
Now don't get me wrong, the idea of retiring on a 'fixed' income is insane. All one has to do is look around and see that it is not working, never has, never will work. To assume that your outcome will be different is insane. Thus you need an income stream, no matter what.
Instead of increasing retirement age, how about teaching kids how to invest correctly, 'sanely' and 'carefully'...just google Jim Cramer and you can learn.
Teach your kids how to be self sufficient, which means capable of generating their own power (electricity and fuel) and maintaining food (aqua-ponics) self sufficiency, so that what meager wealth they are able to save via investments will not be eroded by the 10% via their control over everything, especially food.
A swamp weed, like a cotton-tail type of plant can be grown and processed by an individual at lower than $1.27 per gallon, just need a diseal engine! I know a guy doing it, so yes it can be done!
Solor and wind generated electricity to power an electric vehicle, does not need power from the grid. Just don't attempt to patent anything or sell anything as others have been prevented, just do it. How many of the over 3000 'secretized' energy patents might make one self sufficient? If 10% of them work...
The idea of pushing the retirement age, yet higher, is insane. This is what politicians have been doing since before the 1980s, and its not working. In fact 'austerity' will not work either, except for the 10%, you can not save yourself to profitability. You have to 'grow' to succeed. Grow from a fundamentally sound value base and you have th
In theory, looks great, but those still on XP, wont adjust.
And if XP is no longer supported . . . ?
They have no choice. Do they want their jobs? Of course they will switch. Just do them a favor and switch them to something better and not something worse.
..
Until a complex Excel macro doesn't work....
You need to stop thinking like a geek converting dear old Dad to LibreOffice for home use home and start thinking about the skill sets and productivity of fifty to five hundred clerical workers with different skill sets and responsibilities.
In a corporate setting, all business critical macros would be identified and converted before that part of that business unit was migrated to Linux. Of course if the CEO says do it, it will get done and you know this. No point in pulling out the geek and home use only analogy.
You next sentance made me laugh, thank you for that.
... Until an incoming document from an outside source cannot be read....
Really pissed me off (and the VP of IT, thank goodness) when this happened to me with Microsoft Office. Was it Win 2000, XP or Vista, whichever it pissed everyone off. The final solution, the documents were coverted to PDF files and everyone was forced to move to the new version in spite of the incoming documents both from outside sources and internal sources.
We did stop accepting.doc formatted Word documents. Its a shame Microsoft chose to make their data formats incompatible with the Open Data Formats standards group.
Their (Microsoft) poor choice was/is not a reason to stay with Microsoft, but rather a reason to dump their office product.
Sadly many more businesses decided to go along rather than switch office products to LibreOffice. In one experience, they decided to start converting massive amounts of documents (the converters MS provided were not 100% effective...just another reason not to like them), talk about a loss in productivity and a waste of time.
Based on my over 20 years of corporate experience, the old analogies of...
No one ever got fired for recommending IBM ~ yes I am that old
No one ever got fired for recommending Microsoft
... simply no longer apply for Windows 8. As a CEO I would seriously consider looking for new management up to and including VPs that blindly recommend Windows 8 without considering Linux today.
I personally believe that Windows 8 presents a clear business risk that is best to be avoided. I know the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) for Windows 8 is higher than Linux. I leave it up to others to learn the truth for themselves.
The workers will still want to use MS Word, and Excel, and Exchange for email.
Others below have indicated their positive experiences migrating windows users to Linux. Windows users do NOT have problems with any of the many GUIs in Linux.
Based on my corporate experience, you would have CEO, VP of IT, DIR of IT buy in on the switch over to Linux from Windows, thus it would make sense that they would dictate a move away from MS Office to Libreoffice.
As for Macros with Word and/or Excel, a working group would be started to identify those macros critical to the needs of the business and someone would be hired to convert only those to to LibreOffice Writer and LIbreOffice Calc. Probably get a volunteer from that group to do the conversion. And all other macros, not considered business critical, would be considered 'not to be used' moving forward.
With executive management buy in, its a no brainer, without it, a move to Linux probably would not happen. Of course then that executive needs to be held accountable for the Windows 8 heck to come.
As for scaling, there are sites that have scaled to above 10K Linux users, so anyone who says it can't be done, is clueless, ignore them.
Best of all, remember that each new version of Windows takes more and more from the Linux kernel, so in reality, Windows has already said that if you can't beat them, join them, they are just not advertising that fact.
Portability of learned skills means you don't have to re-train your workers.
Most often repeated FUD ever in the yes/no to Windows debate. Every version of Windows I have used from 1.0a as an app on top of MSDOS has required some re-learning of the Graphical User Interface (GUI) by anyone using it.
May as well take the same time to re-learn a Linux GUI instead. I would suggest Linux Mint, Debian or Fedora for desktop users.
Every new version of a desktop operating system will take a user some time to learn. There is no need to make Linux look like Windows or Windows look like Linux. There is no time savings or addtional time cost going from one to the other.
If a grandma can learn the GUI for Linux Mint, employees of your business can learn it as well.
And don't get me started about incompatibale data formats between MS Office products, just switch the office to LibreOffice and never have those issues again either. How many times has MS screwed us with incompatible data formats from one version of MS Word (in office) to the next? I remember two, time is kind, as I know it has happened to me more than twice, probably with one of the other office apps (Excel, Powerpoint, etc...). This makes MS a worse option as you never know when they are going to get you again and you can't say they won't, simply because they have...more than once.
The most important decision is the hardware, IMO, ONLY purchase hardware designed to run Linux from Linux Vendors ONLY. This means no big box stores, they simply do not do Linux well if at all. This avoids the proprietary chipsets that vendors have put in to favor Windows, esp with UEFI and Windows 8. Windows 7 will probably be the last MS OS I purchase because of the UEFI BS.
Personally I prefer ZaReason as they will install whatever distro I want on the hardware and everything just works out of the box. You could go System76 or any other Linux vendor, sure there are a few out there. ZaReason is just my preference.
Full disclosure, I do not work for ZaReason and have purchased their hardware...very happy with it, every time.
Yes, finally, my childhood come to life. Many an hour was spent making car sounds vroom, vroom, errrick (curve), vroom with my cousin with our Glow in the Dark Matchbox cities.
The idea of including weather info into the roadway (or perhaps a heads up display...) sounds interesting.
Just think it would be better in a heads up display than on the road.
Thanks for a great childhood memory.
To ebayers, sorry, my mom gave them away years ago, so you will have to shop elsewhere.
Like your thinking. More than once I wanted to run the new app with my past user environment and was thwarted, whether the OS was Windows, Linux or Mac OSX. It is frustrating not to be able to. Developers uncouple please.
I have needed to run old versions of software after a new version came out. As long as I can control where to install the application, I usually have no problem. However if the install process locks me into a specific area, than I know, down the road, I will not have this capability.
With Windows 7, PaintShop Pro (v10 I believe) attempted to force me to install in a specific area, however I figured a way around it, put it in a/prog area on a USB device. After that I was able to run PSP from any Windows box I wanted to without problems. I plan to do similar things with my tablets, use the micro SD card for both applications and data. No way should I be forced to connect to the internet to do something.
Because of the above scenario, as much as I loved PSP, I moved away from it simply because they attempted to force me to install in a specific pro-windows way/place. I was able to run an old version of PSP from that computer, in addtion to the new version. I figure I bought it, I should be able to install and run as I want. With the writing on the wall to PSP's stated direction, I left behind one of my favorite tools. GIMP is not as friendly, but extremely powerful.
Never felt like ponying up the extra few hundred dollars for Photoshop, as there was nothing I need to do, that I could not do with PaintShop Pro and/or GIMP. Though I admit when I have used Photoshop it is a great program. I just want to be legal and buy my software I use in web development. Leaving those extra hundreds for investment for retirement.
Still see this as a big issue for my opensource tablet. It is frustrating. I no longer feel sorry fof those that lock themselves into proprietary hardware for an embedded device, whether it be a handheld or tablet. Opensource tools and products are the answer.
Thankfully I read slashdot at the -1 score level, so people wrongly moderating do not censor me. I can sensor myself thank you very much. Those that do not, would have missed this next comment.
After reading (#46516745) above and some of the comments related to that post, the only thing I can think to do is make sure I can restore my tablet from scratch, document how to do it as I won't remember in a few months, and that would at least give me the capabilty to reinstall my android tablet from scratch should I get caught in this type of upgrade fiasco.
If your handheld / tablet uses proprietary pieces and parts, you will be denied the abilty to wipe it clean and reinstall from scratch (via the micro SD card slot) if necessary. In that case the fault is yours as open source, non-proprietary solutions are available, but some comapnies want to force you into only pay them for everything and anything model. Best to avoid their hardware/software unless you enjoy paying away your hard earned money.
Someone with mod points please rate that post back up from 0 as its information is based on experience and is factually true. It provides valid info, though some evidently disagree with it and it got rated down, pathetic.
If the software modifies the format of your data, better have a backup copy or forget it. Something many Intuit CPA users found out to their frustration a few years ago. The idea of hand entering a client's data because the company in its infinite wisdom decided to update the data format without warning anyone is what comes to mind here.
Yours was the best of the bunch (minus formatting html tags), though I enjoyed reading about the trials and tribulations of punch tape vs punch cards vs tape/dat backup systems. The biggest problem I had many years ago was using a dat format system that I could not longer purchase hardware for. So I had tapes, but no way to read them. That taught me a lesson. Never use a media that I might not be able to read from 10 years from today. Thus I only backup on hard disks today.
I agree that to backup music, videos and other static content that has been downloaded via the internet (and not personally created) is a waste of time and space. As you pointed out, with even a throttled cable connection you can download this fairly quickly. So never waste time backing it up. Totally agree with you.
Now the one exception to video, pictures and music, are those that you create yourself. For your own personal pictures and personally created video. That needs to be backed up and I would suggest a harddrive (or multiple hard disks) for this purpose.
If you work in the video / movie industry creating content, obviously this comment does not apply to you...check into creating your own Linux video sever farm for while-you-sleep-rendering and a homemade Linux SANs like this Petabytes on a budget: How to build cheap cloud storage. You will have to learn some Linux to do this, but it would be well worth it, if you have the need. This article should help you, Thoughts about this DIY-Thumper and storage in general
Just as with industrial and union jobs of yesterday, white collar IT jobs, your movie editing jobs are now being offshored to India and when I was in LA a couple of years ago, a number of studios were relocating to Canada because it was cheaper for them...fyi.
For home users not in an industry creating massive videos, the next few paragraphs should cover you. Give thoughts to what you really need and why. Don't back up anything you do not have too. Like Software, Operating Systems, only focus on the data you create.
Plan your locations for different types of data, since you can label (mount point) your directory whatever you want. You could have one for video, one for audio (music), one for non picture images (your digital camera) and one for everything else. If you have the need, perhaps a DB directory as well. This would look as follows:
/video/ ~ for downloaded video, not home movies, never backed up (this will be your largest directory for most)
/music/ ~ for downloaded music, not self created, never backed up (you could write this to DVR or copy to a USB thumb drive if you want, the files are NOT that big. A 64GB thumb drive costs less than $30 on sale. Get a Micro USB adapter and only purchase micro SD cards and get very large ones. I use to use 8GB in my Nokia N800, now my zareason ZT2 Tablet has a 32GB micro SD card in it. Since I am using it for books, PHP development and research only, it will take a very long time to fill up.)
/myvideo/ ~ personally made video, back it up
/mymusic/ ~ personally created music, back it up
/images/ ~ digital images from your digital camera, back it up
/db/ ~ custom database stuff, back it up
/data/ ~ everything else, back it up
For the majority of you reading this, from/myvideo/ to/data/ (five different directories) will easily fit on one 500GB drive. If you are smart and compress it when you backup, you can probably fit a months worth of backups on that 500GB drive if not more. Linux comes with built in compression / backup commands and you can use PKZIP (or other compression program) for Windows to compress your data sizes and make your backup space go further. Even mo
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Damn right... when will I be able to buy a laptop with 2560x1440 resolution?
What do you mean, I can buy one today? Shut yo mouf!
I see your 2560x1400 and the cough, cough, only 4GB of RAM...seriously? Why have the better resolution and limit the amount of RAM (or disk space)?
Instead I would rather have either 16GB (or 32GB) of triple channel memory (RAM) with only 1920x1080 pixels (here) granted it would be best to have both, my guess is companies like ZaReason will when customers clamor for it. The Verix-545 is one heck of a sweet laptop, especially for the price, works with your preferred version of Linux out of the box, everything, it just works. Love having 2 TB of storage too. No more limitations, except resolution, if you consider HD at 1920x1080 to be a limitiation that is.
My only regret is that it does not have a 17", 19" or 21" laptop screen size. Granted I hook it to larger monitors to do work anyway. My future monitor will be a 60" LED 300hz LG TV. Have seen them in the stores on sale for $680, which is phenominal. My last LG was an LCD, 42" and cost over $1,000 on sale years ago.
Best of all, by buying from a Linux vendor only, you are not limited to only MS Win8 via the proprietary hardware...no more blind alleys.
With a LInux vendor, you can always buy a copy of Windows and run it, however the converse is not true, any hardware sold today that is meant for Windows 8 or 9, will *not* run Linux without paying for a Windows license, whether you need it or not.
The only reason not to purchase from a Linux vendor is if you want to run Macintosh OS X, of course that Macbook Pro will cost you considerablly more for less bang...good machines those Apple Macs, just always expensive.
I don't want anything to do with the cellular companies. What I want is a wifi touchscreen that connects to my desktop computer. Something thin, light, that has great battery life, has a cam and mic and speaker so i can use voip wireless around the house/office if I want to.
Could not agree more. Give me Wifi, allow me to configure and use as I need. No need for Cellular. Of course I need something better than Skype as Linux is not well supported in Skype. Sure it works, but you never know when it might not and new features take a year or more to filter down to the Linux version of Skype.
I would add, don't force me into any app that requires bandwidth use to use, not backups, not cloud, not anything.
Auto updates are a huge FAIL for me. This would be enough for me to say no.
I am in the process of determining how to reinstall my Linux 10" tablet from scratch. Figure I better be able to do that before I do anything meaningful with the device. Years ago I learned that if you are going to depend on a tool, you better be able to fully control that tool.
By full control, back it up, back up data, reinstall from scratch, etc.... if you can't, its a disaster waiting to happen.
In the same category would be allowing remote wipes or erasures of my device. No thank you. If the software did that and I could not turn it off to prevent it, I would not buy the device.
The first MS OS to ignore my settings was Windows 2000, told it not to reboot or install anything without prompting me first, which worked fine until a major\ update, than my settings were ignored. I checked after the auto update, it was still set to not do it without my approval, just ignored that setting after the update. Been a loyal Linux user ever since.
Full disclosure, I still have a Windows 7 box for testing, do not plan to ever buy a Windows 8 or higher OS again. No thank you.
If you control a tool, it should obey your wishes period. If it does not, its simply not reliable and will let you down at the worst possible time. The mere fact of requiring an auto update, violates this law for many of us.
Don't try to convince me that updating my device without my permission somehow keeps me safe from exploits that require local access to my device either, as I don't plan to give the keys of my house to anyone, thus they will NEVER gain local access to the device. Ever notice how 99% of exploits require 'local' access. Well I have noticed...no thank you.
Besides if that was a concern, there is an app agnostic tool for Linux that auto encrypts everything on the hard disk, data wise, so I would go there first anyway.
The idea of waking up and my device not working, merely because someone else in their infinite wisdom decided to do something without consulting me first, leaves me cold. No thank you. Is it my device or isn't it?
Having to reboot multiple times to finish would be frustrating as all get out....what a waste of time. At offices, it always seems to happen at the most inopportune times.
You think they would learn...if they force you into an 'auto update' scenario, you are one instant away from a useless paper weight, why even go there.
It's the way I work. I have no interest in 10" or larger tablets. The 7" tablet seems the absolutely perfect size for me. I had a chance to play with an iPad 2 and I just thought it was way too large.
By the same token, when I use a laptop, I feel 15" is absolute perfect. Big enough screen to do serious work, and providing it has a decent keyboard, I'm a happy guy.
The Surface Pro 3 doesn't hit any of my buttons. Too big for what I use a tablet for. Too small for what I use a notebook for. Worst of all, it's price so high I can buy a 7" tablet AND a 15" notebook and still be ahead money wise at the end of the day.
Great response. The last point would kill it for most people. You first point is significant based on experience for me.
Pre Microsoft buying Skype, I 86ed my over $100 per month cellular plan/phone and moved to a Linux handheld + Wifi solution for less than $9 per month. Ran with that for almost 4 years, however Microsofts lack of support for Linux made me say goodbye to Skype.
My first handheld 'full' computer (Linux) had a small 4" screen. No way it could replace a laptop or desktop. As others have stated, need that keyboard. My biggest use was as a Skype phone via Wifi, never got into the geo capabilities with it, though it had two micro SD slots, which I notice no new devices have. Loved that and strongly believe it is a good reason to buy one tablet over another...does it have 2 micro SD slots. You will use them if it does. Also had 512MB of RAM and could play HD content as of 2006. We have come a long way baby!
My second handheld, a 10" Android from ZaReason (ZaTAb ZT2) is great, love it, but still would not want to do coding, word processing, spreadsheets, database work etc...for the same reason, like that Keyboard. Sadly only one micro SD slot. While I find Android a bit more limiting than a full Linux laptop, it is less limiting than any Apple or Microsoft tablet would be.
I see a tablet as a plus if you can do some things on it, but never as a laptop/desktop replacement. I think we are in agreement there.
The screen size of the new Microsoft tablet is too large and I just know it would get sat on, bent, cracked. If I went above my 10" android, I would get one of those Two-screen Linux tablets that opens like a book, that way each side can help protect the other when the tablet 'book' is closed. Heck I got a touch screen protector and case for my 10" ZtTAb as it was. Also having two screens is pretty important in order to do something on one screen while referencing another. Or when interrupted, to handle the interruption and move back to the task at hand with minimal interruption.
For laptops, I like my 17" Zareason Verix 530, would not mind the 15.6" screen being bigger, heck I would get a 21" screen if ZaReason made a laptop with one. At least I have 16GB of triple channel memory and two harddrives, so my laptop can be used to do 100% of what I did with a desktop. At work and/or home office I always have a second monitor anyway. Its become my primary device and I plan to turn my desktop (Breeze 4220, w/ 4 cores) into a glorified server + TV Wall when I get a 60" LG TV. There is linux software that lets you control the cores independently of each other....very cool.
When I use my tablet now, I do miss a keyboard, have not bothered to add one yet, I find myself reading a book, learning a new language (Italian), playing a game, etc... Hope to use it buy and sell stocks down the road, but have not attempted that yet. Also use the micro SD slot with a 64GB micro SD card...can search, review, look up information on documents, both those created by me and those downloaded as reference, but would not want to edit them on that tablet.
If I get PHP successfully running as I believe I can, than I will really want a second micro SD slot. Don't like the idea of needing a hub to do work, though that would be a work around. Imagine running any PHP applicati
Municipal fiber is the way to go. It would change the world and give the US economy a badly needed shot in the arm.
ISP costs have risen four times faster than inflation. We're on the road to having just two national providers. When that happens, costs will go up even faster.
1) Designate ISPs as common carriers.
2) Break up any ISP that provides content.
3) Take a bow for having brought about the digital revolution part 2.
Unfortunately, our elected jackoffs are too beholden to corporate money to do anything like this. Obama, who was supposed to be the first president who "got" the Internet, turned out to be the worst of the bunch, appointing telecom lobbyist Tom Wheeler has head of the FCC, and they're not poised to put the last nail in the Net Neutrality coffin. Obama is a failed president on that count alone.
I would add that muni symmetrical FTTH is the ONLY viable solution for the future of any community. Don't settle for less, it can only hurt your communities economnic viability and small business job creation moving forward.
I think you're right about items 1 2 and 3, but not necessarily municipal fiber. There are some good examples out there, but only because the alternatives are so incompetent/complacent/debt-ridden. If we had a more healthy telecom environment in the USA, nobody would give a damn about Municipal fiber, or Google fiber for that matter. Including Google.
If one of your muni examples is incompetent/complacent/debt-ridden, there is an extremely good chance that the local oligarchy passed legislation to make it so. You need to do more homework as I have plenty of examples of this type of oligarchy legal pestilence.
Sadly the only way to get a "more healthy telecom environment in the USA" will be through de-regulation as in Japan, that gave Japanese consumers 100Mb/100Mb (unthrottled upstream) for $56 per month in the year 2000. The Japanese de-regulated NTT to accomplish this. A few years later, thanks to the investment in Fiber To The Home (FTTH), those same Japanese consumers could get more for less, 1Gb/1GB for $52 per month, again unthrottled upstream.
Did you know that it costs pennies for an ISP to provie 1 GB of bandwidth? To charge us more, they attempt to make it appear scarce.
Here in the USA, the oligarchy successfully changed the 1996 Telecomunications Act to the point it had no teeth, could not be enforced and is useless. The same thing is happening today at the FCC by hiring a Telecom Lobbyist to run the organization, thus net neutrality is in jeapoardy yet again. First they attack the government agencies that are responsible for enforcement, next they attack that agencies budget to prevent enforcement. This is true in every area, not just FTTH and muni Fiber.
Companies only do the right thing that costs more expensive when they are forced too. Markets are coopted to prevent market economics from having a balanced impact.
In some states, the oligarchy successfully legislated laws to prevent competition. In most states this happens after a city municpality first asks the local telco/cable ISPs to provide FTTH, of course the Oligarchy says NO. When the city goes it alone, (ie. in 100% of the cases, Chattanooga, TN) the olicarchy unsuccessively sues to prevent the roleout of FTTH. Of course if the city does not give in and stop, what the oligarchy is hoping for, the FTTH rollout goes through and those American Citizens are finally FREE. They have choices, economic activity, prosperity, unfettered bandwidth, etc... Of course after this the oligarchy pushes through law suits to prevent other cities from obtaining FTTH. In 100% of Republican and Tea Party controlled states, these laws pass successfully. Thus competition is thwarted along with the FTTH. I am not a Democrat, just stating the facts. Such was the case in Wilson, North Carolina after Greenlight built out FTTH.
In fact there are 7 states without right defa
Having read through all the comments so far, I could not help but laugh.
The only reason for Nuclear power is weapons, period. Once you come to that conclusion, once you follow the money, its easy to understand why the plants are not being shutdown.
Nulcear power is not cheap.
If the government did not insure them, they would not get built. Depleted Uranium weapons cost millions per shell, a very profitable business.
Even if a company could justify the cost and build them, there is no way to store the radioactive waste.
How much does re-casking cost? How many reading this understand that the current casks (old nuclear waste) have a life of only 100 years, and in reality start cracking and releasing radiation after only 50 years. Have you ever looked at satellite and or pictures of planes and counted the number of casks in each state of the USA? How much does it cost to re-cask? Did you figure in this cost? For how long?
Even if you take isotopes that have a half life of 240,000 years and just focus on say Cesium 137 (massive amounts released in both Chernobyl and Fukushima) which has a half life of 30 years. It takes a minimum of 10 half lifes to get 'close' to inert (near background radiation before the disaster/spill) 10 half lifes X 30 years = 300 years. Re-casking the waste, assuming it could be contained, its not in Fukushima nor can it be, every 50 years (when it starts cracking) costs how much per cask? That's at least 6 times for Fukushima. Still think its cheaper...than you are not being realistic.
Now consider that scientists went back to Chernobyl in year 29 and measured that the levels of Cesium 137 had not dropped by half as expected. Every half life the radiation should drop by half...but in Chernobyl it has not.
Within the first week of the Fukushima disaster/spill it was reported that not only does the technology NOT exist to stop the Cesium leaks and make the reactors safe, that no company would possess the technology for the next 10 years. Until they can check the leaks, remember all the water being sprayed on to cool is highly Cesium 137 laced and radioactive and what can not be contained, leaks into the ocean, the Cesium 137 being leaked into the environment will do so unabated. Think of that, for the next 10 years...
If you counter that there is no radiation in the containment area, that is not a good thing. It only means that its in the ground water already. Its leaking into the ocean, its being sucked up in the trees, bushes and folliage, Cesium laden pollen, yummy, not.
A normal geiger counter does not register Cesium-137. You need a special dectector designed to register radioactive Cesium-137.
Cesium-137 gets asorbed by the heart muscle.
Baby doctors from Ohio to Pensylvania reported an increase in the holes in hearts of infants, post Fukushima.
Plants that pull up Cesium-137 laden ground waters release the pollen into the air that re-impacts areas previously cleaned.
Pine Trees on mountains high enough for the pollen to get pulled up to the upper atmosphere, not just through evaporation, have been tested and their pine cones have been found to be laden with Cesium-137.
It takes only 48 hours for anything that gets into the jet stream in Japan to find its way to North America and get rained down.
This will occur for the next 10 years, or longer until a method of containment is invented, remember it does not exist today. Nor will it exist in the next 8 years. How much water are they spraying, where are they holding it for 300+ years? Their not holding it for that long...well there you go.
Radioactive debris has already started to reach the West coast of North America.
Everything in the food chain will get its share of Cesium-137, just as some fish are high in mercury, the same rules and principals apply. Bigger feeders eat smaller feeders that eat yet smaller feeders, some of which are bottom feeders. There is no escaping Cesium-137 exposure in the future.
Of course stop using any part of Java that Oracle is claiming a copyright on. Heck I thought it was 9 lines of code, now it might be 37 APIs, come on now...enough already.
If this really pisses you off, especially if you are in a decision making position for IT in your company, seriously look at mariaDB and if possible switch out Oracle's SQL database for mariaDB. If you are considering Atlassian (JIRA, Confluence, Fisheye, Crucible, Bamboo) than use MariaDB instead. The first thing they did when they wrote MariaDB is get rid of all the things wrong with MySQL.
Many Linux distros have finally begun moving away from MySQL and to MariaDB for LAMP. Redhat recently started shipping their Enterprise version with MariaDB over MySQL
If you are the CEO of a company, did your VP of IT even consider the savings to the company that maridb would mean vs Oracle's SQL database solution? If not, perhaps its time to find a VP of IT that will put your company first.
Do you buy stock in companies? Do they use SQL databases? Do they use Oracle? Perhaps its not the best solution. Any company that does not control its cost effectively will take a hit one day, not a matter of if, only when.
Java is a PITA for overhead anyway, ask yourself, can I accomplish my goal without Java when developing applications...you might be surprised at how much faster and customer responsive your app is if you can 86 Java.
If its the entire API and not just 9 lines of code, everyone needs to re-evaluate their use of Java in development and especially in Cloud applications. No more Service As A Dis-service (SAAD vs SAAS)!
If you are reading this, you are a developer, time to think outside the Java / Oracle box!
Good post, will add your points to a list to look at when I have more time.
Since you claim to have an open source preference, I will accept that.
I do not believe Windows is cheaper to run than Linux, period. I do believe that people think it is and this false economy is perpetuated by the FUD MS keeps in the news.
At the sites I have been involved with, when Linux scales, they have fewer IT support and Systems Administrators than much smaller Windows sites. Granted Windows salaries are often less than equivalent Linux salaries for the same job.
As a Master Console Operator on IBM mainframes, I experience first hand how they segregated the jobs, creating 'print operators' in order to lower salaries...when I started an operator did it all. So paying less by segregating jobs is nothing new, that started in the late 70s and early 80s. Same with Microsoft Windows today.
I would suggest that the only reason there are not more Linux sites in the range you specify compared to Windows is strictly because of the FUD continuously spread since the 1970s about costs. In the 70s and early 80s we were told you were 'safe' if you picked IBM. Than Novell LANs took the dominant role between PCs and mainframes. In the mid to late 80s, 90s and 00s the FUD was you were 'safe' if you picked Microsoft.
Thanks to the outright hate of Windows 8, perhaps more sites will realize that opensource can be scaled correctly and when it is, ends up being much, much cheaper than the equivalent Windows environment. It will be interesting to watch, though I doubt the FUD concerning Windows will diminish in the least.
I will apply your questions to the last place I worked, though it would be the same for most of the large sites with hardened NOCs where I have worked:
How do you deploy the operating system?
A ghost-like system, where an image exists for each desktop/laptop, etc...
How do you deploy software to the operating system?
Back in the 90s, it was easy. Before Microsoft when nuts with registration per app, I could pkzip everything, except for Powerpoint, and simply download the zipped file, unzip it and be done with it. Powerpoint had to be loaded individually. At my last site, after an image was put on the system, over the network remotely, updates and patches were handled by a team that did nothing else. Each member of the team would patch over 1000 MS Window PCs. To be honest, I do not see a difference here between Windows and Linux.
How do you re-image the operating system when the user hoses it?
Just as you do, wipe it and reload. In some instances a token effort might be made to get out of the problem and/or fix it, but as time went on, seems the only solution that would un-hose a Windows PC/laptop was a wipe and refresh. This does not make Windows look better to me. While this happens by users with Linux, its more widespread with Windows users, perhaps Linux users tend to become more proficient, for me the jury is out here, so am unsure
And when you re-image, how do you make sure that all the software that they should have is deployed to them with the new image?
See you knew we re-imaged, didn't you. Why you test or have them test, though at my last site, they would check a few things and leave it to the user to test the rest.
How do many IT support calls do you take on the operating system?
I don't have an answer to this one, I was providing cloud support to an Agile/Java setting and mosgt of my support was remote...but assume you are focusing that most problems are about apps, not the OS. While I agree with you, with all the hooks (registry) into the OS by the apps, you pretty much insure that you have to wipe and reinstall to fix.
How do you remote control these operating systems?
I was not responsible for the remote control software, just knew it was there, so can not answer this. For support we used a secure VPN tunnel and C
*If* that is true -- and I'm seeing conflicting information as to whether or not it is -- expect FL to close that loophole to prevent fascist states like MD from targeting FL motorists on interstate highways. FL probably permits database access to allow for CCW reciprocity checks in other Shall-Issue states, and its legislators definitely won't allow abuse of its data by rogue police units like MDTAP.
If only that were true.
Used to live in Florida, not any more, its gone crazy conservative Republican / Tea Party leaning with legislation and thinking. Creating a fake crisis and giving public contracts created from the uproar, to their own businesses for personal gain for example (Gov's wife owned his testing company on paper.). As such, Business interests take priority over privacy and they will *not* close that loophole as the lobbying for the businesses that feed the those political coffers will prevent it.
Wishful thinking on your part, but alas, far from reality given the current political climate in Florida.
Full Disclosure, I am no Democrat, they abuse the system also, just at a lesser degree than Republicans and Tea Party candidates who always abuse the system for their donors benefit. Thanks to Citizens United vs FEC and their prevention of judges getting seated (at all levels, esp Federal Courts that feed into the Supreme Court), they intend for their style of cronie-ism to continue for the foreseeable future. They want only a Republican to appoint judges.
The Tea Party was 100% co-opted by the Koch brothers and their ilk within a month of its inception, in the beginning it was idealist and good, just quickly and easily corrupted... the news reports are there to prove it to anyone willing to look, many don't want to, they have ulterior motives. The Citizens United vs FEC court decision opened the flood gates for massive amounts of money to flood each and every election in the USA, as such most elections are controlled by those with the most money, not the best ideas anymore...thus the loophole is well funded politically.
While there are many examples, one that readily comes to mind by its frequency in the news over the last few days are the tax cutting in Kansas and now Missouri. While Missouri's will not take effect for two years, obfuscating the true cause of the problem when it occurs in 2016, in Kansas, the promised new revenue from economic development did not materialize and they are running a deficit (tax revenue) of over $580M ($480M + 92M was reported on TV news...msnbc I believe, I watch CNN and Fox some too, but I believe that number came from MSNBC) up to $1.3B per this article (Kansas is on track for a nearly 1.3B tax shortfall this year, and in April we endured an unprecedented income drop of over 45%. That's right. The state economy lost 45% of its tax income.). Because of the deficit the Conservative state government (100% Rep controlled) did not fund the school system effectively. In fact it was so poorly funded that judges had to step in and order the state legislature to fund the schools. (this is still playing out and will be interesting to see what the Republicans say to the courts)
In Missouri, the Gov either has or will veto the legislation, forcing them to over-ride his veto and take full responsibility for the tax cutting legislation that will hurt Missouri...Gov points to Kansas deficit as reason for his veto (Article: MO Gov. Jay Nixon points to Kansas, Shuts down Legislative Republicans) If you watch the embedded video, toward the
I too have tried this with text files and other methods (ie. SQL databases) only to come up way short. I know you cellphone users don't like that as anything more complex than text is going to present allot of problems for an itty bitty display surface.
With LibreOffice Writer, I can save pretty much anything, except perhaps binary blobs, instead I can 'refer' to that blob's subdirectory path within LibreOffice. By referencing other documents, even images stored elsewhere, you can keep the file size of your journal from growing larger than your journal editor can handle. Wile 'hackedit' (h.exe) would let you edit a file larger than memory, like other text editors, to not have links to content and the ability to include graphics is too limiting. For windows OS I found WordPad to be adequate as it could handle pretty large files, however ultimately too limiting.
Forget about MS Office Word, if the data format is not changed on you, there will be some quirk introduced in a later version to make it more difficult to include other content.
LibreOffice Writer works very well for saving URLs in a format that you can click on to get back to the original source. If you need the material for future reference, you should store a copy of the web content in a local directory. Down the road if your source gets deleted, you can put the saved copy on your own website and call it a 'cached copy'. At least you have the source. Not much you can not download with FireFox + the DownloadHelper Plugin.
Nothing worse than trying to back up information with sources only to have those sources disappear...biggest problem on Google's Youtube IMO. (If someone does not like what you are saying, they will say you are infringing on a copyright, Google automatically pulls the content and you are required to prove that its not infriging before you can load it back...by the time you load it back, the gain of immediacy for your content is lost, thus the value of Youtube for that is diminished.)
Some Positives . . .
I would like a game that does not penalize a player for having a life away from the computer.
Imagine a game where someone who logs in a few times per week, can still enjoy as much as someone who has no life and plays for 8 hours (or more) straight and you get the idea.
Also prefer games where you have a mission and are flying/driving a tank, plane and/or spaceship more than the personal shooter games. The Activision Battlezone and Wing Commander games for the PC come to mind, they were excellent! Would love to get those running on my Linux boxes, even if I had to slow down (or ignore) clock cycles to get it to run right. Loved those.
The First person shooters make me yawn.
They will lose many customers over this especially since they didn't even warm their paying customers. We are US military living overseas. Not having access to my prime time shows isn't the end of the world but it was nice to have some things from home. I hate Japan and those shows helped me escape once in a while. Netflix still works with VPN but only has out dates reruns.
I do see a class-action suit in their future due to the way they handled their customers. I am paying for a service I can't use and their tech support wouldn't own up to the change so I didn't cancel right away. I am just glad I found out now so I can cancel. I see a huge downsizing of Hulu employees on the horizon as well unless vpn companies work fast to get some new ip addresses out there!
Another valid post, a valid reaction, for some reason was modded down.
The article referenced mentions that you can purchase your own private IP address and run the VPN tunnel from it, since no one else can register that IP address with Hulu, it will work with a VPN tunnel from your home.
Granted we should not have to do this, way to blow it entertainment industry through Hulu, a huge fail!
Someone mod this one back up, as a valid response to this type of stupid FUD is to cancel the service and take your money elsewhere.
As others have mentioned, a good use of 'the cloud' to constantly change an IP address to obsfucate and anonymize, which of course the advertising industry does not want.
1. Rent a cheap VPS 2. Tunnel connection through it (e.g. via a SOCKS proxy) or set up your own VPN 3. Keep the IP to yourself so you don't get flagged That's how I get to watch BBC's premiers at the same time people in London do, and if I care about something in the US, I just switch to another VPS.
Why was this modded down, unless some shill does not want others to know how to do it, perhaps?
Seems that if you 'mask' the VPN IP Address, as 'your IP address', while it would no longer be anonymous, your VPN should not get flagged as being either a service or from a foreign country.
Man, what country do you live in? Here in the US, you have two choices: The local cable internet monopoly, or nothing. Unless you seriously consider wireless phone data an option.
Not if you move to one of these less than 30 symmetrical Fiber To The Home (FTTH) communities, check out the map!
So when moving, know you have options and move to an area that will give you FTTH internet freedom.
Prosperity and jobs are already flowing to these cities.
I agree that anyone with a house paid off and a job in their area is not going to move. However, that same person, with a house paid off, but no job, better move or have investments paying a livable wage or the property taxes will eventually cost their heirs the home.
Those looking for a job, should seriously consider making the jump to a Symmetrical FTTH community sooner rather than later.
Of course you can always get DSL, dd-WRT on a supported firewall/router, has shown me that unthrottled DSL is faster than over 80% of throttled cable service. Remember, 100% of cable internet service is throttled, its only a matter of how much, not if. In a few areas where symmetrical FTTH competition exists and the oligopoly has not been able to pass legislation (see red states especially) at the state level to prevent competition, they actually throttle less than normal, thus only there is Cable internet faster than DSL.
If you are shopping for internet access and can not get symmetrical FTTH, than go DSL for Internet. If you want cable for TV and movies, so be it, but never package anything else with it. No phone, no Internet with Cable TV & movies unless you want to be gouged forever. As that will cost you much, much more over time, then getting them separately. Better just to go straight to DSL for internet, if you can not get FTTH.
You may not want to move from a home you own, but I'm surprised that people don't consider these types of things when they are moving. During my last move, I determined I wanted better internet than Comcast provides and specifically limited my search for a place to live to somewhere where that was the case. Now I'm enjoying 100mbit symmetric internet for under $40/mo and really enjoying the fact that none of my money goes to those greedy bastards.
As a bonus, when I travel overseas, I can use my own home connection as my VPN service. I can completely sidestep the regional blocking done by the streaming providers.
Intelligent and smart, why on earth were you rated down? Amazing what you can get for less than $50 per month if you move to a FTTH community.
Perhaps some Cable shills with moderation powers....
Everyone can do this if you are looking to move. Look for Fiber To The Home (FTTH) like the less than 30 communities on this map.
The secret to look for is that the Fiber connection offers the same bandwidth upstream as downstream. So there advertised bandwidths are the same, ie. 10Mb/10Mb, 15Mb/15Mb, 20Mb/20Mb, 30Mb/30Mb, 50Mb/50Mb, 100Mb/100Mb, 1000Mb/1000Mb (1TB/1TB), unlike services that call themselves fiber but are not symmetrical and advertise 50Mb/5Mb - - - wrong, 50Mb downstream and 5 Mb upstream tells you they limit, restrict, censor, throttle their bandwidth. Move somewhere else.
With true FTTH, there is no business incentive to throttle, limit, restrict, etc... for bandwidth reasons.
Added bonus, having FTTH adds $5,000 to the price of the home, costs between $1,500 ~ $3,000 to run the fiber link from the switching service to your home and once run, that FIBER link is sold with the home, its property of the home-owner, not any other company, period.
Anything less than this is a wrong, a mistake and prepetuates the failed scarcity myth / increased monthly prices to perpetuity, which is the only reason to restrict bandwidth. To make you think its scarce, when its not, to get customers to pay more.
In the right circles, the Cable company CFOs will admit this scarcity myth fact to investors as a reason investing in cable companies makes more sense. We have a great business model, we can increase our customers rates anytime we want for as much as we want, thus we are always going to be profitable, invest in us
If you are moving, only purchase homes in a community in the map, avoid the others.
Another added plus, the communities with FTTH, are growing small business and jobs with livable wages faster than all other communities in the USA! Small businesses are thriving and actively looking to relocate to these areas for the bandwidth that only true FTTH can provide. Big data demands symmetrical FTTH.
A very smart post, you should be modded up!
In terms of power dynamics in politics, we are likely to see geritocracy in the US as our population ages. We *need* to increase the retirement age and reduce the amount of spending on pensions. How is this going to happen when the majority of the population is old and is willing to express their displeasure in the voting booth?
We *need* to do things smarter, differently, better and not be insane!
Totally agree with your first paragraph, as we have seen since 1980, those with money, will always act in their own self interest to the detriment of the rest of society. Yes they control the money, thanks to Citizens United vs FEC they control politics via their aggressive political contributions and yes they most certainly can control who does and who does not get money. What you would expect when 10% have 90% of the wealth in this country.
And lets not get started with the pollution created by those 10%, google Coal Ash in Detriot, Duke Industires in NC and the Nuclear Power industry...hint if you have to re-cask every 50 - 100 years, no way in heck is it ever going to be cheaper.
As weather control scientist have always warned us, 'there will be winners and their will be losers', this thought actually applies to all industries. And those industries have no incentive to police themselves, therefore lack of funding for government agencies that do police them, can only hurt the majority of any population. Oh could I go one, but enough, as many refuse to admit how all these factors are inter-related. Quantitative Methods baby, its all inter-related, you are cheated when they convince you that somehow these many things are not related.
I have to take issue with your last paragraph, quoted above, not with the first statement, we see that today in politics...so the first sentence I agree with you.
Rather I take issue with the next sentence. Current retirement age is already too high, specifically to reduce the likelihood that one collects on their retirement. Think outside the box, if the 10% can prevent you from collecting on your promised/guarranteed retirement long enough, they will find a way to rob you of it...or better yet, let you die off so that they can get at it later once you are gone. Of course if you control your retirement yourself, that is smart and prevents this.
Now don't get me wrong, the idea of retiring on a 'fixed' income is insane. All one has to do is look around and see that it is not working, never has, never will work. To assume that your outcome will be different is insane. Thus you need an income stream, no matter what.
Instead of increasing retirement age, how about teaching kids how to invest correctly, 'sanely' and 'carefully'...just google Jim Cramer and you can learn.
Teach your kids how to be self sufficient, which means capable of generating their own power (electricity and fuel) and maintaining food (aqua-ponics) self sufficiency, so that what meager wealth they are able to save via investments will not be eroded by the 10% via their control over everything, especially food.
A swamp weed, like a cotton-tail type of plant can be grown and processed by an individual at lower than $1.27 per gallon, just need a diseal engine! I know a guy doing it, so yes it can be done!
Solor and wind generated electricity to power an electric vehicle, does not need power from the grid. Just don't attempt to patent anything or sell anything as others have been prevented, just do it. How many of the over 3000 'secretized' energy patents might make one self sufficient? If 10% of them work...
The idea of pushing the retirement age, yet higher, is insane. This is what politicians have been doing since before the 1980s, and its not working. In fact 'austerity' will not work either, except for the 10%, you can not save yourself to profitability. You have to 'grow' to succeed. Grow from a fundamentally sound value base and you have th
In theory, looks great, but those still on XP, wont adjust.
And if XP is no longer supported . . . ?
They have no choice. Do they want their jobs? Of course they will switch. Just do them a favor and switch them to something better and not something worse.
.. Until a complex Excel macro doesn't work. ...
You need to stop thinking like a geek converting dear old Dad to LibreOffice for home use home and start thinking about the skill sets and productivity of fifty to five hundred clerical workers with different skill sets and responsibilities.
In a corporate setting, all business critical macros would be identified and converted before that part of that business unit was migrated to Linux. Of course if the CEO says do it, it will get done and you know this. No point in pulling out the geek and home use only analogy.
You next sentance made me laugh, thank you for that.
... Until an incoming document from an outside source cannot be read. ...
Really pissed me off (and the VP of IT, thank goodness) when this happened to me with Microsoft Office. Was it Win 2000, XP or Vista, whichever it pissed everyone off. The final solution, the documents were coverted to PDF files and everyone was forced to move to the new version in spite of the incoming documents both from outside sources and internal sources.
We did stop accepting .doc formatted Word documents. Its a shame Microsoft chose to make their data formats incompatible with the Open Data Formats standards group.
Their (Microsoft) poor choice was/is not a reason to stay with Microsoft, but rather a reason to dump their office product.
Sadly many more businesses decided to go along rather than switch office products to LibreOffice. In one experience, they decided to start converting massive amounts of documents (the converters MS provided were not 100% effective...just another reason not to like them), talk about a loss in productivity and a waste of time.
Based on my over 20 years of corporate experience, the old analogies of...
No one ever got fired for recommending IBM ~ yes I am that old
No one ever got fired for recommending Microsoft
... simply no longer apply for Windows 8. As a CEO I would seriously consider looking for new management up to and including VPs that blindly recommend Windows 8 without considering Linux today.
I personally believe that Windows 8 presents a clear business risk that is best to be avoided. I know the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) for Windows 8 is higher than Linux. I leave it up to others to learn the truth for themselves.
The workers will still want to use MS Word, and Excel, and Exchange for email.
Others below have indicated their positive experiences migrating windows users to Linux. Windows users do NOT have problems with any of the many GUIs in Linux.
Based on my corporate experience, you would have CEO, VP of IT, DIR of IT buy in on the switch over to Linux from Windows, thus it would make sense that they would dictate a move away from MS Office to Libreoffice.
As for Macros with Word and/or Excel, a working group would be started to identify those macros critical to the needs of the business and someone would be hired to convert only those to to LibreOffice Writer and LIbreOffice Calc. Probably get a volunteer from that group to do the conversion. And all other macros, not considered business critical, would be considered 'not to be used' moving forward.
With executive management buy in, its a no brainer, without it, a move to Linux probably would not happen. Of course then that executive needs to be held accountable for the Windows 8 heck to come.
As for scaling, there are sites that have scaled to above 10K Linux users, so anyone who says it can't be done, is clueless, ignore them.
Best of all, remember that each new version of Windows takes more and more from the Linux kernel, so in reality, Windows has already said that if you can't beat them, join them, they are just not advertising that fact.
Is retraining for a modern Linux desktop any harder than retraining for W8?
NO, in case you were serious.
Portability of learned skills means you don't have to re-train your workers.
Most often repeated FUD ever in the yes/no to Windows debate. Every version of Windows I have used from 1.0a as an app on top of MSDOS has required some re-learning of the Graphical User Interface (GUI) by anyone using it.
May as well take the same time to re-learn a Linux GUI instead. I would suggest Linux Mint, Debian or Fedora for desktop users.
Every new version of a desktop operating system will take a user some time to learn. There is no need to make Linux look like Windows or Windows look like Linux. There is no time savings or addtional time cost going from one to the other.
If a grandma can learn the GUI for Linux Mint, employees of your business can learn it as well.
And don't get me started about incompatibale data formats between MS Office products, just switch the office to LibreOffice and never have those issues again either. How many times has MS screwed us with incompatible data formats from one version of MS Word (in office) to the next? I remember two, time is kind, as I know it has happened to me more than twice, probably with one of the other office apps (Excel, Powerpoint, etc...). This makes MS a worse option as you never know when they are going to get you again and you can't say they won't, simply because they have...more than once.
The most important decision is the hardware, IMO, ONLY purchase hardware designed to run Linux from Linux Vendors ONLY. This means no big box stores, they simply do not do Linux well if at all. This avoids the proprietary chipsets that vendors have put in to favor Windows, esp with UEFI and Windows 8. Windows 7 will probably be the last MS OS I purchase because of the UEFI BS.
Personally I prefer ZaReason as they will install whatever distro I want on the hardware and everything just works out of the box. You could go System76 or any other Linux vendor, sure there are a few out there. ZaReason is just my preference.
Full disclosure, I do not work for ZaReason and have purchased their hardware...very happy with it, every time.
Yes, finally, my childhood come to life. Many an hour was spent making car sounds vroom, vroom, errrick (curve), vroom with my cousin with our Glow in the Dark Matchbox cities.
The idea of including weather info into the roadway (or perhaps a heads up display...) sounds interesting.
Just think it would be better in a heads up display than on the road.
Thanks for a great childhood memory.
To ebayers, sorry, my mom gave them away years ago, so you will have to shop elsewhere.
Like your thinking. More than once I wanted to run the new app with my past user environment and was thwarted, whether the OS was Windows, Linux or Mac OSX. It is frustrating not to be able to. Developers uncouple please.
I have needed to run old versions of software after a new version came out. As long as I can control where to install the application, I usually have no problem. However if the install process locks me into a specific area, than I know, down the road, I will not have this capability.
With Windows 7, PaintShop Pro (v10 I believe) attempted to force me to install in a specific area, however I figured a way around it, put it in a /prog area on a USB device. After that I was able to run PSP from any Windows box I wanted to without problems. I plan to do similar things with my tablets, use the micro SD card for both applications and data. No way should I be forced to connect to the internet to do something.
Because of the above scenario, as much as I loved PSP, I moved away from it simply because they attempted to force me to install in a specific pro-windows way/place. I was able to run an old version of PSP from that computer, in addtion to the new version. I figure I bought it, I should be able to install and run as I want. With the writing on the wall to PSP's stated direction, I left behind one of my favorite tools. GIMP is not as friendly, but extremely powerful.
Never felt like ponying up the extra few hundred dollars for Photoshop, as there was nothing I need to do, that I could not do with PaintShop Pro and/or GIMP. Though I admit when I have used Photoshop it is a great program. I just want to be legal and buy my software I use in web development. Leaving those extra hundreds for investment for retirement.
Still see this as a big issue for my opensource tablet. It is frustrating. I no longer feel sorry fof those that lock themselves into proprietary hardware for an embedded device, whether it be a handheld or tablet. Opensource tools and products are the answer.
Thankfully I read slashdot at the -1 score level, so people wrongly moderating do not censor me. I can sensor myself thank you very much. Those that do not, would have missed this next comment.
After reading (#46516745) above and some of the comments related to that post, the only thing I can think to do is make sure I can restore my tablet from scratch, document how to do it as I won't remember in a few months, and that would at least give me the capabilty to reinstall my android tablet from scratch should I get caught in this type of upgrade fiasco.
If your handheld / tablet uses proprietary pieces and parts, you will be denied the abilty to wipe it clean and reinstall from scratch (via the micro SD card slot) if necessary. In that case the fault is yours as open source, non-proprietary solutions are available, but some comapnies want to force you into only pay them for everything and anything model. Best to avoid their hardware/software unless you enjoy paying away your hard earned money.
Someone with mod points please rate that post back up from 0 as its information is based on experience and is factually true. It provides valid info, though some evidently disagree with it and it got rated down, pathetic.
If the software modifies the format of your data, better have a backup copy or forget it. Something many Intuit CPA users found out to their frustration a few years ago. The idea of hand entering a client's data because the company in its infinite wisdom decided to update the data format without warning anyone is what comes to mind here.
Yours was the best of the bunch (minus formatting html tags), though I enjoyed reading about the trials and tribulations of punch tape vs punch cards vs tape/dat backup systems. The biggest problem I had many years ago was using a dat format system that I could not longer purchase hardware for. So I had tapes, but no way to read them. That taught me a lesson. Never use a media that I might not be able to read from 10 years from today. Thus I only backup on hard disks today.
I agree that to backup music, videos and other static content that has been downloaded via the internet (and not personally created) is a waste of time and space. As you pointed out, with even a throttled cable connection you can download this fairly quickly. So never waste time backing it up. Totally agree with you.
Now the one exception to video, pictures and music, are those that you create yourself. For your own personal pictures and personally created video. That needs to be backed up and I would suggest a harddrive (or multiple hard disks) for this purpose.
If you work in the video / movie industry creating content, obviously this comment does not apply to you...check into creating your own Linux video sever farm for while-you-sleep-rendering and a homemade Linux SANs like this Petabytes on a budget: How to build cheap cloud storage. You will have to learn some Linux to do this, but it would be well worth it, if you have the need. This article should help you, Thoughts about this DIY-Thumper and storage in general
Just as with industrial and union jobs of yesterday, white collar IT jobs, your movie editing jobs are now being offshored to India and when I was in LA a couple of years ago, a number of studios were relocating to Canada because it was cheaper for them...fyi.
For home users not in an industry creating massive videos, the next few paragraphs should cover you. Give thoughts to what you really need and why. Don't back up anything you do not have too. Like Software, Operating Systems, only focus on the data you create.
Plan your locations for different types of data, since you can label (mount point) your directory whatever you want. You could have one for video, one for audio (music), one for non picture images (your digital camera) and one for everything else. If you have the need, perhaps a DB directory as well. This would look as follows:
/video/ ~ for downloaded video, not home movies, never backed up (this will be your largest directory for most)
/music/ ~ for downloaded music, not self created, never backed up (you could write this to DVR or copy to a USB thumb drive if you want, the files are NOT that big. A 64GB thumb drive costs less than $30 on sale. Get a Micro USB adapter and only purchase micro SD cards and get very large ones. I use to use 8GB in my Nokia N800, now my zareason ZT2 Tablet has a 32GB micro SD card in it. Since I am using it for books, PHP development and research only, it will take a very long time to fill up.)
/myvideo/ ~ personally made video, back it up
/mymusic/ ~ personally created music, back it up
/images/ ~ digital images from your digital camera, back it up
/db/ ~ custom database stuff, back it up
/data/ ~ everything else, back it up
For the majority of you reading this, from /myvideo/ to /data/ (five different directories) will easily fit on one 500GB drive. If you are smart and compress it when you backup, you can probably fit a months worth of backups on that 500GB drive if not more. Linux comes with built in compression / backup commands and you can use PKZIP (or other compression program) for Windows to compress your data sizes and make your backup space go further. Even mo