Reading this I felt like a donkey chasing the carrot. Learning "new" skills is not the solution. Sooner or later the figurehead above you will become enamored with a similarly skilled programmer in India / China and will tell you to sod off.
The only solution to all this is to force companies to have the vast majority of their tech staff (90+ %) in the same country they are based on. US companies should have (almost) all their staff in the States, French in France and so on.
[inflammatory-lame] You don't see them outsourcing management... management is mostly a non-appreciative bunch of smart-asses patting each other in the back. [/inflammatory-lame]
We worked hard to get our degrees, probably harder than they ever did. We live in the same country with them, so we must also make a living out of the hours we put in at their work. They obviously think we ask for "too much" for what we give them.
[inflammatory-lame] So they keep their income the same (by not going to live in China/India/wherever) but make the programmer accept Indian/Chinese rates, so there's more for them. Of course no programmer in their country will accept such rates, hence the outsourcing. [/inflammatory-lame]
What I described is obvious, but reading it like that doesn't make it look very nice (does it?) my fellow colleagues.
But then again, be happy that you have what you have. Consider yourselves fortunate that you don't have to work in the country where I work (Greece), even though I work at a reputable institution:-/ I keep having second thoughts about my return here and I seriously consider "outsourcing" myself outta here for good. {sorry guys, but I wanted to let this out somewhere}
(yes, I'm a programmer with an MSc from a good UK university + certifications + a few years of working experience and Yes, I do have to accept near-Indian rates if I want to keep myself occupied in this bloody country.)
That device would be an *EXCELLENT* present for some of the lecturers I had at uni.
Other applications: - boring meetings ("Hello Mr CFO, here's a nice present for you") - sales people ("why, yes, thank you, I've heard enough but I already told you 20 times that I'm not buying")
Fellow/.ers are welcomed to contribute other potential uses.
Well, you didn't lose me (good old uni years)... but smalltalk is like an old Lambo Diablo. It has many of the nice features built in, what it does it does very well and it's of exceptional build, but it's not very practical for everyday use.
For our friend who started this topic, what I do is store first by language and then a subdirectory by project (and subdirs with important versions sometimes).
Having said that, now that I have quite a bit of a code base, sometimes I find it hard to remember what project it was that I wrote a certain small but tricky bit of code. I need to find a solution to that sometime, probably by writing a database of code snippets and store them by keywords & relevance.
But come to think of it, such an app wont be useful just for code storage. It'll be handy to store all those small but useful pieces of information you collect in every day life (like tips you hear about one thing, maybe you write them down in a small piece of paper and then you lose it) in all sorts of topics: DIY / health / nutrition / history / God knows what.
If only I were a database & search engine expert:-/
Having read (most of) the comments, I want to chip in my 2c.
Concerning the article... what it says is old news if you're into driving. It's becoming increasingly difficult to get a decent car to hone your skills in (one with good suspension setup & all the electronics disableable).
People who just want to get from A to B in fact welcome this. They're not interested in how a car works, how they can "tamper" with its course on the road (or off it:-) ). The less they do or know about it, the better, 'coz' they just had a tough day at work.
This is where the vast majority of most of the car makers' money is going into. Making safe cars for the indifferent (scared?) driver, who sees the more "interested" drivers as maniacs (and I'm not talking about the maniacs who practice while endangering others or just show off mid-town).
Fortunately, there are still enough departments in most european and japanese(*) companies that make cars for "interested" drivers. Unfortunately, the cars they make usually end up being quite pricey and targeted to the more affluent among us.
(*) unfortunately it's been very long since an american manufacturer managed to produce anything that handles well enough for europeans' tastes (and shipped it across to Europe, of course)
Probably has to do with that a fuzzed-out application at the back (unfocused) would be a better background for any semi-transparent window round the front (ie. focused). If you have a page full of text at the back and then the focused window is also full of text (of similar size, font etc) then it could get quite tiring to read the top window on occasions.
I say that from previous experience with various add-ons (I haven't been able to look at the shots yet and probably wont be able to for the next few hours, until the site recovers).
There are a couple of things I'd like to point out on top of the article:
1. A complaint: All the top-of-the-range mice are for right handers only. Being a left hander, I am forced to buy mid-range or cheap-and-cheerful mice.
I'd love to buy and even pay extra for a left-handed (or ambidextrous) version of, say, the Logitech MX700/900 but there simply isn't one.
[evil] A part of me would like to get a left-handed mouse and force one of them mouse designers to use it for a couple of days, to see how it is [/evil]
2. A comment to companies: when you're designing your next new-generation keyboard, PLEASE leave the six keys (Insert, Home etc.) in the classic config, backspace big and no key to the right of right shift.
I believe most of you (who have grown up with this config, and don't look a lot at the keyboard) will have come across this problem with the latest-and-greatest keyboards.
If you want DSL, you have to pay the national carrier a 'line activation fee' of around 45 euro (plus another ~40 for registration IIRC ?) and a monthly fee of 25 euro for a 384 line, around 44 euro for a 512 line and I don't remember what it is for the 1M line.
THEN, you have to go and subscribe to an ISP and pay them around 50 euro (IIRC) on top of that every month for the 384 line.
I don't remember the exact pricing for the ISPs because I tried to order DSL a couple of weeks back, but when I realised that the 25 euro/month were only for the carrier, I went back, gave them a mouthfull and cancelled the subscription (I just came back from the UK, where pricing was a lot more reasonable).
Prices here are understandably high since DSL was rolled out only a few months back, but the carrier's royalties were not something I felt comfortable with.
Then buy a Sonyericsson T610 (if your network allows it). Quite cheap and good enough for a phone, I'd say. It has about 2MB of memory free (with your average set of ringtones/wallpapers/themes/games installed, which is more than enough for your average dictation.
The other day I recorded a 20 minute talk and it took about 800K. Then connect it to a bluetooth-enabled PC and transfer the file to it. It's in AMR format, but you can get converters for it for free. I have one that does AMR to OGG.
Then have your secretary install Winamp and you're off.
---
On a relevant note to the conversation above, cameras on most phones are not really brilliant. I would love if we had the option to choose features in the phones (ie. the phones were modular, even physically).
I say that because it'd be nice to choose between a camera-enabled T610 (for example) and a memorycard+mp3/ogg enabled version. (I'd choose the latter, btw). (yes, I know they've released an attachment that does this, but that's an extra 250!!!)
This way we could have what we want without the bells and whistles some smart-head market analyst thinks will be cool on a phone.
I compared it to my T610. Generally I spoke from my experience with models from both brands. I have owned a 6150 and a 6310i, but I have *used* many more phones.
Phone programming, I'm getting into it now. I spoke from a user perspective.
But having switched from Nokia to SE recently, I doubt it. This may seem a bit off-topic, or maybe a bit of a rant, but lets see.
Nokia has long focused on style rather than substance. Just look at their range. Another example: if you want bluetooth to work, DON'T go for Nokia. And yes, I'm gonna shell out for the 7700 to just use the IR, right???
Nokias are better thought out in some areas (eg. data fields supported in the addressbook, some apps), but quite conservative in terms of technology & practical features (unless it will appeal to 14-17 year-olds).
Although the 7700 is loaded with nice 'features' and all, I am far from convinced. For one thing, why would I want a mini (maxi?) N-gage potato-shaped phone in my pocket? Hmmm.
On the other hand, the only thing I find annoying on the P900 is SE's stubborn flog-a-dead-horse decision to push for their beloved Memory Stick Duo. It's like the minidisk (or worse), Sony, wake up to it!
Once there was a survey by club Nokia, which I filled in and I pointed out how sick I was of their 'everything lifestyle' image and how I thought their chief designer must be *very* gay. It felt so good, esp. after you look at their range.
Trian
(previous owner of a 6150, a 6310i and now a SE T610)
Coming from Greece, which as a country is, AFAIK, often portrayed as anti-american, I couldn't agree more.
Yes, personally I (*) am rather pissed off with US policy all over the world (**), but that doesn't mean I (we) hate the people......unless it's one of those arrogant/ignorant nationalistic... lovely people. You come looking down on me, 'america ueber alles' style, and I (we?) won't be as friendly.
Trian
(*) and many other Greeks I expect -- around 98% (IIRC) of the population was against the war on Iraq, for example. (**) I'm almost equally annoyed with our govenment for essentially bending over so many times (adoption of DMCA and other).
While this may be brushing 'redundant/offtopic', I have to say that getting one of those may cost you a bit more, but it's much nicer than a consumer graphics card.
What the author fails to mention is that there's better R&D (build quality?) put in there. Not just application-specific optimisations. If they *had* tested the consumer equivalents, they'd see them outperformed, methinks. That's my experience, anyway.
Back in '98 I had a Diamond FireGL 1000 Pro (yes, the FireGL series was owned by Diamond then), which was matching/outperforming many 'new' gaming cards my mates were buying (it was a fairly old model at the time, IIRC). Thing is, I hadn't paid a fortune for it, as you might think. It was a bit expensive, but not *that* different from what my mates were paying.
Now I have a FireGL 8800 and again the performance is there. Gaming-wise, I can play GTA3 and CMR3 at resolutions previously undreamt of with the 9500 (1600x1200).
Having said that, it's a pain to get (linux) support by ATI. Ever tried emailing them? Up 'till March (IIRC) things were OK and they even had good drivers. But now it's all shaky and iffy, as we all know.
Now I'm looking for a 3DLabs/NVidia. The former are increasing their linux support (I even recall a/. article on it), while the latter have been traditionally good with it.
It would have been very interesting if they'd included the VP990 Pro or the VP970 in the comparison...
I hate to break it to you, but Palestine has been at WAR with Israel for many many years (...you insensitive clod --couldn't resist:).
When you are at war, you don't think about making/selling movies mate.
On the other hand, they've been bitten by the Israel-supporting US many times, and they want to bite back.
When they say that 'US laws don't apply here'... well, we may generally have many counterexamples (Christiansen, anyone?), but they know that the system is already not in their favour, so why bother?
...but then I remembered all that about companies outsourcing to India, Pakistan and the like.
<extreme-n-cynical> The basic principle is of management is: pay you less while they squeeze the most out of you, so that they can keep more... Why would you want to give them your PhD as a side-present? </extreme-n-cynical>
This is usually the case when the manager has little/no experience with the work in the field he's managing. Sadly, it's also the case with the vast majority of managers in my country:-(
In the end I decided it's not really worth it. I can still pursue my research interests privately, on my free time, if I want. Most academic staff I know seem they'll be happy to co-operate anyway, if they see you want to get somewhere.
And, having worked in the industry for a while, it's much more relaxed than academic work. You get free weekends and holidays! (if you're in Europe, anyway)
Trian
For context: I'm Greek, and I'm now finishing my MSc in CS in England (where I also got my first degree, in CS with Honours).
Overall, I agree. Yet I disagree with that we have to be like windows to be accepted by the general public.
Yes, that's the easy way. "Here, it looks like windoze, it acts like windoze, there are equivalent apps, but it's written by different people."
But you can also make it more usable by creating a "novel" (as far as the windows user is concerned) yet user-friendly interface. Something that people will work easily with. We need some more HCI people.
One problem is that many many programmers can't think like 'normal' users. And the GUI subsequently comes out too technical. At least let HCI people have their say. <troll> In some usability lists I was a member, your opinion counted (only) if you knew how to program it, it seemed. </troll>
On a side note, personally I'd be happier if we tried to imitate the Mac. For me OS X is Unix without the headaches. And they've always been known for user-friendliness.
We do get this sort of options, but having read the article, BTO will potentially offer a lot more options, from seat trims and head units down to brake and suspension systems (hopefully). Basically the whole car will be a set of modules, by the looks of it. Plug and play. The big question is, will it be plug and play a'la mac (which had PnP before windoze but for a limited set of stuff) or a'la windoze.
In Europe, on the manufacturers' networks we get to choose some of the optional components (eg. sporty version of side-skirts, different dials and gearstick decoration) and maybe the odd feature from some "better" version of the model, but nothing critical. In most cases these are about decorative parts or lighting (eg. xenon headlights).
For anything more drastic there are of course some official or semi-official improvement/tuning houses for many european & asian manufacturers, which will take your standard car and beef it up aesthetically or performance-wise. Prodrive (Subaru), AMG (Merc), Abt Sportsline (Audi, VW, Skoda, Seat), AC Schnitzer (BMW) are just some off the top of my head. They tend to be somewhat expensive, though.
I'd actually be more comfortable if at least 3 browsers other than IE had a sizable share.
Agreed. If there are more browsers that have big market share, that will force:
better adoption of standards, as more and more webmasters will complain to the browser vendors that it's a pain to support their products.
hence site developers of "consumer" corporate sites will be forced to code some less IE-specific pages.
On a relevant note, have you noticed how corporate sites partially work (if at all) when you don't use IE? Most recent example for me: www.motorola.com and their hellomoto s(h)ite.
It's very important that people who use cards of this sort (or who plan to make the jump) email them and encourage them.
On reading this, I immediately sent them an email, congratulating them on their move to support linux.
I am an (otherwise happy) owner of an ATI FireGL 8800, but next card I'll be buying won't be an ATI, unless they change their linux policy. I'm not impressed by that they just list it (at the bottom of the list) as a priority, either. ATI, beware!
The only "affordable" workstation cards I know that have linux support are nVidia-based. (PNY Quadro FX series at www.schneider-digital.de)
3DLabs has a _very_ interesting VP range. I wish they 'bless' that series with linux drivers as well. Up till now they were out of the question *just because* of their (lack of) linux support.
Slashdot Mirror
Reading this I felt like a donkey chasing the carrot. Learning "new" skills is not the solution. Sooner or later the figurehead above you will become enamored with a similarly skilled programmer in India / China and will tell you to sod off.
:-/ I keep having second thoughts about my return here and I seriously consider "outsourcing" myself outta here for good. {sorry guys, but I wanted to let this out somewhere}
The only solution to all this is to force companies to have the vast majority of their tech staff (90+ %) in the same country they are based on. US companies should have (almost) all their staff in the States, French in France and so on.
[inflammatory-lame]
You don't see them outsourcing management... management is mostly a non-appreciative bunch of smart-asses patting each other in the back.
[/inflammatory-lame]
We worked hard to get our degrees, probably harder than they ever did. We live in the same country with them, so we must also make a living out of the hours we put in at their work. They obviously think we ask for "too much" for what we give them.
[inflammatory-lame]
So they keep their income the same (by not going to live in China/India/wherever) but make the programmer accept Indian/Chinese rates, so there's more for them. Of course no programmer in their country will accept such rates, hence the outsourcing.
[/inflammatory-lame]
What I described is obvious, but reading it like that doesn't make it look very nice (does it?) my fellow colleagues.
But then again, be happy that you have what you have. Consider yourselves fortunate that you don't have to work in the country where I work (Greece), even though I work at a reputable institution
(yes, I'm a programmer with an MSc from a good UK university + certifications + a few years of working experience and Yes, I do have to accept near-Indian rates if I want to keep myself occupied in this bloody country.)
nuff said
That device would be an *EXCELLENT* present for some of the lecturers I had at uni.
/.ers are welcomed to contribute other potential uses.
Other applications:
- boring meetings ("Hello Mr CFO, here's a nice present for you")
- sales people ("why, yes, thank you, I've heard enough but I already told you 20 times that I'm not buying")
Fellow
Well, you didn't lose me (good old uni years)... but smalltalk is like an old Lambo Diablo. It has many of the nice features built in, what it does it does very well and it's of exceptional build, but it's not very practical for everyday use.
:-/
For our friend who started this topic, what I do is store first by language and then a subdirectory by project (and subdirs with important versions sometimes).
Having said that, now that I have quite a bit of a code base, sometimes I find it hard to remember what project it was that I wrote a certain small but tricky bit of code. I need to find a solution to that sometime, probably by writing a database of code snippets and store them by keywords & relevance.
But come to think of it, such an app wont be useful just for code storage. It'll be handy to store all those small but useful pieces of information you collect in every day life (like tips you hear about one thing, maybe you write them down in a small piece of paper and then you lose it) in all sorts of topics: DIY / health / nutrition / history / God knows what.
If only I were a database & search engine expert
(nut now I got off topic)
Having read (most of) the comments, I want to chip in my 2c.
:-) ). The less they do or know about it, the better, 'coz' they just had a tough day at work.
;-) : http://www.speedydelivery.co.uk/media/escort_mk2_r s2000_a.jpgw 2005_7549.jpg
Concerning the article... what it says is old news if you're into driving. It's becoming increasingly difficult to get a decent car to hone your skills in (one with good suspension setup & all the electronics disableable).
People who just want to get from A to B in fact welcome this. They're not interested in how a car works, how they can "tamper" with its course on the road (or off it
This is where the vast majority of most of the car makers' money is going into. Making safe cars for the indifferent (scared?) driver, who sees the more "interested" drivers as maniacs (and I'm not talking about the maniacs who practice while endangering others or just show off mid-town).
Fortunately, there are still enough departments in most european and japanese(*) companies that make cars for "interested" drivers. Unfortunately, the cars they make usually end up being quite pricey and targeted to the more affluent among us.
(*) unfortunately it's been very long since an american manufacturer managed to produce anything that handles well enough for europeans' tastes (and shipped it across to Europe, of course)
Personally... I'm an owner of a '90s RWD jap car and getting more and more interested in one of those (or anything in its class
http://www.carster.pl/pic/rallyShow2005_/rallySho
(and yes, I'd love to rally one of those if I could afford it)
Probably has to do with that a fuzzed-out application at the back (unfocused) would be a better background for any semi-transparent window round the front (ie. focused). If you have a page full of text at the back and then the focused window is also full of text (of similar size, font etc) then it could get quite tiring to read the top window on occasions.
I say that from previous experience with various add-ons (I haven't been able to look at the shots yet and probably wont be able to for the next few hours, until the site recovers).
Cheers,
There are a couple of things I'd like to point out on top of the article:
1. A complaint: All the top-of-the-range mice are for right handers only. Being a left hander, I am forced to buy mid-range or cheap-and-cheerful mice.
I'd love to buy and even pay extra for a left-handed (or ambidextrous) version of, say, the Logitech MX700/900 but there simply isn't one.
[evil] A part of me would like to get a left-handed mouse and force one of them mouse designers to use it for a couple of days, to see how it is [/evil]
2. A comment to companies: when you're designing your next new-generation keyboard, PLEASE leave the six keys (Insert, Home etc.) in the classic config, backspace big and no key to the right of right shift.
I believe most of you (who have grown up with this config, and don't look a lot at the keyboard) will have come across this problem with the latest-and-greatest keyboards.
Here we have a nice pricing scheme:
If you want DSL, you have to pay the national carrier a 'line activation fee' of around 45 euro (plus another ~40 for registration IIRC ?) and a monthly fee of 25 euro for a 384 line, around 44 euro for a 512 line and I don't remember what it is for the 1M line.
THEN, you have to go and subscribe to an ISP and pay them around 50 euro (IIRC) on top of that every month for the 384 line.
I don't remember the exact pricing for the ISPs because I tried to order DSL a couple of weeks back, but when I realised that the 25 euro/month were only for the carrier, I went back, gave them a mouthfull and cancelled the subscription (I just came back from the UK, where pricing was a lot more reasonable).
Prices here are understandably high since DSL was rolled out only a few months back, but the carrier's royalties were not something I felt comfortable with.
cheers,
Trian
Then buy a Sonyericsson T610 (if your network allows it). Quite cheap and good enough for a phone, I'd say. It has about 2MB of memory free (with your average set of ringtones/wallpapers/themes/games installed, which is more than enough for your average dictation.
The other day I recorded a 20 minute talk and it took about 800K. Then connect it to a bluetooth-enabled PC and transfer the file to it. It's in AMR format, but you can get converters for it for free. I have one that does AMR to OGG.
Then have your secretary install Winamp and you're off.
---
On a relevant note to the conversation above, cameras on most phones are not really brilliant. I would love if we had the option to choose features in the phones (ie. the phones were modular, even physically).
I say that because it'd be nice to choose between a camera-enabled T610 (for example) and a memorycard+mp3/ogg enabled version. (I'd choose the latter, btw). (yes, I know they've released an attachment that does this, but that's an extra 250!!!)
This way we could have what we want without the bells and whistles some smart-head market analyst thinks will be cool on a phone.
(yes, I can keep dreaming)
Trian
... but I can't wait for the day when Darl McBride is some Colombian/Mexican guy's new girlfriend in prison :-)
Trian
I didn't.
:-/
I compared it to my T610. Generally I spoke from my experience with models from both brands. I have owned a 6150 and a 6310i, but I have *used* many more phones.
Phone programming, I'm getting into it now. I spoke from a user perspective.
The troll...
Maybe.
But having switched from Nokia to SE recently, I doubt it. This may seem a bit off-topic, or maybe a bit of a rant, but lets see.
Nokia has long focused on style rather than substance. Just look at their range. Another example: if you want bluetooth to work, DON'T go for Nokia. And yes, I'm gonna shell out for the 7700 to just use the IR, right???
Nokias are better thought out in some areas (eg. data fields supported in the addressbook, some apps), but quite conservative in terms of technology & practical features (unless it will appeal to 14-17 year-olds).
Although the 7700 is loaded with nice 'features' and all, I am far from convinced. For one thing, why would I want a mini (maxi?) N-gage potato-shaped phone in my pocket? Hmmm.
On the other hand, the only thing I find annoying on the P900 is SE's stubborn flog-a-dead-horse decision to push for their beloved Memory Stick Duo. It's like the minidisk (or worse), Sony, wake up to it!
Once there was a survey by club Nokia, which I filled in and I pointed out how sick I was of their 'everything lifestyle' image and how I thought their chief designer must be *very* gay. It felt so good, esp. after you look at their range.
Trian
(previous owner of a 6150, a 6310i and now a SE T610)
I can't wait for the time when Darl McBride is some Mexican/Colombian guy's new girlfriend in prison...
Trian
Coming from Greece, which as a country is, AFAIK, often portrayed as anti-american, I couldn't agree more.
...unless it's one of those arrogant/ignorant nationalistic... lovely people. You come looking down on me, 'america ueber alles' style, and I (we?) won't be as friendly.
Yes, personally I (*) am rather pissed off with US policy all over the world (**), but that doesn't mean I (we) hate the people...
Trian
(*) and many other Greeks I expect -- around 98% (IIRC) of the population was against the war on Iraq, for example.
(**) I'm almost equally annoyed with our govenment for essentially bending over so many times (adoption of DMCA and other).
I vaguely remember some Powerslide / Q1 / don't remember games. IIRC my mates were using a savage 4 (?), some voodoo banshees, stuff like that.
I don't recall the d3d performance being superb either, but did you try to use opengl?
Trian
While this may be brushing 'redundant/offtopic', I have to say that getting one of those may cost you a bit more, but it's much nicer than a consumer graphics card.
/. article on it), while the latter have been traditionally good with it.
What the author fails to mention is that there's better R&D (build quality?) put in there. Not just application-specific optimisations. If they *had* tested the consumer equivalents, they'd see them outperformed, methinks. That's my experience, anyway.
Back in '98 I had a Diamond FireGL 1000 Pro (yes, the FireGL series was owned by Diamond then), which was matching/outperforming many 'new' gaming cards my mates were buying (it was a fairly old model at the time, IIRC). Thing is, I hadn't paid a fortune for it, as you might think. It was a bit expensive, but not *that* different from what my mates were paying.
Now I have a FireGL 8800 and again the performance is there. Gaming-wise, I can play GTA3 and CMR3 at resolutions previously undreamt of with the 9500 (1600x1200).
Having said that, it's a pain to get (linux) support by ATI. Ever tried emailing them? Up 'till March (IIRC) things were OK and they even had good drivers. But now it's all shaky and iffy, as we all know.
Now I'm looking for a 3DLabs/NVidia. The former are increasing their linux support (I even recall a
It would have been very interesting if they'd included the VP990 Pro or the VP970 in the comparison...
Trian
I hate to break it to you, but Palestine has been at WAR with Israel for many many years (...you insensitive clod --couldn't resist :).
When you are at war, you don't think about making/selling movies mate.
On the other hand, they've been bitten by the Israel-supporting US many times, and they want to bite back.
When they say that 'US laws don't apply here'... well, we may generally have many counterexamples (Christiansen, anyone?), but they know that the system is already not in their favour, so why bother?
my 0.02
T.
...but then I remembered all that about companies outsourcing to India, Pakistan and the like.
:-(
<extreme-n-cynical>
The basic principle is of management is: pay you less while they squeeze the most out of you, so that they can keep more... Why would you want to give them your PhD as a side-present?
</extreme-n-cynical>
This is usually the case when the manager has little/no experience with the work in the field he's managing. Sadly, it's also the case with the vast majority of managers in my country
In the end I decided it's not really worth it. I can still pursue my research interests privately, on my free time, if I want. Most academic staff I know seem they'll be happy to co-operate anyway, if they see you want to get somewhere.
And, having worked in the industry for a while, it's much more relaxed than academic work. You get free weekends and holidays! (if you're in Europe, anyway)
Trian
For context: I'm Greek, and I'm now finishing my MSc in CS in England (where I also got my first degree, in CS with Honours).
Hmmm... time to be creative in these registration form fields, guys...
:-)
I certainly was
Trian
Off topic as per the general discussion, but relevant to mouse design:
Trackballs are nice. Problem is, I'm left handed. So they're out of the question for me (along with the nice top-of-the-range Logitech mice...).
Why not design something we left-handeds can use as well, instead of just making the odd product with bells and whistles?
(it was sooo annoying that the MX700 is designed for right hand use only... are we lesser beings or something???)
Trian
Overall, I agree. Yet I disagree with that we have to be like windows to be accepted by the general public.
Yes, that's the easy way. "Here, it looks like windoze, it acts like windoze, there are equivalent apps, but it's written by different people."
But you can also make it more usable by creating a "novel" (as far as the windows user is concerned) yet user-friendly interface. Something that people will work easily with. We need some more HCI people.
One problem is that many many programmers can't think like 'normal' users. And the GUI subsequently comes out too technical. At least let HCI people have their say. <troll> In some usability lists I was a member, your opinion counted (only) if you knew how to program it, it seemed. </troll>
On a side note, personally I'd be happier if we tried to imitate the Mac. For me OS X is Unix without the headaches. And they've always been known for user-friendliness.
Trian
OK, don't flame me. I just saw it further down. I searched for "monty" and "python", found none and posted the parent.
Trian
Why is American beer like having sex in a canoo?
- It's f*cking close to water.
Well, yes and no.
We do get this sort of options, but having read the article, BTO will potentially offer a lot more options, from seat trims and head units down to brake and suspension systems (hopefully). Basically the whole car will be a set of modules, by the looks of it. Plug and play. The big question is, will it be plug and play a'la mac (which had PnP before windoze but for a limited set of stuff) or a'la windoze.
In Europe, on the manufacturers' networks we get to choose some of the optional components (eg. sporty version of side-skirts, different dials and gearstick decoration) and maybe the odd feature from some "better" version of the model, but nothing critical. In most cases these are about decorative parts or lighting (eg. xenon headlights).
For anything more drastic there are of course some official or semi-official improvement/tuning houses for many european & asian manufacturers, which will take your standard car and beef it up aesthetically or performance-wise. Prodrive (Subaru), AMG (Merc), Abt Sportsline (Audi, VW, Skoda, Seat), AC Schnitzer (BMW) are just some off the top of my head. They tend to be somewhat expensive, though.
Trian
Agreed. If there are more browsers that have big market share, that will force:
On a relevant note, have you noticed how corporate sites partially work (if at all) when you don't use IE? Most recent example for me: www.motorola.com and their hellomoto s(h)ite.
Trian
Congratulations to 3Dlabs!
It's very important that people who use cards of this sort (or who plan to make the jump) email them and encourage them.
On reading this, I immediately sent them an email, congratulating them on their move to support linux.
I am an (otherwise happy) owner of an ATI FireGL 8800, but next card I'll be buying won't be an ATI, unless they change their linux policy. I'm not impressed by that they just list it (at the bottom of the list) as a priority, either. ATI, beware!
The only "affordable" workstation cards I know that have linux support are nVidia-based. (PNY Quadro FX series at www.schneider-digital.de)
3DLabs has a _very_ interesting VP range. I wish they 'bless' that series with linux drivers as well. Up till now they were out of the question *just because* of their (lack of) linux support.
Trian