Oh and...
We do actually use squid, it's bloody great, never dies, never faults and never crashes on us.
But we now run webmarshal over the top and it causes us endless grief.
I should have worded my brief better,
I wasn't really intending this to turn into a browser war.
It was more the fact that even the developer / tech computers are supposed to be 'clean of Firefox' purely because it's not Micro$oft.
I am in favor of the standard client machines having a single browser (even if it is IE *shudder*).
No,
A lot of our machines are as slow as old P4 1.6Ghz With 256/512 Of PC133 because we cannot afford to upgrade them at present.
The problem is that Windows XP runs like an absolute dog.
If we had a minimal environment i.e. an XFCE based desktop these machines would still be perfectly usable.
At the moment we're remoting onto them, removing old files, deleting old profiles, defragging the hard drive, running ccleaner and regcleaner etc... or just re-formatting them.
Someone at my work emailed me this, thismorning:
"I'll tell you this we had an opportunity to use a product to compete with end note and save us thousands of dollars and they denied it. They even wanted him to remove it from his computer. All he wanted was add a add-in to word so he could use this open source type end-note program. He was looking at this because his department couldn't or wouldn't fund end-note $600"
Discount?... Think again.
At $720+ per client PC for OS and Office licenses I think not, not to mention the fact that lots of the software requires 'Microsoft specialized' technicians / engineers to implement. (Sharepoint)
Great comment.
Thank you for your input, Definitely taken that onboard.
We tried to launch a pilot to run a wiki-based knowledge base for the techs and service desk, it was knee-capped by several people saying 'Use sharepoint, that's a great alternative to a wiki'.
They failed to understand:
-The difference between the way Sharepoint and Wikimedia works
-The fact that we don't need specialized 'sharepoint developers' to work on the system
-The fact that the sharepoint implementation we already have is a slow, cumbersome beast that lacks customization and portability.
You wouldn't believe the number of times we've tried to make management realise there are real-life cost-effective alternatives.
Meetings are guaranteed to turn into head-banging sessions when ever its brought up.
Well I did say "I (...) was recently outraged" so of course it was going to be followed by opinionated drive.
Thanks for your wonderful insight on how I can improve our systems.
I realise we wouldn't be saving any $ by using Firefox but comments prohibiting even on 'tech machines' leads to a pretty communist workplace.
Plenty of websites don't render properly in IE including several that specific users visit.
OP Here
---
FYI Microsoft makes the hospital pay PER COMPUTER (around):
NZ$250~ for the OS and client access software.
+
NZ$470~ for the MS Office license.
=$720NZD ($500~ USD) Per Computer.
And that's just on the client side.
I had MAJOR performance issues with FreeNAS.
I spent 3 months testing it at home for work use, tried it on 3 different half decent machines.
After [x] number of days each box's network transfers would slow down to the crawl, logged several faults with the FreeNAS team and it looks like it was a problem with the BSD Kernel and Samba (Combo known for bad performance).
I shifted to Ubuntu Server x64 and haven't turned back, bloody brilliant especially after you install Webmin.
Is Obama going mad?
Here in NZ we have one of the WORST internet "solutions" in the world!
Its:
-Slow
-VERY expensive
-Lots of area's don't even have access to internet
-Heavily Data Capped (I pay $120 NZ for 10mbit (which is more like 7mbit) with only 40GB of data!)
Slashdot Mirror
Oh and ...
We do actually use squid, it's bloody great, never dies, never faults and never crashes on us.
But we now run webmarshal over the top and it causes us endless grief.
I should have worded my brief better, I wasn't really intending this to turn into a browser war. It was more the fact that even the developer / tech computers are supposed to be 'clean of Firefox' purely because it's not Micro$oft. I am in favor of the standard client machines having a single browser (even if it is IE *shudder*).
No, A lot of our machines are as slow as old P4 1.6Ghz With 256/512 Of PC133 because we cannot afford to upgrade them at present. The problem is that Windows XP runs like an absolute dog. If we had a minimal environment i.e. an XFCE based desktop these machines would still be perfectly usable. At the moment we're remoting onto them, removing old files, deleting old profiles, defragging the hard drive, running ccleaner and regcleaner etc... or just re-formatting them.
bahhaha. I actually lol'd.
Someone at my work emailed me this, thismorning: "I'll tell you this we had an opportunity to use a product to compete with end note and save us thousands of dollars and they denied it. They even wanted him to remove it from his computer. All he wanted was add a add-in to word so he could use this open source type end-note program. He was looking at this because his department couldn't or wouldn't fund end-note $600"
Thanks for your input. Sounds like you've felt the same M$ pain I have.
Discount?... Think again. At $720+ per client PC for OS and Office licenses I think not, not to mention the fact that lots of the software requires 'Microsoft specialized' technicians / engineers to implement. (Sharepoint)
Great comment. Thank you for your input, Definitely taken that onboard. We tried to launch a pilot to run a wiki-based knowledge base for the techs and service desk, it was knee-capped by several people saying 'Use sharepoint, that's a great alternative to a wiki'. They failed to understand: -The difference between the way Sharepoint and Wikimedia works -The fact that we don't need specialized 'sharepoint developers' to work on the system -The fact that the sharepoint implementation we already have is a slow, cumbersome beast that lacks customization and portability.
You wouldn't believe the number of times we've tried to make management realise there are real-life cost-effective alternatives. Meetings are guaranteed to turn into head-banging sessions when ever its brought up.
Well I did say "I (...) was recently outraged" so of course it was going to be followed by opinionated drive. Thanks for your wonderful insight on how I can improve our systems.
I realise we wouldn't be saving any $ by using Firefox but comments prohibiting even on 'tech machines' leads to a pretty communist workplace. Plenty of websites don't render properly in IE including several that specific users visit.
OP Here --- FYI Microsoft makes the hospital pay PER COMPUTER (around): NZ$250~ for the OS and client access software. + NZ$470~ for the MS Office license. =$720NZD ($500~ USD) Per Computer. And that's just on the client side.
Agreed. I'm using flashblock on my computer now, so god damn sick of laggy flash sites hogging all my bandwidth and cpu.
Yay, no 2D or 3D support! I wonder, in what dimension does this driver work?
I had MAJOR performance issues with FreeNAS. I spent 3 months testing it at home for work use, tried it on 3 different half decent machines. After [x] number of days each box's network transfers would slow down to the crawl, logged several faults with the FreeNAS team and it looks like it was a problem with the BSD Kernel and Samba (Combo known for bad performance). I shifted to Ubuntu Server x64 and haven't turned back, bloody brilliant especially after you install Webmin.
Is Obama going mad? Here in NZ we have one of the WORST internet "solutions" in the world! Its: -Slow -VERY expensive -Lots of area's don't even have access to internet -Heavily Data Capped (I pay $120 NZ for 10mbit (which is more like 7mbit) with only 40GB of data!)
It's back...