And who pays for it? The taxpayers, whether they have a computer or not, or even want one. There lies the crux of the problem, what you pay out of pocket is not the only expense. Not to mention the fact that you now have a government buerocracy running your WAN. Sound like a great idea if you're a government and want tight control over your citizens.
The whole effort looks doomed from the get go. The kind of money needed to feed and care for a satellite network is not going to come from web advertising etc.
BOA has online account viewing, but if you want to use the bill paying you have to pay $8 for them to ship you the software and then $6 per month to use it unless you have an "Advantage" account, in which case they charge you to ship it, but skip the monthly.
The software runs on Win3.1 (or higher) and requires a 386 with 4mb ram. I've seen it, and it stunk.
I'm about to switch banks anyway, since they wouldn't let my 8 months pregnant wife use their restroom. They made her go across the road to McDonald's. Wonderful customer service they have, like there aren't at least 15 different banks in our small town of 56,000.
MS sees the new consoles coming out and realizes that with all the application service providers on the net, it won't be long before a LOT of people are using one of these things to hook up to the net, do word processing and everything else they do with a computer now.
Microsoft's obvious strategy is to make sure they get a piece of the action. They know that what would have been Windows market share will go to consoles, so they have to move into consoles themselves.
The really nice thing about the X box (from MS perspective) is that since it will use mostly off the shelf PC hardware, they may be able to break even selling the box, which something none of the console manufacturers are doing at this point
As far as the processor being slow, that isn't really a factor with a console since you have much less overhead running on it, and with a stable non-changing platform you can optimize code like a mad man. Do you remember how far EA managed to go with the Atari 2600? They were doing stuff that Atari swore was impossible
If you dropped the BS requirement you'd have a lot easier time getting qualified people. Heck, you're already giving them a test anyway, why not open it up to the best and the brightest. At least give weight to experience without college.
Contrary to popular PHB belief all people who didn't go to college are not uneducated, we're merely BS free
I agree with most of your post but... you can have custom properties for a form in VB.
Remember a programming language is not a religion, it's a tool. The problem is when the only tool people have been exposed to is a hammer (or C/C++/VB/Whatever) then they think everything is a nail.
For our company VB was a move up! Before the current IS department was in place everything (and I mean everything) was done in Access. Talk about crap.
Personally, I would love for us to move to C++ for some of our apps, but frankly we don't have the people (or office space to hire more people) to give us the extra time it would take. Fortunately, most of our request are for simple database access stuff that VB is pretty good for.
Right on. Frankly, the IT department where I work now has a very low number of people with BS in CS degrees. And frankly, we're better off for it. Why?
Because we know how to figure stuff out. We all know that we don't know everything about software development and are willing to find the best solution.
Not to say that degreed people are idiots, just that there are far too many of them that learned enough to make it through school and then immediately turned off there brains, figuring they knew all they needed to know in order to get a good job.This industry doesn't need more people, we need more people who care about doing a good job, about meeting their mileposts, that care about developing solid, maintainable applications
Phew! Rant mode off
Re:The only "shortage" is of **CHEAP** tech worker
on
The IT Labor Shortage
·
· Score: 1
Exactly. Why the heck would I want to move to Silicon Valley?
So far, the major decider as to whether you can or cannot find an IT job is location. Fortunately, the US is still a relatively free country, and you can move. Personally, I'd rather stay in the area I am now. I took my current job at about 2/3 of the average salary so I could stay in this area.
If you're willing to move to where the job is you'll have no problems, but if you live in an area where IT jobs are tight, good luck. Don't forget to factor in cost of living when you're looking at all the money you could be making in San Jose though
Mostly depends on where I'm willing to work and what I'm willing to do. In this area of the south, IT jobs are pretty slim, but then again, so are firms that use a lot of IT.
Actually, you can use different shells with windows. Ever hear of LiteStep? Basically, it just replaces Windows explorer. Heck, you can even use fileman. Of course, it doesn't really make the platform any more stable.
Your school needs to learn what a lease is. If they can't afford to replace their computers at least every two years I would hate to see what their computer science curriculum looks like. Two years is a long long life for a computer system.
Actually, chickens will happily eat other chickens and even there own eggs if they happen to break them. Before you ask, yes, I do raise chickens.
As far as cattle taking more energy to raise then is gained from them, this is absolutely untrue. It takes a heck of a lot more energy to cultivate ground, plant, raise, and harvest plants then it does to throw a couple of head of cattle out and let them eat the grass that grows naturally.
Also, the cattle fertilize the ground as they graze. After a few years of grazing, the ground is a fair bit better off than before, and none of the grass is wasted since it is turned into beef. Granted most people do supplement the cow's diet with grain and hay, especially during the winter. But we grow our own hay on land that cannot be used for other purposes (you try growing crops on a 45 degree slope).
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And who pays for it? The taxpayers, whether they have a computer or not, or even want one. There lies the crux of the problem, what you pay out of pocket is not the only expense. Not to mention the fact that you now have a government buerocracy running your WAN. Sound like a great idea if you're a government and want tight control over your citizens.
The whole effort looks doomed from the get go. The kind of money needed to feed and care for a satellite network is not going to come from web advertising etc.
The software runs on Win3.1 (or higher) and requires a 386 with 4mb ram. I've seen it, and it stunk.
I'm about to switch banks anyway, since they wouldn't let my 8 months pregnant wife use their restroom. They made her go across the road to McDonald's. Wonderful customer service they have, like there aren't at least 15 different banks in our small town of 56,000.
MS sees the new consoles coming out and realizes that with all the application service providers on the net, it won't be long before a LOT of people are using one of these things to hook up to the net, do word processing and everything else they do with a computer now.
Microsoft's obvious strategy is to make sure they get a piece of the action. They know that what would have been Windows market share will go to consoles, so they have to move into consoles themselves.
The really nice thing about the X box (from MS perspective) is that since it will use mostly off the shelf PC hardware, they may be able to break even selling the box, which something none of the console manufacturers are doing at this point
As far as the processor being slow, that isn't really a factor with a console since you have much less overhead running on it, and with a stable non-changing platform you can optimize code like a mad man. Do you remember how far EA managed to go with the Atari 2600? They were doing stuff that Atari swore was impossible
Contrary to popular PHB belief all people who didn't go to college are not uneducated, we're merely BS free
Remember a programming language is not a religion, it's a tool. The problem is when the only tool people have been exposed to is a hammer (or C/C++/VB/Whatever) then they think everything is a nail.
For our company VB was a move up! Before the current IS department was in place everything (and I mean everything) was done in Access. Talk about crap.
Personally, I would love for us to move to C++ for some of our apps, but frankly we don't have the people (or office space to hire more people) to give us the extra time it would take. Fortunately, most of our request are for simple database access stuff that VB is pretty good for.
Because we know how to figure stuff out. We all know that we don't know everything about software development and are willing to find the best solution.
Not to say that degreed people are idiots, just that there are far too many of them that learned enough to make it through school and then immediately turned off there brains, figuring they knew all they needed to know in order to get a good job.This industry doesn't need more people, we need more people who care about doing a good job, about meeting their mileposts, that care about developing solid, maintainable applications
Phew! Rant mode off
So far, the major decider as to whether you can or cannot find an IT job is location. Fortunately, the US is still a relatively free country, and you can move. Personally, I'd rather stay in the area I am now. I took my current job at about 2/3 of the average salary so I could stay in this area.
If you're willing to move to where the job is you'll have no problems, but if you live in an area where IT jobs are tight, good luck. Don't forget to factor in cost of living when you're looking at all the money you could be making in San Jose though
Mostly depends on where I'm willing to work and what I'm willing to do. In this area of the south, IT jobs are pretty slim, but then again, so are firms that use a lot of IT.
Actually, you can use different shells with windows. Ever hear of LiteStep? Basically, it just replaces Windows explorer. Heck, you can even use fileman. Of course, it doesn't really make the platform any more stable.
Your school needs to learn what a lease is. If they can't afford to replace their computers at least every two years I would hate to see what their computer science curriculum looks like. Two years is a long long life for a computer system.
As far as cattle taking more energy to raise then is gained from them, this is absolutely untrue. It takes a heck of a lot more energy to cultivate ground, plant, raise, and harvest plants then it does to throw a couple of head of cattle out and let them eat the grass that grows naturally.
Also, the cattle fertilize the ground as they graze. After a few years of grazing, the ground is a fair bit better off than before, and none of the grass is wasted since it is turned into beef. Granted most people do supplement the cow's diet with grain and hay, especially during the winter. But we grow our own hay on land that cannot be used for other purposes (you try growing crops on a 45 degree slope).