"All"? That's actually a very big deal. Electric motors, even after the 10%-20% transmission loss is still dramatically more efficient that are internal combustion engines. Not to mention, power plants also gain efficiency from scale. Not to mention this allows for cleaner air and centralized pollution mitigation. We all have roughly $1000 added to each vehicle in an effort to simply make the exhaust less toxic; which completely ignores making it "clean." For JUST US car manufacturers, that's roughly $3.6 billion dollars wasted annually.
While I certainly agree with the rest of your post, thermal electric plants still aren't very efficient.
This could be a good application for Nuclear energy. Compared to other power plants, Nuclear really doesn't like ramping up/down, so having many vehicles charging off peak could help bring up the base load. As well, Wind energy could fit in there as well. One downside to wind energy is the unpredictability of generation. With a "smart charger", in addition to time-of-day billing, you could have the charger commanded to charge or not charge depending on wind production. This could be combined with teired billing. If you want it charged immediately you pay a premium, if you're willing to wait till overnight off-peak you'll get a lower rate, and if you want to be at the whim of the wind you can get a lower rate still.
I've yet to run into a machine that one if not both of the network interfaces (eg: wifi and ethernet) weren't recognized. It's the same situation with Ubuntu. I was setting up Ubuntu on an older Dell Laptop, the install had drivers for the ethernet, not for the Wifi. I plugged in the ethernet, and had it search for drivers.
As well particularly verbose errors are ignored. The whole thing is a big problem because it makes it very difficult to protect users against themselves if they willingly agree to install malware, and ignore security warnings. This is why fake AV software "XPAntivirus 2019" and the like are so successful.
In Windows 7 I've found that if the driver isn't included, going to Windows Update will find the driver. Much like what Ubuntu does for devices it supports, but without included drivers.
Pretty much. The linux devs don't realize that they're making cludget unfriendly processes. Number of clicks matter. If I can't, without a manual, install program X onto my computer in 3-6 clicks, it's too hard.
"Oh just use the package manager" No. I want to go to their website and click the fucking download button. Then I want to open that downloaded file. Then I want it to install. Anything else is unacceptable for a typical user.
I agree that giving copy & paste CLI instructions can be the fastest way to relay help. However to the user it still looks like "magic". If you're navigating through configuration dialogs, the user may see what type of things are in there, and where to look for other settings. With CLI instructions, it's copy and paste with no understanding. Of course if you're giving user instructions to navigate the Windows registry, that's just as cryptic as many Linux CLI /.conf instructions, and people would be better off using the "reg" CLI tool to shortcut the unnecessary clicking.
I'm a Windows poweruser who tries to use CLI when it's faster
Most LCD monitors I see are angled 45 degrees. So they are are dimmed from ideal, but even if the panel is rotated 90 degrees (eg: in portrait) it is still visible. If you rotate your view 45 degrees the monitor will appear black. Whether it's clockwise or counterclockwise depends on the model.
However some screens like my ancient color LCD in my Nokia phone are visible through 360 degrees.
I used to prefer matte. Even with my TV, it annoyed me that I was looking at myself when the screen was a bit dark and the sun shone brightly. But I do like the glossy Apple screens. No idea if they did something with them to make them less mirrory, or if all glossy screens have improved that way, or if it's just a matter of better lighting conditions.
Besides, when the sun shines on a matte screen, you can't see a thing either.
This can be a problem if you want to say, edit the hosts file in Windows. There's no easy "Edit as administrator", so your best bet is opening notepad as admin (start-notepad-ctrl+shift+enter), then navigating to the file.
I assume you mean OO Write is like Word 2003, which isn't the previous version, but two versions ago (office 2010 is now out). The version released 7 years ago, and superseded three and a half years ago.
So you're comparing the latest version of Open Office to a version of MS Office at least 7-8 years old. I've found Office 2007 rock stable, and the only slowdowns are usually caused by overbearing AV plugins. Open office on the other hand I've found takes at least twice as long to open, and uses 5x more RAM just sitting there with nothing open.
users still need to have in-depth knowledge to do basic stuff, like install new applications
You consider clicking the 'Applications' menu and scrolling to and clicking 'Ubuntu Software Center' in-depth knowledge?
While my username may show a certain bias, one thing I have to give to Linux (including Ubuntu) is that the package management system does make software installation extremely easy. As long as it's in the repo. See how popular the concept is with the general public in the form of "App stores" (sic). No really, the name makes me sick.
Package management was almost born out of necessity because of dealing with dependency hell, which is much worse than dll hell ever was. That's where package management fails, if you step outside the box. If an application isn't in that distro's repos for that release, manually installing applications becomes exponentially more difficult. Even major programs like Firfox and Open Office aren't backported to LTS releases of Ubuntu. Simply "upgrading the OS" isn't the best answer, particularly when LTS versions are supposed to be for the stable environment businesses demand.
I do wish that there was an easy package management for Windows, of course without losing the ability to manually install applications. The best I can due to try and minimize the risk of users installing malware, is recommend they only install software from sites like download.com or softpedia. Of course that's no gaurentee, and there's plenty of safe applications not on those sites.
Another example is the Office 2007 / 2010 Ribbon. Yes it's from MS, but it's designed to be more usable, more discoverable, and most people once they get used to it love it. However there's still some people who rote-learned unorganized cluttered menus and toolbars and are upset that things changed.
Steve Jobs will be demonstrating to the media and the public the correct way to hold the phone. Everyone needs a remedial course since everyone's holding it wrong.
You're not going to get much engine braking at Wide open throttle. If you're in a manual, declutching should be second nature. Declutch/neutral, let it bounce off the rev limiter or shut it off.
An automatic engine braking won't help much. Even if the car is limited to 1st gear, that can easily be 45MPH, and many electronic autos won't allow a shift into first above ~30 MPH, and further, will upshift into second even in "L" if the car is held at WOT and accelerates to 45MPH.
Best options are neutral and bounce off the rev limiter, or Neutral and turn the key off ONE CLICK (so the steering won't lock)
Incorrect. You turn off the engine by turning the key only one click away from "start". Do not remove the key or place it in the lock position, and don't press the key eject button (which exists on manuals). Putting the car in neutral in an automatic reduces your braking power, which you will obviously need. Turning off your engine leaves your braking power intact, but turns off power steering. In many cars, power steering is off at any reasonable speed, anyways, so you won't miss it (and if it was one, you still aren't going to miss it).
Of course, if you have a manual, you could just press in the clutch.
You only need to shift into neutral first if you have one of these craptastic push-to-start cars where the push button takes 3 seconds to turn the car off (what an idiotically terrible design).
One click away from start is ON. Normally it's ACC-LOCK-OFF-ON-START or LOCK-ACC-ON-START or similar, where START is a momentary contact. You're looking for OFF or ACC (depending).
With ATX power supplies I like that the OS can shut down the computer, but it irritates me that to force a shutdown you have to hold the button for what seems like forever. If I wanted to request a poweroff I would do it via the OS UI. If I'm pressing the button I want it off NOW. With this stupid feature now it cars, there really is a safety issue.
Depending on what model toyota was involved. The computer would NOT allow a shift into neutral at open throttle due to the damage that would cause the motor.
Do you know what models are affected by this? Most engines have a rev limiter, but at the same time, wouldn't it be better to obey the shift to neutral request, and cut the throttle to the engine (overriding the WOT request)
Most recent automatics will not allow the key to go into "lock" unless the car is in park. Of the manuals I've driven there's either a release button, or you have to push the key in, or some other form of release to the steering to lock. You will be working against the inactive power steering system, and will have no power assist on the brakes (assuming you used up all stored vacuum trying the brakes before), however the car will still be controllable, and preferable to a runaway. Most owners manuals do not recommend towing an automatic for a long time with the drive wheels down (no lubrication), but the short distance to stop would be fine.
Technology can be great to supplement traditional skills, but problems can arise if it flat out replaces it.
Calculators can be a great tool for modeling, or more complex problems. In the "real world" you have access to calculators, but in my experience, people with more solid basic math skills can either do problems in their head that others would have to rely on calculators for, and can fully understand and make better use of the calculators for complex problems.
Likewise spell check doesn't override the need to know how to spell, and Wikipedia doesn't mean research skills are useless.
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"All"? That's actually a very big deal. Electric motors, even after the 10%-20% transmission loss is still dramatically more efficient that are internal combustion engines. Not to mention, power plants also gain efficiency from scale. Not to mention this allows for cleaner air and centralized pollution mitigation. We all have roughly $1000 added to each vehicle in an effort to simply make the exhaust less toxic; which completely ignores making it "clean." For JUST US car manufacturers, that's roughly $3.6 billion dollars wasted annually.
While I certainly agree with the rest of your post, thermal electric plants still aren't very efficient.
This could be a good application for Nuclear energy. Compared to other power plants, Nuclear really doesn't like ramping up/down, so having many vehicles charging off peak could help bring up the base load. As well, Wind energy could fit in there as well. One downside to wind energy is the unpredictability of generation. With a "smart charger", in addition to time-of-day billing, you could have the charger commanded to charge or not charge depending on wind production. This could be combined with teired billing. If you want it charged immediately you pay a premium, if you're willing to wait till overnight off-peak you'll get a lower rate, and if you want to be at the whim of the wind you can get a lower rate still.
Most of the computers I set up with Windows 7 had the Wifi recognized.
I've yet to run into a machine that one if not both of the network interfaces (eg: wifi and ethernet) weren't recognized. It's the same situation with Ubuntu. I was setting up Ubuntu on an older Dell Laptop, the install had drivers for the ethernet, not for the Wifi. I plugged in the ethernet, and had it search for drivers.
Users don't read dialogs. They try to do whatever possible to dismiss it as quick as possible, without reading it. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2003/09/01/54734.aspx http://arstechnica.com/security/news/2008/09/study-confirms-users-are-idiots.ars
As well particularly verbose errors are ignored. The whole thing is a big problem because it makes it very difficult to protect users against themselves if they willingly agree to install malware, and ignore security warnings. This is why fake AV software "XPAntivirus 2019" and the like are so successful.
In Windows 7 I've found that if the driver isn't included, going to Windows Update will find the driver. Much like what Ubuntu does for devices it supports, but without included drivers.
Pretty much. The linux devs don't realize that they're making cludget unfriendly processes. Number of clicks matter. If I can't, without a manual, install program X onto my computer in 3-6 clicks, it's too hard. "Oh just use the package manager" No. I want to go to their website and click the fucking download button. Then I want to open that downloaded file. Then I want it to install. Anything else is unacceptable for a typical user.
Which is why Apple's App Store is a huge flop.
And most of these "secretaries" were infinitely grateful to have a GUI now so they didn't have to use cryptic command
I like CLI, you like CLI, the average user hates it, even though some familiarity with it would be beneficial.
I agree that giving copy & paste CLI instructions can be the fastest way to relay help. However to the user it still looks like "magic". If you're navigating through configuration dialogs, the user may see what type of things are in there, and where to look for other settings. With CLI instructions, it's copy and paste with no understanding. Of course if you're giving user instructions to navigate the Windows registry, that's just as cryptic as many Linux CLI / .conf instructions, and people would be better off using the "reg" CLI tool to shortcut the unnecessary clicking.
I'm a Windows poweruser who tries to use CLI when it's faster
You were looking at it wrong.
Most LCD monitors I see are angled 45 degrees. So they are are dimmed from ideal, but even if the panel is rotated 90 degrees (eg: in portrait) it is still visible. If you rotate your view 45 degrees the monitor will appear black. Whether it's clockwise or counterclockwise depends on the model.
However some screens like my ancient color LCD in my Nokia phone are visible through 360 degrees.
I used to prefer matte. Even with my TV, it annoyed me that I was looking at myself when the screen was a bit dark and the sun shone brightly. But I do like the glossy Apple screens. No idea if they did something with them to make them less mirrory, or if all glossy screens have improved that way, or if it's just a matter of better lighting conditions.
Besides, when the sun shines on a matte screen, you can't see a thing either.
Apple. The shinier the better.
This can be a problem if you want to say, edit the hosts file in Windows. There's no easy "Edit as administrator", so your best bet is opening notepad as admin (start-notepad-ctrl+shift+enter), then navigating to the file.
I assume you mean OO Write is like Word 2003, which isn't the previous version, but two versions ago (office 2010 is now out). The version released 7 years ago, and superseded three and a half years ago.
So you're comparing the latest version of Open Office to a version of MS Office at least 7-8 years old. I've found Office 2007 rock stable, and the only slowdowns are usually caused by overbearing AV plugins. Open office on the other hand I've found takes at least twice as long to open, and uses 5x more RAM just sitting there with nothing open.
He kind of ran out of good rants a while ago. Now he just posts something monthly to keep the flame war up in the comments.
users still need to have in-depth knowledge to do basic stuff, like install new applications
You consider clicking the 'Applications' menu and scrolling to and clicking 'Ubuntu Software Center' in-depth knowledge?
While my username may show a certain bias, one thing I have to give to Linux (including Ubuntu) is that the package management system does make software installation extremely easy. As long as it's in the repo. See how popular the concept is with the general public in the form of "App stores" (sic). No really, the name makes me sick.
Package management was almost born out of necessity because of dealing with dependency hell, which is much worse than dll hell ever was. That's where package management fails, if you step outside the box. If an application isn't in that distro's repos for that release, manually installing applications becomes exponentially more difficult. Even major programs like Firfox and Open Office aren't backported to LTS releases of Ubuntu. Simply "upgrading the OS" isn't the best answer, particularly when LTS versions are supposed to be for the stable environment businesses demand.
I do wish that there was an easy package management for Windows, of course without losing the ability to manually install applications. The best I can due to try and minimize the risk of users installing malware, is recommend they only install software from sites like download.com or softpedia. Of course that's no gaurentee, and there's plenty of safe applications not on those sites.
Another example is the Office 2007 / 2010 Ribbon. Yes it's from MS, but it's designed to be more usable, more discoverable, and most people once they get used to it love it. However there's still some people who rote-learned unorganized cluttered menus and toolbars and are upset that things changed.
You know that Windows Vista and Windows 7 were released which by default run the user as a limited user, and prompt for elevation when needed.
No, they want to lock everyone that comes in, and pretend they didn't come ;) Control the toublemakers, and the herd will obey
I don't think Gizmodo got an invite. They're the ones they want to lock away
Steve Jobs will be demonstrating to the media and the public the correct way to hold the phone. Everyone needs a remedial course since everyone's holding it wrong.
You're not going to get much engine braking at Wide open throttle. If you're in a manual, declutching should be second nature. Declutch/neutral, let it bounce off the rev limiter or shut it off.
An automatic engine braking won't help much. Even if the car is limited to 1st gear, that can easily be 45MPH, and many electronic autos won't allow a shift into first above ~30 MPH, and further, will upshift into second even in "L" if the car is held at WOT and accelerates to 45MPH.
Best options are neutral and bounce off the rev limiter, or Neutral and turn the key off ONE CLICK (so the steering won't lock)
Incorrect. You turn off the engine by turning the key only one click away from "start". Do not remove the key or place it in the lock position, and don't press the key eject button (which exists on manuals). Putting the car in neutral in an automatic reduces your braking power, which you will obviously need. Turning off your engine leaves your braking power intact, but turns off power steering. In many cars, power steering is off at any reasonable speed, anyways, so you won't miss it (and if it was one, you still aren't going to miss it).
Of course, if you have a manual, you could just press in the clutch.
You only need to shift into neutral first if you have one of these craptastic push-to-start cars where the push button takes 3 seconds to turn the car off (what an idiotically terrible design).
One click away from start is ON. Normally it's ACC-LOCK-OFF-ON-START or LOCK-ACC-ON-START or similar, where START is a momentary contact. You're looking for OFF or ACC (depending).
With ATX power supplies I like that the OS can shut down the computer, but it irritates me that to force a shutdown you have to hold the button for what seems like forever. If I wanted to request a poweroff I would do it via the OS UI. If I'm pressing the button I want it off NOW. With this stupid feature now it cars, there really is a safety issue.
Depending on what model toyota was involved. The computer would NOT allow a shift into neutral at open throttle due to the damage that would cause the motor.
Do you know what models are affected by this? Most engines have a rev limiter, but at the same time, wouldn't it be better to obey the shift to neutral request, and cut the throttle to the engine (overriding the WOT request)
Most recent automatics will not allow the key to go into "lock" unless the car is in park. Of the manuals I've driven there's either a release button, or you have to push the key in, or some other form of release to the steering to lock. You will be working against the inactive power steering system, and will have no power assist on the brakes (assuming you used up all stored vacuum trying the brakes before), however the car will still be controllable, and preferable to a runaway. Most owners manuals do not recommend towing an automatic for a long time with the drive wheels down (no lubrication), but the short distance to stop would be fine.
Technology can be great to supplement traditional skills, but problems can arise if it flat out replaces it.
Calculators can be a great tool for modeling, or more complex problems. In the "real world" you have access to calculators, but in my experience, people with more solid basic math skills can either do problems in their head that others would have to rely on calculators for, and can fully understand and make better use of the calculators for complex problems.
Likewise spell check doesn't override the need to know how to spell, and Wikipedia doesn't mean research skills are useless.