Quick note on a 4cyn Jetta TDI a friend has: He has a manual, and tends to over fill his tires on long road trips - not wise nor safe, but it adds to your MPG count - he claims he gets about 70 MPG on the freeways in ND. Also, there are a lot of E85 engines out there now... they can take standard gasoline and Corn fuel. The filling stations are rare, but the corn fuel is about 105 octain, and you need no modifications to switch between the two fuels. There are over 70 E85 gas stations in MN where I live, and they are trying to spread them elsewhere too.
Here are some links for you to look at: http://www.al-corn.com/faq/e85.asp http://ww w.exolmn.com/e-85information.htm http://www.motor trend.com/features/news/112_news03 0226_fuel/index1.html
Also here is a link to a search by the U.S. DoE by auto type: http://www.ccities.doe.gov/vbg/progs/search _class. cgi
If you read Sec. 540c. paragraph c, you apparently need to get your phone companies permission to use a cordless phone in your home now. Least that is how I read it....
"To receive, disrupt, decrypt, transmit, retransmit, acquire, intercept, or facilitate the receipt, disruption, decryption, transmission, retransmission, acquisition, or interception of any telecommunications service without the express authority or actual consent of the telecommunications service provider."
I wonder if you can recieve your neighbor's cordless 900 MHz phone with this guy. Not a scanner but you can tune it in I bet. Just gota know when to try as in when they are out on their deck with the phone.
What I find interesting but off topic a bit, is that Govener Jesse Ventura of MN vitoed (spelling?) the bill and the others in power (not sure of all the makeups of MN govenment since I moved to MN less than a year ago) over-rode his vito (once again spelling?) to pass the statium.
Also, Busch is a beer company and old-style was a beer company that was bough out by someone (forget who,) but I think if it was not Busch that bought them out, that is is funny/ironic that the team demanded an Old-Style statium.
And Yes, I did laugh at the bumber stickers that said "My Governor can beat up your Governor."
We had a similar problem with our two offices and name resolution. We implemented WINS on both sides of the WAN and it still never quite worked right, until we switched everyone over to the new w2k domain that had WINS on both the PDC and BDC, and ran DHCP instead of static IPs. End result, it worked, usualy, and users liked having the new harware to support w2k pro.
Motorola has these as well and on the FRS radio web page (look at a manual such as the one for the 6320 on page 36,) they tell you both the RF frequency (page 35) and the code frequency, which is actualy a short audio tone. If your radio is set to "code 17" and some one else transmits, and they are also on "code 17" then your radio will filter out the tone that goes for a fraction of a second and then start listening. Take a scanner, scan the range of your FRS radio (462.5625 to 467.7125 Mhz if I remember) and set a code on your radio... you will hear a tone before your talking.
About the only thing that pops into my mind with this is the voltage of the PCMCIA sockets on your laptop and what the card draws. I know there are 5 volt and 3.3 volt cards and slots. Some cards I have seen are dual voltage, so it does not matter what the socket is. Check to see if the card you are using is a 3.3 only, and then see if you can track down the specks for your laptop's PCMCIA sockets and see if they are 5 volt. You may be burning out the card that can only take 5 volts for about two weeks.
Other than that, posibly look at getting a diffrent PCMCIA NIC. I use a netgear 410 10/100 NIC that Redhat 7.2 identified close enough to work on an old Fujitsu notebook on the first try. This is a cheep NIC that is decent overall and the only problem I have seen is breaking off the part that holds the pins on the dongle that goes into the card (the non-RJ-45 end.) This was in an office where there were 45 laptops using this model NIC.
Read on and see that HP has solved this at the printer....
I also delt with a HP 4500c at my old job. Besides needing to be vaccuumed out every month, and having the $170 immaging drum run out every 3-4 months, it did have the four toners, and a fifth extra big black only toner that ran a lot faster. The manual also said that if it was a b&w only page it went off the jumbo black toner, but if there was even a single pixle of color, it ran against all four color toners. (C,M,Y,& black).
Our other office had the 8500c, but there always seemed to be a reason it was not in use... needing parts, new pickup pads, damaged roller, no yellow toner available, paper jam.
Not to come across as a jerk, but for noise canceling headphones, I know that they work by creating an equal but opposite soundwave to essentualy cancle out the original noise. Why not look at using small ear-bud type headphones and (dispite looking like a freak) put on a pair of earmuffs like you use at a gun range. Some of the better ones (like Peletor) drop the noise by almost 30 db, which is 1/8 the original sound.
As for the sound proof closet, bad sceens from movied pop into my mind, but There are a few options, but all of them make it harder to keep the room cool if you have a half dozen computers in it. I know most THX certified movie theaters have a quick solution durring building them. Instead of one layer of sheet rock/drywall per each side of the stud, they use three per side. Gets spendy, but you when isolating 120 db from one theater and the ones next door, it works. Non smooth walls help too, like carpet, here again look at a movie theater wall. Heavy/thick drapes could also be installed or hung. I just thought of possibly building a cover box out of say two or three layers of sheet rock, adding a ventalation system to it, and putting it over the loud machine(s) in question. Imagine a cardbord box that is just put over the top of the computer, only it's two layers of sheet rock, 2x4's and a door with a hindge. Think of the old printer alcoves that were for the old dot matrix printers. They were lined with foam fingers to absorb the noise.
Also, there are a lot of low noise computer fans now available, and ways that you can silence the hardware, by adding weight to a noise producer like a hard drive. If you bold on a chunck of aluminum to a hard drive, you can change the vibration frequency on it, changing the pitch you hear, and possibly force it to an extreme you cannot hear.
I pay Qwest $32 a month to run a 256k up and 640k down to my ISP who is Visi, who charges another $19.95 a month for their end, providing me the same to the internet. Kinda a VPN thing over Qwest's ATM's to VISI's. I do get a static IP though and they don't care what I run on it, (web, ftp, ssh, straming media,) as long as I don't harrass other users of the internet (ie DoS).
Life is good for the most part, I just hate seeing a $72 a month bill to Qwest for DSL connectivity, land line, and caller ID. But oh well... I also use my cell phone for all long distance. I love confusing AT&T, Sprint, and MCI telemarketers saying I do not have a PIC code on my line and I do not want a PIC code on my line.... You know what that is sir?....sorry for your time sir...
Just a bit of info that I have come up wiht in the past 3 months or so that I have been looking into this type of thing myself.
Cabela's (Outfitter for hunting and fishing) has a few options from Origon Scientific like a few other users have mentioned, and I have also see the ones by Davis like your link show. My first recogmendation is find out if they are looking to spend $20 or $700. Then find our what they want to see on it. Temp only or humdity, wind speed with direction, barometer, UV index, and rain fall? Then look into seeing how their home is setup. Can they use wired or should they go with wireless - most wireless transmits on 433Mhz +/- a bit. Not a concern for users of WIFI and whatnot, but might cause trouble with their garage remote system, but I have heard nothing of this sort yet.
I live in an apartment, and I for now and for the past 3 years have used a $20 indoor outdoor thermometer that Radio Shack sells that was designed for automobiles. Works fine, but only delivers the temp. It also has a backlight for early morning/late night viewing. (Helps me decide if it is worth going out to try to see a meteor shower or two this winter dispite all the light polution in the Twin Cities.) It does all I need for now, but when I get a house, I would love to get a wireless system that has wind speed and direction, as well as humidity. BTW, I think the newer version of the Radio Shack Auto thermometer has a "freezing alert" pico buzzer in it now. Might get anoying at times, like 3AM.
One warning about mounting remote sensors, keep them in the shade if they are temp sensors for the obvious reason. Most people forget that though when mounting them. Under a deck, or on the shaded side of the house (usualy the north side if you are north of the equator,) works better than the sunny side. Also remember that the remote transmitters will use and eat batteries unless you buy the solar kits with the rechargable packs on them. They get pricy though. Wires may be a pain, but they are cheeper. That and when it's 20 below and a windchill of 30 below, you will be happy not to have to go outside to change the batteries so you know how cold it is.
Also, check out Target and other discount stores. I have seen a few with remote sensors for under $100 there. Not the top of the line, but still, they give internal temp, humidity and barametric preasure, and I think I saw one with the same three measurement for outside.
Also remind them that they will not be walking around the house/apt. with the reciever after the first week as they will loose the novelty of it. There is no point, IMO, to spen $500+ on something that will be forgotten about in a few weeks. Also, I hate the concept of these programs for windows based computers, but lots of local TV stations will offer a "weather bug" that will sit on the systray and show the current temp outside at the TV station. Drawback, internet connection needed for updates, computer needs to be on, resources are consumed, and most have adds built in to offset the cost of the data feed bandwidth and the development of the program.
One minor point, 10/100BT can have power over ethernet (POE) but 1000BT cannot. It uses all four pair of the wires for the bandwidth. Try a two pair cross connect cable for 10/100BT and you are fine, but it will not work for 1000BT. You need all four pairs.
This is not ment to be a troll to larien's post, but I read slashdot, ocassionaly post on slashdot, but have to disagree on your buisness verses nerds or geeks comment. I work for a buisness with sales people, who use Goldmine, and at my last job ACT. There was no linux in house, but my tinker box or two that I would kill 30 minutes or so a month when I needed some "me time," at my old job. (Former job was network admin, telcom admin, and helpdesk support.) My current job, we use win2k for the notebooks just because of compatability with clients emailing atachments. I know Staroffice and KDE's Koffice are better than ever, but still. We do use linus for all of our servers, and for our custom application. We also tried linux for the laptops/sales people befor I got here, but it was a headach for the reson stated above.
People like me would be the ones who see the need, and desire for Linux based CRM packages, and might have come across on our jobs. I unfortunalty however have not, but I will keep my eyes open for something.
On a side note, I however ma be classified as a crack-head for the ask slashdot I submitted a while back. Can we use graphic cards' extra power as a mini-computer under linux when not playing 3D games? Took 4 months and a second submission to get it shot down.
The sceen from "Terminiator (1)" with the cop telling Sara Conner that Arnold was probably high on something when he put his hand through the window, didn't feel a thing, and probably broke every bone in his hand. Hello Crackhead Theafs - see car you like, take new pain pill, wait 30 minutes, punch in window, take car. Just think, no more going to jail for having a slim-jim on you, cause you don't need it anymore.
Ways of testing the mice. (Sorry but bad imagry comes to mind, like poking their feet or worse crushing their feet or other parts and seeing if they react.)
The third and desired way, helping people who are extra sensitive to pain or in cronic pain due to genetics or disease. I've seen an episode of the Scientific American Fontiers show on PBS about people who need to have their feet treated every 3-4 months with extra concentrated pepper extract paste, (many time stronger than any pepper spray,) to basicly over load the pain receptors in their feet, so they shut down for a while. For this and other things like in the artical, (cancer and whatnot,) I can see a true use.
Here are tow things I would recogmend. One, install a web access system like NetCensus and have a log given to the teacher showing the IP, the DHCP table, and the access attempts that went through, and did not go through. They can see "Bill" was trying to get to www.porn.com and "Susie" was trying to get to "www.web-based-email.com" when they should have been looking at the topic of discussion's web page.
Second, (although not probable,) install Carnivor or a clone of it. And lick out the results of interest such as email, and web surfing. If there is any thing that looks funny from a classroom standpoint, look further into it and mail a copy to the kid's parrents.
This however does leave the option of Solitair to be run on the computer, but if it's a WinX machine, you can not have it installed, and use Regedit or Poledit to restric the install feature of any software.
Clamping down a networked PC can be a pain, so the options are do or do not. You can always clamp down the web access a lot easier. Two access levels. Teacher and Student.
Unfortunalty, they are all expensive or just plane crazy. Buy (and be a jerk and return it when done) an IR heat camera. Or ask for a demo of one that you can hold onto for a week or so. Raytheon has an IR division, and they are the ones who make the IR Night Vision camera for Cadillac, but you cannot buy the camera alone, unless you are an auto manufacture. They have a lot more models as well that you can buy. Check out http://www.raytheoninfrared.com/html/prodmenu.htm for more info and what not. (Sorry no prices.)
Also, there is always the option of common sence while adding a bit of risk. I take no responsibilty for what you do with this info.
If your looking for hot spots on a solid metal case (no vet holes on the side you want to look at) try a spray bottel with water, and watch where it evaporates from first. Alcohaul would work too, and faster, but maybe too fast. Just remember water + electricty = bad things.
Try using your hand if it's safe and feel for warm spots verses other areas around it. Keep in mind, hot = pain, and flesh = conductor of electricity. If you want to stick your hand in the back of your TV and feel arround for hot spots, it's your life at risk, not mine.
Ask your local police department if they have a heat cam and if they would let you see your house through it. Often times they use them to look for "hot rooms" on homes in neighborhoods where they think there is a drug house growing things that they should not be. They may say yes, but they may also look closer at your house than you want. Hell, maybe Home Depot has them for rent now like an air hammer and a radial arm saw.
If you don't mind the mess, use wax, that melts at a temp just above the temp you want the thing to be at and spread some around. Cryans might work, or candels. Butter or Crisco also would work. I don't know their melting points, but butter has to be between 70 and 120 degrees F.
You may think I'm crazy, or on crack, but I am trying to help. Keep in mind, you never mentioned what you want to see the heat pattern on, whether house, car, ice fishing shack, custom electronic device, or something compleatly different. I hope this helps in some way.
I was sent to inventory some equipment at a company that my employer gave a few loans to. They were a VC and went under unfortunalty for them and my employer as they still had 1-3 years to go on the loans.
Long story shortened, to cover outstanding debts with creditors, like us, they had an auction run, and attracted a lot of people. Some stuff went dirt cheep, and some went way over the cost of buying it new. They had 15-20 E450 servers, a single 6500 server, and a 10,000 server among many other pricy toys I would just want to hold for a few minutes.
Check out auctioners and also some used resellers, but used resellers usualy let the Sun hardware go for a few bucks cheeper than new.
Also, consider the relationship with Sun if you want a support contract. If you buy it from Sun or a Sun dealer, Sun likes you. If you buy used, your requests are often put on the back burner, or so I've been told.
FYI, the Auction Co. was Paul E. Saperstine, and they can be found on the web at http://www.pesco.com/
I forget how old the system has been in place as I have never seen it, but I know a guy at a bank who has been working on the same credit card system software for his entire carere. It's been about 30-35 years now, which puts it at about 1966 to 1971, and writen in cobal.
IMO, this guy needs to get off his soap box and stop stating the obvious. He makes a lot of valid points, but he stopped just short of saying "comuters run on electricity, and you need to plug them in to use them." I'm amaized at the fact that this artical got published at CNET and that I actually read it. Hell, if I ran this post through a spell checker, I would only be a half step behind him.
I can now say "I got my thoughts published on the internet at a popular news sight." just like him.
At my past job, they also enforced the "IE is corperate standard" polocy. They however did allow employies to use other browsers if they wanted, but they would get no support from the help desk. It was a stratigy to lower opperating costs, or so they said. Ironicaly, you were not suppose to download/install any software without IT's approval, so you were SOL unless you had the power to say "I need this for this reason."
Also, more recently, I have run into a few things at my current job that have IE requiored, due to features built in to it. These are mainly features with Java and Orical DB stuff. Opera and Netscape would not run the Java we have in place at the time of implementaion.
Slashdot Mirror
Quick note on a 4cyn Jetta TDI a friend has:
w w.exolmn.com/e-85information.htmr trend.com/features/news/112_news03 0226_fuel/index1.html
h _class. cgi
He has a manual, and tends to over fill his tires on long road trips - not wise nor safe, but it adds to your MPG count - he claims he gets about 70 MPG on the freeways in ND.
Also, there are a lot of E85 engines out there now... they can take standard gasoline and Corn fuel. The filling stations are rare, but the corn fuel is about 105 octain, and you need no modifications to switch between the two fuels. There are over 70 E85 gas stations in MN where I live, and they are trying to spread them elsewhere too.
Here are some links for you to look at:
http://www.al-corn.com/faq/e85.asp
http://w
http://www.moto
Also here is a link to a search by the U.S. DoE by auto type:
http://www.ccities.doe.gov/vbg/progs/searc
If you read Sec. 540c. paragraph c, you apparently need to get your phone companies permission to use a cordless phone in your home now. Least that is how I read it....
"To receive, disrupt, decrypt, transmit, retransmit, acquire, intercept, or facilitate the receipt, disruption, decryption, transmission, retransmission, acquisition, or interception of any telecommunications service without the express authority or actual consent of the telecommunications service provider."
you forgot SMS spam being read to you at 3 AM by a computer voice
State of MN says they are burglary tools. End of story. Unless you are a locksmith, you can go to jail if you have them.
I wonder if you can recieve your neighbor's cordless 900 MHz phone with this guy. Not a scanner but you can tune it in I bet. Just gota know when to try as in when they are out on their deck with the phone.
What I find interesting but off topic a bit, is that Govener Jesse Ventura of MN vitoed (spelling?) the bill and the others in power (not sure of all the makeups of MN govenment since I moved to MN less than a year ago) over-rode his vito (once again spelling?) to pass the statium.
Also, Busch is a beer company and old-style was a beer company that was bough out by someone (forget who,) but I think if it was not Busch that bought them out, that is is funny/ironic that the team demanded an Old-Style statium.
And Yes, I did laugh at the bumber stickers that said "My Governor can beat up your Governor."
100 GB is great, but if it is the size of the original Lazer Disks, or LPs, that might prevent it from taking off as a desired medium.
Try this here there was a space.
Not ment to be a target for flames, but one of many things I did learn at my old job is this:
Microsoft Networking - It's broke it's broke it's broke it's broke it's broke it's broke it's broke...
We had a similar problem with our two offices and name resolution. We implemented WINS on both sides of the WAN and it still never quite worked right, until we switched everyone over to the new w2k domain that had WINS on both the PDC and BDC, and ran DHCP instead of static IPs. End result, it worked, usualy, and users liked having the new harware to support w2k pro.
Motorola has these as well and on the FRS radio web page (look at a manual such as the one for the 6320 on page 36,) they tell you both the RF frequency (page 35) and the code frequency, which is actualy a short audio tone. If your radio is set to "code 17" and some one else transmits, and they are also on "code 17" then your radio will filter out the tone that goes for a fraction of a second and then start listening. Take a scanner, scan the range of your FRS radio (462.5625 to 467.7125 Mhz if I remember) and set a code on your radio... you will hear a tone before your talking.
About the only thing that pops into my mind with this is the voltage of the PCMCIA sockets on your laptop and what the card draws. I know there are 5 volt and 3.3 volt cards and slots. Some cards I have seen are dual voltage, so it does not matter what the socket is. Check to see if the card you are using is a 3.3 only, and then see if you can track down the specks for your laptop's PCMCIA sockets and see if they are 5 volt. You may be burning out the card that can only take 5 volts for about two weeks.
Other than that, posibly look at getting a diffrent PCMCIA NIC. I use a netgear 410 10/100 NIC that Redhat 7.2 identified close enough to work on an old Fujitsu notebook on the first try. This is a cheep NIC that is decent overall and the only problem I have seen is breaking off the part that holds the pins on the dongle that goes into the card (the non-RJ-45 end.) This was in an office where there were 45 laptops using this model NIC.
Read on and see that HP has solved this at the printer....
I also delt with a HP 4500c at my old job. Besides needing to be vaccuumed out every month, and having the $170 immaging drum run out every 3-4 months, it did have the four toners, and a fifth extra big black only toner that ran a lot faster. The manual also said that if it was a b&w only page it went off the jumbo black toner, but if there was even a single pixle of color, it ran against all four color toners. (C,M,Y,& black).
Our other office had the 8500c, but there always seemed to be a reason it was not in use... needing parts, new pickup pads, damaged roller, no yellow toner available, paper jam.
Not to come across as a jerk, but for noise canceling headphones, I know that they work by creating an equal but opposite soundwave to essentualy cancle out the original noise. Why not look at using small ear-bud type headphones and (dispite looking like a freak) put on a pair of earmuffs like you use at a gun range. Some of the better ones (like Peletor) drop the noise by almost 30 db, which is 1/8 the original sound.
As for the sound proof closet, bad sceens from movied pop into my mind, but There are a few options, but all of them make it harder to keep the room cool if you have a half dozen computers in it. I know most THX certified movie theaters have a quick solution durring building them. Instead of one layer of sheet rock/drywall per each side of the stud, they use three per side. Gets spendy, but you when isolating 120 db from one theater and the ones next door, it works. Non smooth walls help too, like carpet, here again look at a movie theater wall. Heavy/thick drapes could also be installed or hung. I just thought of possibly building a cover box out of say two or three layers of sheet rock, adding a ventalation system to it, and putting it over the loud machine(s) in question. Imagine a cardbord box that is just put over the top of the computer, only it's two layers of sheet rock, 2x4's and a door with a hindge. Think of the old printer alcoves that were for the old dot matrix printers. They were lined with foam fingers to absorb the noise.
Also, there are a lot of low noise computer fans now available, and ways that you can silence the hardware, by adding weight to a noise producer like a hard drive. If you bold on a chunck of aluminum to a hard drive, you can change the vibration frequency on it, changing the pitch you hear, and possibly force it to an extreme you cannot hear.
Forgot to mention, I am in the Twin Cities area. Minneapolis, MN of America.
I pay Qwest $32 a month to run a 256k up and 640k down to my ISP who is Visi, who charges another $19.95 a month for their end, providing me the same to the internet. Kinda a VPN thing over Qwest's ATM's to VISI's. I do get a static IP though and they don't care what I run on it, (web, ftp, ssh, straming media,) as long as I don't harrass other users of the internet (ie DoS).
Life is good for the most part, I just hate seeing a $72 a month bill to Qwest for DSL connectivity, land line, and caller ID. But oh well... I also use my cell phone for all long distance. I love confusing AT&T, Sprint, and MCI telemarketers saying I do not have a PIC code on my line and I do not want a PIC code on my line.... You know what that is sir?....sorry for your time sir...
Just a bit of info that I have come up wiht in the past 3 months or so that I have been looking into this type of thing myself.
Cabela's (Outfitter for hunting and fishing) has a few options from Origon Scientific like a few other users have mentioned, and I have also see the ones by Davis like your link show. My first recogmendation is find out if they are looking to spend $20 or $700. Then find our what they want to see on it. Temp only or humdity, wind speed with direction, barometer, UV index, and rain fall? Then look into seeing how their home is setup. Can they use wired or should they go with wireless - most wireless transmits on 433Mhz +/- a bit. Not a concern for users of WIFI and whatnot, but might cause trouble with their garage remote system, but I have heard nothing of this sort yet.
I live in an apartment, and I for now and for the past 3 years have used a $20 indoor outdoor thermometer that Radio Shack sells that was designed for automobiles. Works fine, but only delivers the temp. It also has a backlight for early morning/late night viewing. (Helps me decide if it is worth going out to try to see a meteor shower or two this winter dispite all the light polution in the Twin Cities.) It does all I need for now, but when I get a house, I would love to get a wireless system that has wind speed and direction, as well as humidity. BTW, I think the newer version of the Radio Shack Auto thermometer has a "freezing alert" pico buzzer in it now. Might get anoying at times, like 3AM.
One warning about mounting remote sensors, keep them in the shade if they are temp sensors for the obvious reason. Most people forget that though when mounting them. Under a deck, or on the shaded side of the house (usualy the north side if you are north of the equator,) works better than the sunny side. Also remember that the remote transmitters will use and eat batteries unless you buy the solar kits with the rechargable packs on them. They get pricy though. Wires may be a pain, but they are cheeper. That and when it's 20 below and a windchill of 30 below, you will be happy not to have to go outside to change the batteries so you know how cold it is.
Also, check out Target and other discount stores. I have seen a few with remote sensors for under $100 there. Not the top of the line, but still, they give internal temp, humidity and barametric preasure, and I think I saw one with the same three measurement for outside.
Also remind them that they will not be walking around the house/apt. with the reciever after the first week as they will loose the novelty of it. There is no point, IMO, to spen $500+ on something that will be forgotten about in a few weeks. Also, I hate the concept of these programs for windows based computers, but lots of local TV stations will offer a "weather bug" that will sit on the systray and show the current temp outside at the TV station. Drawback, internet connection needed for updates, computer needs to be on, resources are consumed, and most have adds built in to offset the cost of the data feed bandwidth and the development of the program.
One minor point, 10/100BT can have power over ethernet (POE) but 1000BT cannot. It uses all four pair of the wires for the bandwidth. Try a two pair cross connect cable for 10/100BT and you are fine, but it will not work for 1000BT. You need all four pairs.
Continuing on this OT discussion thread...
This is not ment to be a troll to larien's post, but I read slashdot, ocassionaly post on slashdot, but have to disagree on your buisness verses nerds or geeks comment. I work for a buisness with sales people, who use Goldmine, and at my last job ACT. There was no linux in house, but my tinker box or two that I would kill 30 minutes or so a month when I needed some "me time," at my old job. (Former job was network admin, telcom admin, and helpdesk support.) My current job, we use win2k for the notebooks just because of compatability with clients emailing atachments. I know Staroffice and KDE's Koffice are better than ever, but still. We do use linus for all of our servers, and for our custom application. We also tried linux for the laptops/sales people befor I got here, but it was a headach for the reson stated above.
People like me would be the ones who see the need, and desire for Linux based CRM packages, and might have come across on our jobs. I unfortunalty however have not, but I will keep my eyes open for something.
On a side note, I however ma be classified as a crack-head for the ask slashdot I submitted a while back. Can we use graphic cards' extra power as a mini-computer under linux when not playing 3D games? Took 4 months and a second submission to get it shot down.
Three things come to mind with this topic.
The sceen from "Terminiator (1)" with the cop telling Sara Conner that Arnold was probably high on something when he put his hand through the window, didn't feel a thing, and probably broke every bone in his hand. Hello Crackhead Theafs - see car you like, take new pain pill, wait 30 minutes, punch in window, take car. Just think, no more going to jail for having a slim-jim on you, cause you don't need it anymore.
Ways of testing the mice. (Sorry but bad imagry comes to mind, like poking their feet or worse crushing their feet or other parts and seeing if they react.)
The third and desired way, helping people who are extra sensitive to pain or in cronic pain due to genetics or disease. I've seen an episode of the Scientific American Fontiers show on PBS about people who need to have their feet treated every 3-4 months with extra concentrated pepper extract paste, (many time stronger than any pepper spray,) to basicly over load the pain receptors in their feet, so they shut down for a while. For this and other things like in the artical, (cancer and whatnot,) I can see a true use.
Here are tow things I would recogmend. One, install a web access system like NetCensus and have a log given to the teacher showing the IP, the DHCP table, and the access attempts that went through, and did not go through. They can see "Bill" was trying to get to www.porn.com and "Susie" was trying to get to "www.web-based-email.com" when they should have been looking at the topic of discussion's web page.
Second, (although not probable,) install Carnivor or a clone of it. And lick out the results of interest such as email, and web surfing. If there is any thing that looks funny from a classroom standpoint, look further into it and mail a copy to the kid's parrents.
This however does leave the option of Solitair to be run on the computer, but if it's a WinX machine, you can not have it installed, and use Regedit or Poledit to restric the install feature of any software.
Clamping down a networked PC can be a pain, so the options are do or do not. You can always clamp down the web access a lot easier. Two access levels. Teacher and Student.
Unfortunalty, they are all expensive or just plane crazy. Buy (and be a jerk and return it when done) an IR heat camera. Or ask for a demo of one that you can hold onto for a week or so. Raytheon has an IR division, and they are the ones who make the IR Night Vision camera for Cadillac, but you cannot buy the camera alone, unless you are an auto manufacture. They have a lot more models as well that you can buy. Check out http://www.raytheoninfrared.com/html/prodmenu.htm for more info and what not. (Sorry no prices.)
Also, there is always the option of common sence while adding a bit of risk. I take no responsibilty for what you do with this info.
If your looking for hot spots on a solid metal case (no vet holes on the side you want to look at) try a spray bottel with water, and watch where it evaporates from first. Alcohaul would work too, and faster, but maybe too fast. Just remember water + electricty = bad things.
Try using your hand if it's safe and feel for warm spots verses other areas around it. Keep in mind, hot = pain, and flesh = conductor of electricity. If you want to stick your hand in the back of your TV and feel arround for hot spots, it's your life at risk, not mine.
Ask your local police department if they have a heat cam and if they would let you see your house through it. Often times they use them to look for "hot rooms" on homes in neighborhoods where they think there is a drug house growing things that they should not be. They may say yes, but they may also look closer at your house than you want. Hell, maybe Home Depot has them for rent now like an air hammer and a radial arm saw.
If you don't mind the mess, use wax, that melts at a temp just above the temp you want the thing to be at and spread some around. Cryans might work, or candels. Butter or Crisco also would work. I don't know their melting points, but butter has to be between 70 and 120 degrees F.
You may think I'm crazy, or on crack, but I am trying to help. Keep in mind, you never mentioned what you want to see the heat pattern on, whether house, car, ice fishing shack, custom electronic device, or something compleatly different. I hope this helps in some way.
I was sent to inventory some equipment at a company that my employer gave a few loans to. They were a VC and went under unfortunalty for them and my employer as they still had 1-3 years to go on the loans.
Long story shortened, to cover outstanding debts with creditors, like us, they had an auction run, and attracted a lot of people. Some stuff went dirt cheep, and some went way over the cost of buying it new. They had 15-20 E450 servers, a single 6500 server, and a 10,000 server among many other pricy toys I would just want to hold for a few minutes.
Check out auctioners and also some used resellers, but used resellers usualy let the Sun hardware go for a few bucks cheeper than new.
Also, consider the relationship with Sun if you want a support contract. If you buy it from Sun or a Sun dealer, Sun likes you. If you buy used, your requests are often put on the back burner, or so I've been told.
FYI, the Auction Co. was Paul E. Saperstine, and they can be found on the web at http://www.pesco.com/
I forget how old the system has been in place as I have never seen it, but I know a guy at a bank who has been working on the same credit card system software for his entire carere. It's been about 30-35 years now, which puts it at about 1966 to 1971, and writen in cobal.
IMO, this guy needs to get off his soap box and stop stating the obvious. He makes a lot of valid points, but he stopped just short of saying "comuters run on electricity, and you need to plug them in to use them." I'm amaized at the fact that this artical got published at CNET and that I actually read it. Hell, if I ran this post through a spell checker, I would only be a half step behind him.
I can now say "I got my thoughts published on the internet at a popular news sight." just like him.
At my past job, they also enforced the "IE is corperate standard" polocy. They however did allow employies to use other browsers if they wanted, but they would get no support from the help desk. It was a stratigy to lower opperating costs, or so they said. Ironicaly, you were not suppose to download/install any software without IT's approval, so you were SOL unless you had the power to say "I need this for this reason."
Also, more recently, I have run into a few things at my current job that have IE requiored, due to features built in to it. These are mainly features with Java and Orical DB stuff. Opera and Netscape would not run the Java we have in place at the time of implementaion.