Once IBM ported Linux so it runs on their "big iron" minis and mainframes, they became arguably the biggest deployers on Linux in the world, since IBM minis and mainframe are so widely used even today. It was this success that drove Sun to finally open up Solaris.
Actually, IBM spend a huge sum of money to port Linux to run on their minis and mainframe systems just after 2000, if I remember correctly. Among the first products ported to run under Linux was their DB2 database program, which immediately perked up interest from many users since DB2 is heavily used on high-end database applications.
I'm really surprised that the Obama Administration wants McNealy to write a position paper on using Open Source when it would have been far more appropriate to ask someone at IBM write such a position paper. After all, once IBM ported Linux to run on their "big iron" computing systems several years ago, people started taking this OS seriously.
Open Source is already big in government and large companies for one reason: IBM.
Remember several years ago when IBM ported Linux to run on their "big iron" minis and mainframes? As a result, IBM is pretty much one of the largest distributors of hardware that run Linux and software services heavily based on Linux.
In short, it took the enormous influence of IBM to convince people that running Linux is a good idea.
I would legally marijuana on the following conditions:
1) The government provides a clear warning that use of marijuana has serious health effects such as impairment of judgment and health effects similar what you get with smoking tobacco when you smoke marijuana.
2) Define a maximum legal level of THC in marijuana on a per gram basis.
3) Increase the severity of punishment on operating machinery while impaired by alcohol, certain legal over-the-counter and perscription medications, and the use of opium derivatives, cocaine and marijuana.
One important thing that President Obama did during the transition was put up the change.gov website. This allowed Americans to provide a lot of feedback on what needs to be done to revive the USA.
There's been some interesting stories over the past couple months about how many European countries have always considered themselves far more progressive in terms of race than the US, but are now being forced to realize that a minority citizen would never be elected to their highest offices.
I agree 100%. Descendants of the minorities that moved to the UK and France from their former colonies are nowhere close to getting high positions in government, to say the least. And the issue with soccer hooliganism in Europe has shown how shockingly racist some Europeans still are.
Well, at least we recognize someone who was a Harvard Law School graduate (we're talking arguably the most prestigious law school in the USA) and even edited the Harvard Law Review. That's a level of achievement everybody appreciates.
I think the idea of gay marriage will not be popular in Washington, DC because most of the world's major religions don't recognize such an idea and you don't want to rile up the religious community for all the WRONG reasons.
Now, a secular registered domestic partner idea (California already recognizes this in their state income tax laws) makes a lot more sense, since you mostly avoid the minefield of having to deal with religious authorities.
Well, it did really help that President Obama doesn't have the bad habit of droning on and on and on like former President Clinton did. I liked the inaugural speech--short and to the point.
(By the way, I also liked the new whitehouse.gov web site--they essentially took the coding and layout used for change.gov (one of the best-designed web sites I've seen in years) and moved it over.)
2) When you boot the first time, it launches a bare minimum web browser that sets up your Internet connection, whether through LAN, broadband modem or dial-up modem.
3) The minimum browser then brings up a list of software you want downloaded--web browser, media player, low-cost business software suite, etc. Once selected, it will download and install the software.
1) It has VASTLY better security even before you install all necessary security software.
2) Its interface does more than under Windows XP.
3) Unlike Windows Vista, Windows 7 won't bog down even if you have 1.5 to 2 GB of system memory. (Vista needed 3 GB of RAM before it hit its memory "sweet spot" in the 32-bit version.)
Actually, Microsoft heavily revamped the OS code in Windows 7 so it works well with even Netbook small laptops powered by the Intel Atom CPU.
As such, this means highly optimized x86 code, and the result is often substantial performance increases over Windows Vista on regular machines that use more powerful Intel and AMD CPU's.
That would be true in the past but with Ford coming out with the new Fiesta for the US market at the beginning of 2010 and a new Focus with more fuel-efficient engines by fall 2010, that benefit Ford as they will have a ready product line to take advantage of people buying more fuel-efficient cars.
Ford is working on a new technology called EcoBoost (essentially much-improved turbocharged engines) that will offer very good fuel economy without sacrificing power. Don't be surprised that Ford offers a 1.4-liter I-4 engine in turbocharged form for the next-generation Focus, which means around 140 bhp power but with excellent fuel economy.
If the EU wants to be consistent, they would have to require Apple to remove iTunes, Safari and iLife from every Mac delivered in Europe. That means you either have to download it or buy the software as a separate cost item.
In the end, I think what EU really wants is to strip down Windows 7 so it has the same functionality as the first release of Windows 95--you have to install the web browser, media player and possibly the fast disk search functionality separately.
Because Wal-Mart and Costco have MASSIVE buying power, they can keep prices low on any consumer electonic product and home video software product they sell. That means Best Buy cannot keep their prices high for long before they start losing customers to Wal-Mart and Costco.
Also, Best Buy has to compete against online retailers like Amazon.com, Buy.com, and Overstock.com, which also means Best Buy has to keep pricing reasonable to keep customers, too.
The other thing that killed Circuit City was the fact they never got their act together when it came to selling home video software. How could they compete against Best Buy's well-organized display of home videos (originally in VHS, now in DVD and increasingly Blu-ray formats). And don't forget the original DIVX format fiasco from the late 1990's, too.
I think they will confirm the existence of at least microbial life on Mars either with the Mars Science Laboratory rover that will arrive at Mars in 2011 or the ExoMars lander that will arrive at Mars in 2017. The latter finding it is much more likely, thanks to an extensive biosciences lab the lander will carry.
There's also this problem: Microsoft products are so entrenched that the cost of converting people to use an Open Source alternative in terms of re-writing software and re-training people to use it is going to be steeply expensive.
Open Source software makes more sense for computing environments where ease of use is less an issue, such as server machines. Why do you think IBM ported Linux to run on their "big iron" hardware?
The biggest problem that people forgot about the current financial mess are:
1) The current Federal income tax system encourages too much debt financing (with horrible results as we can all see now).
2) They kept the minimum margin requirement too low, which encourages too much stock and commodities futures speculation with its wild up and down price swings. If we had 20-25% minimum margin requirements the price of oil would not have shot up to US$148/barrel and crashed to circa US$39/barrel as of today.
I think Dvorak conveniently forgot that in American history, we've had some pretty serious financial scandals well before the invention of the computer spreadsheet.
Does anyone remember the Credit Mobilier scandal that nearly did in the Union Pacific Railroad in 1872? Or how the "robber barons" rigged the stock market to amass their monopoly power at the end of the 19th Century? Or how too-low minimum margin requirements in the 1920's caused the 1929 stock market crash? Sheesh.
Because the VC-25A has way lower takeoff and landing cycles and way more maintenance work done per flying hour than any commercial service 747, these planes are probably in vastly better mechanical condition than any 747 serviced and flown by a high-quality airline line Singapore Airlines or Cathay Pacific Airways.
As such, I see a more likely program being a rewing program (essentially installing the 747-400 wing complete with winglets) and replacing the original GE F103 engines with the GE GENx engines. This would allow the plane to cut fuel burn as much as 17-20% compared to the current model on very long flights, and it could mean the updated VC-25 could fly over 8,000 nautical miles (still air range) before needing refuelling.
In fact, the VC-25A's are kept in far better mechanical condition than any 747 ever in service, mostly because of lower takeoff and landing cycles (takeoffs and landings put a huge load of stress on an airframe) and the fact the VC-25A gets far more mechanical inspections and service than what even a good airline like Singapore Airlines and Cathay Pacific Airways does with their 747's.
A far more likely project would be to re-wing the VC-25A with essentially the 747-400 wing (including winglets) and replace the GE F103 (aka. GE CF6-80C2B1) engines with the GENx engine, both of which will substantially cut fuel consumption and may allow the VC-25A to fly over 8,000 nautical miles (still air range) unrefuelled.
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You're wrong on this.
Once IBM ported Linux so it runs on their "big iron" minis and mainframes, they became arguably the biggest deployers on Linux in the world, since IBM minis and mainframe are so widely used even today. It was this success that drove Sun to finally open up Solaris.
Actually, IBM spend a huge sum of money to port Linux to run on their minis and mainframe systems just after 2000, if I remember correctly. Among the first products ported to run under Linux was their DB2 database program, which immediately perked up interest from many users since DB2 is heavily used on high-end database applications.
I'm really surprised that the Obama Administration wants McNealy to write a position paper on using Open Source when it would have been far more appropriate to ask someone at IBM write such a position paper. After all, once IBM ported Linux to run on their "big iron" computing systems several years ago, people started taking this OS seriously.
Open Source is already big in government and large companies for one reason: IBM.
Remember several years ago when IBM ported Linux to run on their "big iron" minis and mainframes? As a result, IBM is pretty much one of the largest distributors of hardware that run Linux and software services heavily based on Linux.
In short, it took the enormous influence of IBM to convince people that running Linux is a good idea.
I would legally marijuana on the following conditions:
1) The government provides a clear warning that use of marijuana has serious health effects such as impairment of judgment and health effects similar what you get with smoking tobacco when you smoke marijuana.
2) Define a maximum legal level of THC in marijuana on a per gram basis.
3) Increase the severity of punishment on operating machinery while impaired by alcohol, certain legal over-the-counter and perscription medications, and the use of opium derivatives, cocaine and marijuana.
One important thing that President Obama did during the transition was put up the change.gov website. This allowed Americans to provide a lot of feedback on what needs to be done to revive the USA.
You mean an actually decent speechwriter. That speech reminded me a lot of what Martin Luther King would say in his better speeches.
There's been some interesting stories over the past couple months about how many European countries have always considered themselves far more progressive in terms of race than the US, but are now being forced to realize that a minority citizen would never be elected to their highest offices.
I agree 100%. Descendants of the minorities that moved to the UK and France from their former colonies are nowhere close to getting high positions in government, to say the least. And the issue with soccer hooliganism in Europe has shown how shockingly racist some Europeans still are.
Well, at least we recognize someone who was a Harvard Law School graduate (we're talking arguably the most prestigious law school in the USA) and even edited the Harvard Law Review. That's a level of achievement everybody appreciates.
I think the idea of gay marriage will not be popular in Washington, DC because most of the world's major religions don't recognize such an idea and you don't want to rile up the religious community for all the WRONG reasons.
Now, a secular registered domestic partner idea (California already recognizes this in their state income tax laws) makes a lot more sense, since you mostly avoid the minefield of having to deal with religious authorities.
Well, it did really help that President Obama doesn't have the bad habit of droning on and on and on like former President Clinton did. I liked the inaugural speech--short and to the point.
(By the way, I also liked the new whitehouse.gov web site--they essentially took the coding and layout used for change.gov (one of the best-designed web sites I've seen in years) and moved it over.)
I think one way it can be done is this:
1) You buy a machine loaded with Windows 7.
2) When you boot the first time, it launches a bare minimum web browser that sets up your Internet connection, whether through LAN, broadband modem or dial-up modem.
3) The minimum browser then brings up a list of software you want downloaded--web browser, media player, low-cost business software suite, etc. Once selected, it will download and install the software.
A number of reasons:
1) It has VASTLY better security even before you install all necessary security software.
2) Its interface does more than under Windows XP.
3) Unlike Windows Vista, Windows 7 won't bog down even if you have 1.5 to 2 GB of system memory. (Vista needed 3 GB of RAM before it hit its memory "sweet spot" in the 32-bit version.)
Actually, Microsoft heavily revamped the OS code in Windows 7 so it works well with even Netbook small laptops powered by the Intel Atom CPU.
As such, this means highly optimized x86 code, and the result is often substantial performance increases over Windows Vista on regular machines that use more powerful Intel and AMD CPU's.
That would be true in the past but with Ford coming out with the new Fiesta for the US market at the beginning of 2010 and a new Focus with more fuel-efficient engines by fall 2010, that benefit Ford as they will have a ready product line to take advantage of people buying more fuel-efficient cars.
Ford is working on a new technology called EcoBoost (essentially much-improved turbocharged engines) that will offer very good fuel economy without sacrificing power. Don't be surprised that Ford offers a 1.4-liter I-4 engine in turbocharged form for the next-generation Focus, which means around 140 bhp power but with excellent fuel economy.
If the EU wants to be consistent, they would have to require Apple to remove iTunes, Safari and iLife from every Mac delivered in Europe. That means you either have to download it or buy the software as a separate cost item.
In the end, I think what EU really wants is to strip down Windows 7 so it has the same functionality as the first release of Windows 95--you have to install the web browser, media player and possibly the fast disk search functionality separately.
Small wonder why the iTunes Music Store and the Amazon MP3 download store are doing so well nowadays.
Wal-Mart and Costco.
Because Wal-Mart and Costco have MASSIVE buying power, they can keep prices low on any consumer electonic product and home video software product they sell. That means Best Buy cannot keep their prices high for long before they start losing customers to Wal-Mart and Costco.
Also, Best Buy has to compete against online retailers like Amazon.com, Buy.com, and Overstock.com, which also means Best Buy has to keep pricing reasonable to keep customers, too.
The other thing that killed Circuit City was the fact they never got their act together when it came to selling home video software. How could they compete against Best Buy's well-organized display of home videos (originally in VHS, now in DVD and increasingly Blu-ray formats). And don't forget the original DIVX format fiasco from the late 1990's, too.
I think they will confirm the existence of at least microbial life on Mars either with the Mars Science Laboratory rover that will arrive at Mars in 2011 or the ExoMars lander that will arrive at Mars in 2017. The latter finding it is much more likely, thanks to an extensive biosciences lab the lander will carry.
There's also this problem: Microsoft products are so entrenched that the cost of converting people to use an Open Source alternative in terms of re-writing software and re-training people to use it is going to be steeply expensive.
Open Source software makes more sense for computing environments where ease of use is less an issue, such as server machines. Why do you think IBM ported Linux to run on their "big iron" hardware?
The biggest problem that people forgot about the current financial mess are:
1) The current Federal income tax system encourages too much debt financing (with horrible results as we can all see now).
2) They kept the minimum margin requirement too low, which encourages too much stock and commodities futures speculation with its wild up and down price swings. If we had 20-25% minimum margin requirements the price of oil would not have shot up to US$148/barrel and crashed to circa US$39/barrel as of today.
I think Dvorak conveniently forgot that in American history, we've had some pretty serious financial scandals well before the invention of the computer spreadsheet.
Does anyone remember the Credit Mobilier scandal that nearly did in the Union Pacific Railroad in 1872? Or how the "robber barons" rigged the stock market to amass their monopoly power at the end of the 19th Century? Or how too-low minimum margin requirements in the 1920's caused the 1929 stock market crash? Sheesh.
Because the VC-25A has way lower takeoff and landing cycles and way more maintenance work done per flying hour than any commercial service 747, these planes are probably in vastly better mechanical condition than any 747 serviced and flown by a high-quality airline line Singapore Airlines or Cathay Pacific Airways.
As such, I see a more likely program being a rewing program (essentially installing the 747-400 wing complete with winglets) and replacing the original GE F103 engines with the GE GENx engines. This would allow the plane to cut fuel burn as much as 17-20% compared to the current model on very long flights, and it could mean the updated VC-25 could fly over 8,000 nautical miles (still air range) before needing refuelling.
In fact, the VC-25A's are kept in far better mechanical condition than any 747 ever in service, mostly because of lower takeoff and landing cycles (takeoffs and landings put a huge load of stress on an airframe) and the fact the VC-25A gets far more mechanical inspections and service than what even a good airline like Singapore Airlines and Cathay Pacific Airways does with their 747's.
A far more likely project would be to re-wing the VC-25A with essentially the 747-400 wing (including winglets) and replace the GE F103 (aka. GE CF6-80C2B1) engines with the GENx engine, both of which will substantially cut fuel consumption and may allow the VC-25A to fly over 8,000 nautical miles (still air range) unrefuelled.