I've been using mplayer for a long time now, and I am compelled to say: I haven't seen a media player that is nearly as useful as mplayer is, no matter what the platform. Mplayer is a killer app, and is a big motive for me to use Linux over other choices.
In my view, it is the Federal Government's responsibility to protect the privacy of citizens who make the conscious decision to not ever be sollicited by telemarketers while at home. I believe a federally - regulated do-not-call list with provisions for strong sanctions against offenders is the single, true, effective answer to a problem that has been plaguing our society for far too many decades.
This seems backward to me. If a government wanted to protect citizens from getting telemarketting calls, they should have an opt in list. Those who want to be bothered can add themselves to the list, and telemarketters should only be allowed to call those on the list.
> 1. driver support Linux users have become accustomed to checking for drivers before they buy the product... As you say though, support continues to improve.
> 2. Macromedia You say Zend is acceptable...
> 3. OE Check out Evolution (www.ximian.com).
> 4. Quicken Several business people have told me they'd dump MS-ware in their office if it wasn't for Quicken. Its too bad Intuit doesn't port it, but eventually GNUcash will mature enough that people can switch.
> 5. things not working as expected I've never used Windows as a primary OS, and this is one of the reasons why! The issue of usability is probably pretty subjective, but I can offer an anecdote: I presently support ~50 UNIX users and ~10 Win2k users. 80% of support calls are from the 10 Windows users, and it is usually MS software confusing them. Its mostly quirky error messages and weird work-arounds to get things to work they way they want, and of course interoperability issues due to the "embraced and extended" protocols, even between different versions of MS products. All of these people have been using Windows for years, too. New UNIX users often have a bunch of questions when they start, then I rarely hear from them again.
>(And as far as that goes, please recognize that "abuse of monopoly power" is translated as "whatever the judge and the political powers of the day consider as bad behavior on the part of a business," which is by definition somewhat unknown -- there was no law against Microsoft's practices until the judge decided that they were unfair.)
Thats BS; you're implying that their is no written anti-trust law. However, the trial that took place between the DoJ and MS was to discover whether MS was in breach of those laws. If your theory was true, the prosecutor's jobs would be much different, since they wouldn't be arguing that the accused broke laws.
> It works, it can talk TCP/IP, and it's not Micro$oft.
Thats funny. The release of BSD4.2 in 1984 included the TCP/IP suite of networking protocols -- many years before Linux was even invented. It works very well, you can be sure.
SuSE's eMail Server product looks like a viable alternative to Exchange. Unfortunately, their present offer requires installing SuSE (our infrastructure is based on Solaris and FreeBSD, and changing that would be quite painful). If enough people request a stand-alone version, then they will probably ship one.
I happen to be an administrator of a SunRay network, and can offer the following advice: if you decide to go with thin clients, don't cut any corners on your networking hardware. Get gigE, and quality switches. You want as much bandwidth as possible going into your server. A couple of users streaming video will cause everyone's thin-client workstation to slow down considerably, unless your pipes are wide enough to handle it.
>I can't really comment that much on Canada....can someone else fill in the gaps?
Canada is closer to the US than the UK in terms of consumer/corporate culture and resulting deminishing civil rights. For example, like the WTO protests in Seatle, APEC protesters in B.C. were also brutalized by authorities, who faced no consequences for it. Privacy laws are slowly and ineffectively poking around parliament, but no politicians dare interfere with the almighty corporate interests.
However, its closer to the UK in terms of current social policy. For example, education (including post-secondary) and health care, while not free, is heavily subsidized by the government. There is more government regulation in industry than in the US, but less than in the UK.
Some Canadians bitch about high taxes, others about lax privacy laws and social welfare policies. All in all, the country is very ideologically devided; it is no wonder that "national unity" and talks of separation are constantly central political issues.
I think that as a Canadian, it is much easier to travel than if you are an American. This may be due to our more friendly foriegn policy...
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I've been using mplayer for a long time now, and I am compelled to say: I haven't seen a media player that is nearly as useful as mplayer is, no matter what the platform. Mplayer is a killer app, and is a big motive for me to use Linux over other choices.
This seems backward to me. If a government wanted to protect citizens from getting telemarketting calls, they should have an opt in list. Those who want to be bothered can add themselves to the list, and telemarketters should only be allowed to call those on the list.
> 1. driver support
Linux users have become accustomed to checking for drivers before they buy the product... As you say though, support continues to improve.
> 2. Macromedia
You say Zend is acceptable...
> 3. OE
Check out Evolution (www.ximian.com).
> 4. Quicken
Several business people have told me they'd dump MS-ware in their office if it wasn't for Quicken. Its too bad Intuit doesn't port it, but eventually GNUcash will mature enough that people can switch.
> 5. things not working as expected
I've never used Windows as a primary OS, and this is one of the reasons why! The issue of usability is probably pretty subjective, but I can offer an anecdote: I presently support ~50 UNIX users and ~10 Win2k users. 80% of support calls are from the 10 Windows users, and it is usually MS software confusing them. Its mostly quirky error messages and weird work-arounds to get things to work they way they want, and of course interoperability issues due to the "embraced and extended" protocols, even between different versions of MS products. All of these people have been using Windows for years, too. New UNIX users often have a bunch of questions when they start, then I rarely hear from them again.
Cheers.
>(And as far as that goes, please recognize that "abuse of monopoly power" is translated as "whatever the judge and the political powers of the day consider as bad behavior on the part of a business," which is by definition somewhat unknown -- there was no law against Microsoft's practices until the judge decided that they were unfair.)
Thats BS; you're implying that their is no written anti-trust law. However, the trial that took place between the DoJ and MS was to discover whether MS was in breach of those laws. If your theory was true, the prosecutor's jobs would be much different, since they wouldn't be arguing that the accused broke laws.
> It works, it can talk TCP/IP, and it's not Micro$oft.
Thats funny. The release of BSD4.2 in 1984 included the TCP/IP suite of networking protocols -- many years before Linux was even invented. It works very well, you can be sure.
SuSE's eMail Server product looks like a viable alternative to Exchange. Unfortunately, their present offer requires installing SuSE (our infrastructure is based on Solaris and FreeBSD, and changing that would be quite painful). If enough people request a stand-alone version, then they will probably ship one.
This one relates the story of a government's thin client deployment in the state of florida:
I happen to be an administrator of a SunRay network, and can offer the following advice: if you decide to go with thin clients, don't cut any corners on your networking hardware. Get gigE, and quality switches. You want as much bandwidth as possible going into your server. A couple of users streaming video will cause everyone's thin-client workstation to slow down considerably, unless your pipes are wide enough to handle it.
Cheers
>I can't really comment that much on Canada....can someone else fill in the gaps?
Canada is closer to the US than the UK in terms of consumer/corporate culture and resulting deminishing civil rights. For example, like the WTO protests in Seatle, APEC protesters in B.C. were also brutalized by authorities, who faced no consequences for it. Privacy laws are slowly and ineffectively poking around parliament, but no politicians dare interfere with the almighty corporate interests.
However, its closer to the UK in terms of current social policy. For example, education (including post-secondary) and health care, while not free, is heavily subsidized by the government. There is more government regulation in industry than in the US, but less than in the UK.
Some Canadians bitch about high taxes, others about lax privacy laws and social welfare policies. All in all, the country is very ideologically devided; it is no wonder that "national unity" and talks of separation are constantly central political issues.
I think that as a Canadian, it is much easier to travel than if you are an American. This may be due to our more friendly foriegn policy...