When those ads starting getting out of control, I just position my fingers over Control-W and start banging away until all the annoying windows are closed.
IMO the *most* annoying thing about popups (aside from their very existence) is that they take focus away from the actual page. When I shop at Amazon (I know, shoot me now) I often get three or four letters in the search box before the pop-up code executes, and then that pop-up window steals the remaining keystrokes -- annoying as all hell.
Yeah, that's like the old joke: "drinking milk causes death." How? Because all newborn babies drink milk (or formula). And everyone dies eventually. In other words, there is a perfect correlation between milk consumption and death! Must be that milk consumption causes death!! Haha.
Adding 50 and 50 may not be a great example, but I really believe that people should be able to do some basic math in their head simply because it improves their ability to understand the world. Being able to handle percentages in particular strikes me as important, because they occur in so many everyday scenarios. What does it mean if that shirt is 20% off the marked price? What does it mean if a presidential candidate was elected by 26% of registered voters? What does it mean if the rate of inflation is 2% and your certificate of deposit pays 3.5%?
...the job to be done is properly defined. It probably has to include maintenance, provision for the programmer's leaving the company, and so on. In other words, it's more than just performing the task at hand, it's the long-term objective that the tool you're creating is trying to achieve.
Don't forget credit cards. A while back I got a solicitation for a "titanium" credit card. I guess they decided that with everyone giving away platinum cards, they needed a more exotic-sounding metal. It's too bad I know that titanium is actually much less exotic and expensive than platinum or whatever.
Now if it had been a rhodium or palladium Visa card, I might've thought of it differently...
Note that the story says it is the first of a series on 64-bit processors. I assume IA-64/Itanium was first because it is the one most likely to show up on mere mortals' desktops a few years from now...
but in the case of HIV, for example, those variants are known to appear at a strinkingly high rate as a result of mutations. Any population will naturally include variants with unusual traits, but those variants do also change over time, and new ones come into being. Read this.
You're not entitled to anything if you volunteer information. You're not an employee (not even an independent contractor) unless an individual or company explicitly agrees to compensate you for your services.
If you think you're wasting your time and not getting anything in return for it (better-quality software, or the satisfaction of helping other people also affected by the bug), then don't do it!
It's not just the folks behind Sysadmin, it's been folded into Sysadmin. And I was disappointed with the resulting magazine, at least what I've seen of it so far. It just didn't seem to have the depth and quality of the old TPJ. In fact, my sub is now up for renewal, and I decided not to spend the money for another year -- even though I'm not at all a penny-pincher and subscribe to *lots* of magazines and for-fee services. I just didn't see it providing any real value in its current form.
Assuming 80GB drives each drawing 40 watts of power, and electricity rates at $0.20/kWh, you're looking at an annual power cost of less than $1 per gigabyte of spinning disk storage. That hardly accounts for the difference.
mine explicitly covers damage from "airplanes, including self-propelled missiles and spacecraft." (There's an exception for nuclear weapons detonation, but that wouldn't seem to apply in this case.)
Yeah, there's actually some ad for the BBC that shows up in magazines here that says something like this:
Shag
Bollocks
Wanker
...
Find out what they mean before the American censors do.
It's funny how many posters are saying things like "Hey, why shred old documents or delete old e-mail if you have nothing to hide?" Which, IMO, is about as valid as the argument "Why use encryption if you have nothing to hide?" Of course, suggest outlawing or controlling encryption and slashdotters would (rightfully) be up in arms.
Even if you and everyone who works for your company is a Good Guy, there are still reasons you may want to destroy older documents that you're not legally required to keep. You might have an unscrupulous customer or competitor or even employee who decides it would be fun to sue you for some crap. Guess what: Suddenly every e-mail written inside the company, ever, is on display for everyone to see. And those things can be taken out of context. The kind of hyped language that, say, sales guys like to use can easily be interpreted the wrong way. Maybe somebody sends out an e-mail that says "I want you all to do whatever it takes to beat the competition and sell this customer! I mean it, no limits, whatever it takes!" Now, maybe that is evidence that the e-mail writer is condoning corrupt and/or illegal activities. Or maybe it's just typical motivational rah-rah. But your opponent's lawyers would probably have lots of fun with it.
That's just one dumb example, but my point is this: Just because you and your company have righteousness on your side doesn't mean your lives can't be made miserable.
Anyone have a recent copy of the big orange that can check?
I have the 1982 edition, which states:
14.2 It is often an open question whether or not periods should be used with particular abbreviations. The trend is now strongly away from the use of periods with all kinds of abbreviations that have carried them in the past. In our view this is to the good: anything that reduces the fussiness of typography makes for easier reading.
14.15 Both in run of text (preferably after one spelled-out use) and in tabular matter, notes, etc., the names of government agencies, network broadcasting companies, associations, fraternal and service organizations, unions, and other groups are often abbreviated. Such abbreviations are usually set in full caps with no periods[.]
However, IIRC, the New York Times is a holdout in this regard and still uses periods in most acronyms. Of course, the Times is stylistically very conservative; I believe it was only a few years ago that the Times stopped spelling government (when referring to the federal government as an entity) with a capital G. I could never decide if that was out of some sort of Teutonic complex or because the Times simply had a predilection for Big Government with a literal Big G;-)
A work in the public domain can be copied freely by anyone. Such works include those of the U.S. Government and works for which the copyright has expired.
There's a long article (which unfortunately is not available online) discussing experiments like these and coming to the conclusion that the vast majority of people value "fairness" over material success in this particular case. I was particularly fascinated by the experiment known as the Ultimatium Game; the article says that only 4% of people, IIRC, choose what the mathematically most beneficial solution. (In other words, in 96% of cases people would choose the "fair" outcome over one that was objectively better for BOTH participants.) Worth checking out if you are interested in this kind of thing.
OK, it's been a couple years since I lived back east and checked in with friends in New Jersey, but for a while (in the recent past) NJ drivers licenses had NO photograph on them. This actually tended to cause anxiety for friends who had to use them as proof of age in, say, bars outside of the area, because bouncers would not believe that a state would actually issue photo-less IDs.
Kind of a useless bit of information, but isn't that what Slashdot is all about?;-)
it is common usage in the magazine-publishing business (at least with tech products, which is what I'm familiar with) to talk about embargo date as being the NDA release date or the date on which information provided in an advance press release can be disclosed to the public.
Put aside your pride (and concerns about feeding your family) for a moment and try to take an objective look at the situation, the players, and what might be going on behind the scenes. Based on your description, it sounds like there's something very strange happening here.
You say your boss likes you, but your boss also tells you that the IT director wants to get rid of you? That's weird -- the IT director is going to get rid of a valuable employee over his immediate boss's objections? What could be causing that? Maybe your boss is not being completely honest with you (could it be that he wants to get rid of you and shift the blame to someone else so he can save himself some guilt when it comes time to fire you?). I'm not saying that's the case, since I don't know the circumstances, but I think you need to consider what may really be happening vs. what people are telling you.
You also say "everywhere I work...as soon as they learn my age they automatically hate me." That's really odd. I can understand some level of jealousy, and even one or two companies that are full of bozos who dislike young whippersnappers like you, but if you are finding this in a variety of different work environments then there may be something else going on. If you are really performing and able to work with people, most companies wouldn't care about your age. Since you are basically saying that your age is ALWAYS a problem, I think you have to ask whether your age -- or more precisely your attitude, level of maturity, or other things that come with your age -- REALLY IS a problem. (I don't say this to be cruel; I was also a precocious kid, was managing six people by age 23, etc; this is my perspective as a now-30-something who knows he made plenty of stupid mistakes in his youth.)
Two suggestions. First, start by making a really candid assessment of the situation, starting with your own behavior. What could you have been doing that would lose you points with your boss, your boss's boss, your coworkers, or other people in the company instead of winning points? Could it be that you make them feel dumb? (There's sometimes a fine line between helping people out and being an obnoxious know-it-all.) Could it be that you don't behave in a "professional" manner? Could you be really full of yourself? (There's a big difference between telling people your age and flaunting it.) Could it be that you actually made decisions, or advocate positions, that are bad for the company? (In my experience, this is a common one among young people who are very smart but lack business wisdom -- they may get all up in arms because they're convinced they have the Right Answer about some technical issue, but they fail to consider the larger business concerns.)
Second, take pre-emptive action. If you think you might get fired, you need to be ready with an alternative. Polish up your resume, get in touch with old contacts who might know where you could find a new position (referrals are always much better than answering random want ads or Monster postings), etc. But be careful not to neglect your responsibilities in the meantime -- you want to be a model employee. And DO NOT talk about this with anyone other than your immediate boss! Being a chatterbox will only reinforce any image of you as immature.
Personally I wouldn't suggest legal recourse, because I doubt you'll really get anywhere with it. There's not a whole lot of precedent I'm aware of (IANAL, of course) for "reverse" age discrimination, and furthermore, actually proving that's what led to your firing (should it come to that) might be really difficult. It certainly won't exactly be something you'll want to brag about to your next employer.
Real nearsightedness is myopia, caused basically by an incorrectly shaped eyeball.
You probably experienced presbyopia, which is the gradual loss of flexibility in your lenses, thus making near items harder to focus on. This is a normal process that occurs with age.
Admittedly, looking at a monitor all day long can cause eyestrain, especially if you tend toward hyperopia (farsightedness) to begin with. That's my problem: While I can see all right at distances of a couple feet from my face and beyond, my eye muscles have to strain constantly, even when I'm focused at infinity, and working on a computer screen all day every day makes the strain get really bad if I'm not wearing my glasses.
That doesn't make any sense to me. As a W2 employee, your employer pays half of the FICA (Social Security) and Medicare taxes, whereas as a sole proprietor you pay both sides yourself. The difference is >7% (in favor of being a W2 employee) for that alone. On the other hand, you may not have as many options as far as deductibility of equipment and whatnot...
Slashdot Mirror
IMO the *most* annoying thing about popups (aside from their very existence) is that they take focus away from the actual page. When I shop at Amazon (I know, shoot me now) I often get three or four letters in the search box before the pop-up code executes, and then that pop-up window steals the remaining keystrokes -- annoying as all hell.
Yeah, that's like the old joke: "drinking milk causes death." How? Because all newborn babies drink milk (or formula). And everyone dies eventually. In other words, there is a perfect correlation between milk consumption and death! Must be that milk consumption causes death!! Haha.
Adding 50 and 50 may not be a great example, but I really believe that people should be able to do some basic math in their head simply because it improves their ability to understand the world. Being able to handle percentages in particular strikes me as important, because they occur in so many everyday scenarios. What does it mean if that shirt is 20% off the marked price? What does it mean if a presidential candidate was elected by 26% of registered voters? What does it mean if the rate of inflation is 2% and your certificate of deposit pays 3.5%?
...the job to be done is properly defined. It probably has to include maintenance, provision for the programmer's leaving the company, and so on. In other words, it's more than just performing the task at hand, it's the long-term objective that the tool you're creating is trying to achieve.
Now if it had been a rhodium or palladium Visa card, I might've thought of it differently...
Note that the story says it is the first of a series on 64-bit processors. I assume IA-64/Itanium was first because it is the one most likely to show up on mere mortals' desktops a few years from now...
but in the case of HIV, for example, those variants are known to appear at a strinkingly high rate as a result of mutations. Any population will naturally include variants with unusual traits, but those variants do also change over time, and new ones come into being. Read this.
the contest rules say it's open to non-US citizens as long as the descriptions are in English.
If you think you're wasting your time and not getting anything in return for it (better-quality software, or the satisfaction of helping other people also affected by the bug), then don't do it!
It's not just the folks behind Sysadmin, it's been folded into Sysadmin. And I was disappointed with the resulting magazine, at least what I've seen of it so far. It just didn't seem to have the depth and quality of the old TPJ. In fact, my sub is now up for renewal, and I decided not to spend the money for another year -- even though I'm not at all a penny-pincher and subscribe to *lots* of magazines and for-fee services. I just didn't see it providing any real value in its current form.
Assuming 80GB drives each drawing 40 watts of power, and electricity rates at $0.20/kWh, you're looking at an annual power cost of less than $1 per gigabyte of spinning disk storage. That hardly accounts for the difference.
mine explicitly covers damage from "airplanes, including self-propelled missiles and spacecraft." (There's an exception for nuclear weapons detonation, but that wouldn't seem to apply in this case.)
5. Aircraft, including self-propelled missiles and spacecraft.
Who knows, maybe my insurance company would go after the spacecraft designers/operators/whoever -- or, more likely, after their insurance agency.
Yeah, there's actually some ad for the BBC that shows up in magazines here that says something like this:
...
Shag
Bollocks
Wanker
Find out what they mean before the American censors do.
Even if you and everyone who works for your company is a Good Guy, there are still reasons you may want to destroy older documents that you're not legally required to keep. You might have an unscrupulous customer or competitor or even employee who decides it would be fun to sue you for some crap. Guess what: Suddenly every e-mail written inside the company, ever, is on display for everyone to see. And those things can be taken out of context. The kind of hyped language that, say, sales guys like to use can easily be interpreted the wrong way. Maybe somebody sends out an e-mail that says "I want you all to do whatever it takes to beat the competition and sell this customer! I mean it, no limits, whatever it takes!" Now, maybe that is evidence that the e-mail writer is condoning corrupt and/or illegal activities. Or maybe it's just typical motivational rah-rah. But your opponent's lawyers would probably have lots of fun with it.
That's just one dumb example, but my point is this: Just because you and your company have righteousness on your side doesn't mean your lives can't be made miserable.
I have the 1982 edition, which states:
14.2 It is often an open question whether or not periods should be used with particular abbreviations. The trend is now strongly away from the use of periods with all kinds of abbreviations that have carried them in the past. In our view this is to the good: anything that reduces the fussiness of typography makes for easier reading.
14.15 Both in run of text (preferably after one spelled-out use) and in tabular matter, notes, etc., the names of government agencies, network broadcasting companies, associations, fraternal and service organizations, unions, and other groups are often abbreviated. Such abbreviations are usually set in full caps with no periods[.]
However, IIRC, the New York Times is a holdout in this regard and still uses periods in most acronyms. Of course, the Times is stylistically very conservative; I believe it was only a few years ago that the Times stopped spelling government (when referring to the federal government as an entity) with a capital G. I could never decide if that was out of some sort of Teutonic complex or because the Times simply had a predilection for Big Government with a literal Big G ;-)
A work in the public domain can be copied freely by anyone. Such works include those of the U.S. Government and works for which the copyright has expired.
http://fairuse.stanford.edu/library/faq.html
but not posted on their site. You have to pick up the hardcopy...
There's a long article (which unfortunately is not available online) discussing experiments like these and coming to the conclusion that the vast majority of people value "fairness" over material success in this particular case. I was particularly fascinated by the experiment known as the Ultimatium Game; the article says that only 4% of people, IIRC, choose what the mathematically most beneficial solution. (In other words, in 96% of cases people would choose the "fair" outcome over one that was objectively better for BOTH participants.) Worth checking out if you are interested in this kind of thing.
Kind of a useless bit of information, but isn't that what Slashdot is all about? ;-)
it is common usage in the magazine-publishing business (at least with tech products, which is what I'm familiar with) to talk about embargo date as being the NDA release date or the date on which information provided in an advance press release can be disclosed to the public.
You say your boss likes you, but your boss also tells you that the IT director wants to get rid of you? That's weird -- the IT director is going to get rid of a valuable employee over his immediate boss's objections? What could be causing that? Maybe your boss is not being completely honest with you (could it be that he wants to get rid of you and shift the blame to someone else so he can save himself some guilt when it comes time to fire you?). I'm not saying that's the case, since I don't know the circumstances, but I think you need to consider what may really be happening vs. what people are telling you.
You also say "everywhere I work...as soon as they learn my age they automatically hate me." That's really odd. I can understand some level of jealousy, and even one or two companies that are full of bozos who dislike young whippersnappers like you, but if you are finding this in a variety of different work environments then there may be something else going on. If you are really performing and able to work with people, most companies wouldn't care about your age. Since you are basically saying that your age is ALWAYS a problem, I think you have to ask whether your age -- or more precisely your attitude, level of maturity, or other things that come with your age -- REALLY IS a problem. (I don't say this to be cruel; I was also a precocious kid, was managing six people by age 23, etc; this is my perspective as a now-30-something who knows he made plenty of stupid mistakes in his youth.)
Two suggestions. First, start by making a really candid assessment of the situation, starting with your own behavior. What could you have been doing that would lose you points with your boss, your boss's boss, your coworkers, or other people in the company instead of winning points? Could it be that you make them feel dumb? (There's sometimes a fine line between helping people out and being an obnoxious know-it-all.) Could it be that you don't behave in a "professional" manner? Could you be really full of yourself? (There's a big difference between telling people your age and flaunting it.) Could it be that you actually made decisions, or advocate positions, that are bad for the company? (In my experience, this is a common one among young people who are very smart but lack business wisdom -- they may get all up in arms because they're convinced they have the Right Answer about some technical issue, but they fail to consider the larger business concerns.)
Second, take pre-emptive action. If you think you might get fired, you need to be ready with an alternative. Polish up your resume, get in touch with old contacts who might know where you could find a new position (referrals are always much better than answering random want ads or Monster postings), etc. But be careful not to neglect your responsibilities in the meantime -- you want to be a model employee. And DO NOT talk about this with anyone other than your immediate boss! Being a chatterbox will only reinforce any image of you as immature.
Personally I wouldn't suggest legal recourse, because I doubt you'll really get anywhere with it. There's not a whole lot of precedent I'm aware of (IANAL, of course) for "reverse" age discrimination, and furthermore, actually proving that's what led to your firing (should it come to that) might be really difficult. It certainly won't exactly be something you'll want to brag about to your next employer.
Good luck.
You probably experienced presbyopia, which is the gradual loss of flexibility in your lenses, thus making near items harder to focus on. This is a normal process that occurs with age.
Admittedly, looking at a monitor all day long can cause eyestrain, especially if you tend toward hyperopia (farsightedness) to begin with. That's my problem: While I can see all right at distances of a couple feet from my face and beyond, my eye muscles have to strain constantly, even when I'm focused at infinity, and working on a computer screen all day every day makes the strain get really bad if I'm not wearing my glasses.
That doesn't make any sense to me. As a W2 employee, your employer pays half of the FICA (Social Security) and Medicare taxes, whereas as a sole proprietor you pay both sides yourself. The difference is >7% (in favor of being a W2 employee) for that alone. On the other hand, you may not have as many options as far as deductibility of equipment and whatnot...
I can see artifacts in my standard digital cable signal anyway. For me, TiVo doesn't seem to make things any worse than they already are.