I caught a show on TLC once about e-commerce fraud and other computer security issue.
One guy on the show (some FBI e-security expert) mentionned a very interesting fact: E-commerce is not new. The only thing "new" about it is the fact that you do it from the comfort of your own home.
He said that most people dont even realize that when they withdraw money off the ATM, or pay at the restaurant via credit or debit card, they're in fact using "e-commerce". The only difference being that the banking networks are a bit more private. (Even that is changing, since more and more banks are using VPN's with strong crypto.)
The other thing worth of mention from that show was that we're only seeing the tip of the iceberg. Banks and other institution involved in e-commerce are reluctant to sound the alarm when it comes to fraud. They dont want to scare the average joe. This helps the criminal, since the other institution are not warned when a new hole arise. If they would sound the alarm loud and fast, everyone else could patch up.
This is since the last os update, when I also installed some new hardware (hey, even linux guys have to reboot on kernel patches!)
That's until I can interest someone in coding some userfriendly "on-the-fly" kernel patch.
I mean, Tandem (now Compaq Non-stop whatever) does this. You can install a new os rev. without even coming so close as interupting service on the machine. Now, how hard could it be to implement this on your run-of-the-mill Linux ? (Granted. very hard, but possible.)
I guess if that particular itch raises it's ugly head, some Alan, Linus or other will scratch it badly...
I can see it already "Uptime: 4 years, 364 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes, 59 seconds
I know a lot of NPO's that have more then 15 computers. Granted, there are a lot more that dont even have one computer. Take some org like UNICEF, The Red Cross. These guys have networks that would make any decent sysadmin drool all over himself.
OTOH, I have a sister that works for a smaller NPO, and they have a +- 20 computer office.
They budget for maintenance on them, and dont let them grow old. That covers most problems.
Personally, I'd be willing to donate my time to maintain such a network. If I could deduct my time as a "donation" to charity, I'd be even more inclined to do so. Being that my average consultancy rate is around 85$ / hour (yes, I know, I'm cheap.), 2 hours/week @ 85$ = 170$ * 52 weeks = 8840$ tax break (give or take a little.).
This way, everybody wins. They get "free" support, you get tax relief, and someone in the end (in my sister's case, a whole lotta kids) get free services.
If this does not exist, it should. Anyone up for "sysadminforpeace.org" ? =)
Now, that's news for nerds and stuff that matters.
1st, congratulations to both parents.
Now, for the questions:
1- Is the baby going to be open sourced ?
2- Is this going to delay the release of 2.4 ?
3- I'd like me a beowulf cluster of these...
Mod me down if you must, but I at least made myself chuckle writing this one.
If you dont mind having a couple of months of freezing temperature a year, Montreal's the place to be.
Overall, it's a safe city, got a great nightlife, cost of housing is ridiculous compared to US, we got broadband all over the place, a few decent sushi places, and most everything California has to offer, minus the smog, pollution, skin cancer and other small irritants.
Salaries are not as high, but then again, cost of living is low low low. You can get a house for 50K$ Canadian (that's 25K for you USAian.), and the most I had to commute for (and It's a 25 mile drive) is 25 minutes.
Plus the ladies are gorgeous... It's got everything.
Luckily for us, we got winter keeping you crazy dot commers out.
Since cable has a limit of 6GB/month around here through Videotron, this is the best option I can get.
DISCLAIMER: I kind of work for a wholly owned subsidiary of Videotron Ltd. Therefore, I get it better then all of you since I get all for free. I might be biased.
There's a cap on your uplink. There is also a bandwidth quota. Believe me. If they see you regularly go over 6-7GB down a month, they'll bill you (read your TOS), or suggest you upgrade to their 400$ Business DSL solution.
Also, I've ordered a DSL from Sympatico the week they became available. I pitted it against my cable modem, and they do not compare. My cable was always 30-40% faster then the DSL line. Even now, they put some uplink caps on to quash warez servers (But I still get more then enough bandwidth for X over SSH), it remains faster then DSL.
Sidenote: The cable network is now switched at the end, so you really are alone on the net.
I can just picture the two agents in their office:
A1: Damn... This slashdot crowd is really getting on our case now. We've had a million hit in just a few hours.
A2: Fear not. I'll just image this drive, and we'll give him back the laptop. That'll give the bureau some good free PR. ...Imaging and a week later, Dillinger gets his laptop back.
A1: Lookie here... A gigabyte of MP3's. Pass me that CD list of the CD we seized...
A2: Right. He doesnt own any Hootie and the Blowfish CD's, but he has a collection of them.
A1: What about this porn right here ? (clickety click, porn gets emailed to innocent hotmail account belonging to A1.)
A2: Ok. Now we got the Slashdot crowd off our back. Let's just figure out a way to bust this poor guy big time. Did you make sure you stuck that kiddie porn on his laptop when you gave it back ?
A1: Yeah. Threw a couple of conspiratory documents on there too.
A2: Let's flip for who calls the judge. We need that warrant. Got the number of that judge we caught with kiddie porn last month ?
50 bucks last me about a week and a half. And that's strictly business.
What I can recommend is Fido (with the US equivalent being Omnis I think. At least that's what my Fido registers on when I cross the border.)
They're digital, they're Nokia's and I like it. You even have an analog module option. Just stick it under the battery, and you're in business. Other important thing: No roaming fee, and all your outgoing calls are local to the area you're in. You got an Alaskian phone, you're in NYC, dial an NYC number, and it's local.
Up here, you get 400 minutes for 40$ CDN, and if you dont use it all, it rolls over to the next month. They have pay-as-you-go, and also 200,300,400,600,700,800,1000 minutes plan.
Throwing a ball or being in a pre-IPO company like Netscape as a coder isn't anything special. It's all luck and being in the right place at the right time to get the payoff.
Would you have gone to work for a company in it's very early beginning if someone told you : "Well. We can't really pay you this week, instead we'll give you some stock options...".
I'm a dad, and I have to feed my family. Kids dont grow all that well when fed with stock options. Clothes dont get purchased. The sheer stress of not having a steady income can ruin the best of couples.
These guys were not just "lucky". It's a very calculated risk to go work for a Pre-IPO outfit. You can end up wealthy, but you can also end up on the sidewalk.
daycare (ranging from $150-$300
Weekly, I assume. That would nicely pay for some serious telecommuting tools and services.
In Quebec, government subsidize daycare, and you pay 5$ / day per kid.
While most day care is nice & safe, a lot of parents have found out the hard way that degree of safety isn't as high as it should be. You really accept that risk with your own kids?
I have a kid, and him hurting himself is not something I look forward. But in that regard, I think of it as "learning", because if a kid never falls down, he'll never learn balance. Kid's will be kid's. They'll eventually get bruises, bleedy noses, scrapes and other trauma. It's normal. Now if someone was to voluntarily hurt my kid, that would be a different story, but fact is:Even at home under a parents constant supervision, a kid will hurt himself. That's a law of nature.
My wife and I need to both work
If the government wasn't confiscating half your income, that wouldn't be necessary.
Life's a bitch. I dont live in Monaco or Switzerland, and income taxes are a part of my life. I dont like it, I would like it to change, I do my part to get them to be lower. What else can I do ?
Some people simply can't afford to have kids.
Some people simply can't afford to have sex.
Maybe it sounds preachy, but if you can't
afford to have you or your spouse stay home
with the kids for the majority of their waking
hours, maybe you should just keep the old
pants on. goes especially true for "its
not my spouse"
Have to say this, but sometimes, contraception devices appeared to have been developped and produced by microsoft. They fail at the worst possible moment, and you dont find out until it's too late. Then you have two choices : Take responsability for your actions, and end up with a 'little bundle of joy', or wuss out, and end up killing who might have developped the cure for cancer 20 years from now.
(Ok. I might be stretching it a bit. There are some cases where abortion is the right thing to do, but in our case, it was not even a considered option. YMMV. This is a too-touchy subject to spend any more bits on.)
You can't count going out to eat more because that's really an unrelated choice. If you're going to net zero, eat in. Dinner isn't that hard to prepare. It typically takes me or my wife about 30 minutes, and we can do other things while we're at it. You know what? It tastes better and is healthier than restaraunt food too.
Right on. I've been living on hotel/restaurant food for the last week or so, and trust me. There's nothing like a good pasta platter at home. Plus the fixing up time can be used to discuss the passed day and other trivial business. I totally recommend against discussing budget during food fixup time, because usually a whole lot of sharp equipment is at the disposal of both individuals.
30 minutes for fix up might be overkill tho. Oliveiri came out with a 5 minutes pasta extravaganza kit. Costs about 6$ (canadian) for Pesto sauce and linguini's. That makes up for a quick supper.
My own children will never be in "daycare". Until they start going to school, they'll either be cared for by myself or my wife, or another family member, even if it means we have to live that much more frugally.
I used to say that. I even used to believe in it for a while.
It is a full-of-good-intentions line of thinking, but in the long run, it will not benefit the kid, or the person caring for them.
When my son was born 4 years ago, I was working a job paid well above average, driving an ordinary car, and my wife was working part-time as a life guard. Life was good. Then, she decided that she'd stay home with the kid (maternal fiber or something.). That worked for 3 years. Trust me, a kid is expensive. It requires feeding, clothing (a lot) and bunch of other trinkets that end up costing a bundle.
You also do not want to raise a kid in a bad neighbourhood (read inexpensive.) We had to move in a nicer neighbourhood (read twice the price). Now, we can still afford it, but my wife was getting lonesome at home. The kid was developping great, but was missing the company of same-aged friends. She then decided to go back to school. She's now graduated, and starting on a new job. When she went back to school, we had to:
1) find a daycare that had enough room for one more kid (big problem in Quebec. Read about it.)
2) find a daycare that would not make me drive 2 hours to work and back.
3) find a daycare that had an educative program. Not just some room where you stick the kid and they drool all over each other. My kid already has basic understanding of what a computer is and does. He doesnt dig 3-4 yrs old toys. He likes lego's and screwing over my computer.
I found such a gem. My kid learns basic reading skills and maths skills. They encourage the kid to do what they like, and all the educators working there are chosen on a strict process. They pay them well enough that it's not a "burden" to educate the kids.
I have found out something in the process. My kid likes it. He likes having friends there, he enjoys the social side of it. He also developped better motor skills. He talks better, he reads a bit and knows how to count.
Now, if my company would be offering a daycare withing the facilities, even though I had to pay full price for it, I would not mind. That would be one less hour commute at night, and I'd still have supervision over my kid's doing (which I'm severely lacking now.)
To us, daycare is a blessing. We're not bad parents because of that. It gives the entire family equal opportunity to grow. The kid is happy, the wife is happy, and as a consequence, I'm happy. What could be wrong with that ?
We are the Borg. Resistence is futile. Lower your shields and prepare to be assimilated....
That's something that's always bothered me. We all know that the Borg's could board a ship with shields up (happened a lot in ST:First encounter). Why the hell are they even bothering to ask over commlink ??
Ok. I know this is O/T. Let me fix this:
We all know that AOL could restrict content in there own proprietary client. So why the hell are they even bothering to tell people lies like "It's aesthetic" ??
This is a bullshit answer. What if I don't want to spend the time and resources to host my own email (or fix my car). I might have better things to do with my time.
Then, don't ask on slashdot. This is news for nerds remember ?
The answers you'll get here will mostly be roll-your-own because that's what people here are used to. Looking for an off-the-shelf solution ? Try c-net...
Call it stupid, but I dont primarily work for a pay. I work because I like what I'm doing.
To me, having to go in sometime at odd hours is not a burden. I dont say I'd go in and work 20 hours shift every day, but considering the pay check I get every two weeks, they're certainly entitled to a few hours of my precious sleep.
Even if I was paid less then I am, I'd go in occasionaly anyways. Reason: I'm proud of my boxes, and I like it when they run well.
I've quit a very good job to move where I'm at now, just to follow a boss that knew the difference between a system admin. and a slave.
If I get to work a 20 hours straight, they expect me _NOT_ to come in the next day. No questions asked. I need a day off, I can take it, No questions asked. I need to leave half-in to the day ? No questions asked. They give me headroom, because I give them headroom. We're an alarm company with over 100K customers. This is what 24/7 is all about, and having a Sun enterprise barfing on you, is not something that can wait till the next day. Granted, it does not happen regularly. But since we're 24/7, e-mail gets used around the clock, and is considered critical. If it's not critical, we dont run it, period. All our systems have a need for 24/7 uptime (and that's including the NT boxes.). We're a very low-staffed department, all salaried, so we can kiss OT goodbye. But as I said higher, we get _very_ flexible schedule and a nice pay/advantage package, and this makes up for all the odd hours we put in.
Is that according to http://www.geocities.com/~mrsam/etrouble/eapp.html , the author claims to make > $125K per year, and to have $60K in cash.
If that's the case, then why is he using a free website like Geocities for his stuff? Would paying ~$20 a month for webhosting really be that expensive for him? Seriously.
Why do you think he manages to get 125K / year and has 60K in cash ? He just does not spend it on futile things such as webhosting. If you can get it for free, why pay for it ?
Incidently, the richest people on this planet are the ones that save a penny here and there. You dont (usually) make money by spending irresponsibly (sp?).
It is also pretty common to see NT machines acting as firewalls using commercial firewall products.
Sad...Sad...Sad... I've suffered a shop where we had an NT/Checkpoint Firewall 1 box managing the traffic. Poor Poor Poor Checkpoint. We're talking a dual-PII with 512MB ram and gigabit network cards here. The machine was lagging so bad (of a simple T1 traffic) that you could difficultly browse the firewall logs at the console. You had to do it from another station.
At least Checkpoint did a good job of securing NT's network flaws. If it wasnt so hard on the machine, I say they should all come preloaded with CP Fw1... But that would be too much of a load on the poor CPU.
I know that there are no stateful inspection firewalls on linux just yet, but we're on the right path. And we can still handle T1 traffic off a small pentium.
The more they stay the same. Looking at the vast majority of comments here, (not including those that give RH the benefit of the doubt, and that believe they may have been taken out of context.), you could take this article, and search/replace RedHat for Microsoft.
I guess it is going to be only a matter of time before zealots start knee-capping them for being succesful.
Note to RedHat: You're successful now. You're known, profitable and you're a big corporation. Everything you say can and will be used against you. Comes with the territory.
Drug testing doesn't show current impairment. What I did last friday night, on my free time, when my pager was off, is MY TIME. It is not my employers time. They have NO RIGHT to criticize how I spend that time.
You're right... What you do on your time should be your own business. When what you do on your own time starts affecting what you do on company's time, it becomes their duty to take proper action (send you to rehab, fire you, what not.)
These guys have got to account for you with regards to the shareholders. You screw up, they look bad, people lose money, you're gone. It's that simple...
I would feel violated if my personal transmissions were searched without my knowledge
This is something I have a serious problem with. As far as I'm concerned, whatever employees are doing on MY network is company's business... There is no such thing as personal information on my turf.
Call it overly restrictive, but in the business I'm in (security/alarms) you cannot afford to have "rogue" information travelling. It is ground for immediate dismissal. Employees get a free HOME internet access as part of the package, but on the job, we dont pay them to surf personally.
I've seen too many people taking the company's line for granted. It costs money. Money that could be use to get me a raise.
What about splitting your code into modules that could be recombined later using some kind of installer ?
For example: Gasoline is legal. Vita-Grow is legal. Combining both is legal. Blowing off a part of Oklahoma with the mix is not. But no one could have sued the guy who sold the gasoline to McVail.
Therefore, if I was to publish a set of "modules" and the instructions to combine them together (remember. The anarchist cookbook is still legal to read/sell last time I checked.) you could be untouchable. Your specific modules by themselves are harmless... It's those evil h4ck3rZ that found a way to do bad things with it.
Except for the fact that he mentioned the new kernel update being significant, not much was said that hasn't already been known.
I look forward to seeing the new kernel because Linus says "It is painful for me to go back and use the 2.2 kernel". Either thier have been some major significant updates, or some modifications have been made to make it easier.
But just the same old stuff people like us have known for months. Pretty Redundant.
You have to keep in mind that you probably are not the "target" audience for WSJ. To a PHB, this article would have been deemed Technical. Still, it's nice to see that the guy remains level-headed. Most people when struck with fame and riches usually go out of their ways to be flashy and seen. He just keeps it low profile, and let the code speak for him.
Too bad some people around here have not learned from him yet...
/* RANT */
Why does slashdot insist on putting the default to Submit instead of Preview ? /* RANT */
I'm currently in the process of purchasing a cluster from VA Linux, and seeing this does not re-assures me at all.
I've been getting great response from my appointed sales person, (Thanks Jason), and over the years, I've learned to not take everything a sales person tells you for granted. They have a product to sell, and they usually will do anything it takes.
Surprisingly enough, Jason gave me the bare technical on what I asked for, and did not try to b.s. me into buying something I did not need. We wanted to buy a couple of extra 1U unit for NT servers, and he recommended against it (at the cost of a sale) because he could not guarantee excellent operation.
Now, this is something I respect. Also, when pricing my babies, I had a 24/7 phone support and next day on-site service contract added at very minimal costs. This is a clever (if not essential) thing to do when you plan on running enterprise application on servers. If one of my admin would not get a contract on ANY hardware we purchase here, I'd most likely have to get him out the door and beat him silly. You can NOT live in a production environment without either spare hardware or a decent service contract. (My SUN's all have 24/7 2 hours response time HARD and SOFT support).
With what I'm projecting for my to be bought cluster, I cannot afford extensive downtime. This is why I chose VA. I want a platform that will work out of the box, and not require me to tweak, tune, re-install everything. They ship me a dual-cpu / raid / whatever's in the box customized kernel, and they will support that. I praise them for it. And if the hardware is half a good as the pre-sale service I've been getting, well, I'm in heaven.
Please stop kneecapping companies because you chose to totally ignore their warnings, and fucked up on your own. And please hit yourself over the head with a sharp object for not ordering a decent support contract along with your server.
(My employer does not speak for me, I dont speak for them. It's kind of a deal we have in here.)
Slashdot Mirror
I caught a show on TLC once about e-commerce fraud and other computer security issue.
One guy on the show (some FBI e-security expert) mentionned a very interesting fact: E-commerce is not new. The only thing "new" about it is the fact that you do it from the comfort of your own home.
He said that most people dont even realize that when they withdraw money off the ATM, or pay at the restaurant via credit or debit card, they're in fact using "e-commerce".
The only difference being that the banking networks are a bit more private. (Even that is changing, since more and more banks are using VPN's with strong crypto.)
The other thing worth of mention from that show was that we're only seeing the tip of the iceberg. Banks and other institution involved in e-commerce are reluctant to sound the alarm when it comes to fraud. They dont want to scare the average joe. This helps the criminal, since the other institution are not warned when a new hole arise. If they would sound the alarm loud and fast, everyone else could patch up.
Summary: It's not any safer to have a clerk swipe you credit card in a machine then to type it yourself on the net. With the technique of skimming, Actually, it's probably safer to type it up yourself on the net.
That's until I can interest someone in coding some userfriendly "on-the-fly" kernel patch.
I mean, Tandem (now Compaq Non-stop whatever) does this. You can install a new os rev. without even coming so close as interupting service on the machine. Now, how hard could it be to implement this on your run-of-the-mill Linux ?
(Granted. very hard, but possible.)
I guess if that particular itch raises it's ugly head, some Alan, Linus or other will scratch it badly...
I can see it already "Uptime: 4 years, 364 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes, 59 seconds
Kernel patch applied: 600"
Ahhhh...
Well well well...
I know a lot of NPO's that have more then 15 computers. Granted, there are a lot more that dont even have one computer.
Take some org like UNICEF, The Red Cross. These guys have networks that would make any decent sysadmin drool all over himself.
OTOH, I have a sister that works for a smaller NPO, and they have a +- 20 computer office.
They budget for maintenance on them, and dont let them grow old.
That covers most problems.
Personally, I'd be willing to donate my time to maintain such a network.
If I could deduct my time as a "donation" to charity, I'd be even more inclined to do so.
Being that my average consultancy rate is around 85$ / hour (yes, I know, I'm cheap.), 2 hours/week @ 85$ = 170$ * 52 weeks = 8840$ tax break (give or take a little.).
This way, everybody wins. They get "free" support, you get tax relief, and someone in the end (in my sister's case, a whole lotta kids) get free services.
If this does not exist, it should. Anyone up for "sysadminforpeace.org" ? =)
Now, that's news for nerds and stuff that matters. 1st, congratulations to both parents.
:
Now, for the questions
1- Is the baby going to be open sourced ?
2- Is this going to delay the release of 2.4 ?
3- I'd like me a beowulf cluster of these...
Mod me down if you must, but I at least made myself chuckle writing this one.
If you dont mind having a couple of months of freezing temperature a year, Montreal's the place to be.
Overall, it's a safe city, got a great nightlife, cost of housing is ridiculous compared to US, we got broadband all over the place, a few decent sushi places, and most everything California has to offer, minus the smog, pollution, skin cancer and other small irritants.
Salaries are not as high, but then again, cost of living is low low low. You can get a house for 50K$ Canadian (that's 25K for you USAian.), and the most I had to commute for (and It's a 25 mile drive) is 25 minutes.
Plus the ladies are gorgeous... It's got everything.
Luckily for us, we got winter keeping you crazy dot commers out.
There's a cap on your uplink. There is also a bandwidth quota. Believe me. If they see you regularly go over 6-7GB down a month, they'll bill you (read your TOS), or suggest you upgrade to their 400$ Business DSL solution.
Also, I've ordered a DSL from Sympatico the week they became available. I pitted it against my cable modem, and they do not compare. My cable was always 30-40% faster then the DSL line. Even now, they put some uplink caps on to quash warez servers (But I still get more then enough bandwidth for X over SSH), it remains faster then DSL.
Sidenote: The cable network is now switched at the end, so you really are alone on the net.
I can just picture the two agents in their office:
A1: Damn... This slashdot crowd is really getting on our case now. We've had a million hit in just a few hours.
A2: Fear not. I'll just image this drive, and we'll give him back the laptop. That'll give the bureau some good free PR.
A1: Lookie here... A gigabyte of MP3's. Pass me that CD list of the CD we seized... A2: Right. He doesnt own any Hootie and the Blowfish CD's, but he has a collection of them.
A1: What about this porn right here ? (clickety click, porn gets emailed to innocent hotmail account belonging to A1.)
A2: Ok. Now we got the Slashdot crowd off our back. Let's just figure out a way to bust this poor guy big time. Did you make sure you stuck that kiddie porn on his laptop when you gave it back ?
A1: Yeah. Threw a couple of conspiratory documents on there too.
A2: Let's flip for who calls the judge. We need that warrant. Got the number of that judge we caught with kiddie porn last month ?
A1 and A2 start laughing like Dr. Evil... EOF.
50 bucks last me about a week and a half. And that's strictly business.
What I can recommend is Fido (with the US equivalent being Omnis I think. At least that's what my Fido registers on when I cross the border.)
They're digital, they're Nokia's and I like it. You even have an analog module option. Just stick it under the battery, and you're in business. Other important thing: No roaming fee, and all your outgoing calls are local to the area you're in. You got an Alaskian phone, you're in NYC, dial an NYC number, and it's local.
Up here, you get 400 minutes for 40$ CDN, and if you dont use it all, it rolls over to the next month. They have pay-as-you-go, and also 200,300,400,600,700,800,1000 minutes plan.
'nuff said.
Would you have gone to work for a company in it's very early beginning if someone told you : "Well. We can't really pay you this week, instead we'll give you some stock options...".
I'm a dad, and I have to feed my family. Kids dont grow all that well when fed with stock options. Clothes dont get purchased. The sheer stress of not having a steady income can ruin the best of couples.
These guys were not just "lucky". It's a very calculated risk to go work for a Pre-IPO outfit. You can end up wealthy, but you can also end up on the sidewalk.
'nuff said.
In Quebec, government subsidize daycare, and you pay 5$ / day per kid.
I have a kid, and him hurting himself is not something I look forward. But in that regard, I think of it as "learning", because if a kid never falls down, he'll never learn balance. Kid's will be kid's. They'll eventually get bruises, bleedy noses, scrapes and other trauma. It's normal. Now if someone was to voluntarily hurt my kid, that would be a different story, but fact is :Even at home under a parents constant supervision, a kid will hurt himself. That's a law of nature.
Life's a bitch. I dont live in Monaco or Switzerland, and income taxes are a part of my life. I dont like it, I would like it to change, I do my part to get them to be lower. What else can I do ?
Have to say this, but sometimes, contraception devices appeared to have been developped and produced by microsoft. They fail at the worst possible moment, and you dont find out until it's too late. Then you have two choices : Take responsability for your actions, and end up with a 'little bundle of joy', or wuss out, and end up killing who might have developped the cure for cancer 20 years from now.
(Ok. I might be stretching it a bit. There are some cases where abortion is the right thing to do, but in our case, it was not even a considered option. YMMV. This is a too-touchy subject to spend any more bits on.)
Right on. I've been living on hotel/restaurant food for the last week or so, and trust me. There's nothing like a good pasta platter at home. Plus the fixing up time can be used to discuss the passed day and other trivial business. I totally recommend against discussing budget during food fixup time, because usually a whole lot of sharp equipment is at the disposal of both individuals.
30 minutes for fix up might be overkill tho. Oliveiri came out with a 5 minutes pasta extravaganza kit. Costs about 6$ (canadian) for Pesto sauce and linguini's. That makes up for a quick supper.
I used to say that. I even used to believe in it for a while.
It is a full-of-good-intentions line of thinking, but in the long run, it will not benefit the kid, or the person caring for them.
When my son was born 4 years ago, I was working a job paid well above average, driving an ordinary car, and my wife was working part-time as a life guard. Life was good. Then, she decided that she'd stay home with the kid (maternal fiber or something.). That worked for 3 years. Trust me, a kid is expensive. It requires feeding, clothing (a lot) and bunch of other trinkets that end up costing a bundle.
You also do not want to raise a kid in a bad neighbourhood (read inexpensive.) We had to move in a nicer neighbourhood (read twice the price). Now, we can still afford it, but my wife was getting lonesome at home. The kid was developping great, but was missing the company of same-aged friends. She then decided to go back to school. She's now graduated, and starting on a new job. When she went back to school, we had to:
1) find a daycare that had enough room for one more kid (big problem in Quebec. Read about it.)
2) find a daycare that would not make me drive 2 hours to work and back.
3) find a daycare that had an educative program. Not just some room where you stick the kid and they drool all over each other. My kid already has basic understanding of what a computer is and does. He doesnt dig 3-4 yrs old toys. He likes lego's and screwing over my computer.
I found such a gem. My kid learns basic reading skills and maths skills. They encourage the kid to do what they like, and all the educators working there are chosen on a strict process. They pay them well enough that it's not a "burden" to educate the kids.
I have found out something in the process. My kid likes it. He likes having friends there, he enjoys the social side of it. He also developped better motor skills. He talks better, he reads a bit and knows how to count.
Now, if my company would be offering a daycare withing the facilities, even though I had to pay full price for it, I would not mind. That would be one less hour commute at night, and I'd still have supervision over my kid's doing (which I'm severely lacking now.)
To us, daycare is a blessing. We're not bad parents because of that. It gives the entire family equal opportunity to grow. The kid is happy, the wife is happy, and as a consequence, I'm happy. What could be wrong with that ?
That's something that's always bothered me. We all know that the Borg's could board a ship with shields up (happened a lot in ST:First encounter). Why the hell are they even bothering to ask over commlink ??
Ok. I know this is O/T. Let me fix this
We all know that AOL could restrict content in there own proprietary client. So why the hell are they even bothering to tell people lies like "It's aesthetic" ??
Then, don't ask on slashdot. This is news for nerds remember ?
The answers you'll get here will mostly be roll-your-own because that's what people here are used to. Looking for an off-the-shelf solution ? Try c-net...
Call it stupid, but I dont primarily work for a pay. I work because I like what I'm doing.
To me, having to go in sometime at odd hours is not a burden.
I dont say I'd go in and work 20 hours shift every day, but considering the pay check I get every two weeks, they're certainly entitled to a few hours of my precious sleep.
Even if I was paid less then I am, I'd go in occasionaly anyways. Reason: I'm proud of my boxes, and I like it when they run well.
I've quit a very good job to move where I'm at now, just to follow a boss that knew the difference between a system admin. and a slave.
If I get to work a 20 hours straight, they expect me _NOT_ to come in the next day. No questions asked. I need a day off, I can take it, No questions asked. I need to leave half-in to the day ? No questions asked. They give me headroom, because I give them headroom. We're an alarm company with over 100K customers. This is what 24/7 is all about, and having a Sun enterprise barfing on you, is not something that can wait till the next day. Granted, it does not happen regularly. But since we're 24/7, e-mail gets used around the clock, and is considered critical. If it's not critical, we dont run it, period. All our systems have a need for 24/7 uptime (and that's including the NT boxes.). We're a very low-staffed department, all salaried, so we can kiss OT goodbye. But as I said higher, we get _very_ flexible schedule and a nice pay/advantage package, and this makes up for all the odd hours we put in.
Why do you think he manages to get 125K / year and has 60K in cash ? He just does not spend it on futile things such as webhosting. If you can get it for free, why pay for it ?
Incidently, the richest people on this planet are the ones that save a penny here and there.
You dont (usually) make money by spending irresponsibly (sp?).
Sad...Sad...Sad... I've suffered a shop where we had an NT/Checkpoint Firewall 1 box managing the traffic. Poor Poor Poor Checkpoint. We're talking a dual-PII with 512MB ram and gigabit network cards here. The machine was lagging so bad (of a simple T1 traffic) that you could difficultly browse the firewall logs at the console. You had to do it from another station.
At least Checkpoint did a good job of securing NT's network flaws. If it wasnt so hard on the machine, I say they should all come preloaded with CP Fw1... But that would be too much of a load on the poor CPU.
I know that there are no stateful inspection firewalls on linux just yet, but we're on the right path. And we can still handle T1 traffic off a small pentium.
The more they stay the same. Looking at the vast majority of comments here, (not including those that give RH the benefit of the doubt, and that believe they may have been taken out of context.), you could take this article, and search/replace RedHat for Microsoft.
I guess it is going to be only a matter of time before zealots start knee-capping them for being succesful.
Note to RedHat: You're successful now. You're known, profitable and you're a big corporation. Everything you say can and will be used against you. Comes with the territory.
You're right... What you do on your time should be your own business. When what you do on your own time starts affecting what you do on company's time, it becomes their duty to take proper action (send you to rehab, fire you, what not.)
These guys have got to account for you with regards to the shareholders. You screw up, they look bad, people lose money, you're gone. It's that simple...
Nowadays, we should call this place SlashDMCA.org.
(getting ready to be modded down to oblivion.)
This is something I have a serious problem with. As far as I'm concerned, whatever employees are doing on MY network is company's business... There is no such thing as personal information on my turf.
Call it overly restrictive, but in the business I'm in (security/alarms) you cannot afford to have "rogue" information travelling. It is ground for immediate dismissal. Employees get a free HOME internet access as part of the package, but on the job, we dont pay them to surf personally.
I've seen too many people taking the company's line for granted. It costs money. Money that could be use to get me a raise.
What about splitting your code into modules that could be recombined later using some kind of installer ?
For example: Gasoline is legal. Vita-Grow is legal. Combining both is legal. Blowing off a part of Oklahoma with the mix is not. But no one could have sued the guy who sold the gasoline to McVail.
Therefore, if I was to publish a set of "modules" and the instructions to combine them together (remember. The anarchist cookbook is still legal to read/sell last time I checked.) you could be untouchable. Your specific modules by themselves are harmless... It's those evil h4ck3rZ that found a way to do bad things with it.
You have to keep in mind that you probably are not the "target" audience for WSJ. To a PHB, this article would have been deemed Technical. Still, it's nice to see that the guy remains level-headed. Most people when struck with fame and riches usually go out of their ways to be flashy and seen. He just keeps it low profile, and let the code speak for him.
Too bad some people around here have not learned from him yet...
/* RANT */
Why does slashdot insist on putting the default to Submit instead of Preview ?
/* RANT */
I'm currently in the process of purchasing a cluster from VA Linux, and seeing this does not re-assures me at all.
I've been getting great response from my appointed sales person, (Thanks Jason), and over the years, I've learned to not take everything a sales person tells you for granted. They have a product to sell, and they usually will do anything it takes.
Surprisingly enough, Jason gave me the bare technical on what I asked for, and did not try to b.s. me into buying something I did not need. We wanted to buy a couple of extra 1U unit for NT servers, and he recommended against it (at the cost of a sale) because he could not guarantee excellent operation.
Now, this is something I respect. Also, when pricing my babies, I had a 24/7 phone support and next day on-site service contract added at very minimal costs. This is a clever (if not essential) thing to do when you plan on running enterprise application on servers. If one of my admin would not get a contract on ANY hardware we purchase here, I'd most likely have to get him out the door and beat him silly. You can NOT live in a production environment without either spare hardware or a decent service contract. (My SUN's all have 24/7 2 hours response time HARD and SOFT support).
With what I'm projecting for my to be bought cluster, I cannot afford extensive downtime. This is why I chose VA. I want a platform that will work out of the box, and not require me to tweak, tune, re-install everything. They ship me a dual-cpu / raid / whatever's in the box customized kernel, and they will support that. I praise them for it. And if the hardware is half a good as the pre-sale service I've been getting, well, I'm in heaven.
Please stop kneecapping companies because you chose to totally ignore their warnings, and fucked up on your own. And please hit yourself over the head with a sharp object for not ordering a decent support contract along with your server.
(My employer does not speak for me, I dont speak for them. It's kind of a deal we have in here.)