According to NetworkWorld, many licencees are discovering that due to slipping release dates, many thousands of dollars spent on these contracts have brought them zero return."
At what point did these customers forget they are dealing with a software company? Missed dates, slippage, heck, I work as a programmer and there's often good reasons (You can have it now unfinished, untested or with bugs OR you can wait for it to be finished, passed Q/A and tested), granted there
are numerous examples of Microsoft using the customer for testing after rollout ("Oh, that bug will be fixed in the next service pack"), but again I don't think they're unique. They're just singled out because Microsoft is a favorite whipping boy. Imagine the losses that may be incurred by (more) flawed code being released on schedule.
What were you using for a telescope? What mm for lens? (22, 6?)How did you set up the camera?
Meade ETX125AT, 15mm eyepiece, Nikon CoolPix 800 set focus to INF. It defaulted to 8 sec exposure, considering available light, 8 sec was probably about 7 sec too long, but there's no way to change shutter speed on this camera. If it's clear, I'll take another shot at it tonight. I may swing by the Orion telescope outlet store and pick up a filter to see if that helps.
Not specifically linux, but the market. ANYONE who had come along providing that focus with good functionality would have had the same effect.
Who else are you thinking of, besides Linux and Microsoft? Ok, there's SCO, but they're a dying breed as they've given up innovation for litigation. There's BSD (not meaning to troll of inflame but I kinda wad together with Linux, sue me.) There's also Apple (which will no doubt be a major player by the year 3025.) Who else? A few scattered little proprietary or specialty things which will soon be replaced by Linux or Microsoft?
Microsoft to spend more time on security and stability, and less time on adding new features."
What? And part with tradition?
Would this mean the new Microsoft ad taglines would be "Now, more secure and stable than ever!"
I can't see that, since they've already played that card and anyone with a lick of sense has seen the results. More likely they'll just trim their profit margins, try to lock down proprietary technology (to bar Linux from having it) and continue to spin marketspeak.
's probably more political than technical... there are tons of beurocratic (spelling?) things that most of us will never see or know about... favoritism and strings go a long way in those circles.
There's somthing in the news about 65,000 (or was it 6,500) scientists protesting France's move from foundamental research to research which benefits business interests. Pretty transparent, isn't it? Business driving politics driving research.
As much as I love Chandra and Hubble, I wonder if there's not some industry which is benefiting by selling supplies or services to NASA which would be hit by an end to Hubble.
I tried my own first whack at astrophotography last night, of Jupiter and a couple of it's moons. This was one exposure and lack of light wasn't a problem. As I have one of the first digital cameras from Nikon (CoolPix 800) I can't adjust shutter speed so I've got to think of another approach. I'll say this, attaching a digital camera to a telescope is tricker than I thought and very problematic. With some newer cameras people have done much better.
At what point does a bios become an operating system in and of itself. Seems like all the features this thing has will require more than just basic input/output.
I'm sure I read something on Slashdot a while back which was meant to be very worrying, like Microsoft proposing standards for BIOS which lock people ever more into Windows. That Soyo is playing with a motherboard which requires no operating system, I rather wonder if the CEO of Soyo will be taking to carrying a gun and checking into hotels using an assumed name because he feels someone from Redmond considers this all very unsavory and threatening and intends to bump him off.
The Encylopedia Industry just needs a lobby. How about EIAA? Sue and whine when your business model fails to make money. It's the American Way.
C'mon, the worst they will get you for is plagurisim and it's more likely your peers will nail you before the Encyc people do.
There was something about being a kid and flipping through my parents Encyclopedia Americana during a rainy day, or a sunny one for that matter. I wouldn't mind having a printed set still, even as the information might be dated, I still like going through books. I can't imagine the industry for the printed books is doing very well anymore, aside from library sales.
"According to the Deseret News, Darl McBride says he sometimes
carries a gun because his enemies are out to kill him. He checks
into hotels under assumed names.
Soooooo, it was actually Darl?
It would explain the dope, but didn't we all think it was crack he was on?
the company may be ordered to remove Windows Media Player as an integrated feature of the dominant Windows operating system
This means people will have to seek out what player(s) they want, hence make their choice(s). The forcing of Microsoft to include cat+dog+bird+fish brand players should be viewed as less likely. That Microsoft would share with other player providers those bits of the "operating system" which make their player so well integrated is desirable.
Given the quirks of babelfish and similar, I hope poor, mangled machine translations don't cause more negative incidents than they prevent.
Iraqi: "Welcome liberators!"
Xlation: "Jihad!"
Navy: "The pilot has your base in sight."
Xlation: "All your base are belong to us."
Iraqi: "We already knew that."
Xlation: "Yankee go home."
Navy: "What you say?"
Xlation: "Make your time."
Iraqi: "What are you doing!"
Xlation: "Send out Zig!"
Navy: "I don't think this is working very well."
Xlation: "May your mother in law fall into a well!"
Iraqi: "Ah, friend! We only have misunderstanding, welcome!"
As for the lack of alternatives... well, right now I have hundreds of choices for media players so it sure doesn't look like WMP is the only option.
Assume you run other than Windows as an operating system on a PC or PDA. Assume you want to view or listen to a stream and the website only supports a proprietary format. Assume that all other proprietary formats have died out because their business models (whatever their merits) couldn't compete with a bundled player and encouragement by that player provider has convinced websites to only offer that proprietary format. You now have to have their player and probably an operating system it's compiled for which is acceptable to them. See any potential problems here?
I WILL BE THE JUDGE OF WHAT THIRD PARTY CRAP IS INSTALLED ON MY COMPUTER.
As you noted, "because people are too novice to do that", clearly you're adept enough to make these choices, but don't assume that the majority of people have a clue what you are ranting about. This measure is to protect OEMs to place whatever they want to on computers they sell, then leave it up to the user to inform themselves and make the choices. At least then they will have the ability to choose, against Microsoft's argument, "Hey we just want to make everything easy for people and a consistent platform, made by us, is the best way." *cough* *cough*
MS doesn't know what a level playing field looks like.. and it doesn't seem like they care to either.. they wield a monopoly and use it as leverage to keep cometition at bay and to force the public to keep them as the "Leaders" of software innovation(even though what they come up with is not innovation).
No, really? I've gotten the impression that many posters on this topic don't recall the past several years and battles with Microsoft concerning browsers. Many voices said that Netscape now sucked and there was no further point in the argument. Now we've got some decent choices (I'm using Firebird, atm)
Consider how unlikely this option would be if Microsoft had continued, unfettered. HTML starts coming in and regardless what tool or browser you requested the link, IE intercepts it and comes up. Rude, no? Possible, absolutely! Look what they've did with digital camera stuff!
Microsoft's greatest innovations are acquisistion, imitation and assimilation. The pattern just moves from battlefield to battlefield, but doesn't change.
If they could make them remove Outlook being installed by default we would have something.
Outlook or Outlook Express?
A common thread among replies seems to assume that computer users build their own computers and install the operating system themselves. Wow! That's pretty blind, isn't it? I mean the avg slashdotter probably takes this for granted (and is taking it for granted), but Dell, HP, Gateway and a slew of eurobrands I'm pretty sure account for most PC sales and the act of selecting a player, mail client, instant messenger client, etc. are done by an OEM.
Upon first boot the user may be offered the option to remove some things, but advisably after acquainting them with each of these tools (and you can bet there'd be some real fighting over what that content would be.)
Back when I bought a new Sony laptop, which came with Outlook Express installed, the horrid thing kept pestering me on bootup if I would like a tour of the thing with options being something like:
Yes
Yes
Ok
I finally found the exe for Outlook Express and deleted it and some other stuff and now I get a pop-up (after 4 years) now and then still trying to launch this crap. NEVER was there an option to say 'No, never bug me again and uninstall this crap as I'll be using my own choice of email client.' I'm at a loss as to why, other than Microsoft bend Sony's arm or Sony was clueless this thing could be so annoying.
Why should Microsoft be required to offer Real's whoreware product, laden with spyware and annoying popups and notifications.
Could it be because competition is a good thing? Sure Real and their practices suck, but would you rather have no choice but WMP? And I'm only addressing you in the general sense, because like americans, there are undoubtably millions of europeans who don't know or give a rat's patoot, so long as they can watch or listen to their hearts content.
Encourage a level playing field and let each player, or those yet to be born, to have a fair shot at it and survive or die based upon their own merits.
A CRT will ware out in about five years. Brightness and contrast will decrease to a level which is unacceptable.
Where did you dig that number up? I've got CRTs that are 20 years old and still work fine. I've seen a few CRTs with patterns burned into them from running 8 or more hours a day, but they still work for years.
The gripes I have about CRT's are:
Lead: Cathode ray tubes have landed in city dumps for decades. Got lead in your ground water, yet?
Radiation: I've already had cancer once, it was enough. I use LCD screens whenever I can now. I suspect some long term damage to vision, too, as my peripheral vision appears more acute. I still have excellent eyesight, but I'm not as old as I'm planning to be.
Deskspace: They take up too much realestate.
Power: Suck lots, though not as much as the CPU does.
On the Pro side, they've typically looked better than most LCD's, so I stuck with the behemoths until a year ago when I figured Samsung finally had one worth getting (Syncmaster 172t, it's only real problem is it's too bright even on the lowest setting!)
How much material is required to dispose of a personal computer?
Those PetsWarehouse suits a few years back were a mess, and undoubtably an abuse of the courts.
Suppose someone registered a domain name www.robertnovakisaweasel.com, you could pretty much expect he would have filed similar suits to those he did.
Re:Slashdotters==Curmudgeons?
on
iPod Mini Sells Out
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
I mean, why would colors excite so much?
How about this: How about a ratio of who is buying these things. Male/Female? If you're around women much you know how they like to accessorize. Pink is probably the most purchased color.
The impression I get is that most slashdotters, in mostly male-centric site, tend to think in their own terms, thus leaving out the choices of women.
For me, black would be OK, but you'd never catch me listening to tunes while running (which I don't do anymore) or cycling (which I do religiously) because I believe having 100% of the senses focused on not getting run over is a good way to work out.
I know of 2 people that recieved them unsolicited in the mail, and no none of them own a aplle anything.. the only thing that is common is they both own a VW beetle.
!
I knew that I'd regret getting that pickup truck. First it was the faulty wiring, then the price of gas, now it denies me free schwag.
sigh
I guess I'm just not random enough anymore...
Re:Slashdotters==Curmudgeons?
on
iPod Mini Sells Out
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Yeah, the main selling point to me is that it is smaller. If I wanted to maximize hard drive space for the dollar I could drag around a IDE tower.
Sure, and you could hack the thing, install Linux on it, and play Ogg tunes. I'm sure there's people whose eyes don't glaze over as we go into the technical details and merits of our accomplishments. I'm always shocked when I run into someone who knows what I'm talking about.
"A left handed 9.4GB veeblefetzer with interchangeable 3.0 GHz portrzebie, no kidding?"
Slashdot Mirror
At what point did these customers forget they are dealing with a software company? Missed dates, slippage, heck, I work as a programmer and there's often good reasons (You can have it now unfinished, untested or with bugs OR you can wait for it to be finished, passed Q/A and tested), granted there are numerous examples of Microsoft using the customer for testing after rollout ("Oh, that bug will be fixed in the next service pack"), but again I don't think they're unique. They're just singled out because Microsoft is a favorite whipping boy. Imagine the losses that may be incurred by (more) flawed code being released on schedule.
Meade ETX125AT, 15mm eyepiece, Nikon CoolPix 800 set focus to INF. It defaulted to 8 sec exposure, considering available light, 8 sec was probably about 7 sec too long, but there's no way to change shutter speed on this camera. If it's clear, I'll take another shot at it tonight. I may swing by the Orion telescope outlet store and pick up a filter to see if that helps.
Why? what happens when you ki
NO CARRIER
Who else are you thinking of, besides Linux and Microsoft? Ok, there's SCO, but they're a dying breed as they've given up innovation for litigation. There's BSD (not meaning to troll of inflame but I kinda wad together with Linux, sue me.) There's also Apple (which will no doubt be a major player by the year 3025.) Who else? A few scattered little proprietary or specialty things which will soon be replaced by Linux or Microsoft?
What? And part with tradition?
Would this mean the new Microsoft ad taglines would be "Now, more secure and stable than ever!"
I can't see that, since they've already played that card and anyone with a lick of sense has seen the results. More likely they'll just trim their profit margins, try to lock down proprietary technology (to bar Linux from having it) and continue to spin marketspeak.
's probably more political than technical... there are tons of beurocratic (spelling?) things that most of us will never see or know about... favoritism and strings go a long way in those circles.
There's somthing in the news about 65,000 (or was it 6,500) scientists protesting France's move from foundamental research to research which benefits business interests. Pretty transparent, isn't it? Business driving politics driving research.
As much as I love Chandra and Hubble, I wonder if there's not some industry which is benefiting by selling supplies or services to NASA which would be hit by an end to Hubble.
I tried my own first whack at astrophotography last night, of Jupiter and a couple of it's moons. This was one exposure and lack of light wasn't a problem. As I have one of the first digital cameras from Nikon (CoolPix 800) I can't adjust shutter speed so I've got to think of another approach. I'll say this, attaching a digital camera to a telescope is tricker than I thought and very problematic. With some newer cameras people have done much better.
CA: "I did not have relations with that ho!"
I'm sure I read something on Slashdot a while back which was meant to be very worrying, like Microsoft proposing standards for BIOS which lock people ever more into Windows. That Soyo is playing with a motherboard which requires no operating system, I rather wonder if the CEO of Soyo will be taking to carrying a gun and checking into hotels using an assumed name because he feels someone from Redmond considers this all very unsavory and threatening and intends to bump him off.
Just when I overclock mine, they cancel Martha Stewart.
C'mon, the worst they will get you for is plagurisim and it's more likely your peers will nail you before the Encyc people do.
There was something about being a kid and flipping through my parents Encyclopedia Americana during a rainy day, or a sunny one for that matter. I wouldn't mind having a printed set still, even as the information might be dated, I still like going through books. I can't imagine the industry for the printed books is doing very well anymore, aside from library sales.
Soooooo, it was actually Darl? It would explain the dope, but didn't we all think it was crack he was on?
Moderating-Metamoderating for the average person on the street!
"Buggerit!"
BZZT!
"Millenium hand and shrimp!"
They also may:
This means people will have to seek out what player(s) they want, hence make their choice(s). The forcing of Microsoft to include cat+dog+bird+fish brand players should be viewed as less likely. That Microsoft would share with other player providers those bits of the "operating system" which make their player so well integrated is desirable.
Iraqi: "Welcome liberators!"
Xlation: "Jihad!"
Navy: "The pilot has your base in sight."
Xlation: "All your base are belong to us."
Iraqi: "We already knew that."
Xlation: "Yankee go home."
Navy: "What you say?"
Xlation: "Make your time."
Iraqi: "What are you doing!"
Xlation: "Send out Zig!"
Navy: "I don't think this is working very well."
Xlation: "May your mother in law fall into a well!"
Iraqi: "Ah, friend! We only have misunderstanding, welcome!"
Assume you run other than Windows as an operating system on a PC or PDA. Assume you want to view or listen to a stream and the website only supports a proprietary format. Assume that all other proprietary formats have died out because their business models (whatever their merits) couldn't compete with a bundled player and encouragement by that player provider has convinced websites to only offer that proprietary format. You now have to have their player and probably an operating system it's compiled for which is acceptable to them. See any potential problems here?
As you noted, "because people are too novice to do that", clearly you're adept enough to make these choices, but don't assume that the majority of people have a clue what you are ranting about. This measure is to protect OEMs to place whatever they want to on computers they sell, then leave it up to the user to inform themselves and make the choices. At least then they will have the ability to choose, against Microsoft's argument, "Hey we just want to make everything easy for people and a consistent platform, made by us, is the best way." *cough* *cough*
No, really? I've gotten the impression that many posters on this topic don't recall the past several years and battles with Microsoft concerning browsers. Many voices said that Netscape now sucked and there was no further point in the argument. Now we've got some decent choices (I'm using Firebird, atm)
Consider how unlikely this option would be if Microsoft had continued, unfettered. HTML starts coming in and regardless what tool or browser you requested the link, IE intercepts it and comes up. Rude, no? Possible, absolutely! Look what they've did with digital camera stuff!
Microsoft's greatest innovations are acquisistion, imitation and assimilation. The pattern just moves from battlefield to battlefield, but doesn't change.
Outlook or Outlook Express?
A common thread among replies seems to assume that computer users build their own computers and install the operating system themselves. Wow! That's pretty blind, isn't it? I mean the avg slashdotter probably takes this for granted (and is taking it for granted), but Dell, HP, Gateway and a slew of eurobrands I'm pretty sure account for most PC sales and the act of selecting a player, mail client, instant messenger client, etc. are done by an OEM.
Upon first boot the user may be offered the option to remove some things, but advisably after acquainting them with each of these tools (and you can bet there'd be some real fighting over what that content would be.)
Back when I bought a new Sony laptop, which came with Outlook Express installed, the horrid thing kept pestering me on bootup if I would like a tour of the thing with options being something like:
Yes
Yes
Ok
I finally found the exe for Outlook Express and deleted it and some other stuff and now I get a pop-up (after 4 years) now and then still trying to launch this crap. NEVER was there an option to say 'No, never bug me again and uninstall this crap as I'll be using my own choice of email client.' I'm at a loss as to why, other than Microsoft bend Sony's arm or Sony was clueless this thing could be so annoying.
Duh. How about the OEM? You think Microsoft makes computers? (Well, they probably will do that, too at some point, where they can get away with it.)
"Rediculous: as opposed to Greendiculous or Bluediculous..."
Could it be because competition is a good thing? Sure Real and their practices suck, but would you rather have no choice but WMP? And I'm only addressing you in the general sense, because like americans, there are undoubtably millions of europeans who don't know or give a rat's patoot, so long as they can watch or listen to their hearts content.
Encourage a level playing field and let each player, or those yet to be born, to have a fair shot at it and survive or die based upon their own merits.
"Psst! Push Ogg!"
Where did you dig that number up? I've got CRTs that are 20 years old and still work fine. I've seen a few CRTs with patterns burned into them from running 8 or more hours a day, but they still work for years.
The gripes I have about CRT's are:
Lead: Cathode ray tubes have landed in city dumps for decades. Got lead in your ground water, yet?
Radiation: I've already had cancer once, it was enough. I use LCD screens whenever I can now. I suspect some long term damage to vision, too, as my peripheral vision appears more acute. I still have excellent eyesight, but I'm not as old as I'm planning to be.
Deskspace: They take up too much realestate.
Power: Suck lots, though not as much as the CPU does.
On the Pro side, they've typically looked better than most LCD's, so I stuck with the behemoths until a year ago when I figured Samsung finally had one worth getting (Syncmaster 172t, it's only real problem is it's too bright even on the lowest setting!)
How much material is required to dispose of a personal computer?
Expect an appeal.
Those PetsWarehouse suits a few years back were a mess, and undoubtably an abuse of the courts.
Suppose someone registered a domain name www.robertnovakisaweasel.com, you could pretty much expect he would have filed similar suits to those he did.
How about this: How about a ratio of who is buying these things. Male/Female? If you're around women much you know how they like to accessorize. Pink is probably the most purchased color.
The impression I get is that most slashdotters, in mostly male-centric site, tend to think in their own terms, thus leaving out the choices of women.
For me, black would be OK, but you'd never catch me listening to tunes while running (which I don't do anymore) or cycling (which I do religiously) because I believe having 100% of the senses focused on not getting run over is a good way to work out.
!
I knew that I'd regret getting that pickup truck. First it was the faulty wiring, then the price of gas, now it denies me free schwag.
sigh
I guess I'm just not random enough anymore...
Sure, and you could hack the thing, install Linux on it, and play Ogg tunes. I'm sure there's people whose eyes don't glaze over as we go into the technical details and merits of our accomplishments. I'm always shocked when I run into someone who knows what I'm talking about.
"A left handed 9.4GB veeblefetzer with interchangeable 3.0 GHz portrzebie, no kidding?"