"For a start it can run on any machine known to man"
Thank you for that tip. Can you please assist me in locating the version of Linux for the Z80? I've got a ZX81 here that is just itching to be used again and Linux would be just lovely on it.
So don't sell them an end product. Sell them the labor to create the product.
Here in Idaho we have sales tax. If I sold software then the customer would have to pay not only the cost of the creation of the software (which would include the cost of my doing business such as my taxes) but they would also have to pay sales tax.
Instead I create a product for them and they just contract my labor to do so. That gets around the double (triple) taxation.
And in your case it might be the only way to stay in the game since the government is obviously set in its ways to make sure you can't play.
The only question I have is why these things are built with fans on all the time.
Here you have a kilobuck or more worth of computing equipment and it's built too stupid to regulate its own temp?
Well it's pretty simple to do just in hardware. But you can get pretty trick putting some feedback into the machine and letting it control yourself and learn some real hacking in the process.
My first, and most successful, attempt at this was with my DFI socket 7 motherboard, AMD K6-2 450 MHz processor (running overclocked at 500 MHz), 15 MB Maxtor hard drive, etc. etc.
First off all of this is installed in a discarded Gateway full size tower case. Picked that up for $15 and got lots of room. Plus it's got a 500 Watt supply that is loafing along with what I ask of it.
I took that case and sealed it shut with clear silicone sealant. The thing is air tight for the most part. I installed a case fan up front that draws air in and, of course, made sure that the air holes in front of where that fan is installed are open. In front of that fan I've installed a HEPA filter for a Hoover, picked that up at Wal Mart for $2 and it keeps things VERY clean inside.
The HEPA filter is important because any dust that does make its way in the machine will trap heat. Dust buildup kills electronics. Stop the dust before it gets a chance to collect in your heat sink and power supply.
So now I have very controled air flow. It comes in at the bottom and exits out the top via the power supply fan port. Air passes by everything.
Then I built a small circuit that monitors temperature at 6 points. I didn't really need 6 points, but I liked a nice even number and had the components. I placed one sensor just outside the case but behind the plastic and it monitors room temp. Another sensor monitors the temp of the CPU heat sink in the center of the sink and close to the CPU. Another sensor is attached to the main chip of the video card. Yet another monitors the exhaust temp, having been placed in the airflow path just outside of the power supply fan. The remaining sensors are just sitting in the case.
With that done I now have lots of data to tell me what gets hot and when.
Now what to do about it.
I ran wires from all three fans (Case input, CPU heat sink, and power supply) to a circuit board I made. The board is powered by the computer power supply using the origional CPU fan connections but indeed powers all three fans. I have played with resistor control of the fans but found it was just a heck of a lot easier to transistor switch them.
Yet another board ties it all together. I've played with a couple of different versions of this board, one analog (or hardware) and another digital (or computer controlled). What this board does is turn certain fans on or off based upon what's getting hot and how hot it's getting.
Keep in mind that I'm still playing with all this and it's a learning excersise. In other words I haven't got the computer controlled board doing much for me.
With my analog board it turns on the CPU fan when the temp is around 110 F (approx, this isn't rocket science). Once on it won't turn off until the temp drops below 98.6 (body temp). I'm just guessing here, didn't actually measure anything here, just going by "hot" and "cool".
Anyway, if the CPU temp does not drop a couple of degrees in a few minutes, then the power supply fan comes on. If the temp climbs still or does not drop within a few more minutes then the intake fan comes on. All fans stay on until CPU temp drops back down to "normal". "Normal" is defined as some degrees above room temp.
If the video chip gets "warm" then the intake fan comes on until it drops back to "normal"
I know this is all crude. But it's great fun and I'm having a blast building and tinkering.
The most important thing I've learned so far is that the CPU fan comes on from time to time, the other fans come on maybe twice a day when the room is really warm.
And I can't be fucking things up too bad because I ain't fried anything yet and this computer runs 24/7/365. Playing Quake or compiling programs can kick the fans on but that's to be expected. Other than that it's one hell of a lot more quiet in my office.
Oh, and for those of you in "energy challenged states" (hello you Californians who want to steal our lake to make electricity to heat your hot tubs) my power use has gone down some. I don't remember the actual measurements but there was a signifigant difference measured between "all fans on" and the way it normally runs now. I measured that difference in the AC current at the input to the power supply.
So go forth, have some fun, be safe.
And maybe one day the guys designing these computers will make these stupid boxes take care of themselves.
Reset V 3.1.4.1.5pre99.45ccad was released today also. Please note that this is the unstable branch of the stable development tree and only to be used for testing on non-production systems.
And use the mirrors, don't flood the main site in your mad rush to get a copy today!
Cripes! Enough with development point release announcements already!
Here again we see someone who wasn't satisified with a profitable and stable company but just had to be king of the hill. She admits that they went looking for capital to "accellerate growth".
What the hell is up with that?
It's ego and penis envy, whatever you want to call it.
I fail to understand why they needed to "grow" if they were stable and making a profit. Why does everyone seem to think they need to be bigger, badder, and better than the rest.
Hell, as long as you're making some money, contributing something to the world, and putting food on the table for you and your family then relax and enjoy. From the way she describes it, they were in just that position before they went looking for "venture capital"
If growth was needed, it would have funded itself thru profits.
I think she said they had about 60 some people before looking to "grow". After they "grew" those people had to make their home elsewhere.
She seems to assign a lot of blame to the managment people who were hired to help them grow. I would say that she and the other founders were as much or more to blame for the failure of the company simply because of thier greedy vision.
This is another one of those Star Trek ideas that sounds so wild but is really just too wild to really make it.
First, $0.05 is a lot of money. Yes, I actually said that. Screw you, I've been poor, depression poor. Someone else pointed out that $0.05 is 50 times the cost of a UPC print and the manufacturers cost would actually be double that anyway. What I need to survive is the milk, flour, eggs, and cheese and I'm willing to pay for that. But at the end of my shopping trip you've tried to extract about $2.00 for some tags that don't do me, the consumer, squat? No, I don't think so.
Spoofing is another reason it just isn't going to work. Say I'm wearing a coat I purchased last year and I go into a store to buy my brother the same coat this year as a gift because he liked mine so much. I'm in the checkout line and they're gonna scan two tags (the one I want to buy and the one I've had for a year). Sorting out stuff like that is going to be a costly nightmare for the retailer, especially if it goes so far that we have to go to small claims court in the end.
Bait and switch spoofing will be as bad or worse than it is now with UPC scanning. For those of you who don't know, that's where you put a copy of a UPC (or the RF tag) of a products low end cousin on the package of the high end model. Checkers are trained for speed these days and told not compare scan reads with the product being scanned. I know one guy who got out of Wal Mart with a $500 TV for only $90 doing that.
I'm with ya, open source can be a good thing. In many cases it is.
But it's not the be all, end all.
You have to pick the right tool for the job. Just as I like open source, I like monster SUV's with 5 inch lift kits and V8 engines. But I don't really advocate that for my mother who only uses her vehicle to go to the mall.
In the same way I'm sure there are lots of applications within the government for which open source would NOT be practical. One must look at the application at hand, the end goal, and the parameters that define the project. If open source code solves some or all of the challenges at hand then by all means they should consider it.
It seems that so often on this forum people forget that. Linux, open source, V8 engines, and cold beer are wonderful things but not all the time and for all people.
I'm with you there. I've worked with several folks who were here under H1B status and it does suck in a lot of ways. I would imagine it's even tougher dealing with INS after last September.
You're right that it really should be a simple thing. With all these complications and restrictions we're lucky we can even breath without a permit and a dozen lawyers involved. I would love it if we could get back to where business deals were conducted over a drink and sealed with a handshake that was binding. Then again, in this day and age, I'm sure I could be sued for suggesting that.
I used to think that way to and would have given the results of my labor to the company for free. But there is more at stake here than that. There are several things to consider.
Like a kid with a toy they've been given vs. one they earned, the company will value and respect the work more if they pay for it. If he gives them the tweak to make the CD work then it's more like "oh look what the nice kid who plays with Linux gave us" rather than giving his work the credit that is due.
Second, if you give it to them you set a precident. They will come to expect that they can pay to hire programmers to write Windows apps then have Linux compatability follow for free.
I came to understand this recently working as a mechanic. The agency that hired me does not have money in this years budget to pay me overtime. Sometimes I get involved in a job and don't want to quit and am willing to stay late a few more minutes without pay to finish up.
Sounds fine right?
Not when there are other mechanics who are budgeted. By working for free I have taken the opportunity for them to work. I've taken money away from them. So not only am I not playing nicely with the other mechanics, now my employeer thinks "it's no big deal to budget for this guy for overtime next year, he'll work for free".
The same thing would apply here.
I'm not saying he should ask a fortune, but at the very least he should seek a token for his work.
Tough thing tho about the H1B restrictions. Not sure about how to work around that and even giving it away could cause problems.
I can understand you wanting to work all this out as fun or education. Hell I'm of the hacking mind myself and learned most of my electronics and computer stuff by beating my head against things like this.
However......
Since they assume that everyone using their service runs Windows, you should make the point with them that this is not the case. Maybe do them the favor of pointing out their flaws but don't fix them for free.
What you are doing might have some value to their business. If so you should get a cut of that value.
Otherwise let them figure out how to make their product secure yet available to all their customers.
The first thing you really need to research is why these systems are being replaced.
If the equipment is still functional and it is being replaced, you might have a valid FWA claim.
Solid state electronic equipment should last far longer than 3 to 5 years. Replacement parts should easily be available.
I know that there is a strong urge to update hardware to run the latest software. But when you look at the tasks performed by most of these office machines, you will find that they are used for basic office functions.
This means that the features provided by newer software largely go unused. As a result the purchase of the latest software was a waste. It then follows that the hardware required to run that software was not required.
Consider also that the new software/hardware often requires (re)training of the operators. Those costs are often wasted as well if the operator has no need for the new features of the new software.
So rather than looking at Linux, GNU, Open Source, or whatever to save you money, look instead at justification for making any change at all. If a change of software/hardware is required, find out why. The requirements for the change will dictate what new hardware/software needs to be obtained. If Linux meets those needs then it can be considered.
I really haven't seen anything new in hardware or software in the last 5 years that would require replacement of an office machine that was in working order. Perhaps some upgrade in local or network storage if that is in short supply.
Otherwise, if you really are interested in saving tax dollars, look into justification and perhaps persue a fraud, waste, abuse investigation.
Ok, I'm just a dumb radio/computer geek and gearhead. Pardon my stupidity here but:
How would development of translucent or transparent concrete be related to the development of a transparent aluminium?
I've read everything in the discussion so far and still fail to understand. From what I've read so far the making of concrete is a very different process from making aluminium, which is just what I would have imagined.
So why would reading the article in the Economist cause someone to wonder about the creation of transparent aluminium?
These free CD's that AOL keeps littering the country with seem to want to provide a desktop/browser enviroment. Why they link it with IE when they own Netscape is beyond me.
But imagine them pulling off what Microsoft wants so badly to do.
You go to your mailbox and pick up the free AOL DVD which has just arrived. You pop it into your computer and it does a 100% automatic installation so that when you reboot you are offered your choice of your old system or AOL. AOL is the default.
If you boot into AOL you find that you have a total operating enviroment provided to you free of charge. It works more reliably than Windows. If you cared to look you would learn that it was powered by Red Hat Linux as the OS. Netscape would be your browser. AOL would be your pipeline to the net, free for the first 10,000 hours. Time/Warner would be responsible for content comeing down that pipeline. StarOffice or some such would give you the office tools you need.
You would instantly have no need to boot into the Windows/MSN/MSNBC side of things. So I imagine that a desktop icon could be provided to eliminate that crap from your hard drive to free up valuable disk space.
I don't know if this is where AOL is going with this, but they could.
Chances are they'll just let Red Hat gather dust like everything else they purchased.
Oh how I wish they would have developed to its potential.
I would agree that the release of 2.5.0 would be siginificant. In that case let everyone know that there is a new development tree starting. Then people could track, or participate in, that tree in the appropriate forum. But I just don't see it as being headline news in a general sense.
If this really is headline news, where are the regular updates on/. about development releases for other *nix OS? Or are they less signifigant somehow?
And that is exactly why this appears to be a silly legal game. The very idea that there would be anyone confused between Lindows and Windows is absurd. This starts to have the appearance of lawyers vs. lawyers for the sake of the game rather than bringing a new product to market for the sake of profit.
I have a customer that runs a local windows and doors business. We laughed a bit about this and he mentioned that he's not aware of any major window manufacturers who have been harassed by Microsoft. So to say that Microsoft claims that any use of "windows" is an infringement doesn't wash.
Maybe you mean that Microsoft only unleashes their dogs of war when the word is used in a computer software context?
Whatever. So your product name has stirred up some attention and publicity. That's a good thing, until the lawyers get involved. Now things get expensive and in that kind of game any idiot knows that Gates & Co. wins, you lose. It doesn't matter who is right or wrong, he who has the most $ wins.
If it were my product (Lindows) I would choose this time to tell Microsoft that the name of the product will be changed if they will go away. If your product is any good then your company is about making a profit on that product and it won't matter too much what the name is. But if you continue to play this game with Microsoft people are going to get the idea that you're not in this for the product but in this to fight a silly battle with Big Bad Bill.
One thing that slays me about all this is the attitude that if I record something to a CD it MUST be material that was created by someone else. The folks pushing this battle and demanding taxes on blank media assume that the common man is not capable of creating his own music, documents, movies, etc.
I got a taste of this during the discussion of Napster at http://www.tednugent.com where they were insisting that if I made my own MP3 file it was copyrighted and illegal for me to offer for free. Never mind if I wrote and performed my own music, recorded it myself, and chose to give it away to the world. The attitude seems to be that even if a moron like myself is capable of such a thing, I'm not as wise as the RIAA and should be protected from myself and not allowed to give it for free.
But of course.....the RIAA wants a chunk of "the action" and if I give it away there isn't any action.
I understand that some places (Canadia?) already have a tax on blank media under the assumption that you are going to use that media to copy copyrighted material. They don't seem to take into account that the same media can be used to save files of any type. Maybe you just wanted to save your family photos to CD, or your letters to your girlfriend. Oh well, you pay the tax anyway.
I'm not sure I understand how your post is relevant and rates an "Interesting" mod, but I thought I would reply anyway.
Your post is funny and when I read it I laughed. Then I thought about it and wondered to myself why it's funny because, after all, that's what they're doing with software these days.
With a software product you have only labor involved, assuming the potential customer downloads the product. If he wants it on media then you make him pay for media an shipping. But a car has a hell of a lot of material involved in it, so you would require a healthy dose of venture capital to purchase the material and give that away. Yikes!
So software is really one of the few things you could do this with. Cars, no way.
Slashdot Mirror
"For a start it can run on any machine known to man"
Thank you for that tip. Can you please assist me in locating the version of Linux for the Z80? I've got a ZX81 here that is just itching to be used again and Linux would be just lovely on it.
"If you disagree with me then you are wrong"
No, look here, if you were right I would agree with you. However you are not and I won't. But I still am and still do.
So don't sell them an end product. Sell them the labor to create the product.
Here in Idaho we have sales tax. If I sold software then the customer would have to pay not only the cost of the creation of the software (which would include the cost of my doing business such as my taxes) but they would also have to pay sales tax.
Instead I create a product for them and they just contract my labor to do so. That gets around the double (triple) taxation.
And in your case it might be the only way to stay in the game since the government is obviously set in its ways to make sure you can't play.
The only question I have is why these things are built with fans on all the time.
Here you have a kilobuck or more worth of computing equipment and it's built too stupid to regulate its own temp?
Well it's pretty simple to do just in hardware. But you can get pretty trick putting some feedback into the machine and letting it control yourself and learn some real hacking in the process.
My first, and most successful, attempt at this was with my DFI socket 7 motherboard, AMD K6-2 450 MHz processor (running overclocked at 500 MHz), 15 MB Maxtor hard drive, etc. etc.
First off all of this is installed in a discarded Gateway full size tower case. Picked that up for $15 and got lots of room. Plus it's got a 500 Watt supply that is loafing along with what I ask of it.
I took that case and sealed it shut with clear silicone sealant. The thing is air tight for the most part. I installed a case fan up front that draws air in and, of course, made sure that the air holes in front of where that fan is installed are open. In front of that fan I've installed a HEPA filter for a Hoover, picked that up at Wal Mart for $2 and it keeps things VERY clean inside.
The HEPA filter is important because any dust that does make its way in the machine will trap heat. Dust buildup kills electronics. Stop the dust before it gets a chance to collect in your heat sink and power supply.
So now I have very controled air flow. It comes in at the bottom and exits out the top via the power supply fan port. Air passes by everything.
Then I built a small circuit that monitors temperature at 6 points. I didn't really need 6 points, but I liked a nice even number and had the components. I placed one sensor just outside the case but behind the plastic and it monitors room temp. Another sensor monitors the temp of the CPU heat sink in the center of the sink and close to the CPU. Another sensor is attached to the main chip of the video card. Yet another monitors the exhaust temp, having been placed in the airflow path just outside of the power supply fan. The remaining sensors are just sitting in the case.
With that done I now have lots of data to tell me what gets hot and when.
Now what to do about it.
I ran wires from all three fans (Case input, CPU heat sink, and power supply) to a circuit board I made. The board is powered by the computer power supply using the origional CPU fan connections but indeed powers all three fans. I have played with resistor control of the fans but found it was just a heck of a lot easier to transistor switch them.
Yet another board ties it all together. I've played with a couple of different versions of this board, one analog (or hardware) and another digital (or computer controlled). What this board does is turn certain fans on or off based upon what's getting hot and how hot it's getting.
Keep in mind that I'm still playing with all this and it's a learning excersise. In other words I haven't got the computer controlled board doing much for me.
With my analog board it turns on the CPU fan when the temp is around 110 F (approx, this isn't rocket science). Once on it won't turn off until the temp drops below 98.6 (body temp). I'm just guessing here, didn't actually measure anything here, just going by "hot" and "cool".
Anyway, if the CPU temp does not drop a couple of degrees in a few minutes, then the power supply fan comes on. If the temp climbs still or does not drop within a few more minutes then the intake fan comes on. All fans stay on until CPU temp drops back down to "normal". "Normal" is defined as some degrees above room temp.
If the video chip gets "warm" then the intake fan comes on until it drops back to "normal"
I know this is all crude. But it's great fun and I'm having a blast building and tinkering.
The most important thing I've learned so far is that the CPU fan comes on from time to time, the other fans come on maybe twice a day when the room is really warm.
And I can't be fucking things up too bad because I ain't fried anything yet and this computer runs 24/7/365. Playing Quake or compiling programs can kick the fans on but that's to be expected. Other than that it's one hell of a lot more quiet in my office.
Oh, and for those of you in "energy challenged states" (hello you Californians who want to steal our lake to make electricity to heat your hot tubs) my power use has gone down some. I don't remember the actual measurements but there was a signifigant difference measured between "all fans on" and the way it normally runs now. I measured that difference in the AC current at the input to the power supply.
So go forth, have some fun, be safe.
And maybe one day the guys designing these computers will make these stupid boxes take care of themselves.
.
If you've read your history then you know that all attempts at democracy fail, and so will this one.
Thankfully I live in a democratic republic!
Reset V 3.1.4.1.5pre99.45ccad was released today also. Please note that this is the unstable branch of the stable development tree and only to be used for testing on non-production systems.
And use the mirrors, don't flood the main site in your mad rush to get a copy today!
Cripes! Enough with development point release announcements already!
.
Here again we see someone who wasn't satisified with a profitable and stable company but just had to be king of the hill. She admits that they went looking for capital to "accellerate growth".
What the hell is up with that?
It's ego and penis envy, whatever you want to call it.
I fail to understand why they needed to "grow" if they were stable and making a profit. Why does everyone seem to think they need to be bigger, badder, and better than the rest.
Hell, as long as you're making some money, contributing something to the world, and putting food on the table for you and your family then relax and enjoy. From the way she describes it, they were in just that position before they went looking for "venture capital"
If growth was needed, it would have funded itself thru profits.
I think she said they had about 60 some people before looking to "grow". After they "grew" those people had to make their home elsewhere.
She seems to assign a lot of blame to the managment people who were hired to help them grow. I would say that she and the other founders were as much or more to blame for the failure of the company simply because of thier greedy vision.
This is another one of those Star Trek ideas that sounds so wild but is really just too wild to really make it.
First, $0.05 is a lot of money. Yes, I actually said that. Screw you, I've been poor, depression poor. Someone else pointed out that $0.05 is 50 times the cost of a UPC print and the manufacturers cost would actually be double that anyway. What I need to survive is the milk, flour, eggs, and cheese and I'm willing to pay for that. But at the end of my shopping trip you've tried to extract about $2.00 for some tags that don't do me, the consumer, squat? No, I don't think so.
Spoofing is another reason it just isn't going to work. Say I'm wearing a coat I purchased last year and I go into a store to buy my brother the same coat this year as a gift because he liked mine so much. I'm in the checkout line and they're gonna scan two tags (the one I want to buy and the one I've had for a year). Sorting out stuff like that is going to be a costly nightmare for the retailer, especially if it goes so far that we have to go to small claims court in the end.
Bait and switch spoofing will be as bad or worse than it is now with UPC scanning. For those of you who don't know, that's where you put a copy of a UPC (or the RF tag) of a products low end cousin on the package of the high end model. Checkers are trained for speed these days and told not compare scan reads with the product being scanned. I know one guy who got out of Wal Mart with a $500 TV for only $90 doing that.
Bad idea. Very bad.
Are you sure of that? From what I've read of the man he had a rather.......unconventional sex life.
I'm with ya, open source can be a good thing. In many cases it is.
But it's not the be all, end all.
You have to pick the right tool for the job. Just as I like open source, I like monster SUV's with 5 inch lift kits and V8 engines. But I don't really advocate that for my mother who only uses her vehicle to go to the mall.
In the same way I'm sure there are lots of applications within the government for which open source would NOT be practical. One must look at the application at hand, the end goal, and the parameters that define the project. If open source code solves some or all of the challenges at hand then by all means they should consider it.
It seems that so often on this forum people forget that. Linux, open source, V8 engines, and cold beer are wonderful things but not all the time and for all people.
.
I'm with you there. I've worked with several folks who were here under H1B status and it does suck in a lot of ways. I would imagine it's even tougher dealing with INS after last September.
You're right that it really should be a simple thing. With all these complications and restrictions we're lucky we can even breath without a permit and a dozen lawyers involved. I would love it if we could get back to where business deals were conducted over a drink and sealed with a handshake that was binding. Then again, in this day and age, I'm sure I could be sued for suggesting that.
Sigh.
Oh well. Smile. And good luck with that CD.
I used to think that way to and would have given the results of my labor to the company for free. But there is more at stake here than that. There are several things to consider.
Like a kid with a toy they've been given vs. one they earned, the company will value and respect the work more if they pay for it. If he gives them the tweak to make the CD work then it's more like "oh look what the nice kid who plays with Linux gave us" rather than giving his work the credit that is due.
Second, if you give it to them you set a precident. They will come to expect that they can pay to hire programmers to write Windows apps then have Linux compatability follow for free.
I came to understand this recently working as a mechanic. The agency that hired me does not have money in this years budget to pay me overtime. Sometimes I get involved in a job and don't want to quit and am willing to stay late a few more minutes without pay to finish up.
Sounds fine right?
Not when there are other mechanics who are budgeted. By working for free I have taken the opportunity for them to work. I've taken money away from them. So not only am I not playing nicely with the other mechanics, now my employeer thinks "it's no big deal to budget for this guy for overtime next year, he'll work for free".
The same thing would apply here.
I'm not saying he should ask a fortune, but at the very least he should seek a token for his work.
Tough thing tho about the H1B restrictions. Not sure about how to work around that and even giving it away could cause problems.
I can understand you wanting to work all this out as fun or education. Hell I'm of the hacking mind myself and learned most of my electronics and computer stuff by beating my head against things like this.
However......
Since they assume that everyone using their service runs Windows, you should make the point with them that this is not the case. Maybe do them the favor of pointing out their flaws but don't fix them for free.
What you are doing might have some value to their business. If so you should get a cut of that value.
Otherwise let them figure out how to make their product secure yet available to all their customers.
The first thing you really need to research is why these systems are being replaced.
If the equipment is still functional and it is being replaced, you might have a valid FWA claim.
Solid state electronic equipment should last far longer than 3 to 5 years. Replacement parts should easily be available.
I know that there is a strong urge to update hardware to run the latest software. But when you look at the tasks performed by most of these office machines, you will find that they are used for basic office functions.
This means that the features provided by newer software largely go unused. As a result the purchase of the latest software was a waste. It then follows that the hardware required to run that software was not required.
Consider also that the new software/hardware often requires (re)training of the operators. Those costs are often wasted as well if the operator has no need for the new features of the new software.
So rather than looking at Linux, GNU, Open Source, or whatever to save you money, look instead at justification for making any change at all. If a change of software/hardware is required, find out why. The requirements for the change will dictate what new hardware/software needs to be obtained. If Linux meets those needs then it can be considered.
I really haven't seen anything new in hardware or software in the last 5 years that would require replacement of an office machine that was in working order. Perhaps some upgrade in local or network storage if that is in short supply.
Otherwise, if you really are interested in saving tax dollars, look into justification and perhaps persue a fraud, waste, abuse investigation.
Ok, I'm just a dumb radio/computer geek and gearhead. Pardon my stupidity here but:
How would development of translucent or transparent concrete be related to the development of a transparent aluminium?
I've read everything in the discussion so far and still fail to understand. From what I've read so far the making of concrete is a very different process from making aluminium, which is just what I would have imagined.
So why would reading the article in the Economist cause someone to wonder about the creation of transparent aluminium?
The article mentions that the doctor wants the material to be able to recycle. The author comments that this might be a "tall order".
This tells me they must be using some VERY uncommon bonding agent. They do mention the use of glass, which is a sand product anyway, being used.
It's hard to imagine why they couldn't recycle this stuff like they recycle concrete now. It makes me even more curious as to what their formula is.
These free CD's that AOL keeps littering the country with seem to want to provide a desktop/browser enviroment. Why they link it with IE when they own Netscape is beyond me.
But imagine them pulling off what Microsoft wants so badly to do.
You go to your mailbox and pick up the free AOL DVD which has just arrived. You pop it into your computer and it does a 100% automatic installation so that when you reboot you are offered your choice of your old system or AOL. AOL is the default.
If you boot into AOL you find that you have a total operating enviroment provided to you free of charge. It works more reliably than Windows. If you cared to look you would learn that it was powered by Red Hat Linux as the OS. Netscape would be your browser. AOL would be your pipeline to the net, free for the first 10,000 hours. Time/Warner would be responsible for content comeing down that pipeline. StarOffice or some such would give you the office tools you need.
You would instantly have no need to boot into the Windows/MSN/MSNBC side of things. So I imagine that a desktop icon could be provided to eliminate that crap from your hard drive to free up valuable disk space.
I don't know if this is where AOL is going with this, but they could.
Chances are they'll just let Red Hat gather dust like everything else they purchased.
Oh how I wish they would have developed to its potential.
Oh, so asking an honest question in an effort to understand is considered trolling?
Well then, in an effort to better myself and learn:
I TROLL WITH PRIDE!
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I would agree that the release of 2.5.0 would be siginificant. In that case let everyone know that there is a new development tree starting. Then people could track, or participate in, that tree in the appropriate forum. But I just don't see it as being headline news in a general sense.
/. about development releases for other *nix OS? Or are they less signifigant somehow?
If this really is headline news, where are the regular updates on
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I'm sorry to hear that my attitude bugs you. Please know that I didn't start my day in that direction.
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I don't dispute that information about kernel releases should be news. But there are places to get that specific kind of information (kernel.org?).
It just seems odd that a development release would make HEADLINE news on
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And that is exactly why this appears to be a silly legal game. The very idea that there would be anyone confused between Lindows and Windows is absurd. This starts to have the appearance of lawyers vs. lawyers for the sake of the game rather than bringing a new product to market for the sake of profit.
Yawn.
So the release of a development kernel is headline news?
Updates to the stable tree, major improvements, security fixes, and such....well that I can understand.
Michael,
I have a customer that runs a local windows and doors business. We laughed a bit about this and he mentioned that he's not aware of any major window manufacturers who have been harassed by Microsoft. So to say that Microsoft claims that any use of "windows" is an infringement doesn't wash.
Maybe you mean that Microsoft only unleashes their dogs of war when the word is used in a computer software context?
Whatever. So your product name has stirred up some attention and publicity. That's a good thing, until the lawyers get involved. Now things get expensive and in that kind of game any idiot knows that Gates & Co. wins, you lose. It doesn't matter who is right or wrong, he who has the most $ wins.
If it were my product (Lindows) I would choose this time to tell Microsoft that the name of the product will be changed if they will go away. If your product is any good then your company is about making a profit on that product and it won't matter too much what the name is. But if you continue to play this game with Microsoft people are going to get the idea that you're not in this for the product but in this to fight a silly battle with Big Bad Bill.
Which is it?
One thing that slays me about all this is the attitude that if I record something to a CD it MUST be material that was created by someone else. The folks pushing this battle and demanding taxes on blank media assume that the common man is not capable of creating his own music, documents, movies, etc.
I got a taste of this during the discussion of Napster at http://www.tednugent.com where they were insisting that if I made my own MP3 file it was copyrighted and illegal for me to offer for free. Never mind if I wrote and performed my own music, recorded it myself, and chose to give it away to the world. The attitude seems to be that even if a moron like myself is capable of such a thing, I'm not as wise as the RIAA and should be protected from myself and not allowed to give it for free.
But of course.....the RIAA wants a chunk of "the action" and if I give it away there isn't any action.
I understand that some places (Canadia?) already have a tax on blank media under the assumption that you are going to use that media to copy copyrighted material. They don't seem to take into account that the same media can be used to save files of any type. Maybe you just wanted to save your family photos to CD, or your letters to your girlfriend. Oh well, you pay the tax anyway.
I'm not sure I understand how your post is relevant and rates an "Interesting" mod, but I thought I would reply anyway.
Your post is funny and when I read it I laughed. Then I thought about it and wondered to myself why it's funny because, after all, that's what they're doing with software these days.
With a software product you have only labor involved, assuming the potential customer downloads the product. If he wants it on media then you make him pay for media an shipping. But a car has a hell of a lot of material involved in it, so you would require a healthy dose of venture capital to purchase the material and give that away. Yikes!
So software is really one of the few things you could do this with. Cars, no way.