If there were a company with no Finance Department, no contact with the outside world, and users that were willing to support themselves (or had sufficient IT resources to hold their hands), OO could be a potential fit, but the liklihood of a company like that existing is about as great as the aforementioned frogs.
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OK, you are almost halfway now. Boy, you sure are far up Microsoft's ass.
If a company cannot survive without Microsoft Office, then they might as well pack up and go home.
If a small company can look at the weaknesses of a product, they can honestly decide whether or not to use it. Now you might think that the ones you listed are big issues, but they might not be . It would depend on the company. I can certainly see how some companies could look at the list of flaws and still decide to use it.
Even if your whole company migrates, you still have to deal with people who use Microsoft Office.
To be technically correct, they have to deal with you.
That sounded like an oddly "In Soviet Russia" comment, but I think you see my point. They are the majority, therefore they "win" when it comes to battles. That is how Word got its foothold, that is how it is going to keep it. I say Word instead of Office, because they are all just tagalong junkyard dogs. The word processor is what got them there.
Heh, so your Windows PC at work is percieved as unstable because of corporate policy requires you to patch and reboot too often? You're losing me here. I'm not sure where "acceptable stability" is given a nod, and yet in your next sentence you say you do not consider it stable. I can only assume it is because of whatever policies are in place at your work.
I am just saying that comparatively, it is stable for Windows . If I were just given the machine, would I call it stable? Probably not. But compared to NT and 98, it is better.
Again I say to you, look above and below. It IS possible to do the same thing to Linux.
Drop the Linux vs Windows comparison. My company is never going to switch to Linux, I understand your point, but it is moot. Forget I ever brought up my Linux uptime, just talk about Windows. Which leads to...
And again I ask, how does it not matter whether the point of failure is the OS or the applications being run?
Because to me, a reboot is a reboot. I am somewhat playing devil's advocate in that even when I know it is an application causing me to reboot, I can step back, pretend to be a dumb user, and say "I have to reboot my computer - AGAIN". Since I don't control the apps I can use, it doesn't matter if it is the app or not. My machine is not stable enough to run for a week - regardless of what is causing it. And it always seems to need a reboot right when I am in the middle of something important.
An OS should be able to contain those kinds of things and prevent the app from causing a system FUBAR. Whatever your OS of choice is. To ME, Windows doesn't do that.
A linux desktop should look like Windows not only because its what people are used to, but its what most people have proven to be able to use.
Because their alternatives have been....?
And you make a huge leap in coming up with the statement "proven to be able to use". How come the SAME issues always come up for newbies? Sure, they get used to clicking on Start for everything, but their initial inclination is not to do so.
Why not have Administration, Applications, System, Internet buttons at the bottom? That seems to make sense to me. Would MS change their now-familiar layout? Probably not. KDE or Gnome could. Heck, the distro or even the user could. Something like that would be a small change that user's might like better. I don't think it would be a stretch to think that there are more things out there that user's might like better than something Windows provides.
The fact that you're Linux box has been up for 79 days, while sounding impressive doesn't give much insight since we don't have any type of baseline to compare between your work/home machines.
True, and I wasn't really trying to compare them, it was more of a point of reference. I didn't even need to say that. In fact, disregard it, it isn't relevant to my point at all.
You ask if the OS or the apps you run (on your work machines) are to blame and say it doesn't matter. Actually it does.
Not really. TECHNICALLY, I know it matters, but practically it doesn't. I still have to reboot. If my OS is rock-solid, but some app can force me to reboot, then what benefit is it to have a rock-solid OS? That is what I meant by it not mattering.
I understand the point of due diligence when patching. You say that if I gave my Windows box as much attention as my Linux box.... In reality, my Windows box gets much more attention in that arena. By corporate policy (shudder) we have a patching client always running, pointing to a corporate server. They serve up fresh-patchy-goodness to us whenever they feel like it. At home, I maintain my own firewall and apply patches when I need to on my Linux machine, which isn't very often at all. In fact, I believe that the frequency of the MS patches are what cause some of the problems in our department, but I haven't been able to prove it yet.
I get your point about beta software - but that doesn't really apply. My main office machine is usually only running a few apps - Office, Outlook (corporate mandate again), PuTTY, Opera, Tivoli, and several tools from Rational (ClearQuest, ReqPro, TestManager). Now I know that those Rational apps aren't the most stable, and are probably the cause of many of my problems, but I can't not use them. I am no OS guru, but I don't think that an app should have the power to bring down the system or make it grind to a halt. And I can't just blame those apps. When I try to attach a file to an email by right-clicking on the file and selecting Send To -> Mail Recipient, my machine will freeze after I send it. It seems to be the open folder that is causing the problem, and if I can get to the process in time to kill it, I can save a reboot. But I am not always that lucky.
But that is just one example. I liked 2000. But any new machine that we get has to have XP on it. If 2000 was so stable (which it was, compared to previous incarnations) then why is XP that much better for an office environment? That is rhetorical, we all know why - because business is business.
In my experience, most people who see their Windows systems slow down are invested with spyware they acquired through file-swapping apps. Get all that junk off your system and start paying for CD's and movies and your system will work just fine.
Bzzzt. Sorry, not in this case. Quite a jump you make there - do you happen to work for the RIAA or the MPAA? Your "logic" seems to be on par with theirs. These are work machines. The only non-work-related apps that I have installed is an old version of Winamp. No P2P, no spyware, no hacked software - we have corporate deal licenses for all our software. We also have very restrictive firewalls in place to limit the websites we can visit. Sure, there is probably still spyware on machines in our network, but not on my machine.
All jokes aside, BSODs are very very few and far between (certainly on the *nix scale) since 2k/XP was released.
True. But my 2000 and XP machines (at work) routinely have to be rebooted because they come to a crawl, or freeze. Is it the OS to blame, or the apps I am running? That is a rhetorical question - the cause of the reboot doesn't matter. This doesn't even count required reboots for software installs/patches, which are common. Just because there is no BSOD doesn't necessarily mean it is stable. Is XP more stable than Win98? Yes. Does it still have acceptable stability? Yes. Would I consider it to be a stable OS? Nope. If Windows was all I knew, I would probably say yes.
And not to be cliche, but my Linux machine at home, which I use on a daily basis, has been up for 79 days. I have had a few Xwindows crashes and freezes, but the OS is still running.
You can't make a digital copy of a CD and share it without seriously risking infringment.
Under this reading, sharing an MP3 ripped from a CD with friends is fine, as long as it is an analogue of the original. If an exact duplicte of it turns up anywhere else, you're toast.
Just to be technically accurate, there are no MP3s on a CD. So you are making a transformed derivative copy of portions of it. So is an exact duplicate of that derivative copy a derivation of the original? So is the infringement making a copy of the (derivative) copy or making another derivative copy of the original? What if there could be a very slight modification to the copy such that it was not an exact duplicate of the original?
And before all the "it's still stealing" dopes come out of the woodwork, I am just trying to discuss the technical points of the argument. I am not passing judgement on them or applying them to a specific scenario.
It seems I wrote answers on a laptop on a plane a long time ago and then forgot to submit them. And now they are stale.
It's probably safe to say that they weren't lost due to a BSOD, huh?:-)
Thank you for responding! I have emailed the Slashdot editors several times about this, because it was one of the interviews I was looking forward to, but never happened. But I never could get any response.
They should conduct another one, seeing as how a lot of those questions had to do with SCO, but some didn't (like mine). I am sure there are many other Open Source questions out there that you could handily field.
Back in college, late 80s/early 90s, working in the computer lab, I had the power to reset the user's passwords on the VMS VAX. (This was back in the day) Everyone forgot their passwords then too. All the guys and ugly girls would get some random password, and all the hot girls would get my name or phone number as their top-secret password.
It never worked, but it was a good plan in theory.
I do remember helping one girl who wore a workout suit into the computer lab, no bra, and the jacket partially unzipped. It is amazing how much help she needed (well, received) from me that day. It is also coincidental that the optimum location to stand when helping someone who is sitting down working on a computer is behind them and off to the side a little.
Bruce, I know this is slightly off-topic, but whatever happened to your Slashdot interview? I thought that you must just be way too busy to answer the questions, but here you are posting on Slashdot. At the time at least, some of the questions were good ones, and I had one that I'd still like to hear your opinions on. The interview questions were posted on July 28 of 2003. What happened?
Conversely, don't fall for the propoganda that recording movies and distributing them on the internet is any less wrong than stealing just because "it's not stealing".
Are you talking morally or legally? If you want to talk degrees of wrong, let's look at the punishments for these offenses:
Steal a DVD from BestBuy? Think that is a year in jail? Hardly.
Here is the additional distinction that needs to be made when the "copyright infringement" vs "stealing" argument comes up. One is a CIVIL offense, and one is a CRIMINAL offense. The problem here is that they are imposing criminal punishments on civil offenses.
THAT is the real argument against this. I think the MPAA and the RIAA should crack down on piracy, but they should not be allowed to ruin someone's life for their offenses. The punishment should fit the crime.
He did make what the "web" is today, the fact that you're reading this now is down to him, he did something which is far easier to do now (though still not!) in a time when this sort of concept couldn't be comprehended.
I think we need a new mod category: Incomprehensible.
Folks, they are paying PER CPU hour, not per wallclock hour.
Since in almost every case you will be I/O bound, while this thing may tie up your entire connection it will not run more than a couple of CPU minutes per wallclock hour.
Thus the spammers screw the people doing this - they think they are going to get 24*7 = $168 a week, but they really are going to get about 24*7*.1 = $16.8 a week. Then they will get nothing because their account was terminated.
HOWEVER, this gives us a GREAT way to screw the spammers - run this sucker on an UNDERCLOCKED machine.
WAYYYYYY underclocked.
Like about 100 kHz.
That way, even with a modem the program will be CPU bound.
I am glad someone pointed this out so I didn't have to. Now I am going to go fire up my TRS-80 and make some money!!!:-)
Wow. I was just thinking to myself, "You know what, Mike? We need MORE LINUX DISTRIBUTIONS!"
You refer to yourself in the third person? Uhhh, OK. Anyway, this distribution is not for you. It is for the people who buy their systems. Not only that, but we need distributions that only work_on/come_with certain hardware. So now I go from 2% market share to 0.0002% marketshare!
The world does not revolve around marketing. Do you think BMW cares that they don't have the marketshare of Ford? Do you think Apple is trying to unseat Microsoft? Niche markets can be very profitable. It sounds to me like this isn't in the same market as all of the other distros - so in their market, they may have 100% marketshare.
It is a decent idea, and one that could be successful. I think it would be interesting if it did, because it might show people who think like you that we don't need the same stale, lame, annoying ways of doing business.
OK, so what? ONE listener complained, and the FCC gets him pulled off of 6 channels? Have you seen any fines against Oprah? Has she been pulled off the air yet? There have been complaints about her to the FCC too.
2. NO big radio corporation fights the FCC on its content restrictions (even if they probably should since there's obviously a case on 1st amendment grounds) - Clear Channel isn't alone in that area. Because of that, the "offer they can't refuse" which the FCC is offering is to levy monstrous, excessive fines on them, and if they don't pay up and take corrective action then broadcast licenses can be pulled.
i.e. you cannot fight it. So which is it? Either get fined, or take the "offending" material off the air? In this case, it is both. Why were they fined if they took him off the air? And why aren't the same standards applied to EVERYONE who broadcasts on TV and radio? This isn't about Howard Stern, it is much bigger than that. Of course, you get your news from MTV...
3. Keep your keyboard quiet if you don't know what you're talking about.
Seriously, how is a chat session any different than an email conversation, apart from the lag time between send and receive? We aren't talking real-time communication, the person typing the message still has to hit a key to send it. Now if it were real-time, where I could see the person's message as they typed it, then it might be a different story. But it isn't.
Clear Channel, like any other huge media company, doesn't have a "true" political leaning. Their only concern is making money. If conservative talk show hosts make them money, they put them on the air. If an ultra-liberal was going to make them money (before the JJ flap, they WERE carrying Howard Stern on several stations - hardly a good "Christian" program), they'd put that person on the air.
BS. Total BS. Why was Stern pulled off the air where he was #1 in the ratings? You don't pull your number one show unless you are in bed with the FCC, and they "make you an offer you can't refuse." Remember, he was pulled from the air before any fines were levied, and he wasn't even told he was being pulled. And it was for a year old comment made by a listener. Yet the words used in that comment can be heard on network TV today.
The whole thing reeks, and it isn't just with Stern. There are many other shows that have been treated like this, he is just the highest profile one. Yet some shows are allowed to slide. Hmm, I wonder why....
Slashdot Mirror
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OK, keep coming
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OK, you are almost halfway now. Boy, you sure are far up Microsoft's ass.
If a company cannot survive without Microsoft Office, then they might as well pack up and go home.
If a small company can look at the weaknesses of a product, they can honestly decide whether or not to use it. Now you might think that the ones you listed are big issues, but they might not be . It would depend on the company. I can certainly see how some companies could look at the list of flaws and still decide to use it.
That sounded like an oddly "In Soviet Russia" comment, but I think you see my point. They are the majority, therefore they "win" when it comes to battles. That is how Word got its foothold, that is how it is going to keep it. I say Word instead of Office, because they are all just tagalong junkyard dogs. The word processor is what got them there.
I am just saying that comparatively, it is stable for Windows . If I were just given the machine, would I call it stable? Probably not. But compared to NT and 98, it is better.
Again I say to you, look above and below. It IS possible to do the same thing to Linux.
Drop the Linux vs Windows comparison. My company is never going to switch to Linux, I understand your point, but it is moot. Forget I ever brought up my Linux uptime, just talk about Windows. Which leads to...
And again I ask, how does it not matter whether the point of failure is the OS or the applications being run?
Because to me, a reboot is a reboot. I am somewhat playing devil's advocate in that even when I know it is an application causing me to reboot, I can step back, pretend to be a dumb user, and say "I have to reboot my computer - AGAIN". Since I don't control the apps I can use, it doesn't matter if it is the app or not. My machine is not stable enough to run for a week - regardless of what is causing it. And it always seems to need a reboot right when I am in the middle of something important.
An OS should be able to contain those kinds of things and prevent the app from causing a system FUBAR. Whatever your OS of choice is. To ME, Windows doesn't do that.
Because their alternatives have been....?
And you make a huge leap in coming up with the statement "proven to be able to use". How come the SAME issues always come up for newbies? Sure, they get used to clicking on Start for everything, but their initial inclination is not to do so.
Why not have Administration, Applications, System, Internet buttons at the bottom? That seems to make sense to me. Would MS change their now-familiar layout? Probably not. KDE or Gnome could. Heck, the distro or even the user could. Something like that would be a small change that user's might like better. I don't think it would be a stretch to think that there are more things out there that user's might like better than something Windows provides.
True, and I wasn't really trying to compare them, it was more of a point of reference. I didn't even need to say that. In fact, disregard it, it isn't relevant to my point at all.
You ask if the OS or the apps you run (on your work machines) are to blame and say it doesn't matter. Actually it does.
Not really. TECHNICALLY, I know it matters, but practically it doesn't. I still have to reboot. If my OS is rock-solid, but some app can force me to reboot, then what benefit is it to have a rock-solid OS? That is what I meant by it not mattering.
I understand the point of due diligence when patching. You say that if I gave my Windows box as much attention as my Linux box.... In reality, my Windows box gets much more attention in that arena. By corporate policy (shudder) we have a patching client always running, pointing to a corporate server. They serve up fresh-patchy-goodness to us whenever they feel like it. At home, I maintain my own firewall and apply patches when I need to on my Linux machine, which isn't very often at all. In fact, I believe that the frequency of the MS patches are what cause some of the problems in our department, but I haven't been able to prove it yet.
I get your point about beta software - but that doesn't really apply. My main office machine is usually only running a few apps - Office, Outlook (corporate mandate again), PuTTY, Opera, Tivoli, and several tools from Rational (ClearQuest, ReqPro, TestManager). Now I know that those Rational apps aren't the most stable, and are probably the cause of many of my problems, but I can't not use them. I am no OS guru, but I don't think that an app should have the power to bring down the system or make it grind to a halt. And I can't just blame those apps. When I try to attach a file to an email by right-clicking on the file and selecting Send To -> Mail Recipient, my machine will freeze after I send it. It seems to be the open folder that is causing the problem, and if I can get to the process in time to kill it, I can save a reboot. But I am not always that lucky.
But that is just one example. I liked 2000. But any new machine that we get has to have XP on it. If 2000 was so stable (which it was, compared to previous incarnations) then why is XP that much better for an office environment? That is rhetorical, we all know why - because business is business.
Bzzzt. Sorry, not in this case. Quite a jump you make there - do you happen to work for the RIAA or the MPAA? Your "logic" seems to be on par with theirs. These are work machines. The only non-work-related apps that I have installed is an old version of Winamp. No P2P, no spyware, no hacked software - we have corporate deal licenses for all our software. We also have very restrictive firewalls in place to limit the websites we can visit. Sure, there is probably still spyware on machines in our network, but not on my machine.
I know you were just trolling though - nice try.
True. But my 2000 and XP machines (at work) routinely have to be rebooted because they come to a crawl, or freeze. Is it the OS to blame, or the apps I am running? That is a rhetorical question - the cause of the reboot doesn't matter. This doesn't even count required reboots for software installs/patches, which are common. Just because there is no BSOD doesn't necessarily mean it is stable. Is XP more stable than Win98? Yes. Does it still have acceptable stability? Yes. Would I consider it to be a stable OS? Nope. If Windows was all I knew, I would probably say yes.
And not to be cliche, but my Linux machine at home, which I use on a daily basis, has been up for 79 days. I have had a few Xwindows crashes and freezes, but the OS is still running.
Yes, Gimp is in deep trouble. Rumor has it they'll have to fork over 50% of their profits.
Under this reading, sharing an MP3 ripped from a CD with friends is fine, as long as it is an analogue of the original. If an exact duplicte of it turns up anywhere else, you're toast.
Just to be technically accurate, there are no MP3s on a CD. So you are making a transformed derivative copy of portions of it. So is an exact duplicate of that derivative copy a derivation of the original? So is the infringement making a copy of the (derivative) copy or making another derivative copy of the original? What if there could be a very slight modification to the copy such that it was not an exact duplicate of the original?
And before all the "it's still stealing" dopes come out of the woodwork, I am just trying to discuss the technical points of the argument. I am not passing judgement on them or applying them to a specific scenario.
I was hoping this meant an end to overtime, but instead it is an end to overtime PAY (whatever that is).
At these speeds, there is no need for the last D in DVD.
Then again, he could be breaking new ground.
It's probably safe to say that they weren't lost due to a BSOD, huh? :-)
Thank you for responding! I have emailed the Slashdot editors several times about this, because it was one of the interviews I was looking forward to, but never happened. But I never could get any response.
They should conduct another one, seeing as how a lot of those questions had to do with SCO, but some didn't (like mine). I am sure there are many other Open Source questions out there that you could handily field.
Anyway, thanks for the response.
It never worked, but it was a good plan in theory.
I do remember helping one girl who wore a workout suit into the computer lab, no bra, and the jacket partially unzipped. It is amazing how much help she needed (well, received) from me that day. It is also coincidental that the optimum location to stand when helping someone who is sitting down working on a computer is behind them and off to the side a little.
At home: USB port, DVD-reader. 56k modem for emergencies.
Funny, when I am at work, I work.
(except for reading Slashdot of course - but I could probably argue that keeping up with tech news is part of my job)
Bruce, I know this is slightly off-topic, but whatever happened to your Slashdot interview? I thought that you must just be way too busy to answer the questions, but here you are posting on Slashdot. At the time at least, some of the questions were good ones, and I had one that I'd still like to hear your opinions on. The interview questions were posted on July 28 of 2003. What happened?
Are you talking morally or legally? If you want to talk degrees of wrong, let's look at the punishments for these offenses:
Steal a DVD from BestBuy? Think that is a year in jail? Hardly.
Here is the additional distinction that needs to be made when the "copyright infringement" vs "stealing" argument comes up. One is a CIVIL offense, and one is a CRIMINAL offense. The problem here is that they are imposing criminal punishments on civil offenses.
THAT is the real argument against this. I think the MPAA and the RIAA should crack down on piracy, but they should not be allowed to ruin someone's life for their offenses. The punishment should fit the crime.
I think we need a new mod category: Incomprehensible.
And those holes usually have pretty weak security by default, so they would be called "Security Holes".
Hmm, what a coincidence...
I am glad someone pointed this out so I didn't have to. Now I am going to go fire up my TRS-80 and make some money!!! :-)
You refer to yourself in the third person? Uhhh, OK. Anyway, this distribution is not for you. It is for the people who buy their systems. Not only that, but we need distributions that only work_on/come_with certain hardware. So now I go from 2% market share to 0.0002% marketshare!
The world does not revolve around marketing. Do you think BMW cares that they don't have the marketshare of Ford? Do you think Apple is trying to unseat Microsoft? Niche markets can be very profitable. It sounds to me like this isn't in the same market as all of the other distros - so in their market, they may have 100% marketshare.
It is a decent idea, and one that could be successful. I think it would be interesting if it did, because it might show people who think like you that we don't need the same stale, lame, annoying ways of doing business.
OK, so what? ONE listener complained, and the FCC gets him pulled off of 6 channels? Have you seen any fines against Oprah? Has she been pulled off the air yet? There have been complaints about her to the FCC too.
2. NO big radio corporation fights the FCC on its content restrictions (even if they probably should since there's obviously a case on 1st amendment grounds) - Clear Channel isn't alone in that area. Because of that, the "offer they can't refuse" which the FCC is offering is to levy monstrous, excessive fines on them, and if they don't pay up and take corrective action then broadcast licenses can be pulled.
i.e. you cannot fight it. So which is it? Either get fined, or take the "offending" material off the air? In this case, it is both. Why were they fined if they took him off the air? And why aren't the same standards applied to EVERYONE who broadcasts on TV and radio? This isn't about Howard Stern, it is much bigger than that. Of course, you get your news from MTV...
3. Keep your keyboard quiet if you don't know what you're talking about.
clickety clickety click.
Seriously, how is a chat session any different than an email conversation, apart from the lag time between send and receive? We aren't talking real-time communication, the person typing the message still has to hit a key to send it. Now if it were real-time, where I could see the person's message as they typed it, then it might be a different story. But it isn't.
BS. Total BS. Why was Stern pulled off the air where he was #1 in the ratings? You don't pull your number one show unless you are in bed with the FCC, and they "make you an offer you can't refuse." Remember, he was pulled from the air before any fines were levied, and he wasn't even told he was being pulled. And it was for a year old comment made by a listener. Yet the words used in that comment can be heard on network TV today.
The whole thing reeks, and it isn't just with Stern. There are many other shows that have been treated like this, he is just the highest profile one. Yet some shows are allowed to slide. Hmm, I wonder why....