Sounds like a nice theory, but I don't believe it. If the goal is to prevent somebody from hogging a space all day, then a parking meter doesn't do the job; I can defeat the "goal" by feeding the meter.
I think the real goal is often to gain revenue from both meter receipts and parking violation receipts. It's certainly worth big money in Milwaukee, my nearest big city; see this Milwaukee Journal/Sentinel article for recent coverage.
Given that all the.NET languages boil down to the same compiled runtime "language", and given that C++ is a.NET language, could somebody explain how problems endemic to C/C++ are kept from spreading to all languages in the.NET family?
I plead ignorance on.NET. I'm much more familiar with Java and prior generations of Microsoft languages.
As it turns out, *no* spammer has the same filter I do. I use Bayesian filters; in particular, Thunderbird for recreational use, and Outlook with SpamBayes for professional use. What I consider as spam is different from what anybody else considers as spam, so my filter is different from anybody else's.
If you find yourself forced to use Outlook (Look out!) for whatever reason, you might want to try using SpamBayes for Bayesian spam filtering. I actually like it better than Thunderbird's filtering. It dumps mail into three buckets: spam, ham, and not sure. I've been using it for one of my accounts for a number of months now, and I haven't seen spam in my ham bucket since about a week after I started using it. The "not sure" bucket is innovative; it allows a third option for e-mails that the filter isn't sure about. I get about 5 e-mails a week in the "not sure" bucket; they're about half ham, half spam.
I use Thunderbird at home. Its built-in Bayesian filter is pretty good (though not as good as SpamBayes, in my experience), and because you can view e-mail in Text or Simple HTML mode (as well as full HTML when necessary), you can avoid falling victim to web bugs.
I've been in this situation a number of times, and my actions are different every time. Meetings are two-way conversations, not one-way; you must evaluate the needs of both sides of the conversation before you begin. Do the following...
Know what your goals are in being employed at this company. Are you trying to get promoted? Are you trying to hold onto your job amidst layoffs? Are you over your head in work? Are you trying to improve a relationship with your boss or your boss's boss? Are you trying to improve your skill set? Is being right very important to you, even more important than your job? (For some, it is.) Is the respect of your coworkers crucial to you? (For some, it is not.) Assess what it is that keeps you there.
Look at the other people who work for your company who do what you want to do (if that includes you, awesome!). Think about their motives and expertise. How did they get to do what they do? Do they regularly question authority, or do they keep their mouths shut? Do they snipe at their coworkers? Are they good team players? What do they do to win praise and positive attention from decision-makers?
Figure out what the true purpose of the meeting is. Are the officers looking to air out problems? Is this just a social chit-chat? Are they trying to improve morale? Are these new guys on the block, or have they been around for awhile? Are they looking to spot potential promotion candidates? Are they looking for layoff candidates? Are they looking for solutions to pressing needs? Are they assessing the usefulness of middle management? Do they mind taking on risk for potential gain? Do they want to hear success stories? Use your company network and your past experience to get some good guesses as to the real purpose for this meeting. Your best info might come from an informal chat with the officers; if you rub shoulders in the cafeteria, you might want to ping them about the meeting and evaluate their response.
Combine the answers to the above questions, and answer this question: How can you use the meeting to help you reach your goals?
What image are you trying to project? Remember to dress and act the part of that image. Think of five good topics to discuss, and be ready to sound intelligent. You might not have much time to talk, so get to the point.
The problem is that they didn't do what I wanted them to.
I wanted Intuit to clean up the software I bought from them last year. Intuit never did that, and they insulted me by telling me that I had an agenda beyond actually getting my taxes done.
As a result, I put an in-house three-year moratorium on Intuit purchases. So I'm looking at new provider. From what I've read in this topic, it'll probably be TaxAct. I've heard that TaxCut spams its users, and TaxAct doesn't necessitate sending in those annoying rebate forms.
Judge Nottingham's decision on the Do-Not-Call list today is extremely disappointing. But why stop there? Indeed, why should commercial speech be favored over non-commercial speech? I wonder what would happen if this judge were to rule on the constitutionality of the DMCA, esp. with respect to DeCSS...
Try the e-mail client within Mozilla. There are lots of cool features, including a spam filter that you teach. I use it at home and see very little spam. I'd use it at work, but we use Outlook there, and I have to reply to Outlook meeting notices and schedule conference rooms.
Brief non-topical note: You might come to like Mozilla the browser, too. It's PC World Magazine's best browser of 2003 (scroll down a bit to see the note).
The new Mozilla ROCKS! It's noticably faster than 1.2.1, and I'm looking forward to seeing e-mails trickle into my Junk folders. Thanks very much to all the developers!
Hmph. If IE didn't autoload with Windows, I bet it'd load a lot slower.
Personally, I've set up Mozilla on my Windows box to enable Quick Launch. That way, part of Mozilla starts up with Windows, so launches are faster. On my box, Mozilla loads in about half a second.
Under Windows, in Mozilla's preferences dialog, go to the top-level of Advanced, then choose "Quick Launch".
I just had an online chat with Intuit support. Apparently, SafeCast is unnecessary for the proper functioning of TurboTax! This is the transcript:
You have been connected to D. Craig. D. Craig: Hello? XXX, how may I help you today? XXX: How can I remove SafeCast from my PC when I'm finished with TurboTax for the year? D. Craig: XXX, one moment please. D. Craig: You can remove it from the add-remove programs in the control panel. XXX: After I've removed it, will I be able to use TurboTax again to print tax forms on my PC? D. Craig: Please give me a moment to research the issue. D. Craig: Yes, you will be able to print. D. Craig: Is there anything else I can help you with? XXX: Yes. How will I be able to print if I've removed SafeCast? I thought SafeCast was necessary for printing forms. D. Craig: You will be able to do it. XXX: So I could remove SafeCast, say, NOW, and the forms would print? D. Craig: yes. XXX: Wow! Your web site seems to indicate otherwise. That's very helpful; thanks! D. Craig: You asked about the SafeCast information and we provided you with the help in this regard. D. Craig: I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for visiting our TurboTax Support Chat
Legitimate consumer software doesn't take active steps to prevent a user from uninstalling the software. This isn't consumer software, it's a Trojan Horse.
I've been waiting since the weekend for a reply to my plea to Intuit, asking for instructions on how to remove Safecast from my PC when I'm done with TurboTax. Now I'm as frustrated with their support as I am with their poor design decision.
I sent e-mails to Intuit and Macrovision this weekend, asking how to disable/remove their spyware after I was done with TurboTax this year. Surprise, surprise; I haven't received a response.
I've been running OpenOffice.org at home on Windows XP since February, when I bought my new PC with no Excel license. (Dude, I got a Dell as cheap as I could, with Microsoft Works.)
In April, I moved all my financial records to the new PC, and installed RedHat on the old PC, thus losing my legal capability to run Excel, except via Wine or re-installing Windows on the old PC. I use OOo's spreadsheet daily on the new PC and have yet to see a crash.
The OOo betas did crash. If you haven't tried OOo since the beta days, you should take another look.
One day, they tell you that they won't release more patches for Office 95 or 97 because they've been desupported. The next day, they tell you that they'll release security fixes (probably not other bug fixes?) because it's in they're corporate interest.
Microsoft's interests and my interests as a consumer are pretty far apart. Maybe someday, they'll figure that out. Bayesian spam filters in Mozilla 1.3 and popup disabling in today's Mozilla are what I want, not enhanced spammability. Until Microsoft builds software that suits my needs, I'll stick with OpenOffice and Mozilla for home use.
The article says that the music companies and retailers will "distribute $75.7 million in CDs to public and non-profit groups...".
That $75.7 million figure had BETTER be wholesale. Somehow or another, though, I can't imagine these companies giving away 250 million CDs. Unless they're all Vanilla Ice CDs.:-)
What about pcANYWHERE? It's faster and more stable than Remote Desktop, Remote Control SMS, and VNC. pcANYWHERE works very well over dialup as well, much faster this way. Remote Control SMS simply is useless over dialup.
...and pcANYWHERE is just as much a violation of the WinXP EULA as VNC, for the same reasons.
I'm addicted to Civ2. Back in my single days, I'd play for a weekend without much sleep. I'm married now, and the addiction is mostly dormant. I still play a game here and there, and I'm sucked into it as always. I recently found out about the "One City Challenge" (see the Civ2 FAQ), which triggered another bout of addiction.:-)
Slashdot Mirror
Sounds like a nice theory, but I don't believe it. If the goal is to prevent somebody from hogging a space all day, then a parking meter doesn't do the job; I can defeat the "goal" by feeding the meter. I think the real goal is often to gain revenue from both meter receipts and parking violation receipts. It's certainly worth big money in Milwaukee, my nearest big city; see this Milwaukee Journal/Sentinel article for recent coverage.
Given that all the .NET languages boil down to the same compiled runtime "language", and given that C++ is a .NET language, could somebody explain how problems endemic to C/C++ are kept from spreading to all languages in the .NET family?
.NET. I'm much more familiar with Java and prior generations of Microsoft languages.
I plead ignorance on
As it turns out, *no* spammer has the same filter I do. I use Bayesian filters; in particular, Thunderbird for recreational use, and Outlook with SpamBayes for professional use. What I consider as spam is different from what anybody else considers as spam, so my filter is different from anybody else's.
If you find yourself forced to use Outlook (Look out!) for whatever reason, you might want to try using SpamBayes for Bayesian spam filtering. I actually like it better than Thunderbird's filtering. It dumps mail into three buckets: spam, ham, and not sure. I've been using it for one of my accounts for a number of months now, and I haven't seen spam in my ham bucket since about a week after I started using it. The "not sure" bucket is innovative; it allows a third option for e-mails that the filter isn't sure about. I get about 5 e-mails a week in the "not sure" bucket; they're about half ham, half spam.
I use Thunderbird at home. Its built-in Bayesian filter is pretty good (though not as good as SpamBayes, in my experience), and because you can view e-mail in Text or Simple HTML mode (as well as full HTML when necessary), you can avoid falling victim to web bugs.
Know what your goals are in being employed at this company. Are you trying to get promoted? Are you trying to hold onto your job amidst layoffs? Are you over your head in work? Are you trying to improve a relationship with your boss or your boss's boss? Are you trying to improve your skill set? Is being right very important to you, even more important than your job? (For some, it is.) Is the respect of your coworkers crucial to you? (For some, it is not.) Assess what it is that keeps you there.
Look at the other people who work for your company who do what you want to do (if that includes you, awesome!). Think about their motives and expertise. How did they get to do what they do? Do they regularly question authority, or do they keep their mouths shut? Do they snipe at their coworkers? Are they good team players? What do they do to win praise and positive attention from decision-makers?
Figure out what the true purpose of the meeting is. Are the officers looking to air out problems? Is this just a social chit-chat? Are they trying to improve morale? Are these new guys on the block, or have they been around for awhile? Are they looking to spot potential promotion candidates? Are they looking for layoff candidates? Are they looking for solutions to pressing needs? Are they assessing the usefulness of middle management? Do they mind taking on risk for potential gain? Do they want to hear success stories? Use your company network and your past experience to get some good guesses as to the real purpose for this meeting. Your best info might come from an informal chat with the officers; if you rub shoulders in the cafeteria, you might want to ping them about the meeting and evaluate their response.
Combine the answers to the above questions, and answer this question: How can you use the meeting to help you reach your goals?
What image are you trying to project? Remember to dress and act the part of that image. Think of five good topics to discuss, and be ready to sound intelligent. You might not have much time to talk, so get to the point.
Good luck!
The problem is that they didn't do what I wanted them to.
I wanted Intuit to clean up the software I bought from them last year. Intuit never did that, and they insulted me by telling me that I had an agenda beyond actually getting my taxes done.
As a result, I put an in-house three-year moratorium on Intuit purchases. So I'm looking at new provider. From what I've read in this topic, it'll probably be TaxAct. I've heard that TaxCut spams its users, and TaxAct doesn't necessitate sending in those annoying rebate forms.
Moderators, please mod the parent up as insightful. It deserves better than its current score of 1.
Judge Nottingham's decision on the Do-Not-Call list today is extremely disappointing. But why stop there? Indeed, why should commercial speech be favored over non-commercial speech? I wonder what would happen if this judge were to rule on the constitutionality of the DMCA, esp. with respect to DeCSS...
Try the e-mail client within Mozilla. There are lots of cool features, including a spam filter that you teach. I use it at home and see very little spam. I'd use it at work, but we use Outlook there, and I have to reply to Outlook meeting notices and schedule conference rooms.
Brief non-topical note: You might come to like Mozilla the browser, too. It's PC World Magazine's best browser of 2003 (scroll down a bit to see the note).
The "write me a minivan" Dilbert was published on November 13, 1995.
If you google for "dilbert write me a minivan", you just might find a copy.
The new Mozilla ROCKS! It's noticably faster than 1.2.1, and I'm looking forward to seeing e-mails trickle into my Junk folders. Thanks very much to all the developers!
Hmph. If IE didn't autoload with Windows, I bet it'd load a lot slower.
Personally, I've set up Mozilla on my Windows box to enable Quick Launch. That way, part of Mozilla starts up with Windows, so launches are faster. On my box, Mozilla loads in about half a second.
Under Windows, in Mozilla's preferences dialog, go to the top-level of Advanced, then choose "Quick Launch".
I just had an online chat with Intuit support. Apparently, SafeCast is unnecessary for the proper functioning of TurboTax! This is the transcript:
You have been connected to D. Craig.
D. Craig: Hello? XXX, how may I help you today?
XXX: How can I remove SafeCast from my PC when I'm finished with TurboTax for the year?
D. Craig: XXX, one moment please.
D. Craig: You can remove it from the add-remove programs in the control panel.
XXX: After I've removed it, will I be able to use TurboTax again to print tax forms on my PC?
D. Craig: Please give me a moment to research the issue.
D. Craig: Yes, you will be able to print.
D. Craig: Is there anything else I can help you with?
XXX: Yes. How will I be able to print if I've removed SafeCast? I thought SafeCast was necessary for printing forms.
D. Craig: You will be able to do it.
XXX: So I could remove SafeCast, say, NOW, and the forms would print?
D. Craig: yes.
XXX: Wow! Your web site seems to indicate otherwise. That's very helpful; thanks!
D. Craig: You asked about the SafeCast information and we provided you with the help in this regard.
D. Craig: I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for visiting our TurboTax Support Chat
Legitimate consumer software doesn't take active steps to prevent a user from uninstalling the software. This isn't consumer software, it's a Trojan Horse.
I've been waiting since the weekend for a reply to my plea to Intuit, asking for instructions on how to remove Safecast from my PC when I'm done with TurboTax. Now I'm as frustrated with their support as I am with their poor design decision.
Never again.
I sent e-mails to Intuit and Macrovision this weekend, asking how to disable/remove their spyware after I was done with TurboTax this year. Surprise, surprise; I haven't received a response.
I'm using something else next year.
I've been running OpenOffice.org at home on Windows XP since February, when I bought my new PC with no Excel license. (Dude, I got a Dell as cheap as I could, with Microsoft Works.)
In April, I moved all my financial records to the new PC, and installed RedHat on the old PC, thus losing my legal capability to run Excel, except via Wine or re-installing Windows on the old PC. I use OOo's spreadsheet daily on the new PC and have yet to see a crash.
The OOo betas did crash. If you haven't tried OOo since the beta days, you should take another look.
Grrrrr... That's pretty frustrating.
One day, they tell you that they won't release more patches for Office 95 or 97 because they've been desupported. The next day, they tell you that they'll release security fixes (probably not other bug fixes?) because it's in they're corporate interest.
Microsoft's interests and my interests as a consumer are pretty far apart. Maybe someday, they'll figure that out. Bayesian spam filters in Mozilla 1.3 and popup disabling in today's Mozilla are what I want, not enhanced spammability. Until Microsoft builds software that suits my needs, I'll stick with OpenOffice and Mozilla for home use.
The article says that the music companies and retailers will "distribute $75.7 million in CDs to public and non-profit groups...".
:-)
That $75.7 million figure had BETTER be wholesale. Somehow or another, though, I can't imagine these companies giving away 250 million CDs. Unless they're all Vanilla Ice CDs.
The imaginary day in the not-too-distant future is described at the GNU web site.
What about pcANYWHERE? It's faster and more stable than Remote Desktop, Remote Control SMS, and VNC. pcANYWHERE works very well over dialup as well, much faster this way. Remote Control SMS simply is useless over dialup.
...and pcANYWHERE is just as much a violation of the WinXP EULA as VNC, for the same reasons.
I'm addicted to Civ2. Back in my single days, I'd play for a weekend without much sleep. I'm married now, and the addiction is mostly dormant. I still play a game here and there, and I'm sucked into it as always. I recently found out about the "One City Challenge" (see the Civ2 FAQ), which triggered another bout of addiction. :-)
Hey, maybe this technology could be used to reboot a remote Windows box! Now that would be useful.