Just so that nobody thinks that nobody is reading this thread... No Linux deployments at my company. I don't think that we'll look at Linux again for at least a few more years. None of our important apps work on Linux, and we have no Linux expertise in our small company.
Oh right. OSX is perfectly safe and invunerable... so long as you patched a few unpatched critical security holes yesterday, and weren't previously infected...
Actually, the BEST solution to prevent this from happening is to buy locally, instead of from some anonymous, no-name place because they have the best price, or instead of a giant retailer that just doesn't give a shit. I have -zero- sympathy from people who expect to get a price at or below wholesale, AND fantastic customer service. Quite honestly, this guy got what he deserved.
I've told myself that I'd pick up a 5D as soon as the price dropped below $3,000. I've been regularly checking both Yahoo! Shopping and PriceGrabber for a while waiting for one to drop. Well yesterday for the first time I saw that the 5D was for sale for $2,899 at PriceRitePhoto.
Why did this guy buy from this place? Oh yeah, because he could save 0.37%. That's just stupid. Maybe if consumers these days wouldn't be such price whores, they'd have 1. better customer service experiences and 2. we'd still actually have towns and cities with stores in them.
That's not good enough, though - they have to do everything that Windows does, exactly the same way, and also manage to somehow be "better".
Right. Exactly. Because change is work, and most people these days aren't too keen on doing more work when the current thing works just fine. For most people, their urgency to even consider Linux would probably be on par with that of upgrading their refrigerator ice maker's circuitry to the latest version, especially now that the masses are (finally) using an NT kernel.
It hasn't been worth it from a time standpoint for me to build my own computers for the past 10 years or so, but hasn't there been about as many sockets as chips in the past decade or so? The last bunch of *widely* compatible sockets/chips that I remember were all of the 486's, and Pentium I's. Since then, it seems like every chip model has needed a new socket. And, quite honestly, in most cases, with computer pricing at ridiculous levels, it's not really worth switching out processors any more.
1. There are varying degrees of journalism. Calling "60 Minutes" "journalism" is like calling somebody who whipped up a blog a computer programmer. Even if you want to look at 60 Minutes as "journalism", just because your brother and anybody else with a computer can edit video doesn't necessarily mean that it's done by real journalists. Better still, there's lots and lots of real journalism that doesn't rely on video in any way, whatsoever.
2. Elitism? Snobbery? Because I don't think that anyone who writes a blog is a "journalist"? Call it what you will. I also don't call my mom a software engineer because she can create an email. To call a blogger a "journalist" is to shit on every real journalist that has ever existed. A "blogger" is somebody who writes a diary online. It's nothing more than narcissism at its worst.
You're not a journalist. That doesn't give you the right to call yourself and every other 75 IQ person who can write a scathing expose on their adventures baking bread a "journalist". You have no right to insult journalists that way.
I'd mod you as funny if I didn't actually want to respond to your drivel.
Abandoning any pretense of objectivity, Wally actually came on the TV news and told us he opposed Vietnam and that we were doomed (that helped us win, huh?)
Right off, I can see that you have no clue as to what journalism is about. A journalist is not supposed to "help win wars". They're supposed to report the facts in a cohesive manner. People who "help win wars" are called "soliders", and they carry guns, not cameras. It sounds as if you actually want journalists to push government propaganda. Wow.
And you're exactly right. In that situation, Walter Cronkite did abandon any pretense of objectivity. That wasn't journalism. Do you think that people are stupid enough to think that what every single talking head on TV says is fact? Do you think that he was trying to pass off his very well-educated opinion as fact? Of course not. You're citing an example of editoralizing. Not journalism.
So then, your link to a web site with somewhat insane conspiracy theories written by a guy named "Al". So let me see... do I consider news from the BBC, which has college educated journalists, photographers, editors, and fact checkers to be more accurate than a blog written by some guy who calls himself "Al"? You bet your ass I do. If that's what you call good information, then I know this guy who stands on the street corner near here that you can talk to. He has this great story about pink elephants that I think will prove to you, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the CS Monitor makes up their stories.
You can keep your tin foil hat, thanks. There are good and bad sources of news, as there have always been, but to think that "Al" and his buddies sitting at home have discredited the entire field of journalism, is, quite honestly, one of the most batshit things I have ever read here on Slashdot.
Hint: There are such things as non-web based apps. More importantly, there any many different ways of getting to databases that have nothing to do with web applications.
I got mine off of ubid.com. I've bought lots of machines there... mostly refurbished, lots of time with manufacturer warranty. None on ubid right now, but there are a shitload on ebay (search for "Proliant", since those were the popular ones with ISPs and dot-commers). Personally, I wouldn't even buy a toothbrush from ebay, but if you're someone who doesn't mind dealing with that clusterfuck, there are some incredible deals out there right now on all of these servers coming off-lease from the dot-com era.
Well, journalism isn't concerned with knowing the industry you're writing about. That's like getting a comp sci degree and learning how to use Visual Studio. All of the subject matter can be learned pretty easily. What people (bloggers and their fans) don't understand is that journalism deals with being able to write coherently, using facts, and as little bias as possible. Journalism is a real skill/profession that people such as yourself just don't understand. That doesn't mean that they don't provide society a very valuable service.
I'm in the same boat. That being said, I just picked up an off-lease Proliant with dual Xeon 1 gHz processors, 2 GB RAM, and 5 SCSI hard drives (RAID 5), with room for 7 more drives, redundant, hot-swappable power supplies and fans for $500. There are a LOT of massive servers coming onto the market now that were paid for with VC money during the dot-com days (5 year amortization). I'm guessing that the box we're getting was probably barely used by a dot-com with no customers and no product but with too much VC money. I mean, I run a moderatly-trafficed web site and I can't even come *close* to maxxing out a machine like this. We'll be using this machine to run web servers, mail servers, a few RDBMS's, a point-of-sale system, etc.
But, (and this is a big "but"), did Tom's Hardware get paid to write a stellar review of an average computer in a yellow case? I bet that they didn't. Slashdot is lacking something called "journalistic integrity" which many people these days don't really care about, which is why the "reviews" were so much different. As with most mysteries of modern life, the answer can be found by following the money.
Ok, now that I have that off my chest... I have been wondering of late whether we are not in fact arriving at a time when more organisations are going to demand not just open standards for document formats, but the actual right to the ability to peer-review code for which they are in some way, shape or form responsible. How can a company be sure that it isn't distributing rootkits on their CDs if they can't look at the code? Think Sony is going to think twice about buying code that it hasn't reviewed?
Because every company is not in the business of developing software. It's called "specialization" and it's the basis for a modern economy. I buy lots of software. If it doesn't do what it's supposed to my recourse is to ask the company for a refund or sue. I can't imagine a whole heck of a lot of companies that 1. aren't Forbes 500 companies that also 2. aren't software development firms have any interest or any ability in auditing each piece of software (hell, any software) that comes through their front door.
If you're having somebody develop code for you, then sure, why not, if there's any interest...
I don't know who or what this is, but when Ford sends you a recall notice about your brakes, do you make sure to fix it yourself to "keep your car safe"? I know I've got better things to do then to handle my own recall notices or to install every single patch by hand as they become available.
Nice fairy tale, except that it doesn't work. Last time I tried Ubuntu (6 months ago), after I installed PostGreSQL and all documentation and clients, there wasn't even a way for me to start it. It don't work.
The great thing about having $0 competition is that it will eventually force Microsoft to reduce its prices.
That would be true if the competition was an equal replacement. The thing is that they're nowhere near equal for most people (myself included). Case in point: I know that Linux exists, I've downloaded many, many distributions, yet I still buy Windows. They're not anywhere near replacements for each other for me.
Not at all surprising based on how little you seem to know about PCs.
And what is this based on, exactly? I take care of all of my company's machines, and we don't really have any down time or problems, so I think I'm doing pretty damn well, thanks.
I don't think that what you're describing is an argument for/against either Windows or Linux. That machine is still quite a beast, especially compared to all of my machines at my business (all Pentium 2's of some kind, 256-512MB RAM, running Windows 2000 very happily). Of course, in my experience, any Linux that I've tried on all of those machines all run as slow as mud.
When somebody buys a server with no OS, installs a Linux that they downloaded, is that really a "server" or just a play box? Anybody who's serious about setting up a "server" is going to buy support.
I don't know. What's the point of plugging in 1000 Linux computers together? What's the point of lighting in PC's? What's the point of MySQL? What's the point of the iPod? This, at least, was a scientific/engineering achievement.
The first is an investment in a community wealth generator; the second is an expenditure.
I disagree that it's a "community wealth generator". Nobody who supports OSS ever addresses the fact that paid programming jobs are being lost to OSS projects. Proprietary software generates hundreds of billions of dollars a year in revenue for the companies and the employees that make and maintain it. OSS generates a few hundred million, if that much.
It's the same as if a wealthy person opened up a plumbing company for fun (which is essentially what OSS is... wealthy people doing it for fun). Assume that this new plumbing company did plumbing work for free. There are most definitely going to be unemployed or at least underemployed plumbers in that same are simply due to the lost business. There's really no way around this... OSS destroys *much* more wealth than it creates. So sure, you may get some neat-o app for free, but don't forget the guy who's trying to make a living and support his family (and our taxes) by programming.
Slashdot Mirror
Just so that nobody thinks that nobody is reading this thread... No Linux deployments at my company. I don't think that we'll look at Linux again for at least a few more years. None of our important apps work on Linux, and we have no Linux expertise in our small company.
Oh right. OSX is perfectly safe and invunerable... so long as you patched a few unpatched critical security holes yesterday, and weren't previously infected...
p atches/2100-1002_3-5976718.html
http://news.com.com/Apple+releases+OS+X+security+
Actually, the BEST solution to prevent this from happening is to buy locally, instead of from some anonymous, no-name place because they have the best price, or instead of a giant retailer that just doesn't give a shit. I have -zero- sympathy from people who expect to get a price at or below wholesale, AND fantastic customer service. Quite honestly, this guy got what he deserved.
I've told myself that I'd pick up a 5D as soon as the price dropped below $3,000. I've been regularly checking both Yahoo! Shopping and PriceGrabber for a while waiting for one to drop. Well yesterday for the first time I saw that the 5D was for sale for $2,899 at PriceRitePhoto.
Why did this guy buy from this place? Oh yeah, because he could save 0.37%. That's just stupid. Maybe if consumers these days wouldn't be such price whores, they'd have 1. better customer service experiences and 2. we'd still actually have towns and cities with stores in them.
Sorry, but you couldn't write yourself out of a paper bag.
I'll eat karma on this post. People need to know. I know I'm not a writer, but I'm not assuming that my writing is worth shit.
That's not good enough, though - they have to do everything that Windows does, exactly the same way, and also manage to somehow be "better".
Right. Exactly. Because change is work, and most people these days aren't too keen on doing more work when the current thing works just fine. For most people, their urgency to even consider Linux would probably be on par with that of upgrading their refrigerator ice maker's circuitry to the latest version, especially now that the masses are (finally) using an NT kernel.
It hasn't been worth it from a time standpoint for me to build my own computers for the past 10 years or so, but hasn't there been about as many sockets as chips in the past decade or so? The last bunch of *widely* compatible sockets/chips that I remember were all of the 486's, and Pentium I's. Since then, it seems like every chip model has needed a new socket. And, quite honestly, in most cases, with computer pricing at ridiculous levels, it's not really worth switching out processors any more.
1. There are varying degrees of journalism. Calling "60 Minutes" "journalism" is like calling somebody who whipped up a blog a computer programmer. Even if you want to look at 60 Minutes as "journalism", just because your brother and anybody else with a computer can edit video doesn't necessarily mean that it's done by real journalists. Better still, there's lots and lots of real journalism that doesn't rely on video in any way, whatsoever.
2. Elitism? Snobbery? Because I don't think that anyone who writes a blog is a "journalist"? Call it what you will. I also don't call my mom a software engineer because she can create an email. To call a blogger a "journalist" is to shit on every real journalist that has ever existed. A "blogger" is somebody who writes a diary online. It's nothing more than narcissism at its worst.
You're not a journalist. That doesn't give you the right to call yourself and every other 75 IQ person who can write a scathing expose on their adventures baking bread a "journalist". You have no right to insult journalists that way.
I'd mod you as funny if I didn't actually want to respond to your drivel.
Abandoning any pretense of objectivity, Wally actually came on the TV news and told us he opposed Vietnam and that we were doomed (that helped us win, huh?)
Right off, I can see that you have no clue as to what journalism is about. A journalist is not supposed to "help win wars". They're supposed to report the facts in a cohesive manner. People who "help win wars" are called "soliders", and they carry guns, not cameras. It sounds as if you actually want journalists to push government propaganda. Wow.
And you're exactly right. In that situation, Walter Cronkite did abandon any pretense of objectivity. That wasn't journalism. Do you think that people are stupid enough to think that what every single talking head on TV says is fact? Do you think that he was trying to pass off his very well-educated opinion as fact? Of course not. You're citing an example of editoralizing. Not journalism.
So then, your link to a web site with somewhat insane conspiracy theories written by a guy named "Al". So let me see... do I consider news from the BBC, which has college educated journalists, photographers, editors, and fact checkers to be more accurate than a blog written by some guy who calls himself "Al"? You bet your ass I do. If that's what you call good information, then I know this guy who stands on the street corner near here that you can talk to. He has this great story about pink elephants that I think will prove to you, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the CS Monitor makes up their stories.
You can keep your tin foil hat, thanks. There are good and bad sources of news, as there have always been, but to think that "Al" and his buddies sitting at home have discredited the entire field of journalism, is, quite honestly, one of the most batshit things I have ever read here on Slashdot.
Hint: There are such things as non-web based apps. More importantly, there any many different ways of getting to databases that have nothing to do with web applications.
I got mine off of ubid.com. I've bought lots of machines there... mostly refurbished, lots of time with manufacturer warranty. None on ubid right now, but there are a shitload on ebay (search for "Proliant", since those were the popular ones with ISPs and dot-commers). Personally, I wouldn't even buy a toothbrush from ebay, but if you're someone who doesn't mind dealing with that clusterfuck, there are some incredible deals out there right now on all of these servers coming off-lease from the dot-com era.
Well, journalism isn't concerned with knowing the industry you're writing about. That's like getting a comp sci degree and learning how to use Visual Studio. All of the subject matter can be learned pretty easily. What people (bloggers and their fans) don't understand is that journalism deals with being able to write coherently, using facts, and as little bias as possible. Journalism is a real skill/profession that people such as yourself just don't understand. That doesn't mean that they don't provide society a very valuable service.
I'm in the same boat. That being said, I just picked up an off-lease Proliant with dual Xeon 1 gHz processors, 2 GB RAM, and 5 SCSI hard drives (RAID 5), with room for 7 more drives, redundant, hot-swappable power supplies and fans for $500. There are a LOT of massive servers coming onto the market now that were paid for with VC money during the dot-com days (5 year amortization). I'm guessing that the box we're getting was probably barely used by a dot-com with no customers and no product but with too much VC money. I mean, I run a moderatly-trafficed web site and I can't even come *close* to maxxing out a machine like this. We'll be using this machine to run web servers, mail servers, a few RDBMS's, a point-of-sale system, etc.
But, (and this is a big "but"), did Tom's Hardware get paid to write a stellar review of an average computer in a yellow case? I bet that they didn't. Slashdot is lacking something called "journalistic integrity" which many people these days don't really care about, which is why the "reviews" were so much different. As with most mysteries of modern life, the answer can be found by following the money.
Ok, now that I have that off my chest ... I have been wondering of late whether we are not in fact arriving at a time when more organisations are going to demand not just open standards for document formats, but the actual right to the ability to peer-review code for which they are in some way, shape or form responsible. How can a company be sure that it isn't distributing rootkits on their CDs if they can't look at the code? Think Sony is going to think twice about buying code that it hasn't reviewed?
Because every company is not in the business of developing software. It's called "specialization" and it's the basis for a modern economy. I buy lots of software. If it doesn't do what it's supposed to my recourse is to ask the company for a refund or sue. I can't imagine a whole heck of a lot of companies that 1. aren't Forbes 500 companies that also 2. aren't software development firms have any interest or any ability in auditing each piece of software (hell, any software) that comes through their front door.
If you're having somebody develop code for you, then sure, why not, if there's any interest...
teh internets
I don't know who or what this is, but when Ford sends you a recall notice about your brakes, do you make sure to fix it yourself to "keep your car safe"? I know I've got better things to do then to handle my own recall notices or to install every single patch by hand as they become available.
you should know /etc/init.d/postgresql start|stop|restart
I should? Really? And where does that information come from, because I have no idea what you're talking about?
Actually, it's just handling a simulation. You really should read the fucking article. Hell, just skim it, at least.
Nice fairy tale, except that it doesn't work. Last time I tried Ubuntu (6 months ago), after I installed PostGreSQL and all documentation and clients, there wasn't even a way for me to start it. It don't work.
The great thing about having $0 competition is that it will eventually force Microsoft to reduce its prices.
That would be true if the competition was an equal replacement. The thing is that they're nowhere near equal for most people (myself included). Case in point: I know that Linux exists, I've downloaded many, many distributions, yet I still buy Windows. They're not anywhere near replacements for each other for me.
Not at all surprising based on how little you seem to know about PCs.
And what is this based on, exactly? I take care of all of my company's machines, and we don't really have any down time or problems, so I think I'm doing pretty damn well, thanks.
I don't think that what you're describing is an argument for/against either Windows or Linux. That machine is still quite a beast, especially compared to all of my machines at my business (all Pentium 2's of some kind, 256-512MB RAM, running Windows 2000 very happily). Of course, in my experience, any Linux that I've tried on all of those machines all run as slow as mud.
Insert Windows CD. Reboot.
When somebody buys a server with no OS, installs a Linux that they downloaded, is that really a "server" or just a play box? Anybody who's serious about setting up a "server" is going to buy support.
I don't know. What's the point of plugging in 1000 Linux computers together? What's the point of lighting in PC's? What's the point of MySQL? What's the point of the iPod? This, at least, was a scientific/engineering achievement.
The first is an investment in a community wealth generator; the second is an expenditure.
I disagree that it's a "community wealth generator". Nobody who supports OSS ever addresses the fact that paid programming jobs are being lost to OSS projects. Proprietary software generates hundreds of billions of dollars a year in revenue for the companies and the employees that make and maintain it. OSS generates a few hundred million, if that much.
It's the same as if a wealthy person opened up a plumbing company for fun (which is essentially what OSS is... wealthy people doing it for fun). Assume that this new plumbing company did plumbing work for free. There are most definitely going to be unemployed or at least underemployed plumbers in that same are simply due to the lost business. There's really no way around this... OSS destroys *much* more wealth than it creates. So sure, you may get some neat-o app for free, but don't forget the guy who's trying to make a living and support his family (and our taxes) by programming.