By "standards" the poster meant teaching standards.
Each government or educational board outlines a teaching guide or "standard" that all classes/teachers/schools must follow. This is to ensure all students are taught the SAME thing regardless of location.
This is to ensure educational quality.
In Alberta, for example, all students in the province have the same classes and educational quality regardless of whether they go to school in the poor areas or the rich areas. In grades 6, 9, and 12 (maybe grade 3 now too) there are governmental exams which test all students with a single government written exam. This is used to test the effectiveness of these "standards." By reviewing the grades on these tests, the government is able to find schools that are not teaching effectively, or not following the "standards."
When he was referring to the fact that not many companies ship a billion of anything, he was alluding to shipping a billion of what is supposed to be a non-consumable product.
Razor blades, paper towels, burgers, etc, are considered consumables, whereas a mouse or microprocessor isn't.
It's easy to ship a billion burgers when people can eat three of them a day. I'm sure if I went through 3 mice a day Logitech would be shipping far more than a billion. Considering my mouse lasts longer than the usefulness of my computer itself, shipping a billion is saying something. I must have gone through 15 computers with my Fujitsu AT keyboard and Logitech PS/2 mouse. Another 3 computers with my Logitech G15 keyboard and G5 mouse.
or is anything worth protecting worth using CAT5 on?
Most banks and government institutions don't use WIFI because of the security vulnerabilities. Granted CAT5 doesn't have have security to access (like wifi tkip/aes key), but it is physically secure, which is at the same level of security as the physical machines themselves.
I find WIFI performance and coverage to be dodgy at best. It's an absolute pain to support.
At work we have a server with files datestamped 1988. Old accounting software from 1987, only usable in DOS.
We also have a server with SCO on it running some ancient program.
I hope to GOD these two servers NEVER break down, because I'm the one that will have to restore them. The main issue is finding another computer that will install this stuff. We still have all the original install disks for everything, but the problem is finding hardware that is supported. Usually people are worried about forward compatibility when upgrading, but no, nothing USB, nothing PCI-E, etc will work on Win3.1.
I guess we could virtualize it...but where's the fun in that?
That doesn't see the huge concern over "progress" resulting in slightly slower software on the same hardware?
It's been happening with every new version of almost ANY software. The only time speed increases with a subsequent version is when the original program was either hacked together or not properly optimized for specific hardware.
No one opens up Photoshop and says "Oh no, CS3 is slower than Photoshop 4...WTF? How is this possible?"
And thanks to Vista (tm), memory is now DIRT CHEAP. I can stuff 8GB into a machine for less than $150!
If you really want to complain about violating some law of nature in regards to software engineering - complain to Adobe about ACROBAT!
5. Boss comes into your office and says you didn't program it correctly - that you should have incorporated some sort of IP spoofing techniques. He fires you for incompetence.
The first "generation" of Netbooks - if you can call it a generation, were inexpensive.
They served a single purpose - very basic internet access for cheap. The EEE PCs were roughly $349/$399 (CDN) for the first batch and were cheaper than any other notebook/netbook available.
Now the EEE PCs start at $400 and top out at close to $1000. The Lenovo, MSI, Acer and Dells all come in around $400 - $650 for the same feature set that last year was $399. There has certainly been a price premium put on these for the luxury of portability. They are now competing with price (but not performance) of other ultraportable 12.1" notebooks! Some of these netbooks are not much more portable than a Thinkpad X60/61 - and not much cheaper in some cases.
It's not like the user will be doing anything for the first minute after the computer starts anyway. It's merely the act of waiting and not being able to interact while it boots. Once it boots up people will still *do nothing* of importance on it.
It's psychological - the user wants to see progress. Even if it boots up and shows the desktop quickly, the user will have to wait until all the startup programs finish loading. If they can double-click on IE (oops, Firefox, since we're on Slashdot) sooner they will be happy, even if the system is only semi-responsive.
I'd go web-based or Java, since many phones support it.
Think of the problems if you develop for a specific platform and it becomes obsolete. I imagine your home will be around for many years, but I doubt any interation of Android or the iPhone will be. Unless you plan to change around your programming when you get a new phone.
Anything that has strong ties to legacy software or hardware will be supported for a longer period of time. Look at user-base, ease of installation and repair, and of course, the track-record of the company...Apple would be a bad choice, I can see them switching things up without notice and all of a sudden you can't dim your lights.
is that they aren't susceptible to magnetic interference. With modern day TV rooms, this is essential. Even though everyone claims they have "magnetically shielded" speakers, put a few big ones close to a CRT, then tell me whether or not they are truly "magnetically shielded."
Most blogs are ill-informed, much like the tech magazines people are talking about. I run a blog, about server stuff. It's more for me than anyone else. I put down problems and solutions, ones I may come by only once a year, things I wouldn't remember. It has helped me.
The difference between blogs and online magazines is that with a blog you know you are getting opinion or bias. You hope a big company like CNET wouldn't do that. But they do, it's just behind the scenes.
Blogs are usually poorly written in comparison to online magazines such as CNET. This isn't always the case though, many professional or talented writers have blogs and it shows. They are typically the popular ones.
Another problem with blogs is that you never know if something is trust-worthy. If I need to follow instructions to do something, let's say remove spyware or dual-boot a system, I would rather trust CNET than a blog. If CNET is wrong, I have some course of action, if the blog is, who am I going to complain to? Will they listen?
Larger companies are always slower to change. Maybe they are in the process of changing, maybe they don't want to. There have always been "blogs" on the internet, they used to be called personal websites. Suddenly every jackass (including myself) has one, and it makes it easier to post.
So why have blogs overtaken search engines and social bookmarking? Because of SEO, search engine optimization. Long gone are the days when url rewriting, keyword analysis/stuffing and proper html validation were the secret weapons of smart people on the internet. MoveableType, Wordpress, etc, does all this stuff automatically. A Wordpress blog is better "optimized" than many larger editorial sites.
Google is a search engine that places too much emphasis on backlinks. People as a whole are stupid, people on the internet are even dumber. They link to sensational news, not necessarily GOOD news. So naturally all the "important" and "true" information goes to the bottom of the SERPs.
Wow, that was a sensational rant. I should post this on my blog pronto. *grin*
The company I host with requires quite a bit of security to have requests sent through. Unfortunately I've been burned by it before. You need a few pieces of identification in addition to the correct email address. But without the correct email address, even the other peices of identification won't get you served. This is good since I know my servers are cared for well.
Perhaps these hosts were so small that the tech recognized the person writing in, the language style, etc. This doesn't excuse it at all. This does make be uncomfortable, knowing that in the past, without much money or resources to spend on hosting I have gone to these "low budget" possibly shady hosting companies. Granted, in the article, most sites on these servers have very little to no content that is worth hijacking. But that wouldn't be the point for "hackers"...it would be to just screw up someone's day or week.
I vote for one of the more eccentric, unemployed slashdot users to start a site that chronicles his/her attempts to take over small sites and then post the results in a table for easy avoidance of said hosting companies.
I don't see an overwhelming problem with this. Most disaster recovery situations need a professional or someone who has significant know-how with computers. If you backup the entire drive and need to recover it, you won't need the Vista install disk anyway. The only situation where it will be a pain is if you reformat your drive often and install a fresh copy. There will likely be a way around this soon.
For professionals, they will likely keep a Windows XP or 2000 image hanging around if they need to reformat a customer's computer that has vista upgrade. It also keeps computer techs one step ahead of customers.
I read a few comments on here that must have been from Americans posing as Canadians. One stated that Canadians don't get all the movies up here...Well, that's not true. We get every movie Hollywood puts out. Sure, small-town Saskatchewan may get movies later, but that's because their theatre may only have one screen.
To say we are responsible for 50% of movie pirating is wrong, they mean Canadian theatres are the location of 50% of the telesyncing that takes place. So by delaying our movie releases, we will be less likely to be the first out with a TS on bittorrent. This is significant because, as the article states, it is much much easier to prosecute a US citizen than a Canadian citizen in terms of pirating. In Canada, the usher has to catch the guy recording the movie, then get the police and charge him. In the states, he/she can be charged after the fact if it is proven he/she recorded it earlier at a movie venue.
So you may think what the big deal is with delaying the movies in Canada...well, it will force all of the Telesyncing to be done by US citizens in US movie theatres, and therefore it will be much much much easier to prosecute the pirates. By moving 100% of the pirating to the states, they can effectively control litigation of the offenders. It is actually quite clever. It WILL result in more people downloading movies in Canada I'm sure (since we will be unable to watch them legitimately) but it will (and it's a gamble) hopefull curb piracy in the states.
Most people believe that pirating movies and music does not hurt the big stars. Well, realistically it probably doesn't. But there are hundreds or thousands more people that work in/on movies than the big name stars and I'm sure their salary will be the first to be cut if the studios feel the pinch. You can save a few million by cutting salaries of all the other workers while keeping the stars' paychecks high.
Same deal when a company falls on hard times, the lowly employees get canned, raises are suspended, some salary reductions may occur if voted in (sometimes employees are given this choice instead of being laid off), but the CEO and the high-ups still make a crapload of money.
Not to say I'm a Saint or anything. Sometimes I get to thinking and realize I may be getting that one key grip laid off.
I know at the UofA there is a calculator policy that dictates what calculators can be used.
I have used an HP RPN and a TI-89 and I prefer the TI-89 because of the "pretty print"... it allows you to see your equations as if written on paper, so you no longer need to double guess your brackets. RPN is fine and well for some engineers, but it is a steep learning curve, and realistically it is not THAT much quicker. Figure out exactly how much and what type of calculations you will be doing and see if RPN has an advantage. If you're doing integrals all the time, stick with the TI-89. If you're inputing 300 bracket a calculation, do RPN it will save you time.
But you should check to see if any of your current or future classes have restrictions. I know we can't use anything that has any wireless capability (no laptops, phones, newer calculators) and we have two classes: programmable and non-programmable. That is if calculators are allowed. We are never allowed calculators in math classes (would make it too easy otherwise), but they would allow a slide-ruler.
Just a few months ago my friend put a bag of microwaveable popcorn into the microwave and left it for a few minutes. He came back and the microwave was smoking and the bag was on fire. Apparently the butter and kernels stuck together and burned. The apartment smelled for about 2 weeks (we could only open the windows a little at a time -- Canadian winter) and the microwave was ruined.
I think it's pretty funny that people tried this without wetting the sponge, however, I know many people that do not realize the nuances of how a microwave actually works.
Slashdot Mirror
Pigeon Bandwidth: http://science.slashdot.org/science/04/03/31/2224227.shtml?tid=126&tid=133&tid=186&tid=95
By "standards" the poster meant teaching standards.
Each government or educational board outlines a teaching guide or "standard" that all classes/teachers/schools must follow. This is to ensure all students are taught the SAME thing regardless of location.
This is to ensure educational quality.
In Alberta, for example, all students in the province have the same classes and educational quality regardless of whether they go to school in the poor areas or the rich areas. In grades 6, 9, and 12 (maybe grade 3 now too) there are governmental exams which test all students with a single government written exam. This is used to test the effectiveness of these "standards." By reviewing the grades on these tests, the government is able to find schools that are not teaching effectively, or not following the "standards."
Store it in the trees in the park. Worked for Mr. Burns.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail
...I'm just charging my batteries.
"battery's almost dying, I need to talk some more, let me call AOL and try to cancel."
When he was referring to the fact that not many companies ship a billion of anything, he was alluding to shipping a billion of what is supposed to be a non-consumable product.
Razor blades, paper towels, burgers, etc, are considered consumables, whereas a mouse or microprocessor isn't.
It's easy to ship a billion burgers when people can eat three of them a day. I'm sure if I went through 3 mice a day Logitech would be shipping far more than a billion. Considering my mouse lasts longer than the usefulness of my computer itself, shipping a billion is saying something. I must have gone through 15 computers with my Fujitsu AT keyboard and Logitech PS/2 mouse. Another 3 computers with my Logitech G15 keyboard and G5 mouse.
or is anything worth protecting worth using CAT5 on?
Most banks and government institutions don't use WIFI because of the security vulnerabilities. Granted CAT5 doesn't have have security to access (like wifi tkip/aes key), but it is physically secure, which is at the same level of security as the physical machines themselves.
I find WIFI performance and coverage to be dodgy at best. It's an absolute pain to support.
At work we have a server with files datestamped 1988. Old accounting software from 1987, only usable in DOS.
We also have a server with SCO on it running some ancient program.
I hope to GOD these two servers NEVER break down, because I'm the one that will have to restore them. The main issue is finding another computer that will install this stuff. We still have all the original install disks for everything, but the problem is finding hardware that is supported. Usually people are worried about forward compatibility when upgrading, but no, nothing USB, nothing PCI-E, etc will work on Win3.1.
I guess we could virtualize it...but where's the fun in that?
Next step: the gibson.
That doesn't see the huge concern over "progress" resulting in slightly slower software on the same hardware?
It's been happening with every new version of almost ANY software. The only time speed increases with a subsequent version is when the original program was either hacked together or not properly optimized for specific hardware.
No one opens up Photoshop and says "Oh no, CS3 is slower than Photoshop 4...WTF? How is this possible?"
And thanks to Vista (tm), memory is now DIRT CHEAP. I can stuff 8GB into a machine for less than $150!
If you really want to complain about violating some law of nature in regards to software engineering - complain to Adobe about ACROBAT!
you forgot #5
5. Boss comes into your office and says you didn't program it correctly - that you should have incorporated some sort of IP spoofing techniques. He fires you for incompetence.
The first "generation" of Netbooks - if you can call it a generation, were inexpensive.
They served a single purpose - very basic internet access for cheap. The EEE PCs were roughly $349/$399 (CDN) for the first batch and were cheaper than any other notebook/netbook available.
Now the EEE PCs start at $400 and top out at close to $1000. The Lenovo, MSI, Acer and Dells all come in around $400 - $650 for the same feature set that last year was $399. There has certainly been a price premium put on these for the luxury of portability. They are now competing with price (but not performance) of other ultraportable 12.1" notebooks! Some of these netbooks are not much more portable than a Thinkpad X60/61 - and not much cheaper in some cases.
It's not like the user will be doing anything for the first minute after the computer starts anyway. It's merely the act of waiting and not being able to interact while it boots. Once it boots up people will still *do nothing* of importance on it.
It's psychological - the user wants to see progress. Even if it boots up and shows the desktop quickly, the user will have to wait until all the startup programs finish loading. If they can double-click on IE (oops, Firefox, since we're on Slashdot) sooner they will be happy, even if the system is only semi-responsive.
does it have GPS Nav?
and damn stylish at that.
I'd go web-based or Java, since many phones support it.
Think of the problems if you develop for a specific platform and it becomes obsolete. I imagine your home will be around for many years, but I doubt any interation of Android or the iPhone will be. Unless you plan to change around your programming when you get a new phone.
Anything that has strong ties to legacy software or hardware will be supported for a longer period of time. Look at user-base, ease of installation and repair, and of course, the track-record of the company...Apple would be a bad choice, I can see them switching things up without notice and all of a sudden you can't dim your lights.
...with the rock slide instead of what happens in the prairies.
is that they aren't susceptible to magnetic interference. With modern day TV rooms, this is essential. Even though everyone claims they have "magnetically shielded" speakers, put a few big ones close to a CRT, then tell me whether or not they are truly "magnetically shielded."
Most blogs are ill-informed, much like the tech magazines people are talking about. I run a blog, about server stuff. It's more for me than anyone else. I put down problems and solutions, ones I may come by only once a year, things I wouldn't remember. It has helped me.
The difference between blogs and online magazines is that with a blog you know you are getting opinion or bias. You hope a big company like CNET wouldn't do that. But they do, it's just behind the scenes.
Blogs are usually poorly written in comparison to online magazines such as CNET. This isn't always the case though, many professional or talented writers have blogs and it shows. They are typically the popular ones.
Another problem with blogs is that you never know if something is trust-worthy. If I need to follow instructions to do something, let's say remove spyware or dual-boot a system, I would rather trust CNET than a blog. If CNET is wrong, I have some course of action, if the blog is, who am I going to complain to? Will they listen?
Larger companies are always slower to change. Maybe they are in the process of changing, maybe they don't want to. There have always been "blogs" on the internet, they used to be called personal websites. Suddenly every jackass (including myself) has one, and it makes it easier to post.
So why have blogs overtaken search engines and social bookmarking? Because of SEO, search engine optimization. Long gone are the days when url rewriting, keyword analysis/stuffing and proper html validation were the secret weapons of smart people on the internet. MoveableType, Wordpress, etc, does all this stuff automatically. A Wordpress blog is better "optimized" than many larger editorial sites.
Google is a search engine that places too much emphasis on backlinks. People as a whole are stupid, people on the internet are even dumber. They link to sensational news, not necessarily GOOD news. So naturally all the "important" and "true" information goes to the bottom of the SERPs.
Wow, that was a sensational rant. I should post this on my blog pronto. *grin*
I say start making better AI for regular computer games.
Have computers emulate how humans play.
Well, not really...
The company I host with requires quite a bit of security to have requests sent through. Unfortunately I've been burned by it before. You need a few pieces of identification in addition to the correct email address. But without the correct email address, even the other peices of identification won't get you served. This is good since I know my servers are cared for well.
Perhaps these hosts were so small that the tech recognized the person writing in, the language style, etc. This doesn't excuse it at all. This does make be uncomfortable, knowing that in the past, without much money or resources to spend on hosting I have gone to these "low budget" possibly shady hosting companies. Granted, in the article, most sites on these servers have very little to no content that is worth hijacking. But that wouldn't be the point for "hackers"...it would be to just screw up someone's day or week.
I vote for one of the more eccentric, unemployed slashdot users to start a site that chronicles his/her attempts to take over small sites and then post the results in a table for easy avoidance of said hosting companies.
I don't see an overwhelming problem with this. Most disaster recovery situations need a professional or someone who has significant know-how with computers. If you backup the entire drive and need to recover it, you won't need the Vista install disk anyway. The only situation where it will be a pain is if you reformat your drive often and install a fresh copy. There will likely be a way around this soon.
For professionals, they will likely keep a Windows XP or 2000 image hanging around if they need to reformat a customer's computer that has vista upgrade. It also keeps computer techs one step ahead of customers.
I read a few comments on here that must have been from Americans posing as Canadians. One stated that Canadians don't get all the movies up here...Well, that's not true. We get every movie Hollywood puts out. Sure, small-town Saskatchewan may get movies later, but that's because their theatre may only have one screen.
To say we are responsible for 50% of movie pirating is wrong, they mean Canadian theatres are the location of 50% of the telesyncing that takes place. So by delaying our movie releases, we will be less likely to be the first out with a TS on bittorrent. This is significant because, as the article states, it is much much easier to prosecute a US citizen than a Canadian citizen in terms of pirating. In Canada, the usher has to catch the guy recording the movie, then get the police and charge him. In the states, he/she can be charged after the fact if it is proven he/she recorded it earlier at a movie venue.
So you may think what the big deal is with delaying the movies in Canada...well, it will force all of the Telesyncing to be done by US citizens in US movie theatres, and therefore it will be much much much easier to prosecute the pirates. By moving 100% of the pirating to the states, they can effectively control litigation of the offenders. It is actually quite clever. It WILL result in more people downloading movies in Canada I'm sure (since we will be unable to watch them legitimately) but it will (and it's a gamble) hopefull curb piracy in the states.
Most people believe that pirating movies and music does not hurt the big stars. Well, realistically it probably doesn't. But there are hundreds or thousands more people that work in/on movies than the big name stars and I'm sure their salary will be the first to be cut if the studios feel the pinch. You can save a few million by cutting salaries of all the other workers while keeping the stars' paychecks high.
Same deal when a company falls on hard times, the lowly employees get canned, raises are suspended, some salary reductions may occur if voted in (sometimes employees are given this choice instead of being laid off), but the CEO and the high-ups still make a crapload of money.
Not to say I'm a Saint or anything. Sometimes I get to thinking and realize I may be getting that one key grip laid off.
I know at the UofA there is a calculator policy that dictates what calculators can be used.
... it allows you to see your equations as if written on paper, so you no longer need to double guess your brackets. RPN is fine and well for some engineers, but it is a steep learning curve, and realistically it is not THAT much quicker. Figure out exactly how much and what type of calculations you will be doing and see if RPN has an advantage. If you're doing integrals all the time, stick with the TI-89. If you're inputing 300 bracket a calculation, do RPN it will save you time.
I have used an HP RPN and a TI-89 and I prefer the TI-89 because of the "pretty print"
But you should check to see if any of your current or future classes have restrictions. I know we can't use anything that has any wireless capability (no laptops, phones, newer calculators) and we have two classes: programmable and non-programmable. That is if calculators are allowed. We are never allowed calculators in math classes (would make it too easy otherwise), but they would allow a slide-ruler.
Just a few months ago my friend put a bag of microwaveable popcorn into the microwave and left it for a few minutes. He came back and the microwave was smoking and the bag was on fire. Apparently the butter and kernels stuck together and burned. The apartment smelled for about 2 weeks (we could only open the windows a little at a time -- Canadian winter) and the microwave was ruined.
I think it's pretty funny that people tried this without wetting the sponge, however, I know many people that do not realize the nuances of how a microwave actually works.