"Microsoft is looking at charging for some of its software updates that it now distributes for free."
Bill's missing some key business concepts here.
Product Quality. "5% of all windows installations crash two or more times every day." Bill concedes his product is shit.
Support. Updates providing new features could be charged for, but certainly not for fixing existing deficiencies (crashes, security) in features the customer has already purchased.
Conclusion, Bill gets home and corporate users hooked on his product: He's the biggest drug dealer on the planet.
Western culture begets western culture. Eastern culture is fragile. Try respecting other's beliefs, choices, censorship. The United States Government is far from perfect in many ways (revenge wars) and still holds to some (Christian) religious beliefs in their laws.
It's also not inducing thought; perhaps introducing thought. In which case, not very interresting ones.
Am I the only one who was wriggling in my seat for 4 reels (1 hour and 20 minutes) of complete horse-shit, averaging about half a plot development for each reel? The film picked up a bit with its cryptic horse-shit philosophy, but otherwise was ultimately benign.
I live in Australia, and I have to say, despite having some loose privacy laws (apparently Australia has the highest level of phone taps by 'authorities' per capita) and the odd debate over such shit as national identity cards (our television media doesn't bring privacy issues to the public's awareness, but the odd page X - where X > 20 - article gets linked on/.), but this makes me want to puke.
Sony Music often outsources the support musicians for recordings (who are paid once for their work as they are not the authors of the piece) to Mexicanos down south.
Of course Sony doesn't volunteer to pay them agreed minimum wages in the States.
I don't know where the CDs are produced, so I know nothing about the import tax in this instance, just about the employees rights in recordings.
But can't they find more productive ways to [waste and/or] spend our tax dollars. Teenagers with mp3s (or some other common "pirate" commodity). They've already trimmed education _more_ because of the war.
"Overall, a great reference for beginner and more advanced programmers alike."
I'm not a big fan of books that are targeted at both beginner and advanced programmers. Authors and publishers attempt to target their product at all available readers, but I find myself skipping chapters in some books (either early or late). What have you found?
In all simplicity, when I was finishing my secondary education I had a desk in my bedroom with a desktop computer on it -- and I got NO study done whatsoever. So I pulled the plug, put it in the store room and ended up getting decent grades. I find technology in the bedroom completely detracts from my relaxation. I read more now, and the only thing in my room is a mobile phone which I turn off when I want. A lot of people it seems have trouble turning their phone off (my younger brother will wake up at 4 in the morning to answer a call:)).
So I definitely need to separate the technology (now a laptop computer on the desk in the spare bedroom) from my bedroom.
Beer is an Aussie thing. The Powerhouse Museum (Sydney, Australia) has had a game in one of it's many discrete corners where you must successfully brew a batch of beer. At the end of the game, if you got the mix correct, the guy swallows your drink and says "Well done son!" (or something similar:)), or he spits it out and tells you you screwed up!
Anyway, from the age of 6 I've been a few times and my dad was the first to show me how to get the ingredients in the recipe correct. Beer is made and drunk all around the world, but it is such an integral part of aussie culture. I love it here.
The article doesn't mention that Einstein was a shocker at simple arithmatic. He had the natural genius to interpret large and complex equations, but was unable to perform simple calculations.
"There also seems to be a lack of detailed documentation and an easy-to-use interface which normally attract the not-so-sophisticated users."
In regards to the user interface, I find _many_ (no, not all) open source contributors are computer programmers (duh:)) and college and university students/grads -- who _must_ have studied user interfaces at some point!! (I hope -- I studied them in high school.) My point is, I think user-interfaces are have improved and are improving. The foundations of UNIX-like systems allow for modular additions (like X Window System) and take a look at the huuuge amount of work going into KDE and Gnome. Yes the command-line stuff is UNIX stuff - can't be avoided, but it can be _built upon_, and this is happening.
So I think this aspect of open-source is on the rise. I'm a Debian user, but I checked out Redhat Linux version 8 the other day, and wow! I don't run a desktop on my Debian machine (pwm baby!) but the Gnome desktop under Redhat is astonishing! It is a _USER_ desktop, WITHOUT all the Windows shit (you know what I'm talking about -- legacy support since 1982:)).
I'd consider putting the new Redhat on my ma's machine and spending a few hours showing her the ropes. I have no doubt it'd go well (but don't challent me to it just yet -- I'm still finishing up my exams).
It is within your right under tha authors' chosen license that you may modify the source and make it publically available (which it must be:)).
I personally think it's great you're concerned with etiquette, but the author is uncontactable. If he contacts you in the future with concerns about your work, it appears you already have the manners to listen to him, at any time.
"...good insurance. If the building burns to the ground Monday morning, you want to be able to call the insurer Monday Noon, and have the check in hand Tuesday morning at the latest."
This is good advice. Sites need insurance, but demanding payment in under 24 hours is not reasonable. If insurance for fires is unconditional, then within one to five days is reasonable, but then again, many people will have conditions in their insurance contract that may either be void in certain circumstances, or simply require investigation under others.
"70 per cent of Telstra's broadband customers did not reach their download limits."
Telstra's most limited account is 300Mb limit per month at AU$54.95. Each additional Mb is charged at 15.9c per megabyte.
Some Australian ISPs charge for each additional megabtye over your limit, and others throttle your speed to something ridiculous (like 28.8kbps). I ordered the latter for my uncle when setting up his ADSL because many people are ignorant of their web usage (at least at first).
If a user on the 300Mb plan downloads 500Mb in their first month, they will pay
I'm suprised no Aussies brought this up in the recent article Add-Ons Add Up.
Independent resources for market research include Whirlpool (Australian Broadband News) and Broadband Choice for indexed summaries of all providers plans. Read them first! Please!
Start the flame wars
on
Antique Distros?
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
I thought that was what Debian386 (i.e. not x86) was for.:)
Tolkien translates better to film because all his characters are so completely two-dimensional."
I disagree. Firstly the character depth in the LotR novels is amazing. Character complexity is what made reading LotR such an amazing experience for me, and conversely the complete absence of such themes from the film resulted in my absolute disappointment. I personally love the bond Gimli and Legolas form despite the greater hatred between the two dwarves and elves, and this was not hinted at even slightly in the film.
In regards to Harry Potter, the characters are complex but in a local scope, and this is what differentiates the two. Harry Potter is of the low fantasy genre and LotR is of the high fantasy genre. Typically low fantasy is fantasy of local scope and few central characters undergoing the one central plot together, whereas high fantasy consists of epic scope, multiple central characters with different (and usually inter-connected) plots, and elevated language.
If you're in with the ravers, the Outback Eclipse Festival 2002 at Lyndhurst is a 4-day music festival celebrating the eclipse.
From inthemix.com, "Day will turn into night as the moon passes directly in front of the sun. This will be the best viewing point in the world to see this 100% solar eclipse."
"Over 50 international and local live acts and DJs, performing artists, crazy installations, mega shade, free drinking water, chillout village featuring geodesic domes." See you there.
My cable guy (on a slightly funny yet sad side-note) didn't have a PCMCIA network card and left my house happy having achieved his list of todos. I felt very empty waiting 3 days to get to shop for my own NIC to finish the job. The EULA was the least of my concern.
On a more valid note, in Australia I do know that Optus Cable is a permanent connection and does not require any software whatsoever (and none is installed), while Telstra Cablerequires softward because it is PPPoE and perhaps other non-standard things (for a very long time they did not use DOCSIS modems).
Not having learned Latin, but being a scientist I can answer a different question -- Have I ever, in my scientific career, wished I had learned Latin? Never.
I agree completely. I study Science (CompSci) and Arts (Languages) and only now taking Spanish as one of my 2 language majors I wish I'd continued Latin in school (I studied for 2 years, but could've gone the distance for 6). I think scientific names translate well enough into English and other European languages that Science students need not worry.
Understood. If you feel safe sending a cheque then do so. I measure my trust of the seller by speaking with them on the telephone (short international calls aren't that expensivce). The most important thing to remember with cheques is to write on them (front or back) "for deposit only" and initial this (most cheques say "non-negotiable" on them now-a-days but this also).
Slashdot Mirror
Rob Pike's famous response to the obligatory "What would you have done differently" question (asked above) was: "I would have left the e on creat."
- Product Quality. "5% of all windows installations crash two or more times every day." Bill concedes his product is shit.
- Support. Updates providing new features could be charged for, but certainly not for fixing existing deficiencies (crashes, security) in features the customer has already purchased.
Conclusion, Bill gets home and corporate users hooked on his product: He's the biggest drug dealer on the planet.This just goes to show that if it's about the environment, or about starving children, it is always, _always_ about money.
That questioning the truth is a bad thing?
Western culture begets western culture. Eastern culture is fragile. Try respecting other's beliefs, choices, censorship. The United States Government is far from perfect in many ways (revenge wars) and still holds to some (Christian) religious beliefs in their laws.
It's also not inducing thought; perhaps introducing thought. In which case, not very interresting ones.
Am I the only one who was wriggling in my seat for 4 reels (1 hour and 20 minutes) of complete horse-shit, averaging about half a plot development for each reel? The film picked up a bit with its cryptic horse-shit philosophy, but otherwise was ultimately benign.
I live in Australia, and I have to say, despite having some loose privacy laws (apparently Australia has the highest level of phone taps by 'authorities' per capita) and the odd debate over such shit as national identity cards (our television media doesn't bring privacy issues to the public's awareness, but the odd page X - where X > 20 - article gets linked on /.), but this makes me want to puke.
Sony Music often outsources the support musicians for recordings (who are paid once for their work as they are not the authors of the piece) to Mexicanos down south.
Of course Sony doesn't volunteer to pay them agreed minimum wages in the States.
I don't know where the CDs are produced, so I know nothing about the import tax in this instance, just about the employees rights in recordings.
But can't they find more productive ways to [waste and/or] spend our tax dollars. Teenagers with mp3s (or some other common "pirate" commodity). They've already trimmed education _more_ because of the war.
- Angry student ) :
"Overall, a great reference for beginner and more advanced programmers alike."
I'm not a big fan of books that are targeted at both beginner and advanced programmers. Authors and publishers attempt to target their product at all available readers, but I find myself skipping chapters in some books (either early or late). What have you found?
In all simplicity, when I was finishing my secondary education I had a desk in my bedroom with a desktop computer on it -- and I got NO study done whatsoever. So I pulled the plug, put it in the store room and ended up getting decent grades. I find technology in the bedroom completely detracts from my relaxation. I read more now, and the only thing in my room is a mobile phone which I turn off when I want. A lot of people it seems have trouble turning their phone off (my younger brother will wake up at 4 in the morning to answer a call :)).
So I definitely need to separate the technology (now a laptop computer on the desk in the spare bedroom) from my bedroom.
Beer is an Aussie thing. The Powerhouse Museum (Sydney, Australia) has had a game in one of it's many discrete corners where you must successfully brew a batch of beer. At the end of the game, if you got the mix correct, the guy swallows your drink and says "Well done son!" (or something similar :)), or he spits it out and tells you you screwed up!
Anyway, from the age of 6 I've been a few times and my dad was the first to show me how to get the ingredients in the recipe correct. Beer is made and drunk all around the world, but it is such an integral part of aussie culture. I love it here.
The article doesn't mention that Einstein was a shocker at simple arithmatic. He had the natural genius to interpret large and complex equations, but was unable to perform simple calculations.
"There also seems to be a lack of detailed documentation and an easy-to-use interface which normally attract the not-so-sophisticated users."
:)) and college and university students/grads -- who _must_ have studied user interfaces at some point!! (I hope -- I studied them in high school.) My point is, I think user-interfaces are have improved and are improving. The foundations of UNIX-like systems allow for modular additions (like X Window System) and take a look at the huuuge amount of work going into KDE and Gnome. Yes the command-line stuff is UNIX stuff - can't be avoided, but it can be _built upon_, and this is happening.
:)).
In regards to the user interface, I find _many_ (no, not all) open source contributors are computer programmers (duh
So I think this aspect of open-source is on the rise. I'm a Debian user, but I checked out Redhat Linux version 8 the other day, and wow! I don't run a desktop on my Debian machine (pwm baby!) but the Gnome desktop under Redhat is astonishing! It is a _USER_ desktop, WITHOUT all the Windows shit (you know what I'm talking about -- legacy support since 1982
I'd consider putting the new Redhat on my ma's machine and spending a few hours showing her the ropes. I have no doubt it'd go well (but don't challent me to it just yet -- I'm still finishing up my exams).
It is within your right under tha authors' chosen license that you may modify the source and make it publically available (which it must be :)).
:)
I personally think it's great you're concerned with etiquette, but the author is uncontactable. If he contacts you in the future with concerns about your work, it appears you already have the manners to listen to him, at any time.
Good luck.
"...good insurance. If the building burns to the ground Monday morning, you want to be able to call the insurer Monday Noon, and have the check in hand Tuesday morning at the latest."
This is good advice. Sites need insurance, but demanding payment in under 24 hours is not reasonable. If insurance for fires is unconditional, then within one to five days is reasonable, but then again, many people will have conditions in their insurance contract that may either be void in certain circumstances, or simply require investigation under others.
"70 per cent of Telstra's broadband customers did not reach their download limits."
Telstra's most limited account is 300Mb limit per month at AU$54.95. Each additional Mb is charged at 15.9c per megabyte.
Some Australian ISPs charge for each additional megabtye over your limit, and others throttle your speed to something ridiculous (like 28.8kbps). I ordered the latter for my uncle when setting up his ADSL because many people are ignorant of their web usage (at least at first).
If a user on the 300Mb plan downloads 500Mb in their first month, they will pay
$54.95 + 200Mb * $0.159 = $54.95 + $31.80 = $86.75.
If you think that is bad, if a 3Gb user downloads 3.8Gb in their first month (like most teenagers I know), they're up for
$87.95 + 800Mb * $0.139 = $87.95 + $111.20 = $199.15.
I'm suprised no Aussies brought this up in the recent article Add-Ons Add Up.
Independent resources for market research include Whirlpool (Australian Broadband News) and Broadband Choice for indexed summaries of all providers plans. Read them first! Please!
I thought that was what Debian 386 (i.e. not x86) was for. :)
"...learning how to type using emacs."
The next think you know the kids will be fighting...
"vi!"
"Emacs!"
"vi!"
Tolkien translates better to film because all his characters are so completely two-dimensional."
I disagree. Firstly the character depth in the LotR novels is amazing. Character complexity is what made reading LotR such an amazing experience for me, and conversely the complete absence of such themes from the film resulted in my absolute disappointment. I personally love the bond Gimli and Legolas form despite the greater hatred between the two dwarves and elves, and this was not hinted at even slightly in the film.
In regards to Harry Potter, the characters are complex but in a local scope, and this is what differentiates the two. Harry Potter is of the low fantasy genre and LotR is of the high fantasy genre. Typically low fantasy is fantasy of local scope and few central characters undergoing the one central plot together, whereas high fantasy consists of epic scope, multiple central characters with different (and usually inter-connected) plots, and elevated language.
J.K.Rowling and J.R.R.Tolkien are uncomparable.
You put your loot in the cart... You leave. No cashier to deal with.
Why do I see one security guard for every two cashiers? Truly a step in the right direction.
If you're in with the ravers, the Outback Eclipse Festival 2002 at Lyndhurst is a 4-day music festival celebrating the eclipse.
From inthemix.com, "Day will turn into night as the moon passes directly in front of the sun. This will be the best viewing point in the world to see this 100% solar eclipse."
"Over 50 international and local live acts and DJs, performing artists, crazy installations, mega shade, free drinking water, chillout village featuring geodesic domes." See you there.
"...even mentioning this is probably in violation of the text."
You can't violate the EULA if you don't accept it. If you don't accept it, I guess you can't fly American Air!
I've seen the acronym "TA" appear in a few articles recently - could someone please explain it for me. Ty.
My cable guy (on a slightly funny yet sad side-note) didn't have a PCMCIA network card and left my house happy having achieved his list of todos. I felt very empty waiting 3 days to get to shop for my own NIC to finish the job. The EULA was the least of my concern.
On a more valid note, in Australia I do know that Optus Cable is a permanent connection and does not require any software whatsoever (and none is installed), while Telstra Cable requires softward because it is PPPoE and perhaps other non-standard things (for a very long time they did not use DOCSIS modems).
Not having learned Latin, but being a scientist I can answer a different question -- Have I ever, in my scientific career, wished I had learned Latin? Never.
I agree completely. I study Science (CompSci) and Arts (Languages) and only now taking Spanish as one of my 2 language majors I wish I'd continued Latin in school (I studied for 2 years, but could've gone the distance for 6). I think scientific names translate well enough into English and other European languages that Science students need not worry.
Understood. If you feel safe sending a cheque then do so. I measure my trust of the seller by speaking with them on the telephone (short international calls aren't that expensivce). The most important thing to remember with cheques is to write on them (front or back) "for deposit only" and initial this (most cheques say "non-negotiable" on them now-a-days but this also).
Good luck.