Without the net I would be totally unproductive today.
Last week I sprained my ankle and due to doctors orders I must stay off my feet a couple of days.
By using my DSL access and cell phone I can keep up with the folks at work as well as be productive on some of my other projects. I don't feel isolated at all, but empowered. I also saved money and the environment by not driving the 27 miles to and from work today.
I have found that technology is the whipping boy for those who do not understand it, and a servant to those who do.
The top Unix admin at our corporate headquarters is a Unix Chick eight years my junior. The number two person in our local Unix users goup is an attractive female. And two of the best DBA's in the area are female.
All of these women are the tops in their field, but they are a small segment compared to the overwhelming majority that are men.
I tried to "nuture" my nieces into going into a technical field, but they were captured by the Barbie camp along before I had a chance...
One of the major problems I run into as a retrocomputerist, (Collecting and preserving old computers) is the copyrights on old manuals.
While corporations commonly do not support products that are more than few years old, I can't share the manuals or data books for discontinued ten year old computers or chips to help some one else repair their systems. Why is that not fair use? I not talking about release source code of something that might re-profitable someday. (Computer games) I am talking about preserving some history here.
It's like we are locked into this preverted system that seeks to maximise corporate profits at all costs regardless of the public. You can count me as one who will not buy DVD's nor grace the movieplexs either.
People can run whatever operating systems they need or want to run.
I think the chips on the shoulder you see are either directed at the companies raking in the IPO dough or the "open source/closed mind" zealots.
A quick poll amoung the folks at a recent Unix users group meeting showed that the majority of them ran Sun or some other traditional vendors software on their machines at work.
As far as their at home choice or alternative, it depend on their needs. Some liked Linux for its large number of applications. Others prefered FreeBSD for easy of configuration or OpenBSD for it's security. The general feeling was that Unix is just Unix.
The major concern amoung the Linux users was the quality of the distribution. With ease of install improving, security seem to be a primary concern. It would be nice if the main distro vendors took some clues from OpenBSD. There were also some concerns with the quality of Redhat's latest offerings. One person called it the "IPO" illness, where the quality of a companies product suffers after the IPO.
Correction: The G4 is not a Motorola Chip....
on
Darwin on Crusoe?
·
· Score: 1
The G3 and G4 are Not Motorola chips. They are AIM chips. (AIM = Apple, IBM, Motorola).
The last original microprocessor family designed solely by Motorola was the 88000 RISC series.
Moving Mars by Greg Bear - the best of the Mars books, with a awesome plot and a female lead character.
Shockwave Rider by John Brunner - a Classic about the net before the Internet existed.
Nova by Delaney - a classic science fiction retelling of Moby Dick, but better.
The Flinx books by Allen Dean Foster - good series of classic adventure type tales.
The Door Into Summer, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Have Space Suit - Will Travel by Robert Heinlein - three must reads by the grandmaster of science fiction hackery.
The Giants Novels by James Hogan - good believable science fiction from a good author.
The Cyberiad by Stanislaw Lem - the ultimate in android humor, the only book which has gotten me in trouble for laughing out loud in public.
N-Space by Larry Niven - one of the masters on the short story.
The Humanoids by Jack Williamson - must read for all humans. This book and series are the closest thing to the truth about do-gooders(from Wing IV) that you will find. Classic tales of how the quest for security kills the human spirit. Not for hard core members of either main political party.
I usually learn most by lurking on newsgroups or mailing lists. I also spend a good deal of time researching on the net and in books.
I too have seen Tom help absolute newbies. But I have also seen him and others squash folks with what were real questions that need the touch of a tutor, not the lash. I think this has lead to the increase in sales of Python books.
We have a common joke in users groups in this area that reflects the zeal that sometimes comes from both the Internet and local Perl wizards:
Having Tom Christiansen as Best Newbie Helper is like having Bill Clinton as best family man.
Even if you have read the FAQ, the ORA books, look at the source code, hacked on the problem for days, the chances are that Tom or his side kick Abagail will cut your head off if you ask for help on the Perl Newsgroups.
And if you escape to comp.lang.python, he'll show up there to insult your choice of scripting languages.
Other than that he's a great guy! Love his writing.
1) You end up shifting the pollution to the power generation stations. Recent generations of autos have much better pollution controls than ten years ago.
2) They have no range. The energy density of battery systems is just not up to par with the alternatives. You can't use them for long haul of large loads.
3) Gasoline is actually more efficent both energy wise and economy wise. Several studies by notable geeks have proved this. See Don Lancaster's web site for the equations.
Now some good things:
1) Electric works for commuter trains, and smaller short range vehicles.
2) Hybrids are showing promise.
3) Fuel cell technology may make a lot of the problems with internal combustion engines mute.
As far as Reagan, I am more pissed that he killed off the tax credits for engery efficent houses and set solar energy research back ten years.
The rumour that the oil companies have secret caborator designs that allow the average auto to get 110mpg are bunk. Even Honda stuggles to get 60 mpg in a semi-average vehicle. But there are hydroelectric companies that have bought many of the patents on more efficent solar cell designs.
The Top Ten Reasons the DotComGuy is not a True Dallas Area Geek.
10. He will miss Fantansia 2000 on IMAX. Geeks dig classical stuff like that has a break from the techno and rock-n-roll life styles.
9. People in Dallas drive, even geeks. Those who drive bicycles, motorcycles and small cars are called "targets". Then there are road trips to Austin and such.
8. Geeks in Dallas go to users group meetings. There are ten different users groups where half the other geeks are named Chris. NTLUG, DFWUUG, etc..
7. A true geek would have invited some buds along fro the piece of the action. At least a cat or a kitten. Then he could have a DotComPussyCat.
6. First Saturday Sale. A Dallas thing.
5. Going to Frys or MicroCenter to scoop out the latest stuff. Both carry Linux stuff and other essentials. MicroCenter has more BSD stuff and better books. Frys has a bit of everything. CompUsa is for the lame.
4. Resturants. Dallas has more resturants then any other place in the known universe. You could eat out every meal for a century without being in a chain or repeating yourself. See Addison.
3. A true geek would have a column in the Dallas Observer and substain from messing with Belo association. There is the WFAA Kristine Kahanek weather babe exception. www.wfaa.com
2. A true geek would have moved in with a workstation to start with. A older geek would have an old PDP-11 or maybe a SGI 02. Laptops as a sole system are for marketing wusses.
1. Babes. How is he going to get any quality women? True geek women are not into idoits called DotComGuy. What the heck do you call him? Dot? Com? Guy? Women want a true geek, half which in Dallas are called Chris Something.
I wonder what would happen if I scrambled critical data concerning your life around.
"Gee Mr. Bohn," says the nice lady behind the counter, "Our systems shows that you are overdue on your student loan payments. Guess you can't have that nice car or house or engagment ring."
"Mr. Bohn, due to the lack of poor grades, police record, and drug abuse, we do not want you working for the XYZ company."
"The arrest warrent says the address is 123 Main and the crook is armed and dangerous and a cop killer." (The felon actual lives at 123 Maine, but hey, due to a error, you don't care, you are dead.)
I don't know what Steve Jobs did with the technology, but these little honeys really did the job.
I don't see that handwriting recognition is going to help Linux in any way, most things Unixy are designed for the keyboard with a occasional mousing around. To really make efficent use of the technology you need a shell or operating system design to support it.
For references check out anything related to the Newton or for a good view of the damage Redmond has done to pen computing check out the book Start Up : A Silicon Valley Adventure by Jerry Kaplan.
Try getting a non-Windows Printer...
on
FreeBSD at COMDEX
·
· Score: 1
Recently I went shopping for a laser printer that could support all the various operating systems at the Nerd House.
After finding very few postscript printers out there I went to the Linux Printing HowTo List:
I finally went with a HP Laserjet 2100TN which does a yeoman job for all the various boxes in the house. I have had good luck with the HP printers at work and like most of their product lines except the Laserjet 5 series...
I hate the fact that standards like postscript have been dropped in favor of Win-Drivers. It took 10 times as long to load the drivers on the Windows machines than it took to tell the Mac's and the various favors of unix boxes about the new printer...
"Unix has become stagnant. Unix has ceased to be the platform of choice for the development and deployment of innovative technology."
"Unix has become large and complex. Obsession with the wrong sorts of compatibility (i.e., unused features) has lead to a bloated, hard to maintain, Unix source base."
Face it folks, both Unix, Linix and NT are bloated. Maybe a new OS like Be would do better.
At the last meeting of the Dallas Internet Society, the subject of software patents that were nothing but rehashes of old prior art with the word web attachted was brought up.
The panel of lawyers response was in the line of, "So what you ignorant peasant, software patents are here to stay and we will make billions by being legal parasites."
This article is almost identical to to the articles I have read in both NT Magazine and on the MSDN site.
The study said that stability evidence was almost entirely anecdotal... Anytime I have had a serious problem with NT, Microsoft says that it is anecdotal and I must be doing something wrong.
Slashdot Mirror
Without the net I would be totally unproductive today.
Last week I sprained my ankle and due to doctors orders I must stay off my feet a couple of days.
By using my DSL access and cell phone I can keep up with the folks at work as well as be productive on some of my other projects. I don't feel isolated at all, but empowered. I also saved money and the environment by not driving the 27 miles to and from work today.
I have found that technology is the whipping boy for those who do not understand it, and a servant to those who do.
The top Unix admin at our corporate headquarters is a Unix Chick eight years my junior. The number two person in our local Unix users goup is an attractive female. And two of the best DBA's in the area are female.
All of these women are the tops in their field, but they are a small segment compared to the overwhelming majority that are men.
I tried to "nuture" my nieces into going into a technical field, but they were captured by the Barbie camp along before I had a chance...
They still have not come up with anything as good as the last Newton.
Wake me up when someone does.
I agree.
One of the major problems I run into as a retrocomputerist, (Collecting and preserving old computers) is the copyrights on old manuals.
While corporations commonly do not support products that are more than few years old, I can't share the manuals or data books for discontinued ten year old computers or chips to help some one else repair their systems. Why is that not fair use? I not talking about release source code of something that might re-profitable someday. (Computer games) I am talking about preserving some history here.
It's like we are locked into this preverted system that seeks to maximise corporate profits at all costs regardless of the public. You can count me as one who will not buy DVD's nor grace the movieplexs either.
People can run whatever operating systems they need or want to run.
I think the chips on the shoulder you see are either directed at the companies raking in the IPO dough or the "open source/closed mind" zealots.
A quick poll amoung the folks at a recent Unix users group meeting showed that the majority of them ran Sun or some other traditional vendors software on their machines at work.
As far as their at home choice or alternative, it depend on their needs. Some liked Linux for its large number of applications. Others prefered FreeBSD for easy of configuration or OpenBSD for it's security. The general feeling was that Unix is just Unix.
The major concern amoung the Linux users was the quality of the distribution. With ease of install improving, security seem to be a primary concern. It would be nice if the main distro vendors took some clues from OpenBSD. There were also some concerns with the quality of Redhat's latest offerings. One person called it the "IPO" illness, where the quality of a companies product suffers after the IPO.
The G3 and G4 are Not Motorola chips. They are AIM chips. (AIM = Apple, IBM, Motorola).
The last original microprocessor family designed solely by Motorola was the 88000 RISC series.
The lack of privacy is not so much a problem as is it's nasty brother; identity theft.
If you ever wanted to make somones life living hell, steal their identity, raun up a bunch of bills and then watch them squirm the rest of their life.
This has happened to people all over the United States and they are having a terrible time try to put their lives back together...
Moving Mars by Greg Bear - the best of the Mars books, with a awesome plot and a female lead character.
Shockwave Rider by John Brunner - a Classic about the net before the Internet existed.
Nova by Delaney - a classic science fiction retelling of Moby Dick, but better.
The Flinx books by Allen Dean Foster - good series of classic adventure type tales.
The Door Into Summer, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Have Space Suit - Will Travel by Robert Heinlein - three must reads by the grandmaster of science fiction hackery.
The Giants Novels by James Hogan - good believable science fiction from a good author.
The Cyberiad by Stanislaw Lem - the ultimate in android humor, the only book which has gotten me in trouble for laughing out loud in public.
N-Space by Larry Niven - one of the masters on the short story.
The Humanoids by Jack Williamson - must read for all humans. This book and series are the closest thing to the truth about do-gooders(from Wing IV) that you will find. Classic tales of how the quest for security kills the human spirit. Not for hard core members of either main political party.
Sometimes.
I usually learn most by lurking on newsgroups or mailing lists. I also spend a good deal of time researching on the net and in books.
I too have seen Tom help absolute newbies. But I have also seen him and others squash folks with what were real questions that need the touch of a tutor, not the lash. I think this has lead to the increase in sales of Python books.
We have a common joke in users groups in this area that reflects the zeal that sometimes comes from both the Internet and local Perl wizards:
"Perl, the choice of arrogant bastards!"
Having Tom Christiansen as Best Newbie Helper is like having Bill Clinton as best family man.
Even if you have read the FAQ, the ORA books, look at the source code, hacked on the problem for days, the chances are that Tom or his side kick Abagail will cut your head off if you ask for help on the Perl Newsgroups.
And if you escape to comp.lang.python, he'll show up there to insult your choice of scripting languages.
Other than that he's a great guy! Love his writing.
There are several problems with electic cars.
1) You end up shifting the pollution to the power generation stations. Recent generations of autos have much better pollution controls than ten years ago.
2) They have no range. The energy density of battery systems is just not up to par with the alternatives. You can't use them for long haul of large loads.
3) Gasoline is actually more efficent both energy wise and economy wise. Several studies by notable geeks have proved this. See Don Lancaster's web site for the equations.
Now some good things:
1) Electric works for commuter trains, and smaller short range vehicles.
2) Hybrids are showing promise.
3) Fuel cell technology may make a lot of the problems with internal combustion engines mute.
As far as Reagan, I am more pissed that he killed off the tax credits for engery efficent houses and set solar energy research back ten years.
The rumour that the oil companies have secret caborator designs that allow the average auto to get 110mpg are bunk. Even Honda stuggles to get 60 mpg in a semi-average vehicle. But there are hydroelectric companies that have bought many of the patents on more efficent solar cell designs.
Go figure.
The Top Ten Reasons the DotComGuy is not a True Dallas Area Geek.
10. He will miss Fantansia 2000 on IMAX. Geeks dig classical stuff like that has a break from the techno and rock-n-roll life styles.
9. People in Dallas drive, even geeks. Those who drive bicycles, motorcycles and small cars are called "targets". Then there are road trips to Austin and such.
8. Geeks in Dallas go to users group meetings. There are ten different users groups where half the other geeks are named Chris. NTLUG, DFWUUG, etc..
7. A true geek would have invited some buds along fro the piece of the action. At least a cat or a kitten. Then he could have a DotComPussyCat.
6. First Saturday Sale. A Dallas thing.
5. Going to Frys or MicroCenter to scoop out the latest stuff. Both carry Linux stuff and other essentials. MicroCenter has more BSD stuff and better books. Frys has a bit of everything. CompUsa is for the lame.
4. Resturants. Dallas has more resturants then any other place in the known universe. You could eat out every meal for a century without being in a chain or repeating yourself. See Addison.
3. A true geek would have a column in the Dallas Observer and substain from messing with Belo association. There is the WFAA Kristine Kahanek weather babe exception. www.wfaa.com
2. A true geek would have moved in with a workstation to start with. A older geek would have an old PDP-11 or maybe a SGI 02. Laptops as a sole system are for marketing wusses.
1. Babes. How is he going to get any quality women? True geek women are not into idoits called DotComGuy. What the heck do you call him? Dot? Com? Guy? Women want a true geek, half which in Dallas are called Chris Something.
Wrong!
I wonder what would happen if I scrambled critical data concerning your life around.
"Gee Mr. Bohn," says the nice lady behind the counter, "Our systems shows that you are overdue on your student loan payments. Guess you can't have that nice car or house or engagment ring."
"Mr. Bohn, due to the lack of poor grades, police record, and drug abuse, we do not want you working for the XYZ company."
"The arrest warrent says the address is 123 Main and the crook is armed and dangerous and a cop killer." (The felon actual lives at 123 Maine, but hey, due to a error, you don't care, you are dead.)
Bad data can kill. Think before you type.
Been There, Done That.
Come on folks!
Its called the Newton Message Pad 2100.
I don't know what Steve Jobs did with the technology, but these little honeys really did the job.
I don't see that handwriting recognition is going to help Linux in any way, most things Unixy are designed for the keyboard with a occasional mousing around. To really make efficent use of the technology you need a shell or operating system design to support it.
For references check out anything related to the Newton or for a good view of the damage Redmond has done to pen computing check out the book Start Up : A Silicon Valley Adventure by Jerry Kaplan.
Recently I went shopping for a laser printer that could support all the various operating systems at the Nerd House.
t .cgi
After finding very few postscript printers out there I went to the Linux Printing HowTo List:
http://www.picante.com/~gtaylor/pht/printer_lis
I finally went with a HP Laserjet 2100TN which does a yeoman job for all the various boxes in the house. I have had good luck with the HP printers at work and like most of their product lines except the Laserjet 5 series...
I hate the fact that standards like postscript have been dropped in favor of Win-Drivers. It took 10 times as long to load the drivers on the Windows machines than it took to tell the Mac's and the various favors of unix boxes about the new printer...
Consider this already done.
Check out Allaires contribution to XML: WDDX
"Unix has become stagnant. Unix has ceased to be the platform of choice for the development and deployment of innovative technology."
"Unix has become large and complex. Obsession with the wrong sorts of compatibility (i.e., unused features) has lead to a bloated, hard to maintain, Unix source base."
Face it folks, both Unix, Linix and NT are bloated. Maybe a new OS like Be would do better.
At the last meeting of the Dallas Internet Society, the subject of software patents that were nothing but rehashes of old prior art with the word web attachted was brought up.
The panel of lawyers response was in the line of,
"So what you ignorant peasant, software patents are here to stay and we will make billions by being legal parasites."
So much for open source...
This article is almost identical to to the articles I have read in both NT Magazine and on the MSDN site.
The study said that stability evidence was almost entirely anecdotal... Anytime I have had a serious problem with NT, Microsoft says that it is anecdotal and I must be doing something wrong.
This article may be correct, but it is FUD.