IMO a better path would have been to build a multi-purpose handheld optimized for e-book reading- license the Palm OS so that people could do all that other stuff too, but use a big, clear screen with dedicated nav buttons so it was the best darn e-book reading Palm money can buy. Or the best darn e-book reading Linux pad, I'm not picky.
You might want to check out the hiebook... It allows you to put your own content on it, it is multi-purpose and you can download the SDK for it... It's supposed to be very good, but I've never seen one in the silicon, so I'm just going from commentary.
I've always had trouble finding a nice way of reading books on LCD screen. If outside the sun destoryed (I assume this is a typo for destroyed, and the sun didn't actually remove the story that you were reading) the contrast or if inside you had to be just right so there was enough light. Nightmare.
Hmmm... That's why you have a backlight. Thouhg frankly, my Rocket E-Book has good enough contrast that I can read it with the backlight off in decent lighting and only need to turn the backlight on (usually at one of the lowest settings) when the lighting is less than optimal.
I understand that you were probably using some other (less well designed) device, but specialisation does have some distinct advantages.
Z. (Who only ever reads free content on his Rocket E-Book)
Give me a seasoned vet who has the depth and breadth of experience to have learned all of those "only happens once every x years" type of lessons over some young, fast coder who has yet to learn these lessons.
Where X=1,000? 1,000,000? What arbitrary limit are you going to impose?
Z. Who thinks the best candidate for the job should be chosen...
"Any fool can peel the Apple...It takes a real man to eat the core." - Stephen King, Everything's Eventual
Thanks... It's nice to have some sort of justification of my feelings of masculinity. I have eaten the core of the apple for most of my life. All, but the little stick bit... In my mind, it takes a real masochist to eat the stick too.
God knows how the moderators work... (I know how I do when moderating, but this is bizarre. It was moderated up (several times) as interesting, down twice as overrated (I don't believe in overrated or underrated as moderations. If you didn't find it interesting but someone else did then why should you be allowed to say that they are wrong...
But the one that I found strangest was the Flamebait moderation. Can ANYONE explain that to me?
Given that an SSL connection is cryptographically secure, and that any security is only as strong as its weakest link...
How secure do you really think an SSL connection is when both parties are having to trust certificates signed by third parties? I don't know how Verisign store their root keys, nor do I know how they verify the identity of someone before issuing a certificate. So can I really trust that a certificate signed by them is valid and can you see any way of removing the trust element?
If a Senator violates his/her state's trust on the other side of the US, I see no reason to not let a state court issue a warrant for their arrest which would prompt the US Marshalls to arrest them and extradite them to their home state for prosecution.
There is a reason... it's called the constitution, and perhaps you should read it some time. I quote (emphasis added):
The Senators and Representatives shall receive a compensation for their services, to be ascertained by law, and paid out of the treasury of the United States.
They shall in all cases, except treason, felony and breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any speech or debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other place.
So, unless the representative commits treason, a felony or breach of the peace they can't be arrested. I would be interested in knowing what "Ethics crimes" you would consider to be so serious that they should be felonies, and how you would prove anything as they can't be questioned about speechs or debates in the house. You can't ask Representative Corporate Monkey why he voted a specific way. If he voted for Megacorp because he felt it was for the best for his constituents, or because they helped his campaign funds doesn't make a difference. The constitution says that he can't be questioned about it.
As for removing the "unconstitutional size limits" on the house. You should read the constitution. The constitution does not specify a number of seats in the house. It does however specify a maximum. The maximum is one per thirty thousand constituents, with a mimimum of one per state. It does not say that a representative can only have thirty thousand constituents, nor does it say that you have to have one representative for every thirty thousand people. If you want to follow this rule strictly then sure, you can increase the size of the house.
But, given that the current US population is 290,236,982 (Source US Census) that would require 9,674 representatives. Assuming that we pay them a mere $30,000 a year salary (or $1 per constituent), then we have almost three hundred million dollars per year going to them... On top of which we have to pay for the office space, the assistants, the football stadium sized congress building,... Can you imagine trying to co-ordinate a meeting with over nine thousand participants? Can you imagine trying to get them to come to concensus over anything?
Not that your suggestion is completely unworkable or anything...
Well forgive me... Apparently the information I was given by several people was wrong. It just goes to show how complicated the american tax system really is.
I've looked at the Tax Chart, and at the Tax schedule, and I think the chart is a masterpiece. Given the choice I would rather pay taxes according to the schedule as the chart assumes that you are earning the exact top of that pay band.
You already have a tax based on stupidity, and it is very popular. It's called the lottery.
Despite being wrong on the specifics, I still believe that the American tax system is overly complicated and unnecessary. The British system puts the onus on the employer to deduct the correct amount of tax from that periods pay cheque and even if you are asked to fill in a tax return (you don't have to.) Usually it just confirms that you paid the correct amount of tax.
Taxation should be based upon ONE SINGLE CRITERIA. Citizenship.
Cool... I agree. I'm not a citizen, I shouldn't have to pay for a government that makes it harder for me to live here, doesn't care what I think, and threatens to throw me in gaol without telling me why, or anyone else where I've gone.
The question from Mr. Federal Taxman should be, "Are you a citizen? Well then, you owe this much of what you earned this year. Non-Citizen you say? Well then, you owe this much more!"
Oh, you mean that non citizens should be discouraged from coming to the US. Never mind that we may bring valuable skills with us, that we are not allowed to sponge off of welfare, that we may be here for reasons other than "America is the best country in the whole wide world." In my case it was easier for me to move to be with my wife than for her to uproot her three children by her previous marriage.
So, no. This is not a fair or sensible tax reform.
However, the way that US taxes work is not sensible. In the UK you pay your taxes based on how much you earn. If you earn a certain amount you pay, say 27% on that. If you earn more than that amount you pay 27% on the amount up to that level, and then maybe 40% on everything over it.
Unlike the US system it means that you should always accept a pay rise. The American system means that if you are just below the threshold you need to make sure your next raise jumps you far enough over the threshold to make sure you actually take more money home.
This is a stupid scheme. It doesn't even need to be a flat rate tax (as some people are proposing) but if it is...
You get your first $10,000 without being taxed, then everything between $10,000 and $50,000 gets taxed at 15%, everything between $50,000 and $100,000 gets taxed at 20% and everything over $100,000 gets taxed at 35% then it is fair, everyone pays reasonable taxes, and it is easy to understand.
Besides, what ruler could compare to Emperor Norton I?
As a Scot (and so born as a peasant under the rule of the English Monarchy) I agree...
Emperor Joshua Norton I, Emperor of the United States of America and Protector of Mexico, is not well enough known within the US. He should be revered as the enlightened monarch that he was. He should be lauded. He should be venerated as a saint.
I believe that you friend is wrong. HP do more (a lot more) than make printers. They make storage devices (tape drives, SAN disk arrays...) They make computers (PCs, HP3000, HP9000(HP-UX machines)...) They make software (OpenView, HP-UX, OpenVMS...) They have four research labs worldwide (2 US, 1 UK, 1 JP)
Sure they make printers, but I doubt that that is even the majority of their business. Some companies I know of have hundreds of HP-UX machines, ranging from A class (2U 1-2 proc server) all the way up to superdome (stand alone larger than a 19" rack, 32 or 64 proc servers). Considering that HP, Sun and IBM all sell Unix Servers that Linux is not yet ready to compete with (One application we use is AIX or VMS only and I know a lot of other companies in the same sector worldwide use the same application) HP is unlikely ever to become a "printer company". It may drop it's PC lines... but that is far from being the same thing.
Oh, and I don't mean to offend anyone with the "Unix Servers that Linux is not yet ready to compete with" bit, but it's purely the hardware. When did you last see a Linux box with partitioning (multiple real servers running on the same physical hardware (dedicated resources, not shared resources and emulation)) massive amounts of memory, more than 8 CPUs? I believe that Linux is capable of being ported to this hardware (IBM have already done the same thing with their Z series) but then who would you buy the hardware from... Sun, HP or IBM... they still make the sale, I don't think they are so bothered about the OS as selling you the hardware and the support agreement. When you can go down to your local computer store and pick up OEM partitioning Unix server parts to build your own equivalent Linux box THEN I will retract my statement.
I got that one too... But I was wrong. Given 1) A photo of a car crossing a bridge.
2) A piece of art showing a person, a globe, a telephone, a computer, a radio, a skscraper and a car. The person was the most obvious point in the picture.
3) A photo of a man holding a steering wheel as though he was driving.
4) A photo of a street with a hotel with some flags hanging from it. The flags are the most prominent aspect. There are some cars in the street.
5) A photo of a woman standing next to the open door of a vehicle.
6) A photo of a ferris wheel. No cars are visible anywhere in it.
What would you choose? I guessed wheels apparently I was wrong...
Sendmail This is the perfect book to spin your head, and leave you with a headache for months. But it's the topic, not the book, that's so complicated. If it didn't do absolutely everything, I'm sure it would be simpler to use.
The book IS complicated, yes, that is because the subject is complicated, but Sendmail IS way more complicated than it needs to be.
The TOPIC (running a mail server) is not that complicated... as long as the server isn't Sendmail.
A lot of alternative mail servers are simpler to configure which makes them easier to use, and easier to prove secure.
Look at Qmail or Zmail as examples.
Yes, I know I'm being pedantic, but even if you never use anything but Sendmail, looking into the RFCs or alternative mail servers will give you some insights into both mail servers in general, and different approaches to the same problem.
An interesing sidenote is this thread on the IETF discussion list." the_proton writes "The server j.root-servers.net has changed IP address to 192.58.128.30. The new root zone hints can be grabbed from ftp://rs.internic.net/domain/named.root or ftp://ftp.internic.net/domain/named.root. The new zone serial number is 2002110501."
[Brain explodes]
(Isn't it amazing when you read something written in your own language and don't understand a word of what's being said?);)
Perhaps it doesn't make sense to you because you don't need to know about it... I'm sure that you say things in English that I wouldn't understand at times...
However, here is the "simple" explanation...
An interesing sidenote is this thread on the IETF discussion list." the_proton writes "
That's just preamble... forget it.
The server j.root-servers.net has changed IP address to 192.58.128.30.
A server called j.root-servers.net has had its IP address changed. The root-servers.net servers (a, b, c,...) are spread out all over the world and tell everyobody where to start looking for IP addresses given a domain name. They can point you to the root server for a particular tld (.org) or a country (.za)... They are important.
The new root zone hints can be grabbed from ftp://rs.internic.net/domain/named.root or ftp://ftp.internic.net/domain/named.root.
The file which you use to tell your name server where to start looking for an IP address/Domain name has been updated and a new copy is available at one of these two ftp sites. Unless you are running your own DNS server (and even then you can safely ignore this) then you don't need to worry about updating this file.
The new zone serial number is 2002110501."
DNS Zone files have serial numbers. These numbers always increase. It helps you tell if you have got the right version of the DNS information... Your server should cache DNS lookups. The standard serial number is based on the date... in fact it is YYYYMMDDXX where YYYY is the year, MM is the month, DD is the day and XX is an index (multiple updates can be performed in the same day, this allows up to one hundred changes to a zone in a day).
I hope that the humourous intent of my creme de la creme (thank you Miss Jean Brodie) comment was obvious. I do not consider myself to be some sort of intellectual giant. I do sometimes consider myself to have a better solution to a particular problem than someone else does, but only sometimes. It's not an "I'm a genius, you must be an imbecile" type of thing, more a "I think this is better than that in this situation." type of thing.
Anyway, I do actually wish more programmers... learn their bloody maths
But Barbie says "Math is hard"... And if a blonde bimbo with long legs says that, then geeks will listen to her, if only because she's female... Nevermind that she is made of plastic...:-)
Seriously, I've worked with people in the past who surprised me by their ignorance of the history of computing/computers and as they did not know where some of the things they were dealing with came from then they did not understand what they were doing. I've also worked with people who made me feel like a mental midget simply because they were so all round intelligent (and they had social skills...) One of them was not only good at maths, computer software and computer hardware... but interested in History, Music, Choral singing, Astronomy, Literature... In fact their only drawback appeared to be a lack of colour sense. They always wore black as it saved them from looking too bizarre. I've also worked with an excellent software architect who was a serious polyglot and linguist. I know that he could speak at least five languages fairly well (excluding programming languages) which beats my two roundly into submission.
On the whole though most creative writers I know are smarter people than most programmers I know
I don't know many creative writers, but the ones that I do know/have met seem to be smart people. The only people that I have met that I would generally say "X is smarter than most people" about are the few polymaths that I have met. There are maybe as many as six or seven of them, and their breadth and depth of knowledge always impressed me. Most people I have met who are truly "smart" in one field seem to be no "smarter" than average outside of it.
One day I would like to be considered to be one of those polymaths... at the moment my own ignorance of so many things frightens me, but I'm gradually improving. I recently built a fence, I know that I can repair various plumbing and electrical problems... The sense of accomplishment in doing those was no less than when a program first compiles and runs successfully. I know that I can write fairly well (but I'm not good enough at descriptive narrative for fiction). I can't draw or play a musical instrument, but I do appreciate a lot of art and a wide range of music. I can only speak two languages, and don't know anything about biology/anatomy... My knowledge of economics is severly limited (probably because I can't understand how you can make money selling currency, or how the stock market works... Shares are worth the dividend, but people are willing to pay much more than that. People are trading not on the actual return from the share, but on the perceived value of the share (i.e. the share price is determined by the share price and has no relationship to the actual value of the company or its profits). and so it goes...)
Now, I'd further suggest that it actually doesn't take the greatest brain in the world to write code.
And with that I agree... It's not how much better than someone else that you can think, but simply how you can think. It's a mixture of creative and logical thinking for good coding and just logical thinking for code that works...
My Wife (Yes, I'm married and read slashdot, live with it...) is no good at maths (primarily because one of her early teachers rather than showing her how to do something ridiculed her for not understanding... She practically refuses to try to learn maths now) but is far ahead of me in both her writing and artistic skills. By artistic skills I mean almost all branches of art, sculpture, painting (oils and watercolours), drawing (pen and ink, pencil, charcoal...) and so on. This is not because I'm intelligent and she isn't, or vice versa. It's because we think in different ways.
I'd further suggest that many of these people *believe* they are smart simply because they write code. Why by golly they're bonafide *programers,* which we all know is the elite of the elite of the elite of the smart. Them Nuke-you-leer fizzycists have nothin' on 'em.
My Goodness, if Programmers are the elite of the elite of the elite of the smart, and Nuclear Physicists are also smart then where does that place me? I've got a degree in Applied Physics (I specialised in Nuclear physics, and I've worked in a large Nuclear Research facility)... AND a degree in Software Engineering. I must be in the creme de la creme of the elite of the elite of the elite of the smart...:-}
They have no business with my personal medical data if they can't even use good information security practices.
I'm so happy for you. You are aware that if the HIPAA Regulations are taken at their word then your healthcare organisation can't give out ANY information to anyone that says that you MIGHT have received treatment. So, I hope that you can find the Emergency Room when you need it. We're covering all the signs for the Hospital up in case people see your car outside the building. We don't want them jumping to conclusions. After all they might know that you've been to hospital.
I won't mention the stealth ambulances, if I did people might realise when we're parked outside your door that you might have a healthcare issue.
Yes, Security IS a bitch. And you're right that we shouldn't be emailing medical records around in plain text. Oh, Sorry... WE DON'T! Nor do we we give out any personal information whether over insecure phone lines or any other way.
The problem isn't just that "basic security is routinely ignored" but that the "vague government mandates" are so badly written. HIPAA Stands for Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act... And is intended to reduce costs and administrative overhead of healthcare by standardizing the electronic transmissions of certain administrative and financial transactions while protecting the security and privacy of healthcare information.
The privacy legislation covers all medical record and other individual identifiable information maintained or disclosed in any form, whether electronic, paper or orally. (From a summary I found online). Notice the words in bold. This does mean that if your car is recognised in a hospital parking lot then there is a lack of compliance.
Now, tell me how your healthcare provider is supposed to meet THAT strict a standard...
'There is a special privilege on NT called "Backup Operator" - it allows you to copy any file to tape, or back again, but does not let you read the file.'
The idea of having a special privilege that allows a user to copy any file to tape or back is neither new, nor unique to NT. In fact I've worked on Unix boxes that had something remarkably similar. (Look up CMW before you claim that Unix doesn't prevent Root reading certain files. This Grade of Security exists but is such a pain to use it's limited to very specialised uses, HP-UX CMW, SCO CMW and Trusted Solaris are the only implementations I know of right now...)
But what happens when a "Backup Operator" copies a disk to tape, takes the tape to a Unix box, and DD's the tape into a file. They can then go through, modify that file and DD it back onto the tape.
Sure it's far fetched, but if I wanted to boost my salary by hacking the payroll records then I could do it that way. Of course I wouldn't dream of doing such a thing.
And where did LoRider say that his wife was fired. Perhaps she worked there for a couple of years with things getting worse and worse and then she left.
I've worked for over a year in a job that looking back on it I'm surprised I stayed as long as I did. At the time it was just getting worse slowly... I'm glad that I left that job.
I realise that you're just a Troll, and possibly even a Microsoft Employee at that, but why do you feel the need to attack someone like that.
Everything that I've heard about Microsoft and Intel makes me glad that I don't work for either of them. I'm not saying that I couldn't, or that I wouldn't enjoy it, just that I have heard enough things about both of them that I wouldn't want to work for either of them. That's my opinion... I like the company that I work for now, I like the atmosphere here, I like the attitude of people.
At a previous job the only people in my group with anything above a Bachelors degree were myself and a Chinese woman. Out of about sixteen people it was the two foreigners who had taken the time to go through the extra schooling.
I'm not going to claim that schooling equals intelligence or schooling equal talent. I've been there... I know it doesn't... But I found it odd that none of the Americans (by birth) had bothered with extra schooling.
I was told a while back that some of the British politicians were worried about the "Brain Drain" from the UK to America. Yet it sounds like the Americans don't trust these people for federal work. I wonder how it applies to work done on Federal systems by outside contractors? Or can Federal Systems worked on by outside contractors use libraries (open source or otherwise) that might have been developed (even in part) by non US citizens...
This sounds like a wonderful way to stop all progress in the technology sector in the US... Can't use Telephones... Alexander Graham Bell was a Scot and might have built something subtle into the design... Can't trust the US Navy (founded by a Scot)... Can't use Pneumatic tres on your bike (both Pneumatic Tyres and Bike invented by Scots)... The TV, Penicillin, Breech Loading Rifles, Anaesthetic... All the work of Scots. (Search for "Wha's Like Us" for more...) So, how insular and Backward does the Federal Government want to get to remove it's reliance on those dirty nasty foreigners...:-)
Hey, it's o.k. I USED to work for Lockheed Martin.
The funniest thing about that job was the mandatory Export Controls training that we had to do. I worked in a datacentre that handled outsourced IT... for Nike. According to the Export Controls training I can be trusted (and counted as though I was an American Citizen) as I am a permanent resident alien. If I do become a naturalised US citizen, and thus become a Dual national (as I don't believe that the British allow you to renounce your British citizenship) then I am suddenly LESS trustwirthy and must be treated as an agent of a foreign power.
Slashdot Mirror
IMO a better path would have been to build a multi-purpose handheld optimized for e-book reading- license the Palm OS so that people could do all that other stuff too, but use a big, clear screen with dedicated nav buttons so it was the best darn e-book reading Palm money can buy. Or the best darn e-book reading Linux pad, I'm not picky.
You might want to check out the hiebook... It allows you to put your own content on it, it is multi-purpose and you can download the SDK for it... It's supposed to be very good, but I've never seen one in the silicon, so I'm just going from commentary.
Z.
I've always had trouble finding a nice way of reading books on LCD screen. If outside the sun destoryed (I assume this is a typo for destroyed, and the sun didn't actually remove the story that you were reading) the contrast or if inside you had to be just right so there was enough light. Nightmare.
Hmmm... That's why you have a backlight. Thouhg frankly, my Rocket E-Book has good enough contrast that I can read it with the backlight off in decent lighting and only need to turn the backlight on (usually at one of the lowest settings) when the lighting is less than optimal.
I understand that you were probably using some other (less well designed) device, but specialisation does have some distinct advantages.
Z. (Who only ever reads free content on his Rocket E-Book)
Give me a seasoned vet who has the depth and breadth of experience to have learned all of those "only happens once every x years" type of lessons over some young, fast coder who has yet to learn these lessons.
Where X=1,000? 1,000,000? What arbitrary limit are you going to impose?
Z. Who thinks the best candidate for the job should be chosen...
Towel (? - never sure if he was joking in his interviews about it or not.)
Nope, he wasn't joking. I've seen the towel and remember it as being very expensive for what it was.
Z.
"Any fool can peel the Apple...It takes a real man to eat the core." - Stephen King, Everything's Eventual
Thanks... It's nice to have some sort of justification of my feelings of masculinity. I have eaten the core of the apple for most of my life. All, but the little stick bit... In my mind, it takes a real masochist to eat the stick too.
Z.
God knows how the moderators work... (I know how I do when moderating, but this is bizarre. It was moderated up (several times) as interesting, down twice as overrated (I don't believe in overrated or underrated as moderations. If you didn't find it interesting but someone else did then why should you be allowed to say that they are wrong...
But the one that I found strangest was the Flamebait moderation. Can ANYONE explain that to me?
Z.
Given that an SSL connection is cryptographically secure, and that any security is only as strong as its weakest link...
How secure do you really think an SSL connection is when both parties are having to trust certificates signed by third parties? I don't know how Verisign store their root keys, nor do I know how they verify the identity of someone before issuing a certificate. So can I really trust that a certificate signed by them is valid and can you see any way of removing the trust element?
Z.
If a Senator violates his/her state's trust on the other side of the US, I see no reason to not let a state court issue a warrant for their arrest which would prompt the US Marshalls to arrest them and extradite them to their home state for prosecution.
There is a reason... it's called the constitution, and perhaps you should read it some time. I quote (emphasis added):
So, unless the representative commits treason, a felony or breach of the peace they can't be arrested. I would be interested in knowing what "Ethics crimes" you would consider to be so serious that they should be felonies, and how you would prove anything as they can't be questioned about speechs or debates in the house. You can't ask Representative Corporate Monkey why he voted a specific way. If he voted for Megacorp because he felt it was for the best for his constituents, or because they helped his campaign funds doesn't make a difference. The constitution says that he can't be questioned about it.
As for removing the "unconstitutional size limits" on the house. You should read the constitution. The constitution does not specify a number of seats in the house. It does however specify a maximum. The maximum is one per thirty thousand constituents, with a mimimum of one per state. It does not say that a representative can only have thirty thousand constituents, nor does it say that you have to have one representative for every thirty thousand people. If you want to follow this rule strictly then sure, you can increase the size of the house.
But, given that the current US population is 290,236,982 (Source US Census) that would require 9,674 representatives. Assuming that we pay them a mere $30,000 a year salary (or $1 per constituent), then we have almost three hundred million dollars per year going to them... On top of which we have to pay for the office space, the assistants, the football stadium sized congress building,... Can you imagine trying to co-ordinate a meeting with over nine thousand participants? Can you imagine trying to get them to come to concensus over anything?
Not that your suggestion is completely unworkable or anything...
Z.
cacofonix couldn't be translated either... But What an excellent series the Asterix books are...
Is it just me, but does Asterix get his name because he is the star of the stories?
Z.
Well forgive me... Apparently the information I was given by several people was wrong. It just goes to show how complicated the american tax system really is.
I've looked at the Tax Chart, and at the Tax schedule, and I think the chart is a masterpiece. Given the choice I would rather pay taxes according to the schedule as the chart assumes that you are earning the exact top of that pay band.
You already have a tax based on stupidity, and it is very popular. It's called the lottery.
Despite being wrong on the specifics, I still believe that the American tax system is overly complicated and unnecessary. The British system puts the onus on the employer to deduct the correct amount of tax from that periods pay cheque and even if you are asked to fill in a tax return (you don't have to.) Usually it just confirms that you paid the correct amount of tax.
Taxation should be based upon ONE SINGLE CRITERIA. Citizenship.
Cool... I agree. I'm not a citizen, I shouldn't have to pay for a government that makes it harder for me to live here, doesn't care what I think, and threatens to throw me in gaol without telling me why, or anyone else where I've gone.
The question from Mr. Federal Taxman should be, "Are you a citizen? Well then, you owe this much of what you earned this year. Non-Citizen you say? Well then, you owe this much more!"
Oh, you mean that non citizens should be discouraged from coming to the US. Never mind that we may bring valuable skills with us, that we are not allowed to sponge off of welfare, that we may be here for reasons other than "America is the best country in the whole wide world." In my case it was easier for me to move to be with my wife than for her to uproot her three children by her previous marriage.
So, no. This is not a fair or sensible tax reform.
However, the way that US taxes work is not sensible. In the UK you pay your taxes based on how much you earn. If you earn a certain amount you pay, say 27% on that. If you earn more than that amount you pay 27% on the amount up to that level, and then maybe 40% on everything over it.
Unlike the US system it means that you should always accept a pay rise. The American system means that if you are just below the threshold you need to make sure your next raise jumps you far enough over the threshold to make sure you actually take more money home.
This is a stupid scheme. It doesn't even need to be a flat rate tax (as some people are proposing) but if it is... You get your first $10,000 without being taxed, then everything between $10,000 and $50,000 gets taxed at 15%, everything between $50,000 and $100,000 gets taxed at 20% and everything over $100,000 gets taxed at 35% then it is fair, everyone pays reasonable taxes, and it is easy to understand.
Then again, Bureaucracy rules over here.
Z.
Besides, what ruler could compare to Emperor Norton I?
As a Scot (and so born as a peasant under the rule of the English Monarchy) I agree...
Emperor Joshua Norton I, Emperor of the United States of America and Protector of Mexico, is not well enough known within the US. He should be revered as the enlightened monarch that he was. He should be lauded. He should be venerated as a saint.
Z.
I believe that you friend is wrong. HP do more (a lot more) than make printers.
They make storage devices (tape drives, SAN disk arrays...)
They make computers (PCs, HP3000, HP9000(HP-UX machines)...)
They make software (OpenView, HP-UX, OpenVMS...)
They have four research labs worldwide (2 US, 1 UK, 1 JP)
Sure they make printers, but I doubt that that is even the majority of their business. Some companies I know of have hundreds of HP-UX machines, ranging from A class (2U 1-2 proc server) all the way up to superdome (stand alone larger than a 19" rack, 32 or 64 proc servers). Considering that HP, Sun and IBM all sell Unix Servers that Linux is not yet ready to compete with (One application we use is AIX or VMS only and I know a lot of other companies in the same sector worldwide use the same application) HP is unlikely ever to become a "printer company". It may drop it's PC lines... but that is far from being the same thing.
Oh, and I don't mean to offend anyone with the "Unix Servers that Linux is not yet ready to compete with" bit, but it's purely the hardware. When did you last see a Linux box with partitioning (multiple real servers running on the same physical hardware (dedicated resources, not shared resources and emulation)) massive amounts of memory, more than 8 CPUs? I believe that Linux is capable of being ported to this hardware (IBM have already done the same thing with their Z series) but then who would you buy the hardware from... Sun, HP or IBM... they still make the sale, I don't think they are so bothered about the OS as selling you the hardware and the support agreement. When you can go down to your local computer store and pick up OEM partitioning Unix server parts to build your own equivalent Linux box THEN I will retract my statement.
Z.
I got that one too...
But I was wrong.
Given
1) A photo of a car crossing a bridge.
2) A piece of art showing a person, a globe, a telephone, a computer, a radio, a skscraper and a car. The person was the most obvious point in the picture.
3) A photo of a man holding a steering wheel as though he was driving.
4) A photo of a street with a hotel with some flags hanging from it. The flags are the most prominent aspect. There are some cars in the street.
5) A photo of a woman standing next to the open door of a vehicle.
6) A photo of a ferris wheel. No cars are visible anywhere in it.
What would you choose? I guessed wheels apparently I was wrong...
Z.
Sendmail This is the perfect book to spin your head, and leave you with a headache for months. But it's the topic, not the book, that's so complicated. If it didn't do absolutely everything, I'm sure it would be simpler to use.
The book IS complicated, yes, that is because the subject is complicated, but Sendmail IS way more complicated than it needs to be.
The TOPIC (running a mail server) is not that complicated... as long as the server isn't Sendmail.
A lot of alternative mail servers are simpler to configure which makes them easier to use, and easier to prove secure.
Look at Qmail or Zmail as examples.
Yes, I know I'm being pedantic, but even if you never use anything but Sendmail, looking into the RFCs or alternative mail servers will give you some insights into both mail servers in general, and different approaches to the same problem.
Z.
Feel my pain. I admin many large HP-UX machines.
To quote Bill (the Cat) "BLLLLFFFTTT"
If you want Pain then try using AIX...
I do remember seeing a piece of advice for those wishing to become System Administrators...
Find an OS that you hate... Congratulations, you will be working with it for the rest of your life.
After Solaris, I thought HP-UX was bad... Not awful, but bad... Now I deal with AIX...
Z... Admin of AIX, HP-UX, Solaris and Linux boxes... I try to forget the SCO machines.
An interesing sidenote is this thread on the IETF discussion list." the_proton writes "The server j.root-servers.net has changed IP address to 192.58.128.30. The new root zone hints can be grabbed from ftp://rs.internic.net/domain/named.root or ftp://ftp.internic.net/domain/named.root. The new zone serial number is 2002110501."
[Brain explodes]
(Isn't it amazing when you read something written in your own language and don't understand a word of what's being said?) ;)
Perhaps it doesn't make sense to you because you don't need to know about it... I'm sure that you say things in English that I wouldn't understand at times...
However, here is the "simple" explanation...
An interesing sidenote is this thread on the IETF discussion list." the_proton writes "
That's just preamble... forget it.
The server j.root-servers.net has changed IP address to 192.58.128.30.
A server called j.root-servers.net has had its IP address changed. The root-servers.net servers (a, b, c,...) are spread out all over the world and tell everyobody where to start looking for IP addresses given a domain name. They can point you to the root server for a particular tld (.org) or a country (.za)... They are important.
The new root zone hints can be grabbed from ftp://rs.internic.net/domain/named.root or ftp://ftp.internic.net/domain/named.root.
The file which you use to tell your name server where to start looking for an IP address/Domain name has been updated and a new copy is available at one of these two ftp sites. Unless you are running your own DNS server (and even then you can safely ignore this) then you don't need to worry about updating this file.
The new zone serial number is 2002110501."
DNS Zone files have serial numbers. These numbers always increase. It helps you tell if you have got the right version of the DNS information... Your server should cache DNS lookups. The standard serial number is based on the date... in fact it is YYYYMMDDXX where YYYY is the year, MM is the month, DD is the day and XX is an index (multiple updates can be performed in the same day, this allows up to one hundred changes to a zone in a day).
Does this help?
Z.
Anyways sonny, don't give yourself airs.
I hope that the humourous intent of my creme de la creme (thank you Miss Jean Brodie) comment was obvious. I do not consider myself to be some sort of intellectual giant. I do sometimes consider myself to have a better solution to a particular problem than someone else does, but only sometimes. It's not an "I'm a genius, you must be an imbecile" type of thing, more a "I think this is better than that in this situation." type of thing.
Anyway, I do actually wish more programmers ... learn their bloody maths
But Barbie says "Math is hard"... And if a blonde bimbo with long legs says that, then geeks will listen to her, if only because she's female... Nevermind that she is made of plastic... :-)
Seriously, I've worked with people in the past who surprised me by their ignorance of the history of computing/computers and as they did not know where some of the things they were dealing with came from then they did not understand what they were doing. I've also worked with people who made me feel like a mental midget simply because they were so all round intelligent (and they had social skills...) One of them was not only good at maths, computer software and computer hardware... but interested in History, Music, Choral singing, Astronomy, Literature... In fact their only drawback appeared to be a lack of colour sense. They always wore black as it saved them from looking too bizarre. I've also worked with an excellent software architect who was a serious polyglot and linguist. I know that he could speak at least five languages fairly well (excluding programming languages) which beats my two roundly into submission.
On the whole though most creative writers I know are smarter people than most programmers I know
I don't know many creative writers, but the ones that I do know/have met seem to be smart people. The only people that I have met that I would generally say "X is smarter than most people" about are the few polymaths that I have met. There are maybe as many as six or seven of them, and their breadth and depth of knowledge always impressed me. Most people I have met who are truly "smart" in one field seem to be no "smarter" than average outside of it.
One day I would like to be considered to be one of those polymaths... at the moment my own ignorance of so many things frightens me, but I'm gradually improving. I recently built a fence, I know that I can repair various plumbing and electrical problems... The sense of accomplishment in doing those was no less than when a program first compiles and runs successfully. I know that I can write fairly well (but I'm not good enough at descriptive narrative for fiction). I can't draw or play a musical instrument, but I do appreciate a lot of art and a wide range of music. I can only speak two languages, and don't know anything about biology/anatomy... My knowledge of economics is severly limited (probably because I can't understand how you can make money selling currency, or how the stock market works... Shares are worth the dividend, but people are willing to pay much more than that. People are trading not on the actual return from the share, but on the perceived value of the share (i.e. the share price is determined by the share price and has no relationship to the actual value of the company or its profits). and so it goes...)
Z.
Now, I'd further suggest that it actually doesn't take the greatest brain in the world to write code.
And with that I agree... It's not how much better than someone else that you can think, but simply how you can think. It's a mixture of creative and logical thinking for good coding and just logical thinking for code that works...
My Wife (Yes, I'm married and read slashdot, live with it...) is no good at maths (primarily because one of her early teachers rather than showing her how to do something ridiculed her for not understanding... She practically refuses to try to learn maths now) but is far ahead of me in both her writing and artistic skills. By artistic skills I mean almost all branches of art, sculpture, painting (oils and watercolours), drawing (pen and ink, pencil, charcoal...) and so on. This is not because I'm intelligent and she isn't, or vice versa. It's because we think in different ways.
I'd further suggest that many of these people *believe* they are smart simply because they write code. Why by golly they're bonafide *programers,* which we all know is the elite of the elite of the elite of the smart. Them Nuke-you-leer fizzycists have nothin' on 'em.
My Goodness, if Programmers are the elite of the elite of the elite of the smart, and Nuclear Physicists are also smart then where does that place me? I've got a degree in Applied Physics (I specialised in Nuclear physics, and I've worked in a large Nuclear Research facility)... AND a degree in Software Engineering. I must be in the creme de la creme of the elite of the elite of the elite of the smart... :-}
Z.
They have no business with my personal medical data if they can't even use good information security practices.
I'm so happy for you. You are aware that if the HIPAA Regulations are taken at their word then your healthcare organisation can't give out ANY information to anyone that says that you MIGHT have received treatment. So, I hope that you can find the Emergency Room when you need it. We're covering all the signs for the Hospital up in case people see your car outside the building. We don't want them jumping to conclusions. After all they might know that you've been to hospital.
I won't mention the stealth ambulances, if I did people might realise when we're parked outside your door that you might have a healthcare issue.
Yes, Security IS a bitch. And you're right that we shouldn't be emailing medical records around in plain text. Oh, Sorry... WE DON'T! Nor do we we give out any personal information whether over insecure phone lines or any other way.
The problem isn't just that "basic security is routinely ignored" but that the "vague government mandates" are so badly written. HIPAA Stands for Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act... And is intended to reduce costs and administrative overhead of healthcare by standardizing the electronic transmissions of certain administrative and financial transactions while protecting the security and privacy of healthcare information.
The privacy legislation covers all medical record and other individual identifiable information maintained or disclosed in any form, whether electronic, paper or orally. (From a summary I found online). Notice the words in bold. This does mean that if your car is recognised in a hospital parking lot then there is a lack of compliance.
Now, tell me how your healthcare provider is supposed to meet THAT strict a standard...
Z.
czechoslovakia
Z.
'There is a special privilege on NT called "Backup Operator" - it allows you to copy any file to tape, or back again, but does not let you read the file.'
The idea of having a special privilege that allows a user to copy any file to tape or back is neither new, nor unique to NT. In fact I've worked on Unix boxes that had something remarkably similar. (Look up CMW before you claim that Unix doesn't prevent Root reading certain files. This Grade of Security exists but is such a pain to use it's limited to very specialised uses, HP-UX CMW, SCO CMW and Trusted Solaris are the only implementations I know of right now...)
But what happens when a "Backup Operator" copies a disk to tape, takes the tape to a Unix box, and DD's the tape into a file. They can then go through, modify that file and DD it back onto the tape.
Sure it's far fetched, but if I wanted to boost my salary by hacking the payroll records then I could do it that way. Of course I wouldn't dream of doing such a thing.
People might also want to check out the SAGE Code of Ethics.
Z.
And where did LoRider say that his wife was fired. Perhaps she worked there for a couple of years with things getting worse and worse and then she left.
I've worked for over a year in a job that looking back on it I'm surprised I stayed as long as I did. At the time it was just getting worse slowly... I'm glad that I left that job.
I realise that you're just a Troll, and possibly even a Microsoft Employee at that, but why do you feel the need to attack someone like that.
Everything that I've heard about Microsoft and Intel makes me glad that I don't work for either of them. I'm not saying that I couldn't, or that I wouldn't enjoy it, just that I have heard enough things about both of them that I wouldn't want to work for either of them. That's my opinion... I like the company that I work for now, I like the atmosphere here, I like the attitude of people.
So, lay off the personal attacks please.
Z.
At a previous job the only people in my group with anything above a Bachelors degree were myself and a Chinese woman. Out of about sixteen people it was the two foreigners who had taken the time to go through the extra schooling.
:-)
I'm not going to claim that schooling equals intelligence or schooling equal talent. I've been there... I know it doesn't... But I found it odd that none of the Americans (by birth) had bothered with extra schooling.
I was told a while back that some of the British politicians were worried about the "Brain Drain" from the UK to America. Yet it sounds like the Americans don't trust these people for federal work. I wonder how it applies to work done on Federal systems by outside contractors? Or can Federal Systems worked on by outside contractors use libraries (open source or otherwise) that might have been developed (even in part) by non US citizens...
This sounds like a wonderful way to stop all progress in the technology sector in the US... Can't use Telephones... Alexander Graham Bell was a Scot and might have built something subtle into the design... Can't trust the US Navy (founded by a Scot)... Can't use Pneumatic tres on your bike (both Pneumatic Tyres and Bike invented by Scots)... The TV, Penicillin, Breech Loading Rifles, Anaesthetic... All the work of Scots. (Search for "Wha's Like Us" for more...) So, how insular and Backward does the Federal Government want to get to remove it's reliance on those dirty nasty foreigners...
Z.
Hey, it's o.k. I USED to work for Lockheed Martin.
The funniest thing about that job was the mandatory Export Controls training that we had to do. I worked in a datacentre that handled outsourced IT... for Nike. According to the Export Controls training I can be trusted (and counted as though I was an American Citizen) as I am a permanent resident alien. If I do become a naturalised US citizen, and thus become a Dual national (as I don't believe that the British allow you to renounce your British citizenship) then I am suddenly LESS trustwirthy and must be treated as an agent of a foreign power.
Of course it's sensible and sane.
Z.