There are some talk radio shows broadcast on AM that I'd like to listen to. However, they're broadcast during the day, and I can't listen to them while I'm at work, so I was in a similar situation.
Unfortunately, none of the PC tuner cards have AM tuners on them, only FM. Makes sense, since my computer equipment seems to generate a lot of interference on the AM frequencies. So, what I ended up doing was buying a GE SuperRadio III and a long headphone extension cord so that I could keep the radio in a separate room and minimize the interference.
Since I'm only running Win2K at the moment, I bought Total Recorder for US$12, which lets me make timed recordings in just about any format. (Unfortunately, no VBR for MP3, though, so I record to WAV and then convert using LAME.)
Using the "--present mw-us" flag with LAME, I can compress a three hour show down to 51.5 MB. A full week of both my favorite shows fits nicely on a CD for archiving or sharing.
I'm surprised no one's compared these products. The DWL-900P+ does the same thing as the WET11, but includes 256-bit WEP and it uses the new TI 802.11b chip that can do 22 Mbps. It's only $115, too (retail).
I just bought two of them so that I could share the DSL line with my upstairs neighbor. (I hadn't heard about the WET11 when I bought the D-Links.)
Not flamebait, but not close reading, either. The original poster says that "soldiers/police will try to stop me". Sorry, but that doesn't sound like investigative journalism to me. Maybe if "Undercover Journalist" said corporate security wouldn't like what he was doing I'd be more inclined to believe him. Journalists are supposed to be precise in conveying information in written form...
As it is, Undercover Journalist comes off as an Al Qaeda wannabe, or maybe some Earth Liberation Front nut. I hope that Undercover Journalist seriously reconsiders his/her plan. The paperwork you need to fill out after you shoot a domestic terrorist is a real PITA.:-)
Steve Jobs visited PARC and saw the Star user interface, which was one of the first WiMP UIs. When he came back and described what he saw to the Lisa development team, Steve swore he saw overlapping windows in the UI. It turns out that he didn't see overlapping windows -- the Star didn't have them -- but the Lisa team managed to implement them to meet Steve's dream.
Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, VA, has worked with city leaders to install 10Mbs Ethernet connections throughout the entire city. If you want to find a plan that will provide fast, inexpensive connectivity to the entire community (including students living off campus), I'd start poking around at www.bev.net, especially the BEV Digital Library, which tells you exactly how to plan and implement such a system.
The 3Com OfficeConnect 56K LAN Modem does everything you want in a single box. I bought one for my parents, who can't see the value in paying for a cable modem and are content with using an analog phone line. It seems to work pretty well and has a browser-based interface for configuring it. (The interface is way ugly, but functional.)
Re:How fast compared to ATA-100?
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Firewire and Linux?
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· Score: 2, Interesting
(Yeah, I'm too lazy and ignorant to see what other manufacturers are doing... [grin])
Re:How fast compared to ATA-100?
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Firewire and Linux?
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· Score: 5, Informative
Be careful with your bits and bytes:
Ultra ATA/100 has a maximum burst transfer rate of 100 megabytes per second (MB/s), or 800 megabits per second (Mb/s).
Ultra 160 SCSI has a maximum sustained transfer rate of 160 megabytes per second (MB/s), or 1280 megabits per second (Mb/s).
IEEE 1394 has a maximum sustained transfer rate of 50 megabytes per second (MB/s), or 400 megabits per second (Mb/s).
USB 2.0 has a maximum sustained transfer rate of 60 megabytes per second (MB/s), or 480 megabits per second (Mb/s).
USB 1.1 at high speed has a maximum sustained transfer rate of 1.5 megabytes per second (MB/s), or 12 megabits per second (Mb/s).
Hence, Ultra 160 SCSI is faster than Ultra ATA/100, which is faster than IEEE 1394. Don't get me wrong -- I think 1394 is great, but don't throw out your ATA or SCSI interfaces quite yet.
I've used Mindspring for years because they have many, many POPs in the continental US. They also have a 1-800 number for those rare times when there isn't a POP available via a local call. (This used to be the situation when I was visiting remote military bases.)
With Mindspring's acquisition (merger, whatever) by Earthlink, I find that I now have access to a pretty good set of POPs in other parts of the world, too. I used the POPs in Ireland and Australia quite a bit and had no trouble. The price was pretty reasonable, too -- about 10 cents a minute.
My current company has been using iPass for years, but its much more expensive (25 to 60 cents per minute, depending on location) the last time I checked.
AT&T is supposed to have a pretty good set of global POPs, too, but I don't have any direct experience with them.
After getting my masters degree I worked for a contractor who had the contract to manage and develop a Cabinet-level Department's Internet presence. It was a great opportunity to learn the practical application of all the things I learned in school. I was able to quickly move from basic HTML markup (and Gopher maintenance -- yuck!), to CGI development and graphic design, network design, remote access (a/k/a modem) management, UNIX administration, and security. I was given the time to learn each of these areas in as much detail as I felt sufficient to do a good job, which was a huge plus. I don't think anyone could wear all those hats today -- the scope of what folks are trying to achieve with Internet technologies is too big. However, I'm sure you can find a similar degree of diversity in whatever specialty you end up in.
However, if you're the least bit goal oriented and a high achiever, you'll quickly become frustrated by the quality of people you have to work with and all the red tape you have to wade through to get significant things accomplished. How quickly you become frustrated will depend a lot on which agency you work for/with. From what I've seen, DoD work can be the neatest because they're typically pushing the boundaries of what the technology can do. (Plus, who can deny the initial rush of working on "secret" projects?) Remember, however, that this is highly dependent upon the individual initiative you end up working on. Not every DoD job is cutting-edge; there are quite a few dumb, mundane, boring ones.
The civilian agencies will probably burn you out more quickly, on average.
Regardless of where you end up, develop a plan for blowin' the joint in a year. Work hard to be given concrete responsibilities and thoroughly document the work you do, so that by the end of the year you've been responsible for two or three significant achievements. Then, at the year mark, evaluate your current situation and compare it with what's available in the civilian marketplace. Maybe the economy's still in the toilet and you've identified further opportunities for achievement within the government. If so, stick around for another year and achieve those new goals. If not, bail!
Whatever you do, don't become one of the (all-too-common) folks who complain about their jobs, who say that they're worth more than they're getting paid, and who claims they have incredible talents that are going to waste. Because, frankly, if you were so great, why would you be sticking around in such a horrible situation?
Lastly, I'll echo another poster's comments that it's much better to work for a contractor than to work as a government employee. Having to help out on proposals for new work -- in addition to your eight-hour-a-day comittment to your primary client -- can be a drag, but they pay is better and the opportunity to switch to different contracts is a plus.
It sounds like you're looking for software design and development practices. If so, Steve McConnell has written several excellent and very accessable books on the topic. (You can get more details on the books at .)
In particular, his "Software Project Survival Guide" does a great job of describing a good process you should follow to give your software the best chance possible of shipping on time, within budget, and with as few bugs as possible. I especially like that Steve is not dogmatic about his approach; he readily admits that not everyone is going to find it a panacea. However, it *is* a very good place to start, especially if you're new to professional software development. Once you've followed his recommendations on a few projects you'll know enough to know when you should deviate from those recommendations.
When dealing with developers who have recently graduated from college, or those that haven't worked with more than a couple other developers, I've found that this book provides excellent guidance. Most of this kind of developer just don't understand why and how formal policies and procedures are important, but this book makes intelligent arguments that are quite persuasive. (Some folks will never get it, though, and the best thing you can do is get rid of them as quickly as possible before their ways doom the project.) I bought copies for every person on my development teams and had weekly reading assignments that we'd discuss over beers on Friday afternoons. It made for great conversation and learning!
Er, I have to disagree about the 7867W. Yes, it's fairly small (but the Vulcan's smaller) and the battery life will get you through a pretty long day, but I've had to send mine back once already because the earpiece went bad. (I've had it since April.) Folks at the cellular store were well acquainted with the problem, which suggests that my phone isn't uniquely saddled with this problem. The keys have poor feedback, IMHO, too, and sometimes the keys bind, resulting in the wrong keypress. This happens pretty rarely, but it's annoying none the less.
Before this phone I've had various Nokias and have been much happier with them. I've even dropped one of them down flights of stairs and it continued to work perfectly. (It did put a small crack in the faceplate, though...) The UI works much better, IMNSHO (I'm a former UI geek), too. The two things that bugged me about the Nokias were 1) You couldn't force them into analog mode, and 2) They didn't have an internal vibrating ring. #2 isn't an issue any more with the latest phones, but to my knowledge you still can't force them into analog mode.
Etymotic makes a fantasic set of in-ear headphones called the ER-4S. They provide 20 to 25 dB of passive noise reduction (depending on how well you fit the plugs into your ears). They have audiophile quality drivers so that you can have great sounding audio piped into your ears. Best of all, because of all the noise reduction they provide, you don't need to crank up the volume since the drivers aren't competing with the ambient environment. This is healthier for your ears, especially with prolonged use.
Of course, like most anything, you get what you pay for. The ER-4S list for $330 a pair at <http://www.etymotic.com/>, but you can get them for about $300 from <http://headroom.headphone.com/> (when their site isn't hacked).
I've used these headphones for nearly three years now and they're still holding up very well. I also use their standard earplugs when riding on the highway on my motorcycle. They're quite comfortable for all day use!
Java Server Pages (JSP) offers the cleanest separation of presentation from business logic. You have to have a little discipline to maintain the clear separation, but it's pretty trivial. Here's how it works:
Your web page designer uses whatever tools he likes the best to create and design the web pages. Whenever he wants to incorporate dynamic content (i.e. result sets from DB queries) he inserts an XML-like tag. At request time the JSP engine executes the method specified in the XML-like tag. So, your designer has to learn a few new tags, but that's no biggie for any designer that doesn't rely on WYSIWYG tools for page design.
Your web application developer writes JSPs (or Servlets) that define the methods called from the designer's XML-like tags. The app developer never needs to muck around with HTML, with the exception of providing pre-formatted HTML results from the method calls (if you want to get that fancy).
In short, each person gets to focus on using their specific skill set. They work on different files so they aren't stepping on each other's toes during the development process. They clearly define a service (or API, if you like) so that the web page developer knows the library of tags available, and the developer knows what functionality each tag needs.
Best of all, the Apache Group is responsible for the reference implementation of the JSP engine, called Jakarta/Tomcat. (Sun has farmed the work out to them.) It should run fine on your favorite Linux or BSD distro, as well as some other platforms we don't mention in polite company.:-)
Take a look at <http://java.sun.com/products/jsp/index.html>, or <http://jakarta.apache.org/> for more details, tutorials, and downloads.
The irony of managers having offices and the knowledge workers having cubes is that that's the exact opposite of what each group needs. Managers spend their time interacting with others -- making phone calls, interviewing, meeting, etc. They flit from task to task, often juggling multiple tasks simultaneously. They need to be able to quickly communicate with those around them. Cubes work great for this, plus they give some privacy.
Knowledge workers, however, have the opposite needs. They spend their time focused on a single task for extended periods of time. They need to be able to create an environment that provides the right level of external distraction; some folks like to work in silence while others concentrate better with the TV on. They need to control temperature and lighting. They need to have lots of whiteboard space for sketching out ideas, and lots of shelving for the dead tree manuals they need to have handy. Offices are perfect for this.
Unfortunately, I have yet to see an organization that hasn't been afflicted by the office royalty syndrome...
CORBA moving towards J2EE-style communications
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Alternatives to COM+
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CORBA's great stuff, but the specs were so sloppy that different ORBs from different companies usually didn't work together, making it a real pain to build extranets or complicated intranet apps that spanned multiple technologies across an enterprise. CORBA 2.3 finally provided the Internet Inter-ORB Protocol (IIOP), which tries to codify a standard way for different ORBs to communiate together. The major vendors have been a little slow to adopt it, but they're coming around.
However, if you're thinking about getting into CORBA you should be aware that the OMG (CORBA's parent organization) is moving towards adopting the Java 2 Enterprise Edition's communications method, i.e. RMI over IIOP. They realize that there are already far more Java programmers than there are CORBA programmers, even though CORBA's been around much longer. So, they're embracing some of the Java standards in order to build their market.
In short, if you're going to make a serious commitment to CORBA you should get ahead of the game and learn Java 2, including the Java IDL and EJB packages. By the time you've grokked these technologies the CORBA marketspace will have caught up with you and you'll be sitting pretty!
You can get by with a cheap wire rack -- I did, and I'm a bit of a snob about these kind of things. Sure, it would have been nice to have a real rackmount system, but since it was coming out of my pocket and the computers were owned by my (former) company, I wanted to spend as little as possible. I found a sturdy, cheap set of wire racks from Ikea that you could buy by individual piece (shelves and poles). It worked like a champ.
The only drawback was that I had a separate monitor, keyboard, and mouse for each machine and no money for a KVM. Check out the previous "Ask Slashdots" for KVM recommendations. They'll save a lot of space and cable hassle.
If you do a lot of travelling, definitely go with AT&T's One Rate plan. I've used it for almost two years and have had very, very few problems with it. (The most common problem seems to be the voice mail system crashing for several days at a time in the DC/Baltimore/Philly areas. Very frustrating when it happens, but they've also refunding part of my monthly fee to compensate. Note that it's only happened twice in two years.) I used my Nokia 6162 as my only phone -- it was that reliable! I got service in even the most backwater, rinky-dink towns. (Well, OK, it dropped my calls every time I passed by the CIA's Bush campus, but that's probably not their fault.:-)
I just moved to the SF Bay area and, ufortunately, AT&T doesn't offer local service here. I had to switch to GTE and buy all new equipment, since GTE is the only other provider who currently offers a plan like AT&T's One Rate. However, they're CDMA-based, whereas AT&T is TDMA. I don't like the CDMA phones as much (ended up with a Motorola StarTac), but it's mainly a features issue; the voice quality and coverage seems comparable, or maybe just a tad less.
With either plan you just can't beat the "no long distance" and "no roaming" versus traditional plans.
There's some confusion amongst the previous responders (and myself, I guess) about what you're considering a content management system. Do you mean dynamic page generation (a la PHP), or do you mean revision control (a la CVS), or do you mean something like a templating system and an easy interface for non-technical users to contribute info (a la Interwoven's TeamSite), or do you mean digital asset management (a la Artesia Technologies' TEAMS)?
Anyone know the dates and places for Gibson's book tour (outside of the SF dates in the article)? His publisher's web site doesn't seem to have any info.
I haven't seen anything that uses the "open source" moniker, but I've run across a few books and articles that talk about "virtual teams" which may be of help. (Unfortunately, I haven't taken the time to read them so I don't have specific references handy.) VTs are usually geographically dispersed, so they face many of the same communications issues that open source projects face.
While the communications issue throws a few curves into the situation, open source projects really are about software development (SD). As such, there are quite a few good books out there that will help you learn to manage SD efforts. The best practical guide I've ever seen to SD project management is Steve McConnell's "Software Project Survival Guide." It doesn't claim to be the "one true way" to manage SD projects, but he relies on a lot of academic research as well as his own experience to come up with a comprehensive method that actively works to minimize risk and improve communications amongst all parties. I highly, highly recommend it.
As for managing people, while McConnell does provide quite a few good pointers, its written from the point of view of someone who already understands the technical person's mindset. If you have to work with Pointy-Haired Bosses, I'd recommend reading DeMarco & Lister's "Peopleware." It provides a lot of sound business arguments that PHBs will understand for why your project and its people need adequate resources, quiet offices, and different motivators/rewards.
Bzzzt! An $80K townhome in DC is probably in SE -- the crack-infested quadrant of the city. Bare minimum digs in a decent area like Adams Morgan or Dupont Circle are around $300K. Competition is so fierce in those areas that folks read the classifieds online the night before the paper is printed, then show up at 6 AM to wait in line to see the property.
IMHO, I think it's crazy to want to jump through such hoops to want to live in a high crime, high tax, and poor public service city. Of course, I guess that's why I live in Arlington.:-)
Sorry, Jon, but your article misses the mark with me. I never idolized Amazon as anything other than a more convenient bookstore, but apparently you did. Stores can't make money with books anymore; Amazon is selling the NYT Best Sellers list at a loss, and as a whole their book business hasn't turned a profit yet, either. They have to branch out to other markets where there is still profit to be made. And, because the Amazon name has great market recognition, they're leveraging it. Simple business, not moral decay and a fall from grace.
I don't know about support for ACLs, but I've never heard that discussed as a weakness. To the contrary, all I've heard is much complaining about how hard it is to manage ACLs and how the user and group model tends to be more practical. (In fact, I've never met an NT sysadmin who's made serious use of NT's ACLs.)
Is this a byproduct of poor implementations, or am I missing something?
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There are some talk radio shows broadcast on AM that I'd like to listen to. However, they're broadcast during the day, and I can't listen to them while I'm at work, so I was in a similar situation.
Unfortunately, none of the PC tuner cards have AM tuners on them, only FM. Makes sense, since my computer equipment seems to generate a lot of interference on the AM frequencies. So, what I ended up doing was buying a GE SuperRadio III and a long headphone extension cord so that I could keep the radio in a separate room and minimize the interference.
Since I'm only running Win2K at the moment, I bought Total Recorder for US$12, which lets me make timed recordings in just about any format. (Unfortunately, no VBR for MP3, though, so I record to WAV and then convert using LAME.)
Using the "--present mw-us" flag with LAME, I can compress a three hour show down to 51.5 MB. A full week of both my favorite shows fits nicely on a CD for archiving or sharing.
I'm surprised no one's compared these products. The DWL-900P+ does the same thing as the WET11, but includes 256-bit WEP and it uses the new TI 802.11b chip that can do 22 Mbps. It's only $115, too (retail).
I just bought two of them so that I could share the DSL line with my upstairs neighbor. (I hadn't heard about the WET11 when I bought the D-Links.)
Not flamebait, but not close reading, either. The original poster says that "soldiers/police will try to stop me". Sorry, but that doesn't sound like investigative journalism to me. Maybe if "Undercover Journalist" said corporate security wouldn't like what he was doing I'd be more inclined to believe him. Journalists are supposed to be precise in conveying information in written form...
As it is, Undercover Journalist comes off as an Al Qaeda wannabe, or maybe some Earth Liberation Front nut. I hope that Undercover Journalist seriously reconsiders his/her plan. The paperwork you need to fill out after you shoot a domestic terrorist is a real PITA. :-)
Steve Jobs visited PARC and saw the Star user interface, which was one of the first WiMP UIs. When he came back and described what he saw to the Lisa development team, Steve swore he saw overlapping windows in the UI. It turns out that he didn't see overlapping windows -- the Star didn't have them -- but the Lisa team managed to implement them to meet Steve's dream.
Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, VA, has worked with city leaders to install 10Mbs Ethernet connections throughout the entire city. If you want to find a plan that will provide fast, inexpensive connectivity to the entire community (including students living off campus), I'd start poking around at www.bev.net, especially the BEV Digital Library, which tells you exactly how to plan and implement such a system.
The 3Com OfficeConnect 56K LAN Modem does everything you want in a single box. I bought one for my parents, who can't see the value in paying for a cable modem and are content with using an analog phone line. It seems to work pretty well and has a browser-based interface for configuring it. (The interface is way ugly, but functional.)
It seems that USB 2.0 is a little more available than 1394b, but not by much. For example, Adaptec makes several different USB 2.0 hubs (see http://www.adaptec.com/worldwide/product/prodtechi ndex.html?cat=%2fTechnology%2fUSB&source=home). However, Adaptec doesn't sell any 1394b products yet.
(Yeah, I'm too lazy and ignorant to see what other manufacturers are doing... [grin])
Be careful with your bits and bytes:
Hence, Ultra 160 SCSI is faster than Ultra ATA/100, which is faster than IEEE 1394. Don't get me wrong -- I think 1394 is great, but don't throw out your ATA or SCSI interfaces quite yet.
I've used Mindspring for years because they have many, many POPs in the continental US. They also have a 1-800 number for those rare times when there isn't a POP available via a local call. (This used to be the situation when I was visiting remote military bases.)
With Mindspring's acquisition (merger, whatever) by Earthlink, I find that I now have access to a pretty good set of POPs in other parts of the world, too. I used the POPs in Ireland and Australia quite a bit and had no trouble. The price was pretty reasonable, too -- about 10 cents a minute.
My current company has been using iPass for years, but its much more expensive (25 to 60 cents per minute, depending on location) the last time I checked.
AT&T is supposed to have a pretty good set of global POPs, too, but I don't have any direct experience with them.
After getting my masters degree I worked for a contractor who had the contract to manage and develop a Cabinet-level Department's Internet presence. It was a great opportunity to learn the practical application of all the things I learned in school. I was able to quickly move from basic HTML markup (and Gopher maintenance -- yuck!), to CGI development and graphic design, network design, remote access (a/k/a modem) management, UNIX administration, and security. I was given the time to learn each of these areas in as much detail as I felt sufficient to do a good job, which was a huge plus. I don't think anyone could wear all those hats today -- the scope of what folks are trying to achieve with Internet technologies is too big. However, I'm sure you can find a similar degree of diversity in whatever specialty you end up in.
However, if you're the least bit goal oriented and a high achiever, you'll quickly become frustrated by the quality of people you have to work with and all the red tape you have to wade through to get significant things accomplished. How quickly you become frustrated will depend a lot on which agency you work for/with. From what I've seen, DoD work can be the neatest because they're typically pushing the boundaries of what the technology can do. (Plus, who can deny the initial rush of working on "secret" projects?) Remember, however, that this is highly dependent upon the individual initiative you end up working on. Not every DoD job is cutting-edge; there are quite a few dumb, mundane, boring ones.
The civilian agencies will probably burn you out more quickly, on average.
Regardless of where you end up, develop a plan for blowin' the joint in a year. Work hard to be given concrete responsibilities and thoroughly document the work you do, so that by the end of the year you've been responsible for two or three significant achievements. Then, at the year mark, evaluate your current situation and compare it with what's available in the civilian marketplace. Maybe the economy's still in the toilet and you've identified further opportunities for achievement within the government. If so, stick around for another year and achieve those new goals. If not, bail!
Whatever you do, don't become one of the (all-too-common) folks who complain about their jobs, who say that they're worth more than they're getting paid, and who claims they have incredible talents that are going to waste. Because, frankly, if you were so great, why would you be sticking around in such a horrible situation?
Lastly, I'll echo another poster's comments that it's much better to work for a contractor than to work as a government employee. Having to help out on proposals for new work -- in addition to your eight-hour-a-day comittment to your primary client -- can be a drag, but they pay is better and the opportunity to switch to different contracts is a plus.
It sounds like you're looking for software design and development practices. If so, Steve McConnell has written several excellent and very accessable books on the topic. (You can get more details on the books at .)
In particular, his "Software Project Survival Guide" does a great job of describing a good process you should follow to give your software the best chance possible of shipping on time, within budget, and with as few bugs as possible. I especially like that Steve is not dogmatic about his approach; he readily admits that not everyone is going to find it a panacea. However, it *is* a very good place to start, especially if you're new to professional software development. Once you've followed his recommendations on a few projects you'll know enough to know when you should deviate from those recommendations.
When dealing with developers who have recently graduated from college, or those that haven't worked with more than a couple other developers, I've found that this book provides excellent guidance. Most of this kind of developer just don't understand why and how formal policies and procedures are important, but this book makes intelligent arguments that are quite persuasive. (Some folks will never get it, though, and the best thing you can do is get rid of them as quickly as possible before their ways doom the project.) I bought copies for every person on my development teams and had weekly reading assignments that we'd discuss over beers on Friday afternoons. It made for great conversation and learning!
Er, I have to disagree about the 7867W. Yes, it's fairly small (but the Vulcan's smaller) and the battery life will get you through a pretty long day, but I've had to send mine back once already because the earpiece went bad. (I've had it since April.) Folks at the cellular store were well acquainted with the problem, which suggests that my phone isn't uniquely saddled with this problem. The keys have poor feedback, IMHO, too, and sometimes the keys bind, resulting in the wrong keypress. This happens pretty rarely, but it's annoying none the less.
Before this phone I've had various Nokias and have been much happier with them. I've even dropped one of them down flights of stairs and it continued to work perfectly. (It did put a small crack in the faceplate, though...) The UI works much better, IMNSHO (I'm a former UI geek), too. The two things that bugged me about the Nokias were 1) You couldn't force them into analog mode, and 2) They didn't have an internal vibrating ring. #2 isn't an issue any more with the latest phones, but to my knowledge you still can't force them into analog mode.
HTH...
Etymotic makes a fantasic set of in-ear headphones called the ER-4S. They provide 20 to 25 dB of passive noise reduction (depending on how well you fit the plugs into your ears). They have audiophile quality drivers so that you can have great sounding audio piped into your ears. Best of all, because of all the noise reduction they provide, you don't need to crank up the volume since the drivers aren't competing with the ambient environment. This is healthier for your ears, especially with prolonged use.
Of course, like most anything, you get what you pay for. The ER-4S list for $330 a pair at <http://www.etymotic.com/>, but you can get them for about $300 from <http://headroom.headphone.com/> (when their site isn't hacked).
I've used these headphones for nearly three years now and they're still holding up very well. I also use their standard earplugs when riding on the highway on my motorcycle. They're quite comfortable for all day use!
Say no more -- this gun makes you the baddest prairie dog on the farm. Full auto with 20 microdarts means never having to say you're sorry. :-)
Java Server Pages (JSP) offers the cleanest separation of presentation from business logic. You have to have a little discipline to maintain the clear separation, but it's pretty trivial. Here's how it works:
:-)
Your web page designer uses whatever tools he likes the best to create and design the web pages. Whenever he wants to incorporate dynamic content (i.e. result sets from DB queries) he inserts an XML-like tag. At request time the JSP engine executes the method specified in the XML-like tag. So, your designer has to learn a few new tags, but that's no biggie for any designer that doesn't rely on WYSIWYG tools for page design.
Your web application developer writes JSPs (or Servlets) that define the methods called from the designer's XML-like tags. The app developer never needs to muck around with HTML, with the exception of providing pre-formatted HTML results from the method calls (if you want to get that fancy).
In short, each person gets to focus on using their specific skill set. They work on different files so they aren't stepping on each other's toes during the development process. They clearly define a service (or API, if you like) so that the web page developer knows the library of tags available, and the developer knows what functionality each tag needs.
Best of all, the Apache Group is responsible for the reference implementation of the JSP engine, called Jakarta/Tomcat. (Sun has farmed the work out to them.) It should run fine on your favorite Linux or BSD distro, as well as some other platforms we don't mention in polite company.
Take a look at <http://java.sun.com/products/jsp/index.html>, or <http://jakarta.apache.org/> for more details, tutorials, and downloads.
The irony of managers having offices and the knowledge workers having cubes is that that's the exact opposite of what each group needs. Managers spend their time interacting with others -- making phone calls, interviewing, meeting, etc. They flit from task to task, often juggling multiple tasks simultaneously. They need to be able to quickly communicate with those around them. Cubes work great for this, plus they give some privacy.
Knowledge workers, however, have the opposite needs. They spend their time focused on a single task for extended periods of time. They need to be able to create an environment that provides the right level of external distraction; some folks like to work in silence while others concentrate better with the TV on. They need to control temperature and lighting. They need to have lots of whiteboard space for sketching out ideas, and lots of shelving for the dead tree manuals they need to have handy. Offices are perfect for this.
Unfortunately, I have yet to see an organization that hasn't been afflicted by the office royalty syndrome...
CORBA's great stuff, but the specs were so sloppy that different ORBs from different companies usually didn't work together, making it a real pain to build extranets or complicated intranet apps that spanned multiple technologies across an enterprise. CORBA 2.3 finally provided the Internet Inter-ORB Protocol (IIOP), which tries to codify a standard way for different ORBs to communiate together. The major vendors have been a little slow to adopt it, but they're coming around.
However, if you're thinking about getting into CORBA you should be aware that the OMG (CORBA's parent organization) is moving towards adopting the Java 2 Enterprise Edition's communications method, i.e. RMI over IIOP. They realize that there are already far more Java programmers than there are CORBA programmers, even though CORBA's been around much longer. So, they're embracing some of the Java standards in order to build their market.
In short, if you're going to make a serious commitment to CORBA you should get ahead of the game and learn Java 2, including the Java IDL and EJB packages. By the time you've grokked these technologies the CORBA marketspace will have caught up with you and you'll be sitting pretty!
You can get by with a cheap wire rack -- I did, and I'm a bit of a snob about these kind of things. Sure, it would have been nice to have a real rackmount system, but since it was coming out of my pocket and the computers were owned by my (former) company, I wanted to spend as little as possible. I found a sturdy, cheap set of wire racks from Ikea that you could buy by individual piece (shelves and poles). It worked like a champ.
The only drawback was that I had a separate monitor, keyboard, and mouse for each machine and no money for a KVM. Check out the previous "Ask Slashdots" for KVM recommendations. They'll save a lot of space and cable hassle.
If you do a lot of travelling, definitely go with AT&T's One Rate plan. I've used it for almost two years and have had very, very few problems with it. (The most common problem seems to be the voice mail system crashing for several days at a time in the DC/Baltimore/Philly areas. Very frustrating when it happens, but they've also refunding part of my monthly fee to compensate. Note that it's only happened twice in two years.) I used my Nokia 6162 as my only phone -- it was that reliable! I got service in even the most backwater, rinky-dink towns. (Well, OK, it dropped my calls every time I passed by the CIA's Bush campus, but that's probably not their fault. :-)
I just moved to the SF Bay area and, ufortunately, AT&T doesn't offer local service here. I had to switch to GTE and buy all new equipment, since GTE is the only other provider who currently offers a plan like AT&T's One Rate. However, they're CDMA-based, whereas AT&T is TDMA. I don't like the CDMA phones as much (ended up with a Motorola StarTac), but it's mainly a features issue; the voice quality and coverage seems comparable, or maybe just a tad less.
With either plan you just can't beat the "no long distance" and "no roaming" versus traditional plans.
There's some confusion amongst the previous responders (and myself, I guess) about what you're considering a content management system. Do you mean dynamic page generation (a la PHP), or do you mean revision control (a la CVS), or do you mean something like a templating system and an easy interface for non-technical users to contribute info (a la Interwoven's TeamSite), or do you mean digital asset management (a la Artesia Technologies' TEAMS)?
Anyone know the dates and places for Gibson's book tour (outside of the SF dates in the article)? His publisher's web site doesn't seem to have any info.
I haven't seen anything that uses the "open source" moniker, but I've run across a few books and articles that talk about "virtual teams" which may be of help. (Unfortunately, I haven't taken the time to read them so I don't have specific references handy.) VTs are usually geographically dispersed, so they face many of the same communications issues that open source projects face.
While the communications issue throws a few curves into the situation, open source projects really are about software development (SD). As such, there are quite a few good books out there that will help you learn to manage SD efforts. The best practical guide I've ever seen to SD project management is Steve McConnell's "Software Project Survival Guide." It doesn't claim to be the "one true way" to manage SD projects, but he relies on a lot of academic research as well as his own experience to come up with a comprehensive method that actively works to minimize risk and improve communications amongst all parties. I highly, highly recommend it.
As for managing people, while McConnell does provide quite a few good pointers, its written from the point of view of someone who already understands the technical person's mindset. If you have to work with Pointy-Haired Bosses, I'd recommend reading DeMarco & Lister's "Peopleware." It provides a lot of sound business arguments that PHBs will understand for why your project and its people need adequate resources, quiet offices, and different motivators/rewards.
Good luck!
Bzzzt! An $80K townhome in DC is probably in SE -- the crack-infested quadrant of the city. Bare minimum digs in a decent area like Adams Morgan or Dupont Circle are around $300K. Competition is so fierce in those areas that folks read the classifieds online the night before the paper is printed, then show up at 6 AM to wait in line to see the property.
:-)
IMHO, I think it's crazy to want to jump through such hoops to want to live in a high crime, high tax, and poor public service city. Of course, I guess that's why I live in Arlington.
Sorry, Jon, but your article misses the mark with me. I never idolized Amazon as anything other than a more convenient bookstore, but apparently you did. Stores can't make money with books anymore; Amazon is selling the NYT Best Sellers list at a loss, and as a whole their book business hasn't turned a profit yet, either. They have to branch out to other markets where there is still profit to be made. And, because the Amazon name has great market recognition, they're leveraging it. Simple business, not moral decay and a fall from grace.
I don't know about support for ACLs, but I've never heard that discussed as a weakness. To the contrary, all I've heard is much complaining about how hard it is to manage ACLs and how the user and group model tends to be more practical. (In fact, I've never met an NT sysadmin who's made serious use of NT's ACLs.)
Is this a byproduct of poor implementations, or am I missing something?