I have the (mis?)fortune of having a first name, last initial gmail account. There are two not too bright (or downright evil) gentlemen out there that share my first name and last initial, who think they have my email address.
I get all kinds of email meant for them, once including rental details for a chalet for a week! I haven't done anything sinister (yet) but I find opting out of their bacn works better at clearing my inbox than marking it spam...
I think a lot of people are missing one of the biggest pains out of the DST change, which is meetings booked in an exchange environment. Even if you do everything Microsoft/RIM recommend, and do them within hours of each other (a very daunting task for any enterprise sized environment,) you will still have meetings off by an hour.
This can be caused by lots of reasons. If one desktop recieves the patch and sends a meeting to another user, who has not received the patch, the meeting time will be wrong. Even if you manage your DST updates flawlessly within your environment, and don't have any misplaced meetings, you have no control over any external sources that may be booking meetings with your users. It's pretty inconceivable that everyone will update at the same time.
I really don't want to be the one on the CEO's warpath the first time he shows up for a meeting early/late. These issues can be partly resolved by user education, but as another poster mentioned, it is very easy to get confused when talking about timezones. I've been working on our DST project, and I still need to think carefully every time I discuss the ramifications.
I think Cnet had it right when they wrote that users should add this to their signature:
'Please note, if I (am) an hour late or an hour early for my meeting with you, please understand, its not my fault, it's my government.'
It is possible to replace the Hal.dll with the correct one for your system, negating the need for multiple images. What I do is have one single image, without any drivers installed. The image is sysprep'd then ghosted. I use Windows PE to restore my ghost images, and change the hal.dll to the correct one for the machine. Then I install drivers (note, if you specify the search path in your sysprep.ini you can have the drivers install automatically.)
It all works pretty well. You'll find you will likely only be using two hal types (ACPI & APIC). Of course, this isn't supported by Microsoft, and I don't think it will work for 64 bit computers.
However, this is Microsofts strategy for Vista... There will be a base image, which extra file sets get laid down on (depending on which OS flavor it is, and the machines HAL.)
I'd like to throw my support in for Musicbrainz as well. Even if you use another program to play/organize your music, it is well worth running through your collection with Musicbrainz. The best part is, the more people who use it, the easier it becomes to tag your music, as the TRM information is already in the database.
Don't make the mistake I did, and put your entire collection through at once, turns into a very big task. It is much easier to do a few albums/artists at a time.
As well, it can adapt to pretty much any file structure you want. There are numerous posts in this thread about various folder structures to keep your music in. The only method I have read that Musicbrainz can't deal with is incomplete/complete albums. Other than that, outputting into first letter, year, artist, album, genre etc is all handled.
My friend did this a few times on a very large iTunes collection, and decided to write a perl script to fix it... I'll shamelessly promote it on here, cause well, its not my script. It's called iTunes Dupeblaster Source is available as well, so you can modify to suit your needs.
I was looking into similar products for a project at work, and we settled on CMS Backup Solutions They have both PCMCIA, Firewire and USB drives, in varying capacities. If you look at their page, you'll notice that the PCMCIA drive is 75Mbps. This is not a limitation of the drive, but of the PCMCIA standard. We were using Ghost to clone the entire drive to these devices, which can take up to 10 hours on PCMCIA, but under 2 on USB2 (480Mbps). The CMS drives come with backup software as well, however I cannot give you any details on how it works, as we had already decided to go with Norton Ghost.
As well, as others have mentioned, you can get a removable drive for the laptop itself. This is definately the fastest method (800Mbps). I have used these on compaq laptops, they hold a normal laptop HD, and you just swap it into the expansion slot when you need it.
Unfortunately, this decision (although I personally believe it will never be made) has little to do with the GNU/Linux community. If MS decides to make Office for Linux, all the community can do is not use it.
However, this will not stop a company interested in lowering IT costs, and remaining on Office.
Most companies are not interested in F/OSS as a political ideal, but as a means to an end. As such, they are going to use any combination of proprietary & open software that they are comfortable with using, and lowers the bottom line.
You are correct, Free Software has nothing to do with Price (beer) but about liberty.
However, I think you are missing the point. For IT managers, Linux & F/OSS are all about Price. This is why more and more government IT departments are threating to go to Linux, and my Microsoft is doing everything but giving away its first-born to keep them on Windows & Office.
The billion dollar question is if Linux will capture a significant enough percentage of the market share to warrant selling MS Office for it. The author believes that this market already exists in developing countries, but is being filled largely by pirated MS software. If this is the case, then for MS there is some sense in getting $30 a seat for MS office for linux, instead of nothing for a pirated copy of XP & Office.
I think there would be a market for this. Consider an IT department that is transistioning to Linux. If they can use Microsoft Office on Linux, there is one less area to re-train the users, saving the business money and time. That is of course assuming that the cost of the Office liscenses is less than the cost of training all your users.
Seems rather obvious to me. If every machine stocked 5,10, and 20 dollar denominations, then there is more types to run out of, and the machine can hold less cash. This means that they need to refill the machines more often.
That said, I have been to machines that give out all denominations. However, they are usually at the bank, not at my local convience store.
On the other extreme, It seems most ATM's I have been to in Amsterdam (I am currently working there) only offer 50 euro denominations. And you thought only 20's were a pain.
Slashdot Mirror
I have the (mis?)fortune of having a first name, last initial gmail account. There are two not too bright (or downright evil) gentlemen out there that share my first name and last initial, who think they have my email address.
I get all kinds of email meant for them, once including rental details for a chalet for a week! I haven't done anything sinister (yet) but I find opting out of their bacn works better at clearing my inbox than marking it spam...
FWIW.
I think a lot of people are missing one of the biggest pains out of the DST change, which is meetings booked in an exchange environment. Even if you do everything Microsoft/RIM recommend, and do them within hours of each other (a very daunting task for any enterprise sized environment,) you will still have meetings off by an hour.
This can be caused by lots of reasons. If one desktop recieves the patch and sends a meeting to another user, who has not received the patch, the meeting time will be wrong. Even if you manage your DST updates flawlessly within your environment, and don't have any misplaced meetings, you have no control over any external sources that may be booking meetings with your users. It's pretty inconceivable that everyone will update at the same time.
I really don't want to be the one on the CEO's warpath the first time he shows up for a meeting early/late. These issues can be partly resolved by user education, but as another poster mentioned, it is very easy to get confused when talking about timezones. I've been working on our DST project, and I still need to think carefully every time I discuss the ramifications.
I think Cnet had it right when they wrote that users should add this to their signature:
'Please note, if I (am) an hour late or an hour early for my meeting with you, please understand, its not my fault, it's my government.'
1. Invest in Open Source
2. ????
3. Profit!
It is possible to replace the Hal.dll with the correct one for your system, negating the need for multiple images. What I do is have one single image, without any drivers installed. The image is sysprep'd then ghosted. I use Windows PE to restore my ghost images, and change the hal.dll to the correct one for the machine. Then I install drivers (note, if you specify the search path in your sysprep.ini you can have the drivers install automatically.)
It all works pretty well. You'll find you will likely only be using two hal types (ACPI & APIC). Of course, this isn't supported by Microsoft, and I don't think it will work for 64 bit computers.
However, this is Microsofts strategy for Vista... There will be a base image, which extra file sets get laid down on (depending on which OS flavor it is, and the machines HAL.)
I'd like to throw my support in for Musicbrainz as well. Even if you use another program to play/organize your music, it is well worth running through your collection with Musicbrainz. The best part is, the more people who use it, the easier it becomes to tag your music, as the TRM information is already in the database.
Don't make the mistake I did, and put your entire collection through at once, turns into a very big task. It is much easier to do a few albums/artists at a time.
As well, it can adapt to pretty much any file structure you want. There are numerous posts in this thread about various folder structures to keep your music in. The only method I have read that Musicbrainz can't deal with is incomplete/complete albums. Other than that, outputting into first letter, year, artist, album, genre etc is all handled.
(Not related to Musicbrainz, just a big fan)
My friend did this a few times on a very large iTunes collection, and decided to write a perl script to fix it... I'll shamelessly promote it on here, cause well, its not my script. It's called iTunes Dupeblaster Source is available as well, so you can modify to suit your needs.
You just need to get 999,999 of your friends to buy one with you!
A similar story on the register (I think) mentioned that they would only do bulk deals, with a minimum of 1 million units.
I was looking into similar products for a project at work, and we settled on CMS Backup Solutions They have both PCMCIA, Firewire and USB drives, in varying capacities. If you look at their page, you'll notice that the PCMCIA drive is 75Mbps. This is not a limitation of the drive, but of the PCMCIA standard. We were using Ghost to clone the entire drive to these devices, which can take up to 10 hours on PCMCIA, but under 2 on USB2 (480Mbps). The CMS drives come with backup software as well, however I cannot give you any details on how it works, as we had already decided to go with Norton Ghost.
As well, as others have mentioned, you can get a removable drive for the laptop itself. This is definately the fastest method (800Mbps). I have used these on compaq laptops, they hold a normal laptop HD, and you just swap it into the expansion slot when you need it.
I happened to remember this study which compares passphrases and random passwords.
I found it interesting that passphrases are just as secure as random passwords, and as easy to remember as dictionary based passwords.
A 10 character passphrase based password is very hard to brute force.
Unfortunately, this decision (although I personally believe it will never be made) has little to do with the GNU/Linux community. If MS decides to make Office for Linux, all the community can do is not use it.
However, this will not stop a company interested in lowering IT costs, and remaining on Office.
Most companies are not interested in F/OSS as a political ideal, but as a means to an end. As such, they are going to use any combination of proprietary & open software that they are comfortable with using, and lowers the bottom line.
You are correct, Free Software has nothing to do with Price (beer) but about liberty.
However, I think you are missing the point. For IT managers, Linux & F/OSS are all about Price. This is why more and more government IT departments are threating to go to Linux, and my Microsoft is doing everything but giving away its first-born to keep them on Windows & Office.
The billion dollar question is if Linux will capture a significant enough percentage of the market share to warrant selling MS Office for it. The author believes that this market already exists in developing countries, but is being filled largely by pirated MS software. If this is the case, then for MS there is some sense in getting $30 a seat for MS office for linux, instead of nothing for a pirated copy of XP & Office.
I think there would be a market for this. Consider an IT department that is transistioning to Linux. If they can use Microsoft Office on Linux, there is one less area to re-train the users, saving the business money and time. That is of course assuming that the cost of the Office liscenses is less than the cost of training all your users.
Seems rather obvious to me. If every machine stocked 5,10, and 20 dollar denominations, then there is more types to run out of, and the machine can hold less cash. This means that they need to refill the machines more often.
That said, I have been to machines that give out all denominations. However, they are usually at the bank, not at my local convience store.
On the other extreme, It seems most ATM's I have been to in Amsterdam (I am currently working there) only offer 50 euro denominations. And you thought only 20's were a pain.