I admit I had to Google that one. Stupid article doesn't explain the name at all, and here I was thinking we had some big new Debian/Ubuntu vulnerability.
Bah. My son was a car mechanic for seven years. Each new job paid less than the last one. If you work for a dealership, you get paid shit for mechanics work.
I lived the first 30 years of my life without a smartphone, so yeah, no problem. But since the age of ~10, I've always had a computer and television. I don't really think I'm any more addicted to the phone than those things from years ago.
The only real change is how much information advertisers have about us these days. For me personally, not a big deal. I plan my budget months in advance and I'm not all that affected by advertisements. Getting ads for things I actually want isn't that big of a deal.
Hell, I took statistics more than 25 years ago and I'm pretty sure my old HP calculator could do all those functions. Certainly, we could do them with Quattro Pro. I just had to pull out my Statistics textbook ('91) to verify that it actually had those tables in it. I certainly don't recall using them even in the early 90s.
I had Kwikset Zwave door locks installed with the Vivint SmartHome system in my old house. The two AA batteries tended to last about 4-5 months.
The system was generally awesome and very convenient. I had timers set to automatically lock the doors in the evening and morning in case we forgot. If I left the garage door open more than 10 minutes, you'd get an alert on your phone. Quite handy, but no clue what version of Z-Wave those locks used.
Looks interesting, but I'm not sure I'd be able to see the red very well, being among the 8% of men who have red-green colorblindness. One hopes they are considering that, but I didn't see it addressed in the article.
I'm 48, but spent decades in sysadmin and then moved to QA. I've only been a paid programmer for about 5 years. Personally, I think part of the solution is finding a well paying, but non-sexy niche area to specialize in. It's 2017, and I'm doing test case automation in PERL for a switch manufacturer, but it damn sure pays the bills.
The whole world is not doing applications programming in Java, Node.js, or whatever the latest new hotness is.
Personally, I don't consider thinness of a phone to be a great feature. I'd much rather have a bigger battery. Phone thicknesses are fine, and the rubbery case makes it much easier to hold onto. I haven't needed a thinner phone since my first Galaxy S model.
Thinness is a pure marketing gimmick, and contributes to the fragility problem.
Only an idiot uses their $750 phone without a good case. I received my Otterbox Defender for the GS8+ two weeks before I got the phone. I've dropped it several times with no problems.
I think that something far more likely is a collapse of the college education system in the US.
All of my kids will be/are going to community college or state schools. Unless you are rich, a private school is laughably out of the question these days.
People take Musk's jokes too seriously. SpaceX is building a pedestrian underpass to the big SpaceX parking lot that is across a major street (Crenshaw Blvd in Hawthorne). There have been accidents, and a number of SpaceX employees have been hit by cars trying to cross the busy street.
And that's why I always tip my Uber and Lyft drivers. They aren't making as much as you think, and most people aren't doing it as their first choice of employment.
OTOH, if I were unemployed and since I have a decent car, I'd probably start driving for Uber or Lyft immediately while I looked for another 'real' job.
I loaded custom ROMs on my first three Android phones, and spent a ton of time tweaking things. This is not all that different from what I used to do with Linux years ago.
However, a number of things happened such that I no longer bother: - Android got a lot better overall - Samsung boot locked my stupid phone (GS6) - bad - Samsung started issuing monthly patch updates - good
I'm vaguely considering trying to find an unlockable phone for my next one, but after getting burned by Google with my last Nexus tablet that they killed with an update, I'm not real thrilled by them either.
After I hack my transponder to imitate an out of control 18-wheeler, that rush hour traffic will part for me like the Red Sea for Moses. Commuting will be a breeze.:)
My company doesn't have "sick leave", we have PTO (personal time off). This is a twisted system which means your sick time and vacation time are the same pool. Naturally, this means you screw up your vacation plans if you take sick time, so I just come in to work unless I'm on my death bed.
There is nothing whatsoever in Musk's plans that prohibit them from sending 10 (or 100) ships up first that are loaded with cargo for the first colonists. In fact, doing otherwise would be ridiculous. Don't take the video quite so literally.
Musk himself said he is focused on building the transportation infrastucture, not the colony itself. He is leaving that to others and basically inviting people with resources and ideas to join in.
My CEO has only been on the job for about three years, and frankly, he is a vast improvement over the previous guy. He's doing a great job, and moving the company in the right direction. He clearly understands the industry a lot better than I do, so I'm not complaining.
I tried to go cheap and get a Surface 3 a year ago when my latest Android tablet died. A tablet, a laptop. What's not to like? (Ok, it runs Windows...)
I'm sorry to say that the Surface 3 is my worst computer purchase ever. Despite multiple reinstalls, firmware and driver updates, the thing has constant issues. The wifi and video drivers are the primary culprits.
Privacy implications aside, I think Windows 10 works great. I've been running it for almost a year now on my Surface 3 tablet and on two different Dell boxes at home. Since two of those machines had come with Windows 8 on them, it was a big improvement.
My only usability complaint so far is that I had somewhere missed a firmware update on the Surface tablet that resulted in a lot of network and video driver crashes for a while.
Generally, I don't use the Edge browser or Cortana very much. The one feature I really do like is the decent multiple desktop support. I've been using crappy, half-assed apps to do this for years on Windows.
As for the privacy aspects, I've had a long standing disagreement with a friend about whether collecting marketing preferences constitute a privacy "violation" or not. I don't really think so, but even if they do, it is entirely voluntary. I really don't care if someone targets me with advertising or mails me coupons for stuff I might want to buy. If you don't like the privacy 'violations' of Windows, there are ways to turn it off, or you can just use Linux.:)
Slashdot Mirror
I admit I had to Google that one. Stupid article doesn't explain the name at all, and here I was thinking we had some big new Debian/Ubuntu vulnerability.
- Necron69
Bah. My son was a car mechanic for seven years. Each new job paid less than the last one. If you work for a dealership, you get paid shit for mechanics work.
- Necron69
Being an old school fart, the vast majority of my Twitter usage comes while I'm sitting at my computer, not on my phone.
- Necron69
Mobile payments are a solution in search of a problem. I tried Google pay once for the novelty, and never used it again.
- Necron69
I lived the first 30 years of my life without a smartphone, so yeah, no problem. But since the age of ~10, I've always had a computer and television. I don't really think I'm any more addicted to the phone than those things from years ago.
The only real change is how much information advertisers have about us these days. For me personally, not a big deal. I plan my budget months in advance and I'm not all that affected by advertisements. Getting ads for things I actually want isn't that big of a deal.
Necron69
Hell, I took statistics more than 25 years ago and I'm pretty sure my old HP calculator could do all those functions. Certainly, we could do them with Quattro Pro. I just had to pull out my Statistics textbook ('91) to verify that it actually had those tables in it. I certainly don't recall using them even in the early 90s.
- Necron69
I had Kwikset Zwave door locks installed with the Vivint SmartHome system in my old house. The two AA batteries tended to last about 4-5 months.
The system was generally awesome and very convenient. I had timers set to automatically lock the doors in the evening and morning in case we forgot. If I left the garage door open more than 10 minutes, you'd get an alert on your phone. Quite handy, but no clue what version of Z-Wave those locks used.
Looks interesting, but I'm not sure I'd be able to see the red very well, being among the 8% of men who have red-green colorblindness. One hopes they are considering that, but I didn't see it addressed in the article.
- Necron69
There's a special, scientific term for women who use the rhythm method of birth control. They're called 'mothers'.
- Necron69
Who are you calling old, you whippersnapper!? :)
I'm 48, but spent decades in sysadmin and then moved to QA. I've only been a paid programmer for about 5 years. Personally, I think part of the solution is finding a well paying, but non-sexy niche area to specialize in. It's 2017, and I'm doing test case automation in PERL for a switch manufacturer, but it damn sure pays the bills.
The whole world is not doing applications programming in Java, Node.js, or whatever the latest new hotness is.
- Necron69
Personally, I don't consider thinness of a phone to be a great feature. I'd much rather have a bigger battery. Phone thicknesses are fine, and the rubbery case makes it much easier to hold onto. I haven't needed a thinner phone since my first Galaxy S model.
Thinness is a pure marketing gimmick, and contributes to the fragility problem.
- Necron69
Only an idiot uses their $750 phone without a good case. I received my Otterbox Defender for the GS8+ two weeks before I got the phone. I've dropped it several times with no problems.
- Necron69
I think that something far more likely is a collapse of the college education system in the US.
All of my kids will be/are going to community college or state schools. Unless you are rich, a private school is laughably out of the question these days.
- Necron69
People take Musk's jokes too seriously. SpaceX is building a pedestrian underpass to the big SpaceX parking lot that is across a major street (Crenshaw Blvd in Hawthorne). There have been accidents, and a number of SpaceX employees have been hit by cars trying to cross the busy street.
- Necron69
You do realize that the whole purpose of the Interstate Highway System is to facilitate commerce, right?
It wasn't built so you can drive to Vegas for the weekend.
- Necron69
And that's why I always tip my Uber and Lyft drivers. They aren't making as much as you think, and most people aren't doing it as their first choice of employment.
OTOH, if I were unemployed and since I have a decent car, I'd probably start driving for Uber or Lyft immediately while I looked for another 'real' job.
- Necron69
I loaded custom ROMs on my first three Android phones, and spent a ton of time tweaking things. This is not all that different from what I used to do with Linux years ago.
However, a number of things happened such that I no longer bother:
- Android got a lot better overall
- Samsung boot locked my stupid phone (GS6) - bad
- Samsung started issuing monthly patch updates - good
I'm vaguely considering trying to find an unlockable phone for my next one, but after getting burned by Google with my last Nexus tablet that they killed with an update, I'm not real thrilled by them either.
- Necron69
After I hack my transponder to imitate an out of control 18-wheeler, that rush hour traffic will part for me like the Red Sea for Moses. Commuting will be a breeze. :)
- Necron69
My company doesn't have "sick leave", we have PTO (personal time off). This is a twisted system which means your sick time and vacation time are the same pool. Naturally, this means you screw up your vacation plans if you take sick time, so I just come in to work unless I'm on my death bed.
Incentives matter.
- Necron69
Folks, 'Atlas Shrugged' was supposed to be a warning to the USA, not a how-to manual.
People respond to incentives. Any conceivable tax increase to raise the funds needed for a UBI will make the Great Depression look like a joke.
- Necron69
U.N. Spacy SDF 0.1
There is nothing whatsoever in Musk's plans that prohibit them from sending 10 (or 100) ships up first that are loaded with cargo for the first colonists. In fact, doing otherwise would be ridiculous. Don't take the video quite so literally.
Musk himself said he is focused on building the transportation infrastucture, not the colony itself. He is leaving that to others and basically inviting people with resources and ideas to join in.
- Necron69
My CEO has only been on the job for about three years, and frankly, he is a vast improvement over the previous guy. He's doing a great job, and moving the company in the right direction. He clearly understands the industry a lot better than I do, so I'm not complaining.
- Necron69
I tried to go cheap and get a Surface 3 a year ago when my latest Android tablet died. A tablet, a laptop. What's not to like? (Ok, it runs Windows...)
I'm sorry to say that the Surface 3 is my worst computer purchase ever. Despite multiple reinstalls, firmware and driver updates, the thing has constant issues. The wifi and video drivers are the primary culprits.
Do yourself a favor and don't buy one of these.
- Necron69
Privacy implications aside, I think Windows 10 works great. I've been running it for almost a year now on my Surface 3 tablet and on two different Dell boxes at home. Since two of those machines had come with Windows 8 on them, it was a big improvement.
My only usability complaint so far is that I had somewhere missed a firmware update on the Surface tablet that resulted in a lot of network and video driver crashes for a while.
Generally, I don't use the Edge browser or Cortana very much. The one feature I really do like is the decent multiple desktop support. I've been using crappy, half-assed apps to do this for years on Windows.
As for the privacy aspects, I've had a long standing disagreement with a friend about whether collecting marketing preferences constitute a privacy "violation" or not. I don't really think so, but even if they do, it is entirely voluntary. I really don't care if someone targets me with advertising or mails me coupons for stuff I might want to buy. If you don't like the privacy 'violations' of Windows, there are ways to turn it off, or you can just use Linux. :)
- Necron69