I had LASIK surgery 18 months ago. I had both eyes done at the same time. This was a new version of LASIK that supports correction of astigmatism. I had astigmatism nearly as bad in both eyes as my near sightedness, which wasn't horrible -5.5, but combined with the astigmatism, it made me nearly blind w/o glasses.
The proceedure itself took less than 20 minutes. The majority of the work goes into the planning, checking, and rechecking of the proposed modifications done to the surface of your eye.
It's very cool, I have a video of the proceedure.
Basically, they use a device that planes the top of your cornea into a "flap", which gets flipped out of the way. They then laze away the various parts of your eye to bring the topography back into norm. The flap gets replaced. No sutures, the flap stays via suction.
That is why it's quite important that you follow the directions explicitly after surgery. The surgery itself is less than half the solution, the healing process is critical to ensuring your vision becomes 20/20. DO wear the protective sheilding. DO use the rewetting drops. DO NOT rub your eyes. DO follow up with all your follow-up visits.
There are many possible complications to the proceedure. Immediately after surgery your eyes are extremely sensitive to light. It also feels like sand is in your eyes for a few hours after surgery. I also personally experienced coronas at night around lights. It made driving the first few days nearly impossible. It lessened and at the end of two weeks was gone. Other complications can arise, especially infection.
Your vision continues to change, noticably for the first 6 months. You can see better immediatly, if the surgery is a success. The Dr.s normally aim on the 20/40 side of 20/20. They generally don't touch up if your 20/40 or better, but will touch up after a month if they need to. (I didn't need to)
My vision is essentially somewhere between 20/20 and 20/15. I have a very slight astigmatism in my left eye still, but it's not enough that it distorts my vision noticably (unless I'm taking an eye exam and get down to 20/20-20/15 tests).
I paid $2100/eye. Correction w/o astigmatism was $1900/eye.
My personal opinion: It's the best $4200 I've spent. Ever. I am now liberated. I can ski. Swim. Dive. Surf. Play sports. Wake up & see. Be intimate. Anything. I _enjoy_ buying Sunglasses again! I didn't do it for cosmetic reasons, I did it so I could live my life the way I wanted to. And that's the only reason to do it.
If glasses aren't preventing you from doing anything you want to do, then LASIK eye surgery is a frivilous, unnecessary risk. Otherwise, it's a personal decision that you'll have to evaluate yourself.
I've configured HylaFax on an old 486 box running RH Linux 5.0. There were some configuration issues with the Fax/Modem (US Robotics Sportster 56k x2 upgraded to v.90), but those were easily resolved. (It was a flow-control issue).
I can now effortlessly support faxing from both Win* clients (using WHFC) on the network and the Mac clients. To support the Mac clients currently you need to enable the older Hylafax protocol which is seriously insecure. If you do that, be sure that the box is well inside your network's borders. The author of the Macintosh Hylafax client said that a newer version is coming that supports the new HylaFax 4 protocol, but there is no time frame.
All links for both HylaFax and the clients can be found from HylaFax's homepage (http://www.hylafax.org/).
I undstand concerns. No one wants to idly sit back and allow Yet Another Company gain control of the computing market and dictate the options available to advocates everywhere. It's happened quite often. IBM. Microsoft. Sure there were competitors. HP. Boroughs. Sperry. Digital. Lotus. Apathy begat those monopolies and the lack of freedom that has ensued.
I've poked at Linux for quite a while now. Since the 0.96 days. Distributions I've used over the years include SLS (anyone still remember them?), SlackWare, RedHat, and Debian. Being in the USA, I haven't really had any impetus to try other distributions such as TurboLinux and SuSE, although I've read reviews that speak their praises.
The original SLS and Slackware packages were cumbersome. However, Distributions were a huge improvement. Not having to boot Minix to cross compile the necessary utilities. Not having to download all the various sources and put everything together, in the appropriate places on the filesystem. Scripts to tweak for what you had, or didn't have. Obviously that's got certain appeal, piecing together your own OS from scratch, but that gets old rather quick.
Slackware was great for me, because it had more features, and was better put together than the short-lived SLS distro. Sure there were others, such as TAMU, and Yggsdrill (or however it's spelled).. but with Slackware, I could download all the packages, or even a CD, and install on a new 486 computer and be up and running in no time. Tinkering with programs that *I* wanted to, or even just sitting back and reading news and e-mailing my friends.
I then, cautiously, moved to RedHat. v2.03. It was a big step, I really liked my SlackWare. However, RedHat was the new distro on the block, and even Linus used it. I read it so in the newsgroups, so if it was good enough for Linus...
I found that RedHat rocked. And each successive version kicked absolute butt. As I dealt with more and more Linux machines, I saw obvious problems (package relocation, in-place remote upgrades, installing to automounted directory structures, etc.) but many of those have been addressed. Their install procedures have gotten so much better, even my M$ enamoured friends can install it now. It's leagues better (and easier) than any NetWare install (with the possible exception of NetWare 5, but I digress...). There is TONS of support for their RPM format. And if you are using a RedHat derived distribution on non-Intel architectures, it's cakework to grab the src.rpm and --rebuild for your architecture. Can you say Alpha, SPARC and PPC folks? It sure annoys me when only x86 versions are available.
The obvious rebuttle is, grab the.tar.gz dummy! Use the Source Luke! Well, I do. Linux is only 1 OS. There's Solaris, SunOS, HPUX, etc. Their package managment is horrid at best..tar.gz is the only useful alternative. But I admit, I'd rather --rebuild a src.rpm and have the software managed, especially in an Upgrade, than I would with software arbitrarily installed in/usr and/usr/local.
I have to say that my tastes at this point are more in the Debian arena than anything else. I dislike the complicated debian source build procedure, and I also would like to see DEB more on par with RPM on optional packaging for software, but I understand that it's more difficult to maintain a DEB package than it is to write a RPM.spec file.
What's my point? Well, if you've made it this far, I'm sure you can already infer what the point is. RedHat to this point has only done good. They have helped bring Linux exposure. Quicker than it might have happened. Some of the attention has been brought in the form of Commercial support. I'm not here to debate that issue. There is a real need for Commercial software. I hope that someday there are 1 or more truely free activly developed and supported equivilents of Commercial software packages.
RedHat has pushed certain portions of the distribution envelope. (RPM, GNOME, glibc 2.0, X on Notebook chipsets, GUI configuration for major components of the system, etc.) If at some point RedHat does something you disagree with, then voice your opinion. I'm sure it will have support, especially if it's a real bonehead mistake that they made. If not, then next upgrade of your system, switch to some other distribution that doesn't make you irate. You'll learn something in the process. I know I did in my RedHat -> Debian transition.
And so what, if in thought experiments or reality, that commercial only software is "supported on RedHat only". Support the free software equivilents. If you can't do it with code, do it with documentation. If you can't do it with documentation, do it with testing. If you can't do it with testing, then do it socially (among friends, newsgroups, etc.) Give them Moral support.
If you really need that commercial package, and RedHat has diverged so much from the LSB that it won't run on Linux-Mandrake, TurboLinux, Caldera OpenLinux, Debian, etc. then run RedHat. It's a good system.
I can tell you this tho, Actions definitly speak louder than people who whine.
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I had LASIK surgery 18 months ago. I had both eyes done at the same time. This was a new version of LASIK that supports correction of astigmatism. I had astigmatism nearly as bad in both eyes as my near sightedness, which wasn't horrible -5.5, but combined with the astigmatism, it made me nearly blind w/o glasses.
The proceedure itself took less than 20 minutes. The majority of the work goes into the planning, checking, and rechecking of the proposed modifications done to the surface of your eye.
It's very cool, I have a video of the proceedure.
Basically, they use a device that planes the top of your cornea into a "flap", which gets flipped out of the way. They then laze away the various parts of your eye to bring the topography back into norm. The flap gets replaced. No sutures, the flap stays via suction.
That is why it's quite important that you follow the directions explicitly after surgery. The surgery itself is less than half the solution, the healing process is critical to ensuring your vision becomes 20/20. DO wear the protective sheilding. DO use the rewetting drops. DO NOT rub your eyes. DO follow up with all your follow-up visits.
There are many possible complications to the proceedure. Immediately after surgery your eyes are extremely sensitive to light. It also feels like sand is in your eyes for a few hours after surgery. I also personally experienced coronas at night around lights. It made driving the first few days nearly impossible. It lessened and at the end of two weeks was gone. Other complications can arise, especially infection.
Your vision continues to change, noticably for the first 6 months. You can see better immediatly, if the surgery is a success. The Dr.s normally aim on the 20/40 side of 20/20. They generally don't touch up if your 20/40 or better, but will touch up after a month if they need to. (I didn't need to)
My vision is essentially somewhere between 20/20 and 20/15. I have a very slight astigmatism in my left eye still, but it's not enough that it distorts my vision noticably (unless I'm taking an eye exam and get down to 20/20-20/15 tests).
I paid $2100/eye. Correction w/o astigmatism was $1900/eye.
My personal opinion: It's the best $4200 I've spent. Ever. I am now liberated. I can ski. Swim. Dive. Surf. Play sports. Wake up & see. Be intimate. Anything. I _enjoy_ buying Sunglasses again! I didn't do it for cosmetic reasons, I did it so I could live my life the way I wanted to. And that's the only reason to do it.
If glasses aren't preventing you from doing anything you want to do, then LASIK eye surgery is a frivilous, unnecessary risk. Otherwise, it's a personal decision that you'll have to evaluate yourself.
There are _no_ regrets in my decision.
--
I've configured HylaFax on an old 486 box running RH Linux 5.0. There were some configuration issues with the Fax/Modem (US Robotics Sportster 56k x2 upgraded to v.90), but those were easily resolved. (It was a flow-control issue).
I can now effortlessly support faxing from both Win* clients (using WHFC) on the network and the Mac clients. To support the Mac clients currently you need to enable the older Hylafax protocol which is seriously insecure. If you do that, be sure that the box is well inside your network's borders. The author of the Macintosh Hylafax client said that a newer version is coming that supports the new HylaFax 4 protocol, but there is no time frame.
All links for both HylaFax and the clients can be found from HylaFax's homepage (http://www.hylafax.org/).
I undstand concerns. No one wants to idly sit back and allow Yet Another Company gain control of the computing market and dictate the options available to advocates everywhere. It's happened quite often. IBM. Microsoft. Sure there were competitors. HP. Boroughs. Sperry. Digital. Lotus. Apathy begat those monopolies and the lack of freedom that has ensued.
.tar.gz dummy! Use the Source Luke! Well, I do. Linux is only 1 OS. There's Solaris, SunOS, HPUX, etc. Their package managment is horrid at best. .tar.gz is the only useful alternative. But I admit, I'd rather --rebuild a src.rpm and have the software managed, especially in an Upgrade, than I would with software arbitrarily installed in /usr and /usr/local.
.spec file.
I've poked at Linux for quite a while now. Since the 0.96 days. Distributions I've used over the years include SLS (anyone still remember them?), SlackWare, RedHat, and Debian. Being in the USA, I haven't really had any impetus to try other distributions such as TurboLinux and SuSE, although I've read reviews that speak their praises.
The original SLS and Slackware packages were cumbersome. However, Distributions were a huge improvement. Not having to boot Minix to cross compile the necessary utilities. Not having to download all the various sources and put everything together, in the appropriate places on the filesystem. Scripts to tweak for what you had, or didn't have. Obviously that's got certain appeal, piecing together your own OS from scratch, but that gets old rather quick.
Slackware was great for me, because it had more features, and was better put together than the short-lived SLS distro. Sure there were others, such as TAMU, and Yggsdrill (or however it's spelled).. but with Slackware, I could download all the packages, or even a CD, and install on a new 486 computer and be up and running in no time. Tinkering with programs that *I* wanted to, or even just sitting back and reading news and e-mailing my friends.
I then, cautiously, moved to RedHat. v2.03. It was a big step, I really liked my SlackWare. However, RedHat was the new distro on the block, and even Linus used it. I read it so in the newsgroups, so if it was good enough for Linus...
I found that RedHat rocked. And each successive version kicked absolute butt. As I dealt with more and more Linux machines, I saw obvious problems (package relocation, in-place remote upgrades, installing to automounted directory structures, etc.) but many of those have been addressed. Their install procedures have gotten so much better, even my M$ enamoured friends can install it now. It's leagues better (and easier) than any NetWare install (with the possible exception of NetWare 5, but I digress...). There is TONS of support for their RPM format. And if you are using a RedHat derived distribution on non-Intel architectures, it's cakework to grab the src.rpm and --rebuild for your architecture. Can you say Alpha, SPARC and PPC folks? It sure annoys me when only x86 versions are available.
The obvious rebuttle is, grab the
I have to say that my tastes at this point are more in the Debian arena than anything else. I dislike the complicated debian source build procedure, and I also would like to see DEB more on par with RPM on optional packaging for software, but I understand that it's more difficult to maintain a DEB package than it is to write a RPM
What's my point? Well, if you've made it this far, I'm sure you can already infer what the point is. RedHat to this point has only done good. They have helped bring Linux exposure. Quicker than it might have happened. Some of the attention has been brought in the form of Commercial support. I'm not here to debate that issue. There is a real need for Commercial software. I hope that someday there are 1 or more truely free activly developed and supported equivilents of Commercial software packages.
RedHat has pushed certain portions of the distribution envelope. (RPM, GNOME, glibc 2.0, X on Notebook chipsets, GUI configuration for major components of the system, etc.) If at some point RedHat does something you disagree with, then voice your opinion. I'm sure it will have support, especially if it's a real bonehead mistake that they made. If not, then next upgrade of your system, switch to some other distribution that doesn't make you irate. You'll learn something in the process. I know I did in my RedHat -> Debian transition.
And so what, if in thought experiments or reality, that commercial only software is "supported on RedHat only". Support the free software equivilents. If you can't do it with code, do it with documentation. If you can't do it with documentation, do it with testing. If you can't do it with testing, then do it socially (among friends, newsgroups, etc.) Give them Moral support.
If you really need that commercial package, and RedHat has diverged so much from the LSB that it won't run on Linux-Mandrake, TurboLinux, Caldera OpenLinux, Debian, etc. then run RedHat. It's a good system.
I can tell you this tho, Actions definitly speak louder than people who whine.