" Thankfully new UK carriers don't have catapults..."
True, but according to the defense industry press, your new boats are being designed for them. You're not getting them right off, but if the US/UK Joint Strike Fighter program tanks, you'll probably have to add them to get a modern strike fighter on the seas. The UK government learned the hard way during the Falklands war that while small STOVL carriers are a cheap method of sea control, they suck at power projection, and a handful of old A-4 Skyhawks and some Exocet missles gave them all the trouble they could handle. This is why the U.S. Navy abandoned it's Sea Control Ship (on which the Spanish light carrier Principe De Asturias is based) concept in the 70's and decided to stick with large catapult flattops. Nothing says intimidation like a flattop with 70+ tactical aircraft sitting off of your coast.
The only reason the Royal Navy is going with the STOVL JSF is because Lockheed Martin promises it will deliver F-18 caliber performance (around Mach 2, with the ability to carry lots of ordinance) with vertical flight capability. Considering how badly the F-22 program has gone (which LM also runs), I'm not real optimistic about JSF. Besides, I'm still not sold on the idea that you can take one aiframe and make it do EVERYTHING. Most newer fighters have multiple abilities, but you wouldn't take an F-15 and turn it into a dedicated tank-buster, or a carrier-born anti-sub bird. Don't be terribly shocked if JSF is eventually canceled.
If that happens, the Royal Navy will want to get a Mach 2 class bird out to sea fast, and that'll mean an F-18 derivative or a navalized Eurofighter. And having a carrier designed for catapults would allow them to make that transistion quickly. It's actually a smart move on the part of the UK. The RN just can't continue to use Sea Harriers forever. They're just not up to snuff for fleet defense AND power projection, and they're getting long in the tooth.
"I love Canada. I plan to move there in a few years"
Good, I've heard it's a beautiful country with great people. While you're at it, do me a favor and take some of these American Slashdot posters with you that think their country sucks so much. And tell them I said don't let the door hit their asses on the way out.
" Oh, and think of the irony that it comes at a time when Neo is in a coma and has been revealed to be not the Saviour, but the Angel of Death; when Buffy has been discontinued; and when Nanny Ogg is feeling just a wee bit under the weather...were these not omens that we failed to heed? How could we be so childish to believe these signs were just random events in popular culture..."
Ummm, because they were? Because you don't have a firm grip on reality if these tidbits of pop culture seem like omens of fate to you?
Look, I love the Matrix too, but these people that mistake movies like it and other pop culture for philosopy (or even a religion...Hello, Canadian Jedis!) need to pull their heads out of their asses and start taking their lithium. It's a FUCKING MOVIE, folks. You'd have thought Jesus Christ was playing Neo in it as seriously as some people are taking it.
As cliched' as it sounds, I'm going to say it anyway. Move out of your parents basement and get a life. There's a real world out there.
Not only is TW in control, basically ignoring whatever Steve Case thinks, but I believe that this was the prelude to TW selling AOL off in the near future. AOL's lifeblood is dial-up, and that's going the way of the dinosaur. They've lost the mindshare race for broadband, and as more people pick up cable or dsl, they're going to use IE. Why? Because most people buy DSL from their phone company and cable of course, from their cable company. These companies happily point out that they supply everything they need, and that AOL can still be had for an "extra charge". That usually kills the deal for AOL right there. Plus, after being on AOL for awhile, users are a little more net-savy. Moving to IE is no big deal for them.
AOL IM still is a draw, and TW will use that to their advantage for the time being, but they know AOL is a sinking ship. This deal got them a big load of cash, asserted control of the AOL operations, and established a relationship with Microsoft that TW will still be using long after AOL has been pawned off to the highest bidder.
Ten years from now, we'll all be saying "remember when" about AOL, much the same way we talk about Prodigy and the BBS system.
Mix up your reading. It's a great way to avoid geek burnout, and sooner or later, you will have burnout. Try a mix of classic lit, modern popular novels, philosophy,religion, and history.
In fact, balance is a good idea for life in general...get away from your keyboard and do new things.
Not a fair accounting....
on
IT at the CIA
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· Score: 5, Insightful
Like any govermnet agency, CIA is going to screw up from time to time. But even if they had everything they wanted, they STILL couldn't be omniscient.
Part of the problem is that CIA can't publicly talk about their successes much, for fear of jeapordizing personnel or methods. And even when they DO publicly make accurate predictions, often they're ignored.
The perfect example of this happened in 1983. The CIA released a report called "Terminal Giants". It was either ignored or written off as "Reagan-esque right wing propoganda" by the media and leftist politicians. The prediction of the report? That the USSR's economy was dying because of excessive military spending, and that the Soviet Union could collapse within ten years.
Nobody believed them. And to this day, CIA still doesn't get credit for that prediction.
Not Exactly...
on
IT at the CIA
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· Score: 4, Insightful
"Again, however, the CIA has dropped the ball on human assets in recent years, mostly because they (and the people who fund them) lacked the imagination to envision the new threats in the post-Soviet era".
While the intelligence community did indeed have a lack of vision with post-Soviet threats, the biggest reason for the dropoff in human assets was a combonation of over-reliance on gee-whiz technologies, like satellite surveilance, and just plain El-Cheapo budgeting on the part of Congress. Basically, after 1991, the attitude was "what do we need spies for? We've got satellites now". After September 11th, when the media was ravaging the CIA for not preventing the attacks, Tom Clancy was interviewed, and his comments were right on the ball. He basically said "Look, we castrated the CIA, and now you're surprised that the agency is ineffective?". That barb was aimed especially at media members and Congressmen that were in such a hurry to save money by cutting personnel.
"Microsoft is not only vicious but also immoral and unethical. MS employees are not bound by the same ethical and moral standards you and I are"
So let me get this straight. Because they work at Microsoft, the employees are inherintly evil? Greedy? Immoral? Inhuman? All of this because they work for Microsoft?
Where the hell do YOU work at?
Businesses are tough places out to make money. Microsoft employees are no different than anyone else. They've got families, go to church, pay taxes, vote, and send their kids to school just like everyone else. The notion that because they work at Microsoft, they're evil is, how shall I say it....fucking moronic.
Slashdot readers are taking the Microsoft thing too far when they start implying that "those people just aren't like US. They're different". Some of you people sound like something out of a bad Nazi movie.
We see this every few years in technical and scientific fields. When I was in high school in the mid-80's, there was much weeping and gnashing of teeth that America didn't have enough aerospace engineers. So, there's a glut of AE degrees a few years later, and what happens? The cold war ends, and the aerospace industry goes into the crapper.
Obviously, the same thing happened with the dot.com bubble; but I see a few things compounding the problems for CS majors.
First, the move away from old unix related subjects like C. C was harder to learn, and most CS environments used to be unix-centric, which was also not for the faint of heart. But in the late 90's, most CS programs went Java and Web centric, and most student OS exposure centered on Windows, which isn't the same kind of learning experience. It didn't help that the web was so trendy.
Secondly, now industry has a vast, cheap, well trained pool of talent to go to overseas, and to some extent, they'll just bypass American students alltogether. You'll always need some semblence of an IT staff stateside, but otherwise, Indian programmers (and their competitors in China, the Phillipines, and Russia) are just too tempting to pass up as a cost saving measure. This trend will only accelerate in the future. In some ways, IT is becoming lower level service job, despite the skill that it takes.
While IT isn't a dead field by any means, it will be a field where only the select few can find what we would consider big success. It's no longer a field like law where, if you're halfway good, there will always be a job for you that pays reasonably well. The golden era, as we might call it, is over for commercial IT jobs.
Where much progress will continue to be made (and the best days are still ahead) is in private voluntary work, such as open source software projects. You're likely to see an increasing trend of people doing coding and computing strictly for fun, while doing something else by day. You'll see more and more accountants, telephone company workers, engineers, medical professionals, and teachers coding or experimenting at night.
Part of the problem with CS programs could be fixed if colleges stopped trying to be so damn trendy. Quit trying to jump on the latest computer fashion, and teach hard fundementals: hardware/software interfacing, software engineering principles, the bedrock languages. I don't see how someone can proudly show off a CS degree without knowing C.
Unfortunately, that still doesn't fix the outsourcing problem.
Theo's ego killed that grant. If he had used measured comments about his anti-war stance, DARPA probably wouldn't have done anything. But he was blatant about it, using "in your face" terminology. And he was shocked, just SHOCKED, when DARPA pulled his funding. Ummm, hasn't anyone ever told him to not bite the hand that feeds him?
As for this being a freedom issue, bullshit. This was a DARPA grant for defense research. He has no right to the funds. Now the US goverment will take their dollars elsewhere for OS security research. You blew it, Theo. You stepped on your dick, no two ways around it.
...it's a stealth plane. Forget radar invisible, we can't even SEE this puppy.
Damn, Burt Rutan is a genius.....
Re:A time of leaps and bounds
on
Secret Empire
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· Score: 1
Yeah, I'm a big Valkyrie fan. I've got pics of that accident, and it wasn't the Super Sabre, it was an F-104 that got caught in the vortex and hit one of the XB-70's vertical stabilizers. A few second later, the Valkyrie plummeted to Earth.
The Valkyrie WAS too cool for words. There's only one left, and I'll never forget the time I saw it in person. It's at the Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton Ohio. I sat on one of it's tires and had lunch. It was absolutely awesome sitting underneath that thing. Everything else is a compromise as far as I'm concerned.
Not only do we still use the U2....
on
Secret Empire
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· Score: 2, Informative
....we also used an improved version called the TR-1, with better avionics and extended range. We still have some older U2's as well, and yes, NASA uses them for high altitude data-gathering.
A time of leaps and bounds
on
Secret Empire
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· Score: 5, Informative
The U2 was very slow. It's essentialy a jet propelled glider designed to fly at the edge of space. This is why the CIA/USAF developed the A-12/SR-71. It had altitude AND speed. It's still probably the fastest jet powered aircraft ever flown (depending on what kind of powerplant the still-secret Aurora really has).
It still amazes me to think of all of the technological leaps that were taken between 1947 and the early 60's. In less than two decades, we went from piston powered prop planes to aircraft that cruised at Mach 3 to the very edge of space (the U2 and SR-71 travel at such high altitudes that the crews wear suits adapted from the space program).
Thinking of the Blackbird, and especially North American's absolutely beautiful XB-70 Valkrie bomber (which cruised at mach 3 and used canards, which are only now coming into common use on aircraft designs), it's hard to be terribly impressed with today's aircraft. In many ways, modern aircraft are a step back.
All in all, it was an exciting time. Ironic, since much of it occured during the "boring" Presidency of Ike.
Al Jazeera is a GOOD development in the Arab world
on
4l-j4z333ra 0wn3d
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· Score: 1
I think the first poster's point was that Al Jazeera should use the existing footage and photos of Saddam's infamous chem attack against Kurds to give some balance in their reporting. Being an Arabic network, you can't blame them for taking an Arabic slant. No harm, no foul there. But the feeling in the US is that while Al Jazeera may not be presenting itself as pro-Saddam, they're not exactly breaking their necks to show that he is indeed a murdering thug. A mass murdering thug at that.
Now, I don't speak Arabic, and don't have access to Al Jazeera television. But despite our misgivings during this time of war, Al Jazeera has largely been a positive influence in the Arab world. It HAS to be, because it's the only Arab based network that's willing to post opposing views....as long as those views are from WITHIN the Arab community. Still, that's an important step. Everything else in the Middle East, outside of Israel, is usually state-run media beholden to whatever national goverment funds it. How honest can Iraqi, Syrian, or Libyan state media be? At least Al Jazeera gives Arabs an independant view, if not totally unbiased.
Al Jazeera is the only Arab-language network where people across the Arab world can watch an unfettered debate on religion or politics. Does anyone think that Saudi or Iranian state television would allow a debate where one of the participants openly stated that some of the Prophet Mohammed's practices (like polygamy) are "rubbish" for today's times? Good Lord, Khomeini ordered a Fatwah (execution) against Salman Rushdie for less.
We may not always like what they say, and indeed, they may at times be anti-US, but they're a far cry better than the other alternatives. Al Jazeera may very well be looked back upon in the future as one of the factors that eventually brought true democracy and freedom of speech to the Arab world.
For all of Apple's reputation as a computer for Liberals, a lot of prominent Conservatives use them. Rush Limbaugh is a longtime Mac user, as is Neo-Con Andrew Sullivan. And unless I'm mistaken, Tom Clancy was a Mac user at one time as well.
Linux IS Unix. Yes, I know it has no "standard" Unix code. Yes, I know Linus Torvalds doesn't have a license to call Linux a Unix. So what?
So what makes something Unix? All of them have some differences, but there are a number of commonalities. You'd never mistake an MS operating system for a Linux system, for example. Though it's not correct to say so in some circles, I say that Unix is as Unix does. If it looks like Unix, and more importantly, ACTS like Unix, it's a Unix.
Basically, if it uses most of the standard Unix commands, and it uses one of the Unix shells (Bash, Korn, etc), and the OS code looks like a Unix (Kernel, Shell, Window system, etc), its a Unix. Even the Kernel isn't as thorough a guide now, as there are enough signifigant differences in "real" Unix systems to make this factor somewhat iffy (monolithic kernels vs. microkernels, for instance).
So to say that Unix is dead because Linux is replacing many traditional Unix systems seems a little disingenous. Just my 2 cents on the issue...
You just nailed something very important right there. The only reason many people buy new MS software is because they have to, because MS intentionally writes new software to be incompatible with some older apps and OS's. If something will work with NT4 and 98, why couldn't it work with 95? And yet many new apps wont work with anything older than 98SE now. They're written that way, probably under pressure from Microsoft.
MS needs to take a hard look at detroit in the 80's, because planned obsolescence was all the rage with the car companies at that time. Vehicles were designed to wear out after 5 years or so, and then you HAD to buy new ones. What did consumers do? They turned to Japan.
The vast majority of people could easily get by with Office 97. And unless it comes with a new computer, I just don't see people rushing out to buy Office 2003 when it really doesn't give them anything new feature wise.
The image of comic books is largely still that of simplisticly written and drawn adventure stories. This hasn't been true for decades now, and some comics have writing that's superb. The X-Men movie sequel is largely based on a Graphic Novel called God Loves, Man Kills by Chris Claremont (longtime X-Men writer). How's that for quality source?
Plus, I think comics are gaining MORE respect among the public. People in my age group (I'm 34) grew up with quality stories and art, so that explains the mounting acceptance and popularity of superheroes for film matierial. Some of the most popular movies of the past few years were inspired by comics. The first 2 Batman movies, SpiderMan, Men in Black. All great movies with widely diverse audiences. There were some stinkers, too (Tank Girl...Ugghhh), but as a whole, the medium is getting better and some of the public know it.
As for the continuing lack of respect for comic books as an art and profession....I lay that blame squarely on other writing and artistic professions. It's basically snobbery on their part. Writing comics isn't "real" writing to a novelist, or journalist. Drawing and inking comics isn't good work compared to, oh, I don't know, abstract art that no one outside the academy gives a shit about. I heard an interview with Stan Lee on NPR a while back, and he talked about how depressed he was in the 70's, because other media outlets (newspapers, time magazine, fiction writers) didn't respect what he was doing, and when he tried to branch out, doors were slammed in his face everywhere. Ironically, he made a bigger impact on our culture than anyone from NewsWeek or the New York Times ever did.
But the respect war is being won. Look at the new crop of comic-based flicks coming out. Daredevil has long been a fan and critical favorite. The Hulk is directed by oscar-winning Ang Lee. And the highly anticipated X-Men sequel is once again directed by Bryan Singer, who is highly respected in Hollywood.
The Japanese culture is simply different. They were never saddled with the "comics is kid stuff" rap. They have a little more of an open mind about such things.
The German government is funding the development of such Exchange/Outlook type groupware via the KDE people. You've also got Evolution as an Outlook replacement, and Oracle has a groupware server that Outlook can plug right into, and it has all of Exchange's functionality. Plus, there's the Bynari solution, which also replicates Exchange's functionality.
And for a variety of reasons. Other posts have mentioned the benefit you get in bandwidth from kicking out the MP3 hogs. But I also think there's another motivation for DALnet, one that will push other networks to follow suit.
Legal Action.
Surely, the RIAA knows about the abundance of MP3 and warez sites on IRC. They've gone after everyone else. It stands to reason that they'll come after IRC sooner or later. And like Napster, they have a central authority they can go to in order to take action.
This policy is a smart pre-emtptive move on DALnet's part.
With the advent of operating system controlled warships, and now wireless networking, it's very apparent that the Military will soon need some new jobs, including, quite literally, hackers. If it's controlled by a computer, and there's a network on it that can be accessed by the outside world, you can be sure various nasties out there will recruit their own people to engage in network warfare.
Why strap a bomb on a tugboat if you can simply steer a US Warship into a dock or a sandbar somwhere via a laptop? This is probably unlikely to happen, but you get my point. The Military will now need people that can hack enemy networks, and defend ours. And that need will only increase as the age of remote-control warfare accelerates. More and more combat aircraft will be remotely piloted in the future, and the various branches of the service will surely find new ways to use automation, remote-control, and real-time computer control to take over dangerous jobs. There will never be a substitue for boots on the ground slogging a rifle, but I don't think it's too much of a stretch to imagine a not-so-distant future where most of an "attack" actually comes from US soldiers and sailors sitting in a room, trailer, tent, or ship somewhere, using their laptops and workstations to wreak havoc upon hostile nations by jamming up networks, shutting down power stations, messing with streetlights, taking down air traffic control centers.....all from a keyboard. And similarly, defending the US from such attacks. That future might not be as far off as you think.
Slashdot Mirror
Ummmm, what does Qbasic have in common with Aramaic, Ancient Egyptian, and Latin? Pat, I'll buy a vowel for "dead language"
I mean, COBOL is lively compared to Qbasic. COBOL is a fucking RAVER compared to Qbasic.
MS doesn't even include Qbasic in it's OS's anymore. Didn't they stop with Windows ME?
Qbasic? Why, God, oh WHY?
" Thankfully new UK carriers don't have catapults..."
True, but according to the defense industry press, your new boats are being designed for them. You're not getting them right off, but if the US/UK Joint Strike Fighter program tanks, you'll probably have to add them to get a modern strike fighter on the seas. The UK government learned the hard way during the Falklands war that while small STOVL carriers are a cheap method of sea control, they suck at power projection, and a handful of old A-4 Skyhawks and some Exocet missles gave them all the trouble they could handle. This is why the U.S. Navy abandoned it's Sea Control Ship (on which the Spanish light carrier Principe De Asturias is based) concept in the 70's and decided to stick with large catapult flattops. Nothing says intimidation like a flattop with 70+ tactical aircraft sitting off of your coast.
The only reason the Royal Navy is going with the STOVL JSF is because Lockheed Martin promises it will deliver F-18 caliber performance (around Mach 2, with the ability to carry lots of ordinance) with vertical flight capability. Considering how badly the F-22 program has gone (which LM also runs), I'm not real optimistic about JSF. Besides, I'm still not sold on the idea that you can take one aiframe and make it do EVERYTHING. Most newer fighters have multiple abilities, but you wouldn't take an F-15 and turn it into a dedicated tank-buster, or a carrier-born anti-sub bird. Don't be terribly shocked if JSF is eventually canceled.
If that happens, the Royal Navy will want to get a Mach 2 class bird out to sea fast, and that'll mean an F-18 derivative or a navalized Eurofighter. And having a carrier designed for catapults would allow them to make that transistion quickly. It's actually a smart move on the part of the UK. The RN just can't continue to use Sea Harriers forever. They're just not up to snuff for fleet defense AND power projection, and they're getting long in the tooth.
"I love Canada. I plan to move there in a few years"
Good, I've heard it's a beautiful country with great people. While you're at it, do me a favor and take some of these American Slashdot posters with you that think their country sucks so much. And tell them I said don't let the door hit their asses on the way out.
Enjoy the beer and the hockey...
" Oh, and think of the irony that it comes at a time when Neo is in a coma and has been revealed to be not the Saviour, but the Angel of Death; when Buffy has been discontinued; and when Nanny Ogg is feeling just a wee bit under the weather...were these not omens that we failed to heed? How could we be so childish to believe these signs were just random events in popular culture..."
Ummm, because they were? Because you don't have a firm grip on reality if these tidbits of pop culture seem like omens of fate to you?
Look, I love the Matrix too, but these people that mistake movies like it and other pop culture for philosopy (or even a religion...Hello, Canadian Jedis!) need to pull their heads out of their asses and start taking their lithium. It's a FUCKING MOVIE, folks. You'd have thought Jesus Christ was playing Neo in it as seriously as some people are taking it.
As cliched' as it sounds, I'm going to say it anyway. Move out of your parents basement and get a life. There's a real world out there.
Not only is TW in control, basically ignoring whatever Steve Case thinks, but I believe that this was the prelude to TW selling AOL off in the near future. AOL's lifeblood is dial-up, and that's going the way of the dinosaur. They've lost the mindshare race for broadband, and as more people pick up cable or dsl, they're going to use IE. Why? Because most people buy DSL from their phone company and cable of course, from their cable company. These companies happily point out that they supply everything they need, and that AOL can still be had for an "extra charge". That usually kills the deal for AOL right there. Plus, after being on AOL for awhile, users are a little more net-savy. Moving to IE is no big deal for them.
AOL IM still is a draw, and TW will use that to their advantage for the time being, but they know AOL is a sinking ship. This deal got them a big load of cash, asserted control of the AOL operations, and established a relationship with Microsoft that TW will still be using long after AOL has been pawned off to the highest bidder.
Ten years from now, we'll all be saying "remember when" about AOL, much the same way we talk about Prodigy and the BBS system.
Mix up your reading. It's a great way to avoid geek burnout, and sooner or later, you will have burnout. Try a mix of classic lit, modern popular novels, philosophy,religion, and history.
In fact, balance is a good idea for life in general...get away from your keyboard and do new things.
Like any govermnet agency, CIA is going to screw up from time to time. But even if they had everything they wanted, they STILL couldn't be omniscient.
Part of the problem is that CIA can't publicly talk about their successes much, for fear of jeapordizing personnel or methods. And even when they DO publicly make accurate predictions, often they're ignored.
The perfect example of this happened in 1983. The CIA released a report called "Terminal Giants". It was either ignored or written off as "Reagan-esque right wing propoganda" by the media and leftist politicians. The prediction of the report? That the USSR's economy was dying because of excessive military spending, and that the Soviet Union could collapse within ten years.
Nobody believed them. And to this day, CIA still doesn't get credit for that prediction.
"Again, however, the CIA has dropped the ball on human assets in recent years, mostly because they (and the people who fund them) lacked the imagination to envision the new threats in the post-Soviet era".
While the intelligence community did indeed have a lack of vision with post-Soviet threats, the biggest reason for the dropoff in human assets was a combonation of over-reliance on gee-whiz technologies, like satellite surveilance, and just plain El-Cheapo budgeting on the part of Congress. Basically, after 1991, the attitude was "what do we need spies for? We've got satellites now". After September 11th, when the media was ravaging the CIA for not preventing the attacks, Tom Clancy was interviewed, and his comments were right on the ball. He basically said "Look, we castrated the CIA, and now you're surprised that the agency is ineffective?". That barb was aimed especially at media members and Congressmen that were in such a hurry to save money by cutting personnel.
"Always remember these two words:"
"Plausible Deniability"
Here's two more for you....
Conspiracy Theory
"Microsoft is not only vicious but also immoral and unethical. MS employees are not bound by the same ethical and moral standards you and I are"
So let me get this straight. Because they work at Microsoft, the employees are inherintly evil? Greedy? Immoral? Inhuman? All of this because they work for Microsoft?
Where the hell do YOU work at?
Businesses are tough places out to make money. Microsoft employees are no different than anyone else. They've got families, go to church, pay taxes, vote, and send their kids to school just like everyone else. The notion that because they work at Microsoft, they're evil is, how shall I say it....fucking moronic.
Slashdot readers are taking the Microsoft thing too far when they start implying that "those people just aren't like US. They're different". Some of you people sound like something out of a bad Nazi movie.
You're absolutely right.
We see this every few years in technical and scientific fields. When I was in high school in the mid-80's, there was much weeping and gnashing of teeth that America didn't have enough aerospace engineers. So, there's a glut of AE degrees a few years later, and what happens? The cold war ends, and the aerospace industry goes into the crapper.
Obviously, the same thing happened with the dot.com bubble; but I see a few things compounding the problems for CS majors.
First, the move away from old unix related subjects like C. C was harder to learn, and most CS environments used to be unix-centric, which was also not for the faint of heart. But in the late 90's, most CS programs went Java and Web centric, and most student OS exposure centered on Windows, which isn't the same kind of learning experience. It didn't help that the web was so trendy.
Secondly, now industry has a vast, cheap, well trained pool of talent to go to overseas, and to some extent, they'll just bypass American students alltogether. You'll always need some semblence of an IT staff stateside, but otherwise, Indian programmers (and their competitors in China, the Phillipines, and Russia) are just too tempting to pass up as a cost saving measure. This trend will only accelerate in the future. In some ways, IT is becoming lower level service job, despite the skill that it takes.
While IT isn't a dead field by any means, it will be a field where only the select few can find what we would consider big success. It's no longer a field like law where, if you're halfway good, there will always be a job for you that pays reasonably well. The golden era, as we might call it, is over for commercial IT jobs.
Where much progress will continue to be made (and the best days are still ahead) is in private voluntary work, such as open source software projects. You're likely to see an increasing trend of people doing coding and computing strictly for fun, while doing something else by day. You'll see more and more accountants, telephone company workers, engineers, medical professionals, and teachers coding or experimenting at night.
Part of the problem with CS programs could be fixed if colleges stopped trying to be so damn trendy. Quit trying to jump on the latest computer fashion, and teach hard fundementals: hardware/software interfacing, software engineering principles, the bedrock languages. I don't see how someone can proudly show off a CS degree without knowing C.
Unfortunately, that still doesn't fix the outsourcing problem.
Theo's ego killed that grant. If he had used measured comments about his anti-war stance, DARPA probably wouldn't have done anything. But he was blatant about it, using "in your face" terminology. And he was shocked, just SHOCKED, when DARPA pulled his funding. Ummm, hasn't anyone ever told him to not bite the hand that feeds him?
As for this being a freedom issue, bullshit. This was a DARPA grant for defense research. He has no right to the funds. Now the US goverment will take their dollars elsewhere for OS security research. You blew it, Theo. You stepped on your dick, no two ways around it.
...it's a stealth plane. Forget radar invisible, we can't even SEE this puppy.
Damn, Burt Rutan is a genius.....
Yeah, I'm a big Valkyrie fan. I've got pics of that accident, and it wasn't the Super Sabre, it was an F-104 that got caught in the vortex and hit one of the XB-70's vertical stabilizers. A few second later, the Valkyrie plummeted to Earth.
A photo of the accident is here.
The Valkyrie WAS too cool for words. There's only one left, and I'll never forget the time I saw it in person. It's at the Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton Ohio. I sat on one of it's tires and had lunch. It was absolutely awesome sitting underneath that thing. Everything else is a compromise as far as I'm concerned.
Some nice Valkyrie pics are here.
....we also used an improved version called the TR-1, with better avionics and extended range. We still have some older U2's as well, and yes, NASA uses them for high altitude data-gathering.
The U2 was very slow. It's essentialy a jet propelled glider designed to fly at the edge of space. This is why the CIA/USAF developed the A-12/SR-71. It had altitude AND speed. It's still probably the fastest jet powered aircraft ever flown (depending on what kind of powerplant the still-secret Aurora really has).
It still amazes me to think of all of the technological leaps that were taken between 1947 and the early 60's. In less than two decades, we went from piston powered prop planes to aircraft that cruised at Mach 3 to the very edge of space (the U2 and SR-71 travel at such high altitudes that the crews wear suits adapted from the space program).
Thinking of the Blackbird, and especially North American's absolutely beautiful XB-70 Valkrie bomber (which cruised at mach 3 and used canards, which are only now coming into common use on aircraft designs), it's hard to be terribly impressed with today's aircraft. In many ways, modern aircraft are a step back.
All in all, it was an exciting time. Ironic, since much of it occured during the "boring" Presidency of Ike.
I think the first poster's point was that Al Jazeera should use the existing footage and photos of Saddam's infamous chem attack against Kurds to give some balance in their reporting. Being an Arabic network, you can't blame them for taking an Arabic slant. No harm, no foul there. But the feeling in the US is that while Al Jazeera may not be presenting itself as pro-Saddam, they're not exactly breaking their necks to show that he is indeed a murdering thug. A mass murdering thug at that.
Now, I don't speak Arabic, and don't have access to Al Jazeera television. But despite our misgivings during this time of war, Al Jazeera has largely been a positive influence in the Arab world. It HAS to be, because it's the only Arab based network that's willing to post opposing views....as long as those views are from WITHIN the Arab community. Still, that's an important step. Everything else in the Middle East, outside of Israel, is usually state-run media beholden to whatever national goverment funds it. How honest can Iraqi, Syrian, or Libyan state media be? At least Al Jazeera gives Arabs an independant view, if not totally unbiased.
Al Jazeera is the only Arab-language network where people across the Arab world can watch an unfettered debate on religion or politics. Does anyone think that Saudi or Iranian state television would allow a debate where one of the participants openly stated that some of the Prophet Mohammed's practices (like polygamy) are "rubbish" for today's times? Good Lord, Khomeini ordered a Fatwah (execution) against Salman Rushdie for less.
We may not always like what they say, and indeed, they may at times be anti-US, but they're a far cry better than the other alternatives. Al Jazeera may very well be looked back upon in the future as one of the factors that eventually brought true democracy and freedom of speech to the Arab world.
For all of Apple's reputation as a computer for Liberals, a lot of prominent Conservatives use them. Rush Limbaugh is a longtime Mac user, as is Neo-Con Andrew Sullivan. And unless I'm mistaken, Tom Clancy was a Mac user at one time as well.
Linux IS Unix. Yes, I know it has no "standard" Unix code. Yes, I know Linus Torvalds doesn't have a license to call Linux a Unix. So what?
So what makes something Unix? All of them have some differences, but there are a number of commonalities. You'd never mistake an MS operating system for a Linux system, for example. Though it's not correct to say so in some circles, I say that Unix is as Unix does. If it looks like Unix, and more importantly, ACTS like Unix, it's a Unix.
Basically, if it uses most of the standard Unix commands, and it uses one of the Unix shells (Bash, Korn, etc), and the OS code looks like a Unix (Kernel, Shell, Window system, etc), its a Unix. Even the Kernel isn't as thorough a guide now, as there are enough signifigant differences in "real" Unix systems to make this factor somewhat iffy (monolithic kernels vs. microkernels, for instance).
So to say that Unix is dead because Linux is replacing many traditional Unix systems seems a little disingenous. Just my 2 cents on the issue...
You just nailed something very important right there. The only reason many people buy new MS software is because they have to, because MS intentionally writes new software to be incompatible with some older apps and OS's. If something will work with NT4 and 98, why couldn't it work with 95? And yet many new apps wont work with anything older than 98SE now. They're written that way, probably under pressure from Microsoft.
MS needs to take a hard look at detroit in the 80's, because planned obsolescence was all the rage with the car companies at that time. Vehicles were designed to wear out after 5 years or so, and then you HAD to buy new ones. What did consumers do? They turned to Japan.
The vast majority of people could easily get by with Office 97. And unless it comes with a new computer, I just don't see people rushing out to buy Office 2003 when it really doesn't give them anything new feature wise.
The image of comic books is largely still that of simplisticly written and drawn adventure stories. This hasn't been true for decades now, and some comics have writing that's superb. The X-Men movie sequel is largely based on a Graphic Novel called God Loves, Man Kills by Chris Claremont (longtime X-Men writer). How's that for quality source?
Plus, I think comics are gaining MORE respect among the public. People in my age group (I'm 34) grew up with quality stories and art, so that explains the mounting acceptance and popularity of superheroes for film matierial. Some of the most popular movies of the past few years were inspired by comics. The first 2 Batman movies, SpiderMan, Men in Black. All great movies with widely diverse audiences. There were some stinkers, too (Tank Girl...Ugghhh), but as a whole, the medium is getting better and some of the public know it.
As for the continuing lack of respect for comic books as an art and profession....I lay that blame squarely on other writing and artistic professions. It's basically snobbery on their part. Writing comics isn't "real" writing to a novelist, or journalist. Drawing and inking comics isn't good work compared to, oh, I don't know, abstract art that no one outside the academy gives a shit about. I heard an interview with Stan Lee on NPR a while back, and he talked about how depressed he was in the 70's, because other media outlets (newspapers, time magazine, fiction writers) didn't respect what he was doing, and when he tried to branch out, doors were slammed in his face everywhere. Ironically, he made a bigger impact on our culture than anyone from NewsWeek or the New York Times ever did.
But the respect war is being won. Look at the new crop of comic-based flicks coming out. Daredevil has long been a fan and critical favorite. The Hulk is directed by oscar-winning Ang Lee. And the highly anticipated X-Men sequel is once again directed by Bryan Singer, who is highly respected in Hollywood.
The Japanese culture is simply different. They were never saddled with the "comics is kid stuff" rap. They have a little more of an open mind about such things.
The German government is funding the development of such Exchange/Outlook type groupware via the KDE people. You've also got Evolution as an Outlook replacement, and Oracle has a groupware server that Outlook can plug right into, and it has all of Exchange's functionality. Plus, there's the Bynari solution, which also replicates Exchange's functionality.
There are more an more alternatives every day.
And for a variety of reasons. Other posts have mentioned the benefit you get in bandwidth from kicking out the MP3 hogs. But I also think there's another motivation for DALnet, one that will push other networks to follow suit.
Legal Action.
Surely, the RIAA knows about the abundance of MP3 and warez sites on IRC. They've gone after everyone else. It stands to reason that they'll come after IRC sooner or later. And like Napster, they have a central authority they can go to in order to take action.
This policy is a smart pre-emtptive move on DALnet's part.
With the advent of operating system controlled warships, and now wireless networking, it's very apparent that the Military will soon need some new jobs, including, quite literally, hackers. If it's controlled by a computer, and there's a network on it that can be accessed by the outside world, you can be sure various nasties out there will recruit their own people to engage in network warfare.
Why strap a bomb on a tugboat if you can simply steer a US Warship into a dock or a sandbar somwhere via a laptop? This is probably unlikely to happen, but you get my point. The Military will now need people that can hack enemy networks, and defend ours. And that need will only increase as the age of remote-control warfare accelerates. More and more combat aircraft will be remotely piloted in the future, and the various branches of the service will surely find new ways to use automation, remote-control, and real-time computer control to take over dangerous jobs. There will never be a substitue for boots on the ground slogging a rifle, but I don't think it's too much of a stretch to imagine a not-so-distant future where most of an "attack" actually comes from US soldiers and sailors sitting in a room, trailer, tent, or ship somewhere, using their laptops and workstations to wreak havoc upon hostile nations by jamming up networks, shutting down power stations, messing with streetlights, taking down air traffic control centers.....all from a keyboard. And similarly, defending the US from such attacks. That future might not be as far off as you think.