With the economy, air quality (in some cities) and the crime rate here in the US, it may be the only viable option kids have for playtime in the future.
Back in my day, kids had imaginations and ran around outside getting hurt!
Um, actually, you are travelling. You may start out in the corner of a room (in the real world) and end up at the opposite side of that room (in the real world). You don't just march in place; the system would be pointless if that was the case. The tiles slide around under your feet in anticipation of your next few steps and make sure you've always got a tile under your foot regardless of the direction you choose.
Step one: remove guts Step two: built a plexiglas window where the monitor screen was Step three: seal plexi Step four: add gravel and a colorful sunken treasure toy box Step five: add water and fish
There, a good use for an old Mac and much more useful than a vt100.
Typically, after hunting and pecking for years, users remember where each key is and can develop consistently quick and accurate typing skills (all the while glancing at the keyboard). 90wpm may be stretching it, but I don't doubt that the H&P method can be perfected after awhile.
Then again, years of practice take the 'hunt' out of it, so you should just call it pecking.
I'm wondering just when MS plans to roll this out via windows update. It's been a few days already and I have 3 machines here that are waiting for it, and none have been pushed anything.
I'm not asking for a mandated GUI installer, just an optional one that ships with the CD. Mandrake has been doing it this way for years.
And yes, I have done headless installs. 2 of my servers are nearly purely ssh beasts with no keyboards or monitors attached, thank you. No cdroms in either one.
Mandrake still embraces both styles, you can use a text-based installer with prompts like the old school Redhat installer if you want, it's a commandline switch at boot time. Best of both worlds, or a work around for wacky video hardware.
Pardon my french, but this looks like the same old crap to me. When are they getting with the times and making a decent graphical installer? I want to be able to mouse around and use nice partitioning tools like Diskdrake.
Even Antecs aren't all they're cracked up to be. I had a simple setup with 3 hard drives, 2 cdroms, 3 case fans and a pair of UV blacklights running for awhile. Eventually the machine started freezing or rebooting mysteriously. I pulled one of the UV blacklights and it was back to normal. Not enough power from the PS which was a 350W jobbie. Later on it started acting up again and I pulled another UV light. Fine again.
Eventually I got sick of all this crap and when I upgraded to a new motherboard and an Athlon 2800 I bought a new 500W power supply. What about the Antec? When I opened the case on it, I found nearly all the capacitors blown and leaked their precious guts. Some capacitors had layers of dust over their leakage showing that they had popped and oozed a long time ago. This PS was barely 2 years old.
So there are definitely better power supplies than Antec, either that or I was asking too much of mine.
Not sure why I'm wasting time with an AC troll but Debian is far from commercial and is included in my top 4 for the simple fact that it has a large installation base, and I ordered them according to 'perceived user base'.
And how many other distros have you seen packaged with ANYTHING? When's the last time you bought a Soyo motherboard or a Dell laptop with a copy of SuSE? Never. That's why it's an accomplishment. Get an account so people can mod you to zero instead of starting with it, jerk.
No, seriously, Mandrake is one of the top 4. Redhat, SuSE, Mandrake, and Debian, in that order. Any company big enough to sell corporate support packages makes it into my book as Commercial Player..and don't forget the Shuttle mini pc's that ship with Mandrake.
Yeah, it's pretty easy and well documented all over the place.
You use the software sources manager, uncheck your current sources first, then add new sources for 10.x. First thing you do from the commandline is 'urpmi urpmi' then 'urpmi --auto-select'. You may have to make some choices along the way but eventually you'll end up with 10.x. Don't forget to 'urpmi kernel' also, as it may not update you to the newest one (which is a failsafe built into urpmi).
You can't make a single boot floppy with kernel 2.6.x, it's just too large. That's why Mandrake doesn't include it as an option in 10.1. However, there is a cd boot image in the images folder on the disc sets and on the mirrors, you can use this to boot up just fine.
2.6 adds features and size, a double-edged sword..but then again, floppies need to be deprecated anyway.
The problem with Mandrake 10 is that ndiswrapper is ancient on it. It ships with ndiswrapper 4 and it's currently at version 9. Alot of support has been added since ver4.
Microsoft is allowing real keys and keygen-created keys to install SP2. The good keygen creates keys Microsoft and SP2 itself doesn't know about but is good enough to pass Windows' hashing check, so you can go ahead and install SP2.
I think this is wise on Microsoft's part. Let even the pirates update security and everyone benefits as a result. Less owned machines == less overall attacks.
My point, which if you hadn't read my post backwards you may have discovered, was that the OS needs to be smarter than the users. We don't *need* users running as root or admin. There's no reason why users should need to install software as root and dump junk system-wide. They should be playing in their own sandbox ala/home/luser where they can't break more than their own stuff, and if they do hose their user directory, they can always jump on as root and recreate it.
They also need an OS that's not akin to swiss cheese from a security standpoint, with the two most useful applications (a browser and a mail client) that make the OS extra vulnerable. It's a sad day when Homeland Security tells folks they need to switch browsers, but it's a boon to the Mozilla and Opera devs.
Ultimately the users should be given 100% trust and should feel safe to click on *anything*. With a proper user model at the OS level, this is easy to accomplish. With a bad OS and a ton of internet 'sploits, this is hard to accomplish. Windows is in need of serious and quick change, neither of which it will get.
Considering that in Nevada, prostitution is legal, and that Las Vegas is full of on-call whores, it's very possible. You've got a ton of guys with expendable incomes, drinks, boredom and lonliness in a whore-filled city.
I bet at least one guy accidentally married a hooker.
Your analogy about the sketchy mechanic is partially faulty. Most users who have spyware/malware install didn't install it or weren't aware of what was being installed with a simple click of the browser. Users know when something is being installed in a legitimate way; you get to choose paths, options, agree to EULA's, etc.
A more proper analogy would be that someone towed the car away in the middle of the night, installed a designed-to-fail water pump, then towed it back before the owner knew it was missing. Repeat this a few times, then the scheduled dealer maintenance is performed and everything breaks at once. Dealer's fault is what the owner will naturally scream. However in this case the manufacturer is ultimately at fault for making the car so damn easy to tow or install bad hardware on. It's like having a button that 10% of criminals know about underneath the bumper that unlocks the car and starts the engine to make sneaking the car away trivially easy.
Sweet Jesus, I can almost hear my phone ringing off the hook already.
I really can't wait for SP2 if it's going to break the vast majority of XP installs. I do onsite support for homes and businesses and removing spyware is my bread and butter. This will be even better, and I can probably charge out the ass for it.
Show me the service pack, Microsoft, and show me the money.
"End users can judge pretty well whether they should trust some new program with their password"
Hahahahah! Oh man that's the best joke I've read all day. You _are_ joking, right? You think that users are as sophisticated as admins and the average slashdotter? Then why have the been bilked out of millions through Nigerian scams, password and cc number phishing, etc? They're morons, and they need to be treated as such. Software shouldn't be easy for end users to install, in fact, I propose that every single piece of software act like a game. "Please enter your registration key which can be found bla bla" and the user goes on with their business. This prevents people from accidentally installing junk, as extra effort is required. Also, if a site you download from generates that key, then emails it to you, you're doubly sure that the software is for you, because you've jumped through a few hoops to get it installed.
The majority of spyware and malware jumps in as users 'click to shock the monkey!' and a good old fashioned BHO is installed, which then gets spyware installed in the background. Next thing you know their screen is crowded with popups, their computer is slow as hell, visits to google.com get redirected to mycrappysearchengine.com, and the users are pissed.
What is the ultimate solution? Not smarter users. We shouldn't expect too much from end users; with today's commoditization of computers and broadband internet, computing should be as simple as flipping a switch and having a screen come up waiting for input. The OS needs to be a hell of alot smarter, not the users.
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With the economy, air quality (in some cities) and the crime rate here in the US, it may be the only viable option kids have for playtime in the future.
Back in my day, kids had imaginations and ran around outside getting hurt!
Um, actually, you are travelling. You may start out in the corner of a room (in the real world) and end up at the opposite side of that room (in the real world). You don't just march in place; the system would be pointless if that was the case. The tiles slide around under your feet in anticipation of your next few steps and make sure you've always got a tile under your foot regardless of the direction you choose.
Step one: remove guts
Step two: built a plexiglas window where the monitor screen was
Step three: seal plexi
Step four: add gravel and a colorful sunken treasure toy box
Step five: add water and fish
There, a good use for an old Mac and much more useful than a vt100.
Typically, after hunting and pecking for years, users remember where each key is and can develop consistently quick and accurate typing skills (all the while glancing at the keyboard). 90wpm may be stretching it, but I don't doubt that the H&P method can be perfected after awhile.
Then again, years of practice take the 'hunt' out of it, so you should just call it pecking.
I'm wondering just when MS plans to roll this out via windows update. It's been a few days already and I have 3 machines here that are waiting for it, and none have been pushed anything.
I'm not asking for a mandated GUI installer, just an optional one that ships with the CD. Mandrake has been doing it this way for years.
And yes, I have done headless installs. 2 of my servers are nearly purely ssh beasts with no keyboards or monitors attached, thank you. No cdroms in either one.
Saying economics is not a science is like saying pyhiatry is not a science.
Well, you said it first...pyhiatry is NOT a science. Never heard of it and neither has Google.
Couldn't you just make one? Anyone with the cd set and a DVD burner should be able to put one together for you.
Mandrake still embraces both styles, you can use a text-based installer with prompts like the old school Redhat installer if you want, it's a commandline switch at boot time. Best of both worlds, or a work around for wacky video hardware.
No gap here.
Pardon my french, but this looks like the same old crap to me. When are they getting with the times and making a decent graphical installer? I want to be able to mouse around and use nice partitioning tools like Diskdrake.
No, they interviewed the front row crowd from an AC/DC concert. The ones who they could talk to passed. The other 90 percent failed.
Even Antecs aren't all they're cracked up to be. I had a simple setup with 3 hard drives, 2 cdroms, 3 case fans and a pair of UV blacklights running for awhile. Eventually the machine started freezing or rebooting mysteriously. I pulled one of the UV blacklights and it was back to normal. Not enough power from the PS which was a 350W jobbie. Later on it started acting up again and I pulled another UV light. Fine again.
Eventually I got sick of all this crap and when I upgraded to a new motherboard and an Athlon 2800 I bought a new 500W power supply. What about the Antec? When I opened the case on it, I found nearly all the capacitors blown and leaked their precious guts. Some capacitors had layers of dust over their leakage showing that they had popped and oozed a long time ago. This PS was barely 2 years old.
So there are definitely better power supplies than Antec, either that or I was asking too much of mine.
Not sure why I'm wasting time with an AC troll but Debian is far from commercial and is included in my top 4 for the simple fact that it has a large installation base, and I ordered them according to 'perceived user base'.
And how many other distros have you seen packaged with ANYTHING? When's the last time you bought a Soyo motherboard or a Dell laptop with a copy of SuSE? Never. That's why it's an accomplishment. Get an account so people can mod you to zero instead of starting with it, jerk.
No, seriously, Mandrake is one of the top 4. Redhat, SuSE, Mandrake, and Debian, in that order. Any company big enough to sell corporate support packages makes it into my book as Commercial Player..and don't forget the Shuttle mini pc's that ship with Mandrake.
I don't know what you consider good, but rpmdrake and kpackage are both included and both dead simple to use.
Yeah, it's pretty easy and well documented all over the place.
You use the software sources manager, uncheck your current sources first, then add new sources for 10.x. First thing you do from the commandline is 'urpmi urpmi' then 'urpmi --auto-select'. You may have to make some choices along the way but eventually you'll end up with 10.x. Don't forget to 'urpmi kernel' also, as it may not update you to the newest one (which is a failsafe built into urpmi).
You can't make a single boot floppy with kernel 2.6.x, it's just too large. That's why Mandrake doesn't include it as an option in 10.1. However, there is a cd boot image in the images folder on the disc sets and on the mirrors, you can use this to boot up just fine.
2.6 adds features and size, a double-edged sword..but then again, floppies need to be deprecated anyway.
The problem with Mandrake 10 is that ndiswrapper is ancient on it. It ships with ndiswrapper 4 and it's currently at version 9. Alot of support has been added since ver4.
So, to summarize:
Microsoft is allowing real keys and keygen-created keys to install SP2. The good keygen creates keys Microsoft and SP2 itself doesn't know about but is good enough to pass Windows' hashing check, so you can go ahead and install SP2.
I think this is wise on Microsoft's part. Let even the pirates update security and everyone benefits as a result. Less owned machines == less overall attacks.
Yeah you get owned by Sasser...Faster than you can install service packs! This is, of course, on a screaming wet fresh install.
My point, which if you hadn't read my post backwards you may have discovered, was that the OS needs to be smarter than the users. We don't *need* users running as root or admin. There's no reason why users should need to install software as root and dump junk system-wide. They should be playing in their own sandbox ala /home/luser where they can't break more than their own stuff, and if they do hose their user directory, they can always jump on as root and recreate it.
They also need an OS that's not akin to swiss cheese from a security standpoint, with the two most useful applications (a browser and a mail client) that make the OS extra vulnerable. It's a sad day when Homeland Security tells folks they need to switch browsers, but it's a boon to the Mozilla and Opera devs.
Ultimately the users should be given 100% trust and should feel safe to click on *anything*. With a proper user model at the OS level, this is easy to accomplish. With a bad OS and a ton of internet 'sploits, this is hard to accomplish. Windows is in need of serious and quick change, neither of which it will get.
Considering that in Nevada, prostitution is legal, and that Las Vegas is full of on-call whores, it's very possible. You've got a ton of guys with expendable incomes, drinks, boredom and lonliness in a whore-filled city.
I bet at least one guy accidentally married a hooker.
Your analogy about the sketchy mechanic is partially faulty. Most users who have spyware/malware install didn't install it or weren't aware of what was being installed with a simple click of the browser. Users know when something is being installed in a legitimate way; you get to choose paths, options, agree to EULA's, etc.
A more proper analogy would be that someone towed the car away in the middle of the night, installed a designed-to-fail water pump, then towed it back before the owner knew it was missing. Repeat this a few times, then the scheduled dealer maintenance is performed and everything breaks at once. Dealer's fault is what the owner will naturally scream. However in this case the manufacturer is ultimately at fault for making the car so damn easy to tow or install bad hardware on. It's like having a button that 10% of criminals know about underneath the bumper that unlocks the car and starts the engine to make sneaking the car away trivially easy.
Sweet Jesus, I can almost hear my phone ringing off the hook already.
I really can't wait for SP2 if it's going to break the vast majority of XP installs. I do onsite support for homes and businesses and removing spyware is my bread and butter. This will be even better, and I can probably charge out the ass for it.
Show me the service pack, Microsoft, and show me the money.
"End users can judge pretty well whether they should trust some new program with their password"
Hahahahah! Oh man that's the best joke I've read all day. You _are_ joking, right? You think that users are as sophisticated as admins and the average slashdotter? Then why have the been bilked out of millions through Nigerian scams, password and cc number phishing, etc? They're morons, and they need to be treated as such. Software shouldn't be easy for end users to install, in fact, I propose that every single piece of software act like a game. "Please enter your registration key which can be found bla bla" and the user goes on with their business. This prevents people from accidentally installing junk, as extra effort is required. Also, if a site you download from generates that key, then emails it to you, you're doubly sure that the software is for you, because you've jumped through a few hoops to get it installed.
The majority of spyware and malware jumps in as users 'click to shock the monkey!' and a good old fashioned BHO is installed, which then gets spyware installed in the background. Next thing you know their screen is crowded with popups, their computer is slow as hell, visits to google.com get redirected to mycrappysearchengine.com, and the users are pissed.
What is the ultimate solution? Not smarter users. We shouldn't expect too much from end users; with today's commoditization of computers and broadband internet, computing should be as simple as flipping a switch and having a screen come up waiting for input. The OS needs to be a hell of alot smarter, not the users.