>let them add it themselves. It's not primarily something that Granny needs to do at home anyway. Sticking it into the OS 'coz you can is not the thing to do
Have you've installed RedHat/Mandrake/other installation friendly distribution recently? They install lots of stuff that would fall your categories.
To the technical side of Linux, only as far as to get more programmers working on it.
To the religious side of Linux, its the entire battle.
I think you understand this point, from the rest of your post, but maybe I'm just tired of how the vast majority of comments will be on the religous side of things rather than the technical merits. MS might be focusing on this bigger picture;
"Taylor was handed a just-finished study that found Microsoft too emotionally biased against open-source code and blind to customer distrust in its own brand."
>"... as spoken by someone who has little financial knowledge or sense."
And what I am saying is that if you look at financial history, look at what financial planners say, look at an typical American lifestyle and future expecations. Play around with the numbers. You will see that saving for what you need for retirement and saving $6 million dollars are pretty close in terms of possiblity and effort. So anyone who has some financial knowledge or sense can easily come up with the "$6 million" conclusion.
>Do you realize that I am expecting you to prove to me that someone needs $6 million to "not be poor as a senior citizen."???
Do you realize its not my point to prove to you this, as I never claimed it. I am saying that depending who you are, saving for a confortable retirement is a little easier as saving $6 million dollars.
Fine, but the reason I didn't go into this is because each person is unique.
Assume that you need $1 million by the age of 65.
Assume that real rate of return is 4% (depends on what you invest in, but we are also assuming that its consistant and tax-free so there is give and take.)
If you save $500 a month for 40 years (starting at age 25) you will have about $950,000.
If you save $1000 a month for 30 years (starting at age 35) you will have a little over $990,000.
How realistic is this? Could you do this over that period of time? How much different than using $6 million? ("possible", "impossible", "possible but why would I kill myself to do it?", "possible, but I'm dreaming")
As I said before, each person is unique but look at the average American;
>And the bug wasn't ``missed''. It was found, and filed.
And then hidden. In this way its no different than closed source.
But what should have prevented it was that more people should, in theory, have found it. The more people who find it, the harder it is to hid it. And this is one of the more popular Open Source projects.
"But its hard to find bugs" does nothing for the argument for open source. How can you argue that its more secure/bug-free if its hard to find bugs in the first place? A thousand eyes missed this one. You might have just had 3 paid testers looking for it because its the same result.
>A lot of companies are using the Microsoft server tools (like IIS, SQL Server, Windows Media Server) because they're designed to work with Internet Explorer (and vice-versa).
If they are going to buy a set of products because they tightly interoperate, they are not going to care what the "standard" is.
>companies would have to stop serving up web pages that don't render properly in Mozilla/Opera/whatever.
Is that a function of coding or of the webserver? Couldn't I make perfect Mozilla/Opera/whatever rendable code with IIS?
>for a company that doesn't need Windows-specific applications, they might switch. This scares Microsoft more than anything else.
>Now this is what I call truely clueless. Typical MS thinking that is the cause of IE's sercurity vulnerabilities and lack of established standards.
Its called "knowing their customer".
There are clueless users out there and if you tell them to upgrade just because of security ("Isn't this what the Windows Update is for?") or of standard compliance ("but all my web sites look ok") then you won't get people to move.
Tell them it faster, makes new web sites look prettier, popup blocking and has tabbing features, all sexy reasons, then people have a motive to move.
>When you buy shares of Google, you'd really like Google to get that capital.
Huh?
If you want Google to get the capital, just send them the money. (Ok, but you want something for it)
If they need money, they could just put up a bond. You would by that. If they haven't sold a bond, they they don't really need the capitial, but its nice that you are thinking of them.
If you want give money to Google and own a share of Google, then you wouldn't buy in this IPO. Why? These are non-voting rights. You don't really "own" the company. You can't walk in a kick out your partners or have a say in how the company is run. You just get a nice piece of paper which value is determined by the market. (Is everyone in the later category below?)
>If you're a speculative buyer who things that Google's price is going to jump up, and if you can just get your hands on it, to turn it over days later while it's on the way up.
Not sure why anyone would think that it will go up in a few days. Regular IPOs go up because there are people who didn't get into the pre-IPO or didn't get all of what they wanted. With Google, EVERYONE gets in and a good marjority will get what they want. Anyone buying is someone who realizes that Google is a good stock to buy between the close of the auction and the start of normal trading. Not a large group or those tending to have lots of money.
>You need about $6 million dollars to not be poor as a senior citizen... >... as spoken by someone who has little financial knowledge or sense.
Actually his comment is more realistic than you might think.
Come up with the number that you think you will need for retirement. Don't include goverment assistance, because you can't be sure if it will still be there years in the future. Don't forget to count inflation. And don't forget that life expendencies are increasing every year. There is a good chance, assuming that you aren't 65 already, that you will live to be 100.
Now look at that number and ask yourself how realistic is it and what do you need to do to save that money. Now look at the $6 million number and ask yourself how realistic is it and what do you need to do to save $6 million.
You might as well be asking yourself to save the $6 million.
>You can almost tell how old people are by their responses
Thats pretty insightful.:)
I would love to be in my 50s right now. I would have had;
Schools that were safe. It was more affordable to get a post-secondary education. You grew up in a world without AIDS, so if you were into sex outside of marriage that was about as good as its been (until they find a cure/vaccination).
Job security was pretty good as long as you were half smart. Well paying secure union jobs were aplenty. A 20 year mortagage in the city was reasonable proportional to your salary vs. today. You should have had some extra money to ride the biggest bull market ever (USA 1980-2000).
>All I know is that when you get old, you get near-unhirable.
I've been hearing this for the past 10 years, why should people in their 50s now be caught off guard?
When I actually get in my 50s, it will be a different enviornment than what 50s are like today. Just like everyone one in their 20s/30s/40s have their own unique challanges that people in the 20s/30s/40s of previous generations never encountered.
>without any income, you HAVE to start eating your savings pretty soon.
I totally agree with this. But there is a point where its the short/medium term of working at a crap job/doing something humbling/applying for loans and your child's future.
>only to find out that after one year, he couldn't afford to pay for it any more. That wouldn't have been too optimal either.
There is no sure thing in life. Including the fact that she might get kicked out, hate her school and want out. She could have been in 2nd year and then he could lose his job. Someone one in the family could develop an expensive illness. Again, I don't see how not having a job for 11 months is a make-or-break deal. You could still end up wasting a years worth of money even if he didn't lose his job.
>When I asked her what happens if a price breaks through the floor, she responded with the hilariously tautological, "well, it just goes lower until it establishes a new floor!"
Thats the main problem with technical analysis, eventually all methods fall back on "This trend will continue until it doesn't".
What it does provide is a nice, clean and easy to understand set of rules. The future accuracy will always be in question regardless how well it worked in the past.
>This person may have taken a similar plan (pay down morgage , use income to send kid to school).
Paying down the mortgage and sending kids to school is not a 1 year sacrifice, its multiple years.
Your parents planned to send you to school many years ago, but if they lost their job 11 months before you leaving to school do you think they would want you not to go?
This is what I honestly don't understand, is it because of the 11 months of unemployement or poor planning?
>How does your degree reflect just how much work you've done?
Not much. Its just a piece of paper. Thats all. Its NOT a legal certified document that says that you put this many man-hours studying for a certain level of exam or that you are this intelligent.
Don't get too hung over with the fact that its a "University Degree" and that its better than this/that. Its just a piece of paper.
>What does that little piece of paper really mean, anyway?
As much as a potential employer feels it worth. As much as your family feel its worth. As much as you feel its worth as an accomplishment.
> I had my parents install RH9 by themselves.. >(for my Dad, who is a math lecturer) complete working TeX system, complete with editors desgined to work with LaTeX.
You father who is a mathematics lecturer (I assume at least high-school) and has a use for TeX is NOT the typical parent.
The first Myth; "Until that happens, however, the reality is, installing the operating system is an extra task would-be Linux users must undertake.
The writer admits that Windows is easier (no need for an extra task), so he hasn't really debunked it.
"No, it's not apples to apples, because Linux's apples need to be peeled before use."
Peeling = extra task = more complicated.
So how did he debunk this?
In the software chart;
First column "..." Second column "Simply too numerous to mention."
Thats a great piece of writing there.
In response to the 3rd Myth "It's hard to install software"
First he says that anyone who thinks this way is lazy. Um.... all computer users are lazy, thats why we have the desktop, GUI, mice, keyboards, nice big monitors.
And to prove his point he states, and I quote in its entirety because its an clever argument: "It's not, but it's just as easy."
Thanks for debunking that myth with that brilliant piece of factual logic. How could anyone have missed it?
Slashdot Mirror
>let them add it themselves. It's not primarily something that Granny needs to do at home anyway. Sticking it into the OS 'coz you can is not the thing to do
Have you've installed RedHat/Mandrake/other installation friendly distribution recently? They install lots of stuff that would fall your categories.
>when has public view been important to linux?
To the technical side of Linux, only as far as to get more programmers working on it.
To the religious side of Linux, its the entire battle.
I think you understand this point, from the rest of your post, but maybe I'm just tired of how the vast majority of comments will be on the religous side of things rather than the technical merits. MS might be focusing on this bigger picture;
"Taylor was handed a just-finished study that found Microsoft too emotionally biased against open-source code and blind to customer distrust in its own brand."
>"... as spoken by someone who has little financial knowledge or sense."
And what I am saying is that if you look at financial history, look at what financial planners say, look at an typical American lifestyle and future expecations. Play around with the numbers. You will see that saving for what you need for retirement and saving $6 million dollars are pretty close in terms of possiblity and effort. So anyone who has some financial knowledge or sense can easily come up with the "$6 million" conclusion.
>Do you realize that I am expecting you to prove to me that someone needs $6 million to "not be poor as a senior citizen."???
Do you realize its not my point to prove to you this, as I never claimed it. I am saying that depending who you are, saving for a confortable retirement is a little easier as saving $6 million dollars.
Fine, but the reason I didn't go into this is because each person is unique.
b w/ 2002-07-19-usat-cover.htm
Assume that you need $1 million by the age of 65.
Assume that real rate of return is 4% (depends on what you invest in, but we are also assuming that its consistant and tax-free so there is give and take.)
If you save $500 a month for 40 years (starting at age 25) you will have about $950,000.
If you save $1000 a month for 30 years (starting at age 35) you will have a little over $990,000.
How realistic is this? Could you do this over that period of time? How much different than using $6 million? ("possible", "impossible", "possible but why would I kill myself to do it?", "possible, but I'm dreaming")
As I said before, each person is unique but look at the average American;
http://www.usatoday.com/money/perfi/retirement/
>And the bug wasn't ``missed''. It was found, and filed.
And then hidden. In this way its no different than closed source.
But what should have prevented it was that more people should, in theory, have found it. The more people who find it, the harder it is to hid it. And this is one of the more popular Open Source projects.
"But its hard to find bugs" does nothing for the argument for open source. How can you argue that its more secure/bug-free if its hard to find bugs in the first place? A thousand eyes missed this one. You might have just had 3 paid testers looking for it because its the same result.
>A lot of companies are using the Microsoft server tools (like IIS, SQL Server, Windows Media Server) because they're designed to work with Internet Explorer (and vice-versa).
If they are going to buy a set of products because they tightly interoperate, they are not going to care what the "standard" is.
>companies would have to stop serving up web pages that don't render properly in Mozilla/Opera/whatever.
Is that a function of coding or of the webserver? Couldn't I make perfect Mozilla/Opera/whatever rendable code with IIS?
>for a company that doesn't need Windows-specific applications, they might switch. This scares Microsoft more than anything else.
IE IS a Windows specific application.
>Now this is what I call truely clueless. Typical MS thinking that is the cause of IE's sercurity vulnerabilities and lack of established standards.
Its called "knowing their customer".
There are clueless users out there and if you tell them to upgrade just because of security ("Isn't this what the Windows Update is for?") or of standard compliance ("but all my web sites look ok") then you won't get people to move.
Tell them it faster, makes new web sites look prettier, popup blocking and has tabbing features, all sexy reasons, then people have a motive to move.
>when did we have "good" commercial software?
Good point.
Vs. "good" free software?
With the later they went with "Cheap", "Good" and dropped the "Fast".
The only reason why they get it "Good" is because they have so much time to work on it.
And example is Firebird, a great ("Good") and free ("Cheap") product which is still in the Technology Preview stage ("Fast").
>When you buy shares of Google, you'd really like Google to get that capital.
Huh?
If you want Google to get the capital, just send them the money. (Ok, but you want something for it)
If they need money, they could just put up a bond. You would by that. If they haven't sold a bond, they they don't really need the capitial, but its nice that you are thinking of them.
If you want give money to Google and own a share of Google, then you wouldn't buy in this IPO. Why? These are non-voting rights. You don't really "own" the company. You can't walk in a kick out your partners or have a say in how the company is run. You just get a nice piece of paper which value is determined by the market. (Is everyone in the later category below?)
>If you're a speculative buyer who things that Google's price is going to jump up, and if you can just get your hands on it, to turn it over days later while it's on the way up.
Not sure why anyone would think that it will go up in a few days. Regular IPOs go up because there are people who didn't get into the pre-IPO or didn't get all of what they wanted. With Google, EVERYONE gets in and a good marjority will get what they want. Anyone buying is someone who realizes that Google is a good stock to buy between the close of the auction and the start of normal trading. Not a large group or those tending to have lots of money.
>Wiling away your time in retail has got to be one of the most pointless existences imaginable.
Funny, lots of people say that about spending 8+ hours a day staring a screen in a small, grey, windowless cubical.
For some, doing retail is a step up.
>You need about $6 million dollars to not be poor as a senior citizen...
>... as spoken by someone who has little financial knowledge or sense.
Actually his comment is more realistic than you might think.
Come up with the number that you think you will need for retirement. Don't include goverment assistance, because you can't be sure if it will still be there years in the future. Don't forget to count inflation. And don't forget that life expendencies are increasing every year. There is a good chance, assuming that you aren't 65 already, that you will live to be 100.
Now look at that number and ask yourself how realistic is it and what do you need to do to save that money.
Now look at the $6 million number and ask yourself how realistic is it and what do you need to do to save $6 million.
You might as well be asking yourself to save the $6 million.
>For every problem, there is a solution that is simple, elegant, and wrong.
I have many failed math tests which are living examples of this.
>You can almost tell how old people are by their responses
:)
Thats pretty insightful.
I would love to be in my 50s right now. I would have had;
Schools that were safe. It was more affordable to get a post-secondary education. You grew up in a world without AIDS, so if you were into sex outside of marriage that was about as good as its been (until they find a cure/vaccination).
Job security was pretty good as long as you were half smart. Well paying secure union jobs were aplenty. A 20 year mortagage in the city was reasonable proportional to your salary vs. today. You should have had some extra money to ride the biggest bull market ever (USA 1980-2000).
>All I know is that when you get old, you get near-unhirable.
I've been hearing this for the past 10 years, why should people in their 50s now be caught off guard?
When I actually get in my 50s, it will be a different enviornment than what 50s are like today. Just like everyone one in their 20s/30s/40s have their own unique challanges that people in the 20s/30s/40s of previous generations never encountered.
>without any income, you HAVE to start eating your savings pretty soon.
I totally agree with this. But there is a point where its the short/medium term of working at a crap job/doing something humbling/applying for loans and your child's future.
>only to find out that after one year, he couldn't afford to pay for it any more. That wouldn't have been too optimal either.
There is no sure thing in life. Including the fact that she might get kicked out, hate her school and want out. She could have been in 2nd year and then he could lose his job. Someone one in the family could develop an expensive illness. Again, I don't see how not having a job for 11 months is a make-or-break deal. You could still end up wasting a years worth of money even if he didn't lose his job.
>When I asked her what happens if a price breaks through the floor, she responded with the hilariously tautological, "well, it just goes lower until it establishes a new floor!"
Thats the main problem with technical analysis, eventually all methods fall back on "This trend will continue until it doesn't".
What it does provide is a nice, clean and easy to understand set of rules. The future accuracy will always be in question regardless how well it worked in the past.
>This person may have taken a similar plan (pay down morgage , use income to send kid to school).
Paying down the mortgage and sending kids to school is not a 1 year sacrifice, its multiple years.
Your parents planned to send you to school many years ago, but if they lost their job 11 months before you leaving to school do you think they would want you not to go?
This is what I honestly don't understand, is it because of the 11 months of unemployement or poor planning?
You've been working for at least 23 years, are unemployeed for the past year and are just now running out of UI.
I honestly can't see how that could be the make-or-break decision for your child going to college or not.
Was this year going to be the "save up my entire salary so my child can get a post-secondary education"?
>How does your degree reflect just how much work you've done?
Not much. Its just a piece of paper. Thats all. Its NOT a legal certified document that says that you put this many man-hours studying for a certain level of exam or that you are this intelligent.
Don't get too hung over with the fact that its a "University Degree" and that its better than this/that. Its just a piece of paper.
>What does that little piece of paper really mean, anyway?
As much as a potential employer feels it worth. As much as your family feel its worth. As much as you feel its worth as an accomplishment.
> I had my parents install RH9 by themselves ..
>(for my Dad, who is a math lecturer) complete working TeX system, complete with editors desgined to work with LaTeX.
You father who is a mathematics lecturer (I assume at least high-school) and has a use for TeX is NOT the typical parent.
>Really? I don't. Can you name any offhand?
http://www.computergripes.com/firefoxsites.html
The first Myth;
"Until that happens, however, the reality is, installing the operating system is an extra task would-be Linux users must undertake.
The writer admits that Windows is easier (no need for an extra task), so he hasn't really debunked it.
"No, it's not apples to apples, because Linux's apples need to be peeled before use."
Peeling = extra task = more complicated.
So how did he debunk this?
In the software chart;
First column "..."
Second column "Simply too numerous to mention."
Thats a great piece of writing there.
In response to the 3rd Myth "It's hard to install software"
First he says that anyone who thinks this way is lazy. Um.... all computer users are lazy, thats why we have the desktop, GUI, mice, keyboards, nice big monitors.
And to prove his point he states, and I quote in its entirety because its an clever argument:
"It's not, but it's just as easy."
Thanks for debunking that myth with that brilliant piece of factual logic. How could anyone have missed it?
IM is becoming more than just instant transfering of text.
File transfers (GAIM sort of has this), webcams, plugins and games are becoming big reasons for IMs.
Sorry but saying "close enough" isn't good enough when the rest of the world can do it.
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?kbid=283 673
>It's a promise unfulfilled
And MS was never mistaken before? How is this oen different?
>you have to see that this is a dangerous time for them.
When was it NOT a dangerous time for MS? How is this time more dangerous than others?
How is it it not a dangerous time for OSX and Linux?
Um... hes talking about a college degree, not a university one.