Back in the days when I was working with LAVCs (Local Area VAX Clusters) over 10-Mbit Lans, diskless systems were possible but any disk I/O hit the bandwidth of the entire network. Pageing could murder the system. Also for larger clusters, simply loading the system on a number of machines took time as a mass storage server can only serve one system per request.
Ok, modern LANs, especially this one is a lot faster, but you still don't want to burden your cluster communications bus with disk I/O requests.
Anyway, that 80 gig Maxtor does not add much to the cost of the node.
With great difficulty, I managed to see Bad Taste and Brain Dead (thank heavens for P2P). I saw Heavenly Creatures but missed his other stuff. Only Heavenly Creatures really shows him to have major potential and I am suprised that New Line managed to see this.
I just hope he doesn't go the way of Ridley Scott or James Cameron.
I had heard $200mill earlier (before FOTR) came out but the postproduction was incomplete for the other two films. The word is that New Line liked the results from the first so much that they increased the post production budget.
To be honest, I guess that New Line didn't really guess how big it would be until the first came out. Many fantasy films do not do that well and maybe they didn't realise the place of LOTR.
New Line seems better than many companies, but if they realised how big this was worth, I guess they wouldn't have given it to Jackson or the cast. As it is, as there were no superstars there (or their egos), just a very good team and the movies was the better for it.
With the LOTR, the inital budget was $200,000 for three films. We seem to be getting quite good value for our money and some of the incom from the first film seems to be being tuned around into better postproduction for the others.
Peter Jackson is definitely not commanding a high salary (he doesn''t have enough experience), although I rea;;yy hope they give him a point or two of revenue. The same goes for the rest of the cast: no big budget names there.
Instead, we have got a picture that looks like a lot of money was spent on it. If someone at newline ends up making a bundle out of it, so what, we have ended up with a good film. Rgerttably that can not be said of a lot of movies out there.
I wonder if they check the connection speed. If it on a LAN, then it should be possible to route it via another ISP, even over a dialup line. Difficult to do, but it would be kind of fun watching IP blocks get blacklisted.
I'm curious at to why the time sheets need Active-X?
This is exactly the kind of relatively dumb for-filling exercise that is ideal for the web. I have seen some lovely soloutions, even freeware ones where most of the work is done in PHP back on the server and the browser is largely version agnostic.
Incidentally, the paranoia we went through to test our stuff is justified. Some idiot calling the API direct managed to exchange price and quantity (they switched the checks off as well). If the price is 5000 and the quantity is 10, selling 5000 at 10 is going to do bad things (and wipe about 100 million Euros off the market).
The container isn't standard. If it was, then there would be no issues between the different versions and you would be guaranteed forward compatibility.
You usually can count on some compatability, but this is where working at the sharp end is an issue. Most things will work fine, but a few critical things will give you a headache.
Mozilla (not the same as Netscape and also with version problems)
Opera
...
You have to QA against each, then there is the Java Runtime, then the OS and the OS version. This, I guarantee you isn't nice.
And then the browser may also be used for general Internet access so requires a quick mandatory update because of the latest security hole. Your only real hope is to differentiate the version of the browser use for application access (and thus has been QAed) from the version used for general purpose work.
I was working at a financial exchange and the application used a 3 to 4 tier client-server technology. The client can't be moved to the web because performance would suck big time. Some of the clerical back-office operations could theoretically be moved to the web, but when someone looked at doing this, performance sucked.
Some exchange members may effectively put a web server at tier 3 (Member interconnectivity server) and a browser on tier 4, but that is their problem not the exchange's.
If we were writing the application again, maybe we would move non-performance critical stuff off to the web. Already the front-end is written in Java, but a mixed architecture would be verycomplicated (how to support a web-server tied intimitely with the exchange interconnection software).
The main win that a web-based solution would bring is that it would make a client much easier to update. At the moment, the exchange has to coordinate the rolling out of new releases over 550 organisations with many thousands of workstations. Painful, eh?
And then on the browser side, which do you support? If you work at the sharp end, there are many incompatability issues. If you role out your own tested/debugged browser, you may as well roll out a dedicated client.
For use as a dedicated application clients, most browsers are awefully fat (big and slow with unwanted functionality) and the extra they bring make them less easy to support when some bozo calls up to say that their trades are being garbled or lost.
Ok, we all know about zero defects, this being 'defect from specification'. It is possible to specify and producs a system that doesn't fail. Components can and do fail, but it possible to design out single points of failure. For example, Airbuses fly by wire technology depends upon three different implementations of software across two hardware implementations.
If an enterprise depends upon a single firewall, they deserve all they get. A real enterprise (i.e., with the cash) invests in a DMZ and at least two different firewall technologies each side of that DMZ.
Back to the world of the home user of XP. I was horrified when I first discovered that they still hadn't separated privileges, i.e., a user can use and install from the same account (and can do so without realising it).
Firstly a desktop is harder to move around. It is for lending/renting out amongst the villagers. I think a laptop may be a better solution, but with a handheld, it is as portable as a pocket calculator.
I don't know literacy rates in India, but I guess many more farmers are numerate. Maybe it will encourage some of them towards literacy if they see the advantage.
However, how many people in villages can't speak Hindi/Tamil? I know there are a few thousand regional languages and while urban people generally get some education and can speak these languages, I'm sure there are many that don't in rural areas.
From experience in another country (Uzbekistan), many of the farmers (I would say the majority) do not know world prices. Information is much more carefully controlled there in India, but India is much bigger and has a lower rate of literacy, particularly in rural areas.
I agree with you, arbitrage is cool, but you will find that it is difficult for people to bypass the existing middlemen without information.
As for other uses of IT, I'm a firm believer in GIS. Land ownership is often somewhat questionable and it is and avantage to everyone knowing who has what, and what the government thinks it is providing. For example, did that water pipe that the Govt think it has provided really ever get built? If the people know of the plans, they will make sure that things happen rather than let it dissappear in corruption.
That was supposed to be St Petersburg. Moscow looks flashier but is tackier. Actually because of some idiots trying to ask too much, the chase was filmed in Helsinki, but the location footage really came from St. Pete.
This one will, according to the blurb, there are button shapes over the display, so although it restricts the screen design, it does make it navigable by touch.
My guess from looking at the translation, this was from an Open Software Committee and they were trying to make a point. Whether or not one agrees that Open Source is more secure, it is definitely more accountable.
It all comes down to whether the ROC trusts MS's implementation. You may write a filter that is wonderful, but you always have the possibility that someone comes in through another route.
The provided filter with RAS sucks and is not stateful so you *must* write your own (the interfaces are documented). The XP solution only adds a prettier interface to the W2K filter (i.e., you can name protocols rather than use port numbers), but it isn't stateful either.
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Ok, modern LANs, especially this one is a lot faster, but you still don't want to burden your cluster communications bus with disk I/O requests.
Anyway, that 80 gig Maxtor does not add much to the cost of the node.
How did those bastards manage to get so many SS51Gs, especially as the rest of us are having to wait (probably after that /. article last week).
I just hope he doesn't go the way of Ridley Scott or James Cameron.
To be honest, I guess that New Line didn't really guess how big it would be until the first came out. Many fantasy films do not do that well and maybe they didn't realise the place of LOTR.
New Line seems better than many companies, but if they realised how big this was worth, I guess they wouldn't have given it to Jackson or the cast. As it is, as there were no superstars there (or their egos), just a very good team and the movies was the better for it.
This is exactly why I said rather than profit points. Hopefully as he has some experience, he hasn't been shafted.
Sorry, I meant of course $200,000,000. Still cheap for three major movies.
Peter Jackson is definitely not commanding a high salary (he doesn''t have enough experience), although I rea;;yy hope they give him a point or two of revenue. The same goes for the rest of the cast: no big budget names there.
Instead, we have got a picture that looks like a lot of money was spent on it. If someone at newline ends up making a bundle out of it, so what, we have ended up with a good film. Rgerttably that can not be said of a lot of movies out there.
Ours wasn't. In any case, if you are a major multinational company, coordinating a roll-out isn't easy.
I wonder if they check the connection speed. If it on a LAN, then it should be possible to route it via another ISP, even over a dialup line. Difficult to do, but it would be kind of fun watching IP blocks get blacklisted.
This is exactly the kind of relatively dumb for-filling exercise that is ideal for the web. I have seen some lovely soloutions, even freeware ones where most of the work is done in PHP back on the server and the browser is largely version agnostic.
Incidentally, the paranoia we went through to test our stuff is justified. Some idiot calling the API direct managed to exchange price and quantity (they switched the checks off as well). If the price is 5000 and the quantity is 10, selling 5000 at 10 is going to do bad things (and wipe about 100 million Euros off the market).
True, and then there are the Win security updates...
You usually can count on some compatability, but this is where working at the sharp end is an issue. Most things will work fine, but a few critical things will give you a headache.
- IE (which version?)
- Netscape (which version?)
- Mozilla (not the same as Netscape and also with version problems)
- Opera
- ...
You have to QA against each, then there is the Java Runtime, then the OS and the OS version. This, I guarantee you isn't nice.And then the browser may also be used for general Internet access so requires a quick mandatory update because of the latest security hole. Your only real hope is to differentiate the version of the browser use for application access (and thus has been QAed) from the version used for general purpose work.
Some exchange members may effectively put a web server at tier 3 (Member interconnectivity server) and a browser on tier 4, but that is their problem not the exchange's.
If we were writing the application again, maybe we would move non-performance critical stuff off to the web. Already the front-end is written in Java, but a mixed architecture would be verycomplicated (how to support a web-server tied intimitely with the exchange interconnection software).
The main win that a web-based solution would bring is that it would make a client much easier to update. At the moment, the exchange has to coordinate the rolling out of new releases over 550 organisations with many thousands of workstations. Painful, eh?
And then on the browser side, which do you support? If you work at the sharp end, there are many incompatability issues. If you role out your own tested/debugged browser, you may as well roll out a dedicated client.
For use as a dedicated application clients, most browsers are awefully fat (big and slow with unwanted functionality) and the extra they bring make them less easy to support when some bozo calls up to say that their trades are being garbled or lost.
If an enterprise depends upon a single firewall, they deserve all they get. A real enterprise (i.e., with the cash) invests in a DMZ and at least two different firewall technologies each side of that DMZ.
Back to the world of the home user of XP. I was horrified when I first discovered that they still hadn't separated privileges, i.e., a user can use and install from the same account (and can do so without realising it).
Woukdn't this the perfect use for AOL accounts. I don't think MS would want to exclude so many users.
I don't know literacy rates in India, but I guess many more farmers are numerate. Maybe it will encourage some of them towards literacy if they see the advantage.
However, how many people in villages can't speak Hindi/Tamil? I know there are a few thousand regional languages and while urban people generally get some education and can speak these languages, I'm sure there are many that don't in rural areas.
And they don't need their own sattelites. I guess it only works where there is mobile newtork coverage though (which is most of the UK plus Europe).
I agree with you, arbitrage is cool, but you will find that it is difficult for people to bypass the existing middlemen without information.
As for other uses of IT, I'm a firm believer in GIS. Land ownership is often somewhat questionable and it is and avantage to everyone knowing who has what, and what the government thinks it is providing. For example, did that water pipe that the Govt think it has provided really ever get built? If the people know of the plans, they will make sure that things happen rather than let it dissappear in corruption.
That was supposed to be St Petersburg. Moscow looks flashier but is tackier. Actually because of some idiots trying to ask too much, the chase was filmed in Helsinki, but the location footage really came from St. Pete.
The sat operators have been told to close down non-essential systems and to reorientate themselves to present a minimal profile to the showers.
It does do macros according to this site.
This one will, according to the blurb, there are button shapes over the display, so although it restricts the screen design, it does make it navigable by touch.
The provided filter with RAS sucks and is not stateful so you *must* write your own (the interfaces are documented). The XP solution only adds a prettier interface to the W2K filter (i.e., you can name protocols rather than use port numbers), but it isn't stateful either.