I am not interested in the argument of outsourcing software projects lead American programmers becoming jobless, but let me comment on all the four points you have raised.
Distance problem...you are not elaborating on that problem so I cannot comment.
Time problem...depending on where you are on America, you can always put an early morning or late evening meetings with your counterparts on the other side. If you are on East Coast, your 8.30AM will be 6PM in India, not too early for you, and not too late for your Indian counterpart. The same way, if you are on West Coast, you can have an evening meeting. And I dont think it is a good idea to have more than one meeting a day however complex the project you are doing.
Quality...I dont know what you mean by quality. If it is a turnkey project, you start with a set of requirements and you pay for the deliverables. Any quality you need should be defined in the Scope/Proposal/Design document you have created...if you forgot to add that, then it is your problem. And I dont really understand what you mean by quality...is it the amount of errors/leakage of memory/finish and look of screens...it is subjective and it depends on the details you provide.
Culture...you say it is very difficult to work with people who doesnt agree on culture. So, if you are meat eater, if you have a vegetarian in your team, does that mean you wont be able to work as a team. You are exagerrating trivial issues. Your outsourcing partner wont care about your culture and probably is broadminded enough not to bring his/her habits/beliefs into work. You should check your attitude before blaming others.
In summary...there are issues, but if you plan properly most of the FUD associated with offshore development can be tackled. And I believe if you can manage an onsite project properly, then you can manage an offshore project the same way.
I converted to broadband the beginning of this year. In addition to the convienience of a good ADSL connection, broadband and dialup are costing the same.
How?
Previously for one telephone line without long distance I was paying around $75 per month (the local call for dialup internet they started charging extra bucks after a few hours of usage) Plus the dialup costs of atleast $25 per month...Total = around $100.
Now I pay total of $90...broadband is 50 bucks and telephone with callwaiting and other crap is around 40 bucks.
My dialup usage was very high as I work from home. It was atleast 3-4 hours daily.
This cannot be applied for an average user who may use internet for one hour or less everyday.
One of the projects I worked couple of years back had overhyped overfed clean smooth talkers from Accenture...the type you find in consulting.
The company had a very very expensive content management system which unfortunately had static HTML pages. The Accenture guys were charging 200 dollars an hour to code those static HTML pages.
The employees of the company (who were very competent - senior engineers from Iran, Russia and India) were sidelined by these smooth talkers. The management was completely sold on the complex powerpoint presentations made by a fatso...the smoothest talker of the lot.
I worked there for two months...I had an altercation with one of those smooth talkers and he made sure I was fired.
I am talking about information being available to the illiterate and the poor. It is not stock quotes and sports news.
I am talking about price of commodities, may be the weather, some new type of seeds (hope it is not going to be the Monsanto 'death' seeds), rebates, subsidies.
It is virtually impossible to convey the importance of information for these people. You need think from a different perspective.
The killer application for fighting illiteracy through internet is yet to be found. Simputer and ventures like that may help in the development.
Simputer was developed with portability and low power consumption (runs on standard AA batteries) as key points. Simputer is not meant for the standard redneck or Average Joe Yankee to pull the shopping cart with his PC to his SUV.
It is meant for the poorest of the poor, usually surviving on 1 or 2 dollars a day. You have information on the fingertips with a DSL connection. They are probably illiterate.
Your comment reminded me of a great line from the film SALVADOR...we are poor, you in Washington are so rich, but why are you so blind?
Plus the fact that instead of bulky reels of film you will have something on a digital media. You can beam the file from a studio to a satellite and then directly to the theater. (It will be fun to catch that beam and stream to the internet - the next stage of piracy.)
Film prints using DTS technology for sound are already having something similar. They have sound info on CD as well as the print itself. I dont know about dolby digital, may be someone can clarify.
Who cares? Millions of people will shell out 10 bucks or more for substandard crap from Hollywood.
But to say film is dead is unfortunately or fortunately true.
The advantage is post production - the whole process of post production can be done on comps.
Now you need to make a telecine copy on Video/digital of the negative you shoot and then do post (editing, rerecording, mixing etc.). After this you physically/actually cut the negatives using an EDL (edit decision list). Any CG effects you may have will be recorded on film too.
After all this make another set of negatives from which you print the actual reel you see in theaters.
This whole process can be simplified/streamlined once film is taken away and it is bits and bytes.
Is he dead? Is he alive? Is he and his family still not using a VCR? What about the other Valenti clones in MPAA? Or is he still in charge of MPAA?
They are waiting for someone to come with a technically sound and feasible revenue model for online distribution. Till that happens they will cry and go for war.
Using Open office for sometime and I will recommend.
It has no problems in using Microsoft formats and files. The only annoyance is that it will ask everytime a document is saved 'do you want to save in Open Office format'.
I am not good in any of the office packages and so I dont know how the advanced features of word/excel/powerpoint may work. But with what I have seen, most people dont need those advanced features.
Slashdot Mirror
No one said till now...Imagine a beowooolf crap of these.
...is not a saint or sinner, it is an arseh*l%.
I am not interested in the argument of outsourcing software projects lead American programmers becoming jobless, but let me comment on all the four points you have raised.
Distance problem...you are not elaborating on that problem so I cannot comment.
Time problem...depending on where you are on America, you can always put an early morning or late evening meetings with your counterparts on the other side. If you are on East Coast, your 8.30AM will be 6PM in India, not too early for you, and not too late for your Indian counterpart. The same way, if you are on West Coast, you can have an evening meeting. And I dont think it is a good idea to have more than one meeting a day however complex the project you are doing.
Quality...I dont know what you mean by quality. If it is a turnkey project, you start with a set of requirements and you pay for the deliverables. Any quality you need should be defined in the Scope/Proposal/Design document you have created...if you forgot to add that, then it is your problem. And I dont really understand what you mean by quality...is it the amount of errors/leakage of memory/finish and look of screens...it is subjective and it depends on the details you provide.
Culture...you say it is very difficult to work with people who doesnt agree on culture. So, if you are meat eater, if you have a vegetarian in your team, does that mean you wont be able to work as a team. You are exagerrating trivial issues. Your outsourcing partner wont care about your culture and probably is broadminded enough not to bring his/her habits/beliefs into work. You should check your attitude before blaming others.
In summary...there are issues, but if you plan properly most of the FUD associated with offshore development can be tackled. And I believe if you can manage an onsite project properly, then you can manage an offshore project the same way.
I'm a subscriber. Here's the article. I hope it convinces you,too, to subscribe.
Thanks for the article, but sorry, your valiant effort does not convince me.
But are there motherboards/cases/other stuff out there to buy and build your PC rather than buying a laptop with Crusoe processor?
Why do we need an application server and in what circumstances an application server is worth?
I converted to broadband the beginning of this year. In addition to the convienience of a good ADSL connection, broadband and dialup are costing the same.
How?
Previously for one telephone line without long distance I was paying around $75 per month (the local call for dialup internet they started charging extra bucks after a few hours of usage) Plus the dialup costs of atleast $25 per month...Total = around $100.
Now I pay total of $90...broadband is 50 bucks and telephone with callwaiting and other crap is around 40 bucks.
My dialup usage was very high as I work from home. It was atleast 3-4 hours daily. This cannot be applied for an average user who may use internet for one hour or less everyday.
How dare you disagree with a possibly good looking analyst with nice soundbites?
He/She was molested by a taggedbrowser when he/she was a kid.
I am sure cmdrTaco is a he or a she.
Microsoft looks better compared to Sony.
Who takes that newspaper seriously?
What next...National Enquirer?
Linux does not need endorsements from any of those.
You are right.
It is ridiculous trying to make sense out of theories that never work practically.
Java lost momentum the moment they introduced concepts like J2EE...I havent seen a single web application that needed J2EE and its complexity.
One of the projects I worked couple of years back had overhyped overfed clean smooth talkers from Accenture...the type you find in consulting.
The company had a very very expensive content management system which unfortunately had static HTML pages. The Accenture guys were charging 200 dollars an hour to code those static HTML pages.
The employees of the company (who were very competent - senior engineers from Iran, Russia and India) were sidelined by these smooth talkers. The management was completely sold on the complex powerpoint presentations made by a fatso...the smoothest talker of the lot.
I worked there for two months...I had an altercation with one of those smooth talkers and he made sure I was fired.
The company closed down 6 months later.
No one seems to even know what a Simputer looks like?
I am talking about information being available to the illiterate and the poor. It is not stock quotes and sports news.
I am talking about price of commodities, may be the weather, some new type of seeds (hope it is not going to be the Monsanto 'death' seeds), rebates, subsidies.
It is virtually impossible to convey the importance of information for these people. You need think from a different perspective.
The killer application for fighting illiteracy through internet is yet to be found. Simputer and ventures like that may help in the development.
Mandrake may hit walmart. But it is still a PC.
Simputer was developed with portability and low power consumption (runs on standard AA batteries) as key points. Simputer is not meant for the standard redneck or Average Joe Yankee to pull the shopping cart with his PC to his SUV.
It is meant for the poorest of the poor, usually surviving on 1 or 2 dollars a day. You have information on the fingertips with a DSL connection. They are probably illiterate.
Your comment reminded me of a great line from the film SALVADOR...we are poor, you in Washington are so rich, but why are you so blind?
Yes, it indeed brings a smile. I am using Open Office for the last few months and I am very happy with it.
Of course there are some quirks, but you will sure get over it and adjust.
Most of aussies are having a criminal lineage...the government itself is probably having that lineage. No wonder they need to spy on each other.
An honest non-xenophobic aussie is an oxymoron.
It is inevitable. Film is dead...in 2-5 years this question itself will be reduntant...like Jack Valenti shouting about Boston stranglers and VCRs .
Soon cameras using CCDs from companies like Foveon will make 'film' redundant.
And why do you need film?
Plus the fact that instead of bulky reels of film you will have something on a digital media. You can beam the file from a studio to a satellite and then directly to the theater. (It will be fun to catch that beam and stream to the internet - the next stage of piracy.)
Film prints using DTS technology for sound are already having something similar. They have sound info on CD as well as the print itself. I dont know about dolby digital, may be someone can clarify.
Who cares? Millions of people will shell out 10 bucks or more for substandard crap from Hollywood.
But to say film is dead is unfortunately or fortunately true.
The advantage is post production - the whole process of post production can be done on comps.
Now you need to make a telecine copy on Video/digital of the negative you shoot and then do post (editing, rerecording, mixing etc.). After this you physically/actually cut the negatives using an EDL (edit decision list). Any CG effects you may have will be recorded on film too.
After all this make another set of negatives from which you print the actual reel you see in theaters.
This whole process can be simplified/streamlined once film is taken away and it is bits and bytes.
You wont notice the difference between 35mm and digital unless you are told - and this is the reality.
Is he dead? Is he alive? Is he and his family still not using a VCR? What about the other Valenti clones in MPAA? Or is he still in charge of MPAA?
They are waiting for someone to come with a technically sound and feasible revenue model for online distribution. Till that happens they will cry and go for war.
Using Open office for sometime and I will recommend.
It has no problems in using Microsoft formats and files. The only annoyance is that it will ask everytime a document is saved 'do you want to save in Open Office format'.
I am not good in any of the office packages and so I dont know how the advanced features of word/excel/powerpoint may work. But with what I have seen, most people dont need those advanced features.
you idiot from macromedia...why did you guys do this in the first place...you guys are no different from adobe or microsoft...you are perverts.
After much debates and stupid research I went for an ATI Radeon 8500LE OEM card for the Athlon machine I assembled.
I have a 19inch CRT and the display is good and it supports refresh rates of upto 120 in some display modes. It is win2K.
The card costs only $150 from newegg.