Mine stay up 24 and 7 365 but i can afford to accept five 9 uptime and still not worry about downtime
I worked half my career in banking systems and I can tell you that having seen mainfames and unix and windows in all of them that none of them are better than the other - there is this desire to quote uptime like a god but the simple fact is that most of the server uptimes i see quoted are webservers - hardly demanding
Those of us who have to run app servers and file print know that nothing is perfect - we build our systems carefully no matter what OS we use but we are also aware that there will be times when we need to reboot a box no matter what it is (SCO and memory leaks is much more fun than Windows NT4 anywday btw and if you want to see real issues try RS series mainframes running Hogan...)
As i said uptime is like penis size - irrelevant - ive never ever met a system admin in a corporate environment who even knew what their uptime was in days months or otherwise - they knew how long that server had been up without unplanned outages and frankly the number of major financial and other instituions who reboot servers weekly no matter what would make your eyes boggle - then again most of these are clustered servers if they are windows anyway thus uptime is protected even if a reboot is needed
Frankly you wouldnt know what was being rebooted where and when in most cases these days....
Hmm ive got windows NT servers with uptimes of 300 days and 2000 servers with over 150 days so i must be doing something wrong.
Then again i dont measure uptime like dick size - as long as my users can log in and work in normal working hours im happy.
My stable Windows servers never crash, never BSOD and i only bug fix when i need to - this bull about uptime being king is an obsession i will never ever get nor care about - its not how long its up but what you do with it while it is that matters.
And as someone running a linux only home network of 15 machines and linux firewalls ansd web servers i can tell you that in real terms there is no difference between the stability of a well built linux and windows system.
The uptime jokes old and boring and only used to karma whore (the fact that it works says more about the moderators than anything else i could ever say BTW) so why dont you find a new one ?
most countries consider defence to be important - sure it might not seem it to us but still there is an argument. Oh and most third world countries are not dictatorships.
Why do americans have this dream that the rest of the world is just like them ? most countries in the third world would be happy withy having enough food to feed theior populations and basic health care and literacy let alone handheld PC's
And what government funding ? if a government cannot get money to paty for health, education and even food hows it going to fund $2000 PC's ? most of these countries have virtually no ele electrical infrastructure or telecoms systems at all.
This computers for the third world bull is getting tired - if people want to help these countries may i suggest joining a volunteer group and actually going there - you might find that access to a computer is about the last thing on peoples minds in countries like this.
Back in the late 90's that was how business was done and MS were not alone in it - there were other companies out there. As for commenting on companies who directly compete with MS going broke i would have to point out that Lotus managed it on their own - with no upgrades to a wheezing product they stuck users with 123 or office choices for too long and then brought out a buggy and unstable SmartSuite product which lost them most of the customer base they had remaining.
1. Have you used marijuana at all within the last three years? - NO 2. Have you used marijuana more than a total of 15 times in your life? - No 3. Have you used any other illegal drug (including anabolic steroids after February 27, 1991) at all in the past 10 years? - NO 4. Have you used any other illegal drug (including anabolic steroids after February 27, 1991) more than a total of five times in your life? - NO 5. Have you ever sold any illegal drug for profit? - NO 6. Have you ever used an illegal drug (no matter how many times or how long ago)while in a law enforcement or prosecutorial position, or in a position which carries with it a high level of responsibility or public trust? - NO
Not hard is it really ? what are you trying to say here - the majority of the population can answer NO to all of those..
There have been user groups since before linux existed....
I have belonged or belong to Progress user Groups (PUG), Windows NT User Groupsd, Windows 2000 user groups, (these actually supported by MS), Mac user groups, Unix user groups (SCO used to have some good ones) and many many others.
user groups are not just the preserve of Linux or OSS - this is a sorry indictment on the age of Slashdot Staffers and not worthy of a front page post - so what is there is a.Net user group - if there are users then why not ?
Please post some actual news and insight instead of this ok.
He does have some donated stuff apparently... thats an error. and from memory he lost his last job in the dot.com collapse.
But the thing is as i said K5 never made claims to be Open Source, GPL or anything and as long as rusty actually states he is making his living from it then i dont mind - he is upfront and he provides services for those who dont want to pay.
Its a different thing to begging for money and spamming like lilo was my point
Fair enough guys - if im wrong on the redhat base then i am wrong and i will admit it.
I still modify nothing about my comments on SuSe and their ISO etc and personal edition but if i am in error then i am . Thanks for pointing that out with courtesy..
BTW Charles - the AC is my sig and not directed at you
HMMM the plot thickens. or does it... The fact is that large parts of it owe a lot to Red Hat linux no matter how far it has diverged..
Im not even going to get into the uselessness of the personal edition with all its missing apps, the lack of DVD support, the concoluted installation, the no iso policy etc etc. Basically Suse are not whati would think we want to be the standard for linux vendors, sure they produce a great product.. at a price. But when its approaching 80% the cost of a Windows XP license (here in AU) for personal and thats missing many apps mandrake and debian have for nothing then i have to wonder.
If it uses RPM it uses some Red Hat code... sorry but thats the facts maam
Rusty doesnt run and open source site - he doesnt have donated servers or bandwidth he pays for it and K5 is pretty much his whole life at the moment - if you want to subscribe you get some features but if you dont then you can still use the site as it used to be - the features from subsription are new ones.
This is a commiunity site and people have a choice, Rusty agnoized over the subscription idea for over a year before doing it. The OPN issue is a very different one entirely - rusty doesnt force his views down anyones throat and he never spams people - he has never acted like lilo ONCE and to compare the 2 is irellevant.
Not all websites and blogs are owned by large companies you know.... (wonder what sites i would be thinking about here ?)
But it is interesting to note that the three standards all have soimething in common...
1. Built on Red Hat 2. Commercially sold and focused distros (sure you can download them all but Suse is some 7gb of packages with no ISO and to purchase personal in AU costs $175...) they are the 3 distros which appear most focused on packaged box products 3. ALl 3 like to see themselves as leaders in the open source movement
This comes to mind after the self annoucement on Mandrakes site that they were on of the standard distibutions of linux.... and they are part of the standards groups as well...
Come on - the fact is that the three distros are built on one base - Red Hat. They use the same packages in most case and in my mind are pretty much the same thing.
If LSB wants to be a serious thing instead of a back slapping software tick then they need a diverse Standard - the best GNU Linux at the moment for development and use from all i have tried is Debian yet its not a standard... What about Slackware ?...
In short doing a bit of investigating of the members of the LSB groups and the supposed standard bearers may make some things clear... i did - and the terms of the standards make it clear that rather than the 3 mentioned distibutions being the best the fact that they were the 3 who submitted and that they all use the one base and RPM seems to indicate simply that Red Hat is an industry standard..something we all knew anyway.
) Having them say it "isn't my job to do..." Bullshit. You're paid to support my machine. You can set boundaries (don't install chat software, for example) but when I need a tool to get a job done, or I need a machine running, damn it I need it.
Sure and we support photocopiers, printers, coffee machines... most IT departments are understaffed and depending on the problem it aint my job. The web page you want to look at doesnt work ? not my job, that app is fucked ? yeah its a developer problem not my job.. My guys are so overr worked most of them thing a 14 hour day is a holiday so they say this a lot.
2) Being told "I'll get on it soon," then waiting weeks for the solution. Hey, I'll do it myself. But if I have to do it myself, you're not doing your job (and I'm probably not doing my job).
Maybe he has 100 open jobs in his queue and is working 16 hour days? geez did you ever thing about that - my guys support in average 300 people each and get paid $35k AU for that - thats about 18k US - so maybe this guys is just SIMPLY THAT BUSY!
3) Trying to help out by "fixing" working systems, especially during crunch times. Our IT guy decided to upgrade a linux kernel on a working laptops the day before a major demo. The kernel didn't work, and the collective blood pressure in the lab went up quite a bit.
He has his orders from his management - he doesnt do them he gets sacked - thats his job. Stop being so self centered
4) Being a tactless prick. "Why are you using X? Only halfwits use X! Use Y instead." I use X because it works. Now fuck off.
Cause Y is the corporate standard and his job is to make sure that the rules are followed - if not he loses it .
You sound to me like a frustrated expert who would love to this yourself but im well aware of what you are - programmer, degreed, experienced and with a massive EGO. We deal daily with hundreds of customers and any number of them can and will get us in deep shit - your printer doesnt work ? Guess what the CEO's secretary lost a file and she can get the IT guys sacked - you cant. Guess who pulls rank ? How about the level of work the average 2nd level guy does.. If he's lucky hes keeping his head above water.
We love people who install unauthorised software or screw with their systems settings - we adore them - it means one less user to support. Maybe the next time that IT moron comes up you can ask him how his day is and what his workload is like.. After all we work in the same industry and you might just find that
A. he is working very very very hard B. He's human after all C. You might get better support if he likes you and thinks you respect him - see point B
As an IT Manager in mid level of a multi national company i would like to see CIO's and CTO's held responsible for their actions. The company i work for made well over $200 million US profit for the region last year but because they promised $300 million to the market they embarked on a cost cutting orgy. Im down to 4 staff from 8 and no budgets, none of mu guys or I have had a payrise in 2 years and our average bonus last year was $500 - that for an average (for me) of 74 hours a week. My guys have worked harder than ever before but they get nothing, training is promised and not delivered, and and all benefits stripped away and when they get better paid job offers my best staff have to leave as our CTO wont 'pay for his own staff like blackmail'
He of course gets shares... lots of them. In fact he got a payrise last year for his efforts.
Ho about this - when cutting costs the first thing to go is the management share vesting schemes, then the management bonuses, then the management take a pay cut - if i screwed up the way management here did i would be unemployed, they have all gotten bonuses.
Tell me, as a CTO, how am i expected to deliver support to a user base of 1300+ staff with 4 support guys (thats it - no helpdesk just 4) and still maintain some service level? Id really like to hear the wisdom of the wise ?
Which is fine unless you bought this PC cause it was cheap and you don't have another and you need to get this working to get on the net.....
This sort of stuff is something other distros can manage but Lindows cannot and yet people keep defending them. Perhaps they should have spent more time in the test lab and less in court.
unless you install the likes of lycoris or mandrake no office comes bundled with Linux either and from memory open office is not bundled with any. If you use debian for example you apt-get what you want.
Most people buying a windows PC bundle (mums and dads) get Works included which is as good for home users as open office or k office (yes i run both under debian and they're ok - not great and not 100% stable but what is)
lets compare apples with apples - the choices are there, you can get freeware office suites for windows as you can for linux, so making this comparison is somewhat invalid unless you want to use Office and then you have to pay for it. Thats choice - you can choose another office suite if you want to.
Of course thats ignoring Lycoris who have had a fully working single CD desktop linux in build 44 for about 12 months now - it even runs windows apps and has Div-x and samba built in
Its freee as well. Lindows was a troll from the start but it has done a great job of covering up the work of companies like Lyrcoris
PS Xandros is a very intreresting company - you might find that a lot of the stuff they are developing at the moment is not open source if you do a bit of research..
The author is John Markoff - as in the man who pushed the line 'Kevin Mitnick is the worlds most dangerous man'and thus was reponsible for him being treated worse than many murderers - as if accuracy in his stories or trifles like the truth are going to to bother him or his employer..
" which has become the last surviving independent manufacturer of disk-drive platters based in the United States."
Works with this :
" Like many of Silicon Valley's other high-technology companies, Komag has moved all of its manufacturing operations to Asia and cut its cost structure in half in the last two years. There may finally be a payoff: several analysts said the company's turnaround would soon become more visible with the addition of a prominent new customer."
This indicates they don't do any manufacturing in the US? Thus are they a US manufacturer or a US owned Manufacturer ? and does this indicate there are non independant manufacturers in the US - for example IBM with US plants ? The word 'independant' is too important to be edited out of the slashdot story as it spins it in a new direction - there may be other manufacturers in the USA (i have no idea where to find out) but Komag is ONE of the last few independant ones (and i think US owned might be more valid).
This is more interesting :
" The company is left with two modern factories in Malaysia. It is controlled by two New York-based hedge funds, JDS Capital and Cerberus Partners, which specialize in acquiring debt in distressed companies. They currently hold 57.6 percent of the company's shares."
So what manufacturing do they do in the US ? I suspect they have one single disk media plant and the platters are sold to OEM's for use in their drives. (they do - see Komags Website - they supply Seagate, maxtor and WD.
But in fact they don't seem to have a manufacturing plant in the us according to them - from their website
"Komag maintains two R&D centers in the San Francisco Bay Area and manufactures our disks in Malaysia. "
That indicates the plant that the NY Times is talking about is one of their R&D plants and not a production plant. Which it is as Komag lists San Jose and Santa Rosa as their 2 R&D plants - and for my mind R&D isn't manufacture...
So in fact are they a US manufacturer or a US owned manufacturer ? There is a difference to my mind as IBM are a US owned manufacturer.... In fact the article looks like a piece aimed at building the company's stock ahead of their relisting on the share market and not a piece about technology per se.
" It hasn't been easy. On Monday, Dr. Bajorek's company will announce that it is successfully emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy, which the company entered in May 2001."
Honestly before commenting please read the article... Companies in Chapter 11 are not traded thus they have a 0.00 dollar share price..
But i think security of software is often down to the admin... I mean you can secure any operating system if you know what you are doing and its easy to build an insecure box - linux and windows.
How secure is an out of the box mandrake install ? or a windows 2000 ?
A good admin who is a pro will work hard to secure his servers and patch and look after them - a bad admin is a bad admin regardless of the OS
This is indeed an excellent read and well worth the time - if you want some other online books which discuss the earlier days of computing and hacker culture try these
Free As In Freedom - Sam Williams - A biography of Richard Stallman and an excellent read for those who would like to understand the man a bit more or even understand how GNU and Open Source actually happen. I reccomend this to even people who dislike RMS (as i did) as you will understand the man from a new perspective
The Cathedral and the Bazzar- Eric Raymond - This book has been condemmed and praised by many and provides an intersting look at open source and the different models of software - worth a read
There are heaps more out there - post them as you find them - BTW if you have a bit of cash to spend i reccomend Hackers by Steven Levy and Fire in the Valley by freiburger and swain for 2 more great books on computer and PC history
The company makes systems for space, marine and air and sells to the military and private enterprise. They make some very interesting systems and anyone interested in this sort of stuff or wanting to know just how non new this technology is head over and have a read. There are also sample images to show resolution etc of the systems.
" Also, what about 3rd party access? What if the government starts sharing info with advertisers?"
Not something likely to happen as the sort of systems that can do this tend to be used for fairly sensetive uses (read spying) and cost massive amounts of money.
The government often denies they exist so why would they sell the data ? and what data - its images ? they could be of anyone.
I somehow think that no one would use a $650'000 camera to spy on you and your girlfriend - they're to busy hanging out over britney spears house taking videos for that:)
Amongst all the comments that will flow about big brother etc it is interesting to note that there have been satellite systems in existance that can see small details from space since the late 1980's.
What we are talking about here is a gyroscopic stabilised mount which enables cameras on Police helicopters to get a clearer picture at long range. Some of the uses pointed out here are surveilance of suspects, search parties etc. The camera systems have existed on law enforcement helicopters for about 10 years that i can recall and have been getting more advanced every year - its hardly a violation of your rights in a new form unless of course you are worrying about the cops reading the paper over your shoulder.
At $650,000 US its a bit more than a toy and i dont see it being something used by a peeping tom - it raises a few issues on privacy but the fact is Police around the world have had the ability for years its just been an issue with vibration which is amplified the more you zoom making things like license plates harder to read etc.
Interesting but not a massive breakthrough and not something id lose sleep worrying about - the only people who would need worry would be people who were hiding from the police in the first place and it might even save some lives when used on searches.
PS some cooler uses of gyrostablised systems like this (if you like that sort of thing) can be found in new generation FLIR and Laser targeting systems on military aircraft (think the article mentions it)
Slashdot Mirror
Mine stay up 24 and 7 365 but i can afford to accept five 9 uptime and still not worry about downtime
I worked half my career in banking systems and I can tell you that having seen mainfames and unix and windows in all of them that none of them are better than the other - there is this desire to quote uptime like a god but the simple fact is that most of the server uptimes i see quoted are webservers - hardly demanding
Those of us who have to run app servers and file print know that nothing is perfect - we build our systems carefully no matter what OS we use but we are also aware that there will be times when we need to reboot a box no matter what it is (SCO and memory leaks is much more fun than Windows NT4 anywday btw and if you want to see real issues try RS series mainframes running Hogan...)
As i said uptime is like penis size - irrelevant - ive never ever met a system admin in a corporate environment who even knew what their uptime was in days months or otherwise - they knew how long that server had been up without unplanned outages and frankly the number of major financial and other instituions who reboot servers weekly no matter what would make your eyes boggle - then again most of these are clustered servers if they are windows anyway thus uptime is protected even if a reboot is needed
Frankly you wouldnt know what was being rebooted where and when in most cases these days....
Hmm ive got windows NT servers with uptimes of 300 days and 2000 servers with over 150 days so i must be doing something wrong.
Then again i dont measure uptime like dick size - as long as my users can log in and work in normal working hours im happy.
My stable Windows servers never crash, never BSOD and i only bug fix when i need to - this bull about uptime being king is an obsession i will never ever get nor care about - its not how long its up but what you do with it while it is that matters.
And as someone running a linux only home network of 15 machines and linux firewalls ansd web servers i can tell you that in real terms there is no difference between the stability of a well built linux and windows system.
The uptime jokes old and boring and only used to karma whore (the fact that it works says more about the moderators than anything else i could ever say BTW) so why dont you find a new one ?
most countries consider defence to be important - sure it might not seem it to us but still there is an argument. Oh and most third world countries are not dictatorships.
Why do americans have this dream that the rest of the world is just like them ? most countries in the third world would be happy withy having enough food to feed theior populations and basic health care and literacy let alone handheld PC's
And what government funding ? if a government cannot get money to paty for health, education and even food hows it going to fund $2000 PC's ? most of these countries have virtually no ele electrical infrastructure or telecoms systems at all.
This computers for the third world bull is getting tired - if people want to help these countries may i suggest joining a volunteer group and actually going there - you might find that access to a computer is about the last thing on peoples minds in countries like this.
Back in the late 90's that was how business was done and MS were not alone in it - there were other companies out there. As for commenting on companies who directly compete with MS going broke i would have to point out that Lotus managed it on their own - with no upgrades to a wheezing product they stuck users with 123 or office choices for too long and then brought out a buggy and unstable SmartSuite product which lost them most of the customer base they had remaining.
1. Have you used marijuana at all within the last three years? - NO
2. Have you used marijuana more than a total of 15 times in your life? - No
3. Have you used any other illegal drug (including anabolic steroids after February 27, 1991) at all in the past 10 years? - NO
4. Have you used any other illegal drug (including anabolic steroids after February 27, 1991) more than a total of five times in your life? - NO
5. Have you ever sold any illegal drug for profit? - NO
6. Have you ever used an illegal drug (no matter how many times or how long ago)while in a law enforcement or prosecutorial position, or in a position which carries with it a high level of responsibility or public trust? - NO
Not hard is it really ? what are you trying to say here - the majority of the population can answer NO to all of those..
There have been user groups since before linux existed....
.Net user group - if there are users then why not ?
I have belonged or belong to Progress user Groups (PUG), Windows NT User Groupsd, Windows 2000 user groups, (these actually supported by MS), Mac user groups, Unix user groups (SCO used to have some good ones) and many many others.
user groups are not just the preserve of Linux or OSS - this is a sorry indictment on the age of Slashdot Staffers and not worthy of a front page post - so what is there is a
Please post some actual news and insight instead of this ok.
He does have some donated stuff apparently... thats an error. and from memory he lost his last job in the dot.com collapse.
But the thing is as i said K5 never made claims to be Open Source, GPL or anything and as long as rusty actually states he is making his living from it then i dont mind - he is upfront and he provides services for those who dont want to pay.
Its a different thing to begging for money and spamming like lilo was my point
Fair enough guys - if im wrong on the redhat base then i am wrong and i will admit it.
I still modify nothing about my comments on SuSe and their ISO etc and personal edition but if i am in error then i am . Thanks for pointing that out with courtesy..
BTW Charles - the AC is my sig and not directed at you
Hum... SuSE is not based on Redhat.
yet it uses standard RED HAT rpms.....
HMMM the plot thickens. or does it... The fact is that large parts of it owe a lot to Red Hat linux no matter how far it has diverged..
Im not even going to get into the uselessness of the personal edition with all its missing apps, the lack of DVD support, the concoluted installation, the no iso policy etc etc. Basically Suse are not whati would think we want to be the standard for linux vendors, sure they produce a great product.. at a price. But when its approaching 80% the cost of a Windows XP license (here in AU) for personal and thats missing many apps mandrake and debian have for nothing then i have to wonder.
If it uses RPM it uses some Red Hat code... sorry but thats the facts maam
Have the guts to post as a user name
Rusty doesnt run and open source site - he doesnt have donated servers or bandwidth he pays for it and K5 is pretty much his whole life at the moment - if you want to subscribe you get some features but if you dont then you can still use the site as it used to be - the features from subsription are new ones.
This is a commiunity site and people have a choice, Rusty agnoized over the subscription idea for over a year before doing it. The OPN issue is a very different one entirely - rusty doesnt force his views down anyones throat and he never spams people - he has never acted like lilo ONCE and to compare the 2 is irellevant.
Not all websites and blogs are owned by large companies you know.... (wonder what sites i would be thinking about here ?)
But it is interesting to note that the three standards all have soimething in common ...
1. Built on Red Hat
2. Commercially sold and focused distros (sure you can download them all but Suse is some 7gb of packages with no ISO and to purchase personal in AU costs $175...) they are the 3 distros which appear most focused on packaged box products
3. ALl 3 like to see themselves as leaders in the open source movement
This comes to mind after the self annoucement on Mandrakes site that they were on of the standard distibutions of linux.... and they are part of the standards groups as well...
Come on - the fact is that the three distros are built on one base - Red Hat. They use the same packages in most case and in my mind are pretty much the same thing.
If LSB wants to be a serious thing instead of a back slapping software tick then they need a diverse Standard - the best GNU Linux at the moment for development and use from all i have tried is Debian yet its not a standard... What about Slackware ?...
In short doing a bit of investigating of the members of the LSB groups and the supposed standard bearers may make some things clear... i did - and the terms of the standards make it clear that rather than the 3 mentioned distibutions being the best the fact that they were the 3 who submitted and that they all use the one base and RPM seems to indicate simply that Red Hat is an industry standard..something we all knew anyway.
) Having them say it "isn't my job to do..." Bullshit. You're paid to support my machine. You can set boundaries (don't install chat software, for example) but when I need a tool to get a job done, or I need a machine running, damn it I need it.
Sure and we support photocopiers, printers, coffee machines... most IT departments are understaffed and depending on the problem it aint my job. The web page you want to look at doesnt work ? not my job, that app is fucked ? yeah its a developer problem not my job.. My guys are so overr worked most of them thing a 14 hour day is a holiday so they say this a lot.
2) Being told "I'll get on it soon," then waiting weeks for the solution. Hey, I'll do it myself. But if I have to do it myself, you're not doing your job (and I'm probably not doing my job).
Maybe he has 100 open jobs in his queue and is working 16 hour days? geez did you ever thing about that - my guys support in average 300 people each and get paid $35k AU for that - thats about 18k US - so maybe this guys is just SIMPLY THAT BUSY!
3) Trying to help out by "fixing" working systems, especially during crunch times. Our IT guy decided to upgrade a linux kernel on a working laptops the day before a major demo. The kernel didn't work, and the collective blood pressure in the lab went up quite a bit.
He has his orders from his management - he doesnt do them he gets sacked - thats his job. Stop being so self centered
4) Being a tactless prick. "Why are you using X? Only halfwits use X! Use Y instead." I use X because it works. Now fuck off.
Cause Y is the corporate standard and his job is to make sure that the rules are followed - if not he loses it .
You sound to me like a frustrated expert who would love to this yourself but im well aware of what you are - programmer, degreed, experienced and with a massive EGO. We deal daily with hundreds of customers and any number of them can and will get us in deep shit - your printer doesnt work ? Guess what the CEO's secretary lost a file and she can get the IT guys sacked - you cant. Guess who pulls rank ? How about the level of work the average 2nd level guy does.. If he's lucky hes keeping his head above water.
We love people who install unauthorised software or screw with their systems settings - we adore them - it means one less user to support. Maybe the next time that IT moron comes up you can ask him how his day is and what his workload is like.. After all we work in the same industry and you might just find that
A. he is working very very very hard
B. He's human after all
C. You might get better support if he likes you and thinks you respect him - see point B
As an IT Manager in mid level of a multi national company i would like to see CIO's and CTO's held responsible for their actions. The company i work for made well over $200 million US profit for the region last year but because they promised $300 million to the market they embarked on a cost cutting orgy.
Im down to 4 staff from 8 and no budgets, none of mu guys or I have had a payrise in 2 years and our average bonus last year was $500 - that for an average (for me) of 74 hours a week. My guys have worked harder than ever before but they get nothing, training is promised and not delivered, and and all benefits stripped away and when they get better paid job offers my best staff have to leave as our CTO wont 'pay for his own staff like blackmail'
He of course gets shares... lots of them. In fact he got a payrise last year for his efforts.
Ho about this - when cutting costs the first thing to go is the management share vesting schemes, then the management bonuses, then the management take a pay cut - if i screwed up the way management here did i would be unemployed, they have all gotten bonuses.
Tell me, as a CTO, how am i expected to deliver support to a user base of 1300+ staff with 4 support guys (thats it - no helpdesk just 4) and still maintain some service level? Id really like to hear the wisdom of the wise ?
Which is fine unless you bought this PC cause it was cheap and you don't have another and you need to get this working to get on the net.....
This sort of stuff is something other distros can manage but Lindows cannot and yet people keep defending them. Perhaps they should have spent more time in the test lab and less in court.
Jus a point
unless you install the likes of lycoris or mandrake no office comes bundled with Linux either and from memory open office is not bundled with any. If you use debian for example you apt-get what you want.
Most people buying a windows PC bundle (mums and dads) get Works included which is as good for home users as open office or k office (yes i run both under debian and they're ok - not great and not 100% stable but what is)
lets compare apples with apples - the choices are there, you can get freeware office suites for windows as you can for linux, so making this comparison is somewhat invalid unless you want to use Office and then you have to pay for it. Thats choice - you can choose another office suite if you want to.
Of course thats ignoring Lycoris who have had a fully working single CD desktop linux in build 44 for about 12 months now - it even runs windows apps and has Div-x and samba built in
Its freee as well. Lindows was a troll from the start but it has done a great job of covering up the work of companies like Lyrcoris
PS Xandros is a very intreresting company - you might find that a lot of the stuff they are developing at the moment is not open source if you do a bit of research..
Really why bother
The author is John Markoff - as in the man who pushed the line 'Kevin Mitnick is the worlds most dangerous man'and thus was reponsible for him being treated worse than many murderers - as if accuracy in his stories or trifles like the truth are going to to bother him or his employer..
Works with this :
This indicates they don't do any manufacturing in the US? Thus are they a US manufacturer or a US owned Manufacturer ? and does this indicate there are non independant manufacturers in the US - for example IBM with US plants ? The word 'independant' is too important to be edited out of the slashdot story as it spins it in a new direction - there may be other manufacturers in the USA (i have no idea where to find out) but Komag is ONE of the last few independant ones (and i think US owned might be more valid).
This is more interesting :
So what manufacturing do they do in the US ? I suspect they have one single disk media plant and the platters are sold to OEM's for use in their drives. (they do - see Komags Website - they supply Seagate, maxtor and WD.
But in fact they don't seem to have a manufacturing plant in the us according to them - from their website
That indicates the plant that the NY Times is talking about is one of their R&D plants and not a production plant. Which it is as Komag lists San Jose and Santa Rosa as their 2 R&D plants - and for my mind R&D isn't manufacture...
So in fact are they a US manufacturer or a US owned manufacturer ? There is a difference to my mind as IBM are a US owned manufacturer.... In fact the article looks like a piece aimed at building the company's stock ahead of their relisting on the share market and not a piece about technology per se.
from the article
" It hasn't been easy. On Monday, Dr. Bajorek's company will announce that it is successfully emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy, which the company entered in May 2001."
Honestly before commenting please read the article... Companies in Chapter 11 are not traded thus they have a 0.00 dollar share price..
But i think security of software is often down to the admin... I mean you can secure any operating system if you know what you are doing and its easy to build an insecure box - linux and windows.
How secure is an out of the box mandrake install ? or a windows 2000 ?
A good admin who is a pro will work hard to secure his servers and patch and look after them - a bad admin is a bad admin regardless of the OS
This is indeed an excellent read and well worth the time - if you want some other online books which discuss the earlier days of computing and hacker culture try these
Free As In Freedom - Sam Williams - A biography of Richard Stallman and an excellent read for those who would like to understand the man a bit more or even understand how GNU and Open Source actually happen. I reccomend this to even people who dislike RMS (as i did) as you will understand the man from a new perspective
The Cathedral and the Bazzar- Eric Raymond - This book has been condemmed and praised by many and provides an intersting look at open source and the different models of software - worth a read
Underground : Hacking, madness and obsession on the electronic frontier - Sulette Dreyfuss - A great look inside the world of the cracker and very intersting and compelling to read
There are heaps more out there - post them as you find them - BTW if you have a bit of cash to spend i reccomend Hackers by Steven Levy and Fire in the Valley by freiburger and swain for 2 more great books on computer and PC history
For those wanting to find out more about this stuff some links.
Wescam page on their camere systems
The MX 20 is i believe the system they are talking about - has been widely fitted on naval and coast guard aircraft for a number of years
The company makes systems for space, marine and air and sells to the military and private enterprise. They make some very interesting systems and anyone interested in this sort of stuff or wanting to know just how non new this technology is head over and have a read. There are also sample images to show resolution etc of the systems.
" Also, what about 3rd party access? What if the government starts sharing info with advertisers?"
:)
Not something likely to happen as the sort of systems that can do this tend to be used for fairly sensetive uses (read spying) and cost massive amounts of money.
The government often denies they exist so why would they sell the data ? and what data - its images ? they could be of anyone.
I somehow think that no one would use a $650'000 camera to spy on you and your girlfriend - they're to busy hanging out over britney spears house taking videos for that
Amongst all the comments that will flow about big brother etc it is interesting to note that there have been satellite systems in existance that can see small details from space since the late 1980's.
What we are talking about here is a gyroscopic stabilised mount which enables cameras on Police helicopters to get a clearer picture at long range. Some of the uses pointed out here are surveilance of suspects, search parties etc. The camera systems have existed on law enforcement helicopters for about 10 years that i can recall and have been getting more advanced every year - its hardly a violation of your rights in a new form unless of course you are worrying about the cops reading the paper over your shoulder.
At $650,000 US its a bit more than a toy and i dont see it being something used by a peeping tom - it raises a few issues on privacy but the fact is Police around the world have had the ability for years its just been an issue with vibration which is amplified the more you zoom making things like license plates harder to read etc.
Interesting but not a massive breakthrough and not something id lose sleep worrying about - the only people who would need worry would be people who were hiding from the police in the first place and it might even save some lives when used on searches.
PS some cooler uses of gyrostablised systems like this (if you like that sort of thing) can be found in new generation FLIR and Laser targeting systems on military aircraft (think the article mentions it)