"Sorry, my soul is NOT for sale... Always wondering when you'll end up being named in a lawsuit because you may have incorporated some of their worthless IP in a project you're working on?"
Oh, brother.
a.) Microsoft's not going to show you something they don't want you to see.
b.) By seeing the code, you'd know what to avoid, no harm there.
c.) MS won't let us see the code, bitch bitch bitch! MS will let us see the code, bitch bitch bich.
Well i wish I had more info about your particular situation, sadly I do not so the best I can do is share a technique I've used. Admit you're wrong about something. Even if you're not. (Although, if you're like me, I'm sure the opportunity where you really are wrong will materialize.) Admit fault, and apologize. If you have to swallow your pride and do it, give it a shot.
I'll share an example with you: I got into it with my former boss once. (Note: Former long after this incident, so spare me the obvious Trump line.:P) I blamed IBM for a problem on another coworker's machine. She, having been a long time employee before working at this partciular company, knew full well that IBM has a very strong engineering sense and wouldn't possibly make a product that would inconvenience people. I knew full well that something they had pre-installed was causing severe lag in the machine preventing the engineer from working. Obviously I was in the right, so when she told me in front of everybody else I didn't know what I was talking about, I was righteous in blowing up at her in private.
Here's the thing, though. We were(are) good friends. We never had a problem like this before. So when we sat face to face eyes ablaze with anger ready to have a dueling of words, I realized this was not a situation we should ever be in. I mean, she is one of the most rational people I have ever met, and to wind her up like that... well there had to be something more to it. Then it dawned on me. I paused the.. uh.. exchange and I said "I've made one too many cracks at IBM's expense, haven't I?" The anger in her eyes almost immediately melted away. I was right. I was in the wrong. IBM had been the butt of my jokes for like a year, and she quietly let them go by. But they never really went anywhere, they just built up somewhere. And when I publically blasted IBM in a meeting, she had finally had enough.
When I pointed out my contribution to the problem, it immediately defused the situation. Suddenly we were our old selves again and we both figured out what it'd take to prevent that type of thing from happening again. I'm happy to say that by the time our chat was over, there was no discomfort at the office. There was no "ugh that was an ugly moment." It was settled, we were both cool.
If I had been more of an asshole, I could have pursued it. I could have attempted to drill her into the ground. (Although I will say that she's far brighter than I am, I could have easily gone down in flames. hehe.) Instead, quite by accident, I discovered how to get us back onto a pleasant discussion level. Kind of embarrasing on my part, though. heh.
I don't know if this helps you at all. But it might be worth trying. Admit (or claim) a problem was your fault. Maybe you won't seem so threatening to him when he realizes you're not Mr. Perfect.
"Do you really think this is the place to ask that question?"
Why not? There are a significant number of people viewing this forums that have first hand personal experience that it'd be useful to hear from. Ever tried to go camera shopping? Lots of them put up a good fight. Pain in the ass.
"We've come to expect decent security on desktops and servers, why not PDAs as well? At least it may make manufacturers think twice before jumping on the MS bandwagon."
Seeing as how niether the PocketPC nor the PalmOS was built from the ground up with the idea of getting on the net right away, I'm not sure why you'd put any more faith in any PDA short of the Zaurus with its Linux based roots. (Yes, I realize you basically stated this in your subject line, but I don't see how you could ignore Palm in this case given their large market.)
I will say this, though: PDA's aren't like computers, at least not today. Your PDA is chained to your computer. It is, for all intents and purposes, a peripheral. You can't, for example, get on the net with either a Palm or a PocketPC and download/install an app. You have to go through the syncing operation. Because of this very nature of these devices, you can rather easily switch to a brand new unit or get back up to speed on one that's been completely reset. (Doubly useful if your PDA is damaged/stolen, which they are far more prone to than virus damage.) In short, virus security is not that high of priority. It is 'a reaason' to be using Linux on your PDA, but it's so low on the totem pole compared to usability that I wouldn't expect a lot of people to give it that serious of thought. Sad? Maybe. Whoopee, download a patch.
I'm not trying to completely poo poo your point. It's valid. I'm just trying to put it in the proper perspective. The lesson I learned from this story isn't that I should ignore the idea of getting a Palm or a PocketPC, but rather that I should turn lock down the Bluetooth feature on whatever PDA I end up getting. The nice thing about BT is that it does have a trust based relationship doohicky going on with it. I know that's true for PocketPC, and I cannot imagine that the Palm or Zaurus wouldn't respect it either. That's just plain good sense whether the OS is secure or not.
"At least now I can justify the Zaurus over the 'other guys'!"
You'd jump to the $700 'distant 3rd' palm device that's nearly twice as big just to get around the potential of getting a virus that would be hard pressed to get to your system by simply adjusting your bluetooth settings? Pardon me, but the worst case scenario is you reset the PDA and re-sync it.
Yeah, yeah. Except with you, it's personal. This implies that I did something to really upset you. You want to get me back but it hasn't been fruitful. I know. I've been there. Years ago I used to post AC just to get back at people. Blah blah blah.
Well whatever it was, you have two options: 1.) keep trying to get my goat, or 2.) let's settle it. I'm for #2. I'm not the bad guy that all 3 of the people that hate me say I am.;)
"The OSS community needs to attract artists to the OSS movement. Attract artists."
Artists aren't just good for making pretty skins. The job of an artist is to communicate. A good artist knows how to tell a story. UI design isn't a far leap from that. Give them a list of requirements and say "create an interface for this", and a talented artist is going to cook up something useful and most likely surprising.
So how do you attract artists such as myself to do this? Well I'm not 100% certain on that. This is the first time I've heard of anybody wanting to get an artist on an OSS project. Strange since I'm on Slashdot WAY more than most artists. Just putting out a feeler would be good. Put something in your sig and post on Slashdot or something. if it's an app that an artist may care about (like Mozilla, for example) then you might just get yourself a free-freelance artist. Alternatively, you could consider holding a contest. Gather up a prize like a video card or tablet or something, and have the artists show their work. Then, have people vote on the winner. A site I help maintain recently held a contest like that for a non-profit game, and they got a BUNCH of artwork out of it. The talent really came out, too!
Completely unrelated to the book, I fully expected a few jokes about the movie. But as of the time of writing where there's about 50 comments or so, nobody appears to have.
"Not because one is open source, vs. closed source, that shouldn't matter, if the people of the government are paying taxes, it should go to the best product that does the job, for the lowest TCO."
In the case of the gov't, I think there's a stronger factor at play: Don't be a slave to a company. The biggest danger I see with using Word (for example...) at gov't facilities is that MS is a broken file format away from forced upgrades. Granted, this hasn't happened in years. If you use Office 97 today, you're not in a world of hurt with 2000 users. (Note: That's as high as I went, I don't know if O2k3 broke 97 compatibility or not.) But I do remember back in the Office 95 days the transition to 97 was horrible. Everybody had to upgrade at once or the stragglers were instantly left out. The advantage of going Open Source here is that they're not totally tied to one vendor. I'm over dramatizing the situation a bit, but it's not a risk I'd want a gov't to take.
So what exactly is my rebuttal? Well I'm not totllay against what you're saying. I completely agree that they should choose based on what their requiremenets are. I just wanted to add the 'think of the future' variable in there. In which case, some compromise is okay.
" surprised that anyone believes the doc could engineer and build a new type of robot without some help from VIKI and without anyone noticing."
I think the whole point was that he snuck it under her nose. That's why his clues were so abstract.
Don't get me wrong, I see your point, but I don't think it's strong enough as you present it.
"And if he could, then again, why didn't he just instruct the robot to kill VIKI? It's dumb."
How would Sonny get past her? She'd just grab control of the other NS-5's and stop her. If Sonny succeeded, what would prevent USR from rebuilding VIKI and firing the doc so he couldn't stop her again? If there was a simpler solution, why wouldn't he take it?
I'll concede with you on one point, though, the nature of his containment by VIKI could easily have been explained better. The movie was weak in several areas, and that was one of them.
"The rest of the world doesn't care if the average American can speak their language as well as English."
You're right. I did miss the point, I misread the post I was replying to. I was thinking about people coming to the USA and being expected to speak English, not the other way around.
Sorry if I frustrated ya. That's what I get for trying to speed-write a post before fully comprehending what the discussion was about.:/
" I'm pretty sure you'd bitch about it, especially since they knocked on *your* door! "
No, I wouldn't. I know this for a fact because I've had several jobs where I had to communicate with non-english speaking people. I did not get impatient, nor did any of my coworkers. Though I'm sure incidents have occured, I've never witnessed them despite having plenty of opportunity. The frustration I have had with non-english speaking people is when they are at the counter in a customer service job. The job requires the ability to commmunicate with the customer, but they can't do it effectively. That's annoying, and it'd be annoying anywhere else in the world.
I understand your point a little more clearly, though. I think you are speaking more generally than I was. I was thinking about visitors coming to the USA and then taking up jobs. Didn't broaden my scope enough. I need to think about this a little more. I haven't witnessed this behaviour first hand. What I have dealt with was being put down because I wasn't bi-lingual.
Sorry if I frustrated ya. Shoulda done more reading and less writing.
Slashdot Mirror
"Sorry, my soul is NOT for sale... Always wondering when you'll end up being named in a lawsuit because you may have incorporated some of their worthless IP in a project you're working on?"
Oh, brother.
a.) Microsoft's not going to show you something they don't want you to see.
b.) By seeing the code, you'd know what to avoid, no harm there.
c.) MS won't let us see the code, bitch bitch bitch! MS will let us see the code, bitch bitch bich.
"Or they could, of course, take advantage of the technology they have now in the Xbox and let gamers listen to any sort of music they enjoy."
Why 'Or' instead of 'And'?
Well i wish I had more info about your particular situation, sadly I do not so the best I can do is share a technique I've used. Admit you're wrong about something. Even if you're not. (Although, if you're like me, I'm sure the opportunity where you really are wrong will materialize.) Admit fault, and apologize. If you have to swallow your pride and do it, give it a shot.
:P) I blamed IBM for a problem on another coworker's machine. She, having been a long time employee before working at this partciular company, knew full well that IBM has a very strong engineering sense and wouldn't possibly make a product that would inconvenience people. I knew full well that something they had pre-installed was causing severe lag in the machine preventing the engineer from working. Obviously I was in the right, so when she told me in front of everybody else I didn't know what I was talking about, I was righteous in blowing up at her in private.
.. uh.. exchange and I said "I've made one too many cracks at IBM's expense, haven't I?" The anger in her eyes almost immediately melted away. I was right. I was in the wrong. IBM had been the butt of my jokes for like a year, and she quietly let them go by. But they never really went anywhere, they just built up somewhere. And when I publically blasted IBM in a meeting, she had finally had enough.
I'll share an example with you: I got into it with my former boss once. (Note: Former long after this incident, so spare me the obvious Trump line.
Here's the thing, though. We were(are) good friends. We never had a problem like this before. So when we sat face to face eyes ablaze with anger ready to have a dueling of words, I realized this was not a situation we should ever be in. I mean, she is one of the most rational people I have ever met, and to wind her up like that... well there had to be something more to it. Then it dawned on me. I paused the
When I pointed out my contribution to the problem, it immediately defused the situation. Suddenly we were our old selves again and we both figured out what it'd take to prevent that type of thing from happening again. I'm happy to say that by the time our chat was over, there was no discomfort at the office. There was no "ugh that was an ugly moment." It was settled, we were both cool.
If I had been more of an asshole, I could have pursued it. I could have attempted to drill her into the ground. (Although I will say that she's far brighter than I am, I could have easily gone down in flames. hehe.) Instead, quite by accident, I discovered how to get us back onto a pleasant discussion level. Kind of embarrasing on my part, though. heh.
I don't know if this helps you at all. But it might be worth trying. Admit (or claim) a problem was your fault. Maybe you won't seem so threatening to him when he realizes you're not Mr. Perfect.
"Realism... in the form of a breast reduction for Lara."
Speak for yourself. Now we gots enough polygons to make those pyramids rooooound!
"Do you really think this is the place to ask that question?"
Why not? There are a significant number of people viewing this forums that have first hand personal experience that it'd be useful to hear from. Ever tried to go camera shopping? Lots of them put up a good fight. Pain in the ass.
Slashdot's just fine.
"We've come to expect decent security on desktops and servers, why not PDAs as well? At least it may make manufacturers think twice before jumping on the MS bandwagon."
Seeing as how niether the PocketPC nor the PalmOS was built from the ground up with the idea of getting on the net right away, I'm not sure why you'd put any more faith in any PDA short of the Zaurus with its Linux based roots. (Yes, I realize you basically stated this in your subject line, but I don't see how you could ignore Palm in this case given their large market.)
I will say this, though: PDA's aren't like computers, at least not today. Your PDA is chained to your computer. It is, for all intents and purposes, a peripheral. You can't, for example, get on the net with either a Palm or a PocketPC and download/install an app. You have to go through the syncing operation. Because of this very nature of these devices, you can rather easily switch to a brand new unit or get back up to speed on one that's been completely reset. (Doubly useful if your PDA is damaged/stolen, which they are far more prone to than virus damage.) In short, virus security is not that high of priority. It is 'a reaason' to be using Linux on your PDA, but it's so low on the totem pole compared to usability that I wouldn't expect a lot of people to give it that serious of thought. Sad? Maybe. Whoopee, download a patch.
I'm not trying to completely poo poo your point. It's valid. I'm just trying to put it in the proper perspective. The lesson I learned from this story isn't that I should ignore the idea of getting a Palm or a PocketPC, but rather that I should turn lock down the Bluetooth feature on whatever PDA I end up getting. The nice thing about BT is that it does have a trust based relationship doohicky going on with it. I know that's true for PocketPC, and I cannot imagine that the Palm or Zaurus wouldn't respect it either. That's just plain good sense whether the OS is secure or not.
"At least now I can justify the Zaurus over the 'other guys'!"
You'd jump to the $700 'distant 3rd' palm device that's nearly twice as big just to get around the potential of getting a virus that would be hard pressed to get to your system by simply adjusting your bluetooth settings? Pardon me, but the worst case scenario is you reset the PDA and re-sync it.
..and now I'm immune from negative moderations!
What are you talking about? We have been replying to each other's message. Look at the nested view, jack ass.
Yeah, yeah. Except with you, it's personal. This implies that I did something to really upset you. You want to get me back but it hasn't been fruitful. I know. I've been there. Years ago I used to post AC just to get back at people. Blah blah blah.
;)
Well whatever it was, you have two options: 1.) keep trying to get my goat, or 2.) let's settle it. I'm for #2. I'm not the bad guy that all 3 of the people that hate me say I am.
Let's see.. irrational anger... overzealous attempt to prove just how wrong I am... you must be a woman.
"Go jump off a cliff. We hate you, NanoGator. You post on every fucking story. You have no life, outside of Slashdot threads. Die."
Hehehe. You know you're doin something right when your opposition desperately wants you to die.
"But will it run Longhorn?"
Is Apple giving away an iPod to whoever uses this joke for the 100,000,000th time or something?
"The OSS community needs to attract artists to the OSS movement. Attract artists."
Artists aren't just good for making pretty skins. The job of an artist is to communicate. A good artist knows how to tell a story. UI design isn't a far leap from that. Give them a list of requirements and say "create an interface for this", and a talented artist is going to cook up something useful and most likely surprising.
So how do you attract artists such as myself to do this? Well I'm not 100% certain on that. This is the first time I've heard of anybody wanting to get an artist on an OSS project. Strange since I'm on Slashdot WAY more than most artists. Just putting out a feeler would be good. Put something in your sig and post on Slashdot or something. if it's an app that an artist may care about (like Mozilla, for example) then you might just get yourself a free-freelance artist. Alternatively, you could consider holding a contest. Gather up a prize like a video card or tablet or something, and have the artists show their work. Then, have people vote on the winner. A site I help maintain recently held a contest like that for a non-profit game, and they got a BUNCH of artwork out of it. The talent really came out, too!
Okay now I'm just rambling, hope this was useful.
Thanks, man. Have a nice night. :)
Nano
"Just admit to yourself that you failed it."
Yep, I made an ass of myself.
Completely unrelated to the book, I fully expected a few jokes about the movie. But as of the time of writing where there's about 50 comments or so, nobody appears to have.
So, yep, I failed it.
"Here come the jokes about I, Robot mostly from people who haven't read the book."
:P
A.) I read the 'book'. (Actually it was a short story, or a collection of short stories depending on which title you read.)
B.) This doesn't nullify my joke at all.
"You realize it was a book, right?"
You realize it was a short story about a robot named Robbie, right?
Here come the jokes about I Robot from mostly people who haven't seen the movie.
"Not because one is open source, vs. closed source, that shouldn't matter, if the people of the government are paying taxes, it should go to the best product that does the job, for the lowest TCO."
In the case of the gov't, I think there's a stronger factor at play: Don't be a slave to a company. The biggest danger I see with using Word (for example...) at gov't facilities is that MS is a broken file format away from forced upgrades. Granted, this hasn't happened in years. If you use Office 97 today, you're not in a world of hurt with 2000 users. (Note: That's as high as I went, I don't know if O2k3 broke 97 compatibility or not.) But I do remember back in the Office 95 days the transition to 97 was horrible. Everybody had to upgrade at once or the stragglers were instantly left out. The advantage of going Open Source here is that they're not totally tied to one vendor. I'm over dramatizing the situation a bit, but it's not a risk I'd want a gov't to take.
So what exactly is my rebuttal? Well I'm not totllay against what you're saying. I completely agree that they should choose based on what their requiremenets are. I just wanted to add the 'think of the future' variable in there. In which case, some compromise is okay.
"Did you learn any portuguese or not?"
Yes, I did. I also had lengthy chats with my friend down there to help me understand the customs.
" surprised that anyone believes the doc could engineer and build a new type of robot without some help from VIKI and without anyone noticing."
I think the whole point was that he snuck it under her nose. That's why his clues were so abstract.
Don't get me wrong, I see your point, but I don't think it's strong enough as you present it.
"And if he could, then again, why didn't he just instruct the robot to kill VIKI? It's dumb."
How would Sonny get past her? She'd just grab control of the other NS-5's and stop her. If Sonny succeeded, what would prevent USR from rebuilding VIKI and firing the doc so he couldn't stop her again? If there was a simpler solution, why wouldn't he take it?
I'll concede with you on one point, though, the nature of his containment by VIKI could easily have been explained better. The movie was weak in several areas, and that was one of them.
"The rest of the world doesn't care if the average American can speak their language as well as English."
:/
You're right. I did miss the point, I misread the post I was replying to. I was thinking about people coming to the USA and being expected to speak English, not the other way around.
Sorry if I frustrated ya. That's what I get for trying to speed-write a post before fully comprehending what the discussion was about.
" I'm pretty sure you'd bitch about it, especially since they knocked on *your* door! "
No, I wouldn't. I know this for a fact because I've had several jobs where I had to communicate with non-english speaking people. I did not get impatient, nor did any of my coworkers. Though I'm sure incidents have occured, I've never witnessed them despite having plenty of opportunity. The frustration I have had with non-english speaking people is when they are at the counter in a customer service job. The job requires the ability to commmunicate with the customer, but they can't do it effectively. That's annoying, and it'd be annoying anywhere else in the world.
I understand your point a little more clearly, though. I think you are speaking more generally than I was. I was thinking about visitors coming to the USA and then taking up jobs. Didn't broaden my scope enough. I need to think about this a little more. I haven't witnessed this behaviour first hand. What I have dealt with was being put down because I wasn't bi-lingual.
Sorry if I frustrated ya. Shoulda done more reading and less writing.
"Would you hurry up and kill yourself?"
Still persisting, eh? Guess being proven wrong is really damaging to some people.