Yeah, except the app doesn't belong to me so I can't rewrite it. All I can do is hope for compatible MSXML (data island) client support from another browser... That or keep needling the vendor to rewrite using standard compliant technologies.
Believe me, if I had that much sway, we wouldn't be having this conversation.:)
Almost all of the software we run requires Windows, and some of it also requires IE (so we actually will still be running IE, but only for approved applications and sites). That wasn't my decision, but the decision of the vendors we purchase from. We aren't anywhere near big enough to staff a dev dept to create this stuff in-house, and I'm not sure it would even come close to being cost effective if we did. I'm pushing vendors toward considering platform independent solutions whenever possible, but you have to understand that that is a ten-year decision for some of them, and they made committments (not just software purchases, but code base, training, employees) to MS that are not easily undone.
People are always posting comments like "Why does everyone still use MS when there are great tools like Linux, KDE, OpenOffice and Mozilla?" Well, it's because we can't run our business on just that. We need accounting software and lease management software and payroll software, and that means proprietary vendors who have made decisions in their self interest that force us to pick Windows.
If it makes you feel better, tho', I run our corporate intranet on Apache on Win2K and our mail server is currently, SunOS, and I'm switching it to debian Sarge in the fall.
Microsoft doesn't, but my software vendors do. We are in the the process of moving part of our customer management system to a new web-based software system that is built on J2EE, SQL and XML
The problem? It requires MSXML 3.0 because they use data islands to populate the web forms. Therefore, (for that application, at least) we have to use IE on Windows. Period.
Why switch to such an app? The other half of the software (the back-end) is the best in the industry - it runs on IBM UniData on NT/2K or AIX and requires only telnet on ANY platform. The integration between the two was compelling enough to make all the other requirements inconsequential.
They're good people though, and the IE requirement is actually a little weird considering that the document generation engine uses Apache FOP's XSL:FO renderer to generate PDFs, so they aren't opposed to non-MS software, I just think they really wanted to use data islands.
I keep working them on this, but the truth is, this is why MS pushes so hard for the attention of developers.
P.S. Why can't someone just write an MSXML 3.0 -compatable data island extension for FF?
(P.S. GMAIL invites! I woke up this morning and saw that my other gmail account got 2 new invites, so if you reply with a funny joke about sex and befriend me, I'll give em out to my two favorite ones.)
It simply isn't fair to blame Microsoft for the ignorance of their users.
No, no, no.... a *funny* joke about sex. No Gmail for you!
My original comment doesn't have anything to do with good vs. evil or money, so any such relationships you inferred in that regard are your own.
All I said was that since the guy in the article doesn't want patents to obstruct the proliferation of his inventions, the comparing him to Edison (who did) is not completely valid, and that Linus and Bill are similarly positioned.
There's no good or evil anywhere in there. Sheesh!
I might be hallucinating, but wasn't Edison (who invented AC generators, the phonograph and the motion picture camera/projector system) a patent hawk who did everything he could to extract money for every little invention he had a hand in creating? In fact, IIRC, that's why the motion picture industry set up shop in the (then) isolated desolation of Hollywood, California -- they wouldn't have to pay his exorbitant licensing fees out there.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like comparing this guy to Edison is like comparing Linus to Bill Gates.... in a comparative sort of way.
What I find offensive is the way the CIO tried to pass it off as though paying for company materials out of your own pocket somehow exemplifies your character and work attitude. That's what makes him a screwheaded dork.
The only good news is that some of these expenses might (repeat, **MIGHT**) be tax deductable, but it's going to depend on *A* *LOT* of factors, including your financial position, other tax deductions, etc. It might not work out, but it may be worth looking into. Maybe someone else here is already doing that or tried and failed?
"Cybersecurity consultant" huh? The only people I know of that use that title are PHBs looking for catchphrases on resumes, jackasses with A+ certifications that read a book on security once, my boss, and Kevin Mitnick.
Honestly, if you want to play games with your customers, you are going to teach your customers to play games. It's like one day, these jokers are going to wake up and realize that hey, maybe it wasn't such a good idea to inflate the prices on 99% of your inventory so we don't lose money on the other 1% that is on sale this week.
This crap more than anything is pushing me to local independent and online retailers (which really can't move merchandise like this because there are no salespeople and a significatntly lower personal investment in travel/time). Forgive the analogy, but it feels like dealing with Microsoft Office for crying out loud! 25 features I don't need -- and now have to figure out how to turn off -- so I can make it work like the five-year-old version I wanted.
I don't know how any company stays in business by annoying their customers to death. As far as I'm concerned, every single one of these large national franchise chains can just take their stupid idiotic corporate policy shell games and shove it.
Defender was hard enough with a joystick and five buttons spread out over a wide two-hand console. I can't imagine playing it on my cell phone with a keyboard the size of a mini-post-it note (and my big fat tree-trunk thumbs) would be even remotely entertaining.
If they were gonna steal a game, they shoulda done some research first. Something like Galaxian or Galaga would have been a better fit.
Eventually all of this will be irrelevant because HW will have so far outstripped the requirements of software that we'll just run all of our programs on emulators on the hardware. That will fix not only the security problems, but it has the added bonus that since you'll be able to get all emulators for all platforms, there won't be any compatability issues -- everything will be truly platform independent.
Sony engineers worked from the basic principle that projectors, like all TVs and monitors, form colors by blending three primary hues: red, green and blue. They came up with a filter that allows the screen to reflect only red, green and blue light. The other light in a room, such as white incandescent or fluorescent bulbs, isn't reflected.
...completely skirting around the fact that THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS WHITE LIGHT!
Man I hate it when the newspapers print stupid things. Whaddaya wanna bet they are using something like polaroid or narrow bandpass quarter wave plate filters with a similarly filtered projector? What would be cool is a fluorescent screen and a projector that uses light (UV?) outside the visible spectrum. Then the screen really could be visibly black but it would still glow when stimulated by the projector.
Sez on the linked page this is from the same folks that brought you KaZaa!
Great. The folks that introduced spyware EULAs to file sharing now want to handle your phone service. OSS or not, can they be trusted to provide any more free downloads?
Ditto. Case in point: We are putting in a new management software and the front end system is written in J2EE running on the BEA Weblogic platform. Well, that's open, so what's the problem? MSXML 3.0. The vendor elected to use XML data islands instead of XSLT xforms or server-side scripting to populate the html forms, so the thing (which is otherwise very well written) only runs on IE. The thing that pisses me off is that it's about 95% platform independent! They're SOOOO CLOSE! Then they blow it by using an obtuse, MS-only non-standards compliant developer hack to fill data into the fields on the onscreen forms.
(sigh)
Does anyone know if there is an effort to build IE-Style XML data island support as a plugin for FireFox? It would be useful if it were possible.
"You'll take the role of a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed trainee at a Yoshinoya store who must work his way up through the ranks of the apron-and-hat-wearing set to be the best employee to ever seat a customer, pour tea, prepare a bowl, and shout 'Arigato gozaimashita!'"
Smack me for this, but my eyes keep seeing "Mr. Roboto" in there somewhere. Does anyone else reflexively think of the song "Mr. Roboto" by Styx whenever they see the word "arigato"?
/only knows enought Japanese to **fake** like he's a dumb American Styx fan.
Regardless what the they *want*, we're the one with the money. Homeusers are going to perceive this as a competitor with rentals and PPV, not sales, so they better be priced around rental rates if they want any traction with the people who are buying them.
Does anyone else find it funny that the Starforce home page features a picture (top right) of a dude at a keyboard throwing up his hands (blurred) in apparent disgust while the two "overlords" standing behind him are laughing and smiling?
My six dual-Zeon IBM xServer 225's correctly see four processors as well. One of them also has MSSQL2K and it also understands the two of the processors are hyperthreaded non-physical CPUs and does not complain that we only have two processor licenses installed.
It was a surprise to me when I installed Windows on them a couple of months back because I didn't even think Win2K supported hyperthreading. w00t!
Perhaps any hyperthreading-related issues that may have existed with Win2K were patched in a service pack?
It seems to me that the problem with Microsoft's approach is that notifying the user isn't enough. Users don't understand what is really happening when a web page presents a "you need to install this component" box. Whitelists are a good idea, but does Firefox reject non-whitelisted sites outright or does it pop up a warning dialog? If it pops up a warning, this won't work either because (as we all know) users can't read.
I would suggest an "install mode" that requires a special option on the tools menu to be manually enabled or maybe start the program a different way. Install mode would close all other open FF windows and tabs, and opens the extension manager so you can add and remove extensions - AND THAT'S IT. Once you are done, you close the browser (which you usually have to do anyway) and reopen it normally with the new installed extensions.
This stops users who don't understand what install mode is and why it should be a separate, non-integrated process can't hurt themselves with malicious extensions, even if they want to.
Feh, they've probably already thought if that and rejected it for whatever reason, so feel free to mod this into the same hole that swallowed Timothy Busfield's career.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, except the app doesn't belong to me so I can't rewrite it. All I can do is hope for compatible MSXML (data island) client support from another browser... That or keep needling the vendor to rewrite using standard compliant technologies.
Believe me, if I had that much sway, we wouldn't be having this conversation.
Almost all of the software we run requires Windows, and some of it also requires IE (so we actually will still be running IE, but only for approved applications and sites). That wasn't my decision, but the decision of the vendors we purchase from. We aren't anywhere near big enough to staff a dev dept to create this stuff in-house, and I'm not sure it would even come close to being cost effective if we did. I'm pushing vendors toward considering platform independent solutions whenever possible, but you have to understand that that is a ten-year decision for some of them, and they made committments (not just software purchases, but code base, training, employees) to MS that are not easily undone.
People are always posting comments like "Why does everyone still use MS when there are great tools like Linux, KDE, OpenOffice and Mozilla?" Well, it's because we can't run our business on just that. We need accounting software and lease management software and payroll software, and that means proprietary vendors who have made decisions in their self interest that force us to pick Windows.
If it makes you feel better, tho', I run our corporate intranet on Apache on Win2K and our mail server is currently, SunOS, and I'm switching it to debian Sarge in the fall.
I've been usin' FF since 0.2 and I just implemented a new "no IE" policy at my office. Everyone is installing FF over the next few days.
I didn't do it for any particularly idealistic reasons, just because IE isn't worth the problems anymore.
You should have seen the looks on people's places when I told them about the IIS/IE attacks that were uncovered last week.
Microsoft doesn't, but my software vendors do. We are in the the process of moving part of our customer management system to a new web-based software system that is built on J2EE, SQL and XML
The problem? It requires MSXML 3.0 because they use data islands to populate the web forms. Therefore, (for that application, at least) we have to use IE on Windows. Period.
Why switch to such an app? The other half of the software (the back-end) is the best in the industry - it runs on IBM UniData on NT/2K or AIX and requires only telnet on ANY platform. The integration between the two was compelling enough to make all the other requirements inconsequential.
They're good people though, and the IE requirement is actually a little weird considering that the document generation engine uses Apache FOP's XSL:FO renderer to generate PDFs, so they aren't opposed to non-MS software, I just think they really wanted to use data islands.
I keep working them on this, but the truth is, this is why MS pushes so hard for the attention of developers.
P.S. Why can't someone just write an MSXML 3.0 -compatable data island extension for FF?
/. needs a +1 GENIUS moderation. "Insightful" just doesn't cut it sometimes.
(P.S. GMAIL invites! I woke up this morning and saw that my other gmail account got 2 new invites, so if you reply with a funny joke about sex and befriend me, I'll give em out to my two favorite ones.)
It simply isn't fair to blame Microsoft for the ignorance of their users.
No, no, no.... a *funny* joke about sex. No Gmail for you!
My original comment doesn't have anything to do with good vs. evil or money, so any such relationships you inferred in that regard are your own.
All I said was that since the guy in the article doesn't want patents to obstruct the proliferation of his inventions, the comparing him to Edison (who did) is not completely valid, and that Linus and Bill are similarly positioned.
There's no good or evil anywhere in there. Sheesh!
Duh. Correctinated. I meant DC, not AC. *smack!*
I might be hallucinating, but wasn't Edison (who invented AC generators, the phonograph and the motion picture camera/projector system) a patent hawk who did everything he could to extract money for every little invention he had a hand in creating? In fact, IIRC, that's why the motion picture industry set up shop in the (then) isolated desolation of Hollywood, California -- they wouldn't have to pay his exorbitant licensing fees out there.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like comparing this guy to Edison is like comparing Linus to Bill Gates.... in a comparative sort of way.
Me, too!
What I find offensive is the way the CIO tried to pass it off as though paying for company materials out of your own pocket somehow exemplifies your character and work attitude. That's what makes him a screwheaded dork.
The only good news is that some of these expenses might (repeat, **MIGHT**) be tax deductable, but it's going to depend on *A* *LOT* of factors, including your financial position, other tax deductions, etc. It might not work out, but it may be worth looking into. Maybe someone else here is already doing that or tried and failed?
"Cybersecurity consultant" huh? The only people I know of that use that title are PHBs looking for catchphrases on resumes, jackasses with A+ certifications that read a book on security once, my boss, and Kevin Mitnick.
Yeah, just like "rock solid".
Honestly, if you want to play games with your customers, you are going to teach your customers to play games. It's like one day, these jokers are going to wake up and realize that hey, maybe it wasn't such a good idea to inflate the prices on 99% of your inventory so we don't lose money on the other 1% that is on sale this week.
This crap more than anything is pushing me to local independent and online retailers (which really can't move merchandise like this because there are no salespeople and a significatntly lower personal investment in travel/time). Forgive the analogy, but it feels like dealing with Microsoft Office for crying out loud! 25 features I don't need -- and now have to figure out how to turn off -- so I can make it work like the five-year-old version I wanted.
I don't know how any company stays in business by annoying their customers to death. As far as I'm concerned, every single one of these large national franchise chains can just take their stupid idiotic corporate policy shell games and shove it.
Defender was hard enough with a joystick and five buttons spread out over a wide two-hand console. I can't imagine playing it on my cell phone with a keyboard the size of a mini-post-it note (and my big fat tree-trunk thumbs) would be even remotely entertaining.
If they were gonna steal a game, they shoulda done some research first. Something like Galaxian or Galaga would have been a better fit.
Eventually all of this will be irrelevant because HW will have so far outstripped the requirements of software that we'll just run all of our programs on emulators on the hardware. That will fix not only the security problems, but it has the added bonus that since you'll be able to get all emulators for all platforms, there won't be any compatability issues -- everything will be truly platform independent.
Sony engineers worked from the basic principle that projectors, like all TVs and monitors, form colors by blending three primary hues: red, green and blue. They came up with a filter that allows the screen to reflect only red, green and blue light. The other light in a room, such as white incandescent or fluorescent bulbs, isn't reflected.
Man I hate it when the newspapers print stupid things. Whaddaya wanna bet they are using something like polaroid or narrow bandpass quarter wave plate filters with a similarly filtered projector? What would be cool is a fluorescent screen and a projector that uses light (UV?) outside the visible spectrum. Then the screen really could be visibly black but it would still glow when stimulated by the projector.
Sez on the linked page this is from the same folks that brought you KaZaa!
Great. The folks that introduced spyware EULAs to file sharing now want to handle your phone service. OSS or not, can they be trusted to provide any more free downloads?
Ditto. Case in point: We are putting in a new management software and the front end system is written in J2EE running on the BEA Weblogic platform. Well, that's open, so what's the problem? MSXML 3.0. The vendor elected to use XML data islands instead of XSLT xforms or server-side scripting to populate the html forms, so the thing (which is otherwise very well written) only runs on IE. The thing that pisses me off is that it's about 95% platform independent! They're SOOOO CLOSE! Then they blow it by using an obtuse, MS-only non-standards compliant developer hack to fill data into the fields on the onscreen forms.
(sigh)
Does anyone know if there is an effort to build IE-Style XML data island support as a plugin for FireFox? It would be useful if it were possible.
"You'll take the role of a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed trainee at a Yoshinoya store who must work his way up through the ranks of the apron-and-hat-wearing set to be the best employee to ever seat a customer, pour tea, prepare a bowl, and shout 'Arigato gozaimashita!'"
Smack me for this, but my eyes keep seeing "Mr. Roboto" in there somewhere. Does anyone else reflexively think of the song "Mr. Roboto" by Styx whenever they see the word "arigato"?
I'm crying on the inside.
Sincerely,
F.W.
MPAA == Dumbasses.
Regardless what the they *want*, we're the one with the money. Homeusers are going to perceive this as a competitor with rentals and PPV, not sales, so they better be priced around rental rates if they want any traction with the people who are buying them.
$10 each? Not on your frickin' life!
$1 each? Where do I get em?
Reality is a harsh cold mistress.
Does anyone else find it funny that the Starforce home page features a picture (top right) of a dude at a keyboard throwing up his hands (blurred) in apparent disgust while the two "overlords" standing behind him are laughing and smiling?
My six dual-Zeon IBM xServer 225's correctly see four processors as well. One of them also has MSSQL2K and it also understands the two of the processors are hyperthreaded non-physical CPUs and does not complain that we only have two processor licenses installed.
It was a surprise to me when I installed Windows on them a couple of months back because I didn't even think Win2K supported hyperthreading. w00t!
Perhaps any hyperthreading-related issues that may have existed with Win2K were patched in a service pack?
I agree.
Were it my choice to decide, I would award your short, simple, sweet, *illuminating* genius of a post a full 11 on a scale of 1 to 10.
Thank you for making my life complete. (*sniff*)
It seems to me that the problem with Microsoft's approach is that notifying the user isn't enough. Users don't understand what is really happening when a web page presents a "you need to install this component" box. Whitelists are a good idea, but does Firefox reject non-whitelisted sites outright or does it pop up a warning dialog? If it pops up a warning, this won't work either because (as we all know) users can't read.
I would suggest an "install mode" that requires a special option on the tools menu to be manually enabled or maybe start the program a different way. Install mode would close all other open FF windows and tabs, and opens the extension manager so you can add and remove extensions - AND THAT'S IT. Once you are done, you close the browser (which you usually have to do anyway) and reopen it normally with the new installed extensions.
This stops users who don't understand what install mode is and why it should be a separate, non-integrated process can't hurt themselves with malicious extensions, even if they want to.
Feh, they've probably already thought if that and rejected it for whatever reason, so feel free to mod this into the same hole that swallowed Timothy Busfield's career.
To that, I say "Duh, I should have pointed that out myself." It's basically the "We don't negotiate with terrorists" strategy.