I look briefly at the time when I set up my computer, ensure that it's within the proper range of "It's light out" or "It's dark out" and leave it be.
Late for a meeting? "Oh my god! The clock on my PC was wrong! Damned XP time-synch decided I was in Hungary.
Seriously, though, I prefer setting the time myself from my watch or from the microwave in the lounge, or from calling out to a co-worker "Hey Sam! Got the time?"
I just feel odd about letting *anything* remote change any setting on my computer, even if it's just the time. ESPECIALLY if I'm on Windows. I mean... How long before there's a clock-virus?:p
Thanks- I was tired when I posted my response, so I guess I missed the bulk of what I was reading. (Bad Sara, must drink more espresso before reading/.)
If you're going to make defamatory remarks about anyone anywhere, then you should be careful and ensure that what you're saying is true. Definitely.
Funny story- A friend of mine briefly had a site on one of the servers that I maintain, and posted a page that basically consisted of a bunch of links to *government documents on government sites* about a certain-public-figure. Since I owned the domain, I recieved a letter from the guy and his lawyer claiming that a.) the information was false and b.) the guy was not a public figure and thus could not be held to the higher standards of proof in a defamation case.
My response was to do a few google searches on the person's name where he was quoted in multiple publications, and where he *multiple times* called him things such as public advocate, etc. That, along with the fact that the documents were on government websites and were public information, would make it a hard case to prove in court.
I never heard back from the guy, and the email address that the "lawyer" used bounced the mail back to me.
If it's not true, definitely be careful. But if it *IS* true and you can prove it, hold your ground. =]
That disturbs me. The internet is constantly changing its faces. Is "new form" strictly defined?
- If I register a new domain name and move my content over to a new host, is that re-publishing?
- If I re-design my website and as a consequence every page, including the 'defamatory' article changes its appearance, is that a new form?
- If the internet standard changes from html to markuplanguageX and I convert my entire site, will the conversion open me up to a lawsuit?
- The web is a media that encourages re-editing. If I notice that 6 months ago I made a typo in the 'defamatory article', and I fix it, does that extend the statute for an additional 6 months?
The problem with applying rules-geared-for-print to the internet is that it is a very different medium, and it opens a number of different cans of worms.
Do you know what one of those booths costs?;) If they want to pay big money to come to a show where no one's interested in them in the least... That's their problem, no? I mean, they'll get about as good a reaction as a satanist at a Christian convention.
That said, I say we storm the booth with penguin and OSS stickers =]
Er. Why wouldn't MS be welcome? I mean, of COURSE they're going to come with something Linuxey. I mean. They know that if they try to show MS Windows there they'll be lynched. >=]
Honestly, though. Other proprietary vendors are welcome. (Think Maya, XSI, and a variety of other software vendors) Yes, MS is a bit over the top but... If they develop something for Linux why shouldn't they be welcome?
Note that "Welcome" is hinged upon their developing something for Linux, and "Unwelcome" would be their showing up as the KKK at an African American march. Preaching "Open Source is Evil" would be bad manners and quite likely be met by geekily violence.
Hah. When I was 15 my friend got this brand new computer. I was so jealous (I was stuck on a 286 I had pretty much scavenged out of the garbage at that time, and she got a P1 which was top-of-the-line) One month later I see the thing in the garbage smashed.
She wasn't even bloody intersted in the damned thing.
[I'm not saying Elizabeth Smart was like this. I'm not saying she deserved what happened. I think it's terrible. I'm just saying there are a lot of kids out there who aren't even getting enough to eat, and then there's the other extreme.]
I don't hate corporations. I love the ones that have their act together (Maxtor, for one. UPS lost a hard drive they were supposed to deliver, and Maxtor had one to me within 2 days of my informing them that it was MIA. At their own expense, including expedited shipping.)
I hate corporations that get so segmented and bogged down that the customer or end-user has to communicate with multiple departments that SHOULD be in communication with eachother. I don't feel as though I should be on first-name basis with the tech staff in 3 departments of a corportation, when they don't seem to know eachothers names. "Well your DSL department said that the Routing tables might be responsible, but the Routing department said that the DNS might be responsible. I know you say that the DSL department should take care of this, but everyone really seems to think it's on your shoulders."
It's when tech support seems to be playing a game of telephone using the customer they're supposed to provide support and service for that corporations make me froth at the mouth.
Who says "Big" means capable? In my experience "Big" means fragmented with parts that are unable to communicate with the whole.
A good example of this: My DSL provider. The "DSL department" cannot communicate with the "Hosting department" to figure out which part of it is eating the mail for the domain they host. Hah.
Small companies tend to have their act more "together" because they do not need to have a board meeting to decide whether or not to take path A or path B.
All large companies have going for them is funding.
I'm in New York City. Milwaukee is far far away, as is Salt Lake City. I never heard of Alexis, I never saw Alexis on the news. The first time I heard of Alexis was... Well... Now.
Truth is, I watched each news broadcast about Elizabeth Smart with two conflicting emotions. "God, that's horrible. Poor little girl." And "Wait a minute. She can't possibly be the only kid who has been kidnapped since the last kidnapping news story I saw. Why the heck is she getting so much media coverage...?" Which was answered shortly after that. "Oh. She's overprivilidged".
It's no news that kids with money are more important than those without. It's no news that kids from affluent families are more likely to get media time, if only because the parents know how to publicize things.
You cannot say that Alexis has gotten nearly as much coverage as Smart. I mean.. C'mon. Barely a day passes without Smart's picture being on *Something*. I hear her name mentioned more than I hear about Israel, more than I hear about terrorist threats, more than I hear about things that happened in the city I'm living in.
*laughs* Let's put it this way. If someone doesn't know what they're doing, they shouldn't be using a computer in the first place. And if they MUST, then the order in which they can cause the least damage seems to be along the lines of : Mac OS 9(ish), Windows(98/ME/XP home), OS X, Linux (Redhat/Yellowdog), etc.
The reason I suggested Redhat was not because I think it's a good idea for the person to use it, rather I was saying "Err. That thingy you're complaining about not existing actually does exist in one of the most popular consumer/business oriented distros of Linux."
And actually, if they don't know what they're doing and use auto-partition they might very well end up killing their Windows partition [if they have one] and being very unhappy. =] In general, if you don't know how to partition a bloody drive, don't do it.
Er. If you don't know what you're doing, use RedHat. That has an auto-partition option. It partitions based on a.) what type of install you've chosen and b.) how much space you have.
I think other distros offer something similar. You just can't use any of these if you're going to be dual-booting. Otherwise it will try to eat up all available space and then some.
Ermph.::mutters under my breath:: bloody navigation at the BOTTOM of the help pages.::mutter mutter:: create administrator password then jump through hoops to enable root.::mutter growl hiss spit::
There are plenty of things in the OSS world that have one-click simplicity. It just depends where you click. And know what? I wouldn't have it any other way. It means you can use the software the way YOU think it should be used, and not the way some programmer has decided is the simplest way.
Actually I'm used to Windows. I spend most of my time on it.
Besides, OS is a bit more than tweaking a few strings of a configuration file. =] (Although I have done that, and with some results.) Usually it takes something a bit more along the lines of jumping into large amounts of code and figuring out "does the button not work because the button doesn't have any code, or becuase something breaks when the button is pushed?"
Ok. I'm damned argumentative.
That said, if Windows goes so far as to make the right-click menu something that I have to buy from a third party vendor, I'll go nuts, format my hard drive and let Linux take over the entire thing instead of being regulated to its half. =]
Seriously, though. If you've used Windows lately you should know that MS doesn't take stuff out just because it's not used.. Their rationale for taking something out seems to be more along the lines of it being used too much!
Animated desktops? Eek. I have enough problems with my desktop when I'm drunk. Imagine if the desktop was moving.
I'll provide you my thought process so that you can tell me where it broke down.
1- You made it sound as though multiple desktops was already IMPLEMENTED in Windows. Implementation of a feature in an OS/Gui is usually when the vendor makes it easily accessable, or provides it WITHOUT the necessity of a third-party vendor. I do not believe Windows does this. It might have the back-end for the functionality, but it does not make it available in an accessible manner.
2- The only thing I could think of that could possibly be misconstrued as "multiple desktops" that I was aware of was alt-tab, which Windows has had since at least V3.1 which you mentioned.
3- I went back and re-read your post and it still sounds like all that's lacking is MS's willingness to advertise this functionality.
4- Your manner of communicating (from the "Not to be an ass" comment, to the rest of your post, was consistent with someone who is generally clueless, and in fact an ass.
5- My assumption: you were/are an ass and clueless to boot.
My assumption remains unchanged, although I do concede you know what a desktop is, and you have a point about Windows having the FUNCTIONALITY, if not a proper native GUI implementation of it. However, you are still clueless and an ass about human communication and how others can potentially view you due to your nature of communication. I would suggest that in the future you not take affront when someone talks down to you after you've made a comment that could be misread in a number of ways, and instead re-educate them, or back off your position and say "Oops. I can see how my comment would be mis-read, but I meant..."
Intelligence and knowledge are functionally useless to society without the means to properly convey them.
Er. If you're refering to Alt-Tab under Windows, that's application switching.
Desktop switching means you press a key-combo and it switches you to an entirely different desktop. Yep, that's right. The applications you see, the icons on the desktop, the wallpaper, etc. can all change. (Or not, depending on what your settings are.) Application switching merely allows you to switch between windows, and does not give you any extra screen real estate at all.
KDE, gnome, and others have both application switching and desktop switching. Windows only has application switching, unless you download a utility to do it. (Most of them suck and feel unnatural.) Optionally you could use another window manager... (Of course I prefer to let lilo work her majic.)
What I don't understand is WHY oh WHY hasn't MS stolen the idea for multiple desktops? It's nothing short of pure genius.
Yeah. Switching between desktops under x-window is just a key-command away, and with most laptops these days weighing in at under 5 lbs, that little flick of the wrist to switch is not that big of a deal. Better than carrying around a 12 lb monster!
Laptops are for portability, not for screen real estate.
Oh, I described my job, as well. The joys of working for a small company with a cool boss that doesn't care what hours you work, what you're wearing while you work, or where you work them from as long as the work gets done.
If, however, I were to get fired, I'd throw on a business suit and go trolling for jobs under the cover of being a conventional business-minded person because that is, unfortunately, what people seem to be looking for. They got burned out on the pajama-wearing, discman-toting sysadmin long ago.
Unfortunately employers are going in the opposite direction.
(keep in mind I'm talking mostly about the US, since I live here and it's what I know.)
Fact 1 of life: The economy sucks. People of all vocations are hunting desperately for work.
Fact 2 of life: Geeks are among those who are the most desperate for work. (translated: we no longer hold the cards.)
Fact 3 of life: If the employer wants a monkey in a suit, the employer will find 10 or 15 guys who are willing to be the monkey in the suit. They've been hunting for a job for the past 10-12 months. They have rent, a mortage, a car if they're lucky, and various other expenses. If the employer also wants a monkey that does not listen to MP3's, by jove he'll find one.
That said, I'm a big fan of the "Work at home wearing a big teeshirt and flip-flops at 2 AM while Massive Attack blasts from the stereo" attitude. Anyone know where I can find one of those bosses?
I've seen it happen, too. My mother once came back with a ton of CD-RW disks when I sent her to buy CD-R's. The salesperson told her they were "better".
I've since trained her in the ability to inform the salesperson that she's purchasing for someone who does know what they want/need and that if the salesperson is trying to sell her something unsuitable then it will be returned with extremly annoyed complaints. I haven't re-tested her since then, but I have a feeling they'll back off quite quickly, as stores seem to get annoyed when something is brought back "Because it didn't perform magic tricks the way salesperson x told me it would."
Salespeople can be quite utterly obnoxious. I think tech-related salespeople are the worst of the pack, even going beyond the car salesman.
Slashdot Mirror
I look briefly at the time when I set up my computer, ensure that it's within the proper range of "It's light out" or "It's dark out" and leave it be.
:p
Late for a meeting? "Oh my god! The clock on my PC was wrong! Damned XP time-synch decided I was in Hungary.
Seriously, though, I prefer setting the time myself from my watch or from the microwave in the lounge, or from calling out to a co-worker "Hey Sam! Got the time?"
I just feel odd about letting *anything* remote change any setting on my computer, even if it's just the time. ESPECIALLY if I'm on Windows. I mean... How long before there's a clock-virus?
-Sara
Thanks- I was tired when I posted my response, so I guess I missed the bulk of what I was reading. (Bad Sara, must drink more espresso before reading /.)
If you're going to make defamatory remarks about anyone anywhere, then you should be careful and ensure that what you're saying is true. Definitely.
Funny story- A friend of mine briefly had a site on one of the servers that I maintain, and posted a page that basically consisted of a bunch of links to *government documents on government sites* about a certain-public-figure. Since I owned the domain, I recieved a letter from the guy and his lawyer claiming that a.) the information was false and b.) the guy was not a public figure and thus could not be held to the higher standards of proof in a defamation case.
My response was to do a few google searches on the person's name where he was quoted in multiple publications, and where he *multiple times* called him things such as public advocate, etc. That, along with the fact that the documents were on government websites and were public information, would make it a hard case to prove in court.
I never heard back from the guy, and the email address that the "lawyer" used bounced the mail back to me.
If it's not true, definitely be careful. But if it *IS* true and you can prove it, hold your ground. =]
-Sara
But that wastes a keystroke! =]
Key-commands and keyboard shortcuts are your friends.
-Sara
Hrm. "New form"
That disturbs me. The internet is constantly changing its faces. Is "new form" strictly defined?
- If I register a new domain name and move my content over to a new host, is that re-publishing?
- If I re-design my website and as a consequence every page, including the 'defamatory' article changes its appearance, is that a new form?
- If the internet standard changes from html to markuplanguageX and I convert my entire site, will the conversion open me up to a lawsuit?
- The web is a media that encourages re-editing. If I notice that 6 months ago I made a typo in the 'defamatory article', and I fix it, does that extend the statute for an additional 6 months?
The problem with applying rules-geared-for-print to the internet is that it is a very different medium, and it opens a number of different cans of worms.
-Sara
Do you know what one of those booths costs? ;) If they want to pay big money to come to a show where no one's interested in them in the least... That's their problem, no? I mean, they'll get about as good a reaction as a satanist at a Christian convention.
That said, I say we storm the booth with penguin and OSS stickers =]
-Sara
A better logo for the spoofy "MSLinux" would be a penguin in shackles.
I can just see it now... "All the power of Linux, but you can only run it if you have a licensed version of Windows installed."
-Sara
Er. Why wouldn't MS be welcome? I mean, of COURSE they're going to come with something Linuxey. I mean. They know that if they try to show MS Windows there they'll be lynched. >=]
Honestly, though. Other proprietary vendors are welcome. (Think Maya, XSI, and a variety of other software vendors) Yes, MS is a bit over the top but... If they develop something for Linux why shouldn't they be welcome?
Note that "Welcome" is hinged upon their developing something for Linux, and "Unwelcome" would be their showing up as the KKK at an African American march. Preaching "Open Source is Evil" would be bad manners and quite likely be met by geekily violence.
-Sara
Hah. When I was 15 my friend got this brand new computer. I was so jealous (I was stuck on a 286 I had pretty much scavenged out of the garbage at that time, and she got a P1 which was top-of-the-line) One month later I see the thing in the garbage smashed.
She wasn't even bloody intersted in the damned thing.
[I'm not saying Elizabeth Smart was like this. I'm not saying she deserved what happened. I think it's terrible. I'm just saying there are a lot of kids out there who aren't even getting enough to eat, and then there's the other extreme.]
-Sara
I don't hate corporations. I love the ones that have their act together (Maxtor, for one. UPS lost a hard drive they were supposed to deliver, and Maxtor had one to me within 2 days of my informing them that it was MIA. At their own expense, including expedited shipping.)
I hate corporations that get so segmented and bogged down that the customer or end-user has to communicate with multiple departments that SHOULD be in communication with eachother. I don't feel as though I should be on first-name basis with the tech staff in 3 departments of a corportation, when they don't seem to know eachothers names. "Well your DSL department said that the Routing tables might be responsible, but the Routing department said that the DNS might be responsible. I know you say that the DSL department should take care of this, but everyone really seems to think it's on your shoulders."
It's when tech support seems to be playing a game of telephone using the customer they're supposed to provide support and service for that corporations make me froth at the mouth.
-Sara
Who says "Big" means capable? In my experience "Big" means fragmented with parts that are unable to communicate with the whole.
A good example of this: My DSL provider. The "DSL department" cannot communicate with the "Hosting department" to figure out which part of it is eating the mail for the domain they host. Hah.
Small companies tend to have their act more "together" because they do not need to have a board meeting to decide whether or not to take path A or path B.
All large companies have going for them is funding.
-Sara
So another rule of the contest: The system must be made entirely out of salvaged computer parts dug out of the dumpster.
Cannibalistic computing.
Hmm.. Banana skins and ketchup stuck to the side of the case might diminish sex appeal, though.
-Sara
How does this have *anything* to do with a BOOK written about MySQL?
;)
This comment would be ALOT better if it was about the book or about the review.
-Sara
"Honey!? Are you posting to slashdot again? Why oh why can't you be a NORMAL man and look at some porn instead?"
-Sara
I'm in New York City. Milwaukee is far far away, as is Salt Lake City. I never heard of Alexis, I never saw Alexis on the news. The first time I heard of Alexis was... Well... Now.
Truth is, I watched each news broadcast about Elizabeth Smart with two conflicting emotions. "God, that's horrible. Poor little girl." And "Wait a minute. She can't possibly be the only kid who has been kidnapped since the last kidnapping news story I saw. Why the heck is she getting so much media coverage...?" Which was answered shortly after that. "Oh. She's overprivilidged".
It's no news that kids with money are more important than those without. It's no news that kids from affluent families are more likely to get media time, if only because the parents know how to publicize things.
You cannot say that Alexis has gotten nearly as much coverage as Smart. I mean.. C'mon. Barely a day passes without Smart's picture being on *Something*. I hear her name mentioned more than I hear about Israel, more than I hear about terrorist threats, more than I hear about things that happened in the city I'm living in.
American media is insane.
-Sara
*laughs* Let's put it this way. If someone doesn't know what they're doing, they shouldn't be using a computer in the first place. And if they MUST, then the order in which they can cause the least damage seems to be along the lines of : Mac OS 9(ish), Windows(98/ME/XP home), OS X, Linux (Redhat/Yellowdog), etc.
The reason I suggested Redhat was not because I think it's a good idea for the person to use it, rather I was saying "Err. That thingy you're complaining about not existing actually does exist in one of the most popular consumer/business oriented distros of Linux."
And actually, if they don't know what they're doing and use auto-partition they might very well end up killing their Windows partition [if they have one] and being very unhappy. =] In general, if you don't know how to partition a bloody drive, don't do it.
-Sara
Er. If you don't know what you're doing, use RedHat. That has an auto-partition option. It partitions based on a.) what type of install you've chosen and b.) how much space you have.
I think other distros offer something similar. You just can't use any of these if you're going to be dual-booting. Otherwise it will try to eat up all available space and then some.
-Sara
Ermph. ::mutters under my breath:: bloody navigation at the BOTTOM of the help pages. ::mutter mutter:: create administrator password then jump through hoops to enable root. ::mutter growl hiss spit::
There are plenty of things in the OSS world that have one-click simplicity. It just depends where you click. And know what? I wouldn't have it any other way. It means you can use the software the way YOU think it should be used, and not the way some programmer has decided is the simplest way.
Since when are options a bad thing?
-Sara
Actually I'm used to Windows. I spend most of my time on it.
Besides, OS is a bit more than tweaking a few strings of a configuration file. =] (Although I have done that, and with some results.) Usually it takes something a bit more along the lines of jumping into large amounts of code and figuring out "does the button not work because the button doesn't have any code, or becuase something breaks when the button is pushed?"
Ok. I'm damned argumentative.
That said, if Windows goes so far as to make the right-click menu something that I have to buy from a third party vendor, I'll go nuts, format my hard drive and let Linux take over the entire thing instead of being regulated to its half. =]
Seriously, though. If you've used Windows lately you should know that MS doesn't take stuff out just because it's not used.. Their rationale for taking something out seems to be more along the lines of it being used too much!
Animated desktops? Eek. I have enough problems with my desktop when I'm drunk. Imagine if the desktop was moving.
-Sara
What was I supposed to assume?
I'll provide you my thought process so that you can tell me where it broke down.
1- You made it sound as though multiple desktops was already IMPLEMENTED in Windows. Implementation of a feature in an OS/Gui is usually when the vendor makes it easily accessable, or provides it WITHOUT the necessity of a third-party vendor. I do not believe Windows does this. It might have the back-end for the functionality, but it does not make it available in an accessible manner.
2- The only thing I could think of that could possibly be misconstrued as "multiple desktops" that I was aware of was alt-tab, which Windows has had since at least V3.1 which you mentioned.
3- I went back and re-read your post and it still sounds like all that's lacking is MS's willingness to advertise this functionality.
4- Your manner of communicating (from the "Not to be an ass" comment, to the rest of your post, was consistent with someone who is generally clueless, and in fact an ass.
5- My assumption: you were/are an ass and clueless to boot.
My assumption remains unchanged, although I do concede you know what a desktop is, and you have a point about Windows having the FUNCTIONALITY, if not a proper native GUI implementation of it. However, you are still clueless and an ass about human communication and how others can potentially view you due to your nature of communication. I would suggest that in the future you not take affront when someone talks down to you after you've made a comment that could be misread in a number of ways, and instead re-educate them, or back off your position and say "Oops. I can see how my comment would be mis-read, but I meant..."
Intelligence and knowledge are functionally useless to society without the means to properly convey them.
-Sara
Er. If you're refering to Alt-Tab under Windows, that's application switching.
Desktop switching means you press a key-combo and it switches you to an entirely different desktop. Yep, that's right. The applications you see, the icons on the desktop, the wallpaper, etc. can all change. (Or not, depending on what your settings are.) Application switching merely allows you to switch between windows, and does not give you any extra screen real estate at all.
KDE, gnome, and others have both application switching and desktop switching. Windows only has application switching, unless you download a utility to do it. (Most of them suck and feel unnatural.) Optionally you could use another window manager... (Of course I prefer to let lilo work her majic.)
What I don't understand is WHY oh WHY hasn't MS stolen the idea for multiple desktops? It's nothing short of pure genius.
-Sara
Yeah. Switching between desktops under x-window is just a key-command away, and with most laptops these days weighing in at under 5 lbs, that little flick of the wrist to switch is not that big of a deal. Better than carrying around a 12 lb monster!
Laptops are for portability, not for screen real estate.
-Sara
Oh, I described my job, as well. The joys of working for a small company with a cool boss that doesn't care what hours you work, what you're wearing while you work, or where you work them from as long as the work gets done.
If, however, I were to get fired, I'd throw on a business suit and go trolling for jobs under the cover of being a conventional business-minded person because that is, unfortunately, what people seem to be looking for. They got burned out on the pajama-wearing, discman-toting sysadmin long ago.
-Sara
Unfortunately employers are going in the opposite direction.
(keep in mind I'm talking mostly about the US, since I live here and it's what I know.)
Fact 1 of life: The economy sucks. People of all vocations are hunting desperately for work.
Fact 2 of life: Geeks are among those who are the most desperate for work. (translated: we no longer hold the cards.)
Fact 3 of life: If the employer wants a monkey in a suit, the employer will find 10 or 15 guys who are willing to be the monkey in the suit. They've been hunting for a job for the past 10-12 months. They have rent, a mortage, a car if they're lucky, and various other expenses. If the employer also wants a monkey that does not listen to MP3's, by jove he'll find one.
That said, I'm a big fan of the "Work at home wearing a big teeshirt and flip-flops at 2 AM while Massive Attack blasts from the stereo" attitude. Anyone know where I can find one of those bosses?
-Sara
Only if they contain loud moaning sounds.
-Sara
I've seen it happen, too. My mother once came back with a ton of CD-RW disks when I sent her to buy CD-R's. The salesperson told her they were "better".
I've since trained her in the ability to inform the salesperson that she's purchasing for someone who does know what they want/need and that if the salesperson is trying to sell her something unsuitable then it will be returned with extremly annoyed complaints. I haven't re-tested her since then, but I have a feeling they'll back off quite quickly, as stores seem to get annoyed when something is brought back "Because it didn't perform magic tricks the way salesperson x told me it would."
Salespeople can be quite utterly obnoxious. I think tech-related salespeople are the worst of the pack, even going beyond the car salesman.
-Sara