Subscribe to one free daily naked chick mailing list. Imagine how much of that spam is about porn! There are probably more porn emails sent out every week than there are people on the planet.
I keep three email accounts. One I give out for things - registrations, contests, all that stuff. One I give out to friends and family. The third just quietly sits there empty. I check it periodically anyway and it makes me happy when no mail is found.
I want the cable company monitoring my television viewing habits. That's how they know to make more shows that I want to see. I also want them to advertise stuff I actually want to buy.
I don't approve of all monitoring, to be sure. I believe in privacy for most things, but some monitoring has tangible benefits for me.
I would naturally prefer to have to opt in, though.
It's "Family Day" but I'm working, so I'm cranky and willing to burn the mod points (certainly off-topic for sure).
Using the word "fail" in broken english has now become classic douche-baggery. Don't just parrot the same tired crap you heard a couple of years back. Think up something new, please. I'm surprised you didn't find a way to work "Micro$oft" into the post.
"CRN takes a look at the past five years of Microsoft's acquisition history, which totals $13 billion and more than 7,000 new employees, and highlights 10 deals and how they've affected the software giant. While some larger acquisitions stand out for better or worse, such as Danger and aQuantive, there are some smaller, blink-and-you'll-miss-it deals that have proved pivotal for Microsoft's push into new areas such as virtualization."
Sounds like it might be an interesting article. Also looks odd - a slashdot article submission about Microsoft that's, at worse, neutral. Where's the pro-forma jab?
"And Microsoft's recent acquisition track record may lend credence to the heavy criticism levied against the company by former employees like Dick Brass."
"Your comment is a perfect example of being off-topic;"
And your comment is a perfect example of being too exhausting to read. I'm sure you had a good point, but I saw that huge block of unbroken text and thought, "no thanks".
Yes, I'm being pedantic, but the "enter" key can be a trusted ally and an aid to communication. Use it wisely.
"Every job is different. Every career is different. Things ebb and flow. For a long time, IT workers were spoiled primadonna. Now they're just another cost center. Guess what, the economy is jacked up. Budget cuts have to happen. IT is a necessity, but so is efficiency, cost control, etc. Welcome to the real world you big f'ing crybabies."
I'm dramatically overpaid for what I do if you look at it from a day-to-day effort perspective. I do my work, but my dad is a heavy duty mechanic, and I'm a chair jockey. I make twice what he does, and he puts in an honest day's effort every single day. It's not fair.
But I'm a troubleshooter by nature, and every once in a while I pull a large rabbit out of the hat and save the day in a big way. I like to think that closes the gap between contribution and compensation a bit.
"It's not a threat to the advanced Office user market, but it is a threat to Microsoft's dominance in the "I want to send a recipe to my friends" type casual users."
That market is mostly gone. Who creates word processor documents to hold recipes anymore? People bookmark recipes in their browser, or save the page using "File->save". When they send a recipe they copy it into an email and click "send", and the recipient saves the email under "recipes".
I think casual use of word processors is really declining. I could be wrong. But when my mom's friend had a hard drive die recently she wasn't concerned about any word processor docs. She was worried about her music and her email "because that's where everything is".
"I didn't read your entire post, but, MS Office can't properly handle CSV either. If you have an internationalized Windows and in the language settings of WINDOWS (not of office or anything!!), you have somewhere ";" instead of "," as "separator", then MS Excel can't read a CSV that uses "," anymore! It's called COMMA separated list, and yet excel can't read it and uses your localized settings, so that people with a computer of a different language can't even exchange such files with each other!"
I'm looking at the wizard right now, and I see under "delimiters" options for tab, semicolon, comma - and an option for "other", along with a box to put your delimiter in. I'll be very surprised if that doesn't work for you.
"Often times, for CSV data, it's best to throw up your hands and use a text editor because spreadsheet apps all try to be 'too smart' about the task."
The "text to columns" wizard lets you fine tune everything, including making sure pesky columns stay "text". I'm not much of a wizard user, but that one works great.
Trying it in Excel right now, with long lines of mixed data.
Pasted csv data into cell A1... Data strip->Text to columns... specify delimited with comma... preview looks good... one column should be date format in the cell - adjusted... "Finish" - Done.
Instead of using the wizard, let's try opening it with the good old double-click... hey, what do you know? Even formatted the date automatically.
If you're having problems getting your CSV to work in Excel it's either because you don't know how to use Excel or you've got a malformed CSV.
Post your sample CSV data that Excel can't figure out and prove me wrong.
"Excuse me why I change careers and head into nursing, at least they get paid what they are worth, and more as years go by, esp if you specialize in certain fields."
Was going to address this, copy-pasted it, decided not to... and submitted the darned post. I really wish I could edit slashdot posts.
Well, as long as I'm here, my annual salary this year was 2.6 times what I was making in 1998 on the help desk.
"If you wear an unprofessional looking uniform (read: branded for your department), you reinforce the idea that you belong there. There will be no advancement into other groups even within IT at that company"
Skill shows through no matter what shirt you wear. And although I can only speak for some, I think you'll find that the source of the bias would be that you're working on the help desk - not that your shirt has a company logo on it. I can't imagine saying to somebody, "Gee, that help desk guy has a lot of potential. Too bad his team has matching shirts - guess he's not worth promoting."
I can, however, see a guy stuck on the help desk complaining that the shirt makes him invisible. After all, it couldn't be because he doesn't further his education, get industry certification, apply for better positions, or at least try to play golf/poker with his boss occasionally.
"The problem with this thinking is that a good tech should NEVER outgrow help desk. A good tech constantly updates his skills and should be paid and respected for that expertise, not made to wear uniforms and perform ridiculous dances on command....The idea of "help desk" as "entry level" employment is really stupid. Relying on your worst paid and most-stressed employees to keep the company running is a fantastic example of horrible management.
It's not stupid at all. Why would a company want to pay an employee based on a whole bunch of skills that he doesn't use? If I want a house painted, I want to pay house painting wages. I don't care that the painter is a $400/hr lawyer. If the guy is very skilled, put him to work doing things that challenge him. You won't find those things on the help desk.
The idea that a good tech should never outgrow the help desk only works if you artificially restrict his growth by refusing training, or if the role of the help desk expands with him - and either way he's still not going to be answering the general phone.
"Your type of thinking is why good techs don't stay in help desk and is, furthermore, one of the many reasons help desk can't help you 75% of the time. All the good techs have "advanced" (IE: run the hell out)."
No, they advance because the job doesn't challenge a good tech for long.
"Thanks for making my skills feel more and more like I am on the same level as a burger flipper."
Working the help desk should be a stepping stone to better roles for those who really aspire to it. Staying on the help desk is for people whose skills are as good as they are going to get, or for the unmotivated. It IS the burger flipping of IT, like it or not.
But a real burger flipper has three career paths: continue flipping burgers, become a manager of burger flippers, or leave the industry.
As an IT guy, you have PLENTY of opportunity. Wearing a branded shirt won't make your skills invisible. Real talent shows, and if you have talent beyond the basics - which is, frankly, all you need to man the help desk - you won't stay there. It's a waste for you and the company to have you explaining to somebody how to put their Word icon back on their desktop.
I did my time in the trenches. I worked hardware repair and software support for a retailer from 1992-1997. Then I moved to the contracted corporate help desk of a major industrial corporation. I blew the talent curve, and one year later to the day I was hired by that corporation directly, on their critical operations supprot team. Today I'm a senior analyst for them, writing and maintaining industrial simulation and scheduling software, and making a very nice living.
I don't have any formal education. What I had was a stack of hardware certificates and an MCSE (6 exams passed in 9 weeks). In my day to day help desk work the right people noticed I was good. I can point to five other people from my office door that came by a similar route.
Excuse me why I change careers and head into nursing, at least they get paid what they are worth, and more as years go by, esp if you specialize in certain fields.
"The way damages were calculated is detailed by the document linked (and was upheld by appeal, as it most likely substantially underestimated the real damages)."
The damages were not upheld because the estimate was worth a shit (and after reading how they arrived at them I think they were WAY high) they were upheld because Microsoft failed to file a pre-verdict JMOL on damages. Or so it says under B. Reasonableness of the Damages Award.
If you're like most companies that are trying to keep a "helpdesk-centric" model going, your group is the forward face of IT, and the contact point. Help desks aren't about strong individuality - they're about consistency/uniformity of service. I don't see why the idea couldn't be extended to wearing branded shirts.
When your skills outgrow the help desk - and they should - consider losing the uniform as a perk of advancement.
Sure, Microsoft has made some terrible ads. And when the get a good one they follow it up with a bad one. The "I'm a PC and I'm 4 and a half" ad was pretty good. The same girl doing the "happy words" ad was terrible.
Lots of people like the Apple "I'm a Mac" ads but I find them to be terrible for a different reason. I think elevating your product relative to your competitor by calling them down directly is mean-spirited and low.
To me those ads make Apple seem slimy. They are what you get when you take an American political attack ad, throw in some whimsy, and add a generous helping of conceited snobbery.
You have a "max", and then you put a turbo on it, and suddenly the max goes up. Doesn't mean it wasn't a max before - take away the turbo and you have your plain old max back. Go ahead and try to exceed it.
"I don't mean to be rude, but that there is your problem. The "news" that arrives on your television or radio is highly manipulated and filtered to tailor your thinking. I highly recommend reading the blogs of ordinary citizens or "citizen journalists" in the target area along with your mainstream media. It's quite revealing."
I do mean to be rude. This need you have to talk down to people, and to imply that we're a bunch of gullible Fox-news watchers, is more prickdom.
In my post neither "world" nor "news" is capitalized, so both are meant generically. You assume I'm sticking to mainstream media, a fact that can't be supported by anything I've written. In truth I get my news from a wide variety of sources, including blogs (although most of them are as heavily slanted and error-prone as anything "big media" offers - sometimes more so).
There is more news than I have time to read. Some of it is going to get missed.
"That's probably because you don't pay much attention to the world. If you had, you may have heard of this African country called Sudan, and a particularly a region in it called Darfur..."
I've been glued to world news for most of the last five years and I had to look up Eritrea. I've also never heard of it before.
You might have made an excellent point after this phrase, or provided some details, but when I read the first line I thought to myself, "Condescending dick." So I never read the rest of your post.
"When people get fed up with crippled "home" versions and paying more for "ultimate" versions, Linux will surely take off."
I don't know whether to reply with a sincere criticism or a joke. So... I'll do both.
So, we'll start with the fact that the "ultimate" version is not required by, and not lusted after by, well, the vast majority of users. With Windows 7 you don't need Ultimate for much of anything. Hell, I was a Vista Ultimate x64 user and when I picked up Windows 7 I got "Professional" instead. They moved all the good stuff down a step. But here's the kicker - if you actually want the things that the Pro version requires, you aren't going to switch to linux to save a small amount of money. Especially if what you want is to do things like extend Media Centre to a compatible streaming device in the living room.
Now for the cheap shot at linux in the form of a semi-incorrect joke (only "semi" because this is a very common perception):
Being forced to pay extra to get leather seats and a great stereo isn't gonna make me run out and switch to a rickshaw.
"Inevitably, some Slashdotter will claim that yet-to-be discovered technology will always provide a fix for the problem. Believing that yet-to-be discovered technology will be discovered (and will be the salvation) is exactly equivalent to believing the numerous claims of religion. Often, the same Slashdotter who is atheist does not hestitate to believe in yet-to-be discovered technology. A hypocrite, a fool, or both?"
Scientists and engineers have a long and detailed history of coming up with creative solutions to complex problems. Religion, on the other hand, places the burden of the final proof on the far side of death, and has no real track record of delivering on their promises.
These things are not equivalent at all. Not even close.
Slashdot Mirror
Subscribe to one free daily naked chick mailing list. Imagine how much of that spam is about porn! There are probably more porn emails sent out every week than there are people on the planet.
I keep three email accounts. One I give out for things - registrations, contests, all that stuff. One I give out to friends and family. The third just quietly sits there empty. I check it periodically anyway and it makes me happy when no mail is found.
I want the cable company monitoring my television viewing habits. That's how they know to make more shows that I want to see. I also want them to advertise stuff I actually want to buy.
I don't approve of all monitoring, to be sure. I believe in privacy for most things, but some monitoring has tangible benefits for me.
I would naturally prefer to have to opt in, though.
"FAIL on the basic UI of the phone."
It's "Family Day" but I'm working, so I'm cranky and willing to burn the mod points (certainly off-topic for sure).
Using the word "fail" in broken english has now become classic douche-baggery. Don't just parrot the same tired crap you heard a couple of years back. Think up something new, please. I'm surprised you didn't find a way to work "Micro$oft" into the post.
"CRN takes a look at the past five years of Microsoft's acquisition history, which totals $13 billion and more than 7,000 new employees, and highlights 10 deals and how they've affected the software giant. While some larger acquisitions stand out for better or worse, such as Danger and aQuantive, there are some smaller, blink-and-you'll-miss-it deals that have proved pivotal for Microsoft's push into new areas such as virtualization."
Sounds like it might be an interesting article. Also looks odd - a slashdot article submission about Microsoft that's, at worse, neutral. Where's the pro-forma jab?
"And Microsoft's recent acquisition track record may lend credence to the heavy criticism levied against the company by former employees like Dick Brass."
Ah... there it is.
I had no idea linux proponents were all Jedi. That explains everything.
"You don't NEED the extra features in Photoshop."
"You don't NEED integrated audio processing software."
"You don't NEED anything OpenOffice doesn't have."
"You don't NEED..."
Now those Jedi need to start using their powers for good.
"You NEED to write documentation for non-technical users..."
"Your comment is a perfect example of being off-topic;"
And your comment is a perfect example of being too exhausting to read. I'm sure you had a good point, but I saw that huge block of unbroken text and thought, "no thanks".
Yes, I'm being pedantic, but the "enter" key can be a trusted ally and an aid to communication. Use it wisely.
If you are a player of WoW, You agree to the terms of service. That means you and Blizzard "agreed" you wouldn't share/sell the account.
So, in essence, if you play the game, you, specifically, gave them the right.
"Every job is different. Every career is different. Things ebb and flow. For a long time, IT workers were spoiled primadonna. Now they're just another cost center. Guess what, the economy is jacked up. Budget cuts have to happen. IT is a necessity, but so is efficiency, cost control, etc. Welcome to the real world you big f'ing crybabies."
I'm dramatically overpaid for what I do if you look at it from a day-to-day effort perspective. I do my work, but my dad is a heavy duty mechanic, and I'm a chair jockey. I make twice what he does, and he puts in an honest day's effort every single day. It's not fair.
But I'm a troubleshooter by nature, and every once in a while I pull a large rabbit out of the hat and save the day in a big way. I like to think that closes the gap between contribution and compensation a bit.
But I'm posting this from work...
"It's not a threat to the advanced Office user market, but it is a threat to Microsoft's dominance in the "I want to send a recipe to my friends" type casual users."
That market is mostly gone. Who creates word processor documents to hold recipes anymore? People bookmark recipes in their browser, or save the page using "File->save". When they send a recipe they copy it into an email and click "send", and the recipient saves the email under "recipes".
I think casual use of word processors is really declining. I could be wrong. But when my mom's friend had a hard drive die recently she wasn't concerned about any word processor docs. She was worried about her music and her email "because that's where everything is".
"I didn't read your entire post, but, MS Office can't properly handle CSV either. If you have an internationalized Windows and in the language settings of WINDOWS (not of office or anything!!), you have somewhere ";" instead of "," as "separator", then MS Excel can't read a CSV that uses "," anymore! It's called COMMA separated list, and yet excel can't read it and uses your localized settings, so that people with a computer of a different language can't even exchange such files with each other!"
I'm looking at the wizard right now, and I see under "delimiters" options for tab, semicolon, comma - and an option for "other", along with a box to put your delimiter in. I'll be very surprised if that doesn't work for you.
"Often times, for CSV data, it's best to throw up your hands and use a text editor because spreadsheet apps all try to be 'too smart' about the task."
The "text to columns" wizard lets you fine tune everything, including making sure pesky columns stay "text". I'm not much of a wizard user, but that one works great.
Trying it in Excel right now, with long lines of mixed data.
Pasted csv data into cell A1... Data strip->Text to columns... specify delimited with comma... preview looks good... one column should be date format in the cell - adjusted... "Finish" - Done.
Instead of using the wizard, let's try opening it with the good old double-click... hey, what do you know? Even formatted the date automatically.
If you're having problems getting your CSV to work in Excel it's either because you don't know how to use Excel or you've got a malformed CSV.
Post your sample CSV data that Excel can't figure out and prove me wrong.
"Excuse me why I change careers and head into nursing, at least they get paid what they are worth, and more as years go by, esp if you specialize in certain fields."
Was going to address this, copy-pasted it, decided not to... and submitted the darned post. I really wish I could edit slashdot posts.
Well, as long as I'm here, my annual salary this year was 2.6 times what I was making in 1998 on the help desk.
"If you wear an unprofessional looking uniform (read: branded for your department), you reinforce the idea that you belong there. There will be no advancement into other groups even within IT at that company"
Skill shows through no matter what shirt you wear. And although I can only speak for some, I think you'll find that the source of the bias would be that you're working on the help desk - not that your shirt has a company logo on it. I can't imagine saying to somebody, "Gee, that help desk guy has a lot of potential. Too bad his team has matching shirts - guess he's not worth promoting."
I can, however, see a guy stuck on the help desk complaining that the shirt makes him invisible. After all, it couldn't be because he doesn't further his education, get industry certification, apply for better positions, or at least try to play golf/poker with his boss occasionally.
"The problem with this thinking is that a good tech should NEVER outgrow help desk. A good tech constantly updates his skills and should be paid and respected for that expertise, not made to wear uniforms and perform ridiculous dances on command....The idea of "help desk" as "entry level" employment is really stupid. Relying on your worst paid and most-stressed employees to keep the company running is a fantastic example of horrible management.
It's not stupid at all. Why would a company want to pay an employee based on a whole bunch of skills that he doesn't use? If I want a house painted, I want to pay house painting wages. I don't care that the painter is a $400/hr lawyer. If the guy is very skilled, put him to work doing things that challenge him. You won't find those things on the help desk.
The idea that a good tech should never outgrow the help desk only works if you artificially restrict his growth by refusing training, or if the role of the help desk expands with him - and either way he's still not going to be answering the general phone.
"Your type of thinking is why good techs don't stay in help desk and is, furthermore, one of the many reasons help desk can't help you 75% of the time. All the good techs have "advanced" (IE: run the hell out)."
No, they advance because the job doesn't challenge a good tech for long.
"Thanks for making my skills feel more and more like I am on the same level as a burger flipper."
Working the help desk should be a stepping stone to better roles for those who really aspire to it. Staying on the help desk is for people whose skills are as good as they are going to get, or for the unmotivated. It IS the burger flipping of IT, like it or not.
But a real burger flipper has three career paths: continue flipping burgers, become a manager of burger flippers, or leave the industry. As an IT guy, you have PLENTY of opportunity. Wearing a branded shirt won't make your skills invisible. Real talent shows, and if you have talent beyond the basics - which is, frankly, all you need to man the help desk - you won't stay there. It's a waste for you and the company to have you explaining to somebody how to put their Word icon back on their desktop.
I did my time in the trenches. I worked hardware repair and software support for a retailer from 1992-1997. Then I moved to the contracted corporate help desk of a major industrial corporation. I blew the talent curve, and one year later to the day I was hired by that corporation directly, on their critical operations supprot team. Today I'm a senior analyst for them, writing and maintaining industrial simulation and scheduling software, and making a very nice living.
I don't have any formal education. What I had was a stack of hardware certificates and an MCSE (6 exams passed in 9 weeks). In my day to day help desk work the right people noticed I was good. I can point to five other people from my office door that came by a similar route. Excuse me why I change careers and head into nursing, at least they get paid what they are worth, and more as years go by, esp if you specialize in certain fields.
"The way damages were calculated is detailed by the document linked (and was upheld by appeal, as it most likely substantially underestimated the real damages)."
The damages were not upheld because the estimate was worth a shit (and after reading how they arrived at them I think they were WAY high) they were upheld because Microsoft failed to file a pre-verdict JMOL on damages. Or so it says under B. Reasonableness of the Damages Award.
If you're like most companies that are trying to keep a "helpdesk-centric" model going, your group is the forward face of IT, and the contact point. Help desks aren't about strong individuality - they're about consistency/uniformity of service. I don't see why the idea couldn't be extended to wearing branded shirts.
When your skills outgrow the help desk - and they should - consider losing the uniform as a perk of advancement.
Sure, Microsoft has made some terrible ads. And when the get a good one they follow it up with a bad one. The "I'm a PC and I'm 4 and a half" ad was pretty good. The same girl doing the "happy words" ad was terrible.
Lots of people like the Apple "I'm a Mac" ads but I find them to be terrible for a different reason. I think elevating your product relative to your competitor by calling them down directly is mean-spirited and low.
To me those ads make Apple seem slimy. They are what you get when you take an American political attack ad, throw in some whimsy, and add a generous helping of conceited snobbery.
You have a "max", and then you put a turbo on it, and suddenly the max goes up. Doesn't mean it wasn't a max before - take away the turbo and you have your plain old max back. Go ahead and try to exceed it.
"Have you been living under a rock? NTFS has been writable on Linux for a long time now..."
Oh yeah, because the determining factor of one's general awareness is whether or not one knows that NTFS is writeable on linux.
I knew that, but I certainly didn't hear the announcement on a TV ad during "House".
"I don't mean to be rude, but that there is your problem. The "news" that arrives on your television or radio is highly manipulated and filtered to tailor your thinking. I highly recommend reading the blogs of ordinary citizens or "citizen journalists" in the target area along with your mainstream media. It's quite revealing."
I do mean to be rude. This need you have to talk down to people, and to imply that we're a bunch of gullible Fox-news watchers, is more prickdom.
In my post neither "world" nor "news" is capitalized, so both are meant generically. You assume I'm sticking to mainstream media, a fact that can't be supported by anything I've written. In truth I get my news from a wide variety of sources, including blogs (although most of them are as heavily slanted and error-prone as anything "big media" offers - sometimes more so).
There is more news than I have time to read. Some of it is going to get missed.
"That's probably because you don't pay much attention to the world. If you had, you may have heard of this African country called Sudan, and a particularly a region in it called Darfur..."
I've been glued to world news for most of the last five years and I had to look up Eritrea. I've also never heard of it before.
You might have made an excellent point after this phrase, or provided some details, but when I read the first line I thought to myself, "Condescending dick." So I never read the rest of your post.
"When people get fed up with crippled "home" versions and paying more for "ultimate" versions, Linux will surely take off."
I don't know whether to reply with a sincere criticism or a joke. So... I'll do both.
So, we'll start with the fact that the "ultimate" version is not required by, and not lusted after by, well, the vast majority of users. With Windows 7 you don't need Ultimate for much of anything. Hell, I was a Vista Ultimate x64 user and when I picked up Windows 7 I got "Professional" instead. They moved all the good stuff down a step. But here's the kicker - if you actually want the things that the Pro version requires, you aren't going to switch to linux to save a small amount of money. Especially if what you want is to do things like extend Media Centre to a compatible streaming device in the living room.
Now for the cheap shot at linux in the form of a semi-incorrect joke (only "semi" because this is a very common perception):
Being forced to pay extra to get leather seats and a great stereo isn't gonna make me run out and switch to a rickshaw.
"Inevitably, some Slashdotter will claim that yet-to-be discovered technology will always provide a fix for the problem. Believing that yet-to-be discovered technology will be discovered (and will be the salvation) is exactly equivalent to believing the numerous claims of religion. Often, the same Slashdotter who is atheist does not hestitate to believe in yet-to-be discovered technology. A hypocrite, a fool, or both?"
Scientists and engineers have a long and detailed history of coming up with creative solutions to complex problems. Religion, on the other hand, places the burden of the final proof on the far side of death, and has no real track record of delivering on their promises.
These things are not equivalent at all. Not even close.