It may not be absolutely correct (note that there is humour there), however, it hits the nail on the head. Exactly why does Explorer need to 'verify' before deleting?
You may have to pay (for the moment! ULL coming soon! Maybe!) the Telstra Tax (min $20 a month atm), but you get to choose from over a hundred DSL providers.
Australia is like this. Your physical connection - copper wire - is provided by Telstra (in most places). You pay min $20 per month. It is REQUIRED to pay this fee if you want/need a landline. Your internet connection is via many ISPs who have a variety of connection methods and paths. Some, like iiNet, build their own (or parts of their own) network. How much you pay is down to how much you are willing to shop around.
These days you can join an ISP without a contract, up front cost is around AUS$100
For more info, go to http://www.whirlpool.net.au/ See the lively discussion on the forums there about Australian ISPs.
I am sure that we can do this a better way. Canberra is 1/3 of the way through building a fiber network (Transact) but it turns out that it isn't FTTH it is Fiber To The Curb - the last 'mile' is a standard DSL box. Ouch. It's more of a pain in the ass to deal with that standard DSL.
In other news, plans for 'better' networks are being killed by DSL2 - speeds up to 8MB down are now available across Australia.
More news: To try and save his political position the prime minister of Australia declared that the Liberal Government will spend bucketloads in deploying 'high speed internet' everywhere. We'll wait and see on this one. At the moment DSL2 costs a chunk more than DSL and adoption isn't as high. It's like having dialup vs DSL.. some people can't justify the extra cost for the extra speed.
Absolutely. I have read that this is what the UK fears as well. Mostly what they worry about is having to support people who do not support the system.
I am a good example. The system supported me for.. less than a year.. before I got my first 'real' job. Since then I've paid so much tax back into the system that it completely blows away A) The time the system supported me through the 'dole' and B) All of the times the system has given me 'rebates' (eg: Medicare and the like). This is how our system is supposed to work. It completely goes to pieces when people start abusing it.
In Australia right now we have between 1 and 3% unemployment - meaning that only those who really avoid it well or seriously can't work don't have a job.
The Government knew in around 2002 that the health insurance system here was going to implode. It simply could not sustain itself - especially since how much some of the companies pay their exec these days. This is one of the reasons they brought in the 30% rebate. However, since then, every time the Government increases payouts - medicare or private health insurance related - you see the medical side raise their prices significantly. Going to the doctor for a simple 15 minute checkup can cost you $60 these days.
The system that has been proposed to replace this is very simple: Increase the Medicare Levy (currently 1.5%) by 1% and force _everyone_ to pay it. Then, remove the laws requiring that 'well off' (those who earn more than $50K) to have health insurance. Have the Government do what health insurance companies currently do with the Medicare Levy. 2.5% of _everyone_ is a lot of money here, and as long as they reign in the PBS system it will cover what the current Health Insurance systems cover. People can still pay for higher HI if they want or need it, but with this system it removes the ability for HI to rip people off automatically and line their pockets.
As a final thought, consider this: The last guesstimate at how much it costs the Government for Medicare is approximately 1% of the money raised through the Medicare Levy. Don't even ask how much they get from the petrol and alcohol taxes.
This is how much you pay for health insurance just to avoid being slogged an extra 1% tax. So, if you earn $60K then for $600 you get something. Normally these types of health insurance do not cover very much and if you do find yourself in hospital you will be handing your wallet to them.
You are correct though - friends of mine have serious ailments that require hospital care as part of their existence (diabetes does that to you). In their case, yes, they pay $1000 to $1500 a month for 'health insurance'. Ouch.
I was merely pointing out how most people are forced into having health insurance - whether they need it, like it, want it.. or not.
Wrong. In 10 years time you will sit down to play your PS6 and have a full screen forced on you while levels load saying "Duke Nukem Forever: Coming soon!" while it uploads your playing and vital statistics to Sony.
Actually, there is nothing stopping them from doing this now..
In Australia if you earn over $50,000 a year ($100,000 for couples) give or take a few rules.. then if you do not have the minimum level of private health insurance (which normally has a minimum of $500 excess for the hospital cover) then they tax you an extra 1%.
The Australian Tax Office applies the Medicare Levy. This levy is 1.5% of your taxable income. Most people have to pay this. This pays for our system where you have a Medicare coverage service done, eg go to your GP and get charged $50, and Medicare pays back a percentage, eg $25.
Private health insurance in Australia is getting so expensive that the Govt and Private Health insurers now have taken several steps to try and avoid a full revolt by the public. The first is the private health insurance rebate. This reduces all private health insurance by at least 35%. For older people it can reduce it by 35% or 40% depend on your age.
However, what they also do is 'load' your health insurance. If you do not have private health insurance by your 31st birthday then for each year that you are not covered by health insurance they add a loading of 2% per year (when you do join private health insurance). This is called Lifetime Health Cover. It is designed to force 30 to 45 year old people to take out insurance early.
For most people, here is how it works: You take your taxable income of you or you and your spouse, add or subtract according to the various rules (each child increases how much taxable income you can earn by $1500 per year before they slog the extra 1% on you for not being covered) and you work out how much extra tax you are going to pay anyway. So, if your total taxable income is going to be $65,000 then you are looking at having $650 ripped out of your pocket at tax time. So, you go out and look for private health insurance that will be accepted by the tax office for $650 or less. This means you at least get something out of the money you are going to lose. Usually the something is ambulance cover and minimum hospital cover which limits how much they can charge you for a visit to $500.
This works because it is enforced at tax time. If you cannot prove that you were covered by private health insurance and you earn more than $50,000 then they extract it (pro-rata mind you, so if you are covered for 50% of the year then you only pay 0.5%) from you as part of your yearly tax return.
How about we not go into how the major private health insurance companies in Australia have raised their premiums by ~$5 per year for the last 3 years...
Technical question: How would you capture all information that goes through RAM? Next question: How would you store it? That's got to be GB of data for a server..
Dumping RAM to disk would not be good - that would be 2GB+ for every dump and would not include all of the information in RAM.
Even then, how would you get it to them? You would need a removable hard drive just to store this information. Who pays for the storage space, the CPU time to do this processing and the human time required to set it up?
Consider all of the sites you go to in a single day. How many do you actually need cookies for? Right. A handful. The default behaviour, given how the technology is abused these days, should be to delete all cookies and purge the cache when the browser closes - except for the sites specified by the user.
It still irks me that IE (yes, we have to use it at work) still doesn't have an option for 'delete all cookies on exit' - but it is perfectly capable of clearing the rest of the cache.
I agree that the option to accept from originating site is good, but these days I don't care. Either way the cookies are purged every day.
Guys! Any chance of a Secret of Mana or Secret of Evermore remake? I would have loved to have played more of both of these classics..... and A Link to the Past as well (while we are here:P )
How long until all browsers have a url checker built in with some simple basic rules applied? Eg: If the address contains ".bank.com" and there is a "." after the com then alert the user / disable javascript / etc.
Yes, I do know that for a lot of people having technology that calls attention to these kinds of problems just causes them to not worry about it. There are, however, too many people who just don't have a clue, are not capable or don't care. I've taught many of them to be careful.
I still wonder why people don't use the Firefix / Adblock / Filterset.G combination as a basic starting point.
It is good to see that there are some anti-phishing addons for Firefox now.
Regardless of who fired him, if 'management' want to fire someone then fine. They must then accept that what that person did does not get done until they are replaced. I have had this in reverse: I was removed from a position (to another position of the same level) and when the previous position was not filled they expected me to upkeep the role.
Forget it. No. Go jump in the lake.
Use the managementese variations of these words to tell them that if they want to remove someone then they need to replace the person or not have that position filled.
What are you going to do next time? I'd recomend reading the book Death March to gain an insight into this area of management.
Advice: Don't let it happen again. It is not your fault. However, by all means, work overtime if they feel like compensating you accordingly.
The first question: "Imagine you have two marbles and a 100-story building. You are told that the marbles will break if they are dropped from a certain floor. Figure out a way, as effectivly as possible, how high you can drop the marbles before they break. Remember, it could be the 1st floor, it could be the 99th."
First, state that 'this must be done so that an answer is found using only 2 marbles. This means that when the second marble breaks you must have an answer.
Try this: 1. Go up 1 floor. Drop a marble. If it breaks, the answer is '0 floors' (special case! ) 2. Until (the first marble breaks)
Go up 3 floors, drop one marble (and retrieve it if it doesn't break)
If it breaks, go down 2 floors and drop a marle
If it doesn't break go up a floor and drop a marble
This will check for floors 1, 4, 7, 10 and so on. When the marble breaks, you check current floor -2. If it is ok, you check the -1. From this you can tell which floor the marble will break on.
Takes 4 tries to get check level 10 though, and 22 tries to get to 100.
Thank you for the clarification. We have a mac in the house, but I'm mostly on Windows / Linux. I currently use Sage with Firefox and haven't yet got into complexities with RSS feeds - one bugbear is that some feeds use feed:// which doesn't always translate (changing this to http:// fixes it).
I'll look into this when I'm next allowed to use the mac:)
I'd like to comment that the Search box being at the bottom of the window is one of the reasons I first switched to Firefox (back in the days when Netscape was dead and Opera was the only real alternative). I've lost track of the number of times I've used MS applications (or anything else really) and have been annoyed by the search box covering up text. Just my 2p.
Perhaps your comment could be more correctly summed up as: "SUGGESTION: Allow the Search bar to float and not be locked at the bottom of the window."
Funny you should mention that... the camera purchase I mean. A friend of mine recently (last weekend) asked me for help in purchasing a new camera. It came down to a cybershot (the upgraded version of the one I have, which I quite like btw) or an Olympus model. The guy behind the counter was good to do a deal on either and in the end he asked me which one I'd buy.
My response? 'Do you know what Sony did with the rootkit fiasco a while back? Right? Yes. Ok. Do you REALLY want to plug *anything* made by Sony into your PC? Even if it is only a camera that connects via USB so you can upload. Your choice.'
He bought the Olympus. (yes, for other reasons than that 'it's a Sony! Yuck!'. Still)
Yes, it is only one sale. Yes, it is only one cheap ($300) camera. However, it is one less Sony product sold, and one more person who will seriously think about *anything* branded with Sony in the future. And his family. And his friends. And anyone else who asks me if I'd reccomend a Sony product.
Back to the article. I'm shockd that it says that it is 'fixing problems'. I thought that it meant that they were going to remove the DRM:)
I have the entire Farscape series on DVD.. and I love watching them. If they had that message I would be sickened before getting through series one. I have one (1) DVD that I know of that has this message. After seeing it on a disc I purchase I stopped buying DVDs.
As a footnote, after going to the movies 3 times and sitting through the useless mpaa ad about 'stealing is a crime' I don't go to the cinema any more. (yes, I know what stealing is, and what a crime is, and I know what mpaa do to people in the US through the courts). Besides not having my ears blasted, other people ruining the movie and a whole list of other reasons not to go.. I find myself with 1/2 hour of my life NOT spend watching ads and short versions of movies (which they pathetically call 'trailers'.
Any list that groups iTunes with Media Player and Zune into one "things with DRM" category is defective. iTunes is one of the most annoying programs available for Windows, and it's free to boot.
Absolutely! I agree! iTunes is quite defective for several reasons.
There. Fixed that for you.
Before we begin, I'd like to say that iTunes isn't so bad.. overall. However, there are some things that make you want to pull your hair out. If you have hair.
Here's a list, since you asked:
iTunes Bitching
B: Why isn't there a 'staging area' where you can add songs and do things to them before iTunes does what it does? (resolves names, artist, type etc). Why: So many times I have dragged whole folders into the 'Music' folder - only to 'lose' some! Now I can't find them easily.. and not even search can help me:(
B: Can there be an option to keep the original name, or revert to previous information? Can this be held inside iTunes so reversion is possible? Why: The 'offical' name/information may not be what I would like it to be
B: Why isn't there a 'broken' grouping in the Library - to list music that cannot be played/used on an iPod? Why: An error message is displayed - after which you go hunting for music that is 'broken' for one reason or another. While we are here: Yes, the 'convert to MP3' option is nice, but where is the 'Convert to MP3 and remove the original song and don't ever bug me about it again' option? Continuing on, where, oh bloody where, is the 'convert this video to MP4' option?
B: Why isn't there an option to 'always convert to MP3' for.wmv songs? Why: This functionality would be nice to have.
B: Why is everything labelled as 'Music' or 'Movies'. I do have TV shows! I don't want my 'audio books' to be playing when I 'play all'. Why: Having chapter 8 of Goblet of Fire play in the middle of music is disturbing.
B: Can we PLEASE, OF FOR THE LOVE OF THE DEITY OF YOUR CHOICE PLEASE, have an option to disable the 'double-click plays the song' functionality. Why: I've lost track of how many times I have been modifying field values for songs and it has started playing the song. Not good. Why: I have been building playlists and instead of dragging a song to a playlist it has interruppted the current song and started a new one instead of adding it to the playlist. Arggg!!!!! This is enough to drive you insane after a couple of times.
B: Provide more information about what the options in Edit > Preferences actually do. Why: Does the option 'shuffle songs' shuffle all songs? What are 'groupings'? What is the difference between the three? Why are these radio buttons instead of check boxes?
B: If a song has been converted to MP3 and added - then don't report that syncing it is 'a problem'. Why: It has already been added - as an MP3!
B: If something cannot be played on the iPod then give me the options to do something about it! At the very least a 'remove this from the 'Music' folder or 'tag these items as faulty and don't report them again' Why: It is very nice to get the error message, BUT I CANNOT FIND THAT SONG IN THE ITUNES PROGRAM ANYWHERE!?! Misc: Yes, there is a column on the left hand side to indicate these problems. No, you can't sort on it. No, you can't filter on it - you need to manually scroll through the whole lot to find them.
B: I've found a song in my playlist that I don't want in iTunes at all - Why can't I delete it from iTunes from the playlist? Why: Because sometimes you are playing through a playlist and would like to remove the song completely. Going through the main MUSIC folder for every single bloody song to remove is a pain.
B: Why can't my TV Shows go into 'TV Shows'. Why: No. Don't answer. I know. Because they are 'movies' and I should create a movie playlist called 'TV Shows' to hold them.
B: Can't add I add my podcasts I have downloaded as MP3 files
Viruses Oh yes. Amongst other crap installed. I've noticed that it is faster when windows is freshly installed.
SATA / IDE All of my drives are on their own IDE / SATA - except the opticals.
Network speed Agreed. However, this doesn't explain the slow drive to drive slowness.
RAM Admittedly something I haven't tried on the 2.4 machine. It has 512MB and in the end I decided to not upgrade the RAM but to get a new computer:) I seriously thought that a better CPU, newer motherboard and 2GB would eliminate the problem. The most I can say is that the 3.0 machine can (usually) copy large files around and it doesn't interfer with video / music. I find it disturbing when the machine 'locks up' for short times (100% CPU - usually by an 'invisable' (doesn't show on the process list) process for around 5 to 10 seconds).
I realise that XP on a 512MB box isn't helping in the first place.. but bear in mind that this machine isn't doing too much else besides being a file server while I was doing this stuff (moving large folders around). It used to be used to play movies / music etc.
Drivers That's what I first thought! Latest drivers downloaded - for all hardware. No difference.
Heating This one did worry me. I've installed another fan, and have a spare that I'm contemplating. Box boxes right now are 'cool' - but summertime heat ~30deg outside doesn't help. Will see if this trend continues into winter. I thought that heat was causing this in the 2.4.. so I took the side off and used a large external fan:) It did help the motherboard temp during summer quite a bit - but not the copy speed.
Impatience I'm very patient:) What gets me is when small files take 20 to 30 seconds to copy (small folders of stuff). Strangely, larger folders can be quite quick.
Thank you for listing your thoughts out. I have been through the above, and looked at the network card (another response) and have seriously considered a reinstall (it is on the cards since the machine has not had a refresh for 6 months).
What do you do when you have a problem like this; you have spent time looking at it but can't identify the source and it isn't irritating enough to warrent a weekend to rebuild the machine / OS and hunt down the cause? In my case I made this machine my secondary box and the effect isn't as bad on the new machine. Sometime in the near future it will be Ubuntu and I suspect not a problem (unless it is hardware).
In other notes, I had booted with the Knoppix DVD and tested. Fast, or faster. 1GB drive to drive in under 30 seconds. No system lockup while the copies (multiple copies) were happening. No need to thwok me for using windows on it - yes, it is just asking for it. Yes, it is only a matter of (my) time until it is Linux.
I thought of this. One new PCI Netgear (admitadly only a $50 one, but still) network card later.. no, same transfer rates. The motherboards in question are the gigabyte 8INXP (Intel Pro 1000 MT - on the 2.4 machine) and a Gigabyte 8I945P Pro (Broadcom Netlink Gigabit Ethernet - on the 3.0Ghz - 2 GB ram).
From what I've played around with it looks like the problem is on the windows side somewhere - not in the networking.
Also, when opening large folders (eg, with 20GB+ of files) explorer freezes. Don't try and copy the whole folder at once:P It can take a while before it begins:)
Interesting that you mention the sound playback. I find that video feeezes and the CPU is pretty much clogged up by an 'invisable' task sometimes and other times by explorer itself. It's when 'invisable' tasks chew the CPU that is concerning.
I will give it a test next time I need to transfer a significant amount of data across. No, I can't explain why FTP is faster. No, I haven't done testing to see exactly how fast, and no.. I don't know why standard windows explorer copy is (or appears to be slower).
I can tell you that I've tried tweaking everything I can think of or google to find out exactly why it isn't a lot faster- I've read some other people's responses to this (for XP) and I still can't see why it sometimes locks up just to copy large files. More research needed on my part.
A long time ago - around '95 - a was at a friends house and he was doing some stuff on his computer. At one point he rebooted from windows into OS/2 and executed a large copy (along with a few other things) in OS/2 and said: 'booting into OS/2 and doing this is a lot faster'.
I found that really funny at the time. A while later (much more recently) another friend of mine had dualboot on his main machine - XP and Redhat. Once again, I got to see someone reboot a machine into a different OS to execute file transfers (in this case, across to another hard drive, and across the network). Granted, he had several scripts that he used on redhat that assisted what he was doing. What he said was that the same speed could only be achieved in XP by using FTP or similar utility (to his knowledge).
This news of Vista having the same problem (sounds like the same problem anyway - but worse) when copying files doesn't shock me. My slower machine (running XP SP2, a 2.4Ghz 512MB ram) can take ages to copy files - even if it is just across to another hard drive. When copying across the network I set up all of the copies and leave it (don't bother even trying to run anything else while it is doing this). On my newer machine, a 3Ghz 2GB ram (etc etc) dual core machine I expected this 'copy lag' to go away. N'uh uh. When I copy large (100MB+ files) around (drive to drive, or drive to network) the machine has a tendancy to lag badly. The 2.4Ghz machine lags so badly you can browse with Mozilla but not much else. The 3.0Ghz machine (so far as I am aware) should _not_ lag this badly.
To answer the questions: 1) Yes, I have looked into the hardware side of both of these machines and tried some tweaking. No luck. 2) Yes, I have looked into software settings including DMA and drivers. 3) Yes, I have trawled around the web looking for answers. The only answer I have atm is to use FTP:) or simply not use Explorer (I did try a few explorer replacement programs. Now I just queue the files and wait).
Any suggestions welcome. Yes, I have googled.
Lets not even start on trying to network XP "professional" with XP "home". *argl*
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It may not be absolutely correct (note that there is humour there), however, it hits the nail on the head.
Exactly why does Explorer need to 'verify' before deleting?
You may have to pay (for the moment! ULL coming soon! Maybe!) the Telstra Tax (min $20 a month atm), but you get to choose from over a hundred DSL providers.
:)
http://www.whirlpool.net.au/ has a list of them
Australia is like this.
Your physical connection - copper wire - is provided by Telstra (in most places). You pay min $20 per month. It is REQUIRED to pay this fee if you want/need a landline.
Your internet connection is via many ISPs who have a variety of connection methods and paths. Some, like iiNet, build their own (or parts of their own) network. How much you pay is down to how much you are willing to shop around.
These days you can join an ISP without a contract, up front cost is around AUS$100
For more info, go to http://www.whirlpool.net.au/
See the lively discussion on the forums there about Australian ISPs.
I am sure that we can do this a better way. Canberra is 1/3 of the way through building a fiber network (Transact) but it turns out that it isn't FTTH it is Fiber To The Curb - the last 'mile' is a standard DSL box. Ouch. It's more of a pain in the ass to deal with that standard DSL.
In other news, plans for 'better' networks are being killed by DSL2 - speeds up to 8MB down are now available across Australia.
More news: To try and save his political position the prime minister of Australia declared that the Liberal Government will spend bucketloads in deploying 'high speed internet' everywhere. We'll wait and see on this one. At the moment DSL2 costs a chunk more than DSL and adoption isn't as high. It's like having dialup vs DSL.. some people can't justify the extra cost for the extra speed.
Absolutely. I have read that this is what the UK fears as well. Mostly what they worry about is having to support people who do not support the system.
I am a good example. The system supported me for.. less than a year.. before I got my first 'real' job. Since then I've paid so much tax back into the system that it completely blows away A) The time the system supported me through the 'dole' and B) All of the times the system has given me 'rebates' (eg: Medicare and the like). This is how our system is supposed to work. It completely goes to pieces when people start abusing it.
In Australia right now we have between 1 and 3% unemployment - meaning that only those who really avoid it well or seriously can't work don't have a job.
The Government knew in around 2002 that the health insurance system here was going to implode. It simply could not sustain itself - especially since how much some of the companies pay their exec these days. This is one of the reasons they brought in the 30% rebate. However, since then, every time the Government increases payouts - medicare or private health insurance related - you see the medical side raise their prices significantly. Going to the doctor for a simple 15 minute checkup can cost you $60 these days.
The system that has been proposed to replace this is very simple: Increase the Medicare Levy (currently 1.5%) by 1% and force _everyone_ to pay it. Then, remove the laws requiring that 'well off' (those who earn more than $50K) to have health insurance. Have the Government do what health insurance companies currently do with the Medicare Levy. 2.5% of _everyone_ is a lot of money here, and as long as they reign in the PBS system it will cover what the current Health Insurance systems cover. People can still pay for higher HI if they want or need it, but with this system it removes the ability for HI to rip people off automatically and line their pockets.
As a final thought, consider this: The last guesstimate at how much it costs the Government for Medicare is approximately 1% of the money raised through the Medicare Levy. Don't even ask how much they get from the petrol and alcohol taxes.
I should elaborate on this figure.
This is how much you pay for health insurance just to avoid being slogged an extra 1% tax. So, if you earn $60K then for $600 you get something. Normally these types of health insurance do not cover very much and if you do find yourself in hospital you will be handing your wallet to them.
You are correct though - friends of mine have serious ailments that require hospital care as part of their existence (diabetes does that to you). In their case, yes, they pay $1000 to $1500 a month for 'health insurance'. Ouch.
I was merely pointing out how most people are forced into having health insurance - whether they need it, like it, want it.. or not.
Wrong. In 10 years time you will sit down to play your PS6 and have a full screen forced on you while levels load saying "Duke Nukem Forever: Coming soon!" while it uploads your playing and vital statistics to Sony.
Actually, there is nothing stopping them from doing this now..
In Australia if you earn over $50,000 a year ($100,000 for couples) give or take a few rules.. then if you do not have the minimum level of private health insurance (which normally has a minimum of $500 excess for the hospital cover) then they tax you an extra 1%.
The Australian Tax Office applies the Medicare Levy. This levy is 1.5% of your taxable income. Most people have to pay this. This pays for our system where you have a Medicare coverage service done, eg go to your GP and get charged $50, and Medicare pays back a percentage, eg $25.
Private health insurance in Australia is getting so expensive that the Govt and Private Health insurers now have taken several steps to try and avoid a full revolt by the public. The first is the private health insurance rebate. This reduces all private health insurance by at least 35%. For older people it can reduce it by 35% or 40% depend on your age.
However, what they also do is 'load' your health insurance. If you do not have private health insurance by your 31st birthday then for each year that you are not covered by health insurance they add a loading of 2% per year (when you do join private health insurance). This is called Lifetime Health Cover. It is designed to force 30 to 45 year old people to take out insurance early.
For most people, here is how it works:
You take your taxable income of you or you and your spouse, add or subtract according to the various rules (each child increases how much taxable income you can earn by $1500 per year before they slog the extra 1% on you for not being covered) and you work out how much extra tax you are going to pay anyway. So, if your total taxable income is going to be $65,000 then you are looking at having $650 ripped out of your pocket at tax time. So, you go out and look for private health insurance that will be accepted by the tax office for $650 or less. This means you at least get something out of the money you are going to lose. Usually the something is ambulance cover and minimum hospital cover which limits how much they can charge you for a visit to $500.
This works because it is enforced at tax time. If you cannot prove that you were covered by private health insurance and you earn more than $50,000 then they extract it (pro-rata mind you, so if you are covered for 50% of the year then you only pay 0.5%) from you as part of your yearly tax return.
How about we not go into how the major private health insurance companies in Australia have raised their premiums by ~$5 per year for the last 3 years...
Technical question: How would you capture all information that goes through RAM?
Next question: How would you store it? That's got to be GB of data for a server..
Dumping RAM to disk would not be good - that would be 2GB+ for every dump and would not include all of the information in RAM.
Even then, how would you get it to them? You would need a removable hard drive just to store this information. Who pays for the storage space, the CPU time to do this processing and the human time required to set it up?
Consider all of the sites you go to in a single day.
How many do you actually need cookies for? Right. A handful.
The default behaviour, given how the technology is abused these days, should be to delete all cookies and purge the cache when the browser closes - except for the sites specified by the user.
It still irks me that IE (yes, we have to use it at work) still doesn't have an option for 'delete all cookies on exit' - but it is perfectly capable of clearing the rest of the cache.
I agree that the option to accept from originating site is good, but these days I don't care. Either way the cookies are purged every day.
Guys! Any chance of a Secret of Mana or Secret of Evermore remake? ... and A Link to the Past as well (while we are here :P )
I would have loved to have played more of both of these classics..
How long until all browsers have a url checker built in with some simple basic rules applied?
Eg: If the address contains ".bank.com" and there is a "." after the com then alert the user / disable javascript / etc.
Yes, I do know that for a lot of people having technology that calls attention to these kinds of problems just causes them to not worry about it. There are, however, too many people who just don't have a clue, are not capable or don't care. I've taught many of them to be careful.
I still wonder why people don't use the Firefix / Adblock / Filterset.G combination as a basic starting point.
It is good to see that there are some anti-phishing addons for Firefox now.
Let's try it.
It can't be too hard to isolate an American who has broken Australia's laws. Anyone want to bet that it won't work the other way?
Serious question: If it doesn't work the other way (that Australia cannot sentence American citizens), then could this decision be reversed?
Captcha: Pleaded. How appropriate.
Regardless of who fired him, if 'management' want to fire someone then fine. They must then accept that what that person did does not get done until they are replaced. I have had this in reverse: I was removed from a position (to another position of the same level) and when the previous position was not filled they expected me to upkeep the role.
Forget it. No. Go jump in the lake.
Use the managementese variations of these words to tell them that if they want to remove someone then they need to replace the person or not have that position filled.
What are you going to do next time? I'd recomend reading the book Death March to gain an insight into this area of management.
Advice: Don't let it happen again. It is not your fault.
However, by all means, work overtime if they feel like compensating you accordingly.
First, state that 'this must be done so that an answer is found using only 2 marbles.
This means that when the second marble breaks you must have an answer.
Try this:
1. Go up 1 floor. Drop a marble. If it breaks, the answer is '0 floors' (special case! )
2. Until (the first marble breaks)
Go up 3 floors, drop one marble (and retrieve it if it doesn't break)
If it breaks, go down 2 floors and drop a marle
If it doesn't break go up a floor and drop a marble
This will check for floors 1, 4, 7, 10 and so on.
When the marble breaks, you check current floor -2. If it is ok, you check the -1. From this you can tell which floor the marble will break on.
Takes 4 tries to get check level 10 though, and 22 tries to get to 100.
Any thoughts?
Thank you for the clarification. We have a mac in the house, but I'm mostly on Windows / Linux.
:)
I currently use Sage with Firefox and haven't yet got into complexities with RSS feeds - one bugbear is that some feeds use feed:// which doesn't always translate (changing this to http:// fixes it).
I'll look into this when I'm next allowed to use the mac
In response,
I'd like to comment that the Search box being at the bottom of the window is one of the reasons I first switched to Firefox (back in the days when Netscape was dead and Opera was the only real alternative). I've lost track of the number of times I've used MS applications (or anything else really) and have been annoyed by the search box covering up text. Just my 2p.
Perhaps your comment could be more correctly summed up as:
"SUGGESTION: Allow the Search bar to float and not be locked at the bottom of the window."
Funny you should mention that... the camera purchase I mean.
:)
A friend of mine recently (last weekend) asked me for help in purchasing a new camera. It came down to a cybershot (the upgraded version of the one I have, which I quite like btw) or an Olympus model. The guy behind the counter was good to do a deal on either and in the end he asked me which one I'd buy.
My response? 'Do you know what Sony did with the rootkit fiasco a while back? Right? Yes. Ok. Do you REALLY want to plug *anything* made by Sony into your PC? Even if it is only a camera that connects via USB so you can upload. Your choice.'
He bought the Olympus. (yes, for other reasons than that 'it's a Sony! Yuck!'. Still)
Yes, it is only one sale. Yes, it is only one cheap ($300) camera. However, it is one less Sony product sold, and one more person who will seriously think about *anything* branded with Sony in the future. And his family. And his friends. And anyone else who asks me if I'd reccomend a Sony product.
Back to the article. I'm shockd that it says that it is 'fixing problems'. I thought that it meant that they were going to remove the DRM
Erm, I hate to say this but.. stop buying them?
I have the entire Farscape series on DVD.. and I love watching them. If they had that message I would be sickened before getting through series one. I have one (1) DVD that I know of that has this message. After seeing it on a disc I purchase I stopped buying DVDs.
As a footnote, after going to the movies 3 times and sitting through the useless mpaa ad about 'stealing is a crime' I don't go to the cinema any more. (yes, I know what stealing is, and what a crime is, and I know what mpaa do to people in the US through the courts). Besides not having my ears blasted, other people ruining the movie and a whole list of other reasons not to go.. I find myself with 1/2 hour of my life NOT spend watching ads and short versions of movies (which they pathetically call 'trailers'.
Absolutely! I agree! iTunes is quite defective for several reasons.
:(
.wmv songs?
There. Fixed that for you.
Before we begin, I'd like to say that iTunes isn't so bad.. overall. However, there are some things that make you want to pull your hair out. If you have hair.
Here's a list, since you asked:
iTunes Bitching
B: Why isn't there a 'staging area' where you can add songs and do things to them before iTunes does what it does? (resolves names, artist, type etc).
Why: So many times I have dragged whole folders into the 'Music' folder - only to 'lose' some! Now I can't find them easily.. and not even search can help me
B: Can there be an option to keep the original name, or revert to previous information? Can this be held inside iTunes so reversion is possible?
Why: The 'offical' name/information may not be what I would like it to be
B: Why isn't there a 'broken' grouping in the Library - to list music that cannot be played/used on an iPod?
Why: An error message is displayed - after which you go hunting for music that is 'broken' for one reason or another.
While we are here: Yes, the 'convert to MP3' option is nice, but where is the 'Convert to MP3 and remove the original song and don't ever bug me about it again' option?
Continuing on, where, oh bloody where, is the 'convert this video to MP4' option?
B: Why isn't there an option to 'always convert to MP3' for
Why: This functionality would be nice to have.
B: Why is everything labelled as 'Music' or 'Movies'. I do have TV shows! I don't want my 'audio books' to be playing when I 'play all'.
Why: Having chapter 8 of Goblet of Fire play in the middle of music is disturbing.
B: Can we PLEASE, OF FOR THE LOVE OF THE DEITY OF YOUR CHOICE PLEASE, have an option to disable the 'double-click plays the song' functionality.
Why: I've lost track of how many times I have been modifying field values for songs and it has started playing the song. Not good.
Why: I have been building playlists and instead of dragging a song to a playlist it has interruppted the current song and started a new one instead of adding it to the playlist. Arggg!!!!!
This is enough to drive you insane after a couple of times.
B: Provide more information about what the options in Edit > Preferences actually do.
Why: Does the option 'shuffle songs' shuffle all songs? What are 'groupings'? What is the difference between the three? Why are these radio buttons instead of check boxes?
B: If a song has been converted to MP3 and added - then don't report that syncing it is 'a problem'.
Why: It has already been added - as an MP3!
B: If something cannot be played on the iPod then give me the options to do something about it! At the very least a 'remove this from the 'Music' folder or 'tag these items as faulty and don't report them again'
Why: It is very nice to get the error message, BUT I CANNOT FIND THAT SONG IN THE ITUNES PROGRAM ANYWHERE!?!
Misc: Yes, there is a column on the left hand side to indicate these problems. No, you can't sort on it. No, you can't filter on it - you need to manually scroll through the whole lot to find them.
B: I've found a song in my playlist that I don't want in iTunes at all - Why can't I delete it from iTunes from the playlist?
Why: Because sometimes you are playing through a playlist and would like to remove the song completely. Going through the main MUSIC folder for every single bloody song to remove is a pain.
B: Why can't my TV Shows go into 'TV Shows'.
Why: No. Don't answer. I know. Because they are 'movies' and I should create a movie playlist called 'TV Shows' to hold them.
B: Can't add I add my podcasts I have downloaded as MP3 files
(it's high school, what are the odds that it's worth copyrighting?).
So, does that mean that the teenager who built the cheap spectrograph for under $500 recently would lose all rights to it?
Viruses
:) I seriously thought that a better CPU, newer motherboard and 2GB would eliminate the problem. The most I can say is that the 3.0 machine can (usually) copy large files around and it doesn't interfer with video / music. I find it disturbing when the machine 'locks up' for short times (100% CPU - usually by an 'invisable' (doesn't show on the process list) process for around 5 to 10 seconds).
:) It did help the motherboard temp during summer quite a bit - but not the copy speed.
:) What gets me is when small files take 20 to 30 seconds to copy (small folders of stuff). Strangely, larger folders can be quite quick.
Oh yes. Amongst other crap installed. I've noticed that it is faster when windows is freshly installed.
SATA / IDE
All of my drives are on their own IDE / SATA - except the opticals.
Network speed
Agreed. However, this doesn't explain the slow drive to drive slowness.
RAM
Admittedly something I haven't tried on the 2.4 machine. It has 512MB and in the end I decided to not upgrade the RAM but to get a new computer
I realise that XP on a 512MB box isn't helping in the first place.. but bear in mind that this machine isn't doing too much else besides being a file server while I was doing this stuff (moving large folders around). It used to be used to play movies / music etc.
Drivers
That's what I first thought! Latest drivers downloaded - for all hardware. No difference.
Heating
This one did worry me. I've installed another fan, and have a spare that I'm contemplating. Box boxes right now are 'cool' - but summertime heat ~30deg outside doesn't help. Will see if this trend continues into winter. I thought that heat was causing this in the 2.4.. so I took the side off and used a large external fan
Impatience
I'm very patient
Thank you for listing your thoughts out. I have been through the above, and looked at the network card (another response) and have seriously considered a reinstall (it is on the cards since the machine has not had a refresh for 6 months).
What do you do when you have a problem like this; you have spent time looking at it but can't identify the source and it isn't irritating enough to warrent a weekend to rebuild the machine / OS and hunt down the cause? In my case I made this machine my secondary box and the effect isn't as bad on the new machine. Sometime in the near future it will be Ubuntu and I suspect not a problem (unless it is hardware).
In other notes, I had booted with the Knoppix DVD and tested. Fast, or faster. 1GB drive to drive in under 30 seconds. No system lockup while the copies (multiple copies) were happening. No need to thwok me for using windows on it - yes, it is just asking for it. Yes, it is only a matter of (my) time until it is Linux.
I thought of this. One new PCI Netgear (admitadly only a $50 one, but still) network card later.. no, same transfer rates. The motherboards in question are the gigabyte 8INXP (Intel Pro 1000 MT - on the 2.4 machine) and a Gigabyte 8I945P Pro (Broadcom Netlink Gigabit Ethernet - on the 3.0Ghz - 2 GB ram).
:P It can take a while before it begins :)
From what I've played around with it looks like the problem is on the windows side somewhere - not in the networking.
Also, when opening large folders (eg, with 20GB+ of files) explorer freezes. Don't try and copy the whole folder at once
Interesting that you mention the sound playback. I find that video feeezes and the CPU is pretty much clogged up by an 'invisable' task sometimes and other times by explorer itself. It's when 'invisable' tasks chew the CPU that is concerning.
Yes, Linux with Samba works quite well if you have a spare machine.. my Linux box hardware died not long ago :)
I will give it a test next time I need to transfer a significant amount of data across.
No, I can't explain why FTP is faster. No, I haven't done testing to see exactly how fast, and no.. I don't know why standard windows explorer copy is (or appears to be slower).
I can tell you that I've tried tweaking everything I can think of or google to find out exactly why it isn't a lot faster- I've read some other people's responses to this (for XP) and I still can't see why it sometimes locks up just to copy large files. More research needed on my part.
A long time ago - around '95 - a was at a friends house and he was doing some stuff on his computer. At one point he rebooted from windows into OS/2 and executed a large copy (along with a few other things) in OS/2 and said: 'booting into OS/2 and doing this is a lot faster'.
:) or simply not use Explorer (I did try a few explorer replacement programs. Now I just queue the files and wait).
I found that really funny at the time. A while later (much more recently) another friend of mine had dualboot on his main machine - XP and Redhat. Once again, I got to see someone reboot a machine into a different OS to execute file transfers (in this case, across to another hard drive, and across the network). Granted, he had several scripts that he used on redhat that assisted what he was doing. What he said was that the same speed could only be achieved in XP by using FTP or similar utility (to his knowledge).
This news of Vista having the same problem (sounds like the same problem anyway - but worse) when copying files doesn't shock me. My slower machine (running XP SP2, a 2.4Ghz 512MB ram) can take ages to copy files - even if it is just across to another hard drive. When copying across the network I set up all of the copies and leave it (don't bother even trying to run anything else while it is doing this). On my newer machine, a 3Ghz 2GB ram (etc etc) dual core machine I expected this 'copy lag' to go away. N'uh uh. When I copy large (100MB+ files) around (drive to drive, or drive to network) the machine has a tendancy to lag badly. The 2.4Ghz machine lags so badly you can browse with Mozilla but not much else. The 3.0Ghz machine (so far as I am aware) should _not_ lag this badly.
To answer the questions:
1) Yes, I have looked into the hardware side of both of these machines and tried some tweaking. No luck.
2) Yes, I have looked into software settings including DMA and drivers.
3) Yes, I have trawled around the web looking for answers. The only answer I have atm is to use FTP
Any suggestions welcome. Yes, I have googled.
Lets not even start on trying to network XP "professional" with XP "home". *argl*