...I think we're beating a dead one here. The death of the floppy has been proclaimed countless times. I understand what this is trying to get at, but it really doesn't matter. As long as people get shit done, who cares? My roommate insists on using floppies, mainly out of laziness, but even that is a self-correcting behavior as most floppies made these days can't be used more than once or twice without producing crippling errors. Lose enough important work and you'll catch on. Either way, we don't need someone to tell us how it is or how it will be. People might cling to the floppy yet in the future because it's what they know. Then again, they might randomly get the courage to try something new. It is impossible to predict, but that is not important because it really couldn't matter less what happens.
OK. Thank you for your story. I did somewhat twist your words, but you have to understand that good customer service is hard to comprehend. We just have to keep them all working for our money.
Did you ever think that might not be completely true, however? How is that at all a viable business plan? You can't just go throw up a new tower because some candy-assed customer whines that he gets bad service in his Faraday Cage of an apartment building. Yes, they have a shitload of money, including some of mine, but that doesn't mean that they're going to spend it to make one person happy. Perhaps they do in fact work harder than others, but that doesn't mean they do exactly what you think they do.
I think a big part of the problem has to do with the diversity and obscurity of the information available. Yes, you might spend some time reading about things you already know something about, but often the idea behind research is to learn new things. Therefore, it's hard for bogus material to be found, especially if it at least sounds reasonable.
I wrote a fair sized paper last year comparing the majority of Christian religions and how they formed and how they differ on key issues. Frankly, it was hard to find concise, usable information anywhere else, but Wikipedia was more than helpful and by having half of my sources be from Wikipedia I pulled of an A with the Theology chair at a Catholic university. Go figure.
Except that's not really how the software works. It's supposed to be "intelligent," not just something a 10-line script could handle. If it pulls all spam messages and doesn't touch real stuff, then it's not false in any way, it's just doing what it's supposed to. I understand what you're saying, but it seems to me that you're missing the point. This isn't Soviet Russia, it's ok if the software is a little better than we originally planned it to be.
Well, that's obvious, but did you ever consider what product is on almost every business user's Windows or Mac machine? That's right, Microsoft Office. Considering even using site licensing Office typically costs hundreds of dollars per machine simply to install and use, it is much, much more expensive than products such as SQL Server. You really have to look at the whole picture. I guess people are so entrenched in the whole Linux-vs-Windows thing that they have lost sight of the fact that replacing the Office suite is the easier and more significant task. If you get all your users using OpenOffice and Mozilla products on Windows, then whenever you upgrade their machines you just install Linux instead and put those exact same products on top. They'll hardly even appreciate the difference, other than the presumed speed and stability improvements. If, on the other hand, you dump users right into Linux without transitioning like this, they are more likely to freak out. When everything changes at once, there is going to be an awful lot of lost productivity. Anyway, this is really going off-topic, but honestly for business-people who make decisions, the most compelling reason to use Windows right now is for Office. You can get everything else on Linux, and hopefully for less. There just isn't anything that is quite like Office yet. This doesn't mean I like Office, as I frequently clash with it, but it honestly gets a lot of jobs done better than its alternatives. I'm hoping that will continue to change.
BTW- don't talk to me about running Microsoft Office on top of Linux. I don't care how you do it, it's a bad idea. Office is a broken product by Microsoft's standards. If you're using Linux, use software developed for Linux and you'll be much more satisfied.
Basically I don't understand why this unit wasn't even more popular. If I wanted to get a handheld strictly for PIM use/typing, this would still be the unit I would get today. Instead, I find myself using the Sidekick as it's network integration is spectacular in comparison. Ideally I would like a Psion 5mx form-factor device with the nice keyboard, a fast CPU, a durable hard drive (mainly for music), enough ram to run Linux well, a higher resolution color screen, GSM radio, a Bluetooth headset that doesn't suck (OK, so the phone part isn't critical, but I'm not holding a Psion to my face), USB 2.0/FireWire, and maybe 802.11g for kicks.
Yea except these are the idiots that will also sue Google and try to take them down because of their own mistakes. If you're in some sort of struggle with an idiot, you'll be ok, but may God help you if that idiot has a halfway decent lawyer.
Canadian dollars wouldn't make sense, not that it really matters though. A Canadian dollar typically exchanges for less than a USA dollar, therefore one would assume that prices given in Canadian would appear higher. It seems that perhaps better deals can be had in Canada though. Ultimately it seems to come down to location. I don't know what the technology sales market is like in Taiwan, but I'm willing to be you can get a really damn nice mouse there for about $5 (pick your currency). Regardless, there is no point in getting in a pissing contest over who thinks what is a good value and whatnot.
If FileMaker 6 works for you then don't upgrade, at least not yet. Sure, 7 is much better, but for existing systems it doesn't really offer any benefits unless you feel something is missing. (If it ain't broke, don't fix it)
The only method that works if you have a roommate is for that roommate to be a trusted friend of yours. Otherwise you just have no idea what's going to happen to your hardware when you're not there. It would be nice to be able to assume that your stuff will be safe, but in my experience there are more and more devious morons getting into college each year so it's hard to keep anything safe. Of course, when I lived on campus I was utterly careless and never had a problem. One more note: If you let your hardware be known to everyone then you're going to lose something.
Since when are we not all taxpayers? A consumer is almost always inherently a taxpayer in the U.S. A notable exception would be certain untaxed items in some locales, big ones being food and clothing. You also need to get the money somehow so that you can "consume" and that is usually taxed. I hate how we allow ourselves to be called taxpayers because what that means is that we are seen by the politicians as nothing more than those people who give them money. Call me a citizen or constituent, but not just some dumb taxpayer. Shit, I'd rather be called a "voter" than a taxpayer, because if there was only one activity associated with me that one would be better.
Just an FYI, Office is Microsoft's flagship product, NOT Windows. Office costs significantly more. Windows is simply a vehicle to deliver other software.
Frankly, I don't think that any company that supports Windows XP based PCs could possibly offer a satisfactory level of technical support. I am currently providing technical support on a college campus during move-in and what I am seeing nearly has me in tears. Malware was just starting to become critical during last year's move-in, but this time around it is simply shocking. I have seen countless brand new computers that are already impossibly crippled.
What upsets me so much about this is not that Microsoft sucks at writing secure, reliable software but rather that there are so many people that are so willing to exploit it. Considering how many unique exploits there are on Windows XP, I feel that regardless of secure we think that Linux or BSD or Mac OS X may be, that if they had the dominant market share in their current state there would also be a large number of malware apps running wild on those platforms.
When you consider that it takes a significant amount of time to diagnose and resolve malware issues properly over the telephone, it immediately becomes impossible to offer good technical support. Sure, there are other key issues, such as outright hardware failure, but when malware is slowing down the machine average call time automatically increases. So unless your policy is to shaft users (and their data) and tell them to reformat/reinstall/use the restore CD right off the bat, or you are willing to pay what it really takes to have enough reps to help your customers, then there is absolutely no way to provide satisfactory technical support. Not in California, not in Canada, not in India.
Perhaps you won't knowingly. I'm no expert on just about anything but I'm sure there's been more than one software installer on Windows that modifies existing registry keys in order to make the installed software work. Odds are good you wouldn't know unless you were closely looking at what the install was doing. Odds are you wouldn't be doing that either. Which is not to say that it's either a good or bad idea to do, it's just hard because there really is no uniformity.
"It is made by Ruckus Network, and was developed by a group of MIT students."
No offense, but WTF does that mean? Made and developed are essentially synonyms in this case. I often wonder why so many poorly worded submissions make it to the front page of Slashdot. Is it because putting anything in quotes seems to remove all responsibility from the editor? Or is it sheer ignorance. I understand that the English language is a nasty, irregular bastard of a language, but for the love of corn let's try to be professional. And if I see one more "Microsoft are developing" or "Google have updated" or any other such nonsense I'm going to have to beat the living shit out of an ignorant bastard. An entity, even if it is comprised of many individuals, should be treated as singular because it is. I'll stop with the common sense lesson, but if you want people to honestly pay attention to what's important, don't let your poor writing get in the way. Believe me, it's a distraction, and for even more close-minded individuals than myself it can be a complete turn-off. Thanks for your attention.
...but the 40 below days you need to worry about. Seriously, you could kill people by messing with thermostats under such conditions. But I suppose that any house that would even have this feature would also probably be brand new and have insulation even thicker than my skull, so it wouldn't be tragic.
Seeing IKEA in this post made me cringe. I hope that anyone here has enough sense in them to be a very, very selective shopper there. It's appalling how much cheap crap they sell to people thinking they're getting a great deal. Fiber board is rarely a good deal. Here's a hint: if something doesn't seem right on the store's floor, it's not going to be right at home, especially not after a year of regular use. I know that there a plenty of other stores that peddle the same crap, but IKEA has made it their thing to only sell low quality products. Basically, you get what you pay for. If you want high-quality furniture especially, get it local. You won't be disappointed.
I agree with that basic idea. However, from what I have heard and also from personal experience I don't think that the quality is quite there yet. I'm sure it will be at some point, but we can't just take the same technology we use for pen drives and MP3 players and expect it to hold a pagefile (for example). Obviously, if price is any indication, this is higher quality memory than the stuff we normally can get our hands on. Either way I don't think anyone can really speak on this at all until we see a MTBF number and then compare that to current hard drives. Then, beat the hell out of one yourself and see how long it lasts. I was just speculating, but I have yet to be convinced I'm wrong.
I wonder how long you can beat at a device like this in a server environment before it croaks. I'd give it no more than a year life expectancy, but hey, I'm feeling pessimistic.
OK, I don't think I should even try to touch on that comment about affording food versus affording a gaming console/computer. I hope most realize how things work in this thing called reality. If you don't, go to a "bad" neighborhood and check things out for a while. Check out the inside of a project. My current theory after being a contractor for the Minneapolis Public Housing Authority for the past few months is the more DirecTV dishes on a house, the poorer the occupants. It really is strange. Not that I think liberties should be squelched, but no one should have a right to TV if they cannot even afford housing. Additionally, not to encourage piracy, but these dish-using people need to learn how to share if they must have them at all.
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...I think we're beating a dead one here. The death of the floppy has been proclaimed countless times. I understand what this is trying to get at, but it really doesn't matter. As long as people get shit done, who cares? My roommate insists on using floppies, mainly out of laziness, but even that is a self-correcting behavior as most floppies made these days can't be used more than once or twice without producing crippling errors. Lose enough important work and you'll catch on. Either way, we don't need someone to tell us how it is or how it will be. People might cling to the floppy yet in the future because it's what they know. Then again, they might randomly get the courage to try something new. It is impossible to predict, but that is not important because it really couldn't matter less what happens.
OK. Thank you for your story. I did somewhat twist your words, but you have to understand that good customer service is hard to comprehend. We just have to keep them all working for our money.
Did you ever think that might not be completely true, however? How is that at all a viable business plan? You can't just go throw up a new tower because some candy-assed customer whines that he gets bad service in his Faraday Cage of an apartment building. Yes, they have a shitload of money, including some of mine, but that doesn't mean that they're going to spend it to make one person happy. Perhaps they do in fact work harder than others, but that doesn't mean they do exactly what you think they do.
I wrote a fair sized paper last year comparing the majority of Christian religions and how they formed and how they differ on key issues. Frankly, it was hard to find concise, usable information anywhere else, but Wikipedia was more than helpful and by having half of my sources be from Wikipedia I pulled of an A with the Theology chair at a Catholic university. Go figure.
Except that's not really how the software works. It's supposed to be "intelligent," not just something a 10-line script could handle. If it pulls all spam messages and doesn't touch real stuff, then it's not false in any way, it's just doing what it's supposed to. I understand what you're saying, but it seems to me that you're missing the point. This isn't Soviet Russia, it's ok if the software is a little better than we originally planned it to be.
Except that we are doing most offshore outsourcing with English speaking people. Learn the facts before you use this as a welfare excuse, people.
BTW- don't talk to me about running Microsoft Office on top of Linux. I don't care how you do it, it's a bad idea. Office is a broken product by Microsoft's standards. If you're using Linux, use software developed for Linux and you'll be much more satisfied.
Basically I don't understand why this unit wasn't even more popular. If I wanted to get a handheld strictly for PIM use/typing, this would still be the unit I would get today. Instead, I find myself using the Sidekick as it's network integration is spectacular in comparison. Ideally I would like a Psion 5mx form-factor device with the nice keyboard, a fast CPU, a durable hard drive (mainly for music), enough ram to run Linux well, a higher resolution color screen, GSM radio, a Bluetooth headset that doesn't suck (OK, so the phone part isn't critical, but I'm not holding a Psion to my face), USB 2.0/FireWire, and maybe 802.11g for kicks.
Yea except these are the idiots that will also sue Google and try to take them down because of their own mistakes. If you're in some sort of struggle with an idiot, you'll be ok, but may God help you if that idiot has a halfway decent lawyer.
Canadian dollars wouldn't make sense, not that it really matters though. A Canadian dollar typically exchanges for less than a USA dollar, therefore one would assume that prices given in Canadian would appear higher. It seems that perhaps better deals can be had in Canada though. Ultimately it seems to come down to location. I don't know what the technology sales market is like in Taiwan, but I'm willing to be you can get a really damn nice mouse there for about $5 (pick your currency). Regardless, there is no point in getting in a pissing contest over who thinks what is a good value and whatnot.
If FileMaker 6 works for you then don't upgrade, at least not yet. Sure, 7 is much better, but for existing systems it doesn't really offer any benefits unless you feel something is missing. (If it ain't broke, don't fix it)
The only method that works if you have a roommate is for that roommate to be a trusted friend of yours. Otherwise you just have no idea what's going to happen to your hardware when you're not there. It would be nice to be able to assume that your stuff will be safe, but in my experience there are more and more devious morons getting into college each year so it's hard to keep anything safe. Of course, when I lived on campus I was utterly careless and never had a problem. One more note: If you let your hardware be known to everyone then you're going to lose something.
it denies consumers, and in this case taxpayers
Since when are we not all taxpayers? A consumer is almost always inherently a taxpayer in the U.S. A notable exception would be certain untaxed items in some locales, big ones being food and clothing. You also need to get the money somehow so that you can "consume" and that is usually taxed. I hate how we allow ourselves to be called taxpayers because what that means is that we are seen by the politicians as nothing more than those people who give them money. Call me a citizen or constituent, but not just some dumb taxpayer. Shit, I'd rather be called a "voter" than a taxpayer, because if there was only one activity associated with me that one would be better.
Just an FYI, Office is Microsoft's flagship product, NOT Windows. Office costs significantly more. Windows is simply a vehicle to deliver other software.
What upsets me so much about this is not that Microsoft sucks at writing secure, reliable software but rather that there are so many people that are so willing to exploit it. Considering how many unique exploits there are on Windows XP, I feel that regardless of secure we think that Linux or BSD or Mac OS X may be, that if they had the dominant market share in their current state there would also be a large number of malware apps running wild on those platforms.
When you consider that it takes a significant amount of time to diagnose and resolve malware issues properly over the telephone, it immediately becomes impossible to offer good technical support. Sure, there are other key issues, such as outright hardware failure, but when malware is slowing down the machine average call time automatically increases. So unless your policy is to shaft users (and their data) and tell them to reformat/reinstall/use the restore CD right off the bat, or you are willing to pay what it really takes to have enough reps to help your customers, then there is absolutely no way to provide satisfactory technical support. Not in California, not in Canada, not in India.
Perhaps you won't knowingly. I'm no expert on just about anything but I'm sure there's been more than one software installer on Windows that modifies existing registry keys in order to make the installed software work. Odds are good you wouldn't know unless you were closely looking at what the install was doing. Odds are you wouldn't be doing that either. Which is not to say that it's either a good or bad idea to do, it's just hard because there really is no uniformity.
i though that we wanted to chmod 740 NOT 744 with that damn RIAA. wait, this doesn't even make sense.
No offense, but WTF does that mean? Made and developed are essentially synonyms in this case. I often wonder why so many poorly worded submissions make it to the front page of Slashdot. Is it because putting anything in quotes seems to remove all responsibility from the editor? Or is it sheer ignorance. I understand that the English language is a nasty, irregular bastard of a language, but for the love of corn let's try to be professional. And if I see one more "Microsoft are developing" or "Google have updated" or any other such nonsense I'm going to have to beat the living shit out of an ignorant bastard. An entity, even if it is comprised of many individuals, should be treated as singular because it is. I'll stop with the common sense lesson, but if you want people to honestly pay attention to what's important, don't let your poor writing get in the way. Believe me, it's a distraction, and for even more close-minded individuals than myself it can be a complete turn-off. Thanks for your attention.
Mine's HQ341. Suckers!
I think only the socially inept put background music on their web page. How lame.
...but the 40 below days you need to worry about. Seriously, you could kill people by messing with thermostats under such conditions. But I suppose that any house that would even have this feature would also probably be brand new and have insulation even thicker than my skull, so it wouldn't be tragic.
Seeing IKEA in this post made me cringe. I hope that anyone here has enough sense in them to be a very, very selective shopper there. It's appalling how much cheap crap they sell to people thinking they're getting a great deal. Fiber board is rarely a good deal. Here's a hint: if something doesn't seem right on the store's floor, it's not going to be right at home, especially not after a year of regular use. I know that there a plenty of other stores that peddle the same crap, but IKEA has made it their thing to only sell low quality products. Basically, you get what you pay for. If you want high-quality furniture especially, get it local. You won't be disappointed.
I agree with that basic idea. However, from what I have heard and also from personal experience I don't think that the quality is quite there yet. I'm sure it will be at some point, but we can't just take the same technology we use for pen drives and MP3 players and expect it to hold a pagefile (for example). Obviously, if price is any indication, this is higher quality memory than the stuff we normally can get our hands on. Either way I don't think anyone can really speak on this at all until we see a MTBF number and then compare that to current hard drives. Then, beat the hell out of one yourself and see how long it lasts. I was just speculating, but I have yet to be convinced I'm wrong.
I wonder how long you can beat at a device like this in a server environment before it croaks. I'd give it no more than a year life expectancy, but hey, I'm feeling pessimistic.
OK, I don't think I should even try to touch on that comment about affording food versus affording a gaming console/computer. I hope most realize how things work in this thing called reality. If you don't, go to a "bad" neighborhood and check things out for a while. Check out the inside of a project. My current theory after being a contractor for the Minneapolis Public Housing Authority for the past few months is the more DirecTV dishes on a house, the poorer the occupants. It really is strange. Not that I think liberties should be squelched, but no one should have a right to TV if they cannot even afford housing. Additionally, not to encourage piracy, but these dish-using people need to learn how to share if they must have them at all.