As I said, I'm Dutch, perhaps I'm more aware of my surrounding countries because my own country is rather small. However, I'm also generally aware of countries half-way across the globe. This is a direct effect of education that is/was open minded enough to teach something about everything (instead of the other way around).
For a multinational it isn't really important where it originated, it has different strategies for each zone anyway. Do you know where Shell came from? Doesn't matter, they are everywhere now.
As a kid I played with nothing else, so I did know where Lego comes from, I always wanted to go to Legoland...;-)
For my summerholiday I'm doing a tour of Norway, by the way...
I don't agree with you on the two kinds of people. I haven't seen this in most other (granted: European) nationalities. There it is much more a gradual scale, not binary. The two links you gave would be funny if they weren't so unbelievably sad...;-)
But how can you not know Ikea is from Sweden? They are famous for their Swedish Meatballs! And (at least around here) they have the Swedish flag on everything. Not to mention their stores are this color.
Luckily education here is rapidly going down the drain so it will even out eventually.
Yes I could. Same with the countries in Africa and Asia. Probably because I live in a small country (I'm Dutch), I had to learn where to find every nation with corresponding capital city on a blind map. I think I can still name all the states in the US too, and I'm an old fart now...
I will admit that I reacted a bit stingy. I shouldn't have, it was uncalled for.
It's just that I get annoyed by the never-ending display of ignorance about the world outside the US by most Americans that I encounter. It is really weird, of all the Americans I've met they were either some of the sharpest minds I know, or they were as dumb as a sack of wet potatoes. No inbetweens. That's strange, no?
Sweden. Ikea is originally from Sweden. But it's all the same to you, isn't it? There's only two countries: the usa and the evil bad unimportant countries with savages in it.
I got the impression that Ubuntu in general tried to bring (rush?) eye candy to the desktop. Perhaps that impression is wrong. I don't like Beryl much but I can see the distinction between the beta-ness of Beryl and Ubuntu proper.
However that doesn't negate my point that Feisty broke my wireless. I still haven't gotten it working, by the way. As said, I can see the networks (even my neightbours) but it won't connect whatever I try.
Mind, Edgy wasn't a no-flaws install either. I'm seriously considering going back to the LTS version as that worked like a charm out of the box.
To recap: I'm very content with Ubuntu, I use it daily. It is very capable and I wish it all the best for the future. But at the same time I find that every new version breaks something for me. I can live with that because I'm not dependent on the latest-and-greatest.
I upgraded from Edgy to Feisty. Now my Linksys PCI wireless card is acting up. I can see the wireless network, but it doesn't connect to it. Or rather, it connects but silently refuses to use it.
Needless to say I'm not impressed. I couldn't care less about eye-candy, maybe the next release could focus on stability and quality?
Comma is the decimal separator in Europe
on
OpenOffice 2.2 Released
·
· Score: 4, Informative
it uses semicolons instead of commas to separate fields in things like IF statements. Very irritating. I use Excel quite a bit and the few times I've tried Calc it drives me crazy with its different syntax.
In most European countries the comma is used as the decimal separator. Three thousand dollar and twenty-five cents would be $3.000,25 (not $3,000.25 you might be used to). In a locale that does this Excel uses the semi-colon too.
Still, that means that 2/3 of his discoveries are new and original!
Might it be that education structures the mind to follow the known paths? Perhaps by not knowing the 'usual' solutions, you can come up with a more elegant and deep solution?
My Toshiba Satellite Pro 4600 (Pentium 3, 1 GHz, 256 Mb) works great with Ubuntu. All devices detected and working. And it is quite snappy too!
I've used it for internet/open office for about two years.
While I don't know this particular system, most large database systems are not run on the local pc. Not even client-server.
They probably use a terminal emulator (vt100, what-have-you) to get access to the big iron that runs the database app.
I've used such a setup from 1994 to 1999, after that the system got overhauled to include a flashy web frontend. Mind you, you can still access the app the 'original way' too and on occasion I have to. It is much, much faster this way too.
In the power supply there are two capacitors from the 'live' wires to ground. These capacitors are used to prevent too much electrical noise in the power lines.
Now, if you don't have a ground prong on your plug, the ground (as seen from the power supply) is floating at around 40 volts (or 80 volts in a 220 V mains). However, the current that can flow is very, very low. Yes, it is annoying if you get zapped, but it is not dangerous to you. It might not be all that healthy for other electronics though.
When trying to measure these kind of things, please do not use you multi meter which has an insanely high internal resistance. This gets you reading that are way off. Load the voltage with a 10 kOhm resistor and measure again, you will measure a voltage of nearly zero.
Flash is only used for ads and other blinking crap. It bloats pages making them load slower.
Right now, there is a severe storm in Europe. People have died, thousands are stranded and can't get home tonight because of closed roads and shutdown public transport. The official emergency site to keep people informed about this crisis has been unreachable for most of the day. Why? Because the front page is riddled with Flash applets. Because of this the servers are severely overloaded. Nice going, for an emergency service.
Think about it this way: you are always in 'command mode'. In this mode you can issue commands that modify your text or move your cursor around. When you want to insert (or append) any text, you give the 'insert' command, by pressing 'i'. Then you enter your text. When you are done, you press 'escape'.
Where is the confusion? You just treat insert as a command which has a limited scope. You stop inserting when you are done, just as you stop deleting when you are done.
It really makes perfect sense.
From vi to vim, now back again to vi
on
The Birth of vi
·
· Score: 1
After learning about vim (back in the 3.0 time), I used it for everything. However, since about a year I find myself going back to the original vi.
I don't know why, but it 'feels' better. Yes, I sometimes miss the syntax highlighting of vim and I really love the visual columnar blocks (don't need it much, but when i do it's really nifty!). But overal I feel vim has become too bloated. Too many config files, too many dependencies and (yes) too many commands.
Are you not a bit curious why the 2002-vintage system is upgraded, including a new CPU?
A casual reader might think that Vista will run fine on a 2002 computer, while my assertion is that it most definately will not. At least not without upgrading the ram to 1 Gb, and for the full monty you need a top-range GPU and CPU.
This is not a problem for you, and it is not a problem for me. However, it *is* a financial problem for many businesses.
Anyway, I've made my point, you've made yours. We aren't going to budge, let's call it quits, ok?;-)
Memory: 2GB (four 512MB DDR-PC2700 DIMMs, upgraded from original 512MB configuration)
Display adapter: ATI Radeon 9600, 256MB, AGP8X (upgraded from original Nvidia 128MB card)
I may be stupid or deceptive, but 2GB and a 9600 is *NOT* mainstream. Therefore you do not get a really good "experience", just as you say yourself.
[...] if you go back to the 2k-like version of the shell UI, you won't even know you're running Vista, even from a perf perspective.
If you read those tech sites, or even http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/11/ 10/1847244, you will see that to run Vista in its intended glory, you have to have at least 1 Gig of ram and a very decent GPU. So, yes, many (if not most) gamer and enthousiast rigs will run Vista.
How many business PC's will run Vista? I don't know where you work, but the 6500 pc's at the company I work for have 256 Mb and NO gpu to speak of. While these machines might technically run Vista it won't be usable at all. We know, we've tested.
We have enough problems with upgrading to XP.
Maybe you shouldn't try to extrapolate your hardware to the corporate world.
1. Vista runs extremely well on any modern pc
As long as that pc is really high-end, bleeding edge, give us all your money hella expensive, yes. But any business pc I've seen in the last year (that's modern, i guess) won't run Vista all that well.
2. It's better looking, more polished and overall a much nicer experience
Windows 2000 is better looking than XP, with its Teletubby pasture and Fisher-Price color scheme. You might think of computing as an "experience", I just want to get my work done. Preferably without having to wear welding goggles because of the colors of the desktop.
3. It just makes more sense to get it preloaded
No it isn't. Because then you also get all the heaped up crap the vendor gets payed for bundling. Example: buy a Dell (but this is by no means the only vendor that does this) and you have to spend a few hours to remove the tryware, spyware, crippleware and downright stupidware before the machine is even remotely usable.
4. The drivers and other compatibility issues will be ironed out quickly.
I'm still waiting for XP drivers for some of my equipment. I have a really nice scanner that is useless because there is no XP driver and the W2k driver crashes. As luck would have it, it works fine with FreeBSD.
... but it's good
We'll see. I'm not upgrading my XP boxes anytime soon. In fact, I'm gonna make sure I buy a few XP licences on Ebay for future use.
Our company has 6500+ pc's with Win2000. Upgrading to XP just isn't viable as there is too much software that breaks in subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) ways.
Yes, we should upgrade sometime soon, but as long as we can buy extra Win2000 support we won't, as it would mean a *serious* investment. And for what? To have the same functionality as we already have? Get real.
You can cover hundreds of miles on HF with a transmitter that runs off a single PP3 battery and uses a handful of components.
I've been looking for a schematic for something like this. Preferably 40 meters, capable of over 4 hours of sustained transmission on a PP3. Range should be at least 50 miles. Of you know of a schematic that can do this, please let me know.
Slashdot Mirror
If you don't understand the current theories, don't worry about it. But please refrain from posting while obviously drunk, 'mkay?
See Files-11 for a flashback.
For a multinational it isn't really important where it originated, it has different strategies for each zone anyway. Do you know where Shell came from? Doesn't matter, they are everywhere now.
As a kid I played with nothing else, so I did know where Lego comes from, I always wanted to go to Legoland... ;-)
For my summerholiday I'm doing a tour of Norway, by the way...
But how can you not know Ikea is from Sweden? They are famous for their Swedish Meatballs! And (at least around here) they have the Swedish flag on everything. Not to mention their stores are this color.
Luckily education here is rapidly going down the drain so it will even out eventually.
I will admit that I reacted a bit stingy. I shouldn't have, it was uncalled for.
It's just that I get annoyed by the never-ending display of ignorance about the world outside the US by most Americans that I encounter. It is really weird, of all the Americans I've met they were either some of the sharpest minds I know, or they were as dumb as a sack of wet potatoes. No inbetweens. That's strange, no?
Sweden. Ikea is originally from Sweden. But it's all the same to you, isn't it? There's only two countries: the usa and the evil bad unimportant countries with savages in it.
I got the impression that Ubuntu in general tried to bring (rush?) eye candy to the desktop. Perhaps that impression is wrong. I don't like Beryl much but I can see the distinction between the beta-ness of Beryl and Ubuntu proper.
However that doesn't negate my point that Feisty broke my wireless. I still haven't gotten it working, by the way. As said, I can see the networks (even my neightbours) but it won't connect whatever I try.
Mind, Edgy wasn't a no-flaws install either. I'm seriously considering going back to the LTS version as that worked like a charm out of the box.
To recap: I'm very content with Ubuntu, I use it daily. It is very capable and I wish it all the best for the future. But at the same time I find that every new version breaks something for me. I can live with that because I'm not dependent on the latest-and-greatest.
Stop it, no STOP IT, you're killing me! You should be a stand up comedian! ;-)
Thanks for the laughs!
I upgraded from Edgy to Feisty. Now my Linksys PCI wireless card is acting up. I can see the wireless network, but it doesn't connect to it. Or rather, it connects but silently refuses to use it.
Needless to say I'm not impressed. I couldn't care less about eye-candy, maybe the next release could focus on stability and quality?
It is not a bug. It is designed that way.
In most European countries the comma is used as the decimal separator. Three thousand dollar and twenty-five cents would be $3.000,25 (not $3,000.25 you might be used to). In a locale that does this Excel uses the semi-colon too.
Might it be that education structures the mind to follow the known paths? Perhaps by not knowing the 'usual' solutions, you can come up with a more elegant and deep solution?
My Toshiba Satellite Pro 4600 (Pentium 3, 1 GHz, 256 Mb) works great with Ubuntu. All devices detected and working. And it is quite snappy too! I've used it for internet/open office for about two years.
They probably use a terminal emulator (vt100, what-have-you) to get access to the big iron that runs the database app.
I've used such a setup from 1994 to 1999, after that the system got overhauled to include a flashy web frontend. Mind you, you can still access the app the 'original way' too and on occasion I have to. It is much, much faster this way too.
Now, if you don't have a ground prong on your plug, the ground (as seen from the power supply) is floating at around 40 volts (or 80 volts in a 220 V mains). However, the current that can flow is very, very low. Yes, it is annoying if you get zapped, but it is not dangerous to you. It might not be all that healthy for other electronics though.
When trying to measure these kind of things, please do not use you multi meter which has an insanely high internal resistance. This gets you reading that are way off. Load the voltage with a 10 kOhm resistor and measure again, you will measure a voltage of nearly zero.
Right now, there is a severe storm in Europe. People have died, thousands are stranded and can't get home tonight because of closed roads and shutdown public transport. The official emergency site to keep people informed about this crisis has been unreachable for most of the day. Why? Because the front page is riddled with Flash applets. Because of this the servers are severely overloaded. Nice going, for an emergency service.
Don't use Flash, it's dangerous.
Where is the confusion? You just treat insert as a command which has a limited scope. You stop inserting when you are done, just as you stop deleting when you are done.
It really makes perfect sense.
I don't know why, but it 'feels' better. Yes, I sometimes miss the syntax highlighting of vim and I really love the visual columnar blocks (don't need it much, but when i do it's really nifty!). But overal I feel vim has become too bloated. Too many config files, too many dependencies and (yes) too many commands.
So, back to vi it is for me.
A casual reader might think that Vista will run fine on a 2002 computer, while my assertion is that it most definately will not. At least not without upgrading the ram to 1 Gb, and for the full monty you need a top-range GPU and CPU.
This is not a problem for you, and it is not a problem for me. However, it *is* a financial problem for many businesses.
Anyway, I've made my point, you've made yours. We aren't going to budge, let's call it quits, ok? ;-)
Memory: 2GB (four 512MB DDR-PC2700 DIMMs, upgraded from original 512MB configuration)
Display adapter: ATI Radeon 9600, 256MB, AGP8X (upgraded from original Nvidia 128MB card)
I may be stupid or deceptive, but 2GB and a 9600 is *NOT* mainstream. Therefore you do not get a really good "experience", just as you say yourself.
[...] if you go back to the 2k-like version of the shell UI, you won't even know you're running Vista, even from a perf perspective.
Now there is a compelling argument to upgrade...
How many business PC's will run Vista? I don't know where you work, but the 6500 pc's at the company I work for have 256 Mb and NO gpu to speak of. While these machines might technically run Vista it won't be usable at all. We know, we've tested. We have enough problems with upgrading to XP.
Maybe you shouldn't try to extrapolate your hardware to the corporate world.
1. Vista runs extremely well on any modern pc
As long as that pc is really high-end, bleeding edge, give us all your money hella expensive, yes. But any business pc I've seen in the last year (that's modern, i guess) won't run Vista all that well.
2. It's better looking, more polished and overall a much nicer experience
Windows 2000 is better looking than XP, with its Teletubby pasture and Fisher-Price color scheme. You might think of computing as an "experience", I just want to get my work done. Preferably without having to wear welding goggles because of the colors of the desktop.
3. It just makes more sense to get it preloaded
No it isn't. Because then you also get all the heaped up crap the vendor gets payed for bundling. Example: buy a Dell (but this is by no means the only vendor that does this) and you have to spend a few hours to remove the tryware, spyware, crippleware and downright stupidware before the machine is even remotely usable.
4. The drivers and other compatibility issues will be ironed out quickly.
I'm still waiting for XP drivers for some of my equipment. I have a really nice scanner that is useless because there is no XP driver and the W2k driver crashes. As luck would have it, it works fine with FreeBSD.
We'll see. I'm not upgrading my XP boxes anytime soon. In fact, I'm gonna make sure I buy a few XP licences on Ebay for future use.
Yes, we should upgrade sometime soon, but as long as we can buy extra Win2000 support we won't, as it would mean a *serious* investment. And for what? To have the same functionality as we already have? Get real.
I've been looking for a schematic for something like this. Preferably 40 meters, capable of over 4 hours of sustained transmission on a PP3. Range should be at least 50 miles. Of you know of a schematic that can do this, please let me know.