After the Dean campaign was presented with clear cut evidence as to the nature of emailresponse.net, they investigated promptly and terminated their relationship with the company that same day.
Why wasn't this tidbit of info in the original post? Sounds like the submitter may have had an axe to grind. Slashdot mods should be more vigilant and not allow this kind of thing to slip by, the things at stake are too important.
There is so much anti-Apple FUD in this discussion it makes me want to puke. I don't even know where to start, and I've only read halfway down the first page.
Please, would it be too much to ask for everyone to try to VERIFY the information they post before they go and say that Mac OS X (Server) can't do this, that, or the other thing, or that you can't upgrade on a Mac?
Oh, and "I tried it and it didn't work" doesn't count. I've tried plenty of things that didn't work for me, on multiple OSes, and that doesn't mean they don't work for anybody.
Cringely is only half right--the other reason Mac OS X hasn't made more inroads is that there is too much misinformation being disseminated regarding its capabilities. IT Staff ( and I include myself in this) need to keep in mind that they serve their users, NOT the other way 'round, and we are OBLIGATED to make sure that we research all possible solutions thoroughly (weeding out endemic FUD) and give our users the best solution for their needs. Period.
That's an oversimplification and untrue. Read the article, you'll see that while he had all sorts of things to say about how the marketing, manufacturing, and design procceses should proceed, he never once said anything derogatory about the concept of the Segway itself.
Use NetRestore and NetBoot on your OS X server for rollout, then maintain them with Radmind. NetRestore is much like Apple Software Restore, but better, and Radmind is a replacement for RevRDist or Assimilator, but again, much improved. I've used them all and managing OS X this way is so easy is ridiculous.
Okay, I'm sure this thread will be overbrimming with vitriol against Rosen, Bush, the RIAA, etc., but I encourage Slashdotters to, instead of, or in addition to, venting your frustration & anger here (a.k.a. preaching to the choir), write to anyone and everyone who has either the power to inform the world of this colonialism/nepotism/whatever it is, or to do something about it. The discussion at Slashdot is often excellent, but sometimes I worry that we spend too much time talking and not enough time fighting for what we so passionately argue for here.
I know of a lot of people (myself included) who use multiple external hard drives in rotation for their backups. Especially now with servers' hard drive capacities growing so fast. I just specc'd out a fileserver for a department at a cash-strapped public institution, and a tape drive big enough to backup the system's disk would have been more than 50% of the cost of the computer. Not to mention the cost of tapes. Instead I set them up with two firewire hard drives. For their needs, the reliability/longevity/cost equation made hard drives the best solution.
Not unless a)you had access to the source and picked through it with a fine-toothed comb looking for such time-bombs, or b) your testing process included setting your computer's clock forward one day at a time for the rest of time.
Seeing as this problem manifested itself on thousands of unrelated or unconnected computers at the same time, it is reasonable to conclude that it is triggered by a specific date or a set amount of time passing. There is no way to test for this unless you already know it's there.
Easy enough to fix. Set acceleration to none in mouse properties, motion.
True, that will make it easier to control the mouse while doing detail work, but you'll have to turn it off again when you want to be able to move the mouse across the screen quickly.
Windows also has controls that allow you to control mouse acceleration so it is exponential, but I found that the results were still not as usable as the Mac's acceleration model, at least in Win2k sp2 which is where I last tested it. I'm assuming that XP is the same.
So, someone ran some benchmarks and then Adobe posted a bogus graph showing that a PC was faster than a Mac doing something. Perhaps a little oversimplified, but I think anyone who picks a PC over a Mac based on that one page is missing a few things.
What about a consistent, well-design user interface that isn't always one step behind?
What about superior color management and a truly WYSIWYG pdf-based display architecture?
What if design pros don't want to have to deal with linear mouse acceleration that makes fine adjustments akin to slow torture?
What about the fact that most design pros don't want to have to spend a day every month or so troubleshooting some nonsensical Windows problem?
What about Microsoft's increasingly oppressive product activation and upgrade policies? What about their draconian approach to DRM?
What if people don't want to use an OS that is still built upon the blasphemy that is the Windows Registry?
What about the 50,000+ virii that affect Windows only, and the handful that affect OS X?
What if creative pros don't want to deal with a welter of Windows-only spyware?
What about Microsoft's seive-like security?
I could go on. I know all those things add up to more lost time for me than the time saved on a few select operations.
"Each 180GB Apple Drive Module uses a dedicated drive change, maximizing the 400MB/s Fibre Channel host connection."
Yes, that's right, each drive gets its own independent ATA channel to itself, which allows Apple to acheive redundancy, speed, and a low overall price.
Application vs Window. I don't remember if this was mentioned, but this has always annoyed me about Macs. In windows, if I close Word or some other program by clicking on the "close" button on the top right of the window, it closes. On a Mac, the window closes but the application stays open. This wouldn't be a problem for notepad or somesuch, but for large programs like Word, Photoshop, and other things, this can eat ALOT of memeory. This too, is cruft.
Allow me to disagree. First, leaving applications open on OS X doesn't use a lot of memory. For instance, I've had MS Excel running for 6 hours now, using it off and on, and it's using 0.4% of the CPU and 1.8% of memory right now with no open windows. Photoshop behaves similarly.
Second, why should closing an application's only open document quit the application? What if you want to open another document, or just leave the app open to save yourself the trouble of re-launching it? By confusing Close with Quit MS created yet another confusing UI metaphor, combining two different actions.
You could make that argument, but I wasn't forced to install 10.2 because my 10.1.5 install suddenly stopped working. Point is, on my PowerBook, I'm in control of the OS, not the other way 'round.
And what's with the "blue screen" comments? Like most Slashdotters, I don't like Microsoft - but to suggest that Windows has problems with "blue screens" is, like, so 1999.
Well, in my case, it's like, so, 2002. Trying to configure some Dells running W2k for a computer lab and getting lovely spontaneous reboots because the computers had shipped with buggy display drivers. I mean, c'mon, I can understand it if a bad display driver can garble the screen image, but why oh why should the computer reboot if I drag a window the wrong way?!?
But isn't it funny how most of their users are still using Mac OS 9.x, which is far less stable than WinXP?
It's true that some installations of WinXP are more stable than some installations of Mac OS 9, but Apple's switch ads aren't trying to get people to buy a Mac and run OS 9 on it. That's impossible to do anyway on their latest hardware. They want people to buy a Mac with OS X on it. OS 9 is out of the equation for new users.
Office v.X uses a different codebase and is developed by a different team than Office for Windows. They share a common file format, basic interface aspects, and featureset, but they are very different beasts.
For example, installation of Office X means dragging its application folder from the install CD to your hard drive. The first time you launch an office app, it installs the few support files it needs. If any of these support files get broken or lost, they will be automatically reinstalled the next time an office app is run.
You do need to run an installer to install "extras" like Equation Editor, Clip Art, and extra Office Assistants (ooh! ooh! hurt me more!), but for most users installation is literally drag-and-drop.
XP is better than what came before, but just last week I had to spend an hour troubleshooting and finally reinstalling Outlook XP on my girlfriend's brand-new Vaio. After 6 weeks of working fine Outlook just refused to open, no matter how many times you "repaired" it. No software/hardware changes to the setup, just 6 weeks of turn it on in the AM, check email all day, and turn it off at night. If this is enough to break Outlook in a little over a month, then someone at Microsoft (still) isn't doing their job.
For a point of comparison, my PowerBook G4 has been running OS X 10.1->10.2.4 since July '01 (across several network environments), and I haven't had to reinstall anything. Just 2 data points, but ones I find telling.
Good old Ellen wouldn't do much to attact the kind of users Microsoft seems to be targeting. Seems to me, they're aiming at IT people in small companies who have been using Macs for years because of the ease with which you can set up a decent Mac network. Microsoft wants them to believe that using Windows in such an environment is better. Not that I've run the numbers themselves, but I'd think Windows' licensing policy would make it more expensive than a Mac LAN even before you took it out of the box.
Slashdot Mirror
What? A post which includes all sides of the story? You must be new.
No, just hopelessly idealistic ;).
After the Dean campaign was presented with clear cut evidence as to the nature of emailresponse.net, they investigated promptly and terminated their relationship with the company that same day.
Why wasn't this tidbit of info in the original post? Sounds like the submitter may have had an axe to grind. Slashdot mods should be more vigilant and not allow this kind of thing to slip by, the things at stake are too important.
There is so much anti-Apple FUD in this discussion it makes me want to puke. I don't even know where to start, and I've only read halfway down the first page.
Please, would it be too much to ask for everyone to try to VERIFY the information they post before they go and say that Mac OS X (Server) can't do this, that, or the other thing, or that you can't upgrade on a Mac?
Oh, and "I tried it and it didn't work" doesn't count. I've tried plenty of things that didn't work for me, on multiple OSes, and that doesn't mean they don't work for anybody.
Cringely is only half right--the other reason Mac OS X hasn't made more inroads is that there is too much misinformation being disseminated regarding its capabilities. IT Staff ( and I include myself in this) need to keep in mind that they serve their users, NOT the other way 'round, and we are OBLIGATED to make sure that we research all possible solutions thoroughly (weeding out endemic FUD) and give our users the best solution for their needs. Period.
Apparently the Navy disagrees.
Please substantiate your claims with references. Especially the bit about the "desktop-quality IDE hard drives". Put up or stop posting FUD.
That's an oversimplification and untrue. Read the article, you'll see that while he had all sorts of things to say about how the marketing, manufacturing, and design procceses should proceed, he never once said anything derogatory about the concept of the Segway itself.
Not the idea itself.
Use NetRestore and NetBoot on your OS X server for rollout, then maintain them with Radmind. NetRestore is much like Apple Software Restore, but better, and Radmind is a replacement for RevRDist or Assimilator, but again, much improved. I've used them all and managing OS X this way is so easy is ridiculous.
The MSN client is the browser. Which means that there's yet another browser out there to worry about when designing pages. Sigh...
to your computer so you can keep them around/move to other computers etc.
Or so I hear. Can't remember where from.
http://www.apple.com/webobjects/
http://www.rogueamoeba.com/audiohijack/
Okay, I'm sure this thread will be overbrimming with vitriol against Rosen, Bush, the RIAA, etc., but I encourage Slashdotters to, instead of, or in addition to, venting your frustration & anger here (a.k.a. preaching to the choir), write to anyone and everyone who has either the power to inform the world of this colonialism/nepotism/whatever it is, or to do something about it. The discussion at Slashdot is often excellent, but sometimes I worry that we spend too much time talking and not enough time fighting for what we so passionately argue for here.
I know of a lot of people (myself included) who use multiple external hard drives in rotation for their backups. Especially now with servers' hard drive capacities growing so fast. I just specc'd out a fileserver for a department at a cash-strapped public institution, and a tape drive big enough to backup the system's disk would have been more than 50% of the cost of the computer. Not to mention the cost of tapes. Instead I set them up with two firewire hard drives. For their needs, the reliability/longevity/cost equation made hard drives the best solution.
FYI, Windows 2000 was version 5.0 and XP is version 5.1, and boy did Microsoft charge for it!
Could't this have been seen in prerollout test?
Not unless a)you had access to the source and picked through it with a fine-toothed comb looking for such time-bombs, or b) your testing process included setting your computer's clock forward one day at a time for the rest of time.
Seeing as this problem manifested itself on thousands of unrelated or unconnected computers at the same time, it is reasonable to conclude that it is triggered by a specific date or a set amount of time passing. There is no way to test for this unless you already know it's there.
Easy enough to fix. Set acceleration to none in mouse properties, motion.
True, that will make it easier to control the mouse while doing detail work, but you'll have to turn it off again when you want to be able to move the mouse across the screen quickly.
Windows also has controls that allow you to control mouse acceleration so it is exponential, but I found that the results were still not as usable as the Mac's acceleration model, at least in Win2k sp2 which is where I last tested it. I'm assuming that XP is the same.
So, someone ran some benchmarks and then Adobe posted a bogus graph showing that a PC was faster than a Mac doing something. Perhaps a little oversimplified, but I think anyone who picks a PC over a Mac based on that one page is missing a few things.
What about a consistent, well-design user interface that isn't always one step behind?
What about superior color management and a truly WYSIWYG pdf-based display architecture?
What if design pros don't want to have to deal with linear mouse acceleration that makes fine adjustments akin to slow torture?
What about the fact that most design pros don't want to have to spend a day every month or so troubleshooting some nonsensical Windows problem?
What about Microsoft's increasingly oppressive product activation and upgrade policies? What about their draconian approach to DRM?
What if people don't want to use an OS that is still built upon the blasphemy that is the Windows Registry?
What about the 50,000+ virii that affect Windows only, and the handful that affect OS X?
What if creative pros don't want to deal with a welter of Windows-only spyware?
What about Microsoft's seive-like security?
I could go on. I know all those things add up to more lost time for me than the time saved on a few select operations.
Yes, that's right, each drive gets its own independent ATA channel to itself, which allows Apple to acheive redundancy, speed, and a low overall price.
Application vs Window. I don't remember if this was mentioned, but this has always annoyed me about Macs. In windows, if I close Word or some other program by clicking on the "close" button on the top right of the window, it closes. On a Mac, the window closes but the application stays open. This wouldn't be a problem for notepad or somesuch, but for large programs like Word, Photoshop, and other things, this can eat ALOT of memeory. This too, is cruft.
Allow me to disagree. First, leaving applications open on OS X doesn't use a lot of memory. For instance, I've had MS Excel running for 6 hours now, using it off and on, and it's using 0.4% of the CPU and 1.8% of memory right now with no open windows. Photoshop behaves similarly.
Second, why should closing an application's only open document quit the application? What if you want to open another document, or just leave the app open to save yourself the trouble of re-launching it? By confusing Close with Quit MS created yet another confusing UI metaphor, combining two different actions.
You could make that argument, but I wasn't forced to install 10.2 because my 10.1.5 install suddenly stopped working. Point is, on my PowerBook, I'm in control of the OS, not the other way 'round.
And what's with the "blue screen" comments? Like most Slashdotters, I don't like Microsoft - but to suggest that Windows has problems with "blue screens" is, like, so 1999.
Well, in my case, it's like, so, 2002. Trying to configure some Dells running W2k for a computer lab and getting lovely spontaneous reboots because the computers had shipped with buggy display drivers. I mean, c'mon, I can understand it if a bad display driver can garble the screen image, but why oh why should the computer reboot if I drag a window the wrong way?!?
But isn't it funny how most of their users are still using Mac OS 9.x, which is far less stable than WinXP?
It's true that some installations of WinXP are more stable than some installations of Mac OS 9, but Apple's switch ads aren't trying to get people to buy a Mac and run OS 9 on it. That's impossible to do anyway on their latest hardware. They want people to buy a Mac with OS X on it. OS 9 is out of the equation for new users.
Office v.X uses a different codebase and is developed by a different team than Office for Windows. They share a common file format, basic interface aspects, and featureset, but they are very different beasts.
For example, installation of Office X means dragging its application folder from the install CD to your hard drive. The first time you launch an office app, it installs the few support files it needs. If any of these support files get broken or lost, they will be automatically reinstalled the next time an office app is run.
You do need to run an installer to install "extras" like Equation Editor, Clip Art, and extra Office Assistants (ooh! ooh! hurt me more!), but for most users installation is literally drag-and-drop.
XP is better than what came before, but just last week I had to spend an hour troubleshooting and finally reinstalling Outlook XP on my girlfriend's brand-new Vaio. After 6 weeks of working fine Outlook just refused to open, no matter how many times you "repaired" it. No software/hardware changes to the setup, just 6 weeks of turn it on in the AM, check email all day, and turn it off at night. If this is enough to break Outlook in a little over a month, then someone at Microsoft (still) isn't doing their job.
For a point of comparison, my PowerBook G4 has been running OS X 10.1->10.2.4 since July '01 (across several network environments), and I haven't had to reinstall anything. Just 2 data points, but ones I find telling.
Good old Ellen wouldn't do much to attact the kind of users Microsoft seems to be targeting. Seems to me, they're aiming at IT people in small companies who have been using Macs for years because of the ease with which you can set up a decent Mac network. Microsoft wants them to believe that using Windows in such an environment is better. Not that I've run the numbers themselves, but I'd think Windows' licensing policy would make it more expensive than a Mac LAN even before you took it out of the box.
...and I use a Mac. The connection? Neither one ever lets me down.