i required office 2007 for school. this irked me, not because of the ribbon...but because i had to start dual booting just to use it.
i have zero problems with the "ribbon" toolbar. its tabbed context menus, as far as im concerned, and ive found it easy enough to learn, as i never used office software much in the first place.
perhaps its a case of a UI design that isnt bad, just different, kinda like what linux proponents tout when people switch from windows to linux with gnome or KDE: you just have to get used to it?
I've been a fan of The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings since I was a child, and I also find The Hobbit more enjoyable. Tolkien goes into *a lot* of detail anyway, and i skip over a majority of things in the Lord of the Rings that are descriptive of scenery and some other things.
I agree with that opinion. However, where I attend (a small community college) the problem needs to be addressed, but it has equally as much to do with bandwidth constraints as it does classroom attention.
In the computer labs people looking at youtube or myspace together can cause distraction, which is decidedly unfair to students who *do* wish to learn.
Furthermore, for computer-related classes, bandwidth is limited due to users accessing bandwidth-greedy multimedia content. Some of my teachers *use* the network during class time to show sources of information, highlite interesting facts or things for students, or even to copy VMs and software over the LAN so that students can get a hands-on approach to learning. When the bandwidth is eaten by youtube and myspace and it hampers the ability of a teacher to perform his instruction, it should be banned.
Apparently the school is considering blacklisting those two sites on in the computer labs, and will allow access to them through any other means (wireless) or in the library.
Personally I equate it to bringing in a video player or something similar to class or being on the telephone: get the fuck out of the room if you dont want to be there. I *want* to be there, I *want* to learn and i want *NO* distractions while Im doing it.
its funny you mention that, because over the last couple of weeks, i have considered trying out Xen or something to just virtualize XP, because rebooting is a bitch but even more of my classes will be requiring office 2007
its a fully online "intro to computers" class that is required, meh. youre likely right, all the school computers have office 2007, and the text this class uses deals with office 2007 for productivity, and gets specifically into doing this and that in the various office apps. a free trial is provided for the course, its just a hassle to be doing everything in linux, but have to reboot just to be able to format a paper for submission or do a couple hours worth of excel homework.
i guess it wont hurt to learn how to use excel and formulas and such...but its still a hassle.
theres 2 reasons i use windows at all:
office 2007 (i like it, and one of my classes requires the format for submission)
webcam support: while mine technically works in linux, it freezes randomly.
it bugs me, really, because until i started this class back in january, i hadnt had to use windows for a year. what a lovely year that was.
or maybe the military wants us to *think* that the robots are going out of service, while they intend to do some more secretive work, testing or upgrades on them.
im not for censorship. i dont care about the *content*, but a huge number of students are hogging bandwidth, during class, to browse myspace and youtube. its a serious classroom disruption on a regular basis, in addition the waste of bandwidth
why should they be allowed to do this? theyre entertaining themselves. they wouldnt get away with an mp3/video player or something similar.
granted, a better option may be for instructors to monitor students more closely and dismiss those who abuse class time, but theyd have to patrol class throughout each period to do this in order to monitor each pc, why should they have to go through that trouble when the trouble can be blocked at the edge routers? it would save internet bandwidth, and LAN bandwidth.
I started attending community college back in january, and there has been a constant message regarding bandwidth: people use youtube like theres no tomorrow, please stop using youtube, and stop using myspace to conserve bandwidth.
why they dont outright blacklist them both is beyond me. hell, i was surprised that it was allowed in the first place.
more like ignorance: most people dont pay any attention to this sort of thing.
im all for a right to bear arms, albeit with some gun control, but try to imagine the type of political character it would take to incite enough gun owners to rally together in a semi-organized mass in order to cause a specific revolution. it wont happen, and if it did, the outcome would suck horribly. anyway, youd need a huge portion of the military to go with the revolutionary side, or it would last about 20 minutes.
im all for someone inciting enough people to educate themselves in order to provide and vote for decent candidates, but i think a review of political history will show that this is not likely to happen either. people dont care, as long as theyre mostly happy.
I get asked a lot, which this probably won't surprise you, why doesn't the kernel have a stable device driver ABI?
Linus Torvalds: Well, there's - the lack of an ABI is two-fold: one is we really, really, really don't want one. Every single time people ask for a stable ABI, the main reason for wanting a stable ABI is they want to have their binary drivers and they don't want to give out source and they don't - certainly don't want to merge that source into the stable kernel or the standard kernel.
last time i installed Debian with a desktop environment, it defaulted to Gnome. a server install comes to a console, sure, but if you use their installer and want a desktop, Gnome is what they give you.
I agree about E17. IIRC, they announced that they got accepted into the Summer of Code, and hope to have more interested coders stick around to help. It'd be interesting. I tried it last year when Debian Etch was made stable, I liked it, but not enough to use it regularly, especially if it isnt well supported. Even the forums are almost dead.
I use Gnome/Ubuntu now. I prefer it over KDE as something about KDE never sat right with me. I think when Ubuntu 8.04 comes out Ill try that and Kubuntu, and Xubuntu and see which I want to stick with on my laptop. Its aging (a T40) and Im afraid too much more in the way of progress will significantly hamper its capability. If KDE 4.x is noticeable faster than Gnome, I may get over it and use it or XFCE anyway.
i remember that article....wasnt there mention somewhere, though, of a US $499 price point and Intel's new Diamondville CPU being used? Id be very interested in it if such were the case. Id be willing to get rid of my T40 (which I use daily) and just get a 17" LCD or some such to go with it.
gsm is pricey and no better than a modem (if that good) in some areas
i worked for a wISP in kansas, and one customer put our gear on a tower he had to get our service, because he hated dial up and tried his cell provider...but their nearest high speed tower was 35 miles away and literally dial up speeds (if that)
also, he didnt want satellite because of the lousy speed/latency (our equipment was the same price, but much faster)
fwiw, i came across more than one mint condition windows 98 CD while i was there as well, belonging to systems with *original* windows installs.
talk about being creeped out. it was like a time vortex.
i think the vista sp1 allows you now to see the 4gb, but you still cant use all of it. i was also under the impression that the usability limit was due to 32-bit code, and that with a 64-bit hardware system a 64-bit OS will allow much more ram to be used.
Slashdot Mirror
theres actually a team? i thought it was a myth.
i required office 2007 for school. this irked me, not because of the ribbon...but because i had to start dual booting just to use it. i have zero problems with the "ribbon" toolbar. its tabbed context menus, as far as im concerned, and ive found it easy enough to learn, as i never used office software much in the first place. perhaps its a case of a UI design that isnt bad, just different, kinda like what linux proponents tout when people switch from windows to linux with gnome or KDE: you just have to get used to it?
I've been a fan of The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings since I was a child, and I also find The Hobbit more enjoyable. Tolkien goes into *a lot* of detail anyway, and i skip over a majority of things in the Lord of the Rings that are descriptive of scenery and some other things.
Action!
In the computer labs people looking at youtube or myspace together can cause distraction, which is decidedly unfair to students who *do* wish to learn.
Furthermore, for computer-related classes, bandwidth is limited due to users accessing bandwidth-greedy multimedia content. Some of my teachers *use* the network during class time to show sources of information, highlite interesting facts or things for students, or even to copy VMs and software over the LAN so that students can get a hands-on approach to learning. When the bandwidth is eaten by youtube and myspace and it hampers the ability of a teacher to perform his instruction, it should be banned.
Apparently the school is considering blacklisting those two sites on in the computer labs, and will allow access to them through any other means (wireless) or in the library.
Personally I equate it to bringing in a video player or something similar to class or being on the telephone: get the fuck out of the room if you dont want to be there. I *want* to be there, I *want* to learn and i want *NO* distractions while Im doing it.
thanks for the suggestion; ill give it a shot :)
i guess it wont hurt to learn how to use excel and formulas and such...but its still a hassle.
theres 2 reasons i use windows at all: office 2007 (i like it, and one of my classes requires the format for submission) webcam support: while mine technically works in linux, it freezes randomly. it bugs me, really, because until i started this class back in january, i hadnt had to use windows for a year. what a lovely year that was.
or maybe the military wants us to *think* that the robots are going out of service, while they intend to do some more secretive work, testing or upgrades on them.
And when then have to give 100% of the money away its still not a problem...because the volume is set to 11.
sometimes i hate humans. really.
why should they be allowed to do this? theyre entertaining themselves. they wouldnt get away with an mp3/video player or something similar.
granted, a better option may be for instructors to monitor students more closely and dismiss those who abuse class time, but theyd have to patrol class throughout each period to do this in order to monitor each pc, why should they have to go through that trouble when the trouble can be blocked at the edge routers? it would save internet bandwidth, and LAN bandwidth.
why they dont outright blacklist them both is beyond me. hell, i was surprised that it was allowed in the first place.
im all for a right to bear arms, albeit with some gun control, but try to imagine the type of political character it would take to incite enough gun owners to rally together in a semi-organized mass in order to cause a specific revolution. it wont happen, and if it did, the outcome would suck horribly. anyway, youd need a huge portion of the military to go with the revolutionary side, or it would last about 20 minutes.
im all for someone inciting enough people to educate themselves in order to provide and vote for decent candidates, but i think a review of political history will show that this is not likely to happen either. people dont care, as long as theyre mostly happy.
God doesn't want us to have cholesterol problems. Isn't that obvious? Pork-fat rules! /BAM!
maybe in some time ATI will have better support, theyre working on it, but itd be a long time before i bought an ati card to use with linux.
:P /victory, sucker.
however, my T40 has a radeon 7500 mobile in it, and runs compiz great. however, its old, and uses open drivers
Clickity
good article, short read. enjoy
last time i installed Debian with a desktop environment, it defaulted to Gnome. a server install comes to a console, sure, but if you use their installer and want a desktop, Gnome is what they give you.
I agree about E17. IIRC, they announced that they got accepted into the Summer of Code, and hope to have more interested coders stick around to help. It'd be interesting. I tried it last year when Debian Etch was made stable, I liked it, but not enough to use it regularly, especially if it isnt well supported. Even the forums are almost dead.
I use Gnome/Ubuntu now. I prefer it over KDE as something about KDE never sat right with me. I think when Ubuntu 8.04 comes out Ill try that and Kubuntu, and Xubuntu and see which I want to stick with on my laptop. Its aging (a T40) and Im afraid too much more in the way of progress will significantly hamper its capability. If KDE 4.x is noticeable faster than Gnome, I may get over it and use it or XFCE anyway.
i remember that article....wasnt there mention somewhere, though, of a US $499 price point and Intel's new Diamondville CPU being used? Id be very interested in it if such were the case. Id be willing to get rid of my T40 (which I use daily) and just get a 17" LCD or some such to go with it.
i still use ATA, you insensitive clod! /seriously, my tower is over 5 years old :(
ive never needed a driver to use a usb mouse....where are you from?
i suppose some gaming mice may *need* drivers to use all the fancy buttons, but just to act like a mouse? this is news to me.
gsm is pricey and no better than a modem (if that good) in some areas i worked for a wISP in kansas, and one customer put our gear on a tower he had to get our service, because he hated dial up and tried his cell provider...but their nearest high speed tower was 35 miles away and literally dial up speeds (if that) also, he didnt want satellite because of the lousy speed/latency (our equipment was the same price, but much faster) fwiw, i came across more than one mint condition windows 98 CD while i was there as well, belonging to systems with *original* windows installs. talk about being creeped out. it was like a time vortex.
i think the vista sp1 allows you now to see the 4gb, but you still cant use all of it. i was also under the impression that the usability limit was due to 32-bit code, and that with a 64-bit hardware system a 64-bit OS will allow much more ram to be used.
my dad's POS system for his drycleaning plant is all DOS-based. no windows whatsoever. he has a minor problem *maybe* once every-other year. maybe.