It's happened before... R. G. Serle
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Merck's Deleted Data
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· Score: 4, Interesting
When Donald Rumsfeld was head of R.G. Serle they were doing FDA safety studies for Aspartame (later branded as NutraSweet). Several rodents in the safety study died of brain cancer, but Serle removed them from the study and the data. A PhD working on the project blew the whistle. Congress investigated, hiring two lawyers to continue their work. A couple years later the acting head of the FDA, as his final act before resigning, approved NutraSweet. He then appeared as the legal eagle for NutraSweet. Guess who his two assistants were... Right.
Aspartame breaks down in warm water to release Methyl Alcohol, among other things, which causes cancers of the brain, eye, kidneys and liver. It can cause, like it did in me, a red flush over the upper half of the body and the face, and severe oil production by the Sebaceous glands, and a continual headach. It is associated with memory loss. My once nearly photographic memory is now gone.
That this is true is born out by IDC's evaluation of the data. http://www.linuxworld.com.au/index.php/id;17540595 24;fp;2;fpid;1 "After a long period focused on cutting costs and buying servers just to run current applications, enterprises are once again investing strategically in systems to handle future workloads, said IDC analyst Matt Eastwood. IT organizations are once again being asked to support real growth, he said."
This article contains some MS PR spin that the Gartner version did not: that purchases of Linux servers is short sighted because Linux server cannot be 'strategically' deployed but MS servers can. An odd assertion given the fact that many deploying Linux servers to replace Microsoft servers find that one Linux server can easily handle the load of 3 or 4 Microsoft servers, and do so more reliably and with less maintenance. Microsoft servers are notorious for being able to support only ONE application per server, a deployment model recommended by Microsoft itself, if not to improve MS server speed and stability then to improve Microsoft's sales figures.
As you point out, comparing sales levels of prior years with those given this year by Gartner and IDC, with Microsoft FUD wrappings, either Microsoft server shares have been declining while Linux' have been rising, or these "Consulting" firms are merely passing on MS PR memos with their own corporate dressing on them. I have no doubt that Linux server shares are rising, having grown from a few percent a few years ago to 31% this year, AND that Gartner was and is a mere extension of Microsoft's PR department. After all, they've been revealed as such in prior "research" reports that they put on line where they claimed the report was their work but they forgot to remove the Microsoft PR logo from the article.
the copies of Linux that were not purchased from retail channels but were downloaded free of charge.
They also, no doubt, included in the counting the number of times a single, freely downloaded copy of Linux was installed more than once.
Yup, despite the fact that these "onsulting" firms income streams totally depend on advising on the use of Microsoft software, I'm sure Gartner analysts will be professional and do their best to tally accurate counts, eschewing the crass action of merely rubberstamping a Microsoft PR memo. After all, people who earn fees by being featured in Microsoft server sales videos shouldn't have too much trouble remaining unbiased.
mmm... after thinking about it I'm sure they never counted the four Linux servers we recently installed at work. Maybe they aren't as accurate as I thought.
Author a clueless Windows user?
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Requiem for Usenet
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· Score: 3, Insightful
"Usenet is deeply flawed. Its democratic dream offers no defence against viruses, spammers, criminals, hucksters or deranged individuals. Rummaging about in Usenet is like slumming through the tenderloin district during the plague years -- your chances of catching a computer virus or a handful of invitations to unspeakable sexual acts is much greater than finding what you were looking for in the first place."
The author must be using Windows in the "Stupid Mode", without engaging his brain. Apparently he has never heard of "Kill files" and other blocking techniques to eliminate the trash from the UseNet data stream. One would get the impression that when he gets into his car he finds it impossible to avoid the "tenderloin" of San Francisco because he doesn't know how to steer away from that area. He probably stops for every "Why lie, I need money for booze" bum standing at the entrances to Walmart.
Just like using email, one learns that messages from unknown senders, which get by spam blockers, are never opened. And when one is curiously impulsed to open an suspecious email they always have their anti-virus program engaged to scan it first. Duh!
Because I program for a living I use UseNet at work via my W2K box to access other coders using the tools I'm using, and I've never had a problem. I never open msgs that offer "enhancement" products, pharms, or rollex watches, either. For the last eight years I've used Linux, dual booting at work and solely at home. When running Linux I've NEVER encountered any malware which was effective. I've installed Linux anti-virus programs, like f-prot, to scan my NTFS filesystem while running Linux just to be sure there aren't bugs which Norton hasn't found.
What really burns me is that the author is just like the idiots who passed the "Patriot" Act. This guy thinks that curtailing freedom is the only way to guarantee safety. If there is no safety behind prison bars what makes him think that walling off society with "politically correct" bars will work any better?
You are right. The sound files you pointed to were excellent, especially the "Calm Field" piece which featured a violin. Very good work. Exactly what midi music should strive for.
On the other hand, I listened to all of the midi pieces referenced in the topic and found all but one of them, "Turn My Head", grated on my ears, or they had performers who equated shouting messages of murder, mayhem and destruction to be the same as real singing. The grating effect comes, I believe, from a lack of harmonics which would smooth out the listening experience. The messages come from a misplaced idea that shock can subtitute for talent, except that the performers fail to realize that in the age of terrorizm such 'messages' fail to shock as much as they create disgust.
My first Linux distro was Red Hat's latest, 5.0. It came with the paperback entitled "Learn Linux in 24 Hours", by Bill Brush, IIRC.
Ubuntu's console install looks exactly like RH 5.0's install console screens. They were klutzy then and they are klutzy now. They detract from Ubuntu's overall image, but once you realize how limited the GNOME desktop is you can understand the match.
"Sources" is a count of infected PCs, i.e., unique IP addresses "originating traffic". "Targets" are the PCs "receiving traffic". "Records" is the number of PACKETS observed.
What is odd is that while there are supposedly 111 PCs that are infected and sending out hack attempts, those 111 PCs seem to target ONLY 8 PCs, and the total PACKET transmitted/recieved on 11/03 was only 22K. Very strange. Very LOW numbers and with a VERY LIMITED number of boxes.
Notice that the majority of "infections" are occuring on Nov 3, 4 and 5, and the reports from THREE anti-virus houses are on the 4th and 5th, the same day as the big spike in the "infection": A scan from VirusTotal detects "cback" as: Antivirus Version Update Result Fortinet 2.48.0.0 11.04.2005 Linux/Rev.B-bdr Kaspersky 4.0.2.24 11.05.2005 Backdoor.Linux.Small.al McAfee 4620 11.04.2005 Linux/BackDoor-Rev.b
For such an infintesimally small number of supposedly hacked boxes these three anti-Virus houses already have dection software which can see the "trojan". That is REALLY FAST dection code writing, deployment and reporting for such a SMALL number of boxes.
Has someone salted the Linux anti-virus mine to hype business?
Commercial? Xandros, and several other Debian based clones.
OpenSource SimplyMEPIS, KNOPPIX, Kanotix, and a plethora of Debian based clones.
My favorite is SimplyMEPIS
But, considering that regardless of the distro the same release number of KDE behaves the same way on all distros that deploy it, any is as good as another, all other things being equal. So KDE is not a reason to choose a distro unless that distro is the first to release with the latest version of KDE and you want to move to it.
Linux distros that feature GNOME still have to install connectivity to KDE functionality because the VAST majority of applications are written using QT widgets. Companies wanting to create cross platfrom applications to enable their move to Widnows without reinventing the wheel will use QT because it is the smoothest route to take.
I find it rather ironic that GNOME was created as a GPL response to QT's propritary widget set, but after the KDE Foundation negotiated with TrollTech to continually release a GPL version of QT the reason for GNOME's existance became moot. Now, ironically, GNOME is being favored by the Linux distro makers who are selling proprietary brands and services.
Why would someone use a spreadsheet that allows only 16K rows per sheet to load about 250,000 rows, 13 columns per row, of flat ascii data??? (Actually, there are numbers in the data but they are treated as strings in the spreadsheet to further slow things down.) Clearly, a database is called for. But, even if you were bound and determined to use a pickup truck to haul your 600 acres of corn to market, you should at least use a one that allows for a longer bed. George should have put those 250,000+ rows into only one OOo odt sheet.
An aside, why would one save the spreadsheet as an sxc, forcing users to convert to the odt format in order to test OOo, then have sheet settings which resize the row heights and recalculate the spreadsheet before it opens to the user? Because he has to avoid the one sheet solution.
and don't worry about becoming dependent only to have a "Licen$e" fee imposed, or EULA restrictions about using GPL software in conjuction with it.
Since VISTA is turning out to be just a theme upgrade, why not upgrade to Linux and stop shelling out more and more money just to get a new theme or security holes patched, or the stability improved?
Here in the mid-west small communities are drying up and blowing away because of the collapse of the farming economy. All the small farms are being/have been bought up by the huge multi-national conglomerates like Cargil, etc. The ex-farmers are moving to town and applying at Walmart for jobs.
This trend could be reversed by setting up 10-50MW SPTII sites all over the mid-West, or even the entire country, in these small rural communities. The technology is similar to that of farm equipment, and the ex-farmers could begin "farming" electricity and Hydrogen. Even under overcast conditions these power stations develop 1/3rd their max power. Excess power can be stored in several forms.
While high tension power lines (450KV) could connect regional areas most power would be produced locally. Our national electrical power would then be terrorist proof.
Duing the 15 years I ran my own computer consulting business I discovered one nice test to determine what small business owners actually feel about the welfare of their employees:
Are the bathrooms kept clean and stocked?
Employers who don't care about their employees usually don't care about the employees environment. The employee bathrooms are pig styes.
Some other tips I picked up through experience:
Larger businesses and corporations usually have janitorial services so for them the "Bathroom Test" doesn't apply. In that situation the best way to evaluate the corporate environment is to talk with the in-house coders, if any, or other employees. If their remarks suggesst managers whose behavior indicates that they are graduates of the Atilla The Hun School of Management then its time to investigate other opportunities. Paper clip counting is a dead give-away.
If the PCs and other hardware are antiquated or poorly maintained its time to look elsewhere.
If most of the employees are recent hires themselves but the company has been around for a while then its time to look elsewhere.
If they want you to punch a clock then look elsewhere.
If they want you will be "salaried" instead of you billing them and there is no cap on the hours you'll be working then look elsewhere.
Which leads to: If they want you to violate one or more of the 20 or so IRS rules that determine if you are an independent consultant or an employee then look elsewhere.
If they are paying you out of a "special" fund then look elsewhere.
If they want you to code two sets of book, one for the IRS and one "just to give them a bottom line" then look elsewhere.
If the secretary confides in you that the boss is running a prostitution ring on the side, and those bobcats from California have cocain welded into the 4X4 bucket support beams, you'd better be looking elsewhere.
If the owner is a business partner with the local IRS agent then you'd better look elsewhere.
If employers don't respect the law then they won't respect the employees or the consultant.
If employers don't respect their employees they won't respect the consultants they hire.
plans were laid out than so that UTOPIAN people would evolve in order to be available to populate the new UTOPIAN world. A UTOPIAN world cannot survive the assult of NON-UTOPIAN people. It doesn't matter how fancy the toilet is if people insist on defecating on the floor.
As far as Kerzweil's prediction I doubt that it will survive the oil shortages, the cusp of which we are NOW riding.
And that was for a "single engine land" Visual Flight Rules pilot license.
From what I have been able to read this 'car' hasn't even achieved its FAA certification yet.
Regardless of how many computers it has those who plan to fly it should plan on qualifying for a "multi-engine land" Instrument Flight Rules pilot license. That was the second level of FAA pilot certification when I got my license and you had to have logged at least 300 hours in single engine aircraft before you'd be accepted for training for the multi-engine license. The designer of this car is trying to bypass current training regimens, and well he should. I shudder to imagine what would happen if you had Sally or Joe Sixpack trying to fly these things around the country, especially over my house!!
EVEN IF all you have to do is turn on the flight control computer, click on your destination, click a "GO" button and let a computer and GPS interface control your entire flight, without any need to learn how to fly, I'd hope that they'd require an AIRPLANE parachute to be installed, much like air-bags in cars today. Otherwise we'd be seeing Voluntar's playing pin-ball with houses when their embedded VISTA 2050 dies with a "BSOD".
I am writing this msg from my first laptop, a Gateway M675PRR.
I set it up dual boot, with SimplyMEPIS 3.3 and spend 98% of my time on MEPIS. I have a Targus USB mini-mouse plugged in and headphones for sound to avoid distubing my wife. When traveling I use Street Atlas 6.0 with EarthMate GPS. At home I set in the Lazy Boy with a thin, wide four-legged table over the LazyBoy, upon which my laptop rests, and my wife sets on the couch. We both watch TV and talk while I work on my laptop. Before, I was always in my office working on one of my two desktops because moving a desktop to the living room and back and each day wasn't practicaly. Now, she's happy and I am happy.:-)
After six months my experience with this laptop is so favorable that I doubt I will ever again purchase another desktop, new or used.
According to the timeline given, VISTA coding began around August of 2004 and the first trial release was a year later. In other words, a complex operating system was developed in under a year and is slated for release at Christmas, a mere 18 months after its inception.
One of the FUD attacks from Micosoft against Linux was that Linux was 'immature', even though it had been under continual development since 1992. If over a dozen years of development doesn't qualify for maturity, certainly one year of development is the dictionary definition of immaturity.
Will SOHO users really want to roll VISTA out into their server rooms and desktops? I doubt enterprise users will.
What we really need from government is an investigation of the long-term effects of OSS on our indigenous software industry, assistance to combat the threat to the industry's livelihood that OSS might pose and the development of a strategy to build on the opportunities that OSS has created. Without prompt action, my fear is that a further move towards OSS could result in the nightmare scenario of OSS at one extreme and Microsoft at the other with nothing else in between. Where would our freedom of choice be then?
Had the USTPO existed 100 years ago in the form it has today we would still be using Horse drawn carriages. IP patents, etc., would have prevented other kinds of four wheel vehicles from being manufactured because of the 'threat' to the livelyhood of the horse-drawn carriage industry.
The idiot who wrote this article now wants the US government to "investigate' the long term effects that FOSS will have on our "indiginous software industry' - code words for Microsoft. Isn't this the same Microsoft that is busily out sourcing to China and India the work that 'indiginous' programmers in Seattle were paid to do? That out sourcing is a far bigger threat to 'indiginous' programmers than FOSS.
He also has "fear' that further movements to OSS would create a situation where Microsoft is at one end and OSS is at the other end of the programming spectrum and nothing is in between. I've got news for him. That situation already exists, but the culprit is Microsoft. When ever a software startup creates a new market niche that begins to create a stir guess who eats it up? Not OSS, that's for sure. Microsoft's own agressive monoplistic behavior has made most would-be startups pass on the possibility. Those that didn't pass paid with their corporate lives. We all know the list of companies that became 'partners' with Microsoft, until Gates and company got a look at the code. Then follows a short period of silence, followed by the sudden appearance of a software product that is identical to the 'partners' application. It wasn't OSS that tried to put a patent fence around 132 public protocols. It isn't OSS money that is buying off crooked politicians to get special interest legislation passed.
If Gates and Company has its way there will be NO FREEDOM OF CHOICE in the software OR PC industry in America, or any other country if they can buy enough influence.
All IE has is a lot of makeup and the pock marks of too many STD infections... The only thing Gates is offering is more makeup to cover more blimishes.
The 2nd Law of thermodynamic: no process can take place unless the Entropy of the Universe increases. Even "intelligently directed" activity.
Short story. It will take MORE energy to put CO2 "back into the bottle" than was consumed releasing it. And, if you don't use Carbon fuels to pump carbon out of the atmosphere, by what ever process, mechanical or chemical, what energy source would you use that has the density necessary to do the job in an adequate time scale?
None.
Building a city below sea leavel, or trying to save one which has sunk below sea level by continually pumping water over a levee is one of the most foolish wastes of energy I can imagine. Sooner or later another break in the levee will occure. Mother nature, terrorists, a drunker LSU fan....
CO2 in the atmosphere has risen from 275ppm to about 375ppm since measurements of that gas began more than 100 years ago. Everyone assumes it is due to burning of fossil fuels, but that assumption cannot be proven because Carbon atoms from various sources have not been tagged and followed by any global experiment that I am aware of. All assignments have been based on statistics, and with that science you can prove anything.
At the equator water vapor is present in the atmosphere at 2,169 times the concentration of CO2 and water vapor has 7 TIMES the greenhouse power that CO2 has. That makes water, effectively, 15,000 times more powerful a greenhouse gas than CO2. Most people assume that CO2 is the culprit because of an unproven theory that water vapor amplifies the effects of CO2. Or, maybe it's the other way around. Unproven theories tend to be dynamic.
Other sources of CO2 have increased: the human population has risen from 1 BILLION to 6 BILLION in the last 100 years, and humans exhale CO2 24/7, unlike combustion engines. Most humans on this planet do not own a combustion engine or use one.
The ratio of CO2 produced / O2 consumed is called respiratory quotient (RQ), which depends on type of nutrients being used for energy. According to a study by the USDA [1], an average person's respiration generates approximately 450 liters (roughly 900 grams) of carbon dioxide per day, or about 5.4 Billion tons per day, or 1,971 Billion tons per year. That's about 538 Billion tons of Carbon. By comparison, the USA produces about a little more than 1 Billion tons of coal per year. The World demand for oil last year was 82 Million barrels per day, or around 9.3 Billion tons of oil per year. If I've made a mistake I'm sure someone will correct me, if they use the same source of information: http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/international/petroleu .html Please do.
If my figures are correct human breath contributes more C02 to the atmosphere than machines do, probably because CO2 absorbed from the atmosphere by plants used as food, as they grow, is more than that created by farmers producing the food plants.
Dr. Alfred Bartlett was the first to state that "Farming is just a way of using land to convert oil into food." It's takes approximately 7 times more energy to put a slice of bread in your mouth than you get by metabolising it.
If CO2 is the cause of gloabl warming, humans appear to be the major source and the Carbon fuels used to feed them the minor source. If we cut back on the use of fossil fuel we condem a BILLION or more people to a death sentence by starvation, and the starving will continue until we replace Carbon with another energy source of equal or better density, or until the final population level can be supported by the new energy source.
Personally, I believe the evidence shows, and long before the "Carbon Tax" became the newest wealth redistribution scheme, that the Sun is responsible for the Earth's mean temperature, even with 6 BILLION people calling Earth home.
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When Donald Rumsfeld was head of R.G. Serle they were doing FDA safety studies for Aspartame (later branded as NutraSweet). Several rodents in the safety study died of brain cancer, but Serle removed them from the study and the data. A PhD working on the project blew the whistle. Congress investigated, hiring two lawyers to continue their work. A couple years later the acting head of the FDA, as his final act before resigning, approved NutraSweet. He then appeared as the legal eagle for NutraSweet. Guess who his two assistants were... Right.
Aspartame breaks down in warm water to release Methyl Alcohol, among other things, which causes cancers of the brain, eye, kidneys and liver. It can cause, like it did in me, a red flush over the upper half of the body and the face, and severe oil production by the Sebaceous glands, and a continual headach. It is associated with memory loss. My once nearly photographic memory is now gone.
Rumsfeld got $6M for his "work".
This article smacks of MS shilling.
5 24;fp;2;fpid;1
I agree.
It has all the ear-marks of a "Submarine" article, as defined by Paul Graham.
http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html
That this is true is born out by IDC's evaluation of the data.
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/index.php/id;1754059
"After a long period focused on cutting costs and buying servers just to run current applications, enterprises are once again investing strategically in systems to handle future workloads, said IDC analyst Matt Eastwood. IT organizations are once again being asked to support real growth, he said."
This article contains some MS PR spin that the Gartner version did not: that purchases of Linux servers is short sighted because Linux server cannot be 'strategically' deployed but MS servers can. An odd assertion given the fact that many deploying Linux servers to replace Microsoft servers find that one Linux server can easily handle the load of 3 or 4 Microsoft servers, and do so more reliably and with less maintenance. Microsoft servers are notorious for being able to support only ONE application per server, a deployment model recommended by Microsoft itself, if not to improve MS server speed and stability then to improve Microsoft's sales figures.
As you point out, comparing sales levels of prior years with those given this year by Gartner and IDC, with Microsoft FUD wrappings, either Microsoft server shares have been declining while Linux' have been rising, or these "Consulting" firms are merely passing on MS PR memos with their own corporate dressing on them. I have no doubt that Linux server shares are rising, having grown from a few percent a few years ago to 31% this year, AND that Gartner was and is a mere extension of Microsoft's PR department. After all, they've been revealed as such in prior "research" reports that they put on line where they claimed the report was their work but they forgot to remove the Microsoft PR logo from the article.
the copies of Linux that were not purchased from retail channels but were downloaded free of charge.
They also, no doubt, included in the counting the number of times a single, freely downloaded copy of Linux was installed more than once.
Yup, despite the fact that these "onsulting" firms income streams totally depend on advising on the use of Microsoft software, I'm sure Gartner analysts will be professional and do their best to tally accurate counts, eschewing the crass action of merely rubberstamping a Microsoft PR memo. After all, people who earn fees by being featured in Microsoft server sales videos shouldn't have too much trouble remaining unbiased.
mmm... after thinking about it I'm sure they never counted the four Linux servers we recently installed at work. Maybe they aren't as accurate as I thought.
The author must be using Windows in the "Stupid Mode", without engaging his brain. Apparently he has never heard of "Kill files" and other blocking techniques to eliminate the trash from the UseNet data stream. One would get the impression that when he gets into his car he finds it impossible to avoid the "tenderloin" of San Francisco because he doesn't know how to steer away from that area. He probably stops for every "Why lie, I need money for booze" bum standing at the entrances to Walmart.
Just like using email, one learns that messages from unknown senders, which get by spam blockers, are never opened. And when one is curiously impulsed to open an suspecious email they always have their anti-virus program engaged to scan it first. Duh!
Because I program for a living I use UseNet at work via my W2K box to access other coders using the tools I'm using, and I've never had a problem. I never open msgs that offer "enhancement" products, pharms, or rollex watches, either. For the last eight years I've used Linux, dual booting at work and solely at home. When running Linux I've NEVER encountered any malware which was effective. I've installed Linux anti-virus programs, like f-prot, to scan my NTFS filesystem while running Linux just to be sure there aren't bugs which Norton hasn't found.
What really burns me is that the author is just like the idiots who passed the "Patriot" Act. This guy thinks that curtailing freedom is the only way to guarantee safety. If there is no safety behind prison bars what makes him think that walling off society with "politically correct" bars will work any better?
You are right. The sound files you pointed to were excellent, especially the "Calm Field" piece which featured a violin. Very good work. Exactly what midi music should strive for.
On the other hand, I listened to all of the midi pieces referenced in the topic and found all but one of them, "Turn My Head", grated on my ears, or they had performers who equated shouting messages of murder, mayhem and destruction to be the same as real singing. The grating effect comes, I believe, from a lack of harmonics which would smooth out the listening experience. The messages come from a misplaced idea that shock can subtitute for talent, except that the performers fail to realize that in the age of terrorizm such 'messages' fail to shock as much as they create disgust.
My first Linux distro was Red Hat's latest, 5.0. It came with the paperback entitled "Learn Linux in 24 Hours", by Bill Brush, IIRC.
Ubuntu's console install looks exactly like RH 5.0's install console screens. They were klutzy then and they are klutzy now. They detract from Ubuntu's overall image, but once you realize how limited the GNOME desktop is you can understand the match.
Here are the reported numbers:
"Sources" is a count of infected PCs, i.e., unique IP addresses "originating traffic".
"Targets" are the PCs "receiving traffic".
"Records" is the number of PACKETS observed.
What is odd is that while there are supposedly 111 PCs that are infected and sending out hack attempts, those 111 PCs seem to target ONLY 8 PCs, and the total PACKET transmitted/recieved on 11/03 was only 22K. Very strange. Very LOW numbers and with a VERY LIMITED number of boxes.
Notice that the majority of "infections" are occuring on Nov 3, 4 and 5, and the reports from THREE anti-virus houses are on the 4th and 5th, the same day as the big spike in the "infection":
A scan from VirusTotal detects "cback" as:
Antivirus Version Update Result
Fortinet 2.48.0.0 11.04.2005 Linux/Rev.B-bdr
Kaspersky 4.0.2.24 11.05.2005 Backdoor.Linux.Small.al
McAfee 4620 11.04.2005 Linux/BackDoor-Rev.b
For such an infintesimally small number of supposedly hacked boxes these three anti-Virus houses already have dection software which can see the "trojan". That is REALLY FAST dection code writing, deployment and reporting for such a SMALL number of boxes.
Has someone salted the Linux anti-virus mine to hype business?
Commercial?
Xandros, and several other Debian based clones.
OpenSource
SimplyMEPIS, KNOPPIX, Kanotix, and a plethora of Debian based clones.
My favorite is SimplyMEPIS
But, considering that regardless of the distro the same release number of KDE behaves the same way on all distros that deploy it, any is as good as another, all other things being equal. So KDE is not a reason to choose a distro unless that distro is the first to release with the latest version of KDE and you want to move to it.
Linux distros that feature GNOME still have to install connectivity to KDE functionality because the VAST majority of applications are written using QT widgets. Companies wanting to create cross platfrom applications to enable their move to Widnows without reinventing the wheel will use QT because it is the smoothest route to take.
I find it rather ironic that GNOME was created as a GPL response to QT's propritary widget set, but after the KDE Foundation negotiated with TrollTech to continually release a GPL version of QT the reason for GNOME's existance became moot. Now, ironically, GNOME is being favored by the Linux distro makers who are selling proprietary brands and services.
Why would someone use a spreadsheet that allows only 16K rows per sheet to load about 250,000 rows, 13 columns per row, of flat ascii data??? (Actually, there are numbers in the data but they are treated as strings in the spreadsheet to further slow things down.) Clearly, a database is called for. But, even if you were bound and determined to use a pickup truck to haul your 600 acres of corn to market, you should at least use a one that allows for a longer bed. George should have put those 250,000+ rows into only one OOo odt sheet.
An aside, why would one save the spreadsheet as an sxc, forcing users to convert to the odt format in order to test OOo, then have sheet settings which resize the row heights and recalculate the spreadsheet before it opens to the user? Because he has to avoid the one sheet solution.
and don't worry about becoming dependent only to have a "Licen$e" fee imposed, or EULA restrictions about using GPL software in conjuction with it.
Since VISTA is turning out to be just a theme upgrade, why not upgrade to Linux and stop shelling out more and more money just to get a new theme or security holes patched, or the stability improved?
Duh!
http://rhlx01.rz.fht-esslingen.de/projects/alt_ene rgy/sol_thermal/powertower.html
Here in the mid-west small communities are drying up and blowing away because of the collapse of the farming economy. All the small farms are being/have been bought up by the huge multi-national conglomerates like Cargil, etc. The ex-farmers are moving to town and applying at Walmart for jobs.
This trend could be reversed by setting up 10-50MW SPTII sites all over the mid-West, or even the entire country, in these small rural communities. The technology is similar to that of farm equipment, and the ex-farmers could begin "farming" electricity and Hydrogen. Even under overcast conditions these power stations develop 1/3rd their max power. Excess power can be stored in several forms.
While high tension power lines (450KV) could connect regional areas most power would be produced locally.
Our national electrical power would then be terrorist proof.
a Unix or BSD clone?
Sounds like it to me.
Enquiring minds want to know.
Clippy. Judging by all the praise from Dido and Enderle it has to be the greatest thing ever invented since .... eh ... Bob?
Duing the 15 years I ran my own computer consulting business I discovered one nice test to determine what small business owners actually feel about the welfare of their employees:
Are the bathrooms kept clean and stocked?
Employers who don't care about their employees usually don't care about the employees environment. The employee bathrooms are pig styes.
Some other tips I picked up through experience:
Larger businesses and corporations usually have janitorial services so for them the "Bathroom Test" doesn't apply. In that situation the best way to evaluate the corporate environment is to talk with the in-house coders, if any, or other employees. If their remarks suggesst managers whose behavior indicates that they are graduates of the Atilla The Hun School of Management then its time to investigate other opportunities. Paper clip counting is a dead give-away.
If the PCs and other hardware are antiquated or poorly maintained its time to look elsewhere.
If most of the employees are recent hires themselves but the company has been around for a while then its time to look elsewhere.
If they want you to punch a clock then look elsewhere.
If they want you will be "salaried" instead of you billing them and there is no cap on the hours you'll be working then look elsewhere.
Which leads to: If they want you to violate one or more of the 20 or so IRS rules that determine if you are an independent consultant or an employee then look elsewhere.
If they are paying you out of a "special" fund then look elsewhere.
If they want you to code two sets of book, one for the IRS and one "just to give them a bottom line" then look elsewhere.
If the secretary confides in you that the boss is running a prostitution ring on the side, and those bobcats from California have cocain welded into the 4X4 bucket support beams, you'd better be looking elsewhere.
If the owner is a business partner with the local IRS agent then you'd better look elsewhere.
If employers don't respect the law then they won't respect the employees or the consultant.
If employers don't respect their employees they won't respect the consultants they hire.
Would a silencer reduce or eliminate the robot's effectiveness?
Anyone know?
I drive a 4 door 2002 Saturn SL 5 speed stick that consistantly gets 30-32 mpg in the city and on my last long trip (2200mi round) it got 43 mpg.
plans were laid out than so that UTOPIAN people would evolve in order to be available to populate the new UTOPIAN world. A UTOPIAN world cannot survive the assult of NON-UTOPIAN people. It doesn't matter how fancy the toilet is if people insist on defecating on the floor.
As far as Kerzweil's prediction I doubt that it will survive the oil shortages, the cusp of which we are NOW riding.
is what it cost me in the USA in 1983.
And that was for a "single engine land" Visual Flight Rules pilot license.
From what I have been able to read this 'car' hasn't even achieved its FAA certification yet.
Regardless of how many computers it has those who plan to fly it should plan on qualifying for a "multi-engine land" Instrument Flight Rules pilot license. That was the second level of FAA pilot certification when I got my license and you had to have logged at least 300 hours in single engine aircraft before you'd be accepted for training for the multi-engine license. The designer of this car is trying to bypass current training regimens, and well he should. I shudder to imagine what would happen if you had Sally or Joe Sixpack trying to fly these things around the country, especially over my house!!
EVEN IF all you have to do is turn on the flight control computer, click on your destination, click a "GO" button and let a computer and GPS interface control your entire flight, without any need to learn how to fly, I'd hope that they'd require an AIRPLANE parachute to be installed, much like air-bags in cars today. Otherwise we'd be seeing Voluntar's playing pin-ball with houses when their embedded VISTA 2050 dies with a "BSOD".
I am writing this msg from my first laptop, a Gateway M675PRR.
:-)
I set it up dual boot, with SimplyMEPIS 3.3 and spend 98% of my time on MEPIS. I have a Targus USB mini-mouse plugged in and headphones for sound to avoid distubing my wife. When traveling I use Street Atlas 6.0 with EarthMate GPS. At home I set in the Lazy Boy with a thin, wide four-legged table over the LazyBoy, upon which my laptop rests, and my wife sets on the couch. We both watch TV and talk while I work on my laptop. Before, I was always in my office working on one of my two desktops because moving a desktop to the living room and back and each day wasn't practicaly. Now, she's happy and I am happy.
After six months my experience with this laptop is so favorable that I doubt I will ever again purchase another desktop, new or used.
According to the timeline given, VISTA coding began around August of 2004 and the first trial release was a year later.
In other words, a complex operating system was developed in under a year and is slated for release at Christmas, a mere 18 months after its inception.
One of the FUD attacks from Micosoft against Linux was that Linux was 'immature', even though it had been under continual development since 1992. If over a dozen years of development doesn't qualify for maturity, certainly one year of development is the dictionary definition of immaturity.
Will SOHO users really want to roll VISTA out into their server rooms and desktops? I doubt enterprise users will.
Had the USTPO existed 100 years ago in the form it has today we would still be using Horse drawn carriages. IP patents, etc., would have prevented other kinds of four wheel vehicles from being manufactured because of the 'threat' to the livelyhood of the horse-drawn carriage industry.
The idiot who wrote this article now wants the US government to "investigate' the long term effects that FOSS will have on our "indiginous software industry' - code words for Microsoft. Isn't this the same Microsoft that is busily out sourcing to China and India the work that 'indiginous' programmers in Seattle were paid to do? That out sourcing is a far bigger threat to 'indiginous' programmers than FOSS.
He also has "fear' that further movements to OSS would create a situation where Microsoft is at one end and OSS is at the other end of the programming spectrum and nothing is in between. I've got news for him. That situation already exists, but the culprit is Microsoft. When ever a software startup creates a new market niche that begins to create a stir guess who eats it up? Not OSS, that's for sure. Microsoft's own agressive monoplistic behavior has made most would-be startups pass on the possibility. Those that didn't pass paid with their corporate lives. We all know the list of companies that became 'partners' with Microsoft, until Gates and company got a look at the code. Then follows a short period of silence, followed by the sudden appearance of a software product that is identical to the 'partners' application. It wasn't OSS that tried to put a patent fence around 132 public protocols. It isn't OSS money that is buying off crooked politicians to get special interest legislation passed.
If Gates and Company has its way there will be NO FREEDOM OF CHOICE in the software OR PC industry in America, or any other country if they can buy enough influence.
She still the sexiest browser out there.
All IE has is a lot of makeup and the pock marks of too many STD infections... The only thing Gates is offering is more makeup to cover more blimishes.
No flames. Good question.
The 2nd Law of thermodynamic: no process can take place unless the Entropy of the Universe increases.
Even "intelligently directed" activity.
Short story. It will take MORE energy to put CO2 "back into the bottle" than was consumed releasing it. And, if you don't use Carbon fuels to pump carbon out of the atmosphere, by what ever process, mechanical or chemical, what energy source would you use that has the density necessary to do the job in an adequate time scale?
None.
Building a city below sea leavel, or trying to save one which has sunk below sea level by continually pumping water over a levee is one of the most foolish wastes of energy I can imagine. Sooner or later another break in the levee will occure. Mother nature, terrorists, a drunker LSU fan....
CO2 in the atmosphere has risen from 275ppm to about 375ppm since measurements of that gas began more than 100 years ago. Everyone assumes it is due to burning of fossil fuels, but that assumption cannot be proven because Carbon atoms from various sources have not been tagged and followed by any global experiment that I am aware of. All assignments have been based on statistics, and with that science you can prove anything.
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At the equator water vapor is present in the atmosphere at 2,169 times the concentration of CO2 and water vapor has 7 TIMES the greenhouse power that CO2 has. That makes water, effectively, 15,000 times more powerful a greenhouse gas than CO2. Most people assume that CO2 is the culprit because of an unproven theory that water vapor amplifies the effects of CO2. Or, maybe it's the other way around. Unproven theories tend to be dynamic.
Other sources of CO2 have increased: the human population has risen from 1 BILLION to 6 BILLION in the last 100 years, and humans exhale CO2 24/7, unlike combustion engines. Most humans on this planet do not own a combustion engine or use one.
The ratio of CO2 produced / O2 consumed is called respiratory quotient (RQ), which depends on type of nutrients being used for energy. According to a study by the USDA [1], an average person's respiration generates approximately 450 liters (roughly 900 grams) of carbon dioxide per day, or about 5.4 Billion tons per day, or 1,971 Billion tons per year. That's about 538 Billion tons of Carbon. By comparison, the USA produces about a little more than 1 Billion tons of coal per year. The World demand for oil last year was 82 Million barrels per day, or around 9.3 Billion tons of oil per year. If I've made a mistake I'm sure someone will correct me, if they use the same source of information: http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/international/petrole
Please do.
If my figures are correct human breath contributes more C02 to the atmosphere than machines do, probably because CO2 absorbed from the atmosphere by plants used as food, as they grow, is more than that created by farmers producing the food plants.
Dr. Alfred Bartlett was the first to state that "Farming is just a way of using land to convert oil into food." It's takes approximately 7 times more energy to put a slice of bread in your mouth than you get by metabolising it.
If CO2 is the cause of gloabl warming, humans appear to be the major source and the Carbon fuels used to feed them the minor source. If we cut back on the use of fossil fuel we condem a BILLION or more people to a death sentence by starvation, and the starving will continue until we replace Carbon with another energy source of equal or better density, or until the final population level can be supported by the new energy source.
Personally, I believe the evidence shows, and long before the "Carbon Tax" became the newest wealth redistribution scheme, that the Sun is responsible for the Earth's mean temperature, even with 6 BILLION people calling Earth home.