Whoah. Wait a minute here. I agree that microsoft has a pretty good track record for backwards compatibility. And I will concede that I stopped using their crap over 6 years ago. But this rah-rah crap needs to be taken into perspective.
We all, I think, will concede that microsoft's biggest problem with their operating system is not their look and feel, not their inability to produce powerful applications, but the sheer amount of cruft in their applications and operating systems due to the "bolting" on of features that should have been inherent in the actual design.
Apple bit the bullet many years ago (as the System 7 team originally demanded of Amelio in order to give a true 32-bit multi-tasking os) when Jobs came back on board by making a new OS that was mostly incompatible with existing applications. But, since I fled Apple back in the 90's because of how crappy their OS had become, they have me back in their fold BECAUSE they took this step and thus made their platform finally stable.
I still use Linux and OS X on a daily basis and eschew anything microsoft. But here's the deal, guys. microsoft has to take the hit and actually redesign their system to be SECURE, NETWORKED, AND MODERN. This was promised with NT. No dice. Was promised with Windows Millenium. Again, nothing changed. 2000? Nope. XP? Better, but still the promise was broken. Each time they promised the new system was "rewrite." And each time, it was a lie.
I don't expect microsoft to protect all stupid users from themselves. But promising these features and the stability and reliability I have had with Apple and Linux for many years and then using those promises merely for marketability without being able to produce is the biggest fraud in our industry (well, aside from Duke Nuke'm Forever, maybe).
Eventually backwards compatibility, as sacred as it should be, has to bow to modernity. And microsoft needs to figure this out.
Instead of using the deplorable X11 version of OpenOffice, why not use NeoOffice.org ? I have used it for the past year on my PBook when dealing with m$ office users and have never had a problem. It is essentially a native wrapper around OpenOffice and works just fine. No more X windows to run it. Give it a try. You might be surprised.
I have worked many many jobs. Between being laid off, watching companies collapse (yes, I worked for Enron Online for 6 months before the end came), and doing contract work, I have built up a large number of contacts in the industry. I have spendt many years referring the best of these contacts to various contracting agencies I have relationships with (and no, I have never taken a referral fee).
Quite frequently, those of us worked in teams at some of these places that went under end up getting hired as a team for contracting work. I would suggest that most developers try and practice this kind of networking as it is very lucrative and teams end up coming in knowing one another's expertise, work habits, foibles, and weaknesses.
Ready made teams are difficult to find, but perhaps by approaching certain notable contracting agencies, you can find out about such teams. Of course, this all costs money to get people to drop whatever they're doing and come to a project. Especially if it's only for a 6 month gig. Another way I would suggest doing this is looking at opensource projects similar to what your product is. By doing so, you might get leads on such teams.
As always, it's going to be a buyer beware situation. But isn't it always?
I concur. I'm using the 3660 with T-Mobile and my experience with iSync has been a joy. Bluetooth is definitely the way to go and the phone should be pretty cheap now that it's two generations behind. Also, you might want to look at the 6600 as its support is the same.
Cheers.
I would say that FireFox is a necessity. I have to design and test with FireFox since it is the browser my clients will be using. I am designing front-ends with XUL and therefore it is VERY necessary.
Konqueror is fine for normal browsing, but I definitely think FireFox is worth it. Thanks for the note about the tools. I'll definitely check into them.
Cheers.
I am Mandrake Club Member and love their product. I have demonstrated Linux to many of my friends and colleagues by distributing the Mandrake Move cd. For myself, however, I have found that to make the Move distribution more powerful, what I really need is the live cd and a very very large USB key (> 512 megs) for development tools and FireFox.
I know the idea of these live Linux distros is to try and get people to use Linux and do so on any computer, but what I need is very specialized. I would like to be able to take with me only the bits and pieces I need.
For now, the only other alternative is to use the Live CD (for booting with Linux), a USB key for storing your home directory and editable files, and another cd for your tools (if the key isn't large enough). Wouldn't it make more sense for these vendors to provide some kind of program fo customizing the Live CD so it contains only the things you need rather than the tools THEY think you need?
Um, that seemed to be the whole point. Again and again throughout the article he does a mea culpa. At the same time, I believe his general frustration with not knowing how to proceed comes through.
We in FOSS need a more concrete process on how to handle bug through the system. And even very successful projects, like Mozilla/FireFox, can do a better job at communicating the way to handle these types of situations.
Uh...obviously didn't read the faq for doom3. Took me ten minutes following the instructions on the faq.
As for quake3, this is total bullshit. I bought the Loki version back when I barely knew how to spell linux but had decided to throw windows out the door. The install was easy as throwing the damned cd in the drive bay.
What? Can't click an icon through konquerer?
Christ...
I've had many of the same problems for years. I am a software developer as well as a writer and so the ability to type is rather important for my livlihood. I investigated a number of alternatives (I'd been using the M$ ergo keyboard for a number of years), and finally decided on the Fingerworks Touchstream to solve my problems.
It's taken me a while to get used to it and has dropped my overall typing speed. But in general, it has worked quite well as a keyboard/mouse replacement and I highly recommend it.
Oh, and I also play starcraft(through transgaming) as well as UT2004/Q3/SOF and other fps' with my touchsteam. My hands are much happier now.
Cheers.
I did a little research before I spent the cash on m y Fingerworks touchstream. I spend about 12 hours coding a day and had finally reached the point where I really needed to get something to help alleviate rsi. I've only had the device for a day and it's very awkward at first, but I believe I'll be back up to 70 wpm in a few weeks. Short of having surgery, or the greatly sought uis of gibson lore, I believe devices like these will hopefully prevent rsi for others. As for price, I make my living with my hands...what's that worth?
I think perhaps the greatest hurdle these devices face is that it's nearly impossible to find an outlet to demo them.
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Whoah. Wait a minute here. I agree that microsoft has a pretty good track record for backwards compatibility. And I will concede that I stopped using their crap over 6 years ago. But this rah-rah crap needs to be taken into perspective.
We all, I think, will concede that microsoft's biggest problem with their operating system is not their look and feel, not their inability to produce powerful applications, but the sheer amount of cruft in their applications and operating systems due to the "bolting" on of features that should have been inherent in the actual design.
Apple bit the bullet many years ago (as the System 7 team originally demanded of Amelio in order to give a true 32-bit multi-tasking os) when Jobs came back on board by making a new OS that was mostly incompatible with existing applications. But, since I fled Apple back in the 90's because of how crappy their OS had become, they have me back in their fold BECAUSE they took this step and thus made their platform finally stable.
I still use Linux and OS X on a daily basis and eschew anything microsoft. But here's the deal, guys. microsoft has to take the hit and actually redesign their system to be SECURE, NETWORKED, AND MODERN. This was promised with NT. No dice. Was promised with Windows Millenium. Again, nothing changed. 2000? Nope. XP? Better, but still the promise was broken. Each time they promised the new system was "rewrite." And each time, it was a lie.
I don't expect microsoft to protect all stupid users from themselves. But promising these features and the stability and reliability I have had with Apple and Linux for many years and then using those promises merely for marketability without being able to produce is the biggest fraud in our industry (well, aside from Duke Nuke'm Forever, maybe).
Eventually backwards compatibility, as sacred as it should be, has to bow to modernity. And microsoft needs to figure this out.
Instead of using the deplorable X11 version of OpenOffice, why not use NeoOffice.org ? I have used it for the past year on my PBook when dealing with m$ office users and have never had a problem. It is essentially a native wrapper around OpenOffice and works just fine. No more X windows to run it. Give it a try. You might be surprised.
I have worked many many jobs. Between being laid off, watching companies collapse (yes, I worked for Enron Online for 6 months before the end came), and doing contract work, I have built up a large number of contacts in the industry. I have spendt many years referring the best of these contacts to various contracting agencies I have relationships with (and no, I have never taken a referral fee).
Quite frequently, those of us worked in teams at some of these places that went under end up getting hired as a team for contracting work. I would suggest that most developers try and practice this kind of networking as it is very lucrative and teams end up coming in knowing one another's expertise, work habits, foibles, and weaknesses.
Ready made teams are difficult to find, but perhaps by approaching certain notable contracting agencies, you can find out about such teams. Of course, this all costs money to get people to drop whatever they're doing and come to a project. Especially if it's only for a 6 month gig. Another way I would suggest doing this is looking at opensource projects similar to what your product is. By doing so, you might get leads on such teams.
As always, it's going to be a buyer beware situation. But isn't it always?
I concur. I'm using the 3660 with T-Mobile and my experience with iSync has been a joy. Bluetooth is definitely the way to go and the phone should be pretty cheap now that it's two generations behind. Also, you might want to look at the 6600 as its support is the same. Cheers.
I would say that FireFox is a necessity. I have to design and test with FireFox since it is the browser my clients will be using. I am designing front-ends with XUL and therefore it is VERY necessary. Konqueror is fine for normal browsing, but I definitely think FireFox is worth it. Thanks for the note about the tools. I'll definitely check into them. Cheers.
I am Mandrake Club Member and love their product. I have demonstrated Linux to many of my friends and colleagues by distributing the Mandrake Move cd. For myself, however, I have found that to make the Move distribution more powerful, what I really need is the live cd and a very very large USB key (> 512 megs) for development tools and FireFox. I know the idea of these live Linux distros is to try and get people to use Linux and do so on any computer, but what I need is very specialized. I would like to be able to take with me only the bits and pieces I need. For now, the only other alternative is to use the Live CD (for booting with Linux), a USB key for storing your home directory and editable files, and another cd for your tools (if the key isn't large enough). Wouldn't it make more sense for these vendors to provide some kind of program fo customizing the Live CD so it contains only the things you need rather than the tools THEY think you need?
Um, that seemed to be the whole point. Again and again throughout the article he does a mea culpa. At the same time, I believe his general frustration with not knowing how to proceed comes through. We in FOSS need a more concrete process on how to handle bug through the system. And even very successful projects, like Mozilla/FireFox, can do a better job at communicating the way to handle these types of situations.
Uh...obviously didn't read the faq for doom3. Took me ten minutes following the instructions on the faq. As for quake3, this is total bullshit. I bought the Loki version back when I barely knew how to spell linux but had decided to throw windows out the door. The install was easy as throwing the damned cd in the drive bay. What? Can't click an icon through konquerer? Christ...
I've had many of the same problems for years. I am a software developer as well as a writer and so the ability to type is rather important for my livlihood. I investigated a number of alternatives (I'd been using the M$ ergo keyboard for a number of years), and finally decided on the Fingerworks Touchstream to solve my problems. It's taken me a while to get used to it and has dropped my overall typing speed. But in general, it has worked quite well as a keyboard/mouse replacement and I highly recommend it. Oh, and I also play starcraft(through transgaming) as well as UT2004/Q3/SOF and other fps' with my touchsteam. My hands are much happier now. Cheers.
I did a little research before I spent the cash on m y Fingerworks touchstream. I spend about 12 hours coding a day and had finally reached the point where I really needed to get something to help alleviate rsi. I've only had the device for a day and it's very awkward at first, but I believe I'll be back up to 70 wpm in a few weeks. Short of having surgery, or the greatly sought uis of gibson lore, I believe devices like these will hopefully prevent rsi for others. As for price, I make my living with my hands...what's that worth? I think perhaps the greatest hurdle these devices face is that it's nearly impossible to find an outlet to demo them.