Only people running w2k3 AND linux were allowed to respond.
Shame they didn't ask me. While my win2k3 server is up and has been for a while, that's a far cry from saying it's trouble free. More than that, my linux boxes have been up without complaint for far longer AND are more trouble free AND are running apps that don't run on windows.
So, were they to ask me, the headlines might have read something like, "Linux more versatile and trouble free than windows counterpart".
I'll grant you, the win2k3 server is acting in a role that wouldn't be done nearly as well as the linux boxes.
I think you're correct about the final outcome but I can't see the middle managers putting an online store like this into production with the sole purpose of having it fall flat on its face so the record execs can go before congress to get more anti-piracy legislation.
Middle managers wouldn't be "in the know", as it were. It'd be the bigwigs of the industry who'd devise this, then pass it on to the middlemen to implement, leaving out details like, "It's supposed to fail".
This is a Thin-Client. That means it runs a stripped down version of the OS and IE, maybe Remote Desktop and that's about it. Any applications that it would run are web-applications and most of the processing is actually usually run on the server. No MS Office, no dental apps, nada.
Right. MS office, dental apps, all of it would be run from the terminal server. This little guy is perfectly suited to that.
Again, you would need IE6 (or some other browser) to do much of anything.
No you wouldn't. Most of my users don't touch the browser in their day to day.
Bandwidth. If I am running some word processing app over the server, how much bandwidth is being used for every single menu, spell check, autosave, etc. You need a MUCH beefier server to handle all the terminal services/application streaming/file server functions.
Not really. Given the type of power you can get nowadays on the cheap, a 2k server is more then capable of handling 30+ active terminal server connections. Yes, this is from experience. As in, I just checked my terminal server.
Remeber the dumb-terminals of about 10-15 years ago? Monocrome... keyboard input only... It was determined at the time that we could never need anything more than that! "The server can be upgraded to whatever we need!" Unfortunately, technology is advancing and user requirements do change. What happens in 3 years from now, a great web technology comes out and becomes the standard. You want to leverage this great new technology at work. The thing is there's a 70MB installation to run it with current web browsers. What now? you can't install it, so either your thin-client machines just became outdated or your in-house application did.
Or you run it from terminal services, like you should have been doing all along.
They are texas based, but they say they have businesses in Canada. Not that I necessarily believe them, but who knows.
Avoid them. Like the plague.
And yes, all dental software I've run across sucks, but I have to say the latest Dentrix Enterprise isn't bad. It's not as complete as I'd like, and it's still fat client ( instead of web client ), but they use a real sql backend, so I can't fault them there.
Something to keep in mind: My practice is large enough that in a few years, we will be investing in writing our own practice management software to my specs. A list that I have compile so far includes:
1) Web based client 2) database agnostic. We will probably start with postgresql, but I don't want the web app to even care about the database beyond where it is and how to log in. sql queries will be as database agnostic as possible. 3) Accountability. *nothing* is ever deleted out of the database. At most, a procedure or appt will be deactivated, so the web app can't see it. 4) Easy to follow audit trail
# difficult if not impossible to move around (though it's not entirely clear -- is it a "plug and play" into a pre-installed wall jack? If so, then it becomes "moveable", but requires custom installation of jacks anywhere you'd use it.)
For some environments, these are cheap enough to just scatter around the office. But even for locations that aren't, in most places workstations hardly move around. My workplace, for example, the same damn systems are in the same damn spots from 6 years ago.
# low powered processing
I don't need a lot of power. I have 3 apps I need to work ( two propriety dental apps, and ms office ). That's it. Not a whole lot of processing required.
# IE6
Again, most enviroments don't need workers going on the web for anything, so this is a moot point.
# limited standalone capability (designed to leverage Terminal Services)
This is actually a benefit..of sorts. A more centralized computer model is what we should have been moving to this entire time. Why do my clients need all this horsepower and harddrive space if they are just doing basic word processing?
Answer: No reason in the world. This is a far more efficient solution. Technical merits of Terminal Services notwithstanding.
# price (not really that inexpensive, no bargain over current desktop prices, but much less functionality)
Except what you end up paying for maintence in the long run. Fewer things to break, lower chance of breaking.
That alone makes this gold.
# video memory (max video memory is 8M) # video resolution (max is 1600x1200)
Most industries, this doesn't matter worth beans. As long as the damn thing can display windows and a reasonable res ( 1280x1024 is the high range of reasonable ), then it's fine.
# expandability
My clients don't need expandability. They need reliability and simple.
Funny, but I am in the process of trying to figure out how to schedule the work I need to get done this summer around my european counterparts 8 weeks of vacation. Eight weeks, not including holidays! Funny, they never get labeled as lazy.
That's because, as a rule, european folk have enough problems that most people see no point in highlighting yet another.
Again,:D ( -- I am officially renaming this smily as the "Shit eating grin" )
That this question is even being asked
on
On Point On Slacking
·
· Score: 4, Funny
That this even is being asked illustrates a very serious problem in this country. We are a nation of slobs and lazy asses.
So there I was, with all the hardware necessary for a MythTV box. I thought, "What fun, I can record anything I want, whenever I want, and play it back on my own time". So I set down and got to work. Couple days later, I had it all hooked up to the TV.
And what do I find? There's nothing on TV to watch. I literally spent the afternoon/evening looking for something, anything to record. I still can't find anything worth the harddrive space.
So, I accepted defeat, set it up to record Dora the Explorer and Sesame street ( 2 year old daughter ), and started putting my DVD isos on the harddrive. Might as well savage some use out of it.
If you think this is a horrible idea. If I can access the carrier, then anybody can access the carrier, it's only a matter of time. Hell, with internet enabled planes, is it too far fetched to think about remotely hijacking a plane? No more suicide runs, no sir. Do it remotely from the safety of your own cave ( sorry, had to ).
Quoteth the article Tests flights carried out in Portugal have shown that the system works well.
Well ain't good enough. It has to be perfect. 100%. To the point where no one even suspects it of problems.
Who else suddenly has an urge to go buy a spindle of DVDs and slip a blank ( convienently labeled, "MI-III" ) with everything they ship?
Seriously, if you do a cost analysis, you'll find that the 10-20 bucks wasted on the spindle buys you the option to ship a real backup copy in the future.
And speaking of backups, isn't it still fair use to make backups?
I am the net admin for a medium size dental office. My users haven't seen spam in their inbox in so long, they don't even know what it looks like.
The thing that makes this incredible is that my users consist of 50-60 young women with "CLICK ON THAT" disease, along with a few power users who subscribe to 2 or 3 mailing lists a piece.
And I'm using nothing more than sendmail+mimedefang+clamav+spamassassin. Haven't had a spam make it through to an inbox in 6 months, and no false positives in the years this system has been on line.
So no, they aren't too restrictive. They are just right.
This just highlights fundemental flaws in our countries IP laws. Here is a successful company with a sought after product, and they can't keep themselves out of court for violating IP concerns.
Nevermind the technical merits of said device, which I have never owned or had to work with.
In what sense? Piss poor acting. Not just from Hayden ( who seems to operate in that mode ), but from everyone. Even my man Jackson. Shallow story, poor execution of what little plot they had. Cheesy Darth Vader scene, characters breaking from the mold they set in the previous two films.
I'll give you an example of that last one; Pademe losing her will to live? Here is a strong woman who has an almost limitless well of compassion in her ( think about her comments about being a part of the government for her people ), who is having two babies. And because her husband tries to kill her, she loses her will to live.
Bullshit.
I won't even go into how she changed from a strong character to a whiny housewife between 2 and 3.
The only thing 3 had going for it was Force and saber fights, but even in that #1 has it beat.
Slashdot Mirror
Only people running w2k3 AND linux were allowed to respond.
Shame they didn't ask me. While my win2k3 server is up and has been for a while, that's a far cry from saying it's trouble free. More than that, my linux boxes have been up without complaint for far longer AND are more trouble free AND are running apps that don't run on windows.
So, were they to ask me, the headlines might have read something like, "Linux more versatile and trouble free than windows counterpart".
I'll grant you, the win2k3 server is acting in a role that wouldn't be done nearly as well as the linux boxes.
I think you're correct about the final outcome but I can't see the middle managers putting an online store like this into production with the sole purpose of having it fall flat on its face so the record execs can go before congress to get more anti-piracy legislation.
Middle managers wouldn't be "in the know", as it were. It'd be the bigwigs of the industry who'd devise this, then pass it on to the middlemen to implement, leaving out details like, "It's supposed to fail".
This is a Thin-Client. That means it runs a stripped down version of the OS and IE, maybe Remote Desktop and that's about it. Any applications that it would run are web-applications and most of the processing is actually usually run on the server. No MS Office, no dental apps, nada.
Right. MS office, dental apps, all of it would be run from the terminal server. This little guy is perfectly suited to that.
Again, you would need IE6 (or some other browser) to do much of anything.
No you wouldn't. Most of my users don't touch the browser in their day to day.
Bandwidth. If I am running some word processing app over the server, how much bandwidth is being used for every single menu, spell check, autosave, etc.
You need a MUCH beefier server to handle all the terminal services/application streaming/file server functions.
Not really. Given the type of power you can get nowadays on the cheap, a 2k server is more then capable of handling 30+ active terminal server connections. Yes, this is from experience. As in, I just checked my terminal server.
Remeber the dumb-terminals of about 10-15 years ago? Monocrome... keyboard input only... It was determined at the time that we could never need anything more than that! "The server can be upgraded to whatever we need!" Unfortunately, technology is advancing and user requirements do change. What happens in 3 years from now, a great web technology comes out and becomes the standard. You want to leverage this great new technology at work. The thing is there's a 70MB installation to run it with current web browsers. What now? you can't install it, so either your thin-client machines just became outdated or your in-house application did.
Or you run it from terminal services, like you should have been doing all along.
Haven't used Windent but it may be US only?
They are texas based, but they say they have businesses in Canada. Not that I necessarily believe them, but who knows.
Avoid them. Like the plague.
And yes, all dental software I've run across sucks, but I have to say the latest Dentrix Enterprise isn't bad. It's not as complete as I'd like, and it's still fat client ( instead of web client ), but they use a real sql backend, so I can't fault them there.
Something to keep in mind: My practice is large enough that in a few years, we will be investing in writing our own practice management software to my specs. A list that I have compile so far includes:
1) Web based client
2) database agnostic. We will probably start with postgresql, but I don't want the web app to even care about the database beyond where it is and how to log in. sql queries will be as database agnostic as possible.
3) Accountability. *nothing* is ever deleted out of the database. At most, a procedure or appt will be deactivated, so the web app can't see it.
4) Easy to follow audit trail
Along with all the goodies we need from dentrix.
Dentrix and Schick CDR. We use windent as well, but I would recommend anyone and everyone steer as far from that software as possible.
# difficult if not impossible to move around (though it's not entirely clear -- is it a "plug and play" into a pre-installed wall jack? If so, then it becomes "moveable", but requires custom installation of jacks anywhere you'd use it.)
For some environments, these are cheap enough to just scatter around the office. But even for locations that aren't, in most places workstations hardly move around. My workplace, for example, the same damn systems are in the same damn spots from 6 years ago.
# low powered processing
I don't need a lot of power. I have 3 apps I need to work ( two propriety dental apps, and ms office ). That's it. Not a whole lot of processing required.
# IE6
Again, most enviroments don't need workers going on the web for anything, so this is a moot point.
# limited standalone capability (designed to leverage Terminal Services)
This is actually a benefit..of sorts. A more centralized computer model is what we should have been moving to this entire time. Why do my clients need all this horsepower and harddrive space if they are just doing basic word processing?
Answer: No reason in the world. This is a far more efficient solution. Technical merits of Terminal Services notwithstanding.
# price (not really that inexpensive, no bargain over current desktop prices, but much less functionality)
Except what you end up paying for maintence in the long run. Fewer things to break, lower chance of breaking.
That alone makes this gold.
# video memory (max video memory is 8M)
# video resolution (max is 1600x1200)
Most industries, this doesn't matter worth beans. As long as the damn thing can display windows and a reasonable res ( 1280x1024 is the high range of reasonable ), then it's fine.
# expandability
My clients don't need expandability. They need reliability and simple.
Funny, but I am in the process of trying to figure out how to schedule the work I need to get done this summer around my european counterparts 8 weeks of vacation. Eight weeks, not including holidays! Funny, they never get labeled as lazy.
:D ( -- I am officially renaming this smily as the "Shit eating grin" )
That's because, as a rule, european folk have enough problems that most people see no point in highlighting yet another.
Again,
That this even is being asked illustrates a very serious problem in this country. We are a nation of slobs and lazy asses.
:D
I say this WHILE posting to slashdot.
So where is the defining factor between government and private business? And before you answer, see At&t and the NSA.
So there I was, with all the hardware necessary for a MythTV box. I thought, "What fun, I can record anything I want, whenever I want, and play it back on my own time". So I set down and got to work. Couple days later, I had it all hooked up to the TV.
And what do I find? There's nothing on TV to watch. I literally spent the afternoon/evening looking for something, anything to record. I still can't find anything worth the harddrive space.
So, I accepted defeat, set it up to record Dora the Explorer and Sesame street ( 2 year old daughter ), and started putting my DVD isos on the harddrive. Might as well savage some use out of it.
Is that you, Satoru Iwata?
...I'm getting a wii, despite the name.
Both Sony and Microsoft can go fuck themselves.
Zero to slashdotted in no comments flat.
If you think this is a horrible idea. If I can access the carrier, then anybody can access the carrier, it's only a matter of time. Hell, with internet enabled planes, is it too far fetched to think about remotely hijacking a plane? No more suicide runs, no sir. Do it remotely from the safety of your own cave ( sorry, had to ).
Quoteth the article
Tests flights carried out in Portugal have shown that the system works well.
Well ain't good enough. It has to be perfect. 100%. To the point where no one even suspects it of problems.
The one of the purposes of a government is to protect its people, right?
So who protects the people from their government?
Who else suddenly has an urge to go buy a spindle of DVDs and slip a blank ( convienently labeled, "MI-III" ) with everything they ship?
Seriously, if you do a cost analysis, you'll find that the 10-20 bucks wasted on the spindle buys you the option to ship a real backup copy in the future.
And speaking of backups, isn't it still fair use to make backups?
Doesn't matter where the data comes from, as long as it's verifiable, it's still valid data.
In general, I agree. Myth is more expensive and not as user friendly.
That said, I built one, and I'm about to build a second and seperate front end. Why? For the same reason people climb mountains:
Because it's there.
I am the net admin for a medium size dental office. My users haven't seen spam in their inbox in so long, they don't even know what it looks like.
The thing that makes this incredible is that my users consist of 50-60 young women with "CLICK ON THAT" disease, along with a few power users who subscribe to 2 or 3 mailing lists a piece.
And I'm using nothing more than sendmail+mimedefang+clamav+spamassassin. Haven't had a spam make it through to an inbox in 6 months, and no false positives in the years this system has been on line.
So no, they aren't too restrictive. They are just right.
This just highlights fundemental flaws in our countries IP laws. Here is a successful company with a sought after product, and they can't keep themselves out of court for violating IP concerns.
Nevermind the technical merits of said device, which I have never owned or had to work with.
Episode 3 was actually pretty good.
In what sense? Piss poor acting. Not just from Hayden ( who seems to operate in that mode ), but from everyone. Even my man Jackson. Shallow story, poor execution of what little plot they had. Cheesy Darth Vader scene, characters breaking from the mold they set in the previous two films.
I'll give you an example of that last one; Pademe losing her will to live? Here is a strong woman who has an almost limitless well of compassion in her ( think about her comments about being a part of the government for her people ), who is having two babies. And because her husband tries to kill her, she loses her will to live.
Bullshit.
I won't even go into how she changed from a strong character to a whiny housewife between 2 and 3.
The only thing 3 had going for it was Force and saber fights, but even in that #1 has it beat.
dvd menus
I don't want to use a GUI.
Neither do I. I have xine called from my myth box, which doesn't have a keyboard.
xine doesn't play many files I try, and I don't want to figure out how to fix it.
I haven't had any problems with VOBs, MPGs, AVIs, ISOs.
mplayer plays video files on slow machines smoother than xine.
Subjective. I've had smooth dvd playback on a pIII 550 ( coppermine ).
Why not just use xine and be done with it? From what I've seen, xine does everything that mplayer does, and more, so why bother.
Or am I missing something?
You can't go back to something that you never did.
The company that wears the napster costume isn't the original napters any more than I am.