I hope you're joking. What the librarian handed over was not his personal property. It was paid for by the taxpayers. If you made a personal tape of a crime you can do what you please with it, but you don't (or at least should not) have the same latitude when the property in question is not your own.
There are reasons we have courts and legal processes. They may be inconvenient, but that does not men they can circumvented when it suits us.
I have had quite similar experiences, both in the US and in India. I saw this same situation here in the US when the job market for tech skills was ultra-hot (think 1999), and I see it now for the techies coming from India.
It is not a cultural thing, it is simply a overheated job market, and as it cools down only the really skilled will survive, and the rest will be weeded out.
I went to an Apple store in a neighborhood mall. The queue to the checkout couter was at least 15 people long. Then I saw this dude standing behind a make-shift counter with a hald held scanner like device in hand, and a mountain of iPods behind him.
I was out of the store with my iPod nano within minutes. When I got home my credit card reciept was already in my inbox.
I agree that code re-use within organizations is over-rated, but code re-use in the broader scheme of things is absolutely there, and growing. Over the years of doing server-side Java programming, I have come to increasingly rely on the various apache (and other such Open Source) projects to provide everything from XML parsers, to IDEs.
On the other hand code re-use within organizations is rare, but I think that is mostly a process issue, not a technology one. In my experience product development companies have much better processes to foster such re-use, while non-software companies, where the IT division is more a necessary evil, rather than an asset, do not.
It is looking like Sun has finally made up their mind and has decided to ditch Linux once and for all to put their energies into Solaris. For the longest time they were doing a half-hearted job of courting Linux, but I'm glad that they have finally made a decision and moved on.
It makes sense too. They have a world class Unix based OS and it made little sense for them to just abandon it and move to Linux. If they are able to generate some interest in an open source Solaris, that might be a more sensible path forward for them
A comment such as this could mean just about anything, and unless you are a mind reader you dont know any better.
For instance the comment could have meant something as trivial as... should this be refactored into a seperate function, or perhaps it was some redundant code... there is no real way to know.
Point is, if I saw a comment in the code that bothered me I would at least try to get to the bottom of it before I did something drastic like switching platforms.
Lok Technologies, a San Jose, Calif.-based maker of networking gear, started out using Linux in its equipment but switched to OpenBSD four years ago after company founder Simon Lok, who holds a doctorate in computer science, took a close look at the Linux source code.
"You know what I found? Right in the kernel, in the heart of the operating system, I found a developer's comment that said, 'Does this belong here?' "Lok says. "What kind of confidence does that inspire? Right then I knew it was time to switch."
So this guy switched from Linux to BSD not because he saw some poorly implemented code, but because of a comment?
That is absolutely insane.
Dont confuse business acumen with intelligence. What the parent is saying is that Bill Gates may be a shrewd and remarkably successful businessman, but that does not mean he is a genius. They're 2 very different things.
I think a good deterrant to these things would be to make the company who owns this data take responsibility if it gets in the wrong hands. While this does not solve the problem, companies will be more wary of who they do business with if their neck is on the line, it wont simply be a question of awarding work to the lowest bidder.
While offshoring of these type of jobs may be inevitable, I would expect companies to be damn sure of what they are doing if they are handing my personal details to a third party, especially one outside the US
While dealing with identity theft happening within the US is bad enough, it would be a nighmare trying to sort this out when it happens overseas.
This does not mean that people outside the US are any more (or less) dishonest than within. But when you try to track down criminals in another country you are essentially at the mercy of the police in that place, and there may be no way of compelling them to help... i.e you are essentially at their mercy.
From time to time, in order to improve Google Gulp's usefulness for our users, Google Gulp will send packets of data related to your usage of this product from a wireless transmitter embedded in the base of your Google Gulp bottle to the GulpPlex(TM), a heavily guarded, massively parallel server farm whose location is known only to Eric Schmidt, who carries its GPS coordinates on a 64-bit-encrypted smart card locked in a stainless-steel briefcase handcuffed to his right wrist. No personally identifiable information of any kind related to your consumption of Google Gulp or any other current or future Google Foods product will ever be given, sold, bartered, auctioned off, tossed into a late-night poker pot, or otherwise transferred in any way to any untrustworthy third party, ever, we swear. See our Privacy Policy.
Does this guy just wake up every morning, and decide that he is going to get himself in the news by making inflammatory statements/claims?
I believe the real war for M$ is in the trenches, and Ballmer making these stupid statements from time to time has only got to unnerve his customers (rather than his competitors).
What they really need to be doing is getting aggressive on making deals happen using price points that will work (which they are already doing), and work on improving their image as far as security goes (something they dont seem to have a high priority for). This type of arm-twisting may have worked in the past, but so far it has made no dent in the OSS roadmap.
I agree completely...
If we are so intent on making an example of them, we should bankrupt them so that they not lnly lose what they have, they also lose a portion of their future earnings.
Spammers spam because it makes them money. If that monetary incentive is taken away, we might have a resolution that actually works, and without having to lock people up.
The way I look at it is...
- I get a free OS (beer & speech).
- Updates from a source I can trust (Redhat)
Now, if it does help RedHat get some things done for their paying corporate customers it seems like a fair deal to me.
Downloads are meaningless. Just look at a few of the comments attached to this story - people downloading it many multiple times and often uninstalling it. I know that I personally am responsible for at least 15 Mozilla downloads, and 2 OpenOffice downloads, and while I finally do use Mozilla I haven't used OpenOffice.
I agree, the number of downloads by themselves do not have much relevance. What I do think is relevant is that there seems to be an upward trend in the number of downloads, and that to me indicates that there is an increasing interest in these projects.
(2) "Countless CD installations" does not imply there's necessarily a lot. It simply implies we can't count them.
Again, the sheer number here may not matter, but the trend is more important. Increasing number of CD installations I think is more important than the downloads because in my experience, non/semi-techies seems to have a higher preference for the physical media that techies do. More CD installs could potentially be construed as more interest being shown by non/semi techies.
(3) 14% of the large enterprise office systems as counted how? I note that the same story also says "Microsoft dominates the office suite market, with 95% of the overall share" - so why's "large enterprise office" so different from "office"? Are they making a distinction that naturally favors Linux houses?
Couldn't agree more, in my opinion market share numbers are the most nebulous of all numbers... always.
Quoting... the report notes that OpenOffice.org, an open source alternative to Microsoft Office, has secured 14% of the large enterprise office systems market, with over 16 million downloads and countless CD installations
The interesting this about these numbers is that no one can put a spin on this. For instance, if these numbers were about 'number of PCs sold with Linux pre-loaded', you would have claims that this was only being done to circumvent the MS tax, and most people subsequently loaded the PC with pirated Windows OS.
Slashdot Mirror
I hope you're joking. What the librarian handed over was not his personal property. It was paid for by the taxpayers. If you made a personal tape of a crime you can do what you please with it, but you don't (or at least should not) have the same latitude when the property in question is not your own. There are reasons we have courts and legal processes. They may be inconvenient, but that does not men they can circumvented when it suits us.
It is not a cultural thing, it is simply a overheated job market, and as it cools down only the really skilled will survive, and the rest will be weeded out.
I was out of the store with my iPod nano within minutes. When I got home my credit card reciept was already in my inbox.
The Constant Gardener anyone?
Well, it means you've just slashdotted your toilet.
Sure, but how many of them are monopolies, convicted of abusing their monopoly position?
On the other hand code re-use within organizations is rare, but I think that is mostly a process issue, not a technology one. In my experience product development companies have much better processes to foster such re-use, while non-software companies, where the IT division is more a necessary evil, rather than an asset, do not.
It makes sense too. They have a world class Unix based OS and it made little sense for them to just abandon it and move to Linux. If they are able to generate some interest in an open source Solaris, that might be a more sensible path forward for them
The product name is new, the product core is not. Other names it went by include (in chronological order)
For instance the comment could have meant something as trivial as ... should this be refactored into a seperate function, or perhaps it was some redundant code ... there is no real way to know.
Point is, if I saw a comment in the code that bothered me I would at least try to get to the bottom of it before I did something drastic like switching platforms.
Lok Technologies, a San Jose, Calif.-based maker of networking gear, started out using Linux in its equipment but switched to OpenBSD four years ago after company founder Simon Lok, who holds a doctorate in computer science, took a close look at the Linux source code.
"You know what I found? Right in the kernel, in the heart of the operating system, I found a developer's comment that said, 'Does this belong here?' "Lok says. "What kind of confidence does that inspire? Right then I knew it was time to switch."
So this guy switched from Linux to BSD not because he saw some poorly implemented code, but because of a comment?
That is absolutely insane.
Gives a whole new meaning to the line 'What Would Jesus Do'
Dont confuse business acumen with intelligence. What the parent is saying is that Bill Gates may be a shrewd and remarkably successful businessman, but that does not mean he is a genius. They're 2 very different things.
dude, he's a researcher, they know all sorts of cool things ... and stuff.
While offshoring of these type of jobs may be inevitable, I would expect companies to be damn sure of what they are doing if they are handing my personal details to a third party, especially one outside the US
While dealing with identity theft happening within the US is bad enough, it would be a nighmare trying to sort this out when it happens overseas. ... i.e you are essentially at their mercy.
This does not mean that people outside the US are any more (or less) dishonest than within. But when you try to track down criminals in another country you are essentially at the mercy of the police in that place, and there may be no way of compelling them to help
From the page ...
Google Gulp and Your Privacy
From time to time, in order to improve Google Gulp's usefulness for our users, Google Gulp will send packets of data related to your usage of this product from a wireless transmitter embedded in the base of your Google Gulp bottle to the GulpPlex(TM), a heavily guarded, massively parallel server farm whose location is known only to Eric Schmidt, who carries its GPS coordinates on a 64-bit-encrypted smart card locked in a stainless-steel briefcase handcuffed to his right wrist. No personally identifiable information of any kind related to your consumption of Google Gulp or any other current or future Google Foods product will ever be given, sold, bartered, auctioned off, tossed into a late-night poker pot, or otherwise transferred in any way to any untrustworthy third party, ever, we swear. See our Privacy Policy.
I think this means that it still needs some work.
I believe the real war for M$ is in the trenches, and Ballmer making these stupid statements from time to time has only got to unnerve his customers (rather than his competitors).
What they really need to be doing is getting aggressive on making deals happen using price points that will work (which they are already doing), and work on improving their image as far as security goes (something they dont seem to have a high priority for). This type of arm-twisting may have worked in the past, but so far it has made no dent in the OSS roadmap.
I agree completely ...
If we are so intent on making an example of them, we should bankrupt them so that they not lnly lose what they have, they also lose a portion of their future earnings.
Spammers spam because it makes them money. If that monetary incentive is taken away, we might have a resolution that actually works, and without having to lock people up.
The way I look at it is ...
- I get a free OS (beer & speech).
- Updates from a source I can trust (Redhat)
Now, if it does help RedHat get some things done for their paying corporate customers it seems like a fair deal to me.
Monkeys dont get no respect around here!
I agree, the number of downloads by themselves do not have much relevance. What I do think is relevant is that there seems to be an upward trend in the number of downloads, and that to me indicates that there is an increasing interest in these projects.
(2) "Countless CD installations" does not imply there's necessarily a lot. It simply implies we can't count them.
Again, the sheer number here may not matter, but the trend is more important. Increasing number of CD installations I think is more important than the downloads because in my experience, non/semi-techies seems to have a higher preference for the physical media that techies do. More CD installs could potentially be construed as more interest being shown by non/semi techies.
(3) 14% of the large enterprise office systems as counted how? I note that the same story also says "Microsoft dominates the office suite market, with 95% of the overall share" - so why's "large enterprise office" so different from "office"? Are they making a distinction that naturally favors Linux houses?
Couldn't agree more, in my opinion market share numbers are the most nebulous of all numbers ... always.
The interesting this about these numbers is that no one can put a spin on this. For instance, if these numbers were about 'number of PCs sold with Linux pre-loaded', you would have claims that this was only being done to circumvent the MS tax, and most people subsequently loaded the PC with pirated Windows OS.
You just cannot make those claims in this case.
The new company will be called Titflix ...
ducks