Obviously law enforcement officials should make every effort to keep databases and such clear from factual error, but we have to accept the fact that human errors will inevitably occur.
I'm glad you agree because I was about to take a certain political parties voter registration list and make minor changes to line it up with a list of known felons. And we'll include lists of people protesting at the convention because there might be reasonable suspicion they're doing something illegal. It's good to know that afterwards we'll be able to escape any real consequences as errors will inevitably occur. And we'll bag a few doing something, so we get a good faith exemption on those.
When there's no real consequence for not obeying them, rules are meaningless. And there's no bottom to that hole.
Or maybe I'll just slip a few records in so it's not so obvious...what was your name again?
If I hadn't been able to install Ubuntu Netbook Remix, I would have returned the machines myself.
It would be interesting to dig deeper into the return numbers and find out if it was problems with Linux in general or the specific OS installed on the returned devices. I believe the Linux in general issues can be addressed, but the device specific OS issues will be more difficult.
As long as every netbook manufacturer is determined to roll their own flavor, then Linux will continue to be plagued with dilution by fragmentation in the marketplace. Instead of the Windows way and the Linux way, there's the Windows way and 20 different Linux ways.
So our country goes farther in the hole every day and big companies skip out overseas to avoid paying taxes here. You don't have to be a financial expert to know that just ain't right.
Our "M" has most definitely varied. The only machines we consistently have problems with are the Vista laptops. We're pushing out Ubuntu on our desktops, it's a heck of a lot easier to manage. And the money we save on licenses is a bonus.
Is that what you consider bullshit bashing? We don't like Vista, we like Ubuntu better. Unfortunately the sales staff got laptops that came with Vista and those machines account for the majority of our service calls.
I've lived through decades of IT buzzwords. At some level, even the internet, they all turned out to be just tools. Like any tool they are refined over the years, do some things really well and are appropriate in some situations. Where I think we get sideways in IT are the crusaders, either community or paid, who try to make the latest tool the one that solves all problems. Like web services. Remember when those came out? They were going to be the end all of computing. Software as a service, web 2.0...
So now it's "the cloud". It's just recycled software as a service delivered over the internet. Some are good and useful tools, some aren't. We use Gmail and I'm pretty comfortable with it. Would I use it to store confidential patient data? Not a chance. Neither would I outsource client confidential data to an outsource provider, especially an offshore provider. Although I'm certain there are many companies doing that without giving it a second thought, we're not going to. We'll keep the data here, encrypted at rest, and strictly limit who has access to the data and the hardware. It's not bullet proof, but it's not dumping people's medical records on an outsource "cloud" data storage system. Which might be good but might not. Which might be running their data storage or backups somewhere offshore. Maybe that data is secure, maybe not. Some things it makes sense to cloud out and some things it doesn't.
One thing that makes me crazy are vendors and partners all using different types of systems. One vendor has some outsource phone conference thing, another one uses some off-site thing to manage his contacts that sends ME email wanting me to update my contact information for HIM, another has some subscription project management something that buries me with pages of project updates with the current entry all the way at the bottom. It's a service mess.
That's what I set up for our office. It's not perfect but you do get a lot of functionality right out of the gate. Document sharing, chat, shared calendars. No one had trouble adapting, many were already forwarding mail to a Gmail account anyway.
Because that's what they want to believe - ideology trumping facts.
From the article: If the findings of some political scientists are right, attempting to correct misinformation might do nothing more than reinforce the false belief.
Okay, assuming you're correct, how do you combat ideological dogma? When there are so many opportunities to select a news source that fits your pre-conceived bias, then how do we have intelligent discussions rooted in reality and facts?
Or just "old".;) Actually, I'm going back to the command line future myself. It's just so much faster. Takes a while to get the hang of it, but when you do you can fly.
I must be reading that wrong because it sounds like Congress doing something that makes sense. It's unfortunate that it takes legislation to get DHS to pull their collective head out of their butt. This should never have been a problem that needed solving.
No offense intended, but the only people who think things are getting easier are people who don't know how they work in the first place.
Part of what I did coming into a new CIO position was simplifying the IT environment. A big component of that was stopping Windows development and moving Windows out of our server mix. The complexity of the whole Windows ecosystem adds overhead and expense without much value...except to MCSE's. The old arguments about it costing more to find qualified developers and support is just tripe. We haven't had any problems replacing our Windows-only staff and vendors at competitive local market rates and saved big on license costs.
We can also match or beat application development times in a FOSS environment. I'm sure those heavily invested in Windows development are seething to tell me how wrong I am, but I prove that every day. We're building big systems on a LAMP stack and pushing the envelope for time to market. I came from a Windows shop, I am...well, used to be...a Windows developer. It's all FUD. You don't need Windows, Windows developers, or all the overhead it takes to keep that ecosystem running in some kind of decent shape. You can deliver enterprise services at a fraction of the cost and at competitive turn-around times. Simplify your environment and you'll save yourself a lot of money and stress.
I'm kinda with you on that. I don't take tests and don't test people as part of the interview process. I do ask for a code sample and I'll ask them to explain how a particular section works.
If I'd tried testing applicants, I would have missed our most recent hire. He's a genius programmer but was totally flummoxed during the interview process. His code samples were brilliant but he's a very poor test-taker and not socially comfortable.
It's pretty easy to fire people these days, so I'm not sure there's much benefit in running some game show type testing process.
You won't be able to do this from a hotel room but I took a welding class and everyone that passed their test had a chance to meet with local companies looking for welders. Most of them were willing to consider part-timers, especially if you were TIG certified. If you can weld aluminum or do food grade work, you're golden.
One guy in our class got a job at an Antarctic research station.
I ended up getting an exec job before the class was over, so it never turned into a part-time gig. But I still have people who want me to weld stuff for them. And if you have a plasma cutter besides the welding gear, you'll have lots of friends and plenty of part-time work. Even my buddies will slip me a couple bucks, it's enough to pay for my welding supplies. You can usually find classes at a local community college, I'd stay away from the trade schools.
The only problem with getting certified in stick welding is you'll never be able to look at big pipes or structural welds without inspecting the beads. Checking for splatter, bad puddles and spots where they missed flux. You can get to be a seam snob.
If you're artistic metal art is really popular. There was a guy who come in once in a while to buy our class scrap. He made metal art little things and made quite a lot of money selling them. I used the plasma cutter to make a name plate for a friend and I bet I've had five of her friends call and ask if I would make them one. And, I have to say, a plasma cutter is not only a cool tool to use, it sounds totally bad ass. Like a jet engine that blasts a spray of molten metal. Imagine being able to cut in 1/4 steel as easy as writing with a big Sharpie.
...the Chinese government, to define methods of tracing the original source of Internet communications and potentially curbing the ability of users to remain anonymous. The U.S. National Security Agency is also participating in the 'IP Traceback' drafting group...
So now we're teaming up with the Chinese to develop better ways to spy on people.
If the ad itself is being talked about, then it has been successful on some level.
Someone delusional can get people talking about their behavior but that doesn't make them a success. People were talking about Vista after it first came out. Lot of people talked about Bob and Clippy.
I think it's like watching a train wreck. Lot people are going to talk about it, but that doesn't mean they're going to go, "Hey, let's take the train to grandmas this weekend!"
If all the cell providers have basically the same contract, then there is no real choice. You're not dealing with a free market when providers collude to fix service agreements, you're dealing with a cartel. And as long as there are self-righteous apologists sticking up for the cell phone cartel, nothing is going to change.
AT&T runs commercials all the time advertising their accessibility in Europe and overseas. I don't remember anywhere in there hearing that charges could be as high as $20,000.00. If AT$T had to disclose that in a service contract, no one would sign up for their service.
It's time consumers stop being victimized by service contracts where one side reserves the right to change the terms at any time. That's not a contract, it's a hostage. And stop wagging fingers at consumer caught in silliness like this. These people could very well be facing financial ruin.
How does mandatory big seats/wide isles help anyone aside from perhaps the obese?
Because if you limit take off and landing slots the airlines will try to find more ways to pack more seats into the cabin until they have people hanging under the wings. If you don't mandate seat and isle widths and specify the number of bathrooms per passenger it'll be exactly a week before some airline starts experimenting with "vertically oriented" seating designs to try and stuff more people in the tube so they advertise lower prices.
, but the article doesn't give any real suggestions.
People probably won't like my suggestion, which would be to regulate air travel again. Cut the routes, limit take off and landing slots, increase the seat and isle widths and let airlines raise prices to the market level of support. Add a gas tax to keep the cost of gasoline above $3.50/gallon and take the money pay for building a high speed train system across the US. To me that would be worth going into debt for, short term anyway. It would create jobs here and give people an alternative to our broken air transportation system.
The trains could handle the commodity traffic and airlines could compete for luxury traffic, just like the old days. We have to do something. We have 3% of the world population and use 25% of the gasoline. Without alternatives we're never going to get people out of their cars. If I could go anywhere in the continental US in 24 hours, I'd never fly again.
With the added bonus of keeping air traffic at a predictable level for the FAA.
Yeah. Are you really surprised or being factious? It didn't surprise anyone on the board, no one even challenged the idea. One of our sales staff used to work for IBM, they didn't bat an eye. It's been well received. Staff like it, management is easy and it comes with Google Apps.
In a corporate environment?
Why would this surprise anyone? Google has corporate accounts and customers that dwarf us in size and mail volume.
How's that going to work.
You sign up, set up the accounts, do your migration planning, send out the notice and change your MX record to point to Google. Although there was one grindingly annoying incident that delayed our roll out for a week. One of those features that they should warn you about in flashing red neon letters.
Google gets all your data including the highly sensitive stuff,
And so does RIM, your ISP and anyone with a relay between you and your message destination.
you're now dependant on a net connection for email,
Just where is your mail going without an internet connection? We mostly IM around the office. I was even IM'ing with our CFO and her office is right next door. And we have redundant internet connections anyway.
and Google can pull the service at any time.
Why would they do that? Millions of people trust Google with their email, and Microsoft and Yahoo, Comcast, Time Warner, AT&T, RIM...it's a long list. Google isn't any less reliable than any of them. If Google sold our trade secrets of cut off our mail service I'd blog about it. The traffic alone would probably make up enough revenue to replace the loss of income from getting fired. They'd make me famous.
How are you mitigating these risks?
How are you mitigating the risk of getting hit with a meteorite? Google's probably a million times better at email than we could ever be. If I was really worried about it I'd use the POP features to create a message backup for all the accounts. But why? The important documents are kept on an encrypted partition and we run daily incremental backups. And we trust TrueCrypt for the encrypted partition.
I can't tell if you're joking or really questioning corporate Gmail. It beats the hell out running an Exchange server. What a freaking nightmare that was. License fees, administrative costs, anti-virus software subscriptions...bugger that. You can run the free version or pay for the premium service and get better support and some nice goodies. With some of the outsourcing of large amounts of data to foreign companies I've seen, using Gmail is a low-risk scenario.
You moved your internal Emails (containing business-critical information and trade-secrets) to gmail?
Yes, we switched to corporate Gmail. You have to trust someone. Even if we continued to run our own mail server the messages still travel through unencrypted relays. As mentioned above, many staff were already using POP to get their mail into Gmail anyway. Many companies and government trust RIM with all their text message traffic.
ARE YOU CRAZY?!
A matter of some debate in certain circles. Years ago I worked at a nuclear research lab but no side-side-side effects I've ever noticed.
Once the top staff notice that they using the computer for work rather than spending all their time fighting Windows, you can probably zap that last box, too.
Most of the staff managed without any prompting from us. We were prepared for a lot of hand-holding that never materialized. Even with OpenOffice there hasn't been much. One question on how to do mail merge, I think.
The XP box in the flex area is supposed to be for guests and one of our vendors uses GoToMyPC for demonstrations and that doesn't work with Linux...that I know of anyway. And, yes, that's one of the vendors we're phasing out.
There is entertainment value in seeing the XP box sitting alone and unused in the flex area. Ultimately suffering the indignity of becoming the pedestal for the flex area scanner/copier and being periodically borged with a live CD. Poor sad little Windows box, nobody wants it. lol.
Puppy got the nod because it looks nice. I know that's not a great reason but if that smooths over the transition, fine. The laptops aren't that old. They have 256 meg of RAM and are pretty zippy running Puppy. The sales and execs probably use their Blackberries more than the laptops anyway. The only people with desktops are administrative, developers and support.
Slashdot Mirror
Obviously law enforcement officials should make every effort to keep databases and such clear from factual error, but we have to accept the fact that human errors will inevitably occur.
I'm glad you agree because I was about to take a certain political parties voter registration list and make minor changes to line it up with a list of known felons. And we'll include lists of people protesting at the convention because there might be reasonable suspicion they're doing something illegal. It's good to know that afterwards we'll be able to escape any real consequences as errors will inevitably occur. And we'll bag a few doing something, so we get a good faith exemption on those.
When there's no real consequence for not obeying them, rules are meaningless. And there's no bottom to that hole.
Or maybe I'll just slip a few records in so it's not so obvious...what was your name again?
If I hadn't been able to install Ubuntu Netbook Remix, I would have returned the machines myself.
It would be interesting to dig deeper into the return numbers and find out if it was problems with Linux in general or the specific OS installed on the returned devices. I believe the Linux in general issues can be addressed, but the device specific OS issues will be more difficult.
As long as every netbook manufacturer is determined to roll their own flavor, then Linux will continue to be plagued with dilution by fragmentation in the marketplace. Instead of the Windows way and the Linux way, there's the Windows way and 20 different Linux ways.
So our country goes farther in the hole every day and big companies skip out overseas to avoid paying taxes here. You don't have to be a financial expert to know that just ain't right.
I understand that YMMV
Our "M" has most definitely varied. The only machines we consistently have problems with are the Vista laptops. We're pushing out Ubuntu on our desktops, it's a heck of a lot easier to manage. And the money we save on licenses is a bonus.
Is that what you consider bullshit bashing? We don't like Vista, we like Ubuntu better. Unfortunately the sales staff got laptops that came with Vista and those machines account for the majority of our service calls.
Who wants a cookie?
Oh, me! Me! Me!
Heeeey, you tricked me. The old IT/cookie switch-a-roo.
I've lived through decades of IT buzzwords. At some level, even the internet, they all turned out to be just tools. Like any tool they are refined over the years, do some things really well and are appropriate in some situations. Where I think we get sideways in IT are the crusaders, either community or paid, who try to make the latest tool the one that solves all problems. Like web services. Remember when those came out? They were going to be the end all of computing. Software as a service, web 2.0...
So now it's "the cloud". It's just recycled software as a service delivered over the internet. Some are good and useful tools, some aren't. We use Gmail and I'm pretty comfortable with it. Would I use it to store confidential patient data? Not a chance. Neither would I outsource client confidential data to an outsource provider, especially an offshore provider. Although I'm certain there are many companies doing that without giving it a second thought, we're not going to. We'll keep the data here, encrypted at rest, and strictly limit who has access to the data and the hardware. It's not bullet proof, but it's not dumping people's medical records on an outsource "cloud" data storage system. Which might be good but might not. Which might be running their data storage or backups somewhere offshore. Maybe that data is secure, maybe not. Some things it makes sense to cloud out and some things it doesn't.
One thing that makes me crazy are vendors and partners all using different types of systems. One vendor has some outsource phone conference thing, another one uses some off-site thing to manage his contacts that sends ME email wanting me to update my contact information for HIM, another has some subscription project management something that buries me with pages of project updates with the current entry all the way at the bottom. It's a service mess.
That's what I set up for our office. It's not perfect but you do get a lot of functionality right out of the gate. Document sharing, chat, shared calendars. No one had trouble adapting, many were already forwarding mail to a Gmail account anyway.
And then I realized I might miss his special brand of crazy...
Don't worry, the world is full of crazy. When one falls, seven more rise up to take their place.
Because that's what they want to believe - ideology trumping facts.
From the article: If the findings of some political scientists are right, attempting to correct misinformation might do nothing more than reinforce the false belief.
Okay, assuming you're correct, how do you combat ideological dogma? When there are so many opportunities to select a news source that fits your pre-conceived bias, then how do we have intelligent discussions rooted in reality and facts?
Call me old fashioned...
Or just "old". ;) Actually, I'm going back to the command line future myself. It's just so much faster. Takes a while to get the hang of it, but when you do you can fly.
I left a ticking code bomb on my last job, here's how it happened:
Me: The rest of today I thought we'd go over the end of year maintenance and reports, they're a little involved.
My replacement: I think I got it.
Me: You sure? It's pretty complicated. Two hours really isn't enough of a hand off for an app this complicated.
My replacement: I'm good. I've got to take my kid to the doctor this afternoon (turns to leave).
Me: Okay then.
End of FY ends in about two weeks. Guess they'll find out how ready he really was.
I must be reading that wrong because it sounds like Congress doing something that makes sense. It's unfortunate that it takes legislation to get DHS to pull their collective head out of their butt. This should never have been a problem that needed solving.
This puts the nation at the heart of a software controversy...
I'm not really certain it's so much an OSS v proprietary story as much as government officials being influenced by big corporate money.
No offense intended, but the only people who think things are getting easier are people who don't know how they work in the first place.
Part of what I did coming into a new CIO position was simplifying the IT environment. A big component of that was stopping Windows development and moving Windows out of our server mix. The complexity of the whole Windows ecosystem adds overhead and expense without much value...except to MCSE's. The old arguments about it costing more to find qualified developers and support is just tripe. We haven't had any problems replacing our Windows-only staff and vendors at competitive local market rates and saved big on license costs.
We can also match or beat application development times in a FOSS environment. I'm sure those heavily invested in Windows development are seething to tell me how wrong I am, but I prove that every day. We're building big systems on a LAMP stack and pushing the envelope for time to market. I came from a Windows shop, I am...well, used to be...a Windows developer. It's all FUD. You don't need Windows, Windows developers, or all the overhead it takes to keep that ecosystem running in some kind of decent shape. You can deliver enterprise services at a fraction of the cost and at competitive turn-around times. Simplify your environment and you'll save yourself a lot of money and stress.
I won't take them.
I'm kinda with you on that. I don't take tests and don't test people as part of the interview process. I do ask for a code sample and I'll ask them to explain how a particular section works.
If I'd tried testing applicants, I would have missed our most recent hire. He's a genius programmer but was totally flummoxed during the interview process. His code samples were brilliant but he's a very poor test-taker and not socially comfortable.
It's pretty easy to fire people these days, so I'm not sure there's much benefit in running some game show type testing process.
You won't be able to do this from a hotel room but I took a welding class and everyone that passed their test had a chance to meet with local companies looking for welders. Most of them were willing to consider part-timers, especially if you were TIG certified. If you can weld aluminum or do food grade work, you're golden.
One guy in our class got a job at an Antarctic research station.
I ended up getting an exec job before the class was over, so it never turned into a part-time gig. But I still have people who want me to weld stuff for them. And if you have a plasma cutter besides the welding gear, you'll have lots of friends and plenty of part-time work. Even my buddies will slip me a couple bucks, it's enough to pay for my welding supplies. You can usually find classes at a local community college, I'd stay away from the trade schools.
The only problem with getting certified in stick welding is you'll never be able to look at big pipes or structural welds without inspecting the beads. Checking for splatter, bad puddles and spots where they missed flux. You can get to be a seam snob.
If you're artistic metal art is really popular. There was a guy who come in once in a while to buy our class scrap. He made metal art little things and made quite a lot of money selling them. I used the plasma cutter to make a name plate for a friend and I bet I've had five of her friends call and ask if I would make them one. And, I have to say, a plasma cutter is not only a cool tool to use, it sounds totally bad ass. Like a jet engine that blasts a spray of molten metal. Imagine being able to cut in 1/4 steel as easy as writing with a big Sharpie.
So now we're teaming up with the Chinese to develop better ways to spy on people.
If the ad itself is being talked about, then it has been successful on some level.
Someone delusional can get people talking about their behavior but that doesn't make them a success. People were talking about Vista after it first came out. Lot of people talked about Bob and Clippy.
I think it's like watching a train wreck. Lot people are going to talk about it, but that doesn't mean they're going to go, "Hey, let's take the train to grandmas this weekend!"
So? Don't sign it...
If all the cell providers have basically the same contract, then there is no real choice. You're not dealing with a free market when providers collude to fix service agreements, you're dealing with a cartel. And as long as there are self-righteous apologists sticking up for the cell phone cartel, nothing is going to change.
AT&T runs commercials all the time advertising their accessibility in Europe and overseas. I don't remember anywhere in there hearing that charges could be as high as $20,000.00. If AT$T had to disclose that in a service contract, no one would sign up for their service.
It's time consumers stop being victimized by service contracts where one side reserves the right to change the terms at any time. That's not a contract, it's a hostage. And stop wagging fingers at consumer caught in silliness like this. These people could very well be facing financial ruin.
How does mandatory big seats/wide isles help anyone aside from perhaps the obese?
Because if you limit take off and landing slots the airlines will try to find more ways to pack more seats into the cabin until they have people hanging under the wings. If you don't mandate seat and isle widths and specify the number of bathrooms per passenger it'll be exactly a week before some airline starts experimenting with "vertically oriented" seating designs to try and stuff more people in the tube so they advertise lower prices.
, but the article doesn't give any real suggestions.
People probably won't like my suggestion, which would be to regulate air travel again. Cut the routes, limit take off and landing slots, increase the seat and isle widths and let airlines raise prices to the market level of support. Add a gas tax to keep the cost of gasoline above $3.50/gallon and take the money pay for building a high speed train system across the US. To me that would be worth going into debt for, short term anyway. It would create jobs here and give people an alternative to our broken air transportation system.
The trains could handle the commodity traffic and airlines could compete for luxury traffic, just like the old days. We have to do something. We have 3% of the world population and use 25% of the gasoline. Without alternatives we're never going to get people out of their cars. If I could go anywhere in the continental US in 24 hours, I'd never fly again.
With the added bonus of keeping air traffic at a predictable level for the FAA.
That commercial is like Windows in many ways:
- It costs a lot of money.
- Much of it is pointless.
- More than half the time it doesn't work.
Now if that doesn't describe Vista, then nothing does.
GMail? Seriously?
Yeah. Are you really surprised or being factious? It didn't surprise anyone on the board, no one even challenged the idea. One of our sales staff used to work for IBM, they didn't bat an eye. It's been well received. Staff like it, management is easy and it comes with Google Apps.
In a corporate environment?
Why would this surprise anyone? Google has corporate accounts and customers that dwarf us in size and mail volume.
How's that going to work.
You sign up, set up the accounts, do your migration planning, send out the notice and change your MX record to point to Google. Although there was one grindingly annoying incident that delayed our roll out for a week. One of those features that they should warn you about in flashing red neon letters.
Google gets all your data including the highly sensitive stuff,
And so does RIM, your ISP and anyone with a relay between you and your message destination.
you're now dependant on a net connection for email,
Just where is your mail going without an internet connection? We mostly IM around the office. I was even IM'ing with our CFO and her office is right next door. And we have redundant internet connections anyway.
and Google can pull the service at any time.
Why would they do that? Millions of people trust Google with their email, and Microsoft and Yahoo, Comcast, Time Warner, AT&T, RIM...it's a long list. Google isn't any less reliable than any of them. If Google sold our trade secrets of cut off our mail service I'd blog about it. The traffic alone would probably make up enough revenue to replace the loss of income from getting fired. They'd make me famous.
How are you mitigating these risks?
How are you mitigating the risk of getting hit with a meteorite? Google's probably a million times better at email than we could ever be. If I was really worried about it I'd use the POP features to create a message backup for all the accounts. But why? The important documents are kept on an encrypted partition and we run daily incremental backups. And we trust TrueCrypt for the encrypted partition.
I can't tell if you're joking or really questioning corporate Gmail. It beats the hell out running an Exchange server. What a freaking nightmare that was. License fees, administrative costs, anti-virus software subscriptions...bugger that. You can run the free version or pay for the premium service and get better support and some nice goodies. With some of the outsourcing of large amounts of data to foreign companies I've seen, using Gmail is a low-risk scenario.
You moved your internal Emails (containing business-critical information and trade-secrets) to gmail?
Yes, we switched to corporate Gmail. You have to trust someone. Even if we continued to run our own mail server the messages still travel through unencrypted relays. As mentioned above, many staff were already using POP to get their mail into Gmail anyway. Many companies and government trust RIM with all their text message traffic.
ARE YOU CRAZY?!
A matter of some debate in certain circles. Years ago I worked at a nuclear research lab but no side-side-side effects I've ever noticed.
Once the top staff notice that they using the computer for work rather than spending all their time fighting Windows, you can probably zap that last box, too.
Most of the staff managed without any prompting from us. We were prepared for a lot of hand-holding that never materialized. Even with OpenOffice there hasn't been much. One question on how to do mail merge, I think.
The XP box in the flex area is supposed to be for guests and one of our vendors uses GoToMyPC for demonstrations and that doesn't work with Linux...that I know of anyway. And, yes, that's one of the vendors we're phasing out.
There is entertainment value in seeing the XP box sitting alone and unused in the flex area. Ultimately suffering the indignity of becoming the pedestal for the flex area scanner/copier and being periodically borged with a live CD. Poor sad little Windows box, nobody wants it. lol.
Puppy got the nod because it looks nice. I know that's not a great reason but if that smooths over the transition, fine. The laptops aren't that old. They have 256 meg of RAM and are pretty zippy running Puppy. The sales and execs probably use their Blackberries more than the laptops anyway. The only people with desktops are administrative, developers and support.