As for TV, I'm just waiting until the last two or three of my favorite shows are available on the iTunes Store so I can cancel my DirecTV subscription.
We do sort of the same thing with Netflix. We're ready to drop HBO from our cable lineup. You might have an even better idea there. Download your shows and watch what you want, put an antenna up for local stations. DirecTV always manages to find a reason to raise our rates every year, Dish is worse.
But I'm wondering if the download shows won't start including ads before long? The more people doing something...anything...the more advertisers will pay to be included. Pretty soon it will become a new revenue stream and everyone will be doing it. Instead of a death spiral I might say it's more like an arms race between advertisers and consumers. We're willing to pay more for an ad free medium and they're willing to pay more to get on that medium. Ads aren't really the problem. 20 minutes of ads in a 60 minute program...that's the problem.
And I hope they spend all day writing tailgating tickets, especially if the one in front is doing at least the speed limit. I've got no problem at all with people flying down the highway. Have at it. I'd even favor raising the speed limit to let them go even faster.
But nail them to wall for tailgating, especially trucks. That's not just rude, it's damn dangerous. The really annoying ones are the trucks that ride your tail, then pass, only to drop way below the speed limit on hill so you can rinse, lather, and repeat for miles. Makes me want to drag that sob out of the cab and beat the living hell out of them. Threatening me with 80,000 lbs of metal going 70 mph is one thing, but threatening my family with that same weapon should be an automatic CDL suspension.
You're right about the spelling, backed up by Wikipedia. Corrected as noted.
But I've seen steppe horses in real life and despite being tough, sure footed and strong, they're still ponies in my book. Your legs almost drag on the ground.
I mean, honestly - what does Vista do that XP doesn't?
You could ask the same question about Windows 2000. The majority of users at this customer are still on Win2K and they can do what they need to do. If they could get new Win2K licenses they might use it another ten years.
If MSFT didn't push business customers into upgrading by withdrawing support and OEM agreements that keep them from selling older versions, then I think you'd see a time horizon for os upgrades on the order of 10-12 years. Maybe longer if MSFT opened up older versions of Windows they no longer support to 3rd party vendors. I think you'd be amazed at how much life some of those older versions might really have left.
It's hard for me to believe that through a process of gradual refinement, MSFT couldn't turn Win2K into nearly the powerhouse of functionality and security that Vista represents. But there's no margin in that for Redmond, hence it won't happen. Yet that would seem to be the very value proposition that proprietary software represents. Instead gradual refinement is found more often in open source projects. I can run the same version of Ubuntu to the end of time if I'm so inclined. Even hiring a programmer or team to provide support for new products or functionality. To me that freedom is a better value proposition than Windows.
At a more basic level the software I'm using on this machine costs thousands of dollars. At home I have very useful and functional machines where the software cost is $0. Free, as in beer. Despite MSFT claims that Linux isn't free...I have machines at home that are loaded with all free software and I get lots of work done on them. The development environments are different but I seem to be able to produce apps in one environment as fast as the other. One costs thousands and when you include the cost of the supporting systems (SQL Server, Exchange) the costs top tens of thousands.
MSFT is too big and bloated to be nimble and innovative. For the last ten years their product execution has been horrible. They show up late to the party with a buggy product and treat their customers like criminals.
Time for Ballmer to go. As long as he's in charge at MSFT nothing is going to change.
I do think that the aftermath of the military victory was handled poorly.
This is the latest right wing talking point. Don't admit it was a brain dead idea from the beginning, blame the execution. They're trying the same arguments about Viet Nam. It wasn't the intent, it was the execution. It's setting up Rumsfeld to be the patsy and gives the Republican Congress a pass on not doing anything resembling oversight. Where was all this brilliant insight during the build up to the war?
Divide Iraq into three regions. Kurdistan in the north, which would include the border areas around Mosul, the northern oil fields, etc. A central/western Sunni Arab area, and a southern/eastern Shiite Arab area, including the southern oil fields.
ROFL! That's almost as good the pre-war planning. You just alienated Turkey with the independent Kurdistan idea and gave the Kurds a nearly infinite supply of money to fund Kurdish separatists with the oil field revenue. You alienated one of our better allies in the region and funded ongoing instability in a formerly stable region. Off to a great start.
The Saudis will likely step in and offer some sort of support to stabilize this area.
You got that part right but if you think the Saudi money will go to fund stability you need to put the crack pipe down. The Wahhabis supply most of the really freaky, unstable radicals in the region and there's a good chance the bulk of those funds would end up in the hands of Al-Qaida. Everyone who thinks leaving the Sunnis to depend on the most radial elements of radical Islam for funding please raise their hand.
'm not as worried about the Shiite dominated area.
You're not worried about setting up an Islamic regime run by a radical strong man with ties to Hezbollah? Now I know you're high.
You are right that there's no avoiding a civil war at this point, mainly because it's been going on the last year and half. And you're right that we're not going to fix what's broken with the exercise of military power. Pull our troops back to over the horizon bases...an idea which John Kerry suggested and Bush poo-poo'd. Situate those bases so our guys can help control traffic across the Saudi and Iranian borders. Not that leaving Syria and Jordan borders unguarded is a bright spot, but you have less than 100K troops to work with and that's all you can do. Turn over management of our continued presence to the special forces generals instead of regular Army, which was another huge mistake that tends to get glossed over. But when you have so many screw ups to pick from, it's easy to miss one or two.
I'm just walking along, minding my own ant business, and all of sudden some jackass decides to levitate me. Oh, that's right, it's so funny to pick on the ants. Everyone picks on the ants. We're just trying to make a living and feed the queen...she gets to drink nectar. Think the rest of us get any nectar? Not us worker ants. You try running around blind trying to follow a scent trail during allergy season. We get stepped on, eaten by other bugs and birds...don't get me started. And then there's the nursery, those ingrates never get enough. Like it's not bad enough putting up with their crap along comes to the dominant species and thinks it's just SO funny to levitate us. Suppose I should be glad they didn't roast us under a magnifying glass like the neighbor kid. Little delinquent. I'll be he grows up to be a career criminal. It's all so meaningless.
The simple solution would be to ban trade association enforcement. In one swoop that would take out the BSA, RIAA and MPAA. Make the parent companies be the litigants. If Sony starts suing people for file sharing consumers might well start avoiding all their products at the store.
Make the companies behind these tactics be front and center in any adverse actions and you'll see lawsuits against all but the worst offenders, the ones very few of us feel sorry for, dry up almost overnight.
Yes, it's satire. But that fact that no one would be at all surprised if the MPAA was really being that retarded speaks volumes about them.
I have an issue with "dirty work" organizations. Microsoft and other companies don't want to get their hands dirty suing customers so they fund the BSA. Record labels don't want their name on enforcement actions so they fund RIAA. One of the best things Congress could do for the consumer is strip away the ability of companies to hide behind their mafia inspired enforcement organizations. I don't think it would stop Sony from suing people for using file sharing software but it at least they take the PR hit for doing it.
After all, before IBM handed over some 500 patents to the open source community, it's pretty clear that Linux was infringing some of them.
Says who? If there's one thing that the SCO case has been good for it's been to demonstrate that Linux is pretty solid from an IP perspective. IBM didn't necessarily hand over the patents because they thought Linux was infringing on them. You're making that statement without investigating the reasons behind why IBM gave the Linux community a patent shield.
If anyone has proof Linux is infringing on their patents, then step up to the plate or STFU.
Since my laptop was stolen about five months ago I can appreciate the qualities of a system which could be used to at least cripple hardware which was stolen or otherwise suspect.
And what makes you think MSFT would actually do that? How many stolen iPods do you think are out there? Apple can identify them uniquely but they won't shut them off or trace them as long as the new owners keep buying music. That's a little cynical, I'm sure that's not the only reason. But turning off hardware is a pretty aggressive move, especially if it's not your hardware. Bad juju, mon.
...is when I blocked a range of IP addresses in Shanghai, my phishing attacks dropped dramatically. Unless MSFT can set up an enforcement shop in China, which would be a pay-per-view event all on its own, then the worst of the lot is going to keep operating.
Whatever else MSFT can do to help phishing and spam...more power to them. Seems like a largely token effort. A PR project more than any real attempt at policing the internet.
If I was going to fight Redmond on anything it would be their crapass EULA's which make me glad I have only a minimal amount of their product on my network.
But does anyone actually have some sort of operational study showing that it does, in fact, increase productivity [i]that[/i] much?
Productivity definitely takes a massive hit when your top programmers leave to take jobs in offices with more appealing environments. I don't think you have to show massive productivity improvements, only that it doesn't cost any more than what they're doing now.
Custom environments would never fly in some of the state government offices I worked in. If anyone had any type of office that was unique or different, like trying to bring in a TV, microwave or frig, the other workers would pick and whine about it until it was taken away. It's like they all had to be at exactly the same level of misery.
The best "office" I ever worked in was a project at a large service company. They were remodeling their offices and didn't have anywhere to put contractors, so we took over part of an equipment warehouse. We took sections of chain link panels and made a perimeter so we could lock our equipment up at night. We fastened white boards around the inside which gave us privacy, security and lots of white space to brain storm. Taking one of their flat bed trucks out we picked up old furniture people put out for the trash and bought some cheap covers for them, our tables were plywood sheets on saw horses. Got a TV, cable, high speed internet, a refrigerator, microwave, blender and cappuccino machine. While we were out scouting for furniture we ran across a basketball hoop and snagged that, too. Set it up in the opposite corner of the warehouse. We wired our display monitor to the fence but were otherwise free to fashion our working space to our tastes. I called it the Half-Life office, but it was the most fun and productive environment I've ever worked in (the team personalities were a big factor in that as well). It was pet friendly...at first, anyway.
The customer was a little skeptical at first but we were seriously punching out the code. After a while they'd start getting their daily update around lunch and hang around to shoot baskets afterwards. By the end of the first month the execs would come down, grab a soda out of the frig and plunk down on one of the couches, just to hang out for a while. Mornings were quiet time until about 3:30 when we'd crank up the music to get a little energy going.
That was one of the few jobs I really looked forward to going to work every day. We'd arrive early and stay late and it didn't seem as much like a job. The DBA on the build ended up being hired on as a VP.
I'd take a cut in my charge rate to work in a more comfortable office. Life's too short to be stuck in a cubicle.
The US Air Force has announced that it is developing an unmanned reusable spaceplane [CC], the X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle.
I wonder if the production model is going to have human cargo? It seems not. Humans require a lot of support systems to make the trip. All those support systems take up weight and volume, reducing the cargo carrying capacity of the vehicle.
With the advances in flight automation one wonders how long it will before ground based systems are controlling aircraft instead of a crew in front? I doubt we'll ever completely remove the need for a skilled person who can take over in the event of a system failure, but I'm guessing it won't be long before the human up front spends most of their time reading magazines. When you look at craft like the Predator Drone it would seem that technology is, at a minimum, reshuffling the hierarchy. Autonomous systems in the lead, ground based control as back up, and oh, yeah, the pilot on board in case everything goes to crap.
I wonder why more automation technology hasn't been applied to cargo vessels on the oceans? It seems like that would be a slam dunk for robot pilots or satellite control. Put the humans on board when they hit coastal waters. It would change the design of ships so they could be sealed during transit. If the remote system fails it just shuts down and bobs around until someone can helo out to get it.
The words "Microsoft" and "ingenuity" hardly belong in the same sentence. Considering the billions they allegedly spend on R&D, and I personally don't believe they really spend that much, you'd think they could deliver a better, more reliable product. MSFT has purchased its most innovative products. They haven't developed anything internally that's a home run product in nearly a decade. Their market position is more the result of file formats and OEM agreements than any creative development. They're sort of like Disney after they got rid of all the animators, costume designers and set builders. Just a shell with the name of the imaginative company they used to be.
The open source development model offers a more competitive approach to developing a UI and final product can be configured to user preferences and specific needs. There's no way a focus group will ever be able to compete with an arena where survival of the fittest determines the most useful products and configurations.
I don't see no problem,' said [a club-goer], 22. 'That happens every day on the Internet. Any hacker can get the information anyway.'
This is the generation that grew up with locker and back pack searches, drug tests, and a near total disdain for the concept of privacy rights. Won't it be interesting to see what they think is okay for the cops to do if you're suspected of a crime.
And the way they've been executing on the corporate level the last few years they'd probably screw it up anyway. MSFT is way overdue for a change at the top. The only reason he's been able to hang on for so long is that, up to now, MSFT has been able to paper their mistakes with money. But that margin will get squeezed going forward. And if the OEM's start offering a choice, they'll go downhill in a hurry.
It's going to take something big to get Steveo booted out of there, something massively bad. He's not going to get the hint and leave before the company gets dragged down to pathetic mediocrity. Not that it's a long trip from where they are today.;)
...it was based on interviews. You'd have to read the original report for the methodology. TCO savings can be calculated by project or enterprise function. You can't dismiss the conclusion as fluff without knowing the background of the study.
I can say on a project level OSS database products are almost untouchable on a cost basis. At least every one I've been involved in.
I've been using OpenOffice so long it's hard to go back to MSFT products, even when working at a customer site where they use it. That's mildly amusing because it was sort of a rocky transition when I switched to OO.
A lot of users get comfortable with what they're using, whether it's OO, Office or another product and giving them a compelling reason to change is no small challenge. And then there are people like me who think the $400 price tag to go through that transition pain is a laugher.
Birmingham's expenditure averaged over 2,500 pounds per PC.
That is just total bs. 2,500 pounds for 200 pc's? Get real. With the help of one other skilled person and a couple weeks of planning I could have rolled 200 pc's in one night. What could be on library PC's that couldn't be replaced or framed to run as a network application? That's just absurd.
Here's a story from 2004 where a library rolled 200 workstations over to Linux and that included public kiosks!
I've seen development projects send millions down a hole when managed poorly. Now we see the same thing is possible when desktop migrations are run poorly. The operating system isn't the core issue here. Bah!
Slashdot Mirror
As for TV, I'm just waiting until the last two or three of my favorite shows are available on the iTunes Store so I can cancel my DirecTV subscription.
We do sort of the same thing with Netflix. We're ready to drop HBO from our cable lineup. You might have an even better idea there. Download your shows and watch what you want, put an antenna up for local stations. DirecTV always manages to find a reason to raise our rates every year, Dish is worse.
But I'm wondering if the download shows won't start including ads before long? The more people doing something...anything...the more advertisers will pay to be included. Pretty soon it will become a new revenue stream and everyone will be doing it. Instead of a death spiral I might say it's more like an arms race between advertisers and consumers. We're willing to pay more for an ad free medium and they're willing to pay more to get on that medium. Ads aren't really the problem. 20 minutes of ads in a 60 minute program...that's the problem.
And I hope they spend all day writing tailgating tickets, especially if the one in front is doing at least the speed limit. I've got no problem at all with people flying down the highway. Have at it. I'd even favor raising the speed limit to let them go even faster.
But nail them to wall for tailgating, especially trucks. That's not just rude, it's damn dangerous. The really annoying ones are the trucks that ride your tail, then pass, only to drop way below the speed limit on hill so you can rinse, lather, and repeat for miles. Makes me want to drag that sob out of the cab and beat the living hell out of them. Threatening me with 80,000 lbs of metal going 70 mph is one thing, but threatening my family with that same weapon should be an automatic CDL suspension.
You're right about the spelling, backed up by Wikipedia. Corrected as noted.
But I've seen steppe horses in real life and despite being tough, sure footed and strong, they're still ponies in my book. Your legs almost drag on the ground.
Canadian scientists discovered a black, oily substance inside a meteorite...agh...ah...agh...act normally and await further instructions.
The truth is out there, aye.
I mean, honestly - what does Vista do that XP doesn't?
You could ask the same question about Windows 2000. The majority of users at this customer are still on Win2K and they can do what they need to do. If they could get new Win2K licenses they might use it another ten years.
If MSFT didn't push business customers into upgrading by withdrawing support and OEM agreements that keep them from selling older versions, then I think you'd see a time horizon for os upgrades on the order of 10-12 years. Maybe longer if MSFT opened up older versions of Windows they no longer support to 3rd party vendors. I think you'd be amazed at how much life some of those older versions might really have left.
It's hard for me to believe that through a process of gradual refinement, MSFT couldn't turn Win2K into nearly the powerhouse of functionality and security that Vista represents. But there's no margin in that for Redmond, hence it won't happen. Yet that would seem to be the very value proposition that proprietary software represents. Instead gradual refinement is found more often in open source projects. I can run the same version of Ubuntu to the end of time if I'm so inclined. Even hiring a programmer or team to provide support for new products or functionality. To me that freedom is a better value proposition than Windows.
At a more basic level the software I'm using on this machine costs thousands of dollars. At home I have very useful and functional machines where the software cost is $0. Free, as in beer. Despite MSFT claims that Linux isn't free...I have machines at home that are loaded with all free software and I get lots of work done on them. The development environments are different but I seem to be able to produce apps in one environment as fast as the other. One costs thousands and when you include the cost of the supporting systems (SQL Server, Exchange) the costs top tens of thousands.
Sum it up by asking where's the value in Vista?
ROFL! You just gave me a flashback to this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmkymiR139A&mode= related&search=
Except with Rumsfeld. Would you like an apple pie with thaaaat, would you like to invade Iraaaaaq.... dum, tada, dum. Dum, tada, dum...
MSFT is too big and bloated to be nimble and innovative. For the last ten years their product execution has been horrible. They show up late to the party with a buggy product and treat their customers like criminals.
Time for Ballmer to go. As long as he's in charge at MSFT nothing is going to change.
I do think that the aftermath of the military victory was handled poorly.
This is the latest right wing talking point. Don't admit it was a brain dead idea from the beginning, blame the execution. They're trying the same arguments about Viet Nam. It wasn't the intent, it was the execution. It's setting up Rumsfeld to be the patsy and gives the Republican Congress a pass on not doing anything resembling oversight. Where was all this brilliant insight during the build up to the war?
Divide Iraq into three regions. Kurdistan in the north, which would include the border areas around Mosul, the northern oil fields, etc. A central/western Sunni Arab area, and a southern/eastern Shiite Arab area, including the southern oil fields.
ROFL! That's almost as good the pre-war planning. You just alienated Turkey with the independent Kurdistan idea and gave the Kurds a nearly infinite supply of money to fund Kurdish separatists with the oil field revenue. You alienated one of our better allies in the region and funded ongoing instability in a formerly stable region. Off to a great start.
The Saudis will likely step in and offer some sort of support to stabilize this area.
You got that part right but if you think the Saudi money will go to fund stability you need to put the crack pipe down. The Wahhabis supply most of the really freaky, unstable radicals in the region and there's a good chance the bulk of those funds would end up in the hands of Al-Qaida. Everyone who thinks leaving the Sunnis to depend on the most radial elements of radical Islam for funding please raise their hand.
'm not as worried about the Shiite dominated area.
You're not worried about setting up an Islamic regime run by a radical strong man with ties to Hezbollah? Now I know you're high.
You are right that there's no avoiding a civil war at this point, mainly because it's been going on the last year and half. And you're right that we're not going to fix what's broken with the exercise of military power. Pull our troops back to over the horizon bases...an idea which John Kerry suggested and Bush poo-poo'd. Situate those bases so our guys can help control traffic across the Saudi and Iranian borders. Not that leaving Syria and Jordan borders unguarded is a bright spot, but you have less than 100K troops to work with and that's all you can do. Turn over management of our continued presence to the special forces generals instead of regular Army, which was another huge mistake that tends to get glossed over. But when you have so many screw ups to pick from, it's easy to miss one or two.
I'm just walking along, minding my own ant business, and all of sudden some jackass decides to levitate me. Oh, that's right, it's so funny to pick on the ants. Everyone picks on the ants. We're just trying to make a living and feed the queen...she gets to drink nectar. Think the rest of us get any nectar? Not us worker ants. You try running around blind trying to follow a scent trail during allergy season. We get stepped on, eaten by other bugs and birds...don't get me started. And then there's the nursery, those ingrates never get enough. Like it's not bad enough putting up with their crap along comes to the dominant species and thinks it's just SO funny to levitate us. Suppose I should be glad they didn't roast us under a magnifying glass like the neighbor kid. Little delinquent. I'll be he grows up to be a career criminal. It's all so meaningless.
The simple solution would be to ban trade association enforcement. In one swoop that would take out the BSA, RIAA and MPAA. Make the parent companies be the litigants. If Sony starts suing people for file sharing consumers might well start avoiding all their products at the store.
Make the companies behind these tactics be front and center in any adverse actions and you'll see lawsuits against all but the worst offenders, the ones very few of us feel sorry for, dry up almost overnight.
Yes, it's satire. But that fact that no one would be at all surprised if the MPAA was really being that retarded speaks volumes about them.
I have an issue with "dirty work" organizations. Microsoft and other companies don't want to get their hands dirty suing customers so they fund the BSA. Record labels don't want their name on enforcement actions so they fund RIAA. One of the best things Congress could do for the consumer is strip away the ability of companies to hide behind their mafia inspired enforcement organizations. I don't think it would stop Sony from suing people for using file sharing software but it at least they take the PR hit for doing it.
After all, before IBM handed over some 500 patents to the open source community, it's pretty clear that Linux was infringing some of them.
Says who? If there's one thing that the SCO case has been good for it's been to demonstrate that Linux is pretty solid from an IP perspective. IBM didn't necessarily hand over the patents because they thought Linux was infringing on them. You're making that statement without investigating the reasons behind why IBM gave the Linux community a patent shield.
If anyone has proof Linux is infringing on their patents, then step up to the plate or STFU.
Since my laptop was stolen about five months ago I can appreciate the qualities of a system which could be used to at least cripple hardware which was stolen or otherwise suspect.
And what makes you think MSFT would actually do that? How many stolen iPods do you think are out there? Apple can identify them uniquely but they won't shut them off or trace them as long as the new owners keep buying music. That's a little cynical, I'm sure that's not the only reason. But turning off hardware is a pretty aggressive move, especially if it's not your hardware. Bad juju, mon.
...is when I blocked a range of IP addresses in Shanghai, my phishing attacks dropped dramatically. Unless MSFT can set up an enforcement shop in China, which would be a pay-per-view event all on its own, then the worst of the lot is going to keep operating.
Whatever else MSFT can do to help phishing and spam...more power to them. Seems like a largely token effort. A PR project more than any real attempt at policing the internet.
If I was going to fight Redmond on anything it would be their crapass EULA's which make me glad I have only a minimal amount of their product on my network.
But does anyone actually have some sort of operational study showing that it does, in fact, increase productivity [i]that[/i] much?
Productivity definitely takes a massive hit when your top programmers leave to take jobs in offices with more appealing environments. I don't think you have to show massive productivity improvements, only that it doesn't cost any more than what they're doing now.
Custom environments would never fly in some of the state government offices I worked in. If anyone had any type of office that was unique or different, like trying to bring in a TV, microwave or frig, the other workers would pick and whine about it until it was taken away. It's like they all had to be at exactly the same level of misery.
The best "office" I ever worked in was a project at a large service company. They were remodeling their offices and didn't have anywhere to put contractors, so we took over part of an equipment warehouse. We took sections of chain link panels and made a perimeter so we could lock our equipment up at night. We fastened white boards around the inside which gave us privacy, security and lots of white space to brain storm. Taking one of their flat bed trucks out we picked up old furniture people put out for the trash and bought some cheap covers for them, our tables were plywood sheets on saw horses. Got a TV, cable, high speed internet, a refrigerator, microwave, blender and cappuccino machine. While we were out scouting for furniture we ran across a basketball hoop and snagged that, too. Set it up in the opposite corner of the warehouse. We wired our display monitor to the fence but were otherwise free to fashion our working space to our tastes. I called it the Half-Life office, but it was the most fun and productive environment I've ever worked in (the team personalities were a big factor in that as well). It was pet friendly...at first, anyway.
The customer was a little skeptical at first but we were seriously punching out the code. After a while they'd start getting their daily update around lunch and hang around to shoot baskets afterwards. By the end of the first month the execs would come down, grab a soda out of the frig and plunk down on one of the couches, just to hang out for a while. Mornings were quiet time until about 3:30 when we'd crank up the music to get a little energy going.
That was one of the few jobs I really looked forward to going to work every day. We'd arrive early and stay late and it didn't seem as much like a job. The DBA on the build ended up being hired on as a VP.
I'd take a cut in my charge rate to work in a more comfortable office. Life's too short to be stuck in a cubicle.
The US Air Force has announced that it is developing an unmanned reusable spaceplane [CC], the X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle.
I wonder if the production model is going to have human cargo? It seems not. Humans require a lot of support systems to make the trip. All those support systems take up weight and volume, reducing the cargo carrying capacity of the vehicle.
With the advances in flight automation one wonders how long it will before ground based systems are controlling aircraft instead of a crew in front? I doubt we'll ever completely remove the need for a skilled person who can take over in the event of a system failure, but I'm guessing it won't be long before the human up front spends most of their time reading magazines. When you look at craft like the Predator Drone it would seem that technology is, at a minimum, reshuffling the hierarchy. Autonomous systems in the lead, ground based control as back up, and oh, yeah, the pilot on board in case everything goes to crap.
I wonder why more automation technology hasn't been applied to cargo vessels on the oceans? It seems like that would be a slam dunk for robot pilots or satellite control. Put the humans on board when they hit coastal waters. It would change the design of ships so they could be sealed during transit. If the remote system fails it just shuts down and bobs around until someone can helo out to get it.
The words "Microsoft" and "ingenuity" hardly belong in the same sentence. Considering the billions they allegedly spend on R&D, and I personally don't believe they really spend that much, you'd think they could deliver a better, more reliable product. MSFT has purchased its most innovative products. They haven't developed anything internally that's a home run product in nearly a decade. Their market position is more the result of file formats and OEM agreements than any creative development. They're sort of like Disney after they got rid of all the animators, costume designers and set builders. Just a shell with the name of the imaginative company they used to be.
The open source development model offers a more competitive approach to developing a UI and final product can be configured to user preferences and specific needs. There's no way a focus group will ever be able to compete with an arena where survival of the fittest determines the most useful products and configurations.
I don't see no problem,' said [a club-goer], 22. 'That happens every day on the Internet. Any hacker can get the information anyway.'
This is the generation that grew up with locker and back pack searches, drug tests, and a near total disdain for the concept of privacy rights. Won't it be interesting to see what they think is okay for the cops to do if you're suspected of a crime.
And the way they've been executing on the corporate level the last few years they'd probably screw it up anyway. MSFT is way overdue for a change at the top. The only reason he's been able to hang on for so long is that, up to now, MSFT has been able to paper their mistakes with money. But that margin will get squeezed going forward. And if the OEM's start offering a choice, they'll go downhill in a hurry.
It's going to take something big to get Steveo booted out of there, something massively bad. He's not going to get the hint and leave before the company gets dragged down to pathetic mediocrity. Not that it's a long trip from where they are today. ;)
...it was based on interviews. You'd have to read the original report for the methodology. TCO savings can be calculated by project or enterprise function. You can't dismiss the conclusion as fluff without knowing the background of the study.
I can say on a project level OSS database products are almost untouchable on a cost basis. At least every one I've been involved in.
Getting a lecture about reality from Bill O'Reilly is like getting a lecture on abstinence from Jenna Jamison.
I've been using OpenOffice so long it's hard to go back to MSFT products, even when working at a customer site where they use it. That's mildly amusing because it was sort of a rocky transition when I switched to OO.
A lot of users get comfortable with what they're using, whether it's OO, Office or another product and giving them a compelling reason to change is no small challenge. And then there are people like me who think the $400 price tag to go through that transition pain is a laugher.
Birmingham's expenditure averaged over 2,500 pounds per PC.
That is just total bs. 2,500 pounds for 200 pc's? Get real. With the help of one other skilled person and a couple weeks of planning I could have rolled 200 pc's in one night. What could be on library PC's that couldn't be replaced or framed to run as a network application? That's just absurd.
Here's a story from 2004 where a library rolled 200 workstations over to Linux and that included public kiosks!
I've seen development projects send millions down a hole when managed poorly. Now we see the same thing is possible when desktop migrations are run poorly. The operating system isn't the core issue here. Bah!
Open the gates to more foreign workers, urged Cresanti, including H-1B holders.
Apparently the message the voters sent on Nov 7 isn't getting through to the current administration.
Another patent win for Captain Obvious!