It's about standards. Apple's UI guidelines are very well written, and very well thought out. When developing your app, you don't need to spend a lot of time thinking about the proper place to put something, because it's generally obvious. This makes it so much more user friendly as a user can pick up on things in a very intuitive way. It also gives a general "feel" to the entire operating system.
When working with Objective-C/Cocoa in XCode, your almost forced to give your app a very Mac like feel to it. The same goes for the iPhone. Everything you'd want in your interface is already pre-built, so everybody's apps have a familiar feel. I know I've heard the exact opposite when developing for something like the Blackberry.
Having more people contribute with no clear guidance will just make things worse.
This story is in the hardware category, and I'm trying to understand why.... Even if the company is deploying the "cyber-twins" in a hardware solution, it's the software that's innovative here.
No "state secrets" were lost. If something is "secret", then it's "classified". If it's classified, then it isn't being stored on a system that has access to the internet, directly or indirectly. According to the article, (yes, I read it...) there was some sensative information lost. This is not going to be launch codes or anything that's even remotely that valuable. I'm not saying it's no big deal, I'm saying that it's not nearly as big a deal as you're trying to make it out to be.
The military has become a tool for delivering profits to Lockheed Martin and Boeing and other conglomerates under the auspice of national security.
Is there another company better suited for designing aircraft and other military technolgies? If so, why aren't they bidding on more military contracts?
The Crusader artillery project, finally canceled in 2002 after $11 billion was spent on it. Donald Rumsfeld said it wasn't mobile enough for the 21st century.
Imagine the first pioneers in computing. To 99% of Americans, I'm sure it sounded impossible/stupid/wasteful/etc.. Guess who poured R&D money into computing? Guess who still does? Yes, several military projects have been nothing but giant sinks. They failed. The produced nothing. Can you show me a research institution that hasn't had a failed project? Yes, these failures have big dollar costs, but the successes that they have are immeasurably succesful.
Do you have any idea how much money the military has spent on developing medical technology and techniques? When we go to war, demand for this tech only increases...
The Air Force and Navy have F-15s, F-16s, and F-18s. But they're building the F-22 and some F-35 joint strike aircraft, too? At what point is enough enough?
The F-15 was designed in the 70s. Yes, it's time to replace it if we're going to stay #1. I firmly believe that if you don't have the best airforce in a major war, you loose. I like a my countries military setting itself up for success by being the best. I'm sure if you were the pilot in one of these aircraft, or a Soldier on the ground being supported by these aircraft, you'd agree. Oh, and did you here about just the other day when an F-15 fell out of the sky? Have you heard about the numerous times that "maximum flight hours" for these craft have been extended because nobody expected them to still be in service?
And this doesn't even take into account that such a fearsome military is all too often misused in wars of choice like Vietnam and Iraq. So we spend all of this money to build a huge military, then spend even more money to misuse it...without ever having declared war.
What the military is used for, and how big its budget is are to different subjects. Always try to emphasize one point when making an argument and don't throw in a random tangent.
Although I can provide no links, I do remember seeing many breakdowns of how "war money" is spent. A good portion of that was on equipment and R&D. When I say equipment, I mean non-expendables. A know alot of money has been spent on converting all of our HMMWVs (Humvee) to be up-armored. It seems obvious that having a whole bunch of troops running around on a battlefield without armor was a bad thing. So, the Army added armor to any vehicle that can handle armor. As a Soldier (but not speaking on behalf of the Army or US Government), I'm glad that we learned this against an adversary which doesn't pose a threat to us domestically. Learning this against a large world power would have been probably been costly. Now, the Army has loads and loads of uparmored HMMWVs. Although it was a war expense, it should have been a peace time expense. However, people are treating these numbers like the money would have never been spent if we hadn't gone to war. It's possible that's true, but the money isn't going into "consumables" 100%. Yes, we now spend more money on feeding soldiers, because the food is shipped. However, the Soldiers would have been fed in the states anyway. Again, it's money that is attributed to the war budget, but a portion would have been spent in peace anyway.
Now, I'm not saying I think we should or shouldn't spend this much money on defense, I'm simply saying that you should take any numbers that are based around something so politically charged with a grain of salt. I think all government budgets, it could be shrunk by using the money better. That's a given though. Education, Health Care, Defense, and even NASA have huge amounts of monetary waste simply because of their size. There will be people who mismanage the money (either through mistakes or malice). I'd still like to see alot of that waste go away.
DISCLAIMER: I am a Soldier currently deployed in support of OIF. My above views in no way represent the views of the US Government or the US Army. The above is an indication only of my personal view points and observations.
Everybody is now going to freak out about the "privacy issues". A) The device supposedly transmits the data anonymously B) Nobody is forcing you to get it C) You probably aren't interesting enough to bother watching
Now, privacy concerns are valid and good. I don't want a "big brother" state as much as the next guy. However, how much are we going to let "privacy" get in the way of innovation? Think about how valuable this could be if everybody did have it? Think about the time saved, the gas saved, and possibly even the lives saved. I'd love to know if there is deadlock traffic ahead that I can't see, and I'm still cruising along at 60+ mph.
Now, as far as the privacy goes. I wouldn't even mind if this could be used by law enforcement to catch criminals. What we need is a way to limit when systems like this good be actived. I don't care if the police bust down doors, listen to phone calls, read e-mails, etc... as long as they have a very good reason to suspect the person of wrong doing, and they went through a judge and have the legal authority to use these systems. If there is some good evidence that a person minght be a criminal, I'd love for the police to have every bit of possible information on that person. It makes there job easier and safer, and hopefuly makes the world safer.
We don't need to worry about the technology. We need to worry about the laws that congress passes, and the things that our govenment does that bypass a good solid legal proccess. There are plenty of gadgets in our lives that can be used against us to limit our privacy. That part is done and over. What we need to be conerned about is the actual legal basis for when the government can access those devices. So, before you post about how big brother is going to watch your car, think abougt writing your congressmen instead. Let them know what you think.
He concocted the idea for Instant Ramen after WWII, hoping to reduce the amount of poor nourishment for soldiers in the field.
I'll tell you that soldiers eat this stuff in the field all of the time. I'm in a unit that fields the http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/new s/2002/05/mil-020529-usa01.htm Stryker which has a water heater inside of it. I'd say it gets used for cooking ramen almost as much as it does for heating MREs (Meal Ready to Eat).
Soldiers love this as much as any college student. I can't imagine somebody who doesn't love Ramen though...
Oh, and if you'd be so kind, could you also let them know that The Pirate Bay is back up?
That's the impression I'm under...
No hits due to politics
The search function will be back later today.
That's all I see when I do any sort of search.... sure, they're offering some ads, but later today has lasted more than a day or 2 now...
I'm not doubting that it will come back, but why is everybody already claiming that the bay is up and running?
"What, do they think that we need to prepare for this momentous event?"
No, it's called hype. Creating a search engine better than google is only half the battle. Getting people to give up something they're familiar with is even tougher. If they build up anticipation, and try to make it a big event, some people will begin to anticipate it. After reading this, I'm now eager to see and try this new alternative in 6 months. They're building interest and an early userbase. This is simply standard marketing. Cars are shown off at auto-shows before you can buy them. Movies advertise in previews before you can view them. You tell about the product before it's realesed, so people know about it and are ready to use it on day 1, and you'll have a big pool of early adopters.
I hear that this Intel company is competing with this AMD company. If they offer something that AMD doesn't, then they get customers (well, thos customers that want an open bios). Seriously though, you have to appeal to geeks. I get asked by non-geeks all of the time, what type of computer should I buy? Many of them know to ask, AMD or Intel? If I'm an OSS fan, and AMD has an open bios, and intel doesn't, I'm more likely to both recommend, and buy myself AMD products.
I think that an open BIOS could really change things. The bios is something that hasn't seen true development or innovation since it's inception. Many products have been used by the masses, and not improved, untill FOSS was there to take it's job, and then they got on the ball, and they started competing with each other. This benefits everybody in the end. Besides, anybody who has ever done any OS or bootstrapping development, knows that there are way to many peculiar BIOSs out there, that have to be planned for. They load your code at different locations, they set the registers to different values, and your left wasting those first 512 bytes, just cleaning up what the bios did.
The combined federal campaign is the governments way of helping it's employees/soldiers donate to charities. They do all the research of the organizations and show how much of your money actually goes to the cause. This gives soldiers and the like a chance to donate some of their money, and they know where it's going. They also offer incentives and the like, and make it very easy to give a small portion of your check every month, and get credit for your contribution. They maintain a list of almost any charity you could ever want, and they are actually very non-partisan. I remember seeing several charties for gay and lesbian organizations. I found this link . That might help you out. Just google for combined federal campaign or cfc and maybe add a site:.mil or site:.gov because there are some bogus websites out there. It really is a good source of info about charities. They even list the EFF and some other YRO like groups. Well... I hope I helped.
Charging money for this would actually be alot of legal work. Ubisoft will get their money, but it will probably be US tax dollars that pay them. The Army has a huge budget, and the recruiting budget has gone through the roof as of late. Retention is a bit of a problem, so they have to get new soldiers to fill the ranks. I'm sure that they could develop a game for under $1,000,000. That is a trivial amount of money on the scale of the militaries budget. I work in a supply unit and I see that figure get spent several times a day in food, water, and mechanical parts. Besides, it IS an effective recruiting tool. On average, the army spends around $4,000 for every person who signs up for the army. That includes no training, no plane ticket to basic, just to get them in the door and signing their name. I'm sure that figure has gone up even more since I've come in. Also, I don't think the Army can legally sell a commercial product (they can auction off certain surplus, but that's different). In fact, I don't think any govvernment agency can (or the IRS would probably have their own version of Turbo Tax). Besides, if it's a console game, it'll have to be on a disc. You'll have to go to the recruiter to get that disk. He'll probably ask you a few questions before he gives up the disk. In the end, people will go to the recruiter to get a free game, and feet in the door is all they need. Selling the Army is the easy part, it's getting them into the office the first time that's difficult. A free game will do that, but a game you charge for won't. Well, that's my $.02
Oh, and IAAS.
Well, the Army is more likely to do prosecute a cheater than a commercial company. A commercial company has to spend it's own money to prosecute somebody, while the military has a large budget and access to all government resources. I'm a SysAdmin on a military post in Germany. When we have a "security incident" we're able to send an RCERT team after them, and other resources are always used as needed. The Government has a lot of money to protect itself with. If it says it wants to do this, it certainly has the means.
My friends and I would specifically go to Denny's instead of the IHOP across the street, because they had a booth with an outlet. We would plug in and watch movies while we ate and hung out. It was 3am so nobody minded us hogging a booth, and the manager would come and sit with us and watch the movie when it was slow enough or the movie was good enough. We cost them $.50 in electricity and made them much more than that in business. I don't feal guilty for it....and the manager never minded....
The US Military is all over Germany (namely the southern half like Hesse). They also have many bases in Italy. Right now I'm at work migrating from an NT 4 domain to AD (along with the rest of the military in Europe). Although I'm doing this as a soldier, there are MANY civilian positions in the military along with private companies (AT&T is one I work with) that require well trained civilians. Salaries can start at $60,000 with additional pay for housing and other stuff. 100% medical coverage and a GREAT retirement package are other perks. Oh, and your employer will never go under (or so I hope). You can e-mail me and I'd be willing to set you up with more details and job searches. If you have any windows, HP-UX or SCO experience, you're in demand.
As a sys admin for the military, most of us complain about our dependence on a private company in the government sector. This will allow the Army to create what they need, and add what they need, themselves. Computers in combat environments do things that no off the shelf software was designed to do. Most of our stuff has to be home brewed or contracted out. Linux gives the military more flexiblity in this field. I wish I could run linux on our client/server systems for desktops, but I'm stuck with Windows for now. We do run Unix for many of our supply systems... Unfortunately that Unix platform was provided by SCO..... Many years ago....
That would imply that all soldiers can vote on the same day. That's not the case. At any given time soldiers are off post conducting missions, or even simply traveling in convoys. The purpose of the absentee balot is that it can be filled out and sent on more than one day. Also, many soldiers are to spread out and remote to have an official and proper ballot station set up. Are they supposed to set up the booth in the back of a truck?
You actually bring up a good point. Soldiers used to vote republican. It's just how it was. This year, it's changed alot. There is alot of debate amongst soldiers on who they'll vote for, and we seem to be split as much as the polls on who is going to be voting for who. This is a big push to get us to vote. (You can look at my e-mail address to see why I said we). Soldiers could really play a big part in this election in alot of the swing states. I think that soldiers certainly deserve to be given every possible means of easy and secure voting possible. The president is the commander in chief and that effects soldiers more than any body else. Voting is difficult in the military, but it's something that we've earned. The system does have to be secure and safe though. I pray for the day when E-Voting is a possiblity. Well, as an agnostic I don't really pray.... but you get what I mean.
I remember several christmases ago the "original" elf bowling spread it's way through e-mails. I heard that the program did the same as this worm and activated peoples webcams, and streamed it to one guys website/computer whatever. He then supposedely published the more comical movies that he made. I can't verify if this is true, or just a fun rumor that I heard...
compact disk media is here to stay for a while because there is just no substitute for a media that cost cents.
That's not completely true. Higher quality will make another format more popular with users, and something that can't be copied easily will be popular with the MPAA. With DVD burners (even dual-layer and blu-ray) becoming available to the home user, DVDs are to easy to copy from the MPAA's view, and average consumers who don't burn dvd's and get told that a new format will look better on their new expensive HDTV will be tempted to switch over. I read a recent artical about a company that created a new video recording format that hold about 1GB/layer and can be layered 100 deep. It was some sort of "holographic" alternative that wrote the data onto what looked like a 1" square piece of glass. It even had it's own custom reader out that was rather small. Supposedly it's near impossible for a user to make a pirated copy of this movie, and something that small that can hold that much data would provide some incredible picture quality. Anything that can provide high image quality or is difficult to copy will catch on. Remember, the MPAA can shape the market, and if they like a new technology, they can put on the neccessary preasure to replace DVDs before their time. Of course such a move would motivate users to pirate movies online at the same scale they do music (which is becoming more possible with bigger HDs and highly available broadband). Well, in the end, nobody can predict the death of a technology, espeically somebody with a track record like Bill Gates.
Ok, I think I'm done now...
Slashdot Mirror
It's about standards. Apple's UI guidelines are very well written, and very well thought out. When developing your app, you don't need to spend a lot of time thinking about the proper place to put something, because it's generally obvious. This makes it so much more user friendly as a user can pick up on things in a very intuitive way. It also gives a general "feel" to the entire operating system.
When working with Objective-C/Cocoa in XCode, your almost forced to give your app a very Mac like feel to it. The same goes for the iPhone. Everything you'd want in your interface is already pre-built, so everybody's apps have a familiar feel. I know I've heard the exact opposite when developing for something like the Blackberry.
Having more people contribute with no clear guidance will just make things worse.
This story is in the hardware category, and I'm trying to understand why.... Even if the company is deploying the "cyber-twins" in a hardware solution, it's the software that's innovative here.
same fuckers(2) that Framed Roger Rabbit
No "state secrets" were lost. If something is "secret", then it's "classified". If it's classified, then it isn't being stored on a system that has access to the internet, directly or indirectly. According to the article, (yes, I read it...) there was some sensative information lost. This is not going to be launch codes or anything that's even remotely that valuable. I'm not saying it's no big deal, I'm saying that it's not nearly as big a deal as you're trying to make it out to be.
The military has become a tool for delivering profits to Lockheed Martin and Boeing and other conglomerates under the auspice of national security.
Is there another company better suited for designing aircraft and other military technolgies? If so, why aren't they bidding on more military contracts?
The Crusader artillery project, finally canceled in 2002 after $11 billion was spent on it. Donald Rumsfeld said it wasn't mobile enough for the 21st century.
Imagine the first pioneers in computing. To 99% of Americans, I'm sure it sounded impossible/stupid/wasteful/etc.. Guess who poured R&D money into computing? Guess who still does? Yes, several military projects have been nothing but giant sinks. They failed. The produced nothing. Can you show me a research institution that hasn't had a failed project? Yes, these failures have big dollar costs, but the successes that they have are immeasurably succesful.
Do you have any idea how much money the military has spent on developing medical technology and techniques? When we go to war, demand for this tech only increases...
The Air Force and Navy have F-15s, F-16s, and F-18s. But they're building the F-22 and some F-35 joint strike aircraft, too? At what point is enough enough?
The F-15 was designed in the 70s. Yes, it's time to replace it if we're going to stay #1. I firmly believe that if you don't have the best airforce in a major war, you loose. I like a my countries military setting itself up for success by being the best. I'm sure if you were the pilot in one of these aircraft, or a Soldier on the ground being supported by these aircraft, you'd agree. Oh, and did you here about just the other day when an F-15 fell out of the sky? Have you heard about the numerous times that "maximum flight hours" for these craft have been extended because nobody expected them to still be in service?
And this doesn't even take into account that such a fearsome military is all too often misused in wars of choice like Vietnam and Iraq. So we spend all of this money to build a huge military, then spend even more money to misuse it...without ever having declared war.
What the military is used for, and how big its budget is are to different subjects. Always try to emphasize one point when making an argument and don't throw in a random tangent.
Although I can provide no links, I do remember seeing many breakdowns of how "war money" is spent. A good portion of that was on equipment and R&D. When I say equipment, I mean non-expendables. A know alot of money has been spent on converting all of our HMMWVs (Humvee) to be up-armored. It seems obvious that having a whole bunch of troops running around on a battlefield without armor was a bad thing. So, the Army added armor to any vehicle that can handle armor. As a Soldier (but not speaking on behalf of the Army or US Government), I'm glad that we learned this against an adversary which doesn't pose a threat to us domestically. Learning this against a large world power would have been probably been costly. Now, the Army has loads and loads of uparmored HMMWVs. Although it was a war expense, it should have been a peace time expense. However, people are treating these numbers like the money would have never been spent if we hadn't gone to war. It's possible that's true, but the money isn't going into "consumables" 100%. Yes, we now spend more money on feeding soldiers, because the food is shipped. However, the Soldiers would have been fed in the states anyway. Again, it's money that is attributed to the war budget, but a portion would have been spent in peace anyway.
Now, I'm not saying I think we should or shouldn't spend this much money on defense, I'm simply saying that you should take any numbers that are based around something so politically charged with a grain of salt. I think all government budgets, it could be shrunk by using the money better. That's a given though. Education, Health Care, Defense, and even NASA have huge amounts of monetary waste simply because of their size. There will be people who mismanage the money (either through mistakes or malice). I'd still like to see alot of that waste go away.
DISCLAIMER: I am a Soldier currently deployed in support of OIF. My above views in no way represent the views of the US Government or the US Army. The above is an indication only of my personal view points and observations.
Everybody is now going to freak out about the "privacy issues".
A) The device supposedly transmits the data anonymously
B) Nobody is forcing you to get it
C) You probably aren't interesting enough to bother watching
Now, privacy concerns are valid and good. I don't want a "big brother" state as much as the next guy. However, how much are we going to let "privacy" get in the way of innovation? Think about how valuable this could be if everybody did have it? Think about the time saved, the gas saved, and possibly even the lives saved. I'd love to know if there is deadlock traffic ahead that I can't see, and I'm still cruising along at 60+ mph.
Now, as far as the privacy goes. I wouldn't even mind if this could be used by law enforcement to catch criminals. What we need is a way to limit when systems like this good be actived. I don't care if the police bust down doors, listen to phone calls, read e-mails, etc... as long as they have a very good reason to suspect the person of wrong doing, and they went through a judge and have the legal authority to use these systems. If there is some good evidence that a person minght be a criminal, I'd love for the police to have every bit of possible information on that person. It makes there job easier and safer, and hopefuly makes the world safer.
We don't need to worry about the technology. We need to worry about the laws that congress passes, and the things that our govenment does that bypass a good solid legal proccess. There are plenty of gadgets in our lives that can be used against us to limit our privacy. That part is done and over. What we need to be conerned about is the actual legal basis for when the government can access those devices. So, before you post about how big brother is going to watch your car, think abougt writing your congressmen instead. Let them know what you think.
He concocted the idea for Instant Ramen after WWII, hoping to reduce the amount of poor nourishment for soldiers in the field.
I'll tell you that soldiers eat this stuff in the field all of the time. I'm in a unit that fields the http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/neOh, and if you'd be so kind, could you also let them know that The Pirate Bay is back up? That's the impression I'm under... No hits due to politics The search function will be back later today. That's all I see when I do any sort of search.... sure, they're offering some ads, but later today has lasted more than a day or 2 now... I'm not doubting that it will come back, but why is everybody already claiming that the bay is up and running?
"What, do they think that we need to prepare for this momentous event?" No, it's called hype. Creating a search engine better than google is only half the battle. Getting people to give up something they're familiar with is even tougher. If they build up anticipation, and try to make it a big event, some people will begin to anticipate it. After reading this, I'm now eager to see and try this new alternative in 6 months. They're building interest and an early userbase. This is simply standard marketing. Cars are shown off at auto-shows before you can buy them. Movies advertise in previews before you can view them. You tell about the product before it's realesed, so people know about it and are ready to use it on day 1, and you'll have a big pool of early adopters.
I hear that this Intel company is competing with this AMD company. If they offer something that AMD doesn't, then they get customers (well, thos customers that want an open bios). Seriously though, you have to appeal to geeks. I get asked by non-geeks all of the time, what type of computer should I buy? Many of them know to ask, AMD or Intel? If I'm an OSS fan, and AMD has an open bios, and intel doesn't, I'm more likely to both recommend, and buy myself AMD products.
I think that an open BIOS could really change things. The bios is something that hasn't seen true development or innovation since it's inception. Many products have been used by the masses, and not improved, untill FOSS was there to take it's job, and then they got on the ball, and they started competing with each other. This benefits everybody in the end. Besides, anybody who has ever done any OS or bootstrapping development, knows that there are way to many peculiar BIOSs out there, that have to be planned for. They load your code at different locations, they set the registers to different values, and your left wasting those first 512 bytes, just cleaning up what the bios did.
I've always wanted an excuse to carry around a wallet made of tinfoil.... it'll match my hat, and my under.... I mean socks....
The combined federal campaign is the governments way of helping it's employees/soldiers donate to charities. They do all the research of the organizations and show how much of your money actually goes to the cause. This gives soldiers and the like a chance to donate some of their money, and they know where it's going. They also offer incentives and the like, and make it very easy to give a small portion of your check every month, and get credit for your contribution. They maintain a list of almost any charity you could ever want, and they are actually very non-partisan. I remember seeing several charties for gay and lesbian organizations. I found this link . That might help you out. Just google for combined federal campaign or cfc and maybe add a site: .mil or site: .gov because there are some bogus websites out there. It really is a good source of info about charities. They even list the EFF and some other YRO like groups. Well... I hope I helped.
Charging money for this would actually be alot of legal work. Ubisoft will get their money, but it will probably be US tax dollars that pay them. The Army has a huge budget, and the recruiting budget has gone through the roof as of late. Retention is a bit of a problem, so they have to get new soldiers to fill the ranks. I'm sure that they could develop a game for under $1,000,000. That is a trivial amount of money on the scale of the militaries budget. I work in a supply unit and I see that figure get spent several times a day in food, water, and mechanical parts. Besides, it IS an effective recruiting tool. On average, the army spends around $4,000 for every person who signs up for the army. That includes no training, no plane ticket to basic, just to get them in the door and signing their name. I'm sure that figure has gone up even more since I've come in. Also, I don't think the Army can legally sell a commercial product (they can auction off certain surplus, but that's different). In fact, I don't think any govvernment agency can (or the IRS would probably have their own version of Turbo Tax). Besides, if it's a console game, it'll have to be on a disc. You'll have to go to the recruiter to get that disk. He'll probably ask you a few questions before he gives up the disk. In the end, people will go to the recruiter to get a free game, and feet in the door is all they need. Selling the Army is the easy part, it's getting them into the office the first time that's difficult. A free game will do that, but a game you charge for won't. Well, that's my $.02 Oh, and IAAS.
Well, the Army is more likely to do prosecute a cheater than a commercial company. A commercial company has to spend it's own money to prosecute somebody, while the military has a large budget and access to all government resources. I'm a SysAdmin on a military post in Germany. When we have a "security incident" we're able to send an RCERT team after them, and other resources are always used as needed. The Government has a lot of money to protect itself with. If it says it wants to do this, it certainly has the means.
My friends and I would specifically go to Denny's instead of the IHOP across the street, because they had a booth with an outlet. We would plug in and watch movies while we ate and hung out. It was 3am so nobody minded us hogging a booth, and the manager would come and sit with us and watch the movie when it was slow enough or the movie was good enough. We cost them $.50 in electricity and made them much more than that in business. I don't feal guilty for it....and the manager never minded....
The US Military is all over Germany (namely the southern half like Hesse). They also have many bases in Italy. Right now I'm at work migrating from an NT 4 domain to AD (along with the rest of the military in Europe). Although I'm doing this as a soldier, there are MANY civilian positions in the military along with private companies (AT&T is one I work with) that require well trained civilians. Salaries can start at $60,000 with additional pay for housing and other stuff. 100% medical coverage and a GREAT retirement package are other perks. Oh, and your employer will never go under (or so I hope). You can e-mail me and I'd be willing to set you up with more details and job searches. If you have any windows, HP-UX or SCO experience, you're in demand.
As a sys admin for the military, most of us complain about our dependence on a private company in the government sector. This will allow the Army to create what they need, and add what they need, themselves. Computers in combat environments do things that no off the shelf software was designed to do. Most of our stuff has to be home brewed or contracted out. Linux gives the military more flexiblity in this field. I wish I could run linux on our client/server systems for desktops, but I'm stuck with Windows for now. We do run Unix for many of our supply systems... Unfortunately that Unix platform was provided by SCO..... Many years ago....
That would imply that all soldiers can vote on the same day. That's not the case. At any given time soldiers are off post conducting missions, or even simply traveling in convoys. The purpose of the absentee balot is that it can be filled out and sent on more than one day. Also, many soldiers are to spread out and remote to have an official and proper ballot station set up. Are they supposed to set up the booth in the back of a truck?
You actually bring up a good point. Soldiers used to vote republican. It's just how it was. This year, it's changed alot. There is alot of debate amongst soldiers on who they'll vote for, and we seem to be split as much as the polls on who is going to be voting for who. This is a big push to get us to vote. (You can look at my e-mail address to see why I said we). Soldiers could really play a big part in this election in alot of the swing states. I think that soldiers certainly deserve to be given every possible means of easy and secure voting possible. The president is the commander in chief and that effects soldiers more than any body else. Voting is difficult in the military, but it's something that we've earned. The system does have to be secure and safe though. I pray for the day when E-Voting is a possiblity. Well, as an agnostic I don't really pray.... but you get what I mean.
RTFA, it resets on reboot. It also makes sure that crashes won't effect you...
I remember several christmases ago the "original" elf bowling spread it's way through e-mails. I heard that the program did the same as this worm and activated peoples webcams, and streamed it to one guys website/computer whatever. He then supposedely published the more comical movies that he made. I can't verify if this is true, or just a fun rumor that I heard...
Er, my copper based ethernet is 10/100/1000... Who needs fiber for 1Gbit?
compact disk media is here to stay for a while because there is just no substitute for a media that cost cents.
That's not completely true. Higher quality will make another format more popular with users, and something that can't be copied easily will be popular with the MPAA. With DVD burners (even dual-layer and blu-ray) becoming available to the home user, DVDs are to easy to copy from the MPAA's view, and average consumers who don't burn dvd's and get told that a new format will look better on their new expensive HDTV will be tempted to switch over. I read a recent artical about a company that created a new video recording format that hold about 1GB/layer and can be layered 100 deep. It was some sort of "holographic" alternative that wrote the data onto what looked like a 1" square piece of glass. It even had it's own custom reader out that was rather small. Supposedly it's near impossible for a user to make a pirated copy of this movie, and something that small that can hold that much data would provide some incredible picture quality. Anything that can provide high image quality or is difficult to copy will catch on. Remember, the MPAA can shape the market, and if they like a new technology, they can put on the neccessary preasure to replace DVDs before their time. Of course such a move would motivate users to pirate movies online at the same scale they do music (which is becoming more possible with bigger HDs and highly available broadband). Well, in the end, nobody can predict the death of a technology, espeically somebody with a track record like Bill Gates.
Ok, I think I'm done now...