I like Ubuntu myself, and would like to run it as the sole OS on my laptop. But I can't seem to get over the last few hurdles with it as a laptop OS. Based on experiences running Ubuntu on a Compaq laptop (now deceased) and in VMware on my current Toshiba laptop, here are some of the things that are keeping me from wiping the disk and running Feisty as my primary OS:
Power management, including suspend and hibernate. This is trivially easy to manage in Windows.
Wireless support. I've never had any luck getting wireless to work. I know other people do, so I know it's possible, but it sure seems like you've got to jump through hoops.
Handheld synchronization. How do I keep my phone sync'd?
Memory card support. That is to say, I'd like to pull the memory card out of my phone, plug it into the laptop, and have full access to it.
There are probably solutions to all of these issues, but I haven't taken the time to figure them out. Yes, that's on me, but it's a barrier to change. I already use Firefox, Thunderbird, and OO, so the apps aren't a problem at all. It's this "fringe" stuff that keeps Windows installed.
The way I see it, though I am an evolutionist, the kids in school should at least be told that there is an opposing view. I'm sure most of them already know there is debate in this field but it is the most sensible thing to do. Share the facts and let the individuals make their own decisions.
The problem with this is that there is no opposing view. At least not one with any real support in the scientific community. To use some other examples, there are those who think the Earth is flat [http://www.alaska.net/~clund/e_djublonskopf/Flate arthsociety.htm. ] There are those who deny the Holocaust. These are opposing views to what is commonly accepted as fact, but they are typically not presented in a classroom because they lack credibility.
The reality is that there is no debate over evolution in the scientific community. There is continuing work on the specifics, the mechanics, and the details, but the basic process is fact.
Re:I liked Internet Explorer 7 the first time...
on
IE7 Bugs and Reviews
·
· Score: 4, Informative
IE7 allows middleclick on links to open in a new tab.
Where as Firefox has removed that feature.
Tools/Options/Tabbed Browsing/Tab Focus/Select Load Middle-clicked URLs in New Tabs.
FF 1.0.6
Neither does my cordless landline phone, which is the only one in the house.
I ran a line out to the garage and stuck an ancient "princess phone" that was in the house when we bought it out there. Now there's one landline phone in the house that works with no power. Foolproof? Hardly. But cheap insurance.
If you lose power and your house burns down at the same time, you're pretty fucked no matter how you slice it.
Hard to argue with that. Sometimes you're just plain screwed. Funny how some people argue against partial solutions because they can come up with a case that the partial solution doesn't cover. Doesn't mean that the partial solution isn't worth doing, though.
The VIN number is just as unique and probably harder to remove than the RFID chip on a vehicle.
From TFA, "After a foreigner entering the U.S. has passed a thorough security check once, they will be given a document containing the chip...The document is meant to be placed on the dashboard of a car so that a person's personal information can be read as they approach a border crossing." So this has nothing to do with tying a person to a vehicle.
But I agree that this is just a boondoggle. You are already "tagged" when you cross the border when your passport is scanned. Using an RFID device is not automatically any more invasive than what is done currently. I suppose there is a concern if RFID readers start popping up all over the place and Big Brother starts following the tourists around. But as another poster pointed out, just toss the RFID document in the trash.
Actually, slavery really only came up near the end of and after the "Civil" War as a meant for the victors to justify it.
Not true. The issue of slavery contributed in a significant way to the cause and conduct of the US Civil War. The southern economy was based on slavery; the northern economy was not. As such you had divisive issues around slavery, specifically the addition of new states as either free or slave, significanlty before the outbreak of open hostilities in 1861. See Bleeding Kansas, for example.
During the war issues of slavery continued to play a role. The Emancipation Proclamation was issued shortly after the battle of Antietam in 1862, hardly "near the end" of the war.
You can't say that the US Civil War was "fought over slavery," but you can't say that slavery was not an issue either.
Mine still has a 5.25" floppy - every once in a while, I have something that needs to be read in that format - admitedly, once every 5-6 years, but I keep it around
It's one thing to have hardware that reads data from these old devices, but what about software that understands the format? I wonder what's on these old 5.25" or 8" disks...do OpenOffice or MS Office read Lotus Symphony or Wordstar formats?
If your new home ends up under water, you can recoup your investment through insurance.
Wandering way off topic here, but this is likely untrue for most folks, at least in the USA. Rising water is a "flood" by insurance definition, and most people don't carry flood insurance. It's the same deal with the landslides that we are seeing here in Southern California this year...if the land you own suddenly goes away, you're not insured for that. It's an "act of God" and, well, you're just f'ed.
Seriously folks, if that was the case, wouldn't you expect the OIL prices to go DOWN? We are looking at 2 bucks a gallon in the midwest.
Others have already commented on why you shouldn't expect oil prices to drop. I'll just add that at $2/gallon it's still cheaper than bottled water. If you still don't like the price you can always try using less of it.
If you look at history, I think this would be topped only by Hitler.
No question Saddam is/was a bad guy. But I suggest you read up on nice folks like Stalin and Pol Pot. And lets not forget that freedom from Saddam was not the #1 reason the US invaded Iraq. The reason given was the "proof" of the existence of weapons of mass destruction and the "fact" that Iraq was an immediate threat to the United States.
I think half the fun for me of using Linux is that I installed it myself. When I first started, I had no idea what I was doing but now, I definitely know my way around and can really appreciate the amazing accomplishment of these developers.
This is a valid point. I've been spending time over the last week or so training my laptop to dual-boot Mandrake 10.1 and WinXP. I'm doing this not so much because I think I'll be more productive with Linux running on my laptop, but as an exercise to see how hard it is and to learn something along the way. For me, Windows XP and MS Office, plus a bunch of other stuff I've loaded like Firefox and Thunderbird, have made the laptop a very useful tool. Yes, there are security concerns, but -- knock on wood -- I have yet to be bitten. Of course I'm pretty careful in maintaining my system: I run a firewall (not the XP one), virus scanner, and a handful of anti-spyware/anti-adware apps. And I don't run IE.
The thing that jumps out at me is that the person who is most likely to get bitten by MS security holes is the person least likely to make the switch to Linux. They want a system they turn on and it works. A tool. They don't want a computing experience or a hobby. There's no way they are going to go through the trials of getting a Linux distro up and running on a laptop. Especially if they want wireless support (I've been battling ndiswrapper on Mandrake for a few days now).
What does this mean for the future? Linux distros have come a long way in a pretty short time. I think if progress continues to be made at this rate then before long we'll see distros that Joe Average can actually install and use. I hope so at any rate.
Primustel in Canada has had a neat VOIP unit you plug a plain ol phone into. You can transfer your existing landline number to it...
Being able to keep your existing number is key. Verizon sent me a flyer advertising their VoIP offering, called Voicewing. I'm already a Verizon DSL subscriber, so I have broadband. I'd like to dump my local phone connection, for which I pay close to $50 a month and don't use a whole lot. So what are my options with VoiceWing, I wonder. I check out the web site.
Turns out that since I have DSL, I must retain my existing POTS line as well. So I can get VoiceWing for $30/month, but I have to keep both POTS and DSL. And the new service will have its own different phone number! Great...I get to pay more and tell everyone that I have a new phone number.
I don't get this. You want your email / calendering system to also be a file store?
Some people do. Organizationally it works with they way they think. You have a folder for communication with a customer, that customer sends you a document, you put it in the same folder. Makes sense.
I have to sheepishly admit a certain degree of disdain for these features. I understand that people use them. But are they really necessary?
I agree with you, these are not necessary features. I don't care to recall mail that I have sent. I don't request read receipts -- I send mail and it's up to you to read it. But the features are there and some folks do use 'em.
And our old Exchange server played nicer with other apps. And that's an important point. There ARE apps that are just as functional as Outlook. Exchange, however, seems to be the sticking point.
I'm interested in what you mean by that. In any but the smallest installations I imagine that Exchange would be running on a dedicated server. So I doubt that it's intended to play nicely with other apps. I can certainly see Exchange as a "sticking point" in terms of deploying a large enterprise e-mail system. The meager scalability would drive me away quickly. But as far as end user experience, the Outlook/Exchange combination is hard to beat.
On my personal computers I run Thunderbird for mail and Palm Desktop for calendar (it works well enough and syncs with my handheld). Thunderbird is great for reading mail and I really like the RSS integration. But I don't think it competes with Outlook/Exchange for the enterprise market. Why?
No calendar. People use Outlook as much as a scheduling tool as an email reader.
No real integration with the desktop. I can drag a document into Outlook and it'll store it on the Exchange server.
Goodies like dependable read receipts, message recall, individual message reclaimation. These are effectively impossible in a standards-based multi-platform mail client, but you get them in a lock-in system like Exchange/Outlook and people use 'em.
I love Thunderbird and I applaud the efforts of the community that created it. But don't think of it as an Outlook killer, at least not yet.
I am always facinated by the zeolotry and intolerance of the Atheist. They close their minds and demand that everyone else have a closed mind too.
Open your mind
This is classic. You tell others to open their minds, but you characterize all atheists with one broad stroke. Very open minded.
I'm an atheist but I've come to this place in an open-minded way. I've read quite a bit on philosophy of religion, theology, and arguments for God. I would love for someone to present me with a logically sound argument for the existence of an omnipotent creator. It'd be very comforting to know of such a being. But I can't just believe because it'd be nice to do so. I need a kernel of evidence from which to start and I've yet to find it. The search goes on, but for now I'm one of those atheists.
In other words, a degree is a bonus now rather than a prerequisite if you have talent and experience.
I disagree. A degree matters for two reasons: first, it shows that you can finish what you start. You went to school, you stuck with it, you earned a degree. That matters. Second, it is important to know theory. I'm tired of working alongside self-proclaimed hackers who have some skill, but little ability to view problems in an abstract way. Thus they repeatedly reinvent the wheel. They also tend to be of the edit-compile-test-repeat school and rarely think through a problem before attacking it.
I learned a lot of good design habits being a CS major. It's not about learning a language or an OS, it's about learning how to learn.
I love how programmers deride "process" initiatives (like the CMM) but these are exactly the things that can help in situations like this.
Very true. I don't know for sure, but I would bet that most of the developers at EA are fairly young. Not long out of school, smart, energetic, and absolutely positive that they know exactly what they are doing. No heavyweight process is going to get in their way! I know because I used to be this way myself.
Having been in the industry for a while now (18 years), I've seen my share of projects crash and burn as a result of developer self-indulgence. A small dose of formalization applied along the way can really help get things done on time. Yes, it can be boring. It can be awkward. Sometimes you feel ridiculous sitting in a meeting talking these things over, but it beats the hell out of staring fuzzily at the debugger at 2:00 in the morning after 14 cups of coffee.
No process is perfect, and there will be crunches from time to time. I think professionals in every field are OK with that.
What I don't understand is why EA encourages this sort of behavior (this assumes that the blog post is accurate, of course). This has got to be more expensive than doing things the right way. You will have more defects in your software, and you will burn people out. Naturally your best and brightest people will have the easiest time finding another job, so those are the ones you lose. And you're stuck with the bottom feeders and the new guys. Wouldn't it be nice to hang on to good people for a few years so they can apply their expertise? I wonder how many people have survived these conditions at EA for any length of time. Jobs may be scarce, but what kind of life is working 12 hours a day seven days a week?
For audio I use a Squeezebox [http://slimdevices.com/]. This is an 802.11 gizmo that allows you to stream music from computer to stereo. Works well.
I've not conquered the video thing yet. I like the idea of having easy access to the digital media, but I don't like the idea of having a computer in the family room. Computers go in the office, where there's a desk and a proper work environment.
I agree. The Skype software is fine, and it works well. But I don't want to be tethered to my computer when I make a phone call. I know there are wireless headsets out there, but what sort of range do they have? And how well do they handle the rest of the stuff flying through the air in a typical home (802.11, 900Mhz phones, 2.4Ghz phones, microwave ovens, etc.)?
Welcome to Earth. Politics is ugly here, and most people don't have a lot
of discernment. The tradition of electing US Presidents based on lies goes
back to George Washington, whose campaign featured fictitious anecdotes to
boost public opinion of his honesty and other character traits. I don't like
it either, FWIW, but it's not unique to any particular party or candidate.
True enough. And I didn't mean to imply that the Republicans were running any "dirtier" or more disingenuous a campaign than the Dems.
I think it was the contrast in feeling that I had between yesterday and today. Yesterday I was really energized. Mine was the first ballot cast at our precinct, and I even got to verify that the ballot box was empty before mine was put in. I saw people coming in, saw reports of folks waiting to vote, and thought "this is great! Democracy in action." And it is great. I thought of all the people who have made sacrifices, including giving up their lives, so that we retain this freedom. And then today I got to reading some of the poll results about why people chose what they chose and I just felt disgusted. But we'll survive.
I've already been hearing talk from people excited about electing Cheney next election. It would not surprise me at all.
I don't think that'll happen. First, Cheney's too old. Second, he lacks the proper charisma. He's fat, bald, and harsh. That won't fly.
As a Green who voted for Kerry I am disappointed to see Bush re-elected. But I'm really disappointed in the reasons why he was re-elected. Many Bush supporters polled indicated that they believe Iraq had WMD. They further believe that Saddam was linked to al-Qaeda and supported the 9/11 attacks. I don't mind folks who have informed opinions that differ from mine. But it's depressing to see people who have been lied to acting on those lies as if it were the right thing to do.
They did, but never one to generate a product or profit. They just generated venture capital and blew it on expensive toys.
So true. The dot-bomb where I worked for about 15 months was a classic example of this. We had enough funding to keep a small group of us going long enough to create something useful. But the CEO hired by the board of directors ruined all that. They paid him a $300,000 salary, plus a $50,000 per quarter bonus that had no performance parameters. He submitted weekly expense reports in the 2-3 thousand dollar range. When board meetings were held the out of town board members stayed at the Ritz. It was all obviously just a boondoggle for the CEO and board members, there was never any intent to run a real company. Either that or these guys were incompetent beyond any reason. The company went bankrupt, of course.
If you're at a startup and money is being spent on extravagent toys, just have fun. The company will fail, but you can have some fine dinners along the way.
AC wrote How about making the browser more user-friendly and not requiring archaic commands in about:config?
And mosschops responded Unfortunately, backwards compatability can't always be guaranteed, particularly in applications under rapid development like Firefox.
Both true, but unrelated. I can't really expect beta software to be backward compatible from release to release. I do expect released software to be backward compatible, and hopefuly FF will figure this out from 1.0 on.
As for the about:config stuff, couldn't agree more. It's OK for truly obscure stuff to be buried in there, but it's an interface that shouldn't be required for the vast majority of users. Expose those things in a proper configuration screen!
I've been using FF for a while now and my biggest gripe is around the tabbed browsing. Tabbed browsing is a wonderful thing, but FF doesn't take true advantage of it without the tabbed browsing extension. And if extensions break when you upgrade the browser, that's a drag. I'll certainly withhold judgement on FF until after the formal 1.0 release, which I'm hoping is an improvement over the PR. If it's not I'll stick with Mozilla, but I fear that'll become a backwater.
On reading that I looked at my watch, thought about three watches I own, tried to think about the 20 odd watches my fiances has (one for each pair of shoes, of course), and I think there isn't a full digital watch among them.
Wandering off topic here, but as someone else said, it is THHGTTG we're discussing here, so off topic is on topic. Sort of like tea and no tea.
Analog watches are more popular because people are more interested in relative time than absolute time. In other words, we don't really care what time it is, we care how long it is before something happens. How long til lunch? How long til the movie starts? Etc. And your brain grasps these intervals much more intuitively when they are presented with hands going around in a circle. With a digital watch you actually have to do math to figure out how long you have. With an analog it's not "twenty minutes," it's 120 degrees of the circle, which you quickly have a strong feel for.
Slashdot Mirror
- Power management, including suspend and hibernate. This is trivially easy to manage in Windows.
- Wireless support. I've never had any luck getting wireless to work. I know other people do, so I know it's possible, but it sure seems like you've got to jump through hoops.
- Handheld synchronization. How do I keep my phone sync'd?
- Memory card support. That is to say, I'd like to pull the memory card out of my phone, plug it into the laptop, and have full access to it.
There are probably solutions to all of these issues, but I haven't taken the time to figure them out. Yes, that's on me, but it's a barrier to change. I already use Firefox, Thunderbird, and OO, so the apps aren't a problem at all. It's this "fringe" stuff that keeps Windows installed.There's room for humorous references in any discussion.
The problem with this is that there is no opposing view. At least not one with any real support in the scientific community. To use some other examples, there are those who think the Earth is flat [http://www.alaska.net/~clund/e_djublonskopf/Flate arthsociety.htm. ] There are those who deny the Holocaust. These are opposing views to what is commonly accepted as fact, but they are typically not presented in a classroom because they lack credibility.
The reality is that there is no debate over evolution in the scientific community. There is continuing work on the specifics, the mechanics, and the details, but the basic process is fact.
Tools/Options/Tabbed Browsing/Tab Focus/Select Load Middle-clicked URLs in New Tabs. FF 1.0.6
I ran a line out to the garage and stuck an ancient "princess phone" that was in the house when we bought it out there. Now there's one landline phone in the house that works with no power. Foolproof? Hardly. But cheap insurance.
Hard to argue with that. Sometimes you're just plain screwed. Funny how some people argue against partial solutions because they can come up with a case that the partial solution doesn't cover. Doesn't mean that the partial solution isn't worth doing, though.
From TFA, "After a foreigner entering the U.S. has passed a thorough security check once, they will be given a document containing the chip...The document is meant to be placed on the dashboard of a car so that a person's personal information can be read as they approach a border crossing." So this has nothing to do with tying a person to a vehicle.
But I agree that this is just a boondoggle. You are already "tagged" when you cross the border when your passport is scanned. Using an RFID device is not automatically any more invasive than what is done currently. I suppose there is a concern if RFID readers start popping up all over the place and Big Brother starts following the tourists around. But as another poster pointed out, just toss the RFID document in the trash.
Not true. The issue of slavery contributed in a significant way to the cause and conduct of the US Civil War. The southern economy was based on slavery; the northern economy was not. As such you had divisive issues around slavery, specifically the addition of new states as either free or slave, significanlty before the outbreak of open hostilities in 1861. See Bleeding Kansas, for example.
During the war issues of slavery continued to play a role. The Emancipation Proclamation was issued shortly after the battle of Antietam in 1862, hardly "near the end" of the war.
You can't say that the US Civil War was "fought over slavery," but you can't say that slavery was not an issue either.
It's one thing to have hardware that reads data from these old devices, but what about software that understands the format? I wonder what's on these old 5.25" or 8" disks...do OpenOffice or MS Office read Lotus Symphony or Wordstar formats?
Wandering way off topic here, but this is likely untrue for most folks, at least in the USA. Rising water is a "flood" by insurance definition, and most people don't carry flood insurance. It's the same deal with the landslides that we are seeing here in Southern California this year...if the land you own suddenly goes away, you're not insured for that. It's an "act of God" and, well, you're just f'ed.
Others have already commented on why you shouldn't expect oil prices to drop. I'll just add that at $2/gallon it's still cheaper than bottled water. If you still don't like the price you can always try using less of it.
No question Saddam is/was a bad guy. But I suggest you read up on nice folks like Stalin and Pol Pot. And lets not forget that freedom from Saddam was not the #1 reason the US invaded Iraq. The reason given was the "proof" of the existence of weapons of mass destruction and the "fact" that Iraq was an immediate threat to the United States.This is a valid point. I've been spending time over the last week or so training my laptop to dual-boot Mandrake 10.1 and WinXP. I'm doing this not so much because I think I'll be more productive with Linux running on my laptop, but as an exercise to see how hard it is and to learn something along the way. For me, Windows XP and MS Office, plus a bunch of other stuff I've loaded like Firefox and Thunderbird, have made the laptop a very useful tool. Yes, there are security concerns, but -- knock on wood -- I have yet to be bitten. Of course I'm pretty careful in maintaining my system: I run a firewall (not the XP one), virus scanner, and a handful of anti-spyware/anti-adware apps. And I don't run IE.
The thing that jumps out at me is that the person who is most likely to get bitten by MS security holes is the person least likely to make the switch to Linux. They want a system they turn on and it works. A tool. They don't want a computing experience or a hobby. There's no way they are going to go through the trials of getting a Linux distro up and running on a laptop. Especially if they want wireless support (I've been battling ndiswrapper on Mandrake for a few days now).
What does this mean for the future? Linux distros have come a long way in a pretty short time. I think if progress continues to be made at this rate then before long we'll see distros that Joe Average can actually install and use. I hope so at any rate.
Being able to keep your existing number is key. Verizon sent me a flyer advertising their VoIP offering, called Voicewing. I'm already a Verizon DSL subscriber, so I have broadband. I'd like to dump my local phone connection, for which I pay close to $50 a month and don't use a whole lot. So what are my options with VoiceWing, I wonder. I check out the web site.
Turns out that since I have DSL, I must retain my existing POTS line as well. So I can get VoiceWing for $30/month, but I have to keep both POTS and DSL. And the new service will have its own different phone number! Great...I get to pay more and tell everyone that I have a new phone number.
Some people do. Organizationally it works with they way they think. You have a folder for communication with a customer, that customer sends you a document, you put it in the same folder. Makes sense.
I agree with you, these are not necessary features. I don't care to recall mail that I have sent. I don't request read receipts -- I send mail and it's up to you to read it. But the features are there and some folks do use 'em.
I'm interested in what you mean by that. In any but the smallest installations I imagine that Exchange would be running on a dedicated server. So I doubt that it's intended to play nicely with other apps. I can certainly see Exchange as a "sticking point" in terms of deploying a large enterprise e-mail system. The meager scalability would drive me away quickly. But as far as end user experience, the Outlook/Exchange combination is hard to beat.
On my personal computers I run Thunderbird for mail and Palm Desktop for calendar (it works well enough and syncs with my handheld). Thunderbird is great for reading mail and I really like the RSS integration. But I don't think it competes with Outlook/Exchange for the enterprise market. Why?
No calendar. People use Outlook as much as a scheduling tool as an email reader.
No real integration with the desktop. I can drag a document into Outlook and it'll store it on the Exchange server.
Goodies like dependable read receipts, message recall, individual message reclaimation. These are effectively impossible in a standards-based multi-platform mail client, but you get them in a lock-in system like Exchange/Outlook and people use 'em.
I love Thunderbird and I applaud the efforts of the community that created it. But don't think of it as an Outlook killer, at least not yet.
I'm an atheist but I've come to this place in an open-minded way. I've read quite a bit on philosophy of religion, theology, and arguments for God. I would love for someone to present me with a logically sound argument for the existence of an omnipotent creator. It'd be very comforting to know of such a being. But I can't just believe because it'd be nice to do so. I need a kernel of evidence from which to start and I've yet to find it. The search goes on, but for now I'm one of those atheists.
I disagree. A degree matters for two reasons: first, it shows that you can finish what you start. You went to school, you stuck with it, you earned a degree. That matters. Second, it is important to know theory. I'm tired of working alongside self-proclaimed hackers who have some skill, but little ability to view problems in an abstract way. Thus they repeatedly reinvent the wheel. They also tend to be of the edit-compile-test-repeat school and rarely think through a problem before attacking it.
I learned a lot of good design habits being a CS major. It's not about learning a language or an OS, it's about learning how to learn.
Very true. I don't know for sure, but I would bet that most of the developers at EA are fairly young. Not long out of school, smart, energetic, and absolutely positive that they know exactly what they are doing. No heavyweight process is going to get in their way! I know because I used to be this way myself.
Having been in the industry for a while now (18 years), I've seen my share of projects crash and burn as a result of developer self-indulgence. A small dose of formalization applied along the way can really help get things done on time. Yes, it can be boring. It can be awkward. Sometimes you feel ridiculous sitting in a meeting talking these things over, but it beats the hell out of staring fuzzily at the debugger at 2:00 in the morning after 14 cups of coffee.
No process is perfect, and there will be crunches from time to time. I think professionals in every field are OK with that.
What I don't understand is why EA encourages this sort of behavior (this assumes that the blog post is accurate, of course). This has got to be more expensive than doing things the right way. You will have more defects in your software, and you will burn people out. Naturally your best and brightest people will have the easiest time finding another job, so those are the ones you lose. And you're stuck with the bottom feeders and the new guys. Wouldn't it be nice to hang on to good people for a few years so they can apply their expertise? I wonder how many people have survived these conditions at EA for any length of time. Jobs may be scarce, but what kind of life is working 12 hours a day seven days a week?
I've not conquered the video thing yet. I like the idea of having easy access to the digital media, but I don't like the idea of having a computer in the family room. Computers go in the office, where there's a desk and a proper work environment.
I agree. The Skype software is fine, and it works well. But I don't want to be tethered to my computer when I make a phone call. I know there are wireless headsets out there, but what sort of range do they have? And how well do they handle the rest of the stuff flying through the air in a typical home (802.11, 900Mhz phones, 2.4Ghz phones, microwave ovens, etc.)?
True enough. And I didn't mean to imply that the Republicans were running any "dirtier" or more disingenuous a campaign than the Dems.
I think it was the contrast in feeling that I had between yesterday and today. Yesterday I was really energized. Mine was the first ballot cast at our precinct, and I even got to verify that the ballot box was empty before mine was put in. I saw people coming in, saw reports of folks waiting to vote, and thought "this is great! Democracy in action." And it is great. I thought of all the people who have made sacrifices, including giving up their lives, so that we retain this freedom. And then today I got to reading some of the poll results about why people chose what they chose and I just felt disgusted. But we'll survive.
That one got a chuckle. Thanks!
I don't think that'll happen. First, Cheney's too old. Second, he lacks the proper charisma. He's fat, bald, and harsh. That won't fly.
As a Green who voted for Kerry I am disappointed to see Bush re-elected. But I'm really disappointed in the reasons why he was re-elected. Many Bush supporters polled indicated that they believe Iraq had WMD. They further believe that Saddam was linked to al-Qaeda and supported the 9/11 attacks. I don't mind folks who have informed opinions that differ from mine. But it's depressing to see people who have been lied to acting on those lies as if it were the right thing to do.
So true. The dot-bomb where I worked for about 15 months was a classic example of this. We had enough funding to keep a small group of us going long enough to create something useful. But the CEO hired by the board of directors ruined all that. They paid him a $300,000 salary, plus a $50,000 per quarter bonus that had no performance parameters. He submitted weekly expense reports in the 2-3 thousand dollar range. When board meetings were held the out of town board members stayed at the Ritz. It was all obviously just a boondoggle for the CEO and board members, there was never any intent to run a real company. Either that or these guys were incompetent beyond any reason. The company went bankrupt, of course.
If you're at a startup and money is being spent on extravagent toys, just have fun. The company will fail, but you can have some fine dinners along the way.
And mosschops responded Unfortunately, backwards compatability can't always be guaranteed, particularly in applications under rapid development like Firefox.
Both true, but unrelated. I can't really expect beta software to be backward compatible from release to release. I do expect released software to be backward compatible, and hopefuly FF will figure this out from 1.0 on.
As for the about:config stuff, couldn't agree more. It's OK for truly obscure stuff to be buried in there, but it's an interface that shouldn't be required for the vast majority of users. Expose those things in a proper configuration screen!
I've been using FF for a while now and my biggest gripe is around the tabbed browsing. Tabbed browsing is a wonderful thing, but FF doesn't take true advantage of it without the tabbed browsing extension. And if extensions break when you upgrade the browser, that's a drag. I'll certainly withhold judgement on FF until after the formal 1.0 release, which I'm hoping is an improvement over the PR. If it's not I'll stick with Mozilla, but I fear that'll become a backwater.
Wandering off topic here, but as someone else said, it is THHGTTG we're discussing here, so off topic is on topic. Sort of like tea and no tea.
Analog watches are more popular because people are more interested in relative time than absolute time. In other words, we don't really care what time it is, we care how long it is before something happens. How long til lunch? How long til the movie starts? Etc. And your brain grasps these intervals much more intuitively when they are presented with hands going around in a circle. With a digital watch you actually have to do math to figure out how long you have. With an analog it's not "twenty minutes," it's 120 degrees of the circle, which you quickly have a strong feel for.
Not sure if this is "full teco", but it claims to be teco: TECO for DOS.