Exactly. The law is the "rule book" we exist in society by. Not being able to know the law is a horrific situation for anyone to be in, especially if the penalties are so severe.
How on earth can you play a game without knowing the rules?
Right... because some accountants with revolvers are going to stop an apache attack helicopter, and a couple of abrams tanks...
I love your romantic perspective on this, but if you think some American Average Joes with guns are going to do ANYTHING against any aggressor, you're going to be very very upset when the tanks start rolling down your street.
The sheer difference between the general populace and the armed forces, with regard to firepower, is so woefully unbalanced it's akin to comparing the stone-throwing palestinians with the tank-wielding israelis. there's no match.
The second ammendment causes more harm than good. I mean, if guns made people safe, why did the Germans get so far in WW2? They fought people with armies, air forces and navies. They fought guys with training, and still beat loads of countries into submission. How you think less people can fight a stronger enemy and win is beyond me.
Grow up, mate, seriously. How on earth that could even be considered "insightful" is beyond me. Slating intel for power usage? Having a go at Microsoft for an OS that uses what every other OS will use when released? I mean, at least get a good point before spouting all that stuff. sheesh.
Your friend's RiscOS box can't run anything useful, and looks like a childs toy. next!
Do you have windows boxes that crash every week? If you do, the problem isn't with the software. I use windows on servers at work, and they stay up for months at a time. They're just as reliable as the linux servers we use for similar tasks. The whole "windows crashes every 4 minutes" joke is exactly that - a joke. It's like saying that linux only has a command-line interface, and the most modern browser is lynx. Funny? yes. Any base in reality what-so-ever? No.
Don't get on your high horse - your evil "Microsoft only" consultants could have quite easily used a microsoft bridge. It's not down to them wanting to only use microsoft products, but more a case of them not setting the infrastructure up correctly.
"This applies to non-M$ as much as M$, though with a lot less frequency"
Well, seeing as it's used by 90% of the most computer-illiterate people in the world, I'm not surprised any flaws in it get widely publicised.
I've had linux boxes crash on me just as much as windows ones. OSs crash. They all do. People sound like tired, stuck records when they bang on about windows crashing. It's not 1995 any more - things have progressed significantly. Failure to recognise that shows the complete lack of objectivity present on this board, but then we knew that already:-P
"We're seasoned IT professionals, but mention Microsoft and we'll start spitting blood on you"
Not everyone gets on with the different ways OSS apps do things. Sure, we can extoll the virtues of the ideology and talk about how it's free, etc., but it doesn't change the fact that lots of people prefer IE and MS Office over their OSS counterparts. Those are the majority of users, and it's those people who need converting.
They also enlisted the help of a sole Kiwi inventor, who'd made a handheld laser modeling gun. Held in the hand, with no external supports or machinery (like a barcode scanner at the shops), it can quickly scan a model into the computer with great detail. You "paint" it with the laser, and it draws it on screen. Fascinating stuff.
It's complete focus like that which makes WETA one of the world-leaders in bleeding-edge model making.
But that's easy - you've never seen a T-Rex walking around, so if they make it look like a T-Rex, they've succeeded. WETA's real strong-point wasn't their visual accuracy, but the movements of each CGI character. It's easy enough to plonk a 3D model in there, but to get it to move like its real-life counterpart is something completely, absolutely different.
Motion capturing is cool, but you have to pick the right subject to capture, otherwise you end up with a geek's movements in a monkey's body, or whatever.
Don't forget you're also paying for the memory, cpu, NIC, motherboard, etc. This is a whole computer in a box, remember. Comparing it to an external drive is like comparing a RAID-5 fileserver to a USB keychain:-P
With the latest versions of Samba and OSX, you can get practically anything talking to anything. Samba 3 even supports becoming an active directory controller (as well as logging on to one, and sharing file permissions).
It's reeeally easy to get linux/windows/osx on a network talking to each other easily. It's when you want macs with OS9 on the network that things go horribly wrong very fast. Everyone else plays together nicely:)
If the snap server runs linux, which I believe it does, and as long as that machine has winbind, kerberos and samba v3+, it can participate on corporate domains seamlessly.
It's things like that which makes linux as powerful as it is, not the latest office clone or eye-candy.
Can you add it while the server is on? Can you remove it again, while the server is on?
This is supposed to make it easier to install a drive, not replace internal storage. It's machine-independent, so you don't have to worry about putting it on a slow machine that's processing paycheques or anything.
It's like people who argue against bluetooth because we have WLAN - they're both for different purposes, and those not appreciating those differences slam the supposedly-weaker technology into the ground.
You add it to your network, so users can store their files on it. You can add it without ripping a machine open, and it doesn't require space in a fileserver. It's installed in minutes, and if a fault occurs can be removed in seconds.
Then get a decent firewall and set up the permissions on the network properly. If your guys spend 70% of their time cleaning machines, they're not doing their jobs properly.
We spend 0% of our time cleaning our windows machines, as we control what gets installed on them.
Web plugins are the perfect example of legitimate web-borne installs. Flash player? Fine. Install.
I actually like microsoft's approach in IE - it tells you the signer of the app (if any), and gives you info on who's giving you the software. It lets you know exactly who's trying to install what on your machine. True, 90% of the time it's crap, but 10% of the time it's something genuinely useful.
Take DirectX out of the install package? Do you know how many calls to their CS that will cause? People are dumb - they don't read install notes (heck - on windows you don't have to). Also, an installer for a game should install the game on your machine, including everything it needs. It should be a two-clicks-and-youre-playing scenario, not a multiple-application approach to installing software. Windows users are used to minimal fuss when installing, and rooting around CDs for software you need to install is pointless (especially when most people will end up running the same apps in the same order, anyway).
It's false security. Moving DirectX/etc out of the install package just causes people to run them from different locations. If they had spyware in them, they'd still be installed on most computers. All you've succeeded in doing is making the install procedure more complicated and time-consuming. The same amount of machines will be tainted, regardless.
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How on earth can you play a game without knowing the rules?
I love your romantic perspective on this, but if you think some American Average Joes with guns are going to do ANYTHING against any aggressor, you're going to be very very upset when the tanks start rolling down your street.
The sheer difference between the general populace and the armed forces, with regard to firepower, is so woefully unbalanced it's akin to comparing the stone-throwing palestinians with the tank-wielding israelis. there's no match.
The second ammendment causes more harm than good. I mean, if guns made people safe, why did the Germans get so far in WW2? They fought people with armies, air forces and navies. They fought guys with training, and still beat loads of countries into submission. How you think less people can fight a stronger enemy and win is beyond me.
seriously. don't just look at what someone's telling you, but why.
But it's called "PATRIOT"! It must be good! Surely voting against it makes you a commie pinko unAmerican terrorist...
Your friend's RiscOS box can't run anything useful, and looks like a childs toy. next!
Concerned about safety? Why don't many people wear their seat belts then?
Do you have windows boxes that crash every week? If you do, the problem isn't with the software. I use windows on servers at work, and they stay up for months at a time. They're just as reliable as the linux servers we use for similar tasks. The whole "windows crashes every 4 minutes" joke is exactly that - a joke. It's like saying that linux only has a command-line interface, and the most modern browser is lynx. Funny? yes. Any base in reality what-so-ever? No.
Don't get on your high horse - your evil "Microsoft only" consultants could have quite easily used a microsoft bridge. It's not down to them wanting to only use microsoft products, but more a case of them not setting the infrastructure up correctly.
They're expert sailors. Paper maps = second nature. I doubt anyone was endangered by this.
Well, seeing as it's used by 90% of the most computer-illiterate people in the world, I'm not surprised any flaws in it get widely publicised.
I've had linux boxes crash on me just as much as windows ones. OSs crash. They all do. People sound like tired, stuck records when they bang on about windows crashing. It's not 1995 any more - things have progressed significantly. Failure to recognise that shows the complete lack of objectivity present on this board, but then we knew that already :-P
"We're seasoned IT professionals, but mention Microsoft and we'll start spitting blood on you"
Not everyone gets on with the different ways OSS apps do things. Sure, we can extoll the virtues of the ideology and talk about how it's free, etc., but it doesn't change the fact that lots of people prefer IE and MS Office over their OSS counterparts. Those are the majority of users, and it's those people who need converting.
but then that would be like palladium, so it must be evil. and you too, for suggesting it. :-P
It's complete focus like that which makes WETA one of the world-leaders in bleeding-edge model making.
Motion capturing is cool, but you have to pick the right subject to capture, otherwise you end up with a geek's movements in a monkey's body, or whatever.
Don't forget you're also paying for the memory, cpu, NIC, motherboard, etc. This is a whole computer in a box, remember. Comparing it to an external drive is like comparing a RAID-5 fileserver to a USB keychain :-P
j/k
You're probably better off just biting the bullet on that one, and getting the best deal on a cheap NAS you can find :)
You're paying that $300 for a motherboard, PSU, memory, NIC, CPU, R&D and labour. It's actually a great deal.
With the latest versions of Samba and OSX, you can get practically anything talking to anything. Samba 3 even supports becoming an active directory controller (as well as logging on to one, and sharing file permissions).
It's reeeally easy to get linux/windows/osx on a network talking to each other easily. It's when you want macs with OS9 on the network that things go horribly wrong very fast. Everyone else plays together nicely :)
If the snap server runs linux, which I believe it does, and as long as that machine has winbind, kerberos and samba v3+, it can participate on corporate domains seamlessly.
It's things like that which makes linux as powerful as it is, not the latest office clone or eye-candy.
This is supposed to make it easier to install a drive, not replace internal storage. It's machine-independent, so you don't have to worry about putting it on a slow machine that's processing paycheques or anything.
It's like people who argue against bluetooth because we have WLAN - they're both for different purposes, and those not appreciating those differences slam the supposedly-weaker technology into the ground.
network attached storage
You add it to your network, so users can store their files on it. You can add it without ripping a machine open, and it doesn't require space in a fileserver. It's installed in minutes, and if a fault occurs can be removed in seconds.
I take it you don't administer a network :-P
BBC has the edgiest shows on TV, without a doubt. BBC3 is the new Channel 4.
Imagine what would happen if monkey dust was shown on US network TV? Hahahaha! Hilarious.
We spend 0% of our time cleaning our windows machines, as we control what gets installed on them.
Still, doesn't make 'em right for putting them on our computers in the first place.
I actually like microsoft's approach in IE - it tells you the signer of the app (if any), and gives you info on who's giving you the software. It lets you know exactly who's trying to install what on your machine. True, 90% of the time it's crap, but 10% of the time it's something genuinely useful.
Take DirectX out of the install package? Do you know how many calls to their CS that will cause? People are dumb - they don't read install notes (heck - on windows you don't have to). Also, an installer for a game should install the game on your machine, including everything it needs. It should be a two-clicks-and-youre-playing scenario, not a multiple-application approach to installing software. Windows users are used to minimal fuss when installing, and rooting around CDs for software you need to install is pointless (especially when most people will end up running the same apps in the same order, anyway).
It's false security. Moving DirectX/etc out of the install package just causes people to run them from different locations. If they had spyware in them, they'd still be installed on most computers. All you've succeeded in doing is making the install procedure more complicated and time-consuming. The same amount of machines will be tainted, regardless.
And wasn't just a page of "hahahahahhaaaa!"s.