and strangely, their example "Such issues also have made premium cable networks reluctant to offer on-demand services that would allow subscribers to watch any episode of, say, ``Six Feet Under'' they choose, at any time. " is misleading. I have 6 Feet Under on demand, and what's more, it's free.
There are two axis on this chart - one is what people are willing to indure (restrictions, cost, etc) the other, what they're willing to do (bend rules, spend hours setting up their own recorder). By annoying customers like this, they make people who would never have cared want to set up their own MythTV type setups.
Actually the best training is at work; home networks just don't typically have the complexity you find in a business environment. Unfortunately most people can't just hang out with a linux admin team for a few months to pick up stuff.
Very good point. At work you'll have tons of boxes running different versions of different OSes, with different configurations and programs available. You'll have to deal with all sorts of oddities, things that can't be fixed or replaced but have to be used, and things that were not done the right way and have been kept alive for all too long.
If you're really serious about it, and you have the room and cash, you can try. Get a whole lot of boxes - cheap junk is possibly better than new, as you'll get to diagnose hardware problems along the way. Set them up with different distros, versions, configurations. Network them, run different databases and app servers, mail servers and what not.
Then start trying to do things. Move servers from box to box, from the command line, without shutting anything down. Learn to write shell scripts and Perl so you can monitor everything and control everything.
If you want to complete the ambiance of a hosting facility set up tons of loud fans, install extra locks, and put up chain link fences. And try subsisting on a steady diet of microwave burritos, Mountain Dew and Ho Hos (subsitute with Ding Dongs, Devil Dogs, etc.)
I just wish someone would make a linux distro that is more like OS X. It would bring Linux to the desktop faster and give grandma an interface she could easily understand.
I don't really understand what you're talking about. Are you refering to the GUI? What about KDE? That's pretty easy to use.
Do you mean software installs? I'm not a huge fan, as I like a package manager that can handle dependencies and help with uninstalling and such, as you're more likely to find in Linux/*BSD.
And something being immediately understandable does not make it powerful. If anything, it can hinder it.
Sybase has serious share in some specific markets. Here in NYC there are a lot of financial firms that use it heavily. I've also read it's big in healthcare and telecom, and I would imagine there are some hooks between it and SQLAnywhere, which is theirs, too.
It might not be attractive to you if you need to decide on a RDBMS from scratch. If, however, you have an existing Sybase system deployed, or you have a Sybase DBA, or you like the performance, tools, expertise, or vertical focus, than this might be wonderful for you.
You bring up some really good points. Many FMP set ups start out by people who don't really know what they're doing, or they're just interim solutions that become the solution b/c people don't understand the idea of prototypes.
Optimizing the existing set up is an option. Also, can't you use FMP to be the front end to another DB? I know you can do that with Access, and you can basically just have people use a view of the database. That way you could even have FMP run just on their machine, and have the DB do all the work.
Consider inertia. Making big changes, like switching the whole company to Macs is dangerous. Even if it goes well, if there are any problems, you'll be blamed. And it will cost. PCs are uber cheap, the IT staff is already there - and not too expensive.
You'd need to hire/train new IT people, buy new software, and train your employees (no matter how easy or similar it may be, people will need it).
If non-Windows is your rationale, depending on what software you'd need, you'd probably be better off using Linux/*BSD. Much cheaper all around.
One of which is that it eases Linux adoption on the desktop by allowing Linux clients to access Windows apps running on Windows servers...
I didn't see this. They mention a Windows client, but that allows you to run the remote Linux/KDE apps, right? Nice if you want to experiment with this, make transition easier, but not, as far as I can tell, as a way for Linux folks to run Windows apps. Unless the server was running vmware, I suppose, which would be cool.
I've worked with Filemaker a fair amount, and moved apps over to web based systems with other databases.
The most recent versions of Filemaker, when treated just right, may be a blessing, but in my experience Filemaker just doesn't scale well. After you've started really putting a lot of data in there it creeps. It is it's own thing, too, so you can't use standard database modeling, reporting, etc. And hosting is an issue.
The impending new version might just be your occasion to stop, drop Filemaker, and roll your own.
Finding a tool to move the data and structure over is tempting, but consider whether the database structure you have is a good one, and if all your data is normalized. This would be a good opportunity to work on that, if you'd be moving to another system anyway.
And try thinking using the Unix philosophy. Use differnt tools. Use a database to store the data, use an off the shelf reporting tool (ie crystal reports) if you want, use Access or Filemaker to allow clients to make custom views, use modeling tools, etc.
If you need something that runs on Windows or Mac, well, you need it. And betting your livelihood on Wine or crossover or VNC or vmware or whatnot is scarey if you don't do a lot of homework. Plus, you're forsaking most support. You have to know what you're doing, and have the time.
Some people prefer the way things are in Linux/BSD. Package management, being able to do tons on the command line, tons of control. Windows doesn't have that, and I don't really feel it on Mac OS X, either, so far.
And cost is definitely an issue. If you don't want to buy expensive hardware, you may have to run an OS where you can configure it as you need it, maybe with a more minimal install or windowing system. And if you don't want to buy the OS for $200+ and updates every year for $100+ and Photoshop for $500+ (or however much it is), and Office for $500+ (again, however much) then things like Mac OS X aren't an option.
Being able to use the program at full tilt without a manual... isn't that a pinnacle of usability?
It does seem like it, and I think it would be great for someone to be able to jump in and use the program extensively without having to learn anything. But there are some functions I'm not sure a lot of users would even know they'd like. There is a graphic version of Vim that can be helpful for those more mouse oriented, but it's still a somewhat cryptic program for those just trying it out. But you can do some amazingly difficult things really easily with it, if you invest a bit of time.
If you're doing video editing, DVD authoring or serious Photoshop work on your machine, it's probably best to have it dedicated to that. Other software might slow things down or be slowed down, and possibly screw up your livelihood.
Linux is used in 'creative industries' a great deal. Depends on what you're referrring to.
Ask on some parents on Linux user group lists or IRC channels about their kids using Linux. It's not so difficult, and thinking kids are morons and only letting them learn Word and Excel is so sad.
There are a lot of things you can do with wireless networking on Linux that you can't easily do on other OSes. And by plug and play, you most likely mean without any security running. That's not too good.
Some commercial apps run on Linux natively. Some FOSS apps run on Linux and don't run on Windows.
Not everyone needs a mouse driven interface with drag and drop and copy and paste.
And if you want to have a super cheap, powerful machine, Linux is a great option.
In all fairness, I think many people equate usability with a pretty interface and being able to use the application at full tilt without reading a manual.
I find Vim to be quite usable. Likewise many command line functions that would be a massive pain to do in a GUI. But I'm sure a lot of people think these are poorly designed interfaces.
In most medium to large scale enterprises, there are *always* product management teams and UI designers who hash out all aspects of the UI before the coders even start their work. It is these people who have the say in how the app looks, *not* the developer. The developer's job is to make the nice mock-ups work as expected.
But most product managers and UI designers do not understand functionality very well. Functionality, not colors and graphics, are what programmers deal with.
So if you start out with product managers and UI people making mockups, you end up with a very 2D feeling app. If you start out with programmers, you often get a bizarre and complicated UI that no amount of pretting up is going to help.
The solution is to have the product managers stay largely quiet after laying out what the requirements are, letting a core team of programmers and designers work together to establish look and functionality (use cases and mockups), then they can go work concurrently.
In looking for the documentation you see "A detailed and user-friendly documentation is available separately with the complete AMSEL distribution." So I thought maybe it or something like it would be downloadable. I looked through the FTP server, and there's not a lot there. Nothing in the demos directory. Downloaded the source and didn't see much in the way of documentation there, either.
May be a good system, but I would hesitate to use it until I saw more life and info.
Sometimes, I think people are so bent on the whole "one nation, under god" in the Pledge of Alliegance that they forget that the Pledge ends "with liberty and justice for all"
Your implication that these statements are contradictory is baffling to me, as they seem to echo and substantiate eachother.
I think some clarification might be valuable, lest we talk of opposition to all Muslims.
Fundamentalism, when used to describe religious practice, describes an adherence to the original ideals of the religion without watering down by modern culture. If you believe in the freedom of religious expression, which includes believing there is no God, or we're all gods, or that only science can hold the answers, you should defend the rights of religious, and therefore Islamic fundamentalists.
Islamism is the idea that since Islam is the truth, it should be the foundation for the law and government. This idea is a revolutionary one (in the overthrow the government sense), and the foundation for many Islamic terror groups. Of course not all Islamists are bad people, but they are all quite serious about their beliefs.
It would be much better to understand and remove the causes for these problems...
One of the big problems is the past - what we've done against people and governments, who we supported (often out of an idea of convenience, or a n enemy of your enemy idea). It's just not possible to remove the past. And tackling poverty and lack of education may come accross as colonialism and indoctrination.
And is the idea to help the economy of a goverment we hate, that hurts it's own people and others? To educate people who are trying to devise strategies on how to destroy us?
I understand your desire to help and not harm, but I think the situation is often more complex than just deciding between helping and bombing.
Here's another idea I take issue with: "it's not just about bombing people into oblivion; it's about encouraging free government with a free flow of information" The question I have here is why, after over a year, have we still seen none of this come to fruition? Sure, we handed over power [thestar.com], but to an unelected government that we selected. Also, how did we contribute to the free flow of information by banning newspapers? [theage.com.au]
How quickly do you expect a fully democratic government with freedoms very rare in the middle east to spring from the rubble of a war? I understand why an unelected government, and shutting down a newspaper upset you, but I think you need to consider the obstacles in place in Iraq, and the value of caution.
You go on to insist that this was somehow was positive for "most of the civilized world", but offer no rational for that logic. I'll throw out a few reasons. -Saddam Hussein violated the resolutions of the UN, which attempted to keep Iraq from being completely destroyed. -He sponsored palestinian and perhaps other terrorists. -He tortured and executed huge numbers of people.
so it's Java the beverage and island vs..NET the URL extension... and perhaps the fish catching tool. Perhaps a more semantic search would be in order to bring this back to only be silly instead of useless.
Netcraft's list is just reporting the servers furthest forward, aren't they? You can't tell what app servers or database servers are running, right? So all you're really telling is what Apache et al are running on.
And Mac OS X is not FreeBSD. Similar? sure. Loosely based on? I'll buy that. But there are some major differences. Take a look at this usenet post (http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF- 8&selm=3CF65A12.9020000%40coldmail.com.invalid ) or search out others.
With Oracle now running on OS X, and the fact that masses of Enterprise Application vendors use Java, that argument is dwindling away--as any enterprise app written using J2EE will run on OS X just fine.
But there are some big differences between Solaris and other big time commercial Unices and *BSDs and Linux on the one side and Mac OS X on the other.
Solaris on Sun hardware has some failover and maintenance jazz that Apple hardware doesn't.
Solaris and the others can be stripped down to bare bones to conserve resources and make the box more secure - I haven't seen this done with Mac OS X.
Mac OS X does things differently. From what I can tell, for example, the default shell is bash and typing vi will get you vim. Now I know the default shell in Linux is usually bash, as well, but many shell scripts that are written for ksh or c shell or something of that sort will behave a little differently in bash, and I'm sure there must be all sorts of nuances I haven't found yet.
No. Terrorists have been very specific about their complaints with the US. It's actually just a couple of long standing US policies and could very easily be changed.
Unfortunately the time machine is in the shop, so changing the past won't be possible for a while yet. Until then perhaps we can just be nice and promise to stop being bad.
And by the way, the 'christians' in the crusades attacked other christians, too. Using the crusades to point out failings of christians only succeeds in pointing out the failings of people. Being christian does not imply perfection - it's a journey. And too many people call themselves christian, but are not at all.
Slashdot Mirror
and strangely, their example "Such issues also have made premium cable networks reluctant to offer on-demand services that would allow subscribers to watch any episode of, say, ``Six Feet Under'' they choose, at any time.
" is misleading. I have 6 Feet Under on demand, and what's more, it's free.
There are two axis on this chart - one is what people are willing to indure (restrictions, cost, etc) the other, what they're willing to do (bend rules, spend hours setting up their own recorder). By annoying customers like this, they make people who would never have cared want to set up their own MythTV type setups.
Actually the best training is at work; home networks just don't typically have the complexity you find in a business environment. Unfortunately most people can't just hang out with a linux admin team for a few months to pick up stuff.
Very good point. At work you'll have tons of boxes running different versions of different OSes, with different configurations and programs available. You'll have to deal with all sorts of oddities, things that can't be fixed or replaced but have to be used, and things that were not done the right way and have been kept alive for all too long.
If you're really serious about it, and you have the room and cash, you can try. Get a whole lot of boxes - cheap junk is possibly better than new, as you'll get to diagnose hardware problems along the way. Set them up with different distros, versions, configurations. Network them, run different databases and app servers, mail servers and what not.
Then start trying to do things. Move servers from box to box, from the command line, without shutting anything down. Learn to write shell scripts and Perl so you can monitor everything and control everything.
If you want to complete the ambiance of a hosting facility set up tons of loud fans, install extra locks, and put up chain link fences. And try subsisting on a steady diet of microwave burritos, Mountain Dew and Ho Hos (subsitute with Ding Dongs, Devil Dogs, etc.)
I just wish someone would make a linux distro that is more like OS X. It would bring Linux to the desktop faster and give grandma an interface she could easily understand.
I don't really understand what you're talking about. Are you refering to the GUI? What about KDE? That's pretty easy to use.
Do you mean software installs? I'm not a huge fan, as I like a package manager that can handle dependencies and help with uninstalling and such, as you're more likely to find in Linux/*BSD.
And something being immediately understandable does not make it powerful. If anything, it can hinder it.
Sybase has serious share in some specific markets. Here in NYC there are a lot of financial firms that use it heavily. I've also read it's big in healthcare and telecom, and I would imagine there are some hooks between it and SQLAnywhere, which is theirs, too.
It might not be attractive to you if you need to decide on a RDBMS from scratch. If, however, you have an existing Sybase system deployed, or you have a Sybase DBA, or you like the performance, tools, expertise, or vertical focus, than this might be wonderful for you.
You bring up some really good points. Many FMP set ups start out by people who don't really know what they're doing, or they're just interim solutions that become the solution b/c people don't understand the idea of prototypes.
Optimizing the existing set up is an option. Also, can't you use FMP to be the front end to another DB? I know you can do that with Access, and you can basically just have people use a view of the database. That way you could even have FMP run just on their machine, and have the DB do all the work.
Consider inertia. Making big changes, like switching the whole company to Macs is dangerous. Even if it goes well, if there are any problems, you'll be blamed. And it will cost. PCs are uber cheap, the IT staff is already there - and not too expensive.
You'd need to hire/train new IT people, buy new software, and train your employees (no matter how easy or similar it may be, people will need it).
If non-Windows is your rationale, depending on what software you'd need, you'd probably be better off using Linux/*BSD. Much cheaper all around.
One of which is that it eases Linux adoption on the desktop by allowing Linux clients to access Windows apps running on Windows servers...
I didn't see this. They mention a Windows client, but that allows you to run the remote Linux/KDE apps, right? Nice if you want to experiment with this, make transition easier, but not, as far as I can tell, as a way for Linux folks to run Windows apps. Unless the server was running vmware, I suppose, which would be cool.
I've worked with Filemaker a fair amount, and moved apps over to web based systems with other databases.
The most recent versions of Filemaker, when treated just right, may be a blessing, but in my experience Filemaker just doesn't scale well. After you've started really putting a lot of data in there it creeps. It is it's own thing, too, so you can't use standard database modeling, reporting, etc. And hosting is an issue.
The impending new version might just be your occasion to stop, drop Filemaker, and roll your own.
Finding a tool to move the data and structure over is tempting, but consider whether the database structure you have is a good one, and if all your data is normalized. This would be a good opportunity to work on that, if you'd be moving to another system anyway.
And try thinking using the Unix philosophy. Use differnt tools. Use a database to store the data, use an off the shelf reporting tool (ie crystal reports) if you want, use Access or Filemaker to allow clients to make custom views, use modeling tools, etc.
Contact me if you want sympathy or some help.
If you need something that runs on Windows or Mac, well, you need it. And betting your livelihood on Wine or crossover or VNC or vmware or whatnot is scarey if you don't do a lot of homework. Plus, you're forsaking most support. You have to know what you're doing, and have the time.
Some people prefer the way things are in Linux/BSD. Package management, being able to do tons on the command line, tons of control. Windows doesn't have that, and I don't really feel it on Mac OS X, either, so far.
And cost is definitely an issue. If you don't want to buy expensive hardware, you may have to run an OS where you can configure it as you need it, maybe with a more minimal install or windowing system. And if you don't want to buy the OS for $200+ and updates every year for $100+ and Photoshop for $500+ (or however much it is), and Office for $500+ (again, however much) then things like Mac OS X aren't an option.
Being able to use the program at full tilt without a manual... isn't that a pinnacle of usability?
It does seem like it, and I think it would be great for someone to be able to jump in and use the program extensively without having to learn anything. But there are some functions I'm not sure a lot of users would even know they'd like. There is a graphic version of Vim that can be helpful for those more mouse oriented, but it's still a somewhat cryptic program for those just trying it out. But you can do some amazingly difficult things really easily with it, if you invest a bit of time.
Mac OS X accesses Windows Servers using Samba, which was available on Linux when OS X was a sparkle in Steve Jobs eyes.
If you're doing video editing, DVD authoring or serious Photoshop work on your machine, it's probably best to have it dedicated to that. Other software might slow things down or be slowed down, and possibly screw up your livelihood.
Linux is used in 'creative industries' a great deal. Depends on what you're referrring to.
Ask on some parents on Linux user group lists or IRC channels about their kids using Linux. It's not so difficult, and thinking kids are morons and only letting them learn Word and Excel is so sad.
There are a lot of things you can do with wireless networking on Linux that you can't easily do on other OSes. And by plug and play, you most likely mean without any security running. That's not too good.
Some commercial apps run on Linux natively. Some FOSS apps run on Linux and don't run on Windows.
Not everyone needs a mouse driven interface with drag and drop and copy and paste.
And if you want to have a super cheap, powerful machine, Linux is a great option.
In all fairness, I think many people equate usability with a pretty interface and being able to use the application at full tilt without reading a manual.
I find Vim to be quite usable. Likewise many command line functions that would be a massive pain to do in a GUI. But I'm sure a lot of people think these are poorly designed interfaces.
In most medium to large scale enterprises, there are *always* product management teams and UI designers who hash out all aspects of the UI before the coders even start their work. It is these people who have the say in how the app looks, *not* the developer. The developer's job is to make the nice mock-ups work as expected.
But most product managers and UI designers do not understand functionality very well. Functionality, not colors and graphics, are what programmers deal with.
So if you start out with product managers and UI people making mockups, you end up with a very 2D feeling app. If you start out with programmers, you often get a bizarre and complicated UI that no amount of pretting up is going to help.
The solution is to have the product managers stay largely quiet after laying out what the requirements are, letting a core team of programmers and designers work together to establish look and functionality (use cases and mockups), then they can go work concurrently.
In looking for the documentation you see "A detailed and user-friendly documentation is available separately with the complete AMSEL distribution." So I thought maybe it or something like it would be downloadable. I looked through the FTP server, and there's not a lot there. Nothing in the demos directory. Downloaded the source and didn't see much in the way of documentation there, either.
May be a good system, but I would hesitate to use it until I saw more life and info.
Sometimes, I think people are so bent on the whole "one nation, under god" in the Pledge of Alliegance that they forget that the Pledge ends "with liberty and justice for all"
Your implication that these statements are contradictory is baffling to me, as they seem to echo and substantiate eachother.
...start combatting Islamic fundamentalism/radicalism
I think some clarification might be valuable, lest we talk of opposition to all Muslims.
Fundamentalism, when used to describe religious practice, describes an adherence to the original ideals of the religion without watering down by modern culture. If you believe in the freedom of religious expression, which includes believing there is no God, or we're all gods, or that only science can hold the answers, you should defend the rights of religious, and therefore Islamic fundamentalists.
Islamism is the idea that since Islam is the truth, it should be the foundation for the law and government. This idea is a revolutionary one (in the overthrow the government sense), and the foundation for many Islamic terror groups. Of course not all Islamists are bad people, but they are all quite serious about their beliefs.
It would be much better to understand and remove the causes for these problems...
One of the big problems is the past - what we've done against people and governments, who we supported (often out of an idea of convenience, or a n enemy of your enemy idea). It's just not possible to remove the past. And tackling poverty and lack of education may come accross as colonialism and indoctrination.
And is the idea to help the economy of a goverment we hate, that hurts it's own people and others? To educate people who are trying to devise strategies on how to destroy us?
I understand your desire to help and not harm, but I think the situation is often more complex than just deciding between helping and bombing.
Here's another idea I take issue with:
"it's not just about bombing people into oblivion; it's about encouraging free government with a free flow of information"
The question I have here is why, after over a year, have we still seen none of this come to fruition? Sure, we handed over power [thestar.com], but to an unelected government that we selected. Also, how did we contribute to the free flow of information by banning newspapers? [theage.com.au]
How quickly do you expect a fully democratic government with freedoms very rare in the middle east to spring from the rubble of a war? I understand why an unelected government, and shutting down a newspaper upset you, but I think you need to consider the obstacles in place in Iraq, and the value of caution.
You go on to insist that this was somehow was positive for "most of the civilized world", but offer no rational for that logic.
I'll throw out a few reasons.
-Saddam Hussein violated the resolutions of the UN, which attempted to keep Iraq from being completely destroyed.
-He sponsored palestinian and perhaps other terrorists.
-He tortured and executed huge numbers of people.
so it's Java the beverage and island vs. .NET the URL extension... and perhaps the fish catching tool. Perhaps a more semantic search would be in order to bring this back to only be silly instead of useless.
I live in Queens, NYC and all the libraries are brimming with big LCDs. My tiny local branch has 6, I think.
I was wondering the same thing. I can already run OS X and Linux on my Mac why would I need Solaris?
I really can't picture Sun targetting the majority of Mac OS X users. Maybe the scientific community.
I would suspect that Sun's intent is to impact AIX on IBM PowerPC's platform and not Mac's
Wow... that would be a serious target to attack.
They could also just want to hedge their bets and offer alternatives. There seem to be a lot of things happening with powerpc.
Netcraft's list is just reporting the servers furthest forward, aren't they? You can't tell what app servers or database servers are running, right? So all you're really telling is what Apache et al are running on.
- 8&selm=3CF65A12.9020000%40coldmail.com.invalid ) or search out others.
And Mac OS X is not FreeBSD. Similar? sure. Loosely based on? I'll buy that. But there are some major differences. Take a look at this usenet post (http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF
With Oracle now running on OS X, and the fact that masses of Enterprise Application vendors use Java, that argument is dwindling away--as any enterprise app written using J2EE will run on OS X just fine.
But there are some big differences between Solaris and other big time commercial Unices and *BSDs and Linux on the one side and Mac OS X on the other.
Solaris on Sun hardware has some failover and maintenance jazz that Apple hardware doesn't.
Solaris and the others can be stripped down to bare bones to conserve resources and make the box more secure - I haven't seen this done with Mac OS X.
Mac OS X does things differently. From what I can tell, for example, the default shell is bash and typing vi will get you vim. Now I know the default shell in Linux is usually bash, as well, but many shell scripts that are written for ksh or c shell or something of that sort will behave a little differently in bash, and I'm sure there must be all sorts of nuances I haven't found yet.
No. Terrorists have been very specific about their complaints with the US. It's actually just a couple of long standing US policies and could very easily be changed.
Unfortunately the time machine is in the shop, so changing the past won't be possible for a while yet. Until then perhaps we can just be nice and promise to stop being bad.
And by the way, the 'christians' in the crusades attacked other christians, too. Using the crusades to point out failings of christians only succeeds in pointing out the failings of people. Being christian does not imply perfection - it's a journey. And too many people call themselves christian, but are not at all.