What they're describing what I'd describe as an OLAP 2.0. They're taking similar capabilities (central data store, cubed data) and combining them with user generated content, sharing and the cloud.
The system looks extremely similar to an BI system.
I'd make an counter point to TFA: I actually think that this is probablly Business Objects / Microstrategy / Cognos's biggest dream: the system shows the power that effectively BI can provide an business with data which is effectively shared and public.
Google are making their business case: give vendor lots-of-money and they can gain the capability over your own data, but in an nicely managable manner (so your competitors won't be getting access to it).
This case quite clearly highlights all the advantages of an paper trail.
Dispite a the software part of the IT system, we're capable of finding the true result of the election because we've still got the paper votes.
Result: the voting system works.
Compare and contract this to an system which didn't have paper ballots. It would be almost impossible to even see if there was a problem, let alone be able recover from it. You could possibly see that the numbers were wrong if they'd taken an register of who'd voted, or if they'd counted the number of voters manually. However there'd have been no fallback. No way to recover the votes.
So yeah, this case is an fantastic advert for electronic voting systems which have an paper trail.
Well, you have these 'docking points' on monitor 1. There are 6 IIRC - two to each side and one above/below. When you dock the window into these places, they stay maximised and in the relevent corner.
On the second monitor they're just floating windows. Meaning no maximise = you're left with seeing really big borders = annoying.
Yup, but you can't dock things onto both monitors. Which is a shame, because if you could configure everything with docking and then save the settings per task it'd rock.
Imagine being able to configure the IDE for the following function with full docking:
a) Form design. Form designer with toolbox on one screen. Codebehind with solution explorer and the build/fault box on the other.
b) Object orientated development. Code window on one screen, vertically orientated widescreen, book style. Class and Solution explorer on the second screen, orientated horizontally. Probably space for an webbrowser / documentation there too.
c) Debugging. Debug screens one one screen (code window, console, call stack, watch window) and production code the other (same as most people do in 2005).
If I could define those configurations, save them to the menu and then change at will it'd rock.
Quite correct, of the statistics from http://www.planecrashinfo.com/cause.htm are anything to go by. They list 'pilot error', at 50%, as the biggest single cause. That's followed by 'Mechanical failure' at 22%.
What IS interesting from their statistics is that your choice of airline DOES effect your odds of being killed on a single airline flight:
Top 25 airlines with the best records: 1 in 13.57 million Bottom 25 with the worst records: 1 in 1.13 million
So from that you could reason that they neglect not only the planes (poor maintence, overwork) but also their pilots (overwork, poor training)*.
Flying with the top 25% you're TEN (yes, 10) times less likely to die than flying the botton 25%....
* I'd hazard an guess that a large proportion of the top 25 % are airlines which only do internal or short-haul flights, whilst the bottom specilize in flying very long distances.
It's dynamic, but only in relation to the menu which is maximised. All of the other options are there, you just need to click on them.
Compared to 'dynamic' menus in the old version (i.e. everything greyed out), it's much better. Plus it's right 80% of the time, which means greater productivity 80% of the time at the cost of an extra click 20% of the time.
I really can't understand the hate for Ribbon on slashdot. It all seems to be centered on "but they changed it".
Slashdot is an technology community: we're the people who're either instigating change, or are always putting ourselves on the bleeding edge. We accept the fact that we often have to relearn things, because we then gain the advantages of progress.
Ribbon's a really good example. Once you're used to it, you'll find it so much easier to use than the old system that you'll never want to go back.
For example, take Excel 2007. One of the most common functions in Excel is creation of pretty reports using tables and charts. With Ribbon it's so much easier to create and use tables. The interface is fantastic. Far superiour to the old menuing system. The way that they've build the seperation of symantics and style, an made is easy to use is just fantastic. I mean, you've got an cell in an spreadsheet which contains faulty data.
Like most slashdotters I was suspicious at first. You can't help but be after hearing such bad press. However within a day of actually using it, the benefits were clear.
So, if you've not spent much time with Ribbon, do yourself an favour and spend a day playing with it in Excel or Word. You'll learn to love it, and then you'll never want to go back to the 'old' way.
Shame that I don't have any mod points, as you've wrapped up everything which is wrong with CSS.
It's an real shame, because CSS's boxing model is an beautiful idea. It's just an shame that the 'biggest' implementations are so poor that using 'tables' is often the easier solution.
Rough translation: "Brein will use the guilty judgement against the Pirate Bay operators as a chance to try and convince the government to block Pirate Bay in Netherlands".
The current parliment act as if they're in the pockets of Brein, so I'm not sure why TPB thought it safe to put the servers here.
What we really need is some sort of decentralised torrent client.
Really, Microsoft are obviously the best fit to buy them.
Just like in the days of Windows 3.1, Microsoft need an new OS to replace the old mess they currently have. Back then they nicked NT from IBM. Now they can have Solaris.
They're obviously admirers of Java, given how they've effectively created Java++ (C#). So that's an nice fit. They'd also be buying their way into every single educational institution in the world.
Finally they're well placed to use MySQL as the basis for the next version of Access, giving them a nice up sell to SQL Server.
Sun shining through the Windows. You heard it here first, folks.
A contention ratio of 70-1 is really high. What exactly are you selling your customers?
Most ISPs around my part run on an contention ratio of between 20-1 and 50-1. In practise it sits closer to the 20-1 than the 50-1. At 70-1 I'm not surprised that the pipe's constantly full: it's twice what it should be.
Unless, of course, you're selling an 'lite' package. But as you've got an monopoly, it sounds like you're probably selling an 'lite' package at 'premium' prices.
No Pong. No Space Invaders. No Elite. No Dune 2 (first RTW) No Flashback (first motion capture) No Doom.
All of those are top-30 for their initial and lasting impact, especially Doom. There are loads more too, you could argue that Jet Set Willy, Manic Miner and Zork all had an massive impact upon gaming.
This isn't the most influential games list, it's a favs list from someone born in 1990.
1. It's far more scalable than using Microsoft servers. Microsoft just need to add an new login server to increase capacity. If they were to be 'host' for everything, they'd have to upgrade far sooner. Result would be far more downtime on Live around the holidays.
2. With smart player matching, it can also be much faster. If all players are from the same region, but the servers from Microsoft are in an different region, then there'll be far less lag.
It probably has environmental benefits too: Microsoft'd have to keep lots more servers running 24/7 to provide hosting, whereas now they don't require any more resources (the Xboxes are all on in either situation).
I'm 28, and when I was at school we often had trouble due to lack of money for text books. Yet now there's talk of giving all the kids laptops?
Back then I'd spend my IT lessons playing games (or doing homework), as the teachers were basically clueless about everything.
Spend the money on more teachers, or as some other posters have mentioned invest it in the science lab. Don't buy a load of PCs which'll just be used to waste time on.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes and no.
What they're describing what I'd describe as an OLAP 2.0. They're taking similar capabilities (central data store, cubed data) and combining them with user generated content, sharing and the cloud.
The system looks extremely similar to an BI system.
I'd make an counter point to TFA: I actually think that this is probablly Business Objects / Microstrategy / Cognos's biggest dream: the system shows the power that effectively BI can provide an business with data which is effectively shared and public.
Google are making their business case: give vendor lots-of-money and they can gain the capability over your own data, but in an nicely managable manner (so your competitors won't be getting access to it).
This case quite clearly highlights all the advantages of an paper trail.
Dispite a the software part of the IT system, we're capable of finding the true result of the election because we've still got the paper votes.
Result: the voting system works.
Compare and contract this to an system which didn't have paper ballots. It would be almost impossible to even see if there was a problem, let alone be able recover from it. You could possibly see that the numbers were wrong if they'd taken an register of who'd voted, or if they'd counted the number of voters manually. However there'd have been no fallback. No way to recover the votes.
So yeah, this case is an fantastic advert for electronic voting systems which have an paper trail.
Well, you have these 'docking points' on monitor 1. There are 6 IIRC - two to each side and one above/below. When you dock the window into these places, they stay maximised and in the relevent corner.
On the second monitor they're just floating windows. Meaning no maximise = you're left with seeing really big borders = annoying.
That's on Vista with Aero..
Yup, but you can't dock things onto both monitors. Which is a shame, because if you could configure everything with docking and then save the settings per task it'd rock.
Imagine being able to configure the IDE for the following function with full docking:
a) Form design. Form designer with toolbox on one screen. Codebehind with solution explorer and the build/fault box on the other.
b) Object orientated development. Code window on one screen, vertically orientated widescreen, book style. Class and Solution explorer on the second screen, orientated horizontally. Probably space for an webbrowser / documentation there too.
c) Debugging. Debug screens one one screen (code window, console, call stack, watch window) and production code the other (same as most people do in 2005).
If I could define those configurations, save them to the menu and then change at will it'd rock.
Yes, it is slower. However, being able to put form designer on one monitor and code-view on another makes it all worth while.
Quite correct, of the statistics from http://www.planecrashinfo.com/cause.htm are anything to go by. They list 'pilot error', at 50%, as the biggest single cause. That's followed by 'Mechanical failure' at 22%.
What IS interesting from their statistics is that your choice of airline DOES effect your odds of being killed on a single airline flight:
Top 25 airlines with the best records: 1 in 13.57 million
Bottom 25 with the worst records: 1 in 1.13 million
So from that you could reason that they neglect not only the planes (poor maintence, overwork) but also their pilots (overwork, poor training)*.
Flying with the top 25% you're TEN (yes, 10) times less likely to die than flying the botton 25%....
* I'd hazard an guess that a large proportion of the top 25 % are airlines which only do internal or short-haul flights, whilst the bottom specilize in flying very long distances.
They were the first I heard, and the only one I've been able to see live so far (where they were fantastic).
Sweet, to see one of my fav bands mentioned on Slashdot of all places :-)
It's dynamic, but only in relation to the menu which is maximised. All of the other options are there, you just need to click on them.
Compared to 'dynamic' menus in the old version (i.e. everything greyed out), it's much better. Plus it's right 80% of the time, which means greater productivity 80% of the time at the cost of an extra click 20% of the time.
I really can't understand the hate for Ribbon on slashdot. It all seems to be centered on "but they changed it".
Slashdot is an technology community: we're the people who're either instigating change, or are always putting ourselves on the bleeding edge. We accept the fact that we often have to relearn things, because we then gain the advantages of progress.
Ribbon's a really good example. Once you're used to it, you'll find it so much easier to use than the old system that you'll never want to go back.
For example, take Excel 2007. One of the most common functions in Excel is creation of pretty reports using tables and charts. With Ribbon it's so much easier to create and use tables. The interface is fantastic. Far superiour to the old menuing system. The way that they've build the seperation of symantics and style, an made is easy to use is just fantastic. I mean, you've got an cell in an spreadsheet which contains faulty data.
Like most slashdotters I was suspicious at first. You can't help but be after hearing such bad press. However within a day of actually using it, the benefits were clear.
So, if you've not spent much time with Ribbon, do yourself an favour and spend a day playing with it in Excel or Word. You'll learn to love it, and then you'll never want to go back to the 'old' way.
Depends.
Would you expect MySpace to be safe? Because a lot of infections have come from there..
...and take an stroll to the great big place known as "outside".
There are an whole slew of browser attacks which occur via JavaScript, Flash or Acrobat, and NoScript is extremely effective at stopping these.
That's it's role.
An side effect is that some ads are rendered less obtrusive.
However, for blocking ads, you're best off grabbing Adblock and subscribing to the relevent filterlists.
..are more like Scientologists than an cult....
Democracy's a bit like Wikipedia: the most obsessive win.
Shame that I don't have any mod points, as you've wrapped up everything which is wrong with CSS.
It's an real shame, because CSS's boxing model is an beautiful idea. It's just an shame that the 'biggest' implementations are so poor that using 'tables' is often the easier solution.
Not sure that it was such a good idea moving the servers to Netherlands.
The local RIAA (BREIN), have been pretty successful in having the law 'bent' to their will and having various torrent sites closed down.
Even now they've announced that the want to block the Pirate Bay in Netherlands [link is in dutch]:
http://tweakers.net/nieuws/59677/brein-wil-na-vonnis-the-pirate-bay-in-nederland-laten-blokkeren.html
Rough translation: "Brein will use the guilty judgement against the Pirate Bay operators as a chance to try and convince the government to block Pirate Bay in Netherlands".
The current parliment act as if they're in the pockets of Brein, so I'm not sure why TPB thought it safe to put the servers here.
What we really need is some sort of decentralised torrent client.
That'll be BT's 'traffic management'.
They're also spying on your surfing habits to sell advertising (google Phorm for more details).
Oh, and you pay a premium for the service compared to other ISPs.
Glad I left England, my ISP in Netherlands costs 45 EUR / month for 8mbit down (plus phone service), and you actually get that 90% of the time.
Really, Microsoft are obviously the best fit to buy them.
Just like in the days of Windows 3.1, Microsoft need an new OS to replace the old mess they currently have. Back then they nicked NT from IBM. Now they can have Solaris.
They're obviously admirers of Java, given how they've effectively created Java++ (C#). So that's an nice fit. They'd also be buying their way into every single educational institution in the world.
Finally they're well placed to use MySQL as the basis for the next version of Access, giving them a nice up sell to SQL Server.
Sun shining through the Windows. You heard it here first, folks.
A contention ratio of 70-1 is really high. What exactly are you selling your customers?
Most ISPs around my part run on an contention ratio of between 20-1 and 50-1. In practise it sits closer to the 20-1 than the 50-1. At 70-1 I'm not surprised that the pipe's constantly full: it's twice what it should be.
Unless, of course, you're selling an 'lite' package. But as you've got an monopoly, it sounds like you're probably selling an 'lite' package at 'premium' prices.
No Pong.
No Space Invaders.
No Elite.
No Dune 2 (first RTW)
No Flashback (first motion capture)
No Doom.
All of those are top-30 for their initial and lasting impact, especially Doom. There are loads more too, you could argue that Jet Set Willy, Manic Miner and Zork all had an massive impact upon gaming.
This isn't the most influential games list, it's a favs list from someone born in 1990.
Erm, it has nothing to do with "cheapness".
Hosting in this manner has two advantages:
1. It's far more scalable than using Microsoft servers. Microsoft just need to add an new login server to increase capacity. If they were to be 'host' for everything, they'd have to upgrade far sooner. Result would be far more downtime on Live around the holidays.
2. With smart player matching, it can also be much faster. If all players are from the same region, but the servers from Microsoft are in an different region, then there'll be far less lag.
It probably has environmental benefits too: Microsoft'd have to keep lots more servers running 24/7 to provide hosting, whereas now they don't require any more resources (the Xboxes are all on in either situation).
> it makes the place feel like it is full of anal retentive blow-hards on power trips.
Erm, I think you've found the problem.
Agreed, it's a complete and total waste of money.
I'm 28, and when I was at school we often had trouble due to lack of money for text books. Yet now there's talk of giving all the kids laptops?
Back then I'd spend my IT lessons playing games (or doing homework), as the teachers were basically clueless about everything.
Spend the money on more teachers, or as some other posters have mentioned invest it in the science lab. Don't buy a load of PCs which'll just be used to waste time on.
In Netherlands at least, they already do this.
Yet when I walk into an shop selling light fittings, all I can see is designs based on multiple halogen bulbs.
So I've got two lights which between them use 15 x 40w halogen bulbs! That's 600w of lighting goodness.
So yeah, banning such lights would be an excellent idea.