What the heck is wrong with paper anyway? In Canada we've always used paper for elections. I'm all for efficiency, but paper just works and is reliable.
Well thats it I quit. This is one web developer who has serious issues with the greasemonkey idea. You want to build your own tools for my web sites, fine, but seriously don't start sharing them with people who can't figure out whats genuine and whats a plug-in (which is a lot of people by the looks of the greasemonkey demos) , cause next thing you know I've got my boss coming in the door wondering why our client's sites are providing lists of products from their competitors or are breaking on the latest update, etc. I think the web dev community has it tough enough just trying to support multiple browsers. I love Firefox, but I (and I think I speak for a lot of developers out there) am not enthused about greasemonkey.
As a student web developer I must say I'm shocked to read that! Fact is, if your one of those guys who surfs the web with no flash plug-in and javascript disabled your just asking for an unpleasant experience. Despite what most people think, those features are pretty important to an interface designer and the ad community is screwing over the legitimate web dev community all the time by forcing the browser makers to cut javascript functionality.
My final portfolio (what I will be using to get a job) is flash based (it was a requirement) and how exactly can I show off my web projects without launching them in another window? hmm? Maybe I should direct that one to the boys at doubleclick but seriously, I'm tired of spending hours on workarounds for something that the ad community has screwed up. For guys like you I've coupled my flash portfolio with a nice XHTML valid companion site but I do flash and thats all potential employers care about seeing. Thanks doubleclick!
I don't think it's the price point that the manufacturers are after in this case. Any good MBA can see that rebates are a good way to get excellent market research on your product. It's been a challenge in recent years to get this data. In Canada stores use tactics like the HBC Card (like an air miles card) or the Shoppers Optimum Card. Basically its a card that lets you collect points on the things you buy to redeem for free stuff, etc. As everyone knows it's just simply so that manufacturers can see who is buying their product, and that is worth a lot of money to big business.
There is not likely any 'army'. In most cases it's designers following a thick style guide set out by a single head designer or art director.
When I look at a lot of the art put out by MS it's pretty clear that they are suffering from their own size. You can tell that while there may be a style guide it's difficult for them to enforce it across all of their materials and that there is most definitely not a single person approving all materials. (And there should be) In the last year or so I've seen some serious mistakes in the form of large graphic artifacts, color mismatches, and some serious lighting issues on a lot of different MS graphic pieces. The sort of stuff that even a first year graphic design student would pick up right away. In a big company pushing its brand this sort of stuff is a big no no but I think with the global reach of MS and the extra work that comes with it is starting to kill the quality standards in the art.
Odd though, you really don't see this sort of stuff happening with other comparable software companies. And while there are many out there that don't think this sort of stuff is important, trust me, there is a lot more at work in design then making something look pretty.
Any serious web developer knows that while Microsoft's IE is one of the most dominant browsers out there, it has to be the worst for standards compliance. If your a web developer that means your pages function in either IE and nothing else or everything else and not IE. I can't even imagine how much of my time is wasted trying to produce web apps that aren't a compromise just to get them to work in all browsers. It's really limiting. And with Gecko/Netscape based browsers pulling ahead quite a bit in compliance you really have to wonder what the heck the guys at MS are doing... I would have expected a big push for compliance with the whole.NET campaign they are pushing, a lot of it revolves around web app creation, but who wants to create expensive.NET enterprise class web apps is the delivery method isn't standard?
What it's done is limited web developers to compromise after compromise which is really slowing down the evolution of the presentation layer on the web. But that's just my opinion of course.
Is that why I'm seeing hip and trendy ads for hp blade servers during Movie Night in Canada on the CBC? Cause you know, the general public of Canada is all about running out a buying blade servers...
Personally I think Mandrake is one of the best distro's for the beginner and anything that helps them build on that is fine by me. Although personally I wish they would take a more serious look at unifying the look and feel like RedHat or SUSE, but I'm sure that will come with time. I proclaim it conectivadrake! Muha!
Sorry, but hasn't this already been tried? And hasn't it failed miserably? And what ever happend to the msn music store? Wasn't it supposed to crush Apple too? Guess not eh, heck even I could have predicted that one.
Depends. My first mac was an eMac. Mostly because it seemed to fit my budget and I could still afford to jam it with RAM and all the other accessories. To be honest, it's one of the best computers I've ever owned. Hardware interoperability is never an issue and it really makes you feel like you've been missing out in previous years. I think the best part is the community though, It's not like linux where if you have a problem your counting on someone with the same config or distro specific paches to help you through, it's very nice. If you can afford it you can't go wrong with their 'Power' line, although my eMac is a tough bugger too. All the ports and standards you could ask for and industrial design that is really form out of function and not the other way around. I'm not a big mac pusher or anything, I just know when I'm happy with something. Good luck.
Hey, I've got a revolutionary idea! Let's take the phone system and jam it full of broadcast quality television and radio! Then we'll take telecommunications and do something completely crazy, transmit it from towers across the land! MUHAHAHA Nobel prize now please ; )
MPEG, specifically MPEG 4. You would be suprised at the high compression with still pretty decent quality. It will play in quicktime and other players which go across most popular platforms, Windows, Mac, Linux. If you download quicktime from apple (Mac/Windows) you can compress your raw videos into the proper format with that.
On a side note, thanks for considering the rest of us. I know it can be a headache, but nothing drives me more crazy then seeing web sites designed for only one platform, specifically windows. Good luck.
Seriously though, I think we need to get back to tech talk. Your just jealous cause my car goes faster then yours, nah nah. lol, cheers and happy new year.
I agree with the parent of this post. It seems like poor business for MSFT to continue to run a project that does nothing but generate negative issues for the company. But this could explain why IE releases aren't being constantly delivered.
On the issue of dropping IE, I think to any geek, having a browser built into your OS is a nice feature. And one that shows to the end user that Microsoft is capable and willing to cover all bases. I think it remains more of a branding/marketing thing. Users feel comfortable when everything is from one place. Like when you buy a part for your car, you might feel better if that part was from the same company that maufactured your car, even if there was a cheaper competitor part that did the same job.
I've said it before and I'll say it again... I'm all for companies developing their own browsers or even different ways of doing the same thing but please please lets make sure they all follow some guidelines. As a web developer nothing is more time consuming or limiting then trying to make sure your web app performes consistiently across all browsers/platforms. Trust me, with the way things are today I think most web developers praise the idea of one browser squashing them all out, it would make life easier. (Let's just hope that browser is Firefox.)
I'm no apple zealot, but seriously, get her a mac. It will save your life! Issues like viruses, spyware, and the like just aren't a serious issue with macs. Mostly because it's not the most popular system out there. During my summers I would work as a tech for a local government agency, trust me when I say way too much time is spent trying to support Windows as an non-technical end user OS. Don't get me wrong, I think Windows is a very decent OS. But the all-fixing 'lets just do a fresh OS install' just prolongs a problem that is really with educating the end user.
aka Jan Wong. I really love her reporting style. I've written quite a few papers in school based heavily on her excellent coverage on issues within China.
It is nice to see however that she's reporting a somewhat positive message on China, so much of it had been depressing in previous years. I don't think I was the only one to be shocked that Beijing is hosting the Olympics in the near future. Things seem to be slowly turning around for the better. In the words of my college bretherin, I say Giver' China!
Sounds like a Best Buy/Comp USA employee...
on
How Cheap Can A PC Be?
·
· Score: 5, Funny
Ahh yes. Word processing, better get a top of the line box for that. Maybe set up a striped array, dual displays, and a couple of gigs of RAM minimum. Oh and you'll need to buy the latest version of M$ Office, oh and make sure you get the 'professional' version, cause the other versions don't have the advanced features you'll need, like 'undo'. Oh and did I mention there is a manufacturers rebate included in the price, so you'll have to pay $500 at the checkout today but if you fill out the forms immaculately you should get a rebate for the remaining $400 sometime next year. Thanks for shopping with us!
I'm in my last year of study and I'm taking some serious interest in doing my internship with RIM. They are my area's only real big tech company, and I really like the values they've taken up. Just the thought of Microsoft coming in and running the show makes me cringe!
You know BETA is a better standard then VHS right? And that BETA standards are heavily used in the television industry. Turn on your tv right now, chances are what your watching is on beta.
I say, just buy a cheaper phone that sounds good and get a seperate camera. Phone carriers will shift to suit your wants anyway. Competition is tough in the wireless industry;)
This may sound strange to some, but I don't think this web site will do very well at all.
As a UI designer and someone who spends a lot of his time on usability. The MSN store is horrible. It is very hard to navigate and there are design logic mistakes everywhere. But this comes to no suprise. As many of you may have noticed over the last few months images on the microsoft site have been artifacted beyond belief, they need to fire the kid that does their graphics and web UI's; seriously. Like come on, opposing gradients? WTF!?
Anyway, here is my point, the people being targeted on this MSN project are not you and me, it's mom and dad and those out-of-the-techie-loop friends of yours. Which from a designer's perspective require a very SIMPLE UI. Not to mention, these are the people that don't understand the web security stuff or DRM and will drop this fast out of frustration. I predict a major redesign over the next few months, this service will fail simply because people won't be able to find and do what they want.
The Spanish version of Windows used the word Hembra - meaning "woman" in Spain - for choosing gender. But in some Central American republics, notably Nicaragua, the word is an insult meaning "bitch". The programme was changed.
...something tells me Microsoft development teams are made up of more married guys then young grads as the reports claim! lol.
"With the exception of the toy OS Mac OS X, Windows has the lowest TCO...Mac 1 hour to 0day, Windows 3 days to oDay"
Trying hard not to be flamebait here or an ad for apple, but why is Mac OS X considered a toy OS in this report? Seems to me that this report stamped OS X as a viable alternative to windows based networks. Afterall you can have the features of windows, the stability of BSD, and a significantly lower TC'0'. Seems to be the report should be renamed... ; )
I think that so long as the WYSIWYG community keeps implementing these standards into their applications, web developers will follow suit. The latest version of Dreamweaver codes excellent XHTML and almost forces designers/developers to use CSS to incorperate presentation elements out of the box.
For those who code 100% manually XHTML is an easy thing to tackle. The big issue it seems is that, like many web developers out there, I am getting quite sick of the frustration in multiple browser support. While it may be the most popular browser, IE is quite possibly one of the worst for supporting standards. I don't mind Microsoft trying to develop their own web standards so long as they are 'implementable' in other browsers/systems, but that never happens.
I have to say, good for Lindows. They've managed to secure some decent funding for their development while getting a lot of attention. Lets face it, most Linux users are 'in the know' in the IT world. The transition from Lindows to Linspire (or whatever) is *not* going to get people lost. So good for them!
Slashdot Mirror
What the heck is wrong with paper anyway? In Canada we've always used paper for elections. I'm all for efficiency, but paper just works and is reliable.
Well thats it I quit. This is one web developer who has serious issues with the greasemonkey idea. You want to build your own tools for my web sites, fine, but seriously don't start sharing them with people who can't figure out whats genuine and whats a plug-in (which is a lot of people by the looks of the greasemonkey demos) , cause next thing you know I've got my boss coming in the door wondering why our client's sites are providing lists of products from their competitors or are breaking on the latest update, etc. I think the web dev community has it tough enough just trying to support multiple browsers. I love Firefox, but I (and I think I speak for a lot of developers out there) am not enthused about greasemonkey.
On that, would someone take time time and write a nice e-Book on JSP/JavaServlet for WikiBooks? Please! It'll only take a moment ;)
As a student web developer I must say I'm shocked to read that! Fact is, if your one of those guys who surfs the web with no flash plug-in and javascript disabled your just asking for an unpleasant experience. Despite what most people think, those features are pretty important to an interface designer and the ad community is screwing over the legitimate web dev community all the time by forcing the browser makers to cut javascript functionality.
My final portfolio (what I will be using to get a job) is flash based (it was a requirement) and how exactly can I show off my web projects without launching them in another window? hmm? Maybe I should direct that one to the boys at doubleclick but seriously, I'm tired of spending hours on workarounds for something that the ad community has screwed up. For guys like you I've coupled my flash portfolio with a nice XHTML valid companion site but I do flash and thats all potential employers care about seeing. Thanks doubleclick!
I don't think it's the price point that the manufacturers are after in this case. Any good MBA can see that rebates are a good way to get excellent market research on your product. It's been a challenge in recent years to get this data. In Canada stores use tactics like the HBC Card (like an air miles card) or the Shoppers Optimum Card. Basically its a card that lets you collect points on the things you buy to redeem for free stuff, etc. As everyone knows it's just simply so that manufacturers can see who is buying their product, and that is worth a lot of money to big business.
There is not likely any 'army'. In most cases it's designers following a thick style guide set out by a single head designer or art director.
When I look at a lot of the art put out by MS it's pretty clear that they are suffering from their own size. You can tell that while there may be a style guide it's difficult for them to enforce it across all of their materials and that there is most definitely not a single person approving all materials. (And there should be) In the last year or so I've seen some serious mistakes in the form of large graphic artifacts, color mismatches, and some serious lighting issues on a lot of different MS graphic pieces. The sort of stuff that even a first year graphic design student would pick up right away. In a big company pushing its brand this sort of stuff is a big no no but I think with the global reach of MS and the extra work that comes with it is starting to kill the quality standards in the art.
Odd though, you really don't see this sort of stuff happening with other comparable software companies. And while there are many out there that don't think this sort of stuff is important, trust me, there is a lot more at work in design then making something look pretty.
EXACTLY! Like WTF?!!!?
... I would have expected a big push for compliance with the whole .NET campaign they are pushing, a lot of it revolves around web app creation, but who wants to create expensive .NET enterprise class web apps is the delivery method isn't standard?
Any serious web developer knows that while Microsoft's IE is one of the most dominant browsers out there, it has to be the worst for standards compliance. If your a web developer that means your pages function in either IE and nothing else or everything else and not IE. I can't even imagine how much of my time is wasted trying to produce web apps that aren't a compromise just to get them to work in all browsers. It's really limiting. And with Gecko/Netscape based browsers pulling ahead quite a bit in compliance you really have to wonder what the heck the guys at MS are doing
What it's done is limited web developers to compromise after compromise which is really slowing down the evolution of the presentation layer on the web. But that's just my opinion of course.
Business Sense ???
Is that why I'm seeing hip and trendy ads for hp blade servers during Movie Night in Canada on the CBC? Cause you know, the general public of Canada is all about running out a buying blade servers...
Who runs this company?
Personally I think Mandrake is one of the best distro's for the beginner and anything that helps them build on that is fine by me. Although personally I wish they would take a more serious look at unifying the look and feel like RedHat or SUSE, but I'm sure that will come with time. I proclaim it conectivadrake! Muha!
Sorry, but hasn't this already been tried? And hasn't it failed miserably? And what ever happend to the msn music store? Wasn't it supposed to crush Apple too? Guess not eh, heck even I could have predicted that one.
Depends. My first mac was an eMac. Mostly because it seemed to fit my budget and I could still afford to jam it with RAM and all the other accessories. To be honest, it's one of the best computers I've ever owned. Hardware interoperability is never an issue and it really makes you feel like you've been missing out in previous years. I think the best part is the community though, It's not like linux where if you have a problem your counting on someone with the same config or distro specific paches to help you through, it's very nice. If you can afford it you can't go wrong with their 'Power' line, although my eMac is a tough bugger too. All the ports and standards you could ask for and industrial design that is really form out of function and not the other way around. I'm not a big mac pusher or anything, I just know when I'm happy with something. Good luck.
Hey, I've got a revolutionary idea! Let's take the phone system and jam it full of broadcast quality television and radio! Then we'll take telecommunications and do something completely crazy, transmit it from towers across the land! MUHAHAHA Nobel prize now please ; )
MPEG, specifically MPEG 4. You would be suprised at the high compression with still pretty decent quality. It will play in quicktime and other players which go across most popular platforms, Windows, Mac, Linux. If you download quicktime from apple (Mac/Windows) you can compress your raw videos into the proper format with that.
On a side note, thanks for considering the rest of us. I know it can be a headache, but nothing drives me more crazy then seeing web sites designed for only one platform, specifically windows. Good luck.
Seriously though, I think we need to get back to tech talk. Your just jealous cause my car goes faster then yours, nah nah. lol, cheers and happy new year.
I agree with the parent of this post. It seems like poor business for MSFT to continue to run a project that does nothing but generate negative issues for the company. But this could explain why IE releases aren't being constantly delivered.
On the issue of dropping IE, I think to any geek, having a browser built into your OS is a nice feature. And one that shows to the end user that Microsoft is capable and willing to cover all bases. I think it remains more of a branding/marketing thing. Users feel comfortable when everything is from one place. Like when you buy a part for your car, you might feel better if that part was from the same company that maufactured your car, even if there was a cheaper competitor part that did the same job.
I've said it before and I'll say it again... I'm all for companies developing their own browsers or even different ways of doing the same thing but please please lets make sure they all follow some guidelines. As a web developer nothing is more time consuming or limiting then trying to make sure your web app performes consistiently across all browsers/platforms. Trust me, with the way things are today I think most web developers praise the idea of one browser squashing them all out, it would make life easier. (Let's just hope that browser is Firefox.)
I'm no apple zealot, but seriously, get her a mac. It will save your life! Issues like viruses, spyware, and the like just aren't a serious issue with macs. Mostly because it's not the most popular system out there. During my summers I would work as a tech for a local government agency, trust me when I say way too much time is spent trying to support Windows as an non-technical end user OS. Don't get me wrong, I think Windows is a very decent OS. But the all-fixing 'lets just do a fresh OS install' just prolongs a problem that is really with educating the end user.
aka Jan Wong. I really love her reporting style. I've written quite a few papers in school based heavily on her excellent coverage on issues within China. It is nice to see however that she's reporting a somewhat positive message on China, so much of it had been depressing in previous years. I don't think I was the only one to be shocked that Beijing is hosting the Olympics in the near future. Things seem to be slowly turning around for the better. In the words of my college bretherin, I say Giver' China!
Ahh yes. Word processing, better get a top of the line box for that. Maybe set up a striped array, dual displays, and a couple of gigs of RAM minimum. Oh and you'll need to buy the latest version of M$ Office, oh and make sure you get the 'professional' version, cause the other versions don't have the advanced features you'll need, like 'undo'. Oh and did I mention there is a manufacturers rebate included in the price, so you'll have to pay $500 at the checkout today but if you fill out the forms immaculately you should get a rebate for the remaining $400 sometime next year. Thanks for shopping with us!
I'm in my last year of study and I'm taking some serious interest in doing my internship with RIM. They are my area's only real big tech company, and I really like the values they've taken up. Just the thought of Microsoft coming in and running the show makes me cringe!
You know BETA is a better standard then VHS right? And that BETA standards are heavily used in the television industry. Turn on your tv right now, chances are what your watching is on beta.
;)
I say, just buy a cheaper phone that sounds good and get a seperate camera. Phone carriers will shift to suit your wants anyway. Competition is tough in the wireless industry
This may sound strange to some, but I don't think this web site will do very well at all. As a UI designer and someone who spends a lot of his time on usability. The MSN store is horrible. It is very hard to navigate and there are design logic mistakes everywhere.
:o)
But this comes to no suprise. As many of you may have noticed over the last few months images on the microsoft site have been artifacted beyond belief, they need to fire the kid that does their graphics and web UI's; seriously. Like come on, opposing gradients? WTF!?
Anyway, here is my point, the people being targeted on this MSN project are not you and me, it's mom and dad and those out-of-the-techie-loop friends of yours. Which from a designer's perspective require a very SIMPLE UI. Not to mention, these are the people that don't understand the web security stuff or DRM and will drop this fast out of frustration. I predict a major redesign over the next few months, this service will fail simply because people won't be able to find and do what they want.
Rant rant rant....
"With the exception of the toy OS Mac OS X, Windows has the lowest TCO...Mac 1 hour to 0day, Windows 3 days to oDay"
Trying hard not to be flamebait here or an ad for apple, but why is Mac OS X considered a toy OS in this report? Seems to me that this report stamped OS X as a viable alternative to windows based networks. Afterall you can have the features of windows, the stability of BSD, and a significantly lower TC'0'. Seems to be the report should be renamed... ; )
I think that so long as the WYSIWYG community keeps implementing these standards into their applications, web developers will follow suit. The latest version of Dreamweaver codes excellent XHTML and almost forces designers/developers to use CSS to incorperate presentation elements out of the box. For those who code 100% manually XHTML is an easy thing to tackle. The big issue it seems is that, like many web developers out there, I am getting quite sick of the frustration in multiple browser support. While it may be the most popular browser, IE is quite possibly one of the worst for supporting standards. I don't mind Microsoft trying to develop their own web standards so long as they are 'implementable' in other browsers/systems, but that never happens.
I have to say, good for Lindows. They've managed to secure some decent funding for their development while getting a lot of attention. Lets face it, most Linux users are 'in the know' in the IT world. The transition from Lindows to Linspire (or whatever) is *not* going to get people lost. So good for them!