The only incompatabilities I've spotted are with 9x series products and bits of software which don't use environment variables for things like application data storage. As long as the software acts like it's supposed to have done since Windows 2000 and stores the data in the right place, it works fine as far as I can tell.
Drivers are a bit fuzzy, but quickly improving now companies have had a chance to have a serious run at the final release. Most hardware should be good to go by commercial release.
All that said, OS X wins hands down for polish and usability.
the 9x/ME series were relatively easy to belt about and replace bits. NT/2K/XP/Vista have the 'Windows' part much more closely tied into the basic operation of the system (In place of DOS), so although you can change the GUI and browser (Although completely eradicating IE is nigh on impossible) it is still very much visible as Windows after only a few minutes of use.
But isn't flash media faster to defrag? Since you can quickly belt data around the disk without needing to wait for a head to move, I can see defragging being done 'behind the scenes' a lot more.
Because if the speed limit is red, glowing, surrounded by flashing lights, next to 2 Lane Closed displays and has a matrix above it reading "EXTREME CAUTION MAJOR INCIDENT" then people do tend to pay attention.
Ultrabright LEDs are a better light solution, but not bulb. I have some LED GU10 (Halogen fitting) bulbs with pitiful light output, but I've also seen LED fixtures in the form of large panels with evenly spaced LEDs and a diffuser which are far better for lighting large areas such as bathrooms and kitchens in place of flourescent tubes with diffusers.
I believe you can get them with banks of 4 LEDs, RGB and pure white. Hook up to some architectual lighting control system or DMX and you've got a very versatile solution which can change colour temperature depending on the time of day/year.
Obviously this is in its infancy, but surely this is the 'better light bulb' you mention. Extremely high output per Watt, negligable heat output, insanely long lifetime and flexible lighting. The only issue is the cost, but this will come down with time as CF bulbs did.
Screenshots as Word documents is stupid I agree, but there are serious advantages to the functionality in Office 2003+, especially when paired with SharePoint. It makes it a lot simpler to share documents and link things together, for example making sure everybody attending a meeting has exactly the same versions of the documents, all linked to the calendar entry, even if others have changed them in the meantime.
When working solo it has very little benefit I'll admit, but in larger organisations that kind of functionality is a Godsend.
And yes I'm aware that you can do it with a strange combination of OSS offerings, piping, cron and a few custom scripts, but businesses can't afford a full-time OSS Integration Specialist.
After some prodding and playing with my copy of Vista, some video and audio files (protected and unprotected) and the manual I can say the following holds true for me:
Vista does nothing at all to alter unprotected media, be it on standard hardware or stuff with TPM and HDCP up the wazoo. Nada, zip, zilch. It still runs at the expected quality with no signs of watermarking, bitrate reduction or other nasties. In fact, the file remains totally unchanged. This works even if I move the file between two machines.
The protected media doesn't like playing on a machine which isn't authorised to play it. On a machine authed to play it without HDCP and TPM, it is downsampled from HD to something godawful. On a machine with all the DRM support, it works fine.
Conclusion: Unless you're stupid enough to put DRM on your media, Vista won't tweak with the playback.
Would it not be easier to just expand the content available in iTunes (More TV, and please include the UK as well) and make iTV talk to that instead of a whole new system? The infrastructure is there, and having an always on Mac downloading the latest episodes independently of the iTV will make streaming over a network much faster.
My money is on Apple to become the first company to get the hang of housewide media networks. All they need is for the media producers to realise that they have potential access to a huge market by playing along, because I know damn well that I won't mind paying a couple of dollars and episode to download, keep, and watch whenever I want.
For the love of God - PUBLIC SPACE. Anybody can track you in a public space simply by following you. I'd be more worried about credit cards which can be used to track purchase history.
Well, mostly not. Except for Firefox zealots. And people who refuse to consider anything but Linux. Oh, and don't forget distro wars. Should I be using KDE or Gnome? Vi or Emacs?
Yes. An LCD TV is, for an average sized TV, 2x more energy efficient than a CRT of the same size. This changes for small (32") sizes due to the different ways that power is utilised, in that LCD consumption per unit area is virtually constant whereas CRT consumption decreases slightly per unit area the more area there is of the screen.
Oh, and LCD gives you a true visible area as well. Don't forget to take that into account.
The trouble is, although your package manager can get you some maths software pretty damn easily finding out exactly which package does what you want can be more of a pain with Linux than Windows. How it functions (Menus etc) is also more likely to be different to the OS than under Windows or OS X because the coder thought "That's a good UI idea!" rather than "How does everything else do this?".
A 'maths' distro may have 10, 20, 30+ different maths applications which accept input in different formats, have the same switch do different things... in which case the user would be better off with something specifically designed for usability than something designed for flexibility. I'm no expert on different distros, but I think this question is extremely open even with the specifics.
That's easy. You need to leverage the new digital paradigm offered to us by Web 2.0 and the Semantic Web to effectively harness and integrate user-generated and user-driven content in a dynamic framework accessable over a simple user-oriented interface via a wireless broadband multiplexed link. Fool.
Trouble is, the other emo teenagers think red on blue is showing some deep internal conflict and they must all rally round their partner-in-emoness immediately by adding them to their friends list.
What amazes me even more than the emo kids is art students and graphic designers who have MySpace profiles with no sense of colour balance, contrast, tone, typefaces... if I can manage to get it non-painful without expert tuition how can the designers of the future with months of tuition not?
Under your ID page (With your photo, name etc) is all the information in a machine readable format, full of >>>>>>>. If all the RFID chip does is broadcast the same info, and the machine must read the code first, what's the point? US Customs already has my fingerprints and face map on record and linked to my passport number, so it can't be used for biometrics. I see no use in RFID in passports at the present time.
However, there may come a time when you simply stand on a spot, look a scanner in the 'eye' and it does face mapping and retina scans. In this case, I can see the logic in making you 'flash' your passport at the reader so it can grab the info (Or at least a unique key to do a DB lookup if we've got to that stage).
I'm all for automating border processing, and well designed machines cock up a lot less frequently than humans. My only worry is it seems to be US and UK politicians driving this digital ID revolution, instead of people with actual experience in security and data handling. Hell, I could design a better system than the current UK ID card scheme and I've not even got as far as university.
The ToughBooks I've used on sites before now take a serious beating. Drops off scaffolds, falls to concrete (corner and flat, open and not), kicks, and at least one which had a pile of bricks dropped onto it (Left a nice gouge in the shell, but worked perfectly). If the laptop is running or not makes no difference.
Microsoft initially supported FAT16, then FAT32 in the 9x/ME series from 98 onwards. NT/2000/XP/Vista default to NTFS but have had the option for FAT16 or FAT32 partitions.
Now I've got that minor issue out of the way, for most home users what difference does having 3 filesystems make? For servers NTFS is solid (No, really) and if you absolutely need your server to do something which relies on a different filesystem, or even has the option to use one to gain a tiny performance increase, you won't be running Windows Server anyway.
I'm quite a heavy Outlook user, and 2k7 does feel a lot snappier. I don't know if it's down to an upgrade in the pst format or if it's a real improvement in the code, but it certainly seems more responsive than 2k3.
In that case I really would like to know what's running on this machine next to me. It sure as hell doesn't say CTP, Beta or RC. Could it be Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate Edition, the same fully released version which has been available to volume licence customers and MSDN subscribers for a couple of weeks now? I believe it could!
The OS *has* been released. I agree it isn't as polished as a release should be, and it has more than its share of issues, but the fact remains it has been released.
Finally, does the US financial year actually rotate around January 1st?
Number plates are quite frequently scanned to check for speeding. If you are caught speeding, you get a letter saying where you were when caught speeding. How do you think that works?
I don't believe so, as anyone can run a WUS server which keeps a local copy of updates for other machines on the domain to install. I've not read anything on the auth mechanisms used, but that doesn't mean there isn't something out there.
This is what I'm waiting for before I switch to a Mac. I *need* (Not just would like, actually need) a PDA or Smartphone which can sync with all my mail, calendar and contact apps. An iPhone which does this is a fair substitute, providing it has a keyboard or good touchscreen interface. I trust Apple to get it right more than MS, I'm still having trouble with Sync Centre on Vista.
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The only incompatabilities I've spotted are with 9x series products and bits of software which don't use environment variables for things like application data storage. As long as the software acts like it's supposed to have done since Windows 2000 and stores the data in the right place, it works fine as far as I can tell.
Drivers are a bit fuzzy, but quickly improving now companies have had a chance to have a serious run at the final release. Most hardware should be good to go by commercial release.
All that said, OS X wins hands down for polish and usability.
Depends on the version of windows.
the 9x/ME series were relatively easy to belt about and replace bits. NT/2K/XP/Vista have the 'Windows' part much more closely tied into the basic operation of the system (In place of DOS), so although you can change the GUI and browser (Although completely eradicating IE is nigh on impossible) it is still very much visible as Windows after only a few minutes of use.
But isn't flash media faster to defrag? Since you can quickly belt data around the disk without needing to wait for a head to move, I can see defragging being done 'behind the scenes' a lot more.
Because if the speed limit is red, glowing, surrounded by flashing lights, next to 2 Lane Closed displays and has a matrix above it reading "EXTREME CAUTION MAJOR INCIDENT" then people do tend to pay attention.
Ultrabright LEDs are a better light solution, but not bulb. I have some LED GU10 (Halogen fitting) bulbs with pitiful light output, but I've also seen LED fixtures in the form of large panels with evenly spaced LEDs and a diffuser which are far better for lighting large areas such as bathrooms and kitchens in place of flourescent tubes with diffusers.
I believe you can get them with banks of 4 LEDs, RGB and pure white. Hook up to some architectual lighting control system or DMX and you've got a very versatile solution which can change colour temperature depending on the time of day/year.
Obviously this is in its infancy, but surely this is the 'better light bulb' you mention. Extremely high output per Watt, negligable heat output, insanely long lifetime and flexible lighting. The only issue is the cost, but this will come down with time as CF bulbs did.
Screenshots as Word documents is stupid I agree, but there are serious advantages to the functionality in Office 2003+, especially when paired with SharePoint. It makes it a lot simpler to share documents and link things together, for example making sure everybody attending a meeting has exactly the same versions of the documents, all linked to the calendar entry, even if others have changed them in the meantime.
When working solo it has very little benefit I'll admit, but in larger organisations that kind of functionality is a Godsend.
And yes I'm aware that you can do it with a strange combination of OSS offerings, piping, cron and a few custom scripts, but businesses can't afford a full-time OSS Integration Specialist.
After some prodding and playing with my copy of Vista, some video and audio files (protected and unprotected) and the manual I can say the following holds true for me:
Vista does nothing at all to alter unprotected media, be it on standard hardware or stuff with TPM and HDCP up the wazoo. Nada, zip, zilch. It still runs at the expected quality with no signs of watermarking, bitrate reduction or other nasties. In fact, the file remains totally unchanged. This works even if I move the file between two machines.
The protected media doesn't like playing on a machine which isn't authorised to play it. On a machine authed to play it without HDCP and TPM, it is downsampled from HD to something godawful. On a machine with all the DRM support, it works fine.
Conclusion: Unless you're stupid enough to put DRM on your media, Vista won't tweak with the playback.
I hope it does a better bloody job of syncing than Windows Mobile and Vista.
Would it not be easier to just expand the content available in iTunes (More TV, and please include the UK as well) and make iTV talk to that instead of a whole new system? The infrastructure is there, and having an always on Mac downloading the latest episodes independently of the iTV will make streaming over a network much faster.
My money is on Apple to become the first company to get the hang of housewide media networks. All they need is for the media producers to realise that they have potential access to a huge market by playing along, because I know damn well that I won't mind paying a couple of dollars and episode to download, keep, and watch whenever I want.
For the love of God - PUBLIC SPACE. Anybody can track you in a public space simply by following you. I'd be more worried about credit cards which can be used to track purchase history.
Well, mostly not. Except for Firefox zealots. And people who refuse to consider anything but Linux. Oh, and don't forget distro wars. Should I be using KDE or Gnome? Vi or Emacs?
Interesting? Come on mods, this one is funny.
Microsoft Works doesn't?
Yes. An LCD TV is, for an average sized TV, 2x more energy efficient than a CRT of the same size. This changes for small (32") sizes due to the different ways that power is utilised, in that LCD consumption per unit area is virtually constant whereas CRT consumption decreases slightly per unit area the more area there is of the screen.
Oh, and LCD gives you a true visible area as well. Don't forget to take that into account.
The trouble is, although your package manager can get you some maths software pretty damn easily finding out exactly which package does what you want can be more of a pain with Linux than Windows. How it functions (Menus etc) is also more likely to be different to the OS than under Windows or OS X because the coder thought "That's a good UI idea!" rather than "How does everything else do this?".
A 'maths' distro may have 10, 20, 30+ different maths applications which accept input in different formats, have the same switch do different things... in which case the user would be better off with something specifically designed for usability than something designed for flexibility. I'm no expert on different distros, but I think this question is extremely open even with the specifics.
That's easy. You need to leverage the new digital paradigm offered to us by Web 2.0 and the Semantic Web to effectively harness and integrate user-generated and user-driven content in a dynamic framework accessable over a simple user-oriented interface via a wireless broadband multiplexed link. Fool.
Trouble is, the other emo teenagers think red on blue is showing some deep internal conflict and they must all rally round their partner-in-emoness immediately by adding them to their friends list.
What amazes me even more than the emo kids is art students and graphic designers who have MySpace profiles with no sense of colour balance, contrast, tone, typefaces... if I can manage to get it non-painful without expert tuition how can the designers of the future with months of tuition not?
Under your ID page (With your photo, name etc) is all the information in a machine readable format, full of >>>>>>>. If all the RFID chip does is broadcast the same info, and the machine must read the code first, what's the point? US Customs already has my fingerprints and face map on record and linked to my passport number, so it can't be used for biometrics. I see no use in RFID in passports at the present time.
However, there may come a time when you simply stand on a spot, look a scanner in the 'eye' and it does face mapping and retina scans. In this case, I can see the logic in making you 'flash' your passport at the reader so it can grab the info (Or at least a unique key to do a DB lookup if we've got to that stage).
I'm all for automating border processing, and well designed machines cock up a lot less frequently than humans. My only worry is it seems to be US and UK politicians driving this digital ID revolution, instead of people with actual experience in security and data handling. Hell, I could design a better system than the current UK ID card scheme and I've not even got as far as university.
The ToughBooks I've used on sites before now take a serious beating. Drops off scaffolds, falls to concrete (corner and flat, open and not), kicks, and at least one which had a pile of bricks dropped onto it (Left a nice gouge in the shell, but worked perfectly). If the laptop is running or not makes no difference.
You mean like NTFS?
Microsoft initially supported FAT16, then FAT32 in the 9x/ME series from 98 onwards. NT/2000/XP/Vista default to NTFS but have had the option for FAT16 or FAT32 partitions.
Now I've got that minor issue out of the way, for most home users what difference does having 3 filesystems make? For servers NTFS is solid (No, really) and if you absolutely need your server to do something which relies on a different filesystem, or even has the option to use one to gain a tiny performance increase, you won't be running Windows Server anyway.
If anybody want to hold me at gunpoint then provide me with a taylor made suit, I'm fine with that.
I'm quite a heavy Outlook user, and 2k7 does feel a lot snappier. I don't know if it's down to an upgrade in the pst format or if it's a real improvement in the code, but it certainly seems more responsive than 2k3.
That and the new colour categories are nice.
In that case I really would like to know what's running on this machine next to me. It sure as hell doesn't say CTP, Beta or RC. Could it be Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate Edition, the same fully released version which has been available to volume licence customers and MSDN subscribers for a couple of weeks now? I believe it could!
The OS *has* been released. I agree it isn't as polished as a release should be, and it has more than its share of issues, but the fact remains it has been released.
Finally, does the US financial year actually rotate around January 1st?
Ever tried driving round the UK?
Number plates are quite frequently scanned to check for speeding. If you are caught speeding, you get a letter saying where you were when caught speeding. How do you think that works?
I don't believe so, as anyone can run a WUS server which keeps a local copy of updates for other machines on the domain to install. I've not read anything on the auth mechanisms used, but that doesn't mean there isn't something out there.
This is what I'm waiting for before I switch to a Mac. I *need* (Not just would like, actually need) a PDA or Smartphone which can sync with all my mail, calendar and contact apps. An iPhone which does this is a fair substitute, providing it has a keyboard or good touchscreen interface. I trust Apple to get it right more than MS, I'm still having trouble with Sync Centre on Vista.