In a big organization, sometimes it is really hard to get past the initial expectation/distaste people have after having had to deal with incompetent support staff/programmers/whatever holding "paper" certs and one year quickie "degrees".
Half our problem as IT workers is the incredible amounts of scholatic "SPAM" the tech bubble engendered.
Example?
I got handed a new hire for my last project. He didn't know the difference between stack and heap, signed and unsigned or how pointers worked. Not only was he useless to me as a programmer - a drain on my time, but frequently, and loudly exclaimed that he had graduated with "HONOURS". That he was an "engineer!". and FFS, this guy graduated from my ALMA MATER. The last three hires have been from different schools but not much better..
that is why we don't automatically get respect. Too many of us don't deserve it.
>> People dont search for a word like"mesothelioma" just for fun, so its very likely to get "useful" hits.
Bingo. You got it right. other than the 50000 slashdot readers that just googled for "mesothelioma", NO ONE looks for it unless they or someone they know is suffering from it. This makes the targeted ads for "mesothelioma" have a higher clickthrough rate (CTR) and a higher conversion rate as well.
It is a high paying word because the advertisers make money from the traffic.
That does change though - when a word pays too well, people try to get the ads to appear by placing junk content on "mesothelioma" on a page with adsense....and this sends junk traffic to the advertisers, resulting in a lower CTR and poor conversion. Then the price goes down.
>> Non IT people just don't understand why code isn't written correctly the first time.
In the same vein, some of them can't tell the difference between a work in progress and the finished product. Ever have some PHB ask to "see what it looks like", call it finished and assign you to the next project? I try to keep the UI butt ugly right to the end for this reason. If they see controls that aren't scaled or HTML without the css, they "know" it isn't done yet...
good luck getting resources for that, or management with the the backbone and understanding required to make good practices work.
Do you want LAN access where I work? At any mega corp? Just get a job as a night cleaner and start turning keyboards over. The number of post it notes you find will be impressive. Some of the accounts will have admin rights too...
Yeah. I so don't get this. If it was an actual space flight I might understand.
1. Empty your bank account - this ain't gonna be cheap.
2. Get fired up to an arbitrary height like so much luggage.
3. ????
4. Proudly tell the world "I'm an astronaut!"
5. No profit step, sorry. (see #1)
No sh*t. If you're a web developer and you really need to channel content types, do it after parsing HTTP_ACCEPT not HTTP_USER_AGENT.
They are both part of the request header and can be used much more accurately to sniff browser capabilities. Even if someone has changed their UA string to googlebot or lynx or whatever, the content-types are still present in the HTTP_ACCEPT string...
It's just lazy coding IMHO.
Re:WTF?!? Did MSNBC just buy /.?
on
Apple Easter Egg
·
· Score: 2, Funny
>> If this Easter Egg was discovered so many years ago, then how come the news is only appearing on Slashdot now?
Don't worry, It'll get posted twice to make up for the delay...
>> Never dare someone to do stuff like this, it is just too tempting of a target.
I don't know if "dare" is a strong enough word
from the contest page:
>>... safe from intimidating software geniuses like you, we expect to be completely overrun with virus infections within mere days of announcing the contest. So, get started early! Go for it! Here's your chance to be a star!</SNIP>
Pride goeth and all that. Still they might get enough free advertising to make it worthwhile...
>> WARNING! Pez Mp3 player is not recomended for use by children under the age of 10...
Yeah, A lot of things aren't recommended for children under 10. It seems to be their job to find and (if possible) destroy such things. IMHO, buying an MP3 player that looks like candy is just begging for it.
Slashdot Mirror
>> That's pretty good. Does anyone else know of a fast booting OS? I personally hate waiting for my PC to boot up.
Most of the time my "boot up" is waiting 3 seconds for the monitor to warm up. I don't shut of the PC, just the monitor.
If you want a fast boot time, run linux and leave it running...
>> On every mile marker sign on the highway?
that's the only problem I have with this really. It would be so easy to turn into a cash cow
Imagine this for a minute:
An RFID tag in your car gets read at mile-marker 100.
It gets read again at mile-marker 101 57 seconds later.
elapsed time against known distance==speeding ticket in the mail...
>> Thankfully, if Adobe wants to, they could change their Acrobat license agreement to ban this sort of crap.
I'm thinking that won't happen.
Have you forgotten this unfortunate Russian gentleman already? Sure, they dropped the charges, but...
Does Cowboyneal hate these guys or what?
I clicked the DS Linux link, and the first thing I read is:
Server Problems (Started at March 8 2005, 05:56 PM)
We are currently experiencing server difficulties, please remain calm as they are being resolved.
I'm guessing a sick server won't handle slashdotting very well...
"The exponential loss of readership due to posting crappy April Fool's day stories"
Helping Bill Gates with his first Gentoo install..
>> 1. Earn respect. Know your stuff,
In a big organization, sometimes it is really hard to get past the initial expectation/distaste people have after having had to deal with incompetent support staff/programmers/whatever holding "paper" certs and one year quickie "degrees".
Half our problem as IT workers is the incredible amounts of scholatic "SPAM" the tech bubble engendered.
Example?
I got handed a new hire for my last project. He didn't know the difference between stack and heap, signed and unsigned or how pointers worked. Not only was he useless to me as a programmer - a drain on my time, but frequently, and loudly exclaimed that he had graduated with "HONOURS". That he was an "engineer!". and FFS, this guy graduated from my ALMA MATER. The last three hires have been from different schools but not much better..
that is why we don't automatically get respect. Too many of us don't deserve it.
>> People dont search for a word like"mesothelioma" just for fun, so its very likely to get "useful" hits.
..and this sends junk traffic to the advertisers, resulting in a lower CTR and poor conversion. Then the price goes down.
Bingo. You got it right. other than the 50000 slashdot readers that just googled for "mesothelioma", NO ONE looks for it unless they or someone they know is suffering from it. This makes the targeted ads for "mesothelioma" have a higher clickthrough rate (CTR) and a higher conversion rate as well.
It is a high paying word because the advertisers make money from the traffic.
That does change though - when a word pays too well, people try to get the ads to appear by placing junk content on "mesothelioma" on a page with adsense..
>> Non IT people just don't understand why code isn't written correctly the first time.
...much easier than explaining the SDLC.
In the same vein, some of them can't tell the difference between a work in progress and the finished product. Ever have some PHB ask to "see what it looks like", call it finished and assign you to the next project? I try to keep the UI butt ugly right to the end for this reason. If they see controls that aren't scaled or HTML without the css, they "know" it isn't done yet...
>> Canada would be one of the first countires to be umm annexed.
Parent has it all wrong.
>> How would cycling help?
Perhaps he doesn't think dynamic IPs are logged by his ISP.
I would expect they are logged and I bet they are dumped to tape when logs are purged.
Nothing much is anonymous on the IntarWeb...
>> how about getting the system back together again? Did you see what he had at the end of the article? A pile of parts.
I kind of saw that coming when he wrote on page three:
I wasn't sure at first where to start, but eventually trusted my gut instinct and went with the brute force method.
heh. good choice. always go with brute force. especially when dealing with electronics....
>> how about in an ordinary wall plate?
that is even better. If anyone did look at it, their only concern would be "is this drop live?". that's perfect.
"Hey baby, I've got the world's smallest cluster."
Worst. Pickup. Line. Ever.
>>>> Package it in a metal case with RJ-45 at *both* ends and flash a minimal Linux+FW into it.
>> I smell best damn firewall ever.
better yet, stick it in a cheap beige plastic case.
It would look just like a crossover or cable extender and no one would pay it any attention...
8 MB holds a lot of passwords....
>> from Sweden a couple of years ago. He had locked his (most common) 3-digit combo lock
Is there a number shortage in Sweden or what? Three digits seems kind of like... why bother?
>> training for users
good luck getting resources for that, or management with the the backbone and understanding required to make good practices work.
Do you want LAN access where I work? At any mega corp? Just get a job as a night cleaner and start turning keyboards over. The number of post it notes you find will be impressive. Some of the accounts will have admin rights too...
Yeah. I so don't get this. If it was an actual space flight I might understand.
1. Empty your bank account - this ain't gonna be cheap.
2. Get fired up to an arbitrary height like so much luggage.
3. ????
4. Proudly tell the world "I'm an astronaut!"
5. No profit step, sorry. (see #1)
>> Phase 6: The press briefing explaining why they missed.
Let me guess: Flight plan designed in Metric, executed in Imperial Measure.
>> six years later, that no longer cuts it.
No sh*t. If you're a web developer and you really need to channel content types, do it after parsing HTTP_ACCEPT not HTTP_USER_AGENT.
They are both part of the request header and can be used much more accurately to sniff browser capabilities. Even if someone has changed their UA string to googlebot or lynx or whatever, the content-types are still present in the HTTP_ACCEPT string...
It's just lazy coding IMHO.
>> If this Easter Egg was discovered so many years ago, then how come the news is only appearing on Slashdot now?
Don't worry, It'll get posted twice to make up for the delay...
>> "In Longhorn, applications will launch and load files 15 percent faster than with Windows XP."
That's just excellent. Exactly what I'll need to run Duke-nukem Forever. Maybe they'll both release at the same time.
>> Never dare someone to do stuff like this, it is just too tempting of a target.
... safe from intimidating software geniuses like you, we expect to be completely overrun with virus infections within mere days of announcing the contest. So, get started early! Go for it! Here's your chance to be a star!</SNIP>
I don't know if "dare" is a strong enough word
from the contest page:
>>
Pride goeth and all that. Still they might get enough free advertising to make it worthwhile...
>> WARNING! Pez Mp3 player is not recomended for use by children under the age of 10...
Yeah, A lot of things aren't recommended for children under 10. It seems to be their job to find and (if possible) destroy such things. IMHO, buying an MP3 player that looks like candy is just begging for it.