It's funny what has cycled through this category over the years: First, we had our staff reduced and outsourced to contractors. Second, we optimized our equipment to take up less space, electricity, and heating cost. Third, we merged our licenses and maintenance to enterprise contracts. Fourth, we went open-source and cut off certain high-priced vendors. Fifth, our help-desk became voicemail, auto-respond, and Indian. Now we're laying off the contractors and bringing the IT work all in-house again. Why do I think that someday a pile of transistors will be doing my job?
Consistency is a valid goal in (almost) anything. B ecause if you're not consisten t then usability is affec ted and people won't even rea d this f a r, I believe
I've always "tuned" my systems.
In windows, this means setting certain services to "disabled", removing useless programs from the Startup, and checking a few registry keys.
Very handy link - blackviper
When I first heard of the OS/2 Warp campaign, I thought they said "Whorf." "Great", I thought, "an OS for the Klingon Warrior in all of us. We nerds shall snap it up!"
You realize of course, that the moment any Iraqi government feels it can protect itself, it's going to ask us to leave and never come back - and then will be bitterly opposed to the US in perpetuity?
If not, then the Iraqi populace would tear them to pieces...
Re:Not particularly difficult....
on
The Know-It-All
·
· Score: 1
When I was even much younger than you whelps, I decided to read 3 books a day - sometimes more. My total books read now exceed 20,000 - some folks say it has done nothing more than made me an extremely annoying person.
But - I have also traveled widely, taken a few dozen odd jobs, spent eight years as an artist, twenty years in IT, and am a proud father. I enjoy helping people, and the vast knowledge available in books has helped me in this.
Of course, sometimes I refer to myself as a "vast land mine of useless information."
Michael Stonebraker is well-known in the database business, and for good reasons. He was the computer science professor behind Ingres and Postgres. Eighteen months ago, he started a new company, StreamBase, with another computer science professor, Stan Zdonik, with the goal of speeding access to relational databases. In "Data On The Fly," Forbes.com reports that the company software, also named StreamBase, is reading TCP/IP streams and using asynchronous messaging. Streaming data without storing it on disk as are doing other relational database software gives them a tremendous speed advantage. The company claims it can process 140,000 messages per second on a $1,500 PC, when its competitors can only deal with 900 messages per second. Too good to be true? Read more...
Here are some excerpts from the Forbes article.
"Relational databases are one to two orders of magnitude too slow," says Stonebraker, who is chief technology officer at Streambase, a 25-person outfit based in Lexington, Mass. "Big customers have already tried to use relational databases for streaming data and dismissed them. Those products are non-starters in this market." In a recent pilot program, Streambase was able to analyze 140,000 messages per second, while a leading relational database -- Stonebraker won't say which one -- could handle only 900 messages per second. Streambase has 12 customers now testing its software, all of them financial services companies that need to analyze rapid-fire ticker feeds and other streaming data. Unlike traditional database programs, Streambase analyzes data without storing it to disk, performing queries on data as it flows. Traditional systems bog down because they first store data on hard drives or in main memory and then query it, Stonebraker says. The software, which should be commercially available next month, runs on Linux and Solaris, but a Microsoft version should be available soon.
The database business is not a cheap one. So how much this new company will charge for a -- largely -- unproven software?
Streambase charges customers annual subscriptions for its software, setting prices based on how many CPUs a customer uses to power the software. Typical deals so far have ranged from $100,000 to $300,000 a year, says Barry Morris, Streambase's chief executive. In "StreamBase eyes real-time streaming apps," InfoWorld wrote the prices shoud be lower.
The software is available via a subscription model, with pricing in the range of approximately $50,000 per year, Stonebraker said. Subscriptions are sold on a per-CPU basis. Who will be the customers for these speedy accesses to their databases? Let's come back to Forbes.com.
For now Streambase is focusing attention on financial services companies, which hope to do things like track how well traders are performing on a real-time basis, rather than aggregating trades at the end of the day and analyzing them overnight. A bigger opportunity involves processing real-time data feeds generated by sensor networks and RFID tags. A military contractor wants to use Streambase to keep track of soldiers and vehicles in the battlefield. A casino in Las Vegas is considering using Streambase to track the performance of individual gamblers. In an interview with InfoWorld, Stonebraker gave more details about military applications.
We did a prototype that dealt with army battalion monitoring. When an army battalion is 30,000 humans and 12,000 vehicles, the army is deadly serious about getting a vital signs monitor on every one of the humans so they can do combat medical triage or [take other actions]. They already have a GPS system in every vehicle, but that didn't keep Jennifer Lynch's convoy from getting lost. They want to turn this into a system to watch the position of every vehicle and compare it against where you're supposed to be. They also want to put a sensor on the gun turret. Together with position, that allows you to detect crossfire
Slashdot Mirror
Need I count on my twelve fingers the many reasons this will not fly?
Also, the whole tone of the submission seems pejorative.
>One bidder contacts you and tells you he really needs the item you're auctioning...
I didn't stop the auction.
But I checked out his story and sent him another one at cost.
It's called humanity.
"a $27,000+ DVD jukebox"
Betcha cain't rest your beer on it and cry about yer lost love...
Gotta have Dolly parton onit...
It's finally time to replace that obsolescent breep-breep ringing noise on the handsets with the throaty screech of Godzilla.
*Press One to Download Drivers*
Beeep
*Press Two to sync device with server*
Meeep
*Look up to avoid crashing into large truck*
Yaaaaaaagggh!
*crunch*
Alan Turing, meet Gomez Addams..
SBC and Microsoft working together to send us our TeeVee signal?
Why do I envision a mutant version of WebTV?
*Shudder*
I would swallow carpet tacks than accept service from this flatulent combine of corporations...
It's funny what has cycled through this category over the years:
First, we had our staff reduced and outsourced to contractors.
Second, we optimized our equipment to take up less space, electricity, and heating cost.
Third, we merged our licenses and maintenance to enterprise contracts.
Fourth, we went open-source and cut off certain high-priced vendors.
Fifth, our help-desk became voicemail, auto-respond, and Indian.
Now we're laying off the contractors and bringing the IT work all in-house again.
Why do I think that someday a pile of transistors will be doing my job?
It's OK for football teams, canned ham spread, and vacuum cleaners, but not for an operating system?
Consistency is a valid goal in (almost) anything.
B ecause if you're not consisten
t then usability is affec ted
and people won't
even
rea d this
f
a
r, I believe
>I'm free to say "you're fucked", but if I act on it, that's naughty.
...or corporate...
Sounds like the world's oldest profession has a lot in common with printer cartridges.
;)
I mean wine and beer-making, of course.
a giant chunk of "Netizens" ... switching to Firefox all at once...
And Bill Gates would halt in his tracks, breathing sibilantly, and say, "I sense a great disturbance in the force..."
Happiness is a warm pole...
The unholy combination of IE and AOL made pretty? ...it always puzzled me why they bought Netscape and never made it their browser...
The time to worry is when this cycle suspends atypically, causing a dependent issue.
I've always "tuned" my systems. In windows, this means setting certain services to "disabled", removing useless programs from the Startup, and checking a few registry keys. Very handy link - blackviper
Not being a Mac person myself (although I am eyeing the Mini as a starter) I ask:
are there AppleScript security vulnerabilites?
When I first heard of the OS/2 Warp campaign, I thought they said "Whorf." "Great", I thought, "an OS for the Klingon Warrior in all of us. We nerds shall snap it up!"
Then I saw the box... and knew it was doomed.
There's a word for people like you - Saint.
Long may your tribe increase.
Clap.
Clap.
Clap.
*Cough*
You realize of course, that the moment any Iraqi government feels it can protect itself, it's going to ask us to leave and never come back - and then will be bitterly opposed to the US in perpetuity?
If not, then the Iraqi populace would tear them to pieces...
...and I wrote her a poem...
3.14159
Won't you be my Valentine?
When I was even much younger than you whelps, I decided to read 3 books a day - sometimes more. My total books read now exceed 20,000 - some folks say it has done nothing more than made me an extremely annoying person.
But - I have also traveled widely, taken a few dozen odd jobs, spent eight years as an artist, twenty years in IT, and am a proud father. I enjoy helping people, and the vast knowledge available in books has helped me in this.
Of course, sometimes I refer to myself as a "vast land mine of useless information."
The Synopsis:
Streaming a Database in Real Time
Michael Stonebraker is well-known in the database business, and for good reasons. He was the computer science professor behind Ingres and Postgres. Eighteen months ago, he started a new company, StreamBase, with another computer science professor, Stan Zdonik, with the goal of speeding access to relational databases. In "Data On The Fly," Forbes.com reports that the company software, also named StreamBase, is reading TCP/IP streams and using asynchronous messaging. Streaming data without storing it on disk as are doing other relational database software gives them a tremendous speed advantage. The company claims it can process 140,000 messages per second on a $1,500 PC, when its competitors can only deal with 900 messages per second. Too good to be true? Read more...
Here are some excerpts from the Forbes article.
"Relational databases are one to two orders of magnitude too slow," says Stonebraker, who is chief technology officer at Streambase, a 25-person outfit based in Lexington, Mass. "Big customers have already tried to use relational databases for streaming data and dismissed them. Those products are non-starters in this market."
In a recent pilot program, Streambase was able to analyze 140,000 messages per second, while a leading relational database -- Stonebraker won't say which one -- could handle only 900 messages per second. Streambase has 12 customers now testing its software, all of them financial services companies that need to analyze rapid-fire ticker feeds and other streaming data.
Unlike traditional database programs, Streambase analyzes data without storing it to disk, performing queries on data as it flows. Traditional systems bog down because they first store data on hard drives or in main memory and then query it, Stonebraker says.
The software, which should be commercially available next month, runs on Linux and Solaris, but a Microsoft version should be available soon.
The database business is not a cheap one. So how much this new company will charge for a -- largely -- unproven software?
Streambase charges customers annual subscriptions for its software, setting prices based on how many CPUs a customer uses to power the software. Typical deals so far have ranged from $100,000 to $300,000 a year, says Barry Morris, Streambase's chief executive.
In "StreamBase eyes real-time streaming apps," InfoWorld wrote the prices shoud be lower.
The software is available via a subscription model, with pricing in the range of approximately $50,000 per year, Stonebraker said. Subscriptions are sold on a per-CPU basis.
Who will be the customers for these speedy accesses to their databases? Let's come back to Forbes.com.
For now Streambase is focusing attention on financial services companies, which hope to do things like track how well traders are performing on a real-time basis, rather than aggregating trades at the end of the day and analyzing them overnight.
A bigger opportunity involves processing real-time data feeds generated by sensor networks and RFID tags. A military contractor wants to use Streambase to keep track of soldiers and vehicles in the battlefield. A casino in Las Vegas is considering using Streambase to track the performance of individual gamblers.
In an interview with InfoWorld, Stonebraker gave more details about military applications.
We did a prototype that dealt with army battalion monitoring. When an army battalion is 30,000 humans and 12,000 vehicles, the army is deadly serious about getting a vital signs monitor on every one of the humans so they can do combat medical triage or [take other actions]. They already have a GPS system in every vehicle, but that didn't keep Jennifer Lynch's convoy from getting lost.
They want to turn this into a system to watch the position of every vehicle and compare it against where you're supposed to be. They also want to put a sensor on the gun turret. Together with position, that allows you to detect crossfire