In case you have not noticed, it seems that the syfy channel is showing anything but science fiction and made the switch quite some time ago. I really believe that the producers have no idea what scinece fiction really is or who the classic scifi authors might be.
Yahoo,hummm, tried them early on, did not like, will not use yahoo anymore. I fact, I was asked to use facebook, don't like them either, am about to unload them, too. It is like "texting", a total distraction and unsafe for any driver. I think I will remain with html, e-mail, and my blog (which I have neglected to keep up). I have no use for all the toys of Microsoft. In fact, I have had problems with meta on xhtml as on Bluefish and have gone back to html 4.01 without meta at all, but do use CSS. Too much junk is a bane to we dinosaurs.
I did have to call and get my system router, an very old Netgear RT314 to work but that was simple enough. One thing, though, When one does go through CERT's non-tech users site, one finds that tehy recommend bout a hardware (router) and a software firewall. Of course, they are talking about with Microsoft but I find it works with Linux, too. I use Linux but my wife does have a Win98se system which is almost never online. Since I do websites and am an IRC netadmin for deepspace.org, too, I did have to get my new IP registered with my host so I could log on with my O-line, hehehehe. I never did use the Roadrunner web site nor their e-mail and have no real reason to use Comcast's services, either, I simply use their IP throughput and if any problems arise, there is always DSL, but that is AT&T here in Houston, too.
All our intellectual property is build on someone else's intellectual property, i.e., knowledge is inherited from those who came before us. I did not Bill Gates steal DOS in the first place? Don't get me wrong, research and discovery needs to be rewarded, but not at teh expense of depriving other of their life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. A reseacher discovers a cure for cancer, patents his discovery, then withholds it for his billions from the wealthy before the poor are cured. The drug company's do the same and so does Microsoft. chtank
Oh come on guys, wouldn't it be better to understand who it works before saying this it not going to work. WE have had self-sealing fueltanks in military aircraft since WWII which uses a similiquid to fill the hole and seal if from fuel loss. NASA is (has) developed self healing composites for the skin of aircraft and spacecraft from the nanotechnology research. From an engineering standpoint, when we have new and revolutionary ideas put forth it means someone is thinking and not simply reacting against anything new or different. One of the lessons learned in life is that nothing remains the same, change is the constant. This has been put up before, but for those who want to think a little, here it is again: http://www.nano.gov/.
Wikipedia is an excellent souce for basic info in many science and other academic subjects. Just as with books differing information than a school board thinks should not be taught, this school seems to think that all wikipedia should be ban? Gosh, now we are banning everything just because of somebody's own moral code. IT smacks of book burning to me and is, at the same time, saying that our teachers are nto mature eoungh to teach right from wrong.
Remember, it is all about money, big money, billions of buck that they wnat us to give them. Wish they would pay cops, firemen, teachers, and me so much. And to think, I am a dinosaur, deaf, blind, toothless, feable, crippled. Poor guys, they need the money to send thier kids to college I guess, or to get them a guitar.
All of the proposals have merit and need research. I suggest, however, that we do it with knowldge of what is being reserached now. The best sources for gathering all the research together is linked here: http://www.eere.energy.gov/ http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ http://www.nano.gov/ Yes, our government is working on the problem(s), if budget cuts don't go too far, this is one place where our Tax money is well spent.
The internet is the most complete communication tool there it. It beats the telephone, radio, TV, even face to face meetings. Why is it that even before the crackdown on the telemarketers, spam was showing its ugly face? In order to fight spam and child porno, we must include the internet under the control of the FCC and the FTC. Freedom of speach does NOT allow for the invasion of my privacy or for wagging abusinve attacks on my security by spamming my inbox.
Would you belive I watch very little TV and listen to very little radio because of the abusive (half truths, mistruths, and out and out lies) bipartisan advertising. These ads are cross party throughout. The democrates, republicans, independants, Linux, Micro$ofts, and blogs are all guilty.
As a network administrator Web master (for several networks) fight it ever day, too, just to keep our private network designed to provide mainstream web services for the handicapped and elderly users clean and healthy for all ages. As a result, I am forced to read the headers sender address of ALL e-mails I receive, spam or not, just to make sure I am not removing one important measage.
I cannot support any bill by any congressman from any political party that will limit our ability to fight spam, advertising via e-mail, distribution of pornography and child pornography, and the transmission of malware. Such a bill as described above would remove all our tools and safe-guards.
Since I am an IRC Network Administrator and webmaster for www.deepspace.org I am most interested in this question. In fact, the interest goes even deeper. It is not only the blind, but the deaf,the physically impaired, the new computer user, the elderly who are affected, errr, or shall we say, infected, but the lack of "Accessiblility" in Linux and open source. Deepspace is conceived and designed to assist all of the above listed disabled persons to mainstream into the internet. One look at our "business plan" will tell you all you need to know about deepspace.
I suggest to the open source community who care to come to irc.deepspace.org and talk to our impaired users. They can tell you right off those things that work for them. Some are even Linux users, a few are even JAVA users, although the blind have little use for most JAVA. The deaf need the text files and the blind need compatable text readers. For the most part, the elderly (I am one of those at age 72) need all of the above.
We have picked up some tools for use it deepspace but, sadly, most all of them are Microsoft required tools. One of the most note worthy is tIRC, a very functional and well liked mIRC plug-in for the blind to change text to voice. Our vision impaired clients love it and forergo Jaws to use tIRC when in IRC chat.
You will note, too, that www.deepspace.org uses HTML 4.01 transitional. We have found, through asking our clients, that this DTD is the most accessible to them. Our vision impaired user's readers have issues with some of the JAVA/XML they come across. You will please note that in deepspace.org we do provide as many of the IRC tools as we can so the user has a choice of this favorite tool. That is, we have provided a CGI:IRC client, a JAVA Client, and links to mIRC, XChat, Chatzilla, and others. We have, also, made great headway into developing a handbook for our clients; a monumental task when on considers the the above listed impaired users are about 50% of the world's new computer user population.
Yes, we are in great need for the opensource help. Please guys, do not leave the impaired user behind. Yours, CHTANK
I would start with MIT: http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html It's free and openly available to all. This is not actually software but rather much better, it is the MIT courseware.
Since I use Firefox, Thunderbird, and Mozilla 1.71, I have at least one question before I comment further. What, exactly, do YOU mean by machine learning? Note, I like Firefox/Thunderbird/Mozilla 1.71 and installed the recent patch, too. Primarily, MSIE is retained only for updating and installing the many, many MS patches, as I am forced to stay with Win2000pro until such time as this old retired dinosaur can affort to buy a new machine for Linux. My default browser is Mozilla 1.7, default e-mail Client is Thunderbird. Firefox "lost" my bookmarks last time when I upgraded from 0.7 to 0.9, so will wait for the 2.0 to come out before changing defaults.
Otherwise, the only thing Mozilla needs is a much easier way to strip the "bad" code so the html is more W3C Accessibility complient, such as an icon or command, perhaps in "edit" or "view" labled "Accessibility".
We, too, run a business using open source and closed source, too. Our business is for handicapped and impaired users, including the elderly. One item we find with open source is that it is way too nerdy for our users. Since we are a "charity" type organization, we MUST be fully in Compliance with the W3C Accessiblity Standards for our users. This, also, includes all forms, user tools, and many adminstrative tools. We Must be fully crossplatform As well. In many casses, we find that the tools for opensource are simply not ready for our clients. Also, many tools are not available via Opensource; such things as JAWS or Braille readers are "Windows" only or are way beyond the fanancial means of the user. It is a shame that the 1/3 of the population (the approx. of impaired users) of this great nation is totally ingnored. The government and Big Business needs to start making themselves "accessible" to the handicapped, so why doesn't the Open Source Community, too?
Yes, I bought Lindows, but have replace it and Win98se with Mandrake9.1 following an upgrade of ram from 64 meg to 192 meg. Mandrake is running stand alone on the Dell PII/300 and is just fine. Lindows now sits in it's wrapper on the shelf along with dinosaur unusable REDHAT 6 and 7.1, SuSE 5.2 and Mandrake 7.0.
Oh, and I did replace RedHat 7.1 with Win2000pro on my custom Duron 900 with 128 ram. This has become my default tool with the Mandrake box being the learning toy.
My wife's ME remains in place. All are on a LAN to run DSL through a Netgear RT314 router/gateway. This setup is very inexpensive (except for 2K) and works to provide very good interent access for the casual user (dinosaur, too) and give him/her a way to keep the old computer in service when he upgrades to a new one. All he/she needs is a NIC card and cord to plug into the Router.
Since I am one of the "regular users" (I am a very simple end user) mentioned in this article, and although I have redhat 7.1 on it's own box, I have not found much use for it and still have to "operate" linux thru my VNCviewer to access gnome desktop, which work oinly partially for me. (love sentance, I know). My question is (because I was not able to get to opensource.org right off), shouldn't this disk also work with any OS, INCLUDING LINUX? I tried to download and install NS 6.2.2 on my linux box and failed baddly.
Like you, I am a dinosaur, too. I have, sitting here by me, a Redhat box configured as a server that I am very slowly learning to use. Note the words "very slowly". As with you, I studied English and Philosophy but not for a degree. My major course of study was Physics/Chemistry. When I was in school it was automatic failure if we even thought about taking a calculator to class and we were lynched if we used one. We were forced to learn how to do our work manually. Today, it is automatic failure if one dose NOT use one. Today, one must be computer literate, too. The major problem, espeially for us old dinosaurs is that somehow, the computer youth (like most teens) speak a coded language called geek so they may show thier superiority over the us old geezers. So, we who can speak only dinosaur have to learn a totally new language called geek to be computer literate OR use a special expensive translator called Micro$oft just so we can do our work. Learning a totally new language in our last few years is beyond the call of duty. But because I am retired and simply seaking to know for the sake of knowing. Thus, this old dog of a dinosaur is learning a few new tricks. It is just that much harder because the newly hatched geeks are afraid of the old ways and hide the secrets behind their geekese.
After struggling with duel-boot and trying to migtate from windows OS to Linux for several years, this old dinosaur has given up and purchased a new CPU with RedHat 7.1 pre-installed in a server configuration. Now, I can work with it to learn to administer my own linux server on my LAN. I run DSL to the LAN thru a NetGear RT314, but the 314 has failed me. At this time, my LAN has been broken down and this windows box is running alone on the DSL. As soon as I can, I will purchase a Linksys router for the LAN. If this does not work, then I shall work to use my Linux box its self, configuring it's second ethernet card for NAT, but at this time, this approach is beyond my knowledge. I strongly recommend that dinosaurs do not try duel-boot, rather, that they purchase a linux server and run their windows boxes, using samba, apache, ttssh to VNCviewer. We dinosaurs MUST be able to smoothly move from the familiar to the new and better. The learning curve for any *nix is beyond our time and experience, for the most part. We must rely on the gurus (IT's and Techs)and these are usually beyond the little dinosaur's finances and budget. I am retired, on a small fixed income and cannot afford to pay you for you expertise, I am at my financial limit now for my computer tasks. BTW, the URL above is no longer valid, I had to leave homestead because they are charging for their hosting of my website. I have learned to code html and moved to http://freepages.science.rootsweb.com/~chtank/inde x.html
While trying to follow the threads of these conversations, it becomes clear why opersource software does not fly with the buzzard,Microsoft.
At one time, the use of acronyms and abbreviations was required to save bytes, but this is no longer true. What turns most of use old school(ed) simple minded users off is what we call geek. For the most part, it is greek to us. We do use lots of "share ware" however, and enough of us even pay a fair price for it that the author(s) can make a living. We also do use General Public License software, too, but only that which we can download, install, and especially, understand the directions; "If at first you do not succeed, read the directions". Our hangup is the lack of basic use of the language by those who document. Learn to use the basic tools taught in our schools! Forget acronyms, abbreviations, and technical terms, come directly to the point at hand and be very clear in meanings. In other words, simple is better when dealing with simple users. Simple users equals the general computer USER public; the 90% of all users who use at least one of the windows operating systems. We may become frustrated with Microsoft, but at least we can understand and USE it (barely).
For most of my time using the internet, I have been searching for Distance Learning tools. I have found and tested a few, and all fail the tests, except for a few:
IRC; gives on the spot text and a bit of voice if one prepares it early (dcc file transfer)and it is in.wav or MP3 format.
ICQ, AOL, and MSN messenger service; much like IRC.
HTML; "canned" or prerecorded lessons.
There are a number applications which have the whiteboard, and streaming sound, text, and colagerative file sharing, but each targets the commercial use and is cost prohibative to the casual user, either student or teacher. Also, these are too difficult for the casual user to learn.
The test requires that the tool(s) must be intuitive, do what it is supposed to do without a great deal of training or computer knowledge. (this may require some good wizards and deamons).
Video is not needed at all, it does nothing to improve the learning experience, and requires far too much bandwidth (lowest common denominator being 486/66 with win95 and a 28.8 modem). Who wants to watch a professor give a lecture anyway. The whiteboard is a must, as is sound, text, and especially hands on file colaberation. All these tools MUST be able to run on ANY platform, thus, be 100% independant of the operating system. Perhaps the best language would be JAVA, PERL, or even HTML. What ever it is, must be very easy for both the teacher and student to use, at most, with a one time very low cost, no cost being best. It must be very intuitive or it will not find the instructors nor the students, each being easily frustrated and unwilling to go forward.
New programmers can jump right in and help, that is not the problem. The real question MUST be: How can open source help those of us who are not at all interested in learning how to program, or even learning computer technology. We are totally lost in the computer language and must even resort to WYSIWYG HTML. Some, even, must let other do that for them, such as a legally blind friend who is a published poet, but who's eyesite is too poor to do the HTML.
The question is: How can open source and programmers help bring the interent to all the citizans. Please note that the fastest growing segment of the internet is people OVER 50 years old, i.e., your parents and grandparents. Look to them for guidence, they will show you how you can best help. We old geezers did not have to learn how to be mechanics to drive our autos (except way back in the very beginning). We did not have to be radio/television engineers to listen to the radio or watch television. HEHE, for a while, we did have to be engineers for the VCR, though. No, don't ask how one can contribute to the open source, ask how open source can contribute to us. For us, the computer is a major investment, and for now, Microsoft Windows and MAC are the only viable operating systems. I am very sorry to say that the best is yet to come, for until we old, warn out grandma's and grandpa's from yesterday can use Linux INTUITIVELY, then open source will remain a toy of the programmers.
as with the analog for telephone using twisted pair for digital (DSL), now we need to use the radio carrier to put our digital computer links vai this. new site: http://CHTANK.homestead.com/home.html
I have DSL and love it, will never go back to dial-up. I am retired, CAble is (or was) too expensive. My down time has not been any worse (or better) than with dial-ups. The one thing which upsets me is that I am not smart enough to get linux running DSL on my machine, and when asking for help find that linux is not ready for us simple end users. This means I am stuck, for the time being, with Windows 95b (I will not pay Bill Gates another dime, he has screwed me out of enough money already)
I, too, cannot get my Mandrake or redhat or suse to work. I am retired, on a fixed income, and unable to spend $.01K on my machine. My machine is my only connection to the world now. And here I am stuck with Windows 95. Linux, to put it simply, doe not seem to be ready for the simple end users. If I am told one more time I must learn the computer langauage, I will yell from the top of my voice NO! and then ask you what part of no do you not understand, I am staying with win95 until I find some way to get linux to operate, even though my win95 is now failing, too. When it goes, this old dinosaur become extinct on the internet and with computers. It is jsut that simple for we simple end users.
Slashdot Mirror
In case you have not noticed, it seems that the syfy channel is showing anything but science fiction and made the switch quite some time ago. I really believe that the producers have no idea what scinece fiction really is or who the classic scifi authors might be.
Yahoo,hummm, tried them early on, did not like, will not use yahoo anymore. I fact, I was asked to use facebook, don't like them either, am about to unload them, too. It is like "texting", a total distraction and unsafe for any driver. I think I will remain with html, e-mail, and my blog (which I have neglected to keep up). I have no use for all the toys of Microsoft. In fact, I have had problems with meta on xhtml as on Bluefish and have gone back to html 4.01 without meta at all, but do use CSS. Too much junk is a bane to we dinosaurs.
I did have to call and get my system router, an very old Netgear RT314 to work but that was simple enough. One thing, though, When one does go through CERT's non-tech users site, one finds that tehy recommend bout a hardware (router) and a software firewall. Of course, they are talking about with Microsoft but I find it works with Linux, too. I use Linux but my wife does have a Win98se system which is almost never online. Since I do websites and am an IRC netadmin for deepspace.org, too, I did have to get my new IP registered with my host so I could log on with my O-line, hehehehe. I never did use the Roadrunner web site nor their e-mail and have no real reason to use Comcast's services, either, I simply use their IP throughput and if any problems arise, there is always DSL, but that is AT&T here in Houston, too.
All our intellectual property is build on someone else's intellectual property, i.e., knowledge is inherited from those who came before us. I did not Bill Gates steal DOS in the first place? Don't get me wrong, research and discovery needs to be rewarded, but not at teh expense of depriving other of their life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. A reseacher discovers a cure for cancer, patents his discovery, then withholds it for his billions from the wealthy before the poor are cured. The drug company's do the same and so does Microsoft.
chtank
Oh come on guys, wouldn't it be better to understand who it works before saying this it not going to work. WE have had self-sealing fueltanks in military aircraft since WWII which uses a similiquid to fill the hole and seal if from fuel loss. NASA is (has) developed self healing composites for the skin of aircraft and spacecraft from the nanotechnology research. From an engineering standpoint, when we have new and revolutionary ideas put forth it means someone is thinking and not simply reacting against anything new or different. One of the lessons learned in life is that nothing remains the same, change is the constant. This has been put up before, but for those who want to think a little, here it is again: http://www.nano.gov/.
Wikipedia is an excellent souce for basic info in many science and other academic subjects. Just as with books differing information than a school board thinks should not be taught, this school seems to think that all wikipedia should be ban? Gosh, now we are banning everything just because of somebody's own moral code. IT smacks of book burning to me and is, at the same time, saying that our teachers are nto mature eoungh to teach right from wrong.
Remember, it is all about money, big money, billions of buck that they wnat us to give them. Wish they would pay cops, firemen, teachers, and me so much. And to think, I am a dinosaur, deaf, blind, toothless, feable, crippled. Poor guys, they need the money to send thier kids to college I guess, or to get them a guitar.
Talking is not enough, take action. At least you can stop driving and running your AC, lights, computer, micorwave and TV. hehehe.
Think about adding wind turbines to the proposed space elevator, too.
All of the proposals have merit and need research. I suggest, however, that we do it with knowldge of what is being reserached now. The best sources for gathering all the research together is linked here:
http://www.eere.energy.gov/
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/
http://www.nano.gov/
Yes, our government is working on the problem(s), if budget cuts don't go too far, this is one place where our Tax money is well spent.
The internet is the most complete communication tool there it. It beats the telephone, radio, TV, even face to face meetings. Why is it that even before the crackdown on the telemarketers, spam was showing its ugly face? In order to fight spam and child porno, we must include the internet under the control of the FCC and the FTC. Freedom of speach does NOT allow for the invasion of my privacy or for wagging abusinve attacks on my security by spamming my inbox.
Would you belive I watch very little TV and listen to very little radio because of the abusive (half truths, mistruths, and out and out lies) bipartisan advertising. These ads are cross party throughout. The democrates, republicans, independants, Linux, Micro$ofts, and blogs are all guilty.
As a network administrator Web master (for several networks) fight it ever day, too, just to keep our private network designed to provide mainstream web services for the handicapped and elderly users clean and healthy for all ages. As a result, I am forced to read the headers sender address of ALL e-mails I receive, spam or not, just to make sure I am not removing one important measage.
I cannot support any bill by any congressman from any political party that will limit our ability to fight spam, advertising via e-mail, distribution of pornography and child pornography, and the transmission of malware. Such a bill as described above would remove all our tools and safe-guards.
Since I am an IRC Network Administrator and webmaster for www.deepspace.org I am most interested in this question. In fact, the interest goes even deeper. It is not only the blind, but the deaf,the physically impaired, the new computer user, the elderly who are affected, errr, or shall we say, infected, but the lack of "Accessiblility" in Linux and open source. Deepspace is conceived and designed to assist all of the above listed disabled persons to mainstream into the internet. One look at our "business plan" will tell you all you need to know about deepspace.
I suggest to the open source community who care to come to irc.deepspace.org and talk to our impaired users. They can tell you right off those things that work for them. Some are even Linux users, a few are even JAVA users, although the blind have little use for most JAVA. The deaf need the text files and the blind need compatable text readers. For the most part, the elderly (I am one of those at age 72) need all of the above.
We have picked up some tools for use it deepspace but, sadly, most all of them are Microsoft required tools. One of the most note worthy is tIRC, a very functional and well liked mIRC plug-in for the blind to change text to voice. Our vision impaired clients love it and forergo Jaws to use tIRC when in IRC chat.
You will note, too, that www.deepspace.org uses HTML 4.01 transitional. We have found, through asking our clients, that this DTD is the most accessible to them. Our vision impaired user's readers have issues with some of the JAVA/XML they come across. You will please note that in deepspace.org we do provide as many of the IRC tools as we can so the user has a choice of this favorite tool. That is, we have provided a CGI:IRC client, a JAVA Client, and links to mIRC, XChat, Chatzilla, and others. We have, also, made great headway into developing a handbook for our clients; a monumental task when on considers the the above listed impaired users are about 50% of the world's new computer user population.
Yes, we are in great need for the opensource help. Please guys, do not leave the impaired user behind.
Yours,
CHTANK
I would start with MIT: http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html
It's free and openly available to all. This is not actually software but rather much better, it is the MIT courseware.
Since I use Firefox, Thunderbird, and Mozilla 1.71, I have at least one question before I comment further. What, exactly, do YOU mean by machine learning? Note, I like Firefox/Thunderbird/Mozilla 1.71 and installed the recent patch, too. Primarily, MSIE is retained only for updating and installing the many, many MS patches, as I am forced to stay with Win2000pro until such time as this old retired dinosaur can affort to buy a new machine for Linux. My default browser is Mozilla 1.7, default e-mail Client is Thunderbird. Firefox "lost" my bookmarks last time when I upgraded from 0.7 to 0.9, so will wait for the 2.0 to come out before changing defaults.
Otherwise, the only thing Mozilla needs is a much easier way to strip the "bad" code so the html is more W3C Accessibility complient, such as an icon or command, perhaps in "edit" or "view" labled "Accessibility".
We, too, run a business using open source and closed source, too. Our business is for handicapped and impaired users, including the elderly. One item we find with open source is that it is way too nerdy for our users. Since we are a "charity" type organization, we MUST be fully in Compliance with the W3C Accessiblity Standards for our users. This, also, includes all forms, user tools, and many adminstrative tools. We Must be fully crossplatform As well. In many casses, we find that the tools for opensource are simply not ready for our clients. Also, many tools are not available via Opensource; such things as JAWS or Braille readers are "Windows" only or are way beyond the fanancial means of the user. It is a shame that the 1/3 of the population (the approx. of impaired users) of this great nation is totally ingnored. The government and Big Business needs to start making themselves "accessible" to the handicapped, so why doesn't the Open Source Community, too?
Yes, I bought Lindows, but have replace it and Win98se with Mandrake9.1 following an upgrade of ram from 64 meg to 192 meg. Mandrake is running stand alone on the Dell PII/300 and is just fine. Lindows now sits in it's wrapper on the shelf along with dinosaur unusable REDHAT 6 and 7.1, SuSE 5.2 and Mandrake 7.0.
Oh, and I did replace RedHat 7.1 with Win2000pro on my custom Duron 900 with 128 ram. This has become my default tool with the Mandrake box being the learning toy.
My wife's ME remains in place. All are on a LAN to run DSL through a Netgear RT314 router/gateway. This setup is very inexpensive (except for 2K) and works to provide very good interent access for the casual user (dinosaur, too) and give him/her a way to keep the old computer in service when he upgrades to a new one. All he/she needs is a NIC card and cord to plug into the Router.
Since I am one of the "regular users" (I am a very simple end user) mentioned in this article, and although I have redhat 7.1 on it's own box, I have not found much use for it and still have to "operate" linux thru my VNCviewer to access gnome desktop, which work oinly partially for me. (love sentance, I know). My question is (because I was not able to get to opensource.org right off), shouldn't this disk also work with any OS, INCLUDING LINUX? I tried to download and install NS 6.2.2 on my linux box and failed baddly.
Like you, I am a dinosaur, too. I have, sitting here by me, a Redhat box configured as a server that I am very slowly learning to use. Note the words "very slowly". As with you, I studied English and Philosophy but not for a degree. My major course of study was Physics/Chemistry. When I was in school it was automatic failure if we even thought about taking a calculator to class and we were lynched if we used one. We were forced to learn how to do our work manually. Today, it is automatic failure if one dose NOT use one. Today, one must be computer literate, too. The major problem, espeially for us old dinosaurs is that somehow, the computer youth (like most teens) speak a coded language called geek so they may show thier superiority over the us old geezers. So, we who can speak only dinosaur have to learn a totally new language called geek to be computer literate OR use a special expensive translator called Micro$oft just so we can do our work. Learning a totally new language in our last few years is beyond the call of duty. But because I am retired and simply seaking to know for the sake of knowing. Thus, this old dog of a dinosaur is learning a few new tricks. It is just that much harder because the newly hatched geeks are afraid of the old ways and hide the secrets behind their geekese.
After struggling with duel-boot and trying to migtate from windows OS to Linux for several years, this old dinosaur has given up and purchased a new CPU with RedHat 7.1 pre-installed in a server configuration. Now, I can work with it to learn to administer my own linux server on my LAN. I run DSL to the LAN thru a NetGear RT314, but the 314 has failed me. At this time, my LAN has been broken down and this windows box is running alone on the DSL. As soon as I can, I will purchase a Linksys router for the LAN. If this does not work, then I shall work to use my Linux box its self, configuring it's second ethernet card for NAT, but at this time, this approach is beyond my knowledge. I strongly recommend that dinosaurs do not try duel-boot, rather, that they purchase a linux server and run their windows boxes, using samba, apache, ttssh to VNCviewer. We dinosaurs MUST be able to smoothly move from the familiar to the new and better. The learning curve for any *nix is beyond our time and experience, for the most part. We must rely on the gurus (IT's and Techs)and these are usually beyond the little dinosaur's finances and budget. I am retired, on a small fixed income and cannot afford to pay you for you expertise, I am at my financial limit now for my computer tasks. BTW, the URL above is no longer valid, I had to leave homestead because they are charging for their hosting of my website. I have learned to code html and moved to http://freepages.science.rootsweb.com/~chtank/inde x.html
While trying to follow the threads of these conversations, it becomes clear why opersource software does not fly with the buzzard,Microsoft.
At one time, the use of acronyms and abbreviations was required to save bytes, but this is no longer true. What turns most of use old school(ed) simple minded users off is what we call geek. For the most part, it is greek to us. We do use lots of "share ware" however, and enough of us even pay a fair price for it that the author(s) can make a living. We also do use General Public License software, too, but only that which we can download, install, and especially, understand the directions; "If at first you do not succeed, read the directions". Our hangup is the lack of basic use of the language by those who document. Learn to use the basic tools taught in our schools! Forget acronyms, abbreviations, and technical terms, come directly to the point at hand and be very clear in meanings. In other words, simple is better when dealing with simple users. Simple users equals the general computer USER public; the 90% of all users who use at least one of the windows operating systems. We may become frustrated with Microsoft, but at least we can understand and USE it (barely).
For most of my time using the internet, I have been searching for Distance Learning tools. I have found and tested a few, and all fail the tests, except for a few: .wav or MP3 format.
IRC; gives on the spot text and a bit of voice if one prepares it early (dcc file transfer)and it is in
ICQ, AOL, and MSN messenger service; much like IRC.
HTML; "canned" or prerecorded lessons.
There are a number applications which have the whiteboard, and streaming sound, text, and colagerative file sharing, but each targets the commercial use and is cost prohibative to the casual user, either student or teacher. Also, these are too difficult for the casual user to learn.
The test requires that the tool(s) must be intuitive, do what it is supposed to do without a great deal of training or computer knowledge. (this may require some good wizards and deamons).
Video is not needed at all, it does nothing to improve the learning experience, and requires far too much bandwidth (lowest common denominator being 486/66 with win95 and a 28.8 modem). Who wants to watch a professor give a lecture anyway. The whiteboard is a must, as is sound, text, and especially hands on file colaberation. All these tools MUST be able to run on ANY platform, thus, be 100% independant of the operating system. Perhaps the best language would be JAVA, PERL, or even HTML. What ever it is, must be very easy for both the teacher and student to use, at most, with a one time very low cost, no cost being best. It must be very intuitive or it will not find the instructors nor the students, each being easily frustrated and unwilling to go forward.
New programmers can jump right in and help, that is not the problem. The real question MUST be: How can open source help those of us who are not at all interested in learning how to program, or even learning computer technology. We are totally lost in the computer language and must even resort to WYSIWYG HTML. Some, even, must let other do that for them, such as a legally blind friend who is a published poet, but who's eyesite is too poor to do the HTML.
The question is: How can open source and programmers help bring the interent to all the citizans. Please note that the fastest growing segment of the internet is people OVER 50 years old, i.e., your parents and grandparents. Look to them for guidence, they will show you how you can best help. We old geezers did not have to learn how to be mechanics to drive our autos (except way back in the very beginning). We did not have to be radio/television engineers to listen to the radio or watch television. HEHE, for a while, we did have to be engineers for the VCR, though. No, don't ask how one can contribute to the open source, ask how open source can contribute to us. For us, the computer is a major investment, and for now, Microsoft Windows and MAC are the only viable operating systems. I am very sorry to say that the best is yet to come, for until we old, warn out grandma's and grandpa's from yesterday can use Linux INTUITIVELY, then open source will remain a toy of the programmers.
as with the analog for telephone using twisted pair for digital (DSL), now we need to use the radio carrier to put our digital computer links vai this. new site: http://CHTANK.homestead.com/home.html
I have DSL and love it, will never go back to dial-up. I am retired, CAble is (or was) too expensive. My down time has not been any worse (or better) than with dial-ups. The one thing which upsets me is that I am not smart enough to get linux running DSL on my machine, and when asking for help find that linux is not ready for us simple end users. This means I am stuck, for the time being, with Windows 95b (I will not pay Bill Gates another dime, he has screwed me out of enough money already)
I, too, cannot get my Mandrake or redhat or suse to work. I am retired, on a fixed income, and unable to spend $.01K on my machine. My machine is my only connection to the world now. And here I am stuck with Windows 95. Linux, to put it simply, doe not seem to be ready for the simple end users. If I am told one more time I must learn the computer langauage, I will yell from the top of my voice NO! and then ask you what part of no do you not understand, I am staying with win95 until I find some way to get linux to operate, even though my win95 is now failing, too. When it goes, this old dinosaur become extinct on the internet and with computers. It is jsut that simple for we simple end users.