What are you doing in Vista to have Explorer crash on you?
I have 5 full-time Vista users so far, and while it has a long list of bugs and annoyances (even with UAC disabled), I can say it has been fairly stable.
I'd go back to XP if I bought a Laptop, but not because of stability, rather because I haven't found any killer feature and way too many annoyances - although I switched a user from 2k to Vista today and I have to say the visual and ClearType improved the visual experience a lot, too bad the user found it "confusing" and had to deal with the PC hibernating (by default after 1 hr) and updating automatically at 3 am (by default) and asking permission for everything (by default).
Re:Will anyone gain anything from this?
on
The End is Nigh for XP
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· Score: 2, Insightful
I like the idea of there being a real human person willing to answer questions on FOSS, and I was unaware of its existence, but how do newbies find that channel in the first place?
99% of the XP users I know are unaware of the existence of IRC (and Usenet, etc.), but of course that kind of person is not your typical Ubuntu switcher (yet), I guess.
I don't see it as my function to be forced to pay out of my hard efforts and earned $$ to support someone else that is too stupid to see the need for a good education, to plan for the future rather than buy stupid jewelry, cars, etc that they really can't afford.
Life is tough...and it is not fair. The second sentence is what justifies somewhat the need for a social safety net: you might try hard and not succed.
Also, if there is no safety net, you're incentivating people to "play it safe" and not take risks which might be good for society as a whole - I remember an article on MIT Technology Review I think it was, that said that the US encourages innovation because there is less of a stigma attached to bankruptcy than in, say, Europe.
I agree with the sentiment on the first part, though.
"Gamers are getting older"? That's not news, time runs forwards. It'd be more surprising if gamers were getting younger, and I'm damned if I want to go through puberty again.... backwards. You remind me of a quote by argentinean cartoonist Quino (translated):
"I think the way life flows is wrong. It should be the other way round:
-One should die first, to get that over with. -Then, live in an elderly home until you're sent out because you're not old enough anymore. -After that, you start working. You work for forty years until you can enjoy your pension. -Then party, drugs, alcohos and women, until you're ready for highschool. -Then go back to primary school, you're a kid that spends his time playing without a care in the world. -After that, go back to being a baby, go to your mother's womb, until your life is over in a tremendous orgasm. That would be life!"
So why not offer GRADUATED pricing levels? 2 GB/month for $x. 5 GB/month for $2x. 10 GB/month for $10x. You could even break it down to traffic that stays on your own network and traffic that reaches the Internet.
The reason for this is because they want to sell an "unlimited" package to people who will only use 2GB/month. Most people want to have unlimited traffic even if they have no concept of the amount of traffic they need. In Uruguay, we have 2 ISPs: the state-run AntelData, and privately owned Dedicado (thanks to some shady 3rd world deals that created a duopoly).
The state run company is now advertising some tiered service levels (I'm writing this on the 1 Mbps ADSL with a 10 Gb/month soft cap with a surcharge if you go over that), and have some pretty good advertising detailing the amounts of stuff you can do with each service (the 1 Gb/month, 3 Gb/month, 10 Gb/month and 256 kbps and 1 Mbps unlimited services)
The privately owned company has some advertisements making fun of the "Gigamometer" (the page you have to check to see your traffic for the month) and sells far better despite having a vastly inferior service and some false advertising (they advertise 1 Mbps when they have 736/384 kbps service and then claim "but add both and you get 1 Mbps!", plus some very bad contracts and poor customer service - I almost took them to court until my father talked some sense into me, never go to court in a 3rd worlrd country:P ).
So, ranting aside, my anecdote went to say that whomever does that risks being ripped apart by their competition on the advertising front, using against them the fear and ignorance the parent speaks of (most users don't know how much bandwidth they need).
(costing 3cents/gal. for 3 years for a total of an additional 9/gal)
If 3 cents/gal for three years is 9 cents/gal, yes, Michigan is in trouble. I suspect he didn't phrase it correctly. Lemme Google for it... the Times Herald says that
Bipartisan legislation, introduced Tuesday by Rep. Hoon-Yung Hopgood, D-Taylor, and House Minority Leader Craig DeRoche, R-Novi, would raise the gas tax 9 cents in three years - topping out at 28 cents per gallon by 2010. So it seems he was correct. I guess they will be increasing it by 3 cents every year.
I'm South American, I drove in Brazil so don't go on about open spaces, and while automatic transmission is nice it's in no way as fundamental as you'd believe.
and drove for any decent portion of that time Now, here we find the problem. You just drive too much!
I use mass transport systems when available and this January I was amazed to find out just how bad North American ones are compaired to Europe and even to certain parts of South America.
The bus and train systems in Canada are a joke! they have way too few frequencies, are way too slow (read: same speed we get in South America) and incredibly expensive compared to a similar transport anywhere else.
There are European trains in that price range but what you get is vastly superior (I actually read a Canadian advertisement of the spanish Talgo trains as the best they had, while they are standard in Spain and worse than the AVE).
In short, you need to convince a company that they want to hire you; not necessarily that you should be hired for a particular job which they're advertising. Thanks to both for your replies. Unfortunately, I don't think I have such specific in-demand skills to make an employer go that much out of the way (unless they're really short on MS-trained comp-sci graduates), I'll try the slow and safe route:)
But why do we have to do it in such horrible ways? Why aren't we banning what are clearly appalling methods of raising and slaughtering livestock? Of forcing them to live in tiny cages or pens their whole lives with not even a foot of space to move? Well, those methods are often artificially induced by economics and nationalism, I suspect.
Here in Uruguay and nearby Argentina and Brazil, we have literally millions of cows and sheep roaming free on natural plains on what no-one would consider "appalling" conditions (we do have some appalling chicken-raising).
Yet countries in the EU and others would rather have subsidies for their nationally-grown cattle and quotas for foreign grown meat - I've seen how they raise cattle in Austria, with central heating and rations in winter, and I'm certain it's tens or hundreds of times more expensive than rasing them in Uruguay and only possible because of those subsidies.
I think all animals deserve at least a painless death, if nothing else as a right. Even when I kill a bee in what I consider self-defense, I don't want the bee to be in pain. I just want it dead. I agree with that sentiment.
a skilled worker who can speak English and has a job offer is practically guaranteed a visa. Vancouver in the same time zone as Silicon Valley, only a 2 hour flight away, and has a lower cost of living than any large city on the US west coast. I recently went to Canada and I loved it, I'm thinking of emigrating there.
I have been looking into the Skilled Worker program, which I would qualify for, I've been told it'll take a year to a year and a half to process my application (I haven't submitted one yet).
Would it be better (or faster) to apply for a job and try to get a visa that way? I've seen hundreds of job ads for positions I'd be qualified to fill.
It doesn't seem that easy to me to emigrate to Scotland (if you're not an EU citizen).
I'm thinking of emigrating (not because I'm unemployed, there's actually 100% occupation in IT in my country, but because of the low low wages), and after reading your post I made some quick searches.
For someone like me, with a bachelor's degree, I'd have to apply to the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme.
I went to the HSMP website, and this is what it said (despite my speaking fluent English and having a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, being young, healthy and single, all requirements which would qualify me for residence in Canada or Australia, which are the countries I'm looking into):
HSMP Points Calculator
We regret to inform you that at this time, you either do not meet the current pass mark of 75 points or do not meet one of the other requirements for entry to the UK under the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme. You would therefore not have a good chance of being successful in your application based on your skills, qualifications and age.
20 points for your age
30 points for your qualification
0 points for UK Qualification or UK Work Experience
0 points for earning power
50 total points (75 needed to qualify)
You are unable to show that you will have sufficient funds in the UK to pay your living expenses there - not eligible
cute little Honda Civic OMG, you USians really live in another world. You'd never hear a "cute little" description next to Honda Civic in my country (Uruguay).
They're near to luxury cars here, and significantly bigger than what's on the road.
Typical cars in my country and Argentina/Brazil:
Volkswagen Gol, with 4.5 million units sold, with usually 1,6 liter engines with a fuel efficiency of 10-12 kilometers per litre (34 miles per gallon approx) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Gol
Fiat Uno, also several million, with 1.1 liter engines being usual and doing 12-14 kilometrers per litre (40 miles per gallon) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiat_Uno
Hyundai Atos, less sold than those two, with 1.1 liter engines too and about 14 kilometer per litre (a little over 40 miles per gallon), that's my father's car as well as several coworkers' for example. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyundai_Atos
Another popular car for being among the cheapest is the Maruti 800 which has a 0.8 litre engine and does close to 50 miles per gallon! That was the first car I drove (nowadays I don't have a car). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maruti_800
Refurbished monitors are more expensive here (U$ 50 for a 17' CRT), it's still less than U$ 300, and in the third world.
A refurbished Pentium III with a 17' CRT and 256 Mb RAM, etc. sells for U$ 150 (refurbished desktops are huge sellers over here, there are companies that buy old corporate PCs from Europe and US and bring them here).
Am I the only who keeps tabs on this project who worries that the OLPC OX laptops are going to end up in the hands of people who want them as toys or cheap low-cost laptops? Call me cynical but selling these things to governments in Third World countries and expecting the distribution to be done in an honest and ethical way so that every single one ends up in the hands of a deserving child seems hopelessly naive to me.
I live in Uruguay, one of the early adopters of the OLPC program. I know it's tough to believe, but although our governments are corrupt and inefficient, we do have a somewhat working democracy, and this is one of the "hot" issues where the opposition (and people like myself) will be keeping close tabs on the government, which will probably ensure honest distribution.
Believe me, the opposition would like nothing better than a scandal involving this (it would slur the current governing party, which is a frontrunner for the next elections, plus it involves stealing from children so it would be doubly harmful), while the current government would tout it as a huge archievement and will use it as PR whenever it can ("we delivered a computer to every child in the country!!!").
What safeguards are in place to prevent some corrupt government bureaucrat from doling them out to political cronies, black marketeers or any other undeserving party (for financial gain or not) and then just claiming that they have turned up missing or that they never got them and that they need more? Besides the political issue, there's also a mostly free press in Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil. Here we have an investigative TV show which likes to air cases like government officials using public cars, offices, etc. for private use, bribery, etc. and there are similar ones in Argentina and probably Brazil. It would be a huge coup (and ratings boost) to uncover such a case.
I have more faith in our public institutions and our press than I currently have for US press and institutions (see: US elections).
I think it's been said a thousand times already, but I'll say it a thousand and one times: The target for the OLPC is not "the goat farmer in Kenya".
It's a middle ground, like the average child in my country (Uruguay) whose family makes U$ 4.000/year, we have a 99% literacy rate (better than the US) and 500.000 Internet users out of 3.000.000 inhabitants, but most of those have to go to cyber-cafés for computer usage (which charge 50c/hour, and are very popular among children and teenagers).
Uruguay has already commited to buy 50 million dollars in laptops and expects to buy even more:
Lithium batteries are sensitive to heat and impact (which can cause a short-circuit, leading to heat), and can explode. If you've seen pictures of exploding laptop batteries, now imagine an explosion with 30 times as many battery cells. It's like some kind of personal Hiroshima.
I know it's not the same, but in Argentina there is a large installed base of Natural Gas-powered cars (close to one million between Argentina and Brazil), with the gas canister at the back, which means a big crash can potentially cause an explosion.
However, accident rates are similar to normal cars. Maybe it's the same with batteries?
I find it completely unbelievable that Chilean pilots would be so ignorant as to steal an expensive piece of foreign machinery under any circumstances. Let alone fly an airplane of which they were unaware of its capabilities and unfamiliar with its controls. This story just doesn't add up. I can certainly believe this:) In my country, a janitor (earning U$ 100/month) was working at the Motor Show when he saw that a Porsche had been left with the keys on, so he thought he would realise his dream and drive it... he crashed it against a wall.
Now, that's not to say that we all don't make mistakes. There are probably enough mistakes in my post for someone else to pick and berate me, but you were just making way too many mistakes for someone who was commenting on Taco's inability to spell.
Cheers. Yes, he's complaining about Taco misspelling his country's name, but I suspect CmdrTaco's first language is English, while it's clear that the gp's isn't (nor mine, for that matter).
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What are you doing in Vista to have Explorer crash on you?
I have 5 full-time Vista users so far, and while it has a long list of bugs and annoyances (even with UAC disabled), I can say it has been fairly stable.
I'd go back to XP if I bought a Laptop, but not because of stability, rather because I haven't found any killer feature and way too many annoyances - although I switched a user from 2k to Vista today and I have to say the visual and ClearType improved the visual experience a lot, too bad the user found it "confusing" and had to deal with the PC hibernating (by default after 1 hr) and updating automatically at 3 am (by default) and asking permission for everything (by default).
I like the idea of there being a real human person willing to answer questions on FOSS, and I was unaware of its existence, but how do newbies find that channel in the first place?
99% of the XP users I know are unaware of the existence of IRC (and Usenet, etc.), but of course that kind of person is not your typical Ubuntu switcher (yet), I guess.
Also, if there is no safety net, you're incentivating people to "play it safe" and not take risks which might be good for society as a whole - I remember an article on MIT Technology Review I think it was, that said that the US encourages innovation because there is less of a stigma attached to bankruptcy than in, say, Europe.
I agree with the sentiment on the first part, though.
"I think the way life flows is wrong. It should be the other way round:
-One should die first, to get that over with.
-Then, live in an elderly home until you're sent out because you're not old enough anymore.
-After that, you start working. You work for forty years until you can enjoy your pension.
-Then party, drugs, alcohos and women, until you're ready for highschool.
-Then go back to primary school, you're a kid that spends his time playing without a care in the world.
-After that, go back to being a baby, go to your mother's womb, until your life is over in a tremendous orgasm. That would be life!"
Joaquín Salvador Lavado - Quino
Original (in Spanish) taken from:
http://leonafricano.blogspot.com/2006/08/la-vida-
Quino page on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quino
Quino's webpage:
http://www.quino.com.ar/
The reason for this is because they want to sell an "unlimited" package to people who will only use 2GB/month. Most people want to have unlimited traffic even if they have no concept of the amount of traffic they need. In Uruguay, we have 2 ISPs: the state-run AntelData, and privately owned Dedicado (thanks to some shady 3rd world deals that created a duopoly).
The state run company is now advertising some tiered service levels (I'm writing this on the 1 Mbps ADSL with a 10 Gb/month soft cap with a surcharge if you go over that), and have some pretty good advertising detailing the amounts of stuff you can do with each service (the 1 Gb/month, 3 Gb/month, 10 Gb/month and 256 kbps and 1 Mbps unlimited services)
The privately owned company has some advertisements making fun of the "Gigamometer" (the page you have to check to see your traffic for the month) and sells far better despite having a vastly inferior service and some false advertising (they advertise 1 Mbps when they have 736/384 kbps service and then claim "but add both and you get 1 Mbps!", plus some very bad contracts and poor customer service - I almost took them to court until my father talked some sense into me, never go to court in a 3rd worlrd country
So, ranting aside, my anecdote went to say that whomever does that risks being ripped apart by their competition on the advertising front, using against them the fear and ignorance the parent speaks of (most users don't know how much bandwidth they need).
If 3 cents/gal for three years is 9 cents/gal, yes, Michigan is in trouble. I suspect he didn't phrase it correctly. Lemme Google for it... the Times Herald says that Bipartisan legislation, introduced Tuesday by Rep. Hoon-Yung Hopgood, D-Taylor, and House Minority Leader Craig DeRoche, R-Novi, would raise the gas tax 9 cents in three years - topping out at 28 cents per gallon by 2010. So it seems he was correct. I guess they will be increasing it by 3 cents every year.
and drove for any decent portion of that time Now, here we find the problem. You just drive too much!
I use mass transport systems when available and this January I was amazed to find out just how bad North American ones are compaired to Europe and even to certain parts of South America.
The bus and train systems in Canada are a joke! they have way too few frequencies, are way too slow (read: same speed we get in South America) and incredibly expensive compared to a similar transport anywhere else.
There are European trains in that price range but what you get is vastly superior (I actually read a Canadian advertisement of the spanish Talgo trains as the best they had, while they are standard in Spain and worse than the AVE).
You reminded me of this quote: "The state and the Church have always been partners. The state keeps the people poor, the Church keeps them ignorant."
Here in Uruguay and nearby Argentina and Brazil, we have literally millions of cows and sheep roaming free on natural plains on what no-one would consider "appalling" conditions (we do have some appalling chicken-raising).
Yet countries in the EU and others would rather have subsidies for their nationally-grown cattle and quotas for foreign grown meat - I've seen how they raise cattle in Austria, with central heating and rations in winter, and I'm certain it's tens or hundreds of times more expensive than rasing them in Uruguay and only possible because of those subsidies.
I think all animals deserve at least a painless death, if nothing else as a right. Even when I kill a bee in what I consider self-defense, I don't want the bee to be in pain. I just want it dead. I agree with that sentiment.
Nice. Are you encouraged to use those at U of T? In my university we have to use the Author-Date method which is explicitly discouraged by your link.
I prefer the IEEE Citation method, but, like the GP, didn't know it by that name.
I have been looking into the Skilled Worker program, which I would qualify for, I've been told it'll take a year to a year and a half to process my application (I haven't submitted one yet).
Would it be better (or faster) to apply for a job and try to get a visa that way? I've seen hundreds of job ads for positions I'd be qualified to fill.
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/skilled/index.html
Sorry for turning this into a mini-Ask Slashdot
It doesn't seem that easy to me to emigrate to Scotland (if you're not an EU citizen).
_ id=589
k /en/homepage/schemes_and_programmes/hsmp.html
I'm thinking of emigrating (not because I'm unemployed, there's actually 100% occupation in IT in my country, but because of the low low wages), and after reading your post I made some quick searches.
For someone like me, with a bachelor's degree, I'd have to apply to the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme.
I went to the HSMP website, and this is what it said (despite my speaking fluent English and having a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, being young, healthy and single, all requirements which would qualify me for residence in Canada or Australia, which are the countries I'm looking into):
HSMP Points Calculator
We regret to inform you that at this time, you either do not meet the current pass mark of 75 points or do not meet one of the other requirements for entry to the UK under the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme. You would therefore not have a good chance of being successful in your application based on your skills, qualifications and age.
20 points for your age 30 points for your qualification 0 points for UK Qualification or UK Work Experience 0 points for earning power 50 total points (75 needed to qualify)
You are unable to show that you will have sufficient funds in the UK to pay your living expenses there - not eligible
http://www.talentscotland.com/view_item.aspx?item
http://www.workingintheuk.gov.uk/working_in_the_u
Why don't you people use the international (metric) system and be done with it :)
:P
I can't find the website I used, but you are indeed correct. Now where's the edit button...
In South America (where I live) I've seen both km/l and litres per 100 km in common usage.
Sorry, I messed up. I was using a page that converted kilometers per litre to Imperial Gallons.
So, multiply the MPG values by 1.2. Here are the correct values:
Volkswagen Gol - 40 miles per gallon approx
Fiat Uno - 48 miles per gallon
Hyundai Atos - about 50 miles per gallon
Maruti 800 - 60 miles per gallon!!
They're near to luxury cars here, and significantly bigger than what's on the road.
Typical cars in my country and Argentina/Brazil:
Volkswagen Gol, with 4.5 million units sold, with usually 1,6 liter engines with a fuel efficiency of 10-12 kilometers per litre (34 miles per gallon approx)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Gol
Fiat Uno, also several million, with 1.1 liter engines being usual and doing 12-14 kilometrers per litre (40 miles per gallon)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiat_Uno
Hyundai Atos, less sold than those two, with 1.1 liter engines too and about 14 kilometer per litre (a little over 40 miles per gallon), that's my father's car as well as several coworkers' for example.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyundai_Atos
Another popular car for being among the cheapest is the Maruti 800 which has a 0.8 litre engine and does close to 50 miles per gallon! That was the first car I drove (nowadays I don't have a car).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maruti_800
You can do much better than that (even over here - Uruguay - with overpriced parts).
AMD Sempron 2800+ and Asrock motherboard (everything onboard) = U$ 100
Taiwanese Case + PS + Mouse + Keyboard + Speakers = U$ 30
Cheap 20 Gb HDD = U$ 30
CD-Rom = U$ 10
512 MB = U$ 40
---
Total: U$ 210
Refurbished monitors are more expensive here (U$ 50 for a 17' CRT), it's still less than U$ 300, and in the third world.
A refurbished Pentium III with a 17' CRT and 256 Mb RAM, etc. sells for U$ 150 (refurbished desktops are huge sellers over here, there are companies that buy old corporate PCs from Europe and US and bring them here).
I live in Uruguay, one of the early adopters of the OLPC program. I know it's tough to believe, but although our governments are corrupt and inefficient, we do have a somewhat working democracy, and this is one of the "hot" issues where the opposition (and people like myself) will be keeping close tabs on the government, which will probably ensure honest distribution.
Believe me, the opposition would like nothing better than a scandal involving this (it would slur the current governing party, which is a frontrunner for the next elections, plus it involves stealing from children so it would be doubly harmful), while the current government would tout it as a huge archievement and will use it as PR whenever it can ("we delivered a computer to every child in the country!!!").
What safeguards are in place to prevent some corrupt government bureaucrat from doling them out to political cronies, black marketeers or any other undeserving party (for financial gain or not) and then just claiming that they have turned up missing or that they never got them and that they need more?
Besides the political issue, there's also a mostly free press in Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil. Here we have an investigative TV show which likes to air cases like government officials using public cars, offices, etc. for private use, bribery, etc. and there are similar ones in Argentina and probably Brazil. It would be a huge coup (and ratings boost) to uncover such a case.
I have more faith in our public institutions and our press than I currently have for US press and institutions (see: US elections).
I think it's been said a thousand times already, but I'll say it a thousand and one times: The target for the OLPC is not "the goat farmer in Kenya".
_ olpc.html
It's a middle ground, like the average child in my country (Uruguay) whose family makes U$ 4.000/year, we have a 99% literacy rate (better than the US) and 500.000 Internet users out of 3.000.000 inhabitants, but most of those have to go to cyber-cafés for computer usage (which charge 50c/hour, and are very popular among children and teenagers).
Uruguay has already commited to buy 50 million dollars in laptops and expects to buy even more:
http://www.olpcnews.com/countries/uruguay/uruguay
For now, it is quite common for families to buy used/refurbished desktops for 120 U$D in several installments.
I know it's not the same, but in Argentina there is a large installed base of Natural Gas-powered cars (close to one million between Argentina and Brazil), with the gas canister at the back, which means a big crash can potentially cause an explosion.
However, accident rates are similar to normal cars. Maybe it's the same with batteries?
See:
http://autos.yahoo.com/green_center-article_114/
http://www.gnc.org.ar/NBC_news.pdf (PDF warning)
http://www.worldenergy.org/wec-geis/publications/
Unfortunately CANDU reactors have other problems (one of them is the amount of heavy water neede).
Well, I'm from Uruguay, and we get confused with Paraguay all the time, too. Anyone else? :)
Cheers. Yes, he's complaining about Taco misspelling his country's name, but I suspect CmdrTaco's first language is English, while it's clear that the gp's isn't (nor mine, for that matter).