Just to start out with, I am a technical IT manager, and I'm quite knowledgeable about everything that my department works on.
Now, that being said, to do my job, you don't have to be a technical whiz. It certainly helps, but isn't a requirement.
Many good managers of technical departments are not technical themselves. They work on budgets, planning, and leave the technical decision making up to their underlings. If, as a manager, they employ qualified, knowledgable employees, he can rely on their skills for the technical stuff, and he can use his managerial skills to keep the department happy, funded and well-respected.
The technical guys can do what they are good at, and the manager can do what he is good at.
Now, if your manager is non-technical, as well as a being poor at budgeting, politics and management, I agree with the department sitting down with the company president as a group and explain the situation.
I'm not sure if this is any different from the frontier days of the "web". Everyone that had a computer and a dial-up connection was building a web page.
The problem with most of these webpages was that people were building them simply to build them, not because they had content to distribute.
Web pages are now passee, podcast are the new "thing. But, the content problem is even worse, as it is easier to ramble a podcast than to build a webpage.
I'm skipping on the podcasts for now, until the bandwagon breaks up and falls apart.
You may be lucky to find a company that is willing to hire you into a more senior position simply on the merits of your Masters degree, but I wouldn't count on it.
You are probably going to have to develop some experience and workplace accomplishments in your field to be able to move up into the more senior development positions. Your Masters should help you from being brought in at the lowest of development positions, though.
While I am not a Microsoft bigot, and don't really buy into the 64K WMA = CD Quality arguement, I do have to admit that at 64K, WMA sounds slightly better to me than 64K in OGG. That both 64K OGG and WMA are, without a doubt, better than 64K MP3 is an undisputed fact. Once you get to 128K, I find OGG and WMA indistinguishable. I find that 64K WMA is quite comparable to 128K MP3.
So, given that that the marketplace for years has called 128K MP3 equivalent to CD Quality, I can't blame Microsoft for using the same bar to measure and describe their superior format (superior to MP3 at the same bitrate).
Hmm, I'm being moderated a troll. That's not quite fair. The reality of Slashdot is that mirrors should be created of these web pages, so as to reduce the impact on the site owners, as well as increase the availability of the information contained in said pages.
In my humble opinion, this is a good thing. I run a decent sized IT shop, and I feel that not upgrading to SP2 is akin to connecting your computer/network to the internet without a firewall.
$20 for Cingular? I know that T-Mobile offers this, but never seen unlimited data from Cingular at $20. I am currently contemplating a switch from T-Mobile to Cingular, and the data price is the big gotcha for me. (I use a Treo 600 for e-mail and web surfing) If this is true, can you please provide me some more concrete information? (Links, or personal experience)
On Topic: Probably not an inexpensive alternative, but the Cingular EDGE network (PCMCIA cards available) seems to be a very good system (200-400kbps down, not sure up), only problem right now is tha $80/month unlimited data charge.
EA has certainly generated alot of bad press and bad feelings lately. There is alot of animosity towards EA, and seeing them "lose" a battle is something that makes some people happy.
I mean, I'd rather these deals didn't happen at all, but they are happening, and I'd rather not see EA having an exclusive deal on every sports franchise.
While it's a shame to see these exclusive (or semi-exclusive as the article points out) deals being made, it is nice to see Electronic Arts getting a bit of it's own medicine.
These exclusive deals are bad for the games industry and bad for the consumer as they stifle innovation and competition from smaller, more creative game developers.
Actually, I tend to agree with you on this. I love the flexibility of Gentoo, as it appeals to my "tweak everything" nature.
In a production, business environment, I haven't been able to find a good place for Gentoo though, due to it's long installation time (which you have to use if you want to get many of the Gentoo benefits).
My vote still goes to Debian, especially Sarge with the new installer.
As a system administrator and IS manager in a mostly windows environment, I have found Debian to be the most reliable and easy to maintain. The APT system makes security and package upgrades (and downgrades) considerably easier than any RPM system ever was.
While APT is available on Fedora, I have always found Debian to be well-thought out and reliable, even for a Windows guy like me.
Slashdot Mirror
Just to start out with, I am a technical IT manager, and I'm quite knowledgeable about everything that my department works on.
Now, that being said, to do my job, you don't have to be a technical whiz. It certainly helps, but isn't a requirement.
Many good managers of technical departments are not technical themselves. They work on budgets, planning, and leave the technical decision making up to their underlings. If, as a manager, they employ qualified, knowledgable employees, he can rely on their skills for the technical stuff, and he can use his managerial skills to keep the department happy, funded and well-respected.
The technical guys can do what they are good at, and the manager can do what he is good at.
Now, if your manager is non-technical, as well as a being poor at budgeting, politics and management, I agree with the department sitting down with the company president as a group and explain the situation.
I believe ZIP is encryptable with AES-256 now. Wouldn't this be considered "good" encryption?
I'm not sure if this is any different from the frontier days of the "web". Everyone that had a computer and a dial-up connection was building a web page.
The problem with most of these webpages was that people were building them simply to build them, not because they had content to distribute.
Web pages are now passee, podcast are the new "thing. But, the content problem is even worse, as it is easier to ramble a podcast than to build a webpage.
I'm skipping on the podcasts for now, until the bandwagon breaks up and falls apart.
You may be lucky to find a company that is willing to hire you into a more senior position simply on the merits of your Masters degree, but I wouldn't count on it.
You are probably going to have to develop some experience and workplace accomplishments in your field to be able to move up into the more senior development positions. Your Masters should help you from being brought in at the lowest of development positions, though.
Hope this helps.
While I am not a Microsoft bigot, and don't really buy into the 64K WMA = CD Quality arguement, I do have to admit that at 64K, WMA sounds slightly better to me than 64K in OGG. That both 64K OGG and WMA are, without a doubt, better than 64K MP3 is an undisputed fact. Once you get to 128K, I find OGG and WMA indistinguishable. I find that 64K WMA is quite comparable to 128K MP3.
So, given that that the marketplace for years has called 128K MP3 equivalent to CD Quality, I can't blame Microsoft for using the same bar to measure and describe their superior format (superior to MP3 at the same bitrate).
Hmm, I'm being moderated a troll. That's not quite fair. The reality of Slashdot is that mirrors should be created of these web pages, so as to reduce the impact on the site owners, as well as increase the availability of the information contained in said pages.
That poor site, hopefully they don't pay by the megabyte.
In my humble opinion, this is a good thing. I run a decent sized IT shop, and I feel that not upgrading to SP2 is akin to connecting your computer/network to the internet without a firewall.
$20 for Cingular? I know that T-Mobile offers this, but never seen unlimited data from Cingular at $20. I am currently contemplating a switch from T-Mobile to Cingular, and the data price is the big gotcha for me. (I use a Treo 600 for e-mail and web surfing) If this is true, can you please provide me some more concrete information? (Links, or personal experience)
On Topic: Probably not an inexpensive alternative, but the Cingular EDGE network (PCMCIA cards available) seems to be a very good system (200-400kbps down, not sure up), only problem right now is tha $80/month unlimited data charge.
EA has certainly generated alot of bad press and bad feelings lately. There is alot of animosity towards EA, and seeing them "lose" a battle is something that makes some people happy.
I mean, I'd rather these deals didn't happen at all, but they are happening, and I'd rather not see EA having an exclusive deal on every sports franchise.
While it's a shame to see these exclusive (or semi-exclusive as the article points out) deals being made, it is nice to see Electronic Arts getting a bit of it's own medicine.
These exclusive deals are bad for the games industry and bad for the consumer as they stifle innovation and competition from smaller, more creative game developers.
Actually, I tend to agree with you on this. I love the flexibility of Gentoo, as it appeals to my "tweak everything" nature.
In a production, business environment, I haven't been able to find a good place for Gentoo though, due to it's long installation time (which you have to use if you want to get many of the Gentoo benefits).
My vote still goes to Debian, especially Sarge with the new installer.
As a system administrator and IS manager in a mostly windows environment, I have found Debian to be the most reliable and easy to maintain. The APT system makes security and package upgrades (and downgrades) considerably easier than any RPM system ever was.
While APT is available on Fedora, I have always found Debian to be well-thought out and reliable, even for a Windows guy like me.