Except for the fact that the amount of resources required to conduct research (particularly pharma research) is over the top. "ScienceDaily (Jan. 7, 2008) - A new study by two York University researchers estimates the U.S. pharmaceutical industry spends almost twice as much on promotion as it does on research and development, contrary to the industry's claim."
My wife worked for years at a country club near where we use to live. It was NOTHING for pharmaceutical reps. to spend $20,000+ on dinner and drinks for a group of local doctors, just to pitch their latest drugs.
The market doesn't regulate the price of drugs in the US, the patent holder does.
God sees the results of the decisions we make, but as we change our mind and try to decide things, he sees the results of those actions. So he sees everything we choose to do, but also much we don't.
I'm not religious but that makes sense to me at least. This puts me in mind of the Many Worlds theory?
No they are not. Most school boards are made up of people who have never stepped foot in a classroom, but somehow believe that they know more about teaching than the people who do the job every day.
You may have a point about it being easier to install Ubuntu on a random untested piece of hardware than OS X, but. on the opposite end of the spectrum, installing Mac OS X on a Macbook Pro (made for use with OS X) takes fewer clicks and requires less dialog pages be clicked through than installing Ubuntu on a Dell Inspiron 1420 N (made for use with Ubuntu)).
Oh yea!..well...upgrading Unbuntu from Feisty to Gutsy only takes '1 click' from the package manager...so there...take that... ; )
Seriously, what you say may be true, I don't know. I've owned 5 Macs in my life, and they've all come with then OS installed. I wasn't even aware that you could buy a 'naked' Mac. (I suppose that you could completely wipe the hard drive for the joy of re-installing the OS, but I've never had the pleasure.) However, if you're comparing upgrading on a Mac to a complete install of Ubuntu (or other distro), I'd expect there to be more dialogs on the complete install.
"You just described why Mac OS is a better day to day operating system, and Linux is the vasty more configurable one. I should have to sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg-plow to get a GUI, ya know?"
He might have to do more than that to get Mac OSX up and running on his laptop. Comparing pre-installed Mac OSX on Apple hardware to self installed Linux on untested hardware is an "Apples" to Oranges comparison at best.
"It doesn't cover your tasks nor contacts. It's calendar-only. Yes, open protocols suffer from lack of general, abstracted architecture for groupware - they're all patchwork, stitched together. You can use CalDav for calendar, LDAP for address books (theoretically - no useful implementations of this idea exist), IMAP + SMTP for mail, etc. As a result, each type of object has to be handled completely differently on both the server and client sides. Maybe that's the cause of lack of proper OpenSource groupware solutions - there's no single, standard, open, all-purpose groupware protocol to base them on.
Anybody care to design one?"
I only responded with the solution that I use for off-line "Calendaring / Scheduling" since that was the original topic of the discussion.
I have yet to have the need to sync my 'tasks' for off-line use, but I do like to have my contacts with me on the go.
Fortunately, I have shell access to our eGroupware database. I wrote a script that pulls the desired contact info. from the database and saves it to a Vcard file. No, it's not ideal and it's something that should be included in the app., but ical and vcard formats allow me to do that.
Also, there is http://www.egroupware.org/sync, and XML-RPC
"But it's still weak if you need disconnected operation..."
I've been using it with the iCal Server app. to deal with this limitation. This allows me to sync with a desktop/laptop calendar and in turn, sync with my PDA, Cell Phone, and iPod.
I agree, eGroupware has a lot of functionality.
"When you consider the efficiency gains and TCO when you migrate to MS and the entire.NET framework, Microsoft practically *is* paying you to use Windows."
"They will need to become familiar with its interface, idiosyncrasies, and annoyances. Running Open Office is not the same learning experience, especially for those who are not as as technosexual as we are."
Technosexual? That is the problem, too many years of "click on file" -> "click on open" -> "click on browse" -> etc. -> etc. -> etc. "computer training." It's like trying to learn Calculus by memorizing key strokes on a TI89 calculator. If you can't do math on ANY calculator (or pen and paper), please do the world a favor, and don't try to engineer any bridges. Schools should be teaching 'Word Processing,' 'Spreadsheets,' 'Photo Editing,' etc...not 'MS Word,' 'MS Excel,' 'Adobe Photoshop.' People wouldn't be so scared of new/different software if they had a clue as to why they were clicking on "file" -> "open" -> "browse," etc.
From ASCAP's FAQ page...
http://www.ascap.com/licensing/generalfaq.html
5. Aren't musicians, entertainers and DJ's responsible for obtaining permission for music they perform?
Some people mistakenly assume that musicians and entertainers must obtain licenses to perform copyrighted music or that businesses where music is performed can shift their responsibility to musicians or entertainers. The law says all who participate in, or are responsible for, performances of music are legally responsible. Since it is the business owner who obtains the ultimate benefit from the performance, it is the business owner who obtains the license. Music license fees are one of the many costs of doing business.
Have you been paying your ASCAP and BMI performance fees?...
Actually, I am a BMI member. I'm currently not an ASCAP member because songwriters can only register their material with one organization or the other at a time. Any venue that provides (non original only) entertainment has to pay ASCAP and BMI 'dues' based on the size of the that venue. If you're playing covers in a venue that is keeping up with those dues, your performance in that venue is covered under that venue's due requirements. It's done this way because the performance rights organizations know that it's logistically impossible for them to track down and charge fees to every cover band out there. It's much easier to assume that if a venue is having bands, that there will be a certain number of covers played by those bands. Incidentally, the last I read, none of the money from the dues collected actually goes to the writers of the songs that are played. It all goes to the cost of collecting those dues. In other words, the dues are collected in order to pay the salaries of the people who collect those dues. The excuse that the songwriters get when they complain about not getting any of that money is that it is too hard to monitor what songs are being played and how often, in order to allocate the money correctly. It's a total scam. Unfortunately, that is the current state of the music business today. ASPCAP, BMI, RIAA, etc. use copyright, performance right, mechanical right and publishing right laws to bilk BOTH artists and consumers out of every penny they possible can.
I think the real money is in being a cover's band - rather than playing your original work... Is that what you did?
Actually, I did both. You'll never make a living playing 9 or 10 originals for a cut of the door at an underage Punk Rock show once every couple of months. That doesn't mean that you have to give that up. You just have to do something more profitable during the times that those shows aren't going on. For me, that might mean doing "cheesy" acoustic covers during happy hour at the local Country club on a Wednesday night so I could 'afford' to do a 'songwriter's showcase' on Saturday night. Yea, playing "Margaritaville" sucks, but again, for me, it's way better than flipping burgers, and those gigs usually paid $100+ per. hour.
You are aware that musicians create art? If you want to make a living at it, that would be "commercial" art.
They don't do this "business" thing. Correction, the ones that starve don't do the "business" thing.
Create the art, and the money should appear? Since when? I use to believe that, of course I also use to believe that if I put a recording of a song that I just wrote under my pillow before I went to bed at night, when I woke up, there'd be money under my pillow. Then, I grew up. Even before the modern music business evolved, wealthily people commissioned composers to create music that they (the wealthy commissioners) liked. I personally know a couple of very successful songwriters. (with Gold and Platinum records on their living room walls) They write songs first to make a living and second because it's what they love to do.
If not, it's the pirates fault. So now it's 'pirates' who prevent 'BAR BANDS' (that was what we were talking about) from making a decent living? That comment, and perhaps your entire post, is either sarcasm or 'flame bait'. It's hard to tell which.
True, as a rule, but not because there isn't a market capable of supporting bar bands. Most bar bands don't make money for the same reason most new business fail, poor management. I've been playing in bar bands for 25 years, 10 of those years playing bars provided my sole income. I only backed off due to a temporary medical problem. A bar musician can make $50,000+ per. year if they treat it like a 'REAL' job. They can't forget the business in "music BUSINESS." Be flexible, find your target market(s), play to those markets, keep your expenses to a minimum, and work at it 40+ hours per. week. Those are the kinds of things that one does when they run any kind of business.
what is to stop Sally Sandbone from taking the Latest Madonna (or other) song and calling it her own?
Copyright law.
Who is going to go after the protection of content for the content provider?
The original artist's attorney? The RIAA is not required to enforce copyright law. In fact, they probably aren't going to come to the rescue of the "lowly" pianists at Nordstrom's. (I say this being a working musican for the past 25yrs.) The RIAA does not protect content creators! They are only concerned with stockholders profits. This article is a prime example of that fact.
I can only speak from my experience, yours may be completely different.
You will have an easier time finding a consultant to set up your SBS server than a linux server. Although the windows guy that gets sent out by Sycom may not be a genius, Sycom is a very large company and they stand behind their work. This means that even though something may go wrong - you can rely on an entire company to fix it.
Isn't this a little like saying that if Sycom (or any contracting company) happens to assign "Joe Dunce-ski" to your account, you can rely on them to fix anything he screws up? What are the odds that they'll replace "Dunce-ski" with "Moron-ovich?" If the person that they sent me in the first place didn't know what he was doing, my "sense of security" is already out the door. Besides that, small businesses don't know that the reason they're having problems is due to a poorly configured system. They only know "my internet's broken," and the contracting company sure as Hell isn't going to tell them. Most small businesses never get past "Dunce-ski." When there is a problem, the contractor either does a wipe and reinstall or recommends that the hardware be replaced. So, the "sense of security" that comes with having a large local support company is often a "false sense of security."
When there's a new hire the accountant or someone else with minimal tecch knowledge can go ahead and add a new user and set up a new machine.
Yea, and in the process put the business out of compliance with licensing. Just because it's easy for the Accountant to add 100 accounts to a SBS with 5 CALS, doesn't mean he should. That type of mistake could potentially bankrupt a small business should the BSA find out. Besides, every Linux distro that I've ever used has a GUI for adding users "that's so easy even a Caveman/MCSE can use it" (sorry, I couldn't help myself). And, the Account can do so without worrying about licensing issues.
With Linux, you get no official guide the majority of the time.
I disagree with "the majority of the time," it depends of the distro...However, rarely have I ever run into a situation that 'man app' or 'cat/etc/app.conf' (and read the comments) didn't give me the information that I needed.
No, but neither did the Windows machine. It was set up by a contractor because the company didn't have the expertise on staff.
linux guys aren't everywhere.
Agreed, but in my experience, quality Windows Administrators are equally as difficult to find as quality Linux Admins.
In our shop we had SBS 2003 running (since before I was there) and in the 2 years they had it running they probably had, I don't know, a couple of days of downtime total.
I don't doubt that a well maintained Windows server can run reliably. My point was that, again in my experience, Linux requires far less maintenance. Of the two companies that I spoke of, the one running Linux was able to afford to add redundancy to their network, reducing the likelyhood of the entire business being on hold if the main server goes down, and giving them time to ship the main server to someone who can fix it, if needed. They have also saved enough in contractor fees over the past two years that they could pay to fly me back a few dozen times, if they had to, and still be ahead of the game.
The point is that SB owners don't know shit about linux.
The ones that I've worked with don't know shit about Windows either.
I'm trying to learn linux and I find it a royal pain in the ass.
I respect anyone who is willing to put the type of effort that you describe into understanding something unfamiliar to them, whether it be Linux or anything else. In fact, your CUPS saga reminded me of how I felt when I first began playing around with Linux. I also came from a Windows background. Thinking the *nix way instead of the Windows way took some time for me to develop. Tools such as 'webmin' really helped ease me through that initial learning curve. The only reason I started playing with Linux in the first place was that the small company I was working for needed more IT then it could afford, and I was too stubborn to leave it at that. Linux/*nix is not harder then Windows, just different. Once I started to understand it, Windows' wizards started driving me nuts. As for documentation, that is an application developer issue, not a platform one. Plenty of poorly documented applications exist for Windows. I am not trying to start a big "Windblows Sucks," "Linux Rulz" flame war. I'm just arguing that Linux's use, or lack thereof, in the local small business market shouldn't be solely based on the local "Geek Squad's" ability to support it on a daily basis. A well configured system can run for years without issue. The particular one in my example has been running for a little over 4 years without a problem. (2 while I was working there, and 2 since I've been gone) In this company's case, the rewards for choosing Linux have, so far, far outweighed the risks.
"Who's patching those linux servers?"
They are Redhat machines, so that would be "chkconfig yum on." (even the least technical employee can reboot the server for kernel updates).
And, "crontab" + "freshclam --quiet" to help protect the Windows machines on the network.
"Don't even get me started on Linux. I'm sure it's great if you happen to have an open source guru around, but it's just not a viable option for setting up a back-end where no one has any serious tech experience."
Oh Please!...I left my home town a little over 2 years ago to take a better job 6 hrs. away. When I did, I left 2 companies that I was doing support for. One in which I had set up their network with Linux servers, and the other that had already owned a Win '03 SBS when I started. In the time since I've been gone, the Win shop has had to contract with an local support company for about 1/3 the hardware cost of their 1 SBS per. month in order to keep things running. The Linux shop, (which doesn't have an Open Source Guru on staff) has had '0' problems with their system. In fact, the only time that their servers have been down in the past 2+ years was when the power went out for several days due to a flood. In addition, the Linux shop was able to purchase 2 servers, one main and one mirrored backup, for a cheaper price than the Windows shop paid for a single SBS + CALS. Linux may not be a the best option from a contractor's point of view, but in my experience it works get for the client.
Being literate isnt knowing all the different systems... Being computer literate is just knowing how to read whatever interface your given and being able to interacting with it on a basic level.
So, someone who's read every Dr. Seuss book can be considered equally as literate as someone who's mastered Shakespeare, Tolstoy and Proust, right?
I am as anti-MS as they come, but I don't recall saying anything about 'The State' "crushing" MSFT, nor can I find that specific comment throughout this thread. I agree that "The government that can "Crush" MSFT can render the use of free and open source software a "homeland security" risk, and tantamount to an act of terrorism." However, I don't think we've yet gotten to the point where bloodshed is our only means of promoting change in government policy. "We the people..." ARE 'The State.' Civil revolt historically leads to one repressive regime being replaced with another. The Thomas Jefferson quote that you sight earlier eludes to this fact when he states "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time..."
The common civilian is far less equipped to fight government or corporate abuse with guns and ammo then they are to fight with their own voice. The problem is, MOST do neither. They sit by passively as a vocal minority (lobbyist(s)) actively promote their specific agendas. "The truth is out there," but it won't be spoon-fed to the masses by corporate sponsored media.
Calling for the head of Bill Gates on Slashdot might get you modded up. Additionally, being gunned down by the National Guard and the Redmond police while trying to hold Gates and Ballmer accountable for their crimes at gunpoint might elevate one to martyr status in the Open Source community, but I don't believe that its going to actually change the social and/or economic landscape that we live in. Promoting change from within a system calls for real sacrifice. It requires time. One has to invest time in first being aware of, then really understanding the issues. Then one must be willing to invest time in making their views heard by the people who can effect a change.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
Slashdoters unite! Stop these feeble attempts to bring MSFTs abusive monopoly down using the fascist US government's legal system! We must storm the walls of Castle Redmond with torches, pitchforks, and muskets a'blazin'!
"Right, because the IT guy knows how to run the company."
Maybe he/she isn't the right person to manage the company, but I'll bet he/she is better equipped to manage network resources then you.
No such thing (as Unacceptable computer usage). If someone's computer usage (a) breaks no laws (b) does not negatively impact their productivity then it's not "unacceptable".
Here's a clue! On a network, Each user's bad habits effect the performance, availability and stability of the entire network. While that may not negatively impact YOUR productivity, It very well may impact the productivity of others.
...the idea of IT dictating how someone should and shouldn't use their computer to be productive is ludicrous.
I suppose that Accounting dictating that employees not be allowed to gamble with expense account money is ludicrous too? Or, how about not being allowed to enter your company car in a demolition derby? Or, any other reasonable restriction that an employer puts on COMPANY property? Corporate Network != Personal Home Computer
maxed bandwidth usage, Then get more. Great Idea! Perhaps they can pay for it by eliminating company staff who don't respect company resources.
IT services should be like janitorial services.
Another brilliant bit of insight! Forget the years of college and other training that it took for your IT staff to become more knowledgeable than you about computers and network system resources, and have the janitorial staff manage your company network.
and no common sense
I believe that you proved his point.
"Suppose that a very important document is formatted in Billy's proprietary document format v1.21, but there are no more copies of Billy's wordprocessor which was discontinued 250 years ago, so the format has to be reverse engineered."
At which point, since the software copywrite laws have been extended to life plus eternity, anyone wishing to reverse engineer the document format will be required to sacrifice the body of their first born child as a host to Billy's un-dead brain. That'll teach those thieving space pirates!
Slashdot Mirror
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/01/080105140107.htm
It isn't just coffee mugs and iPods.
My wife worked for years at a country club near where we use to live. It was NOTHING for pharmaceutical reps. to spend $20,000+ on dinner and drinks for a group of local doctors, just to pitch their latest drugs.
The market doesn't regulate the price of drugs in the US, the patent holder does.
God sees the results of the decisions we make, but as we change our mind and try to decide things, he sees the results of those actions. So he sees everything we choose to do, but also much we don't.
I'm not religious but that makes sense to me at least. This puts me in mind of the Many Worlds theory?
No they are not. Most school boards are made up of people who have never stepped foot in a classroom, but somehow believe that they know more about teaching than the people who do the job every day.
You may have a point about it being easier to install Ubuntu on a random untested piece of hardware than OS X, but. on the opposite end of the spectrum, installing Mac OS X on a Macbook Pro (made for use with OS X) takes fewer clicks and requires less dialog pages be clicked through than installing Ubuntu on a Dell Inspiron 1420 N (made for use with Ubuntu)).
Oh yea!..well...upgrading Unbuntu from Feisty to Gutsy only takes '1 click' from the package manager...so there...take that... ; )
Seriously, what you say may be true, I don't know. I've owned 5 Macs in my life, and they've all come with then OS installed. I wasn't even aware that you could buy a 'naked' Mac. (I suppose that you could completely wipe the hard drive for the joy of re-installing the OS, but I've never had the pleasure.) However, if you're comparing upgrading on a Mac to a complete install of Ubuntu (or other distro), I'd expect there to be more dialogs on the complete install.
"You just described why Mac OS is a better day to day operating system, and Linux is the vasty more configurable one. I should have to sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg-plow to get a GUI, ya know?"
He might have to do more than that to get Mac OSX up and running on his laptop. Comparing pre-installed Mac OSX on Apple hardware to self installed Linux on untested hardware is an "Apples" to Oranges comparison at best.
"It doesn't cover your tasks nor contacts. It's calendar-only. Yes, open protocols suffer from lack of general, abstracted architecture for groupware - they're all patchwork, stitched together. You can use CalDav for calendar, LDAP for address books (theoretically - no useful implementations of this idea exist), IMAP + SMTP for mail, etc. As a result, each type of object has to be handled completely differently on both the server and client sides. Maybe that's the cause of lack of proper OpenSource groupware solutions - there's no single, standard, open, all-purpose groupware protocol to base them on. Anybody care to design one?"
I only responded with the solution that I use for off-line "Calendaring / Scheduling" since that was the original topic of the discussion. I have yet to have the need to sync my 'tasks' for off-line use, but I do like to have my contacts with me on the go.
Fortunately, I have shell access to our eGroupware database. I wrote a script that pulls the desired contact info. from the database and saves it to a Vcard file. No, it's not ideal and it's something that should be included in the app., but ical and vcard formats allow me to do that.
Also, there is http://www.egroupware.org/sync, and XML-RPC
"But it's still weak if you need disconnected operation..." I've been using it with the iCal Server app. to deal with this limitation. This allows me to sync with a desktop/laptop calendar and in turn, sync with my PDA, Cell Phone, and iPod. I agree, eGroupware has a lot of functionality.
"When you consider the efficiency gains and TCO when you migrate to MS and the entire .NET framework, Microsoft practically *is* paying you to use Windows."
Bwaahaahaahaa...ROLFLMAO!
"They will need to become familiar with its interface, idiosyncrasies, and annoyances. Running Open Office is not the same learning experience, especially for those who are not as as technosexual as we are."
Technosexual? That is the problem, too many years of "click on file" -> "click on open" -> "click on browse" -> etc. -> etc. -> etc. "computer training." It's like trying to learn Calculus by memorizing key strokes on a TI89 calculator. If you can't do math on ANY calculator (or pen and paper), please do the world a favor, and don't try to engineer any bridges. Schools should be teaching 'Word Processing,' 'Spreadsheets,' 'Photo Editing,' etc...not 'MS Word,' 'MS Excel,' 'Adobe Photoshop.' People wouldn't be so scared of new/different software if they had a clue as to why they were clicking on "file" -> "open" -> "browse," etc.
From ASCAP's FAQ page... http://www.ascap.com/licensing/generalfaq.html 5. Aren't musicians, entertainers and DJ's responsible for obtaining permission for music they perform? Some people mistakenly assume that musicians and entertainers must obtain licenses to perform copyrighted music or that businesses where music is performed can shift their responsibility to musicians or entertainers. The law says all who participate in, or are responsible for, performances of music are legally responsible. Since it is the business owner who obtains the ultimate benefit from the performance, it is the business owner who obtains the license. Music license fees are one of the many costs of doing business.
Have you been paying your ASCAP and BMI performance fees?...
Actually, I am a BMI member. I'm currently not an ASCAP member because songwriters can only register their material with one organization or the other at a time. Any venue that provides (non original only) entertainment has to pay ASCAP and BMI 'dues' based on the size of the that venue. If you're playing covers in a venue that is keeping up with those dues, your performance in that venue is covered under that venue's due requirements. It's done this way because the performance rights organizations know that it's logistically impossible for them to track down and charge fees to every cover band out there. It's much easier to assume that if a venue is having bands, that there will be a certain number of covers played by those bands. Incidentally, the last I read, none of the money from the dues collected actually goes to the writers of the songs that are played. It all goes to the cost of collecting those dues. In other words, the dues are collected in order to pay the salaries of the people who collect those dues. The excuse that the songwriters get when they complain about not getting any of that money is that it is too hard to monitor what songs are being played and how often, in order to allocate the money correctly. It's a total scam. Unfortunately, that is the current state of the music business today. ASPCAP, BMI, RIAA, etc. use copyright, performance right, mechanical right and publishing right laws to bilk BOTH artists and consumers out of every penny they possible can.
I think the real money is in being a cover's band - rather than playing your original work... Is that what you did?
Actually, I did both. You'll never make a living playing 9 or 10 originals for a cut of the door at an underage Punk Rock show once every couple of months. That doesn't mean that you have to give that up. You just have to do something more profitable during the times that those shows aren't going on. For me, that might mean doing "cheesy" acoustic covers during happy hour at the local Country club on a Wednesday night so I could 'afford' to do a 'songwriter's showcase' on Saturday night. Yea, playing "Margaritaville" sucks, but again, for me, it's way better than flipping burgers, and those gigs usually paid $100+ per. hour.
You are aware that musicians create art? If you want to make a living at it, that would be "commercial" art.
They don't do this "business" thing. Correction, the ones that starve don't do the "business" thing.
Create the art, and the money should appear? Since when? I use to believe that, of course I also use to believe that if I put a recording of a song that I just wrote under my pillow before I went to bed at night, when I woke up, there'd be money under my pillow. Then, I grew up. Even before the modern music business evolved, wealthily people commissioned composers to create music that they (the wealthy commissioners) liked. I personally know a couple of very successful songwriters. (with Gold and Platinum records on their living room walls) They write songs first to make a living and second because it's what they love to do.
If not, it's the pirates fault. So now it's 'pirates' who prevent 'BAR BANDS' (that was what we were talking about) from making a decent living? That comment, and perhaps your entire post, is either sarcasm or 'flame bait'. It's hard to tell which.
bar bands don't make money as a rule.
True, as a rule, but not because there isn't a market capable of supporting bar bands. Most bar bands don't make money for the same reason most new business fail, poor management. I've been playing in bar bands for 25 years, 10 of those years playing bars provided my sole income. I only backed off due to a temporary medical problem. A bar musician can make $50,000+ per. year if they treat it like a 'REAL' job. They can't forget the business in "music BUSINESS." Be flexible, find your target market(s), play to those markets, keep your expenses to a minimum, and work at it 40+ hours per. week. Those are the kinds of things that one does when they run any kind of business.
what is to stop Sally Sandbone from taking the Latest Madonna (or other) song and calling it her own?
Copyright law.
Who is going to go after the protection of content for the content provider?
The original artist's attorney? The RIAA is not required to enforce copyright law. In fact, they probably aren't going to come to the rescue of the "lowly" pianists at Nordstrom's. (I say this being a working musican for the past 25yrs.) The RIAA does not protect content creators! They are only concerned with stockholders profits. This article is a prime example of that fact.I can only speak from my experience, yours may be completely different.
Isn't this a little like saying that if Sycom (or any contracting company) happens to assign "Joe Dunce-ski" to your account, you can rely on them to fix anything he screws up? What are the odds that they'll replace "Dunce-ski" with "Moron-ovich?" If the person that they sent me in the first place didn't know what he was doing, my "sense of security" is already out the door. Besides that, small businesses don't know that the reason they're having problems is due to a poorly configured system. They only know "my internet's broken," and the contracting company sure as Hell isn't going to tell them. Most small businesses never get past "Dunce-ski." When there is a problem, the contractor either does a wipe and reinstall or recommends that the hardware be replaced. So, the "sense of security" that comes with having a large local support company is often a "false sense of security."
Yea, and in the process put the business out of compliance with licensing. Just because it's easy for the Accountant to add 100 accounts to a SBS with 5 CALS, doesn't mean he should. That type of mistake could potentially bankrupt a small business should the BSA find out. Besides, every Linux distro that I've ever used has a GUI for adding users "that's so easy even a Caveman/MCSE can use it" (sorry, I couldn't help myself). And, the Account can do so without worrying about licensing issues.
I disagree with "the majority of the time," it depends of the distro...However, rarely have I ever run into a situation that 'man app' or 'cat /etc/app.conf' (and read the comments) didn't give me the information that I needed.
No, but neither did the Windows machine. It was set up by a contractor because the company didn't have the expertise on staff.
Agreed, but in my experience, quality Windows Administrators are equally as difficult to find as quality Linux Admins.
I don't doubt that a well maintained Windows server can run reliably. My point was that, again in my experience, Linux requires far less maintenance. Of the two companies that I spoke of, the one running Linux was able to afford to add redundancy to their network, reducing the likelyhood of the entire business being on hold if the main server goes down, and giving them time to ship the main server to someone who can fix it, if needed. They have also saved enough in contractor fees over the past two years that they could pay to fly me back a few dozen times, if they had to, and still be ahead of the game.
The ones that I've worked with don't know shit about Windows either.
I respect anyone who is willing to put the type of effort that you describe into understanding something unfamiliar to them, whether it be Linux or anything else. In fact, your CUPS saga reminded me of how I felt when I first began playing around with Linux. I also came from a Windows background. Thinking the *nix way instead of the Windows way took some time for me to develop. Tools such as 'webmin' really helped ease me through that initial learning curve. The only reason I started playing with Linux in the first place was that the small company I was working for needed more IT then it could afford, and I was too stubborn to leave it at that. Linux/*nix is not harder then Windows, just different. Once I started to understand it, Windows' wizards started driving me nuts. As for documentation, that is an application developer issue, not a platform one. Plenty of poorly documented applications exist for Windows. I am not trying to start a big "Windblows Sucks," "Linux Rulz" flame war. I'm just arguing that Linux's use, or lack thereof, in the local small business market shouldn't be solely based on the local "Geek Squad's" ability to support it on a daily basis. A well configured system can run for years without issue. The particular one in my example has been running for a little over 4 years without a problem. (2 while I was working there, and 2 since I've been gone) In this company's case, the rewards for choosing Linux have, so far, far outweighed the risks.
"Who's patching those linux servers?" They are Redhat machines, so that would be "chkconfig yum on." (even the least technical employee can reboot the server for kernel updates). And, "crontab" + "freshclam --quiet" to help protect the Windows machines on the network.
"Don't even get me started on Linux. I'm sure it's great if you happen to have an open source guru around, but it's just not a viable option for setting up a back-end where no one has any serious tech experience."
Oh Please!...I left my home town a little over 2 years ago to take a better job 6 hrs. away. When I did, I left 2 companies that I was doing support for. One in which I had set up their network with Linux servers, and the other that had already owned a Win '03 SBS when I started. In the time since I've been gone, the Win shop has had to contract with an local support company for about 1/3 the hardware cost of their 1 SBS per. month in order to keep things running. The Linux shop, (which doesn't have an Open Source Guru on staff) has had '0' problems with their system. In fact, the only time that their servers have been down in the past 2+ years was when the power went out for several days due to a flood. In addition, the Linux shop was able to purchase 2 servers, one main and one mirrored backup, for a cheaper price than the Windows shop paid for a single SBS + CALS. Linux may not be a the best option from a contractor's point of view, but in my experience it works get for the client.
Being literate isnt knowing all the different systems ... Being computer literate is just knowing how to read whatever interface your given and being able to interacting with it on a basic level.
So, someone who's read every Dr. Seuss book can be considered equally as literate as someone who's mastered Shakespeare, Tolstoy and Proust, right?
I am as anti-MS as they come, but I don't recall saying anything about 'The State' "crushing" MSFT, nor can I find that specific comment throughout this thread. I agree that "The government that can "Crush" MSFT can render the use of free and open source software a "homeland security" risk, and tantamount to an act of terrorism." However, I don't think we've yet gotten to the point where bloodshed is our only means of promoting change in government policy. "We the people..." ARE 'The State.' Civil revolt historically leads to one repressive regime being replaced with another. The Thomas Jefferson quote that you sight earlier eludes to this fact when he states "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time..."
The common civilian is far less equipped to fight government or corporate abuse with guns and ammo then they are to fight with their own voice. The problem is, MOST do neither. They sit by passively as a vocal minority (lobbyist(s)) actively promote their specific agendas. "The truth is out there," but it won't be spoon-fed to the masses by corporate sponsored media.
Calling for the head of Bill Gates on Slashdot might get you modded up. Additionally, being gunned down by the National Guard and the Redmond police while trying to hold Gates and Ballmer accountable for their crimes at gunpoint might elevate one to martyr status in the Open Source community, but I don't believe that its going to actually change the social and/or economic landscape that we live in. Promoting change from within a system calls for real sacrifice. It requires time. One has to invest time in first being aware of, then really understanding the issues. Then one must be willing to invest time in making their views heard by the people who can effect a change.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
Slashdoters unite! Stop these feeble attempts to bring MSFTs abusive monopoly down using the fascist US government's legal system! We must storm the walls of Castle Redmond with torches, pitchforks, and muskets a'blazin'!
Post the URL of a Windows web site that doesn't work because it is running windows...
I would, but it's down right now. : >)"Right, because the IT guy knows how to run the company."
Maybe he/she isn't the right person to manage the company, but I'll bet he/she is better equipped to manage network resources then you.
No such thing (as Unacceptable computer usage). If someone's computer usage (a) breaks no laws (b) does not negatively impact their productivity then it's not "unacceptable".
Here's a clue! On a network, Each user's bad habits effect the performance, availability and stability of the entire network. While that may not negatively impact YOUR productivity, It very well may impact the productivity of others.
I suppose that Accounting dictating that employees not be allowed to gamble with expense account money is ludicrous too? Or, how about not being allowed to enter your company car in a demolition derby? Or, any other reasonable restriction that an employer puts on COMPANY property? Corporate Network != Personal Home Computer
maxed bandwidth usage, Then get more.
Great Idea! Perhaps they can pay for it by eliminating company staff who don't respect company resources.
IT services should be like janitorial services.
Another brilliant bit of insight! Forget the years of college and other training that it took for your IT staff to become more knowledgeable than you about computers and network system resources, and have the janitorial staff manage your company network.
and no common sense
I believe that you proved his point.
"Suppose that a very important document is formatted in Billy's proprietary document format v1.21, but there are no more copies of Billy's wordprocessor which was discontinued 250 years ago, so the format has to be reverse engineered."
At which point, since the software copywrite laws have been extended to life plus eternity, anyone wishing to reverse engineer the document format will be required to sacrifice the body of their first born child as a host to Billy's un-dead brain. That'll teach those thieving space pirates!