Today everything you create is automaticly copyrighted. It wasn't always that way though. If I remember rightly until the late 1970's you had to claim copyright in a specific way or it was automaticly public domain. It was easy to do correctly, worst case was $25 plus a few stamps, no lawyer, but you had to do it. (companies would of course use a lawyer)
Laws change, the laws that applied back then count in this case, not the laws today.
At some point they will hand you some sort of rule book. Read it! At one time shorts were in the rule book as qualifing as full dress if you were in Hawaii, but nobody wore them until one person showed up at inspection and caught the inspector who didn't know that. (I don't know if this is a true story) I'm not sure if you want to be the one to inform the inspectors they don't know the rules, but you should know them anyway.
Everyone says don't volunteer for anything. This is not true, but make sure you know what you are volunteering for. My uncle volunteered for choir and discovered afterwords that choir practice was always when inspections were held. So long as things looked neat he wasn't held to the standards the rest of his dorm was held to. (He had a good voice though). The person on KP isn't doing exercise in the yard. Personally I'd rather weed the base garden than do a 5 mile run, even if the weeding job is inspected afterwards. When the sargent announces a 26 mile run, but there will be a truck for anyone who colapses on the way - well someone has to drive the truck.
Warning though, do not spend so much time avoiding the exercises that you can't do them. Get in shape before you go, and stay in shape. At some point you won't be able to get out of the drill, so make sure you are not below the rest of your class.
Finially, it is your life. Free advice is worth what you pay for it, I haven't been to boot camp, I'm only repeating stories from those who have. Still there are some useful nuggets in here, so don't waste them
It is hard for microsoft to lock out open source with the product mix they have. They only succede now because they were early and managed to win, but they no longer can compete on features, price, or IBM granted monopoly. (Though they can dictate hardware specs, something that is worrying to me)
Once you have a working version of a word processor nothing much changes. Once in a while the spell checker might need an updated dictionary or import filters for you compition, but open source can get them too. What new useful features can they add. There might be a few, but most fail the useful qualifier, and the rest are useful only to a small group. If you are in the latter group there is a chance that only open source will consider it worth the bother to add your feature, and then only because YOU can hire whoever you want to add it. (your choice to open source it or not unfortunatly)
Remember software is easy to copy. When an architect draws up house plans carpinders need to build it, which takes a team of four, 2 or 3 months, each house. With software once it is built, copies can be made easially. Open source is even easier than closed because it is free so they don't have license keys or the like. Open source: one person can put it in the default install CD, and once it works put it on all workstations in theory, closed source takes just a little longer because you have to handle license keys and legal issues, but still nothing compared to the house.
Once something has the features you need and is free, it has a compelling argument to switch. I do not see how Microsoft or anyone else can keep coming up with new features that are compelling enough to be worth the cost.
I have already switched to Kword. I admit that it still isn't nearly as good as MSWord, but it is good enough, and free. Many computers are coming with WordPerfect installed because it is cheaper, and most home users won't see a need to switch so long as the import/export filters work right.
It may take 100 years, but I suspect that for software that everyone uses, you will soon find that only free software is used. Only the software that is used by few people, or changes often will survive. (tax preperation for instance)
Record companies make their money from the famious artists, and then use their cut to lobby for laws that are against artists and people. Don't don't buy the major artists, because in the end it works against you. Buy from the artists that are self producing (who may or may not have independant distribution deals) who won't be lobbying for laws that are against you.
There is a large amount of music out there. Stores want to carry what sells, radio stations want to play what will get listeners. When they see enough people are buying from talented no-names they will put forth some effort to get the money in there. If they discover that not liking certian laws is part of the reason a no-name is chossen over a major artist of similear talent, they will solve the problem. (of course good luck finding talen in major artists today, but they will likely look for talent before they realise there is more than just talen at stake)
I don't know about you, but I've droped my cell phone into lakes too often to want an expensive one. (it was in my pocket when I fell overboard last time) Sure I recover it, but I haven't had success getting them to work after than.
Combine that with new features coming out all the time, and I'm not sure I want an expensive one. As others have noted, this cheap phone looks better feature wise than a more expensive older model.
Or to put it a different way: why spend money on an expensive phone when I can get a cheap one, and the next model will be better?
where do you get the idea tht Canada is the place where people still have universial human rights. Canada has its share of troubles, in part caused by being a neighbor to the powerful US. Their laws are different, but not nessicarly better. For gunowners their laws are by far worse. For other things their laws are better. Laws and courts in both countries change so even though today Canada might be better for your particular preference in rights, that doesn't mean that next year it will not be worse.
Multiplication and division is arithmatic, NOT MATH! Math teachs I have tlked to have all told me that kids are not mentally ready for math (by which I mean algebra and calculas for starters) before 5th grade or latter. That is okay though, kids need arithmatic (multiplication and division) before they are ready for real math anyway, and it takes years to learn that well.
No, heads to not explode, but kids will not do well either. The brain is not fully developed yet, we need to work within its limits. Push them to develop perhaps, but push to hard and frusteration is the result and then less is learned when the brain finially is ready.
You are confusing Mathamatics and Arithmatic. Kids are not mentally ready for math until 5th grade at the earliest. Until then then need some facts (arithmatic) as a foundation.
Tell her those packets are boring, but sometimes life is borning, and she needs to know all that. Everyone knows that 9+7 is 16, but you need to know that without counting on your fingers, it makes the rest of what she learns possible. Just make her do it, and then let her get on with the other toys.
Don't worry about perfect grades, make sure she knows what is going on. Spend your time teaching her how to think. Teach her to question facts to make sure they are reasonable. The best way to teach is by example. If you kids see you sit in from of the TV watching Hard Copy for your news (or the equivelent) they will learn to watch, and likely belive and care about junk news. If they see you read the Wall Street Journel or other respected papers and then discuss what you read (with your spouse, neightbors, and kids) they will learn to do the same.
Don't be too cought up in what the kid wants to do now. Nobody is equiped to decide what to do with their life until at least 9th grade, and many switch carrers several times. The world needs Doctor, ditch diggers, and preachers. For now make sure she can do whichever one she wants to. (note that all of the above require some inborn ability that not everyone has - doctors need to deal with blood, ditch diggers need to be strong, and preachers need to understand both God and People - assuming they are not crooks, those just need to understand people)
How many of you even learned (much less recall ) that ok is not a word, the correct spelling is okay? I'll bet none of those teachers marking down new words like "r" and "u" mark down "ok".
English teachers do not define the language, use defines the language. We only need english teachers because we need a common starting point, but once we have that we need to move byond them and their rules that don't work. "r" and "u" are two very useful reforms of english spelling. I just wish that the rest of the needed reforms would come in my lifetime so I can spell correctly.
A large monument in the mountains sounds like a good idea, but not with MY face on it. I can think of several girls who would be worthy of the honnor of having their face in my personal monument. With any luck I could convince one to be my wife and skip the russian mail order thing. (Okay, a lot of luck, but it could happen. I'm still budgeting for the russian bride program though)
I think most of my money would be spent on randomlly paying for math education. I've always wanted to go bake to my school and for one quarter pay the tuition for every math class, with the only requirement that you get a C, and the class be difficult. (calc or above, Algebra is high school not college) I would at random go to schools and pay for it, but the announcement would not be made until after the last day to register for class.
You need to study roller coaster design a little more. Many roller coasters are designed to look and feel like they are going to fall apart at any moment. I've ridden those that are, and those that are not. I avoid the roller coasters that feel soild becuase they are no fun. (In general the soild roller coasters ahve to mkae up for the lack of fun by going upside down, while the "weak" ones are fun with much tamer rides)
Engineers are tricky, those roller coasters are still plenty safe, and inspectors are not often bought. For that matter the operators know that they need to appear to be running a minimal maintance operation, but if that actucally running minimal maintance is risking death, and they cannot afford those lawsuits. (Okay, so the insurance company might force it in some cases, but the result is the same: a raide that feels unsafe while still perfectly safe)
Why do you care if the phone is GSM? That is the technical standard. I care that my phone works where I want to use it. GSM, CDMA, AMPS, TDMA (others?) are technical standards, and it the the phone companie's job to figgure out which is best and how to switch people to it. You problem is getting clear calls in various locations. Figgure out where you need a phone, and use it there.
Many US carriers will rent you a phone that will work in Europe, with your number, even though they don't have a GSM network.
The only advantage of GSM has over the others from a consumer stand point is anyone can remove their SIM card and put it in a different phone. (Thus you can buy a US phone, and if you travel get a europe only phone for use there) That is only an advantage that consumers need to care about. (In truth, GSM was an early standard, that like most got some things right, and some wrong, but it happened to win. Windows won the OS war long ago, but it was never the best)
Quit looking at the phone companies problems, and start looking at coverage areas, roaming charges, minutes, roaming coverage, and cost. That is what you care about.
As an aside, if you find one plan you like, but it doesn't cover everywhere, call the provider, they can only build so many towers per year, so they have to decide where. If you tell them that you want coverage someplace they might put a tower there in 6 months or so. It is worth a shot, it might or might not work.
I know of places in the US that have only AMPS coverage, and I don't think that will change anytime soon. I don't know how you pay for a tower that covers Chasely North Dakota (population: < 10, I have relatives that happen to live nearby, within the 36 square mile township there are 100 people)
Sure, easy to you to say AMPS is dieing, and I don't see anyone putting in an AMPs tower anymore, but I don't see them upgraded a lot of rual towers either, at least not while they can maintain the current equipment. Eventially I expect to see upgrades, but not until a digital standard is agreed upon and looks like it will not be upgraded.
I can justify upgrading all the cell phone towers in New York City every few years because there are a lot of users to pay for it, and presumibly demand. I cannot do the same for remote towers that are rarely used.
Don't forget that the problems of city towers are different from rual ones. When the tower is not busy you really want to find some way to increase the range and get rid of a few towers. When the tower is saterated with calls you want to find a way to turn the power down further and split the cell.
correction, GSM in europe uses 900 and 1800 Mhz, with either frequency having nearly full coverage. (900 filled up and carriers wanted in, I belive it was an old analog stnadard not used anymore, but I'm not sure.) Note that 1800 is double 900, and thus makes some parts of dual band radio design simpler.
The US wanted to give 1800 to those who wanted it (at high chost), but that rage was already assigned to someone else (military?) who didn't want to give it up. So trying to be close they assigned 1900. The old US analog freq uencies are at 800 Mhz (you do see CDMA on those frequencies because the cdma people came up with a CDMA/AMPs dual base station, I've not heard of GSM there, but there is no technical reason it couldn't be done)
Don't forget that until cell phones very few people cared about about compatablilyt of wireless standards across the pond. Other than military and a few commmercial shippers nobody really had the ability to communicate more than a few miles. The US can Canada were used to working togather because radio and TV cross the borders so they needed to be sure there was no interfierence, and it would be nice to pick up those cross border stations once in a while.
Don't ask just the providers, ask the independant guy who sells all brands of phone. Sometimes they know the answers, and they are not biased to one service.
I'm not too fond of local goverment either.
At least we have a little more control, but the federal goverment puts too much pressue on what local goverments can do.
I'm not sure I'd agree that the federal goverment does what the people as a whole want. I would say more they do what the people as a whole will let them get by with. With all the things that the goverment does, nobody has time to look at each one, I'm sure there are things (but I don't have the time to look close) that only a few people want, and the rest don't, but those who want it will vote to have it stay, while the rest of us don't know. The DMCA snuck in that way, I had no idea I had to care so much about that one issue until we discovered just how bad it was. I always wonder what other ones have got through that I'm not aware of.
I'd run for congress, but I'm unelectable. (I would keep my promise to make goverment small, and plenty of retired folks, farmers, etc would balk at specifics (while encouraging me on what they don't care about...). Still, I vote for those who will make a difference, which is rarely the big two.
I beg to differ. I know that I'm not the only one who wants goverment to NOT work as a team. Most of my family concluded long ago that the goverment only does things that we do not want them to do. (Mostly spend my money) Sure every once in a while they do something good, but the large majority of the time they do not. Case in point: Passing those terrorist bills after 9/11/2001 that limit freedoms more than terrorism.
I wont' get into how only about 40% of the elligable population votes (in presidential election years, less in off years), Not to mention underage, fellons, and non-residents (citicians but I can't speel it:) who can't vote.
I looked at my transcript at registration for spring quarter and found I needed 8 credits to graduate, I had all my CS courses, and I need 8 math credits for a math minor. It seemed like a no brainer so I registered for those two classes. (The next day I added my credits corretly and discovered that I could graduate then, but I decided to take the minor anyway as it would still take most of a quarter for graduation paperwork to go through I may as well take classes).
I don't regret taking those two classes. They were fun in the way only math classes can be. As my dad remarked after graduation, the announce announced very few minors and double majors that night.
As for usefullness? I'm not sure. I've applied for a few jobs that list math skills, but I've not even gotten in the door. If nothing else though, I figgure it gives me a fall back, but I'm not sure where to.
Can you get a minor instead of a major? (I was missing some classes for a major that I did not want to take) It might mean less classes. I would not recomend that you postpone graduation, but if you have some room in the schedual why not. Don't forget that there are other classes. I considered taking some bible history classes instead, perhaps you have similear interests you would be better off going for.
Remember you can go back to school after you are done with the CS degree, and often your boss will pick up continuing education classes. This is one good reason not to get the major. Warning though, some companies insist continuing education relate to your job (which a math degree may or may not count for), so if you have someone in mind find out now.
Invite as resource. There is one of my outlook pet peves. It is a CONFRENCE ROOM, not a person. The computer should know that. There should be no need for me to figgure that out, and once in a while make a mistake. I've been to several meetings only to discover someone else managed to get the same room, and we had to move. Honest mistake that happened far too often.
The sad part is the company had a windows and Unix solution that worked okay (Synchronize), and switched it out for outlook, even though many people only have unix machines. (When I left several people loged in once to tell outlook to accept all meetings, and then forwarded all mail to the unix mail and kept track of schedual on paper).
FreeBSD still has 2.1 and 2.2 in CVS, and once in a while they get patches. Not often, but once in a while. (1.0 turned out to have some copyright violations, you need an AT&T license to run it, but if you have that licesne we can track down the source to 1.0 for you)
I've used a few. I strongly recomend you invest in one. However you need to beware of the limitations of these tools. They only test what you tell them to test to make sure it works the same as last time. You will have trouble with dynamic data. (even Dates. The tool can be told to ignore things, but then it is ignoring data, so make sure it is ignoring the right thing)
These tools do NOT substitute for the first time through testing. You will still need a QA person to examine all known changes and verifty it they work right, and then tell the tool how to test for the new change.
It is a daily job (Often full time) to update the tool. In fact you should not let the tool guy go on vacation until he has a (several?) replacements who will do the job while he is away. In little time, enough changes that by the time you catch up you are often better off starting over from scratch. Do not let your updates slide, no matter what, or you will regret it.
The tool is not a substitute for first time testing. In fact if you want something that will only test your pages the first time you write them, you are better off doing it by hand, part of teaching the tool how to test a page is to test it while the tool watches. However once you have tested the page once, the tool has no problem testing it every day to make sure nobody accidenly changed something on it. Fortunatly this latter testing is the boring part nobody wants to do. Just make sure that everyone takes the time to write the test for each change. (or at least has the tools guy write the test, depending on your process)
We found that it was as much effort to write the test automation as to do the test for each version change (this was software not web pages), but once the test for each version was written you would press the button and run the test each time a patch was released, and everything would be tested. Once in a while bugs were found, but not very often. Many of the "bugs" found were not bugs, but changes in the way the product worked and we needed to change the script.
Finially the pay off, if there is one, will take more then a year. Warn your management right now about that. Somehow you need to keep metrics (and I'm not convinced any reasonable metrics exists to take) to compare the before and after case. Not everyone who has done test automation is convinced it was worth it. If you think it will take away a lot of the work you are doing now, then no it is not. If you want it to find a lot of bugs you are finding much later, then yes it is.
Overall, test automation is MORE work than you are doing now (just a guess, but likely), but it will catch more bugs faster. Try it, but remember a fair trial is a lot of work and it will take some time for the pay out.
Not nessicarly. WWI was mainly chemical weapons (mustard gas). After all seeing what those weapons did to people, niether side in WWII was willing to be first to use them (even though both sides had more descructive chemical weapons) first because of they didn't want retaliation.
I belive that WWII with bigger weapons helped to prevent a neculear war in the 60's. The last act of WWII was neculear weapons, and the descruction was a roll model. Both sides in the 60's knew that the other could take them out if they started a war, and niether was willing to risk it. (Mutually assured destruction works so long as nobody crazy is in charge)
Current military thinking is to destroy only targets. In the gulf war the military braged about their ability to get one building in a city without bothering others. (though in truth they didn't succede, that was the goal)
WWIII won't be faught for a few years anymore. WWI was building in Europe for years, people actually danced in celebration of war being declared. I've encountered many europeans who think that WWI was a good thing, the world NEEDED a war then! Right now nobody thinks need a war. (Though perhaps the terrorist thing could be considered that - I optimisticly hope not)
I worked ~20 hours a week and went to school full time. I discovered that I could not take more than 13 credits a quarter without failing classes. They kept pushing me to tkae that many hours, but I couldn't do it. My GPA suffered as a result. Do not let them push you.
You already have a good job, so don't rush college. (I was working fast food, so I needed to push). Take one class at a time, and don't worry about the degree taking 15 years to complete. Spend your time in the one class you do take wisely. Study hard, get As. You can get by on a C, but people judge you based on your GPA once you have the degree, and mine was not where it should have been.
How much do you need to work you buisness? It is really easy for someone in school to neglect their work when they one the company. Don't fall for that trap, you could find yourself without a degree and money when your buiseness failed. Sure you can bring it back, but that means leaving school. On the other hand, don't be afraid to cut your buisness back a little to give school more time.
Canada has its share of problems. Not the same problems as the US, but they do plenty of things to their people that a truely free socity would not do.
Some of the things are different, so I cannot make a judgement of which country is worse, but for me, nice as the country is, their problems are worse than ours. (too bad, they got some beatiful girls up there who have made the opposite decision)
My sister is a regular person who uses and prefers linux. Mind dad set up that system (she is in high school), but she uses it. They have several Mac and windows systems, the linux systems (which are slower technically) are prefered. Simple games like Sokoban are more fun than the games windows has. (I'm sure there are windows versions, but linux includes it in the distribution)
The linux desktop (kde and/or Gnome) are maturing nicely, and the large number of free programs means that distributions include everything you need in the price. redhat is $50 at best buy, and includes a good desktop, and all the programs most people need. (several web browsers, a large number of games, an office suite, and email). Not the best you could get, but plenty good. Kword meets all of the average person's needs. Sure the hottest 3d games are only released for windows, but most people just want games to play. It doesn't matter that the windows games are better, so long as the linux games will keep you satisfied.
Slashdot Mirror
Today everything you create is automaticly copyrighted. It wasn't always that way though. If I remember rightly until the late 1970's you had to claim copyright in a specific way or it was automaticly public domain. It was easy to do correctly, worst case was $25 plus a few stamps, no lawyer, but you had to do it. (companies would of course use a lawyer)
Laws change, the laws that applied back then count in this case, not the laws today.
At some point they will hand you some sort of rule book. Read it! At one time shorts were in the rule book as qualifing as full dress if you were in Hawaii, but nobody wore them until one person showed up at inspection and caught the inspector who didn't know that. (I don't know if this is a true story) I'm not sure if you want to be the one to inform the inspectors they don't know the rules, but you should know them anyway.
Everyone says don't volunteer for anything. This is not true, but make sure you know what you are volunteering for. My uncle volunteered for choir and discovered afterwords that choir practice was always when inspections were held. So long as things looked neat he wasn't held to the standards the rest of his dorm was held to. (He had a good voice though). The person on KP isn't doing exercise in the yard. Personally I'd rather weed the base garden than do a 5 mile run, even if the weeding job is inspected afterwards. When the sargent announces a 26 mile run, but there will be a truck for anyone who colapses on the way - well someone has to drive the truck.
Warning though, do not spend so much time avoiding the exercises that you can't do them. Get in shape before you go, and stay in shape. At some point you won't be able to get out of the drill, so make sure you are not below the rest of your class.
Finially, it is your life. Free advice is worth what you pay for it, I haven't been to boot camp, I'm only repeating stories from those who have. Still there are some useful nuggets in here, so don't waste them
It is hard for microsoft to lock out open source with the product mix they have. They only succede now because they were early and managed to win, but they no longer can compete on features, price, or IBM granted monopoly. (Though they can dictate hardware specs, something that is worrying to me)
Once you have a working version of a word processor nothing much changes. Once in a while the spell checker might need an updated dictionary or import filters for you compition, but open source can get them too. What new useful features can they add. There might be a few, but most fail the useful qualifier, and the rest are useful only to a small group. If you are in the latter group there is a chance that only open source will consider it worth the bother to add your feature, and then only because YOU can hire whoever you want to add it. (your choice to open source it or not unfortunatly)
Remember software is easy to copy. When an architect draws up house plans carpinders need to build it, which takes a team of four, 2 or 3 months, each house. With software once it is built, copies can be made easially. Open source is even easier than closed because it is free so they don't have license keys or the like. Open source: one person can put it in the default install CD, and once it works put it on all workstations in theory, closed source takes just a little longer because you have to handle license keys and legal issues, but still nothing compared to the house.
Once something has the features you need and is free, it has a compelling argument to switch. I do not see how Microsoft or anyone else can keep coming up with new features that are compelling enough to be worth the cost.
I have already switched to Kword. I admit that it still isn't nearly as good as MSWord, but it is good enough, and free. Many computers are coming with WordPerfect installed because it is cheaper, and most home users won't see a need to switch so long as the import/export filters work right.
It may take 100 years, but I suspect that for software that everyone uses, you will soon find that only free software is used. Only the software that is used by few people, or changes often will survive. (tax preperation for instance)
Record companies make their money from the famious artists, and then use their cut to lobby for laws that are against artists and people. Don't don't buy the major artists, because in the end it works against you. Buy from the artists that are self producing (who may or may not have independant distribution deals) who won't be lobbying for laws that are against you.
There is a large amount of music out there. Stores want to carry what sells, radio stations want to play what will get listeners. When they see enough people are buying from talented no-names they will put forth some effort to get the money in there. If they discover that not liking certian laws is part of the reason a no-name is chossen over a major artist of similear talent, they will solve the problem. (of course good luck finding talen in major artists today, but they will likely look for talent before they realise there is more than just talen at stake)
I don't know about you, but I've droped my cell phone into lakes too often to want an expensive one. (it was in my pocket when I fell overboard last time) Sure I recover it, but I haven't had success getting them to work after than.
Combine that with new features coming out all the time, and I'm not sure I want an expensive one. As others have noted, this cheap phone looks better feature wise than a more expensive older model.
Or to put it a different way: why spend money on an expensive phone when I can get a cheap one, and the next model will be better?
where do you get the idea tht Canada is the place where people still have universial human rights. Canada has its share of troubles, in part caused by being a neighbor to the powerful US. Their laws are different, but not nessicarly better. For gunowners their laws are by far worse. For other things their laws are better. Laws and courts in both countries change so even though today Canada might be better for your particular preference in rights, that doesn't mean that next year it will not be worse.
Multiplication and division is arithmatic, NOT MATH! Math teachs I have tlked to have all told me that kids are not mentally ready for math (by which I mean algebra and calculas for starters) before 5th grade or latter. That is okay though, kids need arithmatic (multiplication and division) before they are ready for real math anyway, and it takes years to learn that well.
No, heads to not explode, but kids will not do well either. The brain is not fully developed yet, we need to work within its limits. Push them to develop perhaps, but push to hard and frusteration is the result and then less is learned when the brain finially is ready.
You are confusing Mathamatics and Arithmatic. Kids are not mentally ready for math until 5th grade at the earliest. Until then then need some facts (arithmatic) as a foundation.
Tell her those packets are boring, but sometimes life is borning, and she needs to know all that. Everyone knows that 9+7 is 16, but you need to know that without counting on your fingers, it makes the rest of what she learns possible. Just make her do it, and then let her get on with the other toys.
Don't worry about perfect grades, make sure she knows what is going on. Spend your time teaching her how to think. Teach her to question facts to make sure they are reasonable. The best way to teach is by example. If you kids see you sit in from of the TV watching Hard Copy for your news (or the equivelent) they will learn to watch, and likely belive and care about junk news. If they see you read the Wall Street Journel or other respected papers and then discuss what you read (with your spouse, neightbors, and kids) they will learn to do the same.
Don't be too cought up in what the kid wants to do now. Nobody is equiped to decide what to do with their life until at least 9th grade, and many switch carrers several times. The world needs Doctor, ditch diggers, and preachers. For now make sure she can do whichever one she wants to. (note that all of the above require some inborn ability that not everyone has - doctors need to deal with blood, ditch diggers need to be strong, and preachers need to understand both God and People - assuming they are not crooks, those just need to understand people)
How many of you even learned (much less recall ) that ok is not a word, the correct spelling is okay? I'll bet none of those teachers marking down new words like "r" and "u" mark down "ok".
English teachers do not define the language, use defines the language. We only need english teachers because we need a common starting point, but once we have that we need to move byond them and their rules that don't work. "r" and "u" are two very useful reforms of english spelling. I just wish that the rest of the needed reforms would come in my lifetime so I can spell correctly.
A large monument in the mountains sounds like a good idea, but not with MY face on it. I can think of several girls who would be worthy of the honnor of having their face in my personal monument. With any luck I could convince one to be my wife and skip the russian mail order thing. (Okay, a lot of luck, but it could happen. I'm still budgeting for the russian bride program though)
I think most of my money would be spent on randomlly paying for math education. I've always wanted to go bake to my school and for one quarter pay the tuition for every math class, with the only requirement that you get a C, and the class be difficult. (calc or above, Algebra is high school not college) I would at random go to schools and pay for it, but the announcement would not be made until after the last day to register for class.
You need to study roller coaster design a little more. Many roller coasters are designed to look and feel like they are going to fall apart at any moment. I've ridden those that are, and those that are not. I avoid the roller coasters that feel soild becuase they are no fun. (In general the soild roller coasters ahve to mkae up for the lack of fun by going upside down, while the "weak" ones are fun with much tamer rides)
Engineers are tricky, those roller coasters are still plenty safe, and inspectors are not often bought. For that matter the operators know that they need to appear to be running a minimal maintance operation, but if that actucally running minimal maintance is risking death, and they cannot afford those lawsuits. (Okay, so the insurance company might force it in some cases, but the result is the same: a raide that feels unsafe while still perfectly safe)
Why do you care if the phone is GSM? That is the technical standard. I care that my phone works where I want to use it. GSM, CDMA, AMPS, TDMA (others?) are technical standards, and it the the phone companie's job to figgure out which is best and how to switch people to it. You problem is getting clear calls in various locations. Figgure out where you need a phone, and use it there.
Many US carriers will rent you a phone that will work in Europe, with your number, even though they don't have a GSM network.
The only advantage of GSM has over the others from a consumer stand point is anyone can remove their SIM card and put it in a different phone. (Thus you can buy a US phone, and if you travel get a europe only phone for use there) That is only an advantage that consumers need to care about. (In truth, GSM was an early standard, that like most got some things right, and some wrong, but it happened to win. Windows won the OS war long ago, but it was never the best)
Quit looking at the phone companies problems, and start looking at coverage areas, roaming charges, minutes, roaming coverage, and cost. That is what you care about.
As an aside, if you find one plan you like, but it doesn't cover everywhere, call the provider, they can only build so many towers per year, so they have to decide where. If you tell them that you want coverage someplace they might put a tower there in 6 months or so. It is worth a shot, it might or might not work.
I know of places in the US that have only AMPS coverage, and I don't think that will change anytime soon. I don't know how you pay for a tower that covers Chasely North Dakota (population: < 10, I have relatives that happen to live nearby, within the 36 square mile township there are 100 people)
Sure, easy to you to say AMPS is dieing, and I don't see anyone putting in an AMPs tower anymore, but I don't see them upgraded a lot of rual towers either, at least not while they can maintain the current equipment. Eventially I expect to see upgrades, but not until a digital standard is agreed upon and looks like it will not be upgraded.
I can justify upgrading all the cell phone towers in New York City every few years because there are a lot of users to pay for it, and presumibly demand. I cannot do the same for remote towers that are rarely used.
Don't forget that the problems of city towers are different from rual ones. When the tower is not busy you really want to find some way to increase the range and get rid of a few towers. When the tower is saterated with calls you want to find a way to turn the power down further and split the cell.
correction, GSM in europe uses 900 and 1800 Mhz, with either frequency having nearly full coverage. (900 filled up and carriers wanted in, I belive it was an old analog stnadard not used anymore, but I'm not sure.) Note that 1800 is double 900, and thus makes some parts of dual band radio design simpler.
The US wanted to give 1800 to those who wanted it (at high chost), but that rage was already assigned to someone else (military?) who didn't want to give it up. So trying to be close they assigned 1900. The old US analog freq uencies are at 800 Mhz (you do see CDMA on those frequencies because the cdma people came up with a CDMA/AMPs dual base station, I've not heard of GSM there, but there is no technical reason it couldn't be done)
Don't forget that until cell phones very few people cared about about compatablilyt of wireless standards across the pond. Other than military and a few commmercial shippers nobody really had the ability to communicate more than a few miles. The US can Canada were used to working togather because radio and TV cross the borders so they needed to be sure there was no interfierence, and it would be nice to pick up those cross border stations once in a while.
Don't ask just the providers, ask the independant guy who sells all brands of phone. Sometimes they know the answers, and they are not biased to one service.
I'm not too fond of local goverment either. At least we have a little more control, but the federal goverment puts too much pressue on what local goverments can do.
I'm not sure I'd agree that the federal goverment does what the people as a whole want. I would say more they do what the people as a whole will let them get by with. With all the things that the goverment does, nobody has time to look at each one, I'm sure there are things (but I don't have the time to look close) that only a few people want, and the rest don't, but those who want it will vote to have it stay, while the rest of us don't know. The DMCA snuck in that way, I had no idea I had to care so much about that one issue until we discovered just how bad it was. I always wonder what other ones have got through that I'm not aware of.
I'd run for congress, but I'm unelectable. (I would keep my promise to make goverment small, and plenty of retired folks, farmers, etc would balk at specifics (while encouraging me on what they don't care about...). Still, I vote for those who will make a difference, which is rarely the big two.
I beg to differ. I know that I'm not the only one who wants goverment to NOT work as a team. Most of my family concluded long ago that the goverment only does things that we do not want them to do. (Mostly spend my money) Sure every once in a while they do something good, but the large majority of the time they do not. Case in point: Passing those terrorist bills after 9/11/2001 that limit freedoms more than terrorism.
I wont' get into how only about 40% of the elligable population votes (in presidential election years, less in off years), Not to mention underage, fellons, and non-residents (citicians but I can't speel it:) who can't vote.
I looked at my transcript at registration for spring quarter and found I needed 8 credits to graduate, I had all my CS courses, and I need 8 math credits for a math minor. It seemed like a no brainer so I registered for those two classes. (The next day I added my credits corretly and discovered that I could graduate then, but I decided to take the minor anyway as it would still take most of a quarter for graduation paperwork to go through I may as well take classes).
I don't regret taking those two classes. They were fun in the way only math classes can be. As my dad remarked after graduation, the announce announced very few minors and double majors that night.
As for usefullness? I'm not sure. I've applied for a few jobs that list math skills, but I've not even gotten in the door. If nothing else though, I figgure it gives me a fall back, but I'm not sure where to.
Can you get a minor instead of a major? (I was missing some classes for a major that I did not want to take) It might mean less classes. I would not recomend that you postpone graduation, but if you have some room in the schedual why not. Don't forget that there are other classes. I considered taking some bible history classes instead, perhaps you have similear interests you would be better off going for.
Remember you can go back to school after you are done with the CS degree, and often your boss will pick up continuing education classes. This is one good reason not to get the major. Warning though, some companies insist continuing education relate to your job (which a math degree may or may not count for), so if you have someone in mind find out now.
Invite as resource. There is one of my outlook pet peves. It is a CONFRENCE ROOM, not a person. The computer should know that. There should be no need for me to figgure that out, and once in a while make a mistake. I've been to several meetings only to discover someone else managed to get the same room, and we had to move. Honest mistake that happened far too often.
The sad part is the company had a windows and Unix solution that worked okay (Synchronize), and switched it out for outlook, even though many people only have unix machines. (When I left several people loged in once to tell outlook to accept all meetings, and then forwarded all mail to the unix mail and kept track of schedual on paper).
FreeBSD still has 2.1 and 2.2 in CVS, and once in a while they get patches. Not often, but once in a while. (1.0 turned out to have some copyright violations, you need an AT&T license to run it, but if you have that licesne we can track down the source to 1.0 for you)
I've used a few. I strongly recomend you invest in one. However you need to beware of the limitations of these tools. They only test what you tell them to test to make sure it works the same as last time. You will have trouble with dynamic data. (even Dates. The tool can be told to ignore things, but then it is ignoring data, so make sure it is ignoring the right thing)
These tools do NOT substitute for the first time through testing. You will still need a QA person to examine all known changes and verifty it they work right, and then tell the tool how to test for the new change.
It is a daily job (Often full time) to update the tool. In fact you should not let the tool guy go on vacation until he has a (several?) replacements who will do the job while he is away. In little time, enough changes that by the time you catch up you are often better off starting over from scratch. Do not let your updates slide, no matter what, or you will regret it.
The tool is not a substitute for first time testing. In fact if you want something that will only test your pages the first time you write them, you are better off doing it by hand, part of teaching the tool how to test a page is to test it while the tool watches. However once you have tested the page once, the tool has no problem testing it every day to make sure nobody accidenly changed something on it. Fortunatly this latter testing is the boring part nobody wants to do. Just make sure that everyone takes the time to write the test for each change. (or at least has the tools guy write the test, depending on your process)
We found that it was as much effort to write the test automation as to do the test for each version change (this was software not web pages), but once the test for each version was written you would press the button and run the test each time a patch was released, and everything would be tested. Once in a while bugs were found, but not very often. Many of the "bugs" found were not bugs, but changes in the way the product worked and we needed to change the script.
Finially the pay off, if there is one, will take more then a year. Warn your management right now about that. Somehow you need to keep metrics (and I'm not convinced any reasonable metrics exists to take) to compare the before and after case. Not everyone who has done test automation is convinced it was worth it. If you think it will take away a lot of the work you are doing now, then no it is not. If you want it to find a lot of bugs you are finding much later, then yes it is.
Overall, test automation is MORE work than you are doing now (just a guess, but likely), but it will catch more bugs faster. Try it, but remember a fair trial is a lot of work and it will take some time for the pay out.
Not nessicarly. WWI was mainly chemical weapons (mustard gas). After all seeing what those weapons did to people, niether side in WWII was willing to be first to use them (even though both sides had more descructive chemical weapons) first because of they didn't want retaliation.
I belive that WWII with bigger weapons helped to prevent a neculear war in the 60's. The last act of WWII was neculear weapons, and the descruction was a roll model. Both sides in the 60's knew that the other could take them out if they started a war, and niether was willing to risk it. (Mutually assured destruction works so long as nobody crazy is in charge)
Current military thinking is to destroy only targets. In the gulf war the military braged about their ability to get one building in a city without bothering others. (though in truth they didn't succede, that was the goal)
WWIII won't be faught for a few years anymore. WWI was building in Europe for years, people actually danced in celebration of war being declared. I've encountered many europeans who think that WWI was a good thing, the world NEEDED a war then! Right now nobody thinks need a war. (Though perhaps the terrorist thing could be considered that - I optimisticly hope not)
I worked ~20 hours a week and went to school full time. I discovered that I could not take more than 13 credits a quarter without failing classes. They kept pushing me to tkae that many hours, but I couldn't do it. My GPA suffered as a result. Do not let them push you.
You already have a good job, so don't rush college. (I was working fast food, so I needed to push). Take one class at a time, and don't worry about the degree taking 15 years to complete. Spend your time in the one class you do take wisely. Study hard, get As. You can get by on a C, but people judge you based on your GPA once you have the degree, and mine was not where it should have been.
How much do you need to work you buisness? It is really easy for someone in school to neglect their work when they one the company. Don't fall for that trap, you could find yourself without a degree and money when your buiseness failed. Sure you can bring it back, but that means leaving school. On the other hand, don't be afraid to cut your buisness back a little to give school more time.
Me, ME ME!!! I'd rather have that monitor than 8 grand.
Of course I'll bet that if I had 8 grand sitting in a bank account my tune would change, but since I'm unemployed that doesn't seem likely.
Canada has its share of problems. Not the same problems as the US, but they do plenty of things to their people that a truely free socity would not do.
Some of the things are different, so I cannot make a judgement of which country is worse, but for me, nice as the country is, their problems are worse than ours. (too bad, they got some beatiful girls up there who have made the opposite decision)
My sister is a regular person who uses and prefers linux. Mind dad set up that system (she is in high school), but she uses it. They have several Mac and windows systems, the linux systems (which are slower technically) are prefered. Simple games like Sokoban are more fun than the games windows has. (I'm sure there are windows versions, but linux includes it in the distribution)
The linux desktop (kde and/or Gnome) are maturing nicely, and the large number of free programs means that distributions include everything you need in the price. redhat is $50 at best buy, and includes a good desktop, and all the programs most people need. (several web browsers, a large number of games, an office suite, and email). Not the best you could get, but plenty good. Kword meets all of the average person's needs. Sure the hottest 3d games are only released for windows, but most people just want games to play. It doesn't matter that the windows games are better, so long as the linux games will keep you satisfied.