Dumb /. Investment Strategies part 550834
on
Space Hotel
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· Score: 1
Hey, I said I'd consider it, and I thought I made it clear that I was aware that the hotel industry is not looking up.
In other words as it stands Hotels are a bad investments. Long term though, if they pull this off they may come up with a good investment, but if they can't pull off space travel they are not a good investment. I'm not trying to imply this is a good investment, only that if you invest this is probably a big factor.
I don't think the orginial pentimun chip is worth buying, a dual P233 is probably about equal to a single PII250.
I own a dual PPro-200, and I love it, kernels build fast (FreeBSD) So I would recomend a dual processor system, but not with chips as old as you say. (remeber my ppros are equivelent to a PII-380, but the PI would not)
My advice: get a dual pII motherboard, even if you only do one CPU in it. If your comfortable with modifications to hardware consider the dual celerons.
don't forget that memory bandwidth is really a problem with dual chips, get plenty of memory, and a big cache.
Time to invewst in Hilton
on
Space Hotel
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· Score: 1
The hotel industry is in bad times, and things are not looking up otherwise. This deal is the only reason I'd consider an investment in Hilton.
Personally I'm hoping to see perminant self supporting (in a subsistance way) Mars colony in my lifetime. Not really anything that can make money in less then 100 years, but it should be possibal to get it self supporting anyway.
So I'm going to take a second look at Hilton and see if investing is worth it. I've already got a guy in mind to be manager of it - I like to help friends out.
BTW, did I mention that I think the total cost will be twice listed, the costs quoted to make something habitable, and the doubling to provide safety protection. If I'm an invester I cannot afford a Challanger type accident (with paying customers) in the first 20 years. Accidents should never happen, but if they do it should be after everyone is used to the idea os space travel, and buisness trips to space are the norm.
which is a bad thing, not a good thing. Far too many people have figgue this out, which means that I can't live on a 100 acre farm for dirt cheep.
anyone know if I can get a good job in Montana, someplace that Isn't so crowded, but still has good fishing, wide open space, and not far from a good job.
Thats why sensitive computers are not networked
on
Pentagon Cyber Wars
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· Score: 1
Don't ask how I know, but I have it from reliable sources that clasified data may not be kept on a computer connected to external networks.
I don't know if they have that command center under a mountain, but when they do need to transport data long distances, they have not forgotten the bandwidth or security avaiable in a military convoy filled with 8mm (or whatever technology) tapes. When they need a lesser amount of data, they have networks they trust, but though they may run IP they are not internet connected.
Of course they do have internet connected computers, lots of them. Orange book rules (or is it red book) prevent any system less then A1 (or B2, I can't recall) to store even low classification information on a net connected system.
When you compile your kernel you can configure how many to allow. The more you allow, the more memory the kernel needs. (real physical memory, and swap both)
For a non-server home machine 600 is pleny of processes. What I want to know is why someone would run a server with a process table that small?
It is rather obvious that the person writing this knows nothing about unix, and is biased against unix. Look at the way they dismiss the few vender quotes they get, the ignorance of what is really going on. This is journism you expect to see in something one step above the national enquier, not something you expect from a creditable news orginization.
Of course this problem was dismissed be those involed. It is not as serious as you are claiming. Far as I can tell you are saying this is caused by the finger program, which most people consider a security hole anyway, certanitly the administrators who care are security have disabled it. Can it be caused by others? Maybe, but it is no worse then the SYN flood attack that is inhearant in the design of TCP.
Not that much. One that will outlast the momentary power losses, and then allow an orderly shutdown can be had for about USD100. Unless you are a student you can afford that.
Living in the middle of no where (no cable tv lines run by my house) too far from the central office by several miles, I want this!
Too bad as others have said it is so expensive currently. Still, with Masq/natd and a dish it might be worth it. Modems are too slow, and read the USR sportster ask/. for the problems I'm having with my modem that this would slove.
Last summer when I was looking for an aparmtnet I discovered that either I couldn't get xDSL in the building (too far) or I didn't want to live in that type of neighborhood. Not a good choice, I moved back to the parent's place and saved money.
An attempt to investigate Reagan failed because the Senate gave ollie North imunity for anything he did. Then Ollie North fell on the sword and said that Reagan did nothing, knew nothing.
The truth? How can I know, I'm not God.
Those who investigated Clinton didn't give immunity until they were sure of what they would get. They didn't count on polititians deciding that the right thing was less important then a vote for their peers in the Senate.
PS, I should remind you at this time that there are also many people today who belive that Nixon did no wrong and should not have been forced to resign. Those who are defending Clinton look just as foolish too me.
What works for me is going to a drug store (wally world accually) and buying some wrist splints. I can type without them, but not for long. The pain becomes a mild discomfort rather then something to make me want to change jobs.
I like my IBM keyboard, and would buy more. (in fact I have bought more) I still need the splints though.
I've never done it, but I've heard of people taking a track ball (the real thing dummy, not those thumb whatchmacallits) putting foot pedals on the buttons, and useing their feet to control it. Not sure it would work great for games, but for choosing your window (What else do you need a mouse for anyway?) it is said to work great.
With my carpil tunnel problems I'd like to try it. Maybe I could then play my mandolin wihtout pain.
Since my need for a portable computer is mainly so that I can irc or something less useless then the web (/. and a few other (rare) sites side) while sitting in the hot tub. I can see it now, sitting in a hot tub, chatting with a girl I already know to be cute online. If I was independantly wealthy I'd never had to leave, just use my cell phone (or the web) to have meals delivered. Oh wait, as some of you have pointed out, I need something for the John too.
Looks like two different groups will land people on mars the same year. Good for them, I hope both groups try ot out do each other, and in the end both have people on Mars at the same time.
If that happens, some advice: Agree that if one group has problems all compitition is off, both coopoerate to solve the problem. This is on mars of course. What I'm getting at is if one group loses both habitation modules, agree to live togather (very crowded) as best you can. If it turns out that both groups have problems mineing fuel, agree to share what cuelf you have made, so that some people stay for 4 extra years until a rescue mission can be launched, and the other group goes. In the case that one group can't return as planed, agree to get those who have had the most problems (health or personal) off of Mars first even if it means one entire group goes up in the other's rocket. There are more ways to cooperate, agree in an emergency the priority for both groups is solving it for whichever group has the problem.
When there isn't an emergency, compete at all costs. Don't let the other group out do you! Work long and hard to make the biggest best modules (NASA which is planning bigger ones) or the largest rockets (other group) Compete to get the best people for the job, the best test equipment.
I can't belive I'm first to offer to go! (No, not first post dummy)
I've got in mind a couple different females with a technical bent who I could try to talk into going with me. There is no true geek out there that wouldn't want to brag "My kid was born on Mars!" I think that will be the biggest achivment, getting people born up there. Soon were on our way to a perminate colony.
Personally I don't belive life will be found on mars, other then life we bring from earth. I could be wrong though.
So, I'm open to either group if they need more people to go.
For those who don't recall, Warner Brothers owned Atari at the height of the video game craze where Atari was number one. Because they really didn't understand computers, Atari is a nothing company today. (this isn't entirly true, Warner Brothers got rid of atari in the mid 80s, and those who took it over deserve credit for all their bone headed moves too)
Diseny is a big company, but I don't believe they can manage a large computer company as well as the rest of their empire. I could be wrong.
Let me call my broker to sell my shares of Apple, after all they are high, and If I'm right they won't go higher. Hi broker, its bluGill. I'd like to seel everything I've got in Apple What? Oh, I forget, I never had Apple, stupid move, I should have bought in 95. Sorry for wasting your time.
So there you have a full discloser from me.
guess I should upgrade in a few days or so...
on
FreeBSD 3.1 Released
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· Score: 1
Of course now that I've got cooling fans on my overclocked processores. (well I had them before, but one fan died, and the toher heat sink fell off. this time I got quality, maybe they will last more then 3 months) my system has been solid as a rock.
I wish my linux system was as stable, but not enough to upgrade all the deamons to something a little better then the secureity hole ridden versions I've got. (for one I think I'm running a 4.x version of sendmail) The kernel is fine, at least when I compile it with the right options.
I could see making it illegal to cache pages marked no cache. (I know that there are ways to do this to some pages, but I don't know how. This could even add a requirment that the web add a cabibility) But universially? I don't mind my page being cached.
I'd even except that pages could be marked cacheable, which I belive html doesn't provide, to give permission to have a page cached.
I've got a USR courier, upgraded to 56k. Lately I've been seen a lot of delays. for instatance a ping might return like this: ping -i 5 ip ip 64 bytes, 100.56ms (good) ip 64 bytes, 30062.23ms ip 64 bytes, 25071.43ms ip 64 bytes, 20096.57ms ip 64 bytes, 15101.48ms ip 64 bytes, 10128.83ms 5131.43ms ip 64 bytes, 131ms
Of course those numbers are made up, but they are typical, pinging my ISP's mail server (which should be a local subnet) or any other internet service. What is interesting is nothing at all gets through for 20 seconds, and then it all comes in one lump, and then nothing, with no data loss. This suggestes to me that it is a possibal modem problem, and while the modem trys to recover from some noise things back up. Except that 20 seconds is a long time.
I live in an area where noisy phone lines are a way of life (I see a lot of ppp rx errors), and I'm wondering if such delays are normal for bad phone lines, or if I should go through the effort of changing ISPs? Has anyone else seen this and traced it down?
REad what I wrote again. I proposed a serious system that would handle the/. load. It would, no doupt. It would also cost upwards to 3/4 million dollars or more. Throw enough hardware at a problem and software doesn't ahve to be good. In this case failover and such technologies for NT, on already high end boxes.
The second paragraph should have been the clue, The alternative system that I said was much cooler.
I don't use NT. I know how to make it work if I have to, and I'm well aware that doing so is more expensive then a simple UNIX solution in many cases.
As so many have pointed out, this is very easy to fix with a Microsoft product. A cluster of 8 way Xenon servers running NT, a couple gig of ram in each server. fibre channel to dual ported RAID-5 disks, 20 gig of them. NT will stand up to slashdot with that kind of system, no uptime problems.
Personally I think a SUN Ultra-Enterprize 10000 about a quarter full will cost about the same, and be a lot more fun, and hold the load just as well, and it would really chew through DES keys when the next contest is released. To each their own though.
OpenBSD, alpha, netbsd Mips, solaris Sparc, linux PPC, FreeBSD x86, etc ports too. Not everyone is only a strict x86 diet, I switch back and forth often. I wish there was a (secure enoguh that I'd trust it) web based program so that I could get at it from everywhere.
Java solves a lot of problems. Yes it is slow, but I'd rather do my owrk in a slow enviromentthen be stoped.
However it did make sense to use 2 diget dates in cobol programs. Cobol didn't provide an easy way to store dates ie base intiger type. You could however do lots of neat things with money. Cobol is still the number one language (lines of code) because buiness needs map well to cobol making cobol an efficant language to program in.
Remember cobol was deisgned in the early 60s, and was one of the first non machine languages used. They didn't have the binifit of modern knowlege of how to design a langue, and it shows. However cobol turns out to be good enough that it isn't worth the bother of changing, minor issues like y2k are delt with.
don't forget that many of these programs were written on punch cards which have been destroyed by floods or mice, leaving only the compiled version. (stored on mag tape, most importantly lacking the comments)
PCs and unix have problems with y2k, but compared to the old cobol code (especcially the lost source code) that is a minor problem.
Don't forget too that the correct date isn't important to many things. Where I work we have told customers that the boxes we stoped sell in 1985 won't work, upgrade to our latest box. They respond by setting the date to 1972 or something. Not a big deal for a router, or a small buiness cash register. Come to think of it several small buinesses in town are using a mechanicl cash register that cannot work byond 1970, but they set the date to 1950 and keep going.
I know the polorised lens at iMax places give me a headache. I just can't train my eyes to focus on a screen 30 feet away when objects are only a couple feet away.
Don't know if this is a problem for everyone, but it is for me. then again I can't quit figgure out why you would want true 3d for/. email or other news things. For all but a few things it seems an interesting toy. (note that games are by definition a toy, and I'm generally not a gamer)
Obviously your used to a static scope language. Dynamic scoped languages are older, and much more interesting. Who wants to pass be reference when you can really confuse everyone with uplevel (or is it upvar) tricks.
I'll agree that static scoping is a lot easier to program in, a lot easier to read, but it isn't the only way, and you should be exposed to dynamics scoped languages a little just because once in your lifetime it will be useful.
I've programed my 10k lines of TCL/TK, and for the tasks I was doing it was great. Yeah, C has good points, but TCL worked, was easier to program and more readable then your average perl script. Is it a perfect langauge for every task? No, of course not. Is it useful and easy to use? yes.
Slashdot Mirror
Hey, I said I'd consider it, and I thought I made it clear that I was aware that the hotel industry is not looking up.
In other words as it stands Hotels are a bad investments. Long term though, if they pull this off they may come up with a good investment, but if they can't pull off space travel they are not a good investment. I'm not trying to imply this is a good investment, only that if you invest this is probably a big factor.
I don't think the orginial pentimun chip is worth buying, a dual P233 is probably about equal to a single PII250.
I own a dual PPro-200, and I love it, kernels build fast (FreeBSD) So I would recomend a dual processor system, but not with chips as old as you say. (remeber my ppros are equivelent to a PII-380, but the PI would not)
My advice: get a dual pII motherboard, even if you only do one CPU in it. If your comfortable with modifications to hardware consider the dual celerons.
don't forget that memory bandwidth is really a problem with dual chips, get plenty of memory, and a big cache.
The hotel industry is in bad times, and things are not looking up otherwise. This deal is the only reason I'd consider an investment in Hilton.
Personally I'm hoping to see perminant self supporting (in a subsistance way) Mars colony in my lifetime. Not really anything that can make money in less then 100 years, but it should be possibal to get it self supporting anyway.
So I'm going to take a second look at Hilton and see if investing is worth it. I've already got a guy in mind to be manager of it - I like to help friends out.
BTW, did I mention that I think the total cost will be twice listed, the costs quoted to make something habitable, and the doubling to provide safety protection. If I'm an invester I cannot afford a Challanger type accident (with paying customers) in the first 20 years. Accidents should never happen, but if they do it should be after everyone is used to the idea os space travel, and buisness trips to space are the norm.
which is a bad thing, not a good thing. Far too many people have figgue this out, which means that I can't live on a 100 acre farm for dirt cheep.
anyone know if I can get a good job in Montana, someplace that Isn't so crowded, but still has good fishing, wide open space, and not far from a good job.
Don't ask how I know, but I have it from reliable sources that clasified data may not be kept on a computer connected to external networks.
I don't know if they have that command center under a mountain, but when they do need to transport data long distances, they have not forgotten the bandwidth or security avaiable in a military convoy filled with 8mm (or whatever technology) tapes. When they need a lesser amount of data, they have networks they trust, but though they may run IP they are not internet connected.
Of course they do have internet connected computers, lots of them. Orange book rules (or is it red book) prevent any system less then A1 (or B2, I can't recall) to store even low classification information on a net connected system.
When you compile your kernel you can configure how many to allow. The more you allow, the more memory the kernel needs. (real physical memory, and swap both)
For a non-server home machine 600 is pleny of processes. What I want to know is why someone would run a server with a process table that small?
It is rather obvious that the person writing this knows nothing about unix, and is biased against unix. Look at the way they dismiss the few vender quotes they get, the ignorance of what is really going on. This is journism you expect to see in something one step above the national enquier, not something you expect from a creditable news orginization.
Of course this problem was dismissed be those involed. It is not as serious as you are claiming. Far as I can tell you are saying this is caused by the finger program, which most people consider a security hole anyway, certanitly the administrators who care are security have disabled it. Can it be caused by others? Maybe, but it is no worse then the SYN flood attack that is inhearant in the design of TCP.
Not that much. One that will outlast the momentary power losses, and then allow an orderly shutdown can be had for about USD100. Unless you are a student you can afford that.
Living in the middle of no where (no cable tv lines run by my house) too far from the central office by several miles, I want this!
Too bad as others have said it is so expensive currently. Still, with Masq/natd and a dish it might be worth it. Modems are too slow, and read the USR sportster ask /. for the problems I'm having with my modem that this would slove.
Last summer when I was looking for an aparmtnet I discovered that either I couldn't get xDSL in the building (too far) or I didn't want to live in that type of neighborhood. Not a good choice, I moved back to the parent's place and saved money.
An attempt to investigate Reagan failed because the Senate gave ollie North imunity for anything he did. Then Ollie North fell on the sword and said that Reagan did nothing, knew nothing.
The truth? How can I know, I'm not God.
Those who investigated Clinton didn't give immunity until they were sure of what they would get. They didn't count on polititians deciding that the right thing was less important then a vote for their peers in the Senate.
PS, I should remind you at this time that there are also many people today who belive that Nixon did no wrong and should not have been forced to resign. Those who are defending Clinton look just as foolish too me.
What works for me is going to a drug store (wally world accually) and buying some wrist splints. I can type without them, but not for long. The pain becomes a mild discomfort rather then something to make me want to change jobs.
I like my IBM keyboard, and would buy more. (in fact I have bought more) I still need the splints though.
I've never done it, but I've heard of people taking a track ball (the real thing dummy, not those thumb whatchmacallits) putting foot pedals on the buttons, and useing their feet to control it. Not sure it would work great for games, but for choosing your window (What else do you need a mouse for anyway?) it is said to work great.
With my carpil tunnel problems I'd like to try it. Maybe I could then play my mandolin wihtout pain.
Since my need for a portable computer is mainly so that I can irc or something less useless then the web (/. and a few other (rare) sites side) while sitting in the hot tub. I can see it now, sitting in a hot tub, chatting with a girl I already know to be cute online. If I was independantly wealthy I'd never had to leave, just use my cell phone (or the web) to have meals delivered. Oh wait, as some of you have pointed out, I need something for the John too.
Looks like two different groups will land people on mars the same year. Good for them, I hope both groups try ot out do each other, and in the end both have people on Mars at the same time.
If that happens, some advice: Agree that if one group has problems all compitition is off, both coopoerate to solve the problem. This is on mars of course. What I'm getting at is if one group loses both habitation modules, agree to live togather (very crowded) as best you can. If it turns out that both groups have problems mineing fuel, agree to share what cuelf you have made, so that some people stay for 4 extra years until a rescue mission can be launched, and the other group goes. In the case that one group can't return as planed, agree to get those who have had the most problems (health or personal) off of Mars first even if it means one entire group goes up in the other's rocket. There are more ways to cooperate, agree in an emergency the priority for both groups is solving it for whichever group has the problem.
When there isn't an emergency, compete at all costs. Don't let the other group out do you! Work long and hard to make the biggest best modules (NASA which is planning bigger ones) or the largest rockets (other group) Compete to get the best people for the job, the best test equipment.
I can't belive I'm first to offer to go! (No, not first post dummy)
I've got in mind a couple different females with a technical bent who I could try to talk into going with me. There is no true geek out there that wouldn't want to brag "My kid was born on Mars!" I think that will be the biggest achivment, getting people born up there. Soon were on our way to a perminate colony.
Personally I don't belive life will be found on mars, other then life we bring from earth. I could be wrong though.
So, I'm open to either group if they need more people to go.
For those who don't recall, Warner Brothers owned Atari at the height of the video game craze where Atari was number one. Because they really didn't understand computers, Atari is a nothing company today. (this isn't entirly true, Warner Brothers got rid of atari in the mid 80s, and those who took it over deserve credit for all their bone headed moves too)
Diseny is a big company, but I don't believe they can manage a large computer company as well as the rest of their empire. I could be wrong.
Let me call my broker to sell my shares of Apple, after all they are high, and If I'm right they won't go higher.
Hi broker, its bluGill.
I'd like to seel everything I've got in Apple
What?
Oh, I forget, I never had Apple, stupid move, I should have bought in 95. Sorry for wasting your time.
So there you have a full discloser from me.
Of course now that I've got cooling fans on my overclocked processores. (well I had them before, but one fan died, and the toher heat sink fell off. this time I got quality, maybe they will last more then 3 months) my system has been solid as a rock.
I wish my linux system was as stable, but not enough to upgrade all the deamons to something a little better then the secureity hole ridden versions I've got. (for one I think I'm running a 4.x version of sendmail) The kernel is fine, at least when I compile it with the right options.
I could see making it illegal to cache pages marked no cache. (I know that there are ways to do this to some pages, but I don't know how. This could even add a requirment that the web add a cabibility) But universially? I don't mind my page being cached.
I'd even except that pages could be marked cacheable, which I belive html doesn't provide, to give permission to have a page cached.
I've got a USR courier, upgraded to 56k. Lately I've been seen a lot of delays. for instatance a ping might return like this:
ping -i 5 ip
ip 64 bytes, 100.56ms (good)
ip 64 bytes, 30062.23ms
ip 64 bytes, 25071.43ms
ip 64 bytes, 20096.57ms
ip 64 bytes, 15101.48ms
ip 64 bytes, 10128.83ms
5131.43ms
ip 64 bytes, 131ms
Of course those numbers are made up, but they are typical, pinging my ISP's mail server (which should be a local subnet) or any other internet service. What is interesting is nothing at all gets through for 20 seconds, and then it all comes in one lump, and then nothing, with no data loss. This suggestes to me that it is a possibal modem problem, and while the modem trys to recover from some noise things back up. Except that 20 seconds is a long time.
I live in an area where noisy phone lines are a way of life (I see a lot of ppp rx errors), and I'm wondering if such delays are normal for bad phone lines, or if I should go through the effort of changing ISPs? Has anyone else seen this and traced it down?
REad what I wrote again. I proposed a serious system that would handle the /. load. It would, no doupt. It would also cost upwards to 3/4 million dollars or more. Throw enough hardware at a problem and software doesn't ahve to be good. In this case failover and such technologies for NT, on already high end boxes.
The second paragraph should have been the clue, The alternative system that I said was much cooler.
I don't use NT. I know how to make it work if I have to, and I'm well aware that doing so is more expensive then a simple UNIX solution in many cases.
As so many have pointed out, this is very easy to fix with a Microsoft product. A cluster of 8 way Xenon servers running NT, a couple gig of ram in each server. fibre channel to dual ported RAID-5 disks, 20 gig of them. NT will stand up to slashdot with that kind of system, no uptime problems.
Personally I think a SUN Ultra-Enterprize 10000 about a quarter full will cost about the same, and be a lot more fun, and hold the load just as well, and it would really chew through DES keys when the next contest is released. To each their own though.
OpenBSD, alpha, netbsd Mips, solaris Sparc, linux PPC, FreeBSD x86, etc ports too. Not everyone is only a strict x86 diet, I switch back and forth often. I wish there was a (secure enoguh that I'd trust it) web based program so that I could get at it from everywhere.
Java solves a lot of problems. Yes it is slow, but I'd rather do my owrk in a slow enviromentthen be stoped.
I agree that y2k is overhyped.
However it did make sense to use 2 diget dates in cobol programs. Cobol didn't provide an easy way to store dates ie base intiger type. You could however do lots of neat things with money. Cobol is still the number one language (lines of code) because buiness needs map well to cobol making cobol an efficant language to program in.
Remember cobol was deisgned in the early 60s, and was one of the first non machine languages used. They didn't have the binifit of modern knowlege of how to design a langue, and it shows. However cobol turns out to be good enough that it isn't worth the bother of changing, minor issues like y2k are delt with.
don't forget that many of these programs were written on punch cards which have been destroyed by floods or mice, leaving only the compiled version. (stored on mag tape, most importantly lacking the comments)
PCs and unix have problems with y2k, but compared to the old cobol code (especcially the lost source code) that is a minor problem.
Don't forget too that the correct date isn't important to many things. Where I work we have told customers that the boxes we stoped sell in 1985 won't work, upgrade to our latest box. They respond by setting the date to 1972 or something. Not a big deal for a router, or a small buiness cash register. Come to think of it several small buinesses in town are using a mechanicl cash register that cannot work byond 1970, but they set the date to 1950 and keep going.
I know the polorised lens at iMax places give me a headache. I just can't train my eyes to focus on a screen 30 feet away when objects are only a couple feet away.
Don't know if this is a problem for everyone, but it is for me. then again I can't quit figgure out why you would want true 3d for /. email or other news things. For all but a few things it seems an interesting toy. (note that games are by definition a toy, and I'm generally not a gamer)
Obviously your used to a static scope language. Dynamic scoped languages are older, and much more interesting. Who wants to pass be reference when you can really confuse everyone with uplevel (or is it upvar) tricks.
I'll agree that static scoping is a lot easier to program in, a lot easier to read, but it isn't the only way, and you should be exposed to dynamics scoped languages a little just because once in your lifetime it will be useful.
I've programed my 10k lines of TCL/TK, and for the tasks I was doing it was great. Yeah, C has good points, but TCL worked, was easier to program and more readable then your average perl script. Is it a perfect langauge for every task? No, of course not. Is it useful and easy to use? yes.