interesting viewpoint, but many Creationists may simply be people who subscribe to both the scientific theories of intelligent design and also have religious beliefs. Remember, there are non-religious scientists with physical evidence that points towards intelligent design.
The "open minded" scientific community seems to be very closed to hearing out these non-religious scientists.
Oh, and thanks for judging a large community of individuals having only listened mildly to the religious extreemists that refuse to accept scientific challenges. Then again, many people still believe Christians are told to accept what their pastors say in the pulpit, when most actually challenge the congregation to do research themselves and learn for themselves. Sorry if some of us aren't willing to swallow everything our professors tell us without exploring more than just one viewpoint.
Evolution is a good theory. It is fine if this is your favorite theory. It is also fine if I subscribe to a different theory. (that's how we keep from growing stagnant and accept things just because that's what we've always been told. )
This is not a flame against evolutionists. Just against anyone who so religiously defends their beliefs in a theory that they immediately bash anyone who believes something different. (you can try to convince me, but don't bash me.)
Apparently another manager has simply misunderstood the way the internet works.
In other news, water is wet.
If my ISP ever blocked a service because someone used it for illegal purposes I would drop the ISP and find another ISP that *would* allow me to use that service.
I switched my business to only Open Source Software, I deleted any questionable content from my computer, and destroyed all of the CD's friends burned for me after I did a lot of self confrontation one day. I rarely buy music unless it is on CD, and then I immediately rip it onto my computer. I also use bit-torrent to download the software my business runs on. Most of the time, the torrents are provided by the makers of the software.
I never use bittorrent for illegal activity, and in fact rely on it for my business. Why a manager in the recording industry should prevent me from being able to use the tools I rely on is beyond me. And do they honestly think that ISPs will simply add all of the service filtering and packet sniffing without increasing the cost to the general public, or without dramatically slowing down the general speed of the internet?
What would happen if every ISP was required by law to extract packets and test them for copywritten materials? Even if packet filtering only adds a millisecond, I would imagine that would add up VERY fast, and would be increased exponentially by the number of ISP's a single packet might flow through before getting to the intended audience.
Obviously this guy simply does not understand the way the internet works other than how it intersects with the music industry.
I understand that he must have quite a bit of work to do, and the only time he hears of "bittorrent" is when people are reporting the number of albums stolen on it.
Sure, 80% of internet traffic may be stealing music and movies, but let's be honest, if I downloaded all of the text from all of the slashdot archives, a copy of linux, apache, mysql, perl, and whatever else needed to run a server to host slashdot, and also downloaded an illegal copy of lord of the rings, then at least 50% of my internet traffic would have been used for stealing movies.
This is just another reason I wish all the losers on the internet would stop downloading music and movies illegally. I'm going to get screwed out of perfectly legal services that help my business simply because someone wasn't willing to fork over the $15 for a CD.
I think another option will be that people will find more and more uses for them in many different areas, especially the Kiosk arena.
Buy a $400 WindowsCE thin-client that doesn't have a hard drive and requires a server just to boot, or buy a $200 shuttle with a hard drive and a web browser.
I'd love to convert some of our systems to web apps so we could throw a handful of these on the network for a fraction of the cost of what we are paying in order to have a Windows box.
I also think it is only a matter of time before some university shows photos of 42 of these in a massive distributed computing cube running some pointless number-crunching app to find life on other planets. Worthless, but awesome.
You want support with IE, here it is. $CAD 59 for each request during business hours. Over $500 for after hours support. This is why you have in-house IT support staff. To fix your problems. If you were going to call up Microsoft every time you had a problem, your company would go belly-up pretty fast.
So what I hear you saying is you've never tried to configure kerberos authentication within Firefox?
I would GLADLY pay $500 just to figure that out. (but not to buy software that does it, I'd rather learn how, then share it with the rest of the world, like most people should do with the support they receive)
At home, I only use Firefox (then again, I dual-boot linux and windows, and my wife has a macbook from work), and at work I use Firefox, but there are many gotchas that are preventing it from being near as useful as it could be. No windows-based authentication is probably the biggest, because now my users will have to log in to our intranet each day, even after they've logged into their computers. (Which makes a big difference on how many people make full use of the resources available.)
There's also the inability to use Group Policy to lock down various components, not to mention if you log in as an administrator to update firefox, when the non-admin user logs in it throws up an error message about not being able to update all the files. (very annoying for most of my users)
With that said, I just have my staff deal with the problems, but then again I don't force Firefox on them. The day I can control the use of it from my office is the day I enforce a company-wide Firefox policy.
It appears, unfortunately, that the Mozilla Foundation is in bed with Apple and stole their secret: "Ignore the business sector, but imply that you haven't."
I hear and appreciate your comment that if companies called paid tech support with each problem they had it would be insane, but also keep in mind corporate support for free products is usually geared towards the IT Support Staff, who needs support too sometimes (especially when deploying to the whole company for daily use).
I use Ubuntu Linux, Windows XP, and OS X Leopard on a DAILY basis. My preference is Windows XP for usability, Linux for eye-candy and having uber-control, and Leopard for their built-in search. (I love iLife tools as well, but have lately been discouraged when I couldn't figure out how to export a slideshow I made in iPhoto into iDVD... it simply imported the photos, not the Ken Burns effects I spent an hour customizing...)
When someone asks me what they should buy based on hardware (Apple or PC) I simply ask them what they are comfortable with. The fact that I am more comfortable with XP has no bearing on what other people should buy.
MUCH unlike the Apple ads, I think it should be your choice, and I think that XP and Leopard are BOTH great choices, and you need to find what is comfortable for you, not what your co-workers or friends tell you to buy.
Many of these have been stated already, but here's my list:
Server Room area: Anti-static "false" flooring (whatever it is called, that allows the floor to "breathe" and circulate air. Wire trays hanging from the ceiling to manage cables. Twice as much dedicated power as you'll ever need. Dedicated AC unit for the server room. Four-post server racks (no need for panels if the room is secured) Preferrably a glass wall between the server equipment and yourself. color-coded Cat5 Room to grow (an extra rack or two) Room to walk around with a new server A small table
Office: Desk Computer Phone Comfortable Chair Comfortable Keyboard/Mouse Plenty of Filing Cabinets and shelves Workbench with plenty of network cables, power, non-digital KVM, etc. (I can't stand digital KVM's that don't get detected at startup unless the focus is on the computer during boot.) Good speakers A nice soundproof door that cannot be permanently unlocked. (to prevent you from accidentally leaving the server room vulnerable. At least one wall to hang posters, comics, calendars, etc. A dry-erase board if you are into that sort of thing. Legroom
And of course a storage closet. You WILL get way too much stuff when other people decide they don't want it, and they don't want to wait for the recycler to come pick it up.
The comfort items seem silly to a boss at times, but they make a world of difference when it comes to how much stress you can handle.
My office is one out of the three cubicles in my room, and a portion of the slanted, non-air-conditioned closet with water-based fire prevention is my "server room" that houses a single rack. The rest of the servers are on a desk in the storage closet, under my desk, or next to the Web Team's desk. ALWAYS plan-ahead, don't just "Get it done", or you'll wind up with fully soaked servers and people turning off servers that they think are just normal computers.
Let's switch to ODF then explain to millions of other people that we would be appreciative if they ignored the money they spent on Office 2007 and switch to an older interface that doesn't do quite as much.
I love OpenOffice and use it on my desktop at home, my company is part of the ODF alliance, but I would never switch my day job's network to Open Office simply because of the fact that we have to do business with the rest of the world. (Which bothers me quite a bit, considering I love the concepts behind Open Source)
It's saying Steve Jobs is trying to make customers pay more for the right to do something that's already a right.
Since when have we been given access to our federal fair-use rights to copy DVDs?
I thought this conversation was long dead, we have the right to make a backup copy of our DVD, possibly in a different format, as long as it doesn't involve decrypting the DVD. Side-note: you cannot make a copy of a DVD without decrypting it.
Please correct me if I'm wrong. I haven't been backing up my DVDs, playing them on my Linux laptop, or putting them on my iPod for the past few years because I discovered I didn't have access to my rights when it comes to copying DVDs.
I simply don't want someone to read this thread and think that ripping DVDs with handbrake is legal. I haven't been able to determine 100% if it is legal or not, but the DMCA clearly tells you to forfeit your rights in hopes that maybe the pirates are only willing to break 1 law rather than 2. (Meaning the DMCA assumes that the individuals stealing and selling stolen goods will for some reason stop doing so simply because they have to break encryption, which is now illegal...)
As a developer, I've found a great way to prolong the life of IE7 and encourage people to use it. Simply give in and write websites that look great in IE7, then worry about Firefox support. Fortunately, I have a full-time job, so all my side-jobs are a choice, not a necessity, so I simply write code for Firefox and hope it looks good in Internet Explorer. My clients know this, and usually don't care because I'm cheaper than the competition and I always have a good reason for doing what I do. (I don't make it break in IE7, I simply don't care if certain effects work perfectly as long as they somewhat work in IE7, which was the intention of Microsoft, correct? "Somewhat Supports" or "Buggy" seems to be the popular CSS support indicator.)
What would be easier would be if nobody had to forcibly monitor anything, but if they did happen to see someone downloading child porn, then report it.
Kind of like you don't have to be a crime-fighter, but if you see someone getting mugged, and you have a cell phone in your hand, call the cops.
As the IT Administrator of a not-for-profit that has a cafe with free WiFi, I'm not worried at all. The article states:
"Anyone providing an "electronic communication service" or "remote computing service" to the public who learns about the transmission or storage of information about certain illegal activities or an illegal image must..."
We are not required to track what goes on with our WiFi, but when we do notice someone doing something illegal, we are required to notify the authorities. I see no problem with this. It is kind of like saying I have to go and tell management if I see someone shoplifting at WalMart. So what?
I think that, as usual, we are blowing this out of proportion because the government is trying to force us into being responsible human beings.
Ironically I do not believe anyone should force you to be responsible, because that should be a choice you've made already, but since I'm already cool with tossing more validly caught-in-the-act child pornographers through the judicial system, this doesn't really bug me that much. Plus we already have a few layers of content filtering on our free WiFi anyway.
So you're saying that 100 Macs cost only twice as much as a single PC?
Only if you figure in the support costs. Only if you believe the Apple advertisements.
For home use Apples live up to their price tag, especially their laptops and Mac Pros. But I manage a network, so I can't help but think in terms of an entire network of machines, in which case Apples are much more expensive, especially when it comes to support.
Bear in mind that companies don't pay retail for most non-Apple products, and all of Dell's business class machines (Optiplexes and higher) include 3-year on-site next-day hardware warranty service.
Going back to the consumer/average Joe mindset that Apple has adopted, when people ask me what they should get for personal use I recommend the MacBook or MacBook Pro depending on what the individual can afford, then I urge them to spring the extra $215 to get Parallels and an OEM copy of XP Pro for software compatibility.
Part of me wants to agree with you, but the other part of me says the whole point of Firefox is that not all of the cool features are built in. While I would like better RSS integration, I'm glad they are leaving the major feature upgrades to the add-on developers.
(although would it be so hard to add the cool click-and-drag margin resize features for printing that IE7 has?)
At work most of the guys at the top of the Org Chart use AOL at home. Why? Because it works with everything else they use. Their Cell phones, their iTunes store, etc.
It is surprising, but I've had a hard time convincing myself to push anyone towards a gmail account at work when AOL works with so many different services. I still think AOL is the Epson of ISP's, but that's because they assume (sometimes rightly) that their users are ignorant and incapable of doing anything without massive bloatware-provided hand-holding. But, what comes as a result of this is sometimes accidentally effective hand-holding that pulls in a larger market than logic can ever explain.
Not to sound like a naysayer, but honestly the laser adds almost no functionality whatsoever to the Mindstorms kit. In a course I am taking we are designing and building ten different kinds of robots out of these kits, and there isn't one that would benefit from having a frickin laser beam on its forehead.
But think about it, you could have a robot that.... uhm... points at things?... from a very low angle?
Come to think of it, what is the point of a laser on the robot? I would find playing with a laser pointer more fun than playing with a robot with a laser pointer.
Add a battery powered tesla coil that can surprise guests and lazy house-pets, and then I'll be impressed!
(it is cool that people still think to take stuff apart and improve upon it, so I guess I shouldn't be so hard... but I just hope my kid improves on cheap, non-robotic toys)
That's a lot of resources thrown at very few students.
You forgot a word... needlessly...
That's a lot of resources nedlessly thrown at very few students.
I wonder what it would be like if that money went towards regular supplies, like paper and pencil for all the other schools in the district, how far that amount of money would go?
I also wonder if before this happened they analyzed Microsoft's Management skills, perhaps with a case study on Vista?
This looks like a fun idea but it sounds like one giant Microsoft Advertisement to me, and that is only going to stifle the kids' innovation.
With all the Microsoft products I saw around me when I was a kid, I seriously thought you had to work for microsoft to become a programmer. I hate to say it, but this is only going to grow our kids' technology addiction, which I for one do not find healthy. As an IT manager, former programmer, and avid Geekon at my church, I want my kids to read books with paper, ink, and binding. (think about the librarians! won't someone please think about the librarians?!)
All in all, it looks cool, and it is nice of Microsoft to offer their management skills and personnell (that does cost them money), but I find it all kind of pointless when I bet the same result could have been achieved at a quarter of the cost if they got MIT or UC Berkley involved instead. (and open source developing universities actually have a more positive track record on quality and punctuality that Microsoft doesn't.)
Re:Flash as an application development platform
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The Future of Flash
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I hate to say this, but I agree.
When the W3C standardizes SVG that can be easily embedded in pages (such as using img tags) and manipulated using AJAX, I'll definitely prefer that, but for now, I usually try to stay away from flash when I can avoid it. With that said, flash is still king on the video side of things, but hopefully in the future that'll be where it ends.
I still haven't found anything worth doing on the web that I can't do with standard HTML and CSS other than Video, but Flash has its purpose, and it does a great job at what it does. Now, if they would ever make a decent linux player, I'd think even higher of them.
I guess the key point is to encourage developers to offer standards-based HTML files first, then Flash based sites as an added bonus for users who have that capability. (I haven't gotten to test any flash screen-readers yet, but I hear it is somewhat possible to make flash accessible) And for the most part, good developers have been using a "flash/non-flash" splash screen for quite a while, so I don't really have any complaints.
Yup, they're really raking in the dough by selling their browser... wait. I mean, they're really squashing Mozilla and preventing them from selling their browser... er, hold on. Ah... I get it... you're secretly arguing about who makes money off of the ads in search engines, MSN or Google, right? So MS's "monopoly" is crushing poor Google. Not! They've got a bigger share of search than MS does of desktops. Maybe you were making some other point entirely? Where's the abuse, exactly?
Their abuse is in the fact that by making their own standard that only works on their operating system (which they sell, and is the foundation of all their profits) lazy developers are coerced into writing code that only works in Internet Explorer. My university invested over 40 Million USD on software that has a web interface. My thought was "We're really moving forward and making the tools as easy and accessible as possible!". In actuality, the web interface requires Internet Explorer, forcing me to install VMWare on my linux machine so I can start up another license of windows (that we had to pay for) to run the "free" browser by Microsoft.
If they were more standards compliant (or if web developers obeyed standards instead of market trends) then I could simply view the tools in Firefox on linux.
Platform independence on web applications starts when you ignore Internet Explorer as a web browser. (or code so it looks good in both, while still upholding web standards, which is possible in most cases, but sometimes not without javascript and whatnot)
So yes, their free browser does cause a profit inducing monopoly.
The general purpose workstation will always have their place but are expensive overkill for a lot of tasks.
Ah, but you are assuming businesses do what makes sense.
If we were to base it on what makes sense, most networks would be linux thin clients and one linux server, with Open Office 2.0 being the predominant office suite. Cost of software: $0 per seat. Cost of hardware: $200 per seat (pulled that out of thin air) + $25,000 for the server.
Seriously, what common tasks couldn't be done using 100% free software? Yet we still decided instead to go with expensive software on each workstation. Sure we can share documents with the outside world easier, but really, why do we need to? What business seriously needs to give Word or Excel documents to other people that a PDF or ODF of the same content wouldn't satisfy? We use MS Office where I work so we can share documents easily, but that's because other offices in our organization use it as well. If our entire organization switched to OO.o 2 we wouldn't have a problem.
Sidenote: OOo2.0 still has a ways to go before I can use it as comfortably as MS Office. Primarily: tables. Seriously, how long did they spend redefining table support? Please let me merge cells and define borders for each cell. (coming from a user who has no idea how to program these features himself...)
If all businesses followed global, open standards, such as HTML, CSS, XHTML, XML, ODF, etc, then we would be in a much better, and much cheaper place. But since we obviously could care less about the logical course of action, why would we ever give up our workstations even if it did save us money with little to no business impact?
I run an Ubuntu Server (which installs a base system by default, no GUI...) and I have Apache 2 and PHP 5 running very quickly and efficiently on a 100% supported OS. At the time of setting up the server, Ubuntu was the only distro offering enterprise support for PHP 5.
I'm still lost as to why some distros still use PHP 4 when PHP 5 is late into its second year of official release, but that's another topic altogether.
To install software in Ubuntu, you click "Applications">"Add Applications"
This requires the administrator (root) password, since we don't want just anybody to be able to install software. (i.e. viruses embedded into emails)
Then, you just scroll through the categories, and the programs in them, and when you find something you might be interested in, you click on it, see the description of the software on the right side of the window, and if you like it, you put a check in the checkbox next to it.
You keep doing this for however many applications you want. Once you are done, you click Apply, and it downloads the required files, installs them, puts them in the main "Applications" menu, then tells you where to find all of your new software.
It is basically a user-friendly version of "package management", and kind of like Windows XP's Add/Remove programs, only you can add software from a variety of vendors, and you use the internet to get the latest version, rather than your install CD to get a 5 year old version. (kind of nice, actually)
I have used that method to install software such as email clients, 3d rendering programs, vector art programs, audio editing programs, and even desktop publishing software.
For all those.\ users who say "ActiveX good riddance" - yes, EXCEPT that QuickTime, Flash, and all the other IE plugins are guess way - ActiveX plugins.
So that means every page with any usage of plugins will be broken.
I guess for this \.user, I mean not only "ActiveX good riddance", but also "Internet Explorer good riddance". If their browser can't display standards-compliant code, most likely due to their shady business practices, then who cares?
They are saying, change the roads because we found out our car needs to be changed. That is unacceptable. My sites will not change, and if someone wants to view them, and it doesn't work in IE, they are free to use Firefox, Opera, Safari, etc. The fewer sites that require IE, the better, and maybe this will be the final straw that pushes at least one more developer away from the instability that is IE.
IE is not a bad browser, it just renders bad code, and takes a little longer on publishing security patches than other browser manufacturers. Because they have decided to go against Web Standards, I have no sympathy. If they were using Web Standards, I'd consider them, ActiveX, and other things IE displays as being something worth designing for.
Overall, I just don't use some of the more fine-tuned features of CSS/XHTML so it looks good in both fx and IE. But why should I care about IE users getting screwed, when they are getting screwed either way? I'm tired of hacking code so it "works" in IE.
As long as my sites are functional, meaning users get the same information, and as much the same experience as possible, I'm happy. I can 99.9% of the time achieve this with standards-compliance CSS. The other 0.1% of the time I just ignore IE. I know the bulk of users are IE users, but why should they change if we keep building an IE web?
I agree. I have no desire to purchase an expensive player that limits my ability as a consumer.
Same here, which unfortunately means no DVDs for me. As soon as they trade Copy-Protection for Consumer-Protection I'll be back in the game. Until then, I'll watch movies on TV, burn them to non-encrypted DVD with my PC, and watch them as many times as I want, as is my right as a content-subscriber (via cable TV).
Who knows, maybe I'll give in to the stripping of my rights, but that would require them to make a movie worthy of my money and my rights. Gas prices have gone up so money is low, and I've got a fairly decent DVD/CD collection and a windows PC, so my rights are running pretty low too...
But what about the widgets?! Will somebody please think about the widgets?!!?
Really, what is Vista advertising to do that Linux/OSX haven't been doing for years? And why do I need those vital features (such as 3d interfaces, widgets, and an online podcasting service) when XP runs great as long as you reinstall it once a year and filter what you put on it.
Way to go Microsoft, you created a market nobody needed, filled it with crap, and are trying to spin that crap into gold instead of cleaning out the crap and mining for gold.
My negative attitude says they are in this situation due to greed, but more likely they just didn't plan this far ahead. They started off by writing good applications that the workforce needed, then seem to have gotten distracted by all things shiny. They could have been such a great corporation had they stayed focused on finding and meeting needs, as well as caring at least a little about customer satisfaction and overall niceness.
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interesting viewpoint, but many Creationists may simply be people who subscribe to both the scientific theories of intelligent design and also have religious beliefs. Remember, there are non-religious scientists with physical evidence that points towards intelligent design.
The "open minded" scientific community seems to be very closed to hearing out these non-religious scientists.
Oh, and thanks for judging a large community of individuals having only listened mildly to the religious extreemists that refuse to accept scientific challenges. Then again, many people still believe Christians are told to accept what their pastors say in the pulpit, when most actually challenge the congregation to do research themselves and learn for themselves.
Sorry if some of us aren't willing to swallow everything our professors tell us without exploring more than just one viewpoint.
Evolution is a good theory. It is fine if this is your favorite theory.
It is also fine if I subscribe to a different theory. (that's how we keep from growing stagnant and accept things just because that's what we've always been told. )
This is not a flame against evolutionists. Just against anyone who so religiously defends their beliefs in a theory that they immediately bash anyone who believes something different. (you can try to convince me, but don't bash me.)
Apparently another manager has simply misunderstood the way the internet works.
In other news, water is wet.
If my ISP ever blocked a service because someone used it for illegal purposes I would drop the ISP and find another ISP that *would* allow me to use that service.
I switched my business to only Open Source Software, I deleted any questionable content from my computer, and destroyed all of the CD's friends burned for me after I did a lot of self confrontation one day. I rarely buy music unless it is on CD, and then I immediately rip it onto my computer. I also use bit-torrent to download the software my business runs on. Most of the time, the torrents are provided by the makers of the software.
I never use bittorrent for illegal activity, and in fact rely on it for my business. Why a manager in the recording industry should prevent me from being able to use the tools I rely on is beyond me. And do they honestly think that ISPs will simply add all of the service filtering and packet sniffing without increasing the cost to the general public, or without dramatically slowing down the general speed of the internet?
What would happen if every ISP was required by law to extract packets and test them for copywritten materials? Even if packet filtering only adds a millisecond, I would imagine that would add up VERY fast, and would be increased exponentially by the number of ISP's a single packet might flow through before getting to the intended audience.
Obviously this guy simply does not understand the way the internet works other than how it intersects with the music industry.
I understand that he must have quite a bit of work to do, and the only time he hears of "bittorrent" is when people are reporting the number of albums stolen on it.
Sure, 80% of internet traffic may be stealing music and movies, but let's be honest, if I downloaded all of the text from all of the slashdot archives, a copy of linux, apache, mysql, perl, and whatever else needed to run a server to host slashdot, and also downloaded an illegal copy of lord of the rings, then at least 50% of my internet traffic would have been used for stealing movies.
This is just another reason I wish all the losers on the internet would stop downloading music and movies illegally. I'm going to get screwed out of perfectly legal services that help my business simply because someone wasn't willing to fork over the $15 for a CD.
I think another option will be that people will find more and more uses for them in many different areas, especially the Kiosk arena.
Buy a $400 WindowsCE thin-client that doesn't have a hard drive and requires a server just to boot, or buy a $200 shuttle with a hard drive and a web browser.
I'd love to convert some of our systems to web apps so we could throw a handful of these on the network for a fraction of the cost of what we are paying in order to have a Windows box.
I also think it is only a matter of time before some university shows photos of 42 of these in a massive distributed computing cube running some pointless number-crunching app to find life on other planets. Worthless, but awesome.
So what I hear you saying is you've never tried to configure kerberos authentication within Firefox?
I would GLADLY pay $500 just to figure that out. (but not to buy software that does it, I'd rather learn how, then share it with the rest of the world, like most people should do with the support they receive)
At home, I only use Firefox (then again, I dual-boot linux and windows, and my wife has a macbook from work), and at work I use Firefox, but there are many gotchas that are preventing it from being near as useful as it could be. No windows-based authentication is probably the biggest, because now my users will have to log in to our intranet each day, even after they've logged into their computers. (Which makes a big difference on how many people make full use of the resources available.)
There's also the inability to use Group Policy to lock down various components, not to mention if you log in as an administrator to update firefox, when the non-admin user logs in it throws up an error message about not being able to update all the files. (very annoying for most of my users)
With that said, I just have my staff deal with the problems, but then again I don't force Firefox on them. The day I can control the use of it from my office is the day I enforce a company-wide Firefox policy.
It appears, unfortunately, that the Mozilla Foundation is in bed with Apple and stole their secret: "Ignore the business sector, but imply that you haven't."
I hear and appreciate your comment that if companies called paid tech support with each problem they had it would be insane, but also keep in mind corporate support for free products is usually geared towards the IT Support Staff, who needs support too sometimes (especially when deploying to the whole company for daily use).
Agreed!
I use Ubuntu Linux, Windows XP, and OS X Leopard on a DAILY basis. My preference is Windows XP for usability, Linux for eye-candy and having uber-control, and Leopard for their built-in search. (I love iLife tools as well, but have lately been discouraged when I couldn't figure out how to export a slideshow I made in iPhoto into iDVD... it simply imported the photos, not the Ken Burns effects I spent an hour customizing...)
When someone asks me what they should buy based on hardware (Apple or PC) I simply ask them what they are comfortable with. The fact that I am more comfortable with XP has no bearing on what other people should buy.
MUCH unlike the Apple ads, I think it should be your choice, and I think that XP and Leopard are BOTH great choices, and you need to find what is comfortable for you, not what your co-workers or friends tell you to buy.
Many of these have been stated already, but here's my list:
Server Room area:
Anti-static "false" flooring (whatever it is called, that allows the floor to "breathe" and circulate air.
Wire trays hanging from the ceiling to manage cables.
Twice as much dedicated power as you'll ever need.
Dedicated AC unit for the server room.
Four-post server racks (no need for panels if the room is secured)
Preferrably a glass wall between the server equipment and yourself.
color-coded Cat5
Room to grow (an extra rack or two)
Room to walk around with a new server
A small table
Office:
Desk
Computer
Phone
Comfortable Chair
Comfortable Keyboard/Mouse
Plenty of Filing Cabinets and shelves
Workbench with plenty of network cables, power, non-digital KVM, etc. (I can't stand digital KVM's that don't get detected at startup unless the focus is on the computer during boot.)
Good speakers
A nice soundproof door that cannot be permanently unlocked. (to prevent you from accidentally leaving the server room vulnerable.
At least one wall to hang posters, comics, calendars, etc.
A dry-erase board if you are into that sort of thing.
Legroom
And of course a storage closet. You WILL get way too much stuff when other people decide they don't want it, and they don't want to wait for the recycler to come pick it up.
The comfort items seem silly to a boss at times, but they make a world of difference when it comes to how much stress you can handle.
My office is one out of the three cubicles in my room, and a portion of the slanted, non-air-conditioned closet with water-based fire prevention is my "server room" that houses a single rack. The rest of the servers are on a desk in the storage closet, under my desk, or next to the Web Team's desk. ALWAYS plan-ahead, don't just "Get it done", or you'll wind up with fully soaked servers and people turning off servers that they think are just normal computers.
Agreed.
Let's switch to ODF then explain to millions of other people that we would be appreciative if they ignored the money they spent on Office 2007 and switch to an older interface that doesn't do quite as much.
I love OpenOffice and use it on my desktop at home, my company is part of the ODF alliance, but I would never switch my day job's network to Open Office simply because of the fact that we have to do business with the rest of the world. (Which bothers me quite a bit, considering I love the concepts behind Open Source)
Since when have we been given access to our federal fair-use rights to copy DVDs?
I thought this conversation was long dead, we have the right to make a backup copy of our DVD, possibly in a different format, as long as it doesn't involve decrypting the DVD. Side-note: you cannot make a copy of a DVD without decrypting it.
Please correct me if I'm wrong. I haven't been backing up my DVDs, playing them on my Linux laptop, or putting them on my iPod for the past few years because I discovered I didn't have access to my rights when it comes to copying DVDs.
I simply don't want someone to read this thread and think that ripping DVDs with handbrake is legal. I haven't been able to determine 100% if it is legal or not, but the DMCA clearly tells you to forfeit your rights in hopes that maybe the pirates are only willing to break 1 law rather than 2. (Meaning the DMCA assumes that the individuals stealing and selling stolen goods will for some reason stop doing so simply because they have to break encryption, which is now illegal...)
As a developer, I've found a great way to prolong the life of IE7 and encourage people to use it. Simply give in and write websites that look great in IE7, then worry about Firefox support. Fortunately, I have a full-time job, so all my side-jobs are a choice, not a necessity, so I simply write code for Firefox and hope it looks good in Internet Explorer. My clients know this, and usually don't care because I'm cheaper than the competition and I always have a good reason for doing what I do. (I don't make it break in IE7, I simply don't care if certain effects work perfectly as long as they somewhat work in IE7, which was the intention of Microsoft, correct? "Somewhat Supports" or "Buggy" seems to be the popular CSS support indicator.)
What would be easier would be if nobody had to forcibly monitor anything, but if they did happen to see someone downloading child porn, then report it.
Kind of like you don't have to be a crime-fighter, but if you see someone getting mugged, and you have a cell phone in your hand, call the cops.
As the IT Administrator of a not-for-profit that has a cafe with free WiFi, I'm not worried at all. The article states:
We are not required to track what goes on with our WiFi, but when we do notice someone doing something illegal, we are required to notify the authorities. I see no problem with this. It is kind of like saying I have to go and tell management if I see someone shoplifting at WalMart. So what?
I think that, as usual, we are blowing this out of proportion because the government is trying to force us into being responsible human beings.
Ironically I do not believe anyone should force you to be responsible, because that should be a choice you've made already, but since I'm already cool with tossing more validly caught-in-the-act child pornographers through the judicial system, this doesn't really bug me that much. Plus we already have a few layers of content filtering on our free WiFi anyway.
Part of me wants to agree with you, but the other part of me says the whole point of Firefox is that not all of the cool features are built in. While I would like better RSS integration, I'm glad they are leaving the major feature upgrades to the add-on developers.
(although would it be so hard to add the cool click-and-drag margin resize features for printing that IE7 has?)
I'm sold!
Where do I download the windows version?
I reluctantly agree, AOL can make it.
At work most of the guys at the top of the Org Chart use AOL at home. Why? Because it works with everything else they use. Their Cell phones, their iTunes store, etc.
It is surprising, but I've had a hard time convincing myself to push anyone towards a gmail account at work when AOL works with so many different services. I still think AOL is the Epson of ISP's, but that's because they assume (sometimes rightly) that their users are ignorant and incapable of doing anything without massive bloatware-provided hand-holding. But, what comes as a result of this is sometimes accidentally effective hand-holding that pulls in a larger market than logic can ever explain.
But think about it, you could have a robot that.... uhm... points at things? ... from a very low angle?
Come to think of it, what is the point of a laser on the robot? I would find playing with a laser pointer more fun than playing with a robot with a laser pointer.
Add a battery powered tesla coil that can surprise guests and lazy house-pets, and then I'll be impressed!
(it is cool that people still think to take stuff apart and improve upon it, so I guess I shouldn't be so hard... but I just hope my kid improves on cheap, non-robotic toys)
You forgot a word... needlessly...
That's a lot of resources nedlessly thrown at very few students.
I wonder what it would be like if that money went towards regular supplies, like paper and pencil for all the other schools in the district, how far that amount of money would go?
I also wonder if before this happened they analyzed Microsoft's Management skills, perhaps with a case study on Vista?
This looks like a fun idea but it sounds like one giant Microsoft Advertisement to me, and that is only going to stifle the kids' innovation.
With all the Microsoft products I saw around me when I was a kid, I seriously thought you had to work for microsoft to become a programmer. I hate to say it, but this is only going to grow our kids' technology addiction, which I for one do not find healthy. As an IT manager, former programmer, and avid Geekon at my church, I want my kids to read books with paper, ink, and binding. (think about the librarians! won't someone please think about the librarians?!)
All in all, it looks cool, and it is nice of Microsoft to offer their management skills and personnell (that does cost them money), but I find it all kind of pointless when I bet the same result could have been achieved at a quarter of the cost if they got MIT or UC Berkley involved instead. (and open source developing universities actually have a more positive track record on quality and punctuality that Microsoft doesn't.)
I hate to say this, but I agree.
When the W3C standardizes SVG that can be easily embedded in pages (such as using img tags) and manipulated using AJAX, I'll definitely prefer that, but for now, I usually try to stay away from flash when I can avoid it. With that said, flash is still king on the video side of things, but hopefully in the future that'll be where it ends.
I still haven't found anything worth doing on the web that I can't do with standard HTML and CSS other than Video, but Flash has its purpose, and it does a great job at what it does. Now, if they would ever make a decent linux player, I'd think even higher of them.
I guess the key point is to encourage developers to offer standards-based HTML files first, then Flash based sites as an added bonus for users who have that capability. (I haven't gotten to test any flash screen-readers yet, but I hear it is somewhat possible to make flash accessible) And for the most part, good developers have been using a "flash/non-flash" splash screen for quite a while, so I don't really have any complaints.
Their abuse is in the fact that by making their own standard that only works on their operating system (which they sell, and is the foundation of all their profits) lazy developers are coerced into writing code that only works in Internet Explorer. My university invested over 40 Million USD on software that has a web interface. My thought was "We're really moving forward and making the tools as easy and accessible as possible!". In actuality, the web interface requires Internet Explorer, forcing me to install VMWare on my linux machine so I can start up another license of windows (that we had to pay for) to run the "free" browser by Microsoft.
If they were more standards compliant (or if web developers obeyed standards instead of market trends) then I could simply view the tools in Firefox on linux.
Platform independence on web applications starts when you ignore Internet Explorer as a web browser. (or code so it looks good in both, while still upholding web standards, which is possible in most cases, but sometimes not without javascript and whatnot)
So yes, their free browser does cause a profit inducing monopoly.
Ah, but you are assuming businesses do what makes sense.
If we were to base it on what makes sense, most networks would be linux thin clients and one linux server, with Open Office 2.0 being the predominant office suite. Cost of software: $0 per seat. Cost of hardware: $200 per seat (pulled that out of thin air) + $25,000 for the server.
Seriously, what common tasks couldn't be done using 100% free software? Yet we still decided instead to go with expensive software on each workstation. Sure we can share documents with the outside world easier, but really, why do we need to? What business seriously needs to give Word or Excel documents to other people that a PDF or ODF of the same content wouldn't satisfy? We use MS Office where I work so we can share documents easily, but that's because other offices in our organization use it as well. If our entire organization switched to OO.o 2 we wouldn't have a problem.
Sidenote: OOo2.0 still has a ways to go before I can use it as comfortably as MS Office. Primarily: tables. Seriously, how long did they spend redefining table support? Please let me merge cells and define borders for each cell. (coming from a user who has no idea how to program these features himself...)
If all businesses followed global, open standards, such as HTML, CSS, XHTML, XML, ODF, etc, then we would be in a much better, and much cheaper place. But since we obviously could care less about the logical course of action, why would we ever give up our workstations even if it did save us money with little to no business impact?
Simply put: PHP5
I run an Ubuntu Server (which installs a base system by default, no GUI...) and I have Apache 2 and PHP 5 running very quickly and efficiently on a 100% supported OS. At the time of setting up the server, Ubuntu was the only distro offering enterprise support for PHP 5.
I'm still lost as to why some distros still use PHP 4 when PHP 5 is late into its second year of official release, but that's another topic altogether.
To install software in Ubuntu, you click "Applications">"Add Applications"
This requires the administrator (root) password, since we don't want just anybody to be able to install software. (i.e. viruses embedded into emails)
Then, you just scroll through the categories, and the programs in them, and when you find something you might be interested in, you click on it, see the description of the software on the right side of the window, and if you like it, you put a check in the checkbox next to it.
You keep doing this for however many applications you want. Once you are done, you click Apply, and it downloads the required files, installs them, puts them in the main "Applications" menu, then tells you where to find all of your new software.
It is basically a user-friendly version of "package management", and kind of like Windows XP's Add/Remove programs, only you can add software from a variety of vendors, and you use the internet to get the latest version, rather than your install CD to get a 5 year old version. (kind of nice, actually)
I have used that method to install software such as email clients, 3d rendering programs, vector art programs, audio editing programs, and even desktop publishing software.
That's the exact same reason I don't use Calculus, not being an Egyptian nor a Greek myself.
I guess for this \.user, I mean not only "ActiveX good riddance", but also "Internet Explorer good riddance". If their browser can't display standards-compliant code, most likely due to their shady business practices, then who cares?
They are saying, change the roads because we found out our car needs to be changed. That is unacceptable. My sites will not change, and if someone wants to view them, and it doesn't work in IE, they are free to use Firefox, Opera, Safari, etc. The fewer sites that require IE, the better, and maybe this will be the final straw that pushes at least one more developer away from the instability that is IE.
IE is not a bad browser, it just renders bad code, and takes a little longer on publishing security patches than other browser manufacturers. Because they have decided to go against Web Standards, I have no sympathy. If they were using Web Standards, I'd consider them, ActiveX, and other things IE displays as being something worth designing for.
Overall, I just don't use some of the more fine-tuned features of CSS/XHTML so it looks good in both fx and IE. But why should I care about IE users getting screwed, when they are getting screwed either way? I'm tired of hacking code so it "works" in IE.
As long as my sites are functional, meaning users get the same information, and as much the same experience as possible, I'm happy. I can 99.9% of the time achieve this with standards-compliance CSS. The other 0.1% of the time I just ignore IE. I know the bulk of users are IE users, but why should they change if we keep building an IE web?
Same here, which unfortunately means no DVDs for me. As soon as they trade Copy-Protection for Consumer-Protection I'll be back in the game. Until then, I'll watch movies on TV, burn them to non-encrypted DVD with my PC, and watch them as many times as I want, as is my right as a content-subscriber (via cable TV).
Who knows, maybe I'll give in to the stripping of my rights, but that would require them to make a movie worthy of my money and my rights. Gas prices have gone up so money is low, and I've got a fairly decent DVD/CD collection and a windows PC, so my rights are running pretty low too...
But what about the widgets?! Will somebody please think about the widgets?!!?
Really, what is Vista advertising to do that Linux/OSX haven't been doing for years? And why do I need those vital features (such as 3d interfaces, widgets, and an online podcasting service) when XP runs great as long as you reinstall it once a year and filter what you put on it.
Way to go Microsoft, you created a market nobody needed, filled it with crap, and are trying to spin that crap into gold instead of cleaning out the crap and mining for gold.
My negative attitude says they are in this situation due to greed, but more likely they just didn't plan this far ahead. They started off by writing good applications that the workforce needed, then seem to have gotten distracted by all things shiny. They could have been such a great corporation had they stayed focused on finding and meeting needs, as well as caring at least a little about customer satisfaction and overall niceness.