I had a habit of leaving my computer on for hours and not saving (luxury of having an Acorn computer was that it would never crash). This was fine until I spent hours writing a thesis, and popped down to the corner shop for more Coke. When I got back my computer was off losing me hours of work. My house-mate had seen my bouncing-lines screensaver and helpfully turned off the computer with the "game I'd stopped playing". Cue gnashing of teeth.
At my current company there have been a number of thefts in the office next door. My current back-up attitude is don't assume your machine will be there the next day!
Phillip. PS Can people please stop saying 'loosing' instead of 'losing'
- Linux community touted it as proof patches were fast, because it was into the source tree in 90 minutes - It took one month before KDE released a new binary compiled with the patch - It took an additional month before Redhat incorporated this into a patch for their Linux distribution.
The Linux community claimed 90 minutes, when it was really two months.
Why don't people such as mozilla and mandrake now initially release bittorrents, and then via ftp/http a couple of days later? People will take the path of least resistance, and by initially only making it available as a torrent it will push a lot of people into adopting bittorrent which will benefit both the user (faster downloads) and the developers (lower bandwidth cost).
I'd rather wipe out my system, and not touch/home than the other way around. I can reinstall most of the system in short order, but my/home directory contains all the important stuff.
I'd rather not have either wiped out. Losing/home is inconvenient, losing around a days work (you *do* back up daily don't you?). Losing my system, I lose also around a days work (default install is useless, I need all my apps, customised and configured to the way I work).
Well technically Solar Power would be White Power, in that sunlight is white light... But that just sounds bad.
There isn't such a thing as white light, as white is just an equal combination of red, green and blue light. Which sounds quite good politically speaking.
Call me crazy but I really believe that government should always choose the least expensive option whenever possibe.
I'd rather they chose best value for money. Not necessarily the same thing. This can also take into account wider considerations than TCO; there is also local job creation, future savings in not having data locked in a proprietry format, even philosophical values (something paid for by the people should be owned by the people).
Currently, you ask for funding for a project and once you get it the rule is use it or lose it, thus, more money is spent than is really necessary for most projects in order to keep the funding for future years.
No problem with them spending the surplus money, as long as they again provide value for money re: the public. This is where oversight is necessary to make them justify their spending.
I use Linux becauase I'm lazy. Gentoo because it's so easy to maintain and keep up to date. If you pick Mandrake, installing is easier and quicker than Windows. You don't need to buy a new hard drive, just resize your Windows partition so you have some space and stick in the Mandrake CD. It will automatically turn your maching into a dual-boot machine, so you can choose your OS at start-up. Install Kopete (or similar) and you can connect to MSN messenger (and ICQ etc) instantly. My guess is that you haven't used Linux for a long time.
Perhaps my coffee hasn't kicked in yet, but why would anyone believe that HP would assume liability for people who may not even be customers? If they're going to be doing your company this favor, shouldn't it at least prove it's an HP customer? That seems pretty reasonable to me!
You missed the smilie on the end. The author is subtly saying that HP are not his preferred source of machines (ie it's a dig at HP).
TummyX writes: Does CSV have a transformation language (XSLT)? Does CSV have an easy to use parser & object model (SAX, DOM)? Does CSV have an in document addressing language (XPATH)? Does CSV have a standard way of supporting hierarchical data?
You can't get any easier than parsing CSV! Even the most basic languages can do it in a couple of lines. And the object model (a two dimensional array) is pretty well understood by everyone. For transformation, normally a simple loop with some basic logic will suffice.
We do data exports to various companies, and 90% of them prefer CSV to XML because they can dump it straight into a table in a relational database.
I like XML, but it's the right tool for certain jobs as is CSV.
Serapth writes: XML is not much of a step forward really... it is a step forward no doubt... but perhaps the best solution would be to make the data self enacting. Namingly, couple the logic to the data... so that code and data can exist as one.
How is this different to a XML document with PHP embedded (or Perl/Python if that way inclined)?
I think it was a piece from Douglas Adams who told a story of someone he knew using word who wanted all the junk removed from Word's menus that he didn't use. He showed him how to remove menu items thru customization and he ended up with just Open, Save, Bold, Italic, Print and Spell check
This is why I like Abiword, it's so simple and does the job without all the clutter. The first thing I do with a new browser or email client is rip out all the options to a bare minimum. How about a menu option for wordprocessors which contains: Simple menu, Editing Stage, Power User. The first option would be similar to the menu you mentioned, and I think the preferred option for many!
The most important one, IMHO, is to compute a list of close matches and present these choices to the user. They may use the Soundex algorithm or some other tricks to see if characters are transposed, if one characters is wrong, if one is missing, etc. If well implemented, this would solve 60% of the problem.
Ignoring the cases where transposing of characters leads to a wrong but valid domain (problem being from the *user* point of view). The point is that a domain name is an *address*. If I let my domain expire, I wouldn't want all my clients to be redirected automatically from "mywidgets.com" to "ymwidgets.com" who are my closest competitors.
The remaining 40% is due to the fact that people sometimes doesn't actually mistype a known address... they type a dead wrong address, such as "amazonbookstore.com" instead of "amazon.com". In this case, BIND should split up the phrase into separate word (in this case "amazon book store" and redirect to a search engine with those words as parameters.
So would the results bring up "amazon.com" or "bookstore.com" first? In the US you get the inevitable legal case by some 'loser' in the aforementioned example. Someone will have the bright idea of selling the search result to the highest bidder. Oops, we're back to sitefinder!
An address is an address. If you get it wrong, then you need to find out what the right one is. That's not the job of a DNS resolver. The browser can take the failed response and put it directly into Google if the user so wishes.
Use Openoffice.org (assuming it will work for you since you were going to do a full linux switch anyway) and other open source software when applicable. (Mozilla Firebird instead of IE, etc.)
Maybe Abiword should be rebranded OfficeLite? It does everything I need it to do, and starts up in a fraction of a second. Also does a reasonable job of importing Word.
Office of Equal Employment Opportunity: Discrimination is defined in civil rights law as unfavorable or unfair treatment of a person or class of persons in comparison to others who are not members of the protected class because of race, sex, color, religion, national origin, age, physical/mental handicap, sexual harassment, sexual orientation or reprisal for opposition to discriminatory practices or participation in the EEO process.
Federal EEO laws prohibit an employer from discriminating against persons in all aspects of employment, including recruitment, selection, evaluation, promotion, training, compensation, discipline, retention and working conditions, because of their protected status.
I think the point is that you don't choose your race, sex, color, religion, national origin, age, physical/mental handicap, sexual orientation or to be sexually harassed. That is the spirit of EOE. If you choose to prostitute your talents for a morally corrupt company, then that is your choice and you accept the consequences.
Open Source leader Eric Raymond was quoted as saying that he was contacted by the perpetrator and that "he's one of us." To Mr Raymond's partial credit, he asked the attacker to stop. However, he has yet to disclose the identity of the perpetrator so that justice can be done.
Just because the perpetrator allegedly contacted Eric Raymond, it doesn't mean that Eric knows who it is and is, as Mr McBride is charging, covering for the perpetrator.
[snip already rebutted points in other posts]
If the Open Source community wants its products to be accepted by enterprise companies, the community itself must follow the rules and procedures that govern mainstream society. This is what global corporations will require. And it is these customers who will determine the ultimate fate of Open Source - not SCO, not IBM, and not Open Source leaders.
The Open Source community doesn't want its products to be accepted by enterprise companies, enterprise companies are the ones that want the benefits of Open Source. It is the enterprise companies and their partners that are contributing as they can see it's ultimately in their own interest. There is no fate of Open Source being decided here, Mr McBride is vastly over-estimating the importance of his actions.
Rather than ignore or challenge copyright laws, Open Source developers will advance their cause by respecting the rules of law that built our society into what it is today.
-1 Flamebait. No-one has ignored or challenged copyright laws, as no law has proven to be broken.
I was talking with some friends about this the other day. While it sucks for the network users, it just comes down to the fact that you would have to be friggin INSANE to leave your computer sharing lots of files right now. Why not just put a sign up that says "Hey, RIAA! Come sue me!" No thank you.
If everyone believes that then the whole P2P network will collapse and the RIAA have won their battle. If no-one believes this then the RIAA will have a futile time and ultimately will lose the war against P2P. Much like the fortunes of companies rise and fall its perceived future, which may bare little resemblance to its actual performance.
We've got one of these amphibious cars that tootles up and down our river every so often already... www.amphicar.com. This "new" one is just one in a long line of press releases from marketing people who haven't looked into the history of the concept... mind you this new one does look cool...
I think the *new* bit is how fast it goes once in the water. What are the top speeds of the amphicar in and out of water?
they say you could take it on daytrips to france as it has a range of 50 miles (the english channel is 22miles long) so you can drive there, drive 6 miles, and drive back, just as long as none of the waves are bigger than foot you won't get wet (why they chose a convertible i`ll never know).
The waves will have to be a lot smaller than a foot with a boot/backseat full of beer.
Even open source leaders like Red Hat, who do make source code available, stand to benefit little immediately: the native-blood syndrome is too strong.
Maybe not from product but they do from services. If Brazil wanted to make a home-grown distro, then hiring consultancy from an expert such as Red Hat would make very good business sense. It would be much cheaper than re-inventing the wheel and much quicker.
Nice try, but you are in the minority. Virtually every WinXP user I know here has virus problems, including the auto-reboot one. Just because your number hasn't come up yet in the M$ russian roulette doesn't mean you're safe. Most of us have changed over to Linux for a reason, and not all of us philosophical ones believe it or not, but practical ones. btw Photoshop works fine under Linux with the Crossover plugin. If only Counterstrike was plug-and-play under Linux (or even native) then I wouldn't keep re-installing Windows on a partition.
The more I read of SCO's garbage, the more I think that SCO Really Does Not Get It.
I think that McBride and Cronys really do believe in their heart of hearts that people are not capable of organizing, co-ordinating, and for that matter, producing functional code, without the direct support of some company as a mastermind.
I don't think you get McBride. He certainly gets it and is very intelligent (in a purely capitalistic way). It helps him enourmously that he is totally morally corrupt. He is laying waste to the good work of thousands, and possibly destroying thousands of people's jobs and livelihoods. That's not his focus or even his concern though. The job he has taken on is to use a failing company with a dead product and some dodgy IP, and to manipulate the stock price and con investors into ploughing in money that he and his cohorts then siphon off. He may claim he is not selling any shares but in my opinion a fair chunk of that money will make its way into his account as a 'gift'. He doesn't have to win, he just has to duck and dive, buy time to sell off more shares, and say what-ever it takes to edge that stock price up. And at that he has been very successful. Judging by the number of shares sold he has already 'won', anything from now on is just a bonus.
I don't think that SCO wants those lines removed, because their whole business plan now seems based on those lines being in there.
Their business plan is based on pretending those lines are in there. If they really were in there then they wouldn't be afraid to show them. Removing them now is mute if they want to claim damages, as they have millions of Red Hat/Mandrake/etc CDs floating around the world as evidence to prove that the code has been in there.
That's right, the solution to Saddam cooperating with the weapon inspections was to blow him to oblivion.
I don't understand why parent post is moderated +5 insightful. He spent 10 years not cooperating with weapons inspections, and that's well documented by everyone including the UN (and even signed by all the countries that opposed the Yank unilateral action, in many resolutions).
Slashdot Mirror
[snip post so wrong don't know where to start]
Do you feel threathened by something they have and you don't? 5 weeks of paid vacation perhaps?
Five weeks paid in retrospect. Hence the first entire year with a company you are entitled to 0 days holiday.
Phillip.
I had a habit of leaving my computer on for hours and not saving (luxury of having an Acorn computer was that it would never crash). This was fine until I spent hours writing a thesis, and popped down to the corner shop for more Coke. When I got back my computer was off losing me hours of work. My house-mate had seen my bouncing-lines screensaver and helpfully turned off the computer with the "game I'd stopped playing". Cue gnashing of teeth.
At my current company there have been a number of thefts in the office next door. My current back-up attitude is don't assume your machine will be there the next day!
Phillip.
PS Can people please stop saying 'loosing' instead of 'losing'
- Linux community touted it as proof patches were fast, because it was into the source tree in 90 minutes
- It took one month before KDE released a new binary compiled with the patch
- It took an additional month before Redhat incorporated this into a patch for their Linux distribution.
The Linux community claimed 90 minutes, when it was really two months.
Or overnight for those of us using Gentoo.
Phillip.
Why don't people such as mozilla and mandrake now initially release bittorrents, and then via ftp/http a couple of days later? People will take the path of least resistance, and by initially only making it available as a torrent it will push a lot of people into adopting bittorrent which will benefit both the user (faster downloads) and the developers (lower bandwidth cost).
Phillip.
I'd rather wipe out my system, and not touch /home than the other way around. I can reinstall most of the system in short order, but my /home directory contains all the important stuff.
/home is inconvenient, losing around a days work (you *do* back up daily don't you?). Losing my system, I lose also around a days work (default install is useless, I need all my apps, customised and configured to the way I work).
I'd rather not have either wiped out. Losing
Phillip.
Well technically Solar Power would be White Power, in that sunlight is white light... But that just sounds bad.
There isn't such a thing as white light, as white is just an equal combination of red, green and blue light. Which sounds quite good politically speaking.
Phillip.
Call me crazy but I really believe that government should always choose the least expensive option whenever possibe.
I'd rather they chose best value for money. Not necessarily the same thing. This can also take into account wider considerations than TCO; there is also local job creation, future savings in not having data locked in a proprietry format, even philosophical values (something paid for by the people should be owned by the people).
Currently, you ask for funding for a project and once you get it the rule is use it or lose it, thus, more money is spent than is really necessary for most projects in order to keep the funding for future years.
No problem with them spending the surplus money, as long as they again provide value for money re: the public. This is where oversight is necessary to make them justify their spending.
Phillip.
I use Linux becauase I'm lazy. Gentoo because it's so easy to maintain and keep up to date. If you pick Mandrake, installing is easier and quicker than Windows. You don't need to buy a new hard drive, just resize your Windows partition so you have some space and stick in the Mandrake CD. It will automatically turn your maching into a dual-boot machine, so you can choose your OS at start-up. Install Kopete (or similar) and you can connect to MSN messenger (and ICQ etc) instantly. My guess is that you haven't used Linux for a long time.
Phillip.
Perhaps my coffee hasn't kicked in yet, but why would anyone believe that HP would assume liability for people who may not even be customers? If they're going to be doing your company this favor, shouldn't it at least prove it's an HP customer? That seems pretty reasonable to me!
You missed the smilie on the end. The author is subtly saying that HP are not his preferred source of machines (ie it's a dig at HP).
Phillip.
TummyX writes:
Does CSV have a transformation language (XSLT)?
Does CSV have an easy to use parser & object model (SAX, DOM)?
Does CSV have an in document addressing language (XPATH)?
Does CSV have a standard way of supporting hierarchical data?
You can't get any easier than parsing CSV! Even the most basic languages can do it in a couple of lines. And the object model (a two dimensional array) is pretty well understood by everyone. For transformation, normally a simple loop with some basic logic will suffice.
We do data exports to various companies, and 90% of them prefer CSV to XML because they can dump it straight into a table in a relational database.
I like XML, but it's the right tool for certain jobs as is CSV.
Serapth writes:
XML is not much of a step forward really... it is a step forward no doubt... but perhaps the best solution would be to make the data self enacting. Namingly, couple the logic to the data... so that code and data can exist as one.
How is this different to a XML document with PHP embedded (or Perl/Python if that way inclined)?
Phillip.
I think it was a piece from Douglas Adams who told a story of someone he knew using word who wanted all the junk removed from Word's menus that he didn't use. He showed him how to remove menu items thru customization and he ended up with just Open, Save, Bold, Italic, Print and Spell check
This is why I like Abiword, it's so simple and does the job without all the clutter. The first thing I do with a new browser or email client is rip out all the options to a bare minimum. How about a menu option for wordprocessors which contains: Simple menu, Editing Stage, Power User. The first option would be similar to the menu you mentioned, and I think the preferred option for many!
Phillip.
The most important one, IMHO, is to compute a list of close matches and present these choices to the user. They may use the Soundex algorithm or some other tricks to see if characters are transposed, if one characters is wrong, if one is missing, etc. If well implemented, this would solve 60% of the problem.
Ignoring the cases where transposing of characters leads to a wrong but valid domain (problem being from the *user* point of view). The point is that a domain name is an *address*. If I let my domain expire, I wouldn't want all my clients to be redirected automatically from "mywidgets.com" to "ymwidgets.com" who are my closest competitors.
The remaining 40% is due to the fact that people sometimes doesn't actually mistype a known address... they type a dead wrong address, such as "amazonbookstore.com" instead of "amazon.com". In this case, BIND should split up the phrase into separate word (in this case "amazon book store" and redirect to a search engine with those words as parameters.
So would the results bring up "amazon.com" or "bookstore.com" first? In the US you get the inevitable legal case by some 'loser' in the aforementioned example. Someone will have the bright idea of selling the search result to the highest bidder. Oops, we're back to sitefinder!
An address is an address. If you get it wrong, then you need to find out what the right one is. That's not the job of a DNS resolver. The browser can take the failed response and put it directly into Google if the user so wishes.
Phillip.
Use Openoffice.org (assuming it will work for you since you were going to do a full linux switch anyway) and other open source software when applicable. (Mozilla Firebird instead of IE, etc.)
Maybe Abiword should be rebranded OfficeLite? It does everything I need it to do, and starts up in a fraction of a second. Also does a reasonable job of importing Word.
Phillip.
According to that authorative source mi29 chairman D.K. Matai? That 'award winning' security firm? I'd take whatever he says with a pinch of salt.
Phillip.
Office of Equal Employment Opportunity: Discrimination is defined in civil rights law as unfavorable or unfair treatment of a person or class of persons in comparison to others who are not members of the protected class because of race, sex, color, religion, national origin, age, physical/mental handicap, sexual harassment, sexual orientation or reprisal for opposition to discriminatory practices or participation in the EEO process.
Federal EEO laws prohibit an employer from discriminating against persons in all aspects of employment, including recruitment, selection, evaluation, promotion, training, compensation, discipline, retention and working conditions, because of their protected status.
I think the point is that you don't choose your race, sex, color, religion, national origin, age, physical/mental handicap, sexual orientation or to be sexually harassed. That is the spirit of EOE. If you choose to prostitute your talents for a morally corrupt company, then that is your choice and you accept the consequences.
Phillip.
Open Source leader Eric Raymond was quoted as saying that he was contacted by the perpetrator and that "he's one of us." To Mr Raymond's partial credit, he asked the attacker to stop. However, he has yet to disclose the identity of the perpetrator so that justice can be done.
Just because the perpetrator allegedly contacted Eric Raymond, it doesn't mean that Eric knows who it is and is, as Mr McBride is charging, covering for the perpetrator.
[snip already rebutted points in other posts]
If the Open Source community wants its products to be accepted by enterprise companies, the community itself must follow the rules and procedures that govern mainstream society. This is what global corporations will require. And it is these customers who will determine the ultimate fate of Open Source - not SCO, not IBM, and not Open Source leaders.
The Open Source community doesn't want its products to be accepted by enterprise companies, enterprise companies are the ones that want the benefits of Open Source. It is the enterprise companies and their partners that are contributing as they can see it's ultimately in their own interest. There is no fate of Open Source being decided here, Mr McBride is vastly over-estimating the importance of his actions.
Rather than ignore or challenge copyright laws, Open Source developers will advance their cause by respecting the rules of law that built our society into what it is today.
-1 Flamebait. No-one has ignored or challenged copyright laws, as no law has proven to be broken.
Phillip.
I was talking with some friends about this the other day. While it sucks for the network users, it just comes down to the fact that you would have to be friggin INSANE to leave your computer sharing lots of files right now. Why not just put a sign up that says "Hey, RIAA! Come sue me!" No thank you.
If everyone believes that then the whole P2P network will collapse and the RIAA have won their battle. If no-one believes this then the RIAA will have a futile time and ultimately will lose the war against P2P. Much like the fortunes of companies rise and fall its perceived future, which may bare little resemblance to its actual performance.
Phillip.
We've got one of these amphibious cars that tootles up and down our river every so often already... www.amphicar.com. This "new" one is just one in a long line of press releases from marketing people who haven't looked into the history of the concept... mind you this new one does look cool...
I think the *new* bit is how fast it goes once in the water. What are the top speeds of the amphicar in and out of water?
Phillip.
they say you could take it on daytrips to france as it has a range of 50 miles (the english channel is 22miles long) so you can drive there, drive 6 miles, and drive back, just as long as none of the waves are bigger than foot you won't get wet (why they chose a convertible i`ll never know).
The waves will have to be a lot smaller than a foot with a boot/backseat full of beer.
Phillip.
Well we're not that far away:
Things I'd like to see:
Phillip.
Even open source leaders like Red Hat, who do make source code available, stand to benefit little immediately: the native-blood syndrome is too strong.
Maybe not from product but they do from services. If Brazil wanted to make a home-grown distro, then hiring consultancy from an expert such as Red Hat would make very good business sense. It would be much cheaper than re-inventing the wheel and much quicker.
Phillip.
Nice try, but you are in the minority. Virtually every WinXP user I know here has virus problems, including the auto-reboot one. Just because your number hasn't come up yet in the M$ russian roulette doesn't mean you're safe. Most of us have changed over to Linux for a reason, and not all of us philosophical ones believe it or not, but practical ones. btw Photoshop works fine under Linux with the Crossover plugin. If only Counterstrike was plug-and-play under Linux (or even native) then I wouldn't keep re-installing Windows on a partition.
Phillip.
The more I read of SCO's garbage, the more I think that SCO Really Does Not Get It.
I think that McBride and Cronys really do believe in their heart of hearts that people are not capable of organizing, co-ordinating, and for that matter, producing functional code, without the direct support of some company as a mastermind.
I don't think you get McBride. He certainly gets it and is very intelligent (in a purely capitalistic way). It helps him enourmously that he is totally morally corrupt. He is laying waste to the good work of thousands, and possibly destroying thousands of people's jobs and livelihoods. That's not his focus or even his concern though. The job he has taken on is to use a failing company with a dead product and some dodgy IP, and to manipulate the stock price and con investors into ploughing in money that he and his cohorts then siphon off. He may claim he is not selling any shares but in my opinion a fair chunk of that money will make its way into his account as a 'gift'. He doesn't have to win, he just has to duck and dive, buy time to sell off more shares, and say what-ever it takes to edge that stock price up. And at that he has been very successful. Judging by the number of shares sold he has already 'won', anything from now on is just a bonus.
Phillip.
I don't think that SCO wants those lines removed, because their whole business plan now seems based on those lines being in there.
Their business plan is based on pretending those lines are in there. If they really were in there then they wouldn't be afraid to show them. Removing them now is mute if they want to claim damages, as they have millions of Red Hat/Mandrake/etc CDs floating around the world as evidence to prove that the code has been in there.
Phillip.
That's right, the solution to Saddam cooperating with the weapon inspections was to blow him to oblivion.
I don't understand why parent post is moderated +5 insightful. He spent 10 years not cooperating with weapons inspections, and that's well documented by everyone including the UN (and even signed by all the countries that opposed the Yank unilateral action, in many resolutions).
[snip rest of very confused post]
Phillip.