The nice feature will be that Free apps will be easier to convert to "paid" apps quickly and easily rather than doing "work" in the free version, and then chosing to upgrade and not being able to transfer that data in the free version to the paid (more robust) version because the apps are so isolated from one another.
This could work very well for "service" type applications such as 411 or language translations. For instance, if you translated a block of text it would be very easy to have a "submit to professional translator for $cost."
This is a "good" peice of technology, but does open the door for very bad implementations. However, I'm a realist and know that I'm not going to convince anyone who asserts that all software should be free-as-in-beer at all times, that this is a natrual extension to the methods already in place in the app-store.
The key is integration. They stand to make money if developers/companies use their web services in their custom applications/solutions. It makes it more possible to integrate Amazon services into existing systems, and makes them more difficut to "cut-out" of those systems later. For the Kindle (and iPod), the cost is subsidized by content sales, exactly how game console, cellular providers, and drug dealers work. The money is on the comeback in the form of content (music, books, games) or the service.
Disneyworld tickets are $99 so they don't really care what you bring into the park in the form of food. Movie tickets are $9, which doesn't cover their cost, so they need to make their money off refreshments which is why they prohibit food.
Their ideology is profitability. If openness leads to profitability in one enterprise they'll jump on it. If in another it doesn't, they'll resist it. Most businesses don't go closed/open on philosophy, they do so on profitability.
The problem is time and adoption. Flash (as much as I hate it) is available now. Hulu is growing at the rate that needs to run on technology available, not invest in under-developed OSS alternatives that could take a long time to reach a critical mass of adoption. There edge is that they are faster and more available than bit-torrent and a bit easier to use. If you add esoteric plugins to the mix you're going to adjitate the users, and you're going to rely on whatever viewer the client happens to use to process/view the video (VLC, WMP, QT, etc...) which introduces another issue in configurability for the masses. Unfortunately, Flash is the path of least-resistance that works for the vast majority of their customers (even though it runs poorly on non-Windows platforms.)
They are not a technology company... and operate more like a cable/satellite provider that just so happens to use HTTP and a browser to show the lineup rather than a set-top box/media center on game console (though that may change), and probably will.
I think the difference is that this disorder speaks to an individual who remains bitter after a particular "traumatic" (at least to them) incident they can't get over, where there is a known cause, that can be treated, versus a generally bitter disposition.
This is a case where the diagnosis could lead a psychiatrist to apply methods to help the person cope with the traumatic event versus treating bitterness as an inherent personality trait. If an event alters the baseline, rather than just having a high-bitter baseline, there is a lot more that can be done to the stimulus or event causing it. There are people with a non-bitter disposition that would return to a non-bitter disposition should they be able to overcome/work-through/whatever that particular incident.
I don't think Nevada has a lot to worry about in the realm of online gaming. Brick-and-mortar casinos offer a lot that online gaming can never provide. Casino gambling may be the cornerstone of the Nevada economy, but it has diversified to the point that other gaming enterprises do not appear to directly compete, in the form of fine dining, entertainment, and all that Vegas has to offer.
For instance, if you've ever driven North on I-15 on a friday afternoon out of California, people go to Vegas in droves despite that California has easily accessible Indian gaming with all of the same games/slots (except for Sports betting) that Vegas casinos do.
The Internet might take a small portion of the market for gaming, but the lion's share save up their "gambling budget" and take a trip to Vegas or a local casino/resort for the experience of all the non-gaming activities and gamble in an environment that makes it fun even when you're losing.
Now, if the internet could comp you free beers in the comfort of your home, Mr. Reid can start to worry.
I think the problem was that to the average consumer they were pretty obscure, had no retail presense, or brand-recognition, or brand-loyalty. For the informed, I'm sure a lot were fearful that if Apple won, the company would fold and support would disappear or an Apple update would cause system instability or worse. In addition, there are true apple "fans" that appreciate the products/service/support/buying experience. For the well informed, it isn't "overly" hard to build a Hackintosh if you're capable of following directions and have some initative, and can be done on hardware many have lying around.
I think the first group and loyalists are by-and-large the vast majority... except maybe on/.
It seems like they might have been better off using writers for a show like 24 or CSI where they have to be at-least realistic enough to seem "plausible" to the audience. On one of the comentaries for 24, they get their ideas from real life, but make things like repositioning satellites or breaking crypto go much quicker than it can in real life. They'd be better off getting those writers with engineers to say "what would it take to sdo x,y,z like we did in Season 4, Episode 2" to set more realistic short-term goals.
Sci-Fi doesn't have to overcome the "realism barrier", and being so advanced that it is at present seemingly impossible (warp travel, light sabers, etc.) is part of the appeal. The problem is that it will take so long to "get there" (think computers in 50's-60's SciFi), that technology could go in a completely different direction.
However, we're getting to the point with special effects we no longer have to do sci-fi in a way that is "easy" to produce (e.g. a computer with a futuristic GUI like Minority report is producable on screen where in the past computers always talked because it was physically easier to do). The good thing is that since Sci-Fi can produce almost anything on screen or print that it can think up, it will follow more linearly with reality rather than being as limited as to what can be generated.
The TI-89/92 and I'm sure lower had the ability to run ASM programs. We played games on them all the time and the teacher encouraged it because in AP Calc, if you could pass without paying attention, and therefore more power to you, and if you failed because you were playing games, it was no sweat off the teacher's back. Not only that it got us more familar with the devices and taught us to use them more effectively rather than as $150 paperweights.
These devices also had ports for communication, and if there was a market, I'm sure could have had an IR dongle created.
If Palm made an Education model without the IR sensor and hard-flashed particular apps based on what the device was "for" (e.g. a touch calculator, a reading tool, a serial device controller) on low-end hardware for a low-end price, they could have sold millions of them for "specific applications." On the other hand they could have left them open, sold them for $50-60 bucks and given each student one and allowed teachers (if they wished) to integrate them into cirriculum.
There are so many uses for technology in education and the two limiting factors are technologically inept teachers with no desire to learn (Disclaimer: Wife and I both work in Ed, and trust me, there are many of these) and the high per-pupil cost. If they made these things cheap and easy and had buy in from administration they could have done amazing things with these years before OLPC was an option.
You are exactly right. As Palm saw the tides turning, they should have said "We're going to be a great organizer at a great price that just so happens to run all sorts of applications" where PocketPC was "we're just a little tiny computer that can't do a lot of the things the big one can." If they'd stuck to monochrome on lower-end hardware rather than trying to keep up with PocketPC they could have sold millions of those things to people who thought they'd be a great tool, but not worth the price point versus a paper organizer, and been best-of-class.
That being said, they should have also kept the OS general enough and licensed it and you'd have seen the PalmOS in all kinds of embedded applications as linux hadn't developed enough to be as good of embedded OS as it is now.
I'd consider calling a browser without addins "unusable" a little over dramatic.
I'd conjecture most users don't even know about addins, and quite a few in addition would consider them as glue-and-bandaids over a browser shortcoming; not that as an inherently virtuous platform "feature."
Most people will choose Chrome for performance and the Google name that they trust, if they change their browser at all.
My problem isn't when people don't know how to fix the tool, but when people don't know how (or have no desire) to know how to properly use a tool.
When I was in shop class before I was allowed to touch a tool I had to be able to first, explain what the tool was for and how to use it safely (after being taught); then I had to demonstrate (with the instructor) how to use it, and then I was cut loose. I can't stand it when workplaces hire people whose job requires them to use a tool and they aren't firstly given training on the tool (in this case, a computer), but then after a suitable amount of fumbling aren't held accountable for refusing to learn to use (worst) it or being incapable of using it (bad). Computer competency is a necessity in almost all workplaces and when I see an applicant who has taken no initiative to learn minimal computer skills that I know are going to cause them to generate excessive support incidents or cause them to work inefficiently, I always suggest against hiring them, regardless of any other of their qualifications, noting that computer ability is always on the list of qualifications for hire, because of they don't meet the standards and have demonstrated they have no desire for professional development in an important facet of their job.
People willing to learn can be taught, those lazy and naturally bright will hit a wall in time.
I was refering to the reality that many states are considering lowering it to.04, and in California, it is.04 for anyone driving with a class B (CDL) license even if they are in their personal car in a non-commercial situation.
However, to address your point, on the surface it makes sense, but how did they come to that number? Is it plausible that poor driving and drink and driving are coorelational regardless of BAC? Is it possible the DOT is not the most unbiased source of information? Annecdotally, I've known people who are hardcore drinkers and can down 6-7 beers and still pass a field sobriety test, their BAC has to be higher. Some people, due to genetic factors feel the effects at lower-or-higher concentrations.
All that being said, I'm not pro-drunk driving, I'm speaking to the eventuallity that states in order to appear "tough" on DUIs and to raise more money in fines they're going to (I gaurantee) lower the limit into a range where impairment is less likley, particularly in seasoned drinkers.
The problem in a lot of states is that.01 can make a huge difference between a DUI, a DUI with a "high BAC kicker", a wet-reckless, or nothing at all. It has to be accurate to at least a few 9's or for those "on the bubble" cases do have a severe level of doubt. Because driving with a.07 is not illegal (for the most part), but.08 is. The question in court is not "were you drinking tonight", but "how much did you drink" which is a very specific very objective, very deturminable piece of information.
As states lower their legal limits to the point where they intersect with non-impaired drinking drivers, especially with a.01 or more margin of error, you're going to get a lot of overzealous cops in cities with revenue shortfalls taking innocent people in for DUIs and hopefully more and more of these "border cases" will bring these devices into question more than the over-the-top blacking out, pissing his pants multiple-offender does in court.
I worked for the California Community College system. A lot of these schools are running on old exchange installations on aging hardware with tiny quotas, that tend to have poor uptimes. (My school was 60MB for faculty due to Exchange 5.5's 16GB information store limit). Many professors within the college simply told their students to mail them at prof_name.(college_initals)@gmail.com because of higher quotas for massive amounts of students sending poorly optimized attachments as part of their assignment, that was web/client accessible in a better interface than 5.5 had, and had much better uptime. As an institution we advised them to use their college-provided account so IT could view the logs and say "yes or no" this student did/did not attempt to submit their paper ontime.
If anything, this helps students and faculty make sure they are communicating with the right "John Smith, Professor" out there.
Every single student whom crosses the door of SRJC is making a statement that "I feel qualified to be a college-level student." Part of being a student is understanding the tools you use to get the job done. Not taking minimal effort to verify an e-mail address for validity, particularly given most students are forced to use an Online Courseware system that is at something.mycollege.edu, so they know that "this address does not match this address", is no excuse for acting foolishly.
One of the biggest merits of going to any college is that after 18 years of hand-holding in the home and public education spheres, the college is not going to baby sit you, beg you to pay your fees on time, order you to attend lecture (though sadly some professors attempt to to artifically give merit to their poor instruction in the form of attendance-grades), or anything else for that matter. You are there because you want to learn, and almost no career has zero computer interaction, so you should learn to use the computer, just like you learned to read even though you didn't plan on being grammar or literature teacher. I am shocked and disappointed how many people flatly refuse to properly learn to use a tool that can make their job easier. I've never met anyone who "regretted" spending the necessary time to use a computer effectively.
I don't think that is exactly what they are thinking, but they could help MySQL become more Oracle compatible (e.g. support some of the same views, SQL datatypes, etc...). Secondly, there are a lot of mid-sized shops (I've been at several) who are total Microsoft shops, because it plays nice with Active Directory, is cheaper than Oracle and is reasonably manufacturer supported. However, if you have MySQL with major-vendor backing/support available at little-no cost, it might get more middle-managers willing to use it for more and more applications; which is what many developers/technicians are asking them to do, because they embrace OSS, often use it in their personal/side-gig work, and to save money to sure up the budget.
There is a lot of business out there that if you called it Oracle MySQL instead of MySQL, with not so much as one line changed, would be more apt to use it.
Isn't this the merit of OSS, in that someone who needs Firefox to run on older Windows clients can maintain a branch that implements 1.9.1? I'd need to know "why" Gecko 1.9.2 doesn't run on older versions of Windows to make a value judgement as to weather or not this is a bad idea.
Particularly when it comes to security, too much backward compatibility can be a really bad idea, and it is partially MS-fault that everyone expects all general-purpose consumer Windows software to run on older depreciated platforms adding code complexity, inefficiency and a greater risk for security issues.
Apple users have dealt with (for a long time) that certain updated software might require a newer OS release than they have and the vendor left it up to them to make the call if upgrading the OS+software or sticking with what they have is the right call.
State Government is generally very-decentralized when it comes to IT. Most departemnts/divisions have their own IT department (e.g. servers/workstations for the DMV are maintained by IT employees of the DMV, not the State Office of Information Technology). Only state-wide inter-departamental systems (infrastructure, business services like gl/payroll/hr/ap/ar..., maybe e-mail, maybe authentication like LDAP/AD) are generally handled by a centralized department.
If Central IT says no Vista, there isn't much stoping the DMV from doing it and spending state money.
The legistlature by passing a law, can enforce this standard globally (probably with the blessing of the state CIO/Sr. management of Central IT and other large IT groups in the departments) where others (CIO, Governor) can't in many circumstances.
I've worked in some IBM shops that used both MySQL and DB2. In my experience new development is on MySQL (as in a LAMP solution) or MSSQL/.NET on PC servers, and old development (such as Financial Accounting (GL), Payroll, other business services) has been in DB2 on iSeries (AS/400) or with some kind of of syncronization between the two. DB2 seems to be inexorably tied to legacy systems and is on the way out as more and more mainframe developers retire. Folks aren't going to drop DB2 in an artifical way to save money by using MySQL, but replace DB2 as systems are converted to the newer "platform". I think the Sun aquisition bridges the gaps in their strategy (java on MVS as more and more students are learning Java (OO for that matter) over COBOL) extending the life of their mainframe markets and giving them a stronger position in the PC server farm world that seems to be what the next cycle will be.
Why don't they just charge by transfer plus a nominal "infrastuture and support charge" that everyone pays to keep the skeleton staff and core equipment "funded." Let the heavy users pay for their usage and let mom and pop pay for their level of usage. I think it would help the broadboard providers charge competitive costs with the last dial-up holdouts. For most folks, their bill would probably go down.
The major problem is that they've sold it as an all-you-can-eat plan by bits/second not bits/month and now they want to change the rules. Also, the problem is that since cable is a shared connection, one heavy user can drag a segment down, especially if their downloading is non-stop and piss off other customers who get mad when the cable co sold them 5MB/down and they never see over 2. if they sold it by bits consumed and were a little more vauge on the throughput and labeled it as "up to X Mbps", they'd have less customers being bent out of shape because they "aren't getting what they paid for".
The cable providers are just upset because they finally have to deal with "competitors" because for so long, they had no competition in the TV arena, and they're not getting the bang for their buck that they hoped for in upgrading their infrastructure due to slow adoption, high rollout costs and competition from the telcos.
Standardizing on English makes sense, as most APIs use english method names.
I have an inherent advantage because I know what GetNextItemFromStack(&stack) or System.Collections.Generic.List(of System.Data.SqlClient) means (generally) just by knowing English even if I have little programming or API knowledge. In the past, everyone had to figure out what sprintf meant, and the playing field was a little more even. I'd be the first to admit I'd be at a hige dissadvantage if the API I worked in had a German style method name like ErhaltenSiefolgendesEinzelteilvomStapel() (thx babel fish). If I was an API developer, I would think it would be incredibly unfruitful to translate my entire API to most common languages, when learning a foreign language is a fruitful experience for the users who want to use my English API. I don't know anyone who has regreted learning another language, even if they were forced to against their will (e.g. for a college general ed requirement).
You could argue it is anglo-centric to insist all programming knowledge be in english, but it is a whole other matter to assert that programmers who speak english have much greater access to the body of knowledge that already exists, and that the APIs already out there will make more sense. I know that because I want to be a good programmer, I'd learn German or Japanese, or whatever if that is what the ad-hoc standard for programming documentation/API definition was.
Biologists standardized on Latin, which aside from mass and opera, is rarely used in conversation. The IOC standardized on English/French. So this isn't too terribly novel of a concept. I can't speak for the difficulty of other character-sets like kanji/katakana but I think English is a good choice because as far as most of the languages who use the Latin-1 character set, english has little/no accent marks on characters, and has relatively shorter words than some of the other Germanic languages.
Why not allow this sort of behaivor? Many (most?) states already suspend alleged DUI offenders driver's license without a trial-by-jury on as little as the officer's suspision. Seems logical DAs would feel he is allowed to order the alleged to jump through hoops (submit to illegal questioning, attend required education programs, involuntary registrations, monitoring and forced denial of other rights like firearm ownership; were the accused has the burden of proof) without due process, because the <sarcasm>allegation is just the red-headed step child of a conviction</sarcasm>
While we're at it, lets make all men over 18 who watch cheerleading contests on ESPN register as sex offenders because they probably will at some point and finding evidence and going to trial is too hard, and this saves money.
If the newspaper wants to be a Not-For-Profit in the vein of Public TV or Public radio, the problem is that printing has a fixed per-issue cost. It is eaiser to broadcast some waves and hope that donors pick up tab on the the fixed cost. I can't see many newspapers able to survive if they charged a per-paper subscription cost because if they could have done that successfully, they wouldn't be in this position. Even if they could swing it, local papers would need to group together to effectively cover their costs and distribute the costs over a larger readership. Those presses/staff are a pretty fixed cost, the paper itself is next to nothing.
I'd conjecture they'd do the online thing which many are considering anyway, which would make it's cost-strucutre a lot more like the Public TV/Radio businesses. The problem would then be then how do you give tax-exempt status to news outlets who aren't doing much more different than bloggers. I would imagine everyone who blogs trying to get their ad-revenue and other income from their blog considered tax-free as a "small, public news outlet." Ideologically, it would blur the "artifical" lines between small local papers and local community websites or local news blogs, which is good. I've read some blogs better than the local paper, and sometimes even less biased. However, it would effectively give who can sign up for wordpress or blogger a huge tax shield they could route all kinds of costs such as their internet connection, as a a donation to the not-for-profit.
If the school had reason to believe that this student was a danger to herself or someone else, they should have called the police. School Administrators are not trained in the legalities of what effectively comes down to an "arrest, search, and seizure" nor do they have some of the legal protections (when the dust settles) that police do. If the student wasn't a danger to herself or someone else enough to call the police, then she wasn't a danger to herself or someone else enough to be strip searched by a school administrator or school security guard. They didn't call the police because 1) They'd be laughed at, and 2) the had no intention of pursuing the matter through the proper legal channels. If they thought she had 10 kilos of columbian snow, they'd acted differently, but they knew it was petty nonsense they didn't want to deal with the proper procedures on to make sure any punishment stuck.
Schools almost never pursue legal action against a student because 9 out of 10 times they'd get smashed by any reasonable lawyer for gross violations of the students rights (e.g. right to representation, rights related to "color of law" arrest issues) and instead discipline students on their own. I can't see how schools are even able to give detentions; restricting the students freedom of movement; without a proper trial where students have the right to representation.
When I was in school, I was repremanded for "pencil fighting." I'd never been spoken to, but most of the other students got warning-after-warning and I got popped on the first time. I was able to argue to the principal that I was not given "equal protection" under the rules and for the teacher to not give me the same disciplinary procedure as other students was illegal, and they I would call the ACLU if they attempted to make me stay in the building longer than Ohio law said I had to attend school.
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The nice feature will be that Free apps will be easier to convert to "paid" apps quickly and easily rather than doing "work" in the free version, and then chosing to upgrade and not being able to transfer that data in the free version to the paid (more robust) version because the apps are so isolated from one another.
This could work very well for "service" type applications such as 411 or language translations. For instance, if you translated a block of text it would be very easy to have a "submit to professional translator for $cost."
This is a "good" peice of technology, but does open the door for very bad implementations. However, I'm a realist and know that I'm not going to convince anyone who asserts that all software should be free-as-in-beer at all times, that this is a natrual extension to the methods already in place in the app-store.
The key is integration. They stand to make money if developers/companies use their web services in their custom applications/solutions. It makes it more possible to integrate Amazon services into existing systems, and makes them more difficut to "cut-out" of those systems later. For the Kindle (and iPod), the cost is subsidized by content sales, exactly how game console, cellular providers, and drug dealers work. The money is on the comeback in the form of content (music, books, games) or the service.
Disneyworld tickets are $99 so they don't really care what you bring into the park in the form of food. Movie tickets are $9, which doesn't cover their cost, so they need to make their money off refreshments which is why they prohibit food.
Their ideology is profitability. If openness leads to profitability in one enterprise they'll jump on it. If in another it doesn't, they'll resist it. Most businesses don't go closed/open on philosophy, they do so on profitability.
The problem is time and adoption. Flash (as much as I hate it) is available now. Hulu is growing at the rate that needs to run on technology available, not invest in under-developed OSS alternatives that could take a long time to reach a critical mass of adoption. There edge is that they are faster and more available than bit-torrent and a bit easier to use. If you add esoteric plugins to the mix you're going to adjitate the users, and you're going to rely on whatever viewer the client happens to use to process/view the video (VLC, WMP, QT, etc...) which introduces another issue in configurability for the masses. Unfortunately, Flash is the path of least-resistance that works for the vast majority of their customers (even though it runs poorly on non-Windows platforms.)
They are not a technology company... and operate more like a cable/satellite provider that just so happens to use HTTP and a browser to show the lineup rather than a set-top box/media center on game console (though that may change), and probably will.
I think the difference is that this disorder speaks to an individual who remains bitter after a particular "traumatic" (at least to them) incident they can't get over, where there is a known cause, that can be treated, versus a generally bitter disposition.
This is a case where the diagnosis could lead a psychiatrist to apply methods to help the person cope with the traumatic event versus treating bitterness as an inherent personality trait. If an event alters the baseline, rather than just having a high-bitter baseline, there is a lot more that can be done to the stimulus or event causing it. There are people with a non-bitter disposition that would return to a non-bitter disposition should they be able to overcome/work-through/whatever that particular incident.
I don't think Nevada has a lot to worry about in the realm of online gaming. Brick-and-mortar casinos offer a lot that online gaming can never provide. Casino gambling may be the cornerstone of the Nevada economy, but it has diversified to the point that other gaming enterprises do not appear to directly compete, in the form of fine dining, entertainment, and all that Vegas has to offer.
For instance, if you've ever driven North on I-15 on a friday afternoon out of California, people go to Vegas in droves despite that California has easily accessible Indian gaming with all of the same games/slots (except for Sports betting) that Vegas casinos do.
The Internet might take a small portion of the market for gaming, but the lion's share save up their "gambling budget" and take a trip to Vegas or a local casino/resort for the experience of all the non-gaming activities and gamble in an environment that makes it fun even when you're losing.
Now, if the internet could comp you free beers in the comfort of your home, Mr. Reid can start to worry.
I think the problem was that to the average consumer they were pretty obscure, had no retail presense, or brand-recognition, or brand-loyalty. For the informed, I'm sure a lot were fearful that if Apple won, the company would fold and support would disappear or an Apple update would cause system instability or worse. In addition, there are true apple "fans" that appreciate the products/service/support/buying experience. For the well informed, it isn't "overly" hard to build a Hackintosh if you're capable of following directions and have some initative, and can be done on hardware many have lying around. I think the first group and loyalists are by-and-large the vast majority... except maybe on /.
It seems like they might have been better off using writers for a show like 24 or CSI where they have to be at-least realistic enough to seem "plausible" to the audience. On one of the comentaries for 24, they get their ideas from real life, but make things like repositioning satellites or breaking crypto go much quicker than it can in real life. They'd be better off getting those writers with engineers to say "what would it take to sdo x,y,z like we did in Season 4, Episode 2" to set more realistic short-term goals.
Sci-Fi doesn't have to overcome the "realism barrier", and being so advanced that it is at present seemingly impossible (warp travel, light sabers, etc.) is part of the appeal. The problem is that it will take so long to "get there" (think computers in 50's-60's SciFi), that technology could go in a completely different direction.
However, we're getting to the point with special effects we no longer have to do sci-fi in a way that is "easy" to produce (e.g. a computer with a futuristic GUI like Minority report is producable on screen where in the past computers always talked because it was physically easier to do). The good thing is that since Sci-Fi can produce almost anything on screen or print that it can think up, it will follow more linearly with reality rather than being as limited as to what can be generated.
The TI-89/92 and I'm sure lower had the ability to run ASM programs. We played games on them all the time and the teacher encouraged it because in AP Calc, if you could pass without paying attention, and therefore more power to you, and if you failed because you were playing games, it was no sweat off the teacher's back. Not only that it got us more familar with the devices and taught us to use them more effectively rather than as $150 paperweights.
These devices also had ports for communication, and if there was a market, I'm sure could have had an IR dongle created.
If Palm made an Education model without the IR sensor and hard-flashed particular apps based on what the device was "for" (e.g. a touch calculator, a reading tool, a serial device controller) on low-end hardware for a low-end price, they could have sold millions of them for "specific applications." On the other hand they could have left them open, sold them for $50-60 bucks and given each student one and allowed teachers (if they wished) to integrate them into cirriculum.
There are so many uses for technology in education and the two limiting factors are technologically inept teachers with no desire to learn (Disclaimer: Wife and I both work in Ed, and trust me, there are many of these) and the high per-pupil cost. If they made these things cheap and easy and had buy in from administration they could have done amazing things with these years before OLPC was an option.
You are exactly right. As Palm saw the tides turning, they should have said "We're going to be a great organizer at a great price that just so happens to run all sorts of applications" where PocketPC was "we're just a little tiny computer that can't do a lot of the things the big one can." If they'd stuck to monochrome on lower-end hardware rather than trying to keep up with PocketPC they could have sold millions of those things to people who thought they'd be a great tool, but not worth the price point versus a paper organizer, and been best-of-class.
That being said, they should have also kept the OS general enough and licensed it and you'd have seen the PalmOS in all kinds of embedded applications as linux hadn't developed enough to be as good of embedded OS as it is now.
I'd consider calling a browser without addins "unusable" a little over dramatic.
I'd conjecture most users don't even know about addins, and quite a few in addition would consider them as glue-and-bandaids over a browser shortcoming; not that as an inherently virtuous platform "feature."
Most people will choose Chrome for performance and the Google name that they trust, if they change their browser at all.
Is egonomics the study of what Steve Job's thinks will make money?
My problem isn't when people don't know how to fix the tool, but when people don't know how (or have no desire) to know how to properly use a tool.
When I was in shop class before I was allowed to touch a tool I had to be able to first, explain what the tool was for and how to use it safely (after being taught); then I had to demonstrate (with the instructor) how to use it, and then I was cut loose. I can't stand it when workplaces hire people whose job requires them to use a tool and they aren't firstly given training on the tool (in this case, a computer), but then after a suitable amount of fumbling aren't held accountable for refusing to learn to use (worst) it or being incapable of using it (bad). Computer competency is a necessity in almost all workplaces and when I see an applicant who has taken no initiative to learn minimal computer skills that I know are going to cause them to generate excessive support incidents or cause them to work inefficiently, I always suggest against hiring them, regardless of any other of their qualifications, noting that computer ability is always on the list of qualifications for hire, because of they don't meet the standards and have demonstrated they have no desire for professional development in an important facet of their job.
People willing to learn can be taught, those lazy and naturally bright will hit a wall in time.
I was refering to the reality that many states are considering lowering it to .04, and in California, it is .04 for anyone driving with a class B (CDL) license even if they are in their personal car in a non-commercial situation.
However, to address your point, on the surface it makes sense, but how did they come to that number? Is it plausible that poor driving and drink and driving are coorelational regardless of BAC? Is it possible the DOT is not the most unbiased source of information? Annecdotally, I've known people who are hardcore drinkers and can down 6-7 beers and still pass a field sobriety test, their BAC has to be higher. Some people, due to genetic factors feel the effects at lower-or-higher concentrations.
All that being said, I'm not pro-drunk driving, I'm speaking to the eventuallity that states in order to appear "tough" on DUIs and to raise more money in fines they're going to (I gaurantee) lower the limit into a range where impairment is less likley, particularly in seasoned drinkers.
The problem in a lot of states is that .01 can make a huge difference between a DUI, a DUI with a "high BAC kicker", a wet-reckless, or nothing at all. It has to be accurate to at least a few 9's or for those "on the bubble" cases do have a severe level of doubt. Because driving with a .07 is not illegal (for the most part), but .08 is. The question in court is not "were you drinking tonight", but "how much did you drink" which is a very specific very objective, very deturminable piece of information.
.01 or more margin of error, you're going to get a lot of overzealous cops in cities with revenue shortfalls taking innocent people in for DUIs and hopefully more and more of these "border cases" will bring these devices into question more than the over-the-top blacking out, pissing his pants multiple-offender does in court.
As states lower their legal limits to the point where they intersect with non-impaired drinking drivers, especially with a
I worked for the California Community College system. A lot of these schools are running on old exchange installations on aging hardware with tiny quotas, that tend to have poor uptimes. (My school was 60MB for faculty due to Exchange 5.5's 16GB information store limit). Many professors within the college simply told their students to mail them at prof_name.(college_initals)@gmail.com because of higher quotas for massive amounts of students sending poorly optimized attachments as part of their assignment, that was web/client accessible in a better interface than 5.5 had, and had much better uptime. As an institution we advised them to use their college-provided account so IT could view the logs and say "yes or no" this student did/did not attempt to submit their paper ontime.
If anything, this helps students and faculty make sure they are communicating with the right "John Smith, Professor" out there.
Every single student whom crosses the door of SRJC is making a statement that "I feel qualified to be a college-level student." Part of being a student is understanding the tools you use to get the job done. Not taking minimal effort to verify an e-mail address for validity, particularly given most students are forced to use an Online Courseware system that is at something.mycollege.edu, so they know that "this address does not match this address", is no excuse for acting foolishly.
One of the biggest merits of going to any college is that after 18 years of hand-holding in the home and public education spheres, the college is not going to baby sit you, beg you to pay your fees on time, order you to attend lecture (though sadly some professors attempt to to artifically give merit to their poor instruction in the form of attendance-grades), or anything else for that matter. You are there because you want to learn, and almost no career has zero computer interaction, so you should learn to use the computer, just like you learned to read even though you didn't plan on being grammar or literature teacher. I am shocked and disappointed how many people flatly refuse to properly learn to use a tool that can make their job easier. I've never met anyone who "regretted" spending the necessary time to use a computer effectively.
I don't think that is exactly what they are thinking, but they could help MySQL become more Oracle compatible (e.g. support some of the same views, SQL datatypes, etc...). Secondly, there are a lot of mid-sized shops (I've been at several) who are total Microsoft shops, because it plays nice with Active Directory, is cheaper than Oracle and is reasonably manufacturer supported. However, if you have MySQL with major-vendor backing/support available at little-no cost, it might get more middle-managers willing to use it for more and more applications; which is what many developers/technicians are asking them to do, because they embrace OSS, often use it in their personal/side-gig work, and to save money to sure up the budget.
There is a lot of business out there that if you called it Oracle MySQL instead of MySQL, with not so much as one line changed, would be more apt to use it.
Isn't this the merit of OSS, in that someone who needs Firefox to run on older Windows clients can maintain a branch that implements 1.9.1? I'd need to know "why" Gecko 1.9.2 doesn't run on older versions of Windows to make a value judgement as to weather or not this is a bad idea.
Particularly when it comes to security, too much backward compatibility can be a really bad idea, and it is partially MS-fault that everyone expects all general-purpose consumer Windows software to run on older depreciated platforms adding code complexity, inefficiency and a greater risk for security issues.
Apple users have dealt with (for a long time) that certain updated software might require a newer OS release than they have and the vendor left it up to them to make the call if upgrading the OS+software or sticking with what they have is the right call.
State Government is generally very-decentralized when it comes to IT. Most departemnts/divisions have their own IT department (e.g. servers/workstations for the DMV are maintained by IT employees of the DMV, not the State Office of Information Technology). Only state-wide inter-departamental systems (infrastructure, business services like gl/payroll/hr/ap/ar..., maybe e-mail, maybe authentication like LDAP/AD) are generally handled by a centralized department.
If Central IT says no Vista, there isn't much stoping the DMV from doing it and spending state money.
The legistlature by passing a law, can enforce this standard globally (probably with the blessing of the state CIO/Sr. management of Central IT and other large IT groups in the departments) where others (CIO, Governor) can't in many circumstances.
I've worked in some IBM shops that used both MySQL and DB2. In my experience new development is on MySQL (as in a LAMP solution) or MSSQL/.NET on PC servers, and old development (such as Financial Accounting (GL), Payroll, other business services) has been in DB2 on iSeries (AS/400) or with some kind of of syncronization between the two. DB2 seems to be inexorably tied to legacy systems and is on the way out as more and more mainframe developers retire. Folks aren't going to drop DB2 in an artifical way to save money by using MySQL, but replace DB2 as systems are converted to the newer "platform". I think the Sun aquisition bridges the gaps in their strategy (java on MVS as more and more students are learning Java (OO for that matter) over COBOL) extending the life of their mainframe markets and giving them a stronger position in the PC server farm world that seems to be what the next cycle will be.
Why don't they just charge by transfer plus a nominal "infrastuture and support charge" that everyone pays to keep the skeleton staff and core equipment "funded." Let the heavy users pay for their usage and let mom and pop pay for their level of usage. I think it would help the broadboard providers charge competitive costs with the last dial-up holdouts. For most folks, their bill would probably go down.
The major problem is that they've sold it as an all-you-can-eat plan by bits/second not bits/month and now they want to change the rules. Also, the problem is that since cable is a shared connection, one heavy user can drag a segment down, especially if their downloading is non-stop and piss off other customers who get mad when the cable co sold them 5MB/down and they never see over 2. if they sold it by bits consumed and were a little more vauge on the throughput and labeled it as "up to X Mbps", they'd have less customers being bent out of shape because they "aren't getting what they paid for".
The cable providers are just upset because they finally have to deal with "competitors" because for so long, they had no competition in the TV arena, and they're not getting the bang for their buck that they hoped for in upgrading their infrastructure due to slow adoption, high rollout costs and competition from the telcos.
Standardizing on English makes sense, as most APIs use english method names.
I have an inherent advantage because I know what GetNextItemFromStack(&stack) or System.Collections.Generic.List(of System.Data.SqlClient) means (generally) just by knowing English even if I have little programming or API knowledge. In the past, everyone had to figure out what sprintf meant, and the playing field was a little more even. I'd be the first to admit I'd be at a hige dissadvantage if the API I worked in had a German style method name like ErhaltenSiefolgendesEinzelteilvomStapel() (thx babel fish). If I was an API developer, I would think it would be incredibly unfruitful to translate my entire API to most common languages, when learning a foreign language is a fruitful experience for the users who want to use my English API. I don't know anyone who has regreted learning another language, even if they were forced to against their will (e.g. for a college general ed requirement).
You could argue it is anglo-centric to insist all programming knowledge be in english, but it is a whole other matter to assert that programmers who speak english have much greater access to the body of knowledge that already exists, and that the APIs already out there will make more sense. I know that because I want to be a good programmer, I'd learn German or Japanese, or whatever if that is what the ad-hoc standard for programming documentation/API definition was.
Biologists standardized on Latin, which aside from mass and opera, is rarely used in conversation. The IOC standardized on English/French. So this isn't too terribly novel of a concept. I can't speak for the difficulty of other character-sets like kanji/katakana but I think English is a good choice because as far as most of the languages who use the Latin-1 character set, english has little/no accent marks on characters, and has relatively shorter words than some of the other Germanic languages.
So... would this make masturbation=rape?
Why not allow this sort of behaivor? Many (most?) states already suspend alleged DUI offenders driver's license without a trial-by-jury on as little as the officer's suspision. Seems logical DAs would feel he is allowed to order the alleged to jump through hoops (submit to illegal questioning, attend required education programs, involuntary registrations, monitoring and forced denial of other rights like firearm ownership; were the accused has the burden of proof) without due process, because the <sarcasm>allegation is just the red-headed step child of a conviction</sarcasm>
While we're at it, lets make all men over 18 who watch cheerleading contests on ESPN register as sex offenders because they probably will at some point and finding evidence and going to trial is too hard, and this saves money.
If the newspaper wants to be a Not-For-Profit in the vein of Public TV or Public radio, the problem is that printing has a fixed per-issue cost. It is eaiser to broadcast some waves and hope that donors pick up tab on the the fixed cost. I can't see many newspapers able to survive if they charged a per-paper subscription cost because if they could have done that successfully, they wouldn't be in this position. Even if they could swing it, local papers would need to group together to effectively cover their costs and distribute the costs over a larger readership. Those presses/staff are a pretty fixed cost, the paper itself is next to nothing.
I'd conjecture they'd do the online thing which many are considering anyway, which would make it's cost-strucutre a lot more like the Public TV/Radio businesses. The problem would then be then how do you give tax-exempt status to news outlets who aren't doing much more different than bloggers. I would imagine everyone who blogs trying to get their ad-revenue and other income from their blog considered tax-free as a "small, public news outlet." Ideologically, it would blur the "artifical" lines between small local papers and local community websites or local news blogs, which is good. I've read some blogs better than the local paper, and sometimes even less biased. However, it would effectively give who can sign up for wordpress or blogger a huge tax shield they could route all kinds of costs such as their internet connection, as a a donation to the not-for-profit.
If the school had reason to believe that this student was a danger to herself or someone else, they should have called the police. School Administrators are not trained in the legalities of what effectively comes down to an "arrest, search, and seizure" nor do they have some of the legal protections (when the dust settles) that police do. If the student wasn't a danger to herself or someone else enough to call the police, then she wasn't a danger to herself or someone else enough to be strip searched by a school administrator or school security guard. They didn't call the police because 1) They'd be laughed at, and 2) the had no intention of pursuing the matter through the proper legal channels. If they thought she had 10 kilos of columbian snow, they'd acted differently, but they knew it was petty nonsense they didn't want to deal with the proper procedures on to make sure any punishment stuck.
Schools almost never pursue legal action against a student because 9 out of 10 times they'd get smashed by any reasonable lawyer for gross violations of the students rights (e.g. right to representation, rights related to "color of law" arrest issues) and instead discipline students on their own. I can't see how schools are even able to give detentions; restricting the students freedom of movement; without a proper trial where students have the right to representation.
When I was in school, I was repremanded for "pencil fighting." I'd never been spoken to, but most of the other students got warning-after-warning and I got popped on the first time. I was able to argue to the principal that I was not given "equal protection" under the rules and for the teacher to not give me the same disciplinary procedure as other students was illegal, and they I would call the ACLU if they attempted to make me stay in the building longer than Ohio law said I had to attend school.