The same thing's happening in the UK. I keep seeing these adverts for companies such as Computeach which suggest that people can get better salaries by taking one of their courses in IT. In reality, there are no entry-level (and very few mid/high level) jobs in our field, and salaries are incredibly low as a result.
One of my flatmates finished a Computer Studies degree last year and is still unemployed. He's not the only one - apparently only 2 of his fellow students have managed to get jobs in IT, and this situation is not uncommon. Mind you, given that they would have started their degrees at the peak of the dot com boom, I wonder how many of these people are proper geeks who love and are good at coding, and how many of them just went into it for the money.
No, I'm talking about Sony making a proper affordable computer (in a desktop/mini tower case and sold with a monitor) for everyday users that uses the guts of a PS2 (faster processor might be a good idea though).
Sonys PS2 Linux offering is for a very niche market.
I want to see a home computer based on PS2 hardware, running Linux and marketed at the mainstream.
I'd love to see a return to the glory days of the 16 bit home computers (Amiga/Atari ST)! It could also come with a basic development kit (but not some crippled Net Yaroze) for "bedroom coders".
We sure are, only some of us (Americans) are better at killing other people than others (Brits and all socialist Europeans in general). Face it schmucks, American aggression and blood lust backed by real crazy politicians and yes, increasing infringements on freedom, have no equal on this planet.
"The dollar fell broadly on Tuesday to a new record low against the euro and to multiyear lows against other currencies while stabilizing against the yen, aided by suspected yen-selling intervention.
The dollar plummeted to a fresh 11-year low against the British pound and fell to its lowest level in nearly eight years against a basket of currencies under the weight of persistent concerns about the U.S. current account deficit and expectations of continued low U.S. interest rates."
"Just as Microsoft Office has the tools you need to create an outline, a budget or a presentation, iLife offers all of the tools you need for your work outside the office."
"A search for Window Managers on fresh meat brings over 400! yes, 400 window managers."
Ahh, but they're definitely not all window managers, they're just projects where the author has added them to the window manager category because it's (sometimes vaguely) related in someway and some people think that the more categories they list their project in the more hits they'll get.
"What is wrong with the standard K window manager on KDE? What is wrong with the Standard Sawfish Window manager with Gnome! This is the problem. The X11 designers should of FORCED an intergrated Window manager, like Windows and Mac OS did."
Open source is all about choice. Question: What would happen if (somehow) there was only one open source window manger for Linux? Answer: Everyone would fork it and change it to meet their requirements, and we would end up with a myriad of different wms, just as we have now.
People are different, and their working environments should be too. What next? - should we all use the same office suite so that the "average user" (whatever that means) doesn't get confused when he switches between them.
I thought it was cool how no-one really knows what the F stood for anymore, and to make it stand for "Feline" just because some of the developers have cats? That's just daft.
If you can't get hold of whoever came up with the original name to ask them what it was you shouldn't make it up in their absence. They created and named the project and you should respect that.
By the way, FVWM's a good and very configurable wm. However, as a result of being so configurable it's codebase has to support loads of options and is big as a result. Personally I prefer the smaller window managers such as aewm and it's derivatives.
"And it isn't communism at all, not in the Leninist sense, not in the Stalinist sense, not in the Maoist"
Surely eveyone knows that neither the Soviet system as implemented by Lenin and then distorted by Stalin, or Maoism was proper communism.
"i If you are serious, you're just a blathering idiot."
How is it that the US encourages secularism in the middle-east whilst encouraging Christian fundamentalism at home? Does anyone else think this is a little... umm... odd?
Hey - I didn't say that I personally called it "communism that works". I would guess the phrase is suppossed to suggest thart the Social Democratic system as practised in Scandinavia is as close to the redistributative ideals of communism as can be achieved without the problems that the Soviet model sufferred.
But of course I can tell you're an expert in communism - you've heard of both Lenin *and* Stalin!
Well Per, if you can talk about Sweden in the 70s perhaps you can also remember the state of the nation at the turn of the century, and it's not just Sweden - all of Scandinavia reversed its fortunes from being a northern backwater to being wealthy over the last 100 years.
Sweden has some problems that are not shared by the rest oif the nordics but we should not dwell on them...
Is there anything wrong in pointing out the similarities between the different religious fundamentalists? - the muslims believe in Jesus too you know. The dilema of our age is to fight these backward beliefs - I think that most of us on this typically intelligent forum would agree that human progress comes from those who build upon the knowledge of others rather than the primitives who wrote the Bible or the other religious texts. But you probably got taught creationism at school, and evolution is just a competing theory? Or did I get something wrong?
"You realize that the dollar can be converted to Euros"
Good point. It's a shame that the dollar is worth less and less every day. I put this down to the lack of confidence in the current US administration, and the readjusting of the global economy - why is a highly qualified Indian programmer worh less than a medioce US one?
Good point, well made. The American dollar is like the Gold standard, and it is because of this unique status that the US economy has been able to get away with the huge amount of debt (etc) it currently owes. If (when?) OPEC switches to the Euro the US will be fucked but this will upset the global economy so much that it's not in anyone's interest for it to happen overnight)
From the BBC article: "It was thought that US airborne troops would seize the oil installations in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait "
The fact is that as the only superpower, America is the dominant country and is making the same mistakes that us Europeans made when we were in control. Unfortunately, whereas the last 500 years saw defeat on the batlefield as being the ultimate cost, we now see weapons of mass distruction. Look at the Europeans attempts to solve terrorism in Northern Ireland, the Basques or Schleswig-Holstein, and then see how unhelpful voilent "solutions" have been.
We know (sadly all too well) that you cannot fight terrorism with a gun - killing people only creates a new generation of terrorists - you can fight a country but you cannot fight ideas. I might suggest that the money that the US gives to Israel would be better spent on sending the Arab worlds brightest students to good American universities so thay can learn science over religion and take their ideas back with them.
I have a Win2k box at my folks place which has Firebird and Thunderbird set up, and while I was staying with them over Christmas my Dad was telling me how stupid the name was. He's an academic with a linguistics background but completely computer illiterate (for example he double clicks everything). The (in his opinion) silly name gave him less confidence in the software.
I think the name's daft too but found myself defending it to my Dad. It's probably a silly corporate thing...
First of all, thanks for your offtopic "high-handed, idealistic drivel". You are clearly a well meaning person even if I fundamentally disagree with some of your points.
"A little closer to home, in Europe, the American people supported Clinton's intervention in the Serbian anschluss"
You're right, Clinton was a good man, and it's a shame that his reputation has been tarnished because of some extra-marital affair when Bush junior goes to war on a fake pretext of Iraqs complicity in 9/11 and WMD.
"Even though France, Russia and Germany opposed the American invasion to protect the debt with which they propped up Hussein"
I think you're being a little unfair - the fact is that many countries made money out of Husseins govenment, the US included (in fact they led the way). We (the EU) are just incredibly wary of the current US administration. I hope that you, like all right thinking Europeans would like to see the end of the Bush dynasty, and unlike me you'll have a choice in 2004.
"Like typical Americans, we'll help other people when they need it. We don't sit around with our noses in the air ignoring world problems."
Umm, Israel. The US gives this pariah state billions every year to spend on arms (while the Palestinians throw stones), invades Iraq because they had something to do with 9/11 <sarcasm/>, but ignores Zimbabwe because there's no oil there. Jees.
"Americans, they had become the most compassionate, generous nation on Earth"
I'm not trolling but come on - do you really believe that? Off hand I know that the Scandinavian countries donate much more as a percentage of their GDP than the US does.
"Eurasian in their fascist warmongering"
I don't know where to start with this. The EU was built to prevent war and we believe in the UN far more than the US does (evidently).
I do not believe in "my country, right or wrong", and I would hope that most slashdotters do not either, irrespective of their nationality - there's good and bad in every country.
Your sentiment is absolutely correct, but bear in mind that stereotypes exist for a reason, and generally there is more than a little truth to them. That said your statements are slightly off, I wouldn't say that the Germans are less friendly, but perhaps more serious, and I would argue about the French - generally I find them charmingly ideosyncratic and original. The French and the Brits built Concorde remember.
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The same thing's happening in the UK. I keep seeing these adverts for companies such as Computeach which suggest that people can get better salaries by taking one of their courses in IT. In reality, there are no entry-level (and very few mid/high level) jobs in our field, and salaries are incredibly low as a result.
One of my flatmates finished a Computer Studies degree last year and is still unemployed. He's not the only one - apparently only 2 of his fellow students have managed to get jobs in IT, and this situation is not uncommon. Mind you, given that they would have started their degrees at the peak of the dot com boom, I wonder how many of these people are proper geeks who love and are good at coding, and how many of them just went into it for the money.
No, I'm talking about Sony making a proper affordable computer (in a desktop/mini tower case and sold with a monitor) for everyday users that uses the guts of a PS2 (faster processor might be a good idea though).
Sonys PS2 Linux offering is for a very niche market.
I want to see a home computer based on PS2 hardware, running Linux and marketed at the mainstream.
I'd love to see a return to the glory days of the 16 bit home computers (Amiga/Atari ST)! It could also come with a basic development kit (but not some crippled Net Yaroze) for "bedroom coders".
We sure are, only some of us (Americans) are better at killing other people than others (Brits and all socialist Europeans in general). Face it schmucks, American aggression and blood lust backed by real crazy politicians and yes, increasing infringements on freedom, have no equal on this planet.
"Keep your crappy beaver pelts, shells, pine cones, or whatever the fuck you use for currency."
Oh that's rich. How much less is the dollar worth today?
from here:
"The dollar fell broadly on Tuesday to a new record low against the euro and to multiyear lows against other currencies while stabilizing against the yen, aided by suspected yen-selling intervention.
The dollar plummeted to a fresh 11-year low against the British pound and fell to its lowest level in nearly eight years against a basket of currencies under the weight of persistent concerns about the U.S. current account deficit and expectations of continued low U.S. interest rates."
from: http://www.apple.com/ilife/
"Just as Microsoft Office has the tools you need to create an outline, a budget or a presentation, iLife offers all of the tools you need for your work outside the office."
Excuse me while I puke.
"The technology is still pretty new"
I don't know how it's different but we've had Eureka 147 DAB digital radio for 6 years in the UK. We're also pretty keen on mainstream digital terrestrial television broadcasting too.
"A search for Window Managers on fresh meat brings over 400! yes, 400 window managers."
Ahh, but they're definitely not all window managers, they're just projects where the author has added them to the window manager category because it's (sometimes vaguely) related in someway and some people think that the more categories they list their project in the more hits they'll get.
"What is wrong with the standard K window manager on KDE? What is wrong with the Standard Sawfish Window manager with Gnome! This is the problem. The X11 designers should of FORCED an intergrated Window manager, like Windows and Mac OS did."
Open source is all about choice. Question: What would happen if (somehow) there was only one open source window manger for Linux? Answer: Everyone would fork it and change it to meet their requirements, and we would end up with a myriad of different wms, just as we have now.
People are different, and their working environments should be too. What next? - should we all use the same office suite so that the "average user" (whatever that means) doesn't get confused when he switches between them.
I thought it was cool how no-one really knows what the F stood for anymore, and to make it stand for "Feline" just because some of the developers have cats? That's just daft.
If you can't get hold of whoever came up with the original name to ask them what it was you shouldn't make it up in their absence. They created and named the project and you should respect that.
By the way, FVWM's a good and very configurable wm. However, as a result of being so configurable it's codebase has to support loads of options and is big as a result. Personally I prefer the smaller window managers such as aewm and it's derivatives.
"And it isn't communism at all, not in the Leninist sense, not in the Stalinist sense, not in the Maoist"
Surely eveyone knows that neither the Soviet system as implemented by Lenin and then distorted by Stalin, or Maoism was proper communism.
"i If you are serious, you're just a blathering idiot."
How is it that the US encourages secularism in the middle-east whilst encouraging Christian fundamentalism at home? Does anyone else think this is a little... umm... odd?
Hey - I didn't say that I personally called it "communism that works". I would guess the phrase is suppossed to suggest thart the Social Democratic system as practised in Scandinavia is as close to the redistributative ideals of communism as can be achieved without the problems that the Soviet model sufferred.
But of course I can tell you're an expert in communism - you've heard of both Lenin *and* Stalin!
Well Per, if you can talk about Sweden in the 70s perhaps you can also remember the state of the nation at the turn of the century, and it's not just Sweden - all of Scandinavia reversed its fortunes from being a northern backwater to being wealthy over the last 100 years.
Sweden has some problems that are not shared by the rest oif the nordics but we should not dwell on them...
Is there anything wrong in pointing out the similarities between the different religious fundamentalists? - the muslims believe in Jesus too you know. The dilema of our age is to fight these backward beliefs - I think that most of us on this typically intelligent forum would agree that human progress comes from those who build upon the knowledge of others rather than the primitives who wrote the Bible or the other religious texts. But you probably got taught creationism at school, and evolution is just a competing theory? Or did I get something wrong?
"Communism as an idea is pretty stale today"
Try telling that to the Scandinavians - it's been called "communism that works", and guess what - they have a higher standard of living than you!
"Islamic totalitarianism"
Interesting. I guess that would be totally unlike the christian totalitarianism you espouse at home.
Anyway, hope you've had a good new year...
"You realize that the dollar can be converted to Euros"
Good point. It's a shame that the dollar is worth less and less every day. I put this down to the lack of confidence in the current US administration, and the readjusting of the global economy - why is a highly qualified Indian programmer worh less than a medioce US one?
Good point, well made. The American dollar is like the Gold standard, and it is because of this unique status that the US economy has been able to get away with the huge amount of debt (etc) it currently owes. If (when?) OPEC switches to the Euro the US will be fucked but this will upset the global economy so much that it's not in anyone's interest for it to happen overnight)
"States aren't moral actors,"
Mine is. What country do you come from? Practice what you preach anyone?
So what else do they write about in "Crusade" about the "Army War College"?
Could you give me advice about Saladin and the Saracens? Perhaps we should invade Iran... Jees.
Like crashing planes into buildings?
From the BBC article:
"It was thought that US airborne troops would seize the oil installations in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait "
The fact is that as the only superpower, America is the dominant country and is making the same mistakes that us Europeans made when we were in control. Unfortunately, whereas the last 500 years saw defeat on the batlefield as being the ultimate cost, we now see weapons of mass distruction. Look at the Europeans attempts to solve terrorism in Northern Ireland, the Basques or Schleswig-Holstein, and then see how unhelpful voilent "solutions" have been.
We know (sadly all too well) that you cannot fight terrorism with a gun - killing people only creates a new generation of terrorists - you can fight a country but you cannot fight ideas. I might suggest that the money that the US gives to Israel would be better spent on sending the Arab worlds brightest students to good American universities so thay can learn science over religion and take their ideas back with them.
I have a Win2k box at my folks place which has Firebird and Thunderbird set up, and while I was staying with them over Christmas my Dad was telling me how stupid the name was. He's an academic with a linguistics background but completely computer illiterate (for example he double clicks everything). The (in his opinion) silly name gave him less confidence in the software.
I think the name's daft too but found myself defending it to my Dad. It's probably a silly corporate thing...
First of all, thanks for your offtopic "high-handed, idealistic drivel". You are clearly a well meaning person even if I fundamentally disagree with some of your points.
"A little closer to home, in Europe, the American people supported Clinton's intervention in the Serbian anschluss"
You're right, Clinton was a good man, and it's a shame that his reputation has been tarnished because of some extra-marital affair when Bush junior goes to war on a fake pretext of Iraqs complicity in 9/11 and WMD.
"Even though France, Russia and Germany opposed the American invasion to protect the debt with which they propped up Hussein"
I think you're being a little unfair - the fact is that many countries made money out of Husseins govenment, the US included (in fact they led the way). We (the EU) are just incredibly wary of the current US administration. I hope that you, like all right thinking Europeans would like to see the end of the Bush dynasty, and unlike me you'll have a choice in 2004.
Merry Xmas!
"Like typical Americans, we'll help other people when they need it. We don't sit around with our noses in the air ignoring world problems."
Umm, Israel. The US gives this pariah state billions every year to spend on arms (while the Palestinians throw stones), invades Iraq because they had something to do with 9/11 <sarcasm/>, but ignores Zimbabwe because there's no oil there. Jees.
"Americans, they had become the most compassionate, generous nation on Earth"
I'm not trolling but come on - do you really believe that? Off hand I know that the Scandinavian countries donate much more as a percentage of their GDP than the US does.
"Eurasian in their fascist warmongering"
I don't know where to start with this. The EU was built to prevent war and we believe in the UN far more than the US does (evidently).
I do not believe in "my country, right or wrong", and I would hope that most slashdotters do not either, irrespective of their nationality - there's good and bad in every country.
Your sentiment is absolutely correct, but bear in mind that stereotypes exist for a reason, and generally there is more than a little truth to them. That said your statements are slightly off, I wouldn't say that the Germans are less friendly, but perhaps more serious, and I would argue about the French - generally I find them charmingly ideosyncratic and original. The French and the Brits built Concorde remember.