I'm not sure a central repository is all that necessary. It's relatively easy to find five variations on whatever I want to cook, from which I can place a pretty educated guess as to which recipe I would rather use. (Based on ingredients, obvious "convenience substitutions", etc.) It's really a fascinating practice: looking at five different recipes, seeing their similarities and differences, learning the central core theme to the composition, and seeing where different cooks have developed their own riffs.
(I guess I'm saying that if you want a large collection of standard recipes, go buy your requisite copy of the Joy of Cooking. Otherwise, embrace heterogeneity.)
I really haven't explained why a central Google/Open/Wiki cookbook would work against this. I just think that once people saw a recipe had been submitted, they would be less inclined to upload their slightly different version. Maybe such a global project would benefit by somehow encouraging the submission of many varieties, including a "moderation system" by which culinary enthusiasts might edit the variations-on-a-theme and even write editorials on how and why the variations exist, which provide useful time-saving substitutions, when a certain ingredient of method is really necessary to make the "Real McCoy", etc.
Another thing worth mentioning: there are already dozens of "cooking sites" that provide this service, most of them are very "open" allowing easy submission and access. I think a big Open Initiative is successful when there AREN'T pre-existing sites providing a service, or when the sites try to restrict access by forcing a paid subscription model. (Like Wikipedia to online Encyclopedias.) The addition of some generic Open cooking site would become "just another cooking site".
A funny side-note. I've benefitted by the LACK of such a central source. I have a website that I've been cultivating for under a year, where I've put creative (written, artistic, photographic, computing, etc.) works. I've done everything possible to cultivate this site so that visitors would come to it. The thing that brings the most visitors to my site? My "Basic Crepe Recipe". For some funny reason nobody else in the world has a higher Google-ranked Basic Crepe Recipe. (Okay, recently I got knocked down to #2.) So this little "afterthought" has become a leading constant influx of visitors.
When I was a kid I was really resentful of people trying to decide my curriculum based on what they thought was useful. I had the ability to dedicate a fantastic amount of concentration and study on whatever interested me, and "later usefulness" had no bearing on this.
If kids get excited about learning Elvish or Klingon, by all means we should embrace their excitement. That will lead to "ins" in their intellectual development we could never guess at.
Today's curriculum seems to be based so much on practicality and very little on imagination. No wonder Generation-Y seems to lack enthusiasm about the world. We're trying to mold them into "practical little cogs" by McDonalds-izing their world.
I'm not worried about Windows Media Player as much as I am drivers and compilers.
Will the 32-bit emulaton Windows-on-Windows stuff also cover device drivers or are like 2% of us going to be able to run this trial version because something like only 2 video cards are supported? I was under the impression moving 64-bit support to drivers was a majority of the workload. (I think I remember that being one of the slow points getting Linux to 64-bit five years ago.)
The other thing I want to know is this: when will there be a good compiler suite to make the first 64-bit applications? Did Micro$oft port their Visual Studio to 64-bit or are we going to have to use Cygwin. (And can cygwin make 64-bit Windows apps yet?)
If Solitare is the only 64-bit app that'll run on this thing, there's suddenly Not Much Point. I remember running Windows NT for Alpha and scratching my head because solitare was about the only app available to me.
Distrust begets distrust. Secrets beget snooping. If someone (Intel) is going to be so damned hypocritical and lavish in Linux's support of it's product lines (especially the nice early Itanium support while Microsoft was getting is OS finished) they had better not complain when someone "hacks" a solution out of the chip.
It's like the who DVD-CSS mess. Linux people just wanted to be able to watch DVD's without runnning Windows. What resulted was a hack that made convertion of DVD's into cheap Divx copies easy and painless.
It feels like dating someone who never trusts you, never earns your trust (or respect) and goes hysterical when you don't behave exactly how they want. Reminds me of an ex-girlfriend, frankly.
It sounds like a brilliant idea. I'm almost surprised I'd never thought of that before. I'm always hearing discussion of which OS to use for "embedded" projects (in that I mean things outside the standard ordinary PC computer.)
Ever since coming out as the basis for the NeXT computer over 15 years ago, the objective-c based NeXTSTEP/OpenSTEP/Cocoa framework has been touted as one of the most amazingly powerful that a person can develop in. In the old NeXT days I remember hearing the [informal] statement that one programmer up to speed with NeXTSTEP could do the work of about 10 normal programmers. I took that with a grain of salt until I started trying to write some simple apps for the first time in OS X's cocoa.
It is so easy and refreshing in ways I couldn't express with worlds! Writing anything in C++ anymore makes me want to pull my hair out. Sadly, it [objective-c & Cocoa] is still rather obscure. But it would be such a wonderful world if we got to see a renaissance? FINALLY the GNUStep project is beginning to approach a level of usability. If embedded applications started to become a reality...
Oh, that's about as silly a pipe dream as hoping Howard Dean becomes President!
Who understands Mandrake's order fulfillment?
on
MandrakeSoft Roundup
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· Score: 2, Informative
I had a very prompt delivery, but it was strange. I got the 9.2 DVD like TWO DAYS after submitting the order, although I didn't specify any fast delivery. The package had been sent from some wacky-named small company a few miles away from me. When I first saw the parcel I was sure it was some goofy sales pitch from new-age transendantal hippy organization. (I forgot the company's name on the return address, but it was really spacey.)
A week after I got my package the Mandrake ordering system notified me that the package had "just been shipped". Obviously they have some interesting way of outsourcing their delivery process. I just happened to be a "lucky one" I guess.
Sidenote: DAMN but it's nice to get a distro on a DVD! With the most recent versions of RedHat I was swapping CD's constantly for installs. It reminded me of the last days of floppy installations. Anyone remember circa 1995 getting softward that came on 10+ floppy disks?
Last miscellaneous comment: I love my Mandrake! It fascinates me that there are comments about 9.2 being buggy. I moved after the RedHat decision and my 9.2 installation on two computers has been the most stable and pain free of the last many many years. I guess you can never know when you are going to get hit with an installation bug.
I am amazed by the Apple keynotes that Steve Jobs give (and Apple streams from their site) twice a year.
There are two things that amaze me: First, that Apple can consistently release cool things that can keep its user base excited. Second, that Jobs can actually make an interesting two hour show out of it.
For those of you who have never seen the magic of a Steve Jobs Keynote, go to the Apple site under the Quicktime section and view the keynote. It's two hours long, but I'm wiling that if you don't find it at least "really cool" to watch, you'll agree it's better than the average dreck we sit down and watch on the telley each night. This keynote is a good example because it takes a large number of moderate announcements (unlike the unveiling of the iMac, the G5, the major OS upgrades, etc.) but STILL makes you excited enough to want to go out and play with these things.
It also gives me an appreciation of how many market segments Apple is entrenching itself in. You can really see the "digital hub" strategy at work, as well as the fact that income revenue is coming from hardware (iPods) music downloads (iTunes) Internet subscription services (dot-Mac) and others. Go check out the keynote for yourself. I think it'll give you a much different perspective in what and where Apple is in this decade.
And thank goodness SOMEONE is working to keep the computer field new and exciting!
You sound like you're in a precarious position: not being from a "rich" family, but not qualifying for any magic "poverty assistance" levels. Like a majority of people, college will be a real financial sacrifice for you and your family.
As people have already mentioned, the following "financial aids" exist: 1. Student Loans 2. "University-provided aid" scholarships, usually need-based 3. Outside scholarships that you have to find yourself
There are two things I haven't seen anybody warn about here yet, so I'll throw in my two cents.
First of all, the colleges I looked at (15 years ago) all claimed that the aid they might give me would be decreased by the same amount as any outside scholarships I might find. Hense, if I came up with a $10K scholarship, the school would decrease their aid package by $10K. I think that was stupid and discouraged anybody to find outside help.
I hope this has changed recently. Of course, if your desired school is NOT offering you any aid, at least you don't stand to get screwed by this behavior.
Second, schools are NOTORIOUS for giving you a "reasonable" financial aid package for your Freshman year and then cutting it to almost nothing your Sophmore year. This bait-and-switch tactic is great for hooking some students and then BLEEDING them and their families dry. Many of my high school friends had to leave their college of choice after the first year because of this. Talk about a dehumanizing experience!
But again, if your school is not offering you any aid up front, the independence you are forced to seek in the beginning (by applying to lots of smaller scholarships/grants) will be a blessing in disguise as you find yourself NOT blindsided by the nasty Sophmore-aid-cut-syndrome.
I agree with the other people who posted saying that there are lots of scholarships out there. You just have to learn how to research and find them. Enlist your high school guidence counselor's help and don't take "no" for an answer. Also don't assume that if you can't find it on a Google search that it doesn't exist. Find a nonprofit org like some already mentioned to find lists of scholarships out there. If you put in a serious continual 3 hours/week into a serious and comprehensive search, you can fund your college education, and that's a hell of a bargain.
I would not be so certain that this is simply an Access migration issue, although it might be.
First the disclaimer: I hate M$. I've moved myself to the Apple platform, I run a Linux server at home, I almost never use my Windows machine.
But I've been in many clients' offices where I was about to save hundreds of man-hours where clerical people did repetitive tasks by writing a quick VBA application. I've also seen specialized applications (in particular, I have intimate exposure to one used in most non-profit organizations) built completely from the Windows COM/ActiveX architecture, and these apps integrate really nicely with Office in a way that OpenOffice would have to have strong COM integration to compete. (It may, I haven't looked recently.)
I felt bad writing these apps because I knew I was helping to entrench these clients in their Windows world, but when they are running on a shoestring budget (and non-profits get KILLER cheap deals with M$ software) if I can help cut an office's labor by 10% or more, I think I'm morally obligated to do so.
One last point: last time I gave OpenOffice a spin on Windows, it seemed to have a cool feature-set, but anything approaching a complex 100+ page document caused application crashes. I haven't seen Office crash since 2000.
For the most part, I'd say it's not a question of "if" but "when". But "when" might not be today.
Actually, there was a really excellent theater skit called Star Wars in 30 minutes. (www.swin30.com) A friend of mine was involved in the group.
Of course, Star Wars was one of the few movies that didn't try to do too much, so it had a more concise structure. Lucas has this annoying need to visit a dozen planets each movie. The desperate need to touch on a zillion small events makes it hard to create any good theatrical moods other than frantic.
This spoiler shows the same problem emerging. It really sounds like two or three movies' worth of material. Maybe it will have to get split into two parts like Kill Bill
This comes as no surprise, but it's certainly not restricted to the government. Corporate security people tend to be idiots as well. I've worked for so many managers who really don't want to know how insecure their security is.
There's this nasty "kill the messenger" syndrome that makes (good) security specialists unpopular in corporations--and probably in the government as well. They are inevitably required to point out things that make other people look bad, and insecure managers are great at getting them fired.
The result is a bunch of Yes Men who don't point out security problems, but let management feel good about itself.
Intelligent growth and application.
on
Does IT Matter?
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· Score: 5, Interesting
I worked a few years in the IT of a "Fortune 50" drug company. I cannot begin to tell you how many hundreds of thousands of dollars were thrown around for silly and stupid reasons, mostly so Pointy Haired Bosses could play "buzzword bingo" in order to sound important and get promotions.
I on the other hand worked in the trenches and off everyone's radar. I set up a Linux server (I could arguably claim to be the beginning of the Linux movement at this place.) and as I learned about a new interesting technology--mostly database and web stuff--I would ponder whether I could build something that would make IT's job easier. Over three major projects I could estimate having saved at least half a million dollars in labor by leveraging "new technology" to improve operations.
Now back to the question: what do we mean when we talk about being "offensive or defensive"? If offensive/proactive means implementing a new technology because the buzzword is hot, piss off and stop wasting money. If it means keeping a few bright people on the cutting edge, investigating whether new technologies can improve overall corporate efficientcy, then by all means YES.
If it means investing zillions of dollars for the eventual Longhorn update and all the new applications that are upgraded to.Net when all the business needs is email and word processing, I still think W2K is sufficient.
Let's see, starting with litigation, finding no case, expending great resources to expand it until **something** sticks... sound a lot like the Clinton blow-job to me.
Okay, for those of you already piping in that this isn't as fast as it can get, I'd like to see your present hi-speed home access push far over 1 Mbit/sec. Nevertheless, this begs the question:
In 2010 will 100 Mbits be considered fast or slow? Is there a "Moore's Law" for Internet access speeds? Back in about 1982 I was connecting to the local BBS with a 300 baud modem. A megabit download speed (today in 2003) is roughly 3000x that speed, and we're there after 20 years. That equates to almost exactly a 50% increase in speed per year. So if we go another 7 years at that rate, by 2010 we would consider 16 Mbit/sec to be fast.
I agree completely. I've become a dedicated Apple fan because I really think the products (esp OS X) are far superior to everything else. It's basically what I thnk the ultimate "Desktop Linux" should be like.
But boy do they give off that air of not caring. In fact, they don't seem to care about the fact that they don't care. The "it's not our problem" platform is getting so old. Panther wipes out my Firewire drive I was using to back up both systems. Not only didn't Apple care but they waited a week before even admitting there was a problem.
Getting Dreamweaver (arguably the biggest web editing software for the Apple platform) to work with the.Mac accounts went nowhere. All Apple had to say was "Our implementation of WebDAV is standards compliant. It must be Macromedia's problem!"
They also love to outmode their equipment and offer no backward support. A month after I bought my desktop they started implementing the SuperDrive and offering iDVD. There was no option for upgrading my system. They instead insisted I should buy a new computer. A month after I bought my Powerbook the same thing happened again. It's just like this iPod story: they could either lift a finger to support older hardware or get their diehard fans to buy new equipment. They'll choose selling new equipment any day of the week.
They also used to have a really good support network for Apple professionals/consultants (Apple Solutions Experts), but in the last year they cannibalized it and turned it into a means to sell certification licenses. I know a few really pissed off Apple experts who have turned toward Microsoft because MS at least knows not to bite the hand that feeds it.
It's all about profit and nothing about supporting a loyal customer base. And sadly it won't surprise me if this ultimately bites them in the butt!
As much as I love the "go Linux rah rah rah!" mantra, why not just go to asking "What's the best tool for the job?" For the computer-illiterate home user, Windows is fine (I'd advocate a Mac, but maybe the user LIKES having a zillion games and utilities and viruses available for download). For the corporate desktop where things should be locked down, Linux with OpenOffice may be a good bet at a good price.
If you're a power user, Windows is definitely out, Linux is a good bet, OS X is a good alternative. It seems to me whatever your personality is, one of the options will be your natural best fit.
And isn't it kinda nice that things work out that way?
Another good one would be Darren Aronofsky of "Pi" and "Requiem for a Dream". I think he was initially slated to do a Batman prequel but it may have fallen through.
Let's hear it for creative "new blood" in Hollywood!
I'd have to ask if the problem of widespread adoption of Japanese movies by an American audience doesn't have more to do with the limited American interest/understanding of Japanese culture. I think the recent "Lost in Translation" is a great example. Almost any American is going to feel like Japan is another PLANET, and a strange distant foreign (in every sense of the word) one.
Whereas the flip doesn't apply. The Japanese are hungry and almost obsessed over American culture, so they can assimilate it much easier.
These high-quality Japanese Animated movies are great, but there are times where some "joke" or cute part just doesn't "translate" and I'm reminded of what I'm watching.
On the other hand, it's fascinating how much of this stuff is being consumed in daily American television. (Ie. Pokeman.) Maybe I'm just part of a generation that didn't quite attain full saturation. I just watched the occasional "Voltron" episode.
I'm willing to bet the script will be identical to that of "Freddie vs Jason". Hapless humans try to survive as the two nasties battle it out almost on top of them.
I wonder if there will be a day where people actually create a fan base behind good script writers, like they do for moviestars and directors. Then there might be some pressure on the studios to focus on nurturing the good writers and DEVELOPING BETTER SCRIPTS!
I laugh whenever I see news that Microsoft wants to take over the search engine business next. I've got a humble little website that's been up for half a year. On a really good day it gets 5000 visits. It is linked from at least a dozen old established sites, including some major Apple news sites. It has prominent placement on every major search engine... except MSN, where it doesn't show up at all.
Of course, what would you expect for a site that covers Apple and Linux items almost exclusively. If M$ owned Google almost every "undesireable" site would be wiped off the map!
There's a good chance this IS only Panther-specific. There's a lot of new framework stuff for the integrated security processes. In some ways Panther is a significant architectural leap. I don't think they plan on leaving Jaguar users in the cold.
Another nice advantage to moving toward Open Source (like Linux, BSD, etc.) is that it works so much better on older equipment, which I'm willing to bet is prevalent in less affluent countries.
At least that used to be the case. I'm still using a 6-year old computer as my home server running Linux. However I do feel like the push to make pretty, advanced GUIs with Gnome and KDE are creating bloat-addiction that requires more powerful machines. Sometimes I think it wouldn't be so bad to go back to the older window managers.
Microsoft so often likes to talk about Total Cost of Ownership as a reason people shouldn't use Linux. I can just imagine how hard it would be to lock-down all the laptops so children weren't messing up the configurations, etc. Plus the admin time spent fixing all the problems. Apple's OS X is much more likely to run smoothly with less maintenance.
Also, the amazing power of the Cocoa development environment would make it much easier to develop custom educational applications for classes quickly.
The $15K money would be a nice change, but I'm always spending my free time setting up WiFi home networks, etc.
The same problem would exist for both the "Geek Eye" and it's original "Queer Eye"... given a few months without supervision and the recipient will revert back into low-tech chaos. Maintenance is much harder than configuration.
The Simarillian is a must-have for anyone interested in Tolkien's world. It was actually his FIRST work, predating the Hobbit, but people told him it wouldn't sell. It was an ongoing work and his son (Christopher) edited and published it after his death.
It goes through all the history from "In the Beginning there was darkness" sort of Genisis to the final history of Aragorn and Arwen. There you learn about where Gandolf comes from, what the Wizards really are (same tier of age as Balrogs, interestingly) as well as Soron's predecessor, Melkor.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm not sure a central repository is all that necessary. It's relatively easy to find five variations on whatever I want to cook, from which I can place a pretty educated guess as to which recipe I would rather use. (Based on ingredients, obvious "convenience substitutions", etc.) It's really a fascinating practice: looking at five different recipes, seeing their similarities and differences, learning the central core theme to the composition, and seeing where different cooks have developed their own riffs.
(I guess I'm saying that if you want a large collection of standard recipes, go buy your requisite copy of the Joy of Cooking. Otherwise, embrace heterogeneity.)
I really haven't explained why a central Google/Open/Wiki cookbook would work against this. I just think that once people saw a recipe had been submitted, they would be less inclined to upload their slightly different version. Maybe such a global project would benefit by somehow encouraging the submission of many varieties, including a "moderation system" by which culinary enthusiasts might edit the variations-on-a-theme and even write editorials on how and why the variations exist, which provide useful time-saving substitutions, when a certain ingredient of method is really necessary to make the "Real McCoy", etc.
Another thing worth mentioning: there are already dozens of "cooking sites" that provide this service, most of them are very "open" allowing easy submission and access. I think a big Open Initiative is successful when there AREN'T pre-existing sites providing a service, or when the sites try to restrict access by forcing a paid subscription model. (Like Wikipedia to online Encyclopedias.) The addition of some generic Open cooking site would become "just another cooking site".
A funny side-note. I've benefitted by the LACK of such a central source. I have a website that I've been cultivating for under a year, where I've put creative (written, artistic, photographic, computing, etc.) works. I've done everything possible to cultivate this site so that visitors would come to it. The thing that brings the most visitors to my site? My "Basic Crepe Recipe". For some funny reason nobody else in the world has a higher Google-ranked Basic Crepe Recipe. (Okay, recently I got knocked down to #2.) So this little "afterthought" has become a leading constant influx of visitors.
When I was a kid I was really resentful of people trying to decide my curriculum based on what they thought was useful. I had the ability to dedicate a fantastic amount of concentration and study on whatever interested me, and "later usefulness" had no bearing on this.
If kids get excited about learning Elvish or Klingon, by all means we should embrace their excitement. That will lead to "ins" in their intellectual development we could never guess at.
Today's curriculum seems to be based so much on practicality and very little on imagination. No wonder Generation-Y seems to lack enthusiasm about the world. We're trying to mold them into "practical little cogs" by McDonalds-izing their world.
I'm not worried about Windows Media Player as much as I am drivers and compilers.
Will the 32-bit emulaton Windows-on-Windows stuff also cover device drivers or are like 2% of us going to be able to run this trial version because something like only 2 video cards are supported? I was under the impression moving 64-bit support to drivers was a majority of the workload. (I think I remember that being one of the slow points getting Linux to 64-bit five years ago.)
The other thing I want to know is this: when will there be a good compiler suite to make the first 64-bit applications? Did Micro$oft port their Visual Studio to 64-bit or are we going to have to use Cygwin. (And can cygwin make 64-bit Windows apps yet?)
If Solitare is the only 64-bit app that'll run on this thing, there's suddenly Not Much Point. I remember running Windows NT for Alpha and scratching my head because solitare was about the only app available to me.
Distrust begets distrust. Secrets beget snooping. If someone (Intel) is going to be so damned hypocritical and lavish in Linux's support of it's product lines (especially the nice early Itanium support while Microsoft was getting is OS finished) they had better not complain when someone "hacks" a solution out of the chip.
It's like the who DVD-CSS mess. Linux people just wanted to be able to watch DVD's without runnning Windows. What resulted was a hack that made convertion of DVD's into cheap Divx copies easy and painless.
It feels like dating someone who never trusts you, never earns your trust (or respect) and goes hysterical when you don't behave exactly how they want. Reminds me of an ex-girlfriend, frankly.
It sounds like a brilliant idea. I'm almost surprised I'd never thought of that before. I'm always hearing discussion of which OS to use for "embedded" projects (in that I mean things outside the standard ordinary PC computer.)
Ever since coming out as the basis for the NeXT computer over 15 years ago, the objective-c based NeXTSTEP/OpenSTEP/Cocoa framework has been touted as one of the most amazingly powerful that a person can develop in. In the old NeXT days I remember hearing the [informal] statement that one programmer up to speed with NeXTSTEP could do the work of about 10 normal programmers. I took that with a grain of salt until I started trying to write some simple apps for the first time in OS X's cocoa.
It is so easy and refreshing in ways I couldn't express with worlds! Writing anything in C++ anymore makes me want to pull my hair out. Sadly, it [objective-c & Cocoa] is still rather obscure. But it would be such a wonderful world if we got to see a renaissance? FINALLY the GNUStep project is beginning to approach a level of usability. If embedded applications started to become a reality...
Oh, that's about as silly a pipe dream as hoping Howard Dean becomes President!
I had a very prompt delivery, but it was strange. I got the 9.2 DVD like TWO DAYS after submitting the order, although I didn't specify any fast delivery. The package had been sent from some wacky-named small company a few miles away from me. When I first saw the parcel I was sure it was some goofy sales pitch from new-age transendantal hippy organization. (I forgot the company's name on the return address, but it was really spacey.)
A week after I got my package the Mandrake ordering system notified me that the package had "just been shipped". Obviously they have some interesting way of outsourcing their delivery process. I just happened to be a "lucky one" I guess.
Sidenote: DAMN but it's nice to get a distro on a DVD! With the most recent versions of RedHat I was swapping CD's constantly for installs. It reminded me of the last days of floppy installations. Anyone remember circa 1995 getting softward that came on 10+ floppy disks?
Last miscellaneous comment: I love my Mandrake! It fascinates me that there are comments about 9.2 being buggy. I moved after the RedHat decision and my 9.2 installation on two computers has been the most stable and pain free of the last many many years. I guess you can never know when you are going to get hit with an installation bug.
I am amazed by the Apple keynotes that Steve Jobs give (and Apple streams from their site) twice a year.
There are two things that amaze me: First, that Apple can consistently release cool things that can keep its user base excited. Second, that Jobs can actually make an interesting two hour show out of it.
For those of you who have never seen the magic of a Steve Jobs Keynote, go to the Apple site under the Quicktime section and view the keynote. It's two hours long, but I'm wiling that if you don't find it at least "really cool" to watch, you'll agree it's better than the average dreck we sit down and watch on the telley each night. This keynote is a good example because it takes a large number of moderate announcements (unlike the unveiling of the iMac, the G5, the major OS upgrades, etc.) but STILL makes you excited enough to want to go out and play with these things.
It also gives me an appreciation of how many market segments Apple is entrenching itself in. You can really see the "digital hub" strategy at work, as well as the fact that income revenue is coming from hardware (iPods) music downloads (iTunes) Internet subscription services (dot-Mac) and others. Go check out the keynote for yourself. I think it'll give you a much different perspective in what and where Apple is in this decade.
And thank goodness SOMEONE is working to keep the computer field new and exciting!
You sound like you're in a precarious position: not being from a "rich" family, but not qualifying for any magic "poverty assistance" levels. Like a majority of people, college will be a real financial sacrifice for you and your family.
As people have already mentioned, the following "financial aids" exist:
1. Student Loans
2. "University-provided aid" scholarships, usually need-based
3. Outside scholarships that you have to find yourself
There are two things I haven't seen anybody warn about here yet, so I'll throw in my two cents.
First of all, the colleges I looked at (15 years ago) all claimed that the aid they might give me would be decreased by the same amount as any outside scholarships I might find. Hense, if I came up with a $10K scholarship, the school would decrease their aid package by $10K. I think that was stupid and discouraged anybody to find outside help.
I hope this has changed recently. Of course, if your desired school is NOT offering you any aid, at least you don't stand to get screwed by this behavior.
Second, schools are NOTORIOUS for giving you a "reasonable" financial aid package for your Freshman year and then cutting it to almost nothing your Sophmore year. This bait-and-switch tactic is great for hooking some students and then BLEEDING them and their families dry. Many of my high school friends had to leave their college of choice after the first year because of this. Talk about a dehumanizing experience!
But again, if your school is not offering you any aid up front, the independence you are forced to seek in the beginning (by applying to lots of smaller scholarships/grants) will be a blessing in disguise as you find yourself NOT blindsided by the nasty Sophmore-aid-cut-syndrome.
I agree with the other people who posted saying that there are lots of scholarships out there. You just have to learn how to research and find them. Enlist your high school guidence counselor's help and don't take "no" for an answer. Also don't assume that if you can't find it on a Google search that it doesn't exist. Find a nonprofit org like some already mentioned to find lists of scholarships out there. If you put in a serious continual 3 hours/week into a serious and comprehensive search, you can fund your college education, and that's a hell of a bargain.
Good Luck
I would not be so certain that this is simply an Access migration issue, although it might be.
First the disclaimer: I hate M$. I've moved myself to the Apple platform, I run a Linux server at home, I almost never use my Windows machine.
But I've been in many clients' offices where I was about to save hundreds of man-hours where clerical people did repetitive tasks by writing a quick VBA application. I've also seen specialized applications (in particular, I have intimate exposure to one used in most non-profit organizations) built completely from the Windows COM/ActiveX architecture, and these apps integrate really nicely with Office in a way that OpenOffice would have to have strong COM integration to compete. (It may, I haven't looked recently.)
I felt bad writing these apps because I knew I was helping to entrench these clients in their Windows world, but when they are running on a shoestring budget (and non-profits get KILLER cheap deals with M$ software) if I can help cut an office's labor by 10% or more, I think I'm morally obligated to do so.
One last point: last time I gave OpenOffice a spin on Windows, it seemed to have a cool feature-set, but anything approaching a complex 100+ page document caused application crashes. I haven't seen Office crash since 2000.
For the most part, I'd say it's not a question of "if" but "when". But "when" might not be today.
Actually, there was a really excellent theater skit called Star Wars in 30 minutes. (www.swin30.com) A friend of mine was involved in the group.
Of course, Star Wars was one of the few movies that didn't try to do too much, so it had a more concise structure. Lucas has this annoying need to visit a dozen planets each movie. The desperate need to touch on a zillion small events makes it hard to create any good theatrical moods other than frantic.
This spoiler shows the same problem emerging. It really sounds like two or three movies' worth of material. Maybe it will have to get split into two parts like Kill Bill
This comes as no surprise, but it's certainly not restricted to the government. Corporate security people tend to be idiots as well. I've worked for so many managers who really don't want to know how insecure their security is.
There's this nasty "kill the messenger" syndrome that makes (good) security specialists unpopular in corporations--and probably in the government as well. They are inevitably required to point out things that make other people look bad, and insecure managers are great at getting them fired.
The result is a bunch of Yes Men who don't point out security problems, but let management feel good about itself.
I worked a few years in the IT of a "Fortune 50" drug company. I cannot begin to tell you how many hundreds of thousands of dollars were thrown around for silly and stupid reasons, mostly so Pointy Haired Bosses could play "buzzword bingo" in order to sound important and get promotions.
.Net when all the business needs is email and word processing, I still think W2K is sufficient.
I on the other hand worked in the trenches and off everyone's radar. I set up a Linux server (I could arguably claim to be the beginning of the Linux movement at this place.) and as I learned about a new interesting technology--mostly database and web stuff--I would ponder whether I could build something that would make IT's job easier. Over three major projects I could estimate having saved at least half a million dollars in labor by leveraging "new technology" to improve operations.
Now back to the question: what do we mean when we talk about being "offensive or defensive"? If offensive/proactive means implementing a new technology because the buzzword is hot, piss off and stop wasting money. If it means keeping a few bright people on the cutting edge, investigating whether new technologies can improve overall corporate efficientcy, then by all means YES.
If it means investing zillions of dollars for the eventual Longhorn update and all the new applications that are upgraded to
Let's see, starting with litigation, finding no case, expending great resources to expand it until **something** sticks... sound a lot like the Clinton blow-job to me.
Okay, for those of you already piping in that this isn't as fast as it can get, I'd like to see your present hi-speed home access push far over 1 Mbit/sec. Nevertheless, this begs the question:
In 2010 will 100 Mbits be considered fast or slow? Is there a "Moore's Law" for Internet access speeds? Back in about 1982 I was connecting to the local BBS with a 300 baud modem. A megabit download speed (today in 2003) is roughly 3000x that speed, and we're there after 20 years. That equates to almost exactly a 50% increase in speed per year. So if we go another 7 years at that rate, by 2010 we would consider 16 Mbit/sec to be fast.
Okay. I'm envious.
I agree completely. I've become a dedicated Apple fan because I really think the products (esp OS X) are far superior to everything else. It's basically what I thnk the ultimate "Desktop Linux" should be like.
.Mac accounts went nowhere. All Apple had to say was "Our implementation of WebDAV is standards compliant. It must be Macromedia's problem!"
But boy do they give off that air of not caring. In fact, they don't seem to care about the fact that they don't care. The "it's not our problem" platform is getting so old. Panther wipes out my Firewire drive I was using to back up both systems. Not only didn't Apple care but they waited a week before even admitting there was a problem.
Getting Dreamweaver (arguably the biggest web editing software for the Apple platform) to work with the
They also love to outmode their equipment and offer no backward support. A month after I bought my desktop they started implementing the SuperDrive and offering iDVD. There was no option for upgrading my system. They instead insisted I should buy a new computer. A month after I bought my Powerbook the same thing happened again. It's just like this iPod story: they could either lift a finger to support older hardware or get their diehard fans to buy new equipment. They'll choose selling new equipment any day of the week.
They also used to have a really good support network for Apple professionals/consultants (Apple Solutions Experts), but in the last year they cannibalized it and turned it into a means to sell certification licenses. I know a few really pissed off Apple experts who have turned toward Microsoft because MS at least knows not to bite the hand that feeds it.
It's all about profit and nothing about supporting a loyal customer base. And sadly it won't surprise me if this ultimately bites them in the butt!
As much as I love the "go Linux rah rah rah!" mantra, why not just go to asking "What's the best tool for the job?" For the computer-illiterate home user, Windows is fine (I'd advocate a Mac, but maybe the user LIKES having a zillion games and utilities and viruses available for download). For the corporate desktop where things should be locked down, Linux with OpenOffice may be a good bet at a good price.
If you're a power user, Windows is definitely out, Linux is a good bet, OS X is a good alternative. It seems to me whatever your personality is, one of the options will be your natural best fit.
And isn't it kinda nice that things work out that way?
Another good one would be Darren Aronofsky of "Pi" and "Requiem for a Dream". I think he was initially slated to do a Batman prequel but it may have fallen through.
Let's hear it for creative "new blood" in Hollywood!
I'd have to ask if the problem of widespread adoption of Japanese movies by an American audience doesn't have more to do with the limited American interest/understanding of Japanese culture. I think the recent "Lost in Translation" is a great example. Almost any American is going to feel like Japan is another PLANET, and a strange distant foreign (in every sense of the word) one.
Whereas the flip doesn't apply. The Japanese are hungry and almost obsessed over American culture, so they can assimilate it much easier.
These high-quality Japanese Animated movies are great, but there are times where some "joke" or cute part just doesn't "translate" and I'm reminded of what I'm watching.
On the other hand, it's fascinating how much of this stuff is being consumed in daily American television. (Ie. Pokeman.) Maybe I'm just part of a generation that didn't quite attain full saturation. I just watched the occasional "Voltron" episode.
I'm willing to bet the script will be identical to that of "Freddie vs Jason". Hapless humans try to survive as the two nasties battle it out almost on top of them.
I wonder if there will be a day where people actually create a fan base behind good script writers, like they do for moviestars and directors. Then there might be some pressure on the studios to focus on nurturing the good writers and DEVELOPING BETTER SCRIPTS!
Sigh.
I laugh whenever I see news that Microsoft wants to take over the search engine business next. I've got a humble little website that's been up for half a year. On a really good day it gets 5000 visits. It is linked from at least a dozen old established sites, including some major Apple news sites. It has prominent placement on every major search engine... except MSN, where it doesn't show up at all.
Of course, what would you expect for a site that covers Apple and Linux items almost exclusively. If M$ owned Google almost every "undesireable" site would be wiped off the map!
There's a good chance this IS only Panther-specific. There's a lot of new framework stuff for the integrated security processes. In some ways Panther is a significant architectural leap. I don't think they plan on leaving Jaguar users in the cold.
Another nice advantage to moving toward Open Source (like Linux, BSD, etc.) is that it works so much better on older equipment, which I'm willing to bet is prevalent in less affluent countries.
At least that used to be the case. I'm still using a 6-year old computer as my home server running Linux. However I do feel like the push to make pretty, advanced GUIs with Gnome and KDE are creating bloat-addiction that requires more powerful machines. Sometimes I think it wouldn't be so bad to go back to the older window managers.
Microsoft so often likes to talk about Total Cost of Ownership as a reason people shouldn't use Linux. I can just imagine how hard it would be to lock-down all the laptops so children weren't messing up the configurations, etc. Plus the admin time spent fixing all the problems. Apple's OS X is much more likely to run smoothly with less maintenance.
Also, the amazing power of the Cocoa development environment would make it much easier to develop custom educational applications for classes quickly.
The $15K money would be a nice change, but I'm always spending my free time setting up WiFi home networks, etc.
The same problem would exist for both the "Geek Eye" and it's original "Queer Eye"... given a few months without supervision and the recipient will revert back into low-tech chaos. Maintenance is much harder than configuration.
The Simarillian is a must-have for anyone interested in Tolkien's world. It was actually his FIRST work, predating the Hobbit, but people told him it wouldn't sell. It was an ongoing work and his son (Christopher) edited and published it after his death.
It goes through all the history from "In the Beginning there was darkness" sort of Genisis to the final history of Aragorn and Arwen. There you learn about where Gandolf comes from, what the Wizards really are (same tier of age as Balrogs, interestingly) as well as Soron's predecessor, Melkor.
Repeat VERY GOOD BOOK TO HAVE!!!!