Well, now you have to backup those backup hard disks. As far as reliability, tape is ALWAYS the way to go. CD-r's and DVD rams will do it too, for ad hock stuff. Also, why backup programs? Programs you usually have the disk, or as with Linux, you have the distro disk and if for some reason it gets toasted, you can get another one for fairly cheap. I'd backup/etc,/home,/boot and maybe a few miscellaneous directories (if using Linux). Why backup/usr ? They are all programs and most if not all are already on a CD somewhere. No need. I also fail to see why people would waste too much HD space with MP3's. Burn em on CD-R's and you can cart em around, take them with you. If you have a portable or that AIWA car stereo, play them in the portable. If in an office situation, I reccomend the Tivoli storage system ( I think it used to be IBM's ADSM. It uses IBM hardware ). The thing can backup nearly anything including mainframes and PC's. Their's a client available for almost any computer. It's vary expensive tho. If you want to rotate tape off site (YOU SHOULD), make extra sure you do not under estimate the amount of tape you need.
I agree we should care more about space exploration, but I disagree with Hawking. Mother Earth is stronger then we even know. Global warming? Tell that to me when I am freezing my arse off in record cold this winter (notice you never hear about global warming in the middle of winter, at least in the US). Global warming is a farce. Several respected Meteorologists have dissmissed this as BUNK! If we ARE the cause of global warming, then, how come the trend of rising temps occured BEFORE cars have been invented??? It's CYCLICAL! Just like El Nino. The earth is stronger then ANY one being on this planet (ok, except GOD!! ).
Big frickin deal! Do I care what other idiots on Slashdot think of me? NO! I don't keep track of Karma. If I post something, it's MY opinion. I don't FORCE others to like it because I think it's the gospel truth! Granted, the penis bird and goat sex and other idiots do ruin things a little bit for me, they do at least get moderated down AS THEY SHOULD! I have yet to see something that's sub 1 be worth reading anyway. And, yes, it's a little disconcerting when a story I submit get's rejected (but having over a thousand submissions a day you GOTTA turn someone down). But, I have news for you.....SLASHDOT IS NOT MY LIFE AND IF YOU MAKE IT YOURS, YOU WILL BE DISAPPOINTED UNLESS YOU ARE CMDRTACO. There. That said, I used to frequent a BBS (gawd remember those?) and on there, there was always a few people who were CONSTANTLY online. Why? I dunno. They HAD no life of their own. The BBS was their life. These people are now on the net doing something, but the BBS is gone. They finally realized, this virtual thing, the BBS does not a life make. Will I care if Slashdot dies? Well, I will miss it, but life goes on! Personally, I don't see this happening. Slashdot still carries news for nerds. I am a nerd. Even if all of it isn't the most relavent, (heck is there anyone who is relevant ALL OF THE TIME?) it still fullfills it's mantra so to speak. SO, Signal 11 is gone. BIG DEAL. This is the same thing I said when several other people I know of did the same thing on the BBS. This is a guy who has too much time on his hands and all he does is read slashdot 24/7 (ok, not 24/7 but alot anyway). There are alot of these around. Maybe he realized there is life after being on Slashdot. Maybe he'll be back, maybe not. Will my life be less fullfilling because of him not posting? I doubt it. Geeks can have a life too (trust me. They can! I do! and I am a geek!).
4 pk Penguin Mints (Think Geek)
1 case of caffiene (anywhere or on Think Geek)
1-2 lbs espresso
Tux Polo (Think Geek again)
O'rielly Books (ANY!)
1 bottle Sky Rocket Syrup (To make MONSTER cappucino's).
Creative Labs Live Platinum Soundcard
New Printer
Over 300
SMP Pentium III 900 box
6 gig MP3 Player from Think Geek
WAYYY OVER 300 (dream)
Massedi Quad 18" LCD panel display, with 2 Matrox G450 Max Video Cards
MAXED OUT Pentium III 900 SMP Box (biggest and Fastest HD, DVD, CD-RW (SCSI FASTEST AVAILABLE), 3-4 gig memory and possible RAID array.
Man this is the kind of thing I deal with everday. I find a companies (or one or two people depending on who has the number) over use of pagers and cell phones can be fixed in 2 ways. First, do your job right to begin with and don't forget anything (even little things you ASSUME they can get right....remember, assume makes an ass out of u and me.). Second, if they are calling and YOU KNOW it's something stupid, answer the phone in a quick gruff tone or change your tone of voice to indicate that you are busy even if your juist sitting on the couch watching TV. I find doing that helps them get to the point rather quickly! These two things make my cell phone go off far FAR less then most people's at my company.
As far as on the job stress, I work for a college. If I am working on something for the students (say the student programmers have cause the CICS partition to lock up solid for the umpteenth time of the day, or they have forgotten a password for the fiftieth time) and I get a call on the other line, I tell them I will get right to what they want after I fix a particularly complex problem for the students. Since I work at a college, that usually shuts them up for about 5-15 minutes. I also REFUSE to do back flips to get something done unless they go through my boss, or it's an emergency (no power to the Computer Room and it's operating off of batteries is a emergency).
Continue to uphold your technical values while taking on the management aspect. Don't be tempted by the management for dummies type books and things like Stephen Covey (although he's not too bad). Good managers can see the gimmicky management practices and get rid of the things. Things like Zap the lightening bolt of empowerment (big friggin deal....it's stuff your emplyees should already know how to do), and other gimmicky manegment things don't work. What works is that you show your underlings you know what you are talking about. Don't be afraid to get your hands dirty (if that means you have to work a saturday to lighten the load of required saturday coverage in your area, you do it). Also, don't be too dependent on your cell phone. If you can train your underlings so your phone never rings (that's always my goal), then do it. The whole system just works better if you don't micromanage. Of course, there are always some employees that you need to do this with, but they are far and few between.
It's the same here in Columbus, OH. INfact, our library has some stupid probgram that tottally hides the basic IE interface. The retrictions are all there, and you have to pay to print (10 cents per page). Make me wish IE would not do that stupid thing of printing the last two lines at the top of the next page! Even if it would fit on the first page!!
Hey I belive ya man. I just said what they are doing not that it would work! (Helixcode's plan that is);)
There's a few things I feel Red Hat can do to make money. Home users, they may was well forget them when it comes to buying anything other then their CD (and that they don't have to buy from Red Hat either). What I think all Linux distros need to do is market more to business and develop things advantagious to business. The RHAT Network Updater thingy would do for them. Hackers don't mind or care about having to do things manually (especially updates such as this.).
I think Helixcode will make the updates free, but have the other stuff built into Evolution and the like that will, say display when your favorite band is playing and automate buying tickets thru Helixcode. Or automate buying your mom a b-day present at a set date from your mom's big day so it has time to ship to her. Helixcode has stated all of their software will remain free. I assume this means their updater too (which works wonderfully!).
Lessee....this sounds a HECK of a lot like the up2date tool they had in 6.2. This is nothing new. Maybe they mean priority ftp access like you get for 30 days when you buy 6.2 from redhat (in a box, not cheapbytes). I doubt they could charge for this, ahem, service for what amounts to mostly free software. I personally have not seen much that RedHat has done that isn't in the Kernel, and hasn't been done by other distros (oh their installer is their own, but everyone has one like theirs). But I have not seen much else they have done (ok, maybe stuff I don't use yet like the clustering stuff, but heck if I could afford the hardware, I'd be able to afford this subscription thing). I doubt that the rpm's won't be availabe any other way. I am also of agreement that RedHat should wait until 2.4 is out, and work on a Xfree86 4.0.1 configurator (ala Xconfigurator). As far as the stability of these, I see nothing wrong with the kernel or XF86 4.0.1 stability wise. XF86 4.0.1 is ready, as far as I am concerned, but 2.4 is soooo close. I feel it. I don't see it going on much longer before it becomes the official stable kernel.
And when da whole room blows up because of the next Timothy McVeigh or a Tornado hits your build not only is your hardward distroyed, but your data as well. Remember, you need offsite storage to stay in business. Best thing would be to put onw quite distance from ya and mirror them across dedicated links. Second best, offsite tape backup. But having your backup in the same place as the original is asking for trouble!
There are many companies who have tried this same model and they fail, or are failing. I call it the Cell Phone style business model. This model works for Cell Phones because the phone is pretty usless without the service (unless you are friends with a multibillionare who can buy or setup a similar free infrastructure). There are mahy things it has not worked with, or will not work with.....
1. Computers
The free computer with internet acess model is flawed because people can add. When you commit to a internet service to get your computer, you are tied until that computer is WAY beyond useless. Also, these companies forget computers are useful for things BESIDES the internet.
2.:CueCat
This is bound to fail because of the stupidness of the whole thing. I mean, really, a hacker might use this to create something for themselves, but really why do you need a barcode reader?? And the whole idea struck me as kind of dumb after I tried it and thought about it. I mean, except for the decoding thing and DC's only software WHAT possible use do you have for this dumb thing? Indexing CD's, videos, or DVD's by barcode may be the only thing. And why do companies keep trying to put a barcode reader in things? (Networked fridge with BC scanner, still not available cuz it's DUMB!).
3. Netpliance iOpener...
Hmm, lessee, let's make a network appliance out of commodity hardware, try to make it hack proof, and sell it so PC and Internet people can get grandma on the internet. Oh and let's sell them and a whopping loss so we can make money off of people who think they need to use their service on it. Netpliance could have done a smart thing and made a better investment in the hardware and made the thing truely unhackable before selling it. They didn't. Their revenue stream does not exist.
I could go on but what's the point? A company should just sell the freaking device at a reasonable price level, and charge little or nothing for the service. If Tivo reduced their fee to say, about 2 bucks a month (what I used to pay the cable company for monthly guide which I never looked at cuz of the on air tv guide channel and tvgrid.com) I'd jump on it! Another thing they could do is try to work out deals for people to reduce the amount of bills they have for services. An example might be phone companies have one fee to pay for tv guides for tivo's, internet connection thru ADSL, phone service and cable TV all in one bill a month which I'd call an Information Service bill. I'd love that.
Only way he may be a troll is that he's convinced he must pay to get the best. So what if I am feeding what you may call a troll. Maybe I may have enlgihtened him huh? I think he's making a valid point in that there are so many Linux users that are so dirt cheap they'd rather download an iso and take away income from a Linux company or taking away income from Netpliance with the hacked iOpeners. Granted, Netpliance was stupid here, but it does not mean we have to exploit the hole does it? Oh, I will buy an upgrade when it's compelling, but if it ain't, they ain't getting my bucks and I am getting the iso. But when they release a good update of a distro, why not spend the bucks for the extras like bumper stickers, t-shirts and a cd full of the latest tarballs of open source software. If you don't support the distro of your choice by buying those 40 dollar packages, they ain't going to be around very much longer unless they sell hardware. Same goes for Palm. If U like it, why not buy it?
No, they cost me $2. All I have to do is get on my cable modem (granted, the connection isn't free, but I use it for so much more then just downloading isos!), download the latest iso for the distro of my choice, and burn it on a CD! That's IT! It's done! We may CHOOSE to by the more expensive one every once in a while just so we can show our SUPPORT to our chosen distro (be it Red Hat, SuSE, Caldera or whatever). I recently bought a copy of Red Hat 6.2 after using a iso for a while. Why did I do it? I CHOSE to give Red Hat the additonal money not for the support, but so I can support Red Hat 7.0 and further! That's what's cool about Linux is you can choose WHEN to support your distro. If you don't think that the current package has enough to buy (like Windows ME) You can LEGALLY download an iso, burn it, and be running the latest greatest. Now Palm charging for an upgrade is perfectly alright to me because it's closed and within their right. I don't seem to remember them ever giving it away (only way you could get it before was a rom upgrade, not a flash program like the new one). I do agree that bitching about a 20 buck upgrade is unwarrented BUT I also think palm should make the upgrading program work on Linux too.
1. Use a IDE Sandisk like the iOpener uses for the IDE HD (no moving parts, but might be on small side....maybe this isn't a good idea).
2. If an ATAPI zip works, this may solve the remove the HD thing to load songs.
3. Add a LCD or LED display for displaying ID3 tags(might have to hack the player software if it's not already built in, but it's possible.)
Of course one of my ideas would be to get one of those PC104 motherboard the wearable peoples use and adapt a small lcd to work on it using ncurses based mpg123 front end since X would be sluggish since the highest speed I have seen on these boards has been about 133 MHz (might be higher now tho). I do like the idea of using sandisk type of memory for doing a portable device since it's easier to deal with the vibration probs on those.
Here's a bit of an article linked form the IBM site on C|net.
About two-dozen of the prototypes have been created so far. The watches run on an ARM-based EP7211 processor made by Cirrus Logic and have 8MB of memory to run programs and 8MB of flash memory to substitute for a hard disk. The watches also include an infrared and wireless radio connection and a touch-screen display. The watch can tell time and has a calendar and to-do list that can remind the wearer of appointments, Goyal said
Pretty Cool huh?:) No I am not linking to the article, you can do it from the IBM site (so I am lazy alright!!:))
Have you looked on Freshmeat lately? There are two programs that support sending data to the Datalink thru flashing lines on the screen (I think that's how, other wise you might have to rig up a notebook adapter). I just got the Ironman version of the Datalink. While transferring normal data and time might be achieved, the wrist apps on these watches definitely would not be able to be changed with Linux.
Hmmm...it seems to me it would be real easy for them to integrate a peltier or something similar right into the chip. That way the chip would have built in cooling, and NO need for a 1 lb heatsink! The power, well, we have been coasting along with the current power supply connector for a while. It's about time for this change. AND it seems to me, changing a connector on a power supply should do it unless the MB is wanting more voltages then the current power supplies could support. Then again, maybe Intel might just be floating this out to see what the reaction would be.
Yes IBM should have known better AND they should NOT have charged. BUT, I have seen someone say that it isn't possible to design a web page to work in every situation. I say it is! If you follow the standards set forth by W3C, it should be enough, but then again, you got browser companies doing their own things. Sometimes these things aren't all that different (taking this out here, this out there). I remember when the web was about conveying information and NOT about macromedia flash pages and the like. Back then, if a page had graphics, it was pretty cool. Now we expect them to have mouse overs and thinks like this that simply do not work in all browsers. Is this the fault o fthe browser company? NO! The designer should at least test a web page in these browsers:
Netscape
Internet Explorer
AOL (if you know someone with a client)
Mozilla/Netscape 6.0 PR2
Lynx
These are the most browsers out there. I know there are others lik Konquerer, Galeon and Nautilus..but these should be the minimum. I personally think WAP phones aren't that popular, yet, and I don't think they will. What's going to be a BIG hit is Crusoe based wireless web pads. Thye enable you to use all of the plugins and everything you have on a PC, in a nice small package....when they get here. Other things I think that will work great are Linux palm devices. They allow you to run X and a decent web browser (ok, you may have to rewrite one, but the capability is there...can we say Galeon?).
How the HECK is not having this holding X back??? I would rather see FSAA or at least Anti Aliased text! But transparent terminals and see thru menus (if Alpha transparency is what I think it is) are just stealing off of an idea Apple came up with!
Althought I am sure someone else has this as well, I just think there are more important things that hold X and XFree86 back like configuration (hey if MS can figure out what you have installed automagically and it's abilities, XFree86 should too! as far a X goes anyway. I have better things to do then edit modelines and config files.).
While I agree it would be cool to have a ethernet card/jack/chip on board a Tivo, or a Digital Satellite Dish, or a iOpener, what we really forget is WHO they are targetting with these devices. They are selling these to those who have no frakin idea WHAT ethernet is or what a internet server can do. I know some people who think the internet is ONE big computer or service and think their ISP is the one responsible when their connection is slow. These are the type of people who could care less if it runs Linux, Windows or OS/2 for that matter. These are also the people who can't program a VCR either. Adding ethernet would add unneeded complexity.
Re:Netscape 6 sucks, but Mozilla's fine
on
Mozilla M17 Is Out
·
· Score: 1
AMEN! I think what it boils down to, and you can ask Mircosoft this, is that they THINK they can count the amount of times the installer is downloaded and say they have this percentage of the browser market or that many downloads. It's foolish and wrong! Just because the installer has been dloaded x many times means nothing. YOU STILL HAVE TO DOWNLOAD THE FRAGGIN THING THRU THE INSTALLER SO THOSE ITTY BITTY INSTALLER PIECE O CRAPS DON'T SAVE ANY TIME! For the user OR the coder.
It depends....it's too difficult to predict some things. For example, I find it hard to predict log file size reliabley to be able to have enough disk space at all times on it. Plus if it's a webserver, you never know when your traffic will just jump up 100 % (creating a equal jump in the web server log file size). I guess what it all boils down to is make sure you have room to grow in all file systems and use quotas for your/home directory and you ought to be ok for the most part. Of course, if YOU KNOW you aren't going to have enough space, you better be shoppin for drives. Better to have at least double your needs to start off with rather then less.
Slashdot Mirror
Under 300
4 pk Penguin Mints (Think Geek)
1 case of caffiene (anywhere or on Think Geek)
1-2 lbs espresso
Tux Polo (Think Geek again)
O'rielly Books (ANY!)
1 bottle Sky Rocket Syrup (To make MONSTER cappucino's).
Creative Labs Live Platinum Soundcard
New Printer
Over 300
SMP Pentium III 900 box
6 gig MP3 Player from Think Geek
WAYYY OVER 300 (dream)
Massedi Quad 18" LCD panel display, with 2 Matrox G450 Max Video Cards
MAXED OUT Pentium III 900 SMP Box (biggest and Fastest HD, DVD, CD-RW (SCSI FASTEST AVAILABLE), 3-4 gig memory and possible RAID array.
As far as on the job stress, I work for a college. If I am working on something for the students (say the student programmers have cause the CICS partition to lock up solid for the umpteenth time of the day, or they have forgotten a password for the fiftieth time) and I get a call on the other line, I tell them I will get right to what they want after I fix a particularly complex problem for the students. Since I work at a college, that usually shuts them up for about 5-15 minutes. I also REFUSE to do back flips to get something done unless they go through my boss, or it's an emergency (no power to the Computer Room and it's operating off of batteries is a emergency).
1. Computers
The free computer with internet acess model is flawed because people can add. When you commit to a internet service to get your computer, you are tied until that computer is WAY beyond useless. Also, these companies forget computers are useful for things BESIDES the internet.
2. :CueCat
This is bound to fail because of the stupidness of the whole thing. I mean, really, a hacker might use this to create something for themselves, but really why do you need a barcode reader?? And the whole idea struck me as kind of dumb after I tried it and thought about it. I mean, except for the decoding thing and DC's only software WHAT possible use do you have for this dumb thing? Indexing CD's, videos, or DVD's by barcode may be the only thing. And why do companies keep trying to put a barcode reader in things? (Networked fridge with BC scanner, still not available cuz it's DUMB!).
3. Netpliance iOpener...
Hmm, lessee, let's make a network appliance out of commodity hardware, try to make it hack proof, and sell it so PC and Internet people can get grandma on the internet. Oh and let's sell them and a whopping loss so we can make money off of people who think they need to use their service on it. Netpliance could have done a smart thing and made a better investment in the hardware and made the thing truely unhackable before selling it. They didn't. Their revenue stream does not exist.
I could go on but what's the point? A company should just sell the freaking device at a reasonable price level, and charge little or nothing for the service. If Tivo reduced their fee to say, about 2 bucks a month (what I used to pay the cable company for monthly guide which I never looked at cuz of the on air tv guide channel and tvgrid.com) I'd jump on it! Another thing they could do is try to work out deals for people to reduce the amount of bills they have for services. An example might be phone companies have one fee to pay for tv guides for tivo's, internet connection thru ADSL, phone service and cable TV all in one bill a month which I'd call an Information Service bill. I'd love that.
1. Use a IDE Sandisk like the iOpener uses for the IDE HD (no moving parts, but might be on small side....maybe this isn't a good idea).
2. If an ATAPI zip works, this may solve the remove the HD thing to load songs.
3. Add a LCD or LED display for displaying ID3 tags(might have to hack the player software if it's not already built in, but it's possible.)
Of course one of my ideas would be to get one of those PC104 motherboard the wearable peoples use and adapt a small lcd to work on it using ncurses based mpg123 front end since X would be sluggish since the highest speed I have seen on these boards has been about 133 MHz (might be higher now tho). I do like the idea of using sandisk type of memory for doing a portable device since it's easier to deal with the vibration probs on those.
About two-dozen of the prototypes have been created so far. The watches run on an ARM-based EP7211 processor made by Cirrus Logic and have 8MB of memory to run programs and 8MB of flash memory to substitute for a hard disk. The watches also include an infrared and wireless radio connection and a touch-screen display. The watch can tell time and has a calendar and to-do list that can remind the wearer of appointments, Goyal said
Pretty Cool huh? :) No I am not linking to the article, you can do it from the IBM site (so I am lazy alright!! :))
Build in a thermometer (with a thermister)
MP3 player (with a IBM Microdrive on the strap!)
Caluclator (obvious)
Skinable Clock (REAL OBVIOUS! :))
The possibilities are endless!
Netscape, Internet Explorer, Mozilla/Netscape 6.0 PR2, and Lynx.
Netscape Internet Explorer AOL (if you know someone with a client) Mozilla/Netscape 6.0 PR2 Lynx
These are the most browsers out there. I know there are others lik Konquerer, Galeon and Nautilus..but these should be the minimum. I personally think WAP phones aren't that popular, yet, and I don't think they will. What's going to be a BIG hit is Crusoe based wireless web pads. Thye enable you to use all of the plugins and everything you have on a PC, in a nice small package....when they get here. Other things I think that will work great are Linux palm devices. They allow you to run X and a decent web browser (ok, you may have to rewrite one, but the capability is there...can we say Galeon?).
Althought I am sure someone else has this as well, I just think there are more important things that hold X and XFree86 back like configuration (hey if MS can figure out what you have installed automagically and it's abilities, XFree86 should too! as far a X goes anyway. I have better things to do then edit modelines and config files.).