What is a larger annoyance is the SOX stuff that requires keeping emails. Then you add in the smart admins that limit your inbox size although you are not supposed to delete anything. Sure makes tons of sense.
Hopefully. After the SCO/IBM fiasco and now lest we forget the fun with RIM, it is abundantly clear that small companies are going out of their way to try to get market share, publicity, or some other unknown (sometimes backed by a larger *silent* competitor - as with M$ in the SCO/IBM case). What a waste of court bandwidth.
The sad thing is that when a smaller company has a valid claim they usually lose due to being starved out by the larger corporation. Cases without true merit make it hard for real victims, as usual.
Agreed. Another troubling item is that when there is potential for multiple wages within a household one spouse often stays with the kids. On one hand that is commendable, but the reality is that when hit with college education versus retirement, things start to look a bit more grim. The reality is that in order to retire at all and still help your progeny with their education it will be a challenge for most of us. Imagine what it will take for those that only have one income and many mouths to feed. It's not like the old days where dad worked for 40 years at the same job, earned a good pension and retired in a paid-in full home. So the "working two jobs" or having two incomes may be the only feasible option in order to have a retirement.
Well, if you are tired of what you are doing or never really liked it in the first place perhaps it is time to try something else. Otherwise, see where your interests are and market/business trends. It is usually a combination of what the industry is calling for and what is a cool technology to learn. Sometimes they don't go together well. I've done everything from Java, Lotus Script, C, C++, C#, VB, ASP, various.NET web applications and rich client development. At the end of the day I'm more of a generalist, but I can be flexible enough to morph into whatever is needed at the moment. There were days in the past that I hated Lotus Script but enjoyed manipulating the Lotus Notes APIs via C++. I did a large amount of Jave development but it was almost always middle-tier or back-end. These days I'm doing more UI work because in spite of my professed dislike of that type of development I picked up a knack for understanding what my users needed and find I don't have the same extreme irritation with it any more. If you can manage to merge what you enjoy doing with what is good for your career you will be in great shape.
I agree with your sentiments. Wayyy back in college I had a shell account and learned the "end-user" way around Unix and so did my spouse. Later we purchased the "Unix/Linux for Dummies" which had a decent overview of the more obscure aspects of the two operating systems. However, even with books and shell accounts at some point you do need to take the plunge and install the OS. The SUSE distribution is a good one to start with and has a relatively painless installation. At the end of the day, as with pretty much anything you need to use a thing to learn it. These days I've joined the dark side and spend most of my time doing software development on various Windows operating systems although I can dive into Linux/Unix as needed. My spouse stayed with the rebellion and after many years is now a gifted Unix/Linux SAN Manager.
My two cents.
There are many theories running rampant about the so-called Hobbits, from misidentification to the reduced brain hypothesis. Many pressures in an isolated environment can create enough genetic pressure to lead to odd physical changes. Examples are twin studies of Andes Mountains dwelling children. When separated, one twin staying in the higher elevations and the other growing up at sea level researchers have noted drastic differences in the physical morphology. These observations hold true even though the monozygotic twins are genetically identical. The Andes-dwelling child had a large barrel chest and was shorter. The child living at or near seal level was not barrel-chested and taller. Most creatures within the animal kingdom have within their very genetic code a certain level of plasticity that we've seen demonstrated again and again as in the example above. It is not that surprising that there might have been some recessive gene that was expressed in an isolated population. It may not have been due to brain-reduction, but simply local pressures. Until they can actually identify some kind of smoking gun that can state with pretty good clarity that they can prove that these individuals didn't make the toolkit discovered, I'm more open to the possibilities.
One thing that researchers have managed is to grow bladders using a cellular matrix or structure. I've read that they have successfully used such a technique to grow bladders for people that have lost theirs to diseases such as cancer. Now having the ability to grow fully functional organs without the need for a matrix of some type is outstanding for the future of organ replacement.
I don't want to dive into the religious controversy. I would like to make a point about Human psychology. People fear what they don't understand. It reminds me of what most people think a hacker is. They've seen silly movies like "Hackers" and think that those that break into computers (crack) or protect them (hack) are mystical, magical geniuses. In reality most crackers are kids that have downloaded packages like NMAP and Nessus and just try systems until they get in. Yet the mystique is enough to add a flare or fear.
The same thing is at work here hidden under the covers of religion, morality, or whatever label fits. Often fear and religion go hand in hand. It's always been that way. It will continue to be that way. Just our nature.
Yeah, no kidding. It's like any addiction. Either you want to pull back from it or not. You can toss $$ out the door trying to clear out OCD-like behaviors, but at the end of the day what would you really be fixing? I'd wonder if the addicted "gamer" might not just replace one addiction with another.
I agree that the implementor is at issue. Again, the laws are made without any regard for the ramifications for the implementation/interpretation of the masses. I've dealt with at least 3 institutions that couldn't deal with the ER entry of a patient (mother and father in this case) and the power of attorney situation. The hospitals get the authorization from the Medical POA but then don't know what to do if that person (POA) is not physically standing in front of them.
Sure, I agree that there are reasons for HIPPA. I used to work at a firm that required HIPPA certification and I hold a current HIPPA cert. What is troublesome is how the HIPPA laws are used to either avoid dealing with things that are broken, or that they don't necessarily protect the so-called protected information. It could also lead to a person's death if not handled by someone that can bend the rules when the exceptions arise. That's what has me concerned - the lack of a plan for when things don't flow through the gates as expected. It has nothing to do with which adminstration is in power and everything to do with what makes logical sense. The way a hospital enforces HIPPA is broken - at least in my opinion from personal experience.
Case in point: My father was hospitalized and I was called to approve treatment over the phone. The ER personnel never gave me the HIPPA security code. Later I called to check on his status. The nursing desk staff refused to give me that information citing HIPPA. Uh...they called me as medical power of attorney to give permission to treat him yet they never gave me the top-secret security code. When I pointed out how ludicrous that was they just used HIPPA as the reason to not give me my dad's health status. I managed to bypass the idiocy with the use of said Protected Healthcare information to get the information requested. It just shows that laws are made by the powers, but the analysis of the use-cases that will interact with the laws have not been given the proper review for the cases that are exceptions.
So, all that said, nothing surprises me.
Sad but probably true. Having been employed at Fortune 50 companies as well as smaller start-ups the behavior is still the same. Usually the folks that are the muscle beneath the fat will move on. Sometimes that is not always the case, but when the culture at a company changes due to various reasons the effects on employee retainment can be devestating.:( Then again, sometimes that is exactly the point.
I'd say that workers value is based on their performance, not their familial status in some of the better companies. Personally, I think this is a sly move by HP to cause attrition amongst it's workers without overtly laying off employees. HP has been having many problems over the years including merging with Compaq. One way to avoid a public layoff is to just make the environment so uncomfortable that you end up with a mass exodos of employees without the good/bad that comes with a public layoff.
Sure, I agree that most people are not computer literate. However, the reason most of these types get caught is underestimating their victims. Another point to keep in mind is that the reason these folks sign their vehicles of mass chaos is due to pride. When met with the more adept user or someone willing to seek help from the authorities/technical assistance this hubris gets the perpetrator caught.
Heh. Actually I'd have to research it but one of the worms had the real author name in the vb script. Putting the password inside the code is amusing and poor judgement. They assumed the victim(s) wouldn't seek technical help. Bad assumption.
Yes, it's true that everyone is paranoid. Some of it may be due to fear of being accused of terrorist activities. Another thing to remember is that some of the chemicals in the old chemistry sets were toxic - such as mercury. You can still teach chemistry and science without going the gunpowder route. My daughter participated in her school science fair. We did a two-colored flower experiment splitting the stem of a carnation and putting it into two glasses with blue and red water. Another carnation was used as a control. It taught my daughter about capillary action, we made some cool two-colored carnations, and she won honorable mention at the science fair. So I guess it's really what you are trying to teach.
I agree with your comments about Spyware and ads added to a computer that you buy. Lest we forget Dell was in the news for not supporting the removal of spyware from Dell bought computers last year. This is just in keeping with their business model - essentially to not support the privacy of their customers.
I'm not massively crazy/slap-happy about sharepoint, but it does what it is supposed to do. Back early in my career when Notes was starting to lose it's edge in the market I moved away from being a C++/Java Notes API programmer and did more Windows/Unix coding erring on the side of improving my OOA/D skills instead of sticking with a particular shareware application. I have several friends that are still working as Notes Admins or Developers and their job opportunities are shrinking along with the user-base of Notes.
I used to be a Notes Developer/Adminstrator 8 years back. Even then Notes was sadly full of code bloat. If you had the skills to develop in it great, but otherwise you were out of luck. I haven't seen any real improvement on ease of use or performance. Sad but true.
As a C/C++ as well as.NET developer I agree to a certain point. My larger area for concern comes from the fact that use of native code will add potential for speed, but what about use of poorly defined memory management in the unmanaged codebase? This is an over-simplification, yet many of the security flaws in the Windows operating systems in the past were due in no little part to the use of "unmanaged code." M$ is trying to make a more secure OS (at least that is the marketing line here) yet may be seen as treading the same path as they have done in prior versions of Windoze.
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What is a larger annoyance is the SOX stuff that requires keeping emails. Then you add in the smart admins that limit your inbox size although you are not supposed to delete anything. Sure makes tons of sense.
Hopefully. After the SCO/IBM fiasco and now lest we forget the fun with RIM, it is abundantly clear that small companies are going out of their way to try to get market share, publicity, or some other unknown (sometimes backed by a larger *silent* competitor - as with M$ in the SCO/IBM case). What a waste of court bandwidth. The sad thing is that when a smaller company has a valid claim they usually lose due to being starved out by the larger corporation. Cases without true merit make it hard for real victims, as usual.
Agreed. Another troubling item is that when there is potential for multiple wages within a household one spouse often stays with the kids. On one hand that is commendable, but the reality is that when hit with college education versus retirement, things start to look a bit more grim. The reality is that in order to retire at all and still help your progeny with their education it will be a challenge for most of us. Imagine what it will take for those that only have one income and many mouths to feed. It's not like the old days where dad worked for 40 years at the same job, earned a good pension and retired in a paid-in full home. So the "working two jobs" or having two incomes may be the only feasible option in order to have a retirement.
Well, if you are tired of what you are doing or never really liked it in the first place perhaps it is time to try something else. Otherwise, see where your interests are and market/business trends. It is usually a combination of what the industry is calling for and what is a cool technology to learn. Sometimes they don't go together well. I've done everything from Java, Lotus Script, C, C++, C#, VB, ASP, various .NET web applications and rich client development. At the end of the day I'm more of a generalist, but I can be flexible enough to morph into whatever is needed at the moment. There were days in the past that I hated Lotus Script but enjoyed manipulating the Lotus Notes APIs via C++. I did a large amount of Jave development but it was almost always middle-tier or back-end. These days I'm doing more UI work because in spite of my professed dislike of that type of development I picked up a knack for understanding what my users needed and find I don't have the same extreme irritation with it any more. If you can manage to merge what you enjoy doing with what is good for your career you will be in great shape.
I agree with your sentiments. Wayyy back in college I had a shell account and learned the "end-user" way around Unix and so did my spouse. Later we purchased the "Unix/Linux for Dummies" which had a decent overview of the more obscure aspects of the two operating systems. However, even with books and shell accounts at some point you do need to take the plunge and install the OS. The SUSE distribution is a good one to start with and has a relatively painless installation. At the end of the day, as with pretty much anything you need to use a thing to learn it. These days I've joined the dark side and spend most of my time doing software development on various Windows operating systems although I can dive into Linux/Unix as needed. My spouse stayed with the rebellion and after many years is now a gifted Unix/Linux SAN Manager. My two cents.
There are many theories running rampant about the so-called Hobbits, from misidentification to the reduced brain hypothesis. Many pressures in an isolated environment can create enough genetic pressure to lead to odd physical changes. Examples are twin studies of Andes Mountains dwelling children. When separated, one twin staying in the higher elevations and the other growing up at sea level researchers have noted drastic differences in the physical morphology. These observations hold true even though the monozygotic twins are genetically identical. The Andes-dwelling child had a large barrel chest and was shorter. The child living at or near seal level was not barrel-chested and taller. Most creatures within the animal kingdom have within their very genetic code a certain level of plasticity that we've seen demonstrated again and again as in the example above. It is not that surprising that there might have been some recessive gene that was expressed in an isolated population. It may not have been due to brain-reduction, but simply local pressures. Until they can actually identify some kind of smoking gun that can state with pretty good clarity that they can prove that these individuals didn't make the toolkit discovered, I'm more open to the possibilities.
One thing that researchers have managed is to grow bladders using a cellular matrix or structure. I've read that they have successfully used such a technique to grow bladders for people that have lost theirs to diseases such as cancer. Now having the ability to grow fully functional organs without the need for a matrix of some type is outstanding for the future of organ replacement.
I don't want to dive into the religious controversy. I would like to make a point about Human psychology. People fear what they don't understand. It reminds me of what most people think a hacker is. They've seen silly movies like "Hackers" and think that those that break into computers (crack) or protect them (hack) are mystical, magical geniuses. In reality most crackers are kids that have downloaded packages like NMAP and Nessus and just try systems until they get in. Yet the mystique is enough to add a flare or fear. The same thing is at work here hidden under the covers of religion, morality, or whatever label fits. Often fear and religion go hand in hand. It's always been that way. It will continue to be that way. Just our nature.
Yeah, no kidding. It's like any addiction. Either you want to pull back from it or not. You can toss $$ out the door trying to clear out OCD-like behaviors, but at the end of the day what would you really be fixing? I'd wonder if the addicted "gamer" might not just replace one addiction with another.
I agree that the implementor is at issue. Again, the laws are made without any regard for the ramifications for the implementation/interpretation of the masses. I've dealt with at least 3 institutions that couldn't deal with the ER entry of a patient (mother and father in this case) and the power of attorney situation. The hospitals get the authorization from the Medical POA but then don't know what to do if that person (POA) is not physically standing in front of them.
Didn't see that at the hospital I was dealing with.
Sure, I agree that there are reasons for HIPPA. I used to work at a firm that required HIPPA certification and I hold a current HIPPA cert. What is troublesome is how the HIPPA laws are used to either avoid dealing with things that are broken, or that they don't necessarily protect the so-called protected information. It could also lead to a person's death if not handled by someone that can bend the rules when the exceptions arise. That's what has me concerned - the lack of a plan for when things don't flow through the gates as expected. It has nothing to do with which adminstration is in power and everything to do with what makes logical sense. The way a hospital enforces HIPPA is broken - at least in my opinion from personal experience.
Case in point: My father was hospitalized and I was called to approve treatment over the phone. The ER personnel never gave me the HIPPA security code. Later I called to check on his status. The nursing desk staff refused to give me that information citing HIPPA. Uh...they called me as medical power of attorney to give permission to treat him yet they never gave me the top-secret security code. When I pointed out how ludicrous that was they just used HIPPA as the reason to not give me my dad's health status. I managed to bypass the idiocy with the use of said Protected Healthcare information to get the information requested. It just shows that laws are made by the powers, but the analysis of the use-cases that will interact with the laws have not been given the proper review for the cases that are exceptions. So, all that said, nothing surprises me.
Sad but probably true. Having been employed at Fortune 50 companies as well as smaller start-ups the behavior is still the same. Usually the folks that are the muscle beneath the fat will move on. Sometimes that is not always the case, but when the culture at a company changes due to various reasons the effects on employee retainment can be devestating. :( Then again, sometimes that is exactly the point.
I'd say that workers value is based on their performance, not their familial status in some of the better companies. Personally, I think this is a sly move by HP to cause attrition amongst it's workers without overtly laying off employees. HP has been having many problems over the years including merging with Compaq. One way to avoid a public layoff is to just make the environment so uncomfortable that you end up with a mass exodos of employees without the good/bad that comes with a public layoff.
I like the description of "A proof of concept virus." I guess virus writers are using the Agile Methodology. j/k
Sure, I agree that most people are not computer literate. However, the reason most of these types get caught is underestimating their victims. Another point to keep in mind is that the reason these folks sign their vehicles of mass chaos is due to pride. When met with the more adept user or someone willing to seek help from the authorities/technical assistance this hubris gets the perpetrator caught.
Heh. Actually I'd have to research it but one of the worms had the real author name in the vb script. Putting the password inside the code is amusing and poor judgement. They assumed the victim(s) wouldn't seek technical help. Bad assumption.
Didn't they catch the author of one of the worm virii via their name embedded within the code? Real slick.
Yes, it's true that everyone is paranoid. Some of it may be due to fear of being accused of terrorist activities. Another thing to remember is that some of the chemicals in the old chemistry sets were toxic - such as mercury. You can still teach chemistry and science without going the gunpowder route. My daughter participated in her school science fair. We did a two-colored flower experiment splitting the stem of a carnation and putting it into two glasses with blue and red water. Another carnation was used as a control. It taught my daughter about capillary action, we made some cool two-colored carnations, and she won honorable mention at the science fair. So I guess it's really what you are trying to teach.
I agree with your comments about Spyware and ads added to a computer that you buy. Lest we forget Dell was in the news for not supporting the removal of spyware from Dell bought computers last year. This is just in keeping with their business model - essentially to not support the privacy of their customers.
I'm not massively crazy/slap-happy about sharepoint, but it does what it is supposed to do. Back early in my career when Notes was starting to lose it's edge in the market I moved away from being a C++/Java Notes API programmer and did more Windows/Unix coding erring on the side of improving my OOA/D skills instead of sticking with a particular shareware application. I have several friends that are still working as Notes Admins or Developers and their job opportunities are shrinking along with the user-base of Notes.
I used to be a Notes Developer/Adminstrator 8 years back. Even then Notes was sadly full of code bloat. If you had the skills to develop in it great, but otherwise you were out of luck. I haven't seen any real improvement on ease of use or performance. Sad but true.
As a C/C++ as well as .NET developer I agree to a certain point. My larger area for concern comes from the fact that use of native code will add potential for speed, but what about use of poorly defined memory management in the unmanaged codebase? This is an over-simplification, yet many of the security flaws in the Windows operating systems in the past were due in no little part to the use of "unmanaged code." M$ is trying to make a more secure OS (at least that is the marketing line here) yet may be seen as treading the same path as they have done in prior versions of Windoze.