It could be a way for the automakers to get something from the millions of people who, like me, will never buy a new car.
Thats one of the things some car manufactures want to kill.
They dont want people buying an old car, they want people buying a new car at new car prices. BMW et al. dont get any money from used car sales, for them that is a problem.
A lot of features that come in new cars are either designed not to last for more than 5 years or require regular software updates, people who buy these cars don't realise it but it's killing the resale value of their cars. This is called planned obsolescence and the reason why I prefer Japanese cars is that most Japanese manufacturers dont practice it to the same level as Euro or American manufacturers (mainly because they don't have to, the Japanese government have codified it into law for them).
One of the biggest offenders in the planned obsolescence game is BMW... and I'll give you three guesses who owns Mini.
I'm guessing you're happy to drive without insurance then?
Not sure about where you live but in Australia you can insure modifications. I've got a lightly modded car (intake, clutch, flywheel and ECU) and their insured so if the car is repaired under insurance I get the modified parts replaced (if they're replaced in the repairs). The only thing that increases my premiums are modifications that drastically increases the power of the car like adding forced induction (turbo or supercharger) to a N/A car or adding a bigger turbo if you've already got one.
With software hacks, they dont even need to know. I mean, my insurer doesn't give a crap if I install an aftermarket stereo or GPS system in the place of the default one and I don't have to tell them if I don't want to (of course this means they'll replace it with a stock component if it has to be replaced).
The problem is there aren't any exciting cars any more. I put this down to the decline of the manual transmission in the US.
Auto boxes, even powerful auto boxes with 300 odd HP at the rear wheels just aren't fun to drive. The old adage is, it's more fun to drive a slow car fast than a fast car slow. I used to bang an EK Civic (88 Kw) around a track and it was great fun, you cant do that with an auto because the slushbox interferes when you try to take a corner at speed, so you end up going much slower than the manual version.
Plus modern cars just aren't exiting, here's my Prius with it's 1 speed automatic transmission which does 0-100 in 20 seconds with a good tailwind. SUV's are way too high, you don't feel connected to the road at all, I can at least respect an econobox like a Yaris (your Echo's replacement) as a cheap runabout and given a manual transmission, can actually be made to be interesting to drive (well the 1.5L version can). Europeans have the right idea with hot hatches, light cars with small engines and big turbos but I still miss the days of good Japanese turbo sports coupes (Supra, 300zx, S13/14/15, Skylines, Integra, S2000).
If you read the report, on p. 37 they comment that the dataset covers 35 years (1973-2009). The conclusion is based on that dataset. However, a poem written over 100 years ago suggests that conditions in Australia were well known even then. So... is there really a trend? There may be in the data, but the data doesn't span the time period of the poem.
It was a well known event, but it's never been as bad as it was now.
Due to the wonders of science we know that the drought cycle is tied to ENSO events which have been getting more powerful in recent years, so the extreme weather events we've been experiencing here in Australia have become more frequent and more extreme.
While I don't even consider myself among the "deniers"... I think you have to be going around with a big, thick blindfold on, if you really believe the "pro climate change" researchers aren't getting some money out of it.
And how much money is flowing to the climate change deniers? Follow that money.
You'll find it dwarfs climate research grants significantly. If you think it's all a giant conspiracy to get money into the hands of researchers, you really need to up your medication because that's bordering on the paranoid delusional.
Besides this, money going to scientists doing real science is to produce accurate results. Only the money going to climate change deniers is being used to blatantly make stuff up.
I forgot to say this, my primary reason for getting a dash cam was not the cops but other drivers.
If I'm in an accident I want a clear record of what went on (because people will lie when they know its their fault) and my confidence in my driving abilities is good enough that I dont think I'll be the cause of the accident.
Um, while I support your use of the dash-cam, I see it this way. If they are inflating the numbers at all, they are lying, guilty of violating their oath of service (Australia does have those right?) and corrupt. Being pissed off simply shows they aren't mature and have no business being a cop. This isn't you capped my partner in a drug sting or punched me while I arrested you for stealing object. This is a frigging traffic ticket. There is NO excuse.
Whist there is an obligation to behave as a police officer and punishments for breaking the rules, we all know that the world does not always conform exactly to those rules. The sad thing is that you get these little napoleons in all professions that get a tiny taste of power and go mad. The Australian police forces are pretty good at keeping them out (and when they fail, a royal commission works).
Things work a bit differently in Australia. When you mouth off to a cop, he might up your ticket from a 8 KM over to a 11 KM over (9 or 10 KM over is the barrier for increased fines/demerit points). We tolerate this because the flipside of this is that if you're polite to an officer (what we call "passing the personality test") is when an officer likes you enough to reduce that alleged 12 KM over to 8 KM over.
However in the US, if you mouth of to a cop you get tasered, wrestled to the ground, held down and cuffed whilst the officer shouts "stop resisting".
That being said, I have become convinced over time that the artist-record company relationship is actually fair. Artists don't make the majority of the money that gets plunked down for their songs. But, you know, what? They aren't really doing much of the work either. Artists write and perform the song.This takes work, surely. Let's be generous and say each individual song takes a full person year to write and get good at. Record companies dump enormous resources into promoting it. This includes the work of hundreds (thousands?) of people resulting in the expenditure of many years of person effort. It seems to me like the record company is actually the one contributing more value. What happens to artists who try to succeed without record companies, or grants from universities? A tiny percentage of them earn enough to subsist. There is a reason for this.
This is entirely true for your Bieber's, Beoynce's and Skrillex's. But it wasn't always the case.
This is largely due to the fact that music has pretty much died and what we've been left with requires so much post production and marketing to sell, the "artist" is almost unnecessary. The only reason they still need real people is because of the uncanny valley. If we could make an image indistinguishable from a real person, record labels could get rid of the useless meat.
Long gone are the days where bands would write a new record almost entirely on tour, then produce it in a studio over 3 months and it would be mastered a short time later mainly because the band needed to get back on tour to earn money. I'm using Nirvana's Nevermind as an example, recorded between May and June 1991, Mastered on the 2nd of August 1991 and released on the 24th of September 1991. Between the 2nd of May and the 2nd of August, they produced one of the worlds greatest albums, a period of 4 months and half of that was recording. Most of the work was done by Cobain, Novoselic, Grohl and the producer, Butch Vig.
A far cry from today where most of the music is not only fixed by computers, it's actually generated by computers. Beyond the initial recordings, the "artist" (I'm using that term very loosely) isn't required and doesn't really have any input. We now have pop and rap which is largely the creation of computers but dubstep and electronic music is entirely the work of computers. This is why it has become so expensive and time consuming to produce a studio album. You dont start with a band using instruments to produce a near finished product, you have to create that from scratch.
And we're all suffering because of it.
Previously bands would work their way up, playing at parties, weddings, just about anything to get noticed, to get fans. Now so called "artists" are relying on marketing and saturating radio coverage to get people to like their crud. Music is albeit dead now, replaced with rap, dubstep and electronic substitutes. Soon the man with the guitar will be an endangered species.
As a resident of San Diego, I hope to goodness that I don't run into her... or to be more literal, that she doesn't physically run into me or anyone in my family.
To weasel out of an everyday traffic ticket is one thing... but to say that she's "defending the future" is an affront to the public servants and to regular drivers and citizens who are just trying to make our roads safe.
[...]
At some point, we need to just label "idiotic" for what it is, and admit that some "causes" are just that.
This,
Call a spade a spade, a lot of people are just idiots when driving. I'm all for protecting and advancing freedoms, but in the grand scheme of things, the freedom for some moron to smack into people at high speed on the motorway is so far down the list of priorities it's not funny.
The only way to fix bad drivers is by better training. The Nordic nations have extremely low road tolls despite a prevalent drinking culture and a lot of icy roads. It might have something to do with their rigorous driver training which includes skidpan sessions (in wet and icy conditions) as well as night driving courses. People need to learn how to control a car and not rely on software to save them in an emergency.
With that defense, yeah - a total douche. She isn't "defending the future", she's trying to dodge the speeding ticket, with a twist that she was caught what the state of California (IMHO rightly) defines as a monitor. They didn't say it was a "television", and neither does the citation.
Sorry, ma'am, but even if you manage to get the law itself changed, you're still guilty of violating it.
This,
My experience with driving in the US (specifically California) is that if she wasn't doing 80+ in a 65 zone the cops would have picked someone who was, they wouldn't have had to wait long at all. She was caught speeding and is trying to make a spectacle out of it in order to get off.
Whether Google Glass can be classed as a drivers aid is a different issue entirely. Personally I think drivers need to be taught properly in the first place, rather than relying on devices to compensate for their lack of skill (a lack of skill that is obvious enough in Australian drivers, but American drivers make Australians look good).
Secondly, the Google Glasses have GPS, so they could have been recording her speed. This is one of the reasons I have a dashcam, more specifically a dashcam that also records my speed. Few cops in Australia will outright lie (as in make up a charge), but a lot will inflate a speed figure if their pissed off, so an alleged 8 over becomes a 12 over and the fine is doubled (and you get more demerit points).
I used a 12" powerbook for 4 years before replacing it with a 15" macbook pro, which I'm still using as my primary home machine 6 years later. Over a similar timeframe, I've gone through about 5 computers at work.
My mum used the same Windows 98 PC from 1998 to 2011. 12 years.
The only reason she upgraded was because I bought a bargain basement Windows 7 machine from a box retailer as a Christmas gift. I gave her my old 22" monitor in place of the 18" it came with, an 18" fits better on my crash cart anyway.
You see, the thing is my mother doesn't do anything other than read email and use farmbook. Thats it, she didn't see a need to upgrade because her current PC did everything she needed despite being 12 years old. So the longevity of a computer is really up to the user. If you dont use it for anything strenuous, there's no impetus to upgrade.
I used a Gen1 iPhone for over three years before upgrading to an iPhone 4, which I am still using 3+ years later.
Going back to my mum, she used a Nokia brick since 2005 when she first got a phone and that was a hand me down from my dad. She got an Iphone 4s they year they were released and she's had 3 since because they've all broken. I try to convince her to get a more durable phone but she's stuck in the Apple trap.
Good for individual commands, but not for learning the syntax. That's the bit that stumps me. and the fact that some syntaxes work on some commands and not on others annoys me.
I would like a good but brief overview of how powershell commands are actually structured without having to go through a massive Microsoft Press book. Man pages are everywhere on the internet but dont offer a lot of info on actual usage.
Sounds more like your change control process is broken than Powershell being broken (though the fact that PS4.0 breaks many core MS apps on 2008/R2 is pretty lame)
Actually it's both. Powershell's version problems causes headaches.
Bad change control causes headaches.
The second headache does not excuse the first headache, it's like saying that its not bad that I've lost an arm, because now you're going to cut off one of my legs.
In this case, it wasn't worth another headache to get Powershell updated on an entire exchange cluster (which as per usual, management demands zero downtime on).
let's see
in the 80's when soldiers would get paid in cash or real paper checks they would get robbed outside the army base gates on their way to the bank. direct deposit solved that issue
used to be that people kept cash at home. but if your home burns down or you are robbed or whatever, you lose all your money. with CC's you dispute charges and don't lose a dime
Except the 3% or so the bank charges the merchant for accepting your card.
Its the perfect scam, get you (the consumer) addicted to using credit, then charge the merchant for accepting it. The merchant cant say no because you (the credit addled) get uppity and make a scene. Welcome to the false economy of credit cards
Only an absolute idiot believes that banks do things for free, anything for free.
I worked on POS systems back in the late 90s - so, keep in mind my knowledge is not recent - no really, retailers move at a snails pace when it comes to technology.
First, this was an inside job. POS systems are too stupid to connect to the Internet.
I think your info's a little out of date. Most stores run embedded Windows XP on their Point Of Sale equipment (Althouth the other meaning of POS is perfectly suitable here). It's trivial to connect them to the internet. But all you really have to do is connect them to a network (which you have to for EFT to work, let alone connecting back to the mainframe that runs the POS back end) which then makes them vulnerable to a worm from a single infected computer. Not that I disagree that this is an inside job, it's still the most likely explanation even if the staff member was working for someone else.
Also, because banks charge per EFTPOS terminal, a lot of stores will have all electronic transactions done by a single computer in store and all other terminals will be slaved to that computer, when you pay $30 per EFTPOS terminal per month, with 15 checkouts that adds up to a bit ($5400 per year) and as you said, retail operates on razor thin margins.
Working on point of sale systems in 2010's has scared me out of using my card in store. Cash is safer as ATM's are much harder to break into.
Windows 95 and 3.1 still had the same fundamental interface. These same fundamentals exist in Windows 7. There's a marked improvement between them, most notable between 98/ME and 2000/XP but this is due to switching from DOS based systems to NT based systems but still the UI remained uniform, familiar even though the underlying systems had changed.
Looking at Windows 3.1 to Windows 7 the change seemed radical, but it was for anyone who started in Windows 3 or earlier it was extremely gradual. A lot of the success of Windows XP can be attributed to the fact it behaved exactly like Windows 98 with a new coat of paint for almost all users. Once you got past the garish colour scheme it was the same with a few added bits. Same with Windows 3.1 to 95, if you used 3.1 you could use 95 with no problems apart from the fact it looked a little different.
I have seen the numbers actually for a major nation wide retail chain; from an activity based costing perspective.
And here's where you're lying.
Because beyond running my own business I've seen the MSF (Merchant Service Fee) costs for several fuel supply companies (we're talking multinationals here).
The costs on accepting credit cards are insane, staff costs are about half of what they pay in MSF's.
I used to run a PC hardware supply business. My shop front cost me $580 per week in rent, my 3% merchant service fee (a very average MSF) meant that if I did 25,000 turnover in a week, which was not common, but something I did several weeks a year my MSF would cost more than my rent.
.
Back to those multinationals, they might be able to negotiate a 2 or 1.8% MSF, but the profit margins on selling petrol are in the
So my business, Why did I continue to accept credit cards, well few pay for a $2500 system with cash. I couldn't fight this because banks condition people to use credit, they give you incentives but take the cost of those incentives from businesses. If I could turn over 25 grand a week, why did I quit. Well for PC hardware the margins are razor thin. I had a 5% margin that my MSF reduced to 2%, after rents, staffing costs and all the rest, $500 bucks a week in the bank. But I rant a sucessful business that a minor chain decided was worth money... So I sold it for a decent sum.
So I know a thing or two about how things really work in business. Major chains dont care about losing 2% to credit cards because they make billions in turnover, so making less than 1% in profit is easily acceptable. Those multinational petrol suppliers were hardly hurting for money in the middle of the GFC.
Metro on servers is a big turn off but MS will be slow to accept that server admins have different GUI needs. Sure core is catching on some but the GUI users will stick around until forced to use powershell.
The problem isn't GUI users, its the fact Powershell is complete shite.
All this time I cant get a basic instruction on how Powershell works without getting a 500 page book. Learning Linux and AIX wasn't this hard (granted the Linux training covered a lot of the AIX ground).
Also you have to deal with different versions of Powershell, I once spent an entire day constructing a Powershell script for Exchange 2007 only to find out it required Powershell v3 and only v2 was installed on 2008 by default. It was easier to get management to give up on the idea then go through change control to get Powershell updated.
Write a good clean seperation for the launcher and let app developers go to town, like they do on Android. Let the best one win, and incorperate its fearues as the offical one.
I'm an Android fan... but no.
Most people will get saddled with whatever their manufacturer decides to give them. One of Windows' strengths is Androids weakness, uniformity. Someone who has used Windows in other jobs or even other parts of their lives knows the interface. Considering that Windows is a business tool first and foremost, you dont want to be forced to familiarise every staff member with the SOE's most basic interface.
The best interface for Windows is the one they've been using all along. Although the Windows XP and 7 UI are much improved over Windows 3.1, the basics are still the same.
I'm waiting for 9.1. Don't want to be first in the pool.
It'll be fine. It's really just going to be re-badged Windows 7.
Well unless Microsoft really want to screw with their main revenue source (business), it will be.
Windows 7 and Windows XP weren't successful because they were radical, they were successful because they were more of the same, but slightly better. Considering that the majority of MS customers already pay by the year for the same products (Windows licenses, not Windows itself) incremental improvements would be a solid business model. Radical features can be introduced one at a time as opposed to all at once.
a couple things. Handling cash costs retailers money too. Might not impact smaller ones as much but box stores and like it makes a difference. Cash transactions take longer, so they need more checkers, it takes longer to get cash to the bank do they lose interest. Assistant managers often still hourly have to count it, and they usually need an armored car service to come pick it up, and it increases theft risks.
You've never run a business.
I'm not asking, I'm telling because I ran a business and Merchant Service Fees were higher than my staffing costs or my utility bills. Sometimes they were even higher than my rent.
If you honestly think cash is more expensive than credit to accept, you've never seen the figures.
Add to this that electronic transactions can take several days to go through (this is due to the bank interchange system, so switching banks doesn't help), if you're a business that has to buy stuff on daily basis (like fresh food) too many EFT customers can kill you even whilst your business seems strong.
Agree with everything... Though, who actually checks system requirements these days unless you know your machine is so marginal that it isn't even funny. I'll grant maybe I'm not the average, maybe I'm blinded by my own experiences and resources, but unless you're wanting to play Crysis at won't most people's normal machines handle the vast vast majority of games without even blinking?
Am I wrong here?
Considering Crysis came out in 2007... OK I'm being pedantic:)
I agree with your point, the only problem you have is people who dont play games, buying games. Little Johnny's dad buys him Call Of Repetition 46, Dickwolf Ops on PC, he doesn't know or care if it would work in the ancestral family computer. Consoles do eliminate this problem, but introduce dozens more as the GGP pointed out.
The solution is for the people wanting to play the game, becoming involved in buying them (system requirements are published these days, a quick Google will tell you more than the back of the box ever will) otherwise they will remain chained to the console. Some will even begin to like it with some form of Stockholm Syndrome, not only accepting and liking the abuse, but also inflicting it on themselves and others.
Slashdot Mirror
It could be a way for the automakers to get something from the millions of people who, like me, will never buy a new car.
Thats one of the things some car manufactures want to kill.
They dont want people buying an old car, they want people buying a new car at new car prices. BMW et al. dont get any money from used car sales, for them that is a problem.
A lot of features that come in new cars are either designed not to last for more than 5 years or require regular software updates, people who buy these cars don't realise it but it's killing the resale value of their cars. This is called planned obsolescence and the reason why I prefer Japanese cars is that most Japanese manufacturers dont practice it to the same level as Euro or American manufacturers (mainly because they don't have to, the Japanese government have codified it into law for them).
One of the biggest offenders in the planned obsolescence game is BMW... and I'll give you three guesses who owns Mini.
I'm guessing you're happy to drive without insurance then?
Not sure about where you live but in Australia you can insure modifications. I've got a lightly modded car (intake, clutch, flywheel and ECU) and their insured so if the car is repaired under insurance I get the modified parts replaced (if they're replaced in the repairs). The only thing that increases my premiums are modifications that drastically increases the power of the car like adding forced induction (turbo or supercharger) to a N/A car or adding a bigger turbo if you've already got one.
With software hacks, they dont even need to know. I mean, my insurer doesn't give a crap if I install an aftermarket stereo or GPS system in the place of the default one and I don't have to tell them if I don't want to (of course this means they'll replace it with a stock component if it has to be replaced).
My fiance was plenty impressed by my Echo
An Echo isn't as bad as a prius.
The problem is there aren't any exciting cars any more. I put this down to the decline of the manual transmission in the US.
Auto boxes, even powerful auto boxes with 300 odd HP at the rear wheels just aren't fun to drive. The old adage is, it's more fun to drive a slow car fast than a fast car slow. I used to bang an EK Civic (88 Kw) around a track and it was great fun, you cant do that with an auto because the slushbox interferes when you try to take a corner at speed, so you end up going much slower than the manual version.
Plus modern cars just aren't exiting, here's my Prius with it's 1 speed automatic transmission which does 0-100 in 20 seconds with a good tailwind. SUV's are way too high, you don't feel connected to the road at all, I can at least respect an econobox like a Yaris (your Echo's replacement) as a cheap runabout and given a manual transmission, can actually be made to be interesting to drive (well the 1.5L version can). Europeans have the right idea with hot hatches, light cars with small engines and big turbos but I still miss the days of good Japanese turbo sports coupes (Supra, 300zx, S13/14/15, Skylines, Integra, S2000).
If you read the report, on p. 37 they comment that the dataset covers 35 years (1973-2009). The conclusion is based on that dataset. However, a poem written over 100 years ago suggests that conditions in Australia were well known even then. So... is there really a trend? There may be in the data, but the data doesn't span the time period of the poem.
It was a well known event, but it's never been as bad as it was now.
Due to the wonders of science we know that the drought cycle is tied to ENSO events which have been getting more powerful in recent years, so the extreme weather events we've been experiencing here in Australia have become more frequent and more extreme.
While I don't even consider myself among the "deniers" ... I think you have to be going around with a big, thick blindfold on, if you really believe the "pro climate change" researchers aren't getting some money out of it.
And how much money is flowing to the climate change deniers? Follow that money.
You'll find it dwarfs climate research grants significantly. If you think it's all a giant conspiracy to get money into the hands of researchers, you really need to up your medication because that's bordering on the paranoid delusional.
Besides this, money going to scientists doing real science is to produce accurate results. Only the money going to climate change deniers is being used to blatantly make stuff up.
If everyone drives 80 in a 65 zone, maybe the zone is marked incorrectly.
If everyone jumped of a bridge... then jumping of a bridge must be good then.
Just because everyone is doing it, doesn't make it a good idea.
I forgot to say this, my primary reason for getting a dash cam was not the cops but other drivers.
If I'm in an accident I want a clear record of what went on (because people will lie when they know its their fault) and my confidence in my driving abilities is good enough that I dont think I'll be the cause of the accident.
Um, while I support your use of the dash-cam, I see it this way. If they are inflating the numbers at all, they are lying, guilty of violating their oath of service (Australia does have those right?) and corrupt. Being pissed off simply shows they aren't mature and have no business being a cop. This isn't you capped my partner in a drug sting or punched me while I arrested you for stealing object. This is a frigging traffic ticket. There is NO excuse.
Whist there is an obligation to behave as a police officer and punishments for breaking the rules, we all know that the world does not always conform exactly to those rules. The sad thing is that you get these little napoleons in all professions that get a tiny taste of power and go mad. The Australian police forces are pretty good at keeping them out (and when they fail, a royal commission works).
Things work a bit differently in Australia. When you mouth off to a cop, he might up your ticket from a 8 KM over to a 11 KM over (9 or 10 KM over is the barrier for increased fines/demerit points). We tolerate this because the flipside of this is that if you're polite to an officer (what we call "passing the personality test") is when an officer likes you enough to reduce that alleged 12 KM over to 8 KM over.
However in the US, if you mouth of to a cop you get tasered, wrestled to the ground, held down and cuffed whilst the officer shouts "stop resisting".
I like our system better.
This is entirely true for your Bieber's, Beoynce's and Skrillex's. But it wasn't always the case. This is largely due to the fact that music has pretty much died and what we've been left with requires so much post production and marketing to sell, the "artist" is almost unnecessary. The only reason they still need real people is because of the uncanny valley. If we could make an image indistinguishable from a real person, record labels could get rid of the useless meat.
Long gone are the days where bands would write a new record almost entirely on tour, then produce it in a studio over 3 months and it would be mastered a short time later mainly because the band needed to get back on tour to earn money. I'm using Nirvana's Nevermind as an example, recorded between May and June 1991, Mastered on the 2nd of August 1991 and released on the 24th of September 1991. Between the 2nd of May and the 2nd of August, they produced one of the worlds greatest albums, a period of 4 months and half of that was recording. Most of the work was done by Cobain, Novoselic, Grohl and the producer, Butch Vig.
A far cry from today where most of the music is not only fixed by computers, it's actually generated by computers. Beyond the initial recordings, the "artist" (I'm using that term very loosely) isn't required and doesn't really have any input. We now have pop and rap which is largely the creation of computers but dubstep and electronic music is entirely the work of computers. This is why it has become so expensive and time consuming to produce a studio album. You dont start with a band using instruments to produce a near finished product, you have to create that from scratch.
And we're all suffering because of it.
Previously bands would work their way up, playing at parties, weddings, just about anything to get noticed, to get fans. Now so called "artists" are relying on marketing and saturating radio coverage to get people to like their crud. Music is albeit dead now, replaced with rap, dubstep and electronic substitutes. Soon the man with the guitar will be an endangered species.
As a resident of San Diego, I hope to goodness that I don't run into her... or to be more literal, that she doesn't physically run into me or anyone in my family.
To weasel out of an everyday traffic ticket is one thing... but to say that she's "defending the future" is an affront to the public servants and to regular drivers and citizens who are just trying to make our roads safe.
[...]
At some point, we need to just label "idiotic" for what it is, and admit that some "causes" are just that.
This,
Call a spade a spade, a lot of people are just idiots when driving. I'm all for protecting and advancing freedoms, but in the grand scheme of things, the freedom for some moron to smack into people at high speed on the motorway is so far down the list of priorities it's not funny.
The only way to fix bad drivers is by better training. The Nordic nations have extremely low road tolls despite a prevalent drinking culture and a lot of icy roads. It might have something to do with their rigorous driver training which includes skidpan sessions (in wet and icy conditions) as well as night driving courses. People need to learn how to control a car and not rely on software to save them in an emergency.
With that defense, yeah - a total douche. She isn't "defending the future", she's trying to dodge the speeding ticket, with a twist that she was caught what the state of California (IMHO rightly) defines as a monitor. They didn't say it was a "television", and neither does the citation.
Sorry, ma'am, but even if you manage to get the law itself changed, you're still guilty of violating it.
This,
My experience with driving in the US (specifically California) is that if she wasn't doing 80+ in a 65 zone the cops would have picked someone who was, they wouldn't have had to wait long at all. She was caught speeding and is trying to make a spectacle out of it in order to get off.
Whether Google Glass can be classed as a drivers aid is a different issue entirely. Personally I think drivers need to be taught properly in the first place, rather than relying on devices to compensate for their lack of skill (a lack of skill that is obvious enough in Australian drivers, but American drivers make Australians look good).
Secondly, the Google Glasses have GPS, so they could have been recording her speed. This is one of the reasons I have a dashcam, more specifically a dashcam that also records my speed. Few cops in Australia will outright lie (as in make up a charge), but a lot will inflate a speed figure if their pissed off, so an alleged 8 over becomes a 12 over and the fine is doubled (and you get more demerit points).
My iPhone can do everything I can do on my workstation. The screen is too small to be productive at some tasks, but it can do everything.
If it can do everything your workstation can do, you don't need a powerful workstation.
Bargain basement laptop here you come. It's got all the power you need.
I used a 12" powerbook for 4 years before replacing it with a 15" macbook pro, which I'm still using as my primary home machine 6 years later. Over a similar timeframe, I've gone through about 5 computers at work.
My mum used the same Windows 98 PC from 1998 to 2011. 12 years.
The only reason she upgraded was because I bought a bargain basement Windows 7 machine from a box retailer as a Christmas gift. I gave her my old 22" monitor in place of the 18" it came with, an 18" fits better on my crash cart anyway.
You see, the thing is my mother doesn't do anything other than read email and use farmbook. Thats it, she didn't see a need to upgrade because her current PC did everything she needed despite being 12 years old. So the longevity of a computer is really up to the user. If you dont use it for anything strenuous, there's no impetus to upgrade.
I used a Gen1 iPhone for over three years before upgrading to an iPhone 4, which I am still using 3+ years later.
Going back to my mum, she used a Nokia brick since 2005 when she first got a phone and that was a hand me down from my dad. She got an Iphone 4s they year they were released and she's had 3 since because they've all broken. I try to convince her to get a more durable phone but she's stuck in the Apple trap.
Try typing man. That should get you started. :-)
Good for individual commands, but not for learning the syntax. That's the bit that stumps me. and the fact that some syntaxes work on some commands and not on others annoys me.
I would like a good but brief overview of how powershell commands are actually structured without having to go through a massive Microsoft Press book. Man pages are everywhere on the internet but dont offer a lot of info on actual usage.
Sounds more like your change control process is broken than Powershell being broken (though the fact that PS4.0 breaks many core MS apps on 2008/R2 is pretty lame)
Actually it's both. Powershell's version problems causes headaches.
Bad change control causes headaches.
The second headache does not excuse the first headache, it's like saying that its not bad that I've lost an arm, because now you're going to cut off one of my legs.
In this case, it wasn't worth another headache to get Powershell updated on an entire exchange cluster (which as per usual, management demands zero downtime on).
let's see
in the 80's when soldiers would get paid in cash or real paper checks they would get robbed outside the army base gates on their way to the bank. direct deposit solved that issue
used to be that people kept cash at home. but if your home burns down or you are robbed or whatever, you lose all your money. with CC's you dispute charges and don't lose a dime
Except the 3% or so the bank charges the merchant for accepting your card.
Its the perfect scam, get you (the consumer) addicted to using credit, then charge the merchant for accepting it. The merchant cant say no because you (the credit addled) get uppity and make a scene. Welcome to the false economy of credit cards
Only an absolute idiot believes that banks do things for free, anything for free.
I think your info's a little out of date. Most stores run embedded Windows XP on their Point Of Sale equipment (Althouth the other meaning of POS is perfectly suitable here). It's trivial to connect them to the internet. But all you really have to do is connect them to a network (which you have to for EFT to work, let alone connecting back to the mainframe that runs the POS back end) which then makes them vulnerable to a worm from a single infected computer. Not that I disagree that this is an inside job, it's still the most likely explanation even if the staff member was working for someone else.
Also, because banks charge per EFTPOS terminal, a lot of stores will have all electronic transactions done by a single computer in store and all other terminals will be slaved to that computer, when you pay $30 per EFTPOS terminal per month, with 15 checkouts that adds up to a bit ($5400 per year) and as you said, retail operates on razor thin margins.
Working on point of sale systems in 2010's has scared me out of using my card in store. Cash is safer as ATM's are much harder to break into.
Graphically yes, but fundamentally, no.
Windows 95 and 3.1 still had the same fundamental interface. These same fundamentals exist in Windows 7. There's a marked improvement between them, most notable between 98/ME and 2000/XP but this is due to switching from DOS based systems to NT based systems but still the UI remained uniform, familiar even though the underlying systems had changed.
Looking at Windows 3.1 to Windows 7 the change seemed radical, but it was for anyone who started in Windows 3 or earlier it was extremely gradual. A lot of the success of Windows XP can be attributed to the fact it behaved exactly like Windows 98 with a new coat of paint for almost all users. Once you got past the garish colour scheme it was the same with a few added bits. Same with Windows 3.1 to 95, if you used 3.1 you could use 95 with no problems apart from the fact it looked a little different.
I have seen the numbers actually for a major nation wide retail chain; from an activity based costing perspective.
And here's where you're lying.
Because beyond running my own business I've seen the MSF (Merchant Service Fee) costs for several fuel supply companies (we're talking multinationals here).
The costs on accepting credit cards are insane, staff costs are about half of what they pay in MSF's.
I used to run a PC hardware supply business. My shop front cost me $580 per week in rent, my 3% merchant service fee (a very average MSF) meant that if I did 25,000 turnover in a week, which was not common, but something I did several weeks a year my MSF would cost more than my rent.
. Back to those multinationals, they might be able to negotiate a 2 or 1.8% MSF, but the profit margins on selling petrol are in the
So my business, Why did I continue to accept credit cards, well few pay for a $2500 system with cash. I couldn't fight this because banks condition people to use credit, they give you incentives but take the cost of those incentives from businesses. If I could turn over 25 grand a week, why did I quit. Well for PC hardware the margins are razor thin. I had a 5% margin that my MSF reduced to 2%, after rents, staffing costs and all the rest, $500 bucks a week in the bank. But I rant a sucessful business that a minor chain decided was worth money... So I sold it for a decent sum.
So I know a thing or two about how things really work in business. Major chains dont care about losing 2% to credit cards because they make billions in turnover, so making less than 1% in profit is easily acceptable. Those multinational petrol suppliers were hardly hurting for money in the middle of the GFC.
Metro on servers is a big turn off but MS will be slow to accept that server admins have different GUI needs. Sure core is catching on some but the GUI users will stick around until forced to use powershell.
The problem isn't GUI users, its the fact Powershell is complete shite.
All this time I cant get a basic instruction on how Powershell works without getting a 500 page book. Learning Linux and AIX wasn't this hard (granted the Linux training covered a lot of the AIX ground).
Also you have to deal with different versions of Powershell, I once spent an entire day constructing a Powershell script for Exchange 2007 only to find out it required Powershell v3 and only v2 was installed on 2008 by default. It was easier to get management to give up on the idea then go through change control to get Powershell updated.
Write a good clean seperation for the launcher and let app developers go to town, like they do on Android. Let the best one win, and incorperate its fearues as the offical one.
I'm an Android fan... but no.
Most people will get saddled with whatever their manufacturer decides to give them. One of Windows' strengths is Androids weakness, uniformity. Someone who has used Windows in other jobs or even other parts of their lives knows the interface. Considering that Windows is a business tool first and foremost, you dont want to be forced to familiarise every staff member with the SOE's most basic interface.
The best interface for Windows is the one they've been using all along. Although the Windows XP and 7 UI are much improved over Windows 3.1, the basics are still the same.
I'm waiting for 9.1. Don't want to be first in the pool.
It'll be fine. It's really just going to be re-badged Windows 7.
Well unless Microsoft really want to screw with their main revenue source (business), it will be.
Windows 7 and Windows XP weren't successful because they were radical, they were successful because they were more of the same, but slightly better. Considering that the majority of MS customers already pay by the year for the same products (Windows licenses, not Windows itself) incremental improvements would be a solid business model. Radical features can be introduced one at a time as opposed to all at once.
a couple things. Handling cash costs retailers money too. Might not impact smaller ones as much but box stores and like it makes a difference. Cash transactions take longer, so they need more checkers, it takes longer to get cash to the bank do they lose interest. Assistant managers often still hourly have to count it, and they usually need an armored car service to come pick it up, and it increases theft risks.
You've never run a business.
I'm not asking, I'm telling because I ran a business and Merchant Service Fees were higher than my staffing costs or my utility bills. Sometimes they were even higher than my rent.
If you honestly think cash is more expensive than credit to accept, you've never seen the figures.
Add to this that electronic transactions can take several days to go through (this is due to the bank interchange system, so switching banks doesn't help), if you're a business that has to buy stuff on daily basis (like fresh food) too many EFT customers can kill you even whilst your business seems strong.
That's the thing about CREDIT cards, the customer generally doesn't take the financial fall for fraud.
The nice banks will certainly take it out of their bottom line. They'd never charge additional fees to recoup their loses.
They'll certainly never make the merchant pay fees (which will get passed onto you in the form of higher prices.
Agree with everything... Though, who actually checks system requirements these days unless you know your machine is so marginal that it isn't even funny. I'll grant maybe I'm not the average, maybe I'm blinded by my own experiences and resources, but unless you're wanting to play Crysis at won't most people's normal machines handle the vast vast majority of games without even blinking?
Am I wrong here?
Considering Crysis came out in 2007... OK I'm being pedantic :)
I agree with your point, the only problem you have is people who dont play games, buying games. Little Johnny's dad buys him Call Of Repetition 46, Dickwolf Ops on PC, he doesn't know or care if it would work in the ancestral family computer. Consoles do eliminate this problem, but introduce dozens more as the GGP pointed out.
The solution is for the people wanting to play the game, becoming involved in buying them (system requirements are published these days, a quick Google will tell you more than the back of the box ever will) otherwise they will remain chained to the console. Some will even begin to like it with some form of Stockholm Syndrome, not only accepting and liking the abuse, but also inflicting it on themselves and others.