In my experience, sudden unexplainable slow performance often ends up being a hard disk issue. Are you seeing a lot of hard disk activity?
People often assume that such problems are much more malicious than they actually are. I'd check to make sure DMA is still active on your primary disk and grab a copy your manufacturer's disk check utility.
I actually just took a job in software development on z/OS (the new hip, backwards-hat wearing mainframe operating system). Aside from the impressive clustering capabilities, we've got a lot of new and exciting stuff. (I personally am a big fan of AT-TLS) It's true that the systems are old and the interfaces archaic and painful to use, but the level of configurability and reliability these things offer is staggering. We have a few customers with 100% uptimes in the 20-year range.
My school (Northern Illinois University) actually is one of the few left offering full mainframe tracks in their computer science department, although COBOL was the most painful programming experience of my life.
I'd bet that my meta-group of 50 or so people has a median age of about 33, and while it is still the old dinosaurs who know the most, the definition of "dinosaur" in my personal, 15 person group is around 50 years old.
excuse me, I am a really good programmer, did the whole 9 yards growing up as a stereotypical geek (not into sports, into programming way before it was fashionable to do so, from basic, to turbo pascal, to z80 assembly etc.), I lived and breathed programming and computers for many years of my life, however now I am in my late 30s and I try to have a much healthier work-life balance, I don't see why this should be a negative at all.
While that may be true, you're posting on Slashdot, and while this may seem like a fairly innocuous act to you, to me it shows that you clearly have a lot more of that extra-workplace motivation than some people do.
Of course, maybe you posted this from work and have in fact been wasting time all day on this inane bullshit, in which case I suppose that says something else;)
The idea that you aren't as smart if your interface is simple is a stupid one, and makes me want to take away the spedometer in your car to illustrate the point. You're absolutely right. I'll concede that simpler interfaces aren't always less powerful than complex ones. The dashboard on my car typically tells me nothing more than what I need to get from point-A to point-B without running out of gas or getting arrested. Isolating the user from internal complexities has to be pretty high up there on the list of reasons to have a simple interface. Hell, it may be one of the only reasons.
Really what this is ultimately about from my perspective is general human laziness. There aren't many statements I can make on the topic that wouldn't spark a fight, so I'll tread carefully.
I see a lot more mentally lazy people than I see mentally active people in most of my classes. I would guess 60-70% of students just don't engage themselves inside the classroom at all. And being an RA, I get to learn about many of these students in an up close and personal (eg, them vomiting on me) way. At the end of the day, I look around, and see a handful of people who actually care about the world around them, versus hundreds who just want to grab another drink. And while I realize that in college, I'm bound to be around more lazy drunks than any time in my life, I still worry a bit about the world's future.
So I suppose it's wrong to take out my distaste for lazy people on (over?)simplification, but I can't help wonder if it's just fuel for their bad habits.
Society in the 2500's has become so stupid (due to the idiots breeding like crazy, and the intelligent people not getting any) that even doctors have been reduced to people who push large, user-friendly, multi-colored buttons with pictures of different ailments on them, and let a machine do the rest of the work.
While I thought the movie exaggerated quite a bit, it did make me wonder about all of the simplification we are starting to integrate into a lot of our products. The reason Apple many products (eg, iPods) are so wildly popular is that the user doesn't have to think very much to make it work.
Now perhaps this is simply paving the way for people to concentrate on more important issues, but then, there is a difference between not needing to think and not being able to think.
Have you had a look at Sony's latest eReader? I've been considering purchasing one myself, as laptops really are too bulky for enjoyable reading on a couch or in bed.
Of course the real problem with eReaders is the cost; even these "cheap" new Sony ones still cost around $450.
- I asked Google: "How far is Saturn from the Sun?"
It replied "Saturn - Distance From the Sun: Mean: 1427 million KM (9.539 au.)
Max: 1507 million KM (10.069 au.) Min: 1347 KM (9.008 au.)"
- I asked Google "What is the population of Fiji?"
It replied "Fiji -- Population: 905,949 (July 2006 Est.)"
It's actually pretty amazing when you think about it in 1995 terms.
entrapment, in law, the instigation of a crime in the attempt to obtain cause for a criminal prosecution. Situations in which a government operative merely provides the occasion for the commission of a criminal act (e.g., when an undercover agent posing as a narcotics dealer is approached by a would-be customer) do not constitute entrapment. Only when the crime was not initially contemplated by the target is entrapment said to occur: thus, for example, an undercover agent may not recruit a previously law-abiding individual into a drug distribution ring in order to prosecute. Many police operations, especially in the areas of drugs and gambling, raise questions of entrapment, which is available as a defense in a trial.
I should note (before someone else does) that I was meaning that Apple limits me to only one machine for my music synchronization, not the actual music files. (Though those are limited to only 5 machines).
It's one thing to pull an Apple and try to limit my music to one machine, but when my music needs to phone home once a week to unlock itself, that's a whole next level of wrong. I tried using our University's music system "Ruckus", but after the first "lockout" message I encountered during one of our frequent internet outages, I was done for life.
While it is true that any technician who doesn't know what the A+ cert is should probabally be laughed at, that does not mean that it is worth anything. Sure, it's all nice that I know that the little black thing in a floppy disk is called a mylar, but that has nothing to do with actually making a computer work.
The only way to really know what you're getting in a tech is to talk to his (or occastionally her) previous customers and find out:
1. Is he willing to be patient with explaining what he is doing before, during, and after the job?
2. Does he charge a fair price for his skill level?
3. Is he a nice person in general?
4. Does he actually know what he is doing?
Which gets me on another topic entirely. Even the most basic of newbies can do well in the support world if they are willing to treat their customers right. Back when I was a 7th grade hot shot who knew how to replace a stick of RAM in under 2 hours, people would still hire me, and even pay me more than my asking price because I fit categories 1,2, and 3, even if I still had to grown in number 4.
The problem with this can be that many of the most "viral" commericals often have little to do with the actual product being sold. Sure, everyone knows that the creepy king character that we all [love|hate] is for Burger King, but what about all those commericals with half-naked women figting over beer? I for one couldn't tell you which beer giant made those up. (Although, sadly, I could describe the both of the women easily.)
I use the Century CD organizer which is available from http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTool s/item-details.asp?EdpNo=548251&CatId=44. One unit hold 100 CDs and is controled from your PC via USB or Serial. The included software isn't the greatest, but it does get the job done, and an upgraded software package will be out soon that allows you to view/search the contents of each disc. I have 3 at home and the work wonders for me - especially since the software keeps track of who I lend each disc out to, so I know who to hunt down if something goes missing.
That really depends on what your definition of network engineer is. I know a so called "network engineer" who works with a certain giant insurance company, and rakes in sickening amounts of cash. Perhaps your definition of "network engineer" is closer to my definition of "support analyst" - the poor fellow who gets to run around and do the bidding of not only his or her boss, but also of nagging users.
Now granted, my example happens to be a top notch CCIE, but I still think that the typical network engineer (either a physical network, eg. routers/switches, type person or a software network, eg. servers/desktops, type person) is much higher up on the food chain than say, a help-desk tech or a QBASIC programmer.
Slashdot Mirror
>I like it when C obliterates my foot every now and then.
Once again reinforcing the stereotype that people who enjoy programming in C are masochists at heart.
In my experience, sudden unexplainable slow performance often ends up being a hard disk issue. Are you seeing a lot of hard disk activity?
People often assume that such problems are much more malicious than they actually are. I'd check to make sure DMA is still active on your primary disk and grab a copy your manufacturer's disk check utility.
I actually just took a job in software development on z/OS (the new hip, backwards-hat wearing mainframe operating system). Aside from the impressive clustering capabilities, we've got a lot of new and exciting stuff. (I personally am a big fan of AT-TLS) It's true that the systems are old and the interfaces archaic and painful to use, but the level of configurability and reliability these things offer is staggering. We have a few customers with 100% uptimes in the 20-year range.
My school (Northern Illinois University) actually is one of the few left offering full mainframe tracks in their computer science department, although COBOL was the most painful programming experience of my life.
I'd bet that my meta-group of 50 or so people has a median age of about 33, and while it is still the old dinosaurs who know the most, the definition of "dinosaur" in my personal, 15 person group is around 50 years old.
While that may be true, you're posting on Slashdot, and while this may seem like a fairly innocuous act to you, to me it shows that you clearly have a lot more of that extra-workplace motivation than some people do.
Of course, maybe you posted this from work and have in fact been wasting time all day on this inane bullshit, in which case I suppose that says something else
Reminds me of the movie Idocracy:
Society in the 2500's has become so stupid (due to the idiots breeding like crazy, and the intelligent people not getting any) that even doctors have been reduced to people who push large, user-friendly, multi-colored buttons with pictures of different ailments on them, and let a machine do the rest of the work.
While I thought the movie exaggerated quite a bit, it did make me wonder about all of the simplification we are starting to integrate into a lot of our products. The reason Apple many products (eg, iPods) are so wildly popular is that the user doesn't have to think very much to make it work.
Now perhaps this is simply paving the way for people to concentrate on more important issues, but then, there is a difference between not needing to think and not being able to think.
C0
Of course the real problem with eReaders is the cost; even these "cheap" new Sony ones still cost around $450.
- I asked Google: "How far is Saturn from the Sun?"
It replied "Saturn - Distance From the Sun: Mean: 1427 million KM (9.539 au.)
Max: 1507 million KM (10.069 au.) Min: 1347 KM (9.008 au.)"
- I asked Google "What is the population of Fiji?"
It replied "Fiji -- Population: 905,949 (July 2006 Est.)"
It's actually pretty amazing when you think about it in 1995 terms.
entrapment, in law, the instigation of a crime in the attempt to obtain cause for a criminal prosecution. Situations in which a government operative merely provides the occasion for the commission of a criminal act (e.g., when an undercover agent posing as a narcotics dealer is approached by a would-be customer) do not constitute entrapment. Only when the crime was not initially contemplated by the target is entrapment said to occur: thus, for example, an undercover agent may not recruit a previously law-abiding individual into a drug distribution ring in order to prosecute. Many police operations, especially in the areas of drugs and gambling, raise questions of entrapment, which is available as a defense in a trial.
I should note (before someone else does) that I was meaning that Apple limits me to only one machine for my music synchronization, not the actual music files. (Though those are limited to only 5 machines).
It's one thing to pull an Apple and try to limit my music to one machine, but when my music needs to phone home once a week to unlock itself, that's a whole next level of wrong. I tried using our University's music system "Ruckus", but after the first "lockout" message I encountered during one of our frequent internet outages, I was done for life.
While it is true that any technician who doesn't know what the A+ cert is should probabally be laughed at, that does not mean that it is worth anything. Sure, it's all nice that I know that the little black thing in a floppy disk is called a mylar, but that has nothing to do with actually making a computer work.
The only way to really know what you're getting in a tech is to talk to his (or occastionally her) previous customers and find out:
1. Is he willing to be patient with explaining what he is doing before, during, and after the job?
2. Does he charge a fair price for his skill level?
3. Is he a nice person in general?
4. Does he actually know what he is doing?
Which gets me on another topic entirely. Even the most basic of newbies can do well in the support world if they are willing to treat their customers right. Back when I was a 7th grade hot shot who knew how to replace a stick of RAM in under 2 hours, people would still hire me, and even pay me more than my asking price because I fit categories 1,2, and 3, even if I still had to grown in number 4.
The problem with this can be that many of the most "viral" commericals often have little to do with the actual product being sold. Sure, everyone knows that the creepy king character that we all [love|hate] is for Burger King, but what about all those commericals with half-naked women figting over beer? I for one couldn't tell you which beer giant made those up. (Although, sadly, I could describe the both of the women easily.)
I use the Century CD organizer which is available from http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTool s/item-details.asp?EdpNo=548251&CatId=44. One unit hold 100 CDs and is controled from your PC via USB or Serial. The included software isn't the greatest, but it does get the job done, and an upgraded software package will be out soon that allows you to view/search the contents of each disc. I have 3 at home and the work wonders for me - especially since the software keeps track of who I lend each disc out to, so I know who to hunt down if something goes missing.
That really depends on what your definition of network engineer is. I know a so called "network engineer" who works with a certain giant insurance company, and rakes in sickening amounts of cash. Perhaps your definition of "network engineer" is closer to my definition of "support analyst" - the poor fellow who gets to run around and do the bidding of not only his or her boss, but also of nagging users. Now granted, my example happens to be a top notch CCIE, but I still think that the typical network engineer (either a physical network, eg. routers/switches, type person or a software network, eg. servers/desktops, type person) is much higher up on the food chain than say, a help-desk tech or a QBASIC programmer.