However, why did they only include 256MB of flash storage instead of a larger quantity like 2 GB or so?
Many people who exercise smaller flash storage options get flash drives larger than 512MB, so was it really that much more expensive to bump up the available flash storage a little bit?
Regardless, I look forward to the performance benefits devices like these will provide.
I am confused about the concept of cloud computing. Is it supposed to be similar to that of the famed beowulf cluster, as in making a supercomputing platform out of regular computer networks? Or does it use more powerful computers and cluster them together?
Furthermore, what would be the point of doing this exactly?
I go to a party with a head on my shoulders and a limit as to how much I can drink. I drink some alcohol, have fun, and leave either when the party's over or when I get to the tipping point (not drunk, but not entirely in control).
I, for one, refuse to join the ranks of those that must see drunkenness as a means to enjoy themselves. It's self-demeaning, and I completely disagree with it. Furthermore, I'm a cyclist, so it's important to keep tabs on my health.:-D
I drink occassionally to "pep" me up, but definitely not to get drunk. It's no fun being "tipsy" and having little coordination over yourself, so I don't even want to imagine how it would feel to be completely out of it. Many enjoy that, but I personally avoid the troubles that it brings (stupid actions, hangovers, embarrassing situations, etc.)
For a city like New York, the median income statistics can be heavily unreliable, since these measurements include areas like the Upper East Side, the pearls and diamonds of the city, as well as several ofits opposites.
I think what you meant was that GSM mobile providers cannot simply disallow phones that were unlocked by other means than carrier-provided services. Unlocking a phone has been shown to be a legal practice and is endorsed in many countries.
However, carriers CAN "brick" phones using the phone's IMEI. For instance, this is done when a user reports their phone to be stolen. The SIM on the stolen phone is disablea and, in many instances, the phone itself is placed on a blacklist via IMEI, thus preventing it to be activated on any network.
...but it was inevitable. Think about it: while Windows Vista is a great operating system and a recommended upgrade from Windows XP, it has been shown all too many times that there are still growing pains evident with it. There are many drivers that are still being tested and revised due to vastly new frameworks implemented by Microsoft (Creative's situation immediately comes to mind, even though it's thankfully been resolved). Furthermore, there are many software packages that have or will definitely have compatibility issues with Vista (financial applications are a huge example of this, since they tend to be much more conservative. I'm not including the super-large firms that absolutely need to continue relying on extremely antiquated software).
While officially removing Windows XP support will be mostly transparent to end users, developers will be forced to migrate all of their time and energy to a new operating system with a lot of changes under the hood instead of spending time steadily updating current software while researching and testing compatible Vista software as well. Many IT managers and decision-makers will have to devote much more energy to supporting Vista faster, which can result in less-than-stellar results (it's corporate habit to accept a new operating system much later than their introduction).
I think this is a good way for Microsoft to ensure that they keep the risks of transition as minimal as possible. Vista migration will undoubtedly happen, but it's best that it is slow and exceptional rather than rapid and disappointing (as many users are quickly finding out).
Anyone who has had to deal with cockroach buildups in an apartment or house would know that in order to prevent them from coming to your kitchen is to wipe it down really well, because once they start coming, it's damn near impossible to stop them. Once they find a hint of food in a certain location, they will continue to look for it in the same location...
Well, given that this is an internship and is only to last about 3 or 4 more months, I will probably stick it out (since I don't have a choice;-). I'm more optomistic about it, since I have been anxiously waiting to have a real programming job, so I am hoping that there might be a larger opportunity for me waiting when I finish learning how to write Java GUI code without any GUI Editors to help me:-(
I do agree with your first statement. Even in my firm, there are a lot of positions that are clearly intended for fresh college graduates with "glaring" resumes that would make any filter happy. Most of these positions are replaceable, but some go for the corporate ladder.
As for me, I'd rather just worry about biking to work and leaving it at that.
Funny that I was just about to do an AskSlash about this issue because I was starting to get concerned.
It's been very difficult for me to stay up or want to stay up at the current internship that I'm in, which involves writing software for a corporate firm. While the job itself can be stimulating and logically challenging at times, sometimes I feel like I just have a hard time really concentrating on anything. It's not so much the environment; most of the people that work with me are very active in talking about their roles and responsibilities (most conversations either directly involve or segway into this). Actually, I'm not really sure what it is.
I really like to be mobile and move around in my jobs, but I am devoid of needing to do that for this. My main job is to sit down and review/rewrite/create code. I've never done this before, so maybe I'm just not accustomed to needing to look at a computer screen for 8.5+ hours every business day.
In general, IT jobs can have some physical downtime; it's just inevitable. As for kissing co-workers, I would presume that this is more prominent in corporate environments because the physical quality of the girls are MUCH better than those of more research-oriented or specialized firms (forgive me if I've insulted anyone). I know that there are several women at my job that I would love to take out to dinner sometime, but it can be difficult dealing with a formidable age gap as an intern in a pretty established department...
While many might be hoping that there would be some kind of barrier to prevent Apple from deploying such a limitation, it is everything but illegal to do so. The writer of the original article, while providing persuasive evidence that there might have been a warranty violation breach, does not analyze the full letter of that law nor does any sort of comparison with Apple's own legal warranty claims.
If you take a look at the official Apple warranty for the iPhone, there are a couple of points in their exclusions that make clear that they are within legal bounds to do this:
"...to damage caused by service (including upgrades and expansions) performed by anyone who is not a representative of Apple or an Apple Authorized Service Provider ("AASP")..."
"(a) to damage caused by use with non-Apple products;..."
"(e) to a product or part that has been modified to alter functionality or capability without the written permission of Apple"
If these rules were illegal, they would have been contested before their publication, thus before the release of the device. Apple needs to have these rules in place so that they do not have to pay costs for repairing devices that were broken by people who bought phones to intentionally harm them by all sorts of means. The company made a deal with AT&T, and in that deal there was an implicit demand that the phones stay locked to only their service provider, hence making them an exclusive carrier. Altering this would alter the functionality of the phone against Apple's policy, thus proving a legal voiding of warranty.
We can even take this a step further. Even if Apple had no EULA and only went by the letter of the Magnuson-Moss law, the clause in defense only applies for full warranties, for which Apple's product comes only with a limited warranty. This makes a significant difference, as those provisions no longer apply. This is clearly stated in the Wikipedia article linked to this article.
While I do not defend this decision entirely, it is obvious that if you are a user of an unlocked iPhone, and the firmware update only serves to remedy this "flaw," then the solution is easily to avoid the upgrade. There are no new features or enhancements being introduced in this update, so why is this even a concern?
Maybe I'm one of the very few in your definition, but on a personal note I've never done any sort of computer programming until my freshman year of college, and even then the course was taught in a manner too liberal for anyone to learn anything. I started doing real code last year, and it is now fairly easy for me to pick up any language with the right amount of learning time.
It's not so much the age of exposure that's important, but the level of interest that is. If someone wants to learn how to program, they will with enough guidance. Unfortunately, this is a declining trend in the United States...
In all honesty, I would not be surprised if more companies went the way of distributing free (as in beer) components of their larger software. Quick examples I can think of are VMWare's server product and Adobe Photoshop's free fork.
From the videos that were shown, this looks perfectly correct. For those that think that the police acted with too much brutality, compare this situation to the issue that happened a few months (a year?) back with the UCLA student who was tasered for simply resisting to show an ID.
The Apple Classic line suffers from the same fate as the 2nd generation iPod nanos. They both use a completely new chipset not based on PortalPlayer, which is the platform that Rockbox uses. I'm sure it will get ported over time, but it probably will not happen any time soon.
I'll second this. If I needed full Windows compatibility (as I seem to need with Outlook 2003), I would run a VM with some low-resource Windows OS on it (I'm using Server 2003 on it) and let that handle it. For anything else, CrossOver Office (a WINE fork) works flawlessly and without much hard work involved. Nothing beats using Word without using Windows!
So far, I have been able to solve most of my business application needs through the use of either Crossover Office (sucks for Outlook) or VirtualBox running Windows Server 2003 (great for Outlook). However, in my opinion, I think there are some simple user options left out in Linux that are beyond reason at this point.
One example is an equalizer. Why is it impossible to get a decent equalizer for any media application in Linux? There is a HUGE variety of media players for Linux, but NONE (except VLC) offer some kind of reasonable equalizer support! Maybe Amarok, but under GNOME it has run pretty terribly and is kludgey anyway.
Also, why is it so difficult to set up surround sound for my system? So far, it has been quite the mission to get any surround sound support for my sound card (external) under any distribution. Then again, the fault may not be necessary aimed at Linux...
Actually, I have to disagree with this somewhat. The stock fonts are not great, but after I installed the MS fonts and some of the Vista fonts (Segoe UI, Calibri, Candara, etc.), Segoe looked better on Ubuntu than it did on Vista or XP! It kind of looks like OS X fonts, except not as much. You have to apply the "right" sub-pixel rendering to get it perfect, though.
If there were to be such a concept as an ad-driven phone, would it not need some kind of internet connection to get those ads? What if the user prefers not to sign up for a data plan? (Have you seen the prices on Verizon Wireless's EV-DO network? They would drive anyone away!) Does that mean that the user will receive a call every so often for an add like those that lots of users currently get? Or does this mean that the ad will have to be placed in a call because that's the only forceful way that Google can be assured commercial revenue off this product?
I don't think this campaign makes much sense. However, if it were to pull it off and make phone service somewhat cheaper, then I guess that can only be good, if anything, for the sake of competition.
In regard to the tuition increases, I think that it is, for the most part, very necessary for universities to keep getting their fair share of top-rate students and not let *all* of them go to the Ivies for their educational needs. Laboratories for engineering students as well as successful business teachers for the business students have their costs; this is probably the only fair way to justify them.
However, my big problem is with this dichotomy that Engineering/Science majors are worth more than Humanities/Art/Business/whatever students or vice versa. I highly disagree with this. As an Engineering student, I think the existence of [almost] every field is important to maintain some kind of equilibrium in this world. The engineer can construct the biggest and most beautiful buildings, but it takes an artist to suggest the most beautiful design, a businessman to get the financing for the project, a historian to recommend if the idea is good or not based on empirical evidence, and so on. I am not saying that there are fields that are reasonably difficult to justify their worth ("Media Studies," anyone?), but I do not think that it is right to automatically jump the gun and call one major "useless" relative to another because of their more immediate value.
In the end, if it is a salary-based comparison that drives these debates, I do not think that one's respective field matters in determining the level of that person's financial success. Yes, deciding to study Law, Medicine, or Engineering might give one a better chance of reaping more immediate financial benefits, but the people that usually make it to "the top" do it because of their own abilities, not because of the major they chose.
...and get the student a used laptop off Craig's List for about $100 cheaper that has similar specs and such...
This computer is a great deal; an excellent deal for anyone with financial conservation in mind. However, there are so many used PCs (and laptops now) that will not only save you money getting, but will also be getting a computer that is more responsive and trusted (has anyone ever heard of Everex?)
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However, why did they only include 256MB of flash storage instead of a larger quantity like 2 GB or so?
Many people who exercise smaller flash storage options get flash drives larger than 512MB, so was it really that much more expensive to bump up the available flash storage a little bit?
Regardless, I look forward to the performance benefits devices like these will provide.
I am confused about the concept of cloud computing. Is it supposed to be similar to that of the famed beowulf cluster, as in making a supercomputing platform out of regular computer networks? Or does it use more powerful computers and cluster them together?
Furthermore, what would be the point of doing this exactly?
...is USELESS without pics!
I'll let my Karma burn along with this guy.
I think I know of the proper way to party.
I go to a party with a head on my shoulders and a limit as to how much I can drink. I drink some alcohol, have fun, and leave either when the party's over or when I get to the tipping point (not drunk, but not entirely in control).
I, for one, refuse to join the ranks of those that must see drunkenness as a means to enjoy themselves. It's self-demeaning, and I completely disagree with it. Furthermore, I'm a cyclist, so it's important to keep tabs on my health. :-D
I will attest that not all of them do.
I drink occassionally to "pep" me up, but definitely not to get drunk. It's no fun being "tipsy" and having little coordination over yourself, so I don't even want to imagine how it would feel to be completely out of it. Many enjoy that, but I personally avoid the troubles that it brings (stupid actions, hangovers, embarrassing situations, etc.)
For a city like New York, the median income statistics can be heavily unreliable, since these measurements include areas like the Upper East Side, the pearls and diamonds of the city, as well as several of its opposites.
An annual salary of $60,000 with more than 4 kids to one family is considered poverty living by New York State Law.
I think what you meant was that GSM mobile providers cannot simply disallow phones that were unlocked by other means than carrier-provided services. Unlocking a phone has been shown to be a legal practice and is endorsed in many countries.
However, carriers CAN "brick" phones using the phone's IMEI. For instance, this is done when a user reports their phone to be stolen. The SIM on the stolen phone is disablea and, in many instances, the phone itself is placed on a blacklist via IMEI, thus preventing it to be activated on any network.
...but it was inevitable. Think about it: while Windows Vista is a great operating system and a recommended upgrade from Windows XP, it has been shown all too many times that there are still growing pains evident with it. There are many drivers that are still being tested and revised due to vastly new frameworks implemented by Microsoft (Creative's situation immediately comes to mind, even though it's thankfully been resolved). Furthermore, there are many software packages that have or will definitely have compatibility issues with Vista (financial applications are a huge example of this, since they tend to be much more conservative. I'm not including the super-large firms that absolutely need to continue relying on extremely antiquated software).
While officially removing Windows XP support will be mostly transparent to end users, developers will be forced to migrate all of their time and energy to a new operating system with a lot of changes under the hood instead of spending time steadily updating current software while researching and testing compatible Vista software as well. Many IT managers and decision-makers will have to devote much more energy to supporting Vista faster, which can result in less-than-stellar results (it's corporate habit to accept a new operating system much later than their introduction).
I think this is a good way for Microsoft to ensure that they keep the risks of transition as minimal as possible. Vista migration will undoubtedly happen, but it's best that it is slow and exceptional rather than rapid and disappointing (as many users are quickly finding out).
Anyone who has had to deal with cockroach buildups in an apartment or house would know that in order to prevent them from coming to your kitchen is to wipe it down really well, because once they start coming, it's damn near impossible to stop them. Once they find a hint of food in a certain location, they will continue to look for it in the same location...
Just sayin'.
Well, given that this is an internship and is only to last about 3 or 4 more months, I will probably stick it out (since I don't have a choice ;-). I'm more optomistic about it, since I have been anxiously waiting to have a real programming job, so I am hoping that there might be a larger opportunity for me waiting when I finish learning how to write Java GUI code without any GUI Editors to help me :-(
I do agree with your first statement. Even in my firm, there are a lot of positions that are clearly intended for fresh college graduates with "glaring" resumes that would make any filter happy. Most of these positions are replaceable, but some go for the corporate ladder.
As for me, I'd rather just worry about biking to work and leaving it at that.
Funny that I was just about to do an AskSlash about this issue because I was starting to get concerned.
It's been very difficult for me to stay up or want to stay up at the current internship that I'm in, which involves writing software for a corporate firm. While the job itself can be stimulating and logically challenging at times, sometimes I feel like I just have a hard time really concentrating on anything. It's not so much the environment; most of the people that work with me are very active in talking about their roles and responsibilities (most conversations either directly involve or segway into this). Actually, I'm not really sure what it is.
I really like to be mobile and move around in my jobs, but I am devoid of needing to do that for this. My main job is to sit down and review/rewrite/create code. I've never done this before, so maybe I'm just not accustomed to needing to look at a computer screen for 8.5+ hours every business day.
In general, IT jobs can have some physical downtime; it's just inevitable. As for kissing co-workers, I would presume that this is more prominent in corporate environments because the physical quality of the girls are MUCH better than those of more research-oriented or specialized firms (forgive me if I've insulted anyone). I know that there are several women at my job that I would love to take out to dinner sometime, but it can be difficult dealing with a formidable age gap as an intern in a pretty established department...
Good article.
While many might be hoping that there would be some kind of barrier to prevent Apple from deploying such a limitation, it is everything but illegal to do so. The writer of the original article, while providing persuasive evidence that there might have been a warranty violation breach, does not analyze the full letter of that law nor does any sort of comparison with Apple's own legal warranty claims.
If you take a look at the official Apple warranty for the iPhone, there are a couple of points in their exclusions that make clear that they are within legal bounds to do this: "...to damage caused by service (including upgrades and expansions) performed by anyone who is not a representative of Apple or an Apple Authorized Service Provider ("AASP")..." "(a) to damage caused by use with non-Apple products;..." "(e) to a product or part that has been modified to alter functionality or capability without the written permission of Apple"If these rules were illegal, they would have been contested before their publication, thus before the release of the device. Apple needs to have these rules in place so that they do not have to pay costs for repairing devices that were broken by people who bought phones to intentionally harm them by all sorts of means. The company made a deal with AT&T, and in that deal there was an implicit demand that the phones stay locked to only their service provider, hence making them an exclusive carrier. Altering this would alter the functionality of the phone against Apple's policy, thus proving a legal voiding of warranty.
We can even take this a step further. Even if Apple had no EULA and only went by the letter of the Magnuson-Moss law, the clause in defense only applies for full warranties, for which Apple's product comes only with a limited warranty. This makes a significant difference, as those provisions no longer apply. This is clearly stated in the Wikipedia article linked to this article.
While I do not defend this decision entirely, it is obvious that if you are a user of an unlocked iPhone, and the firmware update only serves to remedy this "flaw," then the solution is easily to avoid the upgrade. There are no new features or enhancements being introduced in this update, so why is this even a concern?
Strongly disagree.
Maybe I'm one of the very few in your definition, but on a personal note I've never done any sort of computer programming until my freshman year of college, and even then the course was taught in a manner too liberal for anyone to learn anything. I started doing real code last year, and it is now fairly easy for me to pick up any language with the right amount of learning time.
It's not so much the age of exposure that's important, but the level of interest that is. If someone wants to learn how to program, they will with enough guidance. Unfortunately, this is a declining trend in the United States...
In all honesty, I would not be surprised if more companies went the way of distributing free (as in beer) components of their larger software. Quick examples I can think of are VMWare's server product and Adobe Photoshop's free fork.
From the videos that were shown, this looks perfectly correct. For those that think that the police acted with too much brutality, compare this situation to the issue that happened a few months (a year?) back with the UCLA student who was tasered for simply resisting to show an ID.
Correct.
The Apple Classic line suffers from the same fate as the 2nd generation iPod nanos. They both use a completely new chipset not based on PortalPlayer, which is the platform that Rockbox uses. I'm sure it will get ported over time, but it probably will not happen any time soon.
It just looks better than anything else that's out there. It's UI is also really well developed (albeit very restrictive to more adventurous types).
A refurbished iPhone is already $349.99 for the 8GB version, if you want to snag it before the holidays. Take a look here.
I'll second this. If I needed full Windows compatibility (as I seem to need with Outlook 2003), I would run a VM with some low-resource Windows OS on it (I'm using Server 2003 on it) and let that handle it. For anything else, CrossOver Office (a WINE fork) works flawlessly and without much hard work involved. Nothing beats using Word without using Windows!
So far, I have been able to solve most of my business application needs through the use of either Crossover Office (sucks for Outlook) or VirtualBox running Windows Server 2003 (great for Outlook). However, in my opinion, I think there are some simple user options left out in Linux that are beyond reason at this point.
One example is an equalizer. Why is it impossible to get a decent equalizer for any media application in Linux? There is a HUGE variety of media players for Linux, but NONE (except VLC) offer some kind of reasonable equalizer support! Maybe Amarok, but under GNOME it has run pretty terribly and is kludgey anyway.
Also, why is it so difficult to set up surround sound for my system? So far, it has been quite the mission to get any surround sound support for my sound card (external) under any distribution. Then again, the fault may not be necessary aimed at Linux...
Actually, I have to disagree with this somewhat. The stock fonts are not great, but after I installed the MS fonts and some of the Vista fonts (Segoe UI, Calibri, Candara, etc.), Segoe looked better on Ubuntu than it did on Vista or XP! It kind of looks like OS X fonts, except not as much. You have to apply the "right" sub-pixel rendering to get it perfect, though.
If there were to be such a concept as an ad-driven phone, would it not need some kind of internet connection to get those ads? What if the user prefers not to sign up for a data plan? (Have you seen the prices on Verizon Wireless's EV-DO network? They would drive anyone away!) Does that mean that the user will receive a call every so often for an add like those that lots of users currently get? Or does this mean that the ad will have to be placed in a call because that's the only forceful way that Google can be assured commercial revenue off this product?
I don't think this campaign makes much sense. However, if it were to pull it off and make phone service somewhat cheaper, then I guess that can only be good, if anything, for the sake of competition.
In regard to the tuition increases, I think that it is, for the most part, very necessary for universities to keep getting their fair share of top-rate students and not let *all* of them go to the Ivies for their educational needs. Laboratories for engineering students as well as successful business teachers for the business students have their costs; this is probably the only fair way to justify them.
However, my big problem is with this dichotomy that Engineering/Science majors are worth more than Humanities/Art/Business/whatever students or vice versa. I highly disagree with this. As an Engineering student, I think the existence of [almost] every field is important to maintain some kind of equilibrium in this world. The engineer can construct the biggest and most beautiful buildings, but it takes an artist to suggest the most beautiful design, a businessman to get the financing for the project, a historian to recommend if the idea is good or not based on empirical evidence, and so on. I am not saying that there are fields that are reasonably difficult to justify their worth ("Media Studies," anyone?), but I do not think that it is right to automatically jump the gun and call one major "useless" relative to another because of their more immediate value.
In the end, if it is a salary-based comparison that drives these debates, I do not think that one's respective field matters in determining the level of that person's financial success. Yes, deciding to study Law, Medicine, or Engineering might give one a better chance of reaping more immediate financial benefits, but the people that usually make it to "the top" do it because of their own abilities, not because of the major they chose.
Just my 2 cents.
...and get the student a used laptop off Craig's List for about $100 cheaper that has similar specs and such...
This computer is a great deal; an excellent deal for anyone with financial conservation in mind. However, there are so many used PCs (and laptops now) that will not only save you money getting, but will also be getting a computer that is more responsive and trusted (has anyone ever heard of Everex?)
Those are my two cents.