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Comment Re:Many regular people own MSFT (Score 1) 521

by Pigskin-Referee (#38083928) Attached to: Microsoft Shareholders Unhappy After Annual Meeting

I love standards, there are so many to choose from. Actually, Microsoft had the first universally used standard in relation to word processing with its "DOC" format. As is the standard with open-sore software, they -- referring to open-sore developers -- they contrived to create a new standard which further confused the situation.

I do love the concept of "pirated copy" though. It is probably an extremely old version and I have no doubt but that you will not even take the time to update it before attempting to use it. Pathetic to say the least. By the way, would you mind if someone "pirated" your car for an evening?

Comment Re:Many regular people own MSFT (Score 1) 521

by Pigskin-Referee (#38083888) Attached to: Microsoft Shareholders Unhappy After Annual Meeting

You don't give the OS or Word version so it is not possible to diagnose your problems. In any case, I have used MS Word for over 10 years and have never experienced the problems you claim to be having. You remind me of a newbie using FreeBSD for the first time and not understanding why the sound card, etcetera does not work. If you lack the basic skills to operate the system or applications then there is no way you can experience satisfactory results.

Submission + - Scientist creates thermal 'invisibility cloak' (msn.com)

Submitted by Pigskin-Referee
Pigskin-Referee writes: It no longer belongs to the wizarding world of Harry Potter: A scientist at the University of Texas at Dallas has created his own invisibility cloak.

"We really can hide objects. ... We can switch for a short moment and make it disappear," said Ali Aliev, a physicist at UTD.

His "cloak" right now is small several strands of what look like thread.

But sure enough, in a video of his experiment, you see the strands and then, a second later, they disappear.

The threadlike material is made of carbon nanotubes, Aliev said. He discovered that the material becomes so hot when heated up that it can bend light around an object, making it look as if it has disappeared. (The phenomenon is similar to the way desert heat can create a mirage.)

Right now, the technology is limited to Aliev's lab, but in time the material could easily hide large objects, such as military tankers, he said.

Scientists in the United Kingdom are working on similar technology.

There, inventors have created plates that can stick to an object such as a tank. The plates can heat up or cool down very quickly, matching the temperature outside. When the scene is viewed with a thermal infrared imaging system — for example, night vision goggles the object seems to disappear.

Experts said both technologies are years away from being on the market. Still, what once seemed like science fiction could now be science fact, Aliev said.

"So it's interesting for ordinary people, because usually [scientists] show something microsized under some microscope ... but here, in real time, real objects [were] disappearing," he said.

Comment FreeBSD: Not yet rasy for prime time (Score 1) 487

by Pigskin-Referee (#37997538) Attached to: In Favor of FreeBSD On the Desktop

FreeBSD is a joke. It has no support for wireless "N" devices and poor support for the remaining ones. Getting a simple sound card up and running in FreeBSD can be a serious PIA. In fact, the number of modern devices that don't work or don't work correctly in FreeBSD far exceeds those that do. FreeBSD is dedicated to finding the hardest way to do things and then doing it. It spends way to much time trying to reinvent the wheel rather than taking advantage of it. When you add in that the FreeBSD "INSTALLER" is straight out of the dinosaur age, I can not fathom why anyone other than a true masochist would bother with the OS. Even KDE and Gnome work poorly under FreeBSD. Not surprising when you consider that they have to extensively patch those desktops just to get them running all. Applications like LibreOffice work poorly under a FreeBSD environment.

It has been my experience that the best way to turn a prospective user away from OpenSource software is to let them spend 30 days attempting to install and configure a FreeBSD system and desktop. They soon come running back to Microsoft at light speed. When you then consider that FreeBSD offers no support other than its poorly maintained and often highly abusive "mail forum", I can see why it is easier to find a virgin in a whore house than finding a satisfied FreeBSD user.
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft-Skype Deal Poised to Win EU Approval (pcmag.com)

Submitted by Pigskin-Referee
Pigskin-Referee writes: Microsoft's proposed $8.5 billion acquisition of Skype has earned the approval of the European Union, the Financial Times reported Thursday.

The European Commissioner for Competition, Joaquin Almunia, is expected to rule that the acquisition won't harm competition or turn Skype into a Microsoft-exclusive platform.

The decision ignores accusations that Microsoft is simply bundling services on Windows to drown out smaller competitors, as argued by Italian Skype rival Messagenet last week. Messagenet also urged the Commission to require Microsoft to unbundle Skype from its Windows Office Suite.

The FT reports that Microsoft "promised" the Commission it would keep Skype interoperable and supported on rival operating systems.

"We're committed to the Skype user base," said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer back in May, addressing antitrust concerns at the time. "We want to continue to build and engage that base. Part of that commitment is continuing to support Skype on non-Microsoft platforms."
Facebook

Submission + - Google+: Worse Than a Ghost Town (pbs.org)

Submitted by Pigskin-Referee
Pigskin-Referee writes: When Google rolled out the beta of their "magical and revolutionary" social network (oops, sorry — that's Apple's line), I dutifully signed up like everybody else in the tech industry. I played around with it and found some features I really liked — and some that made me scratch my head and think "Why in the world can't I do that? I can do it on Facebook." I circlified my friends and acquaintances, followed a few people I knew only by reputation, thoroughly enjoyed the "instant upload" feature for smart phones despite its scary aspects, got thoroughly annoyed while trying to navigate the interface a few times, and then ... headed back to Facebook. It seems as if most others are doing the same thing; I've noticed a drop-off in posts on G+ lately (when I bother to go there). I haven't given up on it, but it's an afterthought, whereas Facebook is a part of my life. It's not that Facebook is technically better — in many ways, it's not (although Facebook as been hard at work, making improvements to give people the functionality they've found and like on G+). Ultimately, social networking is about the people, and in general, the people I care about and enjoy "hanging out" with (to borrow a G+ term) are on Facebook. I'll log onto G+ if I want to get into a technical discussion or a political argument. Many of my colleagues are there. But my friends are on Facebook.

Comment So NO to Murdoch (Score 1) 264

by Pigskin-Referee (#37349676) Attached to: After Firing CEO, Yahoo Puts Itself Up For Sale

If Yahoo were ever sold to that slimy, dirt bag Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation I would never use it again for anything.

From what I have read, the infrastructure at Yahoo is seriously dated. Selling to Microsoft with their large cash reserves might prove to be a wise decision. On the other hand, Microsoft tried once and failed. At this point in time Yahoo is by no means as an attractive commodity.
Chrome

Submission + - Internet Explorer 9 safest Web browser? (msn.com)

Submitted by Pigskin-Referee
Pigskin-Referee writes: When it comes to blocking malware, Microsoft's Internet Explorer 9 seems to come out on top, by leaps and bounds, over other browsers.

Tests by NSS Labs to "examine the ability of five different web browsers to protect users from socially-engineered malware" showed that IE9 was able to block this kind of threat 99 percent of the time, beating out Apple Safari 5, Google Chrome 12, Mozilla Firefox 4 and Opera 11.

The closest another Web browser got to that blocking-the-bad stuff rate was Chrome, at a very distant 13.2 percent. At the low end of the blockers was Opera, with a 6.1 percent rate.

NSS also tested socially engineered malware targeted at users in Asia Pacific and in Europe and found IE9 again seemed to blow the others away, with a 95 percent mean block rate in Asia and 92 percent in Europe. Chrome was again second, with a 15.4 percent block rate in Asia being its highest score. Opera again finished last.
Windows

Submission + - 94 Percent of New PCs Will Ship with Windows 7 (pcworld.com)

Submitted by Pigskin-Referee
Pigskin-Referee writes: The Apple Mac is steadily grabbing market share, but Windows-based systems continue to dominate the worldwide personal computer market, according to a new Gartner study.

The report is good news for Microsoft, which has taken its licks lately in the mobile computing market. Redmond's well-received but slow-selling Windows Phone 7 OS has yet to catch on among consumers, who are snapping up Apple iOS and Google Android handsets like crazy.

Windows 7 has proven a big hit on the desktop, however: 42 percent of PCs worldwide will run Win 7 by the end of 2011, Gartner reports. And nearly 635 million new PCs are expected to ship with the OS by the end of the year.

After a slow start, corporations are finally migrating from Windows XP to Windows 7. "Many enterprises have been planning their deployment of Windows 7 for the last 12 to 18 months, and are now moving rapidly to Windows 7," said Gartner research director Annette Jump in a statement.

However, Windows 7 will likely be the last version of Microsoft's iconic OS that gets deployed via massive, enterprise-wide migrations. The move toward virtual and cloud computing architectures in the next five years will change how upcoming versions of Windows are deployed, the study says.

Another long-term issue for Windows is the rise of "OS-agnostic" applications for both consumer and enterprise PCs. As early as next year, half of enterprise apps won't be tied to any particular operating system. In the consumer market, the proportion of OS-agnostic apps already exceeds Windows-specific apps, Gartner estimates.

What About Mac and Linux?

Apple's slice of the global PC pie may be small, but Mac adoption is growing above the market average. The Mac OS shipped on 3.3 percent of new PCs worldwide in 2008. That figure climbed to 4 percent in 2010, and to 4.5 percent this year--and it's projected to grown to 5.2 percent by 2015, Gartner says.

The Mac's popularity varies by region, however. Its strongest support is in North America and Western Europe, but its fastest growth may occur in some emerging countries where its current base is small. Gartner attributes the Mac's rise not only to its easy-to-use interface, but also to its integration with Apple mobile devices such as the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.

Gartner is less optimistic about Linux, which it predicts will remain a niche OS over the next five years with a global share below 2 percent. In the consumer market, Linux will be a non-entity with less than 1 percent of the PC market. End users didn't take to Linux-based mini-notebooks, or netbooks, and today few mini-notes ship with Linux.
Microsoft

Submission + - Only the Stupid Believed It (infoworld.com)

Submitted by Pigskin-Referee
Pigskin-Referee writes: Microsoft bashers fooled again. In what has become overly obvious, Microsoft's pundits will believe anything as long as it is anti Microsoft.

Stupid is as stupid does with IE user hoax 'study'
A silly hoax 'study' claiming that Internet Explorer users have below-average IQs makes some people happy as pigs in slop.

The other day I was reading through the CNN site when I came across an article entitled "Are Internet Explorer users dumb?" It references a Vancouver, B.C.-based psychometric consulting company — which was revealed today to be a hoax — that claims to have given an IQ test to 100,000 people, and the results indicated that IE users scored less than average compared to users of other browsers, who tested as slightly above average.

I mulled this over for a day or two and wanted to respond in my column but decided to drop it. I thought, "This is exactly the kind of tabloid tech journalism that I've spoken out against for years. Why bother with a trip to the gutter?" — until my InfoWorld colleague Robert X. Cringely decided to jump on the "IE users are stupid" bandwagon. It must have been a slow week for technology that he would champion this prejudicial and utterly idiotic study. It's offensive. And the fact that so many tech journalism sites played up this story without verifying the alleged consulting company's existence shows who's really stupid.
Microsoft

Submission + - Boeing taps motion sensor power of MS Kinect (techflash.com)

Submitted by Pigskin-Referee
Pigskin-Referee writes: Thanks to Microsoft Kinect, Boeing doesn't have to lug around a real 737 to trade shows.

The commercial aircraft giant is using the software giant's technology to create a virtual tour of the next-generation Boeing 737 plane, using Kinect, Silverlight Deep Zoom, and Windows 7 Touch and Azure.

Digital marketing agency Wire Stone created Boeing 737 Explained, an interactive marketing tool to help Boeing pitch the aircraft to potential buyers. While Wire Stone is based in the Silicon Valley, the Boeing Kinect work took place at the agency's Seattle office.

In what is being billed as an early commercial non-entertainment use of Kinect, Wire Stone says it integrated Kinect and other Microsoft technology for Boeing to use in trade shows and other venues that can support massive displays where Boeing 737 Explained can be viewed in real-world dimensions.

From selling jetliners to training surgeons, it is already apparent that Kinect has applications beyond games.

The 737 project uses the technology behind Kinect motion controller for Xbox 360 to let a viewer move around and explore the 737.

With Kinect, Boeing is able to turn a dry, technical pitch into a virtual tour of the aircraft.

"If we look at all the approaches that we use to communicate about the 737, most of them are very analytical, enabling us to talk about the financial operating costs, maintenance costs and other attributes," Diana Klug, Director of Marketing for Boeing Commercial Airplanes, said in a statement. "We wanted to take the marketing for the 737 to the next level, and the set of tools that we had did not allow us to convey the full range of new features and improvements that we've made to the product."

Using Kenect and other Microsoft technology, [wire] stone created Boeing 737 Explained, an interactive marketing to help Boeing to pitch the aircraft to potential buyers.

Comment Re:huh (Score 1) 125

by Pigskin-Referee (#36961856) Attached to: Ubuntu One Hits the Million Users Mark

I have been using FreeBSD as a hobbyist tool since 2000. I am presently running Apache22 along with Postfix + Dovecot in conjunction with SQL back-ends, etcetera. FreeBSD claims to be a fully serviceable OS for both "server" and "individual" user use. Obviously, it is not.

Now, your requirements are are far more fundamental than many other users of FreeBSD. A simple perusal of their mailing list will prove that fact. FreeBSD has gotten to the point that they issue a new major version number every 18 months (+/-) regardless of what actual improvements have been made to the OS. There is not a dimes worth of difference from version 6 to versions 8.2. They have crossed a few "t's" and dotted an "i" or two, and that is about it. Every time FreeBSD issues an improvement which in reality is just playing catchup with the rest of the industry, they bump the major version number.

Now, you may not have any use fro "wireless" or its associated devices; however, you are not in the majority of users either. What type of moron would install an OS on a modern laptop that did not fully support modern wireless protocols. The fact that the protocol (N) is over 5 years old and FreeBSD still does not support it says a lot about FreeBSD and it relative worth in the modern market place.

I am glad that you find FreeBSD useful in your relatively limited environment. For many of use, that is not so.

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