I see your point (No, I'm not parent-commenter) .....BUT it reminds me of the old adage: "Just because you CAN do something, doesn't mean you should." Is it great that Linux is free and anyone can modify or create a new Distro to suit their exact needs?.. Yes.. thats awesome and I support it fully. Does that freedom mean that we need 400 different Linux distrubutions? (I don't think so). It's the same logic you could apply to Government. If you want to make Government something that people actually like and want to get involved in--- you focus on making LESS laws, not MORE laws. Linux is the same way. If the Linux crowd ever wants to be "king of the (desktop) hill" (which seems to be the nut they wanna crack).. then they need to make things more streamlined and less confusing. If you are a younger member of the Linux crowd, I urge you to pick a project already in development - and help make it better.. instead of adding some new project.

There used to be a time when I believed that...... but I've stopped. One of the biggest reasons why is I spent 3 years working in a K-12 school district where (as you can imagine) the resources were low (to non-existent) and the challenges/demands placed daily upon me were "impossible". I learned rather quickly that if I was ever going to hope to keep things running there - that I had to spend part of my time each day educating users about prevention issues. On any given day I would talk to computer-illiterate (and sometimes english-illiterate) users from Janitors and cafeteria workers.. to teachers (any grade K-12).. to finance officers, administrators and super-superintendents. All of them had different knowledge levels.. but if you adapt the way you communicate to each person, and spend just a little time educating them about how safe computing practices will save the School District money and make their lives easier----most of them WILL listen. The only things that are "impossible" are the things you've already made up your mind "can't be done".

I had a system last week infected with "Windows Police Pro"... I was able to remove it in about an hour.... (not easy.. but also not difficult - just using the combination of tools I mentioned above).. and got the User back up and working. *shrug* I don't claim to be a "genius"... but I do have years of experience.. and I've been doing IT Admin/support for long enough that my intuition (about how a system is behaving) is usually correct.. and I can be pretty effective when I'm "in the zone".

In the organization I work for.. we are using Mcafee VirusScan Enterprise + AntiSpyware Enterprise 8.5.0i....... I've noticed (almost on a weekly basis).. machines infected with various kinds of spyware (antivirus2009, AlphaAV, and other names) and Mcafee seems incompetently clueless about detecting it. If I install MalwareBytes on the box.. and start a "Full Scan" (using MalwareBytes)... as it goes through touching files on the hard drive only THEN does Mcafee popup and say "Hey, you are infected with XXX " I don't know WHY that is... we seem to have the current Mcafee scan engine and dat files... I chalk it up to corporate level antivirus just not being able to keep up with the fastpaced changes to spyware. I decided to never rely on a single protection product. If I suspect a machine is acting weird (even if it does have up to date Antivirus).. I scan it with Malwarebytes and NOD32's free online scan. I don't think this is strictly a fault with Mcafee.. I think any tool used by itself will miss something... thats why a combination approach is best. (and hey.. if you do some testing and can find patterns of Mcafee not fully protecting you - that might be ammo/fodder to go back to your bosses (or Mcafee rep) and push some buttons.

"almost impossible" = hyperbole Antivirus2009 is actually pretty easy to remove (relatively speaking, when compared to other modern spywares and rootkits). In fact, in many coworkers machines, if they hands-off the keyboard/mouse fast enough (dont click on any popups)... all you really have to do is reboot the computer. (of course, I still do scans with multiple tools just to make sure its clean). Using a combination of tools (Malwarebytes, Spybot S&D, GMER, NOD32 online scan,etc... I've found I can clean almost 100% of machines with no ill after effects)

Over the years I've also spent quite a bit of time on social sites like Slashdot, Fark, Metafilter, Digg,etc.... but now spend the majority of my time on Reddit. I actually like the design (its simple, efficient and useful). But the beauty of Reddit is the organized structure of the sub-reddits. If I'm short for time, i can just quickly browse the frontpage. If I have more time, I can browse my favorite sub-reddits where people know me. The commenting system is easy on the eyes and easy to follow. and the userbase is a nice balance of attitudes.

Well.. it's not hard for SOME ;)... And that's one of the things that frustrates me on top of already being frustrated. I'm 36, and I read forum comments about teenagers who pickup C or read SICP in 1 weekend and they just "get it". Boom. Done. Understood.

I dont understand how they do that. How is it that something I find so totally foreign, they understand as simply as tying shoes. Are they seeing something I'm not? Are they processing the information in a way I'm not? There must be some arrangement/connection of concepts that they are making and I'm not. .. I just cant figure out what that is.

I've read dozens of programming books,. I've installed and built a whole stack of different Linux/Unix distros as test environments,.. but I cant get the "light bulb" of understanding to come on. I have yet to find a tutorial that will walk me through creating simple code examples that actually mean something to me, and build them up slow enough (and explain them deeply enough) to get me to understand. ;(

I've been trying to learn programming for a few years now, and made very little (if any) progress. I have yet to find any mentor, book, or approach that makes sense to me. A large variety of mentors, books and approaches seem to be based on the belief that there is only 1 way to learn to program, and if your brain isnt wired that way, well then you suck and dont deserve any help (to paraphrase). (yes, I do try before I ask questions, because I grew up very independent) I worked in a K-12 school district for a few years and got the chance to observe a variety of teaching styles at a variety of grades. One thing I noticed with regard to really good teachers is that when they found a student not learning, they worked with that student to find a different approach that would work. I think this is a fundamental skill for any good teacher. I've never been able to find anyone in the programming field who has this skill/belief. All the mentors I've had, seem to expect me to learn programming in a very particular style/approach, and at the very instant they observe that style/approach not working for me, they give up (teaching me). I'm frustrated already, it frustrates me even more when my teacher gives up. I could learn programming on my own. I *WANT* to learn programming on my own. Nothing would please me more than spending evenings or weekends sitting at home coding something that actually works. The only cross-pedagogic approach that has been marginally successful to me is Processing.org, but as much as I like their approach, I can't seem to translate what I'm learning there over to help me understand the fundamentals of programming. (Great, I can make a circle bounce on the screen, but that hasnt taught me anything about usable about arrays, objects or functions.)

This might be a dumb question, but since the instruments (Hubble and Hershel) gather 2 different types of information, are the respective scientific teams going to overlay Hubble/Hershel data and extrapolate the differences ? or would that not be worth doing ? (seems to me like it would be.. but again I dont know much about space observatories)

"If you have to ask, you're no use" What a decidedly non-welcoming attitude. I have the same problem as the OP, and its attitudes like this that really make me resent myself for wanting to learn to program. It's like some super double-secret club where all of the members have some attitude like "Well, it was hard for us, and we had to figure it out on our own (uphill, both ways, in the snow) and so therefor you should have to do the same before we will let you in. Sure, technology is better now, and we could improve the learning structure and lower the barriers to entry, but thats sissy girl talk." New and learning programmers don't want "constant reassurance or hand-holding"... we want mentors who will guide and teach us along the way, without being condescending or flippant. New and learning programmers have ideas and new ways of seeing things that should be equally valued for their potential. You'd think... existing programmers would understand that documentation and training efficacy are vitally important avenues to bring new programmers up to speed. The better you welcome and train new programmers, the better your field becomes. We're not asking for it to be easy.. I have no problem with "earning my place" ... but I completely agree with some other postings here that the field seems either intentionally structured to be difficult to break into... OR so chaotic and unstructured that no one gives a damn to improve those aspects of it.

..for a pretty long time actually. I dont want it because I'm some kind of hypochondriac, I just think it would be cool to be able to monitor my daily rhythms. After a while you'd get an idea of what a baseline reading for any normal day was,.. and knowing that information would make you better informed about how your eating/drinking/drug use/whatever affects your body. Better yet,.. when you go to see the doctor, he can look back through your prior week or two of diagnostics and it might help him figure out whats wrong. Imagine trying to troubleshoot a computer where you had no Log files or any historical data. Possible? yes. Faster and better fixes when you have historical data?.. absolutely. (and it could help you catch something small before it becomes a bigger problem)

a variety of reasons why OSS is not making success in the educational sector. Here are my thoughts:

1.) Setting all technology discussions aside : our educational system is broken. Period. (Assuming you are talking about the US of A) Our society places more value on celebrity escapades and sports figures than it does education. No amount of technology (windows/linux/???) will improve a broken system.

Having said that:

2.) For most school districts, changing from Windows to Linux is like asking a Navy to completely change battle-platforms (hardware) in the middle of a Pearl Harbor firefight. Notwithstanding the ideological differences, the everyday lack of resources, time and inter-compatibility almost makes moving to Linux a non-starter before you even begin.

3.) Schools have a long history with brand name "for pay" software (Microsoft, etc). Breaking out of that mindset is extremely difficult. I had no problem talking to my asst-superintendent showing him the cost savings of open source software,.. but what overwhelmed him was the amount of work it would take to convert all of our data, procedures and environment over to accomodate the proposed changes. In a school district its VERY hard to change the status quo. (which is not suprising considering the whole point of american education system is to preserve the status quo). You might say that Linux is just a little bit to "liberal" for the traditional approach most often seen in educational systems. I'm not sure society is ready for linux (as others have said) in this regard.

4.) Linux (in my opinion) has made great improvements and usability tweaks in the past 5 years-ish,.. but it still has a ways to go to be "drop dead simple". In a school environment, software solutions should be GUI driven, not some arcane command line voodoo. No, I'm not saying teachers are dumb and cant learn, I'm saying they dont have the time or desire to. I think sometimes Linux programmers forget that the majority of the people on this planet are NOT happy sitting at a command prompt. Period. Its not because we are dumb and refuse to learn CLI, its because we dont think we should have to in order to keep an OS running.

5.) On a software level,.. I'm not sure I have an answer to the question of: "What OS do you teach in school if the job market is predominantly Microsoft?"... thats a head-scratcher. Our educational system quite simply doesnt have the "bandwidth" (time or resources) to teach multiple Operating systems. (can you imagine trying to teach an "Introduction to Business" class for 25 high school sophmores in a computer lab where 5 machines were Windows, 5 were Mac... 5 were Ubunutu...?... no way would that work. As it is, Teachers arent meeting their professional requirements in an all Microsoft environment.

Before leaving the school district,..I had some plans to setup a few small Ubuntu labs (3 to 5 computers) as an experiment to see how they would get used and what worked / didnt work. Unfortunately, I never got the chance.

I wish I had a better answer.. but the problem is multi-faceted, complex, and like a box full of network-cable "spaghetti". Its going to take many long years of dedicated (and possibly volunteer) work to sort out the issues. I loved working in the K-12 environment because I think education is vitally important. But it burned me out and is so damn full of politics and lack of resources that it really needs to be nuked from space.

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