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Comment Try OpenOffice Math (Score 1) 823

I went through an Econ MA program with the same problem, and even bought a tablet pc and tried to use OneNote to do it. In the end, I found the fastest thing was OpenOffice's formula entry system, Math. The commands are very intuitive, ie. x over y for x/y, and once I learned them, I could type faster than I wrote anyway. It does have the disadvantage of not holding alot of equations at once (at least 2.0 did), and integrating your Write documents is a pain, but it was still the best solution for me. I would usually switch between Write and Math, and just make a note in writer to insert the equation here... or, if it was something short, type the math commands right into writer and then convert it later. The big plus is that, once it is in, it is in a computer-readable form, so there is no "going back" later.

Comment Re:Mod parent up (Score 1) 315

I agree. I want to be paid for my work, but it is not the most important motivation for me to write. Good writing is done for the writer first, and everyone else second. I think DRM is crap, and it hurts customers (whoever they are). The fact is, DRM doesn't stop the people that won't pay for your work, and it hurts the people that want to pay for your work, so why bother? Sure, there are people at the margin who will decide to steal rather than to purchase, but if that group is really large enough to make a significant difference, then the price of your work is too high and your publisher is censoring information with high pricing. If that's the case, you deserve to be ripped-off you jerk. Paying for books is the same as paying for any other good - there is a price that is somewhere between the highest price a customer is willing to pay and the lowest price you are willing to sell it for. If you aren't being a greedy jerk, that price should be somewhere in the middle. Be willing to split the surplus with your reader, and the DRM issue becomes a non-issue. Be like the RIAA, trying to make people pay $20 for one good song (and nine crappy ones), and you deserve to get ripped-off (and you will be).
Displays

Is the Kindle DX Worth the Money? 263

An anonymous reader writes "Now that some little time has passed, and the hype has died down a bit, I'm wondering if anyone has taken the $500 plunge and gotten a Kindle DX. From the academic-paper-reading-geek perspective, is it worth the money? How well does it work with PDFs, and is it easy to get them on and off? I haven't been able to find any good reviews on the interweb that address its usability as I would like to use it."

Comment For you (oh sophisticated user), or for others? (Score 1) 421

I use Subversion through Apache for the documents, and webdav for the "stuff I want to stay on the server" such as my music. I like it because I can access my data from anywhere, and I can secure it with client ssl certificates.

For my email, I use IMAP; for calendars, I use CalDAV; and for contacts, I use OpenLDAP, but that was a pain to set up. I keep my bookmarks synced through Delicious.

If you want to make it easy, use GoogleDocs, GoogleCalendar, Google blah blah blah. Most email clients and calendar clients can interact with Google, and it makes life oh so much easier.

Microsoft

Submission + - IE8 Dev Tools Don't Suck 1

BaileDelPepino writes: IE finally has developer tools that don't suck! With every other release of IE, development was a pain and debugging was a nightmare. Now IE has some decent tools--in fact, the IE includes lots of the best features of Firebug.

I'm giving IE8 and its dev tools a spin today, and I have to say I'm impressed. Now, I'm not planning on abandoning Firefox+Firebug for general development purposes just yet, but I still found a couple of compelling new features in IE, including the integrated javascript debugger, javascript profiler and the (really killer) "trace styles" feature.

Even if you're like me and are loath to give up your favorite web development tool combo, I think we can still all celebrate the fact that we finally have decent baked-in tools for debugging those nasty IE-only problems.

I should also point out that version 8 includes a version 7 compatibility mode, so there's very little reason not to upgrade if you can.
Software

Submission + - Would you install Microsoft Office if it were free 1

nicholdraper writes: "Recently I received the MSDN subscription update disk for Microsoft Office. I am the main developer for a small company and we recently let the developer go who had an active MSDN subscription. I normally install software on my home computer to evaluate it. Here's my dilemma, about ten years ago I started weaning myself from Microsoft software at home. In fact, I use open office regularly and I couldn't be happier. Sure I use word at work, I decided long ago to not waste time on that battle. But, I haven't seen a feature that wasn't in Office 95 that I would use, so I don't see the point in paying for upgrades every two to five years. I am against pirating software, so open source solved my needs. Now, I have a copy paid for by the company where I work, which I should spend time to evaluate. I'm afraid to install it and end up with files in a format for which I would have to pay for software in the future to open. Is there any reason to use MS Office? Would you install it or not?"
Operating Systems

Submission + - Why Linux is Better than Mac (or, how I learned to (scottgrizzard.com)

sgrizzard writes: "http://www.scottgrizzard.com/blog/2009/05/29/why-linux-is-better-than-mac-or-how-i-learned-to-stop-worrying-and-love-apt-get-and-debuild/

On a Mac, it is easy to do the small things, but once you become a little more savvy, the Mac is harder to use and harder to learn.

Macs have this weird, non-liner learning curve that starts very low and stays shallow for a while, but then gets "super-steep" — it is very difficult to be in the tech-savvy but non-pro middle ground.

Linux's learning curve starts a little higher — you really have to be able to install your own operating system and brave enough to try.

However, Linux gives you a much smoother transition from novice to native, with very helpful people to guide you on the way. You don't even notice how much you have learned about software (without books, and without some ridged corporate dictated curriculum) until someone you are talking to (not from the Linux world — usually a Windows IT guy) says, "You mean you modified and compiled your own software? You know how to program C — I could never (read: don't want to) learn how to do that... I'll just stick to Windows.""

Comment Good Decision - Remember unrelated game developers (Score 1) 321

This is a good decision by Konami - its responsibility is to its stockholders, and an established distributer like Konami shouldn't take the risk that backlash will hurt other game sales.

What's more, this decision is in the best interest off all the other developers that publish games with Konami - the sale of unrelated games from unrelated game developers might be hurt by the anti-Konami backlash, but they would see no real benefit from the risk.

Put it this way - think how badly the other two Dixie Chicks were financially affected when Natalie Maines opened her trap in London.

This is the perfect project for an independent publishing company - one which doesn't have a bunch of other projects that could burn with this one.

Comment Fear of Death Causes Both (Score 1) 921

Increased "religiousness" may be correlated with increased "fighting death", but this does not imply causation. It is likely the case that an increased fear of death cause both an increased "religiousness" and an increased "fighting death". ---- The number of bars for a city is also positively correlated with the number of churches a city has - more bars imply more churches. Why? Because larger cities have more of each.

Comment Use something similar to something else you use (Score 1) 370

The most important thing about any documentation solution is that people use it, otherwise it is useless. To minimize the costs of using it, I suggest you find a solution that is similar to something people at your organization are used to using.

I had the same problem land on my desk a month ago. All of our policies and procedures were stored in a big notebook that was horribly out of date and that no one read. Since we use Trac for our dev department, people were used to the wiki formatting on it. I installed MoinMoin as a corporate wiki, which uses the same format.

MoinMoin is great because it uses basic authentication from apache, so you can authenticate it against whatever you have (like Active Directory), and people don't need another set of passowrds. It is simple to use and also easy to backup. Also, if you have a corporate intranet already, it is not difficult to integrate.

The wiki is great because anyone can modify it without alot of fanfare. However, if you choose a solution that is yet another thing to learn how to use, no one will take the time to use it. Again, the most important thing in my opinion is to lower the cost to the end user so that it is easier to post the information on the wiki than answer the same question again and again.

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