Something new with lots of holes to PEN test!

Actually Slashdot Mobile works great on iOS! ;-)

The tweet like previous tweets was a snarky comment meant as a dig against Christians. It annoyed me when I read it. His explaination is not an apology. Am I offended? At first I was but the Bible stresses us not to take offense.

While watching Cosmos I enjoyed most of it till he attacked Christianity now and then. Carl Sagan wasn't a Christian but he didn't attack Christianity. I mean if you are an Athiest why bother? Much of science is theory and only some of it can be proven. To attack and make fun of those who you consider fools only to raise yourself is not an admirable trait. I don't know what Neil's problem with Christians is but he's got a serious anger issue. He has a deep seated hatred for the Christian God. That is usually due to a deep loss of a loved one after spending a lot of time in prayer. It is for that reason I pity Neil DeGrasse Tyson. He carries a spiritual wound. Why else would he care so much what the Christians believe and why attack them? Same goes for those nativity scene attacks and the distorted belief in separation of church and state. Who cares if there's a nativity scene on the town square for a few weeks or if there's a Ten Commandments in the court house?

Stop resisting arrest and you won't force the police to use violence. Be calm and surrender. That way you don't get wrestled to the ground, beaten with batons, tased or shot. Don't point a weapon at an officer and refuse their lawful order to put down the gun or you will get shot. Show the police the respect they deserve and don't mouth off and get angry. Police have to deal with the worst kind of people on a daily basis you certainly don't want to push their buttons.

It's not a race thing even a white lady had a bad experience, she's trying to sue United Airlines for 5 million because on the last leg of a journey to an Alaska ski trip she antagonized the stewardesses more than a couple times and the pilot forced her off the plane. The Seattle police boarded the craft and calmly asked this lady to come quietly or you'll be arrested. Nope, she had to have an attitude and that's when they cuffed her and dragged her off the plane, tearing her jeans in the process. Then they booked her and she was stuck in jail over the weekend. My guess is she hit the bar waiting for this flight and was drunk. She tried to lay down in more expensive seats as well as an exit row. She was obviously belligerent with the flight crew. Now she didn't get shot but she didn't pull out a gun nor did she seriously pose a threat to the officers.

Remember:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-rnl2dU3_k

1st of May (May Day) is also known as the Communist International Workers Day! Communism is a far Left belief and Socialism is not far removed in ideaology. So which party does this PAC support? Can you say the Democrats? Hmm...

Food for thought? NAZI = Nationalist Socialist Party in German. They were Socialist Fascists. Started with organized thugs (brown shirts) violent intimidation then when in power gun control and healthcare were just the beginning. The weak, mentally ill, elderly, disabled, violent criminals (defectives), etc. were euthanized for the benefit of the State but the people were told they were humanely put out of their misery and were better off. Those with guns were registered and rounded up as a result. Enemies disappeared.

Let's not forget what can happen if we let the "useful idiots" have their way. Evil is real. The Democrats have moved very far to the Left. It is no longer your fathers Party. Obama is a Socialist and he has shown Fascist tendencies. Wake up! JFK would not agree with today's Democrats!

Yes, it's true. We are currently producing more oil than Saudi Arabia! But we are far from being independent.

We need to do several things to be truly energy independent:

1. Set standards on gasoline, there are way too many formulas that vary state to state
2. Determine how many refineries we need (haven't built any new refineries for 30+ years).
3. Determine the best locations for the refineries (logistics of incoming raw crude and outgoing fuels)
4. Free up government land for oil drilling and fracking
5. Build pipelines to transport oil cheaply (XL Pipeline needs to happen, Canada is a huge ally and trust worthy)
6. Stop the Greens agenda, the Caribou won't be bothered by oil drilling in Alaska, that's just silly (saw video, hundreds of square miles of nothing but tundra)
6a. Hey, Caribou tastes real good and it's fully of Omega 3's and low in fat. Setup a nomadic ranch herding permit system and let's start selling MacBou Burgers!
7. Oil and Energy Independence needs to be considered a matter of National Security and as such should trump saving the Spotted Squirrel or any other endangered species that really wouldn't be impacted in reality!

There is no reason we shouldn't be paying $1.25 per gallon for gasoline. Don't give me that electric car bullshit either. You're charging you car using energy from coal so you ain't doing any favors using a toy battery car. Also those batteries are bad for the environment and will have to be recycled properly and that's expensive. Build more nuclear power plants. Wind and Solar don't work, at least not at the scale we really need not to mention they both kill birds! We have lots and lots of oil and coal and natural gas resources. More than we ever thought we had years ago. There are even more resources under the polar caps. There is no shortage and there won't be for hundreds of years. By then we should have figured out fusion and then the problems are truly solved.

I have a customer with a MacPro (PowerPC). He can't upgrade the OS anymore since the Intel switch but its working still and is as fast as ever. The machine is 12 years old and still humming along. Sure he spent a lot of money on it but he's gotten his money's worth! In the past he would buy cheapo systems such as those retail discount PC's that are practically obsolete and cut a lot of corners to keep the price down. They would slow down to a crawl in a year, get infected with gobs of malware and then the hardware would fail and he'd buy a new one. The money he spent on all his previous computers exceeds what he spent on one Mac Pro and the life of the Mac Pro exceeded all the old systems. So in the long run he's saved a lot of money. This guy is very cheap, he's complaining about having to upgrade even after 12 years. I tried to explain that the system is way too old and its time to consider an upgrade. But he'll run this thing till it goes snap crackle pop and the magic blue smoke pours out. He's also had two hard disk failures but Time Machine saved his bacon. Within 2-3 hours he was up and running like nothing happened each time. That includes the drive time to Best Buy to pickup a new hard disk! When the MacPro finally bites the dust, he'll likely get an iMac as they have come a long long way from what they were 12 years ago. Also he saved countless hours of tech support and many dollars on AV upgrades and subscriptions. Sure he's got a few questions now and then but it's not really a problem. I just spoke with him last night and his problem was that Comcast was bouncing up and down including his TV service. No problems with the Mac.

The developers, artists, and even the QA staff love their jobs and work very hard. It is the evil publishing companies with bad management and evil treatment of the staff that needs to change. Publish a new game and lay-off 75% of the staff. The creatives quit and move on. Happens all the time. How anyone would want to work in the game industry is a wonder, if they do work in the industry many quit after the first ship-date.

The indie market is different. I am talking about the mainstream classic game publishers.

Meh... Marvel Stomps DC!

*ducks*

FLAME ON!

Dude there's Mercury vapor and powder in CFL's! Hope you didn't get exposed as it exploded in your face! Might be wise to have a heavy metal test with your doctor. http://www2.epa.gov/cfl/cleaning-broken-cfl

I deployed 150 iPads to a group at a business conference at a large Marriott hotel. We crashed the entire hotel network about 5 times. Right before we ran a video conference out of the country, we had to disable the wireless access points to make sure it didn't crash again during the video conference. They do suck bandwidth. I believe many were running Netflix and YouTube and goofing off during the meetings sucking up tremendous bandwidth. They were supposed to be running WebEx which was plenty heavy on the bandwidth. I can imagine the school is sharing bandwidth with other schools and they didn't consider how much bandwidth they needed. We knew we were going to pound the hotels network but they were unwilling for us to have Verizon install a network for our use. We had to use the hotel network which was outsourced to a rink dink vendor.

Most debit cards have a Visa/MC logo and can be used without a pin. In many cases this can avoid a debit card processing fee (most retailers did away with the fee). Making a purchase only requires a signature and gas stations require a zip code and likely a $100 limit. Small purchases at fast food don't require a signature nor pin. The pin is only used at an ATM for cash withdrawal or debit mode at a swipe/keypad terminal.

Mind blowing, industry disruptive invention is not going to stop. It's just that it doesn't happen rapidly and never has! Apple first built iPad prototypes internally and decided to take the technology to the iPhone and release it first. So in 2007 before the iPhone was announced there was an early iPad prototype. The iPad didn't get announced until 2010! So for three more years the iPad was refined and improved, while the iPhone was also improved. Only when Apple was satisfied enough with the iPad was it released to the public. The App Store wasn't announced until 2008. The MacPro hasn't changed much since 2010, but the new cylindrical MacPro was announced via sneak peak at WWDC 2013. I would bet money it's been in design for years! A new design starts after the last one shipped. There may be a bit of a break after a stressful launch but they always go right back to the drawing board when they return. One of the reasons the 2010 MacPro wasn't updated were Xeon delays at Intel. The Xeon E5 Ivy Bridge / E3 Haswell design hasn't really started shipping till now. The E5 Xeon is the processor of choice used in workstations and smaller servers. So the new MacPro cylindrical design will have dual E5 Xeon's with up to 12 cores (6 cores each).

Apple's pace hasn't changed, they have always been about releasing when it's ready and not before. The media forgets how long it took for these products to ship. I guess there was this long period of customer awe in between that's dissipated lately as new products are not as stunning. That doesn't mean there are not things in the R&D pipeline that will change the world! There has always been an attention to detail with Apple designs that exceed that of the rest of the industry. The secrecy is what drives articles like this. But it's also what allows Apple to compete. If they announce products early, the competition will have a "Me Too" product ready. Even though a "Me Too" doesn't come close, it will be cheaper and not as good but will still sell fairly well.

Apple is working on changing television as we know it. I have already built a home solution that far exceeds what the industry has available. However, it's extremely geeky and not ready for general consumer use. But I can watch the TV shows and movies I want, how I want, when I want, and where I want. I have complete freedom to beam it around the house from iPhone, iPad, and multiple TV's. I have a server that manages the content like a TiVo would but much much better. It's the media delivery mechanism and the content itself that has to adapt. Apple is no doubt struggling to get the media companies to play ball. Movies studios, TV networks, Sports distribution channels, etc. They all have to radically change the way they do business. It's not about Prime Time any more. I don't consume media on a schedule any more. I rarely watch live TV. I don't see commercials. I can pause a show in the living room and resume it in the bedroom or on an iPad (No, it's not AT&T Uverse either and it's not streamed from a data center). I can even have new shows transcoded and sync'd to the iPad so when I take a long train commute, I can watch my show on an iPad offline. Apple's competitors know they are working on TV and they are trying to produce new TV's that innovate. Samsung has voice and motion controls, Sony has PS4, Microsoft XBox One, etc. They all think they know what Apple is doing but I would bet they aren't even close. Apple cannot announce their new TV solution until they can get the content providers in line. They did it first with the music industry and they did it with the book industry now it's time to do it with the TV/Movie/Video industries.

Google is not a tech company, they are an advertising company that uses technology. Facebook is not a tech company, they are a social media advertising company that uses cheesy technology. Apple is not a technology company either but a design company that mixes technology and the liberal arts. HP, Samsung, etc., etc. these are electronics manufacturers who design and release technology to support operating systems written by others. So far, Apple is completely unique in the universe. They produce the OS, the hardware and use artistic design to tie it all together. They have taste and style. They actually make you smile and your face lights up when you use their products. It is exactly as they said in their latest advertisements, that is what they do and why they do it. It's all about the experience. In OS X you don't run into those weird situations like you do in Windows, etc. You don't have these thousand little annoyances that make you paranoid so you don't trust the computer. I haven't enjoyed computing so much since I switched to Mac. The last time I had this type of trust in the computer and operating system, it was the old Atari computers. I also don't have to tinker with the technology like I do with Unix/Linux systems. ( I do like to tinker but now I don't need to do it with my day to day regular computer ) The little annoyances can be explained when you take the old Apple dock connector and all the frustration experienced every time you plugged it in. You had to ensure the orientation was right as it only plugged in one way and once the silk screened icon wore off you couldn't tell if it was right side up or down. The lightning connector changes that, no more thinking just plug it in and it works every time. Granted, they didn't do that initially but they improved upon what had gone before. Developers love using Mac laptops because it's Unix under the hood. Everything that runs in Unix/Linux/BSD all works on the Mac plus they can interface with Windows, use MS Office (if they have to) and Adobe software, etc. USENIX is almost all Apple MacBook's nowadays where it was PC's running Linux, Solaris, etc. previously. That's because the Apple experience is so very good. These Unix Guru's use Apple MacBooks because it's the best darn Unix laptop you can get. All the work they do at the server level is not Apple at all, but a myriad of Unix technology.

Apple really is changing the world and for the better. No they are not perfect, no one is perfect but they do strive for a level of excellence that is very noticeable. All this talk about the new MacPro and expandability is BS. The Thunderbolt 2 and Ethernet provides the same speeds of internal SATA III to external drive chassis. There is no need to open the box and plug drives in any more. You can get very good NAS devices and in a professional environment, they have that. An animation studio, movie studio, etc. They don't need internal storage based on spinning rust. They can just copy a project to the internal PCIe Flash SSD and work on it then archive it back to the external storage. That storage could be a local Thunderbolt disk array, or a NAS/SAN. Will Apple produce a 4K Apple Display? I don't know, maybe. But the demo basically said you could drive 3 third party 4K displays. Pricing those 4K displays and about the cheapest is $3,700+ each! So Apple's out of the storage business, like they are out of the server business and maybe out of the external display business too. Internal displays (Retina) will remain. Honestly, they didn't sell that many Cinema / Thunderbolt displays. People have plenty of choice in the display market from affordable up-to ultra high end. Most of the pro's are not buying the Apple displays anyway.

SSD's might not be used as primary storage, yet. The cost of using a lot of SSD's in a SAN is still too high. However, that doesn't mean that SSD technology is not being used. Many systems started using SSD's as Read/Write caches or highspeed buffers, etc. The PCIe SSD cards are popular in highend servers. This is one way that Oracle manages to blow away the competition when benchmarks are compared. They put a PCIe SSD cards into their servers and use them to run their enterprise database at lightning speeds! ZFS can use SSD's as Read/Write caches although you had better battery backup the Write cache!.

Depending on a particular solution, a limited number of SSD's in a smaller NAS/iSCSI RAID setup can make sense for something that needs some extra OOMF! But I don't yet see large scale replacement of traditional spinning rust drives with SSD's yet. In many cases, SSD's only make sense for highly active arrays where reads and writes are very heavy. Lots of storage sits idle and isn't being pounded that hard.

If it ain't broke don't fix it, is a mantra spoken by many IT organizations in large companies. The complexities of migrating WinXP to Win7 are enormous. There are a ton of legacy applications that won't work on 64bit Win7 so 32bit will be used for the majority of users. This even though all the computers are coming with 8GB's of RAM. IT became complacent with WinXP because there was no good reason to change it. In fact, the only reason we are upgrading to Win7 is because we have to as Microsoft is killing support and security updates. We are not even considering Win8 because it's just as bad as Vista and we don't want to have to retrain tens of thousands of users in a schizophrenic user interface (half tablet / half traditional GUI). Office 2010 was bad enough. i.e. not much in the way of real world improvements, just move all the menus and buttons around to confuse experienced end users and give it a face lift. We had to deploy Microsoft's transition Silverlight quick reference tools (formerly Flash for Office 2007) that helped users find where their buttons and menu options moved! In fact, we'd probably be happy if we didn't change from Office XP! We have legacy applications and platforms that are 20 years old, some without source code and whose creators long ago went out of business.

Take a look at what your local Department of Motor Vehicles uses for their computer system and I wouldn't be surprised if it's still dumb terminals running on an AS400 mini computer! Oh sure it might be a Windows variant with an AS400 terminal emulator so they can have MS Office and Outlook for email but the main systems are ancient. Thankfully, most enterprises are not THAT backwards but they certainly have a lot of old systems.

Finally, we are rolling out enterprise Ultrabook laptops with SSD's to the executives running Win7. The only reason for this is happening is because they are demanding the new shiny. They wanted MacBook Air's but virtually no one knows Mac OS X or those in power refuse to deal with it. Still have bad feelings about iPads I suppose (i.e. being forced to deal with them against their will). These are Ultrabooks which would never have existed were it not for Apple raising the bar. All Ultrabooks are copies of MacBook Pro or MacBook Air designs. Big touch pads, beautiful screens, light up keyboards and super fast yet lightweight. I just wish the OS was better. Holding out hope for Windows Blue...