to that

I couldn't agree with this more.

I just bought a Samsung 'smart' tv. I own a cable hd box. While trying to get things to work I discovered by accident that both of these pieces of equipment have oss pieces, which has led me down a rabbit hole of investigating licenses, checking firmware releases and jailbreaking tutorials.

These boxes should be able to talk to each other. Easily. I can see their ip addresses. I am not an expert but I don't want to have to buy a seperate device for each piece of functionality I'd like.

Making equipment inaccessible by doing end runs around the GPL is just making me want to support the GPL more (and these companies less), but I need more 'middle ground' info from the great people who have provided open software.

i.e. it is disheartening that slashdot spends more time debating licenses these days than tech, but it has become nescessary. I'd like to see more discussions about how to enable the equipment we own. I didn't even appreciate that this is what jailbreaking is. I think.

While I agree with your comment, I still think it will happen. Automated systems will make these price calculations and _eventually_ dissatisfied customers will leave, but it will take time and the cause&effect won't be clear. The results will eventually speak for themselves.

Forgot he wrote those. I gained my love of reading from them. I know the Martians are still hiding out there.

When my daughter was in senior kindergartern here in Canada she had a great teacher who emailed us everyday. Just a one liner of what the kids did that day - coloring, sang a song, whatever. It was fantastic. I know some of the kids were recent immigrants and I'm going to assume some of the families were poor, but the email list seemed to have all the families names on it. Having your name on the list was optional.

So it can be done, and I don't think it needs much infrastructure or effort for a simple system.

Now, the next year, when my daughter changed schools and teachers I mentioned this to the new teacher at the first parent-teacher meeting. She said: 'I've heard about that teacher. I won't promise anything.' She implied that she would take it up with the union as to whether it was a requirement of her job.

I am now getting more and more familiar with the educational bureacracy, but there are good teachers out there, and simple, appropriate solutions that help.

Why c# over python? I usually hear positives about c# but python just lets me 'get things done'.

I haven't used c# but on occasion have to wrangle java, and it is painful after the freedom of python. No boilerplate. Based on c#'s lineage I find it hard to imagine that there isn't a fair amount of boilerplate involved with using it.

Can anyone comment on this? Seems the least that could be done if your an organ donor.

Any way to see what the discounts, etc were that are part of this contract? Freedom of Information request?

absolutely this. I usually spend a week each summer on an island near Gibsons - Pasley. Coverage is weak and erratic, despite the cell companies claims.

agreed. None of the complainers has bothered to cite any examples.

That is excellent analysis. Thanks. Unfortunately we are now operating in the realm of politics. I signed the petition, but I agree UBB is not the problem. It is the ridiculously low caps. I'm not sure how that point is going to come across in the political discourse we are about to engage in.

is that Python is becoming so popular that they don't want to support it in any shape or form as it is another avenue that (can) lead away from windows dependence.

I draw this amazing conclusion based on the trends from http://developers.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1753576&cid=33241516 but using just last 12months and comparing c#, python, java, and ruby.

sure, I'll chime in.

I use unix and windows but would no longer consider myself an expert in all the bits. Thats why a gui wins when I need to search through files in a file system ... but I digress.

The best advice I've read for scripts had something to do with ennabling a script to know if it was interactive or not and present and appropriate interface accordingly. Whether it was through a flag or checking for some other interactive vs. non type thingy (which I can't recall at the moment. :)

I'd like to reframe the question as above.

We use OSS where I work (uni.) but a lot of it is through the back door. When our CIO started he disparaged OSS so that the mgr's were wary of suggesting/promoting it. Yet in all the hallway conversations people are pushing it and it has become a significant proportion of our infrastructure, but I do not think it gets the support it deserves.

The vendors get the money but we use OSS/Free software when it is appropriate. So the question I’ve been pondering is how to get the org. to recognize this increasingly obvious fact through more financial support for the projects that are really making a difference.

Of course one big question is: when is OSS/Free software appropriate? Often we rely on vendors because they provide a complete solution where the alternatives just don’t measure up. It’s hard to argue against a COTS solution here, but I feel it often abdicates responsibility for a solution in favor of a check box against the problem.