rtobyr - Slashdot User

Submission + - Why is Microsoft/Bill Gates "The Enemy"? 2

Submitted by

rtobyr

on Thursday November 29, 2012 @02:29AM

rtobyr writes: "We /.'ers love to bash on Microsoft and Bill Gates. I'm no exception. Among many reasons, I hate DOS vice Bash. Bash is so natural. "man" is so useful. DOS is--by comparison--an abomination. Yet, DOS scripts ("batch files") are so much more common--dare I say: the standard--when compared to Bash scripts. Why don't I look at *sh as the abomination?

Barring complaints of the Win8 UI, Vista, & ME (we all make *some mistakes*), Windows OS's starting with 2000 have been satisfactorily stable--even when compared to *nix competitors (including OSX). I can't remember having to reboot a Windows server unless I was updating it.

As much as I really hate to admit it, Windows Server does more than other OS's. I can use IIS if I want, but I can also use Apache or NginX. I can use DotNet or C# if I want, but I can also use C, C++, Python, Perl, or any number of other languages.

Most of "us" prefer Linux over Mac, and Mac over Windows. We prefer Tovralds over Jobs, and Jobs over Gates. Why? Which of them have done the most good? The B&M Gates Foundation gives billions of dollars (to include the lion's share of Warren Buffett's fortune) to charities. Jobs is not known for being a philanthropist. The same goes for Stallman & Torvalds, yet we favor them as role models.

Why? Please don't be to sarcastic. I honestly wonder why my loyalties lie where they do (BSD > Linux > Mac (Actually BSD... I know...) > Windows) when Gates is actually doing more for the impoverished than Stallman, Torvalds, Jobs, and Cook combined?

What phenomenon compels me to internally condemn the most generous, and yet idolize those who--based on what I know of them--are A-Holes?"

Comment Not all veterans (Score 1) 62

by rtobyr on Tuesday November 13, 2012 @11:04AM (#41967459) Attached to: Amazon Donates 2,000 Kindles To Wounded Veterans

are soldiers. Are airmen, sailors, and marines excluded from the offer?

Comment When magnetic poles switch: evolution leaps? (Score 1) 1142

by rtobyr on Friday October 19, 2012 @10:39AM (#41705727) Attached to: Ask Richard Dawkins About Evolution, Religion, and Science Education

We know that the magnetic poles switch about every 200,000 years. During the 1,000 year process, we experience double or more radiation from the Sun. Do you suppose that evolutionary leaps result, which could account for some of the sudden leaps in evolution that Creationists like to point out?

Comment Linus has always been an a-hole (Score 1) 1223

by rtobyr on Thursday September 27, 2012 @10:11AM (#41477277) Attached to: Torvalds Uses Profanity To Lambaste Romney Remarks

Remember when he criticized GNOME? That was about as professional as a judge recommending a lawyer. What about when he called the OpenBSD team a bunch of masturbating monkeys? Linus is an a-hole. This isn't news.

Comment Upgrade Path (Score 1) 867

by rtobyr on Wednesday September 26, 2012 @05:10PM (#41469485) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: What Distros Have You Used, In What Order?

Red Hat -> Fedora -> CentOS -> Slackware -> Ubuntu -> OpenBSD -> Ubuntu -> PC-BSD -> Mint -> Ubuntu -> OSX Where I can't use a Mac, I stick with Ubuntu. AFAIK, it's the only distro that can always be upgraded from one release to the next without the need to re-install.

Comment Was this inspired by (Score 1) 73

by rtobyr on Tuesday September 25, 2012 @10:03AM (#41448887) Attached to: Robot Snakes To Fight Cancer Via Natural Orifice Surgery

Was this inspired by robot scorpions in your belly-button?

Comment Intense gamma ray source? (Score 2) 41

by rtobyr on Thursday September 20, 2012 @10:32AM (#41399043) Attached to: Ultra-Powerful Laser To Be Built In Romania

Didn't Bill Bixby and Lou Ferrigno show us why this is a bad idea?

Submission + - Neil deGrasse Tyson on September 11 Attacks (haydenplanetarium.org)

Submitted by

rtobyr

on Tuesday September 11, 2012 @11:08AM

rtobyr writes: "Astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson witnessed in horror the attacks on September 11, 2001.
I will never be the same after yesterday, in ways that I cannot foresee. I suppose that my generation now joins the ranks of those who lived through unspeakable horrors and survived to tell about it. How naive I was to believe that the world is fundamentally different from that of our ancestors, whose lives were changed by bearing witness to the 20th century's vilest acts of war.
"

Submission + - MacFarlane, Tyson to Revive Sagan's Cosmos (nytimes.com)

Submitted by

rtobyr

on Thursday June 28, 2012 @12:20PM

rtobyr writes: "On Friday the Fox network is to announce that it has ordered a 13-episode series, “Cosmos: A Space-Time Odyssey,” expected to be broadcast in 2013. As part of a creative team that includes Ann Druyan, Sagan’s widow and a collaborator on the original “Cosmos,” one of the executive producers is Seth MacFarlane, the creator, producer, co-star and animating spirit of “Family Guy,” the bawdy and irreverent Fox cartoon sitcom...Unlike Mr. MacFarlane’s cartoon shows, the new “Cosmos” will not feature non-sequitur pop-culture jokes, and will be hosted by Dr. Tyson."

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: FOSS Upgrade Paths

Submitted by

rtobyr

on Monday May 21, 2012 @09:55PM

rtobyr writes: "I've got about 50 servers to manage. I do very much appreciate the technology that has come from FOSS operating systems projects, yet it seems to me that most *free* operating systems do not fully support an upgrade path. Ubuntu is the only exception that I'm aware of. I cannot seamlessly upgrade from Free/PC-BSD 8.x to 9.x. Instead I must re-install from scrach. The same goes for CentOS/RHEL 5.x to 6.x, and for every version of Mint Linux.

The two major commercial operating systems (considered to be evil by the FOSS community) easily upgrade from one version to the next. That's important in a real-life production environment. In 2001, I upgraded 200 workstations and 7 servers from Windows NT 4.0 to Windows 2000 without incident. I've had similar experience with all subsequent MicroEvil systems. I do hate MicroEvil, but I can make only limited conclusions regarding the upgrade paths of other operating systems:

1) The distributions exist only for the sake of doing the project, and for the technologies that it produces (such as OpenBSD's OpenSSH).

2) Folks are expected to install a version of FOSS operating systems, but not upgrade because there's no reason to fix something that isn't broken.

3) FOSS operating systems are only for organizations who have so few servers or so many IT folks that re-installing everything from scratch is not inviably cumbersome.

4) I am oblivious to some upgrade path technique for FOSS operating systems.

5) I am a lame poser too unskilled to understand how to properly manage FOSS servers.

Please enlighten me."

Comment Really? (Score 1) 5

by rtobyr on Thursday April 12, 2012 @08:25PM (#39667783) Attached to: Nanoscientists find long-sought Majorana particle

There's a particle with a name so close to "marijuana" that at first glance you think it is that word?

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: Conflicts of Interest in the FOSS Community?

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 12, 2012 @08:03PM

An anonymous reader writes: Linus Torvalds has caused waves about KDE vice GNOME more than once. My question is this: Should he be bound by morality (not law--I'm not proposing censorship--morality only) to refrain from announcing his preferences about other FOSS products? Isn't Linus Torvalds saying, "I prefer KDE over GNOME" just like a judge endorsing one particular defense lawyer? I think it's wrong. What do you think?

Comment Re:For this you want a professional product (Score 1) 387

by rtobyr on Tuesday April 10, 2012 @03:43PM (#39635765) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Open Source Tax Software?

This is why I disagree with Richard Stallman, and prefer BSD over GPL. Commercial software is a reality, and it will remain a reality.

Comment Re:Not that common - or uncommon (Score 1) 568

by rtobyr on Tuesday April 03, 2012 @10:18AM (#39559703) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Why Aren't Schools Connected?

With a sample size of ONE

You are assuming that I don't know other parents in other school districts and even other states. In addition to local friends and colleagues, I have family in California, Alaska, Oklahoma, Illinois, South Carolina, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, and Hawaii.

Comment Re:Equal Access (Score 1) 568

by rtobyr on Tuesday April 03, 2012 @10:14AM (#39559641) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Why Aren't Schools Connected?

The alternative might save money (might not), but would require teachers either having to figure out each parent's preference independently, or to do all of their work twice for each student

No no no. If you compose something in Word and print it or compose it on Wordpress and print it, there's no extra work. Then both mediums are available for all parents.

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