Sadly, there is this notion that people need to shove into a pile and work in some kind wide open area. I'd like someone to try this: Give 1/2 your people a real office with a door they can shut and control over distractions like turning the damn phone off. Put the other 1/2 in the typical dog-kennel style arrangement where you can hear every goddamn noise and distraction. Do this for 6 months and see who is more productive. I'll bet you can guess the answer. I just can't effing stand the wide open office cube farm. Just how much collaboration do you need?? Are the specs so lousy that you have to discuss every case or sequence? I'll bet there are a lot of people who work late or come in on weekends just to get a couple quiet hours to get some work done. If those people had some peace and quiet they wouldn't have to be at work 90 hours a week to do 25 hours of productive labor.

Who the *&^% wants to work for free?? The motivated young developers I've met lately want to code games (XNA et al) or mobile apps, especially the iPhone. I've met very very few young developers who are really motivated to develop open source programs. I can't say I blame them. Regarding Linux the OS, what's left to be solved? Does the core Linux group really need any help? Can anyone really make a meaningful contribution to Linux anymore? People want to go where the action is. And that isn't Linux.

Thank you! I keep telling people: When it comes to business DON'T F*CK AROUND! Get the RIGHT advice and the the tools from the pro's. If you do anything else, it will just look home made and no one will take you seriously.

http://www.junauza.com/2009/12/free-and-open-source-cad-software-for.html You can also try VariCad at www.varicad.com Honestly, I think it's better to pony up the cash and get version of SolidWorks. See if you can split the costs with someone else. Then you will know for sure that is can handle the file formats of the other products.

Absolutely correct! I use VMWare images of Win2k Server et al and we had to use NewSID to avoid problems. Your images have one SID so when you try and run multiple copies, (especially with a Parent/Child DC's) you get problem. For us, it happened about 50% of the time. For some reason, some students could make all kinds of copies of Win2kserver, run them and have no problems.

I run VMWare at a college and we typically have the students run a scenario of Primary and secondary DC's. Unless we used NewSID, we had problems. The weird part was, it was intermittent. Some students would create multiple copies of the same image and had no problems, others would have nothing but grief unless they used NewSID.

I've noticed some great deals on computers lately but, with all the grief surrounding Vista, I just could not be bothered to by a new PC or a laptop. I supposed I could have just blown away the OS and reloaded XP, but I honestly just can't be bothered to piss away a day trying to do this. And Linux is not an option because some of the apps I'm using are not available on Linux. I wonder how many people have felt the same way.

There needs to be a PUBLIC Parliamentary Inquiry and the first question should be: What high priced idiots did you hire to build this? Seriously, some very high level people need to be kicked out the door for this.

I read a book a little while ago called 'Geekonomics: The Real Cost of Insecure Software' and I have to agree with the author's general sentiments. It's high time that real quality assurance came to software development. Real standards could be set and software would have to comply with those standards. I don't by the argument that this will stifle creativity. If we end up with better products, we will all benefit. Software development tools are now WAY better than anything we had in the past. Now how could the affect Open Source? Well, if Open Source software was proposed by a vendor as a solution, then that vendor would have to be responsible for ensuring that the code would conform to a third party quality assurance criteria. If the QA comes back and the system sucks, someone is going to have to fix it. Then the questions comes, who PAYS to fix Open Source software. Since a lot of Open Source relies on free labor, this could become a problem.

Whenever, I read these studies, they want to factor in depreciation. Unless you are running a business, DEPRECIATION IS NOT A COST! You bought the vehicle and your money has already been spent. It's gone! You CANNOT expense it a second time. Once the car is bought and paid for, your expenses are gas, maintenance and insurance. The one thing these studies rarely ask is: What is your time worth to you?

..and look around you when you are walking around. I'm sure many of us have seen people just blindly walk into the road figuring 'well, I have the right of way, car must stop'... Defensive driving is about paying attention and looking ahead. The same applies when you are walking around. If you are walking into traffic without paying attention, it's 'evolution in action'. This sort of safety mechanism is stupid and expensive and really won't do much to save lives. If you get hit by a car at anything over 20kph, you'll likely spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair drooling.

Shaving your nether regions and using it as a fake beard....

So what happens to the foreigners from out of state or from Canada or Mexico? Free ride!