There is nothing wrong with an application that doesn't conform to standard practices as long as system administrator is fully aware of what the application does, and knowingly chooses to install it. I may have my own reasons why I want to run a rootkit on my machine (honeypots, etc), and Google is not the one who should deprive me of this opportunity. Now, it would be unethical for me to install this app to spy on somebody, but this should be left to my conscience without Google being a moral police.

I thought the general consensus here on /. was that since I own the hardware, I should be able to use it as I please, so why is my opinion so unpopular?

I'm not the OP, but I used the same workaround. The answer is simple - I didn't know about XDG, the command needed to update directory, its parameters, where the config file is located, or whether the app in question is "good behaving". Doing rm & ln is simple, gets the job done, and doesn't require additional googling. The same thing really happened when I installed sun java and didn't know about the alternatives mechanism - manually overriding symlinks, or even prepending java's bin directory to your $PATH is easier than trying to figure out how to do it properly. Of course now that I know about these tools I will use them, but you shouldn't really blame the OP for using something he knows to quickly fix the problem instead of spending additional time learning about new tools.

Both universities I went to required international grad students to pass a spoken English test (typically more difficult to pass than TOEFL) before they were allowed to be TAs. I assume there are similar rules in other schools.

Except it's not only about font size and icons. You have to stretch images in the browser as well to prevent website layout from breaking; that's when things start to look ugly. I have a 14" laptop with 1400x1050 native resolution, and would prefer it to be 1024x768 as suggested by the GP.

Very true. I happened to study in a country where you could earn the highest grade (10) only if you did some significant extra credit, or if you showed that you knew more than the class required in some other way. It highly motivated students to go "above and beyond", and gave a student something to be really proud about when they earned a 10. I also studied in the US, and it's too easy here to get an A - simply do everything that is required with no "thinking outside the box" involved.

Computer Science != Software Engineering

In decent colleges, they teach you basic algorithm design concepts (e.g. dynamic programming), give some examples, and ask you to come up with a specific algorithm to solve a particular problem. This is hardly as simple as implementing a binary search algorithm (this stuff is typically done in introductory courses). Memory allocation is typically completely irrelevant in Algorithms course.

Exactly. In fact, Slashdot is one of few sites that are Doing It Right. I was so impressed when I saw the "Disable Advertising" option that I immediately added *.slashdot.org to my AdBlock whitelist (although I should have done it earlier given the amount of time I spend here).

It seems that this argument comes up at least once in every post related to transportation. Please believe me that once you've been in an accident where you were not the guilty party (because of either other driver, vehicle malfunction, or poor road conditions), you will not find this joke even remotely funny.

Actually, I think that it would be better if every person on the road could experience being in a non-serious accident (i.e. without significant injuries) that only involved their car. Maybe then most people would stop thinking that they are above-average drivers.

90s called, they want their 700MB XVIDs back. Nowadays most movies are available in at least 720p, so content providers should match that.

I think one important service that movie studios can provide to attract customers is "online storage". Here's what they should do:

• Have a system similar to Steam, where you could buy movies online and they would be available to your account for unlimited time.
• New releases should not cost more than $10; older movies should cost proportionally less.
• Server bandwidth should be sufficient to enable viewing (and seeking) streaming video in 720p without buffering.
• In addition to that, all movies should be downloadable in non-DRM'd format (preferably H.264+AAC+MKV).

If they provide such service, I'm sure most people would get rid of their TB hard drives and stop pirating movies, as they would know they can watch a movie they liked any time. They would still be able to backup downloaded movies to avoid the case when the servers become unavailable.

One of my professors had a better way to handle this issue - he required all laptop-users to sit in the back of the classroom. This would still allow students to use laptops in class if they want. However, it would move them sufficiently far away so that other students are not distracted by the clickety-clacking and seeing laptop-users playing games or surfing the web (the same distracting effect as if someone in front of you in a movie theater uses a cell phone).

I firmly believe that pen and paper is still a much better way to take notes and learn in class, but I wouldn't prevent students from using laptops as supposedly they pay the same tuition as everyone else. Even if some students doesn't actively listen to the lecture, it is their choice and it's not an excuse to ban them from attending lectures.

Oh, come on. There is plenty of opportunities for intelligent minorities to finance their education in college.

• You don't need to go to an Ivy League school to get a decent job. Computer Science department in the state university I'm attending (rank 50-80) regularly publishes the average salary of graduating seniors majoring in CS who secured a job (almost everyone who doesn't go to grad school). Last year it was around $50k - and this is for an entry-level position straight out of college.
• If they're short on cash, a very good strategy is to get a 2-year degree from a community college first, and then transfer credits to the university. It is also easier to get into a CC, and prove your worth by getting good grades.
• Being US citizens, they qualify for dirt cheap in-state tuition, and various federal aid (e.g. FAFSA, work-study programs, etc).
• Being a minority, they qualify for a huge number of scholarships that are not available to white males (especially in CS and Engineering).
• There is a large number of other funding opportunities. Our CS department gives a nice lump sum (approx. 1/3 of in-state tuition) every year to top X students in the department. I don't see any reason for an intelligent person to not being able to get good grades and become the top performer.
• It is not a secret that colleges still prefer to admit minorities over equally qualified white males, even though racial quotas are supposed to be illegal.
• To some of you who might say that these people often live in bad neighborhoods that foster "gang culture", so even smart kids are sucked into it: Often freshmen have to live on campus, so they get immersed into a learning community and have to break connections to places they were raised at. A rather interesting article (pdf) on the "acting white" phenomenon that I recently read might be relevant to this discussion.

Yes, I'm bitter - perhaps that's because most of the benefits listed above didn't apply to me, and I still somehow managed to accomplish my goal of doing a good enough job as an undergrad to be accepted in a top 5 grad school. Upward mobility *does exist* if you're persistent (or desperate) enough.