OO.o happily opens and converts MS-Office documents. The problem only exists going sending it back, but not for the sender, unless you count the extra work involved in 'saving as' and resending.

I've given up supporting Windows in my family. I flatly refuse. I've found a more effective use of my time is to burn CDs and DVDs for family visits.

When my wife's vista laptop died, she thought she'd get a free ride and I would fix it for her. I threw a fedora disk at her and said when thats installed, I'll help, until then I don't care. 7 months now, and the most I've been involved is helping with wireless and initially configuring her e-mail aside from some initial "best practices". Since then, she has learned how to help herself has become quite independent, which makes my home life much more enjoyable with less "fixing".

The kids PC is an old Gateway, running CentOS, and I rarely have to help the 3 (he's a webkinz fan), 6, and 9 year olds with it. It just runs, and allows them to play and discover, as opposed to update and frustrate.

1. 1. The network he was unable to attend to (because of being jailed inappropriately) ran FINE in his absence. He has skills, and previous descriptions indicate this is not a simple network.
2. 2. He stuck to his beliefs. I think this is a good quality, especially considering it cost him his freedom for a period of time.
3. 3. In spite of the negative connotations of imprisonment, I'm sure there is educational value from his situation.
4. 4. In my personal opinion, from whats been published, management screwed the pooch on this one, he did the right thing, in several situations.

I would hire him.

I challange your usage of the word, "skilled"." The hardest part is reading.

Owait ... this is /., I see your point now. :P

I prefer the Razer Lachesis or Diamondback for gaming and work. The Lachesis is is 3G 4000dpi and high precision, minimal movement type and the Diamondback is a 2000dpi which basically translates to a really fast mouse with more traditional travel ranges. They both work with Linux, although the actual drivers/profiles needed to be setup on a windows system first. In the case of the Lach, it stores 5 profiles on the mouse itself.

In spite of the pissing match about Ernie's original intentions, free vs OSS, etc... I see upside to retelling this story. Namely, he claims he is running an efficient (apps you NEED, not what comes bundled), high uptime (no MS virus du jour or upgrade parade), and economical (no brand new hardware) business without MS-Windows, MS-Office, MS-Exchange.

FFS. It runs linux successfully.

Quit your complaining. Microsoft transformed many (including many of YOU /.ers) to OSX and Linux.

There is not much. This excerpt, In general terms, in the U.S., whoever can be troubled to key in the data, is deemed to own the right to store and use it, even if the data were collected without permission, is particularly disturbing.

While you may THINK the data was collected for either a sale, long term lease agreements (similar to cable service), or whatnot... the ACTUAL specific purpose was to track you and sell your information to "partners".

This is where the "partners" come in ... See JCpenny and SBS for an example of 1 company using your information and giving it to a partner company.

Too bad its not supposed to be deleted if it can't be confirmed in given period of time. Also, SSNs don't expire, so you get off thier list if you die. Yay.

If the simple fact that many have provided funds or access is an indication, then I'd say LOTS.

I cruise at -1. Those that don't would never see the humor in some of this stuff if people didn't mod them up. Personally, I find some the humor absolutely hilarious but too many people will reach for the troll mod before the funny mod.

There is an-oth-eerrrrrrr.

I hope thats an attempt at humor. It failed (miserably), just like the race card Gates played (stupidly) and has since capitulated from.