TR Forums

My GPU has been stuck in Wichita Falls since Monday. I am pissed. I'm pretty understanding about weather--given my job for gods sakes--but REALLY? The roads are not that frigging bad. I wonder if I could drive down and pick it up?

just brew it! wrote:

In this case, in all likelihood:
consultant: friend, family member, or someone who is owed a favor
the rest: meaningless buzzwords thrown in to provide political cover

But then you obviously knew that already; sounds like you're in for some fun times. "Initiatives". "Restructuring". Maybe even the dreaded "team building exercises" and "exploration of potential synergies". Hopefully it doesn't come to "rightsizing".

I assume you're already familiar with Bu*lsh*t Bingo?

Even worse. "Consultant" is already a State employee who's part of our CF'd health exchange rollout and also does work for Human Services, a/k/a the most TU part of State gov't. This cannot end well.

At least "rightsizing" is out of the control of our new Deputy Commissioner. She'll have to convince two more layers further up and she'll have to deal with the union. The rest of BS Bingo is still in play, though.

Captain Ned wrote:

The rest of BS Bingo is still in play, though.

In that case, you're probably ready to watch this again.

ludi wrote:

Captain Ned wrote:

The rest of BS Bingo is still in play, though.

In that case, you're probably ready to watch this again.

I intend to take this sort of approach.

Reading a web article about the upgrades to the LHC at CERN and this is essentially a throwaway statement:

"CERN also installed nearly 60,000 new cores and more than 100 petabytes of memory"

I'm not sure which sucks more power, the collider or the server farm.

Today I have left the worst, long, rambling phone message ever. At one point I actually said "worst message ever".

Yeah I'm not sure what happened there either.

Vrock wrote:

Firefox? You running Word Perfect and Lotus 1-2-3 also?

This made me lol. Thanks Vrock!

Vrock wrote:

Firefox? You running Word Perfect and Lotus 1-2-3 also?

The great adventure has begun. The new build is on a box next to me downloading its updates as we speak. Once I've got it to where I want it, it'll go in the case.

Took you long enough.

Already despising Win 8.1

Considering that you clung to Windows XP throughout the Vista/7/8/8.1 era, that's not a surprise.

derFunkenstein wrote:

Considering that you clung to Windows XP throughout the Vista/7/8/8.1 era, that's not a surprise.

Use 7 at work, but 8.1 is just off the rails. Hoping the free upgrade to 10 fixes some of that.

trying to migrate to 8.1 has been the most unpleasent computing experience I"ve had since I sat down with XP for Dummies and told myself I wouldn't be a total idiot anymore. I hate this OS. HATE IT. The UI is awful. They kind of mitigated it by putting a shell over it that's similar to 7, but why can't I just default to that? ugh. Waiting for 10 yhere

1 lap around the Nürburgring in 7:50.6, topping 270 km/h (169 mph).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lXGmjt1FtQ

http://blog.caranddriver.com/must-watch ... gring-lap/
That's faster than some seriously high-dollar supercars, and it shatters the previous lap record for a front-wheel drive vehicle by almost 4 seconds.
http://fastestlaps.com/tracks/nordschleife.html
2009 Mercedes SL65 AMG Black Series 7:51
2004 Ford GT 7:52
2008 Lamborghini Gallardo LP560-4 7:52
2014 BMW M4 7:52

Captain Ned wrote:

Already despising Win 8.1

Why? I mean besides your "get off my lawn" syndrome?

DancinJack wrote:

Captain Ned wrote:

Already despising Win 8.1

Why? I mean besides your "get off my lawn" syndrome?

Well, Metro (and yes, I've installed Classic Shell) and its desire to reduce the tiles I need to microscopic size while blattering tiles I'll never use over half my screen, plus never knowing which mouse action is going to launch a Metro-style app vs. old-school Windows. It's a touch-screen UI designed for social media junkies and celebrity-obsessed tweens (not much overlap in that Venn diagram, though). IMO MS got the UI perfect with Win2K and should have mandated its devs to keep this an option in every new version of the OS.

I understand the need to update the OS for security reasons. MS failed by not giving us "off my lawn" people the ability to make the lawn look like we want. Win10 exists solely because post-Ballmer MS finally figured out how badly it screwed up.

I know you need Windows for gaming (and possibly other things as well), so going full-on-alterna-OS like I did a few years back isn't a viable option for you. But did you consider possibly going with Windows 7? Yeah it'll be EOLed sooner than the newer versions, but it is more of an intermediate step from XP, and, well, more familiar for a die-hard XP fan.

Or use Windows for the stuff that requires Windows, but run Linux in a VM for most of your other day-to-day stuff. Yeah, it ain't gonna be just like XP either, but Linux Mint offers a pretty straightforward traditional desktop, and KDE is near-infinitely customizable (though your Google-fu better be up to snuff if you want to get under the hood to dick with anything that isn't exposed in the settings GUIs).

Fences by Stardock. Works a charm for organizing desktop icons.

BIF wrote:

Fences by Stardock. Works a charm for organizing desktop icons.

I haven't looked at Stardock in some time so I thought I would take a look. I like what I see but dang it to hell they are using a subscription model. That's crazy! On a second look, you can buy each piece individually.

just brew it! wrote:

I know you need Windows for gaming (and possibly other things as well), so going full-on-alterna-OS like I did a few years back isn't a viable option for you. But did you consider possibly going with Windows 7? Yeah it'll be EOLed sooner than the newer versions, but it is more of an intermediate step from XP, and, well, more familiar for a die-hard XP fan.

Next work lappy will have 8.1 or 10 (whatever HP is selling that month) so I'd rather get over the learning curve at home than on the job.

8.1/10 isnt so bad. If you hate the tile screen (which I do) you can set the PC to boot directly to desktop after login.

Microsoft are apparently moving in the right direction after the initial 8 release. 8.1 still has flaws, but 10 looks like it should be Windows 7 with a Windows 8 skin (essentially).

I wouldn't be opposed to changes if they actually served a functional purpose and improved the usability.

holy spambots batman

The Egg wrote:

I wouldn't be opposed to changes if they actually served a functional purpose and improved the usability.

I believe I've said that pretty much verbatim, regarding the constant churn of Linux desktop environments.

I had come to love GNOME 2 when it got EOLed and focus shifted to the less functional and much buggier GNOME 3. KDE had gone through a similar transition a year or two prior, but KDE 4 was finally stabilizing, so I became a KDE guy. Over the past couple of years I've learned how to bend KDE to my will and work around its bugs/quirks; so of course now KDE development is shifting to KDE 5.

I'll probably switch to Mint (with the Cinnamon desktop) when KDE 4 is no longer well-supported (if not sooner)...

just brew it! wrote:

I had come to love GNOME 2 when it got EOLed and focus shifted to the less functional and much buggier GNOME 3.

<3 GNOME 2. Was always my favorite DE in Linux when I was using it daily. In college we had KDE on Gentoo and it just did not sit well with me (that was probably just Gentoo being Gentoo ). I use OS X a lot now, and I'm pretty content with whatever desktop system they have setup (not sure what it is called?). I really wish they would allow me to minimize an application by just clicking its icon in the dock though. Can't imagine why that is not an option.

Captain Ned wrote:

Well, Metro (and yes, I've installed Classic Shell) and its desire to reduce the tiles I need to microscopic size while blattering tiles I'll never use over half my screen, plus never knowing which mouse action is going to launch a Metro-style app vs. old-school Windows. It's a touch-screen UI designed for social media junkies and celebrity-obsessed tweens (not much overlap in that Venn diagram, though). IMO MS got the UI perfect with Win2K and should have mandated its devs to keep this an option in every new version of the OS.

I understand the need to update the OS for security reasons. MS failed by not giving us "off my lawn" people the ability to make the lawn look like we want. Win10 exists solely because post-Ballmer MS finally figured out how badly it screwed up.

FWIW, I don't really mean to keep picking on you. I have been using 8.1 Pro x64 on my main (home) computer for about 4 months now and it works wonderfully for my uses. I use Start8 from Stardock, boot to desktop, and disable all the other CHARMS HOT MOUSE AREAS BLAH BLAH 8/8.1 stuff. It feels more or less like 7 now, just with more features, faster, and more polished. There are a few niggles, but I think they are the same ones I had with all versions of Windows. You can do it, Ned!

just brew it! wrote:

I had come to love GNOME 2 when it got EOLed and focus shifted to the less functional and much buggier GNOME 3. KDE had gone through a similar transition a year or two prior, but KDE 4 was finally stabilizing, so I became a KDE guy. Over the past couple of years I've learned how to bend KDE to my will and work around its bugs/quirks; so of course now KDE development is shifting to KDE 5.

I'll probably switch to Mint (with the Cinnamon desktop) when KDE 4 is no longer well-supported (if not sooner)...

I started out life with KDE (started on OpenSUSE, will cherish and adore it forever; you always remember your first...), but eventually found it a bit bloated and too bubbly. I never got around to liking GNOME 2. Unity is awful. XFCE is wonderful, and sees daily use, though I'll probably try eOS at some point.

I love how people wield titles, certs, and degrees in their signature blocks. Like that gives them power over me. Today's example: John K. Doe, MBA, L6SGB. I mean really who the eff cares but you. But can you write me a SSIS package that populates a SharePoint List from mainframe/DB2 and then in turn design a SSRS infographic report? Probably not. This is especially true when your job title/ pay grade doesn't reflect or even amount to those numerous certs and degrees. Its like the epeen of the corporate world.

tanker27 wrote:

I love how people wield titles, certs, and degrees in their signature blocks. Like that gives them power over me. Today's example: John K. Doe, MBA, L6SGB. I mean really who the eff cares but you. But can you write me a SSIS package that populates a SharePoint List from mainframe/DB2 and then in turn design a SSRS infographic report? Probably not. This is especially true when your job title/ pay grade doesn't reflect or even amount to those numerous certs and degrees. Its like the epeen of the corporate world.

Clearly you need someone showing "MCTS: SQL Server 2008 Implementation and Maintenance" in their work signatures!

(.. actually not I have that cert there's no SSIS on it. And it should never be in a signature.)

tanker27 wrote:

love how people wield titles, certs, and degrees in their signature blocks. Like that gives them power over me. Today's example: John K. Doe, MBA, L6SGB. I mean really who the eff cares but you. But can you write me a SSIS package that populates a SharePoint List from mainframe/DB2 and then in turn design a SSRS infographic report? Probably not. This is especially true when your job title/ pay grade doesn't reflect or even amount to those numerous certs and degrees. Its like the epeen of the corporate world.

I love the cybersecurity folks where I work:

Jane Doe, CEH, CISSP (and other garbage I can't remember)

CEH you ask? Certified Ethical Hacker. I guess they take the test (Form No. # 3514 ) in which they answer "True" to the question "Are you ethical?"
CISSP: Certified Information Systems Security Professional. It seems to be all about paperwork, not really about any sort of actual technical detail whatsoever.

The ones I dealt with were people hired straight out of the global helpdesk (as in, password-resets) and the auditing team (as in, did you check the box?). Someone I know personally as an administrator said they literally asked questions like "how do I SSH" and "where is varlog" which they not only thought was a singular directory, but couldn't even intuit from / that maybe /var was somewhere they'd like to check...

There was also an exercise with us at the plants:

CyberSecurity: There is a virus on one of your computers. What do you do next?
Us: Which computer? Which plant? Where in the plant? What networks is it on? What does that computer do normally and what is it doing now that leads us to believe it is infected?
CS: It's a virus. You're Infected. What do you do now?
Us: Our response would be predicated upon additional details you haven't to divulged. The generic question is meaningless. If it if were a work laptop, for instance, we'd just turn it off and contact infrastructure.
CS: No, we're talking about your servers, what would you do?
Us: You didn't say server, but fine, which one? What is actually happening?
CS: It's a virus, that's what happening. What would you do? Why are you making this so hard?

This goes on like this for ten minutes in which CS people getting increasingly angry at us for our perceived intransigence and we're getting annoyed at how idiotic the line of inquiry is. Eventually their superior just discontinued the exercise and we got scolded for not being "cooperative." In what, I wonder? Play-a-long make-believe?

These are the "image forensics people" "reverse engineering people" and "application security people" and they treat those letters after their names as if they were knighthoods, talking about how their "proprietary" information is "classified." and so on. That amount of airs they give themselves is scary.