System i Addict

Can someone explain why the Wireless tools in KDE and GNOME suck so bad? I am not stupid and I guess I could configure the WiFi manually but isn’t that the reason we have KDE and GNOME in the first place?

I have OpenSUSE 10.2 installed on a DELL laptop with an internal WiFi card and Linux sees the card and that is about it. I can’t connect to my Apple Base Station at home or the WiFi network at the office.

Seems like every OS would take a hint from MacOSX and make it that easy!

Maybe it’s just me?

In the past (1999) you were either a fan of IBM or you were a fan of Microsoft. You either installed Lotus or you picked up Exchange. in the end you just needed mail and if the mail server did more than that then you, the admin, were pretty darned happy.

Lotus R5 did more than that. It did a lot. You could make applications on the fly and they were pretty easy to make. Exhcnage still only did email and the other crap that goes along with email. No one was to fussy back then.

Lotus also was able to run thier Domino server on just about any platform. My favorite was the AS/400, not the iSeries or the i5. Along with AiX, Windows, and Linux. You can still to this day only run Exchange on Windows Server. Sad really if you think about it.

As time went on, Lotus didn’t change to much in fact it has not changed that much since R5. The templates for mail and such have gotten better looking but over all it’s still Lotus Notes. Outlook on the other had has always looked better, even though it only does one thing, mail, it still just has a very polished feel to it. Lotus over the years has stepped up to the plate and really worked hard on the web intergration and the Domino Web Access, which is far better than OWA, but still the Notes Client has needed a face lift for some time.

About 14 - 20 months ago Hannover was release as a buzz word around the Lotus community. They showed a slick little GUI that looked IMHO better than Outlook. It was a whole new Notes client. They even have a nice little section on the Lotus.com web site about Hannover, now called Lotus Notes 8, to read and catch up with what is going to be coming. Lotusphere 07 is right around the corner and I would urge IBM to get 8 out the door ASAP.

IBM and Lotus need a huge win in order to stay in this fight. They truley have the better product but you can’t win new customers when you client is butt ugly and what most would consider “outdated” or “old”. I get that a lot from people who don’t undertand the versitility of Lotus Domino and Notes and truley don’t know the reliability of runnning it on a platform like the iSeries. It really is solid on the iSeries. If you run Lotus Domino on Windows, please consider the iSeries, first you will look like a Super Admin with all the uptime and next it will be tons faster. I am not kidding.

Back to the topic at hand. Please IBM release Lotus Notes 8 sooner rather than later and make sure you guys are testing it on Vista. Lord knows we don’t want to use Vista, but we all know it’s coming. If you really love me you will also put out Lotus Notes 8 for Fedora and OpenSUSE as well make me smile from ear to ear.

I want the next Hannover post to be that the code went GA and not another delay!

I guess this is a big deal.

The last version of Notes 6.5 for MacOSX was in my opinion a problem at best and on IBM’s best day the support for it did leave a lot to be desired. I had 2 Macs in my last enviroment running Lotus Notes 6.5 and they both had plenty of issued that IBM support had no real good answer for and in most cases never fixed.

It was one of those moments when you think to yourself? Why does no one at IBM understand the Mac and how can they get away with not really supporting it? Reloading was the ussuall course of action with support. I think after a while you just give up, and that is what I did.

So if you have a Mac running MacOSX 10.4 you can now have the latest Notes Client. Yeah? Does that include Sametime intergration too?

Why is there no Sametime Client for MacOSX? Same goes for Linux? Don’t get me started or we will never get out of here.
Read all about the release here 

I know this is going to sound a bit harsh, but IBM and Lotus need to get Hannover out ahead of schedule and get rid of what is called Notes today. It’s ugly and boring and so over developed it’s hard to use. Now in the same breath so it Outlook but at least it’s got a nice look to it and the every day tasks are easy to use. Lotus Notes’ problem right now is Lotus Notes. Everyone at Lotus knows this but is afraid to say it out loud in fear of someone actually saying what every user is thinking.

Ed if you are reading this. I know you really probably could live without me and I know I am a pain in your ass, but you know what needs to be done. Stop tinkering around and stop making more bad Notes releases and get every developer who can say C++ on Hannover. It’s the only way to stop the problems with your current client.

Oh VISTAR is moving from Domino on iSeries (one of the most stable Mail and Application platforms) to Exchange. That’s over 5000 Employees and about 2000 Clients who are ditching Notes to move to Outlook/Exchange. The only reason I think they have not moved sooner with this plan is me, yep me, being the single Domino Admin, I gave Chris so much crap he preferred not to even deal with me on the subject of Lotus and that discussion and just wait until I either left or he could get AD installed and then Exchange would have been a “no brainier” according to Chris and Tim.

The other sad part is I think Lotus could stop the move but no one has knocked on the door over there in so long that they get the feeling IBM does not give a rats you know what about them. VISTAR spends millions with IBM every 3 years and no one except one person (iSeries Tech) darkens their doorstep more than once a year to see how things are going……badly if you company name is IBM.

Oh well that is all for now. Yeah IBM is thinking about Macs again….what about Lotus?

I found this little diddy while poking around NCLUG.org…..for all you out there in IT I think you will understand what Joel is talking about. I know I do.

Link to Fire & Motion

Linux.com Post: Microsoft Hiring “Open Source Evangelist”?

I serached all over Microsoft.com careers page to see if they had anything they had posted and could not find a posting for this opening. They must just be looking around a bit before they get every Linux dude out there applying for the position….HAHA that is funny.

You know if they called me, I would take it. I would go there and help out. I would have to know what the Linux talking points are going to be. I am a whore anyway.

Discovery Channel has a show that is going to show how Steve Jobs and Apple came up with the iPod and made Apple worth Billions. I would also like to point out that no one has even come close to doing what Apple has done with Digital Music.

Link to Audio - You will need iTunes

The iTMS is offer John Hodgamn’s audio book, “The Areas of My Expertise” for free!

This is what we all have been waiting for. It’s a cool idea I heard someone tossing around a few years ago on a forum and PayPal is probably the only company to be able to pull this off. To bad a Bank who deals with money and fraud all the time could not have come up with the idea?

LinkÂ

I have just started to read this post on Paypal.com so I am learning and understanding it now too?

I know some of you hate Dvorak and some of you love him, but he is a geek and he like his toys so here is a post about what he wants in his next PC. It will be fun to come back to this in 3-5 years and see how silly and outdated this looks!

LinkÂ

Shares of Apple stock were down $3.55, or 4.36 percent, to $77.96 in early morning trading on the Nasdaq stock market following the report on Law.com. Apple is one of many companies–including CNET Networks, publisher of CNET News.com–embroiled in government investigations into the practice of stock-option backdating, in which companies would assign favorable grant dates to stock options in order to ensure hefty profits for executives.

Bad Apple! Bad Apple! (Story Here)

Still doing better than old MS, and the Zune really took off this shopping season too…..Everyone I knew got iPods!

Keep on Truckin Apple and stop fudging the numbers you don’t have too anymore!

Once again I get to point out that Microsoft is a really awful company. They don’t like to play by the ruleas and could care less about the truth and more about the FUD.

They build a highly used and really crappy OS, They market the hell out of it, and they are now bribing bloggers to say nice things with that could be called, the “Ferrari” of laptops, no really you could call it that.

Story Here and some assorted details too….

Trying to explain it as something Normal and Ethical?

So what do we do now? Where do we go? What was Microsoft really trying to do with the laptops? I find this troubling to say the least or as one person put it “highly inappropriate and immoral”.

Nuff Said,
David

Article Here

This is an article about why Windows Rules the world….I would have to disagree and say it has more to do with thier constant marketing and initial sell on simplicity, althought that comes at a price, like the inability to really do antyhing with the OS once you have it installed or be able to trouble shoot it effectily like other real OSes.

“But the real difference between Unix-like operating systems and Windows is their design philosophies. Windows may squander computing power through its clumsy architecture. But by favouring simplicity of use over simplicity of design, Microsoft has been able to leverage cheap but powerful commodity hardware, to provide cost-effective software solutions. These may be complex in design—and full of bugs to boot—but, boy, are they easy to use and maintain. That’s a winning formula in anyone’s book, and the reason why Windows rightly rules the world.” 

This paragraph is the kicker.It does not explain why Microsoft is the most used OS out there, it does however point out that the stupidity of the average user to not know anything about any other OS and to continue to use Windows because they assume it’s easier than other OSes.

“boy, are they easy to use and maintain.

This happens to be the most idiotic statement I have read in a long time. Windows is easy to maintain? I am sorry did you forget about the once a week patches you have to put on? Do you not know about the six figure appliances and devices companies purchase to maintain their Windows desktops? Microsoft Windows XP is probably one of the most expensive desktops to maintain from the word go. I spend far more time updating my one Windows Desktop at home than I do taking care of the 3 Mac, 2 Linux Desktops, and 4 Linux Servers. To be blunt that line is a lie and the writer is uninformed and knows nothing about Windows XP and a Corporate environment.

Full Disclosure : I am not a fan of Windows. I think the world would be a better place without Windows and we also have less talk about security from a single OS than we currently do. I would invite each of you to Try MacOSX or Llinux instead of ever using Windows. I think Microsoft is treating every person and company that uses their software like they are stupid and are to dumb to see the fact that Windows is a filled with problems they will fix later instead of now.

The New Your Times and many other places are reports new security problems in the next version of Windows, called VISTA. There is a Russian Programmer, notice they didn’t call him a hacker and I mean hacker in the good sense of the word, that has found some issues already with the latest release of Windows.

“On Dec. 15, a Russian programmer posted a description of a flaw that makes it possible to increase a user’s privileges on all of the company’s recent operating systems, including Vista. And over the weekend a Silicon Valley computer security firm said it had notified Microsoft that it had also found that flaw, as well as five other vulnerabilities, including one serious error in the software code underlying the company’s new Internet Explorer 7 browser.” 

So at this point on Dec 27th Microsoft still has done little to address thesecurity issue other than saying the following:

“On Friday, a Microsoft executive posted a comment on a company security information Web site stating the company was “closely monitoring” the vulnerability described by the Russian Web site. It permits the privileges of a standard user account in Vista and other versions of Windows to be increased, permitting control of all of the operations of the computer. In Unix and modern Windows systems, users are restricted in the functions they can perform, and complete power is restricted to certain administrative accounts.” 

Is that really an answer? I don’t think it is, I think it’s a cop out and they have failed to see the pinch in the pocket book so they really are not going to fix it. I would bet that SP1 for VISTA will be out sometime Summer 2007.

I don’t get excited or happy when this happens as some of you may think. It troubles me and even more troubling is I heard a person say how much they were looking forward to VISTA? You have got to be kidding me and then went on to say they liked Windows, but to be fair they had never used any other OS other than Windows. You can pick that apart, I don’t need to it’s so obvious.

I am sure they also got the only good Ford Pinto as their first car and have never purchased any other brand since then.

Read the NYT Article and please, please don’t go purchase VISTA, I think it’s going to be the same as those of you who went out and purchased Windows ME. They have been working on VISTA for over 7 years and this is all they can deliver and in that 7 years have stolen so many interface niceties from MacOS, KDE and GNOME that it’s not funny and in truth I have not seen anything in the new OS that is original. I am still looking.

More to come I am sure…..

Link to the Microsoft Get Ready for VISTA Site.

A Windows Vista Capable PC includes at least:

• A modern processor (at least 800MHz¹).
• 512 MB of system memory.
• A graphics processor that is DirectX 9 capable.

A Windows Vista Premium Ready PC includes at least:

• 1 GHz 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor¹.
• 1 GB of system memory.
• Support for DirectX 9 graphics with a WDDM driver, 128 MB of graphics memory (minimum)², Pixel Shader 2.0 and 32 bits per pixel.
• 40 GB of hard drive capacity with 15 GB free space.
• DVD-ROM Drive³.
• Audio output capability.
• Internet access capability.

Now most of you should be able to handle this with your average PC. I am looking at my work desktop and I should be able to run it, I am a bit confused when it comes to Video Cards, but I think I am OK and it should run just fine. The fact that you need 15GB free I would guess to install the OS is just plain silly. Then again Windows just keeps getting bigger.
So give your system the once over and get ready for VISTA, and for all you MacOS & Linux users, don’t worry about a damn thing cause this post is not for you. I can’t wait for the next version of MacOSX and OpenSUSE is not so bad. I am really starting to like it. I can only find one thing on it that is going to keep me from moving to it on my Work Desktop. Rock On and hope you enjoy your VISTA!

I can by the number of post I have put up on the site? Still coming down.

Link to Snow Pics

OK, so I may get kicked out for this one, but I have seen it all now.Ubuntu for Christians. The idea makes sense, I guess, but you have to see it to beleive it.

Now I get the spin on this but what in Ubuntu Linux was “objectionable”? What in any version of Linux was bad for people? I guess I would rather see this than a site about Christians in love with Windows. That would really set me of as I can see the evil in Windows and Microsoft.

I guess you would want to get rid of BitchX? and other poorly named products. I never liked that name anyway.

Good for all ya’ll Linux Christians! That is super!

Ubuntu for ChristiansÂ

Linux for ChristiansÂ

Here is a little diddy about how one man ran Windows and Ubuntu on the, get this, the same PC!

I think most of us have been doing that for years, but it really is not talked about much since the cost of a second cheaper PC is so cheap now a days.

Link to Article

As you may be seeing on the TV there is one hell of a storm going on in Colorado right now. The Kia is stuck on a road in a 4 foot drift. I had to walk a bit in the snow to catch a ride to the in-laws place. I think we are stuck here for the night.

I will have to post some photos when I get a chance. There is about a good foot to two feet down right now and it’s dropping 2 inches an hour until about noon on Thursday. Cars are stuck everywhere and the plows are not out like they used to be in the past. The Major roads are just packed with snow.
The airport is closed. Most major highways are closed and I almost made it home. Close but not close enough.

Link to a story about the weather

It’s going to be a overly white Christmas here in Colorado!

Link to Snow Pictures….. 

MERRY CHRISTMAS YA’LL

I though this was pretty funny. Figured you all might want to read about it too?

Link to Article

IBM Racks Up 2,500th Linux on POWER Applications

More than five years after Big Blue introduced Linux to the iSeries, IBM has claimed an important milestone in its embrace of what was then an upstart operating system. Sybase Unwired Accelerator, which securely extends corporate applications to mobile environments, is the 2,500th Linux application to be made available for IBM’s POWER processor-driven platforms, which include the System i.

Read the Rest of the Article