ITWombat

But if they have too drastic a break with the past then they get castigated for breaking legacy apps. Aside from the increased resource requirements, a lot of members on this forum have been given reduced backward compatibility as a reason for not adopting or delaying deploying Windows Vista in their schools. Sure, anyone and his dad can fork Red Hat code but few corporate IT departments would deploy the resulting distro. You're joking, right? Last time I checked a PDF reader has not been integrated into the Linux kernel and what about all those Firefox plugins, for that matter. The FOSS movement is also producing its equivalent of Flash ( Gnash?). It's not the closed source nature which was the problem. There have been vulnerabilities in FireFox and in open source VM frameworks. In the Windows case Microsoft has used unsafe practices such as tight OS integration of its web browser as a way of achieving vendor lock-in to sure up its monopoly in the desktop operating systems market. Open Source is does not always prevent problems. As a case in point look at the security issues there were with PHP last year. Open source like democracy is not panacea but it does a better job of mitigating the excesses of dominant parties.

£39K! That's AST/SMT money even in London. Certainly compares well with corporate salaries for IT professionals. No doubt you could find even higher amounts in the finance sector but they tend to pay at the top end for most jobs anyway.

That's a bit harsh. It has been a matter of debate the extent to which the OS developer can be held responsible for the quality of OEM bundled software. In this case it is half and half between Adobe and Microsoft. Although it was Adobe 's software that contained the exploited vulnerability, it was Microsoft's Active X technology framework that makes it possible for the cracker to own the own the box.

If you watch late night TV on the commercial channels you might see adverts trying to get men to call premium rate numbers with the promise of speaking to hot women. This begs the question: where are the corresponding adverts which say "Girls! Speak to drooling loosers in your area":confused:

Is it legal for people who live in Kent to have so many tattoos? I shall have to ring the Daily Mail Curtain Twitcher hotline

Planet Recruit have advertised yet another missable job opportunity

Fair enough. I suppose this wouldn't be so much of a problem if you are tied to a particular agency as they would be the employer. Transferability between direct employers isn't that much of problem either. It would just be useful to a have CRB clearance certification available during job hunting. This would then be tied to the employer you finally end up with. The process would then start again if you were to change employers.

If the servers are already plugged in to the mains without incident then doesn't that mean there isn't an excessive draw the distribution board. Surely putting a UPS inhe way shouldn't draw anymore current.

The textbooks and hardware docs say you should use an earthing strap and anti static mat when working with components inside a base unit. Trouble is, I don't always see the technicians who perform the warranty service do this. When I asked one of them about this, he said that these days components are built to be more resistant to electro static discharge. Can this really be true?

Is it possible for someone to initiate a CRB check on themselves, either before or while applying for new jobs? This might be a way of shortening the whole application process for jobs in this sector. Having to wait for the new employer to the start check may stretch things out a bit.

Yeah. I was thinking that too. The old NM won a national prize for telephony so it's not entirely surprising that he might have moved on to better things.

Although software updates have become easier to do in Linux (sometimes too easy see my other thread), downloading is still a chore. I think MacOS X Server has a equivalent of WSUS for updating client Macs. What about a network of Linux PCs. Also is there a way of slip streaming or creating a pack of updates for post install application?

No real enlightenment in the Sudoers file. The only uncommented line is root ALL=(ALL) SETENV: ALL This doesn't seem to have the specificity of the behavior I have observed.

You mean like the way Ubuntu and MacOS X do things? I wondered about that but you can't do any other sys admin tasks as a normal user. You need to be root to install software but anyone else can update it.

Sorry to strike a discordant note on Mothering Sunday. No I haven't been engaged in mortal combat with me Nan. I was just imagining the problems that could occur with Mandriva's update mechanism in certain multi-user scenarios. I noticed the red updates-alert on the task bar and clicked it. I was expecting to be prompted for the password for the root account but no. The password box showed the user name of my low privilege account. Fine, I thought. I'll get to see a list of updates but I won't be able to apply them until I put in a root password. Imagine my surprise when I was able to click on the update button and all the updates started downloading. Within 10 minutes the system had been updated. So what's the problem you ask? At the end of the day, I had an up-to-date and presumably more secure system. Well in this particular case there wasn't really a problem. I haven't heavily modified Mandriva in the time I have been using it so any distribution updates are unlikely break anything. I am also the main and practically only user of the Linux box in question. I will therefore know which updates have been approved and applied. Things could be different if this was heavily customized box and in a shared use environment such as a school ICT suite. You may not want certain updates applied. I am just surprised that Mandriva allows anybody with a valid local account to update the installed distribution. Even in Windows, an administrator either has to manually approve updates or activate automatic updates. An ordinary user can't change/activate the update mechanism on a whim. The strange thing is though, all other system wide administration in Mandriva does require a root password. Why are distro updates so special?

@Mattx Your hatred/fixation with MacOS X is bordering on the pathological. What happened is there a traumatic event in your past which tuned into a Mac-o-phobe? Did the love of your life run of with a Porsche driving Mac user.;-)

Yes Minister

Yes this is the point people are missing. Yes you can configure the Default User profile to produce a standard profile but each user gets a copy only once. Network mandatory profiles overwrite the cached profile on each log in. If you are going down the local mandtory path why not just use the disk protection feature of Microsoft's SteadyState (formerly Shared Computer Toolkit) or may be Deep Freeze by Faronics.

Here's another quote from the same said Muppet. It will make BSF worth it just to see the look on his face when the managed service drones tell him how things really work.

Is there now a session time out from the site. Every time I take while to edit a post I always find I am asked to log in again. The same thing happens when I switch from the Forum list to the News/home page or vice versa. I have to log in again. The funny thing is if I have thread open on another browser tab then I still get logged on access, if you see what I mean. I can understand why a timeout would be implemented for added security but could it operate more consistently? Thanks.

All this time we thought he was just another school-based geek but all is not as it appears with our Tony/Grumbledook ( and I am not talking about the cross-dressing). Have a look at the photos of the EduGeek BETT 2008 staff. Now look at this BETT review video. Our Tony is none other than Jim Knight, Schools Minister in the DCSF!! Could this explain the ambivalence over BSF, eh? ;-)

It started well. After Ubuntu 7.10, Mandriva 2008 seemed quicker and cleaner. No quirks with flash and this time I actually get to see the boot sequence all the way from Grub to the session logon box. Well it was too good to last. I found one quirk that definitely goes in the "you gotta be kidding me!!!" file. It seems that if you log on to Mandriva with two users, the second one has audio disabled. Even bleeding Windows XP has sound for additional users! I just have to remember to be the first person to log in on any given day. Everyone else will have to wait for their YouTube session.

For those of us with capped broadband, magazine cover disks can be quite handy. You can save on the usage clock and the long wait to download and burn a distro ISO image. The Linux Magazine tends to give away more complete versions of a single distro on its cover disk. This could mean, in the case of Ubuntu, the disk contains both the live install and the alternate versions. In other cases the magazine gives away premium versions of a distro. In the old, pre Novell days, it used to give commercial version of Suse Linux. Last year it arrange for giveaway of Xandros with free maintenance subscription for a year. The March 2008 cover disk contained Mandriva Powerpack 2008. This means non-free device drivers and DVD/multimedia codecs. With the problems I've been having with Ubuntu 7.10 Gutsy Gibbon, I thought I would give Mandriva a try. Yeah, it's RPM and it'll probably bite me you-know-where but what the heck. I won't be on the computer during the FA Cup 5th round. Linux Format, tends to do multipacks, more than one distro on the same disk. One feature I like is the multi-boot facility. Other mainly Windows mags just bung ISOs in some folder and that's their good deed done for the month (please don't hurt us RMS). You can choose to boot to one distro or another. There are also PDFs of articles and install packages (usually tar balls) for selected applications. On the March 2008 DVD, Mike Saunders (the disk compiler) went a bit crazy. A double-side DVD distro mega pack. Ubuntu 7.10, OpenSUSE 10.3, Mandriva 2008, Fedora 8, Knoppix 5.1, and PCLinux0S 2007. It also had ISOs of Debian 4, DSL and Mepis 7. It would seem a bit mean to quible with assortment of riches but it seems to be the greatest hits 2007. And come on... Mepis deserves to be on the boot menu. Anyway, these our minor criticisms. This issue definitely gets a definite buy recommendation for bandwidth limited or time poor penguin fans. The editorial/features content is also quite good. It cover broader range of expertise (beginner to intermediate users) and more of a sense of humor than Linux Magazine. Another difference between the two magazines is that strictly speaking only Linux Magazine has a cover mount DVD, stuck on with some sticky gooey thing. By contrast, Linux Format has them in a pocket insert. You're meant to tearout the pocket and refold it into a more conventional CD sleeve. Too much like hard work. That's it for the disk review. I will probably do another unscientific distro review for Mandriva to follow those of Ubtuntu 7.10 and Fedora 8.

If it is hardware RAID then you would do the setup before the OS install. In this way the Windows will see things as it remembers.