Re. Mong (FAO Mike) ...oh yeah, and Vista 32bit versus 64bit
Why don't we let Wikipedia do its worst? See what it knows on the subject...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mong
"Mong can be:
* an alternate name for the Hmong people
* an offensive term for the mentally handicapped, as a contraction of the now-dated term "Mongoloid", formerly used to describe Down syndrome sufferers"
Anyone (...Chris?) want to update Wikipedia with the Australian slang inference?
Ah! Mike! Can you see the word 'VICTIM' anywhere in those definitions?
You, sensitive? Had you forgotten how hard the fight has been for people with various conditions to be respected and not condescended with terms like 'victim'?
Let the individual be the judge of whether they are victims, and the lawyers if necessary, but then I am bald, they are tall and he is fat - are we victims too?
Besides, a term mentioned just once in an unrelated forum where there is ambiguity over its intended meaning ... there is no need to say one word, not at first, and certainly not the last last last last last word. every time.
What a royal bore. What is YOUR victim-syndrome, err, condition?
Short? Fat? Pompous? A victim? I doubt it.
But Chris, really! No single word is fit to describe WinME. Biologists swear to it that mongrels (let's be P.C. eh! "mixed-breeds" - very prim!) can actually benefit from "hybrid vigour", cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_vigour
So there. Surely this is closed now?
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Vista? So, 64bit works okay, maxing out hardware potential by design and in the process maximising energy consumption - environmental disaster, not very green, though it is alleged that it works. Did all the corporate testers, who have since reverted to XP/migrated to Linux, try the 32bit or the 64bit version?
That 32/64bit information is often not reported.
Revenue for Microsoft?
Why don't they begin a(nother) new licensing model?
Your license will last 4? 8? or 12? years before you need to renew by paying a new fee for continued updates/support. They could make licenses cheaper if they had firm control of the licensing! Registration could be compulsory.
They have done that for Vista/2007 OEM products - they last the life of the computer, a topic much discussed on the Register. Horrid.
My suggestion would allow those enjoying a product that has matured a little to continue enjoying it, whilst propping up the impoverished M$ Coffers.
No need to do the GUI shuffle and disco lights 'innovation' (cough) trick, nor to withdraw a semi-mature product when it is coming towards its prime (when the majority have some comfortable familiarity with it that makes for efficient use and cuts wasted time).
The Linux development comparison above would seem to show that competent programming teams, using good process for software engineering, and bug tracking and so on (beyond me and possibly beyond the imagination of the new OS release date setting marketers at M$) have a better idea and chance of success than the whole of Microsoft put together.
It also must help that some of Linux has been programmed from the ground up within living memory, not cludged into, onto, over, and together with pre-existing poor programming the way MS code is described by those who have looked at the Win2000 code that saw the light a few years back.
Release of Vista at this time for money in the retail environment ought to be met by many court cases - in the UK, consumer law has it that a product must be "fit for purpose", and an operating system that struggles with delete, copy, move file operations is scarce fit for alpha testing. But Microsoft is a little big to take to court - roll-on the day that Google has something more competitive to offer, where it will not be in their powerful interests to allow M$ any leeway on peddling unready products.
Googlemail "Beta" - just how honest was that "Beta"? Entirely - there were bugs. Has it upset Google's money making? I doubt it. If anything it is disarmingly honest, which is cause for a different sceptical type of alarm!
I doubt Microsoft will ever become that honest, and it is not to do with making money - not least it is arrogance and dishonesty that they suffer.
They say that a fish rots from the head down, no matter what kind of rot it is.
Back to learning more opensource / Linux skills - we will all be needing them soon.