OpenSolaris 2008.05 release

I am not surprise Windows users don't like Solaris, because is unix and is difficult to use. Unix is like DOS, text base, do not have a easy to use installer. Some Windows users find that unix is difficult to use, because they can't locate where is the C drive, unix use a directory name for each data partition and not using alphabet to name the disk drive.

OpenSolaris release 2008.05 is free for download

I am surprise Linux users don't like Solaris, for the same reason -- Solaris is difficult to use. Even Linux and Solaris are unix base operating system, there are some minor differences. They have a different name for network device, the configuration file setting could be different, Solaris name their X-windows as openwindow, but basically both Linux and Solaris is quite similar.

Solaris is difficult to install. Yes, it could be difficult for new Solaris users, especially when they experience a driver problem (most common is the network driver problem). Without a rich driver support as Windows, install an operating system is always a problem. Linux is easier to install because the Linux users were using Red Hat 9.0, Fedora or Ubuntu. If these Linux users are using Linux since Slackware, they will have a different definition on what "difficult" means.

Install a software (including the operating system) is not really a big issue, it only need to be done for the first time, and sometimes it was done by the hardware engineer or system support engineer. The worst nightmare for software developer is, the piece of software that you write, keep crashing for an unknown reason, it could cause by your application, it could be the operating system, or may be is an unstable system API call in your coding.

I use Windows, I use Linux and I use Solaris. Solaris is my prefer software for server end operating system because Solaris is very stable. I have experience on using Solaris to run heavy loaded software for years without shutdown, it has good performance while running on old and low end Sun machines, eg. 50Mhz sparc CPU.

Sun Microsystems has release Solaris as open source and free for use, that is OpenSolaris, and it runs on x86 platform. So is easy for software developers to try it on their machine. The latest is 2008.05 release, available at opensolaris.org website, try it out today.

Powerful earthquake at Sichuan China

A 7.8-magnitude earthquake happen in Sichuan China this afternoon about 2pm.

When such a news and event happen, is time to test how fast the internet media can responds.

Shanghai can feel the earthquake too.
Originally uploaded by 2 dogs

The earthquake happen in Sichuan but Shanghai can feel the earthquake as well. More flickr photos here.

I search photobucket, but can't find related photos.

Hope the 900 students buried and trap under the collapsed building at Dujiangyan (都江堰) will be saved, let's pray hard for them. Another news here

Dujiangyan is a historical city which has more than 2000 years.

墨魚飯風波

日前香港發生一件社會小插曲，事情的經過在網上被廣泛地報導，引起網民的熱烈討論與媒體的關注。事情應該發生在四月中，約於四月二十九日在互聯網上被廣泛地報導。

事件過發生在香港某一港式快餐店，一位女顧客點了一客墨魚飯，可是椻台告之說沒有單賣墨魚飯，或許可以點六寶飯，內有墨魚。可是這位女顧客卻相當堅持地說，以前曾經點過墨魚飯，而且又只想吃墨魚飯。僵持了一陣子，快餐店員建議點六寶飯或是叉燒墨魚飯，最後女顧客就點了叉燒墨飯，不過卻要求叉燒與飯要分開置放，快餐店也允許這麼要求。

後來準備食物的阿叔又誤將叉燒與墨魚飯放置在一起，早前與椻台已有爭執的女顧客又再次與這位快餐店阿叔起了爭執，而這位阿叔脾氣亦不好，兩者互相對罵，而且越罵越兇，一發不可收拾。後來，女顧主將對罵的片段上載到 youtube 網站，引起軒然大波。大部份的網民都認為女事主小事化大，反而同情被調走的快餐店阿叔。

由於此一事件與早前“巴士阿叔“事件類似，所以又被稱作“快餐店阿叔“事件，或又稱為“墨魚阿姑“事件。這位女事主除了將錄影片段上載到 youtube 之外，也在網上說明經過，發表不滿。後來受到大批網民的口殊筆伐，就將文章與影片撤走，不過影片已經被其他人下載後，又再次放在 youtube 上。

從這次事件，我們又再次看到互聯網這種新媒體的力量。這些社會小插曲，若是投書到報紙與雜誌，可能不被受理，因為傳統的媒體畢竟受到版位的限制，沒有辦法報導每一個事件。而在互聯網上的媒體，“幾乎“沒有有版位的限制問題。事主選擇了在網上披露事情的經過，其影響也超越了傳統媒介。大部份網民非但不支持女事主，而且轉向支持快餐店阿叔，倒是女事主所始料未及之事。

香港網絡大典的快餐店阿叔事件說明。
女事主的事後聲明，轉貼在此。
網民在討論區對事件的回應。

Microsoft drop Yahoo offer

After Microsoft withdraw Yahoo offer, Yahoo share price drop more than 10% to $24.

After Yahoo reject Microsoft's $33 offer, is now $24.

Microsoft offer $33 for Yahoo, make it a $44.6 billion deal, but Yahoo think they worth more than that.

Google share price is almost 600.

Google share price is almost $600, compare with 54x about 2 weeks ago.