I thank God for my primary and secondary school. Some of the best years of my life happen in these two institutions not to mention my education. And all without a care about the real world.
Day 22:
I thank God for the church I'm in. Despite some of the church's shortcomings, we still continue to teach and learn faithfully from God's word which is something that is lacking in a lot of church's today.
It's now approaching the home stretch in the thanksgiving roll call. It's been quite difficult to think and reflect on something everyday but at least it is teaching to put trivial things aside or even some of the worries currently going through.
It's another 2 more days before the last paper and I still haven't touched the Java books yet. I should be starting like now. Speaking of Java, I finally got my last Java assignment marks and I am quite happy of the results. Included in the results is a bonus 1% to the final assessment. But after the Java exam, beware Melbourne University people. The gloating from RMIT students will begin and Facebook flooding will be eminent. I highly recommend you to not read this blog from Thursday onwards until you finish your exams.
What have I been doing wasting time instead of studying or practicing coding? I've been busy plotting my subjects for the rest of my course (aka. 12 more subjects). I was plotting to be able to take all the computer graphics, security and cryptography and network subjects. And I think I have succeeded, with the exception of a possible subject clash. So, hopefully I would be able to do computer graphics, set up security and cryptographic measures on networks. In other words, I would be the cyber cafe uncle/ah beng.
So I was about to get the Windows 7 upgrade from Microsoft's student deal and it is great that I can get the 64-bit Windows 7 Professional for $50. Pretty good deal. But then a thought just came. The deal was on upgrading a previous version of Windows with upgrading from Vista being fairly straight forward while XP is quite annoying but can be done. After reading their FAQs about the deal and of Windows 7, I find Microsoft's push or addressing of the operating system is quite something. It is either that they are so full of themselves or just "capitalizing" on a well known fact. Whenever you read something about getting Windows 7, they will only mention two things. One is to get a new PC with Windows 7 pre-installed and two is to get the upgrade software to upgrade your current Windows. Even when reading stuff about installing, they will only mention two things. One is upgrading from the current version of Windows Vista and two is the do a clean install for XP. The stupid thing is that although the upgrade software is meant to just upgrade from Vista it can also do a full clean install (ie. as if you didn't have an operating system). But if you actually didn't have Windows in your hard drive you can't use the upgrade, you have to get the full product which in most cases is another $100++ at least, as far as the EULA is concerned. If Microsoft really wanted to go down this line of having an upgrade software and a full upgrade, they should have done the upgrade as strictly an upgrade and will not be able to clean install the operating system. What they have done now is essentially there is no real difference between the upgrade and the full version. You just pay an additional $100 just for the legality of installing a new OS on a hard drive/computer with no prior Windows in it.
What I'm trying to say is that Microsoft isn't exactly making their stuff accessible to the general public. Just displaying the options of getting a new PC and upgrading from a current Windows AND neglecting the millions of people who would like to install Windows on their current PCs with a blank hard drive just isn't the smart thing to do. If they really want to win over Mac users or even Linux users who have been using their respective OS for yonks, they should be having clear options on getting and installing Windows. By virtue that they are just pushing marketing the upgrade software waaaaaaay more than the full product just says that "We are still the majority OS around. Conform to us by buying a new PC! Or upgrade because we know you have Windows! To the rest of the world, shame on you." It is even worse that, as stated above, there is essentially no difference between the upgrade and the full version of the software as far as installation is concerned.
I guess I can understand their severity of fixing the sins of Vista, but pushing yourselves as an exclusive software isn't going to help you lots. Maybe that is why Microsoft is spending an insane amount of money in advertising to do some damage control. Even then some of their advertising does more damage than actually fixing it (read: Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates ads). I sincerely hope that they change their upgrade plans and document their FAQs a lot better otherwise they are not going to maintain the monopoly on the OS market.
O Hai!
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