Hello one and all!
Well, I know I said that I would be back here last week but well with Christmas and everything it just got a bit hectic. That said, I feel it is time for me to really voice all the frustrations I have had with Fedora 16. I have to say this has been one of the most useless and poorly conceived distro any of the majors (except maybe for Ubuntu I don't know about them I have never used them) have ever produced. Here are a few reasons why.
First and right of the bat...... GET THE HELL OF ANACONDA AS AN INSTALLER!
It is useless and overly complicated o and by the way IT NEVER WORKS! I have installed Linux Mint, OpenSuse, and CrunchBang most in both 32bit and 64 bit and none, that's right, none, of them have ever given me as much trouble as Fedora and Anaconda.
Secondly, I have installed Fedora 13, 14, 15 and have attempted 16, the latest incarnatio. 16, for what ever reason does not install a boot loader on efi machines. What the hell! yes I know that most people dual boot and have to play around with boot loading but surely if I select the "use entire disk space" button that means that I want a fresh install of EVERYTHING on my computer, including the boot loader. All the other versions have done this, why not 16?
Thirdly, I have an older desktop which has 32bit architecture. So, by logical deduction I Download and burn the 32 bit fedora. Guess what? IT IS NOT A BOOTABLE DVD! I don't use Windows and would like to be able to install straight from disk. It is faster, has more options and gives me the ability to really customise the packages included in the distribution. Did I have that option? No!
Now I should admit that both times I tried to use the DVD full install and not the Live CD. These may have worked better but I prefer the DVD, as I said, because it really gives me the full option of choice when customising the distro.
So there you have it both the 64 and 32 bit versions of Fedora either wouldn't boot or wouldn't install a boot loader. So I have gone back to good ole reliable OpenSuse. I think for the forseeable future I will be staying with them to as they provide really stable distros and have an installer, YaST, that is both easy to use and allows for a highly customised distro and install pattern, it also has intelligence and detects both my windows and home partitions and installs around them, AND WORKS EVERY TIME!
I don't know what the guys at the Fedora project are doing and I have to say that the Fedora 13 box I use as a server has been so strong, It regularly has 100+ days of uptime and it still runs strong, especially on the old pentium 3 that it is on. This latest incarnation however has been a major disappointment. I was looking forward to trying out the latest and greatest but have had to go back to ole reliable because at the very least I need a bootable machine, and I mean really is that so much to ask? I can handle most other problems and am willing to deal with them for the latest and greatest, but to stuff up the installer? What the hell?
So there you have it, my experience, or lack thereof, with Fedora 16. Thanks guys, you have done such a wonderful....... o sorry that was the OpenSuse people. Seriously, you guys need to get your act together for the next release because if crap like this keeps happening you will see your ranking fall.
Anyways thats my little rant for the day, Coming at ya from my OpenSuse Macbook! Talk soon guys and as always, comments, criticisms and suggestions are always welcome.
Tuesday, 27 December 2011
Wednesday, 14 December 2011
Not much to talk about this week
Hey Guys,
Well there isn't really much to update tech wise this week as everything has been chugging along fine, although sound on the Desktop does occasionally just decide that life is not worth living and completely dies. Amarok also sometimes decides it doesn't like Daap for some unknown reason.... all good a restart normally fixes the problem just a bit annoying that's all. So I have moved most sound applications over to the laptop which is still chugging along strong. The wireless just occasionally decides it doesn't like my router, but loves the internet out of the phone. I chock that up to a broadcom update that happened recently though and it doesn't always happen so god knows what that is.
anyways...... since there isn't much happening tech wise for me at the moment..... maybe I should just distro hop for the fun of it... but it's so nice having a stable desktop built on the strength of Linux. meh.
It's also been a pretty big week for me personally as I have managed to graduate from Uni and secure a job so the tech stuff has fallen a bit to the way side.
Although I do think this week I may very well reinstall dos box and get back to the original prince of Persia and the first duke nukem 3d which have always been favorites of mine and run really well under dos box.
So in summary
Nothing really happened in tech for me because life happened. just some annoying bugs which have required work arounds.
So I will endeavor to do something slightly more interesting for next weeks post
As usual , comments, suggestions and criticisms are encourages, also if you have any ideas about things I should try under opensuse please comment and let me know.
Talk Soon!
Well there isn't really much to update tech wise this week as everything has been chugging along fine, although sound on the Desktop does occasionally just decide that life is not worth living and completely dies. Amarok also sometimes decides it doesn't like Daap for some unknown reason.... all good a restart normally fixes the problem just a bit annoying that's all. So I have moved most sound applications over to the laptop which is still chugging along strong. The wireless just occasionally decides it doesn't like my router, but loves the internet out of the phone. I chock that up to a broadcom update that happened recently though and it doesn't always happen so god knows what that is.
anyways...... since there isn't much happening tech wise for me at the moment..... maybe I should just distro hop for the fun of it... but it's so nice having a stable desktop built on the strength of Linux. meh.
It's also been a pretty big week for me personally as I have managed to graduate from Uni and secure a job so the tech stuff has fallen a bit to the way side.
Although I do think this week I may very well reinstall dos box and get back to the original prince of Persia and the first duke nukem 3d which have always been favorites of mine and run really well under dos box.
So in summary
Nothing really happened in tech for me because life happened. just some annoying bugs which have required work arounds.
So I will endeavor to do something slightly more interesting for next weeks post
As usual , comments, suggestions and criticisms are encourages, also if you have any ideas about things I should try under opensuse please comment and let me know.
Talk Soon!
Tuesday, 6 December 2011
Update on my complete Linux switch
Hey Guys just a quick update on how the complete linux experience has been working out for me.
Firstly, I don't know what the Linux Mint team did with their latest round of updates but it DOES NOT work on a Macbook pro 5,5 from early 2009. it got to the point where every time I restarted after the upgrade the network card would hang the boot process and I couldn't get into the OS. I know I probably should have stuck at it to try and find the problem like a good Linux enthusiast but after nearly a week of tearing my hair out over it I decided to give OpenSuse 12.1 a try on the macbook because it has been SOOOOO stable on my 7 year old desktop.
So I go ahead and install the 64 bit version of OpenSuse KDE on the mac book and so far I am incredibly happy. My only gripe is their implementation of the open source Gallium driver (which I prefer to use because it is better integrated into the kernel than the proprietry Nvidia drivers, and actually does things automatically instead of having to manually tell it to do everything, seriously who doesn't auto detect new monitors any more?) seems to hang the computer on every time it resumes from RAM. Don't know why, but changing to the proprietry Nvidia drivers fixed it.
On the proprietary note, OpenSuse has to provide some of the easiest access to Proprietary Drivers of any distro, Mint and Ubuntu do it well but I think the one click install from the web that OpenSuse use is much better. Firstly, this method forces new users to determine that there is a missing driver that explains why there hardware either isn't working, or not working correctly. I think this is really important as, in my opinion, the whole point of moving to Linux is to become better acquainted with the inner workings of a computer. Secondly, when you do find the answer (and seriously it's not that hard) it works! I think it's a great way to both get users use to googling there problems (which is vital if you're going to use Linux) and trusting the answers when they do find them.
So after very little effort I have a very stable install, that doesn't hang on boot, and is doing everything I need it to, well!
It also means I have completely moved away from gnome shell in favour of KDE 4.7.x thus far it runs very smoothly on the mac and looks very nice. It's a little jumpy on the desktop but I chock this up to the ancient video card that is attached to it, I hope to upgrade it soon which will hopefully improve the problem. Having said that KDE is running fine it just has a few rendering problems and is a bit jumpy but it in no way makes it unusable.
I don't really use any KDE specific apps, I tried KMail but thunderbird, for me, is just so much more user friendly and after you have done 7 or 8 reinstalls in a week you do not want to sit there and try to determine exactly how signatures and all of that are meant to be implemented when it takes me a grand total of 30 seconds to set up in thunderbird. I've never really used Konqueror and like most I jump in favor of chrome because I have chrome sync I don't have to set up the browser with all my favourites, apps etc, i just tell it my google ID and poof, it's all there, which is very handy. I do use Dolphin as my primary file manager and it seems to handle everything I need admirably, I particularly enjoy the quick access to sudo.
There is one bizarre thing I will point out. I installed opensuse off of the live CD on my desktop and when I finally got round to setting up the network printer I discovered that the OpenSuse Live CD doesn't install any HP libraries, this rendered the HP printer unusable. Now again, this is a very easy fix but it just seems bizarre to me that such a small file that gives you plug and play access to the vast majority of printers around the world didn't come by default in the live environment. They were there in the DVD but that doesn't have a live environment. However, once they were installed setting up a network printer was a simple press of a few buttons. If your interested in a how to please comment and I will post one at a later date.
Anyways, there you have it a quick update on what has happened in the last week. I now use OpenSuse on all my client computers and fedora 13 on the server. They are all integrating very smoothly and thus far I am very happy with the set up.
As always, if you have any suggestions, criticisms or opinions please feel free to comment below.
Talk soon!
Firstly, I don't know what the Linux Mint team did with their latest round of updates but it DOES NOT work on a Macbook pro 5,5 from early 2009. it got to the point where every time I restarted after the upgrade the network card would hang the boot process and I couldn't get into the OS. I know I probably should have stuck at it to try and find the problem like a good Linux enthusiast but after nearly a week of tearing my hair out over it I decided to give OpenSuse 12.1 a try on the macbook because it has been SOOOOO stable on my 7 year old desktop.
So I go ahead and install the 64 bit version of OpenSuse KDE on the mac book and so far I am incredibly happy. My only gripe is their implementation of the open source Gallium driver (which I prefer to use because it is better integrated into the kernel than the proprietry Nvidia drivers, and actually does things automatically instead of having to manually tell it to do everything, seriously who doesn't auto detect new monitors any more?) seems to hang the computer on every time it resumes from RAM. Don't know why, but changing to the proprietry Nvidia drivers fixed it.
On the proprietary note, OpenSuse has to provide some of the easiest access to Proprietary Drivers of any distro, Mint and Ubuntu do it well but I think the one click install from the web that OpenSuse use is much better. Firstly, this method forces new users to determine that there is a missing driver that explains why there hardware either isn't working, or not working correctly. I think this is really important as, in my opinion, the whole point of moving to Linux is to become better acquainted with the inner workings of a computer. Secondly, when you do find the answer (and seriously it's not that hard) it works! I think it's a great way to both get users use to googling there problems (which is vital if you're going to use Linux) and trusting the answers when they do find them.
So after very little effort I have a very stable install, that doesn't hang on boot, and is doing everything I need it to, well!
It also means I have completely moved away from gnome shell in favour of KDE 4.7.x thus far it runs very smoothly on the mac and looks very nice. It's a little jumpy on the desktop but I chock this up to the ancient video card that is attached to it, I hope to upgrade it soon which will hopefully improve the problem. Having said that KDE is running fine it just has a few rendering problems and is a bit jumpy but it in no way makes it unusable.
I don't really use any KDE specific apps, I tried KMail but thunderbird, for me, is just so much more user friendly and after you have done 7 or 8 reinstalls in a week you do not want to sit there and try to determine exactly how signatures and all of that are meant to be implemented when it takes me a grand total of 30 seconds to set up in thunderbird. I've never really used Konqueror and like most I jump in favor of chrome because I have chrome sync I don't have to set up the browser with all my favourites, apps etc, i just tell it my google ID and poof, it's all there, which is very handy. I do use Dolphin as my primary file manager and it seems to handle everything I need admirably, I particularly enjoy the quick access to sudo.
There is one bizarre thing I will point out. I installed opensuse off of the live CD on my desktop and when I finally got round to setting up the network printer I discovered that the OpenSuse Live CD doesn't install any HP libraries, this rendered the HP printer unusable. Now again, this is a very easy fix but it just seems bizarre to me that such a small file that gives you plug and play access to the vast majority of printers around the world didn't come by default in the live environment. They were there in the DVD but that doesn't have a live environment. However, once they were installed setting up a network printer was a simple press of a few buttons. If your interested in a how to please comment and I will post one at a later date.
Anyways, there you have it a quick update on what has happened in the last week. I now use OpenSuse on all my client computers and fedora 13 on the server. They are all integrating very smoothly and thus far I am very happy with the set up.
As always, if you have any suggestions, criticisms or opinions please feel free to comment below.
Talk soon!
Tuesday, 29 November 2011
Hey guys...... sorry for the long time between drinks
been rather busy with the end of uni and stuff so haven't really had time to write anything until today because at last I am holidays and I have and afternoon to myself
Well I have been rather busy in the Linux sphere since uni finished, I have done complete rebuilds of both my Workstation and Laptop. I have put OpenSuse 12.1 on the workstation with KDE 4.7 and I have to say all that stuff about KDE 4.7 being soooooo resource hungry and slowing up machines seems to be complete codswallop. Thus far I have found it far smoother to run on the old machine than gnome 3 and it seems to be about as reactive as gnome 2 was. It also has the added bonus of the nice widgets and things which, whilst most people will say they are a waste of space, I am finding them useful both to place some pictures on my desktop and for quick access to system info. OpenSuse itself is running quite smoothly and YaST is an excellent system manager, it gives quick access to almost every configuration file I needed and did it smoothly over a GUI which was very nice. It also made the install a breeze, it detected the two linux partitions and asked if I'd like to delete them which I did and it left the windows alone (I have it their for emergencies really I think I have used it once lol) It was so intuitive and easy to use that I think my 6 month old daughter could have done it. The only gripe I really had was the package manager. Why are their two? seems a bit redundant to me, but that's alright zypper does everything I need so that's all I use.
I have also installed Linux Mint 12 on the laptop and here I think the MGSE's really shine, I have got my gnome 3 running virtually the same as I had gnome 2 under mint 11 and once you add gnome-pie pretty well the whole computer is accessible with the keyboard again. The Linux Mint team really do deserve all the praise they are getting at the moment because they have built a distro that works out of the box so well. My only gripe was that I had to go in and install nfs-common which seemed a bit weird to me as I think nfs is one of the greatest features available to linux at the moment as it is such a speedy network protocol, sure it's insecure but so long as you are only using over the local network it's great. All in all though Linux mint 12 is great and it runs so smoothly on the macbook pro. The last Linux to be on this laptop was Fedora and that was such a pain, Linux Mint 12 has been such a breath of fresh air as far as running on macs go.
I did try out macpup on the old box I use as a Server but it was just soooooo buggy, and to top it off I couldn't find any of the packages I like to have on that box. Daap? couldn't find. mp3 support, What's that? and they go on and on about how enlightment is breathing new life into old machines and all it did was bug up and give me nothing to use it was such a disappointment. So for now that box is staying as Fedora 13 with XFCE because it does everything I need it to and sure it's a bit slow but at least it's not buggy as hell.
So that really has been what I have doing for the last couple weeks I'm sorry to have been away for so long but with exams and the new bubs finding the time to do this has been a bit hard, hopefully I'll get back into it soon though.
As usual comments, suggestions and criticisms are all more than welcome.
Talk soon!
been rather busy with the end of uni and stuff so haven't really had time to write anything until today because at last I am holidays and I have and afternoon to myself
Well I have been rather busy in the Linux sphere since uni finished, I have done complete rebuilds of both my Workstation and Laptop. I have put OpenSuse 12.1 on the workstation with KDE 4.7 and I have to say all that stuff about KDE 4.7 being soooooo resource hungry and slowing up machines seems to be complete codswallop. Thus far I have found it far smoother to run on the old machine than gnome 3 and it seems to be about as reactive as gnome 2 was. It also has the added bonus of the nice widgets and things which, whilst most people will say they are a waste of space, I am finding them useful both to place some pictures on my desktop and for quick access to system info. OpenSuse itself is running quite smoothly and YaST is an excellent system manager, it gives quick access to almost every configuration file I needed and did it smoothly over a GUI which was very nice. It also made the install a breeze, it detected the two linux partitions and asked if I'd like to delete them which I did and it left the windows alone (I have it their for emergencies really I think I have used it once lol) It was so intuitive and easy to use that I think my 6 month old daughter could have done it. The only gripe I really had was the package manager. Why are their two? seems a bit redundant to me, but that's alright zypper does everything I need so that's all I use.
I have also installed Linux Mint 12 on the laptop and here I think the MGSE's really shine, I have got my gnome 3 running virtually the same as I had gnome 2 under mint 11 and once you add gnome-pie pretty well the whole computer is accessible with the keyboard again. The Linux Mint team really do deserve all the praise they are getting at the moment because they have built a distro that works out of the box so well. My only gripe was that I had to go in and install nfs-common which seemed a bit weird to me as I think nfs is one of the greatest features available to linux at the moment as it is such a speedy network protocol, sure it's insecure but so long as you are only using over the local network it's great. All in all though Linux mint 12 is great and it runs so smoothly on the macbook pro. The last Linux to be on this laptop was Fedora and that was such a pain, Linux Mint 12 has been such a breath of fresh air as far as running on macs go.
I did try out macpup on the old box I use as a Server but it was just soooooo buggy, and to top it off I couldn't find any of the packages I like to have on that box. Daap? couldn't find. mp3 support, What's that? and they go on and on about how enlightment is breathing new life into old machines and all it did was bug up and give me nothing to use it was such a disappointment. So for now that box is staying as Fedora 13 with XFCE because it does everything I need it to and sure it's a bit slow but at least it's not buggy as hell.
So that really has been what I have doing for the last couple weeks I'm sorry to have been away for so long but with exams and the new bubs finding the time to do this has been a bit hard, hopefully I'll get back into it soon though.
As usual comments, suggestions and criticisms are all more than welcome.
Talk soon!
Sunday, 6 November 2011
So I thought I would take a break from studying for my conflict exam to jump on here and talk to you about a piece of interesting news that cropped up over the weekend
The Linux mint team finally left a blog post (www.linuxmint.com) about the forthcoming Linux Mint 12 release. I have been looking forward to this news for about a month now as I currently use mint at home. The preview is looking rather good, it will come with Kernel 3.0 and Gnome 3.2 with a bit of a spin on it with what the mint team is calling Mint Gnome Shell Extension (MGSEs), although I think I will be turning off a few of the extensions my self as I don't think they make the distro look glossy just cluttered, completely my opinion and at least the mint team are giving me the opportunity to change things if I don't like them. Of course they are also putting in the gnome 2 fork called MATE and I'm sure there will be the usual KDE, LXDE and XFCE spins.
On the matter of Desktop Environments that seems to have caused such a furore amongst the FOSS Community. Why in the hell is what Gnome and Ubuntu doing such a big deal? Almost every distro offers multiple DE's and I'm sure that if you don't like one there is another out there just for you. Isn't that kinda the point of Linux. It seems to me that people are quite willing to criticise at every opportunity and never offer anything constructive. And at the end of the day, Gnome and Ubuntu are not your projects, the people who are actually running and owning the project can do whatever they like with them as it is their's, don't like it, fine, change, it's not like you don't have a choice. I did read an interesting comment over the weekend that said the main problem with the criticism is that those who don't like the changes are being incredibly vocal, while those who do like the changes aren't saying anything as they don't have to. Whether or not Gnome and Ubuntu's Unity have the right idea only time will tell. But at least they are trying to give Linux a character of it's own and not end up being a clone of Windows or Mac. I would also just quickly like to say that if you don't like the amount of clicking involved in Gnome shell to access your apps, install gnome pie, problem solved.
Anyways........ back on topic. I can't wait to give Mint 12 a go it looks like it's going to be one hell of a distro and offer all the usual minty goodness we have come to expect from Clem and the team. I would also like to offer them congratulations for reaching the number one spot on distrowatch.
as usual comments, criticisms and correction are more than welcome
Talk soon!
The Linux mint team finally left a blog post (www.linuxmint.com) about the forthcoming Linux Mint 12 release. I have been looking forward to this news for about a month now as I currently use mint at home. The preview is looking rather good, it will come with Kernel 3.0 and Gnome 3.2 with a bit of a spin on it with what the mint team is calling Mint Gnome Shell Extension (MGSEs), although I think I will be turning off a few of the extensions my self as I don't think they make the distro look glossy just cluttered, completely my opinion and at least the mint team are giving me the opportunity to change things if I don't like them. Of course they are also putting in the gnome 2 fork called MATE and I'm sure there will be the usual KDE, LXDE and XFCE spins.
On the matter of Desktop Environments that seems to have caused such a furore amongst the FOSS Community. Why in the hell is what Gnome and Ubuntu doing such a big deal? Almost every distro offers multiple DE's and I'm sure that if you don't like one there is another out there just for you. Isn't that kinda the point of Linux. It seems to me that people are quite willing to criticise at every opportunity and never offer anything constructive. And at the end of the day, Gnome and Ubuntu are not your projects, the people who are actually running and owning the project can do whatever they like with them as it is their's, don't like it, fine, change, it's not like you don't have a choice. I did read an interesting comment over the weekend that said the main problem with the criticism is that those who don't like the changes are being incredibly vocal, while those who do like the changes aren't saying anything as they don't have to. Whether or not Gnome and Ubuntu's Unity have the right idea only time will tell. But at least they are trying to give Linux a character of it's own and not end up being a clone of Windows or Mac. I would also just quickly like to say that if you don't like the amount of clicking involved in Gnome shell to access your apps, install gnome pie, problem solved.
Anyways........ back on topic. I can't wait to give Mint 12 a go it looks like it's going to be one hell of a distro and offer all the usual minty goodness we have come to expect from Clem and the team. I would also like to offer them congratulations for reaching the number one spot on distrowatch.
as usual comments, criticisms and correction are more than welcome
Talk soon!
Thursday, 3 November 2011
Hello one and all.
well........ Mr Joyce got grilled by a Union bully and an idiot green, *shock*. He held up well and answered as well as he could given the distinct left bias of the panel, ode for there to be an actual impartial centrist on the panel. How about we grill him on the disgusting pay rise and not the legal and justified lock out. But that would require someone viewing the dispute objectively, pfft like that will ever happen in Australia's Government. Well, maybe under Turnbull.
Seems the greens are bashing CSG again, apparently to them if it has the word coal in it then it is bad. Doesn't matter how important it is to the economy. They keep screaming "Food Security" and "Water Table" without proper comprehension on these issues. I've already talked about the issue of the extra clean water that's "too good" according to them as well.
so that's the interesting news I saw this morning. now some techy stuff
well the UEFI thing is still raging. Ed Bott released another Linux bashing article on ZDnet but hey another day another crappy, misleading Bott article. I'll bet his tax return has Microsoft's name all over it. O and where his article is misleading is simple, He claims the manufacturers he contacted gave him guarantees they wouldn't do anything, what? There was nothing in those statements, except possibly Dell's, that indicated they were or were not going to lock out Linux. Incidentally, I have found out that Dell WILL NOT be locking out Linux as they have a number of clients who rely on their computers running something other than Windows and with the moves the US Department of Defense has been making in their software I wouldn't be surprised if that client is the US, but hey Linux is dead apparently so that can't be true. (I'm sorry Their are actually two posts on G+ that I have read recently that have told me the DOD thing and the Linux is dead thing I just can't be bothered linking them if you're interested Google it).
anyways.... that's all the interesting stuff I have found today and felt like commenting on. As always please feel free to comment, criticise or share as you see fit
talk soon!
Wednesday, 2 November 2011
An opinion piece on things in the news, because no one has ever done that before
So I'm bored now so I'd like to have a little rant about all the stuff I have been reading in the paper recently.
Firstly, right off the bat Windsor and the CSG (Coal Seam Gas) thing! My god get over it! The state owns everything more than 6ft below your land. Whether it is fair or not is beside the point, that's the law move on. I have worked for a company that is very heavily involved in CSG and I can tell you that all the companies that are involved in it are doing everything in their power to ensure there is minimal impact on the land that the farmers occupy. Secondly, if you want to get into the sustainability thing, lets talk about what these companies now have to do with the incredibly purified water that comes out with the Gas. THEY HAVE TO PUT IT BACK IN THE GROUND! Why? because apparently it is to pure for the water systems around the plants and some microscopic organisms were getting weak shells! This water could have solved most of the drought issues of a few years ago but no instead of building a pipeline to pump this pure water around state Governments decide to build enormous, expensive, unsustainable desalination plants. And now, thanks to some bleeding heart, they have to go to the expense of putting it back in the ground, BECAUSE IT IS TOO GOOD! what a joke.
Secondly, our economy relies on this CSG, people are so quick to say we should shut down this mine or that gas plant as there is a potential for impact on history or the environment. One, the key word here is potential, it may not. Two, what about the job creation? what about the potential to get some of regional Australia into high paying jobs? what about the potential for the economy and the money that is generated that can be poured back into said community? Have you seen Roma lately? I was up there at the beginning of the year after not having been there in almost 10 years and I can tell you right now that all the money that is pouring into that town has greatly improved it and I'm sorry but there is no way the agriculture industry could have done it, put simply it didn't before it damn well won't now. Yet Mr Windsor thinks it is fine to stop this potential economic boom in regional Australia, because it might mildly inconvenience a few farmers.
Ok next
If we are talking recent News we have to talk Qantas, and since I am potentially 10 days away from finishing a degree in HR to not comment on it would be remiss.
Firstly, let me be clear I am by no means a Unionist, I think they are a waste of space and do nothing but stifle our economy. Secondly, I think Upper level management is beginning to get short sighted and greedy and this is just as bad if not worse.
The whole Qantas thing is a mess of monumental proportions.
1. Since when did a Union have the right to come in and dictate business strategy? and I'm sorry but this includes the distribution of the workforce.
2. What idiotic board would decide it is ok to provide a $3million pay increase to a CEO that has done NOTHING I repeat NOTHING towards value creation in a company?
Put these two together and all of a sudden no-one has the moral high ground and no-one is thinking about the long term viability of both the company and the people. Here is my reasoning on why everyone in this dispute is being selfish.
THE UNIONS
My god, what high horse are they standing on? There are two fundamental issues with their argument and it is these that make them lose all credibility for me.
1. They think they are entitled to significant pay increases, even though they are already paid higher than anyone else in the industry, without any productivity concessions. I'm sorry, what? You essentially want Qantas to hand the Engineers, Pilots and Baggage handlers more money because you said so. Now the Unions will jump up and down saying it's only 2.5% to keep in line with inflation, but let me ask you this, your employees are already paid at least 5% more (http://finance.ninemsn.com.au/newsbusiness/aap/8368932/virgin-ceo-says-his-staff-paid-well) than other airlines so why should Qantas give you a pay rise? are you performing better than the other airlines?
2. The Unions want job security for their members, fair enough, but the price of labour is directly imported onto the price of a ticket. When Qantas wants to compete internationally it needs to be able to lower costs, this means streamlining and improving operation processes, which inevitably makes some roles redundant, and lowering the cost of labour where possible, this means private contracting and outsourcing to other countries, why? Because the archaic, protectionist labour laws in Australia make our workforce uncompetitive. The Unions want their members jobs to be guaranteed and, put simply, that is impossible. Who can truly say their job is guaranteed in private industry? the whole point of it being private is to lower costs and improve processes so the customer gets the best product for the cheapest price. To do this a company needs flexibility and the ability to run its own business, you want a guarantee go work for the government.
It's clear the Unions want things done like they were 50 years ago when Australia was a closed market and there was government intervention everywhere, in today's globalised world this is a fast track to poverty. They want to step in and tell Qantas how to run it's business and when Qantas says no they chuck a hissy fit and take industrial action.
ALAN JOYCE AND THE BOARD
I was on their side through this I really was................ and then he took the completely undeserved pay rise.
I have just gone on and on about how the Unions can not expect something for nothing with regards to pay, and that was his argument as well and it made sense, until he gave himself a very public pay rise. FOOL! I understand that the job market for CEO's is very competitive and to attract the best we have to pay for it, but seriously what exactly has he done? The share price is sinking, he can't control his workforce without running to Fair Work and the reputation of the company has been diving since long before this happened and yet he still gets a pay rise!? what you couldn't live off 2Mill pa for another 12 months and wait for the media storm to finish? You had the moral high ground about wages and productivity and strategy and then completely blew it all away by high jacking the AGM and ensuring a pay rise. You have no clout, no class and are being just plain greedy. You could have easily one the argument until you did that and now the whole of Australia thinks you're nothing but a money grubbing bastard and their right, well done, you might win in the courts and with Fair Work but the damage to yours and Qantas' brand has been done and the blame for that rests squarely on you and your idiotic undeserved pay rise.
The lock out was justified in my opinion, it is really the only type of industrial action available to a company and it was used to perfection. It brought the whole thing to a head and stopped the unjustified hissy fits by the unions. The politicking that has happened after, about who knew what when, is irrelevant and will rightly be ignored by the general public.
Simply put everyone who has been involved in this is in the wrong. They all want to blame each other, they all think that money grows on trees and, at the end of the day, the real loser from this is Qantas as a company and the Customer. Everyone is wanting something for nothing from this company and they just assume that the company can compensate. The unions want pay increases that are unnecessary and unjustified and Alan Joyce gave himself 3mill pa extra for doing squat. So the moral high ground for both parties there is gone. The only thing that is left is the Unions want a say in the strategy of the business and how it deploys its workforce, it CAN NOT have this power, Bluescope Steel anyone? Everyone needs to get over this go back to work and get on with the business of restoring the company, Alan Joyce needs give back his undeserved pay rise ( I know I'm dreaming) and the Unions need to stop harrasing the company about outsourcing and wait until the rest of the airline industry has caught up to Qantas in pay levels.
Yes, Australian jobs will go, but this to is the a problem of the Unions making, they simply want to much money, it is through their incredible ineptitude at realising how the wage directly impacts the cost of living that things are so expensive in this country. How about, instead of focusing on wages the Unions focus on workplace conditions and intangible benefits so that Australia can start to compete internationally in the labour market? Just a thought. You can't have your cake and eat it to, you want high wages, fine except some offshore outsourcing of labour, you want jobs in Australia fine stop increasing the wage without increasing productivity, its that simple, sort of (lol).
any ways just my thoughts on a couple things doing the rounds in the news, I'm sure plenty of people will disagree with me but hey that's the fun of the internet. Please remember that this is all opinion and if there are any grievous factual errors I am more than willing to listen and change the post if it changes my mind.
cheers for listening to my rant.
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