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To me the definition of Spyware is any program that spies on it's users for any reason. Targeted adds is just one example. If a program is watching what I am doing and reporting it back to anyone, whether I knowingly installed it or not, it is Spyware. Here's the Jargon File definition.

Adware is software that displays adds as a way to provide the author with a source of revenue. Again, the Jargon File definition.

The Jargon File definitions aren't as clear as mine, but they do support mine.

It can be argued that most Spyware is also Adware, but there are examples of Adware that is not Spyware. Opera and Eudora are both programs that I consider to be Adware, but do not consider to be Spyware. For the sake of companies like this, it isn't fare to lump the two together. I will be writing to both of them encouraging them to speak out on this issue and maybe even sue Gator for tarnishing their reputations.

Gator is trying to clean up its reputation by confusing the issue. This isn't fare to legitimate Adware authors, and I hope someone sues over it. Gator's reputation is well deserved and bullying sites because they state the obvious, only serves to further tarnish their reputation. I make it a point to remove Gator from any computer I work on. This isn't going to change that. If anything it's going to make me insist on it's removal even for users who think it's useful in some way. There is nothing Gator offers that users can't get someplace else, without the Spyware.

To me the definition of Spyware is any program that spies on it's users for any reason. Targeted adds is just one example. If a program is watching what I am doing and reporting it back to anyone, whether I knowingly installed it or not, it is Spyware. Here's the Jargon File definition.

Adware is software that displays adds as a way to provide the author with a source of revenue. Again, the Jargon File definition.

The Jargon File definitions aren't as clear as mine, but they do support mine.

It can be argued that most Spyware is also Adware, but there are examples of Adware that is not Spyware. Opera and Eudora are both programs that I consider to be Adware, but do not consider to be Spyware. For the sake of companies like this, it isn't fare to lump the two together. I will be writing to both of them encouraging them to speak out on this issue and maybe even sue Gator for tarnishing their reputations.

Gator is trying to clean up its reputation by confusing the issue. This isn't fare to legitimate Adware authors, and I hope someone sues over it. Gator's reputation is well deserved and bullying sites because they state the obvious, only serves to further tarnish their reputation. I make it a point to remove Gator from any computer I work on. This isn't going to change that. If anything it's going to make me insist on it's removal even for users who think it's useful in some way. There is nothing Gator offers that users can't get someplace else, without the Spyware.

Bruce Lee in his film, the *game of death* shows that there was no *way* (al lah - way of the intercepting fist ) but I digress.

The story of Ed, was one of the first Unix editors is told by esr in his new book , The Art of Unix Programming which contains a great section on editors, A Tale of Five Editors - comparing Ed, vi, Sam, Emacs and Wily.

Bruce Lee in his film, the *game of death* shows that there was no *way* (al lah - way of the intercepting fist ) but I digress.

The story of Ed, was one of the first Unix editors is told by esr in his new book , The Art of Unix Programming which contains a great section on editors, A Tale of Five Editors - comparing Ed, vi, Sam, Emacs and Wily.

You are correct (uh, except for your spelling). I haven't seen the print version, but the online version says "preemption".

Buy that book? To hell with that anyway. I've got higher priority book purchases than this thing. I got the O'Reilly 'Running Weblogs with Slash' book on Thursday at Half-Price books for $4.95. I just used wget to scarf down the HTML version off rayboy's website. The URL is here.

In the Operating Systems Comparison section, ESR fails to take note of the Lisp Machine. It's instructive to note that Lisp Machine hackers were the main contributors to the Unix-Haters Handbook and the Unix-Haters mailing list.

Here's the entire online version of the book.

But I was reffering to the mindset behind the whole dot-com era, which involved vague notions of advertising and half-cocked revenue 'concepts' such as basing businesses on giving away products and services for free [eg. gnu].

It was when the investors saw that they were being scammed by madmen and scammers and pulled out that the economy collapsed.

learn your history, it was only a couple years back, dumbass.

(Yeah, that's why I said familiar.)

It's not that he's just blowing his own horn either Ahem...

fetchmail is a network gateway program. (...) It is in extremely widespread use on Unix machines that use intermittent SLIP or PPP connections to Internet service providers, and as such probably touches an appreciable fraction of the Internet's mail traffic.

Then there's this ego-trip.

Read it, it really says a lot about ESR, but I'm not sure whether it's in a good way, or a bad way.

YOu might want to have a look here, here and here!

YOu might want to have a look here, here and here!

YOu might want to have a look here, here and here!

Have you used PHP?

Anyway, why write 50 lines of Java when 5 lines of PHP will do?

YHBT. YHL. HAND.

Thanks for using the proper case for Unix. It's starting to become pet peeve of mine when people use "UNIX" to mean Unix.

Let's not be overly morbid and give BSD credit for its early successes. In the 1970s, Ken Thompson and Bill Joy both made significant contributions to the computing world on the BSD platform. In the 80s, DARPA saw BSD as the premiere open platform, and, after initial successes with the 4.1BSD product, gave the BSD company a 2 year contract.

These early triumphs would soon be forgotten in a series of internal conflicts that would mar BSD's progress. In 1992, AT&T filed suit against Berkeley Software, claiming that proprietary code agreements had been haphazardly violated. In the same year, BSD filed countersuit, reciprocating bad intentions and fueling internal rivalry. While AT&T and Berkeley Software lawyers battled in court, lead developers of various BSD distributions quarreled on Usenet. In 1995, Theo deRaadt, one of the founders of the NetBSD project, formed his own rival distribution, OpenBSD, as the result of a quarrel that he documents on his website. Mr. de Raadt's stubborn arrogance was later seen in his clash with Darren Reed, which resulted in the expulsion of IPF from the OpenBSD distribution.

As personal rivalries took precedence over a quality product, BSD's codebase became worse and worse. As we all know, incompatibilities between each BSD distribution make code sharing an arduous task. Research conducted at MIT found BSD's filesystem implementation to be "very poorly performing." Even BSD's acclaimed TCP/IP stack has lagged behind, according to this study.

Problems with BSD's codebase were compounded by fundamental flaws in the BSD design approach. As argued by Eric Raymond in his watershed essay, The Cathedral and the Bazaar, rapid, decentralized development models are inherently superior to slow, centralized ones in software development. BSD developers never heeded Mr. Raymond's lesson and insisted that centralized models lead to 'cleaner code.' Don't believe their hype - BSD's development model has significantly impaired its progress. Any achievements that BSD managed to make were nullified by the BSD license, which allows corporations and coders alike to reap profits without reciprocating the goodwill of open-source. Fortunately, Linux is not prone to this exploitation, as it is licensed under the GPL.

The failure of BSD culminated in the resignation of Jordan Hubbard and Michael Smith from the FreeBSD core team. They both believed that FreeBSD had long lost its earlier vitality. Like an empire in decline, BSD had become bureacratic and stagnant. As Linux gains market share and as BSD sinks deeper into the mire of decay, their parting addresses will resound as fitting eulogies to BSD's demise.

The Jargon File's definition of copy protection:

A class of methods for preventing incompetent pirates from stealing software and legitimate customers from using it. Considered silly.

Intuit's own "copy protection" proved to fit this definition a little too well.

If some one were to publish this SysV code in a country (server hosted in a country) that does not have copyright laws, [...]

Not needed

If it were avalible on such a server, how many line by line comparisons would we have in a week?

Every comparison you can imagine.

If some one were to publish this SysV code in a country (server hosted in a country) that does not have copyright laws, [...]

Not needed

If it were avalible on such a server, how many line by line comparisons would we have in a week?

Every comparison you can imagine.

Ask a specific question. If you say "Can someone help me to get X working...", you're going to get a "no". Why? Think of what you actually just asked -- you, one of zillions of people, just said "will you commit an unknown amount of time to providing me with support for free".

While you did an excellent job summarizing the points, Eric S. Raymond wrote an article that I found particularly helpful, and after reading and putting into practice what he was saying (all of which made sense) i started getting a lot more help from projects, and was actually able to contribute a lot more in general. Much more satisfying, I say.

...regarding the word "hacker". As many of us here know, the term "hacker" does not mean "computer criminal", as the mainstream press continually connote or denote it. I've often heard the defense that "well, once 99% of people start using a given word in a particular sense, that becomes a/the 'correct' meaning." By this logic, the millions of people who point at their computer (the box with the power supply, optical drive(s), floppy drive(s), hard drive(s), PCI/AGP/ISA card(s), etc. in it) and call it a "CPU", or a "processor", or a "hard drive"-- or even a "modem"-- are correct. They're not, nor are the people who think that "hacker" means "cyber-criminal".

I'd say that perhaps 99% of lay-people would, if shown a computer sans monitor, keyboard and mouse, call it either "a CPU", "a processor" or "a hard drive", and a few will call it "a modem" or "some computer thingy". This does not make these terms correct.

"Hacker" will never mean "computer criminal", no matter how many ignorant journalists and non-techies take it as such.

I am most definitely a hacker. I am most definitely not someone who breaks into systems, creates or uses exploits, makes viruses, etc. etc. etc.

ESR on Carmack on GPL of code -> cheating

I though the "code hasher" was written by Eric S Raymond

However, that may just be wishful thinking on their part.

No, it isn't. Read Eric Raymond's analysis of the code in question, it is very clear that the code has been released at some point under a license that would permit it's use.

How to Get Laid, For Nerds.

Maybe you're confusing it with ESR's Sex Tips for Geeks?

I know this is supposed to be a geek place and you prolly have all seen this already. But it's still an interesting spin on the case mod cooling thread. Be sure to read the whole saga from that point on.

Here's the authoritative reference on baggy-pantsing.

Definition here.

Has Eric Raymond found incriminating similarities between Linux and the System V r4 source trees???

1) August 20th: In his "Smoking Gun Fizzles", Raymond agressively attacks SCO's claims. He even reveals that he has access to proprietary System V R4 sources.

2) Sept 3rd: Eric Raymond publishes "Comparator", a program for the comparison of things like large source trees, with the obvious intention of using it in the context of the SCO case. Eric says "I am grinning a grin that should frighten the thieves and liars at SCO out of a week's sleep." (see eweek)

3) Sept 9th - Eric writes his response to Darl McBride's Open Letter. He defends himself against Darl's personal attacks and misrepresentations. However, it is notable that he makes no claims that he believes SCO has no evidence, and he ends with:

"We will swiftly meet our responsibilities under law, either removing the allegedly infringing code or establishing that it entered Linux by routes which foreclose proprietary claims."

His comments today refer very strictly to the indemnity issue.

Surely Raymond has run comparator on the System V R4 source tree. What are the results? In his Smoking Gun Fizzles piece he had no hesitation to release a diff of Linux and his SVr4 sources, flouting it in the face of SCO lawyers. Yet now he is unwilling to compile an analysis of his Comparator results??

Does Eric Raymond's gaurded comments since releasing Comparator indicate that the results were not favorable????

braddock gaskill

Has Eric Raymond found incriminating similarities between Linux and the System V r4 source trees???

1) August 20th: In his "Smoking Gun Fizzles", Raymond agressively attacks SCO's claims. He even reveals that he has access to proprietary System V R4 sources.

2) Sept 3rd: Eric Raymond publishes "Comparator", a program for the comparison of things like large source trees, with the obvious intention of using it in the context of the SCO case. Eric says "I am grinning a grin that should frighten the thieves and liars at SCO out of a week's sleep." (see eweek)

3) Sept 9th - Eric writes his response to Darl McBride's Open Letter. He defends himself against Darl's personal attacks and misrepresentations. However, it is notable that he makes no claims that he believes SCO has no evidence, and he ends with:

"We will swiftly meet our responsibilities under law, either removing the allegedly infringing code or establishing that it entered Linux by routes which foreclose proprietary claims."

His comments today refer very strictly to the indemnity issue.

Surely Raymond has run comparator on the System V R4 source tree. What are the results? In his Smoking Gun Fizzles piece he had no hesitation to release a diff of Linux and his SVr4 sources, flouting it in the face of SCO lawyers. Yet now he is unwilling to compile an analysis of his Comparator results??

Does Eric Raymond's gaurded comments since releasing Comparator indicate that the results were not favorable????

braddock gaskill

The RIAA is a lose cannon

Is this a "lose" in sense 4 of the Jargon File definition?

A "lose cannon". Seems somehow appropriate...

Chatrooms were always a waste of time anyway imho...

Horses for courses :)
From the Jargon file:

Hackers who don't indulge in Usenet consider it a huge waste of time and bandwidth; fans of old adventure games such as ADVENT and Zork consider MUDs to be glorified chat systems devoid of atmosphere or interesting puzzles; hackers who are willing to devote endless hours to Usenet or MUDs consider IRC to be a real waste of time; IRCies think MUDs might be okay if there weren't all those silly puzzles in the way.

The whole point of the article is a fact so well known that it's included in the jargon file. What's next an article describing the meaningAunt Tillie?

According the the HJF it's actually a misomer, them crediting it's origional incarnation to 'Finigail'. This Finigail noted that (similar to what the artical states) an engenier had installed a set of accelerometers in the wrong way due to them being symetrical, and made a report saying that they should be symetrical to prevent inevitable mixups.

But then again, how much can you trust a 'net based encyclopedia?

Murphy's law

RTFM

http://catb.org/esr/jargon/html/D/dogfood.html

The current president of the ISO, and the recipient of the letter mentioned in the article is Oliver Smoot, MIT '62.

Oliver has had a unit named after him, the smoot

This is an ESR standard in the public domain, and not an ISO standard, hence we can continue to measure objects in smoots for free.

Hanlon's Razor may well apply here.

The prefixes kilo, giga, mega, etc. are well known, well defined SI standards and are not redefined anywhere else.

The whole purpose of SI was to simplify arithmetic in a decimal environment. We are dealing here with a binary environment. To insist on using the decimal meaning of qauntifers, in a binary environment they weren't designed for is ludicrous.

I have another idea which may work- find out what sort of specialist software lawyers require (there has to be something?) and create free packages to fill that need. With OSS/free software quality and a little publicity before too long the community would have a team of lawyers available to if not to equal the mega-corps then at least to frighten off jerks like SCO.

As ESR said "willing allies are far better value than lackeys and sock puppets", it could be time that the community went out of it's way to create some allies in the legal proffession.

And "dub-dub-dub"'s semi official too, since it's got an entry in the Jargon File

If the patent holder decides to pursue this against open source/free software - then we will just have to do things the old fashioned way: kick off a separate application to run the widget in. No skin off my teeth (this means my life as a sysadmin just got 50% easier with regard to configuration management - I would no longer have to maintain plugins, and stand-alone patches).

If the patent holder does this, they won't make any money from it other than getting damages from deep pockets, like M$, and will kill the technology in the bargain.

This would be a canonical example of the Wrong Thing

Yay! I get to say RTFA!

The link (given in 'TFA') is http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/mcbride2.html (it wasn't exactly highlighted, though)

HTH
Cheers & God bless
Sam "SammyTheSnake" Penny

The problem with this logic though is that this is a legal issue. It's demonstrated clearly that they are being incredibly childish, but that they have put this in a court makes anyone somehow connected with open source obligated to respond in kind. It could be GNU responding to SCO in some way, ESR's no secrets page, or even writing your own letters and await responses like I did. Hell, even those guys who sent $699 in monopoly money responded by showing what the SCO runtime license was worth.

JoeJob writes...

How appropriate, that an article about spam would be submitted by a user named JoeJob.

BTW, "ESR" is a slashdot invention -- he never calls himself ESR

What, never?

Download & read the source. Or just read the documentation.

Comparator has the capability (-w) to ignore whitespace while generating the hash, while at the same time tracking the actual line numbers for purposes of merging and reporting. In my experience, most code-copiers are dumb and/or lazy -- to get past ESR's tool, the code-copier would have to (a) realize that they're violating a license, (b) not care, (c) be smart enough to realize that a pure cut-and-paste might get caught, and (d) energetic enough to munge up the code logic and variables. While I'm sure there are people like that, I would argue that most of them wouldn't be interested in contributing the result to the community, and the code wouldn't get past Linus if they did. The more logical case is some one/company who believe that they have a legitimate right to copy code from one kernel to another (BSD -> Linux / Linux -> SysV / SysV -> Linux) and thus not feeling the need to cover things up. Either of the SCO User Group examples would fit this category.

Download & read the source. Or just read the documentation.

Comparator has the capability (-w) to ignore whitespace while generating the hash, while at the same time tracking the actual line numbers for purposes of merging and reporting. In my experience, most code-copiers are dumb and/or lazy -- to get past ESR's tool, the code-copier would have to (a) realize that they're violating a license, (b) not care, (c) be smart enough to realize that a pure cut-and-paste might get caught, and (d) energetic enough to munge up the code logic and variables. While I'm sure there are people like that, I would argue that most of them wouldn't be interested in contributing the result to the community, and the code wouldn't get past Linus if they did. The more logical case is some one/company who believe that they have a legitimate right to copy code from one kernel to another (BSD -> Linux / Linux -> SysV / SysV -> Linux) and thus not feeling the need to cover things up. Either of the SCO User Group examples would fit this category.

Keep in mind, this tool will not divine intent, or direction -- it's only going to give broad hints of where to look for possibly problematic code.