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I agree with your statement in principle--it was essentially what I wanted to post. However, I don't think the bias is coming from TFA this time. Mr. Gralla uses the words "thriving free market," without any obviously negative overtone, and several of his recent articles are pro-privacy and seem to have instances of political lambasting of both sides.

For instance:
http://www.computerworld.com/blogs/node/4056
http://www.computerworld.com/blogs/node/5182
http://www.computerworld.com/blogs/node/5017

Seems like the bias is coming from elsewhere here.

I agree with your statement in principle--it was essentially what I wanted to post. However, I don't think the bias is coming from TFA this time. Mr. Gralla uses the words "thriving free market," without any obviously negative overtone, and several of his recent articles are pro-privacy and seem to have instances of political lambasting of both sides.

For instance:
http://www.computerworld.com/blogs/node/4056
http://www.computerworld.com/blogs/node/5182
http://www.computerworld.com/blogs/node/5017

Seems like the bias is coming from elsewhere here.

Oh yeah, and where do your facts come from?

IT is a hard world, and with massive amounts of cash involved.
The truth is often burried deeply in a shower of propaganda that makes honest efforts and genius technology almost lost - "like tears in the rain"...

The site is know to be pro Apple. But A LOT of things you read there are true. The guy from RDM has some good inside information, and historical correctness overall. Especially covering the Quicktime debacle in the late nineties, I know he is right. The author is not bashing, or getting awfully personal. And although he might not be 100% correct with his figure material, he blows away some smokescreens and uncovers misinformation, and exposes the truly destructive business practices of our sweet little giant.

Oh and wait, who's on crack here?
"Vista can run just fine on computers from the same timeframe if you can find one that supports 256-512mb of RAM"
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9011523

"The hardware is middle of the road, and OSX is not well known for performance in any areas"
http://www.zdnet.com.au/reviews/software/os/soa/Ap ple_Mac_OS_10_4_Tiger/0,139023442,139190318,00.htm

After you read the articles, come back and let me tell you that I have a 1999 PowerMac 20GB HD running 10.4 with 512 MB RAM, and it performs faster and smoother than with 10.3. No upgrades attached except the RAM.

So happy I still party like it's 1999. ;-)

Microsoft security guru wants Vista bugs rated less serious

Any more questions?

8-times more hardware, eh? And where'd you pull that number? Out of your ass?

Thought so.

My ass doesn't run Vista yet, sorry.

Any sysad will tell you XP needs 512MB RAM; and reports on Vista indicate the beast needs 4GB RAM to run as fast as XP. Any fool that doesn't have his head in his ass will tell you 4GB is 8 times 512MB.
XP sweet spot is 512MB: http://www.practicalpc.co.uk/computing/windows/ram needs.htm
Vista sweet spot is 4GB http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9011523

The referenced Computerworld article is here (for all those who haven't yet read it; I myself hadn't).

The problem with Microsoft's "standard" is that in many places it says things like "do what Word 5.0.3 does in when in double-line-spaced mode" without saying just what that means. The specification for Microsoft's XML format is not in the standards documents, it exists in only one place - the source code for Microsoft Word. Making a fully compliant implementation of Microsoft's XML format when you haven't got access to the Word codebase is therefore virtually impossible.

The ODF committee chose to exclude the list of settings (many of which are commonly used in a variety of applications) from the ODF standard, which has resulted in a large number of separately defined application specific settings which is an actual barrier to interoperability. For example, the following are a small selection of properties that OpenOffice saves into ODF using application specific settings (all of which affect the display of the document):

• 
  
• ChartAutoUpdate - specifies if charts in text documents are updated automatically.
  
• AddParaTableSpacing - specifies if spacing between paragraphs and tables is to be added.
  
• AddParaTableSpacingAtStart - specifies if top paragraph spacing is applied to paragraphs 1 on the first
  page of text documents.
  
• AlignTabStopPosition - specifies the alignment of tab stops in text documents.
  
• SaveGlobalDocumentLinks - specifies if the contents of links in the global document are saved or not.
  
• IsLabelDocument - specifies if the document has been created as a label document.
  
• UseFormerLineSpacing - specifies if the former (till OpenOffice.org 1.1) or the new line spacing
  formatting is applied.
  
• AddParaSpacingToTableCells - specifies if paragraph and table spacing is added at the bottom of table cells
  
• UseFormerObjectPositioning - specifies if the former (till OpenOffice.org 1.1) or the new object positioning is applied.
  
• ConsiderTextWrapOnObjPos - specifies if the text wrap of floating screen objects are considered in a specified way in the positioning algorithm.
  

It seems that more effort has gone into finding faults into OOXML while the same faults exist in ODF.

Miguel.

Although, 6 out of 100+ is still a fairly small number.

Rajchel wrote that she decided to move Open XML forward after consulting with staff at the International Technology Task Force. She did not mention that the 6,000-page proposal, submitted by another standards body, Ecma International, had garnered comments and criticism from 20 out of the 30 countries sitting on the JTC-1 committee.

Having read TFA and the PDF of the ECMA responses to the complaints, i can see why they decided to fast-track it, many of the complaints by countries are thoroughly debunked as misunderstandings of the specification. The rest are supposed to be resolved during the 5 month process.

As for TFA, they started out talking about fast-tracking the standard, then went on about totally unrelated and unsubstantiated stories about intimidation.

I may be flamed for it, but i call FUD on the part of Groklaw for this "story", the process is working as intended.

OOXML is not nescesarily a bad standard.
Just not a perfect standard.
I wrote already in my blog about this:
http://ooxmlhoaxes.blogspot.com/2007/03/ooxml-hoax -6-iso-fasttracking-requires.html

I think that Groklaw is trying to discredit OOXML in a very anoying way by hiding the realities of both formats. Groklaw seems to sit on the IBM bandwagon in a big way. (though I might be biased because any positive comment on OOXML I put on Groklaw has been moderated away)

It would have been better if slashdot had linked to the original article in stead of the Groklaw interpretation of it.
Original article here: http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9012860&intsrc=new s_ts_head

--
The Wraith
http://ooxmlhoaxes.blogspot.com/

The printer-friendly version is so much nicer to read on-screen.

Furthermore, tell me this slashdot: Why is it better to be locked-in to Googles proprietary software instead of Microsofts?

What isn't mentioned in Herr Brandenburg's interview is that Fraunhofer have been playing both sides. If you've bought an MP3 capable player, you've paid Fraunhofer royalties. But Fraunhofer have been playing both sides: developing tools to track MP3s using watermarks so record companies crack down on piracy:

http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/securi ty/story/0,10801,108506,00.html
http://p2pnet.net/index.php?page=reply&story=878

They've been expanding their IP business too: Next time you run BitTorrent or eMule (they do both), run it with a network tracker. You'll see computers from Fraunhofer affiliates all over the world taking a peek at what you're downloading.

http://greatinca.net/blog/emule-ip-blocker-hits-04 022006/

Does this mean Fraunhofer's merry band of teutonic scientists can be both co-defendants and expert-witnesses in your case?

Best Buy to Outsource IT to Accenture

  Best Buy reassesses IT Needs

So, the HP laptops that come with FreeDOS don't count?

No, they don't, obviously.

HP has toyed with Linux on laptops a few times. Back in 2003, they even supported Red Flag Linux for a while. But no longer.

Besides, an HP laptop with FreeDOS costs more than a standard system with Windows XP. The HP Compaq nx6325 as a standard package costs $679, but if you go through the configurator and select FreeDOS, you can't get below $1000.

What happened then?

During my last meeting with Sandia management, a semicircle of management was positioned in chairs around me and Bruce Held [Sandia's chief of counterintelligence]. Mr. Held arrived about five minutes late to the meeting and positioned his chair inches directly in front of mine. Mr. Held is a retired CIA officer, who evidently ran paramilitary operations in Africa, according to his deposition testimony.

At one point, Mr. Held yelled, "You're lucky you have such understanding management... if you worked for me, I would decapitate you! There would at least be blood all over the office!" During the entire meeting, the other managers just sat there and watched.

  At the conclusion of the meeting, Mr. Held said, "Your wife works here, doesn't she? I might need to talk to her." [Editor's note: In court testimony, Held admitted using the word "decapitated" and that he wouldn't contest using the word "blood" although he didn't recall saying it. He also apologized for using those terms.]

Indeed, my wife did work there -- in Sandia's International Programs section, working on nuclear counter-proliferation, port and border security issues. In the context of that meeting, it was a chilling comment. Shortly after the meeting, which management described at trial as "a fact-finding session with Mr. Carpenter," my director showed up at my office, escorted me to the gate and stripped me of my badge. That was the last time I was ever at Sandia. [Carpenter's wife resigned and is now a White House fellow working as a special assistant to top-ranking government officials.

No, its operating revenue for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2004 was $36.8 billion (source). Its operating profit for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2006 was $16.5 billion (source). So basically your statement is wrong, based on a misunderstanding of finance (equating profit with revenue) and out-of-date. The good news though is your conclusion "$1.5 billion is not chump change to Microsoft" is probably accurate. And since, in my opinion, the vast majority of posts on this subject seem to draw the wrong conclusion based on false statements, your post that draws the right conclusion based on false statements deserves to be promoted. So MOD PARENT UP!!!

http://computerworld.com/action/article.do?command =printArticleBasic&articleId=9011635

Brought to you by the captcha: unarmed

Upgrade Versions of Vista are Poison.

Of course, this has always been true of Windows Upgrade versions, but not to the extent of Vista.

Using another semiconductor than silicon for the CPU? Or a radical change in the design of the CPU or orther components? Are there experts here who can elaborate on this?

Performance per watt is a biggie for chip manufactures. Having a less than 10 watt server chip is possible, but who wants to use a Palm Pilot for a transaction server?

Having the performance to handle a slashdotting is what is needed in many servers. Performance is first, power consumption is second. That is why the performance per watt is an important part of the chip design. Low power chips is not the main design item. High performance is the most important. Providing that performance at the lowest power possible is the sweet spot chip designers aim for.

Here is additional reading. Look at what the Core 2 Duo and quad is bringing to the server market.
Please note the Woodcrest and Operon is now obsolete. The Operon was leading, but the new multi-core chips are a new race in the performance per watt race.

http://www.computerworld.com/blogs/node/2160

http://www.intel.com/performance/server/xeon/ppw.h tm

http://www.supermicro.com/newsroom/pressreleases/2 006/press081406.cfm

http://news.com.com/Chipmakers+admit+Your+power+ma y+vary/2100-1006_3-6082352.html

First-week retail sales of boxed copies of Windows Vista were almost 60% below sales of boxed copies of Windows XP in the week after its 2001 release

Retail sales of PCs, virtually all of them sporting the new Vista OS, were up 67% over the same week in 2006. While that is hardly an apples-to-apples comparison -- many stores were clearing out their XP inventory in the weeks leading up to Vista's launch -- "it still reflects a fair bit of growth"

The good news for Microsoft: Consumers who are upgrading to Vista on their older machines are opting for pricier, higher-end versions of it. The average selling price of Vista was $207.13, up 66% from the average selling price of XP. That was due in part to the fact that more than 30% of the copies of Vista sold were the Ultimate version, which lists for $399. Early boxed retail sales of Vista down nearly 60% compared to XP

One might, of course, have expected boxed sales of Vista to be somewhat depressed by the distribution of free upgrade coupons distributed with PCs sold over the holidays.

So what are others finding? Our Cisco rep sent us this clarification:

Response to Infoworld article about CTA Open Source

Q. What is this document?

A. This document is a response to the Network World article dated Feb 8, 2007 regarding CTA Open Source

Q. What is the article about? Where is it available?

A. Article is available at

http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/02/07/HNciscot ca_1.html

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=viewArticleBasic&taxonomyName=network_securit y&articleId=9010881&taxonomyId=142&intsrc=kc_top

Q. Is Network World article correct that Cisco will open source CTA in 2 months?

A. No, statements in the article are incorrect and Cisco does not have plans to open source CTA. We apologize for any confusion resulting from the interview and article and any inconvenience it caused.

Q. What are Cisco's plans for open source of CTA?

A. Cisco currently has no plans or dates for open-sourcing CTA.

PC users will never buy OSX (period)

Absolutely true as long as you can't run OS X on a plain vanilla PC. You probably meant to add "they'll just switch to Macs completely".

Paul Mockapetris, chief scientist at Nominum Inc. and founder of the DNS system, recently suggested that DNS operators keep a current copy of root zones in order to isolate themselves from future root-server attacks. Sexton points out that if local root zones were a common practice, DNS operators would seldom notice any root-server outages. An obstacle to this approach is the perception that it requires considerable technical expertise. Furthermore, the localized DNS automatically updates Root Zone data. This configuration allows the casual user to have up-to-date personal mirrors of root-server data without an intimidating hurdle of configuration. Such an approach could also be adapted for ISP or corporate DNS servers. The root-slave approach allows DNS operators to avoid the risk of future root-server attacks and, if implemented on a wide scale by individuals using a localized DNS or other DNS operators, it could reduce the motivation for future root-server attacks.

It's secret (police hacking). Just like "real world" searches, computers may not be searched secretly. So far.

Oh, they can be secretly searched alright, but only by the M$+CIA, and possibly other organizations like the RIAA+MPAA that have done a backroom deal with M$. TC will help insure that not even governments can see them doing it.

If you're naive enough to think they're not doing it consider the CIA's annual budget, consider what they've been discovered doing behind closed doors already (conventional spying, Echelon, some printer tracking, passenger tracking, ...).

Forget terrorists, foreign organizations and governments should be much more paranoid about being spied upon via their PC's for business and military intelligence than they currently appear to be. It's just too easy.

---

Open source software is everything that closed source software is. Plus the source is available.

http://sharkbait.computerworld.com/?q=node/235

Without all the asshattery: http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=printArticleBasic&articleId=9009961

It's the little companies who are more likely to try to pinch pennies by cheating on Windows licenses and software licenses in general.

I just noticed the BSA is running the rat on your boss banner ads on Userfriendly.org. Nice reward offered. It may even be enough to tide you over while your boss goes out of business.

BSA now offering up to $200,000 in rewards for Qualifying Piracy Reports!

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9001708&intsrc=art icle_more_bot

These actions are the big prompt to move from MS to Ubuntu for me. All my white boxes have migrated. Only the OEM PC's from IBM, HP, and Dell have Windows and the older ones are upgrading to Linux.

The machines are not running an MS OS not provided by the manufacture. Any upgrades are to Linux because the license terms are much better and provide immunity to the BSA.

You also forget to note that he is a software consultant.

Looking at the following average pay (national US):
Consultants & Contractors Information Services Consultant

This guy should be making upwards of $75k, if not nearly $100k+. Yes, after taxes that doesn't leave much, maybe $40-55k. Then after you factor in family, mortgages, all the works, there's potentially nothing left over. But if he's been in the industry for nearly a decade, he better have at least $25k saved up. Setting aside $5k/yr would've already done it, let alone the often recommended 10-20% of your base salary.

The truth is, it's because he picked the dream of family over space.

Sorry if this doesn't sit well with those who make less, but this is his situation, not yours. And $25k should not be putting him in debt.

see http://www.blastwave.org/efika/index.html for a really small power supply. The pico-PSU on the PowerPC EFIKA
also referenced in the ComputerWorld article :
http://computerworld.com/action/article.do?command =viewArticleBasic&taxonomyName=hardware&articleId= 9009122&taxonomyId=12&intsrc=kc_top

I do not see Sony winning the format war with blu-ray. Hell, No porn! http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9008579 Not trying to beat a dead horse here but please..

the # shipped to north america (us+can+mex) in 2006 was 1 mil, estimated sold in US was ~490k

From your article: units may not have reached stores in time to be sold (and witness the piles of them in Best Buy last time I was in there, about two weeks ago.) Shipped != Sold.

refer to other posts about the 720p thing

I described the "720p thing" perfectly accurately. I own one, latest updates, and it does not output 720p for DVDs, only games, which is exactly what I said.

and now to the third.. http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070112-8602 .html

Your quote refers to the "BDA". I said Sony was balking - that's not outright refusal, that's dragging feet, that sort of thing. Get, and USE, a dictionary. The reason that I said that is because the wholly-owned Sony subsidiary Sony DADC Global that produces Blue-Ray disks has refused to master Porn DVDs. This is public, stated policy from them.

So seeing as how every part of your "rebuttal" was off the mark, perhaps you should change your reply technique to "think, research, post" — "post and wait for reply" doesn't seem to be working out for you.

Take your own advice:

Even though the BDA association isn't technically against porn, they sure are making it hard for any porn to get produced on Blu-ray. Sony's just announced that it won't allow its subsidiary, Sony DADC Global, from producing any adult film titles. Seeing as Sony DADC is pretty much the largest Blu-ray disc producer, without their support it's near impossible to get any discs out there.

link

Here's a gem from his greatest hits collection:

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9003718&pageNumber =1

"Why Microsoft's Zune scares Apple to the core"

Um - right - whatever. Enjoy the ratings lazywriter.

This former MS evangalist actually apologized, kinda. It's here

When I interviewed Platt for a podcast, he was very good at describing the errors that he writes about in the excerpt the Computerworld ran last October.

COmputerworld has a similar daily dose of funny IT cluelessness, not really development stuff, but more tech support and hardware inanity. It's called Shark Tank.

...let me introduce you to the Shark Tank.

Actually that's kind of what they did when they had a problem with a bug filling the flash memory area of Spirit during the trip to mars, they set a register and booted without mounting the flash drive then cleaned up the drive to resume normal operations. This article talks about the way they fixed that problem. Another interesting thing I found in this article is that the uplink to the rovers while they were on their ways to Mars was only 2Kbit/s! Talk about limited bandwidth, speeds here at home haven't been that slow since 1987 with the introduction of the Hayes 96 with 9600 baud.

It is a guess, but it's a very good guess. From an interview with Ron Hovsepian

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9005462&pageNumber =2

"Their desire to do some things around IP [intellectual property] came up as
one of the things they wanted to talk about."

In addition Microsoft previously approached Red Hat with
a request for exactly the same deal (Red Hat refused).

I don't have 100% documented proof of my statement, which is
why I started the sentance with "My guess is", but I still
stand by it as my understanding of what happened.

Jeremy.

WSJ: You watch physics lectures and Harlem Globetrotters [on YouTube]?
Gates: This social-networking thing takes you to crazy places.
WSJ: But those were stolen, correct?
Gates: Stolen's a strong word. It's copyrighted content that the owner wasn't paid for. So yes.
Tue, 06/20/2006

As another poster has said, the problem with this database is that even the most honest among us commit some crimes so it makes it easier for the police to arrest anyone. Prison space is finite so in practice they arrest the people they don't like, which could be you. It certainly won't be billionaires.

We found a malicious Word document that was written in Portuguese and added detection for it as Trojan.Mdropper.T. The document contains an exploit that drops an executable file, which then installs a downloader threat and opens a clean Word document in an Asian language with some strange predictions about the future. The downloader then downloads a keylogger/infostealer.

I have always had an interest in free software and alternative operating systems. Back in the 1990s, I heard about an interesting innovative operating system called BeOS. BeOS expressed a desire to peacefully coexist with Microsoft. Microsoft applied pressure to computer companies to not sell any computers with BeOS pre-installed, so BeOS went out of Business.

A few years earlier, in the 1990s, a company come out with their own DOS clone. From what I have heard, the Microsoft programmers designed some of the Microsoft products to give error messages when running under the DOS clone even when there really was not a problem.

Once Microsoft gained dominance they tried to squeeze out alternatives my fighting against open standards. They prefer to use proprietary standards instead. On various occasions they have also tried to take open standard and add proprietary extensions to them. That strategy is called extend, embrace and extinguish. Microsoft almost missed the Internet while promoting it's own proprietary alternatives. It almost missed the boat on that and Bill Gates quickly changed course. The Internet was created with open standards such as TCP/IP and HTML. Netscape was the dominate browser back then and the browser, to a large extent, controls what standards are used. If I remember correctly, I once read that Netscape even dared to publicly make some statements about the browser making the choice of operating system less significant. So somehow Microsoft had to destroy Netscape, perhaps, so that they could better influence what standards are used.

According to a website, "Lacking any decent technology of their own, Microsoft licensed the Mosaic web browser from Spyglass which they turned into Internet Explorer." That website then gos on to say "Microsoft royally screwed over Spyglass by licensing their code and then turning around and giving it away for free." By including it for free, pre-installed with Windows they destroyed Netscape and Spyglass. Since then Internet Explorer has become the dominant browser and is the only browser that in not standards compliant.

Sun Microsystems, developed Java a programming language what would allow programmer to create programs that are operating system dependent. Micrsoft bought a license for Java, from Sun, and then tried to add their own proprietary extensions to Java. Sun successfully sued them for violating the terms of the license.

The political fight against the effort to use open-standards such as ODF in Mass is another example. Microsoft prefers to keep their Open Office users locked-in with proprietary standards such as Office 12 XML instead.

About 6 or 7 years ago I stated using Linux which is a free open-source Unix clone operating system. There weren't many big advantages over Windows other than that Linux users didn't get computer viruses or infected by email mail attachments. It somehow more like I was more in control of what was installed on my computer and how it was configured. Furthermore, the GPL license allowed me to freely copy Linux and most of my free Linux programs from one computer to another. I no longer felt big brother Bill looking over my shoulder.

Since then, I Linux has improved to where Ubuntu Linux feels very polished complete and easy to use and install. Whenever I want some new program, I just use Synaptic to choose from the list of thousands of free programs and quickly download whatever free GPL licensed program that I want. I am totally happy with Ubuntu Linux.

Back about 5 or 6 years ago, I was still using Windows ME and Office 2000 on one of my computers. That computer had what I later realized was a slightly bad power supply

Because when Microsoft, who funds SCO, makes shady deals followed by spurious claims engages in viral marketing, it's OK.

But when Sony, who delivers Linux on their console does it, it's BAD.

Yeah must be Wednesday again.

I don't see how collaborating int his area could possibly be bad. Certainly, it will give Novell/SuSE an advantage, but SuSE has consistently had features that other variations of Linux do not, such as bleeding edge drivers and early NTFS support (before it was common). There is certainly (justified) distrust of Microsoft in the Linux/open source community, especially given some of Steve Balmer's comments. ( http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9005171 )

...or is it already here? Glance at this bit about Turner Entertainment "turning" to holographic storage.

I wrote a short paper concerning RFID technology about a year ago, it mostly concerned the hardware and systems architecture. There was no shortage of reports and studies of RFID keys being cracked like the mobile speedpass http://www.jhu.edu/news_info/news/home05/jan05/rfi d.html.

http://www.ti.com/rfid/shtml/news-releases-rel02-1 0-05.shtml. Some of these passive rfid tags have no access control whatsoever. Meaning one take a small RFID programmer into their favorite store and start changing prices, or worse, write a virus to the RFID tag so the next time it's polled it'll get injected into their SQL DB. Possibly compromising their entire POS system. Ironically, this sort of stunt if done well enough could result in a jackpot of creditcard numbers so it wouldn't matter if you used an RFID enabled card or not at that point :).

Some random RFID links.
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/03/rfid _security_a.html
http://www.rfidgazette.org/2004/06/rfid_101.html
http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/133 9/2/129/
http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Technology-Article.a sp?ArtNum=20
http://www.enigmatic-consulting.com/Communications _articles/RFID/Link_budgets.html

A nice article on RFID virus attack
http://www.cbronline.com/article_news.asp?guid=B96 0208D-9ECF-4F0B-B964-4DD779BFF905

http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/securi ty/story/0,10801,100459p2,00.html

From which comes a nice quote, this is from 2005.
"The TI technology is vulnerable to attack because it uses a decade-old, 40-bit cryptographic key to encrypt communications between the RFID DST tags and readers, the researchers found. TI also used an unknown and proprietary encryption algorithm on its DST devices. But Rubin's team reverse-engineered the secret algorithm by observing how DST tags responded to specially crafted challenges. Once they guessed the algorithm, researchers created a software program that could be used in so-called brute-force attacks on DST devices to recover the secret cryptographic keys, Rubin said."

The site, http://rfidanalysis.org/ that hosted these findings no longer exists but you could probably find it cached on the net somewhere, wayback machine maybe.

Remember that RFID represents a system and not one piece of technology. The implementation of the system is dependent on the deployment plan. I could make an "RFID system" with 2 933Mhz radios and a pair of 8-bit microcontrollers from digikey for around $150. Sure, you could pull my data out of the air, but technically speaking I'm using RFID. I could also build my own RFID key system with 2048-bit encryption to act as the keys to my car. It's not that difficult to develop, really just assembling existing technologies. RFID can be done "right" and it is a promising technology. I wouldn't shun it for alot of commercial applications but for personal applications, well ask yourself the question. Is this thing a necessary part of your life?

Peter

I have been an OpenOffice.org supporter and evangelist for many years. It saddens me to see Novell do these things because they at once seem good for their business but place people on the road to vendor lock-in once more. The Microsoft formats are closed and incompatible. The sane approach would be to standardize ODF across the board.

Novell must protect its business as an obligation to its shareholders. In the process, though, they may alienate some of the open-source community supporters to the point where countermeasures may be executed. Forks like this mean that some open-source developers and organizations may ban or license their software in such a way that prevents Novell from sharing the goodies. This in turn results in fragmentation that benefits nobody but Microsoft and its offerings.

This is a master stroke from Microsoft's point of view because this way they may sneak OpenXML into organizations that had otherwise had the sanity to abandon MS-Office and forces them to move in that direction again. Novell gets stuck in the middle, with their leadership getting screwed from both ends (open-source developers and advocates in one corner, and Microsoft in the other) while thinking that they are doing something good. In the end nobody but Microsoft wins this one.

Just say "NO" to OpenXML in an OpenOffice.org fork. Make it an optional package download, and make it a non-default setting, but don't fork the code. In fact, I'd go one step further and make it a requirement for Microsoft Office (and Office Mac) to support ODF if they want OpenXML included in any open-source product. That would make this a two-way street. Are you listening, Novell?

Cheers,

E

This is a big launch for them, but for everyone else it's ho-hum"

I haven't been living in a cave I swear. I had no idea Windows Vista was being released today.

Either I haven't been paying as much attention (Although I'm on top of most of our other software), or MS just isn't pushing this release as aggressively as I would expect.

Vista was delayed over and over and over again--- eventually I stopped paying attention.