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1. Prove it. What you're saying is absurd, if signatures where that easy to forge, the whole e-commerce industry would be falling apart (and not only).

Must I prove it? Well, okay. go here:

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1995993,00.as p

Then, go on to read this:

http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/reference/Securit y_Implications_of_Windows_Vista.pdf

I'll admit that those above are related largely to Vista, but the concept of driver signing started in Win2000 and each release did manage to add more to the original notion.

And while it's true that locking out unsigned drivers entirely is a good deal, I think it will demonstrate more problem than benefit. The real problem will result from forged signatures and if you would like to assert that people out there would not be able to break the encryption involved in the process, please stand up and make yourself humiliated publicly. If it can be encrypted, it can be decrypted. If there is a key, it can be unlocked. These are not laws I just make up, these are laws of nature. These security mechanisms rely on secrecy and if you think it through to conclusion, no secret can withstand the determination of the crackers that exist today.

2. That's the case with XP. Vista doesn't allow *at all* unsigned kernel drivers to be installed. The user has no choice but.. well, he has no choice. He won't install the driver.

Uhm... people are actually *using* Vista? Okay, that's sarcasm mostly, but I think it's pretty clear that a strong and dominant portion of the population are resistant to Vista for the moment and will continue to be resistant, I predict, until no other options are available.

What good points? It has a resource intensive "shiny" interface. It has levels of DRM heretofore unseen in an operating system. It is claimed that it is secure, yet still has gaping security holes. It is claimed that it is safe, yet has to be made un-safe for users to be able to do anything with it. It is expensive, clunky, space consuming, privacy invading, insecure, unsafe, and is more interested in protecting the interests of major Hollywood distributors than its users.

Care to highlight why I'd want to use Vista?

This is definately a negotiating tactic, but its almost certain to backfire on them. When I decide to buy a song these days, unless its for some group I definately want several songs from, I automatically go to iTunes (even before I had a iPod, because I could burn a Mix CD so easily), I never even consider what label its on (even though I hate Sony records, it just doesn't cross my mind). So I'll wind up on iTunes discovering that the music I want isn't there? So Universal hope I'll then curse Apple for not licensing its DRM or being inflexible on their pricing (like I would believe they want to sell it to me for less than $.99 or protect my ability to exercise the fair use provisions of Copyright law). Instead I'll likely wind up buying some other song off iTunes, and likely wonder what kind of third world record company produced a song I can't buy from the most popular online music shop. (Yes, I'll know the DRM line Apple gives is a convenient, if true, excuse for doing something they don't want to do anyway. I'm OK with that. And I'll have the general knowledge the much like the Net Neutrality arguement, companies are using me as a club to get concessions from other companies, but as a former Cogent customer, I'm again on the side that has it right.)

The other posters have already said what Universal wants, a cut of every iPod and iPhone sold, they feel that if it is involved in playing music, they deserve a cut of it.

The Right Thing(tm) is to keep the license as it is. It ensures the Solaris code has to be shared (like the GPL), but doesn't pollute source code around it

( GPL - viral clause = CDDL. Same license as firefox, or apache)

Nobody can say for certain if ZFS will see a legal implementation directly in the Linux kernel, but I think it's fairly obvious that the largest barrier to doing so is a legal one. The summary is worded such that it does not exclude the possibility of the licensing barrier being overcome, which I personally believe will happen. You mentioned at the end of your comment what is in my mind the most likely scenario that would yield full inclusion of ZFS in the Linux kernel: both projects being relicensed (dual-licensed?) under the GPLv3.

I for one didn't quite believe Sun when they made their initial casual talks about deciding to license Java under the GPLv2, but look what happened with that: they followed through, with the primary intention to see Java be as widespread as possible and attract more users and developers. In Sun's perspective, and as they've publicly stated, the fact that their Java technology can now (well, almost) be included by default in any GNU/Linux distribution which chooses to do so was a huge selling point for choosing the GPLv2.

Now Sun has been talking about dual-licensing Solaris under the GPLv3 in addition to the CDDL. Sun sees the GNU/Linux train taking off from the station and doesn't want to miss it: that's why they GPLed Java and that's why they'll probably do the same for Solaris. In addition to this, Linus Torvalds has already stated that ZFS under the GPLv3 is perhaps a good enough reason to relicense the kernel: "maybe ZFS is worthwhile enough that I'm willing to go to the effort of trying to relicense the kernel."


So in summary, we have Sun seriously considering GPLv3 for Solaris, and if they follow through in totality, we have Linus seriously considering starting the move to GPLv3 license Linux, and we also have all of the GNU projects moving to GPLv3 at the hand of the FSF. And the patents Sun has on ZFS? Already taken care of in the GPLv3! Now we just need the licensed to be released....

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2147467,00.as p

Where it is reported 'Apple, ..., said its battery claims are dependent upon specific configurations and "many other factors."'

So it's rock solid true then because of the "claims"!!! So what are the "specific configurations"? And what are some of those "many other factors."?

So - come on Apploids - let's hear from you!

http://securitywatch.eweek.com/apple/apples_newly_ patched_winsafari_springs_new_leak.html

Another Hole Found in Just-Plugged Safari for Windows

http://securitywatch.eweek.com/apple/safari_for_wi ndows.html/

Why would I bother with Safari now?
This is modded 5, Insightful? If you took that attitude you wouldn't use any software, certainly not IE, Firefox and not Windows.

The EFF said don't use Google Desktop because of vulnerabilities" "[We urge] consumers not to use this feature, because it will make their personal data more vulnerable to subpoenas from the government and possibly private litigants, while providing a convenient one-stop-shop for hackers who've obtained a user's Google password," the EFF said in a statement" http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1925064,00.as p If Google is under pressure from some governments to hide things, from others to store and reveal things - why would people want more, more, more Google and their vulnerabilities on a computer? As bad as Microsoft is I would rather deal with the devil I still know then the Googlers who seem to want to be the center of the cyber-universe in a way that seems more grandiose than even M$. They lost me when the started censoring stuff here US never mind China.

Artima
eWeek
InfoQ
Java home
JavaLobby
JavaWorld
JDJ
The Inquirer
The Register
TheServerSide

Whatever, here are links: The slashdot article, and the first post in it links to this article covering the paper author's rebuttle..

I can't help but notice how the numbers keep changing. The study says 283 patents, Balmer at one point said 228, and now it's 235. Frankly since they aren't substantiating any of these claims anyway I think MS just makes up a number to keep people confused. Maybe they'll think that further research turned up another 7 patents, even though it's still all based on a completely braindamaged intepretation of someone else's work.

"And MS doesn't have any special insight either as they haven't studied it either"

Nobody asked for MS's opinion, they just announced it. As far as what they have or have not studied, who knows?

Yea, MS announced their FUD opinion. Without being asked. Linus on the other hand WAS ASKED. As for whether MS has studied it, when Ballmer cites Linux as violating more than 200 MS patents, the study he gets the numbers from is one done by Dan Ravicher for OSRM (Open Source Risk Management) and he says MS mischaracterizes his study.

Back in November 2004, Dan Ravicher complained to Steven Vaughan-Nichols that Ballmer had misread his patent study, so I'm not sure that this is 'new' news.

That Register link is dead (although even Google News indexed the article. wtf?) But many articles are repeating Ravicher's old remarks: Ravicher says his report proves the opposite of Microsoft's claims, The author of that report disowned Ballmer's remarks, etc.

2yr old eWeek interview

So it's ok for MS to swipe other's ideas but do it to MS and you're a patent infringing criminal. Unless they can specify swiped code line for line, this is all bullshit. Every OS pinched from the other guys.

Quick someone patent method for throwing chairs.

http://www.eweek.com/print_article2/0,1217,a=13966 9,00.asp

Seems that Ballmer was apparently quoting a study done by someone else during his little speech. And the author of that study says that Linux infringes no more so than any other large scale piece of code - including Windows! Where has this article gotten such detailed figures? I'm pretty sure the authoer of the original piece didn't get that specific (did he?) so does that mean that Microsoft decided to break them out? And why was Ballmer's number lower than the original author's numbers? The author seems to support Linux and feels he's being taken out of context it seems.

A Google search will help...

Microsoft Patent Could Hamper E-Mail Authentication Group

John R. Levine provides an analysis

Microsoft patents E-mail addresses as clip-board objects

Microsot patents eternal E-mail

Another link

Linux violates more than 200 software patents, Microsoft followed up by saying Ballmer was only citing findings from a controversial study done this summer by OSRM (Open Source Risk Management), a risk-mitigation consultancy.

The study claimed that Linux has been found to potentially violate 283 software patents. The author of that report, however, doesn't see things the way Ballmer `does at all.

"Microsoft is up to its usual FUD [fear, uncertainty and doubt]," said Dan Ravicher, author of the study Microsoft cites, who is an attorney and executive director of PUBPAT (the Public Patent Foundation).

Speaking Thursday at the Microsoft-sponsored Asian Government Leaders summit in Singapore, Ballmer said, "There was a report out this summer by an open-source group that highlighted that Linux violates over 228 patents. Someday, for all countries that are entering WTO [the World Trade Organization], somebody will come and look for money to pay for the patent rights for that intellectual property. So, the licensing costs are less clear than people think today."

In fact, the study said Linux potentially violates 283 software patents, not "over 228" as Ballmer said in his speech.

But Ravicher said Ballmer misinterpreted his study's findings. "He misconstrues the point of the OSRM study, which found that Linux potentially, not definitely, infringes 283 untested patents, while not infringing a single court-validated patent."

"The point of the study was actually to eliminate the FUD about Linux's alleged legal problems by attaching a quantifiable measure versus the speculation," he said. "And the number we found, to anyone familiar with this issue, is so average as to be boring; almost any piece of software potentially infringes at least that many patents."

The study shows that when it comes to software, open-source varieties face fewer patent threats than proprietary ones, Ravicher said. "If one believes the proof is in the pudding, open-source software has much less to worry about from patents than proprietary software."

"Consider this--not a single open-source software program has ever been sued for patent infringement, much less been found to infringe. On the contrary, proprietary software, like Windows, is sued and found guilty of patent infringement quite frequently."

"Open source lacks compliance with many standards when compared with proprietary solutions"

I admit I didn't read the report all that carefully, but this particular observation made my jaw drop. How can anyone argue that open-sourced programs lack compliance with standards when many of the most significant programs were written precisely to conform to well-established standards. Doesn't sendmail comply with RFC2822? Doesn't ISC bind comply with the various DNS standards? Don't MySQL and PostgreSQL comply with SQL standards? Some of these programs (e.g, the DBMSs) might have additional non-compliant extensions, but really how can anyone say that a program like Firefox is less compliant with what passes for the standards on the web than Internet Explorer?

Or are we talking here about "standards" like NTFS or, perhaps worse, "standards" like .doc or .xls?

My prediction is that in twenty years these types of arguments will have faded away as an entire new generation of IT people brought up on open source will be filling these suits rather than the guys around this table. Oh, and I'm at least as old as most of them if not older, but I haven't been put through the corporate mill like these folks, thank the gods, or I'd be writing stupid things like this myself.

On a somewhat-related note, did any of you see the list of the supposedly "most important open-source products of all time" at eWeek? How this list could have excluded X, sendmail, bind, or kerberos is beyond me. Firefox is nice and all, but how much of an Internet would we have had without name services or mail exchange? Heck, even Microsoft decided to adapt Kerberos when it created Active Directory.

The VA has an electronic health record that is winning awards from Harvard:
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1988099,00.as p

Read this article http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2123859,00.as p as it's a bit more interesting. The open source bits are the Dynamic Language Runtime (DLR) and the IronPython language. The DLR sits on top of .NET, so if you are using Mono and IronPython, then I would assume that you would then have all the source from top to bottom.

The MS stuff is here http://www.codeplex.com/IronPython

This time I even checked my links :-)

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1666498,00.as p

Therefore it is somehow unlikely that I ever purchase something which has the smalllest relation for Kodak, but I am glad to hear that they will have smaller income from cartridges.

Links for those who don't bother to read the whole article:

[1] http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2099467,00.as p
[2] http://blog.godshell.com/blog/index.php?/categorie s/2-Technology

Sure thing. Check out the recently-approved Data Retention Laws. Link 1 Link 2. They are cursory introductions, you can dig further if you wish. The articles don't talk about wifi spots but they are regulated too: they have to keep a copy of ID for each customer and be able to track them individually, as I said. Anyway you are perfectly right in not just believing me, so check it out. You'll be appalled.

Remember this?!?

FEMA's IE-Only Form: Just What Katrina Victims Don't Need
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1857297,00.as p

As for which platform Silverlight will support next, Key said, "Linux is an open question. We're looking at the desktops and browsers by volume. We want to put muscle behind supporting the bulk of the market." And Linux support is still under discussion, he said.

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2114418,00.as p

so go easy on me.

I've been a loyal Slashdot reader for years, but have just signed up for an account. It has been apparent that over time the readership has gone from IT professionals with cute little quips to overangsted teenagers who know how to turn on a computer and sign up for an account.

While there have been many articles that have been brought to my attention that would have otherwise been overlooked in my busy schedule, there has recently been a rash of, well put nicely, stupidity being spouted at every chance these keyboard warriors are able.

These comments being brandied about are excellent examples of this downward spiral. Please bear with me whilst I point out the fallacies being brandied about.

1) The government is being racist by banning material?
Since when is Islam a race? Did I miss a memo? Granted the founders of it were Arabic, but since they only constitute ~20% of the total numbers, is it really their religion anymore? If it is, than anybody that hates Christians are racists toward Israelis since they started that religion.

2) Stopping the spread of violent material aimed toward youth means you can not counter it.
This is patently absurd. Remember when you were a kid? And how bitching Britney Spears, MC Hammer, or Christie Lauper was (depending on your age group could be some other 'pop idol')? Could you not agree that the decision making process of a child's brain is not formed well enough to make rational choices? It continues to blow my mind that Christians are crucified on Slashdot, but Muslims are not even though the propaganda they're postulating is so very much more damaging than what comes from the Chistian camp.

3) The government will not know when to stop censoring.
Ahh, the good old "They'll never stop, so we shouldn't have even a little bit". That logic works both ways, remember the Prohibition? For all the hand wringing that goes on in Slashdot, I'd dare anyone to prove that the government has abused their powers to the extent that we have an Orwellian society.

4) Islam is bad. But Christianity is worse.
I want to keep this a short post, but will just throw out some examples of that absurdity. Bombing Internet cafes Mosques telling people they'll die from a "deadly phone virus" Spreading racist rumours that melons will give you AIDS Murdering elderly Buddhists The courts giving free reign to serial killers Attacking university students, vandalising property, and stealing buses

Let me reiterate that the proposed Australian bill is not seeking to ban this material, rather change the system to avoid allowing media that is racist and advocating violence towards others from influencing childern. You must remember that their film board, by the very act of allowing the film to recieve a "PG" rating has essentially given the parents that do a poor job of raising their childern a go-ahead to plop them down in front of a tv and watch this filth.

I propose we get rid of the whole "War on Terrorism". You could never win it. Shoot, the Americans entrance into WWII was pretty much spurred by an act of terrorism. And you know what happened? The US didn't say they were going to fight terrorism. They said they were going to go and get rid of Shintoism and baggage that it carried with it. Only after they had broken that were the Japanese ready to rise to the current power that they now enjoy. The same thing needs to happen in Islam. The followers need to realise that the sway that the evil has over them needs to end. Only than will it be a legitimate religion.

Have you been in a cave on the dark side of the moon since 2000?

During the last five years, Apple released major versions of OS X about every 1-1.5 years while all Microsoft had was XP. Third party developers were actually complaining because of the rapid pace of change of OS X. Before Tiger was released, Apple announced they would be slowing down the pace of their OS X releases.

I'm disappointed that I have to wait longer than expected for Leopard, but I'd rather they ship it when it's ready-- besides, it's not like they had to scrap it midstream and start over, and then chop all the compelling features to make an already embarassingly late ship date.

  It does make sense to focus on the iPhone right now, because the mobile phone market is much larger than the personal computer market. If Apple gets a nice foothold in it, it will mean more money for them to pour into expanding their presence in the computer market.

~Philly

ljaguar, you've been plagiarized by the famous Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols. You made it to eweek.com, too.

It was stored on a Windows box?

botnet
holes
obsessed with botnets

We do have a two fold movement.

First.

The current inflation rate in rupees is 14+% ( 72/14 =~ 5) so indian programmers will be 100% more expensive in 5 years. They currently are about 1/3 the cost (with very low benefits compared to american workers).

The indian peasants are beginning to get pissed off by the inflation so increased taxes are likely.

Second-- the dollar lost 3.5% against the rupee in the last year alone. So the net inflation rate is roughly 18% (72/18 = 4!). So that mean costs for indian programers will double in only 4 years at the current rate.

Now- infosys reports that *many* companies are bidding for their workers. You might be getting the workers for 1/3 the cost, but if another company bids 50% of the cost, then you lose the workers.

Likewise, there are limits to growth.

http://edgeperspectives.typepad.com/edge_perspecti ves/2006/07/innovation_and_.html
"Leading firms like Infosys report turnover rates in the range of 10 - 15%, much more equivalent to what we experience in Silicon Valley."

10-15% ... Last year they had to HIRE 13,000 new employees just to stay at the same number of people.

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1991783,00.as p
Some companies report 15% per year. Quality issues. Very high job hopping rates.

OTH, rumors run rampant where I am of the entire IT staff being replaced by indians. Which opens another can of worms. This company only sells products in the US. Will popular press about them dumping hundreds of americans for indian workers affect their ability to sell product here? It's unclear- folks frequently SAY it matters but then sneak in and buy the bargain anyway.

By Peter Galli (eWeek)
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2108409,00.as p
The Free Software Foundation just published this morning a new draft of the last version of the General Public License, GPL3. This version takes aim specifically at the Microsoft and Novell agreement and seeks to prevent future similar agreements. Peter Galli/eWEEK reported on the news questioning if this new version will forever doom the license. "The draft has evolved over time, but GPLv3 is still clearly designed to build unscalable walls between open-source and proprietary software.

Google's employees. IMHO, Google is making the Google Phone/Tablet available inside Google as a convenient device for Google employees. Similar to how Google uses Gdrive internally. It makes sense to me that Google employees should have quick and easy access to their own network. And with their own phone to do it.

I think a lot of you are being too harsh toward this guy.

IT departments are often the first target when people don't get the results they desire, because IT as a whole has lost much of its prestige and clout in firms over the past decade or so. That's why older people keep leaving the profession, and the rate of recruitment among younger people continues to decline.

People who were once in thrall to technology and computing now think it's unreliable and error-prone. There are many reasons for this, but mostly it's because many people are more experienced with computers and with computing problems. They've watched their computers lock up and need rebooting. They've "lost" an important email. They've "lost" an important document. Who are they going to blame?

On top of that, it sounds like the original poster works for a company that assumes, as do many companies and their investors, that every quarter must show better performance than the last. In the real world, of course, economies move up and down. It's only in the fantasy world of corporate America that expectations of ever-increasing growth continue to be the norm. When the fantasy bubble bursts, IT is an easy target.

Bitter indeed.

Tech-related jobs are growing incredibly fast http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2020986,00.as p , and some of them are considered to be some of the best jobs to be had (according to Money Magazine and Salary.com http://news.com.com/2061-11199_3-6060607.html).

Does this mean everyone has a job? Not necessarily; one has to examine geography, skill, and working habits. Is it like the dot-con (poor spelling pun intentional) boom, where you could spit and get an offer for 50% more than you were making currently, even if you knew nothing? No.

Have the last two places I've worked had trouble finding qualified applicants who can actually produce production-quality code product on a schedule? Yes. Have they had trouble filling roles? Yes. Are both reasonable places to work, with decent hours, great pay, interesting work, and wonderful benefits? Yes. (Since someone will wonder, I left one because I wanted to move to another city).

Am I fortunate? Yes. Am I unique? No.

Not sure where you're getting your information - and I'm sure it's valid for you - but the endless dour outlook just because things aren't like they were during the 90's doesn't mean things are bad.

My personal experience is that the people who whine most about their circumstance are often the ones most unwilling to do anything to change or fix it. I was stuck for a number of years in what I decided was a dead-end marketing career. I got off my posterior side and went back to school, got a CS degree, and hit the pavement. If IT is for you, continue learning and growing - perhaps learn how to be a great employee in addition to a great IT person. If it isn't for you, expand your skills and leave. Whining brings everyone down.

Screw VMWare, an imaged machines

Cybersquatters will generally either offer to sell the name back to the trademark owner for an extortionate price, or make money from internet traffic accidentally landing on their page.

Rob Enderle isn't just any guy. He is the troll if there ever was one. From his Wikipedia page:

Enderle has surpassed most analysts in stirring up industry-wide controversy.

Enderle has been critical of Apple Computer and Linux, as well as Unix and the open source/free software movements in general. In particular, he believes that Linux is a "free-software scam," and he has compared some Linux advocates to terrorists, predicting that "one of them -- or perhaps a group of them -- will go too far at some point and do significant damage to the open-source movement, the ongoing litigation with SCO or their employers." It is for these reasons that Enderle has been called "a Microsoft shill"[2] and even "raving lunatic"[3] by critics.

His free software scam piece is a good example of his twisted ways. Another one is his article about Why SCO Should Win.

my big problem with this program in particular is that the Department of Homeland Security is notorious for not protecting its data (example #1, example #2). so even if you feel confident that they have a good reason for mining this data, you can't possibly have confidence that someone else isn't mining the DHS's data for their own uses.

Oh, and can I be the first to coin the term "Flashtops"?

No.

That's Rob "One impressive piece of execution is that when you fire the machine up it plays a WAV file of a Ferrari race car revving its engine. That alone is worth the relatively low $1,899 price of admission" Enderle.

The "computer guru" who authored the most idiotic product review ever.

I'd rather hear from Dvorak than this guy.

He's nothing if not predictable. He thinks SCO should win its case against "linux" in general, so why would anyone be shocked he's written tripe like this?

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1543531,00.as p

IT shouldn't be an advocate of any product

Of course not.

We should leave that job to hired shills like Rob "Ferrari Laptop" Enderle:

"One impressive piece of execution is that when you fire the machine up it plays a WAV file of a Ferrari race car revving its engine. That alone is worth the relatively low $1,899 price of admission. Even when I'm in a meeting, I don't turn the sound off because of the unbridled envy that seems to show up in the eyes of my, granted mostly male, co-attendees. So far no one has complained."

Click here for more shameless whoring...

I'll apologize in advance if this is a redundant post, but it is just too good to not read. This is full of the usual Microsoft doublespeak and PR. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2102366,00.as p It was not so hard to update my Red Hat systems.

So no, OOo won't replace MSOffice quite yet

You're absolutely right. I agree 100%.
And that's exactly why governments entities and educational institutions in Texas, Massachusetts, Israel, India, Singapore, Germany, France, Brazil, China, Macedonia, Denmark, and from the opendocument fellowship *deep breath*. Australia, Austria, Belgium, British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario, Croatia, Czech Republic, EU bodies, Hong Kong, Netherlands, Pakistan, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, UK, and from the USA: Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Maryland, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada and New York... are NOT all switching or planning to switch to OpenOffice.

Oh wait. They are!

I think the point is that is MS actually does sue Linux users, there will be a huge retaliation. (And there always has been this threat). So they won't.

Before you say "won't that nullify the point of this site, since it won't prove anything about whether MS has patents or not", I'll point out that if "we can't sue or you'll retaliate by suing us" is MS's response (or excuse for not doing anything at all), then it proves that they can't do anything about it and we can get on without all this FUD.

It would also serve to show that they are equally, if not more, in violation of the open source community's patents than we are of them.

I was also interested to read that the original study (the "283 patents" which Ballmer refers to) was actually a finding that Linux contained 283 potential patents in total. It estimated that 1/3 of the patents were owned by the OS community companies themselves (eg. IBM). And Microsoft owned just 10% of them - which if my calculations are correct is just over 28 patents, not over 200 as Ballmer claims.

I think the point is that is MS actually does sue Linux users, there will be a huge retaliation. (And there always has been this threat). So they won't.

Before you say "won't that nullify the point of this site, since it won't prove anything about whether MS has patents or not", I'll point out that if "we can't sue or you'll retaliate by suing us" is MS's response (or excuse for not doing anything at all), then it proves that they can't do anything about it and we can get on without all this FUD.

It would also serve to show that they are equally, if not more, in violation of the open source community's patents than we are of them.

I was also interested to read that the original study (the "283 patents" which Ballmer refers to) was actually a finding that Linux contained 283 potential patents in total. It estimated that 1/3 of the patents were owned by the OS community companies themselves (eg. IBM). And Microsoft owned just 10% of them - which if my calculations are correct is just over 28 patents, not over 200 as Ballmer claims.

Most Critical Firefox Flaw Remains Unzapped!!!

Interesting read at http://securitywatch.eweek.com/open_source/all_the _firefox_flaws_hunted_down_1.html

One of the most important difference of software compared other tangible products is, it doesn't cost to duplicate once a software product is developed. The other major difference is, it doesn't even cost to distribute even if to the whole world thanks to peer-to-peer (P2P) networks.

A minor, student or single person can easily infringe one or many software patents by writing a small computer program. That is, you don't have to be a company to violate Software Patents.

Software Patents are the single most danger faced today by the students, end users, software developers, scientists, companies especially small ones, etc.

Therefore, Software Patents strongly discourage if not completely stop innovation and advancement of science and technology.

Software Patents allow few big companies to earn money with following two dangers to the public:
1. Software Patents holder has no obligation to give a license to others.

2. Even if Software Patents holder agrees to give a license to others, there is no obligation for them to give at price affordable for others.

By using either or both above points they can simply cutoff others from implementing a technology or advancement of a technology. Please note, the technique used is cutoff, not compete.

Today I'm sitting on a product that I developed by advancing the technology using innovative ideas, but I cannot release it to the world either free or at fee unless I violate one single patent owned by a large company.

I wrote to that company asking how much royalty do I have to pay, there is no reply from them. They want us to violate the law and sue us later. They do not want to compete with us, they simply want to cutoff us from competition.

By being a victim of Software Patents, my suggestion is software should be managed by Copyright laws, not by Patent laws. If somebody does not want to given me a license for a software product, I can still sit and develop a functionally equivalent one as if I'm writing a new book without violating law.

This is how major industries such as music, movie, book publishing operates.

Sagara W

Following links may give you a better understanding of this Software Patents issue:
1. Public Patent Foundation ( http://www.pubpat.org/ )
2. http://www.nosoftwarepatents.com/
3. Software Patents vs Parliamentary Democracy ( http://swpat.ffii.org/index.en.html )
4. Petition for a Software Patent Free Europe ( http://petition.eurolinux.org/index_html )
5. Software Patents Gone Bad ( http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1666755,00.as p )

There is a eweek article on DC power in the computer room saving 15%. On the POTS/PSTN side of the company everything is 48v DC. I think the AC data center is more due to vendor hardware availability and the expense on non-commodity power supplies. There is convergence of the PSTN and IP networks happening in the industry and maybe there will be more on the Server and POTS equipment. I think currently the systems are separate and Telco/Hosting companies maintain both the 48v DC supplies for the POTS/PSTN and the AC supplies for the IT systems.