Slashdot Mirror

AntiNorm asks: "I recently installed Mandrake 8.0, and after taking much time to get it working, I found that the free version of WordPerfect 8 would not install. The same thing happened under Redhat 7.0, although it installed and worked fine under RH 6.2. It appears that the binaries (wpinstc and wpinstg) that are called by the installation scripts are unable to find a particular file or library that they need, but I haven't been able to figure out anything beyond that. Has anyone else had this problem? If so, is there a way to get around it?" Update: 05/10 04:27 PM by C : Another similar question hit the bin, today, except this one is about Wordperfect 2000. Are the same problems from WP8 inherited in the latest version? Read more, below.

eadint asks: "I've been using Linux since 1996 and about a year and a half ago when Corel Office 2000 for :inux was released I finally got rid of my Windows partition and started using Linux as my sole operating system. Recently I upgraded to Red Hat 7.1 and I haven't been able to install it on my computer. I'm hoping for some advice on this and also hoping that I don't have to downgrade my OS. I can definitely notice a difference in speed with 7.1"

vergil asks: "I've been researching software and business method patents issued by the U.S. PTO and placing choice examples here. Recently, I stumbled upon an interesting Microsoft patent (6,175,833) filed on April 22, 1998, granted on Jan. 16, 2001 and entitled 'System and method for interactive live online voting with tallies for updating voting results.' Is anyone aware of substantially similar web polls (WhizQuest, perhaps?) that were in use before Microsoft filed for this patent and might qualify as prior art against any of this patent's claims? This nugget of intellectual property seems to cover many fundamental aspects of web-polling - such as the Slash pollbox, for example." In light of the things that can get patented these days, I'm hoping it shouldn't be all that hard to find suitable examples to bust up this one.

"The patent above appears to claim an automated, database-run webpoll that:

• Has an automatic 'authoring tool' that allows an editor to create and store polls (claim 7), including fields for question text, numbers, and answers (claim 4).
• Total votes and percentage fields for displaying poll results (claim 5).
• A 'votes table' to track users that have already voted, a "totals table" to contain vote tallies, a 'vote handler' that processes votes, and a 'survey index table' that displays either the poll questions, or results, depending on whether the user has voted (claim 1)."

Jamie and I looked into this and it appears that the Slash Poll feature does appear to be at least a partial implementation of what's listed in the patent. However it's not real clear, from what data we could retrieve out of the database, exactly when Slashdot started it's online poll. The Earliest live poll on record is titled "Corel" and is dated March 24, 1998.

Of course, the voting system has evolved quite a bit since March of '98. Our current polling system, like the patent, uses 3 tables: one table to keep track of the questions (pollquestions), one to keep track of the answers for each poll (pollanswers), and another to track the individual votes made to the active poll (pollvoters). However, back in March of '98, the system was only two tables: pollquestions, and pollanswers, with pollanswers pulling double duty as the place where the votes were counted. Duplicate vote checking wasn't implemented until the creation of the pollvoters table, waaay back in Slash v0.9, which was released in the beginning of 1999, almost a year later.

Still, as I understand it, you don't need to have prior art that's an exact implementation of a patent to break it. I think that as long as enough core ideas of a patent are exhibited in a piece of prior art, then there may be grounds for the patent to be invalidated, but I Am Not A Patent Lawyer, and unfortunately, I won't have time to contact one before this story runs.

So, is Slashdot's Poll feature enough to constitute prior art in this case?

Regardless, we're looking for other examples prior art (the more the better), to try and break yet another example of a Patent That Should Never Have Been. There is always the worry that Microsoft can begin acting in the same fashion as NCR has recently (since the patent has been issued), and start throwing lawsuits at every online poll they can find on the net.

Including Slashdot's.

Update: 03/16 07:24 PM by C :According to CmdrTaco, the poll system had it's earliest incarnations in the beginnings of Slash, way back in November of 1997, however that system wasn't SQL based, it was text file based (with judicious use of various unix tools [sed, grep, wc] to cull the voting and catch dupes). You can see a mention of the old system from this archived story from the earliest days of Slashdot...way back in November of 1997. The first SQL implementation of the poll is the March, 1998 version. And there is even more existence of online polls from Slashdot archives, including an even earlier article which mentions a ZDNet poll in the comments! Just so you know, even though the dates in the comment say 1998, they do indeed come from 1997. Blame CmdrTaco's bad code. ;)

Don Giovanni writes: "Apple Computer, Inc. has finally filed suit against the Freetype Project for violation of US patents #US5325479 and #US5159668. Linux Today has the story." This from the company that actually licensed Amazon's One-Click patent. Update: 03:30 PM EST by C :We're sorry. The link referred to in this article is incorrect. We're checking up on this information, and if we have any more to report, we will. However as of right now, the consensus is that this is a hoax.

The word is that the Florida recount will be completed later today (before 5 EST). In the meantime, a couple of interesting bits related to math (which seems much more appropriate to Slashdot ;) The big one is of course the 'Voting Irregularity' in Palm Beach where supposedly thousands of seniors voted for Buchanan due to a badly designed ballot. this report (unfortunately, its a PDF) breaks down the returns on various counties and pretty much proves that something was wrong. Any math folks out there interested in doing their own take on the numbers? bwoodard sent in a mathematical argument for the electoral college written by MIT Prof, Alan Natapof. Hopefully we'll have more word later today. Update: 11/09 01:55 PM EDT by C :For those of you interested in seeing why there is such controversy over the Palm Beach County ballot, you can take a look at the ballot to see for yourself if it might be a bit unintuitive. If you'd like more food for thought, you can check out this article which talks a bit about the usability issues behind the ballot's design.

Things shuffled a bit as CNN recalled Florida from Gore, and left the electoral votes at 217 for Bush and 172 for the VP. Things have kind of lagged a bit as apparently the wires are being a little more careful about calling states. And I was hoping to get to bed on time *grin.* Update: 11pm EST by CT : polls on the west coast have closed, Gore inched up 230/217. Update: 11/08 5:45 AM EST by C :By now you all know that Florida, originally awarded to Gore, then later awarded to Bush, is now recounting the votes in a race that is way too close to call. Surprisingly enough, it appears that Gore has now won the popular vote. With the results split between the EC and the people, will this affect how the next president will be able to govern the U.S.?

BillGodfrey asks: "I'm a small director (okay, I'm not, this is just academic question) and I would like to produce DVDs for use on regular players. However, I don't want to buy into any cartels, and I'd like to avoid as many 'stupid moves' as possible (no region codes, allowing fast forward, etc). How would I go about producing a master and getting copies produced?" Would non-profits and small time organizations need to pay the same production fees for a small run of content as major motion picture firms pay? Or is there still a loophole which the general public can use? We're not necessarily talking free, here...a discount would suffice. Update: 09/15 03:49 PM by C :Ugh! The atrocious grammar in the title has been fixed.

David Gervais noted that AOL has begun shutting out third party IM software (among other things, breaking the Linux clones). Their error message is "AOL IMer Client: Gaim CVS Version. 09:24:11 AOL Instant Messenger: You have been disconnected from the AOL Instant Message Service (SM) for accessing the AOL network using unauthorized software." Can someone confirm this, or is Mr Gervais on something here? I've had several folks say they can get through just fine. Perhaps this is just a Gaim CVS bug? Update: 09/11 05:12 PM by C : Have tested AIM connectivity with Gaim v0.9.20 and Everybuddy 0.1.4 with no problems. Sorry for the scare.

James Cownie asks: "The Linux kernel development is an open process, we all know that, but, as an unknown in the community it seems impossible to attract the attention of anyone on the kernel list. I'm not trying to reimplement huge kernel subsystems or do anything major, but I found a genuine kernel bug, documented it and submitted a patch on the kernel mail list; to be met with complete and utter silence. Just as if no-one had read my mail at all. I can stand and react to abuse, or requests to fix my patch, or whatever, but what can I do in response to silence?" UPDATED

"I can't mail Alan Cox (who seems the right person for a fix to 2.2) directly because he rejects all mail from folks he doesn't know. Since the bug causes problems for gdb I mailed the gdb developer list, but also met with silence. So, how can I get someone to take notice? If no-one does, what's the point of an 'open' process? I may as well not bother."

First off, a good deal of patience is necessary when dealing with developers, they can be extremely busy when it comes to dealing with the pressures not only from their day jobs, but also from their code, their other hobbies and whatever time is left over for them to have lives to themselves. Even on internet time, certain things (like bug reports) will slip thru the cracks and seemingly fall into the ether...a few times, this might be the case, most often though, it is not and the developer just hasn't gotten to your bug/comment/suggestion yet.

A suggestion to developers: If you haven't looekd into this, it might not hurt to automate some form of reply stating your situation so that you don't alienate users by your non-response.

Thoughts?

Update: 09/05 11:50 PM by C : Alan Cox had this to say via email:

"I can't mail Alan Cox (who seems the right person for a fix to 2.2) directly because he rejects all mail from folks he doesn't know."

This is wrong. I reject mail from sites in ORBS, RBL or other major spam block lists.

A few things I'd suggest:

1. There is a REPORTING-BUGS file in 2.2/2.3 kernels
2. You should start with MAINTAINERS in the kernel for kernel bug reports
3. If its a vendor supplied kernel start with the vendor bug report system such as http://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla [for Red Hat]. ( C : There's also Debian's bug reporting system at http://www.debian.org/Bugs, and the one for Mandrake-Linux at http://www.linux-mandrake.com/bugs, for other flavors of Linux, check your vendor's homepage)

#3 is important. Vendor kernels rarely match the default due to timing issues, desire to ship stuff like USB, Reiserfs, 3D acceleration and more."

As I said, the developers are listening. You just might need to take the time to find the right communication channel. For a bug report to be worth something, it has to end up in the right place.

James Cownie asks: "The Linux kernel development is an open process, we all know that, but, as an unknown in the community it seems impossible to attract the attention of anyone on the kernel list. I'm not trying to reimplement huge kernel subsystems or do anything major, but I found a genuine kernel bug, documented it and submitted a patch on the kernel mail list; to be met with complete and utter silence. Just as if no-one had read my mail at all. I can stand and react to abuse, or requests to fix my patch, or whatever, but what can I do in response to silence?" UPDATED

"I can't mail Alan Cox (who seems the right person for a fix to 2.2) directly because he rejects all mail from folks he doesn't know. Since the bug causes problems for gdb I mailed the gdb developer list, but also met with silence. So, how can I get someone to take notice? If no-one does, what's the point of an 'open' process? I may as well not bother."

First off, a good deal of patience is necessary when dealing with developers, they can be extremely busy when it comes to dealing with the pressures not only from their day jobs, but also from their code, their other hobbies and whatever time is left over for them to have lives to themselves. Even on internet time, certain things (like bug reports) will slip thru the cracks and seemingly fall into the ether...a few times, this might be the case, most often though, it is not and the developer just hasn't gotten to your bug/comment/suggestion yet.

A suggestion to developers: If you haven't looekd into this, it might not hurt to automate some form of reply stating your situation so that you don't alienate users by your non-response.

Thoughts?

Update: 09/05 11:50 PM by C : Alan Cox had this to say via email:

"I can't mail Alan Cox (who seems the right person for a fix to 2.2) directly because he rejects all mail from folks he doesn't know."

This is wrong. I reject mail from sites in ORBS, RBL or other major spam block lists.

A few things I'd suggest:

1. There is a REPORTING-BUGS file in 2.2/2.3 kernels
2. You should start with MAINTAINERS in the kernel for kernel bug reports
3. If its a vendor supplied kernel start with the vendor bug report system such as http://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla [for Red Hat]. ( C : There's also Debian's bug reporting system at http://www.debian.org/Bugs, and the one for Mandrake-Linux at http://www.linux-mandrake.com/bugs, for other flavors of Linux, check your vendor's homepage)

#3 is important. Vendor kernels rarely match the default due to timing issues, desire to ship stuff like USB, Reiserfs, 3D acceleration and more."

As I said, the developers are listening. You just might need to take the time to find the right communication channel. For a bug report to be worth something, it has to end up in the right place.

Bahumat asks: "I remember hearing about a year back about credit-card size solid-state hard drives that were to revolutionize the storage industry, with the capacity for 2300 gigabytes stored, and the cost of manufacture to be less than $50. The old news release [ C : dated 8/99] is posted here. Does anybody know of any updates or press releases about this technology?"

Kirch asks: " Company XYZ Encryption Technologies creates an encryption package (read anti-piracy) that will encrypt your data (read IP) for you and can only be read through licenced decrypted produced by XYZ. Now, the encryption used is very, very weak. It 'encrypts' by offsetting every bit by one and then 'decrypts' by offsetting every bit again by one. Or yet even better 'encrypts' everything by the Pig Latin method. Now the encryption is kept secret by XYZ. Users use this assuming they are protected by the encryption technology touted by XYZ. A semi smart user looks at the encrypted data and says 'Oh Look it's Pig Latin!' The user posts this on forums, makes a Web page exposing XYZ for using Pig Latin and writes a DePigLatin program. Who is liable here? The company, for producing a product with weak encryption, or the user for posting the DePigLatin program?" Sound familiar? It should, but not necessarily for the reason you expect.

ESRI makes a product called ArcView. Arcview has a feature that allows developers to customize it with Avenue. Developers can also encrypt their scripts so they can sell them to users. Dr. William Huber found out a way to decrypt the "encrypted" scripts using the Avenue scripting language. You'll find his findings here. It seems that he stumbled upon this a year ago. Again, who's at fault? ESRI or Dr. Huber? You'll notice he hasn't actually given out the code but does give out a few hints to those who know Avenue.

My limited understanding of the DMCA is that it is a crime to circumvent anti-piracy measures built into most commercial software. This would make the user a criminal for circumventing an anti-piracy measure. There is no provision saying, well if it's weak, then it's OK. So, according to the DMCA, was circumventing the XYZ Pig Latin Encryption technology a crime?"

The similarities to DeCSS should probably come as no surprise to you all at this point. What is a consumer to do when the very laws that are designed to ultimately protect us (as the software publishers keep saying) can be used as a bludgeon to silence the act of discovering what can and should be considered design flaws? Sure the DMCA protects someone, but the answer most assuredly isn't 'us' in any way shape or form.Of course, that last bit shouldn't come as any surprise to you, either.

Update: 07/13 12:43 AM by C :Some information for those of you who are still looking for ammunition against the DMCA: here's a lengthy paper from Pamela Samuelson, a professor at UC Berkeley, and another article from Openlaw . Finally, this bit from Michael Sims: "Sachems, grandmothers, and hackers of all ages have obtained a New York City Official Media Event Permit to peacefully assemble for the redress of wrongs:

Monday 17 July 2000
10:30 am to 5:00 pm
Court Yard of the Federal Court
500 Pearl Street"
(Manhattan, New York City, obviously)

Also, Martin Garbus (the famous lawyer who's representing the DVD defense) will be speaking at H2K, the hacker's conference this weekend. More precisely, he's speaking this Friday at 3PM at the Hotel Pennsylvania (you can go to Hope.Net for more info)."

LS asks: "For a while now, I've been trying to find work that utilizes my programming skills to do more than just help a company win in the market, make me money, and maybe even provide enjoyment. I'd like to contribute to the well-being of humanity and maybe leave a lasting mark as well. I'm working for a start-up that looks like it's about to fold. Can anyone point me to some resources for finding charitable organizations that need computer work, anywhere in the world?" I think that a quite a few of us who wouldn't mind devoting some hackin' time to a good cause. What's the best way to go looking for organizations who need the help? Updated!

Update: 07/15 05:15 PM by C :Miniluv sent in this helpful tidbit on this issue: "In response to the Ask Slashdot article about Charity Work and Technology, I went digging and came up with TechVolunteer. They don't have any searching or volunteer stuff listed yet, but they say the site is under developement. Maybe some encouragement might help them along?"

jamiefaye asks: "The San Jose Mercury News mentions that a digital signature bill has passed Congress by a lopsided margin of 426-4. Many states allow citizens to petition to pass laws through 'Citizens Initiatives' -- a process made difficult by the need to gather thousands of signatures on paper. Having digital signatures could make this much easier. What kind of legal changes can we expect if the somebody could throw up a Web page, attract attention, and pass a law? I would make telemarketers obey an 'opt-out list' for starters." Possibly, but this is one of the better ideas I've hear on the use of digital signatures. Thoughts? Update: 06/27 08:45 by C :Quite a number of you have pointed out that this bill is about Electric signatures and not Digital signatures as the story originally indicated. An electronic "signature" can be something as simple as clicking 'I agree' or pressing '1' on your phone. And now Congress wants such actions to be legally binding (Congress passed this unanimously, it was the House of Representatives that passed it by a vote of 426-4)? You can get more information by reading this analysis of the bill at Cryptome. This is not good. Also, the link to the above SJ Mercury article now seems to be invalid, but you can find more information on this from CNN. Thanks to all the folks who pointed this out, both in this discussion and by sending in submissions.

Some useful stuff: An anonymous reader noted that AltaVista has opened Raging.Com which is a super fast minimal search engine without all that bloated portal crap. gi_wrighty noted that the winneers of the 5k HTML Contest have Been announced. Impressive minimalism. Soeren Staun-Pedersen noted that a new The Gimp User Group has come along. j1mmy pointed us to pictures of the new Lara Croft Model from E3. Yaruar sent us a story about Lego Filmsets that come with cameras for you do-it-yourselfers. If you don't want to make your own films, how about your own Mars Polar Lander Site? (Thanks Biff Studly). antiwesley sent us interesting insight into a typical geek cube. Speaking of things found in geek Cubes, BenTheDewpendent sent us a page that tracks tons of info on Mountain Dew and bob_jordan found pictures of upcoming Futurama Bender Action Figures (Not as cool as Nate's Picolo tho) Baloo Ursidae sent us a story about electricity generating shoes. Gorphrim sent us some Duron Parodies Finally some Slashdot references: DrFun (one of the original net comics) mentioned us in a recent strip, Someone noted that Geek Culture is selling First Post T-Shirts. QuasEye noted that someone registered hotgrits.org and ironically enough, is running Slashcode. And the WashPost ran an article on us which is mostly accurate. And to wrap things up, maxxon showed us the way to Crank Dot Net, which has stuff on all sorts of conspiracy theories and urban myths and other crazy stuffs on the net. Stuff like UFOs, the face on mars, Creationism, Scientology, antigravity, and perpetual motion and more.

daninja asks: "Yet another laptop with classified information seems to be missing. It looks to me like there must be a good sized market for highly secure laptops with a built in Lojack tracking device (or simply a laptop with an integral handcuff, kind of like that briefcase full o' blues secured to the wrist of Elwood Blues). Such a device (the Lojack version, not the handcuff one) could be designed so that the tracking transmitter couldn't be separated or disabled without rendering the disk unreadable (by a small explosive charge, mildly corrosive gas, or whatever). It seems so obvious, why isn't there such a product? (Hey, maybe I could patent this idea!)"

I have to admit, I too have had ideas along these lines. This shouldn't be too hard to build, however the laptop would have to be always-on (which would be hell on the batteries) and a GPS unit would need to be added in some way shape or form. This isn't all that unlikely, there are handheld GPS units on the market. How difficult would it be to meld one into a laptop?

Update: 04/28 02:15 by C : The link to the picture of the Blues Brothers has vanished. It was there when I posted this article days ago, but it's gone now. Sorry about that.

Slak asks: "Just wondering if the laws under which the U.S. Government is pursuing the DDoS attacks on Yahoo! and Amazon could be applied to telemarketers. I mean, here we have a group that is using a public network to bother end users. " This is a good point. We now have fledgling laws against unsolicited commercial e-mail. What about unsolicited commercial phone calls? They are both forms of harassment. However, protections in the digital world have caught up and surpassed the legal protections we have in meatspace against such annoying practices. Could such laws be written without becoming Draconian in nature? Updated

I should clarify. When I speak of "commercial" phone and "commercial" e-mail, I mean unsolicited contact from a company with the intention of selling you something. Telemarketing has become a large problem in the past decade and I see the spammer as the digital cousin of the telemarketer. However, we now have protections from SPAM yet no protection from the telemarketer (believe me, I've tried ... there was no way I could get an anonymous call block in my area and most telemarketers will not identify themselves via CallerID).

How does the Denial of Service attack fit into all of this? It may not be "commercial" traffic, but it is unsolicited and dealing with it does consume your precious time to get the problem fixed. It's yet another form of harrassment, albeit a different and malicious form. It's like someone calling you up every five minutes and then hanging up. Sure it's harmless, but what happens if someone is trying to make an important phone call to you and can't get through?

Will laws be written to combat such behavior? Can such laws be written?

I'd be interested in hearing what you think.

Update: 04/19 05:49 by C : CuriousGeorge113 beamed us this little tidbit: "There's a very interesting SPAM article over at Salon.com today. The article talks about a new SPAM law soon to be in front of Congress, why it won't work, why people SPAM, and why ISP's dont bother to sue SPAMers." so it looks like our protections against SPAMers although in-place rather ineffective. This situation bears watching.

veldrane asks: "I saw this article on CNN.com about there being authorized DVD players on the market for Linux. Of course, the article is vague about Mark Litvak's claim so I'd like to know is this for real or is it just a statement to take credibility from the LUG protesters in DC?" After reading the article, I found it odd that Mr. Litvak didn't mention any company names that were working on DVD Players for Linux. If anyone knows anything more, I'd be interested in finding out if such a thing exists or is actually just more vapourware expressly for the purpose of discrediting the DeCSS supporters as veldrane suggests. Updated: 04/03 05:51 by C

Oops! I posted this story late on the 28th (with it scheduled to show up today) and had missed the LinDVD announcement. However, contrary to some of the comments that mention this point, this player is not yet on the market. It will be released "soon", but until it appears, it is still vapourware. It would be very cool if InterVideo would release a beta versions of their players so that we can see for ourselves how far along they are and how far they have to go. However this remains their decision. I wish them luck in their work, and am glad to see at least one company step up to the plate like this (even if it is only a binary player).

veldrane wanted to know if there was an actual player that he could go out and buy now, and according to Mark Litvak's comment in the original article, there should be one available.

I'm still wondering why he didn't mention any names if such an animal did exist.

2bfree writes "Netpliance has the I-Opener for $200 and I was wondering if anybody was working on a port for Linux for it. This would be great for controlling other computers on a home network with VNC, Internet access for people that come over and maybe playing MP3s off the network. What do you guys think? " Update: 03/12 12:50 by C :It seems that there is a solution! Check here for the details.

Keefesis asks: "Many high school level teachers, especially in the Science fields, seem to have a hard time keeping up with new information in their fields. Even after the advances have been made, they continue to teach out-of-date or simply incorrect information." It all boils down to how much money our schools are budgeted. It seems that education is always short shifted in our governmental budgets, but we continue to expect them to function with continuallty diminishing resources. Why does this happen? Is this something we can fix in a resonable amount of time? (More) (Updated)

Keefesis continues: "The information is out there, readily available, yet it seems that teachers are rarely notified of new information. Case in point: My high school chemistry teacher still teaches us that there are only 109 elements; while element 118 was discovered almost 6 months ago. Even the planners that the school gave us list up to element 114 (every teacher uses the professor version of the same planner as a gradebook.) What does it take for our high school teachers to stay up-to-date?"

Update: 11/25 02:24 by C :After perusing some of the discussion, a lot of you feel that the system itself, not the funding, is at fault. How can we fix the system? Do we need better teachers? Better administrators? Or is this something that we just can't do without tearing the whole thing down and starting over?

Woodie asks: "Hi,I'm wondering, after reading Dvorak's article on crackers , whether good intrustion detection software exists for Linux. He specifically mentions a product called "BlackICE" - which I checked out the details of - that sounds very interesting. What Linux alternatives are there? I'm not necessarily expecting an easy to use GUI; some kind background daemon that generates a usable log and that can be preconfigured to respond to certain "attacks" would be great. " How reliable are the results from various Intrusion Detection packages? Are these things worthwhile? Or would do-it-yourself monitors be a better choice?

Update: 11/03 11:58 by C : Jargon was also interested in Linux Intrusion Detection and was curious if there were Linux contenders to the likes of Cybercop Sting, and Mantrap"

elemur asks: "I was wondering if there are any projects to expand the use of XML in Linux? There are alot of areas where XML could be more easily and consistently used than continuing making more and stranger configuration files. Many configs could probably fall under a generalized standard application config DTD, and applications that needed something more targeted could supply their own. Some sort of DTD repository could be setup on the machine to handle this. Then, apps just need to use libxml (or whatever it would be called) to handle the reading and parsing. It would seem to make things much more consistent. Has anybody looked into this sort of thing?" It's a good thought. And a standardized configuration file format might be the thing to reduce some of the complexity most folks find in Linux. What do you all think about the capabilities of XML?

Update: 09/29 04:03 by C : Screwtape submitted this tidbit "I just saw this on MozillaZine and I'm quite impressed. Somebody has taken the XML parser from Mozilla, and written software that makes it work like an xterm - but with extra features. For example, you can write a replacement for ls where all the filenames are hyperlinks to the actual files. The site is here. "

mattdm writes in with this query: "I'm trying to get PAM (on Red Hat Linux 5.2) to work with Kerberos. Has anyone done this succesfully? I'm using pam_krb4 from this URL. It works to authenticate people perfectly, but it doesn't save a TGT or set the proper environment variables. This is pretty important to getting Linux officially supported at the university where I work, so any help would be great." Update: 03/17 06:48 by C :The link posted above doesn't work, but you can go here to browse through their PAM files. Thanks to tjrw for the link. Update: 03/18 04:38 by C :The original link has now been fixed.

mattdm writes in with this query: "I'm trying to get PAM (on Red Hat Linux 5.2) to work with Kerberos. Has anyone done this succesfully? I'm using pam_krb4 from this URL. It works to authenticate people perfectly, but it doesn't save a TGT or set the proper environment variables. This is pretty important to getting Linux officially supported at the university where I work, so any help would be great." Update: 03/17 06:48 by C :The link posted above doesn't work, but you can go here to browse through their PAM files. Thanks to tjrw for the link. Update: 03/18 04:38 by C :The original link has now been fixed.

Another of Clan Anonymous Coward asked: "We will be getting a few new boxes soon, and I want to know: can you get workstation quality graphics out of Linux? NT-GL seems to be acceptable, SGI-IRIX has great graphics, and the best I hear about Linux is that it runs X in 2D!" I remember hearing a sentence with the words "Titanic" and "Linux" in it. But seriously, how much would one have to spend to get quality workstation graphics out of a Linux box? And this doesn't have to mean Titanic quality either. If you're interested, hit the link. continued...
"Given say, a $1000 budjet for Drivers, Monitor, and Video Card, what could you do with that in Linux? I would like to know details, for example: what 3D-32M video cards work, what cards are the faster cards, what commercial X product with GL/glide/Mesa are avaliable now, and for what price? With money to spend NOW and a need for graphics NOW, what is there in Linux that works NOW? (and not in a few months, or planned, or in progress)"

C :Good questions, I'm sure there are folks out there that have some answers. Does anyone have the link to that Linux Times article about the Linux Farm used to render _Titanic_?

mrlament wishes to know about the following: "I've been a long time Linux user, but I keep finding myself having to switch over to my Windows box in order to view videos. I've tried xanim, and have yet had it properly handle a single video, aside from the real player, I cannot seem to find a single decent player for MOVs, AVIs and MPGs. Does anyone know of any, or are there just not any out there?" I posted this up here because I get a lot of this from people outside of Ask Slashdot, so I figure there are people out there that want this information. Hit the link for more. In all honesty, I don't think Linux is going to get very far beyond Indeo Video 3.2 support since IV4, IV5 and the I263 codecs are VERY proprietary and (so I've heard) it costs a lot of money just to become a developer. I would love support for AVIs under more than just Windows, but it's been a couple of years since IV4 was released and I just haven't seen support for it materialize anywhere else (if I'm wrong, someone PLEASE correct me!).

I'm surprised that there ISN'T more visible QuickTime support, but that's Apple's bailiwick. Intel and Apple have also begun to crosslicense technology as Apple now gets Intel Video 4.4 support for QuickTime. Of course as far as I can tell, QuickTime is still only available for Macs, 95/98 and NT.

MPG video files are more crossplatform than any of the others. I expect this format is supported under more platforms than any other, however I don't have any information on a LINUX player. If someone has a helpful link, please post it.

As an aside, MainConcept has one of the best movie players I have seen and supports a wide range of formats. It's been the mainstay viewer under OS/2 for a while, and it looks like they've taken an interest in Linux as they are attempting to port their Video Editor over.

Update: 02/13 01:16 by C : I've started a discussion, and someone has already answered my question regarding IV4 and IV5 on Linux. It appears that the only people who can offer support on these codecs is Intel themselves. With their support of Linux in recent times, who knows, this might actually happen. A cordial letter writing campaign might be in order to see if we can get them to port these codecs sooner rather than later?

Daniel Roberts wants to know about the following:: "I am running Red Hat 5.2, and I have been trying to upgrade to 2.2 since pre1. My problem is, I have read through the "Changes" file very carefully, and tried to upgrade all the needed packages... But it still won't work. I am looking for binary RPMs whenever I can, but even Raw Hide does not seem to have all the needed updates to make it work. In particular, I cannot get libc5.4.46 to work, for some reason, even though I've tried to install the binary tar version. My question is: what do I need to do to get Linux 2.2.0 working properly with a stock Red Hat 5.2 system??" Update: 02/12 03:02 by C : I've just discoveded information about "Project Tango" which may be the answer to this question. Thanks to Palin for the heads up. C :I was going to run this as another story on this, but after rereading I figure it's better if we add in this libc-5 issue from davie, who is in the process of a similar upgrade:

"I've built and installed libc-6 and it seems to be working fine. Now I need (at least according to the Changes text in the kernel source) to upgrade my libc-5. The problem is, I can't find any references on how to install a new build of libc-5 for compatability support only--I'm concerned that if I just 'configure, make, make install', I will break libc-6. I've looked at every FAQ and HOWTO I can find and there's nothing helpful. I looked at a libc-5 update RPM for RH 5.1, but I'm reluctant to guess where files go and which files need to be replaced. The libc-5 binary tarball includes fewer files than the update RPM, so I'm not sure what to do. Is there a doc online that explains how to build libc-5 and install it for compatability on a libc-6 box?"

Palin wrote in with this information...and a reliability question on the Tango Project, which looks to be the cure for this problem:

"Do you or anyone else in the Linux comunity know if the Tango Project's RPMs work? If you don't know what the Tango project is... It is a set of rpms for Redhat Linux 5.2 that provide all the necessary software (in RPM format) that one needs to install a 2.2.X kernel. I'd like to apply them...but was wondering what success others have had... The software can be found.... here and here. If it works I might be able to mirror it in the US...but I'm not going to try unless I know people have had success with it... "

Daniel Roberts wants to know about the following:: "I am running Red Hat 5.2, and I have been trying to upgrade to 2.2 since pre1. My problem is, I have read through the "Changes" file very carefully, and tried to upgrade all the needed packages... But it still won't work. I am looking for binary RPMs whenever I can, but even Raw Hide does not seem to have all the needed updates to make it work. In particular, I cannot get libc5.4.46 to work, for some reason, even though I've tried to install the binary tar version. My question is: what do I need to do to get Linux 2.2.0 working properly with a stock Red Hat 5.2 system??" Update: 02/12 03:02 by C : I've just discoveded information about "Project Tango" which may be the answer to this question. Thanks to Palin for the heads up. C :I was going to run this as another story on this, but after rereading I figure it's better if we add in this libc-5 issue from davie, who is in the process of a similar upgrade:

"I've built and installed libc-6 and it seems to be working fine. Now I need (at least according to the Changes text in the kernel source) to upgrade my libc-5. The problem is, I can't find any references on how to install a new build of libc-5 for compatability support only--I'm concerned that if I just 'configure, make, make install', I will break libc-6. I've looked at every FAQ and HOWTO I can find and there's nothing helpful. I looked at a libc-5 update RPM for RH 5.1, but I'm reluctant to guess where files go and which files need to be replaced. The libc-5 binary tarball includes fewer files than the update RPM, so I'm not sure what to do. Is there a doc online that explains how to build libc-5 and install it for compatability on a libc-6 box?"

Palin wrote in with this information...and a reliability question on the Tango Project, which looks to be the cure for this problem:

"Do you or anyone else in the Linux comunity know if the Tango Project's RPMs work? If you don't know what the Tango project is... It is a set of rpms for Redhat Linux 5.2 that provide all the necessary software (in RPM format) that one needs to install a 2.2.X kernel. I'd like to apply them...but was wondering what success others have had... The software can be found.... here and here. If it works I might be able to mirror it in the US...but I'm not going to try unless I know people have had success with it... "

An anonymous coward pleads: "HELP! I've got a 10BaseT 10Mb RPTI Network card that is a PNP card, unfortunatly my Older 586 Bios doesn't support PNP and therefor I can not access it. The only reason I know this card is an RPTI card is because I had to use the FCC ID tag to figure out who made it. Anybody have any english documentation or card bios configuration programs?" C :Actually, where does one go to lookup the FCC ID tag to figure out what a card is? That also would be useful to us geeks with anonymous NICs who like to put them to practical use!

cronio asks "I was wondering if there is a way to get X to work with the Diamond Fusion 2D/3D card using the Voodoo Banshee chipset. So far I haven't been able to get it to work and was wondering if anyone has. Any suggestions?" C :Just a word of note - Diamond is notorious for viciously guarding its Hardware Specs and APIs, and unless a deal has been made (and NDAs signed) by some other party to explicitly make drivers for X, it will be unlikely to see higher end Diamond cards unless one is willing to use a commercial X server. Hopefully, this is not the case in this situation. Answers, anyone?

Jordy writes "Well this report just came out today, a report that Microsoft has overcharged the computer industry $10 billion dollars for it's OS. Microsoft rebutted this and issued it's own press release stating that it's OS was comparable to other OS's. They list, amoung others, Sun Solaris as a comparable product to Windows98. You can read the highlights in an article at news.com." The report is rather interesting, actually, and has some fairly intriguing pricing data in it. Update C : The news.com link has been fixed.

Matan Ziv-Av wants answers for this question: "I have a bad internet connection. What CD includes XFree86 3.3.3 source, and is available for outside North America purchases? In general, Who sells updated snapshots of Sunsite ( C :Now called MetaLab) and other sites (hungry, gimps...)?"

abond asks "I haven't played Video Games for quite a while, but my daughter is now old enough to start. What are the Pro's and Con's of each system, they seem to cost about the same ~US$130. Merry Christmas."
C : I don't post these things to incite flamewars, but this issues tends to attract advocacy responses, which is not what abond asked for. He had a question and I would like him to have an answer, so be aware...I am watching this topic.

NASA is trying to replicate Eugene Podkletnov's gravitational shield results, and an Italian scientist, Giovanni Modanese, has developed a theory of gravity at the quantum level that could explain the results. I find it unbelievable that 2 universities feel they have to hide their results not to be ridiculed publicly. The main task of scientists once a theory appears to stand is to break it. This is vital to avoid people clinging to their reputation instead of advancing science. Unfortunately the fact that Einstein's theories are still unchallenged does not prove that they are the best approximation to reality, it might also prove that we have not been trying to break them hard enough. And the way people dismiss results out of hand without even looking at them is no different from the Vatican and Galileo. Thanks to contibutor Mydraal and Clifton for verifying the link. update err... sorry old news, but still interesting. Podkletnov's paper is available on-line, as is a Nasa report.

Slashdot reader Brice Ruth has this question:

Since installing RedHat 5.1, I've been trying to find any kind of help in running iBCS. I realize that a package for iBCS is preinstalled with RedHat 5.1 (kernel-ibcs...), however, all attempts at running SCO binaries have failed. I HAVE been able to figure out that the reason it is failing is because I don't have libraries for the binaries. Let me rephrase -- I DO have the libraries, since I have access to a perfectly legal copy of SCO OpenServer, however, I have no idea where to place them and what directory structure is necessary so that they are found, etc. Two things would be quite helpful in my quest:

1. a good page that tells me all these things that I need to do
   
2. someone who has successfully used iBCS and is relatively familiar with the process in both SCO and Solaris.

If you have a question you would like posted to Ask Slashdot, then please send them to me. I would like to start posting more questions on a regular basis since Ask Slashdot is now its own section.

Sid Cammeresi writes in with today's question. He asks "I'm looking for a keyboard for my PC with a Unix style layout (back space one row above the home row, escape key next to "1", etc.) I recently saw the web site for the Happy Hacker Keyboard, but it is rather expensive. Do you know of any other vendors of keyboards with Unix layouts? I've looked, but I can't find one." Also note that Ask Slashdot questions should be directed to Cliff. I've got 10 editorials to read already :)

Florian sent us a simple question:What video card do people recommend these days? "I will choose between the Matrox Productiva and the Diamond Viper. I only need the Card for 2D. I already have a Monster Card. So what card could you prefer me? Thanks... " I'm actually curious what experience people have had with modern cards and Linux. My newest video card is a 3 year old Millenium, so I'm totally out of touch. Note:Send submissions to Ask Slashdot to Clifton Wood.

Patrick Allen writes "I dloaded all of the RPM's from KDE.org, and used glint to install all of the packages. I then made the suggested changes to my configuration files (listed below). When I tried to start KDE, my system was dead. I could not even ls -a to get a file listing. Fortunately, I made copies of my config files, and restored them. Now I am back to where I started. I would like to try KDE, but I am not sure where I went wrong." (as always, if you have questions, send them to Cliff)

Our first question comes from john beale who writes "I like Linux and use it for graphics and some development/hacking. However I have some nifty toys (Kodak DC120 digital camera, Turtle Beach Fiji soundcard) which are not supported at all under Linux and others (eg. HP Photosmart film scanner) which have very limited support. Much as I'd prefer not to, I have to boot Win95 to use these devices. Question: how can we encourage hardware manufacturers to either support Linux directly (ha) or release info so others can write drivers?" Hit the link below and let's see what you have to say about this.

Couple of Technical Notes: Ask Slashdot will soon be a more isolated thing, so you'll be able to keep track of them better. For now, I'll make sure to prefix titles with 'Ask Slashdot' so you can quickly skip these questions if they don't interest you.

If you have a question that you want Slashdot's readers to try to answer, email Clifton Wood (note that the email address has changed). Any topic is cool, from Linux to Unix to X-Files to Southpark.

Our first question is really one of Advocacy, but hopefully in the future we will have questions on any topic that happens to be Stuff that Matters.