Slashdot Mirror

Hackerethics (CCC)

Specifically I am referring to: "Make public data available, protect private data."

To quote the CCC: "To protect the privacy of the individual and to strengthen the freedom of the information which concern the public the yet last point was added."

Java needs C? http://www.embedded.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleI D=10700608
news to those guys a I guess...

oh wait you're wrong, It is a Full Fledged object Oriented langauge. They have OSes, written entirely in java, and since java is the native bytecode the code runs a lot better on an OS written in java. Like in the cellphone in TFA linked above.

Here's the JAVA FAQ also, it might help you learn what Java is, and isn't.
http://www.ibiblio.org/javafaq/javafaq.html

Here's some historical video of Engelbart in action (thanks Lisa!):
http://www.lisarein.com/videos/oreilly/etech2003/a lankay/alankay-2of6-mres.mov

Doug Engelbart was also largely influenced by JCR Licklider:
http://www.ibiblio.org/pioneers/licklider.html
Read his seminal papers titled 'Man-Machine Symbiosis' and 'The Computer as a Communication Device':
http://gatekeeper.dec.com/pub/DEC/SRC/research-rep orts/abstracts/src-rr-061.html

http://www.ibiblio.org/Dave/Dr-Fun/df200507/df2005 0718.jpg

See anyone you recognise? ;)

This was brought up before on Slashdot. The original poster mentioned that Kosher for Passover Coke contains real suger and not corn syrup.

They should only need one tracker for the entire archive, and one seeder per node, to handle the entire archive. Both trackers and seeders can handle a virtually unlimited number of files at fixed CPU cost and minimal memory cost if they're designed to do so -- http://osprey.ibiblio.org/ looks promising.

It's already sort of been done: see http://osprey.ibiblio.org/

Beware the Ghost Of Usenet Postings Past

Hardware:
Get a Garmin handheld GPS with a 12v adaptor & download cable, and probably a crate of AA batts.
Stick with consumer stuff. Buying a spare or 3 is cheaper than buying a Trimble survey grade and they all work well enough.

GPS Software:
Download GPStrans &/or GPSbabel.
http://gpstrans.sourceforge.net/
http://www.gpsbabel.org/
You can load the GPS waypoints/track/routes into a mapping format with GRASS GIS's v.in.garmin or gpsbabel+anything.

Mapping software:
Use QGIS. http://qgis.org/
Use GPS plugin.

Data:
Start by downloading SRTM elevation data and VMAP0 digital chart of the world data. Best there will be publicly available for Africa.

Instructions for converting into a usable format here:
http://grass.ibiblio.org/newsletter/GRASSNews_vol3 .pdf

Import and crop with GRASS GIS (r.in.srtm and v.in.ogr modules) and either use with QGIS directly or export into a secondary more popular format for use with other software.

GRASS works well on a Mac. http://grass.ibiblio.org/

GPS interface programs should work on a Mac, GPStrans is command line only so with some hacking and GPSbabel is well maintained so there should be a Mac port by now.

SRTM: http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/srtm/
VMAP0: http://www.mapability.com/info/vmap0_index.html

Hardware:
Get a Garmin handheld GPS with a 12v adaptor & download cable, and probably a crate of AA batts.
Stick with consumer stuff. Buying a spare or 3 is cheaper than buying a Trimble survey grade and they all work well enough.

GPS Software:
Download GPStrans &/or GPSbabel.
http://gpstrans.sourceforge.net/
http://www.gpsbabel.org/
You can load the GPS waypoints/track/routes into a mapping format with GRASS GIS's v.in.garmin or gpsbabel+anything.

Mapping software:
Use QGIS. http://qgis.org/
Use GPS plugin.

Data:
Start by downloading SRTM elevation data and VMAP0 digital chart of the world data. Best there will be publicly available for Africa.

Instructions for converting into a usable format here:
http://grass.ibiblio.org/newsletter/GRASSNews_vol3 .pdf

Import and crop with GRASS GIS (r.in.srtm and v.in.ogr modules) and either use with QGIS directly or export into a secondary more popular format for use with other software.

GRASS works well on a Mac. http://grass.ibiblio.org/

GPS interface programs should work on a Mac, GPStrans is command line only so with some hacking and GPSbabel is well maintained so there should be a Mac port by now.

SRTM: http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/srtm/
VMAP0: http://www.mapability.com/info/vmap0_index.html

have you ever seen an american? they are the most well-rounded anywhere in the world! http://www.ibiblio.org/bop04dl/0454/190.jpg

no one is as round as the americans are!

troll! The first cite is just a splash page, the second doesn't have ANY history of Web servers, and the third is a rather self-serving history from CERN.

Check these out:

http://www.w3.org/Security/Faq/wwwsf3.html
http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/internetworkers /2001-January/002462.html
http://www.w3.org/Daemon/User/Admin.html
http://www.bergen.org/ATC/Course/InfoTech/VRML_FAQ .html
http://csc.colstate.edu/summers/NOTES/servers-ch11 .htm
http://roub.net/mtmstitch.cgi?conversation=allaire
http://aolserver-archive.cleverly.com/GNNDEVELOPER -L.LOG9607.txt
http://sirius.itfrontier.co.jp/kb/cf_article.cfm?T YPE=en&ID=12970

http://www.ibiblio.org/Dave/Dr-Fun/df200507/df2005 0704.jpg

I mean, this effects all of us, so it should be Class action. The winnings should be shared among the world population. If the lawyers did this pro bono (we know better) that would mean $300,000,000/6534663907 http://www.ibiblio.org/lunarbin/worldpop

That gives us all about 5 cents. Mail mine please.

See Dr. Fun's cartoon.

Of course, I also think everyone should have to look at this one too, but that's only because it's freaking awesome :-)

Of course, I also think everyone should have to look at this one too, but that's only because it's freaking awesome :-)

Over a year? I thought it was in 1996.

No problem, he's chipped for it. He has the new Mac iBrain from Apple.

So for instance, based on rainfall patterns, you can predict where grass will grow ;-)

They have scientists?!

But have they replaced the bad cybernetic brain?

See it.

Check into Operation Olympic vs. Ketsu-go, the invasion of Japan vs. the Japanese defense. Casualties would have been HUGE, in the hundreds of thousands, on the Allied side alone.

is kinda available.

OS/360 and MVS up to release 3.8j are public domain (before 1989, no copyright notices = public domain in the US), and have full source code available. 3.8j is from the late 70s I think, but mainframes don't change much anyway. I got it running on the Hercules emulator, but I just followed a guide. Played around with it for awhile but couldn't get anywhere

eric s raymond
(who i respect tremendously and all)

Here is a great online book that starts with basic electrical principles and works up to semiconductor and digital circuit stuff. It is wonderful.

I wasn't aware of that DOS game, but I found a review of it here: GameBytes issue 21.

Actually, this is the sequel. You may have played the original.

I have an NC200; it's fabulous. Amazing keyboard, decent screen (80x16 characters), ten-hour battery life, instant on... the word processor is a bit poor, since it can only cope with 38kB files, but I can live with that. They would appear to have solved the stability issues; it's never crashed on me.

It's also a great hacking machine. It's pretty much all documented using standard components. The built-in BBC Basic has a built-in assembler... someone's done a CP/M port, which will let you run standard software such as Wordstar.

I keep meaning some day to do a proper review of this machine, from a modern perspective; we could learn a lot.

(BTW, I have some software that will let you read the files off an NC-formatted SRAM card.)

Without crackpots this community wouldn't be viable. I mean, who else would spend endless hours devoted to creating UNIX all over again?

http://www.ibiblio.org/ses/washandgo.html

http://www.ibiblio.org/ses/washandgo.html

http://www.ibiblio.org/pioneers/nelson.html

"No one is going to suggest that every facet of copyright law is a perfect fit with our evolving economy and society."

I'm a beginning FreeBSD user and I've discovered that the Unix way is both smart and dumb.

It's smart because it works. It's stupid because it's not user friendly. And often it doesn't work.

FOR FUCK'S SAKE, just because you old-timers are used to making a drawing by putting pieces of graphite on paper with a microscope, doesn't mean it's easy to learn when you're new to it. Build a pencil. It's not as efficient but it's the right time for it.

The biggest problem with installing on a FreeBSD system is that you have to KNOW and REMEMBER so much. There's so many different ways of "installing"/putting files all over the place that you can't use FreeBSD as an operating system once you've read the The Unix and Internet Fundamentals HOWTO and the FreeBSD Handbook

No, that's not enough, it's never enough. There's always an exception to how things are done normally. This package can't install, that port needs gmake instead of make, how do you find out? Not by reading the manual or the installation instructions but because you googled for the error message and someone somewhere had the same problem, and google just happened to index it. It vaguely points you into the right direction and by having above average computer knowledge and above average analytical skills are you able to figure things out MAYBE.

So many tens of thousands of smart people must have stopped using FreeBSD because of all this stupid unusable crap, such a loss for the community.

On the other hand, as I understand it. MacOS X, Darwin and OpenDarwin install/dock programs in one directory. THIS IS GREAT!

Granted, I'm new to UNIX but I still think this is the way to go. Off the top of my head I can think of several reasons:
- When you delete the dir, you KNOW all the files of that program are gone. No "uninstalling" procedure that can go wrong.
- It's easier to create a fine-grained security fence around a single directory than multiple files spread out all over the system.
- Everything is a file, isn't that the UNIX way? If you use the traditional package/ports way of program installation you need to rely on the "magical package manager wizard program" to help you find everything back and delete it. ON THE OTHER HAND with "a program is a directory" you'll have the peace of mind and purity of how things work in the real world. A tool in the real world is mostly also an enclosed system, a thing. PEACE OF MIND PEOPLE? Who isn't frustrated sometimes by PCs?

As I said, just from the top of my head.

I predict that all the traditionalists will have all kinds of reasons that the old ways have to be held on to forever at all costs, but look at the end-result of this. Look at the situation from afar. All new power users of non-Darwin are frustrated by installing programs. I wasn't able to figure out FreeBSD on my own, I needed lots and lots of documentation, among a lot of other things. I WAS able to figure out Windows on my own and I probably won't have trouble with my future Mac. The only problem with Mac OSX is that Mac hardware doesn't have ECC memory, except the server line and Mac OSX isn't copyleft, so in theory they can become evil like MS.

At the moment I need FreeBSD for it's jails. I just have 1 PC so I need a jailed FBSD as a router. However, when I get another PC I WILL switch to something else which has application directories. The most usable operating system in existance at the moment proved it's a good thing.

Can somebody tell me if there's a FreeBSD or OpenBSD fork which uses application dirs which runs on i386. Maybe even something which has jails as well?

Thank you very much in advance, I will do research on my own but as I said, I'm new and I would like to save some time with your help.

I also hope all the old-schoolers are not too stuck in their ways to agree with me about application dirs even just a little bit (think about the end result).

They going to sue over this too? ... All the fobs here should know what this is. http://www.ibiblio.org/kelly/tbalm/

Klik http://klik.atekon.de/

Or Iris from the now defunct Lycoris?

Or perhaps like the Linspire ClickNRun Warehouse http://clicknrun.com/

or perhaps you mean like Damn Small Linux's Click and Load Desktop http://distro.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/distributions/ damnsmall/mydsl/apps/

Or do you mean an Installer like Windows Installers - well they have that too http://autopackage.org/ for instance.

Not to mention Synaptic, K-Package, Yumi, and there are more graphic frontends to Yum and Apt where all you have to do is set the repositories and then just click the program for install and let it go and do its work.

DUDE WTF!!! How much easier can it get than browse to page of the app, read a description and perhaps look at a screenshot- then click it and it installs and configures itself. You don't get any more hand-holding than that.

Perhaps you haven't used a Linux in a while or perhaps you are a paid shill- Either way you seem to not know the current lay of things.

Although DRM is bad!!! What MS is trying to do here goes beyond evil... No more used computer market, no more switching oses, No more running "untrusted"(Read FOSS/Non-MS) apps, uhmm... pretty much MS wants to trun your machine into a pile of crap.

Over here. The article linked to at the bottom is more detailed and convincing than Raymond's blog entry - do read it.

At the very least, Kuhn has been wrong for the last hundred years or so. His major accomplishment was to give a name ("paradigm shift") to a phenomenon that had been going on for awhile in the art world - you get attention for your work by making it radically different from everything else. After the one-two punch of relativity and quantum mechanics, lots of people dreamed of making a "paradigm-shattering" discovery in the sciences, and a bunch of them did, in biology, paleontology, geology, etc.

Sure, scientists are human, and there are fads and fashions in research and publishing. But, swallowing Kuhn whole is well down the path towards deconstruction in the sciences, which I think should be vigorously opposed.

WXYC, the first radio station to stream over the internet, is offering a free CD for download to celebrate their own 10-years-of-streaming anniversary. (Be a good citizen and use the torrent.)

I agree with parent poster - the problem is one of distribution, not supply. And for those who don't believe the claim the entire world population would fit in Texas:

Size of Texas: 261,914 sq miles (land) = 7.30174326 × 10^12 square feet

Population of the world: 6,515,511,450 people

Area / people = 1120.67077 sq ft/person

Family/group of 4 = 4482.7 sq ft

Incredible, isn't it?

What inventions do slashdoters think are too important not to share?
Those related to health, medicine included. If you can't trust closed source software there is no way you can trust closed source food or medicine. If I gave you a clear liqiud and said "Here, drink this". Would you? I wouldn't. I would first ask what it was. If the provider refused to say what the liquid was he has something to hide, and if its worth hiding its probobly not worth ingesting.

Also, a tangent, I think an online wikpidia like open cooking database would be a cool project.
Open source cookbook
Wiki cookbook

Even before that, there were work-arounds

a continual repeat of Caliph Omar's infamous command to burn the books of the Library of Alexandria because "they will either contradict the Koran, in which case they are heresy, or they will agree with it, so they are superfluous."

One of the master meme plagues of western civilization is the supposed story of the burning of the library of Alexandria. IIRC, Carl Sagan waxed most eloquent about that supposed disaster. Edward Gibbon, to my mind the greatest historian and prosidist the Anglosphere has yet produced, recounts the story in Chapter LI: Conquests By The Arabs -- Part VII of his History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire:

I should deceive the expectation of the reader, if I passed in silence the fate of the Alexandrian library, as it is described by the learned Abulpharagius.

The spirit of Amrou was more curious and liberal than that of his brethren, and in his leisure hours, the Arabian chief was pleased with the conversation of John, the last disciple of Ammonius, and who derived the surname of Philoponus from his laborious studies of grammar and philosophy. Emboldened by this familiar intercourse, Philoponus presumed to solicit a gift, inestimable in his opinion, contemptible in that of the Barbarians -- the royal library, which alone, among the spoils of Alexandria, had not been appropriated by the visit and the seal of the conqueror. Amrou was inclined to gratify the wish of the grammarian, but his rigid integrity refused to alienate the minutest object without the consent of the caliph; and the well-known answer of Omar was inspired by the ignorance of a fanatic. "If these writings of the Greeks agree with the book of God, they are useless, and need not be preserved: if they disagree, they are pernicious, and ought to be destroyed." The sentence was executed with blind obedience: the volumes of paper or parchment were distributed to the four thousand baths of the city; and such was their incredible multitude, that six months were barely sufficient for the consumption of this precious fuel.

Since the Dynasties of Abulpharagius have been given to the world in a Latin version, the tale has been repeatedly transcribed; and every scholar, with pious indignation, has deplored the irreparable shipwreck of the learning, the arts, and the genius, of antiquity.

For my own part, I am strongly tempted to deny both the fact and the consequences. The fact is indeed marvelous. "Read and wonder!" says the historian himself: and the solitary report of a stranger who wrote at the end of six hundred years on the confines of Media, is overbalanced by the silence of two annalist of a more early date, both Christians, both natives of Egypt, and the most ancient of whom, the patriarch Eutychius, has amply described the conquest of Alexandria. The rigid sentence of Omar is repugnant to the sound and orthodox precept of the Mohammedan casuists, they expressly declare, that the religious books of the Jews and Christians, which are acquired by the right of war, should never be committed to the flames; and that the works of profane science, historians or poets, physicians or philosophers, may be lawfully applied to the use of the faithful. A more destructive zeal may perhaps be attributed to the first successors of Mohammed; yet in this instance, the conflagration would have speedily expired in the deficiency of materials.

I should not recapitulate the disasters of the Alexandrian library, the involuntary flame that was kindled by Caesar in his own defense, or the mischievous bigotry of the Christians, who studied to destroy the monuments of idolatry. But if we gradually descend from the age of the Antonines to that of Theodosius, we shall learn from a chain of contemporary witnesses, that the royal palace and the temple of Serapis no longer contained the four, or the seven, hundred thousand volumes,

Impressionist currency by Monet would be interesting. Still, wouldn't a Surrealist be a better fit for money?

*sigh*
Forgot where I'm posting. Need to remember to put quotes around historical references and add full reference information. Like this:

"Arsenal of Democracy" - Franklin Delano Roosevelt, December 29, 1940

http://www.ibiblio.org./

Also (and the codehaus people are involved with it, as are the apacheprojects, is the maven repository at ibiblio.org.

OSS project binaries are there -ready to use, with a well known layout (project/jars/artifact-version.jar). So under
http://www.ibiblio.org/maven/ant/ live all the ant stuff, and if I know I want 1.6.2, its URL can be constructed.

The nice thing about this is tools can construct and use them automatically. Maven does this already, Ant1,7 will do so later in the year, as will the SmartFrog deployment framework (disclaimer, I work on both the latter projects). All three projects share a common local cache: once something is downloaded for one project (and authenticated), anything else can use it too). Maybe this will be an end to classpath hell. Or a globalisation of it.

If it's like Buffalo Wi-Fi which covers some portions of downtown and other locations in the city of Buffalo, content such as porn, MP3s, securities trading sites or sites containing large downloadable files are not accessible.

I figure, it's only fair, as they have limited bandwidth, and they own the pipe, so they can control what goes through it. I remember trying to download a small tarball through SourceForge Download Service, and I could get there, but Ibiblio was blocked because of "bandwidth issues."

This may be the compromise solution everyone is looking for to make free municipal Wi-Fi accessible as a minimal way to get folks on the net.

Yeah, SC2 is one of the most enjoyable space operas on the computer still, even though it's an old 2D action/strategy game. I keep wishing they would port it to the Game Boy Advance.

It had some of the most original aliens, and a really nice interweaving of the plots in a non-linear fashon. I just wish modern space games had such rich backround - the 'epic plot' of Halo pales in comparison to the races of SC2.

On a different note, though, the most original concept I've seen for a space game was in a game called 'Inca' from Sierra On-Line way back in 1992. Basically, it featured Incas as a spacefaring race conquered by Conquistadors with lasers and space galleons. Its ship designs were influenced by Inca and Spanish motifs, it looks rater different from the typical SF ships. I can't say much about the game play since i've never played it, but it looked like the game was like the Rebel Assault games from Lucas Arts.

link with screenshots, review of Inca 2

Besides, don't most people hit the monitor? Like the poor CRT had anything to do with the problem!!?

I actually had a crt monitor where the blue gun would sometimes stop firing, so I had a nice yellow screen. (It was running Linux, and spent most of the time at a console prompt). Sometimes running a program with a lot of blue would fix it, like Midnight Commander, sometimes it would just randomly flicker back in to color when sitting there, so I am pretty sure it was the monitor and not the connection to the computer.
Often though, I either slapped the damn thing silly, or picked it up about 6-12 inches and dropped it. It was a great way of dealing with stress. (Yes, people did ask if I felt better after smacking the monitor around).