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The complete stuff has two parts
http://www.infoworld.com/reports/31SRajax.html?sou rce=NLC-SR2006-08-01?source=NLC-SR2006-08-01
The missing part is titled "Proprietary AJAX toolkits: The other side of the coin", where he writes

Integrated data formats unify the proprietary toolkits. Backbase stores all of its layout and event passing information in its own XML format; JackBe uses JavaScript to store data. The open source toolkits have some amount of unification, but they are often more open and cacophonous. True cohesion isn't common except perhaps in the case of Google; its format is fairly inscrutible because it was translated from Java.

among other calamities, i mean, confused thoughts. In what sense Backbase, JackBe and Tibco are integrated if each one of them has it's own propietary UI definition language?
In the other hand, I can tell you that JackBe is not the way to go, at least you are giving up using other libraries, e.g. Protoype, which breaks the JBTable. And believe me, JackBe widgets are not worth the bucks.

So, VMWare's gonna host on OS X, and Microsoft likes Xen? And the Xen guys are getting dinged for their proprietary attitude?

Ok. We've arrived. All ashore that's going ashore!

http://ww6.infoworld.com/products/print_friendly.j sp?link=/article/06/07/31/31FEajax_1.html

"I know I know. I'm probably trolling"

You probably are ..

"people will just put pirate copies of XP on it"

Straight from fud.central. I see both you and Allchin hold this view.

"Once they get the hardware home, however, that Linux OS is quickly erased and replaced with a pirated copy of Windows -- often within 24 hours .. Allchin calls the practice of replacing the default OS with Windows flipping

But can we believe someone who once said this?

"If you're going to kill someone .. you just pull the trigger .. We need to smile at Novell while we pull the trigger" Sept 18, 1993

"Do not be foolish .. do not archive your e-mail." May 2004

What is a Naked PC?

"A Naked PC is one sold without an operating system .. That exposes you to legal action, software viruses and endless technical troubles"

piracy_nakedpc has been blocked by the site owner via robots.txt.

Enkido's 768 service is now available in Manhattan, where the company owns 3,500 route miles of optical fiber and is already within 200 feet of anywhere. Enkido's first 768 customer is Deutsche Telecom. ... To clarify, T0 or DS0 is 56Kbps or 64Kbps. T1 is 1.5Mbps and T3 is 45Mbps.
OC1 is 52Mbps, OC3 155Mbps, OC12 622Mbps, OC48 2.5Gbps, OC192 10Gbps, and OC768 is 40Gbps. Enkido's 768 service, Bob Metcalfe

Infoworld newsclipping on Intel releasing the patches...
http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/08/02/HNintelw irelesspatches_1.html

For the impatient, new drivers are here...
http://support.intel.com/support/wireless/wlan/sb/ cs-010623.htm

And you can double-check what adapter you've got, as long as it's an intel anyway, with the utility here...
http://support.intel.com/support/wireless/wlan/sb/ cs-005905.htm

"There is no way to build a completely secure electronic system. All I'm trying to do is make sure the machines are kept honest."

Senator Trent Lott, the Republican chairman of the Senate Rules and Administration Committee, suggested attaching printers to existing DREs could cause equipment problems on Election Day. "I'm leery of attaching [a printer] on the side," he said. "It seems we're adding a level of complexity."

K8L's modular, on-board, dual-channel memory controllers and 1,600MHz Hypertransport bus are the sort of incremental improvements you might expect, but AMD is also taking up a bunch of big-iron features to carry x86 way past its Intel roots. K8L will feature pooled Level 3 cache, a feature that x86 servers have needed from the start. The Hypertransport bus is getting a kick to Hypertransport 3, which is capable of handling 5.2 billion transactions per second. Remember, like K8, K8L will have multiple Hypertransport channels on each CPU. And you haven't heard the half of it.

Revenue will increase in the next year with new releases."

Not certain, and definitely not equating to profits, which are down.

2. Xbox will eventually kill PS3

Wii is the one to watch.

3. More workers = more products = more profits.

Total bullshit. What's happened was predicted a decade ago. Microsoft has already picked all the "low-hanging fruit", and now needs more bodies to squeeze more revenue out of marginal products.

4. Higher stock value

The current prediction is a flat stock value, because of the buyback. Its been estimated that without the buyback, the stock would have lost about 20%. This buyback is confverting an asset with actual value (cash) into an asset with no intrinsic value(stock). But it was either do the buyback or lose even more, as the assets that are held as stock would have lost even more value.

5. Next Generation OS already in alpha.

No its not, and it won't be within the foreseable future. http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/06/28/HNwinsuc cessor_1.html They haven't even got a clue as to where they want it to go, except for some vague mumblings about "better multiprocessor support".

Heck, even a year after they "deliver" Vista, they still won't have delivered what was slated to go into it originally under the name "blackcomb".

6. New office features and lower price point will = rapid adoption.

Nope. They're in a bind on Office pricing. Lower the price, cannibalize revenues from existing customers. Maintain the price, lose existing customers. Besides, there are no "must haves" for the vast majority of users in the current version, never mind a hypothetical future upgrade. Their only option at this point is to continue to bleed slowly.

7. Lower upgrade prices = rapid adoption.

Same problem as #6 above. They simply can't afford to lower the price - it will mean less $$$, without increasing sales. That's the problem with being a near-monopoly - you're your own worst competitor. Even Microsofts' own employees are saying there's no real reason to upgrade.

8. You should have said "Macs are hot again" after the fan problems.

And yet they've doubled their laptop sales, then doubled them again. They're now 12% of all laptops sold. Microsoft is going to miss the "back-to-school" surge next month, so expect to see mac laptops rise to between 15 and 20% by year-end, as Microsoft also misses the pre-Christmas sales. Expect desktops to follow, as users begin to demand seamless compatibility between their mac laptops and their home desktops.

9. First MacOS worm to wipe out 50% of all connected Macs by 2008.

... as compared to the current crop of viruses and trojans, which have, on a statistical basis, either wiped out, or caused their owners to wipe out, Windows several 100%? Dream on

10. IE 7.5 wipes out Mozilla.

IE is bleeding market share every month. The people who have changed will never go back, because the trust is gone. Microsoft has actually already lost the browser wars - its just taking tie for the news to spread from the head (early adopters) to the rest of the body.

11. Additional features will set Vista apart from XP.

People don't care any more. They don't buy an OS for its features - they just want to use it to do their work, play games, surf the net, etc. Windows95 was the last "gee whiz" release. Those days are gone. They'll never be back. Even the features that wer yanked from vista are not "must-haves" any more - and there will be free 3rd-party replacements for anyone who doesn't wan

Exactly! Like the Caller ID situation. (If memory serves) MS had come up with a promising scheme to try to reduce spam emails, and were willing to release the spec to all, but were holding patents over several methods detailed in the spec. They would then license those patents out to interested parties - pretty much blocking OSS software straight away. They could also decline to license you the patents if they thought your product might compete too well with them - though given their monopoly status, and the recent complaints in the US/EU about their business tactics you might be able to take them to court for abusing their status - though they'd drag it out for years and when you finally won (if you did at all) whatever product you wanted to sell would be obsolete, and your company would probably be bankrupt too.

Well, you read more about murders and heart attacks and snakes (ha ha) when they happen on airplanes, too. For very similar reasons.

The sulfuric acid (or really the sulfate anion) is indeed part of the chemistry of the lead-acid battery. If its purpose were to merely lower the resistance of the electrolyte, there would be a lot safer materials to use, e.g. plain table salt.

I don't think one would vent a battery to accomodate the small amount of differential thermal expansion in its solid or liquid components. You generally don't want battery components exposed to atmospheric oxygen, which is electrochemically active and can change your chemistry significantly.

Of course current Li-ion batteries explode elsewhere. Here's and example random story on it. Doesn't mention airplanes.

In related stories: Microsoft Windows Servers remain secure.

"The problem with windows security is primarily one of legacy support."

Noncense, backward compatibility should not break security. Windows was sold as suitable for secure use in a networked environment. It was even given C2 security certification. The problem is the WinNT memory management unit running under the x86 processor. Something that was first tackled under Linux with Exec Shield. The Windows version called NX can be bypassed as otherwise JIT bytecode won't work.

"inter-processes communication was flawed lacking any authentication method, kernel / userland seperation was virtually nonexistant,"

Wait a minute WinNT was touted as being more secure because of it's use of operating modes. Ring 0 had full access while user apps were restricted to Ring 3, the highest restriction. At least that was the theory.

"these issues persisted right up till XP when microsoft started to take security seriously with SP2."

Er, They still persist. See here, much of this code is included in Windows Server 2003 and will be included in Longhorn

"Microsoft just like the rest of us is new to the whole OS design thing."

When Microsoft hired on the Digital VAX/VMS team they had an oppurtunity to design a secure OS. Most of the defects in the OS can be traced to managment decisions to favor features over security. Embedding Internet Explorer in the OS was one such decision.

"What needs to be done is .. implement a version of windows that incorporates everything we've learned over the last 20 years or so"

If by "We" you mean Microsoft, "We" haven't learned anything since 1988, 18 years ago. Why wait, why not upgrade to SuSE, all the eye candy of Vista without the security vulnerabilities.

I see a lot of this kind of revisionist history on the Internet and in the media. Is there a whole department that does nothing all day but pollute the athmosphere with self serving distortions such as this. How anyone say this with a straight face is beyond me.

'the security kernel of the Windows NT server software was written before the Internet,
and the Windows Server 2003 software was written
before buffer overflows became a frequent target of recent attacks'

David Aucsmith, Security Architect, Microsoft.

As someone who works in publishing, this seems symptomatic of what is a very disturbing trend to me. Somebody has to pay for content. Popular wisdom is that the consumers of that content won't pay for it. There's only one other place to go for the money, it seems, and that's advertisers.

I don't know how to feel about it. I'm somebody who hates ads. I watch a lot of PBS, tend to rent shows on DVD rather than watch them when broadcast on commercial television, or if I do watch them, I skip the ads in my DVR. Likewise, I run AdBlock and an aggressive set of filters in Firefox. My goal is to see no advertisements at all. Ironically, however, those same ads are my livelihood. Am I cutting my own throat?

Even scarier is the fact that all the movie and TV studios are aware of this behavior and are taking steps to correct for it. Product placement, for example -- it's no coincidence that guy is drinking a Coke and not a Pepsi, or that there's a big RSA Security logo on that video monitor in that episode of "24."

So if we don't want to pay for our content, and we refuse to be receptive to traditional advertising messages, how long before that kind of influence gains a foothold in other kinds of media? I work in the trade press, so we're right on the cusp of that -- some people will never believe that a story in my magazine is meant to be impartial, no matter what it says. But does anyone really think the mainstream news media -- even something like the New York Times -- is completely impervious?

I really, really do not want to live in the kind of world where every flat surface is paved with an ad, every movie is a sales vehicle, every TV show is a survey, every newspaper article is corporate public relations. But is it avoidable, given the direction our society is going?

I am curious about the organizations that oppose network neutrality. The article has a list which seems to match the list on a fake grassroots site run by telecoms.

Is the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation really a group representing Black Americans? If so, why would stand aganist network neutrality? Their web site doesn't list Network Neutrality as an issue anywhere that I can find.

How about the National Association of Manufacturers?Net neutrality isn't on their list of key issues either, but a search reveals a misguided report showing how they don't want network neutrality because it would stifle companies from laying new fiber. I can see manufacturers not liking that, but since network neutrality has nothing to do with laying of fiber, I only assume that someone there is misinformed.

The whole list of supporters seems this way. Is anyone here a member of one of these organizations who can shed some light on the views of these organizations?

http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/04/07/77121_15 OPcringely_1.html

If you had access to the serial nubmer on the Certificate of Authenticity, they most likely would have let you activate the copy of Windows.

Really?

we were told that Microsoft could NOT give us the activation for this particular copy of XP since it was sold through a 'special licensing agreement' with E-Machines. Even though we had the 25-digit license number [...] So the customer is forced into purchasing another copy of Windows XP even though they already paid for the original license when they first bought the computer and have all the required proof."

It's your fault for not trying.

No, it isn't my fault. I didn't buy the emachines junk, accept any EULA, create the Windows activation process, lock the license to the bios or select a motherboard with shitty electrolytics. I'm not jumping through hoops for these clowns.

You can read some good reviews here and here.

In fact I said and routinely say nothing of the sort. Matt Asay does a fine job of summarising the main points I made, which you will note do not include claiming "open source could learn from capitalism". In fact I wonder if the other reporter was even at the same event. Reading through the whole thread here I'm amazed that people feel they can come to any conclusions about what I think based on an intentionally provocative and ill-informed article by a ZDNet reporter who badly summarises the thrust of my keynote in reported speech apparently intended to garner Slashdot coverage.

And I disagree with your outdated analysis of Sun, naturally.

Why are financial records not given the same protections as medical records?

Actually, with GLB there are some very specific regulations required for Banks and Financial institutions. The downside is most banks aren't following these guidelines and the laws aren't uniformly enforced. The same thing is happening with your medical records. HIPPA rules are very specific, but the laws aren't being enforced.

You have no privacy and all of these laws are passed just to make you feel better, not to actually regulate anyone.

Here's an example of how S/MIME certificates can be easily spoofed, and how both Outlook and Apple's Mail.app happily accepts them as valid. Want more trustworthy certs? Expect to pay out the nose.

Silly me thinking this was actually an interesting article about China's Redberry platform.

that's the stupidest article I've ever read. I'll save everyone a few minutes of their lives and summarize.

-People drool over my red blackberry
-I'm a free thinker and everyone else is an idiot
-I got a car paintjob on a blackberry case

I was thinking that the article was going to be about China's response to the blackberry but instead ot was just an idiot who discovered simple modding.

InfoWorld has been running articles on this H-1B situation for a while. There's a special report on H-1B visas set up on the site.

Personally, one point that makes me skeptical is that I hear about this from the Programmer's Guild again and again. I'm not sure what the Programmer's Guild does, other than make a big stink about H-1B visas. Not that this is, in and of itself, necessarily a bad thing -- but if the H-1B situation was really as cut and dried, criminal and downright treasonous as the Programmer's Guild says, wouldn't there be some other parties chiming in on the issue?

In defence of Dell of which I am loath to do this is a known problem.

Meet exploding Imac http://www.podcastingnews.com/news/06_06/Mac_Lapto p_Explodes_Flame.html

Meet exploding batteries
http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/12/19/50OPreal ity_1.html

Apparently its to do with run away heat in lithium batteries reaching combustion.

Novell still has a lot to offer. Just one example is Identity Manager, which synchronizes data between different kinds of systems in "real-time" (event driven). It can handle just about any type of directory service (eDir, AD, or LDAP) and any sort of database (Oracle, MSSQL, MySQL, Sybase, Postgres, etc.). It can synchronize accounts and passwords (bi-directionally with eDir, AD, and NT domains) to many systems, including various operating systems. Infoworld recently ranked it the best such solution available (and that was the older version). The product can also handle provisioning of resources automatically. The tools used to manage this very complex software make it about as simple and easy as it possibly could be. This sort of software is very beneficial to larger companies with many different types of systems that all need to be synchronized in some way.

This article is pretty frustrating, as it still gives no answers why Oracle is not a member of ODSL and why they should be? As far as I know Oracle makes database and middleware tools, wich is pretty distinct from operating system kernels. Maybe they require some specific kernel modules to get some better performance in some instances, but does that require them to be a memberof ODSL?

I talked to Wim Coekaerts the other day and he said that one of the things that frustrates him is the level to which Oracle is involved in Linux kernel development and promoting Linux in general, and yet they don't seem to get credit for it. Yes, Oracle is a database and applications vendor -- but Oracle is a pretty resource-intensive application, and a lot of people use it for some very heavy lifting, and as such it can demand a lot from the OS kernel it runs on. Oracle has put a lot of energy into making its database run better on Linux, and making Linux more stable in general.

For more info, check out the column I wrote about it -- Oracle: the biggest Linux vendor you've never heard of

The medical industry has $250,000 fines for breaches of medical data combined with a get out of jail free card from the administration. Examples include doctors just throwing out medical records. The sad thing about that is how many people had to know about that, and nobody said anything.

Hmm - let's see. So you're saying that Microsoft, IBM, Forrester, Gartner, and BEA repeat things to you over and over again until you believe them (white papers and PR / church services), then you attempt to convert others to your beliefs (editorial articles / laws, evangelism, and public proclamations)? haha only serious.

Now you're talking about a different topic. The grandparent was saying that computer journals write what they write because they need to woo advertisers. I'm saying that's false; that's not the way it works. You, however, are saying that tech journalists write what they write because they are ignorant. That might be true, but it's a different argument.

Treat with extreme skepticism any politician who hasn't been in the situation in question, or any editorialist who doesn't build what he writes about. Common sense has only a moderate track record in general, and is miserable in relatively new scientific fields like information science. While it is true that tech magazines attempt - perhaps even go to great lengths - to know and profess truth, how well can one understand a fish while standing on dry land? How well when most of the information one receives comes from commercial fishermen?

Are you really asking a question? If so, are you willing to listen to me if I answer it?

As an editor at InfoWorld, I commission a great deal of work from a broad variety of resources (writers). Like you, the tools I use depend on the job at hand.

If I need somebody to go out and conduct a bunch of interviews (like TFA, but let me reiterate that TFA is not an InfoWorld article, it was published by eWeek) then I hire somebody who is fundamentally a reporter. I need somebody who knows how to reach somebody on the phone, ask some questions, and transcribe the results. A lot of people with deeper technical background won't do that. Believe it or not, they talk tough (like the grandparent) but when the chips are down and they have the floor they not only fail to ask "the tough questions," in fact they often stare at their shoes, fiddle with a pen, and say nothing. I do not exaggerate; some of my writers, though they are highly competent and intelligent people, would need threat of guerilla dental surgery in order to actually call somebody on the phone and get a quote. So I don't use them for those types of articles.

On the other hand, if I want to commission an article about next-generation SAN systems, I want somebody who knows something about storage. If I need an article about server virtualization, I want a writer who knows something about that topic. I draw upon the resources at my disposal.

I personally have a technology background. I'm not a hotshot systems guy by any means, but I have administered Unix and Linux systems, have managed development teams, and have programmed in at least a half-dozen languages -- including Forth and assembly language, just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about. I'm not a DBA but I've worked with relational databases. I've written public domain software that's lost to the sands of MS-DOS and I've made my own minor contributions to open source projects. Believe it or not, when I was about 17 I even wrote a couple early computer viruses.

I admit that I am atypical of the computing press. There are not many people working full-time in this field who have credentials similar to mine -- I know this just based on the resumes I've seen. However, that's not to say that there aren't sharp people out there. You may be familiar with Jon Udell, who is a tremendous resource for InfoWorld. I work with a guy named Mario Apicella, who knows more about storage than anyone I've met. Oliver Rist writes regularly for InfoWorld about Windows, yet his writing i

Hmm - let's see. So you're saying that Microsoft, IBM, Forrester, Gartner, and BEA repeat things to you over and over again until you believe them (white papers and PR / church services), then you attempt to convert others to your beliefs (editorial articles / laws, evangelism, and public proclamations)? haha only serious.

Now you're talking about a different topic. The grandparent was saying that computer journals write what they write because they need to woo advertisers. I'm saying that's false; that's not the way it works. You, however, are saying that tech journalists write what they write because they are ignorant. That might be true, but it's a different argument.

Treat with extreme skepticism any politician who hasn't been in the situation in question, or any editorialist who doesn't build what he writes about. Common sense has only a moderate track record in general, and is miserable in relatively new scientific fields like information science. While it is true that tech magazines attempt - perhaps even go to great lengths - to know and profess truth, how well can one understand a fish while standing on dry land? How well when most of the information one receives comes from commercial fishermen?

Are you really asking a question? If so, are you willing to listen to me if I answer it?

As an editor at InfoWorld, I commission a great deal of work from a broad variety of resources (writers). Like you, the tools I use depend on the job at hand.

If I need somebody to go out and conduct a bunch of interviews (like TFA, but let me reiterate that TFA is not an InfoWorld article, it was published by eWeek) then I hire somebody who is fundamentally a reporter. I need somebody who knows how to reach somebody on the phone, ask some questions, and transcribe the results. A lot of people with deeper technical background won't do that. Believe it or not, they talk tough (like the grandparent) but when the chips are down and they have the floor they not only fail to ask "the tough questions," in fact they often stare at their shoes, fiddle with a pen, and say nothing. I do not exaggerate; some of my writers, though they are highly competent and intelligent people, would need threat of guerilla dental surgery in order to actually call somebody on the phone and get a quote. So I don't use them for those types of articles.

On the other hand, if I want to commission an article about next-generation SAN systems, I want somebody who knows something about storage. If I need an article about server virtualization, I want a writer who knows something about that topic. I draw upon the resources at my disposal.

I personally have a technology background. I'm not a hotshot systems guy by any means, but I have administered Unix and Linux systems, have managed development teams, and have programmed in at least a half-dozen languages -- including Forth and assembly language, just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about. I'm not a DBA but I've worked with relational databases. I've written public domain software that's lost to the sands of MS-DOS and I've made my own minor contributions to open source projects. Believe it or not, when I was about 17 I even wrote a couple early computer viruses.

I admit that I am atypical of the computing press. There are not many people working full-time in this field who have credentials similar to mine -- I know this just based on the resumes I've seen. However, that's not to say that there aren't sharp people out there. You may be familiar with Jon Udell, who is a tremendous resource for InfoWorld. I work with a guy named Mario Apicella, who knows more about storage than anyone I've met. Oliver Rist writes regularly for InfoWorld about Windows, yet his writing i

Hmm - let's see. So you're saying that Microsoft, IBM, Forrester, Gartner, and BEA repeat things to you over and over again until you believe them (white papers and PR / church services), then you attempt to convert others to your beliefs (editorial articles / laws, evangelism, and public proclamations)? haha only serious.

Now you're talking about a different topic. The grandparent was saying that computer journals write what they write because they need to woo advertisers. I'm saying that's false; that's not the way it works. You, however, are saying that tech journalists write what they write because they are ignorant. That might be true, but it's a different argument.

Treat with extreme skepticism any politician who hasn't been in the situation in question, or any editorialist who doesn't build what he writes about. Common sense has only a moderate track record in general, and is miserable in relatively new scientific fields like information science. While it is true that tech magazines attempt - perhaps even go to great lengths - to know and profess truth, how well can one understand a fish while standing on dry land? How well when most of the information one receives comes from commercial fishermen?

Are you really asking a question? If so, are you willing to listen to me if I answer it?

As an editor at InfoWorld, I commission a great deal of work from a broad variety of resources (writers). Like you, the tools I use depend on the job at hand.

If I need somebody to go out and conduct a bunch of interviews (like TFA, but let me reiterate that TFA is not an InfoWorld article, it was published by eWeek) then I hire somebody who is fundamentally a reporter. I need somebody who knows how to reach somebody on the phone, ask some questions, and transcribe the results. A lot of people with deeper technical background won't do that. Believe it or not, they talk tough (like the grandparent) but when the chips are down and they have the floor they not only fail to ask "the tough questions," in fact they often stare at their shoes, fiddle with a pen, and say nothing. I do not exaggerate; some of my writers, though they are highly competent and intelligent people, would need threat of guerilla dental surgery in order to actually call somebody on the phone and get a quote. So I don't use them for those types of articles.

On the other hand, if I want to commission an article about next-generation SAN systems, I want somebody who knows something about storage. If I need an article about server virtualization, I want a writer who knows something about that topic. I draw upon the resources at my disposal.

I personally have a technology background. I'm not a hotshot systems guy by any means, but I have administered Unix and Linux systems, have managed development teams, and have programmed in at least a half-dozen languages -- including Forth and assembly language, just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about. I'm not a DBA but I've worked with relational databases. I've written public domain software that's lost to the sands of MS-DOS and I've made my own minor contributions to open source projects. Believe it or not, when I was about 17 I even wrote a couple early computer viruses.

I admit that I am atypical of the computing press. There are not many people working full-time in this field who have credentials similar to mine -- I know this just based on the resumes I've seen. However, that's not to say that there aren't sharp people out there. You may be familiar with Jon Udell, who is a tremendous resource for InfoWorld. I work with a guy named Mario Apicella, who knows more about storage than anyone I've met. Oliver Rist writes regularly for InfoWorld about Windows, yet his writing i

Looks it's a computer journal. The job of a computer journal is not to ask hard hitting questions. It's to suck up to your advertisers and to make sure you get their press releases published as articles and to generally act as their publicity agents.

I hear this all the time, and I've come to the resignation that it's just a fact of life that people want to think this way, but frankly it's bullshit.

I am a senior editor at InfoWorld. I can tell you unequivocably that the editorial staff at InfoWorld is not in the business of sucking up to advertisers; indeed, we are not involved in the business of procuring advertisements in any way. Any reputable publication has a "church and state" policy with regard to sales and editorial. InfoWorld does, and I have no reason to believe our distinguished competition at eWeek is any different. (Of course, they're not as good at their jobs as we are, but they're not crooks.)

At InfoWorld we are also not in the business of repurposing press releases, nor do we accept any so-called bylined articles contributed by vendors. Any "advertorial" is clearly marked as such -- it's the rules.

Editorial staff at computer journals do nurture relationships with major technology vendors but that's because it's necessary to what we do -- which is report on IT. We may not print answers to the "hard-hitting questions" as often as you might like. In many cases, however, the reason you don't see answers to those questions in print is because the person we ask refuses to answer them.

You don't have to believe me, of course. But come on -- do I walk around saying programmers don't do anything but eat Cheet-Os, drink Mountain Dew, and add bugs to software?

The anonymous submitter was apparently too cowardly to submit a link to the article. I think that's the one he wanted.

Tom isn't "speculating", it's quite honestly a fact that Apple has not released the source to Intel XNU.

To date, yes. I will 100% agree that the Intel xnu source is currently closed. However:

- Intel xnu source hasn't always been closed
- PowerPC snu source is still open
- The change happened with Intel-based Macs began shipping
- He is speculating as to the *reason* xnu on Intel isn't currently open source
- The implication in Yager's articles is that because it's closed now, it must/might be closed permanently

Also, in Yager's first article, he uses the title:

Apple closes down OS X

Excuse me, but when was "OS X" ever open? And since when does one component on one architecture being closed constitute everything being closed, especially when all non-kernel sources that have been traditionally released to date continue to be released.

The first sentence is:

Thanks to pirates, or rather the fear of them, the Intel edition of Apple's OS X is now a proprietary operating system.

Again, huh? First, Mac OS X has always been a proprietary operating system. Nothing has changed. Second, all of the Darwin sources are still released on both architectures. With ONE, admittedly large, exception: the kernel (xnu) on x86.

The problem is exactly as Apple framed it in Yager's followup article:

- Yager presented this inaccurately and sensationalistically, making it seem to a broader audience as if "OS X" itself was previously "open", and is not "closed"
- Yager does not discuss the nuance of what the kernel being closed means from a practical standpoint
- Yager incorrectly asserts this somehow matters more now because Intel-based servers will be coming, because people who buy servers and equipment for enterprise will somehow have needs to use the kernel source, but Apple has been selling into this marketplace for over 4 years, and the fact that the server platform will be on Intel changes none of that
- Yager generally makes it seem like this "matters" to ordinary users in a broader audience

In any case, get your story straight. Either this "doesn't matter", because "nobody needs source code anyway", or "Apple has hit a problem releasing the source code but will do shortly, but cannot dare say such a thing in public because, erm, yeah, RDF! RDF! Our refusal to release source needs no justification, it "just works". Insert hypnotoad here".

There's no logical inconsistency in anything I've said, either here, or previously. Of course it matters. It matters to me. It matters to the people who actually want or need the source, which is an extremely small subset of Mac OS X users. (And no, users who don't even know what a kernel is don't receive a substantive benefit from others outside of Apple being able to see the kernel source.)

I'm tired of hearing pretty much every excuse from the insulting to the flat-out false. Maybe they will release XNU for Intel in the near future. Hey, guess what, MAYBE MICROSOFT WILL RELEASE THE SOURCE TO WINDOWS IN THE FUTURE TOO! Yeah, that's it! We can all start describing MICROSOFT as a FUCKING OPEN SOURCE COMPANY because they MIGHT release the source code under the GPL in a few hours!!!

Wrong.

The source code for Windows has never been open; the argument is not the same.

The source for xnu has been open, continues to be open on PowerPC, and is available in an earlier incarnation for x86 (parity with Mac OS X 10.4.0). Therefore, saying that a final decision might not have been made on current iterations of xnu on x86 is perfectly reasonable.

Further, if anything, MORE source is now released than previously: x86 sources for all non-kernel components are released with parity with Mac OS X releases for PowerPC and x86; previo

InfoWorld ran an short piece on Chris Edge and his use of open source at the Christian Science Monitor earlier this year. It was part of a larger package focusing on a variety of businesses and how they use open source.

InfoWorld ran an short piece on Chris Edge and his use of open source at the Christian Science Monitor earlier this year. It was part of a larger package focusing on a variety of businesses and how they use open source.

Symantec is rating the threat a '2.'

The lowball number is interesting, especially given the fact that Symantec is the company charged with the task of keeping an outbreak like this from happening:

Symantec to scan Yahoo Mail for viruses

Huh?

From: http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/05/25/78683_HN netneutpass_1.html

"A U.S. House of Representatives committee has approved a bill that would prohibit broadband providers from blocking or impairing their customers' access to Web content offered by competitors. The House Judiciary Committee voted 20-13 to approve the bill, called the Internet Freedom and Nondiscrimination Act."

I don't see anything about Tiered access in Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement Act of 2006 which TFA refrences.

You can pirate software, you can't pirate hardware.

I can't find the article that discusses the point, but this (http://weblog.infoworld.com/enterprisemac/archive s/2006/04/os_x_on_generic.html) is close enough.

That's why Apple have Bootcamp, they want to encourage people to buy their hardware.

Duh yourself, no need to be rude.

When you have to use so many charged words in support of your argument then we know you are just a fudding. It is one way of getting more hits on your web site.

When you have to invoke PETA as a contrivance to trash the FSF then I'm afraid you've totally lost any credibility you have to comment on matters technological, at least in my eyes.

Free Software Foundation: Free as in "do what I say

key words:

alarming, crusade, demagoguery, disappointed, evangelical dogma, God is on its side, histrionics, hysterical activism, PETA, insidious, misplaced neopolitical activism, moralistic, name-calling, politicization, radicalism, regrettable spiral, troubling, unilaterally, verboten ...

--

ps: How's the 'Linux flipping phenomenon` proceeding?

Editors can be reached via e-mail, fax, telephone, or mail. The telephone switchboard is open weekdays 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Pacific time. After 5:30 p.m. you will be directed to individual extensions.

My point is you're talking crap that you know fuck all about.

> I also don't think anyone expected there to be so many machines attached to each other as we have now.

In 1988 Fidonet had already been running for 4 years.

Compuserve had POPs all over Europe.

I first encountered Cabir in King's Cross train station in London, I'd left my Bluetooth on after toothing on the train.

If you think people are unprepared, walk into a pub and search for Bluetooth handsets. And if you think that Joe Average has the slightest fucking clue about Bluetooth security you are deluded.

Bluetooth has an insecure history

http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/06/06/HNblueto othvulnerable_1.html

June 06, 2005

Two security researchers say they have discovered a technique for taking control of Bluetooth-enabled mobile phones, even when the handsets have security features switched on.

http://www.thebunker.net/security/bluetooth.htm

  In November 2003, Adam Laurie of A.L. Digital Ltd. discovered that there are serious flaws in the authentication and/or data transfer mechanisms on some bluetooth enabled devices. Specifically, three vulnerabilities have been found:

Firstly, confidential data can be obtained, anonymously, and without the owner's knowledge or consent, from some bluetooth enabled mobile phones. This data includes, at least, the entire phonebook and calendar, and the phone's IMEI.

> Buffer overflows are no longer "rare".

That would be rare not "rare".

When have buffer overflows ever been rare ?

You *almost* sound like you know what you are talking about.

Colin Powell spoke with Chinese trade officials a while back and got them to halt a program that would have required WiFi equipment being sold in China to support WAPI. The program also would have required foreign companies to partner with a Chinese firm before entering the market.

http://www.infoworld.com/article/04/04/05/HNbarret tochina_1.html?source=rss&url=http://www.infoworld .com/article/04/04/05/HNbarrettochina_1.html

FTA: "The U.S. government has also weighed in on the issue. U.S. Secretary of Commerce Donald Evans, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick, sent a letter to senior Chinese government officials in March expressing concern over the implementation of China's WLAN standard and that the move created a dangerous precedent for using standards as a barrier to international trade."

Fortunately, Apple was kind enough to open source Darwin, but it didn't need to.

Apple has closed part of the Kernel now called XNU.

Is Apple kind, or are they just putting up a facade, closing the source where they see fit?

What I didn't see mentioned in this article was the fact that back in March, Microsoft joined a subdivision of INCITS (V1 Text Processing: Office and Publishing Systems Interface group within the International Committee for Information Technology Standards). Which is the group that kind of decides whether or not it should be widely adopted. Being ISO certified is one thing but it doesn't mean everyone's going to use it as a standard.

There was much speculation that Microsoft had joined INCITS with the intent to slowdown or stop the spreading use of ODF and insert their own standard. Sounded like another Microsoft power trip to me.

I predict that Microsoft will bitch and bitch about ODF and then release study after study suggesting some other patent laden format (probably Open XML) over ODF. This is just the first complaint against ODF--too slow. Perhaps next they'll complain that it's not documented well enough, some of their apps just can't support it, it gives their developers arthritis, it looks too ugly, etc.

what's with all the speculation? With their domestic spying program, wouldn't the NSA know whether the PCs were "phoning home"?

I hadn't heard of the Darwin Streaming Server before

DSS was the subject of an InfoWorld article a while back (nov 03) about setting up QuickTime-compatible video feeds.

They rate it 8.7 out of 10 --- very high. Of course, they actually go to the trouble of comparing recent versions of the product with other things on the net, not just some badly done apps in an oversized I.T. department from a guy paid to deal with problems.

http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/05/11/78099_20 TCnotes_1.html

FSM save us from yet another rich client war.

You have 27,000 employees who live and breath Notes. Do you have any idea what it would take to put that many employees on Exchange, and if you did, what what happens when a single file became corrupted? What if you had to upgrade versions?

The biggest problem with Notes is that it's easy to design a bad app. Designer is so easy on the surface, that any moron can make something that looks like its a Notes app. Of course, it won't scale because they didn't know what they were doing when they wrote it. The UI will suck, again, because they didn't know what they were doing when they wrote it. Nonetheless, these quick temporary solutions quickly become permenant and critical, and then someone who knows something has to be paid a lot of money to do it right.

Notes will continue to "suck" for people like you for years, but then again, you don't have an alternative because there is nothing to migrate to. Other products do some of the things Notes does. Many do Mail and Calendaring -- some better, surely. None do the kinds of rapid, inexpensive, but secure and portable applications and integration.

Listen, we business people are, on the whole, very conservative folks. And Microsoft did something you should never, ever, ever do: ignore your customers' safety to pursue an ego trip. This is an unpardonable sin and good business people will pick up their briefcases and go do business elsewhere.

At least, smart business people will do so. As many have, already.

http://www.infoworld.com/articles/hn/xml/02/11/27/ 021127hnerniball.html?s=IDGNS

An InfoWorld article from May 4th quoted Blue Security CEO Eran Reshef as saying:

Among other things, Reshef said that pharmamaster claimed to have a contact at UUNET who would do his bidding. Rather than launch a denial of service attack against BlueSecurity.com, the spammer instructed the contact to alter the routing tables so that traffic from outside Israel would not reach the company's servers.

1. The spammer lied and it wasn't UUNET.
2. UUNET threatened Blue Security and they caved.
3. Blue Security doesn't want to be threatened.