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Domain: infoworld.com
Stories and comments across the archive that link to infoworld.com.
Stories · 1,869
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Was Standardizing On JavaScript a Mistake?
snydeq writes "Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister questions the wisdom of standardizing on a single language in the wake of the ECMA Committee's decision to abandon ECMAScript 4 in favor of the much less ambitious ECMAScript 3.1, stunting the future of JavaScript. Had the work continued, McAllister argues, it could have ushered in an era of large-scale application development that would ensure the browser's ability to meet our evolving needs in the years ahead. 'The more I hear about the ongoing efforts to revise the leading Web standards, the less convinced I am that we're approaching Web-based applications the right way,' McAllister writes. 'If anything, the more we talk about building large-scale Web applications, the more we should recognize that a single style of programming will never suit every job.' McAllister's simple truth: JavaScript will never be good for everything — especially as the Web continues to evolve beyond its original vision. His solution? 'Rather than shoehorning more and more functionality into the browser itself, maybe it's time we separated the UI from the underlying client-side logic. Let the browser handle the View. Let the Controller exist somewhere else, independent of the presentation layer.'" -
Was Standardizing On JavaScript a Mistake?
snydeq writes "Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister questions the wisdom of standardizing on a single language in the wake of the ECMA Committee's decision to abandon ECMAScript 4 in favor of the much less ambitious ECMAScript 3.1, stunting the future of JavaScript. Had the work continued, McAllister argues, it could have ushered in an era of large-scale application development that would ensure the browser's ability to meet our evolving needs in the years ahead. 'The more I hear about the ongoing efforts to revise the leading Web standards, the less convinced I am that we're approaching Web-based applications the right way,' McAllister writes. 'If anything, the more we talk about building large-scale Web applications, the more we should recognize that a single style of programming will never suit every job.' McAllister's simple truth: JavaScript will never be good for everything — especially as the Web continues to evolve beyond its original vision. His solution? 'Rather than shoehorning more and more functionality into the browser itself, maybe it's time we separated the UI from the underlying client-side logic. Let the browser handle the View. Let the Controller exist somewhere else, independent of the presentation layer.'" -
Outages Leave Google Apps Admins In the Hotseat
snydeq writes "This week's Google outages left several Google Apps admins in the lurch — and many of them are second-guessing their advocacy for making the switch to hosted apps, InfoWorld reports. The outages, which affected both Gmail and Apps, 'could serve as a deterrent to some IT and business managers who might not be ready to ditch conventional software packages that are installed on their servers,' according to the article. 'If we began to experience a similar outage more than about two or three business hours per quarter, we'd probably make Google Apps and Gmail a backup solution to a locally hosted mail system, if we used it at all,' said one Apps admin. 'And it would likely be years before we'd try a cloud-based collaborative system again from any vendor.' Coupled with recent Apple and Amazon cloud issues, these Google outages are being viewed by some as big wins for Microsoft." -
Outages Leave Google Apps Admins In the Hotseat
snydeq writes "This week's Google outages left several Google Apps admins in the lurch — and many of them are second-guessing their advocacy for making the switch to hosted apps, InfoWorld reports. The outages, which affected both Gmail and Apps, 'could serve as a deterrent to some IT and business managers who might not be ready to ditch conventional software packages that are installed on their servers,' according to the article. 'If we began to experience a similar outage more than about two or three business hours per quarter, we'd probably make Google Apps and Gmail a backup solution to a locally hosted mail system, if we used it at all,' said one Apps admin. 'And it would likely be years before we'd try a cloud-based collaborative system again from any vendor.' Coupled with recent Apple and Amazon cloud issues, these Google outages are being viewed by some as big wins for Microsoft." -
Outages Leave Google Apps Admins In the Hotseat
snydeq writes "This week's Google outages left several Google Apps admins in the lurch — and many of them are second-guessing their advocacy for making the switch to hosted apps, InfoWorld reports. The outages, which affected both Gmail and Apps, 'could serve as a deterrent to some IT and business managers who might not be ready to ditch conventional software packages that are installed on their servers,' according to the article. 'If we began to experience a similar outage more than about two or three business hours per quarter, we'd probably make Google Apps and Gmail a backup solution to a locally hosted mail system, if we used it at all,' said one Apps admin. 'And it would likely be years before we'd try a cloud-based collaborative system again from any vendor.' Coupled with recent Apple and Amazon cloud issues, these Google outages are being viewed by some as big wins for Microsoft." -
ISO Rejects OOXML Protest Appeals
snydeq writes "ISO and IEC gave OOXML the greenlight after organization leaders rejected appeals from four countries to protest the vote that approved OOXML as a standard. According to an ISO press statement, appeals by the national bodies of Brazil, India, South Africa and Venezuela did not garner support from two-thirds of the members of the ISO Technical Management Board and IEC Standardization Management Board, which is required by ISO/IEC rules to keep the appeals process alive." -
ISO Rejects OOXML Protest Appeals
snydeq writes "ISO and IEC gave OOXML the greenlight after organization leaders rejected appeals from four countries to protest the vote that approved OOXML as a standard. According to an ISO press statement, appeals by the national bodies of Brazil, India, South Africa and Venezuela did not garner support from two-thirds of the members of the ISO Technical Management Board and IEC Standardization Management Board, which is required by ISO/IEC rules to keep the appeals process alive." -
EFF To Appeal Court Order Vs. Subway Hack Demo
snydeq sends along InfoWorld coverage of the EFF's plans to appeal a US District Court order that kept three MIT students from presenting detailed flaws in the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority e-ticketing system at Defcon. And an anonymous reader points out that the MBTA, in addition to triggering the Streisand Effect, released in open court more information on vulnerabilities (PDF) than the students had any intention of presenting. See Exhibit 1 to this court filing. -
EFF To Appeal Court Order Vs. Subway Hack Demo
snydeq sends along InfoWorld coverage of the EFF's plans to appeal a US District Court order that kept three MIT students from presenting detailed flaws in the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority e-ticketing system at Defcon. And an anonymous reader points out that the MBTA, in addition to triggering the Streisand Effect, released in open court more information on vulnerabilities (PDF) than the students had any intention of presenting. See Exhibit 1 to this court filing. -
Nearly 50,000 IT Jobs Lost In Past Year
snydeq writes "Employment statistics from the US Department of Labor show what most IT people have already realized: IT jobs are getting harder to come by. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 13,000 jobs in the information industry were cut in July, bringing the total to 44,000 year over year. An additional 5,000 jobs were lost in telecom this past month. The statistics reinforce a recent survey of top CIOs who indicated that they will be reducing their IT staff over the coming year. According to a staffing research firm, some jobs have gone to outsourcers, while other jobs are simply going away, either due to cost-oriented automation efforts or due to increasing the remaining staff's workload." -
Nearly 50,000 IT Jobs Lost In Past Year
snydeq writes "Employment statistics from the US Department of Labor show what most IT people have already realized: IT jobs are getting harder to come by. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 13,000 jobs in the information industry were cut in July, bringing the total to 44,000 year over year. An additional 5,000 jobs were lost in telecom this past month. The statistics reinforce a recent survey of top CIOs who indicated that they will be reducing their IT staff over the coming year. According to a staffing research firm, some jobs have gone to outsourcers, while other jobs are simply going away, either due to cost-oriented automation efforts or due to increasing the remaining staff's workload." -
Nearly 50,000 IT Jobs Lost In Past Year
snydeq writes "Employment statistics from the US Department of Labor show what most IT people have already realized: IT jobs are getting harder to come by. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 13,000 jobs in the information industry were cut in July, bringing the total to 44,000 year over year. An additional 5,000 jobs were lost in telecom this past month. The statistics reinforce a recent survey of top CIOs who indicated that they will be reducing their IT staff over the coming year. According to a staffing research firm, some jobs have gone to outsourcers, while other jobs are simply going away, either due to cost-oriented automation efforts or due to increasing the remaining staff's workload." -
Why COBOL Could Come Back
snydeq writes "Sure 'legacy systems archaeologist' ranks as one of the 7 dirtiest jobs in IT, but COBOL skills might see a scant revival in the wake of California's high-profile pay-cut debacle. After all, as Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister points out, new code may in fact be more expensive than old code. According to an IDC survey, code complexity is on the rise. And it's not the applications that are growing more complex, but the technologies themselves. 'Multicore processing, SOA, and Web 2.0 all contribute to rising software development costs,' which include $5 million to $22 million spent on fixing defects per company per year. Do the math, and California's proposed $177 million nine-year modernization project cost will double, McAllister writes. Perhaps numbers like those won't deter modernization efforts, but the estimated 90,000 coders still versed in COBOL may find themselves in high demand teaching new dogs old tricks." -
Why COBOL Could Come Back
snydeq writes "Sure 'legacy systems archaeologist' ranks as one of the 7 dirtiest jobs in IT, but COBOL skills might see a scant revival in the wake of California's high-profile pay-cut debacle. After all, as Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister points out, new code may in fact be more expensive than old code. According to an IDC survey, code complexity is on the rise. And it's not the applications that are growing more complex, but the technologies themselves. 'Multicore processing, SOA, and Web 2.0 all contribute to rising software development costs,' which include $5 million to $22 million spent on fixing defects per company per year. Do the math, and California's proposed $177 million nine-year modernization project cost will double, McAllister writes. Perhaps numbers like those won't deter modernization efforts, but the estimated 90,000 coders still versed in COBOL may find themselves in high demand teaching new dogs old tricks." -
Why COBOL Could Come Back
snydeq writes "Sure 'legacy systems archaeologist' ranks as one of the 7 dirtiest jobs in IT, but COBOL skills might see a scant revival in the wake of California's high-profile pay-cut debacle. After all, as Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister points out, new code may in fact be more expensive than old code. According to an IDC survey, code complexity is on the rise. And it's not the applications that are growing more complex, but the technologies themselves. 'Multicore processing, SOA, and Web 2.0 all contribute to rising software development costs,' which include $5 million to $22 million spent on fixing defects per company per year. Do the math, and California's proposed $177 million nine-year modernization project cost will double, McAllister writes. Perhaps numbers like those won't deter modernization efforts, but the estimated 90,000 coders still versed in COBOL may find themselves in high demand teaching new dogs old tricks." -
A Photo That Can Steal Your Online Credentials?
TedSamsonIW writes "InfoWorld reports on a new potential ploy for stealing Web user's private information: Researcher has found that by placing a new type of hybrid file on Web sites that let users upload their own images, they can circumvent security systems and take over Web surfers' accounts. 'They call this type of file a GIFAR, a contraction of GIF (graphics interchange format) and JAR (Java Archive), the two file-types that are mixed. At Black Hat, researchers will show attendees how to create the GIFAR while omitting a few key details to prevent it from being used immediately in any widespread attack.'" -
A Photo That Can Steal Your Online Credentials?
TedSamsonIW writes "InfoWorld reports on a new potential ploy for stealing Web user's private information: Researcher has found that by placing a new type of hybrid file on Web sites that let users upload their own images, they can circumvent security systems and take over Web surfers' accounts. 'They call this type of file a GIFAR, a contraction of GIF (graphics interchange format) and JAR (Java Archive), the two file-types that are mixed. At Black Hat, researchers will show attendees how to create the GIFAR while omitting a few key details to prevent it from being used immediately in any widespread attack.'" -
Windows Is Dead – Long Live Midori?
parvenu74 writes "A story from Infoworld is suggesting that the days of Windows are numbered and that Microsoft is preparing a web-based operating system code-named Midori as a successor. Midori is reported to be an offshoot of Microsoft Research's Singularity OS, an all-managed code microkernel OS which leverages a technology called software isolated processes (SIPs) to overcome the traditional inter-thread communications issues of microkernel OSes." -
San Francisco DA Discloses City's Passwords
snydeq writes "The office of San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris has made public close to 150 usernames and passwords used by various departments to connect to the city's VPN. The passwords were filed this week as Exhibit A in a court document arguing against a reduction in $5 million bail in the case against Terry Childs. Though they placed the passwords in the public record, city prosecutors do seem to think that they are sensitive. InfoWorld's Paul Venezia, who has been following the case closely, provides further analysis of the technical details in the city's case. 'By themselves, [the passwords] would not be enough to allow anyone to access the network via VPN,' Venezia writes, 'but the fact that the city entered them into evidence is quite shocking. At the very least, they'll have to shut down their VPN access for awhile until they've changed them all and modified the configurations of some large number of VPN clients.'" -
San Francisco DA Discloses City's Passwords
snydeq writes "The office of San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris has made public close to 150 usernames and passwords used by various departments to connect to the city's VPN. The passwords were filed this week as Exhibit A in a court document arguing against a reduction in $5 million bail in the case against Terry Childs. Though they placed the passwords in the public record, city prosecutors do seem to think that they are sensitive. InfoWorld's Paul Venezia, who has been following the case closely, provides further analysis of the technical details in the city's case. 'By themselves, [the passwords] would not be enough to allow anyone to access the network via VPN,' Venezia writes, 'but the fact that the city entered them into evidence is quite shocking. At the very least, they'll have to shut down their VPN access for awhile until they've changed them all and modified the configurations of some large number of VPN clients.'" -
San Francisco DA Discloses City's Passwords
snydeq writes "The office of San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris has made public close to 150 usernames and passwords used by various departments to connect to the city's VPN. The passwords were filed this week as Exhibit A in a court document arguing against a reduction in $5 million bail in the case against Terry Childs. Though they placed the passwords in the public record, city prosecutors do seem to think that they are sensitive. InfoWorld's Paul Venezia, who has been following the case closely, provides further analysis of the technical details in the city's case. 'By themselves, [the passwords] would not be enough to allow anyone to access the network via VPN,' Venezia writes, 'but the fact that the city entered them into evidence is quite shocking. At the very least, they'll have to shut down their VPN access for awhile until they've changed them all and modified the configurations of some large number of VPN clients.'" -
Critiquing Claims of an Open Source Jobs Boom
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Bill Snyder examines what appears to be an open source job market boom, as evidenced by a recent O'Reilly Report. According to the study, 5 to 15 percent of all IT openings call for open source software skills, and with overall IT job cuts expected for 2009, 'the recession may be pushing budget-strapped IT execs to examine low-cost alternatives to commercial software,' Snyder writes. But are enterprises truly shifting to open source, or are they simply seeking to augment the work of staff already steeped in proprietary software? The study's methodology leaves too much room for interpretation, Savio Rodrigues retorts. 'That's why the 5% to 15% really doesn't sit well with me,' Rodrigues writes. 'I suspect that larger companies are looking for developers with a mix of experience with proprietary and open source products, tools and frameworks,' as opposed to those who would work with open source for 90 percent of the work day." -
Critiquing Claims of an Open Source Jobs Boom
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Bill Snyder examines what appears to be an open source job market boom, as evidenced by a recent O'Reilly Report. According to the study, 5 to 15 percent of all IT openings call for open source software skills, and with overall IT job cuts expected for 2009, 'the recession may be pushing budget-strapped IT execs to examine low-cost alternatives to commercial software,' Snyder writes. But are enterprises truly shifting to open source, or are they simply seeking to augment the work of staff already steeped in proprietary software? The study's methodology leaves too much room for interpretation, Savio Rodrigues retorts. 'That's why the 5% to 15% really doesn't sit well with me,' Rodrigues writes. 'I suspect that larger companies are looking for developers with a mix of experience with proprietary and open source products, tools and frameworks,' as opposed to those who would work with open source for 90 percent of the work day." -
Critiquing Claims of an Open Source Jobs Boom
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Bill Snyder examines what appears to be an open source job market boom, as evidenced by a recent O'Reilly Report. According to the study, 5 to 15 percent of all IT openings call for open source software skills, and with overall IT job cuts expected for 2009, 'the recession may be pushing budget-strapped IT execs to examine low-cost alternatives to commercial software,' Snyder writes. But are enterprises truly shifting to open source, or are they simply seeking to augment the work of staff already steeped in proprietary software? The study's methodology leaves too much room for interpretation, Savio Rodrigues retorts. 'That's why the 5% to 15% really doesn't sit well with me,' Rodrigues writes. 'I suspect that larger companies are looking for developers with a mix of experience with proprietary and open source products, tools and frameworks,' as opposed to those who would work with open source for 90 percent of the work day." -
Critiquing Claims of an Open Source Jobs Boom
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Bill Snyder examines what appears to be an open source job market boom, as evidenced by a recent O'Reilly Report. According to the study, 5 to 15 percent of all IT openings call for open source software skills, and with overall IT job cuts expected for 2009, 'the recession may be pushing budget-strapped IT execs to examine low-cost alternatives to commercial software,' Snyder writes. But are enterprises truly shifting to open source, or are they simply seeking to augment the work of staff already steeped in proprietary software? The study's methodology leaves too much room for interpretation, Savio Rodrigues retorts. 'That's why the 5% to 15% really doesn't sit well with me,' Rodrigues writes. 'I suspect that larger companies are looking for developers with a mix of experience with proprietary and open source products, tools and frameworks,' as opposed to those who would work with open source for 90 percent of the work day." -
Inside Apple's iPhone SDK Gag Order
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Tom Yager takes a closer look at Apple's iPhone SDK confidentiality agreement, which restricts developers from discussing the SDK or exchanging ideas with others, thereby leaving no room for forums, newsgroups, open source projects, tutorials, magazine articles, users' groups, or books. But because anyone is free to obtain the iPhone SDK by signing up for it, Apple is essentially branding publicly available information as confidential. This 'puzzling contradiction' is the 'antithesis of the developer-friendly Apple Developer Connection' on which the iPhone SDK program is based, Yager contends. 'You'll see arguments from armchair legal analysts that the iPhone developer Agreements won't stand up in court — but those analysts certainly won't stand up in court on your behalf.' Anyone planning to launch an iPhone forum or open source project should have 'a lawyer draft your request for exemption, and make sure that the Apple staffer granting it personally commits to status as authorized to approve exceptions to the iPhone Registered Developer and iPhone SDK Agreements,' Yager warns." -
Inside Apple's iPhone SDK Gag Order
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Tom Yager takes a closer look at Apple's iPhone SDK confidentiality agreement, which restricts developers from discussing the SDK or exchanging ideas with others, thereby leaving no room for forums, newsgroups, open source projects, tutorials, magazine articles, users' groups, or books. But because anyone is free to obtain the iPhone SDK by signing up for it, Apple is essentially branding publicly available information as confidential. This 'puzzling contradiction' is the 'antithesis of the developer-friendly Apple Developer Connection' on which the iPhone SDK program is based, Yager contends. 'You'll see arguments from armchair legal analysts that the iPhone developer Agreements won't stand up in court — but those analysts certainly won't stand up in court on your behalf.' Anyone planning to launch an iPhone forum or open source project should have 'a lawyer draft your request for exemption, and make sure that the Apple staffer granting it personally commits to status as authorized to approve exceptions to the iPhone Registered Developer and iPhone SDK Agreements,' Yager warns." -
EC2 Vs. App Engine Vs. GoGrid Vs. AppNexus
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Peter Wayner delves into the ill-defined realm of 'cloud computing,' providing a deeper look at four shared services: Amazon EC2, Google App Engine, GoGrid, and AppNexus. Offering wildly divergent amounts of hand-holding at various layers in the stack, the services simplify your workload but force you into a set, 'ball-and-chain-computing' routine that you may not prefer. Sure, the services allow you to pull CPU cycles from thin air whenever you need to, but they can't solve the deepest problems that make it hard for applications to scale gracefully, Wayner writes. He describes these 'clouds' as an evolving experiment, rife with potential but 'far from clear winners over traditional shared Web hosting.' The sobering look at the trend includes a QuickTime tour of each service — EC2, App Engine, GoGrid, AppNexus (those links all .MOV)." -
EC2 Vs. App Engine Vs. GoGrid Vs. AppNexus
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Peter Wayner delves into the ill-defined realm of 'cloud computing,' providing a deeper look at four shared services: Amazon EC2, Google App Engine, GoGrid, and AppNexus. Offering wildly divergent amounts of hand-holding at various layers in the stack, the services simplify your workload but force you into a set, 'ball-and-chain-computing' routine that you may not prefer. Sure, the services allow you to pull CPU cycles from thin air whenever you need to, but they can't solve the deepest problems that make it hard for applications to scale gracefully, Wayner writes. He describes these 'clouds' as an evolving experiment, rife with potential but 'far from clear winners over traditional shared Web hosting.' The sobering look at the trend includes a QuickTime tour of each service — EC2, App Engine, GoGrid, AppNexus (those links all .MOV)." -
EC2 Vs. App Engine Vs. GoGrid Vs. AppNexus
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Peter Wayner delves into the ill-defined realm of 'cloud computing,' providing a deeper look at four shared services: Amazon EC2, Google App Engine, GoGrid, and AppNexus. Offering wildly divergent amounts of hand-holding at various layers in the stack, the services simplify your workload but force you into a set, 'ball-and-chain-computing' routine that you may not prefer. Sure, the services allow you to pull CPU cycles from thin air whenever you need to, but they can't solve the deepest problems that make it hard for applications to scale gracefully, Wayner writes. He describes these 'clouds' as an evolving experiment, rife with potential but 'far from clear winners over traditional shared Web hosting.' The sobering look at the trend includes a QuickTime tour of each service — EC2, App Engine, GoGrid, AppNexus (those links all .MOV)." -
EC2 Vs. App Engine Vs. GoGrid Vs. AppNexus
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Peter Wayner delves into the ill-defined realm of 'cloud computing,' providing a deeper look at four shared services: Amazon EC2, Google App Engine, GoGrid, and AppNexus. Offering wildly divergent amounts of hand-holding at various layers in the stack, the services simplify your workload but force you into a set, 'ball-and-chain-computing' routine that you may not prefer. Sure, the services allow you to pull CPU cycles from thin air whenever you need to, but they can't solve the deepest problems that make it hard for applications to scale gracefully, Wayner writes. He describes these 'clouds' as an evolving experiment, rife with potential but 'far from clear winners over traditional shared Web hosting.' The sobering look at the trend includes a QuickTime tour of each service — EC2, App Engine, GoGrid, AppNexus (those links all .MOV)." -
EC2 Vs. App Engine Vs. GoGrid Vs. AppNexus
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Peter Wayner delves into the ill-defined realm of 'cloud computing,' providing a deeper look at four shared services: Amazon EC2, Google App Engine, GoGrid, and AppNexus. Offering wildly divergent amounts of hand-holding at various layers in the stack, the services simplify your workload but force you into a set, 'ball-and-chain-computing' routine that you may not prefer. Sure, the services allow you to pull CPU cycles from thin air whenever you need to, but they can't solve the deepest problems that make it hard for applications to scale gracefully, Wayner writes. He describes these 'clouds' as an evolving experiment, rife with potential but 'far from clear winners over traditional shared Web hosting.' The sobering look at the trend includes a QuickTime tour of each service — EC2, App Engine, GoGrid, AppNexus (those links all .MOV)." -
EC2 Vs. App Engine Vs. GoGrid Vs. AppNexus
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Peter Wayner delves into the ill-defined realm of 'cloud computing,' providing a deeper look at four shared services: Amazon EC2, Google App Engine, GoGrid, and AppNexus. Offering wildly divergent amounts of hand-holding at various layers in the stack, the services simplify your workload but force you into a set, 'ball-and-chain-computing' routine that you may not prefer. Sure, the services allow you to pull CPU cycles from thin air whenever you need to, but they can't solve the deepest problems that make it hard for applications to scale gracefully, Wayner writes. He describes these 'clouds' as an evolving experiment, rife with potential but 'far from clear winners over traditional shared Web hosting.' The sobering look at the trend includes a QuickTime tour of each service — EC2, App Engine, GoGrid, AppNexus (those links all .MOV)." -
SF Admin Gives Up Keys To Hijacked City Network
snydeq writes "Jailed IT admin Terry Childs relinquished his hold over San Francisco's multimillion-dollar FiberWAN, handing his administrative passwords over to San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who was 'the only person he felt he could trust.' Childs is still being held on $5 million bail for his lockout of the city's FiberWAN, a case that has been called into question since an insider came forward with details about both the network and Childs himself. The case hinges on No Service Password Recovery commands Childs allegedly configured onto several Cisco devices, as well as dial-up and DSL modems the SFPD has discovered that would allow unauthorized connections to the FiberWAN. Childs intends to 'expose the utter mismanagement, negligence, and corruption at DTIS, which if left unchecked, will in fact place the City of San Francisco in danger,' according to his motion. The Department of Telecom and IS has cut 200 of its 350 IT positions since 2000 — pressure that may have contributed to Childs' actions, according to interviews with current and former DTIS staffers. Newsom secured the passwords without first telling the DTIS that he was meeting with Childs." -
SF Admin Gives Up Keys To Hijacked City Network
snydeq writes "Jailed IT admin Terry Childs relinquished his hold over San Francisco's multimillion-dollar FiberWAN, handing his administrative passwords over to San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who was 'the only person he felt he could trust.' Childs is still being held on $5 million bail for his lockout of the city's FiberWAN, a case that has been called into question since an insider came forward with details about both the network and Childs himself. The case hinges on No Service Password Recovery commands Childs allegedly configured onto several Cisco devices, as well as dial-up and DSL modems the SFPD has discovered that would allow unauthorized connections to the FiberWAN. Childs intends to 'expose the utter mismanagement, negligence, and corruption at DTIS, which if left unchecked, will in fact place the City of San Francisco in danger,' according to his motion. The Department of Telecom and IS has cut 200 of its 350 IT positions since 2000 — pressure that may have contributed to Childs' actions, according to interviews with current and former DTIS staffers. Newsom secured the passwords without first telling the DTIS that he was meeting with Childs." -
SF Admin Gives Up Keys To Hijacked City Network
snydeq writes "Jailed IT admin Terry Childs relinquished his hold over San Francisco's multimillion-dollar FiberWAN, handing his administrative passwords over to San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who was 'the only person he felt he could trust.' Childs is still being held on $5 million bail for his lockout of the city's FiberWAN, a case that has been called into question since an insider came forward with details about both the network and Childs himself. The case hinges on No Service Password Recovery commands Childs allegedly configured onto several Cisco devices, as well as dial-up and DSL modems the SFPD has discovered that would allow unauthorized connections to the FiberWAN. Childs intends to 'expose the utter mismanagement, negligence, and corruption at DTIS, which if left unchecked, will in fact place the City of San Francisco in danger,' according to his motion. The Department of Telecom and IS has cut 200 of its 350 IT positions since 2000 — pressure that may have contributed to Childs' actions, according to interviews with current and former DTIS staffers. Newsom secured the passwords without first telling the DTIS that he was meeting with Childs." -
The Inside Story On the San Francisco Network Hijacking
snydeq writes "A source with direct knowledge of San Francisco's IT infrastructure has tipped off Paul Venezia to the real story behind Terry Childs' lockout of San Francisco's network, providing a detailed account of the city's FiberWAN, interdepartmental politics, and Terry Childs himself. Childs pleaded not guilty to charges of tampering yesterday and is being held on $5 million bail. According to the source, Childs' purview was limited to the city's FiberWAN — a network he himself built and, believing no one competent enough to touch the network but himself, guarded religiously, sharing details with no one, including routing configuration and log-in information. Childs was so concerned about the network's security that he refused even to write router and switch configurations to flash. But what may prove difficult for the prosecution in its case against Childs is that his restricted access to the network was widely known and accepted among managers and the city's other network engineers. Venezia, who has been suspicious of the official story from the start, suspects that the Childs case may be that 'of an overprotective admin who believed he was protecting the network — and by extension, the city — from other administrators whom he considered inferior, and perhaps even dangerous.' Further evidence is that fact that the network, from what Venezia understands, has been running smoothly since Childs' arrest." -
The Inside Story On the San Francisco Network Hijacking
snydeq writes "A source with direct knowledge of San Francisco's IT infrastructure has tipped off Paul Venezia to the real story behind Terry Childs' lockout of San Francisco's network, providing a detailed account of the city's FiberWAN, interdepartmental politics, and Terry Childs himself. Childs pleaded not guilty to charges of tampering yesterday and is being held on $5 million bail. According to the source, Childs' purview was limited to the city's FiberWAN — a network he himself built and, believing no one competent enough to touch the network but himself, guarded religiously, sharing details with no one, including routing configuration and log-in information. Childs was so concerned about the network's security that he refused even to write router and switch configurations to flash. But what may prove difficult for the prosecution in its case against Childs is that his restricted access to the network was widely known and accepted among managers and the city's other network engineers. Venezia, who has been suspicious of the official story from the start, suspects that the Childs case may be that 'of an overprotective admin who believed he was protecting the network — and by extension, the city — from other administrators whom he considered inferior, and perhaps even dangerous.' Further evidence is that fact that the network, from what Venezia understands, has been running smoothly since Childs' arrest." -
The Inside Story On the San Francisco Network Hijacking
snydeq writes "A source with direct knowledge of San Francisco's IT infrastructure has tipped off Paul Venezia to the real story behind Terry Childs' lockout of San Francisco's network, providing a detailed account of the city's FiberWAN, interdepartmental politics, and Terry Childs himself. Childs pleaded not guilty to charges of tampering yesterday and is being held on $5 million bail. According to the source, Childs' purview was limited to the city's FiberWAN — a network he himself built and, believing no one competent enough to touch the network but himself, guarded religiously, sharing details with no one, including routing configuration and log-in information. Childs was so concerned about the network's security that he refused even to write router and switch configurations to flash. But what may prove difficult for the prosecution in its case against Childs is that his restricted access to the network was widely known and accepted among managers and the city's other network engineers. Venezia, who has been suspicious of the official story from the start, suspects that the Childs case may be that 'of an overprotective admin who believed he was protecting the network — and by extension, the city — from other administrators whom he considered inferior, and perhaps even dangerous.' Further evidence is that fact that the network, from what Venezia understands, has been running smoothly since Childs' arrest." -
The Inside Story On the San Francisco Network Hijacking
snydeq writes "A source with direct knowledge of San Francisco's IT infrastructure has tipped off Paul Venezia to the real story behind Terry Childs' lockout of San Francisco's network, providing a detailed account of the city's FiberWAN, interdepartmental politics, and Terry Childs himself. Childs pleaded not guilty to charges of tampering yesterday and is being held on $5 million bail. According to the source, Childs' purview was limited to the city's FiberWAN — a network he himself built and, believing no one competent enough to touch the network but himself, guarded religiously, sharing details with no one, including routing configuration and log-in information. Childs was so concerned about the network's security that he refused even to write router and switch configurations to flash. But what may prove difficult for the prosecution in its case against Childs is that his restricted access to the network was widely known and accepted among managers and the city's other network engineers. Venezia, who has been suspicious of the official story from the start, suspects that the Childs case may be that 'of an overprotective admin who believed he was protecting the network — and by extension, the city — from other administrators whom he considered inferior, and perhaps even dangerous.' Further evidence is that fact that the network, from what Venezia understands, has been running smoothly since Childs' arrest." -
The Inside Story On the San Francisco Network Hijacking
snydeq writes "A source with direct knowledge of San Francisco's IT infrastructure has tipped off Paul Venezia to the real story behind Terry Childs' lockout of San Francisco's network, providing a detailed account of the city's FiberWAN, interdepartmental politics, and Terry Childs himself. Childs pleaded not guilty to charges of tampering yesterday and is being held on $5 million bail. According to the source, Childs' purview was limited to the city's FiberWAN — a network he himself built and, believing no one competent enough to touch the network but himself, guarded religiously, sharing details with no one, including routing configuration and log-in information. Childs was so concerned about the network's security that he refused even to write router and switch configurations to flash. But what may prove difficult for the prosecution in its case against Childs is that his restricted access to the network was widely known and accepted among managers and the city's other network engineers. Venezia, who has been suspicious of the official story from the start, suspects that the Childs case may be that 'of an overprotective admin who believed he was protecting the network — and by extension, the city — from other administrators whom he considered inferior, and perhaps even dangerous.' Further evidence is that fact that the network, from what Venezia understands, has been running smoothly since Childs' arrest." -
Worm Transcodes MP3s To Infect PCs
snydeq writes "Kaspersky Labs has discovered malware that inserts links to malicious Web pages within ASF media files, posing a danger to Windows users who download music files from P2P networks. Infected files launch IE and load a page that asks the user to download a codec. The download, a Trojan horse, installs a proxy program to route other traffic through the PC. The malware also has worm-like qualities, according to Secure Computing. It searches for MP3s, transcodes them to WMA format, wraps them in an ASF container, and adds links to further copies of the malware, all without modifying the .MP3 extension." -
Worm Transcodes MP3s To Infect PCs
snydeq writes "Kaspersky Labs has discovered malware that inserts links to malicious Web pages within ASF media files, posing a danger to Windows users who download music files from P2P networks. Infected files launch IE and load a page that asks the user to download a codec. The download, a Trojan horse, installs a proxy program to route other traffic through the PC. The malware also has worm-like qualities, according to Secure Computing. It searches for MP3s, transcodes them to WMA format, wraps them in an ASF container, and adds links to further copies of the malware, all without modifying the .MP3 extension." -
Making the Switch To Windows "Workstation" 2008
snydeq writes "Disenchanted with Vista? Why not convert Windows Server 2008 into the lean, efficient, reliable 'power user' OS that Windows should be? InfoWorld's Randall Kennedy, who has been using a converted 'Workstation' 2008 as his primary OS since hitting a wall using Vista as a Visual Studio development platform four months ago, says the guerrilla OS has turned his Dell notebook into a well-oiled machine that never gets sluggish and rarely needs to reboot. Those interested in making the switch should check out win2008workstation.com, a clearinghouse for 'Workstation' 2008 tips and techniques. Kennedy also offers a link to a Windows 2008 Workstation Converter utility for those looking to quickly convert a fresh Server 2008 install without hacking the registry or manually installing/enabling lots of services and features." -
Making the Switch To Windows "Workstation" 2008
snydeq writes "Disenchanted with Vista? Why not convert Windows Server 2008 into the lean, efficient, reliable 'power user' OS that Windows should be? InfoWorld's Randall Kennedy, who has been using a converted 'Workstation' 2008 as his primary OS since hitting a wall using Vista as a Visual Studio development platform four months ago, says the guerrilla OS has turned his Dell notebook into a well-oiled machine that never gets sluggish and rarely needs to reboot. Those interested in making the switch should check out win2008workstation.com, a clearinghouse for 'Workstation' 2008 tips and techniques. Kennedy also offers a link to a Windows 2008 Workstation Converter utility for those looking to quickly convert a fresh Server 2008 install without hacking the registry or manually installing/enabling lots of services and features." -
Kaspersky To Demo Attack Code For Intel Chips
snydeq writes "Kris Kaspersky will demonstrate how attackers can target flaws in Intel microprocessors to remotely attack a computer using JavaScript or TCP/IP packets, regardless of OS. The demo will be presented at the Hack In The Box Security Conference in Kuala Lumpur in October and will show how processor bugs can be exploited using certain instruction sequences and a knowledge of how Java compilers work, allowing an attacker to take control of the compiler. The demonstrated attack will be made against fully patched computers running a range of OSes, including Windows XP, Vista, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, Linux, and BSD. An attack against a Mac is also a possibility." -
Kaspersky To Demo Attack Code For Intel Chips
snydeq writes "Kris Kaspersky will demonstrate how attackers can target flaws in Intel microprocessors to remotely attack a computer using JavaScript or TCP/IP packets, regardless of OS. The demo will be presented at the Hack In The Box Security Conference in Kuala Lumpur in October and will show how processor bugs can be exploited using certain instruction sequences and a knowledge of how Java compilers work, allowing an attacker to take control of the compiler. The demonstrated attack will be made against fully patched computers running a range of OSes, including Windows XP, Vista, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, Linux, and BSD. An attack against a Mac is also a possibility." -
The Web Development Skills Crisis
snydeq writes "Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister raises questions regarding Web development skills in an era of constant innovation. Sure, low barriers to entry give underdog technologies ample opportunity to thrive without the backing of name-brand vendors. But doesn't this fragmentation of the Web development market put undue pressure on developers to specialize? Choosing one tool to be your bread and butter from a field this broad is one thing, McAllister writes. Recruiting talent for a Web project when your technology requirements eliminate most of the applicants is another. The result is a crisis, McAllister concludes, one in which maintaining a marketable skill set gets more and more difficult as the so-called state of the art changes on an almost daily basis." -
The Web Development Skills Crisis
snydeq writes "Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister raises questions regarding Web development skills in an era of constant innovation. Sure, low barriers to entry give underdog technologies ample opportunity to thrive without the backing of name-brand vendors. But doesn't this fragmentation of the Web development market put undue pressure on developers to specialize? Choosing one tool to be your bread and butter from a field this broad is one thing, McAllister writes. Recruiting talent for a Web project when your technology requirements eliminate most of the applicants is another. The result is a crisis, McAllister concludes, one in which maintaining a marketable skill set gets more and more difficult as the so-called state of the art changes on an almost daily basis." -
AT&T To Offer No-Contract iPhone
rfc1394 writes "While the regular price of an iPhone is $199 if you take a 2-year contract with AT&T, if you're willing to pay a lot more you can get one without a contract. An article in InfoWorld mentions that 'Freedom will come with a price — $599 for an 8GB device and $699 for a 16GB — but this will mark the first time consumers in the United States are able to buy an iPhone without being tied down to a two-year contract. The phone probably would still be locked for use only on AT&T's network, said Jupiter Research analyst Michael Gartenberg. But buyers could choose a pay-as-you-go plan for voice service.' The question still remains, does it make any sense to pay that much for a phone that is still locked to AT&T's network even if you aren't bound to a contract?" Update: 07/05 18:21 GMT by T : An anonymous reader suggests that there is a convoluted but possibly cheaper route to an new, unlocked iPhone.