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Domain: slappy.org
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Comments · 260
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You have nailed it!I don't spite, nor begrudge my colleagues, Brett. Rather, I say, use what works for you. You, on the other hand, *DO* begrudge any and all who use the GPL. You insist that all people coding open source software release it in a way *YOU* can take and make money on. I don't suppose you feel any desire to then funnel a fair amount back to the coders, do you? No. You'd rather that coders just give you stuff, to hell with their rights, time, etc.
This is one of the best summaries of how the anti-GPL people come off to GPL people. They rant and rave about "freedom," when in fact what they really want is the "freedom" to restrict what others can do with software (i.e., restrictive binary licensing). But, what's worse is that they want a free ride from Free Software authors while doing so.
If that isn't downright despicable, I don't know what is.
Look, I have no problem with the BSD License, and similar licenses, as a general rule. It's not what I prefer, but I understand that some people prefer them. The GPL advocates I see posts from seem to feel the same way Now, if we could just get the remaining few rabid anti-GPL advocates to take the same view, everyone can be happy.
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A question for youIs there some magical "fairy dust" that gets sprinkled on to government employees that makes them immune to the temptations that apparently mere mortals cannot be trusted with?
Really. Think about it honestly, just briefly.
Honest. Goverment employees are still human, and therefore fallible, last I checked.
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Absoultely correctWhen Australians were coerced into "turning in" (a misnomer) most of their firearms, it was inevitable that their speech would be next to go.
There are a heck of a lot of people who will argue until they're blue in the face that there is no relation between the two, but remember what Mao said:
Every Communist must grasp the truth, "Political power rows out of the barrel of a gun."
It applies to more than just Communists.
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Re:Unix users left out in the coldHow terribly, terribly disappointing!
Why is it disappointing? If you don't need/like/want the "user experience" of KDE or GNOME, wouldn't you just use one of the numerous other UIs out there (including the plain old console)?
That's the great thing about the Free Unix scene; we've got more UI choices than you can shake a stick at.
I'd guess that the KDE team is not targeting its interface at UNIX old-timers, because UNIX old-timers aren't really clamoring for anything resembling KDE, wouldn't you say? If you've followed the KDE project from the beginning, you know that the goal has *always* been to make UNIX useable as a desktop operating system for the masses. I think they're moving towards achieving that goal.
Still, I find KDE useful, and am really looking forward to KDE 2.0 with KOffice. It's quite flexible, so I can create pretty much just the kind of interface I prefer...now if I could just convince them to add a few more virtual desktops (8 is not enough)...
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Alpha, Beta...let's call the whole thing off.Isn't the whole alpha/beta/gamma thing kind of irrelevant when you're talking about open source software, anyhow? Open source software, by its nature, is always under development, and is always in the cycle of feature addition/bug fixing/etc.
Seems to me that the Linux model of devel tree and stable tree is much more appropriate. When Mozilla is ready to start a stable branch (and it's getting fairly close), then I think that's what they should do.
Leave the "alphas" and "betas" to the Netscape Communicator crew.
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Just use plain CVS
I'm using everything straight from CVS, like the FAQ says, and it works great with Quake 3 demo test on my G200. 800x600/vertex, decent frame rate.
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You are so rightI have brought this up numerous times here on Slashdot, to no avail. Your comparison to manufacturing is right on; one simply cannot pretend that education is like making widgets.
I think the point you made about the fact that DC schools were spending *more* money than comparative public schools in North Suburban Chicago is the strongest argument I've ever seen (even stronger than the considerable evidence regarding private schools, perhaps) in support of the idea that, given some minimal level of infrastructure and salary expenditure, additional funds are completely irrelevant to the quality of eductation provided.
Sadly, until more people realize this, and start holding the educational bureaucrats responsible, little will be accomplished.
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PGPM-x spook, and other means of inserting suspicious keywords are nice, but imagine how much more material we could make the NSA chase if even half your outgoing mail was PGP encrypted!
If you don't have GnuPG or PGP, get it now, and start using it!
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Re:The New World Orderbut do you really think they give a flying f**k about a bunch of Linux-loving, long-haired nerds?
Well, that's kind of the point, isn't it?
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The Tyranny of SafetyJackbooted government thugs will do anything now in the name of "safety," and the average person will support such actions, because the average person is a coward.
Our firearms are gradually being taken from us, leaving only government with any real power. Now, our speech is being taken from us, gradually, just like the guns, and we won't be able to do anything about it, even if we wanted to.
Everything now is done in the name of "safety." Liberty means nothing to the average Joe. We now live in an oppressive quasi-matriarchy, where freedom means "the freedom to not do unsafe things."
I'm sure a lot of people will object to what I say, but I don't care. That's how I feel about it. I think we need to get back to trying to preserve our Liberty, instead of trying to deny our humanity.
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Slashdot load average6. A faster connection to
It's probably not your connection; the load average on Slashdot has been obscene the last couple of mornings, like around 30.
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KMail progress?KMail seems to be progressing along nicely. Along with Spruce and others, KMail seems to be one of the better mailers for Linux. However, from using Windows, I still look for a mailer similar to Eudora. Yes, I know there's XFMail, but its interface is kinda dated
So, are there any plans to add a Eudora-like mode to KMail, or to create a Eudora-like mailer for KDE?
Alex Bischoff
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Prayer port?
prayer 7777/tcp #prayer
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Now, wait just a minute...Praying never accomplished anything other wasting time that could have been used productively.
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Absolutely shocking.The number of people posting in this thread who still think that one can achieve security through obscurity, that is.
This is Slashdot, isn't it?
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Re:Patents on slashdotWell, you may well have a point.
In the past, it was my opinion that patents were generally a good thing, and encouraged innovation. I believed that software patents, for a number of reasons, were uniquely bad, because they differed in many ways from other types of patents.
But the sheer idiocy behind some of the patents granted I've seen recently is slowly turning my opinion around. I am starting to believe that patents are just a bad idea, period. They do not protect the "little guy"; instead they are horded by large corporations. And, really, if an idea is truly good, you should be able to make money actually producing the product or service it covers. True, someone else could do the same, but if the idea truly is unique and non-obvious, you should still have a leg up for a while.
It's just getting to the point, I'm afraid, where the negative effects of patents are beginning to outweigh the positives.
If eliminating patents all together is too radical a solution, perhaps some reform of the patent system is in order; patent length could be shortened, competent patent examiners could be hired, a limit on the number of patents per individual/organization could be instituted, etc.
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Re:Patents on slashdotDoes anyone else think that it would be better either to make a patent section on Slashdot, or start a seperate protest website for this stuff?
I don't. I want to hear about this stuff. I want others to hear about it, too. I want something done about these ridiculous patents.
The problem isn't that articles about stupid patents are being posted on Slashdot; the problem is that the patents are being granted.
Something needs to be done to stop these patents, and fast!
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This is just sillyI hereby patent displaying any Windows program on an LCD screen on Tuesdays!
The whole patent system is increasing resembling the Slashdot "First Post" phenomenon. It's not about ingenuity, invention or originality. It's just about being the first to submit something.
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DOH!
Yes. Now I remember.
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Actually...
I think you're talking about GABBO!
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Hey, ease up on jwzWhat you say about XEmacs is demonstrably false.
Try it. Go ahead, select some text in XEmacs, click outside the selected region to deselect, then middle-click to paste. Wa la.
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Re:Full of assumptionsWhat I'm trying to say is that the only *tangible* thing you're buying, really, from the proprietary vendors is support.
I say that because the original poster was talking about ratios of customer profits as if the more copies out there, the more costs were being incurred by the vendor. That's clearly not the case; the only costs they really incur are from support. Thus, I claim, that what you are *really* buying from the proprietary vendors is, in fact, support.
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Full of assumptionsYou're still viewing the whole software industry through industrial-age goggles.
Software distribution is not like typewriter manufacturing, particularly when it is done via ftp.
Yes, there are up-front costs, but the "manufacturing" costs and distribution costs are trivial when an Internet-based distribution method is used.
Even in the more traditional software industry, you don't seem to understand something: support *is* what you're really paying for. Yes, people operate under the fallacy that they're purchasing software, but they're wrong; hasn't anyone read their EULAs?
So, what are they buying, really? A license? How expensive is that to "manufacture?" No, what they're really paying for is support, just like they do in the Free Software model. The big difference? The Free Software vendors are honest about what they're selling.
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Can't wait 'til Sept. 2000Consider that there continues to be no open-source alternative at the strength and dependibility of the RSA product. Consider also that this is an area key to the viability of Linux as a serious alternative operating system.
Sure there is. OpenSSL. It's just not usable in the US (at least for commercial use, and only if you use RSAREF), because of stupid software patents.
But next year, the patent *finally* goes away, and we should be able to use OpenSSL at long last.
Argh. Software patents suck!
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OK...I stand corrected then.In my defense, Microsoft has been *claiming* NTFS is a journaling file system since NT 3.1 was introduced. I guess I'm not really surprised to learn that that's not entirely true.
Apparently it does something kind of, almost like journaling, but not quite.
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Re:Desktop LinuxMinor nitpick:
Windows 1.0 wasn't released until 1985, to the best of my knowledge.
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What the hell?Now, anyone who reads my comments knows I'm about as anti-MS as anyone, but...
Where the hell does this writer come off saying that NT 4.0 lacks a journaling file system?
NTFS has had journaling since 1993, as far as I know.
OTOH, It fragments very badly, but so does ext2.
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Mozilla is looking goodIt looks quite a bit better than even a few months ago.
I can build and *run* from CVS now, and the only thing I needed to do was update libIDL. It's still a *little* crashy, but really not that bad. They do still have some memory usage issues, though.
The page rendering is great, and forms work better than they did before.
I think they'll be able to have a decent beta by the end of the year.
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OT: colors3) What the hell is wrong with the colors on this message? No offense to whosever idea this was, but the usual green and white looks much better.
I think this is the color scheme for the "Your Rights Online" subsection that this article belongs to. It has its own color scheme, like "Ask Slashdot" does.
I agree; the colors don't fit. Especially with the green/white Slashdot logo at the top.
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Already been doneI mean what are they gunna make disposible next....computers?
Packard Bell already thought of this, and for years sucessfully marketed computers which were ready to be tossed in the trash as soon as you took them out of the box.
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Re:Yes and noOnce everyone's compliant with YOUR stuff, just change the terms of the agreements, knowing that those who've signed up HAVE to comply or risk being destroyed by market forces.
But, you're still thinking about thing in terms of government that is designed to assist business.
Consider the following, provided by government:
- Civil courts
- Copyright laws
- Police power
Now, I'm not saying that we should necessarily abolish the above, but consider: how would Microsoft enforce its monopoly if it was without these governmental resources (barring a private Microsoft police force/army...*shudder*)? Who would enforce the OEM/ISV agreements in absence of civil court authority? Who would stop Joe Blow from selling unauthorized copies of Microsoft Office?
My point is simply that it is not as simple as government good, corporation bad. They tend to work together to crush the little guy. Governments need money to run...large corporations have lots of money; you have less. Not too hard to figure out who will always control whatever government power there is. So, I prefer the minimum amount of government necessary to prevent mayhem.
There is no easy answer. If there was, we'd have figured it out long ago.
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Re:Yes and noCan you imagine what life would be like, without regulation, and the only TV stations with licences are all Microsoft-run, the only pre-packaged food you can buy was all Microsoft-made, and could only be cooked in a Microsoft oven, the only software you could buy was all Microsoft-made, and the only Internet ISPs and backbones were all Microsoft-run?
Such a scenario is only possible when government power is available to Microsoft, in order to enforce their monopoly. Without it, they would be forced to compete.
I don't believe in letting someone wield god-like power on the hope (and prayer) that they'll be a benevolent God.
Sure you do. You just limit god-like power to people employed by governments. Personally, I don't believe that the fact that someone has been hired by a government magically transforms them into some sort of all-knowing, eternally wise, super-human.
Remember: Microsoft used government power to enforce the exclusive agreements they set up with OEMs and ISVs.
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Re:Change the revenue streamWell, I certainly don't claim to have all the answers. I was just suggesting that a user-funded organization may be somewhat more effective than an industry-funded one.
What I picture as a somewhat effective "International Internet Users Association:"
- Reasonable yearly fees: ~US$25-50/year
- Not primarily legal oriented; more of a "there are a lot of us, so you'd be wise to deal with us fairly" sort of thing
- User fees would fund arbitrators/negotiators who would help resolve conflicts
- Member benefits to encourage membership would probably include an email address and access to the association's database of vendor data
I still don't think legislation is the answer, partially because the Internet is super-national; it exists beyond traditional national boundaries.
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Change the revenue streamIt seems to me that privacy is a pretty desirable thing among most Internet users. And, it's clear that an organization is most accountable to the people who fund it. So, why not have an organization somewhat like the AAA (American Automobile Association), that is funded (at least primarily) directly by the users? I'm guessing a lot of people would be willing to spend $25 per year for an organization of this type.
If this sounds stupid, please excuse...it's pretty early in the morning right now.
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Re:AOL users don't know what browser there usingPlease stop FUDding. We're obviously talking about *after* the release of Netscape 5.0, which will be based on Mozilla, and bears little resemblance to the old proprietary code base.
Mozilla is stable enough for me to use right now, as I'm posting with it; it should be quite stable by the time it gets put into Communicator 5.
Besides that, Netscape 4.x isn't *that* unstable. I manage to keep it running for a couple of days, usually. It just has a huge memory leak.
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Re:How does this crap get a score of 1?Posts by people who are logged in start with a default score of 1. Anonymous Coward posts start at 0. His post has not (yet) been moderated.
Posts by people with high karma who are logged in start with a score of 2; that's why if you look at this one, it will start off at 2.
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Re:Three letters: A-O-LWell...I'm certainly not going to argue with *you*...
Of course, as you point out, the Netcenter portal was the key reason for the acquisition. I was trying to say, but failing to make it clear, that it is my belief that when you own something as valuable as Netscape Communicator, you don't generally throw it away. It still has value. Also, I believe that I had heard shortly after the acquisition that AOL fully intended to move to Navigator 5 at some point for the AOL browser component. And when they do, it *will* have a significant effect on browser share stats...no two ways about it.
Don't count on AOL to save the day.
I'm not. I'm well aware of you feelings about the Mozilla project, and I agree to an extent about the failure of the project to achieve significant goals. Nevertheless, they are going to ship something *eventually*, and when they do, it will still attract a fair amount of interest.
I guess I'm just trying to tell people that there is no reason to panic. People like to get themselves worked up into a frenzy over software "wars," and I really don't think there's any reason to do so. The Mozilla source is out there; so is the Linux source, the FreeBSD source, the OpenBSD source, and the Xscreensaver source (:-)). It's not going away; there will be a significant number of people who wish to use it for the forseeable future, so it can be maintained.
There's just no reason to panic...at least not now, in my opinion.
Thanks for responding, BTW!
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Re:Three letters: A-O-LWhat do you mean? If there's no other browser on the scene?!?
Hello? AOL owns Netscape. Do you think they are going to just let that investment go to waste? Of course not! AOL is going to replace IE with Netscape in their client; it's just a matter of time.
Then, we will see the resurgence of Netscape...and just how much AOL skews the browser usage numbers.
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Three letters: A-O-LWhen AOL switches back to Netscape, the numbers will look a *lot* different.
No reason to panic yet.
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Re:Innovative mouse; the Lurker emerges
Yes. Mouse Systems did a lot of cool stuff. Just the other day, I happened to look at the bottom of an optical mouse hooked to our SPARC Classic, and the name on it: Mouse System. I had no idea they made those optical mice. Cool stuff.
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Re: On behalf of the consumerI rememeber this very well -- it was a "bonus pack" in warp 3 for internet support, and then you had to download a 3rd party driver for PPP support.
You have a poor memory. OS/2 Warp 3 (Red Box) initially shipped (in October 1994) with an unfinished "Dial Other Internet Providers" tool. You had to download the updated tool to get PPP. It came from IBM, not a third party. This was only the case for Red Box Warp. Blue Box Warp 3 (which included Win-OS/2) never had this problem, as it shipped later. Warp 4 (released 1996) came with the full TCP/IP stack, and Peer to Peer.
OS/2 never stood a chance, regardless of anything IBM did. Microsoft had already blanketed the industry with illegal exclusive preload deals.
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Re: On behalf of the consumerNonsense. Microsoft got where they are through exclusive contracts that guaranteed that they, and they alone, would have a steady income from OEM sales.
The only areas where they truly dominate are Windows/IE and Office, both of which are the benificiaries of exclusive preload deals.
Microsoft knows they write inferior software; otherwise, they would not focus so much of their energies on preventing anyone from competing with them.
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Which Linux?Just wait till Linux is on 99% of desktops...
Which Linux distribution? Oh...you must have thought we were dozing off and not paying attention. No, we're not as stupid as you think we are. We know the difference between Free Software and proprietary, closed software.
If there were as many companies selling Windows as there are selling Linux, we wouldn't be in this mess right now.
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OT: Secure-Linux patchI should add that I installed the Secure-Linux patch on one of my Linux boxes, and then temporarily installed ProFTPd 1.2.0pre1 (a known vulnerable version) on it. I tested it with one of the exploits that we know works, and with Secure-Linux, the exploit failed. Pretty neat.
Secure-Linux won't necessarily keep you safe from every potential exploit, but if you keep up to date, it will at least lessen your chances of getting bit by a heretofore-unknown exploit.
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Re:Why did you wish you choose BSD?Yes. I too, wondered exactly what he meant by that statement. Was he saying that he wished he had chosen OpenBSD in retrospect because:
- He is under attack from script kiddies and thinks he might be more secure with OpenBSD, or
- He is getting tired of all the people asking him why he didn't choose OpenBSD
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Re:X Crashing?Netscape doesn't crash very often for me; it does, however have a memory leak the size of the Colorado River. So, I ususally restart it every couple/few days.
But, Netscape, being a closed-source program, is hardly typical. Everything else I run, other than StarOffice (which I only use on occasion), is Free Software, and it doesn't tend to have those kinds of problems (and when it does, it gets fixed pretty quickly).
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Re:I hope so...
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Hash: SHA1
Easy to duplicate? I think not.
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=rvgZ
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Re:I hope so...
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Easy to duplicate? I think not. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v0.9.8 (GNU/Linux) Comment: For info see http://www.gnupg.org iD8DBQE4IEh8KV5kReY9sP8RAn8JAKCZKGZ23q5U8NBxFrVyQ
+ DNiYollQCfZ8vP pqUx8DUPME1AjzB1bqdDD08= =rvgZ -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
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Re:Pricing StructureWho in there right mind would USE NT's SAM to store web users info.
Let me clarify that a bit: Who in their right mind would use NT?
I mean, you're trying to apply rational decisions to people who are using something (NT) that they would not be using if they were thinking rationally.
So, yes, it seems quite possible that the kind of people who would use NT as a web server platform may well be using NT authentication. IIS/MS-SQL kind of steers you that way, too. The real question is whether this licensing applies anyhow, even if you're not using NT authentication (i.e., if you're using another auth scheme), which is not entirely clear. Or what if you're authenticating from another Microsoft-based source (i.e., from a table in SQL Server)?
Oh, and FYI, NT can take 24 hours or more to CHKDSK a large NTFS drive, under certain circumstances (I personally saw a 1.5 hour CHKDSK on a 4 MB partition).
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Linux wins in TCO, tooAt least for servers, there is no *(@#(*@ way you're going to convince me that the buggy black box that is Windows NT is cheaper to deploy and maintain than Linux.
NT is notorious for acquiring mysterious problems that invoke downtime and long, tedious sessions of trying to figure out what the proper chant is that will make the problem go away.
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