Slashdot Mirror

paladino writes: "The LA County Tax Collectors office wants to collect property taxes from Huges Electronics for the value of their satellites orbiting the earth. They say 'satellites are no different from other movable personal property that he has authority to tax.'" Perhaps LA will need to open a lot for satellites confiscated for non-payment, too. See also The Man Who Owned the Moon by Robert A. Heinlein. Update: 07/11 02:02 PM by J : OK, OK, it's The Man Who Sold the Moon - blame me for this one. Timothy foolishly trusted my brain. /me runs memtest86 on his cranium

proclus writes: "The FreeBSD ports system has been ported to Mac OSX, GNU/Linux, LinuxPPC, and OpenBSD. Check out this descriptive paper and roll your own ports-based distribution." Besides an some informative description of the mechanics of the port system, the paper lays out the case for ports (free and readily available) as a good antidote for .Net and other subscription-based systems.

Milo_Mindbender writes "I'm working on designing a simulator cockpit, similar to the one shown here (about half way down the page) that I helped design while Chief Engineer at Virtual World Entertainment, in the mid 90's, for playing high-end multiplayer simulation games. I need a device to use for multiple small 'instrument panel' screens as seen in the photos. It needs to be off-the-shelf, panel mountable, color, under $400 in quantity, have USB to connect to the cockpit's main PC and have a CPU so it can generate or update simple graphics locally. The perfect thing would be a PDA minus batteries, case and with the ability to poll 8 or so buttons. Support for Embedded Linux would be nice too. Any ideas?"

Saint Aardvark writes "The National Post has an article posted about Peter de Jager, the Canadian computer consultant who helped publicise Y2K. He's taken the post-letdown criticism pretty hard, pointing out that he wrote in 1998 that the problem was effectively solved. It's a fascinating read."

Saint Aardvark writes: "CNN reports here that a new flying wing is being powered by a combination of solar panels and fuel cells that suck up 100kWh every *day*. They hope to keep these(unmanned) babies up for six months at a time -- essentially making them cheap satellites. The $12 million price tag puts it a little out of reach for me and thee right now, but just wait 'til they get open-sourced...:-)" The question is, will this help meet my unbound desire for cheap, ubiquitous, unmetered, wireless Internet access?

SirTimbly writes about QNX: "This little OS is making a big stir lately with big companies. The QNX operating system (pronounced Q-nux) has been rumored lately to be in favor of such companies as CISCO and Palm. This is an embedded OS currently used in Netpliance's i-Opener; it was developed by 3Com and is being used in their latest Internet appliance as well. Read more about this non open-source OS in a ZDNet story here."

QNX might not be new, but SirTimbly is right about it making a stir. Max von H. writes: "Audrey, the household net appliance from 3Com/ergo has been officially released, and there's even an official site on which you can smile at the design. The beast runs QNX/Neutrino, as stated in this ZDNet story. The sweet thing is it can sync with two PalmOS devices, which can make a geek couple's life much easier without having to fumble with a real PC. Say what you want, but Audrey could possibly be successful since anybody can use it, and 3Com has shown a simple system rules when it comes to do simple things."

And no mention of QNX is complete without a reference to the QNX demo disk, which packs a pretty amazing set of features onto a floppy. Here too, it's free, but not Free.

Returning with another science fiction review, Duncan Lawie takes a look at Revelation Space. Written by Alastair Reynolds, this is the author's first book length effort - and it looks good. Revelation Space author Alastair Reynolds pages 470 publisher USA: To Be Published by Ace rating 8.5/10 reviewer Duncan Lawie ISBN 0575068760 summary Fiercely intelligent hard science fiction, bursting with ideas and rich with plot.

Alastair Reynolds is one of the breed of science fiction writers who is also a professional scientist. Originally from Wales, he has a PhD in astronomy from St Andrew's University in Scotland and lives in the Netherlands, where he works on scientific data analysis, primarily for the European Space Agency. He has taken the traditional route into publication through short story writing, having been published in magazines such as Interzone and Asimov's in recent years. Much of his work can be categorised as "radical hard science fiction", a style of writing which has helped revitalise the British science fiction scene. Revelation Space is his first novel.

As the book opens, Volyova is a senior officer on a lighthugger - several kilometres of malfunctioning, self-repairing starship capable of accelerating almost to the speed of light. She is experiencing a little local difficulty with her gunnery officer, who is trying to kill her. Khouri is a soldier who was frozen and shipped 20 light years away from her war and the only world she knew as a result of a clerical error. She has taken up assassination as an appropriate employment since she is "good with weapons". Sylveste is the leader of a scientific colony/expedition which has suffered rebellion and the departure of its only lighthugger. He is more interested in excavating the relics of an alien civilisation almost a million years dead.

These principal characters focus the large cast and the author's first objective is to get them all into the same time frame. This manipulation becomes apparent through the diverse range of settings and time periods in the early chapters - to the extent that it becomes a treatise on working within the boundaries that nature - or Einstein - has set. The complex machinations introduced set up the plot drivers for the book as a whole, though this does not mean that the story is simply revealed to the reader. Much of the intelligence of the novel is derived from the exposure of deeper plot motives as the book progresses. Some revelations are gently foreshadowed whilst others burst from the page. One of the central concerns of the book is the conundrum at the heart of the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence: if we are not alone, where is everybody else?

The story unfolds within a universe populated with enigmatic aliens, bizarre technology, conspiracies, death, world threatening weapons and post-human races. The definition of human has expanded away from the Homo sapiens norm, some becoming machine-human hybrids, others adapting to the new environments the galaxy has to offer. The technological background of the novel is creatively engineered and inventively described. This complex universe pervades the atmosphere of the book without Reynolds having to draw demonstrating the protagonists' limited views. Revelation Space develops as a product of interaction between characters and through increasing understanding of the external world and the history of the galaxy. Though the plot never begins to feel predictable, the central characters become increasingly well defined through development and disclosure. Reynolds' inventiveness combines with a fondness for science fiction tropes to produce a picture of a rich and true human universe five centuries hence.

Alastair Reynolds: home page

Some writers on the Free software movement speak as if the kernel hackers, security experts and fanatical sysadmins who drive Linux and other Free operating systems are martyrs -- folks who may code out of love, but who ultimately are on what could be seen as a suicide mission rather than a milk run. The typical free software guy (and in fact, the typical software guy, period ) gets treated as a one-dimensional character, with the projects they work on reduced to meaningless blurbs. Peter Wayner knows better -- he takes to heart the notion that history is written by the winners, and proceeds to write history. Read on to see why I'm recommending his new book Free For All to my father. A correction: Theo de Raadt (whose name I had originally mispelled, sorry Theo) pointed out that I'd slipped in "Open" where I should have said "Net." Apologies to all involved in each.

Free For All author Peter Wayner pages 340 publisher Harper Business rating 8.2 reviewer timothy ISBN 0066620503 summary From-the-trenches history in the making, a survey course on how, why and when Free software took over.

Future Perfect Free For All's subtitle ("How Linux and the Free software movement undercut the high-tech titans") well expresses the attitude that Wayner lets filter through every page of this book. Wayner writes as if from the perspective of a computer historian 10 or 20 years from now, mentioning casually the tools and methods which allowed (past tense) the Free software movement to flourish as if dismissing in many cases the overwhelming dominance of closed software today. Most desktops, it's true, are running some version of Windows, and despite the popularity of Linux and the BSDs, there are still chickens left to hatch before the count. But in the 1920s and 30s, there were still plenty of horsecarts, too: Wayner proclaims that the internal combustion engine of the day is the virtual engine under the hood of our computers.

It's a forgiveable act of hubris, though, considering that Wayner also points out the plentiful high ground that Free software has newly gained, recently regained, or never lost claim to, and it's a convincing list. Slashdot readers, for instance, may know that Apache serves the majority of today's Web sites, but does the average Barnes and Noble browser, even in the computer section, know just what Apache is? This book wastes few opportunities to point out areas where Free software is the obvious best choice, not just a grin-and-bear-it low-cost alternative to something better.

Historical perspective Wayner sets most of this book in the 1990s -- the reference to Linux in the title makes that a clear and sensible decision -- but makes frequent and welcome trips back in time to temporal locations from the age of Big Iron in the 1960s to Richard Stallman's 1984 GNU Manifesto. To those of us born in the 1970s or later, these episodes serve as welcome reminders of all the history we can learn of only through such means.

To that end, the book offers details and anecdotes about the creation of the Unix and Unixlike operating systems that are on the rise now, from the post-breakup copyright battles over the original source code of AT&T Unix to the serendipitous ignorance of Finnish student Linus Torvalds, who didn't know that there already was all-but-the-polish of a free Unix system already available.

It's not the case, though, that the entire Free software community is presented as one big happily family. More like an extended family with skeletons in several closets and some bickering both around the dinner table and otherwise, but for all that a generally harmonious bunch. The issue of licensing, and of hotly debated terms which might seem to an outsider hopelessly semantic, are raised at several points. Wayner contrasts Richard M. Stallman's vision of Free software (whether you see it as humble or grandiose) with the viewpoints of Eric Raymond, Bruce Perens and others. Stallman and the GNU project seem to get the lion's share of attention, with the obvious justification that without the GNU tools, a free Unix workalike would seem like a quixotic dream.

The time-shuttling approach that he takes with each chapter brings a benefit that makes this book an easy one to put down (for a few minutes, at least) -- it means that each chapter stands as an interesting monologue on some aspect of the Free software movement, and can be read as an enjoyable short essay. Taken together though, the chapters don't just entertain and milk nostalgia from silicon: they make a good case for the premise of the title. Ironically (if you see it this way) this means undercutting some of the arguments that Microsoft is a monopoly. Perhaps Microsoft was a monopoly, but the cut is made and the tree is toppling.

Interestingly, among the copious information about the origins and present state of the various BSD projects (Net, Free, Open), Wayner speaks a good deal about the whispered-about (and shouted-about) animosity between OpenBSD project leader Theo de Raadt and the developers of the other BSD varieties. While de Raadt spoke openly with Wayner, and the NetBSD developers seemingly did not, what ermerges is a slightly more interesting picture than I've seen before about this, and it confirms some positive things I've heard about the whole OpenBSD project. (A project which I think has caused improvement in many other software projects with its unyielding security focus.)

Minor Gripes Wayner's writing is informal -- no stiff upper lip here. That's not a bad thing, but the prose slips regularly into casualisms and jargon, parts of which work better than others, but none so distracting to detract greatly from the story being told. (As if I'm one to complain about that!)

The other problem I have with the storytelling in Free For All is the litany of rhetorical descriptions of hackers which are introduced in order to refute them for no clear reason. No, not all hackers have long scruffy beards; Yes, RMS and Alan Cox do. No, not all hackers are pale and anti-social; Yes, some of them are. Maybe its just that I've heard these things said before so many times that it just doens't seem relevant any more. Perhaps many of these "human interest" elements really will fascinate readers who'd not considered them before.

Recommended Reading Who should read this book? I mentioned that I'm recommending it to my father, for the simple reason that this is one of the few books I've seen which are down-to-earth readable but still meaty enough to walk away from with a satisfied feeling, not like you've just been Dummied.

In fact, it reminds me of Stephen Levy's Hackers, in part because it shares a sense of exhiliration and admiration for the people involved, as well as a freewheeling, back-to-the-story-in-progress story telling style. The hackers who make the BSD projects run, and the Linux kernel expand and shrink as code is cultivated and reined in, may be inspired software geniuses. But they share in the unglamorous, painstaking dogwork as well as the glory, and beam a kind of virulent enthuiasm for the cool stuff they're constantly on the cusp of. Wayner gives an over-the-shoulder peek at what that means which doesn't require a C.S. degree, and serves as its own character glossary.

Add this book to the pile that includes Hackers, The Secret Guide to Computers and Open Sources for readable, fascinating, fun computer history that's also relevant for your pointy headed boss.

You can purchase Free for All at Fatbrain.

drix writes "I ran across a rather disturbing piece of software called Media Enforcer. Basically, it does the same thing that Metallica and Dr. Dre paid NetPD to do a few weeks ago: it lurks around on Napster, gathering the names of any files matching a certain pattern that are offered on the service. Thus, type in "Backstreet Boys" and it will log every person offering Backstreet Boys files on Napster for as long as you want to leave it running. What's scarier - it's next version will add support for doing the same thing simultaneously on the CuteMX, iMesh, and Scour.net filesharing networks. Zeropaid.com is running an interview with the creator of this program, who, not surprisingly, wishes to remain anonymous. " I guess the problem with all this is that a file named Metallica isn't necessary a Metallica song. If the software downloaded the data and actually checked it, I'd feel better about it.

Saint Aardvark writes: "CNN has an article on software engineers sneaking open source software past the boss -- and how the smart boss doesn't look too closely." A nicely balanced article (originally from Computer World).

Saint Aardvark writes "Wired News reports here that Judge Rakoff explained his ruling on MP3.com. According to him, MP3.com was "simply repackaging" the recordings, adding nothing, and therefore unable to claim fair use. "

usgrant writes: "The Robotics Club of Yahoo has grown to 500+ members over the last two years, and now they have created a little something of their own. A few months ago they released their own public robot kit called TRaCY. The kit goes for $89 and has the basic features: IR detection, BASIC Stamp II programmable chip, bump sensors, light sensors, servo motors ... The chip is programmable and is made by Parallax. Write the code on your comp, and upload to the robot through a serial port. The wizards at TRCY even added sample source code to have the 'bot wander the room. (Sorry, I don't think the software has been ported to Linux...) They also released the 'parts' list and a PDF manual for instructions. Lots of people contributing to this on their free time, and looks like some new developments are coming in the near future. "

invenustus writes "I just watched the 10-minute movie TIE-tanic. In case the title doesn't tip you off, it's "Star Wars Meets Titanic." Hilarious, and fairly impressive video and audio editing. I wonder what kind of software they used." I liked this even more than the 'King Kong vs. The Empire' short I saw at an SF convention several years back. Update: 01/18 06:21 by E : It's in QuickTime 4 format, by the way.

Slashdot has received a number of submissions about FIDNET, so-called cyberwarfare, etc., since our first article about it two months ago. Here's a grab bag of more news about it -- Pro-, Neutral, and Anti-. Click below to read more.

Neutral: Foxxz writes "Shortly after the article ran on Slashdot about the FBI computer monitoring program called FIDNET, I wrote to my congressman. Finally I have received a response from him concerning FIDNET. Its not a very pretty picture for the internet; allowing email captures and the monitoring of remote logins. I took the time to type up the letter and post it. I hope to get the document scanned early this week." It's just a form letter, firmly in the middle of the road, but interesting anyway.

Pro: Effect sends this article from a legal publication. "The article is a little old, but a new example of how are tax dollars are spent is here. The rundown is on a new $1.5 billion dollar program to gauge the threat of cyberterrorism and looking for security breaches in critical networks like banks, telecoms and government nets. Any one else want the govenment poking their noses into their files looking for problems? Bear in mind that this is just a proposed start up cost, and the actual program will run much higher."

Anti: George Smith, of the Crypt Newsletter, has been debunking this for some years now. His articles include Electronic Pearl Harbor: A slogan for U.S. Info-warriors, An Electronic Pearl Harbor? Not Likely, a tale about how the FBI finds new computer threats (in April Fool's jokes about computer viruses), and a recent piece written for CyberWire Digest. Smith says, ""Clinton" [a fake virus] was an April Fool's joke published in a PC mag along with a number of similar tales, it was republished in an FBI paper on computer crime in 1996. While it's amusing that the FBI would be taken in by an April Fool's joke, it's rather confounding to realize that this was passed off as serious research. It's a great lesson in why it pays to be skeptical of our leaders when they talk of "cyberterror.""

Future: Johan writes "Jane's Intelligence Review is running an article about cyberwarfare for its next issue, which I'm editing at the moment. It has a number of broad assertions, including:

"For terrorists, CBRN/Cyber weapons provide the opportunity to cause death and disruption at unprecedented levels--resulting in thousands of casualties and billions of dollars in damages to critical infrastructure nodes."

"Acquiring a CBRN/Cyber capability requires extensive funding, an overt or covert acquisition capability, a technological research and development program to produce, weaponize and stockpile CBRN materiel (or the capability to purchase or steal ready-made weapons), and a level of technical expertise and logistical infrastructure that is appropriate to launch successful CBRN attacks..."

"Commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) software products can easily be obtained to conduct cyberterrorism, making CB/Cyber attacks much more feasible to launch than heretofore..."

Although 'cyberwarfare' is a bit of a cliche, given the IT-related nature of many of your readers, I wondered if any of them would like to comment on this, ie, is all this stuff really so?"

The floor is open. -- michael

ronfar writes "The Latest Senatorial Attack on American Freedom. I'm not sure why I care anymore, except that my freedoms are going down the drain along with everybody elses. I mean, it's pretty obvious that the Leibermans, Gores, Bennets and Bauers of the world feel secure in forcefully turning this country into an authoritarian state. The sad thing is that when people finally realize how much they've lost, they will no longer have the power to do anything about it. Our democracy is committing suicide, I just wish someone would intervene and take the razor away before it slits its wrists. "

Joseph writes "Red Hat looks like it put those Atomic Vision folks to work with a new site design. More hype before their IPO?" I'm just glad to see a simpler, more elegant design.

Andreas Pour sent linkage to a page where you can get the KDE mascot in T-shirt form (half the profits go to KDE). Hubert Figuiere sent us pictures from the Paris LinuxExpo if you weren't in France. Brian sent us How Stuff Works. Its actually not bad. cpfeifer wrote in to send us some spoofed book covers including Taking Down the Internet in 30mins for Dummies and IP Spoofing for Dummies. More here. An anonymous reader sent us Prozac Pez if you've been having a rough day. Dwonis sent us a point-form description of Geeks, Twits and Nerds, and the differences between them. aspodf wrote in to show us what happens when Red Meat and Star Wars come together at last. CowboyNeal sent us a link to Career Path which has a Personality Quiz that tells if you are a Jedi Master, or a Sith Lord. I think Neal ended up an Ewok *grin*.

Andreas Pour sent linkage to a page where you can get the KDE mascot in T-shirt form (half the profits go to KDE). Hubert Figuiere sent us pictures from the Paris LinuxExpo if you weren't in France. Brian sent us How Stuff Works. Its actually not bad. cpfeifer wrote in to send us some spoofed book covers including Taking Down the Internet in 30mins for Dummies and IP Spoofing for Dummies. More here. An anonymous reader sent us Prozac Pez if you've been having a rough day. Dwonis sent us a point-form description of Geeks, Twits and Nerds, and the differences between them. aspodf wrote in to show us what happens when Red Meat and Star Wars come together at last. CowboyNeal sent us a link to Career Path which has a Personality Quiz that tells if you are a Jedi Master, or a Sith Lord. I think Neal ended up an Ewok *grin*.

Paul wrote in to point us to the GNU Jobs Page. ^BR wrote in to say that the may issue of Daemon News is out for your BSDies out there, and CaVi wrote in to say that the Linux Gazette is out (sorry that these took so long to announce... moving was a bitch). Bitscape sent us a Salon story about Coding in Vampire Mode. Mikesch noted that www.palmcolors.com is selling colored Palm Pilots rsn. Looking for new backgrounds? President John F. Kennedy wrote in to tell us that the Volume 7 of Propoganda is up. And for those who are curious, he actually did send me beer! robert@budzynski.ddns.org sent us this art gallery with fodder and dayeight sent us a photomosaic picture for you Lara Craft Perverts out there. HighJack noted that the latest version of JWZs X Screensaver distribution contains a new one that looks like those funky falling charachters from The Matrix. And finally for some crazy fun stuff, dave sent us hilarious proof that Star Trek is Satanic, and chrisd sent us one of the best ebay auction items in recent memory. Psst-this is Hemos. It was Rob's birthday on May 10-he thinks he escaped. E-mail him and tell him how much you love him.

tilly sent us a really interesting little article on Why O'Reily is Better written from the perspective of one of their authors. Rahga wrote in to comment that the new KDE Mascot Looks like Playstation's "Croc". He's got a little poll. I vote no, but its close. tilly wrote in to note that Sunday's User Friendly is funny- it features a the ultimate choice. And for the best Star Wars quickie today, Sharkey sent us a link to this picture. Just look at it. Somewhat related is this one from an Anonymous reader: The Dark Redemption which is a 26 minute short film being directed in Australia- it takes place 2 days before the beginning of Star Wars, A New Hope and is apparently being done with permission of Lucas. gwendolin wrote in to ask the ultimate question: Do you dare to eat pop rocks and drink pepsi at the same time? This is wierd stuff (both the page, and the fact that a female with a cool homepage submitted a story!) Some Slashdot Sightings: VinceV wrote in to say that Slashdot apparently is mentioned in the printed manual for Caldera OpenLinux 2.2. cymen wrote in to tell us that Slashdot appeared in the Mit Technology Review. No URL, but someone sent me a scan (that I can't post for they fear the Slashdot effect) but its pretty cool. And finally, for some good old fashioned porn parody, gelbardn sent us Geek Erortica which features live strip shows of Ms. G3 and Ms. Dell. (No its not actually dirty, but its quite amusing).

Slashdot gets a lot of mentions out there, and I'm sick of devoting whole stories to them, so I'm lumping them together. First, I mentioned Cool Site of the Year before, but I just found out that one of the prizes is a New Guitar- so Go vote for us. You can vote once a day, and this is one poll I have no problem Slashdotting *grin*. Cheekyboy wrote in to tell us that we're the #5 site at at 100 Hot's Developer Site List. hatredonalog wrote in to say that the new issue of Linux Journal has Slashdot listed as the #1 Linux Web Page, beating out linux.org. Anonymous Harrison noted that a recent Jerk City cartoon mentions Slashdot. And lastly, the RC5 Team has been doing pretty well these days. In fact, we and the Evangelista's have been swapping the #1 daily keys spot. So go run clients on anything that boots and lets dust 'em.

Tanner Lovelace wrote in to tell us that Maryland has joined the small but growing number of states that are passing laws against spam. You can read the bill itself hereand why it happened here.