Slashdot Mirror
Slashback: Security, Telephony, Solicitude
A good oversight to correct. AndyMan! writes "Regarding yesterdays 'Building A Better Inbox,' I got the following email from support@mailblocks.com:
"'Our apologies, we picked up an old version of our TOS when we went live. We will NOT be allowing 3rd parties to send unsolicited email to our userbase. Please check the site this evening for the updated and correct TOS. We apologize for any confusion or inconvenience.'"
All the government you pay for. dunng808 writes "Despite frequent speculation to the contrary, Security Enhanced Linux is alive and well. Government Executive Magazine has a report from a conference on open-source software at which Peter Loscocco, a senior NSA scientist, revealed that the agency has continued to work on SE Linux despite efforts by Microsoft and the Initiative for Software Choice. "We spent a lot of time educating our managers, who accepted a lot of the flack that has come back to NSA about SE Linux," Loscocco said. For those readers trying to win acceptance of open-source software in the workplace, what effort have you undertaken to educate management, and what has worked?"
Also safe for now is GPS. As an anonymous reader writes, "Following last week's thread on GPS, and the possibility that the Pentagon might goof around with the civilian signal, Forbes checks in with the folks in charge and finds we have nothing to worry about."
OK, both of these things involve series of coherent vibrations in air ... A few months back, we mentioned that TheKompany was selling software to let Zaurus owners use Net2Phone for telephone service, and that they were working on a desktop version as well. Well, now it's ready. HeUnique writes "TheKompany just released tkcphone for the Linux desktop. This is the first product which lets Linux users to use their existing net2phone accounts to talk either through net2phone to net2phone or net2phone to standard POTS phone with the best audio quality (G.729 codec)."
And in almost-but-not-totally-unrelated news, jackjumper writes "Shawn Gordon of The Kompany fame has started his own record label, ProgRock Records. From the interview at Linux and Main: "The idea...is to provide progressive rock music to listeners at a low price while allowing more of that money to find its way to the artists' pockets than happens with conventional recording contracts and at the same time making a gesture -- you know the one -- to the established recording cartel." This sounds really cool."
A deadly pathogen by any other name. waytoomuchcoffee writes "The leading hypothesis for what is causing Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) is now thought to be a coronavirus, one of the virii that can cause the common cold. The New York Times (archive version for those non-members) has a story here. The global toll is now more than 750 stricken and 22 dead. Singapore is quarantining hundreds of people in an effort to stop the outbreak, while the head of the city's hospitals has taken ill with symptoms consistent with SARS. Both the Centers for Disease Control and the World Health Organization have pages up now, which include FAQs and progression information."
How many times do we have to go over this? Vajsvarana writes "The major free Desktop Environment GNOME and KDE has released a common open statement on recent XFree86 troubles. 'Innovation should happen in the open, with all affected parties able to participate early in the process' seems a clear and strong request to XFree86 people."
-Waldo Jaquith
being in china now i am getting really concerned about SARS. while i am a long way from the epicentre the gov here is very quiet and now there are reports of possible infections in beijing...http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/singapo re/story/0,4386,179331,00.html
if beijing becomes a new epicentre for spread of this then we are ALL in deep sh*t cos its such a big city (i think 13m+) the first thing that will happen is that everyone will want to LEAVE in different directions WHAT A DISASTER WAITING TO HAPPEN.
i cant imagine the chinese gov (as with any other) preventing the spread. no way of "patching" this one!
There are many areas in the world that are having problems with GPS but its not due to jaming, its due to the fact that there isn't a full constilation up. PRN 22 went dead a while back and hasn't been replaced. The current plan is to spread out the sats in that orbital ring (the B plane) to help fill up the gap but that will result in more outages in more places for short times compared to the current 1/2 hour outages seen directly in the flight path. The NavCen are recomending that you change your mask angle to 5 degrees if its set higher (many people use 15 degrees).
Right now you can see the problems on this map (mirrored here). The black areas are where GPS isn't going to give a 3d position and the red areas are where it wont get a 4d (3d+time) fix. The dark blue will have issues if any part of the sky is blocked. I don't think I've seen the GPS status this bad for a long time. Maybe its time to launch a few new navstar sats.
What the Forbes article fails elucidate is the difference between military and civilian GPS. Not only is the military GPS on a different band, and considerably more accurate, but it's also encrypted. In fact, SOP if an aircraft is shot down is for the pilot to press a "data destruct" key that formats internal memory storage so the enemy doesn't get ahold of any information on the military band. The encryption keys are also changed daily.
BTW, both military and civilian GPS can increase the accuracy of the signal by using differential GPS, which uses stationary ground stations to reduce uncertainty to well under an inch.
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
More info that is NOT karma whoring, seeing I'm an AC.
For the purists, in Latin, there is a rarely-used plural form:
virus, viri (neuter)
(Forms: almost always restricted to nominative and accusative singular; generally singular in Lucretius, ablative singular in Lucretius)
The point of this is that even in Latin the form "viri" is rarely used. The singular form is used in most every instance. (This is from the Oxford Latin Dictionary.)
So, when considering the Latin: "virii" is incorrect and "viri" was almost never used.
Despite the fact there was little use for the plural form, there is another reason why "viri" was rarely used. The most common Latin word for "man" is "vir" with "viri" being its plural in the form used as the subject of a sentence. Thus, since "men" as the subject of a sentence would be used far more often than "venoms" (virus means venom) the "viri" word was most commonly seen as the plural of "man."
Bottom line: Don't try to make up words using a false Latin plural form. Since the word virus in its English form is now used then the English plural (viruses) should be used.
Bullshit. I live in Hong Kong, so I think I have more of a clue about this than the sensationalist overseas reports.
Yes, it can kill. But so far, all those infected were in close physical contact with carriers -- mostly health workers who treated them, or members of family. Here people are crushed in close contact on public transport every day. If it spread like smallpox, we'd have a million dead already. It's risk, but nothing to obsess over.
Wow 750 infected and 22 dead. How about the millions dead from AIDs? This study says that after 22 years of education 14.7 percent -- one in seven -- of gay and bisexual black men ages 23 to 29 become HIV-positive each year. Since the discovery of AIDS -- first reported in a 1981 government health bulletin as a strange form of pneumonia -- there have been about 750,000 reported cases in America. Nearly 450,000 of those patients have died.
The Washington Post reports that world wide there are now 42 million people living with HIV infection and by 2010 there will be between 50 million and 75 million cases of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection in India, China, Ethiopia, Nigeria and Russia alone.
Why was AIDs not decleared a contagious disease back in 1981 and infected people quaratined? Were the rights of a few worth more than the rights of 75 million?
Today's vices may be tomorrow's virtues.
Reading the commentary literally, I have no issues with their contention whatsoever.
Reading between the lines, doesn't it sound like more subtle versions of what Microsoft has been saying about the GPL the whole time?
Why even mention software development models unless they're trying to cast aspersions on the Open Source model?
Why even mention the poor abused software developers who 'choose to license their intellectual property on commercial terms'?
Someone has a beef, and it's neither the procurement departments nor the open source people. Last time I checked, the open source guys were so disorganized they couldn't organize a piss up in a brewery, let alone lobby procuring departments.
Face it. This is subtle MS FUD. Very subtle MS FUD.
You're doing it wrong.
Hold on there nostradamus, how on earth could you have an rational basis for that kind of claim?
I predict that this virus will hit Silicon Valley hard; I've seen a lot of techies, especially foreign 'guests', just not practicing simple hygiene like washing hands coming out of the restrooms, sneezing widely into the air, etc.
Nice vague tinge of racism.
Also, the disease hit China, and so much manufacturing is now there, so there are plenty of chances for it to be contracted and brought back to the US. I think we have a real problem coming.
Except everything so far suggests this virus (if it is) requires close respiratory contact with infected people. Breathing on a tv that will be boxed, packaged, shipped and left on a ship for weeks hardly counts as close respiratory contact.
I suspect SARS is a two-component disease; first you are hit with the new mutant virus, which sets up your immune system to fail to handle certain things, then the second virus characterizing this disease attacks you unhampered.
Again, on what basis do you make these wild-ass statements? Do you work in a research lab studying SARS? When those researching this aren't even ready to make this kind of statement (they say it's possible, but by no means proven, and always stated as 'might,' 'could,' 'would be unusual,' &c. ), how are your prescient enough to?
We do not have any effective way to combat that.
True, just like we don't have any effective way to handle the vast majority of viral infections we get. We let our immune system go at it, and more often than not we get better.
-Ted
-=-=- Quantum physics - the dreams stuff are made of.
As I said, I'm in Hong Kong, which is not Singapore.
The Straits Times itself is reporting how many parents are clamoring to close the schools for a while
People are panicking. Has little to do with the real risks. Recall the idiocy with which AIDS sufferers are treated in most places. Actually, my dusghter's school has just closed, which is a case of bureaucratic CYA rather than anything else.
SARS is highly contagious in close proximity, as is smallpox. Look at what WHO reports.
I did (before I made my original post). I didn't see anything to contradict what I wrote. It is MUCH less contagious than smallpox, and MUCH less lethal (7 dead out of 222 confirmed cases). It's been here for two weeks (incubation period is a few days or a week) and if it was anything like as bad as smallpox, hundreds would be dead.
WHO SARS FAQ: : How contagious is SARS ? : Based on currently available evidence, close contact with an infected person is needed for the infective agent to spread from one person to another. Contact with aerosolized (exhaled) droplets and bodily secretions from an infected person appears to be important. To date, the majority of cases have occurred in hospital workers who have cared for SARS patients and the close family members of these patients. However, the amount of the infective agent needed to cause an infection has not yet been determined.
Q
A
The purpose of my desktop is to fight against Microsoft?
I think not.
I want to get work done in a timely and cost effective manner not be part of a Jihad.
I'd be rather upset if the people contributing were all fucked up with "must beat Microsfot, must beat Microsoft" rather than "must write good code, must write good code"
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter