Slashdot Mirror
Best FOSS Active Directory Alternative?
danboid writes "I'm an IT technician at a large school near Manchester, England. We currently have two separate networks (one for pupils, one for staff) each with its own Windows Server 2003 Active Directory box handling authentication and storing users' files. We're planning on restructuring the network soon and we'd like to be able to replace the two aging AD servers with a single, more powerful Linux server running an open source OpenLDAP implementation. The main contenders for this purpose seem to be Fedora Directory Server, OpenDS, and Apache Directory Server; but I've been unable to find meaningful comparisons among the three. I'd like to hear which solution Slashdot readers recommend. What is your experience with ease of implementation / maintenance? Any stories of similar (un)successful migrations? Any other tips for an organization wanting to drop AD for a FOSS equivalent?"
Actually, no Disney didn't pay US senators a bunch of money to make copyright work well over the human lifespan. Disney benefited from US senators attempting to turn US copyright into a more compatible version of Europe's copyright because we signed a treaty with them (the Berne Convention).
I know it's fun to run around and claim you were screwed by Big Bad Company but it seriously takes away from anything otherwise creditable that you could be saying. Benefiting from something doesn't mean they had it implemented. Blaming Disney for moving our copyright laws into compliance with a treaty we signed and ratified almost two decades previously is telling the truth.
You must have an over active imagination.
Anyhoo, I fail to see why there is such a hullabaloo in the USA about having a coloured prez."
Ok...I'm trying to figure out why this was modded into troll hell. He was asking what was racist about Samba. And then threw in a ponderance about what all the uproar was about Obama becoming president, just because he's black?
Was it a troll because of the word coloured? If so, since when did that become a racial slur? Are they doing to change the name of the NAACP (that CP part == Colored People)?
Seriously, lighten up people. Not everything is racist...
And about Obama...people were saying you should not even be considering his race when voting for/against him, many went as far as to say if you considered race in voting you were racist in that case.
So, if that's the case...we really shouldn't be worrying too much about his color now that he won. He is JUST another president, please.....carry on with your everyday life.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Actually, Yes they did! You seem to be confusing the Copyright Act of 1976 which brought US law pretty much into accord with the Berne Convention with the Mickey Mouse Protection Act where Disney DID finance the campaigns of a number of low life congress critters to chip away at the public domain.
Note that as a fan of yours I agree with most of what you write, but not in this instance...
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
You have a few facts completely wrong and it appears your attempting to distort things.
The 1976 copyright act which went into effect in 1978 was a result of our participation in the Universal copyright convention. We signed onto the agreement in protest of the Berne convention in 1955 or so. It move copyright terms from 20 years to 75 years (commercial) or life plus 50 years for the author in an attempt to come more in line with European copyright terms. We officially signed the Berne convention in 1987 or so when the Natural rights of authors was dropped making it possible to keep the commercial commission and ownership of copyrighted works within the US.
In 1993, the European union issued a directive to harmonize copyright terms in Europe because most of them exceeded the Berne convention requirements and they were all over the place. This was known as Copyright Duration Directive (93/98/EEC) or the 1993 harmonizing the term of protection of copyright and certain related rights. It ended settling copyright for life plus 70 years as the standard.
In 1998, the Sonny Bono copyright extension act extended US copyright by 20 years making it in line with Europe's once again. Disney may have been a cheer leader in it but history shows us that since the 1950's we were attempting to keep our copyright protections within the same limits as Europe. You can't say that events and motions that preceded our adoption of the copyright extension was due to Disney because of their support. You would have to ignore half a century of history to do so. If it was because of Disney, I'm sure other effects like restoring copyright to expired works would have been included. But they weren't and saying it was because of Disney while ignoring other event creates a fallacy based on discontent directed at the wrong people. It really is that simple.
That would be the Berne convention of 1886, signed into law in the US in 1989 .. they sure were speedy to ensure they were compatible with the rest of the world!
Berne is a copyright framework and sets the term to "authors life + 50 years" or for photos +25 years from creation or films +50 years from showing (roughly).
What's the term in the US now? "authors life + 70" or 120 years??
So definitely no scope there for a pay-off from the likes of Disney.
So for Mickey Mouse, a film character, copyright would expire about 1980 under the prescribed terms. Has Mickey become public domain yet? Author's life + 70 would make it 2030 (ish) but no there's cunningly a 120 year term which puts us to 2050. So that's only 70 years more ... but think of Walt Disney's livelihood, he must need that money to help him create new cartoons ...
Oh, wait ...
The copyright act of 1976 was a result of the Universial copyright convention (UCC) that was intended to be a alternative to the berne convention because of issues some countris (the US) had over the natural right clause of the Berne Convention. We signed the UCC agreements in 1955 or so and didn't implement it until 1976. In 1987, the Berne convention provided a direct exclusion of the natural right clause and we signed on implementing the few other provisions.
The Copyright extension act was a direct response to the EU's Council Directive 93/98/EEC of 29 October 1993 harmonizing the term of protection of copyright and certain related rights made in 1993 and standardized in 1994. It settled on a term of life plus 70 years (the exact same as the copyright extension act did) whihc was about 5 years before our copyright extension act.
Now here is the rub. The EU directive restored copyrights to expired workd. The US version didn't. Do you really think that if BigEvil Media corp, be it Diney or ABC or whatever, would allow that to go unaddressed in America if they were behind the entire thing? Seriously, think about that. In order to believe the Disney was more then a cheerleader, you would have to admit that they were greedy and evil but not all the greedy and evil. Now, I know people who attempt to claim that Disney didn't care because they didn't own anything that was already expired but you have to realize all the expired works out there that they could have purchased and continued protecting for profit.
Disney did campaign for the extension after it was set in motion but then entire Idea that they were behind it stems from rhetoric espoused over the Eldred v Ashcroft lawsuit attempting to challenge the 1998 law. There was no basis for it other then to manipulate public opinion. Early versions of Mickey Mouse are expired and if they authored the bill or paid off congress to pass it, I'm sure they would have included the copyright restorations that the EU's counter part did. In other words, it sounds good to bash congress and Disney but when you examine the practical logic behind it, the glove doesn't fit.
If we have to disagree, I understand. Feeling and emotions over this run high and it isn't like I actually support the copyright extensions. I think copyright term is entirely too long, especially in areas like computer software and stuff. But, I'm a realistic person who see the issue starting in Europe where it really was before it happened in America and if anything is going to be done with it, we realistically need to think about the real reasons behind it and solve issues there first. Blaming it on Disney and corrupt politicians will get us nowhere because the politicians will have to admit they are corrupt in order to redress any grievances. But looking at it for what it is requires them to either separate from Europe's lead or to make changes there first. The big problem of course is either country (America or European) moving in a way that means not respecting the copyright or patents of the other country because of some mismatch in terms lengths.