If you were using VoIP or some other packet data voice service, then yes (given the right software). If you were communicating using GSM or WCDMA, then no.
You can use software to encrypt your conversations sent over packet data networks (in any of the various ways that this is achieved), but you cannot encrypt in hardware any conversations communicated according to the GSM/WCDMA standard. Encryption to protect from eavesdroppers who are labelled with three letter acronyms simply doesn't exist within the mobile phone protocols in use today. If it did, you would already be using it.
Installing Gentoo (I did it around '04 pre gui-installer) was the most informative and daunting thing I did during my initial learning stages with Linux.
Strangely enough, this is where my initial learnings of Linux came from too. Reading through the Gentoo Handbook and installing Gentoo from a stage1 tarball was my dive into the deep end. This was around '04, too, a few months before they started recommending the stage3 route.
In essense, the fastest way to learn how to swim is to dive into the deep end, and I think that's how many people should approach the problem of their lack of Linux knowledge.:-D
No matter how much better Linux gets than Windows, as long as there's less support for it, there are good reasons for not using it.
The tide is slowly turning. Why don't you be part of the revolution?
What I don't understand is how Windows-knowledgable people, aka, "computer knowledgable" people are so afraid of Linux. It's an irrational fear; it doesn't make logical sense to be afraid of a computer operating system. What it does make sense to be though, is afraid of change, and afraid of sticking your foot into something you don't know or understand. The funny thing is though, all the Windows experts running around claiming Linux is harder, slower, whatever silly conjecture they care to spurt, none of them (a) regularly use Linux, or (b) knew how to use Windows in the first place.
Believe it or not, Windows users of Slashdot, you didn't actually know how to use Windows when you first started using it. Like anything else, there was a learning curve, and like anything else, you had to put in some time to get to know the system so you could use it to its full potential. It's the same for Linux and Linux distributions; you have to put time in to learn a new and different system.
This link has probably been bandied around Slashdot before, but it's relevant here: Why Windows Causes Stupidity
The title is a little inflammatory, but if you actually read the article (instead of just skimming over it, ignoring it, and returning here to flame me), you'll understand where the author is coming from.
As a gamer, I like having my Athlon 3.5+ GHz system with 2GB of RAM only report that I've breached my first 1GB when I'm running a memory intensive game, like X3.
Why not use memory if it's there? By the sounds of things (I haven't used Vista myself), Vista's keeping important, commonly-used files in RAM for fast access; the 'cache' that people keep referring to, which is apparently emptied quick-smart once foreground applications (like games) start needing that memory for their own purposes.
The mentality is, if the resources are there, why not use them? Fair enough applications should be programmed with the most efficient memory use in mind, as should the operating system, but if after all of your core system files needed for operation are loaded, you still have a few hundred megabytes (or even gigabytes) available, why shouldn't those free resources be used for speeding up general computing? Lord knows Vista needs it, and that's why it's there.
It's just a waste of memory if it's only being used when on the odd occasion you happen to fire up X3.
Vista is a small step in the right direction in terms of system security, it's a shame that Microsoft and their media conglomerate buddies have been using this increased level of security to further screw over consumers...
Anyway, instead of applications developers simply creating ad-hoc files here and there, dumping shit all through the registry and hogging system resources, now they're having to think intelligently about what their programmes are doing and how they're going to do it.
Regulations may be so, but the fact remains that the majority of American sports cars (bar the Viper, Corvette Z06, and the Ford GT) are not on par with their European counterparts. They "win" price vs. performance by skimping in other areas.
If you've heard of the BBC television series Top Gear, just watch that, and you'll gain an understanding of where I'm coming from with this.
I wish US car makers would stop trumpeting engine size and horsepower quite so much. Believe me, it's a somewhat neglected market because the profit margins aren't out there, but there's quite a segment in the USA that's the same way.
Especially when you consider that the majority of US sports cars have a pitiful measure of power vs. displacement when compared to their European counterparts.:-P
Slashdot Mirror
If you were using VoIP or some other packet data voice service, then yes (given the right software). If you were communicating using GSM or WCDMA, then no.
You can use software to encrypt your conversations sent over packet data networks (in any of the various ways that this is achieved), but you cannot encrypt in hardware any conversations communicated according to the GSM/WCDMA standard. Encryption to protect from eavesdroppers who are labelled with three letter acronyms simply doesn't exist within the mobile phone protocols in use today. If it did, you would already be using it.
In essense, the fastest way to learn how to swim is to dive into the deep end, and I think that's how many people should approach the problem of their lack of Linux knowledge.
What I don't understand is how Windows-knowledgable people, aka, "computer knowledgable" people are so afraid of Linux. It's an irrational fear; it doesn't make logical sense to be afraid of a computer operating system. What it does make sense to be though, is afraid of change, and afraid of sticking your foot into something you don't know or understand. The funny thing is though, all the Windows experts running around claiming Linux is harder, slower, whatever silly conjecture they care to spurt, none of them (a) regularly use Linux, or (b) knew how to use Windows in the first place.
Believe it or not, Windows users of Slashdot, you didn't actually know how to use Windows when you first started using it. Like anything else, there was a learning curve, and like anything else, you had to put in some time to get to know the system so you could use it to its full potential. It's the same for Linux and Linux distributions; you have to put time in to learn a new and different system.
This link has probably been bandied around Slashdot before, but it's relevant here: Why Windows Causes Stupidity
The title is a little inflammatory, but if you actually read the article (instead of just skimming over it, ignoring it, and returning here to flame me), you'll understand where the author is coming from.
Step 1: Install Linux on your computer. Step 2: Install Rockbox on your iPod. Step 3: Be happy. ^_^
The mentality is, if the resources are there, why not use them? Fair enough applications should be programmed with the most efficient memory use in mind, as should the operating system, but if after all of your core system files needed for operation are loaded, you still have a few hundred megabytes (or even gigabytes) available, why shouldn't those free resources be used for speeding up general computing? Lord knows Vista needs it, and that's why it's there.
It's just a waste of memory if it's only being used when on the odd occasion you happen to fire up X3.
Plain and simple, this is the case.
Vista is a small step in the right direction in terms of system security, it's a shame that Microsoft and their media conglomerate buddies have been using this increased level of security to further screw over consumers...
Anyway, instead of applications developers simply creating ad-hoc files here and there, dumping shit all through the registry and hogging system resources, now they're having to think intelligently about what their programmes are doing and how they're going to do it.
Regulations may be so, but the fact remains that the majority of American sports cars (bar the Viper, Corvette Z06, and the Ford GT) are not on par with their European counterparts. They "win" price vs. performance by skimping in other areas. If you've heard of the BBC television series Top Gear, just watch that, and you'll gain an understanding of where I'm coming from with this.