The constant battle is between commercial interests and knowledge expertise. The former creating jobs but locking down the knowledge and the latter disseminating the patented information and allowing the former to even exist.
EVERYBODY's information is at some point somebody's private purvue. Its just a question time 'till somebody puts the information out in the public domain, for free, gratis.
I own several books of algorithms. If they were patentable I shouldn't bother as they wouldn't help me in anyway unless I was working for hire for their patent owner. In fact, the books themselves would be violations of the patent. That clearly isn't the case. The books are published to disseminate knowledge and they do.
A long time ago, I wrote COBOL code to implement a good part of Smalltalk's Collection mechanism, (twice in the same program because I had only two collections and I didn't feel like getting into dynamic memory usage, BLL cells, playing with offsets etc.,) because I needed it to solve the problem that existed.
Do I owe a debt of gratitude to the person who thought if it first? Yes. Do I owe any money? Nope. They didn't write in COBOL and it was just an idea.
That's the thing. As long as you base your code of the inevitability of doing the right thing, 'the correct' thing, you can say that your code was just a reimplementation of the standard.
And screw the software patents. I've never even thought of them before and I'm certainly NOT going to let them stop me in the future. When I code, I certainly will acknowledge where got the idea from, but I am NOT going to let the fact that I got it from somewhere stop me.
Eventually, the proceeds from a work become insignificant, not for the artists themselves, they can still make a living, (but not a killing,) but economically.
At that point nobody sues because it is not worth it. You don't sue someone who happens to be playing your song on his guitar on the beach, even if he was supposed to get paid for 'an hour of playing music on the beach'.
The free and open-source movement is not economically significant BY DESIGN and as such all the standards used perform the same role as played by the language itself (I COULD copyright a word, its called "trademarking", but then I would run the risk of its NOT being used.)
While they MIGHT WANT TO SUE, they won't because there's no money in it.
My advice with software patents is ignore the very concept of them.
Just write your code as if it was free and open. (Never expect to make enough to retire and you shouldn't have any problem as you're obviously too broke to bother with.)
I have had a long (since 1975) and checkered/stellar career. I've averaged 1.5 years per employers/clients. (The current one is bound to end soon and then I can get on with my life.)
I got on my own as an independant contractor and into Smalltalk AFTER getting diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis.
People are funny about hiring and firing. They got no HR training and so don't know how to handle it or themselves. Since I keep, uh, off-site backups of all my work, I am always ready to transfer what I know to the next job. (And I have my backups to make sure I still know it six months, or sic years, down the line.)
My 'best' years were in the 1990s when it seemed I could do no wrong and money rolled in.
And I didn't get it that I was dealing with people who were dealing the same problems year after year and they didn't get it either (but a different it.)
These people, though basically mean and nasty, are also sullen, dull and slow. They just can't see what the problems are and so are doomed to repeat them.
That is an OPPORTUNITY!
Its basically a question of keeping your eyes, ears and mind open. And when you see an opportunity, take it for all its worth.
Maybe you get to 'advance the cause of techiedom' and maybe you just keep the wolf from the door, but its a lot better than the alternative; starving to death.
I've been dealing with (mis)management ass-holes who never seem to get a clue that, when you've planned out a project if you cut the staffing and/or the budget for it, you still get what you pay for (meaning the original projections go out the window.)
Its not rocket science but the way these guys manage, it's more like voodoo (and about as effective as 'gris-gris' in warding off AIDS... NOT!)
The current layout of the presentation of data & their labels in ALL the GUIs is WRONG.
While person A needs to see data in English, person B needs to see it in French and this should be maintainable metadata instead of requiring code change and/or separate copy of code.
You need some mechanism to aid in/with 'plage'd layouts. You have to get rid of current layout tools.
The presentation and selection of executable code needs to be done in internationalizable form. (regardless of the triggers used [short-cut keys, menus & items, pop-up menus, push buttons, light pen activation, whatever.])
Likewise is the configuration of security (person A can see particular data do particular operation while person B shouldn't even see it or know its available.)
The GUIs available to Linux are a time and effort intensive mess.
If you're using Windows or any product developped for and/or with Windows, you're vulnerable.
Basically, the problem is with the approach to software develpment. It wouldn't matter whether you were using a Microsof product or a product developped with the development tools.
If they want a safe internet, they musk get rid of Windows and go to Unix (OS X, BSD or Linux.)
The facts are clear. Windows sucks and that can be expected to continue until Microsoft changes EVERYTHING about their development philosophy, which will require changing all the dev tools.
Its gotten so bad that I call them and do everything off the LinkSys router before they even pick up the phone.
As long as its a simple problem I never want to really speak to them.
When they hear that I am actually even using a router they just get flummoxed and, after a few 'uh's and 'hmm's, tell me to disconnect it and plug my PC directly into the cable modem. (Like I would. I've got enough problems already with script kiddies and nefarious people knocking on my firewall door and rattling the knob. Some of whom are people I know:-)
I don't even, or want to, tell 'em I run a Linux box as a server (with a DynIP addres) or that I'm running a couple of Macs and a Win2k box on a wireless LAN.
I'm not necessarily being paranoid here (well maybe a tad.) Its just that we are known by the threads our actions weave.
We are witnesssing the ossification of data and the enshrining of standards into perpetuity.
I have a 19gig drive at my feet with years of emails going back to the middle of the 1980s. I don't even own a computer to slide the drive into anymore. (Its an Apple SCSI. The last time I transfered to it was 1997, the first time I started 'logging' my messages, I was using 5 1/2" flopppies. I do a lot with archives and I'm congenitally unable to throw anything away but I know that I'm nuts.:-)
Now I'm reading that I CAN'T throw it away despite its being totally useless to me. It figures.
Now I'll have to keep active hardware and a TB of space 'round for decades. Hopefully that will be enough space to see me through to the grave.
CRINGE. The comments in the code are:
obscene (Okay [name deleted] we'll do it your fuckin' way,)
reflect frustration (I have NO idea what this piece of code is supposed to do or what other events are being kicked inside this 'black box' All I know is that performance sucks.) and (I am deeply ashamed about the structure of this algorithm but the data is coming in this way.) OR
just plain wrong/outdated/unmaintained.
One commment left to me on a piece of unraveled recursive code by a guy I was replacing was: (If you get to debug this piece of shit, good luck. I'm gone now. Guess why?)
Documentation by osmosis is common in all in-house development efforts, as is profanity.
The problem is that the gummint doesn't have the kind of selective deafness and blindness that would make them palatable.
Actually, the entire argument is mooted by the fact that the gummint has out-sourced and, in some instances even off-shored, the surveilance effort and can honestly say that they aren't keeping any records on you. They aren't anymore...
They were a staple of Russian life. Keep the [others] fearing for their lives by killing a few (or more). Other is in brackets because they weren't killing just Jews.
The Nazis were not particarly secretive about what they were doing. They just had more propaganda about it. (The parts they didn't want you focusing on.)
As for the patriot act... Imagine a world where you CANT get away with anything, on any side. Oh the horror. The HORROR!
"access to our bank statements, our cars (onboard nav computers telling the government where we are going, where we've been, etc), our schools, our whole livelihood could be changed." its already been done.
You don't want to think about how totally owned your life is (and how badly identity theft and misidentification can hurt you.)
My biggest worry is that the people (them as opposed to us, "the civilians") out there take our lives home and fuck with them.
The cost per mile (and the overnight stays) even a gummint rate would be prohibitive.
"enough money behind it, the concept can be made "
on
Back to Moon in 2015?
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· Score: 1
How? Do you plan to just pile up the bills in a stack.
What kind of bills anyway?
Dollar or unpaid bills. I.O.U.s?
Doesn't matter. This administration is not funding anything unless it can go BOOM! The president's a lame duck who's trying to fight demographics. The congress can't agree on an energy policy.
We're going nowhere unless we can take a slow boat there. (Where our tax base is going anyway along with our jobs.)
While it may be fine for a Microsoft customer (Don't laugh. So its like a Mafia customer. They make them an offer...) like Dell to sell all the machines with XP pre-installed we (a Dell customer to the tune of several 10K units per year) just strip that puppy off the machine and install a plain vanilla Win2k from a CD because its absolute murder on the software when something changes.
If the OS changes and breaks something in our software, its a lot tougher and more expensive for us to fix (when its even possible. We probably won't be able to rehire the same team and most of the, uh, interesting documentation was done by osmosis.)
Microsoft's XP can sit on the shelf 'till the Longhorn cows come home.
Win2K is curently fine. We wouldn't even have gotten off NT4.0 if they hadn't 'end-of-life'd it. It did what was required and stayed out of the way.
If that hurts Microsoft's pocket book, maybe they should get into the toy business.
All Apple needs is a CPU ID and to create an index key with the CPU ID as a primary key for every machine they create.
When the machines call home, they refer a non matching CPU ID to a web page saying "Sorry. Buy a Mac instead"
Apple could care less about unconnected machines. Like who the hell runs unconnected?
Even the military mas machines on the internet. (They also have some on MIL net and never the twain will meet [or there'll be a court martial!] but they're not Macs.)
providing "Software Update"s servers with a valid CPU ID as a primary key to a hardware record that would match the rest of the machine's geshtalt.
Apple builds the machines, issues them with a CPU and creates a row per CPU ID.
The client machines don't have to be impregnably secure, just as long as the server is.
And I really don't see that big a market for OS X that they would make mucho bucks in the Windows or the Linux market share.
If you want to run OS X, why not buy a Mac. If you don't care to, don't buy a Mac. Its not that big a deal. Everybody's in a twitter about breaking Apple's chops when they get the chance.
Maybe there won't be any chops to break. What's the point of owning a Mac, or any computer, if you can't connect?
Think about it. You CAN'T CONNECT! Your CPU is ALONE! Who wants a LONE CPU? (And that's why Apple is not particularly worried.)
A CPU ID on a secure server for software updates takes care of the problem.
Its a freebie for Apple if OS X 'escapes' because they don't have to support it.
Instead it becomes a web browser ad for buying a real Apple whenever 'Software Update' runs. (Which would reveal the IP address of the sender to boot.)
Nah, Apple doesn't have to do a thing on the client machines.
I don't see that there's any need to limit the spread of OS X to non-Apple hardware. Just not support it with "Software Update's.
An Apple, or any PC for that matter, that is not connected to the internet is ALONE.
That means no email, no browser, no access to any information at all. That is such a small number of machines that its not worth thinking about. Nor are they likely to be a source for much piracy.
The rest of the machines need to 'call home' at least once a month, or week, or day, for the Software updates to work.
When they 'call home' they can report their CPU ID and be granted a pass or launch a browser to a page saying 'Buy an Apple instead of using your hacked copy."
Who needs security on the client side when the server side is so much more secure?
25m to 100M CPU ID as primary keys into a table is no big deal for a server anymore. Apple can track every system they make, their geshtalt and track their legitimacy.
Slashdot Mirror
The constant battle is between commercial interests and knowledge expertise. The former creating jobs but locking down the knowledge and the latter disseminating the patented information and allowing the former to even exist.
EVERYBODY's information is at some point somebody's private purvue. Its just a question time 'till somebody puts the information out in the public domain, for free, gratis.
I own several books of algorithms. If they were patentable I shouldn't bother as they wouldn't help me in anyway unless I was working for hire for their patent owner. In fact, the books themselves would be violations of the patent. That clearly isn't the case. The books are published to disseminate knowledge and they do.
A long time ago, I wrote COBOL code to implement a good part of Smalltalk's Collection mechanism, (twice in the same program because I had only two collections and I didn't feel like getting into dynamic memory usage, BLL cells, playing with offsets etc.,) because I needed it to solve the problem that existed.
Do I owe a debt of gratitude to the person who thought if it first? Yes. Do I owe any money? Nope. They didn't write in COBOL and it was just an idea.
That's the thing. As long as you base your code of the inevitability of doing the right thing, 'the correct' thing, you can say that your code was just a reimplementation of the standard.
And screw the software patents. I've never even thought of them before and I'm certainly NOT going to let them stop me in the future. When I code, I certainly will acknowledge where got the idea from, but I am NOT going to let the fact that I got it from somewhere stop me.
Eventually, the proceeds from a work become insignificant, not for the artists themselves, they can still make a living, (but not a killing,) but economically.
At that point nobody sues because it is not worth it. You don't sue someone who happens to be playing your song on his guitar on the beach, even if he was supposed to get paid for 'an hour of playing music on the beach'.
The free and open-source movement is not economically significant BY DESIGN and as such all the standards used perform the same role as played by the language itself (I COULD copyright a word, its called "trademarking", but then I would run the risk of its NOT being used.)
While they MIGHT WANT TO SUE, they won't because there's no money in it.
My advice with software patents is ignore the very concept of them.
Just write your code as if it was free and open. (Never expect to make enough to retire and you shouldn't have any problem as you're obviously too broke to bother with.)
I have had a long (since 1975) and checkered/stellar career. I've averaged 1.5 years per employers/clients. (The current one is bound to end soon and then I can get on with my life.)
I got on my own as an independant contractor and into Smalltalk AFTER getting diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis.
People are funny about hiring and firing. They got no HR training and so don't know how to handle it or themselves. Since I keep, uh, off-site backups of all my work, I am always ready to transfer what I know to the next job. (And I have my backups to make sure I still know it six months, or sic years, down the line.)
My 'best' years were in the 1990s when it seemed I could do no wrong and money rolled in.
And I didn't get it that I was dealing with people who were dealing the same problems year after year and they didn't get it either (but a different it.)
These people, though basically mean and nasty, are also sullen, dull and slow. They just can't see what the problems are and so are doomed to repeat them.
That is an OPPORTUNITY!
Its basically a question of keeping your eyes, ears and mind open. And when you see an opportunity, take it for all its worth.
Maybe you get to 'advance the cause of techiedom' and maybe you just keep the wolf from the door, but its a lot better than the alternative; starving to death.
I've been dealing with (mis)management ass-holes who never seem to get a clue that, when you've planned out a project if you cut the staffing and/or the budget for it, you still get what you pay for (meaning the original projections go out the window.)
Its not rocket science but the way these guys manage, it's more like voodoo (and about as effective as 'gris-gris' in warding off AIDS... NOT!)
some of it is just keeping our ears, eyes and options open.
There's nothing with stuff that could be, which lets out almost all 'space opera' but still leaves a great deal to the imagination.
not a retrofitable option.
The current layout of the presentation of data & their labels in ALL the GUIs is WRONG.
While person A needs to see data in English, person B needs to see it in French and this should be maintainable metadata instead of requiring code change and/or separate copy of code.
You need some mechanism to aid in/with 'plage'd layouts. You have to get rid of current layout tools.
The presentation and selection of executable code needs to be done in internationalizable form. (regardless of the triggers used [short-cut keys, menus & items, pop-up menus, push buttons, light pen activation, whatever.])
Likewise is the configuration of security (person A can see particular data do particular operation while person B shouldn't even see it or know its available.)
The GUIs available to Linux are a time and effort intensive mess.
Its a choice between heart attack or cancer.
If you're using Windows or any product developped for and/or with Windows, you're vulnerable.
Basically, the problem is with the approach to software develpment. It wouldn't matter whether you were using a Microsof product or a product developped with the development tools.
The end result is you're vulnerable.
her ass to "sexy mother fucker" (Horns pleaze...)
on a pair of roller skates, listening to the Black Eyed Peas, doing the robot, snapping her waist and her fingers.
:-)
Man now THAT would be a killer ad.
Well, I'm a Canadian. We're allowed to get these, uh, ideas. If I was Australian, it'd practically be expected of me.
The statistics are clear.
If they want a safe internet, they musk get rid of Windows and go to Unix (OS X, BSD or Linux.)
The facts are clear. Windows sucks and that can be expected to continue until Microsoft changes EVERYTHING about their development philosophy, which will require changing all the dev tools.
Until that happens, Microsoft will be hackable.
Its gotten so bad that I call them and do everything off the LinkSys router before they even pick up the phone.
:-)
As long as its a simple problem I never want to really speak to them.
When they hear that I am actually even using a router they just get flummoxed and, after a few 'uh's and 'hmm's, tell me to disconnect it and plug my PC directly into the cable modem. (Like I would. I've got enough problems already with script kiddies and nefarious people knocking on my firewall door and rattling the knob. Some of whom are people I know
I don't even, or want to, tell 'em I run a Linux box as a server (with a DynIP addres) or that I'm running a couple of Macs and a Win2k box on a wireless LAN.
outside his own ears is kidding themselves.
:-)
I'm not necessarily being paranoid here (well maybe a tad.) Its just that we are known by the threads our actions weave.
We are witnesssing the ossification of data and the enshrining of standards into perpetuity.
I have a 19gig drive at my feet with years of emails going back to the middle of the 1980s. I don't even own a computer to slide the drive into anymore. (Its an Apple SCSI. The last time I transfered to it was 1997, the first time I started 'logging' my messages, I was using 5 1/2" flopppies. I do a lot with archives and I'm congenitally unable to throw anything away but I know that I'm nuts.
Now I'm reading that I CAN'T throw it away despite its being totally useless to me. It figures.
Now I'll have to keep active hardware and a TB of space 'round for decades. Hopefully that will be enough space to see me through to the grave.
CRINGE. The comments in the code are:
obscene (Okay [name deleted] we'll do it your fuckin' way,)
reflect frustration (I have NO idea what this piece of code is supposed to do or what other events are being kicked inside this 'black box' All I know is that performance sucks.) and (I am deeply ashamed about the structure of this algorithm but the data is coming in this way.) OR
just plain wrong/outdated/unmaintained.
One commment left to me on a piece of unraveled recursive code by a guy I was replacing was: (If you get to debug this piece of shit, good luck. I'm gone now. Guess why?)
Documentation by osmosis is common in all in-house development efforts, as is profanity.
The problem is that the gummint doesn't have the kind of selective deafness and blindness that would make them palatable.
Actually, the entire argument is mooted by the fact that the gummint has out-sourced and, in some instances even off-shored, the surveilance effort and can honestly say that they aren't keeping any records on you. They aren't anymore...
But your record is for sale from a few places...
They were a staple of Russian life. Keep the [others] fearing for their lives by killing a few (or more). Other is in brackets because they weren't killing just Jews.
The Nazis were not particarly secretive about what they were doing. They just had more propaganda about it. (The parts they didn't want you focusing on.)
As for the patriot act... Imagine a world where you CANT get away with anything, on any side. Oh the horror. The HORROR!
"access to our bank statements, our cars (onboard nav computers telling the government where we are going, where we've been, etc), our schools, our whole livelihood could be changed." its already been done.
You don't want to think about how totally owned your life is (and how badly identity theft and misidentification can hurt you.)
My biggest worry is that the people (them as opposed to us, "the civilians") out there take our lives home and fuck with them.
Your quote strikes a chord "Japan had a bunch of religious nutcases in control and the bombs shocked everyone back to reality."
But who is shocking whom?
I'd just confine them to their platform.
Stick 'em on 32 bits and leave them there. (Okay, let 'em fight it out with Linux and OS X (he writes from his 64 bit G5 iMac.)
When the world completes the shift to 64 bits, the problem is gone, and so is M$
The cost per mile (and the overnight stays) even a gummint rate would be prohibitive.
How? Do you plan to just pile up the bills in a stack.
What kind of bills anyway?
Dollar or unpaid bills. I.O.U.s?
Doesn't matter. This administration is not funding anything unless it can go BOOM! The president's a lame duck who's trying to fight demographics. The congress can't agree on an energy policy.
We're going nowhere unless we can take a slow boat there. (Where our tax base is going anyway along with our jobs.)
Do I sound bitter. Nah!
Apart for some tighly controlled access machines, we'd much rather keep our data and our system to ourselves.
A CD burner means that we can 'lose' 650+ MB of data at a time. On a machine without a floppy so we can't infect ourselves.
I don't think so.
Make that not knowing their customers' customers.
While it may be fine for a Microsoft customer (Don't laugh. So its like a Mafia customer. They make them an offer...) like Dell to sell all the machines with XP pre-installed we (a Dell customer to the tune of several 10K units per year) just strip that puppy off the machine and install a plain vanilla Win2k from a CD because its absolute murder on the software when something changes.
If the OS changes and breaks something in our software, its a lot tougher and more expensive for us to fix (when its even possible. We probably won't be able to rehire the same team and most of the, uh, interesting documentation was done by osmosis.)
Microsoft's XP can sit on the shelf 'till the Longhorn cows come home.
Win2K is curently fine. We wouldn't even have gotten off NT4.0 if they hadn't 'end-of-life'd it. It did what was required and stayed out of the way.
If that hurts Microsoft's pocket book, maybe they should get into the toy business.
Software Update call home one a month/week/day.
All Apple needs is a CPU ID and to create an index key with the CPU ID as a primary key for every machine they create.
When the machines call home, they refer a non matching CPU ID to a web page saying "Sorry. Buy a Mac instead"
Apple could care less about unconnected machines. Like who the hell runs unconnected?
Even the military mas machines on the internet. (They also have some on MIL net and never the twain will meet [or there'll be a court martial!] but they're not Macs.)
This is a non-issue for Apple.
providing "Software Update"s servers with a valid CPU ID as a primary key to a hardware record that would match the rest of the machine's geshtalt.
Apple builds the machines, issues them with a CPU and creates a row per CPU ID.
The client machines don't have to be impregnably secure, just as long as the server is.
And I really don't see that big a market for OS X that they would make mucho bucks in the Windows or the Linux market share.
If you want to run OS X, why not buy a Mac. If you don't care to, don't buy a Mac. Its not that big a deal. Everybody's in a twitter about breaking Apple's chops when they get the chance.
Maybe there won't be any chops to break. What's the point of owning a Mac, or any computer, if you can't connect?
Think about it. You CAN'T CONNECT! Your CPU is ALONE! Who wants a LONE CPU? (And that's why Apple is not particularly worried.)
A CPU ID on a secure server for software updates takes care of the problem.
Its a freebie for Apple if OS X 'escapes' because they don't have to support it.
Instead it becomes a web browser ad for buying a real Apple whenever 'Software Update' runs. (Which would reveal the IP address of the sender to boot.)
Nah, Apple doesn't have to do a thing on the client machines.
I don't see that there's any need to limit the spread of OS X to non-Apple hardware. Just not support it with "Software Update's.
An Apple, or any PC for that matter, that is not connected to the internet is ALONE.
That means no email, no browser, no access to any information at all. That is such a small number of machines that its not worth thinking about. Nor are they likely to be a source for much piracy.
The rest of the machines need to 'call home' at least once a month, or week, or day, for the Software updates to work.
When they 'call home' they can report their CPU ID and be granted a pass or launch a browser to a page saying 'Buy an Apple instead of using your hacked copy."
Who needs security on the client side when the server side is so much more secure?
25m to 100M CPU ID as primary keys into a table is no big deal for a server anymore. Apple can track every system they make, their geshtalt and track their legitimacy.
The internet works both ways, people. BOTH ways.