I am sorry to say that the "update" from www.phonenews.com looks like a bit of a scam.
First of all because the whole sceme depends on your ability to sell multiple items through eBay. And secondly because the "story" is pushing readers to sign up for a contarct using a direct link in the article - but the link looks very much like an "affiliate link" for AT&T.
If that is correct then www.phonenews.com is making money every time a users signs up for that contracts. And their credibility goes right down the drain.
It leaves the readers with the following two questions:
1.) Should I engage in the described theme which claims to get me a cheap iPhone but is in fact depending on selling stuff through eBay to cover the losses from the preceding transactions?
2.) Did they write this article in order to cash in on the affiliate link, or did they write it because the actually believe it is a good way to get a cheat phone? (Which leads to a third question: Can I trust a "news site" which tries to trick me into signing a contract so they can make money from the referral?)
It could be a European thing. It is easier to rape the customers on new markets, where nobody is used to having a flat-rate data plan for the iPhone for the simple reason that the first generation iPhone was never sold on that market.
Practically the entire European Union, minus France and the UK, would fall into this category.:-)
Yes, I read TFA. And yes, it appears you missed something: the quite obvious possibility, that if flat-rate is (or becomes) available for a sufficient number of users, someone will make a corresponding iPhone app that runs on hacked/jailbroken iPhones.
We are geeks after all?
The number of homebrew apps already available for the current iPhone seems to prove that there is no limit to what you can actually do - regardless of whatever obstacles or deliberate shortcomings the public SDK contains.
And please consider using a little less hostility in your next postings. I don't see a valid reason for such a negative negative response. My first comment is general in nature, and I believe there is a valid point - if you expand your view to include the actual capabilities of the device, and don't restrict yourself to the confined universe of the SDK.
The 300MB limit gives you 10MB/day, which would be fine for VoIP
Provided the users never uses any other services which require data. Which I personally don't think is realistic.
Your point would be valid if the user had 300 megs only for VoIP, but that is not the case. Any VoIP usage comes on top of the existing data usage - and on top of that, the normal subscription includes regular call usage. These two things combined is what makes the scheme work for the telcos.:-)
the SDK simply doesn't allow call switching over non-Wifi data connections.
Interesting. I didn't know that.
But if all new iPhones were sold with true flat-rate data, your can be sure that someone would create an app for hacked iPhones doing exactly that: call switching over 3G/HSDPA connections...;-)
For the telcos, the only way to fight the problem is to ensure that the dataflow is too expensive - making normal calls a more attractive choice.
so in theory you could us an all data plan and use skype for your outgoing calls.
Provided you have a flat-rate data plan with a price tag small enough to actually make your scenario work. Which will not be all that common for the iPhone 2. Telcos are not stupid. They will identify the exact amount of data transfer which is precisely enough for "regular" customers to never actually reach it, but no where near enough to use the device for streaming, VoIP, or similar services/technologies.
A normal smartphone users spends around 100 megs a month. Including constant syncs with his company exchange server. An advanced smartphone user spends about the double of that. The iPhone 2 will be launched with a 300 meg data plan. Not flat-rate. Coincidence? I think not.
300 megs is more than enough for just about every "normal" smartphone user. But not enough to throw in VoIP, radio-streaming on the road, or mobile pr0n.
While the story does have a point, it is important to remember that the iPhone is not sold with flat-rate data subscriptions in all countries.
Especially the iPhone 2 will not be sold with flat-rate. Both Apple and the telcos have gained insight and experience in the customers actual use of the phone. Standard terms for an iPhone 2 will be around 300 megs a month - a number which is very high for browsing and the occasional iTunes purchase, but nowhere near enough to sustain heavy VoIP usage. Or constant radio-streaming. Or video conferences. Or porn-streaming.
I could run my house on a gasoline generator or ~1.30 USD/KWH.
Mjeah, well, the gasoline price in Denmark is currently approx 2.34 USD per Liter (Octane 92).
That is approx 8.86 USD per gallon. For higher octane gasonline (95/98) the price is well over 10 USD per gallon. So I don't think I will be following your example...;-)
Where I live we pay $.08 per kilowatt hour, so running my computer 24/7 costs me (assuming 190 watts at idle) $11 a month, In Denmark (central Copenhagen) one kilowatt hour is priced at 0.44 USD (just reduced from 0.49 this month btw). So running a unit with a consumption of 190 watts for a day costs about 2.00 USD and approx 60.2 USD a month. Between 5 and 6 times as much as you pay.
The price is higher than in Sweden (our neighbouring country) but lower than other countries in the European Union.
My DELL XPS gaming rig certainly uses more than 190 watts when playing games. I would estimate at least 500 watts including the screen, and perhaps even a little more. My girlfriends PC uses about 110 watts on average since she doesn't play a lot of games, and when she plays (Neverwinter Nights 2) power consumption is not significantly higher. Still, leaving both machines turned on 24/7 and adding in 3 hours of gaming a day on average, would cost us more than 200.0 USD a month. So we turn them off or hibernate them when they are not in use.
Makes you realize why "green IT" and low-power computers actually has a future - right?;-)
It is kind of scary that not only did you guys have a very bright guy foresee a situation like that more than 250 years ago. But you have also completely failed to understand and acknowledge the wisdom of those words. You live in "the land of the free", but continue to elect politicians who show nothing but disrespect for that freedom.
George Orwell is turning in his grave somewhere... no doubt about it!
And honestly: The situation will never change until the day where you actually DO something about it. And I don't mean bitching about it in a public forum/debate in the internet. I mean REALLY do something which involves spending your time and money on the subject. Start a movement. Work on influencing politicians and decision makers. Expose some of the tragic stores that are a result of your loss of freedom, and get the media to tell the story. Donate money to organizations who are working their asses off to protect your freedom. And contribute with work yourselves.
If you don't contribute time and money now, you may have to pay with your life later on. Because if you continue on the current path you will eventually have to defend your freedom with a gun rather than with time and money.
Oh, and hey, if you need a web server in a Non-US country to host your activities and efforts, I'll do it for free. I am not afraid of throwing in both time and money to contribute to your freedom. Questions is: Will YOU??? (Yes, YOU, in front of the computer, YOU!).
He's a stupid script kiddie. That may be so. But at the end of the day he did get the job done. Right? RIGHT?
He got busted because he was an ass at planning. Fine. But he altered the scores, which was probably the original goal of his actions.
I have no love for script kiddes - but you should never underestimate them. They often have social skills or creativity beyond that of many programmers. And they get the job done using simple and proven methods; an approach which is mostly rewarded (jobs, career, etc).
The most dangerous "hacker" is one who doesn't care about professional pride. Only about the end goal: stealing and/or altering data.
In fact, these low-tech "script kiddy" approaches are the ones most feared by security experts. Because they are neither too proud or too afraid of bypassing normal security measures by using social engineering or physical force (breaking into an office). This kid would probably have gotten NOWHERE if he had attempted to hack the schools systems from a remote xDSL line, getting past the firewalls and routers, port scanning, sniffing protocols, and using exploits. His solution? Install a keylogger on a computer in the administration. Then use the information collected. Simple and efficient.
According to this story from 2006, social engineering and low-tech approaches are among the biggest security threats.
I know I will never recommend S.u.S.E. again. You are being totally unfair. The article is on a deliberate rampage against Novell and uses out-of-context examples in a deliberate attempt to deliver FUD about SuSE.
Let us please return to a FACT BASED discussion here.
The time-bombing mechanism clause is in the EULA in order to warn users that the commercial distro can be used on a trial-basis, which will disable itself after some time. That is no different than the way a billion other shareware software products have been distributed for the last 3 decades. Ok, so Novell were stupid enough to actually write that in their license. Red Hat has an identical term in their Red Hat Enterprise for Mainframe / System Z distro. See for yourself. It has a 180 day limitation.
Is Red Hat now evil as well? Or could we PLEASE agree on the fact that this is a totally typical and normal way of letting users try c a commercial software distribution for a limited period of time?
I am not a Novell stockholder, so frankly I couldn't care less about their company value or the market share they own. But i WOULD like to see actual FACTS finding a place in this debate. Not small snippets of text taken out of context and abused for spreading a message which is very different from reality.
Taking small paragraphs and using them totally out of context is about the oldest FUD strategy in existence. And it is normally something we only see large corporations and monopolistic companies practice. It is very sad indeed to see that a community normally in opposition of FUD is turning to such methods.
Novell may be evil. Fine. But if you want to call them bad names, could we at least get some actual facts, which live up to the same standards you would normally require in other issues - for example similar to the decent standard we see in the more scientific articles?
Fact and actual information is king. FUD is FUD, no matter who wrote it and for what purpose.
Personally I am beginning to get the impression that all discussions on Novell/SuSE end up similar to this little scene. What more can I say? Buuuuuuuuurnnn! The logic in the discussion seems to be on the same level anyway...
and DROPing a packet. I have heard of just plain Ping... but what is a DROPing?
Or did you maybee miss a letter, and it should have been DROPPing? In which case an IT forum might not be the right place for that discussion...?;-) Or... something...;-)
Seeing as how Ubuntu is Vista with a Linux kernel, I don't see why this can't be a new era for SuSE May I politely suggest: Because there is much more to an OS than whistles and bells in a fancy GUI?
A good package browser, corporate/enterprise-friendly administration tools, security systems and automated deployment mechanisms are all things that corporate users will evaluate.
While other distros may have a more polished and "Vista-like" GUI, SUSE is known to be more enterprise-oriented, because Novells core business is enterprise-grade infrastructure and enterprise-grade cross-platform tools.
You are correct in stating that MVC is often used as an architectural approach. But I think that is the result of a few decades advanced system development. Today MVC is used a lot in the middle-tiers of n-tier solutions. That observation certainly supports your statement. Business consulting companies have also added a lot of BS terms to describe the same problem/solution, giving it names such as "model-based application", "GUI/logic separation", etc.
But when MVC was originally conceived in the late 70s on mainframes, it was merely a way of solving a very primitive issue: how to ensure that many users viewing the same database record had the latest information on their screen.
You can find very lightweight MVC implementations in modern IDEs, and the sole purpose of those lightweight implementations is to ensure a correctly updated user interface (view) in a program where the underlying data is changed often and by other sources than direct input from the view itself.
A good example could be a hard disk defragmentation tool with a graphical display of the actual defragmentation. While the defragmentation process is moving data on the hard disk, the GUI needs to be updated with the new information. Perhaps even for multiple disks (and thereby multiple different defragmentation processes). At the same time the user might want to interact with the view (pushing buttons or resizing the graphs). The user might even have multiple windows open displaying the same defragmentation process, in which case all open views should be updated to reflect the same information. In this case a lightweight MVC approach would be sensible to use.
The observer pattern you refer to can be used in about a billion different scenarios, for a billion different things. It is much more general in nature (which is not bad, just different) than MVC, because MVC is used solely for applications with actual user interaction and a UI displaying information. In other words, MVC solves a much more specific problem than the publish/subscribe (observer) pattern. Most MVC implementations also provide you (the developer) with a library of ready-to-use classes and methods, with which you can construct models, views and controllers. If you used the observer pattern for the same job, you would be required to write a lot of code from scratch (defining which events to publish, which ones an object should subscribe to, and what to to with them when they are triggered).
Perhaps it could be argued that the observer pattern is used in modern MVC implementations, as a method for handling the messages between the objects - i don't know if that is true though. I am not a programmer on that level:-) I use frameworks, I don't actually make frameworks myself...:-)
Would you care to explain WHY? I mean, really explain. With rational arguments - not emotional, religious or similar irrational explanations.
Because Microsoft has had a long history of fighting against Open Source using every tactics possble. Their agreement with Novell makes Novell not trustworthy in that context. I'm not saying Novell makes bad products or SuSE sucks, but simply there is a suspicious agreement between a company that produces Open Source Software and a different one which always fought against OSS.
So, let me get this straight: You are seriously trying to make Novell evil by proxy? And by proxy only? That is not a rational argument in my book. Sorry:-)
Just for example, would you vote a politician who gets money from the opposite party?
I fail to see the relevance of that analogy. Microsoft and Novell are both software companies. Theyy both sell commercial software. And they made a deal where Novell got a truckload of cash while making Microsoft use and distribute their software. And in addition they got insight in certain closed source products which aided their efforts in making Windows/Linux cross-platform solutions (their core business). In any other non-fanatical, non-religious and more sensible context, that would be considered a rational business decision.
I think the answer to your question is: I will vote for the politician who doesn't lie and who gets the job done. So far Novell seems to fit that description. They have done nothing so far to make me believe that they are not trustworthy. And making a business deal with Microsoft is not in itself "untrustworthy". You are the one trying to display that single action as "untrustworthy" and I don't see any rational arguments to support it.
Probably because WINE doesn't try to make you embrace a closed source technology made in Redmond. There are excellent but Windows only apps out there and WINE provides a bridge to fill the gap (yes I know there are Wine APIs, still you aren't encouraged to use them to write Linux apps).
There are excellent.NET-only apps out there, and I welcome the ability to run them off a Linux cluster. I also welcome any initiative which enables me to choose my server OS/platform independently from my business application. And that is precisely what MONO does. MONO is for.NET servers what WINE is for desktop computers. I am a little surprised you don't see a basis for comparison.
Samba does the same network-wise.
Mono, on the other hand, makes you rely on a Windows technology that will always have more support on the windows platform.
Samba is a (great) product which ties Windows clients together with Linux servers. But it also enables users to keep Windows on their client computers, and continue to use Microsoft technologies and protocols for their server-related needs. It "embraces", as you call it, microsoft protocols and methods. Just as WINE "embraces" the Win32 API btw. In both cases their goal is to ensure interoperability between to competing platforms. Hopefully increasing overall competition in the process. And both the Win32 API and all the Microsoft-based network protocols available in SAMBA will always have more support on the Windows platform.
This makes both SAMBA and WINE bad, by your own definition.
Well, I happen top be one of those people who got to talk before some 50 IBM execs in 1997 or so, when they wanted to know more about it, so each of us (IBM contacted my local Linux Users Group) chose an argument then talked in front of them. Let me tell you one thing: while I was uncomfortable sourrounded by so many suits and security measures (armed guards, no photos, etc.) and some of them still weren't allowed to install Linux on their laptop when we offered to help (and they were execs!), which shows how bad the IBM
An MVC implementation can be quite lightweight and small. And used in very small apps where data is altered from multiple sources and the view needs to be kept up to date automatically.
Care to site any studies supporting these claims that design patterns such as MVC and UP objectively improve the quality of software produced by a given number of people in a given amount of time? If not, your opinion, despite your merits, remains only that - otherwise how could we call ourselves scientists? You are missing the point - that is exactly what the author went out to do. Perhaps he may prove my examples/opinions/experiences wrong. In that case: fine:-) But the author is the scientist, so it is his/her job to include topics like implementation methods (such as UP) and Software Patterns. His paper will then (hopefully) either confirm or deny these common conceptions.
Sure they do. But they also have many places where using an MVC would slow down performance without justifying the benefit. So perhaps they use it in some places, but I can't imagine they do it for every single pixel/cell you can edit:-)
- Jesper
Re:Why people should stay away from it
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OpenSUSE 11.0 Released
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· Score: 4, Insightful
and we all know SuSE is now at least half-evil. Would you care to explain WHY? I mean, really explain. With rational arguments - not emotional, religious or similar irrational explanations. Honestly, give me SOLID ARGUMENTS here. And perhaps a few examples. Did somebodys business close because of the MS/Novell deal? Did someone get sued? Did FOSS projects die? Did customers end up with fewer choices? What???? :-)
your boss says "let's try a Linux distro for a while", please, don't suggest OpenSuSE A good recommendation in a corporate setting is always based on a good business case. I would be happy to evaluate your arguments for not choosing SUSE for a company, if they are solid and based on rational arguments.
Untill then I will most certainly recommend SUSE if the business case supports it. And in some cases it will - no questions asked. Novell makes great cross-platform products, so if a company needs, say, a cluster of servers capable of running both J2EE and.NET, it would make a lot of sense comparing SUSE with MONO/JBOSS vs Windows 2008 with BEA (just an example, insert other similar server-cases here).
Or perhaps we could imagine a company wanting to convert their outdated XP clients with Linux clients in order to postpone hardware upgrades (which would be needed in order to migrate to Vista). Perhaps the ability to show webpages with Silverlight elements was an important criteria? What about browsers capable of showing PDF documents, MS Word documents, Flash content, etc? All these are cross-platform initiatives, and I honestly believe that Linux won't make in into the corporate environment without these.
I don't understand why some people think Novell and their projects (for example Mono and Moonlight) are "bad" while other cross-platform initiatives (such as WINE and SAMBA) are "good". I also fail to see why the same people often argue that IBM's investments in Open Source projects are "good" while Novells are "bad". The discussion about Microsoft/Linux/Novell needs to be elevated to a level where it is based on the same standard you would demand in other more scientific debates. Drop the emotional and irrational arguments. Give me facts and examples from real life.
Users and customers benefit from a free market. It gives them the widest range of products to choose from. Any community or company who is engaged in software projects which enhance portability and interconnectivity are "good" as far as I am concerned. Even more so when they are releases them under open source licenses - like MONO and Moonlight.
:-)
- Jesper
Should we also dump reality? Or competition?
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OpenSUSE 11.0 Released
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· Score: 5, Interesting
The only way SUSE will start a new era is if they dump Microsoft as a partner. I respectfully disagree. I know many people have an almost religious crusade against Microsoft any company they are associated with - but I think there is a wider consideration which many people forget. Novells core business is connecting technologies which are for different reasons not already connected. And for the most part the products they connect are a mixture of (F)OSS and classic closed-source commercial software.
While you may disagree with their goals, and be almost religiously in opposition of them, I think they do more good than bad. They ultimately ensure that the customer/consumer has a wider choice in products and technologies, and they are IMHO they key to breaking the monopolistic world domination which certain vendors enjoy.
I honestly don't understand why some people believe Novells projects (for example Mono and Moonlight) are "bad" while similar cross-platform initiatives (such as WINE and SAMBA) are "good". I also don't understand why people see IBM's investments in Open Source projects as "good" while Novells are "bad".
In a free market, the users and customers benefit from having the widest range of products to choose from. Any company or community who is engaged in software projects which enhance portability and interconnectivity are "good" the way I see it. Especially when they release them under open source licenses - like Novell does.
Given the allready widespread use of.NET applications, being able to run them on a Linux cluster ensures that Linux can be a more attractive choice in a given scenario. The ability to provide end-users with Linux desktops which can run Win32 apps (WINE), read PDF documents, browse webpages created with Silverlight and use homepages full of fancy Shockwave Flash elements, makes it easier for a large Enterprise to choose Linux (any distro) as a client platform. In my view that enhances the competition - which is (almost) always good for the customers.
:-)
- Jesper
A crusade against cross-platform initiatives?
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OpenSUSE 11.0 Released
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· Score: 2, Insightful
One basic question. Is Mono and Moonlight a selected by default option or not? I can't say for SUSE 11, but for 10.x neither Mono or Moonlight was installed by default. They were available through the YAST package manager.
I would use original XP or Vista rather than a thing which is made by their cloning partners. At least they are original.
It is sad that you come to such a conclusion without at least evaluating the technical potential of these projects, and perhaps Novells reasons for engaging in them. It sounds almost like you are on a personal crusade against commercial vendors who are in the cross-platform / portability business.
Novell has made it its core business to connect technologies which are for different reasons not already connected. And in most of these cases, the products they connect are either all commercial or a mixture of (F)OSS and classic closed-source commercial software.
While you may disagree with their goals, and be almost religiously in opposition of them, I think they do more good than bad. They ultimately ensure that the customer/consumer has a wider choice in products and technologies, and they are IMHO they key to breaking the monopolistic world domination which certain vendors enjoy.
I frankly don't see why Novells projects (for example Mono and Moonlight) are "bad" while similar cross-platform initiatives (such as WINE and SAMBA) are "good". I think the end user should have the widest range of products to choose from, and any company or community who is engaged in projects which enhance portability and interconnectivity are "good". Especially when they release them under open source licenses - like Novell does.
Competition between major distros doesn't really exist, because all features are available for all distros. While some may argue that SUSE is bad as a matter of principle (because of their deal wil Microsoft, which secured them a truckload of cash), it is my experience that SUSE has more focus on Enterprise needs than most other distros.
So yes - perhaps all features are available for all distros. But not all are actually implemented/moved to another distro. Most corporate users like the way YAST (packet manager) is working, and they also enjoy some of the built-in features for central management and integration with infrastructure products widely used in Enterprises.
Simply put: SUSE has more focus on Enterprise needs, and less focus on whistles and bells (in GUI and elsewhere). An even though many of these features COULD be moved/ported to other distros, they are not. For the simple reasons that users of these distros are not needing or requesting them.
On the other hand distros like Ubuntu has a much nicer appeal to consumer-type end-users. It looks more familiar to them , than SUSE and has a more appealing look'n'feel.
Slashdot Mirror
I am sorry to say that the "update" from www.phonenews.com looks like a bit of a scam.
First of all because the whole sceme depends on your ability to sell multiple items through eBay. And secondly because the "story" is pushing readers to sign up for a contarct using a direct link in the article - but the link looks very much like an "affiliate link" for AT&T.
If that is correct then www.phonenews.com is making money every time a users signs up for that contracts. And their credibility goes right down the drain.
It leaves the readers with the following two questions:
1.) Should I engage in the described theme which claims to get me a cheap iPhone but is in fact depending on selling stuff through eBay to cover the losses from the preceding transactions?
2.) Did they write this article in order to cash in on the affiliate link, or did they write it because the actually believe it is a good way to get a cheat phone? (Which leads to a third question: Can I trust a "news site" which tries to trick me into signing a contract so they can make money from the referral?)
- Jesper
There is, as a matter of fact, a world outside the US ... ;-)
- Jesper
No matter.
Someone has been busy modding it "overrated" so its back to 2 now. ;-)
- Jesper
It could be a European thing. It is easier to rape the customers on new markets, where nobody is used to having a flat-rate data plan for the iPhone for the simple reason that the first generation iPhone was never sold on that market.
Practically the entire European Union, minus France and the UK, would fall into this category. :-)
- Jesper
unless I'm missing something
Yes, I read TFA. And yes, it appears you missed something: the quite obvious possibility, that if flat-rate is (or becomes) available for a sufficient number of users, someone will make a corresponding iPhone app that runs on hacked/jailbroken iPhones.
:-)
We are geeks after all?
The number of homebrew apps already available for the current iPhone seems to prove that there is no limit to what you can actually do - regardless of whatever obstacles or deliberate shortcomings the public SDK contains.
And please consider using a little less hostility in your next postings. I don't see a valid reason for such a negative negative response. My first comment is general in nature, and I believe there is a valid point - if you expand your view to include the actual capabilities of the device, and don't restrict yourself to the confined universe of the SDK.
With all respect
- Jesper
The 300MB limit gives you 10MB/day, which would be fine for VoIP
Provided the users never uses any other services which require data. Which I personally don't think is realistic.
:-)
Your point would be valid if the user had 300 megs only for VoIP, but that is not the case. Any VoIP usage comes on top of the existing data usage - and on top of that, the normal subscription includes regular call usage. These two things combined is what makes the scheme work for the telcos.
- Jesper
the SDK simply doesn't allow call switching over non-Wifi data connections.
Interesting. I didn't know that.
;-)
But if all new iPhones were sold with true flat-rate data, your can be sure that someone would create an app for hacked iPhones doing exactly that: call switching over 3G/HSDPA connections...
For the telcos, the only way to fight the problem is to ensure that the dataflow is too expensive - making normal calls a more attractive choice.
- Jesper
so in theory you could us an all data plan and use skype for your outgoing calls.
Provided you have a flat-rate data plan with a price tag small enough to actually make your scenario work. Which will not be all that common for the iPhone 2. Telcos are not stupid. They will identify the exact amount of data transfer which is precisely enough for "regular" customers to never actually reach it, but no where near enough to use the device for streaming, VoIP, or similar services/technologies.
A normal smartphone users spends around 100 megs a month. Including constant syncs with his company exchange server. An advanced smartphone user spends about the double of that. The iPhone 2 will be launched with a 300 meg data plan. Not flat-rate. Coincidence? I think not.
300 megs is more than enough for just about every "normal" smartphone user. But not enough to throw in VoIP, radio-streaming on the road, or mobile pr0n.
- Jesper
While the story does have a point, it is important to remember that the iPhone is not sold with flat-rate data subscriptions in all countries.
Especially the iPhone 2 will not be sold with flat-rate. Both Apple and the telcos have gained insight and experience in the customers actual use of the phone. Standard terms for an iPhone 2 will be around 300 megs a month - a number which is very high for browsing and the occasional iTunes purchase, but nowhere near enough to sustain heavy VoIP usage. Or constant radio-streaming. Or video conferences. Or porn-streaming.
- Jesper
I could run my house on a gasoline generator or ~1.30 USD/KWH.
Mjeah, well, the gasoline price in Denmark is currently approx 2.34 USD per Liter (Octane 92).
;-)
That is approx 8.86 USD per gallon. For higher octane gasonline (95/98) the price is well over 10 USD per gallon. So I don't think I will be following your example...
- Jesper
The price is higher than in Sweden (our neighbouring country) but lower than other countries in the European Union.
My DELL XPS gaming rig certainly uses more than 190 watts when playing games. I would estimate at least 500 watts including the screen, and perhaps even a little more. My girlfriends PC uses about 110 watts on average since she doesn't play a lot of games, and when she plays (Neverwinter Nights 2) power consumption is not significantly higher. Still, leaving both machines turned on 24/7 and adding in 3 hours of gaming a day on average, would cost us more than 200.0 USD a month. So we turn them off or hibernate them when they are not in use.
Makes you realize why "green IT" and low-power computers actually has a future - right?
- Jesper
The following quote is often accredited to Benjamin Franklin:
... no doubt about it!
"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety"
It is kind of scary that not only did you guys have a very bright guy foresee a situation like that more than 250 years ago. But you have also completely failed to understand and acknowledge the wisdom of those words. You live in "the land of the free", but continue to elect politicians who show nothing but disrespect for that freedom.
George Orwell is turning in his grave somewhere
And honestly: The situation will never change until the day where you actually DO something about it. And I don't mean bitching about it in a public forum/debate in the internet. I mean REALLY do something which involves spending your time and money on the subject. Start a movement. Work on influencing politicians and decision makers. Expose some of the tragic stores that are a result of your loss of freedom, and get the media to tell the story. Donate money to organizations who are working their asses off to protect your freedom. And contribute with work yourselves.
If you don't contribute time and money now, you may have to pay with your life later on. Because if you continue on the current path you will eventually have to defend your freedom with a gun rather than with time and money.
Oh, and hey, if you need a web server in a Non-US country to host your activities and efforts, I'll do it for free. I am not afraid of throwing in both time and money to contribute to your freedom. Questions is: Will YOU??? (Yes, YOU, in front of the computer, YOU!).
- Jesper
He got busted because he was an ass at planning. Fine. But he altered the scores, which was probably the original goal of his actions.
I have no love for script kiddes - but you should never underestimate them. They often have social skills or creativity beyond that of many programmers. And they get the job done using simple and proven methods; an approach which is mostly rewarded (jobs, career, etc).
The most dangerous "hacker" is one who doesn't care about professional pride. Only about the end goal: stealing and/or altering data.
In fact, these low-tech "script kiddy" approaches are the ones most feared by security experts. Because they are neither too proud or too afraid of bypassing normal security measures by using social engineering or physical force (breaking into an office). This kid would probably have gotten NOWHERE if he had attempted to hack the schools systems from a remote xDSL line, getting past the firewalls and routers, port scanning, sniffing protocols, and using exploits. His solution? Install a keylogger on a computer in the administration. Then use the information collected. Simple and efficient.
According to this story from 2006, social engineering and low-tech approaches are among the biggest security threats.
- Jesper
... we have been warned.I know I will never recommend S.u.S.E. again.
You are being totally unfair. The article is on a deliberate rampage against Novell and uses out-of-context examples in a deliberate attempt to deliver FUD about SuSE.
Let us please return to a FACT BASED discussion here.
The time-bombing mechanism clause is in the EULA in order to warn users that the commercial distro can be used on a trial-basis, which will disable itself after some time. That is no different than the way a billion other shareware software products have been distributed for the last 3 decades. Ok, so Novell were stupid enough to actually write that in their license. Red Hat has an identical term in their Red Hat Enterprise for Mainframe / System Z distro. See for yourself. It has a 180 day limitation.
Is Red Hat now evil as well? Or could we PLEASE agree on the fact that this is a totally typical and normal way of letting users try c a commercial software distribution for a limited period of time?
I am not a Novell stockholder, so frankly I couldn't care less about their company value or the market share they own. But i WOULD like to see actual FACTS finding a place in this debate. Not small snippets of text taken out of context and abused for spreading a message which is very different from reality.
Taking small paragraphs and using them totally out of context is about the oldest FUD strategy in existence. And it is normally something we only see large corporations and monopolistic companies practice. It is very sad indeed to see that a community normally in opposition of FUD is turning to such methods.
Novell may be evil. Fine. But if you want to call them bad names, could we at least get some actual facts, which live up to the same standards you would normally require in other issues - for example similar to the decent standard we see in the more scientific articles?
Fact and actual information is king. FUD is FUD, no matter who wrote it and for what purpose.
Personally I am beginning to get the impression that all discussions on Novell/SuSE end up similar to this little scene. What more can I say? Buuuuuuuuurnnn! The logic in the discussion seems to be on the same level anyway...
- Jesper
Or did you maybee miss a letter, and it should have been DROPPing? In which case an IT forum might not be the right place for that discussion...?
- Jesper
A good package browser, corporate/enterprise-friendly administration tools, security systems and automated deployment mechanisms are all things that corporate users will evaluate.
While other distros may have a more polished and "Vista-like" GUI, SUSE is known to be more enterprise-oriented, because Novells core business is enterprise-grade infrastructure and enterprise-grade cross-platform tools.
- Jesper
You are correct in stating that MVC is often used as an architectural approach. But I think that is the result of a few decades advanced system development. Today MVC is used a lot in the middle-tiers of n-tier solutions. That observation certainly supports your statement. Business consulting companies have also added a lot of BS terms to describe the same problem/solution, giving it names such as "model-based application", "GUI/logic separation", etc.
:-) I use frameworks, I don't actually make frameworks myself... :-)
But when MVC was originally conceived in the late 70s on mainframes, it was merely a way of solving a very primitive issue: how to ensure that many users viewing the same database record had the latest information on their screen.
You can find very lightweight MVC implementations in modern IDEs, and the sole purpose of those lightweight implementations is to ensure a correctly updated user interface (view) in a program where the underlying data is changed often and by other sources than direct input from the view itself.
A good example could be a hard disk defragmentation tool with a graphical display of the actual defragmentation. While the defragmentation process is moving data on the hard disk, the GUI needs to be updated with the new information. Perhaps even for multiple disks (and thereby multiple different defragmentation processes). At the same time the user might want to interact with the view (pushing buttons or resizing the graphs). The user might even have multiple windows open displaying the same defragmentation process, in which case all open views should be updated to reflect the same information. In this case a lightweight MVC approach would be sensible to use.
The observer pattern you refer to can be used in about a billion different scenarios, for a billion different things. It is much more general in nature (which is not bad, just different) than MVC, because MVC is used solely for applications with actual user interaction and a UI displaying information. In other words, MVC solves a much more specific problem than the publish/subscribe (observer) pattern. Most MVC implementations also provide you (the developer) with a library of ready-to-use classes and methods, with which you can construct models, views and controllers. If you used the observer pattern for the same job, you would be required to write a lot of code from scratch (defining which events to publish, which ones an object should subscribe to, and what to to with them when they are triggered).
Perhaps it could be argued that the observer pattern is used in modern MVC implementations, as a method for handling the messages between the objects - i don't know if that is true though. I am not a programmer on that level
- Jesper
Would you care to explain WHY? I mean, really explain. With rational arguments - not emotional, religious or similar irrational explanations.
Because Microsoft has had a long history of fighting against Open Source using every tactics possble. Their agreement with Novell makes Novell not trustworthy in that context. I'm not saying Novell makes bad products or SuSE sucks, but simply there is a suspicious agreement between a company that produces Open Source Software and a different one which always fought against OSS.
So, let me get this straight: You are seriously trying to make Novell evil by proxy? And by proxy only? That is not a rational argument in my book. Sorry :-)
Just for example, would you vote a politician who gets money from the opposite party?
I fail to see the relevance of that analogy. Microsoft and Novell are both software companies. Theyy both sell commercial software. And they made a deal where Novell got a truckload of cash while making Microsoft use and distribute their software. And in addition they got insight in certain closed source products which aided their efforts in making Windows/Linux cross-platform solutions (their core business). In any other non-fanatical, non-religious and more sensible context, that would be considered a rational business decision.
I think the answer to your question is: I will vote for the politician who doesn't lie and who gets the job done. So far Novell seems to fit that description. They have done nothing so far to make me believe that they are not trustworthy. And making a business deal with Microsoft is not in itself "untrustworthy". You are the one trying to display that single action as "untrustworthy" and I don't see any rational arguments to support it.
Probably because WINE doesn't try to make you embrace a closed source technology made in Redmond. There are excellent but Windows only apps out there and WINE provides a bridge to fill the gap (yes I know there are Wine APIs, still you aren't encouraged to use them to write Linux apps).
There are excellent .NET-only apps out there, and I welcome the ability to run them off a Linux cluster. I also welcome any initiative which enables me to choose my server OS/platform independently from my business application. And that is precisely what MONO does. MONO is for .NET servers what WINE is for desktop computers. I am a little surprised you don't see a basis for comparison.
Samba does the same network-wise.
Mono, on the other hand, makes you rely on a Windows technology that will always have more support on the windows platform.
Samba is a (great) product which ties Windows clients together with Linux servers. But it also enables users to keep Windows on their client computers, and continue to use Microsoft technologies and protocols for their server-related needs. It "embraces", as you call it, microsoft protocols and methods. Just as WINE "embraces" the Win32 API btw. In both cases their goal is to ensure interoperability between to competing platforms. Hopefully increasing overall competition in the process. And both the Win32 API and all the Microsoft-based network protocols available in SAMBA will always have more support on the Windows platform.
This makes both SAMBA and WINE bad, by your own definition.
Well, I happen top be one of those people who got to talk before some 50 IBM execs in 1997 or so, when they wanted to know more about it, so each of us (IBM contacted my local Linux Users Group) chose an argument then talked in front of them. Let me tell you one thing: while I was uncomfortable sourrounded by so many suits and security measures (armed guards, no photos, etc.) and some of them still weren't allowed to install Linux on their laptop when we offered to help (and they were execs!), which shows how bad the IBM
I respectfully disagree :-)
An MVC implementation can be quite lightweight and small. And used in very small apps where data is altered from multiple sources and the view needs to be kept up to date automatically.
- Jesper
- Jesper
Sure they do. But they also have many places where using an MVC would slow down performance without justifying the benefit. So perhaps they use it in some places, but I can't imagine they do it for every single pixel/cell you can edit :-)
- Jesper
your boss says "let's try a Linux distro for a while", please, don't suggest OpenSuSE A good recommendation in a corporate setting is always based on a good business case. I would be happy to evaluate your arguments for not choosing SUSE for a company, if they are solid and based on rational arguments.
Untill then I will most certainly recommend SUSE if the business case supports it. And in some cases it will - no questions asked. Novell makes great cross-platform products, so if a company needs, say, a cluster of servers capable of running both J2EE and
Or perhaps we could imagine a company wanting to convert their outdated XP clients with Linux clients in order to postpone hardware upgrades (which would be needed in order to migrate to Vista). Perhaps the ability to show webpages with Silverlight elements was an important criteria? What about browsers capable of showing PDF documents, MS Word documents, Flash content, etc? All these are cross-platform initiatives, and I honestly believe that Linux won't make in into the corporate environment without these.
I don't understand why some people think Novell and their projects (for example Mono and Moonlight) are "bad" while other cross-platform initiatives (such as WINE and SAMBA) are "good". I also fail to see why the same people often argue that IBM's investments in Open Source projects are "good" while Novells are "bad". The discussion about Microsoft/Linux/Novell needs to be elevated to a level where it is based on the same standard you would demand in other more scientific debates. Drop the emotional and irrational arguments. Give me facts and examples from real life.
Users and customers benefit from a free market. It gives them the widest range of products to choose from. Any community or company who is engaged in software projects which enhance portability and interconnectivity are "good" as far as I am concerned. Even more so when they are releases them under open source licenses - like MONO and Moonlight.
- Jesper
While you may disagree with their goals, and be almost religiously in opposition of them, I think they do more good than bad. They ultimately ensure that the customer/consumer has a wider choice in products and technologies, and they are IMHO they key to breaking the monopolistic world domination which certain vendors enjoy.
I honestly don't understand why some people believe Novells projects (for example Mono and Moonlight) are "bad" while similar cross-platform initiatives (such as WINE and SAMBA) are "good". I also don't understand why people see IBM's investments in Open Source projects as "good" while Novells are "bad".
In a free market, the users and customers benefit from having the widest range of products to choose from. Any company or community who is engaged in software projects which enhance portability and interconnectivity are "good" the way I see it. Especially when they release them under open source licenses - like Novell does.
Given the allready widespread use of
- Jesper
I would use original XP or Vista rather than a thing which is made by their cloning partners. At least they are original.
It is sad that you come to such a conclusion without at least evaluating the technical potential of these projects, and perhaps Novells reasons for engaging in them. It sounds almost like you are on a personal crusade against commercial vendors who are in the cross-platform / portability business.
Novell has made it its core business to connect technologies which are for different reasons not already connected. And in most of these cases, the products they connect are either all commercial or a mixture of (F)OSS and classic closed-source commercial software.
While you may disagree with their goals, and be almost religiously in opposition of them, I think they do more good than bad. They ultimately ensure that the customer/consumer has a wider choice in products and technologies, and they are IMHO they key to breaking the monopolistic world domination which certain vendors enjoy.
I frankly don't see why Novells projects (for example Mono and Moonlight) are "bad" while similar cross-platform initiatives (such as WINE and SAMBA) are "good". I think the end user should have the widest range of products to choose from, and any company or community who is engaged in projects which enhance portability and interconnectivity are "good". Especially when they release them under open source licenses - like Novell does.
- Jesper
So yes - perhaps all features are available for all distros. But not all are actually implemented/moved to another distro. Most corporate users like the way YAST (packet manager) is working, and they also enjoy some of the built-in features for central management and integration with infrastructure products widely used in Enterprises.
Simply put: SUSE has more focus on Enterprise needs, and less focus on whistles and bells (in GUI and elsewhere). An even though many of these features COULD be moved/ported to other distros, they are not. For the simple reasons that users of these distros are not needing or requesting them.
On the other hand distros like Ubuntu has a much nicer appeal to consumer-type end-users. It looks more familiar to them , than SUSE and has a more appealing look'n'feel.
- Jesper