Another interesting road block I hadn't considered. I guess if I really needed the data from a remote location, I'd have to provide access to the data via HTTP. No write access though unless I added some kind downloader.
That's cool. This is the information I was hoping to get out of this question. I've also read some posts with some really helpful info on obstacles that would need to be overcome to use this application on other computers.
Blame this on my not writing up a really thorough spec for the small summary. You can see some of my other posts for more info, but this was sort of a query to see if anyone had done something similar because it seems like a simple project that might be useful.
As to the GUI, I was thinking it would be nice if it could double as a backup tool and a remote file system tool, ie access the files from another computer.
You are correct, the access from Windows is really of secondary concern. Still, it would be nice to access the data from work or the wife's computer.
I should have also added that I asked the question to see how much flaming and ridicule I could draw by asking about such a cheap-ass, overly complex solution that is simply solved by SSH/SFTP.:)
I should have stated that the data wasn't THAT important since it's already backed up in two other places.
I was initially using Amazon S3 to do the backups, but since I had 20 GB of spare storage on my hosting site, I figured someone else must have tried doing the exact same thing because it's the cheapest solution. It didn't take me long to write a small script to encrypt files and send them to the FTP server, another reason I figured someone else may have done this. So, rather than extending the script, I thought I'd "Ask Slashdot" to see if anyone else had completed the exercise.
If it were REALLY important for me to have this storage, I'd go back to using S3 or spring an extra $10 a month to get my account upgraded to use SSH/SFTP.
As it stands now, I may just get a kick out of implementing the project for fun.
Yes, I've looked at this, but I'm already using a Python script to do most of that. I was hoping to find something with a GUI and that was easier to put on a portable hard drive than Python.
That was one scenario I hadn't thought of, but, since this is a copy of data I've already backed up in other places and check nightly, it's not a big deal if someone deletes it. Plus, it's not THAT valuable.
That would be a pain if someone was deleting it everynight.:)
Hey, I'm already doing that! The problem there is putting a Python installation on my portable drive.
Anyway, the parent is absolutely correct about my problem IF I cared that much about my data. I could pay an extra $10 a month for SFTP/SSH service on my hosting account or use Amazon S3, but, really my data just isn't worth that much because it is personal files I already store in two other places.
To me, the problem seems to be if someone has implemented a secure pseudo-filesystem over FTP. I tried looking for that but couldn't find anything.
I was using Amazon S3 before realizing I was paying double when I had a spare 20 gigabytes on my FTP/HTTP hosting service. I could pay an extra $10 a month to get SFTP/SSH service but I guess I'm being cheap.
I'm also not storing anything so important that I need a technically superior solution.
I use TrueCrypt on my portable hard drive and tried using it for this application. The problem was that TrueCrypt couldn't create a file system on an FTP server.
I've been using TrueCrypt to encrypt individual files before sending them to the FTP server. I'll have to give it a look again since my version might be a little out of date.
The problem with charging the customer upon disposal is that most people will see a $10 charge and will find another way, probably illegal, to dispose of the computer.
Charging the manufacturer isn't good either because the customer then feels no responsibility.
But, having the retailer charging a high amount that is refundable upon disposal, then that gives the customer incentive for proper disposal.
No, this is bad because Borland was given a patent for the ONE solution to a unique, but common, problem.
They may have spent some effort to get this working, but any group of engineers faced with the task of unrolling a stack to get a stack trace when the hardware throws an exception would have come up with a nearly identical solution.
It's more like your car running out of gas for the first time and you discover you need to refill the tank. The bad news is that a tire maker has patented the process of putting the nozzle in your car and charges you an extra fee for it.
Note that, on x86, VC++ and most other PC compilers use a stack-based unwinding and handling mechanism known as SEH, common to OS/2, Windows and Windows NT and described in detail in a famous MSJ article, http://www.microsoft.com/msj/0197/Exception/Except ion.aspx. GCC and most other UNIX compilers, instead, use the same table-based mechanism that is the rule on RISC architectures on x86 too. Also note that any use of stack-based SEH may or may not be covered by USPTO patent #5,628,016, held by Borland International, Inc. SEH on RISC architectures is table-based, thus unaffected by the patent)
Further searching for info on table based implementation reveals http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2004/01/ 14/58579.aspx that this would break compatibility with Windows.
In other words, if you want to use SEH, you're screwed without Borland's help.
How can you not nitpick your mountpoints when their obfuscated names are one of your arguments? Because the correct information makes Linux look better.
You don't put pictures in "C:\pictures", they go in "C:\Documents and Settings\username\My Documents\My Pictures".
All my harddrives are automounted, especially/home, so I put my pictures in "/home/username/pictures". I don't even have to remember some arcane OS construct like "drive".
To be fair to Microsoft, they're trying to move away from the harddrive concept so your photos will go in some virtual photo album named "My Pictures". Only the sys admin will know where they are really stored.
No, I'm not implying homeless people are homeless by choice. From what I've read, many homeless people are suffering from mental or physical health problems and if they had the faculties, would request the appropriate assistance. In this case, society is responsible for taking care of this part of the population.
If the homeless are just "down on their luck", then society is responsible to provide them assistance to get back to being a integral part of society.
What I was implying is that if one has mental and physical health and makes the rational decision to not participate in society, then you should in no way associate with any people in any way.
Looking at dictionary.com, one can summarize the definition of society as "social relationships among people". To me this means any two or more people can be a society. And if you choose not to be a part of ANY society, you cannot form social relationships with any person and hence must go through life completely alone and without assistance from ANY persons.
Maybe I'm looking at it in manner that is too black and white, but to me, one is either "off" or "on" the grid. You can't choose when you'd like to be part of society.
The document says nothing about national security.
I take that back, the document says nothing about this being done for national security, just that the information can be released according to national security guidelines and that the person can see who accesses their records unless it's for national security reasons.
I can't tell if you're trolling or being sarcastic, but I was probably a little too flippant in my post, so I deserve it.
By your argument, I can freely steal what little they own. It's up to them to protect themselves and aren't entitled to police protection.
I can hunt and kill them like vermin. Why go on a prairie dog hunt when you can hunt hobos?
No and no. I don't believe that any rational person can make the decision to live in society and not be a part of that society, it's against one of the most common definitions of societ. But if one person tries to justify this attitude, I certainly don't believe they lose all rights in that society, they are just incorrect. If you interact with any other person, not matter how insignificantly, you are part of society.
What about tourists from other countries? From other states? From the next town over?
It's a global society; everyone is a part of it and cooperates on different levels: city, county, state, national and international.
I'm know you were thinking about something else when you wrote "benefits," but do you really want to make the argument that we should not be equal under the law?
The point of the HMIS document is to provide better management and prediction of health and welfare services to homeless persons. These are the only benefits I was referring to, which I fully support. In no way was I implying homeless should not be equal under the law.
Aren't most if not all homeless shelters and soup kitchens private organizations? Even those that are government I'd assume are local government. What right does the federal government have demanding information from private organizations or local governments?
Yes and no. Many of the private and state programs receive funds from federal grants which puts them under the federal guidelines proposed in this document. In that case the gov't can demand anything it wants, not that all those demands should be met. But the document does indicate they are doing this to provide better services.
This program will probably cost taxpayers more than all the federal homeless programs combined. The national security benefits are not enough to justify the cost, in my opinion.
Maybe, maybe not. I'm haven't seen any cost analysis so I can't judge that. It is hard to argue that some management and planning might make the services better.
The document says nothing about national security. It is about managing and predicting needed services for homeless, veterans, runaways and battered women. It also addresses how that information will be protected and used.
I also find it hard to believe we need to worry about homeless as threats to national security, but, as with any database administered by the gov't, insert paranoia as needed.
Slashdot Mirror
Another interesting road block I hadn't considered. I guess if I really needed the data from a remote location, I'd have to provide access to the data via HTTP. No write access though unless I added some kind downloader.
This is great. I might even sign up to help you out, if you need it.
That's cool. This is the information I was hoping to get out of this question. I've also read some posts with some really helpful info on obstacles that would need to be overcome to use this application on other computers.
Blame this on my not writing up a really thorough spec for the small summary. You can see some of my other posts for more info, but this was sort of a query to see if anyone had done something similar because it seems like a simple project that might be useful.
As to the GUI, I was thinking it would be nice if it could double as a backup tool and a remote file system tool, ie access the files from another computer.
Thanks for the suggestion, but my wife will be upset if I start running around the front yard naked. I'll try to come up with something else.
You are correct, the access from Windows is really of secondary concern. Still, it would be nice to access the data from work or the wife's computer.
I should have also added that I asked the question to see how much flaming and ridicule I could draw by asking about such a cheap-ass, overly complex solution that is simply solved by SSH/SFTP. :)
I should have stated that the data wasn't THAT important since it's already backed up in two other places.
I was initially using Amazon S3 to do the backups, but since I had 20 GB of spare storage on my hosting site, I figured someone else must have tried doing the exact same thing because it's the cheapest solution. It didn't take me long to write a small script to encrypt files and send them to the FTP server, another reason I figured someone else may have done this. So, rather than extending the script, I thought I'd "Ask Slashdot" to see if anyone else had completed the exercise.
If it were REALLY important for me to have this storage, I'd go back to using S3 or spring an extra $10 a month to get my account upgraded to use SSH/SFTP.
As it stands now, I may just get a kick out of implementing the project for fun.
Yes, I've looked at this, but I'm already using a Python script to do most of that. I was hoping to find something with a GUI and that was easier to put on a portable hard drive than Python.
That was one scenario I hadn't thought of, but, since this is a copy of data I've already backed up in other places and check nightly, it's not a big deal if someone deletes it. Plus, it's not THAT valuable.
That would be a pain if someone was deleting it everynight. :)
Hey, I'm already doing that! The problem there is putting a Python installation on my portable drive.
Anyway, the parent is absolutely correct about my problem IF I cared that much about my data. I could pay an extra $10 a month for SFTP/SSH service on my hosting account or use Amazon S3, but, really my data just isn't worth that much because it is personal files I already store in two other places.
To me, the problem seems to be if someone has implemented a secure pseudo-filesystem over FTP. I tried looking for that but couldn't find anything.
Thanks for the laughs.
I was using Amazon S3 before realizing I was paying double when I had a spare 20 gigabytes on my FTP/HTTP hosting service. I could pay an extra $10 a month to get SFTP/SSH service but I guess I'm being cheap.
I'm also not storing anything so important that I need a technically superior solution.
I use TrueCrypt on my portable hard drive and tried using it for this application. The problem was that TrueCrypt couldn't create a file system on an FTP server.
I've been using TrueCrypt to encrypt individual files before sending them to the FTP server. I'll have to give it a look again since my version might be a little out of date.
Areca might work, I'll have to give it a spin. Thanks.
Excellent point. I agree with RMS that the whole trusted computing concept is bad, but I don't think it should be part of the GPL.
We need to educate non-techie consumers why this is so bad and don't buy the crap.
The story at boston.com has more details and the city planners have so far said they will give due consideration.
The Russound looks like what I might need. How much did your system cost?
This is good but can be improved.
The problem with charging the customer upon disposal is that most people will see a $10 charge and will find another way, probably illegal, to dispose of the computer.
Charging the manufacturer isn't good either because the customer then feels no responsibility.
But, having the retailer charging a high amount that is refundable upon disposal, then that gives the customer incentive for proper disposal.
No, this is bad because Borland was given a patent for the ONE solution to a unique, but common, problem.
They may have spent some effort to get this working, but any group of engineers faced with the task of unrolling a stack to get a stack trace when the hardware throws an exception would have come up with a nearly identical solution.
It's more like your car running out of gas for the first time and you discover you need to refill the tank. The bad news is that a tire maker has patented the process of putting the nozzle in your car and charges you an extra fee for it.
How can you not nitpick your mountpoints when their obfuscated names are one of your arguments? Because the correct information makes Linux look better.
/home, so I put my pictures in "/home/username/pictures". I don't even have to remember some arcane OS construct like "drive".
You don't put pictures in "C:\pictures", they go in "C:\Documents and Settings\username\My Documents\My Pictures".
All my harddrives are automounted, especially
To be fair to Microsoft, they're trying to move away from the harddrive concept so your photos will go in some virtual photo album named "My Pictures". Only the sys admin will know where they are really stored.
Harry
No, I'm not implying homeless people are homeless by choice. From what I've read, many homeless people are suffering from mental or physical health problems and if they had the faculties, would request the appropriate assistance. In this case, society is responsible for taking care of this part of the population.
If the homeless are just "down on their luck", then society is responsible to provide them assistance to get back to being a integral part of society.
What I was implying is that if one has mental and physical health and makes the rational decision to not participate in society, then you should in no way associate with any people in any way.
Looking at dictionary.com, one can summarize the definition of society as "social relationships among people". To me this means any two or more people can be a society. And if you choose not to be a part of ANY society, you cannot form social relationships with any person and hence must go through life completely alone and without assistance from ANY persons.
Maybe I'm looking at it in manner that is too black and white, but to me, one is either "off" or "on" the grid. You can't choose when you'd like to be part of society.
The document says nothing about national security.
I take that back, the document says nothing about this being done for national security, just that the information can be released according to national security guidelines and that the person can see who accesses their records unless it's for national security reasons.
I don't agree with this part of the document.
Harry
I can't tell if you're trolling or being sarcastic, but I was probably a little too flippant in my post, so I deserve it.
By your argument, I can freely steal what little they own. It's up to them to protect themselves and aren't entitled to police protection.
I can hunt and kill them like vermin. Why go on a prairie dog hunt when you can hunt hobos?
No and no. I don't believe that any rational person can make the decision to live in society and not be a part of that society, it's against one of the most common definitions of societ. But if one person tries to justify this attitude, I certainly don't believe they lose all rights in that society, they are just incorrect. If you interact with any other person, not matter how insignificantly, you are part of society.
What about tourists from other countries? From other states? From the next town over?
It's a global society; everyone is a part of it and cooperates on different levels: city, county, state, national and international.
I'm know you were thinking about something else when you wrote "benefits," but do you really want to make the argument that we should not be equal under the law?
The point of the HMIS document is to provide better management and prediction of health and welfare services to homeless persons. These are the only benefits I was referring to, which I fully support. In no way was I implying homeless should not be equal under the law.
Aren't most if not all homeless shelters and soup kitchens private organizations? Even those that are government I'd assume are local government. What right does the federal government have demanding information from private organizations or local governments?
Yes and no. Many of the private and state programs receive funds from federal grants which puts them under the federal guidelines proposed in this document. In that case the gov't can demand anything it wants, not that all those demands should be met. But the document does indicate they are doing this to provide better services.
This program will probably cost taxpayers more than all the federal homeless programs combined. The national security benefits are not enough to justify the cost, in my opinion.
Maybe, maybe not. I'm haven't seen any cost analysis so I can't judge that. It is hard to argue that some management and planning might make the services better.
The document says nothing about national security. It is about managing and predicting needed services for homeless, veterans, runaways and battered women. It also addresses how that information will be protected and used.
I also find it hard to believe we need to worry about homeless as threats to national security, but, as with any database administered by the gov't, insert paranoia as needed.
Harry