If I *had* a tool, I wouldn't be sharing it with you. Far too valuable. Generally, *you* wouldn't know if such a tool existed, because if knowledge of the tool leaked, MS *would* implement a fix, making future use problematic.
If the tool doesn't exist, I may well collect encrypted documents in case the tool is available in future - but you did know the temporal risk of encryption, no?
Anyway, in the "real life" of security, things work a bit differently. Almost anything at a "theoretical" level is assumed to be done. Because the black hats wouldn't tell you anyway.
Kasten Chase has a product known as "CipherShare", which allows encrypted collaboration.
If a key is lost, or an employee leaves, (dies), her material can be recovered. It takes an agreement between three people designated as suitable agents. If all three agree, a document can be unlocked.
If they don't agree... the data stays encrypted.
Strikes me as a good balance -- a rougue admin can't do it, but if its needed, the corporate data can be recovered.
And, if you don't believe me, check out the Canon Cat. Really. Post Mac, and has NOTHING that is on your standard UI list. Big (BIG) flop.
Check out Raskins ramblings -- boils down to "The UI should be vi; and people will love it". Especially, vi with dedicated function keys.
In a sense, he *is* right. It would be a better UI. But, he *is* very wrong; people will *not* love it. So its a non-starter.
Ratboy.
Re:Here is the real answer:
on
Linux, Inc.
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Bah and Humbug...
1 - The X protocol can be easily and widely implemented. There is a free reference implementation that (a) works, and (b) is free.
It is *easy* to implement X on anything that has a frame buffer, or is scan-line writeable.
2 - Drivers? Init the hardware and get going. Yup, you may have to figure out the reverse engineering. Suck it up.
3 - The attempts to be "better" than X failed -- because -- (wait for it), they weren't better. They may have been more "Windows" like, or "Mac" like, but certainly not better than X. And that's all there is to it.
What is "Better than X"?
To start with, it would have to support the features of X. And NONE of the attempts (including the Current Mac OS X) does so.
Not that it couldn't be done, it just hasn't been. (why is left to the reader).
-- Network transparency -- Extensible -- Reference implementation -- No OS, device, or platform specific features, except as extensions. -- Good performance across a wide range of platforms -- Support for multiple visuals -- Good event support -- Easy porting
And the final "killer" feature:
-- Should be able to support legacy X (easy), and also (with efficiency) drive X as a back-end.
The final point would be a testament to portability (Note to gentle reader: X does this already, with XNest: X in X).
With all of this in place, I would certainly consider replacing X Native -- I would have nothing to loose. I could even start by "staging" NewGUI on X, and as applications used NewGUI, finally replace X.
But, if X is being used purely as final rendering tool, it can only be replaced if an alternate rendering protocol is arguably better. And this hasn't happened.
Instead, X Extensions tend to take up the slack, and we proceed.
In other words, X *IS* the driver interface to render visuals. Unfortunately, Apple disagrees: putting X *on* OS X, instead of OS X *on* X. Making the Mac useless to quite a few people.
If Apple were confident that OS X protocol were more efficient (less network traffic) than X, why not compete?
Either (1) it isn't more efficient, or (2) the user base doesn't care about that feature. And, it's a major feature to lose. At least for those who use hetergenous platforms.
I have had "Mac Users" come up to me over the years -- it's always the same --
"The Mac is easy to use -- it's got INTERFACE GUIDELINES, and they MAKE everyone use them; and it's, like, GREAT, 'cause then anyone can use the computer!"
There you have it, the semi-literate ramblings of a Mac Monkey, in Valley drag.
Humans begin reasoning on a concrete level. We progress to abstractions. Computers are symbol processing machines. Computers (typically) do not process concrete things.
In order to best exploit the computer, a symbolic and abstract interface is best.
For example, a language based interface. Perhaps some simplification would be useful (works for formal math representations).
We now need to represent this in a fashion that works for most of the readers of this article. Yes, you, gentle reader.
I believe an English base may be appropriate.
We force a syntax to ensure that the computer will understand us the first time; after all, we are smarter than these boxes, and it is easier for us to remove nuances than the machines.
We remove some of the redundancy; after all, people are lazy: ls does look a lot like list, does it not? And (some think its a flaw, but I disagree), I am lazy, and don't like exessive typing.
What do we have? A CLI. In all its Symbolic processing, English based, terse, math symbol, goodness.
What most fail to realize is that the CLI vs. GUI battle was won: by the CLI 3000 years ago.
I guess it takes some people more time to catch up.
"If you feel these (GUI) platforms make you unproductive, then (sic) it's because you're a novice user, too locked in by his prejudices to figure out how to use them properly."
No, GUI platforms try to concretize things, making it much more difficult to reason in symbolic and abstract ways about the problems I am trying to solve. GUIs can be exploited to advantage. An example would be a Web Browser that works well in a GUI, and presents mostly textual information.
Sure, I have a DOCSIS 1 device (Motorola CyberSurfr).
Rogers (my provider) recently (and quietly) moved to 4 service tiers: ultra-lite, lite, regular (express) and super.
Regular and Super are the same per-month (44.95 CDN). I have been a customer so long that I still get the modem rental "free". Super offers 5Mbps down/800kpbs up (while I get 3Mpbs down/384kbps up). *BUT* I have to buy the modem (100 CDN). If it breaks, I own both pieces. And, I have lost a modem to lightning already.
Anyway, looks like Rogers wants *out* of the cable modem renting business! Maybe they are too sensitive to lightning strikes?
DSL in my area is provided by Bell (Sympatico). They are draconian port-blockers - 25 is blocked both out-going (don't mind) and in-coming (!?!).
I have asked Rogers DIRECTLY what the AUP means -- basically they came back with: "We really don't give a rat's behind what you do; just keep the bandwidth usage reasonable, and we'll leave you alone". Which is fine by me.
Anyway, if Rogers doesn't want to rent modems; why would Comcast?
"You can't ignore the largest Unix vendor in the world: Apple. You're just cutting your own throat if you ignore a huge segment of the market for your software. Projects succeed when people USE the software."
I need to cut that out...
Apple "ignored" UNIX and the idea of a cross-platform GUI. If Apple makes OS X GUI available, then, sure, OOo can use it.
Until then? Nope, not happening. It's not open, it's not in MY Unix.
Yep, call me a Zealot, whatever. I DEMAND cross platform compatibility (on my SUN kit, on my HP kit, my IBM kit -- and on my Intel kit). Apple sure is compatible -- that's why X Windows is supplied with the machine.
That's because Apple wants to run with the big dogs. Where they have even LESS presence than Microsoft!
Gotta figure that years of marketing to artists has taken a toll.
Ratboy.
PS. I am envious of 1 (one) feature of the Mac -- the abililty to have truly transparent terminals.
1 - user is an individual -- and each link can have a different owner.
2 - 3D and acceleration supported very well, including multiple render pipes. From day 1 as part of X design. (and X was the POOR choice). X also supports different visuals for each window. For example, 24 bit colour in one window, and 8 bit colour in another on the same screen IF YOUR HARDWARE CAN DO IT.
3 - Sure, packaging conflict is a problem
4 - Unix is VERY scalable - from single desktop to 64 way SMP, from 4MB to Gigabyte memory. From 68K to 64 bit processors. And, yes, it includes code morphing (HP-UX).
I am aware that it is irrelevant whether or not the device facilitates copying.
The statement I was trying to make is that is SHOULD be relevant, and reflected in the Act.
And I am willing to allow an extension of the levy to other media (both in the sense of flash vs. CD-ROM and Song vs. Movie) as long as the copy facilitation is also part of that extension.
What I would like is a common pool, into which the levy goes, and copyright holders are then required to demonstrate that they are entitled to a piece of it. The levy amount should be openly discussed, and widely published, keeping the levy in line with what Canadians see as reasonable.
We are allowed to copy music for personal reasons. In exchange, a levy is placed on blank media.
All for the good.
And now, the appeal ruling is that MP3 players are not subject to the levy, because the Act doesn't mention them.
All for the good -- except that the Act may/will be changed to allow the levy.
Most MP3 devices do NOT facilitate the copying of music! If you can show me how to plug media into an iPod (for instance) to allow the iPod to function as a duplicator; or you are willing to GIVE your iPod to someone else, then the iPod should have the levy applied. If the iPod is capable of downloading music without another computer with media, it should be levied.
And here's the problem -- an iPod CAN'T download from the internet, and you WON'T be lending it out, and it CAN'T have media plugged into it.
About the best you can do is a player with a built-in FM radio, and the ability to record to a removed Flash device.
And the levy should be placed on the Flash media.
Not the players.
So, the ruling is good, but the REASON is wrong, because it opens up the possibility of a lobby to change the Copyright Act.
I just hope that when that happens, the politicians see their way clear to a correct ammendment (say, a levy on blank VCR tapes and DVD recordable media, and allowing personal copying of video).
Now, the joker that suggested that is was not OK to use your iPod on Dec 15, is basically full of it. The personal copying provision allows us to copy to ANY media that is commonly used for the storage of music. That would (by design) include your iPod. So suck it up -- that cannot be removed without changing the Copyright Act.
I find that snavigator is quite good for source analysis. If you want a "lighter" tool, cscope can be used. But snavigator also support fortran, cobol &etc "out of the box".
So, I think that its a fine tool for teaching. Most other "IDE"s tie you in to a particular system or language, which snavigator doesn't. I've used it for the Linux kernel, Solaris, and Windows (among other things).
Its a bit slow building its cross-reference database, though, so for larger source bases you do want access to a "big" machine. You can share the results after the xref is built (the same is possible with cscope).
There is only one patent on Bell Labs (AT&T) Unix. 4,135,240 descibing the set-uid bit. Anything else in a basic implementation would be covered by prior art from the AT&T implementation (note that in the 70s, software was not considered patentable -- so the set-uid patent is for a circuit implementing that method).
Unless its an "Advanced" feature, done independently. Those patents must be much more recent, and OSF/1 itself may provide prior art to demolish those claims. SCO doesn't have any assigned patents, so these would have to be from somewhere else... Since OSF/1 was an effort involving IBM, DEC and HP, it isn't going to conflict with those vendors, leaving SUN. And they have never complained. (but, SUN has 4,276 patents, and I am not going to look through them). And, because SUN is part of the Open Group, they are not very likely to complain in the future.
So, at first blush, its clean (more accurately, more clean than Linux, because there is the IBM/DEC/HP involvement)
Enough about the patents.
On to OSF/1 itself.
OSF/1 uses the Mach kernel. Work started in the late '80s, and predates "software patents". The OSF has become The Open Group, which is sponsored by IBM, SUN, HP, Hitachi and Fujitsu. This group owns the UNIX trademark. Making OSF/1 the "true Unix". Now responsible for the SUS (Single UNIX Specification).
Also, certifies (but does not control) the "Linux Standards Base" (LSB).
How inane. EG. MasterCard in Australia was (probably still is). using 2 E10K for M/C transactions.
How do you break it? Remove a power supply? Sledgehammer the cabinet? Ok, blow one of them up... its fine.
Oh -- you probably meant software. Been architected, tested, before deployment, run on another server (this one in the US). M/C wants warantees. THEN its deployed. Mere mortals will not TOUCH the production box, which is fully N+1.
If it breaks, we are talking MILLIONS of dollars of lost transactions. Does happen (sometimes). Whenever this kind of "breakage" occurs, its front-page news.
So, Big Iron breakage may be useful in the dev/testing phase. But, its already been committed to as a platform.
Vendor reliability and roadmaps are much more important.
-- "Installing OS" as a criteria? Um.. As you will see, this is almost the LEAST of the issues. Anyway, all enterprise class OSs have "kickstart" or "jumpstart" installation (and usually dedicate two servers to the task). Try installing on 2000 servers sometime...
The issue may be "RHEL 3 vs Solaris 10", and that one is based on things like vertical stacking.
"High speed switch" -- WTF? Are you dealing with big iron, or a small cluster. Big iron means big boxes. Or HUNDREDS or THOUSANDS of dual Xeons. Adding one to five? Wrong scale.
"Admin Interface web based?" -- far too low level to bother with. Question should be: Does it integrate into Tivoli? (and management/provisioning system).
"Recovery/RAID, et al." Um... with redundant components, et al. usually not an issue. Also, storage at this level is NAS/SAN so the "RAID" issue doesn't really come up...
"Vendor Responsiveness". If you are paying for a platinum support contract, they get someone out there in a matter of hours.
All of which makes "Big Iron Reviews" problematic.
Set up servers, infrastructure, applications (business and system, including Tivoli, BMC Patrol/Predict, SAP, Websphere, Oracle). Set up networking and storage. And then figure out if it works "better".
People doing this architect and then SLAs (service level agreements) are agreed on.
Would an "innocent user" that is part of a spambot net be charged and jailed?
Only in my best dream! Oh, god, I sure hope so.
Won't happen, but it sure makes a fine fantasy. People would have a choice -- bring in an "expert" to secure their computer, or face the consequence. Loads and loads of business.
Problems: The gov would create a monopoly oversight and/or regulate the service. Microsoft would be left alone. Users would no longer be allowed (by gov fiat) to run ANY services. And so on.
Far worse than the original problem. But, the thought of the "Internet Polic" busting someone... (almost) priceless.
Ok... give me three reasons why paging is superior to segmentation.
I'll start you with one (as a freebie): steady state vm overcommit is not possible on a variable length segment system. And I can show you an approach to get around that problem as well -- but I'll leave it as an exercise for you.
Your turn for two and three.
As too the rest... if we truly had OOP methodology, something like platform neutral methods (think Smalltalk or Java) would be a part of the WP document. It would be responsible for INTERPRETATION, and the rendering would then be on the GUI side, along with command and control.
Honestly, my typical documents and spreadsheets weigh in at several megabytes, so why not? It's because the industry gives lip service to OOP -- but when it comes time to shit or get off the pot, most back away from the idea. Indeed, MS *almost* went there (embed "BASIC" macros into WP documents), but didn't take it to its logical conclusion -- the document *is* the back-end of the word processor.
This also eliminates problems with opening the doc in another application -- and partially eliminates "viruses".
In this senario EVERYTHING is a virus, but runs in a sandbox, and can't do anything to other objects. No need to download "applications" (well, you still need the containers, but each of those should go through a user check).
First, I *have* tried search dialogs that don't come up with a "not found" pop-front.
The first time I did it -- (tried colour change, and a subtle sound), Marketing jumped down my throat and told me "THAT'S NOT THE WAY TO DO IT!" (yes, caps are necessary). Boy, was that beat out of me.
Now, I jam that mofo at the user. Fuck you, and fuck the marketing types.
Personally, I have HAD IT with GUIs. About the GUIest I like is an xterm, and I like the apple transparency in terminals.
Every since every blasted Marketroid and ignorant end user decided that THEY knew how to maximize functionality, I've given it up. Sure, you really need WORD for tables (but don't know how to insert/delete rows and columns in there). Sure, Excel is great, even if you DON'T know what VLOOKUP() is for.
So, I maintain that GUI is very irrelevant. I use VI (vim), and OpenOffice for compatibility. Can't use it as effectively.
Web browsing? Whatever browser is in front of me. I (honestly) can no longer tell the difference. And I don't care.
And I *still* jam mofo stupid dialogs at people, because if I don't, someone WILL ask "where is it? I need it!". And if I do put it in, some just growse (usually quietly).
And I *still* put up button bars with a quintillion options (every Maretroid has his own favorite, dontcha know?).
And I don't drink the koolaid (tm) myself. Witness that the author of the article seems to use two xterms, and probably vi (or emacs) for his major work too.
But it does piss me off.
Oh, it does change. When Marketing spends money on usability studies, and then comes back with "do it right" (though it SHOULD be: "we are sorry, we made you do the wrong thing last time")
Back in 1981, we were writing a word processor -- dedicated box, 64K (yes K) memory, Zilog Z80 processor.
Management complained that dev was taking too long... and yes, we were writing in assembler.
Proposed by co-worker:
Given that testing is perfect, and programming takes too long, why not start by writing your test cases? Then, generate a one-byte program. If it fails a test case, reject. If it can't complete, tentatively keep, and if all cases are met -- ship it.
Given the second case, generate another code byte (there are only 256 to go through), and repeat the test process.
Obviously, the final product will be perfect -- all test cases will work, and (as a bonus), the program will be the optimal size. As another bonus, the company can dispose of all programmers, as these roles would no longer be needed for the developement of new software.
This document still exists in the archives of the company. I wonder how many people have looked at it in the past twenty years and laughed?
Slashdot Mirror
Facinating
If I *had* a tool, I wouldn't be sharing it with you. Far too valuable. Generally, *you* wouldn't know if such a tool existed, because if knowledge of the tool leaked, MS *would* implement a fix, making future use problematic.
If the tool doesn't exist, I may well collect encrypted documents in case the tool is available in future - but you did know the temporal risk of encryption, no?
Anyway, in the "real life" of security, things work a bit differently. Almost anything at a "theoretical" level is assumed to be done. Because the black hats wouldn't tell you anyway.
Ratboy.
My 2 cents:
Kasten Chase has a product known as "CipherShare", which allows encrypted collaboration.
If a key is lost, or an employee leaves, (dies), her material can be recovered. It takes an agreement between three people designated as suitable agents. If all three agree, a document can be unlocked.
If they don't agree... the data stays encrypted.
Strikes me as a good balance -- a rougue admin can't do it, but if its needed, the corporate data can be recovered.
Ratboy.
(oblig disclaimer - I do work for Kasten Chase).
Raskin is "the man" for UI?
In a word; no.
And, if you don't believe me, check out the Canon Cat. Really.
Post Mac, and has NOTHING that is on your standard UI list. Big (BIG) flop.
Check out Raskins ramblings -- boils down to "The UI should be vi; and people will love it". Especially, vi with dedicated function keys.
In a sense, he *is* right. It would be a better UI. But, he *is* very wrong; people will *not* love it. So its a non-starter.
Ratboy.
Bah and Humbug...
1 - The X protocol can be easily and widely implemented. There is a free reference implementation that (a) works, and (b) is free.
It is *easy* to implement X on anything that has a frame buffer, or is scan-line writeable.
2 - Drivers? Init the hardware and get going. Yup, you may have to figure out the reverse engineering. Suck it up.
3 - The attempts to be "better" than X failed -- because -- (wait for it), they weren't better. They may have been more "Windows" like, or "Mac" like, but certainly not better than X.
And that's all there is to it.
What is "Better than X"?
To start with, it would have to support the features of X. And NONE of the attempts (including the Current Mac OS X) does so.
Not that it couldn't be done, it just hasn't been. (why is left to the reader).
-- Network transparency
-- Extensible
-- Reference implementation
-- No OS, device, or platform specific features, except as extensions.
-- Good performance across a wide range of platforms
-- Support for multiple visuals
-- Good event support
-- Easy porting
And the final "killer" feature:
-- Should be able to support legacy X (easy), and also (with efficiency) drive X as a back-end.
The final point would be a testament to portability (Note to gentle reader: X does this already, with XNest: X in X).
With all of this in place, I would certainly consider replacing X Native -- I would have nothing to loose. I could even start by "staging" NewGUI on X, and as applications used NewGUI, finally replace X.
But, if X is being used purely as final rendering tool, it can only be replaced if an alternate rendering protocol is arguably better. And this hasn't happened.
Instead, X Extensions tend to take up the slack, and we proceed.
In other words, X *IS* the driver interface to render visuals. Unfortunately, Apple disagrees: putting X *on* OS X, instead of OS X *on* X. Making the Mac useless to quite a few people.
If Apple were confident that OS X protocol were more efficient (less network traffic) than X, why not compete?
Either (1) it isn't more efficient, or (2) the user base doesn't care about that feature. And, it's a major feature to lose. At least for those who use hetergenous platforms.
Ratboy.
I have had "Mac Users" come up to me over the years -- it's always the same --
"The Mac is easy to use -- it's got INTERFACE GUIDELINES, and they MAKE everyone use them; and it's, like, GREAT, 'cause then anyone can use the computer!"
There you have it, the semi-literate ramblings of a Mac Monkey, in Valley drag.
Humans begin reasoning on a concrete level. We progress to abstractions. Computers are symbol processing machines. Computers (typically) do not process concrete things.
In order to best exploit the computer, a symbolic and abstract interface is best.
For example, a language based interface. Perhaps some simplification would be useful (works for formal math representations).
We now need to represent this in a fashion that works for most of the readers of this article. Yes, you, gentle reader.
I believe an English base may be appropriate.
We force a syntax to ensure that the computer will understand us the first time; after all, we are smarter than these boxes, and it is easier for us to remove nuances than the machines.
We remove some of the redundancy; after all, people are lazy: ls does look a lot like list, does it not? And (some think its a flaw, but I disagree), I am lazy, and don't like exessive typing.
What do we have? A CLI. In all its Symbolic processing, English based, terse, math symbol, goodness.
What most fail to realize is that the CLI vs. GUI battle was won: by the CLI 3000 years ago.
I guess it takes some people more time to catch up.
"If you feel these (GUI) platforms make you unproductive, then (sic) it's because you're a novice user, too locked in by his prejudices to figure out how to use them properly."
No, GUI platforms try to concretize things, making it much more difficult to reason in symbolic and abstract ways about the problems I am trying to solve. GUIs can be exploited to advantage. An example would be a Web Browser that works well in a GUI, and presents mostly textual information.
Ratboy.
Sure, I have a DOCSIS 1 device (Motorola CyberSurfr).
Rogers (my provider) recently (and quietly) moved to 4 service tiers: ultra-lite, lite, regular (express) and super.
Regular and Super are the same per-month (44.95 CDN). I have been a customer so long that I still get the modem rental "free". Super offers 5Mbps down/800kpbs up (while I get 3Mpbs down/384kbps up). *BUT* I have to buy the modem (100 CDN). If it breaks, I own both pieces. And, I have lost a modem to lightning already.
Anyway, looks like Rogers wants *out* of the cable modem renting business! Maybe they are too sensitive to lightning strikes?
DSL in my area is provided by Bell (Sympatico). They are draconian port-blockers - 25 is blocked both out-going (don't mind) and in-coming (!?!).
I have asked Rogers DIRECTLY what the AUP means -- basically they came back with: "We really don't give a rat's behind what you do; just keep the bandwidth usage reasonable, and we'll leave you alone". Which is fine by me.
Anyway, if Rogers doesn't want to rent modems; why would Comcast?
Ratboy
"You can't ignore the largest Unix vendor in the world: Apple. You're just cutting your own throat if you ignore a huge segment of the market for your software. Projects succeed when people USE the software."
I need to cut that out...
Apple "ignored" UNIX and the idea of a cross-platform GUI. If Apple makes OS X GUI available, then, sure, OOo can use it.
Until then? Nope, not happening. It's not open, it's not in MY Unix.
Yep, call me a Zealot, whatever. I DEMAND cross platform compatibility (on my SUN kit, on my HP kit, my IBM kit -- and on my Intel kit). Apple sure is compatible -- that's why X Windows is supplied with the machine.
That's because Apple wants to run with the big dogs. Where they have even LESS presence than Microsoft!
Gotta figure that years of marketing to artists has taken a toll.
Ratboy.
PS. I am envious of 1 (one) feature of the Mac -- the abililty to have truly transparent terminals.
The "Theory of Evolution" *DOES NOT* say "All species on Earth were born from a common ancestor through evolution".
Ratboy
Well -- if you KNEW what would sell, and could MAKE it, then you wouldn't need the marketing dept, now, would you?
And THAT was the point of the grandparent post.
The job of coding an MPEG video stream can be done in parallel. At each I frame there is a natural break.
So, a 2 processor core could do your DVD in 2 hours, 4 processors in one hour, and 8 in 1/2 hour.
Of course you end up with i/o bottlenecks...
ratboy
So, what's to say that running JAVA on the TM *wasn't* tried?
Maybe it didn't offer enough benefit (as compared to JIT) to matter...
Ratboy.
WTF?!?
Firefox under linux stores new plugins in ~/.mozilla/plugins
That would be under the users home directory. Each user can have different plugins.
You can also install them into a shared location for all users.
Ratboy
1 - user is an individual -- and each link can have a different owner.
2 - 3D and acceleration supported very well, including multiple render pipes. From day 1 as part of X design. (and X was the POOR choice). X also supports different visuals for each window. For example, 24 bit colour in one window, and 8 bit colour in another on the same screen IF YOUR HARDWARE CAN DO IT.
3 - Sure, packaging conflict is a problem
4 - Unix is VERY scalable - from single desktop to 64 way SMP, from 4MB to Gigabyte memory. From 68K to 64 bit processors. And, yes, it includes code morphing (HP-UX).
No it isn't perfect, but it sucks less.
Ratboy.
Wrook:
Interesting, but wrong.
The Act does *not* indicate if an original must be used. There is no such wording in the Act.
Making a copy is the subject of the Act, and not the "generation" of the copy.
Ratboy
Seska:
I am aware that it is irrelevant whether or not the device facilitates copying.
The statement I was trying to make is that is SHOULD be relevant, and reflected in the Act.
And I am willing to allow an extension of the levy to other media (both in the sense of flash vs. CD-ROM and Song vs. Movie) as long as the copy facilitation is also part of that extension.
What I would like is a common pool, into which the levy goes, and copyright holders are then required to demonstrate that they are entitled to a piece of it. The levy amount should be openly discussed, and widely published, keeping the levy in line with what Canadians see as reasonable.
Ratboy
[I live in Canada]
We are allowed to copy music for personal reasons. In exchange, a levy is placed on blank media.
All for the good.
And now, the appeal ruling is that MP3 players are not subject to the levy, because the Act doesn't mention them.
All for the good -- except that the Act may/will be changed to allow the levy.
Most MP3 devices do NOT facilitate the copying of music! If you can show me how to plug media into an iPod (for instance) to allow the iPod to function as a duplicator; or you are willing to GIVE your iPod to someone else, then the iPod should have the levy applied. If the iPod is capable of downloading music without another computer with media, it should be levied.
And here's the problem -- an iPod CAN'T download from the internet, and you WON'T be lending it out, and it CAN'T have media plugged into it.
About the best you can do is a player with a built-in FM radio, and the ability to record to a removed Flash device.
And the levy should be placed on the Flash media.
Not the players.
So, the ruling is good, but the REASON is wrong, because it opens up the possibility of a lobby to change the Copyright Act.
I just hope that when that happens, the politicians see their way clear to a correct ammendment (say, a levy on blank VCR tapes and DVD recordable media, and allowing personal copying of video).
Now, the joker that suggested that is was not OK to use your iPod on Dec 15, is basically full of it. The personal copying provision allows us to copy to ANY media that is commonly used for the storage of music. That would (by design) include your iPod. So suck it up -- that cannot be removed without changing the Copyright Act.
Ratboy.
I find that snavigator is quite good for source analysis. If you want a "lighter" tool, cscope can be used. But snavigator also support fortran, cobol &etc "out of the box".
So, I think that its a fine tool for teaching. Most other "IDE"s tie you in to a particular system or language, which snavigator doesn't. I've used it for the Linux kernel, Solaris, and Windows (among other things).
Its a bit slow building its cross-reference database, though, so for larger source bases you do want access to a "big" machine. You can share the results after the xref is built (the same is possible with cscope).
Good luck with your project!
Ratboy.
Jeff:
There is only one patent on Bell Labs (AT&T) Unix. 4,135,240 descibing the set-uid bit. Anything else in a basic implementation would be covered by prior art from the AT&T implementation (note that in the 70s, software was not considered patentable -- so the set-uid patent is for a circuit implementing that method).
Unless its an "Advanced" feature, done independently. Those patents must be much more recent, and OSF/1 itself may provide prior art to demolish those claims. SCO doesn't have any assigned patents, so these would have to be from somewhere else... Since OSF/1 was an effort involving IBM, DEC and HP, it isn't going to conflict with those vendors, leaving SUN. And they have never complained. (but, SUN has 4,276 patents, and I am not going to look through them). And, because SUN is part of the Open Group, they are not very likely to complain in the future.
So, at first blush, its clean (more accurately, more clean than Linux, because there is the IBM/DEC/HP involvement)
Enough about the patents.
On to OSF/1 itself.
OSF/1 uses the Mach kernel. Work started in the late '80s, and predates "software patents". The OSF has become The Open Group, which is sponsored by IBM, SUN, HP, Hitachi and Fujitsu. This group owns the UNIX trademark.
Making OSF/1 the "true Unix". Now responsible for the SUS (Single UNIX Specification).
Also, certifies (but does not control) the "Linux Standards Base" (LSB).
Ratboy.
Jeffy, Jeffy, Jeffy:
Tru64 is a *clean* reimplementation of Unix. No AT&T code at all. So, tell me about SCO again?
"Break it. Call support"
How inane. EG. MasterCard in Australia was (probably still is). using 2 E10K for M/C transactions.
How do you break it? Remove a power supply? Sledgehammer the cabinet? Ok, blow one of them up... its fine.
Oh -- you probably meant software. Been architected, tested, before deployment, run on another server (this one in the US). M/C wants warantees. THEN its deployed. Mere mortals will not TOUCH the production box, which is fully N+1.
If it breaks, we are talking MILLIONS of dollars of lost transactions. Does happen (sometimes). Whenever this kind of "breakage" occurs, its front-page news.
So, Big Iron breakage may be useful in the dev/testing phase. But, its already been committed to as a platform.
Vendor reliability and roadmaps are much more important.
The rest of it is not all that important, really.
Ratboy.
Well... Obi
You aren't even in the ballpark here.
-- "Installing OS" as a criteria? Um.. As you will see, this is almost the LEAST of the issues. Anyway, all enterprise class OSs have "kickstart" or "jumpstart" installation (and usually dedicate two servers to the task). Try installing on 2000 servers sometime...
The issue may be "RHEL 3 vs Solaris 10", and that one is based on things like vertical stacking.
"High speed switch" -- WTF? Are you dealing with big iron, or a small cluster. Big iron means big boxes. Or HUNDREDS or THOUSANDS of dual Xeons. Adding one to five? Wrong scale.
"Admin Interface web based?" -- far too low level to bother with. Question should be: Does it integrate into Tivoli? (and management/provisioning system).
"Recovery/RAID, et al." Um... with redundant components, et al. usually not an issue. Also, storage at this level is NAS/SAN so the "RAID" issue doesn't really come up...
"Vendor Responsiveness". If you are paying for a platinum support contract, they get someone out there in a matter of hours.
All of which makes "Big Iron Reviews" problematic.
Set up servers, infrastructure, applications (business and system, including Tivoli, BMC Patrol/Predict, SAP, Websphere, Oracle). Set up networking and storage. And then figure out if it works "better".
People doing this architect and then SLAs (service level agreements) are agreed on.
Ratboy.
Would an "innocent user" that is part of a spambot net be charged and jailed?
... (almost) priceless.
Only in my best dream! Oh, god, I sure hope so.
Won't happen, but it sure makes a fine fantasy. People would have a choice -- bring in an "expert" to secure their computer, or face the consequence. Loads and loads of business.
Problems: The gov would create a monopoly oversight and/or regulate the service. Microsoft would be left alone. Users would no longer be allowed (by gov fiat) to run ANY services. And so on.
Far worse than the original problem. But, the thought of the "Internet Polic" busting someone
Ratboy
mkosmul:
Ok... give me three reasons why paging is superior to segmentation.
I'll start you with one (as a freebie): steady state vm overcommit is not possible on a variable length segment system. And I can show you an approach to get around that problem as well -- but I'll leave it as an exercise for you.
Your turn for two and three.
As too the rest... if we truly had OOP methodology, something like platform neutral methods (think Smalltalk or Java) would be a part of the WP document. It would be responsible for INTERPRETATION, and the rendering would then be on the GUI side, along with command and control.
Honestly, my typical documents and spreadsheets weigh in at several megabytes, so why not?
It's because the industry gives lip service to OOP -- but when it comes time to shit or get off the pot, most back away from the idea. Indeed, MS *almost* went there (embed "BASIC" macros into WP documents), but didn't take it to its logical conclusion -- the document *is* the back-end of the word processor.
This also eliminates problems with opening the doc in another application -- and partially eliminates "viruses".
In this senario EVERYTHING is a virus, but runs in a sandbox, and can't do anything to other objects. No need to download "applications" (well, you still need the containers, but each of those should go through a user check).
Ratboy.
I call bullshit.
First, I *have* tried search dialogs that don't come up with a "not found" pop-front.
The first time I did it -- (tried colour change, and a subtle sound), Marketing jumped down my throat and told me "THAT'S NOT THE WAY TO DO IT!" (yes, caps are necessary). Boy, was that beat out of me.
Now, I jam that mofo at the user. Fuck you, and fuck the marketing types.
Personally, I have HAD IT with GUIs. About the GUIest I like is an xterm, and I like the apple transparency in terminals.
Every since every blasted Marketroid and ignorant end user decided that THEY knew how to maximize functionality, I've given it up. Sure, you really need WORD for tables (but don't know how to insert/delete rows and columns in there). Sure, Excel is great, even if you DON'T know what VLOOKUP() is for.
So, I maintain that GUI is very irrelevant. I use VI (vim), and OpenOffice for compatibility. Can't use it as effectively.
Web browsing? Whatever browser is in front of me. I (honestly) can no longer tell the difference. And I don't care.
And I *still* jam mofo stupid dialogs at people, because if I don't, someone WILL ask "where is it? I need it!". And if I do put it in, some just growse (usually quietly).
And I *still* put up button bars with a quintillion options (every Maretroid has his own favorite, dontcha know?).
And I don't drink the koolaid (tm) myself. Witness that the author of the article seems to use two xterms, and probably vi (or emacs) for his major work too.
But it does piss me off.
Oh, it does change. When Marketing spends money on usability studies, and then comes back with "do it right" (though it SHOULD be: "we are sorry, we made you do the wrong thing last time")
Ratboy.
Back in 1981, we were writing a word processor -- dedicated box, 64K (yes K) memory, Zilog Z80 processor.
Management complained that dev was taking too long... and yes, we were writing in assembler.
Proposed by co-worker:
Given that testing is perfect, and programming takes too long, why not start by writing your test cases? Then, generate a one-byte program. If it fails a test case, reject. If it can't complete, tentatively keep, and if all cases are met -- ship it.
Given the second case, generate another code byte (there are only 256 to go through), and repeat the test process.
Obviously, the final product will be perfect -- all test cases will work, and (as a bonus), the program will be the optimal size. As another bonus, the company can dispose of all programmers, as these roles would no longer be needed for the developement of new software.
This document still exists in the archives of the company. I wonder how many people have looked at it in the past twenty years and laughed?
Plu ca change.
Ratboy.