realized that it wasn't much diffferent than a piece of hair that had fallen out, or some blood that had leaked out of some cut.
This is a flawed analogy, at best. The cells you mentioned would never have become a human being in the first place. While human, they possessed neither the purpose nor capability to produce a new human life.
The major opposition to embrionic stem cell research, as opposed to adult stem cell research, is that the former kills a human being. Unlike other tissue types, the primary purpose of an embryo is to produce human life; destroying it prevents that life from forming in the first place. We can not rightly claim to be seeking the greater good when we intentionally kill (or "prevent") some humans in the uncertain hopes of curing others.
It is not, as our critics proclaim, that we are opposed to science; many of us believe that science will provide us with genuine material progress. But, as other countries have recognized, embrionic stem cell research is akin to killing toddlers to find a cure for juvenile diabetes. Calling something science does not make it right or noble; witness the manner in which the Nazis conducted "science" experiments on Jewish children - their aims may have been noble, but not the means. Our objection has nothing to do with stifling human knowledge and everything to do with recognizing the fundamental dignity and value of human life.
We need another category on/.: YAME - Yet Another Microsoft Exploit.
Posting stories about security holes in Microsoft products is about as exciting as watching paint dry, or as newsworthy as articles proclaiming, "Water is wet!", or "Ice is cold"...
It's not news for nerds - most of us stopped using these obsolete systems years ago. And yes, I understand Windows users do need to be concerned about these things, but it's still not news. This is business as usual for Microsoft.
Windows and Security holes are like Linux and vi: Yes, you can find systems without them, but they're the exception, rather than the rule.
And yet, I'm almost driven to tears when I hear people naively tell me that their Windows system is secure because they've downloaded the latest patches. Was it that this most recent exploit didn't exist a year ago? Or - could it be - that only crackers knew about it until now? Does patching today protect you from the exploit discovered tomorrow? Didn't it ever occur to people that undiscovered exploits might exist in the Microsoft patches? And if the company didn't do it right the first time, what makes you think they'll do it right this time?
I've seen six generations of Microsoft Windows, and not one of them delivered on the promises Microsoft made. Having watched Microsoft since the release of Windows 95, I've learned that constant security problems are a staple of the Windows experience. If you've been using computers for more than a year and haven't gotten a virus, seen your system crash, or had your machine zombied, then you aren't running Windows. It's that simple folks. Problems are an endemic part of the Windows experience.
A professor once said to me, "We use operating systems for what they're good at, not for what they're bad at..." He was referring to the decision to use Linux as a file and print server while maintaining Windows NT servers for other tasks.
If you run Linux, don't bemoan the difficulty of setup, difficulty of use, or lack of multimedia support. Linux was designed to be secure and reliable, not glitzy. Don't complain that your favorite game doesn't run on it.
If you run Windows, don't bemoan crashes and viruses and security exploits. Windows was designed for multimedia, not security or reliability. Don't complain when you get rooted; that's the price you pay for being able to run the latest games.
This year's underperformer...
on
OQO For Sale
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
However, the OQO isn't designed to be a desktop replacement, nor intended to be a portable video game machine
So, what exactly is it supposed to be? An overpriced PDA? A toy for high level executives?
Oh, I get it - I'm going to spend twice the money I would on a desktop to get less than half the machine.
I really like the concept of the OQO:
Full keyboard
A reasonably sized screen
A 20GB hard drive
Transmeta Crusoe processor
256MB RAM
It's small enough to fit in a large pocket
So it has everything I want in a portable, except: price. I can hardly justify spending $2000 for this thing when the Sharp Zaurus has a full keyboard, runs Linux, and costs about 1/2 to 1/4 as much. I don't think I'd have too hard a time finding at least half a dozen other comparable handtops that cost less than half as much.
Overall, I'm really interested. This would be a really cool machine, but at $2000, it will never be accepted by the mainstream. Price it at $500, and two years from now people will be saying, "Palm who?", and "What's an IPAQ?"...
Has eaten genetically modified food. Maize itself has been cultivated by man over the past thousand years from a grass-like grain with ears a few inches long to the foot-plus long ears we have today.
GM by itself is not harmful when exercised with care and due diligence. But, much like any other technology, those who value profit above public safety will find a way to use GM to line their pockets at the expense of the public.
Until we thoroughly understand GM and its implications, we'd do well to regulate in much the same manner as nuclear power or drugs - where the onus to prove the safety of the product lies with the corporations, not the government. The government should regulate the field until the industry showed that it could regulate itself.
Between work and the rest of my life, I spend a lot of time not browsing in record stores. That's right - I don't have the time to go to the store and sit in a listening room for hours on end...
Even though I spend hours at work listening to music, it's all on CD - I don't want to risk getting sued by the RIAA. And I'm getting pretty tired of my collection - but I'm not going to risk getting fired and (possibly) sued because I wanted to listen to something different...
Now granted, if I had P2P, I could scope out new bands, and order the CD through Amazon during my lunch hour. But I don't have P2P. And I haven't bought a CD in about 12 to 18 months.
I wonder when the RIAA is going to wake up and figure out that P2P is the most effective way to market music to time-starved professionals. We have the money for CD's, but lead hectic lives; time spent in a record store is time that could have been spent coding. We can't stand the stuff on the pop-40 stations, but we are willing to buy good music - if only we could find it...
And the interesting part is that I'm spending much more on books than on CD's these days - I can read before I buy without being thought a criminal.
Your comment reminds me of the minority report where the one false positive is considered by the public to completely outweigh all the good the system has done.
This is exactly the same line of thinking that gets people killed. For example, airbags are now mandatory in automobiles, and yes, they have done a lot to save idiots who couldn't be bothered to fasten their seatbelt before they drove drunk. And unfortunately, this profile does represent a lot of people.
However, the side effect of that cars are now more dangerous for those who wear seatbelts. Prior to the airbag, a conscientious driver who wore a seatbelt stood a low risk of injury in a low to moderate speed impact. But, thanks to the airbag, children and elderly have been killed in minor accidents because the airbag went off. Worse yet are the cases in which people have been burned to death in vehicles after having a minor accident because an exploding airbag broke their wrists and were unable to exit the vehicle.
The problem is that the majority of people choose to drive in unsafe ways. But, we shouldn't reward their negligent behaviour by installing a "safety device" that will mitigate the consequences of their unsafe actions at the expense of making cars more dangerous for safe drivers. Safe drivers are being punished for the folly of reckless ones.
Well, if it's only a matter of preferences, then there's really no point in discussing it.
But C++ did offer considerably more than C, and C more than assembly. C wasn't object oriented, and assembly wasn't easily readable.
So I would have expected the whole Java-.NET-Mono thing to offer something considerably better than C++, but they didn't. In fact, the did just the opposite - they took features away whilst making the language slower.
It isn't a matter of preferences, but performance..NET, and Mono are offering 1970's era performance and development times on 21st century hardware. Consider the categories in which they don't excel:
Development time - Visual Basic and TCL are faster.
Security - Java is more secure.
Runtime speed - pretty hard to beat C/C++, and can't touch assembly.
Portability -.NET doesn't run on UNIX; Mono could be killed by Microsoft with patent encumberances.
Functionality - C++ already has a plethora of useful libraries that we don't need to learn again.
Utility - C/C++ can be used to write anything from OS kernels and drivers to middleware apps.
Mono and.NET don't excel in any of these categories. Granted, it doesn't stop you from using it, but why would you go through the trouble to build a new language if it didn't excel in even one of these categories? The issue isn't with the people who use it, but rather why it was built in the first place. It isn't innovative. In fact, it's an embarassment; a metaphorical grabbing at Microsoft's coattails.
Mozilla gives me tabbed browsing - something MS has yet to discover.
Linux gives me a stable OS - at the time of its release, Windows couldn't run for more than 90 days without crashing.
GCC is probably the best compiler I've seen to date - it would take Microsoft years before VC++ could generate faster code.
And then there's Mono: for those who hate Microsoft so much that they run Linux, yet love MS software so much that they must clone.NET.
Considering the fact that almost everything in Linux and the opn source arena is a knock-off of something else, accusations of "copying" ring loud and false.
The major contribution of Linux was that it brought the stability and functionality of UNIX to the PC desktop for those who couldn't afford the expensive UNIX workstations. In PC-Land, it was a tremendous improvement over DOS and Windows, even if it was a copy of UNIX.
But neither.NET nor Java nor Mono offer anything substantially better than C++. Why bother bringing.NET to Linux (Mono), when gcc already does a better job? It would be akin to me cloning Linux and expecting everyone to use my "special" version of Linux just because I released it under a different license.
Mono is seriously embarassing to the OS community. Why we had to create a cheap knockoff copy Microsoft's.Net (which itself was a bad clone of Java), is beyond me. Perhaps some of the more enlightened ones would be so kind as to instruct me as to which problems Mono solves that C++ didn't.
This is serious re-invention of the wheel. Neither Java, nor.Net, nor Mono have anything new and useful to offer programmers.
They all borrow from the same syntactic conventions.
Their libraries don't offer significantly better features or functions than the existing libraries available in C++.
They impose upon the end user the additional burden of starting up a virtual machine, in addition to the fact that interpreted code almost never runs as fast, let alone faster, than natively compiled code. Granted, you might say Java's hotspot would help this, but what's the point of jumping through hoops to get the same performance you already had?
So let me get this straight: If I wanted to use Mono, I'd have to:
relearn how to do everything I already know how to do in C++...
rewrite all of my personal libraries...
learn a completely new set of bugs in a new API....
All so that my code would do the same thing it's always done, but perhaps a little slower. Why bother?
I know that dissing a language is likely to get me branded a troll, but I honestly don't see the point of jumping on the Java-.Net-Mono bandwagon when I'd have to relearn everything to gain practically nothing. Yes, I'd learn it if a job required it, but why OS authors are bothering to re-implement something that shouldn't have been done in the first place is beyond me.
As much as I hate to say this, I get the impression that the Mono project is little more than a bunch of programmers with something to prove; they stroke their own egos thinking, "Look at me, look at me! Microsoft made.Net, and I made Mono..."
Meanwhile, the rest of us just roll our eyes. Copying Microsoft doesn't make one L33T, just unimaginative. I'd be more impressed if Mono wasn't compatible with.Net, and if it actually offered something better than what C++ did ten years ago.
both C/C++ and assembly. Being well versed in both, he's got the freedom to optimize sections of the code in assembly when necessary, and sense enough not to code the whole application in it.
Good development is more a matter of good design and using the right tools for the job than blindly following the programming trends of the moment. Generally speaking, those who don't bother to learn the platform-specific details also won't bother to learn algorithm optimization, so you get the worst of both worlds - slow algorithms, poorly implemented.
The beauty of C++ is that it hides the implementation details from the application programmer - allowing easy development in the hands of a knowledgeable programmer - but the flipside is that it allows even those obstinately ignorant of computer science fundamentals to create code which works, albeit rather poorly.
A 3GHz P4 is not overpowered...
on
Less Might Be More
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
When you are using Java for desktop applications, or:
When you're running Windows XP and it seems to think the average user needs to turn on every conceivable service at boot time.
When it's chained to a 7200 rpm drive that is around three orders of magnitude slower than the main memory.
When developers are more concerned with glitzy interfaces and with trendy programming than actually writing efficient, well-structured code.
When developers reinvent the wheel in the language du jour, in spite of the fact that other languages might be more suitable (no, C++ is not better than assembler for writing device drivers, and no, Java is never "blazingly fast" - under any circumstances...)
When the firmware uses an interpreted language to implement hardware IO routines.
No, the average user doesn't need a 3 GHz processor.
However, the reason they buy such fast machines is because when it comes to issues of performance, the response they receive most often is that they need to upgrade their machine. This alone speaks volumes about the ability and professionalism of the average Windows developer.
And I can always spot Windows devs at conferences - they're the ones who will argue to the death that assembly is obsolete, as they plug the latest Microsoft reinvention of the wheel which requires ever more processing power and memory to do the same things that it did ten years ago...
There is one way in which changing vote totals in GEMS might not work.
So I guess this implies that almost any other way of changing votes will work?! Isn't this the complete opposite of good security, where you have many ways that don't work, but only one that does?
I'm sorry, but there shouldn't be any way of changing votes without detection; ideally, there wouldn't be any way of changing the recorded votes at all.
I don't have a worse example, because, quite frankly, I've stopped listening to techno-speak.
No, really. When a salesman can't tell me in plain English what a technical term means, I simply don't buy. It's that simple. I've got a degree in the field, and I could care less what buzzword is attached to it; giving a new name to an indexed filesystem, as if it was the be-all-end-all of filesystems doesn't make you look smart, but rather, profoundly ignorant of the fact that IBM was doing the same thing on mainframes 40 years ago.
And the natural consequence of this is that I buy far more technology from the small independent resellers than from the national chains. I've spent at least twice as much on technology in small computer shops than anywhere else.
Funny thing is, I like being treated like a human.
Under this system, the hospital posts shift openings and the highest hourly rate it is willing to pay. Nurses willing to work at least four shifts a month then may bid on the work and pay, as long as their bids do not exceed the maximum pay offered. [emphasis]
The problem I have with this is that it isn't a free auction. The nurses can bid lower, but not higher. If no one is willing to work for even the max bid amount, the shift goes unstaffed. This is a deliberate restriction of free trade, and entirely incompatible with the American way. Placing an upper limit on the price a person may charge for their labor is eerily reminiscent of the same kind of socialism that stunted the economic growth of the USSR throughout the Cold War.
Basically, this is a classic capitalist oppression of workers; workers who work the hardest and least-desirable shifts end up earning the least amount of money. At best it is immoral; at worst, it will further exacerbate the shortage of nurses.
Commercial software producers have a financial incentive to release insecure and buggy software.
The reason why Windows will never be thought of as anything more than a toy is because Microsoft itself doesn't see it in any other light. If it breaks, well, its your problem, not ours - sorry if you think otherwise; you should have read the EULA.
While MS serves as a shining example, they are not alone. You might think that the financial clout of commercial developers would ensure secure software, but you'd be wrong, at least as far as the desktop market is concerned. Once you break into the enterprise market, then you'll find a little bit better conditions.
It basically boils down to this: pride and money:
Money is what keeps the commercial developers from using rigorous security screening and analysis practices. Developers are expensive, and market share is built by releasing new products, not doing security audits...
Pride is what motivates OS/Free software writers to delay the release of their code until they are reasonably sure that it is bug-free. And pride is also why they fix it quickly - they want to be known for the quality of their software, not the security holes it contains.
Given these motivating factors, it is unlikely that commercial software will ever be able to match the security and reliability of OS/Free software. Granted, a commercial app could be secure, but a company that actually spent the time to adequately debug security holes would have a difficult time pleasing the stockholders.
If you're going to troll, at least get your facts straight:
Germany has banned the practice of embrionic stem cell research.
The EU has stringent controls concerning genetically modified foods.
Meanwhile, the US is simply refusing to fund embrionic stem cell research.
But it gets better. The reason why embrionic stem cell research isn't being done in the US is because there's no future in it!
Today Parkinson's disease patients are being treated and cured with adult stem cell derived therapies.
There has been a limited success with using adult stem cell therapies to treat Alzheimer's.
Why bother researching embrionic stem cells when adult stem cells are already being used to develop cures? Even given enough research money, developing a pratical therapy using embrionic stem cells is at least 15 to 20 years away.
Biotech isn't dying in the US. Instead, drug companies are pushing expensive cures for mild ailments (heartburn?!) instead of developing the relatively expensive and risky treatments for more serious conditions. It isn't the Feds - it is economics - there's more money in selling a heartburn medication to hundreds of millions than in finding a cure for AIDS.
Because 90k a year in Silicon Valley is the equivalent of $3/hr in India.
The real problem is that workers today can't simply work for less - about 90% of the after-tax value of a 90k/year salary pays for just two things: a house and a car. You can't live without the former, and you can't hold a job without the latter. The ironic thing is that workers such as truckers are actually in a better position than IT folks, because they can live just about anywhere - instead of paying $400k for a 3 bedroom house in Silicon Valley, they're paying about $70k for a five bedroom place in some small midwestern town.
It's not a matter of the money, but of double standards. For years, US workers clamored for telecommuting so they could live in small towns with lower costs of living. But American companies insisted on bringing their IT workers into the cities, and for a while, paid the salaries commeasurate with the increase in cost of living. But now, rather than allowing existing workers to move back to rural areas, telecommute, and take a pay cut, they are simply shipping jobs overseas. It is deliberate discrimination against American workers - it has nothing to do with money! The fact is, companies such as State Farm avoided the need to outsource in the first place by locating their headquarters in downstate Illinois, where the cost of living is cheaper. Hence, they don't have to pay 90k/year for a good IT worker.
But most companies are not so smart. The same idiots who paid 150k/year for a Java programmer in the 90's are now outsourcing jobs to India. And just like the last bubble, this one too, will burst, with American companies footing the bill for failed projects.
There are some pundits who would have you believe that speeding, etc, are indicative of the risk you pose as a driver.
Problem is, no study has directly correlated increased speed with propensity for accidents. In fact, the exact opposite is true: the majority of accidents take place because of errors in driver judgement, not speed. For example, a driver runs a red light, or the traffic comes to a sudden stop on the expressway. Or someone turns left in front of an oncoming car.
Regardless of how safely you drive, there's always someone else who is an idiot - I've been hit while sitting in a parked car.
Thus, the likelihood of an accident is more a factor of a person's past performance and the number of miles driven than of their particular driving misdemeanors. People who speed are often the lowest risk drivers on the road, simply because speeders usually pay more attention to traffic and road conditions than the ephemeral "sunday driver" types who approach driving as if it was a passive activity, like watching t.v.
The only thing black boxes will show is that far more Americans speed than otherwise thought, and that speed is a very poor indicator of actual risk.
Noting the prevalent use of pen and paper by audience members, Ballmer wondered aloud why the content of his speech was not being captured and translated automatically, while also being synchronized with real-time video and a copy of his Microsoft PowerPoint presentation
Perhaps it was because no reporter was willing to bet their career on a laptop running Windows XP?
Ironically, 20 years from now, these reporters will still be able to read their handwritten notes, but Microsoft will have long abandoned the audio and video codecs used to record the speech today...
And that's assuming that the recording media is still playable. How many people can read 5 1/4" floppies any more?
In the Linux world, nobody stands behind patent claims," he said, noting that Microsoft could be forced to swallow a $550 million judgement if it loses its ongoing case with Eolas Technologies Inc., but that its customers would be protected.
This is an abject legal falsehood; a patent ownder can sue the users of the patent if they so desire. They might choose instead to sue Microsoft, but there is no legal indemnification from a patent lawsuit - Microsoft's EULA explicitly denies liability in this regard. And considering that Microsoft's customers have already been sued over patents (Timeline, anyone?), I don't see how he can even believe this truthfully. And to make matters worse, Microsoft has sued its own customers.
If anything, using Microsoft instead of open source software imposes an even greater risk of patent liability on the users.
Any source of contributed info will remain anonymous of course. We encourage the use of encrpytion. The PGP key for this e-mail address is available on the Hush keyserver or upon request...[emphasis mine]
Apparently, the "right to privacy" applies only to the contributors of the list, not the delegates themselves... This has nothing to do with liberty and equality, but is simply an attempt to formally establish a social underclass without the rights you and I hold so dear. If you listen to their rhetoric, freedom of religion, thought and speech only applies to those who agree with them. If you don't agree with them, you have no such rights.
does your program interoperate with a dozen others in a standard cut-and-paste manner;
does it hide the complexity of operation from the end user so he or she can point and click and get things done;
does it use an API so that software writers outside of your company can can write apps that interact with it;
does your software run on multiple different hardware platforms;
do you add new features to it when marketing surveys show people want it?
1, 2, and 5: Yes. 3 and 4: No.
But, I'm not the only programmer; I work on a team. I'm responsible for very small pieces of a very large project, and because our software was well architected, it's easier for me to write bug-free code.
Are you saying that you write software that is as complex as the usual MS app, and that it contains no errors whatsoever and has never had to be debugged?
Yes, it is more complex, and it did start off with errors - but I made certain it was debugged it before it went into production. And it isn't hard to write bug-free code when you've got a well-written specification and a well designed interface. And when you've got another programmer reviewing your code, you tend to be a little bit more careful. Even if I happen to miss something, the likelihood that a programmer senior to me will miss the same bug is pretty small.
Think about how difficult it would be to write a flawless Hello World program.
But, no, no one could write bug free code, right?
The idea of good design is that you reduce the complexity of the individual components to the point where even a secretary couldn't screw it up. And it does work - the systems I work with contain ten thousand modules; our project would have failed had we used the "Microsoft approach". (Code first, debug later, lament the lack of design in blog somewhere...)
Writing bug free code is more a matter of one's character than ability. You make a concious decision to compromise quality for deadlines; you make a conscious decision to forego good design for the sake of expediency. But if you find yourself in this business for long, you realize that good software always lasts longer than the original coders ever envisioned (Y2K, anyone?). What it really comes down to is whether or not a person has the professionalism to insist on reasonable time schedules and self-discipline to prove their design before beginning coding. Good software comes not from fast coders, but good designers.
COBOL was designed not to actually get work done, but rather to destroy the ego of any young, up-and-coming prima donnas.
After the first year of debugging and maintaining COBOL programs with millions of lines of spaghetti code, obfuscated, global variables, etc... the young programmer has no room left for an ego. He has come to the realization that he can't understand everything about the system completely; he is humbled.
Then, when given a Java assignment, he feels a sense of gratitude and loyalty to his boss, who has just lifted him from an endless quagmire of PERFORMS and GO BACKS, and SOC4 ABEND...
THAT is why COBOL came about. IBM never expected that business would build systems with a language designed to break-in the new hires...
I too am getting sick of YAMBOSHS. (Yet Another Microsoft Bug Or Security Hole Story).
Windows isn't secure. It probably won't be for the forseeable future. Get over it... There's not much point in restating the obvious. Yes, we know Windows is a toy; maybe someday, it will qualify as a real Operating System. Till then, there's not much point in talking about security or reliability in the context of Windows, because, in spite of what Redmond says, things aren't getting better.
When people mention the success of Windows, and infer that "it must be good, 'cause everybody uses it...", I ask them what they think of New Kids On The Block. The response is usually something like, "Well, they talk tough... but I can't see my grandmother being scared of them... they're kind of just posers..."
And then I say "Microsoft is New Kids On The Block":
They talk about security and reliability, but can't deliver.
Everywhere you go, you see their ad.
They seem popular, but anyone who knows anything about the business regards them as a bunch of wannabe's.
It's kind of like that. The rest of the corporate world quietly computes on UNIX and Mainframes as Microsoft claims another security "victory" in a battle already won long ago by UNIX and Mainframes. They talk of reinventing computing - using ideas implemented long ago in MVS... (WinFS, anyone?)
We sit back, chuckle and grin, and think to ourselves, "You know, someday, they might just write something useful..."
But there's really little point in getting all riled up. Microsoft has had 20 years to develop a secure OS; there's no reason to believe that Longhorn will be any different from the rest...
Slashdot Mirror
This is a flawed analogy, at best. The cells you mentioned would never have become a human being in the first place. While human, they possessed neither the purpose nor capability to produce a new human life.
The major opposition to embrionic stem cell research, as opposed to adult stem cell research, is that the former kills a human being. Unlike other tissue types, the primary purpose of an embryo is to produce human life; destroying it prevents that life from forming in the first place. We can not rightly claim to be seeking the greater good when we intentionally kill (or "prevent") some humans in the uncertain hopes of curing others.
It is not, as our critics proclaim, that we are opposed to science; many of us believe that science will provide us with genuine material progress. But, as other countries have recognized, embrionic stem cell research is akin to killing toddlers to find a cure for juvenile diabetes. Calling something science does not make it right or noble; witness the manner in which the Nazis conducted "science" experiments on Jewish children - their aims may have been noble, but not the means. Our objection has nothing to do with stifling human knowledge and everything to do with recognizing the fundamental dignity and value of human life.
We need another category on /.: YAME - Yet Another Microsoft Exploit.
Posting stories about security holes in Microsoft products is about as exciting as watching paint dry, or as newsworthy as articles proclaiming, "Water is wet!", or "Ice is cold"...
It's not news for nerds - most of us stopped using these obsolete systems years ago. And yes, I understand Windows users do need to be concerned about these things, but it's still not news. This is business as usual for Microsoft.
Windows and Security holes are like Linux and vi: Yes, you can find systems without them, but they're the exception, rather than the rule.
And yet, I'm almost driven to tears when I hear people naively tell me that their Windows system is secure because they've downloaded the latest patches. Was it that this most recent exploit didn't exist a year ago? Or - could it be - that only crackers knew about it until now? Does patching today protect you from the exploit discovered tomorrow? Didn't it ever occur to people that undiscovered exploits might exist in the Microsoft patches? And if the company didn't do it right the first time, what makes you think they'll do it right this time?
I've seen six generations of Microsoft Windows, and not one of them delivered on the promises Microsoft made. Having watched Microsoft since the release of Windows 95, I've learned that constant security problems are a staple of the Windows experience. If you've been using computers for more than a year and haven't gotten a virus, seen your system crash, or had your machine zombied, then you aren't running Windows. It's that simple folks. Problems are an endemic part of the Windows experience.
A professor once said to me, "We use operating systems for what they're good at, not for what they're bad at..." He was referring to the decision to use Linux as a file and print server while maintaining Windows NT servers for other tasks.
However, the OQO isn't designed to be a desktop replacement, nor intended to be a portable video game machine
So, what exactly is it supposed to be? An overpriced PDA? A toy for high level executives?
Oh, I get it - I'm going to spend twice the money I would on a desktop to get less than half the machine.
I really like the concept of the OQO:
So it has everything I want in a portable, except: price. I can hardly justify spending $2000 for this thing when the Sharp Zaurus has a full keyboard, runs Linux, and costs about 1/2 to 1/4 as much. I don't think I'd have too hard a time finding at least half a dozen other comparable handtops that cost less than half as much.
Overall, I'm really interested. This would be a really cool machine, but at $2000, it will never be accepted by the mainstream. Price it at $500, and two years from now people will be saying, "Palm who?", and "What's an IPAQ?"...
Has eaten genetically modified food. Maize itself has been cultivated by man over the past thousand years from a grass-like grain with ears a few inches long to the foot-plus long ears we have today.
GM by itself is not harmful when exercised with care and due diligence. But, much like any other technology, those who value profit above public safety will find a way to use GM to line their pockets at the expense of the public.
Until we thoroughly understand GM and its implications, we'd do well to regulate in much the same manner as nuclear power or drugs - where the onus to prove the safety of the product lies with the corporations, not the government. The government should regulate the field until the industry showed that it could regulate itself.
Between work and the rest of my life, I spend a lot of time not browsing in record stores. That's right - I don't have the time to go to the store and sit in a listening room for hours on end...
Even though I spend hours at work listening to music, it's all on CD - I don't want to risk getting sued by the RIAA. And I'm getting pretty tired of my collection - but I'm not going to risk getting fired and (possibly) sued because I wanted to listen to something different...
Now granted, if I had P2P, I could scope out new bands, and order the CD through Amazon during my lunch hour. But I don't have P2P. And I haven't bought a CD in about 12 to 18 months.
I wonder when the RIAA is going to wake up and figure out that P2P is the most effective way to market music to time-starved professionals. We have the money for CD's, but lead hectic lives; time spent in a record store is time that could have been spent coding. We can't stand the stuff on the pop-40 stations, but we are willing to buy good music - if only we could find it...
And the interesting part is that I'm spending much more on books than on CD's these days - I can read before I buy without being thought a criminal.
This is exactly the same line of thinking that gets people killed. For example, airbags are now mandatory in automobiles, and yes, they have done a lot to save idiots who couldn't be bothered to fasten their seatbelt before they drove drunk. And unfortunately, this profile does represent a lot of people.
However, the side effect of that cars are now more dangerous for those who wear seatbelts. Prior to the airbag, a conscientious driver who wore a seatbelt stood a low risk of injury in a low to moderate speed impact. But, thanks to the airbag, children and elderly have been killed in minor accidents because the airbag went off. Worse yet are the cases in which people have been burned to death in vehicles after having a minor accident because an exploding airbag broke their wrists and were unable to exit the vehicle.
The problem is that the majority of people choose to drive in unsafe ways. But, we shouldn't reward their negligent behaviour by installing a "safety device" that will mitigate the consequences of their unsafe actions at the expense of making cars more dangerous for safe drivers. Safe drivers are being punished for the folly of reckless ones.
Well, if it's only a matter of preferences, then there's really no point in discussing it.
But C++ did offer considerably more than C, and C more than assembly. C wasn't object oriented, and assembly wasn't easily readable.
So I would have expected the whole Java-.NET-Mono thing to offer something considerably better than C++, but they didn't. In fact, the did just the opposite - they took features away whilst making the language slower.
It isn't a matter of preferences, but performance. .NET, and Mono are offering 1970's era performance and development times on 21st century hardware. Consider the categories in which they don't excel:
- Development time - Visual Basic and TCL are faster.
- Security - Java is more secure.
- Runtime speed - pretty hard to beat C/C++, and can't touch assembly.
- Portability -
.NET doesn't run on UNIX; Mono could be killed by Microsoft with patent encumberances.
- Functionality - C++ already has a plethora of useful libraries that we don't need to learn again.
- Utility - C/C++ can be used to write anything from OS kernels and drivers to middleware apps.
Mono andMozilla gives me tabbed browsing - something MS has yet to discover.
Linux gives me a stable OS - at the time of its release, Windows couldn't run for more than 90 days without crashing.
GCC is probably the best compiler I've seen to date - it would take Microsoft years before VC++ could generate faster code.
And then there's Mono: for those who hate Microsoft so much that they run Linux, yet love MS software so much that they must clone .NET.
The major contribution of Linux was that it brought the stability and functionality of UNIX to the PC desktop for those who couldn't afford the expensive UNIX workstations. In PC-Land, it was a tremendous improvement over DOS and Windows, even if it was a copy of UNIX.
But neither .NET nor Java nor Mono offer anything substantially better than C++. Why bother bringing .NET to Linux (Mono), when gcc already does a better job? It would be akin to me cloning Linux and expecting everyone to use my "special" version of Linux just because I released it under a different license.
Why not use C# and .Net?
Mono is seriously embarassing to the OS community. Why we had to create a cheap knockoff copy Microsoft's .Net (which itself was a bad clone of Java), is beyond me. Perhaps some of the more enlightened ones would be so kind as to instruct me as to which problems Mono solves that C++ didn't.
This is serious re-invention of the wheel. Neither Java, nor .Net, nor Mono have anything new and useful to offer programmers.
So let me get this straight: If I wanted to use Mono, I'd have to:
- relearn how to do everything I already know how to do in C++...
- rewrite all of my personal libraries...
- learn a completely new set of bugs in a new API....
All so that my code would do the same thing it's always done, but perhaps a little slower. Why bother?I know that dissing a language is likely to get me branded a troll, but I honestly don't see the point of jumping on the Java-.Net-Mono bandwagon when I'd have to relearn everything to gain practically nothing. Yes, I'd learn it if a job required it, but why OS authors are bothering to re-implement something that shouldn't have been done in the first place is beyond me.
As much as I hate to say this, I get the impression that the Mono project is little more than a bunch of programmers with something to prove; they stroke their own egos thinking, "Look at me, look at me! Microsoft made .Net, and I made Mono..."
Meanwhile, the rest of us just roll our eyes. Copying Microsoft doesn't make one L33T, just unimaginative. I'd be more impressed if Mono wasn't compatible with .Net, and if it actually offered something better than what C++ did ten years ago.
both C/C++ and assembly. Being well versed in both, he's got the freedom to optimize sections of the code in assembly when necessary, and sense enough not to code the whole application in it.
Good development is more a matter of good design and using the right tools for the job than blindly following the programming trends of the moment. Generally speaking, those who don't bother to learn the platform-specific details also won't bother to learn algorithm optimization, so you get the worst of both worlds - slow algorithms, poorly implemented.
The beauty of C++ is that it hides the implementation details from the application programmer - allowing easy development in the hands of a knowledgeable programmer - but the flipside is that it allows even those obstinately ignorant of computer science fundamentals to create code which works, albeit rather poorly.
No, the average user doesn't need a 3 GHz processor.
However, the reason they buy such fast machines is because when it comes to issues of performance, the response they receive most often is that they need to upgrade their machine. This alone speaks volumes about the ability and professionalism of the average Windows developer.
And I can always spot Windows devs at conferences - they're the ones who will argue to the death that assembly is obsolete, as they plug the latest Microsoft reinvention of the wheel which requires ever more processing power and memory to do the same things that it did ten years ago...
There is one way in which changing vote totals in GEMS might not work.
So I guess this implies that almost any other way of changing votes will work?! Isn't this the complete opposite of good security, where you have many ways that don't work, but only one that does?
I'm sorry, but there shouldn't be any way of changing votes without detection; ideally, there wouldn't be any way of changing the recorded votes at all.
This is a terrorist offense. Yes, the vendor execs could be dragged into court and sentenced to death for this.
I don't have a worse example, because, quite frankly, I've stopped listening to techno-speak.
No, really. When a salesman can't tell me in plain English what a technical term means, I simply don't buy. It's that simple. I've got a degree in the field, and I could care less what buzzword is attached to it; giving a new name to an indexed filesystem, as if it was the be-all-end-all of filesystems doesn't make you look smart, but rather, profoundly ignorant of the fact that IBM was doing the same thing on mainframes 40 years ago.
And the natural consequence of this is that I buy far more technology from the small independent resellers than from the national chains. I've spent at least twice as much on technology in small computer shops than anywhere else.
Funny thing is, I like being treated like a human.
Under this system, the hospital posts shift openings and the highest hourly rate it is willing to pay. Nurses willing to work at least four shifts a month then may bid on the work and pay, as long as their bids do not exceed the maximum pay offered. [emphasis]
The problem I have with this is that it isn't a free auction. The nurses can bid lower, but not higher. If no one is willing to work for even the max bid amount, the shift goes unstaffed. This is a deliberate restriction of free trade, and entirely incompatible with the American way. Placing an upper limit on the price a person may charge for their labor is eerily reminiscent of the same kind of socialism that stunted the economic growth of the USSR throughout the Cold War.
Basically, this is a classic capitalist oppression of workers; workers who work the hardest and least-desirable shifts end up earning the least amount of money. At best it is immoral; at worst, it will further exacerbate the shortage of nurses.
Commercial software producers have a financial incentive to release insecure and buggy software.
The reason why Windows will never be thought of as anything more than a toy is because Microsoft itself doesn't see it in any other light. If it breaks, well, its your problem, not ours - sorry if you think otherwise; you should have read the EULA.
While MS serves as a shining example, they are not alone. You might think that the financial clout of commercial developers would ensure secure software, but you'd be wrong, at least as far as the desktop market is concerned. Once you break into the enterprise market, then you'll find a little bit better conditions.
It basically boils down to this: pride and money:
Given these motivating factors, it is unlikely that commercial software will ever be able to match the security and reliability of OS/Free software. Granted, a commercial app could be secure, but a company that actually spent the time to adequately debug security holes would have a difficult time pleasing the stockholders.
biotech is being squahed by the right wingers
If you're going to troll, at least get your facts straight:
But it gets better. The reason why embrionic stem cell research isn't being done in the US is because there's no future in it!
Why bother researching embrionic stem cells when adult stem cells are already being used to develop cures? Even given enough research money, developing a pratical therapy using embrionic stem cells is at least 15 to 20 years away.
Biotech isn't dying in the US. Instead, drug companies are pushing expensive cures for mild ailments (heartburn?!) instead of developing the relatively expensive and risky treatments for more serious conditions. It isn't the Feds - it is economics - there's more money in selling a heartburn medication to hundreds of millions than in finding a cure for AIDS.
Because 90k a year in Silicon Valley is the equivalent of $3/hr in India.
The real problem is that workers today can't simply work for less - about 90% of the after-tax value of a 90k/year salary pays for just two things: a house and a car. You can't live without the former, and you can't hold a job without the latter. The ironic thing is that workers such as truckers are actually in a better position than IT folks, because they can live just about anywhere - instead of paying $400k for a 3 bedroom house in Silicon Valley, they're paying about $70k for a five bedroom place in some small midwestern town.
It's not a matter of the money, but of double standards. For years, US workers clamored for telecommuting so they could live in small towns with lower costs of living. But American companies insisted on bringing their IT workers into the cities, and for a while, paid the salaries commeasurate with the increase in cost of living. But now, rather than allowing existing workers to move back to rural areas, telecommute, and take a pay cut, they are simply shipping jobs overseas. It is deliberate discrimination against American workers - it has nothing to do with money! The fact is, companies such as State Farm avoided the need to outsource in the first place by locating their headquarters in downstate Illinois, where the cost of living is cheaper. Hence, they don't have to pay 90k/year for a good IT worker.
But most companies are not so smart. The same idiots who paid 150k/year for a Java programmer in the 90's are now outsourcing jobs to India. And just like the last bubble, this one too, will burst, with American companies footing the bill for failed projects.
There are some pundits who would have you believe that speeding, etc, are indicative of the risk you pose as a driver.
Problem is, no study has directly correlated increased speed with propensity for accidents. In fact, the exact opposite is true: the majority of accidents take place because of errors in driver judgement, not speed. For example, a driver runs a red light, or the traffic comes to a sudden stop on the expressway. Or someone turns left in front of an oncoming car.
Regardless of how safely you drive, there's always someone else who is an idiot - I've been hit while sitting in a parked car.
Thus, the likelihood of an accident is more a factor of a person's past performance and the number of miles driven than of their particular driving misdemeanors. People who speed are often the lowest risk drivers on the road, simply because speeders usually pay more attention to traffic and road conditions than the ephemeral "sunday driver" types who approach driving as if it was a passive activity, like watching t.v.
The only thing black boxes will show is that far more Americans speed than otherwise thought, and that speed is a very poor indicator of actual risk.
Noting the prevalent use of pen and paper by audience members, Ballmer wondered aloud why the content of his speech was not being captured and translated automatically, while also being synchronized with real-time video and a copy of his Microsoft PowerPoint presentation
Perhaps it was because no reporter was willing to bet their career on a laptop running Windows XP?
Ironically, 20 years from now, these reporters will still be able to read their handwritten notes, but Microsoft will have long abandoned the audio and video codecs used to record the speech today...
And that's assuming that the recording media is still playable. How many people can read 5 1/4" floppies any more?
In the Linux world, nobody stands behind patent claims," he said, noting that Microsoft could be forced to swallow a $550 million judgement if it loses its ongoing case with Eolas Technologies Inc., but that its customers would be protected.
This is an abject legal falsehood; a patent ownder can sue the users of the patent if they so desire. They might choose instead to sue Microsoft, but there is no legal indemnification from a patent lawsuit - Microsoft's EULA explicitly denies liability in this regard. And considering that Microsoft's customers have already been sued over patents (Timeline, anyone?), I don't see how he can even believe this truthfully. And to make matters worse, Microsoft has sued its own customers.
If anything, using Microsoft instead of open source software imposes an even greater risk of patent liability on the users.
From the website which posted the list:
Any source of contributed info will remain anonymous of course. We encourage the use of encrpytion. The PGP key for this e-mail address is available on the Hush keyserver or upon request...[emphasis mine]Apparently, the "right to privacy" applies only to the contributors of the list, not the delegates themselves... This has nothing to do with liberty and equality, but is simply an attempt to formally establish a social underclass without the rights you and I hold so dear. If you listen to their rhetoric, freedom of religion, thought and speech only applies to those who agree with them. If you don't agree with them, you have no such rights.
How many people will credit Bill Gates with inventing the music download service?
How many will claim that "if it wasn't for Microsoft, you wouldn't be able to legally download music...."
Sorry Apple, it looks like Billy G is going to steal your thunder...
1, 2, and 5: Yes. 3 and 4: No.
But, I'm not the only programmer; I work on a team. I'm responsible for very small pieces of a very large project, and because our software was well architected, it's easier for me to write bug-free code.
Are you saying that you write software that is as complex as the usual MS app, and that it contains no errors whatsoever and has never had to be debugged?
Yes, it is more complex, and it did start off with errors - but I made certain it was debugged it before it went into production. And it isn't hard to write bug-free code when you've got a well-written specification and a well designed interface. And when you've got another programmer reviewing your code, you tend to be a little bit more careful. Even if I happen to miss something, the likelihood that a programmer senior to me will miss the same bug is pretty small.Think about how difficult it would be to write a flawless Hello World program.
But, no, no one could write bug free code, right?
The idea of good design is that you reduce the complexity of the individual components to the point where even a secretary couldn't screw it up. And it does work - the systems I work with contain ten thousand modules; our project would have failed had we used the "Microsoft approach". (Code first, debug later, lament the lack of design in blog somewhere...)
Writing bug free code is more a matter of one's character than ability. You make a concious decision to compromise quality for deadlines; you make a conscious decision to forego good design for the sake of expediency. But if you find yourself in this business for long, you realize that good software always lasts longer than the original coders ever envisioned (Y2K, anyone?). What it really comes down to is whether or not a person has the professionalism to insist on reasonable time schedules and self-discipline to prove their design before beginning coding. Good software comes not from fast coders, but good designers.
COBOL was designed not to actually get work done, but rather to destroy the ego of any young, up-and-coming prima donnas.
After the first year of debugging and maintaining COBOL programs with millions of lines of spaghetti code, obfuscated, global variables, etc... the young programmer has no room left for an ego. He has come to the realization that he can't understand everything about the system completely; he is humbled.
Then, when given a Java assignment, he feels a sense of gratitude and loyalty to his boss, who has just lifted him from an endless quagmire of PERFORMS and GO BACKS, and SOC4 ABEND...
THAT is why COBOL came about. IBM never expected that business would build systems with a language designed to break-in the new hires...
But, as they say, the rest is history...
Microsoft actually releases a secure OS.
I too am getting sick of YAMBOSHS. (Yet Another Microsoft Bug Or Security Hole Story).
Windows isn't secure. It probably won't be for the forseeable future. Get over it... There's not much point in restating the obvious. Yes, we know Windows is a toy; maybe someday, it will qualify as a real Operating System. Till then, there's not much point in talking about security or reliability in the context of Windows, because, in spite of what Redmond says, things aren't getting better.
When people mention the success of Windows, and infer that "it must be good, 'cause everybody uses it...", I ask them what they think of New Kids On The Block. The response is usually something like, "Well, they talk tough... but I can't see my grandmother being scared of them... they're kind of just posers..."
And then I say "Microsoft is New Kids On The Block":
- They talk about security and reliability, but can't deliver.
- Everywhere you go, you see their ad.
- They seem popular, but anyone who knows anything about the business regards them as a bunch of wannabe's.
It's kind of like that. The rest of the corporate world quietly computes on UNIX and Mainframes as Microsoft claims another security "victory" in a battle already won long ago by UNIX and Mainframes. They talk of reinventing computing - using ideas implemented long ago in MVS... (WinFS, anyone?)We sit back, chuckle and grin, and think to ourselves, "You know, someday, they might just write something useful..."
But there's really little point in getting all riled up. Microsoft has had 20 years to develop a secure OS; there's no reason to believe that Longhorn will be any different from the rest...