Why can't companys stick with an idea or two and make it better?
To a certian extent, Yahoo! is. Waaaay back in the day, Yahoo! was just a search engine, nothing more.
A few years ago, they turned into a portal and haven't changed much since then. Since a portal is an end all, be all place to do everything Yahoo! had to offer many many services and purchase other companies in order to be the best portal there is.
There's nothing wrong with Yahoo! per se, however being a big player in the Portal market takes a lot of money.
I don't think specialized PCs will make it due to simple supply and demand.
If given the choice, who would choose a PC that restricts your rights to copy files you rightly own? Nobody. No demand, thus the supply will falter (witness Sun's Network Computer)
What if this thing does take off? There will be a demand for normal hard drives still (I know I don't want hardware with copy protection built in), thus someone will need to supply the demand. It may be some yet unknown company in Asia, or maybe of the large hard drive manufactuers here in the states won't give in and still make normal drives.
In short, I don't think stuff like this will go over because nobody except companies and governments actually wants these products. However, governments forcing us to use them is another debate....
Meanwhile, websites are cropping up everywhere to encode filenames to simple things like Pig Latin, as well as more complicated stuff. No doubt open-source Napster clones will have that built in within a few days.
I'm wondering, why is it necessary to encode song names? Since the vast majority of Slashdot are law abiding citizens who would only use Napster to trade non-copyrighted music this should be an issue.
Is the encryption being used to allow people to keep trading copyrighted material? If so, why not give the artists the pay they deserve the purchase their MP3 or CD?
But in practice, judges are going to want to rule for the noble music industry against the evil music pirates.
Oh come on, how biased of a statement can this be? If you agree with the Napster decision or not, all judges don't automatically side with big companies.
Slashdot needs to be more careful in its blanket statements and stay away from blatantly biased statements such as this one.
Even though his wording was a little harsh, I feel asackett has a valid point.
When we hear of stupid patents from comapnies like Amazon, Cisco and Microsoft, we get upset. Usually we express ourselves with harsh words, boycotts and sometimes inappropriate actions.
Yet Apple seems to be an execption. They have made people remove Aqua and AquaX themes, created patents for themes, and done some very, very nasty stuff in the past. Yet we still view them as "good" overall.
Can someone explain why Apple is an execption to this rule?
I wonder exactly what you mean here, because I can see two different points of view.
The first, and I assume this is Michael's point of view, is that the insurance company was being dishonest in not telling its (potential) customers of this screening and using "unapproved" tests. Bear in mind many people use "unapproved" things all of the time, take Ginko for example.
The second point of view is the insurance company's. How do they know the person applying for coverage isn't terminally ill and will make the company pay out millions of dollars for treatment? The company has a right to know the state of their paitents before giving coverage.
Roger. What makes you think there is a merger coming? What evidence or even speculation can you give? Do you really think Microsoft will merge with one of the leading chip makers while under the watchful eye of the DOJ? I don't think so.
I guess what I'm trying to say is your statement is bullshit and can't be backed up. Prove me wrong.
...also contends that the latest release of the Linux kernel, 2.4, doesn't have the features required for widespread business use.
Mr. Miller doesn't go on to name which features 2.4 is missing. Linux has a journaling file system, and has had SMP support since 2.2. Could anyone else, or perhaps Mr. Miller himself get more specific as to which features 2.4 is missing?
And the recent security problems with Linux...
All OSes have security problems Mr. Miller. Windows, all the UNIXes, VMS, Mac OS and BeOS have all had security problems at one time or another. It's a fact of life that all software has bugs, and when you get into millions of lines of code (such as an OS), you will find there are many bugs, and they're inevatable. What puts an OS above the others is how the maintainers of that OS deal with bugs and the time they take to correct the bugs. In the case of Open Source, it is dealt with in a straightforward manner, and very quickly.
...Linux also lacks some key features that you'd want for a data center such as hot swappable CPUs and memory.
I thought this was a shortcoming of the x86 architecture, not Linux. Can someone confirm or deny this for me? Also, does Windows NT support hot swapping of CPUs and RAM?
Development costs money, QA (quality assurance) costs money, support costs money...
This has to be my favorite anti-Linux argument. Even thought Mr. Miller fails to mention it, all these things can be said about all of Microsoft's products as well.
Miller claimed that recently released numbers from IDC System Software Research show that "Linux growth in server OS share has been flat for two quarters, and Unix and Novell continue to fall....IDC manager Al Gillen would not confirm Miller's analysis.
Typical Microsoft FUD at its best, and in this case, it's confirmed FUD.
Frankly, I see most of Mr. Miller's statment as accusations that are not backed up by facts. If he was to tell me why Linux wasn't ready for the enterprise and where exactly Linux's "hidden costs" become apparent, then I would perhaps take his side.
Since he presents no evidence to backup his statements, I have no reason to beleive any of them.
They'd be opening themselves to a lawsuit from everyone who was willing to say "I hadn't modified my card, honest" otherwise.
Sorry, but you're wrong. Do you think a bank robber can sue a bank who puts a dye pack in his bag of money to render the money useless? Do you think that people who put razor bars around their stereo equipment can be sued by the theif who loses a finger?
Thirdly the destruction of the cards would force Hughes to replace them. Not a cheap move.
What do you think is cheaper: letting people take $30 or $40 per month out of Hughes' pocket by not paying for the service, or replacing a single smart card. I'm not an authority on the subject, but I think making these people pay for 2 months of service would make up for the cost of a new smart card. BTW, is "thirdly" a word?
Finally, the site Michael linked to requests financial support by clicking a paypal link. Sounds like an elaborate setup to fleece the/. community.
We're glad Shoeboy is looking out for our interests. Slashdot requests financial support by displaying banner ads, and so do 99% of all other sites on the web. The one in question uses PayPal for its financial support instead of banners. What's the problem?
I work at a company who uses lots of the Netra machines, and they're awesome. The Netra 220R is the same as an Ultra Enterprise 250 only rackmountable and the Netra 420R is the same as a Ultra Enterprise 450 only again, it's rack mountable.
The question I have is who is going to use a machine with an IDE drive an only 128 megs of RAM in a production environment? Normal users probably won't use it since it's only rack-mountable, and it's pretty low end to be a business server.
If this is true, then there won't be much of a way to fight back.
The same is true for all land in the United States. The government actually owns the land, but you get to use it after you "purchase" it. If you don't beleive me, don't pay your property taxes and see who's in charge.;)
when a for profit company is in charge of something that should be independent, such as domain name registration.
NSI, like any other company has to make money, moreover profits. Since they are in control of all of the domains, they can hang onto the good ones (or ones who's ownership has expired, such in this case) and resell them for a higher price, thus making a profit and helping the company.
Imagine if Marvel Comics printed 10,000 copies of a hot first issue comic book. It then released 5,000 onto the market, and kept 5,000 for itself. Then, when the comic was selling for $300 each, Marvel sold the 5,000 it kept for $300 each.
Every business has to make money, and maximize its profits. But the way NSI is going about it, is at least shady, and at worst illegal.
Since many of these old games (and applications) don't generate revenue in any way, shape or form for the company any longer, why don't they release them under a license so that the general public can use them without fear of breaking EULAs or copywrite law?
For example, I liked the game Quarantine for the PC. You're a taxi driver taking people around a futuristic city that's filled with psychos and diseased people (yeah, I'm pretty twisted, get used to it). I'm 99.99% sure they haven't sold a copy of this in 3 or 4 years, so why not throw it on a FTP or web site somewhere with a new license and make it available to anyone who wants it?
The other idea I had is an "expiration" if you will on software copywrites, like patents. After X years, the software's EULA no longer applies and people can do whatever they want with it (including make copies).
This looks like a good cause, but the first thing I noticed is there aren't any technical details to be found, from links on the page referenced, or even in the mailing list archives.
The other thing that makes me wonder is "how can this thing actually work?".
I know TCP/IP fairly well, and this doesn't make sense to me. I want to establish a TCP connection to another host (packets are going both ways), so how can I stay anonymous when the remote host needs to send packets back to me? It has to go from router A, to router B, etc and then back to my computer.
The only way around this issue is if a proxy is used, and I don't think this will work because someone has to provide massive amounts of bandwidth for these anonymous connections, and whoever is in control (or can gain control) of the proxy server would see everything.
The other thing too keep in mind is this: no matter what protocol you're using over the Internet, you can find out where the packets are coming from and going to. This includes ssh (Secure Shell), tunneling, normal TCP/UDP connections and even spoofed packets. This is done by running sniffers on each interface on a router (starting with the target that's being DoSed or whatever) and seeing which interface these packets came in on. You find out what that interface is connected to and start sniffing there. Repeat this process enough times, and you'll find out the source and destination of any packet.
Being a UNIX admin, I feel relying on Bugtraq is a horrible way to keep up on the newest vendor patches (note patches not bugs). Not that Bugtraq isn't good, just that if you need to keep up with vendor patches, it's not the way to fly.
This goes back to, what I feel, is Microsoft's issue with Bugtraq reposting bulletins. What if Bugtraq misses a bulletin, and an admin gets pissed when his server gets compromised. Who is blamed? Microsoft. Who is at fault? Bugtraq.
If you want all of the bulletins, get them from the source. I subscribe to the security mailing list from each vendor for all the *NIXes I support. This is the only 99.99% sure way you will see all of the bug and patch reports all of the time. If I miss one, I can then (rightfuly so) blame the vendor for not publishing the information or not getting it to me.
Most UNIX bugs will not even HAVE bulletins to copy & paste
You may be a troll and I'm feeding, but I'll give it a go.
Like Microsoft, all of the major UNIX vendors have security mailing lists. They tell what program the bug is in, if it is a remote or local compromise, and what exactly the compromise can do (denial of service, gain root access, etc). This includes Sun (Solaris), HP (HP-UX), SGI (IRIX) and Digital (Digital UNIX, aka OSF1 aka Tru64).
Same goes with the majority of the large (and even most of the small) Linux vendors. Do you see Bugtraq after a local root compromise has been found? I see updates from 7 or 8 Linux vendors announcing patches or packages with the fix.
Some folks (such as OpenBSD and their code audit) do not report all bugs. As for their reasoning, I don't know, but they will report bugs that users find, but not things they find during their code audit.
So yes, UNIX vendors DO report and patch their bugs.
I don't think this is really as bad as the headline makes it sound.
If I was experimenting with IIS and found a bug (compromise, DoS, etc) I'm still free to post it on the Bugtraq mailing list. Microsoft cannot stop me from doing this.
On the other hand, the Microsoft Security Announcements can't be posted. The solution? Go out to Microsoft's web site which can be found here and check the bulletins yourself. The other option is to subscribe to Microsoft's security mailing list.
I don't think this hurts customers very much, although it does have the side effect of either giving your e-mail address to Microsoft or visiting their web site more often.
Slashdot Mirror
Why can't companys stick with an idea or two and make it better?
To a certian extent, Yahoo! is. Waaaay back in the day, Yahoo! was just a search engine, nothing more.
A few years ago, they turned into a portal and haven't changed much since then. Since a portal is an end all, be all place to do everything Yahoo! had to offer many many services and purchase other companies in order to be the best portal there is.
There's nothing wrong with Yahoo! per se, however being a big player in the Portal market takes a lot of money.
I don't think specialized PCs will make it due to simple supply and demand.
If given the choice, who would choose a PC that restricts your rights to copy files you rightly own? Nobody. No demand, thus the supply will falter (witness Sun's Network Computer)
What if this thing does take off? There will be a demand for normal hard drives still (I know I don't want hardware with copy protection built in), thus someone will need to supply the demand. It may be some yet unknown company in Asia, or maybe of the large hard drive manufactuers here in the states won't give in and still make normal drives.
In short, I don't think stuff like this will go over because nobody except companies and governments actually wants these products. However, governments forcing us to use them is another debate....
Meanwhile, websites are cropping up everywhere to encode filenames to simple things like Pig Latin, as well as more complicated stuff. No doubt open-source Napster clones will have that built in within a few days.
I'm wondering, why is it necessary to encode song names? Since the vast majority of Slashdot are law abiding citizens who would only use Napster to trade non-copyrighted music this should be an issue.
Is the encryption being used to allow people to keep trading copyrighted material? If so, why not give the artists the pay they deserve the purchase their MP3 or CD?
But in practice, judges are going to want to rule for the noble music industry against the evil music pirates.
Oh come on, how biased of a statement can this be? If you agree with the Napster decision or not, all judges don't automatically side with big companies.
Slashdot needs to be more careful in its blanket statements and stay away from blatantly biased statements such as this one.
Even though his wording was a little harsh, I feel asackett has a valid point.
When we hear of stupid patents from comapnies like Amazon, Cisco and Microsoft, we get upset. Usually we express ourselves with harsh words, boycotts and sometimes inappropriate actions.
Yet Apple seems to be an execption. They have made people remove Aqua and AquaX themes, created patents for themes, and done some very, very nasty stuff in the past. Yet we still view them as "good" overall.
Can someone explain why Apple is an execption to this rule?
better, but you need to make the URL a little more random, and perhaps post from a real account.
This makes me laugh about as much as I do when I see a picture of RMS.
honesty-is-the-worst-policy...
I wonder exactly what you mean here, because I can see two different points of view.
The first, and I assume this is Michael's point of view, is that the insurance company was being dishonest in not telling its (potential) customers of this screening and using "unapproved" tests. Bear in mind many people use "unapproved" things all of the time, take Ginko for example.
The second point of view is the insurance company's. How do they know the person applying for coverage isn't terminally ill and will make the company pay out millions of dollars for treatment? The company has a right to know the state of their paitents before giving coverage.
If you feel like moving, I have a spare bedroom....
Be a man. Insult me without using an AC.
Roger. What makes you think there is a merger coming? What evidence or even speculation can you give? Do you really think Microsoft will merge with one of the leading chip makers while under the watchful eye of the DOJ? I don't think so.
I guess what I'm trying to say is your statement is bullshit and can't be backed up. Prove me wrong.
...also contends that the latest release of the Linux kernel, 2.4, doesn't have the features required for widespread business use.
...Linux also lacks some key features that you'd want for a data center such as hot swappable CPUs and memory.
Mr. Miller doesn't go on to name which features 2.4 is missing. Linux has a journaling file system, and has had SMP support since 2.2. Could anyone else, or perhaps Mr. Miller himself get more specific as to which features 2.4 is missing?
And the recent security problems with Linux...
All OSes have security problems Mr. Miller. Windows, all the UNIXes, VMS, Mac OS and BeOS have all had security problems at one time or another. It's a fact of life that all software has bugs, and when you get into millions of lines of code (such as an OS), you will find there are many bugs, and they're inevatable. What puts an OS above the others is how the maintainers of that OS deal with bugs and the time they take to correct the bugs. In the case of Open Source, it is dealt with in a straightforward manner, and very quickly.
I thought this was a shortcoming of the x86 architecture, not Linux. Can someone confirm or deny this for me? Also, does Windows NT support hot swapping of CPUs and RAM?
Development costs money, QA (quality assurance) costs money, support costs money...
This has to be my favorite anti-Linux argument. Even thought Mr. Miller fails to mention it, all these things can be said about all of Microsoft's products as well.
Miller claimed that recently released numbers from IDC System Software Research show that "Linux growth in server OS share has been flat for two quarters, and Unix and Novell continue to fall....IDC manager Al Gillen would not confirm Miller's analysis.
Typical Microsoft FUD at its best, and in this case, it's confirmed FUD.
Frankly, I see most of Mr. Miller's statment as accusations that are not backed up by facts. If he was to tell me why Linux wasn't ready for the enterprise and where exactly Linux's "hidden costs" become apparent, then I would perhaps take his side.
Since he presents no evidence to backup his statements, I have no reason to beleive any of them.
They'd be opening themselves to a lawsuit from everyone who was willing to say "I hadn't modified my card, honest" otherwise.
/. community.
Sorry, but you're wrong. Do you think a bank robber can sue a bank who puts a dye pack in his bag of money to render the money useless? Do you think that people who put razor bars around their stereo equipment can be sued by the theif who loses a finger?
Thirdly the destruction of the cards would force Hughes to replace them. Not a cheap move.
What do you think is cheaper: letting people take $30 or $40 per month out of Hughes' pocket by not paying for the service, or replacing a single smart card. I'm not an authority on the subject, but I think making these people pay for 2 months of service would make up for the cost of a new smart card. BTW, is "thirdly" a word?
Finally, the site Michael linked to requests financial support by clicking a paypal link. Sounds like an elaborate setup to fleece the
We're glad Shoeboy is looking out for our interests. Slashdot requests financial support by displaying banner ads, and so do 99% of all other sites on the web. The one in question uses PayPal for its financial support instead of banners. What's the problem?
I work at a company who uses lots of the Netra machines, and they're awesome. The Netra 220R is the same as an Ultra Enterprise 250 only rackmountable and the Netra 420R is the same as a Ultra Enterprise 450 only again, it's rack mountable.
The question I have is who is going to use a machine with an IDE drive an only 128 megs of RAM in a production environment? Normal users probably won't use it since it's only rack-mountable, and it's pretty low end to be a business server.
Thoughts?
I have a question for you jjlaw: Prices in California may have changed due to deregulation, so how do increased prices create a power shortage?
I don't beleive an increase in prices would lead to greater consumption.
Is the Mambo X MP3/CD Player. It can play audio CDs and CDs of MP3s and is portable.
Another neat feature is is can use CDs that have directories on them, and it skips over non MP3 files (such as covers and CUE sheets).
A good point indeed.
;)
If this is true, then there won't be much of a way to fight back.
The same is true for all land in the United States. The government actually owns the land, but you get to use it after you "purchase" it. If you don't beleive me, don't pay your property taxes and see who's in charge.
when a for profit company is in charge of something that should be independent, such as domain name registration.
NSI, like any other company has to make money, moreover profits. Since they are in control of all of the domains, they can hang onto the good ones (or ones who's ownership has expired, such in this case) and resell them for a higher price, thus making a profit and helping the company.
Imagine if Marvel Comics printed 10,000 copies of a hot first issue comic book. It then released 5,000 onto the market, and kept 5,000 for itself. Then, when the comic was selling for $300 each, Marvel sold the 5,000 it kept for $300 each.
Every business has to make money, and maximize its profits. But the way NSI is going about it, is at least shady, and at worst illegal.
Whoops, I need to take that back.
You aren't able to view the results, but if you fill out the survey, you can submit information and the results will be sent to you.
I was under the impression that one could not view the results due to the surveys being password protected on the web site.
My most sincere apologies.
Just a note, you can contribute, but you must be a paying member to view the salary surveys.
Frankly, I think the idea of a UNIX sysadmin salary survey is great (being one myself), but I don't feel paying for the data that I submitted is fair.
Perhaps if you submit data, you can get access to the results free. You listening USENIX?
Since many of these old games (and applications) don't generate revenue in any way, shape or form for the company any longer, why don't they release them under a license so that the general public can use them without fear of breaking EULAs or copywrite law?
For example, I liked the game Quarantine for the PC. You're a taxi driver taking people around a futuristic city that's filled with psychos and diseased people (yeah, I'm pretty twisted, get used to it). I'm 99.99% sure they haven't sold a copy of this in 3 or 4 years, so why not throw it on a FTP or web site somewhere with a new license and make it available to anyone who wants it?
The other idea I had is an "expiration" if you will on software copywrites, like patents. After X years, the software's EULA no longer applies and people can do whatever they want with it (including make copies).
This looks like a good cause, but the first thing I noticed is there aren't any technical details to be found, from links on the page referenced, or even in the mailing list archives.
The other thing that makes me wonder is "how can this thing actually work?".
I know TCP/IP fairly well, and this doesn't make sense to me. I want to establish a TCP connection to another host (packets are going both ways), so how can I stay anonymous when the remote host needs to send packets back to me? It has to go from router A, to router B, etc and then back to my computer.
The only way around this issue is if a proxy is used, and I don't think this will work because someone has to provide massive amounts of bandwidth for these anonymous connections, and whoever is in control (or can gain control) of the proxy server would see everything.
The other thing too keep in mind is this: no matter what protocol you're using over the Internet, you can find out where the packets are coming from and going to. This includes ssh (Secure Shell), tunneling, normal TCP/UDP connections and even spoofed packets. This is done by running sniffers on each interface on a router (starting with the target that's being DoSed or whatever) and seeing which interface these packets came in on. You find out what that interface is connected to and start sniffing there. Repeat this process enough times, and you'll find out the source and destination of any packet.
Ok, let me repeat myself again. :)
patches not bugs.
and
Not that Bugtraq isn't good, just that if you need to keep up with vendor patches, it's not the way to fly.
Being a UNIX admin, I feel relying on Bugtraq is a horrible way to keep up on the newest vendor patches (note patches not bugs). Not that Bugtraq isn't good, just that if you need to keep up with vendor patches, it's not the way to fly.
This goes back to, what I feel, is Microsoft's issue with Bugtraq reposting bulletins. What if Bugtraq misses a bulletin, and an admin gets pissed when his server gets compromised. Who is blamed? Microsoft. Who is at fault? Bugtraq.
If you want all of the bulletins, get them from the source. I subscribe to the security mailing list from each vendor for all the *NIXes I support. This is the only 99.99% sure way you will see all of the bug and patch reports all of the time. If I miss one, I can then (rightfuly so) blame the vendor for not publishing the information or not getting it to me.
Just my 1/50 of $1.
Most UNIX bugs will not even HAVE bulletins to copy & paste
You may be a troll and I'm feeding, but I'll give it a go.
Like Microsoft, all of the major UNIX vendors have security mailing lists. They tell what program the bug is in, if it is a remote or local compromise, and what exactly the compromise can do (denial of service, gain root access, etc). This includes Sun (Solaris), HP (HP-UX), SGI (IRIX) and Digital (Digital UNIX, aka OSF1 aka Tru64).
Same goes with the majority of the large (and even most of the small) Linux vendors. Do you see Bugtraq after a local root compromise has been found? I see updates from 7 or 8 Linux vendors announcing patches or packages with the fix.
Some folks (such as OpenBSD and their code audit) do not report all bugs. As for their reasoning, I don't know, but they will report bugs that users find, but not things they find during their code audit.
So yes, UNIX vendors DO report and patch their bugs.
I don't think this is really as bad as the headline makes it sound.
If I was experimenting with IIS and found a bug (compromise, DoS, etc) I'm still free to post it on the Bugtraq mailing list. Microsoft cannot stop me from doing this.
On the other hand, the Microsoft Security Announcements can't be posted. The solution? Go out to Microsoft's web site which can be found here and check the bulletins yourself. The other option is to subscribe to Microsoft's security mailing list.
I don't think this hurts customers very much, although it does have the side effect of either giving your e-mail address to Microsoft or visiting their web site more often.