We use quickbooks at work, at I was excited when they went to an online version... great, I don't need Windows to run the client anymore. Wrong.
The new web version requires Windows. Yes, Windows. Not even Mac users can use it. It uses ActiveX for no apperent reason. All of the functionality could have easily been done in HTML with a tiny bit of JS. But they made ActiveX a requirement.
If it's so obviously unnecessary, why would they limit their available customers and produce a seperate Mac version? Here's why.
Quickbooks want's to be an ASP. It's in fashion. They start to design a web version. Microsoft threatens them (because it's in fashion), as there are millions of computers that payed $300 for Windows just so they can run Quickbooks on top of it. Quickbooks ensures Windows will still be required, by an ActiveX dependency.
Of course this is the price for writing code that work on windows, linux, mac, and random unix, so it is a tradeoff many accept.
I don't think it is. Perl, Python, and TCL all run under UNIX and Windows. Hell, they're even compiled at runtime. And somehow they still use much less CPU and memory.
I use several java apps on my P2 300, so I think you are exagerating.
I have 128M of memory. If that's not enough, then that's ridiculous. XNap, a Java napster client, takes ~20 seconds to start up. Java applets in Netscape take 15-30 seconds to start. Oh, and Sun's java plugin likes to crash Mozilla constantly, so I don't even bother enabling it in the first place.
There are now more jobs programming java than any other language.
And they're all boring enterprise level applications. While you may consider that a success, Java didn't change anything. Had it never been invented, though would have been written just the same, in C++.
Most of those apps are likely written so poorly they only run on Windows anyway. I've heard Java's cross platformness is mostly a myth.
Java has done nothing to make consumer apps cross platform.
Java was invented a few years ago
It was invented before Flash. It has Netscape's backing. And it still has less market penetration.
Java seems like a really neat idea, with two huge problems.
1) It's big and slow. Very big. Very slow. Java apps/applets aren't usable on
my P2 266
2) It has the worst marketing and learning curve in the history of computer
programing. All those acronyms above are real. Sun's J2EE "platform" --
platform? what the fuck is a platform? -- is used as a generic term by PHBs
everywhere. To anyone that hasn't taken courses on Java, it's meaningless.
Tell me what it does. Don't just give me a snazzy acronym. Maybe I'd have a use for it if I knew what the hell it was.
Sun is one of our best hopes in getting rid of Microsoft, but they don't seem at all capable of dealing with anyone but the highest levels of enterprise customers. Their workstations have been abysmal failures, Java can only be considered a failure, and ever their server business is on the decline.
1. How does Microsoft plan to allow non-proprietary Operating Systems access to Paladium media?
(Assuming "we don't" is the first answer:)
2. Why would consumers want to purchase your product that removes rights they have over their own media?
(Correct answer: We're a monopoly and they have no choice in the matter. We're serving our own market interests and not those of our customers. We're using our desktop monopoly to gain a stranglehold on all digital media as well, just as we're not supposed to under antitrust law.)
So the obvious solution here is to stop wasting my hard earned tax dollars on shoddy private industry software and have the counties write it themselves. Jurisdictions may have varying laws, but I can't beleive a solid framework couldn't be produces, and then tweaked for each county.
I don't spend my own money supporting poor software companies. It doesn't seem fair the gov't takes a third of my income to support said companies anyway.
If the software is being created by counties with tax dollars, isn't it required to be not only "Open Source", but public domain as well?
Why is voting so freaking hard? Why not have a federal project to develop a decent piece of software that all counties around the country could use if they wanted. Voting software isn't Hard. It's really not. Do it once, do it right, no more problems.
Since I don't have access to Windows, and their download is an EXE, I can't check myself, but if their download includes the browser itself, isn't this a license violation? Where's the source?
If it's installed on top of/under a seperate Mozilla install, all is fine.
Can someone take a look at what's inside that.EXE for me?
It turns out, the S in SRPFJ is for second, not states. So CKK passed the worthless tissuepaper restriction set, with loopholes everywhere, and everything has to be RAND, which is completely useless to OSS. (though, since that is discriminatory, perhaps it can be argued they have to make it usable to GPLed programs... I couldn't find the courts definition of RAND anywhere)
I want my fucking tax dollars back that were wasted on this sham of a trial.
They didn't even solve the OEM issue, as now MSFT is issuing rebates, instead of up-front discounts, to OEMs that "play nice".
From reading though these, and trying to parse the legalese, it seems to me CKK has ordered the states and DOJ's remedies combined:
ORDERED that, in order to obtain final approval of the SRPFJ, Plaintiff Settling States and Microsoft shall submit to the Court a proposed amendment to VII addressing the concerns described in the accompanying Memorandum Opinion; and it is further
The SRPFJ is the "States recommendation for proposed final judgement", or something like that. So it seems to have been passed, along WITH the DOJ's (see FinalDecree.pdf), with the condition by November 8th they combine all of the restrictions into one document.
That seems to be everything we could have hoped for. The DOJs settlement was tissuepaper weak, but with the States' remedies included, it may be worthwhile.
I can't locate the states submission to see exactly what their remedies are.
> The GPL *is* a EULA. EULA stands for End User License Agreement.
The key word there is User. Someone using the program. An EULA governs use of software.
GPL does no such thing. It governs redistribution. GPLed software has no User license. You can use it however you'd like.
> Remember, you have not bought the software you've licensed it
To my knowledge, it's not been established by the courts that when you buy a box from CompUSA with a CD inside labeled Norton Antivirus 12.3, you haven't actually bought any right to use that software.
Nowhere do these boxes say they are merely licenses.
Well, the text of some claim to, at least. It's not been tested in court, but I wouldn't bet my business on fair use still existing. 'Specially after DMCA has already dealt it such a severe blow.
> Neither do all EULAs; they can, in fact, grant rights above and beyond fair use rights.
Can, maybe. But they never do.
If they/gave/ you rights, instead of taking them away, why would you HAVE to agree to the license before being allowed to use the software?
The facts remain:
The GPL NEVER EVER takes rights from you. Ever. EULAd software, in any real world case I've seen, takes many rights from you, and holds you liable to huge chucks of legalese.
GPL is a license for copyright. EULA is a license for use.
> Just because the GPL gives you "more" permission than a typical EULA > doesn't mean it has a different function.
No. No. You're quite wrong. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 3rd Edition notwithstanding.
The function is completely different.
You do not agree to the GPL to use software. (EULAs you do) You do not have to agree to the GPL at all, ever. (EULAs you do) The GPL, if agreed to, does not remove ANY fair-use rights. (EULAs do)
While they are both "licenses", they are licensing completely different things. So yes, it does mean "it has a different function".
> What rights do you start off with that the EULA magically removes?
EVERYTHING IN an EULA "magically removes" rights you already "start off with". That is what an EULA is. It lists all the fair use rights you normally would have, but that you won't as soon as you click accept.
An EULA exists for no other purpose then to remove your rights.
> I can't remember the last time I signed/clicked a EULA that took away rights I already had.
Maybe try reading one next time, instead of just "signing/clicking".
They are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Though in practice they tend to be.
No, the GPL is not a EULA. I covered this in a reply to someone else on this story. You are not required to agree to it at all to use GPL'd software. Only if you want additional rights to modify it.
Yes, it/does/ mean all EULAs are evil, at least under RMS's philosophy.
Additionally, even if the GPL were an EULA, or something like one, I ENCOURAGE it's users to take a deeper look at it along with all other EULAs.
It's a good thing.
Re:what if it also installed it's source?
on
First Worm with a EULA?
·
· Score: 4, Informative
The GPL is *not* an EULA. EULAs take away what rights you have to use a program. The GPL adds them.
Additionally, last time I read the GPL, I don't recall it saying anything about e-mailing itself to everyone in my ~/.mailrc.
My post may have not been the most insightful ever, but I think it's a valid point. A high profile incident of Bad Company A sneaking obviously bad things into an EULA is bound to draw attention to e.g. Microsoft's EULAs. In fact, I'd wager that C-Net's eventual coverage of this incident would also mention and draw parallels to the recent changes in the Windows XP license.
Slashdot mauled the first copy. This site is a fucking joke.
-------
What about a continent with five contries:
+vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv+ 1 1 1 +vvvvvv+vvvvvvvvvvvv+ 1 2 1 1 +vvvvvv+ X 1 1 3 1 1 ones used in place of pipe due to lameness filter +vvvvvv+vvvvvvvvvvvv+ v used in place of dash due to lameness filter 1 4 1 +vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv+
What color do you suggest for the country labeled "X"?
HOW IRONIC IS IT SLASHDOT'S "LAMENESS FILTER" IS ITSELF INDESCRIBABLY LAME?
+vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv+ 1 1 1 +vvvvvv+vvvvvvvvvvvv+ 1 2 1 1 +vvvvvv+ X 1 1 3 1 1 ones used in place of pipe due to lameness filter +vvvvvv+vvvvvvvvvvvv+ v used in place of dash due to lameness filter 1 4 1 +vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv+
What color do you suggest for the country labeled "X"?
HOW IRONIC IS IT SLASHDOT'S "LAMENESS FILTER" IS ITSELF INDESCRIBABLY LAME?
Great, PGP support is included. Now all they need to figure out is how to package enough clue inside the box so people can properly use it.
The OpenPGP and it's public keyring trust system are very complex and not something most users will ever understand. And there are so many other weak links in the chain that it just turns out to be overkill.
Anyone have ideas on how secure e-mail could be brought to the masses? Because shipping PGP is not it. PGP has been around a long, long time (in Internet years), and if there was demand, it would have taken off already.
Slashdot Mirror
"Here's a sample"?
Where's a sample?
If you get to the page and there's no sound, it's because you're using a Free OS and Apple are assholes.
Page nonobviously requires quicktime.
We use quickbooks at work, at I was excited when they went to an online version... great, I don't need Windows to run the client anymore. Wrong.
The new web version requires Windows. Yes, Windows. Not even Mac users can use it. It uses ActiveX for no apperent reason. All of the functionality could have easily been done in HTML with a tiny bit of JS. But they made ActiveX a requirement.
If it's so obviously unnecessary, why would they limit their available customers and produce a seperate Mac version? Here's why.
Quickbooks want's to be an ASP. It's in fashion. They start to design a web version. Microsoft threatens them (because it's in fashion), as there are millions of computers that payed $300 for Windows just so they can run Quickbooks on top of it. Quickbooks ensures Windows will still be required, by an ActiveX dependency.
Microsoft maintains monopoly. User gets screwed.
I don't think it is. Perl, Python, and TCL all run under UNIX and Windows. Hell, they're even compiled at runtime. And somehow they still use much less CPU and memory.
I have 128M of memory. If that's not enough, then that's ridiculous. XNap, a Java napster client, takes ~20 seconds to start up. Java applets in Netscape take 15-30 seconds to start. Oh, and Sun's java plugin likes to crash Mozilla constantly, so I don't even bother enabling it in the first place.
And they're all boring enterprise level applications. While you may consider that a success, Java didn't change anything. Had it never been invented, though would have been written just the same, in C++.
Most of those apps are likely written so poorly they only run on Windows anyway. I've heard Java's cross platformness is mostly a myth.
Java has done nothing to make consumer apps cross platform.
It was invented before Flash. It has Netscape's backing. And it still has less market penetration.
I seriously don't get the whole Java thing. Sun seems to use the word Java in any new development to any product of theirs. It's worse than "XML".
Java, JMX, J2EE, JDC, JDO, JCE, JNSI, JSSE, JNDI, JAX-RPC, SAAJ, Java ACC, JSR-115, JSP 2.0, EJB 2.1, JMS 1.1, JAXM, Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB), JavaServer Pages Standard Tag Library (JSTL), JAXM, JAXP, JAXR
Java seems like a really neat idea, with two huge problems.
1) It's big and slow. Very big. Very slow. Java apps/applets aren't usable on
my P2 266
2) It has the worst marketing and learning curve in the history of computer
programing. All those acronyms above are real. Sun's J2EE "platform" --
platform? what the fuck is a platform? -- is used as a generic term by PHBs
everywhere. To anyone that hasn't taken courses on Java, it's meaningless.
Tell me what it does. Don't just give me a snazzy acronym. Maybe I'd have a use for it if I knew what the hell it was.
Sun is one of our best hopes in getting rid of Microsoft, but they don't seem at all capable of dealing with anyone but the highest levels of enterprise customers. Their workstations have been abysmal failures, Java can only be considered a failure, and ever their server business is on the decline.
...If I weren't hundreds of miles from Harvard.
1. How does Microsoft plan to allow non-proprietary Operating Systems access to Paladium media?
(Assuming "we don't" is the first answer:)
2. Why would consumers want to purchase your product that removes rights they have over their own media?
(Correct answer: We're a monopoly and they have no choice in the matter. We're serving our own market interests and not those of our customers. We're using our desktop monopoly to gain a stranglehold on all digital media as well, just as we're not supposed to under antitrust law.)
So the obvious solution here is to stop wasting my hard earned tax dollars on shoddy private industry software and have the counties write it themselves. Jurisdictions may have varying laws, but I can't beleive a solid framework couldn't be produces, and then tweaked for each county.
I don't spend my own money supporting poor software companies. It doesn't seem fair the gov't takes a third of my income to support said companies anyway.
If the software is being created by counties with tax dollars, isn't it required to be not only "Open Source", but public domain as well?
Why is voting so freaking hard? Why not have a federal project to develop a decent piece of software that all counties around the country could use if they wanted. Voting software isn't Hard. It's really not. Do it once, do it right, no more problems.
The story and comments here are incorrect.
Mozilla doesn NOT, in fact, support P3P. It did at one point. Support was removed, because, as I understand it, P3P is "dumb".
Netscape reincludes it in there releases, but it hasn't been in Mozilla proper for some time now.
Since I don't have access to Windows, and their download is an EXE, I can't check myself, but if their download includes the browser itself, isn't this a license violation? Where's the source?
.EXE for me?
If it's installed on top of/under a seperate Mozilla install, all is fine.
Can someone take a look at what's inside that
It turns out, the S in SRPFJ is for second, not states. So CKK passed the worthless tissuepaper restriction set, with loopholes everywhere, and everything has to be RAND, which is completely useless to OSS. (though, since that is discriminatory, perhaps it can be argued they have to make it usable to GPLed programs... I couldn't find the courts definition of RAND anywhere)
I want my fucking tax dollars back that were wasted on this sham of a trial.
They didn't even solve the OEM issue, as now MSFT is issuing rebates, instead of up-front discounts, to OEMs that "play nice".
The SRPFJ is the "States recommendation for proposed final judgement", or something like that. So it seems to have been passed, along WITH the DOJ's (see FinalDecree.pdf), with the condition by November 8th they combine all of the restrictions into one document.
That seems to be everything we could have hoped for. The DOJs settlement was tissuepaper weak, but with the States' remedies included, it may be worthwhile.
I can't locate the states submission to see exactly what their remedies are.
They are not restrictions. Under copyright law you have no redistribution or modification rights. The GPL GIVES you many rights in these areas.
Redistribution and modification are not use, in a legal sense.
EULAs govern use.
> The GPL *is* a EULA. EULA stands for End User License Agreement.
The key word there is User. Someone using the program. An EULA governs use of software.
GPL does no such thing. It governs redistribution. GPLed software has no User license. You can use it however you'd like.
> Remember, you have not bought the software you've licensed it
To my knowledge, it's not been established by the courts that when you buy a box from CompUSA with a CD inside labeled Norton Antivirus 12.3, you haven't actually bought any right to use that software.
Nowhere do these boxes say they are merely licenses.
> No contract can remove fair use rights.
Well, the text of some claim to, at least. It's not been tested in court, but I wouldn't bet my business on fair use still existing. 'Specially after DMCA has already dealt it such a severe blow.
> Neither do all EULAs; they can, in fact, grant rights above and beyond fair use rights.
/gave/ you rights, instead of taking them away, why would you HAVE to agree to the license before being allowed to use the software?
Can, maybe. But they never do.
If they
The facts remain:
The GPL NEVER EVER takes rights from you. Ever.
EULAd software, in any real world case I've seen, takes many rights from you, and holds you liable to huge chucks of legalese.
GPL is a license for copyright.
EULA is a license for use.
> Just because the GPL gives you "more" permission than a typical EULA
> doesn't mean it has a different function.
No. No. You're quite wrong. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 3rd Edition notwithstanding.
The function is completely different.
You do not agree to the GPL to use software. (EULAs you do)
You do not have to agree to the GPL at all, ever. (EULAs you do)
The GPL, if agreed to, does not remove ANY fair-use rights. (EULAs do)
While they are both "licenses", they are licensing completely different things. So yes, it does mean "it has a different function".
> What rights do you start off with that the EULA magically removes?
EVERYTHING IN an EULA "magically removes" rights you already "start off with". That is what an EULA is. It lists all the fair use rights you normally would have, but that you won't as soon as you click accept.
An EULA exists for no other purpose then to remove your rights.
> I can't remember the last time I signed/clicked a EULA that took away rights I already had.
Maybe try reading one next time, instead of just "signing/clicking".
They are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Though in practice they tend to be.
/does/ mean all EULAs are evil, at least under RMS's philosophy.
No, the GPL is not a EULA. I covered this in a reply to someone else on this story. You are not required to agree to it at all to use GPL'd software. Only if you want additional rights to modify it.
Yes, it
Additionally, even if the GPL were an EULA, or something like one, I ENCOURAGE it's users to take a deeper look at it along with all other EULAs.
It's a good thing.
The GPL is *not* an EULA. EULAs take away what rights you have to use a program. The GPL adds them.
Additionally, last time I read the GPL, I don't recall it saying anything about e-mailing itself to everyone in my ~/.mailrc.
My post may have not been the most insightful ever, but I think it's a valid point. A high profile incident of Bad Company A sneaking obviously bad things into an EULA is bound to draw attention to e.g. Microsoft's EULAs. In fact, I'd wager that C-Net's eventual coverage of this incident would also mention and draw parallels to the recent changes in the Windows XP license.
In other words:
This can only be good for Open Source.
Just beautiful. The more insane EULAs get, the more people will start taking a harder look at all of the ones they currently sign their souls over to.
This can only be good for Open Source.
Slashdot mauled the first copy. This site is a fucking joke.
-------
What about a continent with five contries:
+vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv+
1 1 1
+vvvvvv+vvvvvvvvvvvv+
1 2 1 1
+vvvvvv+ X 1
1 3 1 1 ones used in place of pipe due to lameness filter
+vvvvvv+vvvvvvvvvvvv+ v used in place of dash due to lameness filter
1 4 1
+vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv+
What color do you suggest for the country labeled "X"?
HOW IRONIC IS IT SLASHDOT'S "LAMENESS FILTER" IS ITSELF INDESCRIBABLY LAME?
What about a continent with five contries:
+vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv+
1 1 1
+vvvvvv+vvvvvvvvvvvv+
1 2 1 1
+vvvvvv+ X 1
1 3 1 1 ones used in place of pipe due to lameness filter
+vvvvvv+vvvvvvvvvvvv+ v used in place of dash due to lameness filter
1 4 1
+vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv+
What color do you suggest for the country labeled "X"?
HOW IRONIC IS IT SLASHDOT'S "LAMENESS FILTER" IS ITSELF INDESCRIBABLY LAME?
Prohibit any activities that "interfere" with "Their Purpose"? Almost makes the DMCA copyright extention look sane.
*thinks*
Nope. It's still ludicrous.
Great, PGP support is included. Now all they need to figure out is how to package enough clue inside the box so people can properly use it.
The OpenPGP and it's public keyring trust system are very complex and not something most users will ever understand. And there are so many other weak links in the chain that it just turns out to be overkill.
Anyone have ideas on how secure e-mail could be brought to the masses? Because shipping PGP is not it. PGP has been around a long, long time (in Internet years), and if there was demand, it would have taken off already.