I do not understand what is so interesting about this... This kind of systems usually only operate for short periodes and the data produced are immediately processed and only the results are stored.
That is the difference. SKA will not store the data, because it is unfeasible. A lot of effort goes into the processing pipeline and enabling it to handle the throughput.
The OLPC project is not about a rugged Linux computer with all open source software: it's about education and empowerment through the use of technology.
Really? Have they finally consulted teachers and pedagogues on what software for kids should look like? Or are they still building what they think would be good?
It seems to me that they tangled themselves up in building the best/cheapest hardware & software platform and getting it out there. It would be great if the "teachers community" (if they are organised and exist) would contribute to the project themselves...
In arrays, you want _many baselines_ (telescope to telescope distances) and you want them to be _long_, because that will make your image better. It shouldn't be as large as the earth-radius though, otherwise you can only observe a few hours per day.
The SKA is being built in South Africa or Australia, and New Zealand would like to provide an "addon" to the SKA -- if it is going to be built in Australia --, that will provide a *huge* improve on the baselines involved. Tests have shown that the imaging capability drastically improves, so it would be well worth it.
Disclaimer: I am researching in the NZ institute mentioned.
I used KDE a lot, then GNOME and KDE (before 4.x) in parallel (two machines), now GNOME only, with several XFCE components (thunar, Terminal). To be honest, it really doesn't matter that much. I guess I'm DE-apathetic. As long as it is consistent.
It is important to know your alternatives (e.g. you have many scripting options through cygwin, python, perl), but: Use whatever works for you, and don't be ashamed just because it is not the current trend. You know your requirements (easy to maintain). Don't believe the people that say you have to rewrite everything.
Why? It's not like it's the only option to get Internet access. Just because they don't let you in McD anymore doesn't mean you're gonna starve. On a related note, that restaurants demand money also doesn't violate you're human rights.
Theora: Theora is named after Theora Jones, Edison Carter's Controller on the Max Headroom television program.
Ogg: It is sometimes assumed that the name Ogg comes from the character of Nanny Ogg in Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels, but the Ogg developers say that is not true.[8] Ogg derives from ogging, jargon from the computer game Netrek, which came to mean doing something forcefully, possibly without consideration of the drain on future resources. At its inception, the Ogg project was thought to be somewhat ambitious given the power of the PC hardware of the time.[8] Still, to quote the same reference: "Vorbis, on the other hand is named after the Terry Pratchett character from the book Small Gods."
Vorbis: "Vorbis" is named after a Discworld character, Exquisitor Vorbis in Small Gods, by Terry Pratchett. Coincidentally, Nanny Ogg is another Discworld character, a witch who appears in several books including Witches Abroad, though the Ogg format was not named after her. "Ogg" is in fact derived from ogging, jargon that arose in the computer game Netrek.
Do as I did a while back and set layout.css.visited_links_enabled = false in about:config. Not knowing whether one has seen a page already sucks though. Mozilla said at some point [1,2] that it is hard to fix that issue. I'd be happy it if CSS/JS couldn't see:visited, but the browser can set its color.
I pirate because: 1) I run Linux and therefore it is illegal to have a FLOSS piece that can playback some DVD's and most Bluray discs. Ripping takes too much time so... Well then, you fscking retarted industry... If you don't like me to have legal playback so I can become a customer than I'll just FSCKING DOWNLOAD IT FOR FREE?!?! 2) A series is not out on DVD yet in my country. So how about releasing games and vids simultaniously everwhere?! 3) DRM. You want me to not enjoy my games if I buy them, while you could easily for less money make me not have to activate it and you won't have to run expensive servers for it? Well then... I'll just download it! Too fscking bad...
You could buy the DVD *and* download it.
5) Sometimes games/vids are too expensive. Seriously... I buy PSP games all the time because they are 20 euro's or less. No problem. Steam showed that halving the game's price results is more than twice the sales. Which in the end means more profit. But instead it must be so goddamn expensive.
1. Forks of good* projects have it hard: Wild fox will not be able to keep up with the good infrastructure of Firefox (developers, build system, connections). Mozilla is pretty big and provides a excellent service. Wild fox will have a hard time to keep up with upstream.
2. Mozilla has a bigger target. They aim for a free Internet (and free software). They have been quite successful against IE in these terms (correctness regarding CSS, HTML4 & XHTML, inclusion of HTML5, JS speed). The FSF, GNU & Red Hat have the same goal for free software. The Linux kernel has the same goal too (no closed source modules). Ubuntu does not. Wild Fox has not.
It is shortsighted to find the "tolerant", "pragmatic" projects better. It is not just puristic zealots against "I just want it to work". The availability of free software increases the options users have. Projects that cut the corner slow down the OSS development of free replacement packages, and can damage the upstream process.
Don't get me wrong. It is nice that we can view Flash videos. This binary blob comes with security issues, memory bloat and crashes. At the same time Gnash ran out of funding and most developers had to abandon it. Contrary to what Ubuntu users** believe, good free software doesn't come from screaming loud enough, but actual, continuous work.
* you could also say: projects that don't sufficiently suck ** Enough Ubuntu bashing:-) They are very good at taking an end-user view on projects, which is valuable feedback.
Turn on encryption and change the default password and you're fine.
WLAN routers haven't come without encryption for a long time now. These days the default password (e.g. when you buy them with your internet connection) is some random string specific to this device.
I think one issue that might have contributed to the sentence was that the WLAN router came with encryption, and the user actively disabled it.
This is why distributed approaches like Diaspora/Retroshare/... will fail:
- You have a problem publishing new versions of the software. You can't force new versions out, there will be incompatibilities between nodes, things will not 'just work'.
- Privacy aside, you don't add value that Facebook hasn't.
- Quality of the service: The development team or community will not provide a continuous, mature program version.
* unless they have some business model on how to generate revenue from it.
- No inspiration, or higher goal they strive to. They just do something existing a little bit better. But there is nothing fundamental about why one should use the new service. It is better in features, it is logical to use it. But that is not satisfactory.
- Original developers will at some point stop maintaining the project, and not have gained enough other developers around them that continue development, maintenance and infrastructure on a high quality level.
Please, Diaspora* team, prove me wrong. Read this and prove me wrong. If you can't, it is not the fault of your expertise, or skills as a programmer or software engineer. There is just more to it than developing a superior product.
Retroshare looks really good, maturity and technology-wise. The issue is that no-one cares about these platforms, i.e. they do not gain traction. The reasons for that is in my opinion:
(1) A new social network has to be significantly better than the existing one people are currently using. Otherwise people won't register there too.
- E.g. it has a cool feature: a game, a new form of interaction or discussion, etc.
- It is not enough to be a copy that does pretty much the same thing (or even less) with higher quality & security.
(2) A new social network has to identify and grow from within the user group. Facebook and StudiVZ for example were built from students by students. A project can't come from outside, otherwise it will not target the right user minority (the early adopters).
- A majority of users will join because they know someone in the network (someone socially important to them).
- A small minority will join independently because they think the network is good.
(3) After users are registered in both the old and the new network, the new network has to be consistently better in usability and quality. Bad press about security leaks and privacy (StudiVZ) hurts. This will make users switch completely to the new network (by using it predominantly) and ultimately remove the old networks account.
GPLv3 says: "To “propagate” a work means to do anything with it that, without permission, would make you directly or secondarily liable for infringement under applicable copyright law, except executing it on a computer or modifying a private copy. Propagation includes copying, distribution (with or without modification), making available to the public, and in some countries other activities as well."
GPLv2 doesn't explain it explicitly as far as I saw right now.
I would say distribution happens when two legal parties are involved (two people or two organizations). Computers don't really count (unless you e.g. deploy to a different organization, then implicitly another party is involved).
This is what it boils down to, and what people often forget or misunderstand about GPL. You can do with GPL code whatever you want internally as long as you don't distribute it. It is a license that specifies how the party someone distributes to has to distribute it when he/she does.
The code OP wrote on his own is on his copyright and he can distribute under the GPL. The extensions he wrote for his employer are owned by the employer (he has the copyright). If he wants to distribute it, the employer has to respect the GPL.
They can claim copyright because they own what you produced at the time you were employed there (usually, may depend on the contract).
Since you are at a university it might be smart to see if there are any regulations or memos that recommend or require that department-developed software becomes open source. I know that some countries, particularly in the EU, see that tax-payed software should become publicly available. Try make some suggestions in this direction.
Basically, the guy wants to free the content from social networks back to a desktop app (avoiding lockin and privacy issue). I don't think it'll be attractive to users.
Slashdot Mirror
I do not understand what is so interesting about this ... This kind of systems usually only operate for short periodes and the data produced are immediately processed and only the results are stored.
That is the difference. SKA will not store the data, because it is unfeasible. A lot of effort goes into the processing pipeline and enabling it to handle the throughput.
The OLPC project is not about a rugged Linux computer with all open source software: it's about education and empowerment through the use of technology.
Really? Have they finally consulted teachers and pedagogues on what software for kids should look like? Or are they still building what they think would be good?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Laptop_Per_Child#Criticism
It seems to me that they tangled themselves up in building the best/cheapest hardware & software platform and getting it out there. It would be great if the "teachers community" (if they are organised and exist) would contribute to the project themselves...
In arrays, you want _many baselines_ (telescope to telescope distances) and you want them to be _long_, because that will make your image better. It shouldn't be as large as the earth-radius though, otherwise you can only observe a few hours per day.
The SKA is being built in South Africa or Australia, and New Zealand would like to provide an "addon" to the SKA -- if it is going to be built in Australia --, that will provide a *huge* improve on the baselines involved. Tests have shown that the imaging capability drastically improves, so it would be well worth it.
Disclaimer: I am researching in the NZ institute mentioned.
I used KDE a lot, then GNOME and KDE (before 4.x) in parallel (two machines), now GNOME only, with several XFCE components (thunar, Terminal).
To be honest, it really doesn't matter that much. I guess I'm DE-apathetic. As long as it is consistent.
It is important to know your alternatives (e.g. you have many scripting options through cygwin, python, perl), but:
Use whatever works for you, and don't be ashamed just because it is not the current trend. You know your requirements (easy to maintain). Don't believe the people that say you have to rewrite everything.
I bet not 20 slashdotters wrote any politicians that this issue was important to them and why.
Two people too lazy to read the article.
Make that three...
Why? It's not like it's the only option to get Internet access.
Just because they don't let you in McD anymore doesn't mean you're gonna starve. On a related note, that restaurants demand money also doesn't violate you're human rights.
You can send them a link to http://www.quitfacebookday.com/
We're sorry. Lava flows have taken away this object.
$5,000-$10,000 per exploit, tax-free? This seems like nothing to you?
Depends how much work and time you had to put into it. You won't come up with a new 0-day every day ...
The wikipedia pages around ogg say:
Do as I did a while back and set layout.css.visited_links_enabled = false in about:config. :visited, but the browser can set its color.
Not knowing whether one has seen a page already sucks though. Mozilla said at some point [1,2] that it is hard to fix that issue.
I'd be happy it if CSS/JS couldn't see
[1] http://blog.mozilla.com/security/2010/03/31/plugging-the-css-history-leak/
[2] http://dbaron.org/mozilla/visited-privacy
Your post is nice, but I just wanted to say that that finding is huge! </Kayne West>
I hope they can reproduce the result elsewhere.
I pirate because:
1) I run Linux and therefore it is illegal to have a FLOSS piece that can playback some DVD's and most Bluray discs. Ripping takes too much time so... Well then, you fscking retarted industry... If you don't like me to have legal playback so I can become a customer than I'll just FSCKING DOWNLOAD IT FOR FREE?!?!
2) A series is not out on DVD yet in my country. So how about releasing games and vids simultaniously everwhere?!
3) DRM. You want me to not enjoy my games if I buy them, while you could easily for less money make me not have to activate it and you won't have to run expensive servers for it? Well then... I'll just download it! Too fscking bad...
You could buy the DVD *and* download it.
5) Sometimes games/vids are too expensive. Seriously... I buy PSP games all the time because they are 20 euro's or less. No problem. Steam showed that halving the game's price results is more than twice the sales. Which in the end means more profit. But instead it must be so goddamn expensive.
Or every other DVD.
HTML5 requires a bit more control [...]
Like what for example?
Two things:
1. Forks of good* projects have it hard:
Wild fox will not be able to keep up with the good infrastructure of Firefox (developers, build system, connections). Mozilla is pretty big and provides a excellent service. Wild fox will have a hard time to keep up with upstream.
2. Mozilla has a bigger target. They aim for a free Internet (and free software). They have been quite successful against IE in these terms (correctness regarding CSS, HTML4 & XHTML, inclusion of HTML5, JS speed).
The FSF, GNU & Red Hat have the same goal for free software. The Linux kernel has the same goal too (no closed source modules).
Ubuntu does not. Wild Fox has not.
It is shortsighted to find the "tolerant", "pragmatic" projects better. It is not just puristic zealots against "I just want it to work". The availability of free software increases the options users have.
Projects that cut the corner slow down the OSS development of free replacement packages, and can damage the upstream process.
Don't get me wrong. It is nice that we can view Flash videos. This binary blob comes with security issues, memory bloat and crashes. At the same time Gnash ran out of funding and most developers had to abandon it.
Contrary to what Ubuntu users** believe, good free software doesn't come from screaming loud enough, but actual, continuous work.
* you could also say: projects that don't sufficiently suck :-) They are very good at taking an end-user view on projects, which is valuable feedback.
** Enough Ubuntu bashing
Yeah, Schneier just had a post on worst-case thinking
Turn on encryption and change the default password and you're fine.
WLAN routers haven't come without encryption for a long time now. These days the default password (e.g. when you buy them with your internet connection) is some random string specific to this device.
I think one issue that might have contributed to the sentence was that the WLAN router came with encryption, and the user actively disabled it.
Has anyone actually worked with Sage? How is it? How / when did you find it superior? Pros/cons?
ctd.
This is why distributed approaches like Diaspora/Retroshare/... will fail:
- You have a problem publishing new versions of the software. You can't force new versions out, there will be incompatibilities between nodes, things will not 'just work'.
- Privacy aside, you don't add value that Facebook hasn't.
- Quality of the service: The development team or community will not provide a continuous, mature program version.
* unless they have some business model on how to generate revenue from it.
- No inspiration, or higher goal they strive to. They just do something existing a little bit better. But there is nothing fundamental about why one should use the new service. It is better in features, it is logical to use it. But that is not satisfactory.
- Original developers will at some point stop maintaining the project, and not have gained enough other developers around them that continue development, maintenance and infrastructure on a high quality level.
Please, Diaspora* team, prove me wrong. Read this and prove me wrong.
If you can't, it is not the fault of your expertise, or skills as a programmer or software engineer. There is just more to it than developing a superior product.
Retroshare looks really good, maturity and technology-wise. The issue is that no-one cares about these platforms, i.e. they do not gain traction. The reasons for that is in my opinion:
(1) A new social network has to be significantly better than the existing one people are currently using. Otherwise people won't register there too.
- E.g. it has a cool feature: a game, a new form of interaction or discussion, etc.
- It is not enough to be a copy that does pretty much the same thing (or even less) with higher quality & security.
(2) A new social network has to identify and grow from within the user group. Facebook and StudiVZ for example were built from students by students. A project can't come from outside, otherwise it will not target the right user minority (the early adopters).
- A majority of users will join because they know someone in the network (someone socially important to them).
- A small minority will join independently because they think the network is good.
(3) After users are registered in both the old and the new network, the new network has to be consistently better in usability and quality. Bad press about security leaks and privacy (StudiVZ) hurts. This will make users switch completely to the new network (by using it predominantly) and ultimately remove the old networks account.
Just some ideas...
GPLv3 says: "To “propagate” a work means to do anything with it that, without permission, would make you directly or secondarily liable for infringement under applicable copyright law, except executing it on a computer or modifying a private copy. Propagation includes copying, distribution (with or without modification), making available to the public, and in some countries other activities as well."
GPLv2 doesn't explain it explicitly as far as I saw right now.
I would say distribution happens when two legal parties are involved (two people or two organizations). Computers don't really count (unless you e.g. deploy to a different organization, then implicitly another party is involved).
This is what it boils down to, and what people often forget or misunderstand about GPL. You can do with GPL code whatever you want internally as long as you don't distribute it. It is a license that specifies how the party someone distributes to has to distribute it when he/she does.
The code OP wrote on his own is on his copyright and he can distribute under the GPL. The extensions he wrote for his employer are owned by the employer (he has the copyright). If he wants to distribute it, the employer has to respect the GPL.
They can claim copyright because they own what you produced at the time you were employed there (usually, may depend on the contract).
Since you are at a university it might be smart to see if there are any regulations or memos that recommend or require that department-developed software becomes open source. I know that some countries, particularly in the EU, see that tax-payed software should become publicly available. Try make some suggestions in this direction.
Google Tech Talk about a "Persona Editor".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtRoRMzE8Uc
Basically, the guy wants to free the content from social networks back to a desktop app (avoiding lockin and privacy issue). I don't think it'll be attractive to users.