Quite by accident, I happened across this link to a site from Bruce Schneier, the cryptographer who dreamed up the crypto system used in the book. It is a fairly detailed description of how to implement the Solitaire system. It is detailed, but it is a rather simple and elegant system, and the details are relatively few. I would like to know just how tongue-in-cheek (or not) the multiple references to the 'secret police' are.
The analogy to engineers isn't really appropriate. You don't really need a license to work on a project, but you frequently need a license to certify or sign off on a project. I worked in civil engineering for 10 years and while a large number of the engineers that I worked with were professionally certified, a substantial number were not. The ones who were not were generally new to the job market since it takes about five years work experience to even qualify for a P.E. certification.
Also, a substantial amount of work in my former field is done by people without any engineering degree at all, although that does not mean they have no engineering experience.
The cost of using only P.E.s on projects would probably be prohibitive in today's environment and would probably severley tax the available supply. The likely response would be to lower the qualification requirements to increase the supply, thus diluting the pool substantially. Sounds like what is happening in IT now to some degree.
A better analogy would be to say that project managers should be certified.
I think you are wrong about AOL users loving Linux . To some extent, they are already using it now when they surf the web, and they don't even know it. Most people identify with what they see, and most people see Windows. Also, most people are so cowed by computers that they are afraid to object to the rate at which Windows crashes, they don't know that things should work any other way.
Until Linux gets a warm fuzzy interface that doesn't totally cow the unsophisticated user, it will be perpetually consigned to the server rack.
That is unless there is a quantum leap in the sophistication of users over time. That is a real possibility and worth working toward. When my six year old can out manuever 60% of the people at work on the computer, there is hope for the future.
I read this guy every week on Sunday with his main column (of which this is one) and on Monday in his Q&A column. He is definitely oriented toward the teeming unwashed masses for whom logging on to AOL to get mail is a challenge. He is also quite enamoured of MS. Why he even bothered writing about Linux is beyond me since it is probably way off the radar screen of the vast number of his normal readers.
I wouldn't worry too much about this article causing much of a stir outside the/. crowd. I don't know how prominent it is online, but the print version runs at the top of page 4 of the Trib's Sunday Business section. Most people probably won't even know it is there.
I think, though, that he is emblematic of a divide in the computer world, the folks for whom the computer is a means to an end, and those to whom it is an end in itself. Clearly/.ers are interested in the computer as a computer. Mr. Coates is interested in it to the extent that it helps him get things done and the less he has to think about it the better. I think he is representative of the vast majority of users.
I remember reading a quote a couple of months ago (though I can't remember who or where) stating that evidence that Linux was a marginal product was that Microsoft wasn't writing any applications for it. I guess the point was that MS smells a market like a shark smells blood. Apparently there is blood in the water now.
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Quite by accident, I happened across this link to a site from Bruce Schneier, the cryptographer who dreamed up the crypto system used in the book. It is a fairly detailed description of how to implement the Solitaire system. It is detailed, but it is a rather simple and elegant system, and the details are relatively few. I would like to know just how tongue-in-cheek (or not) the multiple references to the 'secret police' are.
The analogy to engineers isn't really appropriate. You don't really need a license to work on a project, but you frequently need a license to certify or sign off on a project. I worked in civil engineering for 10 years and while a large number of the engineers that I worked with were professionally certified, a substantial number were not. The ones who were not were generally new to the job market since it takes about five years work experience to even qualify for a P.E. certification.
Also, a substantial amount of work in my former field is done by people without any engineering degree at all, although that does not mean they have no engineering experience.
The cost of using only P.E.s on projects would probably be prohibitive in today's environment and would probably severley tax the available supply. The likely response would be to lower the qualification requirements to increase the supply, thus diluting the pool substantially. Sounds like what is happening in IT now to some degree.
A better analogy would be to say that project managers should be certified.
I think you are wrong about AOL users loving Linux . To some extent, they are already using it now when they surf the web, and they don't even know it. Most people identify with what they see, and most people see Windows. Also, most people are so cowed by computers that they are afraid to object to the rate at which Windows crashes, they don't know that things should work any other way.
Until Linux gets a warm fuzzy interface that doesn't totally cow the unsophisticated user, it will be perpetually consigned to the server rack.
That is unless there is a quantum leap in the sophistication of users over time. That is a real possibility and worth working toward. When my six year old can out manuever 60% of the people at work on the computer, there is hope for the future.
I read this guy every week on Sunday with his main column (of which this is one) and on Monday in his Q&A column. He is definitely oriented toward the teeming unwashed masses for whom logging on to AOL to get mail is a challenge. He is also quite enamoured of MS. Why he even bothered writing about Linux is beyond me since it is probably way off the radar screen of the vast number of his normal readers.
/. crowd. I don't know how prominent it is online, but the print version runs at the top of page 4 of the Trib's Sunday Business section. Most people probably won't even know it is there.
/.ers are interested in the computer as a computer. Mr. Coates is interested in it to the extent that it helps him get things done and the less he has to think about it the better. I think he is representative of the vast majority of users.
I wouldn't worry too much about this article causing much of a stir outside the
I think, though, that he is emblematic of a divide in the computer world, the folks for whom the computer is a means to an end, and those to whom it is an end in itself. Clearly
I remember reading a quote a couple of months ago (though I can't remember who or where) stating that evidence that Linux was a marginal product was that Microsoft wasn't writing any applications for it. I guess the point was that MS smells a market like a shark smells blood. Apparently there is blood in the water now.