Why is it always the supporting cast that is most
persistent?
After all, the only actor to appear in as good as every Star Trek episode of every Star Trek series is Majel Barret (sp?) who "plays" the computer voice.:-)
Being a Solaris/Sun sysadmin since '95, I have also always been impressed by Sun's hardware and operating system.
During the last years, this has shifted somewhat. I am no longer all that impressed. First there was the SS5-170's that would hang if a certain run of instructions was executed on the CPU (gcc happened to produce that exact instruction sequence when compiling the program 'main(){while(1);}'. In a university environment as ours, this is entirely unacceptable. The main reason for running UNIX workstations is so that the students can experiment without hanging the machines.
Sun was very nice about the problem, and helped us replace the faulty machines with U-10's. A later batch of U-10's now exhibit a similar problem, where the CPU will, with a certain probability, hang completely on a certain sequence of instructions (albeit not the same sequence as for the SS5's). A sequence that programs such as Netscape and Explorer execute rather frequently. At it's peek, we rebooted on average five of our 150 workstations every day. That is just far too much.
Sun appears to think that the problem is solved, since they have modified libc so that it won't trigger the bug like it did. In my view, if a user-land program can hang a UNIX workstation (even if that user-land program is written in assembler), that workstation is defective. We are still arguing with Sun, who refuse to replace the machines or otherwise compensate us.
Then there was the problem with the U60's that would get corrupted display output (the screen image didn't stand still, it was unsuable) under heavy memory accesses due to a defective frame buffer. It took Sun more than 6 months to replace the frame buffers, and they still refuse to refund or otherwise compensate us for leaving us with defective computers for 6 months.
Also the number of serious bugs in Solaris 8 is, half a year after it was initially released, still at an incredible level. We switched to Solaris 8 in mid-July and have already reported three kernel bugs that hang the computer when triggered (which our users manage to do all the time, just running netscape and mpg123) and one badpatch which made our webserver unusable for a week. Sun has been quick in fixing these problems, but they should never exist in the first place in an operating system that is six months old!
Of course, Sun is better than running PC's. Had we used Microsoft, we would certainly have had bigger problems. PC hardware also isn't that hot. But we are seriously considering throwing the Sun workstations out the door and replacing them with high-end PC's running FreeBSD or similar and only keeping Sun in the server rooms. Sure, we would have to keep separate binary trees, but it might be worth it. Sun workstations aren't exactly free.
Sun is great, but not as great as it once was. They need to get their act together quite heavily if they want to keep the market share they have.
Grab it, test it, torch it, and please - submit bug reports.
There seems to be a bug in your software that somehow automatically crossposts any and all update announcements to the slashdot forum.
This bug cannot lie in any of the source code files, but must somehow be a metabug (perhaps a virus?) that has infected the source code system as such. I would do a virus check of all files, beginning with the CHANGES file, since updates of that file is what seems to trigger the errorenous behaviour.
If no bug can be found, I would guess that the source code is simply feeling lonely and in need of attention, and that this is the cause of it's many slashdot announcements. Perhaps a nanny could be appointed to talk to it, feed it and take care of it?
The link you provided suggest GNAT only runs on 3 platforms, Linux, DOS, and SCO. There is also a GNAT homepage, which shows it's run on more platforms.
The info on the GNAT homepage is true with some modifications. For example, GNAT runs on Solaris according to the GNAT homepage. It doesn't on our Solaris system because of a security option.
A very basic security measure on any Solaris system is to turn stack execution off. A jump to code on the stack will generate an error (and a log entry:-) and the program will stop. That drastically limits the effects of buffer overflows, since code cannot be planted in a buffer on the stack and then executed.
For some bizarre reason, GNAT generates code that always executes on the stack. Run a Solaris system with stack execution disabled, and *bang* no GNAT application will run either. Ever. Run a Solaris system with stack execution enabled (and, thus, leave yourself much more vulnerable to a gazillion buffer overflow exploits), and GNAT will work.
The interesting question is, of course, why on earth GNAT generates code that executes on the stack. GCC doesn't. No other compiler I've come across does.
My point? GNAT support is limited. I certainly wouldn't use GNAT for anything I wanted to distribute widely. And that's quite sad, because Ada is, in spite of its voluminous syntax, actually a great language for really huge projects.
Intuitive interfaces (and does Blender have one?)
on
Blender Goes Freeware
·
· Score: 2
It is actually one of the more intuitive programs I've used once you get used to it.
intuition n. (knowledge obtained from) an ability to understand or know something immediately without needing to think about it, learn it or discover it by using reason.
I've seen and used Blender's interface, and as almost everybody commenting on the article mentions, it is a real bugger to learn. I've never fully managed to. A lot of people have mentioned how it is "intuitive once you learn it". That is a contradiction in terms. Intuitive interfaces are simple, almost child's play, to learn - without manuals or hours upon hours of practice and experimentation. That is what "intuitive" means.
The interface can, however, very well be good even though it isn't intuitive. Take vi, take emacs. Both have un-intuitive interfaces, but they are still good.
The difficult part of interface design is making an interface that is expert-friendly, but without being newbie-hostile. Intuitive and expert-friendly in one interface is the stuff that makes killer-apps.
Now, most 3D-apps do not need to be friendly to the newcomer. Their main revenue comes from serious 3D-artists who are used to complex interfaces and who do not mind an interface taking three weeks to learn. Also, since they all have difficult-to-learn interfaces, you get very loyal customers. If it takes three weeks to learn any other tool, you don't unless you really have to.
What would happen if e.g. Blender got a intuitive interface that was still expert-friendly (such interface can be done, they are just a lot more difficult to design), and also got a lot of really cool features? Perhaps professional artists would try it out, it wouldn't cost them very much time to do that. Perhaps we would also find that a lot of people who are not 3D-designers tried Blender and created marvels with it. If you don't think you're good, you'll never take the weeks to learn it.
That could be a killer-app for Linux if I ever saw one.:-)
I want to see whatever information a company has on me, whenever I want to. If some company, government organization, or otherwise has information on or about me, it should be my right to see it whenever I wish.
That very right has been in swedish computer law since the 1970's. All you have to do is ask them. Companies (or public institutions) must respond within "reasonable time", which is interpreted to be about three weeks, with a complete listing of all information they have on you. They are also obliged to send you this listing without any cost whatsoever on your part. Everything is open to you, except SÄPO (the swedish seucrity police, somewhat like CIA) and military archives.
Until last year everyone who wanted to store information about customers, employees or similar in a database was also required to get permission from the swedish government, so that everyone could find out who had a database on them. This was eased somewhat, as e.g. UNIX passwd-files were databases according to the definition and thus required a permit (no, people did not get permits for passwd-files, which made the datedness of the law very obvious).
Nowadays, companies that store harmless information (such as your adress and telephone number) are only required to report the existence of their database to the government.
Being who you are and what you've become, having done what you did at the time you did it and having since had it studied by the people you have, I'm sure that you, looking back at these glorious times, will have the hindsight to realize that people generally think they're funnier than they are, especially when talking, or writing, to famous people that have written books considered by them (not being the authors) to be rather amusing, and thus also realizing that not talking to them, or reading what they wrote, must have been the better option after all.
Yet, there are people in the world that do aspire to become what you have, at least regarding what they leave behind when they, as you not yet have, die.
As a true cliche the question is: Is there, in your view, anything special to think about before actually sitting down and finding out that writing a book is damn much harder than one ever thought? Is the best way to sit down on a grass hill, stoned just above concious level, and see if anything emerges when you put a typewriter in front of yourself?
Those of us not being of the stoned kind, rather hope that there is, somehow, a better way to find out if you're an unselfconcoius author. Is there anything to help them out? Is there anything to have in mind when trying to get your writing published, apart from the obvious doubtfulness to anything that publishers tell you?
To be more exact, the swedish constitution has a principle of publicity (bad translation perhaps), that states that all documents handled by swedish authorities are public, except those that are explicitly made secret. And there are strict rules for which documents may be made secret.
A guy called Zenon Panoussis made copies of the CoS "bible", and delivered it to a lot of swedish authorities. Any document sent to a swedish authority is public. Thus, anyone could, by reffering to the principle of publicity, read a copy of the CoS bible in any of the offices to which he sent copies.
After this, all kinds of weird things happened to Zenon. Among many other things, his apartment was apparently being monitored 24 hours a day. And he was not just being paranoid.
If you're interested, there is a rather complete story here, but it does not cover the latest developments when the swedish government made a decision to, in this particular case, disregard the principle of publicity and make the Cos "bible" secret without cause. Strictly in conflict with the swedish constitution.
Scientology is very good at causing great deals of trouble without any sort of legal justification. It's as simple as that.
Very true. They managed to convince the Swedish government to break against the swedish constitution just a few months ago. I know it sounds conspiratory, but CoS have a lot of people high up, and have a spooky amount of power.
The swedish government fell to CoS's demands when american politicians in "high positions" threatened to sue Sweden in international court. Why they fell, I can't imagine. So I'm not the least bit surprised that it is the CoS that causes this latest fuzz. And they will never be convicted of purjery. They have far too many too good lawyers and politicians on their side for that.
Why not: 1) Contact the glibc people with patches for those functions (assuming the problems are patchable, which not all of
them are)
Because buffer overruns is a problem on all UNIX systems and not only Linux?:-)
I haven't checked it, but I guess they use LD_PRELOAD to load their versions of the calls? In that case it should work on any UNIX that supports some kind of LD_PRELOAD, which makes it much more usable than if the changes were made solely to glibc.
The point is that they probably had no choice. America is too big to say no to. They threaten with all kinds of embargos, international lawsuits and whatnot, and what is a small country to do? Say no? Hardly an option.
That the Church of Scientology operates throughout the world does not alter the fact that it was american senators that threatened the swedish government into compliance with CoS' demands. The swedish government even openly stated that it was political threats from the USA that made the break against the swedish constitution.
But America is not to blame for everything bad in the world. Definately not. And whatever you think of the methods, they certainly work, and work well.
Actually, I'm not very surprised that this happened. After all, it wasn't more than a few months ago that the Church of Scientology through american senators in it's grasp knowingly convinced the swedish government to commit acts clearly against the swedish constitution.
If an american "church" can do that, why shouldn't Mattel through carefully selected politicians on it's payroll^H^H^H^H^H^H^H list of nice people to contact be able to apply the proper pressure to make a swedish ISP remove the page, and a lonely swedish citizen to give up?
Not to be offensive against americans, but from this side of the pond it's blatantly obvious that America and american politicians use any means to prevent its economical and political interests, wherever in the world America feels it's interests are threatened, and regardless of the strength of the measures (Echelon, Warfare, political pressure, economical pressure, you name it).
America isn't what it is because of talent. It's because of its size, and its willingness to protect itself with any means even when not under direct attack. You don't have to like it, but it works!
Hey! Look at that poe cipher, row 7 from the bottom, slightly right of the middle. It says 'eToY'!
Darn. Just as one dispute was settled, the next begins. Now etoys.com will have to sue Poe postumly for using something that almost looks like their company name...:)
I saw in the LinuxWorld interview that the only distribution you did of DeCSS was to have a link to the source code. In Sweden, where most laws are very similar to Norway's, a case recently showed that linking to illegal data (mp3:s in that case) can never be illegal.
Since the police took your computer, I suppose they have charged you with some kind of crime. What is it, and do you think that the recent Swedish ruling could be used in your favour?
Living in Scandinavia, I know that there is always a debate about the good or bad of the "americanifiation" of our countries. Has there, to your knowledge, been raised any such questions in the media in your case, considering that American economical interests has been allowed to so strongly influence the Norwegian government's actions?
There is a lot of power to exert on a small country such as Norway or Sweden (where I live). Do what the USA has done many times before: Tell the government of that 'if you do not alter your laws to suit our needs, we will tax import of products manufactured in your country so hard that you will be unable to export products here'. Works more often than you would like it to.
Exactly that happened in Sweden a few years back. A swede called Zenon Panoussis decided to make the 'bible' of the Church of Sicentology (which members of that sect must pay the sect many thousand dollars to read) public. He posted it on the Internet. What followed is a long but very interesting story (you can read it at http://www.dtek.chalmers.se/~d1dd/cos/zenon-eng.ht ml). It might seem like the entire story was made up, but I can assure you it was not.
Basically, the documents were submitted to the swedish government in such a way that they, by the swedish constitution, were public and obtainable by anyone. What happened next was that a congressman from the USA (Carlos J. Moorhead (republican)) officially asked the Swedish government to sidestep Sweden's constitution. When they refused, he claimed that not following the wish of the USA was 'illegal and unjust'.
If a sect can have so large an impact on a congressman that he asks another country to sidestep it's constitution, imagine what a big corporation can do to the entire congress.
Exactly what pressure was applied in this particular case we will probably never know, though. But you can count on that the Norwegian government didn't do this by it's own initiative.
I think the first assumption is the most correct. People use Perl because everyone else does. When my boss asks me to write a CGI, he says "can't you write me a perl-program to do that"? I do not know how many times I've informed him of the difference between CGI and Perl, a difference he is uncapable of comprehending.
When it comes to language support, I have not seen anything to imply that Perl has more CGI-relevant modules than other languages. Perhaps more programs already written.
I find many other languages that have similar capabilities when it comes to parsing, string manipulation, regexps etc. I do not think that Perl's features (although good) is the reason for it's success - many other languages have the same features.
I think that in this respect, Perl is a bit like Windows (no further comparisons implied) - people don't use it because they know (if?) it is good, they use it because everyone else does.
*wheew* I'm glad if they get the patent, because then no geek will ever have to feel bad about being a single - making children would be breaching Celera Genomics copyright of the human genes.
In Sweden, everyone have an implicit right to their own names. In fact, The reason that the Furby is called "Furbee" in Sweden is simply that there is a family by the name of Furby who could have sued for copyright infringement on their name if they were offended. And the Furby looking as it does, Mattel didn't want to risk it...:-)
-- Soon we'll be sliding down the razorblade of life...
The article talks about what would happen if Solaris was "free". Does he mean "free" as in open source or free as in "you wouldn't have to pay for it"?
If we're talking about free as in open source, I guess Solaris' success would to a great extent depend on how maintainable the code was. After all, one of Linux' strengths is it's well documented source code that more or less anyone can hack into. If Solaris is less documented, or simply not as well laid-out codewise as Linux, I think that the majority of Linux hackers would stay with Linux.
But what the market would do is probably another question. Perhaps the "backed by a major corporation" bit is enough to make companies choose Solaris, but I'm not sure. I believe that, after all, many corporations switch because they've heard so much about this "Linux"-thingy, not because they believe Linux to be the best UNIX flavour.
So Linux would probably have quite a head-start, and I don't think the outcome is as clear as the article's author implies.
But it _would_ be great if Solaris was truly Open Source, with documentation and all. If not else, there would probably be a whole heap of security holes that would quickly be patched (and exploited). After all, there are still plenty of simple buffer-overruns in Solaris programs.
-- Soon we'll be sliding down the razorblade of life...
What the Swedish papers report is that the IFPI's lawyers claim that having a link to material that is illegal to download is the same thing as encouraging visitors to download that material, and thus is the same as encouraging visitors to break the law.
Their point is, in some small way, understandable. But the implications are more severe than I think the court will ever realize. Is it, for example, illegal for a newspaper to write about problems with drugdealers in a certain park? The paper is, implicitly, telling their readers where to go to find a drugdealer. That is in my eyes equal to a link to another site that contains mp3:s.
But, and that is quite clear, the IFPI do this not because they think their argumentats are right but because they want to scare people off. They have also sent a letter to every univeristy in Sweden, where they claim that "most illegal software and music is spread through the computers of universities." In the same letter they claim that the university is legally responsible for everything downloaded to it's computers. They are, of course, lying. But if it scares universities into checking their students actions, the IFPI has succeeded. And that scares me.
There are scattered reports in swedish newspapers that the 17-year old did not only have links, but that he had actual files as well, and that those files are the main reason for the IFPI:s actions. I'm not sure if those reports are correct.
On an amusing sidenote, one of the Swedish tabloids described the case with a mild misunderstanding: "The 17-year old is charged for having files in the illegal MP3-format on his homepage." Not only was the music copyrighted, it was in an illegal format as well...:-)
Slashdot Mirror
After all, the only actor to appear in as good as every Star Trek episode of every Star Trek series is Majel Barret (sp?) who "plays" the computer voice. :-)
During the last years, this has shifted somewhat. I am no longer all that impressed. First there was the SS5-170's that would hang if a certain run of instructions was executed on the CPU (gcc happened to produce that exact instruction sequence when compiling the program 'main(){while(1);}'. In a university environment as ours, this is entirely unacceptable. The main reason for running UNIX workstations is so that the students can experiment without hanging the machines.
Sun was very nice about the problem, and helped us replace the faulty machines with U-10's. A later batch of U-10's now exhibit a similar problem, where the CPU will, with a certain probability, hang completely on a certain sequence of instructions (albeit not the same sequence as for the SS5's). A sequence that programs such as Netscape and Explorer execute rather frequently. At it's peek, we rebooted on average five of our 150 workstations every day. That is just far too much.
Sun appears to think that the problem is solved, since they have modified libc so that it won't trigger the bug like it did. In my view, if a user-land program can hang a UNIX workstation (even if that user-land program is written in assembler), that workstation is defective. We are still arguing with Sun, who refuse to replace the machines or otherwise compensate us.
Then there was the problem with the U60's that would get corrupted display output (the screen image didn't stand still, it was unsuable) under heavy memory accesses due to a defective frame buffer. It took Sun more than 6 months to replace the frame buffers, and they still refuse to refund or otherwise compensate us for leaving us with defective computers for 6 months.
Also the number of serious bugs in Solaris 8 is, half a year after it was initially released, still at an incredible level. We switched to Solaris 8 in mid-July and have already reported three kernel bugs that hang the computer when triggered (which our users manage to do all the time, just running netscape and mpg123) and one badpatch which made our webserver unusable for a week. Sun has been quick in fixing these problems, but they should never exist in the first place in an operating system that is six months old!
Of course, Sun is better than running PC's. Had we used Microsoft, we would certainly have had bigger problems. PC hardware also isn't that hot. But we are seriously considering throwing the Sun workstations out the door and replacing them with high-end PC's running FreeBSD or similar and only keeping Sun in the server rooms. Sure, we would have to keep separate binary trees, but it might be worth it. Sun workstations aren't exactly free.
Sun is great, but not as great as it once was. They need to get their act together quite heavily if they want to keep the market share they have.
There seems to be a bug in your software that somehow automatically crossposts any and all update announcements to the slashdot forum.
This bug cannot lie in any of the source code files, but must somehow be a metabug (perhaps a virus?) that has infected the source code system as such. I would do a virus check of all files, beginning with the CHANGES file, since updates of that file is what seems to trigger the errorenous behaviour.
If no bug can be found, I would guess that the source code is simply feeling lonely and in need of attention, and that this is the cause of it's many slashdot announcements. Perhaps a nanny could be appointed to talk to it, feed it and take care of it?
The info on the GNAT homepage is true with some modifications. For example, GNAT runs on Solaris according to the GNAT homepage. It doesn't on our Solaris system because of a security option.
A very basic security measure on any Solaris system is to turn stack execution off. A jump to code on the stack will generate an error (and a log entry :-) and the program will stop. That drastically limits the effects of buffer overflows, since code cannot be planted in a buffer on the stack and then executed.
For some bizarre reason, GNAT generates code that always executes on the stack. Run a Solaris system with stack execution disabled, and *bang* no GNAT application will run either. Ever. Run a Solaris system with stack execution enabled (and, thus, leave yourself much more vulnerable to a gazillion buffer overflow exploits), and GNAT will work.
The interesting question is, of course, why on earth GNAT generates code that executes on the stack. GCC doesn't. No other compiler I've come across does.
My point? GNAT support is limited. I certainly wouldn't use GNAT for anything I wanted to distribute widely. And that's quite sad, because Ada is, in spite of its voluminous syntax, actually a great language for really huge projects.
It is actually one of the more intuitive programs I've used once you get used to it.
intuition n. (knowledge obtained from) an ability to understand or know something immediately without needing to think about it, learn it or discover it by using reason.
I've seen and used Blender's interface, and as almost everybody commenting on the article mentions, it is a real bugger to learn. I've never fully managed to. A lot of people have mentioned how it is "intuitive once you learn it". That is a contradiction in terms. Intuitive interfaces are simple, almost child's play, to learn - without manuals or hours upon hours of practice and experimentation. That is what "intuitive" means.
The interface can, however, very well be good even though it isn't intuitive. Take vi, take emacs. Both have un-intuitive interfaces, but they are still good.
The difficult part of interface design is making an interface that is expert-friendly, but without being newbie-hostile. Intuitive and expert-friendly in one interface is the stuff that makes killer-apps.
Now, most 3D-apps do not need to be friendly to the newcomer. Their main revenue comes from serious 3D-artists who are used to complex interfaces and who do not mind an interface taking three weeks to learn. Also, since they all have difficult-to-learn interfaces, you get very loyal customers. If it takes three weeks to learn any other tool, you don't unless you really have to.
What would happen if e.g. Blender got a intuitive interface that was still expert-friendly (such interface can be done, they are just a lot more difficult to design), and also got a lot of really cool features? Perhaps professional artists would try it out, it wouldn't cost them very much time to do that. Perhaps we would also find that a lot of people who are not 3D-designers tried Blender and created marvels with it. If you don't think you're good, you'll never take the weeks to learn it.
That could be a killer-app for Linux if I ever saw one. :-)
That very right has been in swedish computer law since the 1970's. All you have to do is ask them. Companies (or public institutions) must respond within "reasonable time", which is interpreted to be about three weeks, with a complete listing of all information they have on you. They are also obliged to send you this listing without any cost whatsoever on your part. Everything is open to you, except SÄPO (the swedish seucrity police, somewhat like CIA) and military archives.
Until last year everyone who wanted to store information about customers, employees or similar in a database was also required to get permission from the swedish government, so that everyone could find out who had a database on them. This was eased somewhat, as e.g. UNIX passwd-files were databases according to the definition and thus required a permit (no, people did not get permits for passwd-files, which made the datedness of the law very obvious).
Nowadays, companies that store harmless information (such as your adress and telephone number) are only required to report the existence of their database to the government.
Yet, there are people in the world that do aspire to become what you have, at least regarding what they leave behind when they, as you not yet have, die.
As a true cliche the question is: Is there, in your view, anything special to think about before actually sitting down and finding out that writing a book is damn much harder than one ever thought? Is the best way to sit down on a grass hill, stoned just above concious level, and see if anything emerges when you put a typewriter in front of yourself?
Those of us not being of the stoned kind, rather hope that there is, somehow, a better way to find out if you're an unselfconcoius author. Is there anything to help them out? Is there anything to have in mind when trying to get your writing published, apart from the obvious doubtfulness to anything that publishers tell you?
A guy called Zenon Panoussis made copies of the CoS "bible", and delivered it to a lot of swedish authorities. Any document sent to a swedish authority is public. Thus, anyone could, by reffering to the principle of publicity, read a copy of the CoS bible in any of the offices to which he sent copies.
After this, all kinds of weird things happened to Zenon. Among many other things, his apartment was apparently being monitored 24 hours a day. And he was not just being paranoid.
If you're interested, there is a rather complete story here, but it does not cover the latest developments when the swedish government made a decision to, in this particular case, disregard the principle of publicity and make the Cos "bible" secret without cause. Strictly in conflict with the swedish constitution.
Very true. They managed to convince the Swedish government to break against the swedish constitution just a few months ago. I know it sounds conspiratory, but CoS have a lot of people high up, and have a spooky amount of power.
The swedish government fell to CoS's demands when american politicians in "high positions" threatened to sue Sweden in international court. Why they fell, I can't imagine. So I'm not the least bit surprised that it is the CoS that causes this latest fuzz. And they will never be convicted of purjery. They have far too many too good lawyers and politicians on their side for that.
Because buffer overruns is a problem on all UNIX systems and not only Linux? :-)
I haven't checked it, but I guess they use LD_PRELOAD to load their versions of the calls? In that case it should work on any UNIX that supports some kind of LD_PRELOAD, which makes it much more usable than if the changes were made solely to glibc.
That the Church of Scientology operates throughout the world does not alter the fact that it was american senators that threatened the swedish government into compliance with CoS' demands. The swedish government even openly stated that it was political threats from the USA that made the break against the swedish constitution.
But America is not to blame for everything bad in the world. Definately not. And whatever you think of the methods, they certainly work, and work well.
If an american "church" can do that, why shouldn't Mattel through carefully selected politicians on it's payroll^H^H^H^H^H^H^H list of nice people to contact be able to apply the proper pressure to make a swedish ISP remove the page, and a lonely swedish citizen to give up?
Not to be offensive against americans, but from this side of the pond it's blatantly obvious that America and american politicians use any means to prevent its economical and political interests, wherever in the world America feels it's interests are threatened, and regardless of the strength of the measures (Echelon, Warfare, political pressure, economical pressure, you name it).
America isn't what it is because of talent. It's because of its size, and its willingness to protect itself with any means even when not under direct attack. You don't have to like it, but it works!
Darn. Just as one dispute was settled, the next begins. Now etoys.com will have to sue Poe postumly for using something that almost looks like their company name... :)
Since the police took your computer, I suppose they have charged you with some kind of crime. What is it, and do you think that the recent Swedish ruling could be used in your favour?
Living in Scandinavia, I know that there is always a debate about the good or bad of the "americanifiation" of our countries. Has there, to your knowledge, been raised any such questions in the media in your case, considering that American economical interests has been allowed to so strongly influence the Norwegian government's actions?
Exactly that happened in Sweden a few years back. A swede called Zenon Panoussis decided to make the 'bible' of the Church of Sicentology (which members of that sect must pay the sect many thousand dollars to read) public. He posted it on the Internet. What followed is a long but very interesting story (you can read it at http://www.dtek.chalmers.se/~d1dd/cos/zenon-eng.ht ml). It might seem like the entire story was made up, but I can assure you it was not.
Basically, the documents were submitted to the swedish government in such a way that they, by the swedish constitution, were public and obtainable by anyone. What happened next was that a congressman from the USA (Carlos J. Moorhead (republican)) officially asked the Swedish government to sidestep Sweden's constitution. When they refused, he claimed that not following the wish of the USA was 'illegal and unjust'.
If a sect can have so large an impact on a congressman that he asks another country to sidestep it's constitution, imagine what a big corporation can do to the entire congress.
Exactly what pressure was applied in this particular case we will probably never know, though. But you can count on that the Norwegian government didn't do this by it's own initiative.
When it comes to language support, I have not seen anything to imply that Perl has more CGI-relevant modules than other languages. Perhaps more programs already written.
I find many other languages that have similar capabilities when it comes to parsing, string manipulation, regexps etc. I do not think that Perl's features (although good) is the reason for it's success - many other languages have the same features.
I think that in this respect, Perl is a bit like Windows (no further comparisons implied) - people don't use it because they know (if?) it is good, they use it because everyone else does.
*wheew* I'm glad if they get the patent, because then no geek will ever have to feel bad about being a single - making children would be breaching Celera Genomics copyright of the human genes.
-- Soon we'll be sliding down the razorblade of life...
If we're talking about free as in open source, I guess Solaris' success would to a great extent depend on how maintainable the code was. After all, one of Linux' strengths is it's well documented source code that more or less anyone can hack into. If Solaris is less documented, or simply not as well laid-out codewise as Linux, I think that the majority of Linux hackers would stay with Linux.
But what the market would do is probably another question. Perhaps the "backed by a major corporation" bit is enough to make companies choose Solaris, but I'm not sure. I believe that, after all, many corporations switch because they've heard so much about this "Linux"-thingy, not because they believe Linux to be the best UNIX flavour.
So Linux would probably have quite a head-start, and I don't think the outcome is as clear as the article's author implies.
But it _would_ be great if Solaris was truly Open Source, with documentation and all. If not else, there would probably be a whole heap of security holes that would quickly be patched (and exploited). After all, there are still plenty of simple buffer-overruns in Solaris programs.
-- Soon we'll be sliding down the razorblade of life...
Their point is, in some small way, understandable. But the implications are more severe than I think the court will ever realize. Is it, for example, illegal for a newspaper to write about problems with drugdealers in a certain park? The paper is, implicitly, telling their readers where to go to find a drugdealer. That is in my eyes equal to a link to another site that contains mp3:s.
But, and that is quite clear, the IFPI do this not because they think their argumentats are right but because they want to scare people off. They have also sent a letter to every univeristy in Sweden, where they claim that "most illegal software and music is spread through the computers of universities." In the same letter they claim that the university is legally responsible for everything downloaded to it's computers. They are, of course, lying. But if it scares universities into checking their students actions, the IFPI has succeeded. And that scares me.
There are scattered reports in swedish newspapers that the 17-year old did not only have links, but that he had actual files as well, and that those files are the main reason for the IFPI:s actions. I'm not sure if those reports are correct.
On an amusing sidenote, one of the Swedish tabloids described the case with a mild misunderstanding: "The 17-year old is charged for having files in the illegal MP3-format on his homepage." Not only was the music copyrighted, it was in an illegal format as well... :-)