I don't give a shit how good their games are...when they start to sue legit open source projects I refuse to do business with them or play their products anymore.
Now, thats your perogitive, but to be fair, the bnetd guys were violating the license agreement in any case.
(from Diablo2 License.txt - I don't have starcraft so I can't quote that, however I'd gather it would be the same)
YOU SHOULD CAREFULLY READ THE FOLLOWING END USER LICENSE AGREEMENT
BEFORE INSTALLING THIS SOFTWARE PROGRAM. BY INSTALLING, COPYING, OR
OTHERWISE USING THE SOFTWARE PROGRAM, YOU AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THE
TERMS OF THIS AGREEMENT. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO THE TERMS OF THIS
AGREEMENT, PROMPTLY RETURN THE UNUSED SOFTWARE PROGRAM TO THE PLACE
OF PURCHASE OR CONTACT BLIZZARD ENTERTAINMENT CUSTOMER SERVICE AT
(949) 955-1382 FOR A FULL REFUND OF THE PURCHASE PRICE WITHIN THIRTY
(30) DAYS OF THE ORIGINAL PURCHASE.
...
C. You are entitled to use the Program for your own use, but you are not entitled to:
...
(iii) host or provide matchmaking services for the Program
or emulate or redirect the communication protocols used by
Blizzard in the network feature of the Program, through
protocol emulation, tunneling, modifying or adding
components to the Program, use of a utility program, or any
other techniques now known or hereafter developed for any
purpose, including, but not limited to, network play over
the Internet, network play utilizing commercial or
non-commercial gaming networks, or as part of content
aggregation networks without the prior written consent of
Blizzard;
If you disagree with this, license.txt contains details on how to contact blizzard for a full refund.
I don't exactly agree totally with their reasoning here either, but its their product, and I am willing to comply with it to play the game - I can see there reasoning even if I don't agree with it.
Another concept I'm curious about, is what about providing several links to subsets of the complete source code? Surely, one could argue that if they make linking to subsets of the code illegal, then when you break it down far enough, you're into making individual statements in the code illegal.
eg... what happens when I provide 30 links or so each to 3-5 lines of the code?
The "problems" they mentioned were both IIS "flaws" which have been corrected for some time now. Any other flaws exploited will also most likely be present on Windows XP Home, which has IIS as well (called Personal Web Server; incidently you can install a version of it for Win9x as well.)
Nimda also infected machines via the IFRAME exploit in both Outlook Express (sending emails to target machines) and also exploiting Internet Explorer via the same exploit when viewing a page on an infected webserver. It also attempted to write itself to any accessible network shares.
So no, you don't need to be running IIS to be vulnerable to nimda...
The problem is plugging the machine into the network before it's secured.
I can see it now.. student builds, machine, plugs in to view the security howto and download service packs, and gets owned before they do the first reboot.
If there's viruses floating about on their network as much as they claim, then its quite likely to be owned that quickly...
This is just called minimizing administrative overhead.
80% of halfwits who can install Windows believe they're "advanced" users who know what they're doing - the admin can either sort through them all, or just ban the operating system. Guess what's easier and most effective?:P
Personally, I'd just put all student machines on their own segment behind a firewall and they can run whatever they like at their own risk (so the outbreak is contained to student systems), but the network admin can make whatever policy he likes.
I think forcing XP on everyone is a bit stupid though - I'm willing to bet its security record is going to be just as bad, if not worse than Win2ks (universal plug and pray?:P).:)
They're not ubergeeks like most of us/.ers. They won't be trying to scan, edit and compress 10 gigs of high quality video/audio data. They won't be compiling an insanely huge Linux Kernel. They won't be dabbeling in Voice Over IP. Hell, they probably mindlessly rely on MS apps to do the work for them, using Outlook, IE, and others.
You mean, running Windows XP?
I think you hit the nail on the head as to why we *do* need the fastest processors we can get;)
"With open-source, you're not going to get a platform that's as reliable or scalable or as secure as what you're going to get with a leading vendor," Tullis said.
Of course! Everybody knows that Microsoft SQL server is the pinnacle of security!
[/sarcasm]
Funny how sun, who don't happen to have a competing solution, and dont stand to lose any money by supporting it have no problem with open source database software:)
IBM has some valid points, I'm sure if you purchase DB2 or Oracle, you're pretty much guaranteed it will work work your software, and will have plenty of easy to use, standard, management tools - Microsoft's arugment just reeks of open-source bashing.
DB2/Oracle has its place. Mysql/Postfix has its place. Even SQL server has its place (in the offices of admins who just want to get a server running on their LAN and don't care about security)
I tried upgrading to 2.0.39 during the Gobbles worm shenannigans.
Unfortunately, I rely on PHP4.x quite heavily for my sites, and it breaks in subtle and interesting ways on with Apache 2.0. Session management is (was) completely broken for example, and I spent about a week messing about diagnosing the problem, thinking maybe it was a bug in phpBB, or my network...
1.3.x does everything I require of a webserver - why change for the sake of it?
Unfortunately its a bitch of a catch 22 scenario - no one wants to upgrade because its broken, and because no one is testing it in the real world, its probably going to be a while before its trustworthy like 1.3 is.
Maybe as more IIS users switch to it on Windows things will improve - I hear 2.0.x is much improved over 1.3.x on Windows...
d) It will be closed, not compatible, and forced upon a unsuspecting public through monopolistic practices and lawsuits, and become the de facto standard that is a moving target for people trying to interoperate through contant forced upgrades, and patented extensions.
I don't see how this differs from the company (who shall remain nameless) creating their OWN defacto standard that is a moving target etc...
At least if they steal the BSD licensed code, it will inherit some or all of its good points, and even if the company spends enough time deliberately breaking it (which would be silly), its still no different to them writing their own new implementation ('cept maybe its less buggy - is this a bad thing?).
Try thinking outside the "if im too slack to make money off my code, im going to be jealous of anyone who does" mindset once in a while...
People use linux over BSD in most cases because of the wider feature set (journaling filesystems, moderately mature SMP support, some of the BSDs have none) and the dramatically broader driver support. While BSD is catching up in some areas, like sound card support, it is still woefully behind in others. I used to run linux just because MIT-pthreads didn't exist on BSD at the time and I wanted xmms. How sad is that? Not for me, mind you, but for BSD.
Hmm interesting. I was a Linux guy for a few years till recently (since about 96), and switched to BSD because it felt more mature.
Granted, video and sound drivers on FreeBSD aren't at the same level as they are on Linux, however the parts of the OS that matter (documentation that is actually consistant with software for example) FreeBSD is streets ahead. Anything that I've tried to do with it just *works* as the documentation says it should.
As for threads - Linux was without threads for a good long time as well, and went through a number of implementations. FreeBSD now has threads, so they're both now on an even footing there...
Journaled FS - well... FreeBSD has softupdates. Different strategy, similar end result... Honestly don't know enough to comment on which is best, other than the fact I have had no issues with either...
In the few areas where Linux is clearly more advanced than BSD (video drivers/sound drivers) its still pretty pissweak anyway. FreeBSD may not be the shiny pretty desktop OS of the month, but its happily sitting in the background doing more important things.
With regards to SMP - we'll see how FreeBSD 5.0 goes;)
The general feel I get from FreeBSD is that it has its clearly defined limits, but the stuff it does, it does well - there doesn't seem to be much half-assed, unfinished shite that you'll spend 3 days messing with to get it to *almost* work, included.
If someone wants to take *BSD and add proprietry crap, and try and sell it:
a) It will be closed, have no benefits - it will die
b) It will be closed, compatible, and have support - it may flourish. You pay for the support.
c) It will be closed, have additional features, and if it is worth the money, people will buy it. If not (ie, its just *BSD with a name change) people wont bother.
I don't see the problem.
Not everyone who develops software wants to control the use of it. Some people just want to advance the industry.
I mean, so what if MS steals the entire FreeBSD codebase, and calls it Windows NG (new generation) for example. The public gets an OS that doesn't suck, with proper industry support - and people who don't want to use it can continue to use the open-source version.
Its a more generous mindset, and I for one, am all for it.
"We realized that we couldn't continue with the way we were building software and expect to deliver secure products," Valentine said.
I read this as "We realized that we couldn't continue with the way we were building software, and expect to deliver products.":p
smash
Recall that the smaller an object is, the larger its surface area is in relation to its volume.
I would assume that grapes and watermelons have similar density and similar aerodynamic shape - factor in a larger surface area:volume on the grape... that means more drag for its mass, and hence, lower velocity.
I don't remember any scientific rule for this, but it seems logical to me....
Do the same experiment in a vacuum and I'm guessing the expected result (both hit at the same time) would occur.
Just noticed, but it is probably very old.
* You may not disclose the results of any benchmark test of the.NET Framework component of the OS Components to any third party without Microsoft's prior written approval.
This could bite them on the ass (hopefully).
I can see reviews of MS vs competing products, with the benchmarks for MS blank. "There is no result listed for MS **** as they are too scared to let us publish benchmarks."
I totally agree with this - once people start using Linux at work and realize that computers don't just "do wierd stuff" out of the blue, they'll start getting pissed with their home PC crashing, getting infected with viruses and needing a reinstall every few months.
Keep in mind that end users used to use DOS and associated applications. Better, easy to use alternatives were available (Amiga, Apple, ST, etc), but the PC took off at home due to the simple fact that people could run (and lets face it, copy) software that they use at work.
The alternatives were killed off in the Windows 3.1 days (early to mid 90s)... so usability didn't have anything to do with Windows' dominance IMHO.
Administration of work PCs is a non-issue for not switching to Linux. Our company has over 50 office bound employees who use Windows, and they still run to the tech when they can't print.
Same diff.
To the people crapping on about Telstra's ISP being a Microsoft shop... they used to sell and promote ISP-in-a-box Sun Netras. They've also got a large number of Cisco techs, who are usually GEEKS and savvy with some form of NIX.
They may run NT at the moment, but don't think they're incapable of making the switch.
smash(here's hoping. maybe I can go for a job at Tel$tra:)
Most of my spam comes through open relays in korea... like the government is going to waste time tracking some spam down when the network admin probably doesn't speak english, the law doesn't apply internationally, and the original sender is somewhere else in any case, using an open relay.
Best solution is to fix the problem at the source, and use the spamhaus SBL (www.spamhaus.org) and combine with one of the various open relay lists. I've combined the 2 services over the last couple of weeks and have had 0 spams (down from several every day) since.
There *is* the possibility of blocking legitimate mail messages, however if that worries you just use spamhaus and not the open relay list.
Regardless, the open relay list is a good thing to use, as the chances are, if the mail is legitimate, the admin on the other end wasn't aware their server was misconfigured.
If the other admin doesn't want to fix it, they can fax the info. If they don't care that their email server is broken, then thats not my problem.
Just my 2c, ymmv etc, but I think its high time we fixed the problem rather than just sidestepping it with silly legislation;)
Actually, you can't always delete linux(BSD, etc) partitions with DOS Fdisk - it depends on how/where they are.
Now my memory is a bit hazy here but here goes..
If you create a number of "Extended" partitions in linux, MS Fdisk can only see the first partition's worth (4 I believe) - it calls them "logical drives in the extended partition.
I know this can be a problem for MS fdisk, as 1) I only had a Windows bootdisk and was trying to clean up my harddisk once. 2) One of the guys at work used to install Linux boxes with root under hda5, so that DOS fdisk couldnt see it, so that clue-deficient techs couldn't break it:P
Part of the volume reseller agreement that Dell has with Microsoft basically says that they either ship all their boxes with Windows ("an operating system"), or Microsoft doesn't let them sell Windows anymore.
A PC manufacturer unable to sell Windows would die pretty quickly. MS knows this, and so they strongarm the OEMs.
My freebsd firewall box (has a monitor tho that runs the "fire" screensaver) has a 64meg Geforce 2 MX.
My question is this:
Wouldn't it be cool to be able to use the video ram as some sort of harddisk cache, or swap? Plenty of bandwidth... and its about 64mb - 64kb more video memory than I need in that box;)
On the software side of things, anyone remember the shocking reputation that Codemasters used to have (C64 era - granted, they had a number of classics, but most of their games were shit)?
Look at them now - arguably one of the best quality software houses around:)
The old trident video chipsets (such as the 8900 - yes i had one in my 486 too;) were handicapped compared to most of the SVGA cards of the day, as trident didn't implement a way to access more than 1 64k bank of video memory at a time.
This means that copying data around a trident card's video memory had to be done from video -> system -> video as a two step copy, rather than from one memory window to another.
I forget the specifics (was a long time ago) - but I read about this in an old demo coders documentation/tutorial pack. Most excellent, had docs on x86 assembly, 3d engine programming and all the low level info on VGA, and the soundcards of the day:)
Anyone know the pack I'm talking about? I'd love to get my hands on it again:)
Slashdot Mirror
Now, thats your perogitive, but to be fair, the bnetd guys were violating the license agreement in any case.
(from Diablo2 License.txt - I don't have starcraft so I can't quote that, however I'd gather it would be the same)
YOU SHOULD CAREFULLY READ THE FOLLOWING END USER LICENSE AGREEMENT BEFORE INSTALLING THIS SOFTWARE PROGRAM. BY INSTALLING, COPYING, OR OTHERWISE USING THE SOFTWARE PROGRAM, YOU AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THE TERMS OF THIS AGREEMENT. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO THE TERMS OF THIS AGREEMENT, PROMPTLY RETURN THE UNUSED SOFTWARE PROGRAM TO THE PLACE OF PURCHASE OR CONTACT BLIZZARD ENTERTAINMENT CUSTOMER SERVICE AT (949) 955-1382 FOR A FULL REFUND OF THE PURCHASE PRICE WITHIN THIRTY (30) DAYS OF THE ORIGINAL PURCHASE.
C. You are entitled to use the Program for your own use, but you are not entitled to:
(iii) host or provide matchmaking services for the Program or emulate or redirect the communication protocols used by Blizzard in the network feature of the Program, through protocol emulation, tunneling, modifying or adding components to the Program, use of a utility program, or any other techniques now known or hereafter developed for any purpose, including, but not limited to, network play over the Internet, network play utilizing commercial or non-commercial gaming networks, or as part of content aggregation networks without the prior written consent of Blizzard;
If you disagree with this, license.txt contains details on how to contact blizzard for a full refund.
I don't exactly agree totally with their reasoning here either, but its their product, and I am willing to comply with it to play the game - I can see there reasoning even if I don't agree with it.
smash.
Maybe its a mini black hole.
smash
Another concept I'm curious about, is what about providing several links to subsets of the complete source code? Surely, one could argue that if they make linking to subsets of the code illegal, then when you break it down far enough, you're into making individual statements in the code illegal.
eg... what happens when I provide 30 links or so each to 3-5 lines of the code?
smash
Nimda also infected machines via the IFRAME exploit in both Outlook Express (sending emails to target machines) and also exploiting Internet Explorer via the same exploit when viewing a page on an infected webserver. It also attempted to write itself to any accessible network shares.
So no, you don't need to be running IIS to be vulnerable to nimda...
smash.
I can see it now.. student builds, machine, plugs in to view the security howto and download service packs, and gets owned before they do the first reboot.
If there's viruses floating about on their network as much as they claim, then its quite likely to be owned that quickly...
smash.
80% of halfwits who can install Windows believe they're "advanced" users who know what they're doing - the admin can either sort through them all, or just ban the operating system. Guess what's easier and most effective? :P
Personally, I'd just put all student machines on their own segment behind a firewall and they can run whatever they like at their own risk (so the outbreak is contained to student systems), but the network admin can make whatever policy he likes.
I think forcing XP on everyone is a bit stupid though - I'm willing to bet its security record is going to be just as bad, if not worse than Win2ks (universal plug and pray? :P). :)
smash
You mean, running Windows XP?
I think you hit the nail on the head as to why we *do* need the fastest processors we can get ;)
smash
Of course! Everybody knows that Microsoft SQL server is the pinnacle of security!
[/sarcasm]
Funny how sun, who don't happen to have a competing solution, and dont stand to lose any money by supporting it have no problem with open source database software
IBM has some valid points, I'm sure if you purchase DB2 or Oracle, you're pretty much guaranteed it will work work your software, and will have plenty of easy to use, standard, management tools - Microsoft's arugment just reeks of open-source bashing.
DB2/Oracle has its place. Mysql/Postfix has its place. Even SQL server has its place (in the offices of admins who just want to get a server running on their LAN and don't care about security)
Use the correct tool for the job
smash
Unfortunately, I rely on PHP4.x quite heavily for my sites, and it breaks in subtle and interesting ways on with Apache 2.0. Session management is (was) completely broken for example, and I spent about a week messing about diagnosing the problem, thinking maybe it was a bug in phpBB, or my network...
1.3.x does everything I require of a webserver - why change for the sake of it?
Unfortunately its a bitch of a catch 22 scenario - no one wants to upgrade because its broken, and because no one is testing it in the real world, its probably going to be a while before its trustworthy like 1.3 is.
Maybe as more IIS users switch to it on Windows things will improve - I hear 2.0.x is much improved over 1.3.x on Windows...
just my 2c...
smash
I don't see how this differs from the company (who shall remain nameless) creating their OWN defacto standard that is a moving target etc...
At least if they steal the BSD licensed code, it will inherit some or all of its good points, and even if the company spends enough time deliberately breaking it (which would be silly), its still no different to them writing their own new implementation ('cept maybe its less buggy - is this a bad thing?).
Try thinking outside the "if im too slack to make money off my code, im going to be jealous of anyone who does" mindset once in a while...
smash.
Hmm interesting. I was a Linux guy for a few years till recently (since about 96), and switched to BSD because it felt more mature.
Granted, video and sound drivers on FreeBSD aren't at the same level as they are on Linux, however the parts of the OS that matter (documentation that is actually consistant with software for example) FreeBSD is streets ahead. Anything that I've tried to do with it just *works* as the documentation says it should.
As for threads - Linux was without threads for a good long time as well, and went through a number of implementations. FreeBSD now has threads, so they're both now on an even footing there...
Journaled FS - well... FreeBSD has softupdates. Different strategy, similar end result... Honestly don't know enough to comment on which is best, other than the fact I have had no issues with either...
In the few areas where Linux is clearly more advanced than BSD (video drivers/sound drivers) its still pretty pissweak anyway. FreeBSD may not be the shiny pretty desktop OS of the month, but its happily sitting in the background doing more important things.
With regards to SMP - we'll see how FreeBSD 5.0 goes ;)
The general feel I get from FreeBSD is that it has its clearly defined limits, but the stuff it does, it does well - there doesn't seem to be much half-assed, unfinished shite that you'll spend 3 days messing with to get it to *almost* work, included.
anyway... its 3am, im rambling...
smash.
If someone wants to take *BSD and add proprietry crap, and try and sell it:
a) It will be closed, have no benefits - it will die
b) It will be closed, compatible, and have support - it may flourish. You pay for the support.
c) It will be closed, have additional features, and if it is worth the money, people will buy it. If not (ie, its just *BSD with a name change) people wont bother.
I don't see the problem.
Not everyone who develops software wants to control the use of it. Some people just want to advance the industry.
I mean, so what if MS steals the entire FreeBSD codebase, and calls it Windows NG (new generation) for example. The public gets an OS that doesn't suck, with proper industry support - and people who don't want to use it can continue to use the open-source version.
Its a more generous mindset, and I for one, am all for it.
smash.
"We realized that we couldn't continue with the way we were building software and expect to deliver secure products," Valentine said. I read this as "We realized that we couldn't continue with the way we were building software, and expect to deliver products." :p
smash
Recall that the smaller an object is, the larger its surface area is in relation to its volume.
I would assume that grapes and watermelons have similar density and similar aerodynamic shape - factor in a larger surface area:volume on the grape... that means more drag for its mass, and hence, lower velocity.
I don't remember any scientific rule for this, but it seems logical to me....
Do the same experiment in a vacuum and I'm guessing the expected result (both hit at the same time) would occur.
smash.
This could bite them on the ass (hopefully).
I can see reviews of MS vs competing products, with the benchmarks for MS blank. "There is no result listed for MS **** as they are too scared to let us publish benchmarks."
heh. worse result than being 5-10% slower IMHO ;)
smash.
Witness the popularity of DVD players and consoles...
Plenty of non-commodore companies sold amiga add-on hardware - for example the video toasters from newtek, and the current powerpc accelerator boards.
smash
Keep in mind that end users used to use DOS and associated applications. Better, easy to use alternatives were available (Amiga, Apple, ST, etc), but the PC took off at home due to the simple fact that people could run (and lets face it, copy) software that they use at work.
The alternatives were killed off in the Windows 3.1 days (early to mid 90s) ... so usability didn't have anything to do with Windows' dominance IMHO.
Administration of work PCs is a non-issue for not switching to Linux. Our company has over 50 office bound employees who use Windows, and they still run to the tech when they can't print.
Same diff.
To the people crapping on about Telstra's ISP being a Microsoft shop... they used to sell and promote ISP-in-a-box Sun Netras. They've also got a large number of Cisco techs, who are usually GEEKS and savvy with some form of NIX.
They may run NT at the moment, but don't think they're incapable of making the switch.
smash(here's hoping. maybe I can go for a job at Tel$tra :)
Most of my spam comes through open relays in korea... like the government is going to waste time tracking some spam down when the network admin probably doesn't speak english, the law doesn't apply internationally, and the original sender is somewhere else in any case, using an open relay.
Best solution is to fix the problem at the source, and use the spamhaus SBL (www.spamhaus.org) and combine with one of the various open relay lists. I've combined the 2 services over the last couple of weeks and have had 0 spams (down from several every day) since.
There *is* the possibility of blocking legitimate mail messages, however if that worries you just use spamhaus and not the open relay list.
Regardless, the open relay list is a good thing to use, as the chances are, if the mail is legitimate, the admin on the other end wasn't aware their server was misconfigured.
If the other admin doesn't want to fix it, they can fax the info. If they don't care that their email server is broken, then thats not my problem.
Just my 2c, ymmv etc, but I think its high time we fixed the problem rather than just sidestepping it with silly legislation ;)
smash
I haven't had any spam since :)
Now my memory is a bit hazy here but here goes..
If you create a number of "Extended" partitions in linux, MS Fdisk can only see the first partition's worth (4 I believe) - it calls them "logical drives in the extended partition.
I know this can be a problem for MS fdisk, as 1) I only had a Windows bootdisk and was trying to clean up my harddisk once. 2) One of the guys at work used to install Linux boxes with root under hda5, so that DOS fdisk couldnt see it, so that clue-deficient techs couldn't break it :P
smash
Part of the volume reseller agreement that Dell has with Microsoft basically says that they either ship all their boxes with Windows ("an operating system"), or Microsoft doesn't let them sell Windows anymore.
A PC manufacturer unable to sell Windows would die pretty quickly. MS knows this, and so they strongarm the OEMs.
smash
My freebsd firewall box (has a monitor tho that runs the "fire" screensaver) has a 64meg Geforce 2 MX.
My question is this:
Wouldn't it be cool to be able to use the video ram as some sort of harddisk cache, or swap? Plenty of bandwidth... and its about 64mb - 64kb more video memory than I need in that box ;)
Comments?
smash
On the software side of things, anyone remember the shocking reputation that Codemasters used to have (C64 era - granted, they had a number of classics, but most of their games were shit)?
Look at them now - arguably one of the best quality software houses around :)
Times change people... ;)
smash
The old trident video chipsets (such as the 8900 - yes i had one in my 486 too ;) were handicapped compared to most of the SVGA cards of the day, as trident didn't implement a way to access more than 1 64k bank of video memory at a time.
This means that copying data around a trident card's video memory had to be done from video -> system -> video as a two step copy, rather than from one memory window to another.
I forget the specifics (was a long time ago) - but I read about this in an old demo coders documentation/tutorial pack. Most excellent, had docs on x86 assembly, 3d engine programming and all the low level info on VGA, and the soundcards of the day :)
Anyone know the pack I'm talking about? I'd love to get my hands on it again :)
smash
please ignore... testing out posting problems :-\