the first rule is to bathe once/week -at the most-, grow a long, scraggly beard (if you're male), refuse to shave your legs and armpits (if you're female), and ensure you've a ready supply of neo-Marxist drivel to spout whenever anyone complains that someone ought to actually -pay- for equipment, access, etc.
Do the above really well, and you may well be mistaken for either RMS or Esther Dyson!
While working to convince many of my friends and colleagues to give Linux a try, one of the most vexing hurdles I've come across is the following:
Me: "Dude, you should really try Linux! It's fast,
it's free, it's really secure - and, best of
all, you get all the source code, so you can
see how it -really- works, and even contribute
your own code, if you want."
Dude: "Is there antivirus software for Linux?"
Me: "Well, no - Linux doesn't have viruses,
per se, so there's no need for antivirus
software!"
Dude: "My bosses won't let us run any boxes
which don't have antivirus software
installed. Let me know when I can buy
antivirus software for Linux."
So, now that we have virii on Linux, we'll soon have antivirus software, and I can show my friends yet another way in which Linux has caught up with Windows!
it seems like we can't make any cool, upgradeable large-scale systems, anymore.
What did we do when we needed large, mobile cruise-missile & artillery platforms? Why, we loaded up then-forty-year-old Iowa-class battleships, ships so old that it was tough finding personnel who knew how to work the guns!
The shuttle uses early-70s technology. The B-52, the first prototype of which flew in 1949 (!), is still our #1 conventional heavy bomber, and is a testament to forward-thinking in terms of modularity. But it seems that the trend is towards more monolithic, use-it-and-then-throw-it-away-and-buy-a-new-one systems.
Which is great for the suppliers, but not so great for the consumers (and in the case of NASA and DoD, the taxpayers).
I can generally get about 2 years of useful life out of a desktop PC, perhaps upgrading the RAM, video adaptor and CD/DVD/latest-useful-removeable-media drive along the way. I can get about 18 months of use out of a laptop, upgrading the RAM at some point. I can get 3-5 years out of a car, a (potentially) lifetime of use out of a good watch or a gun.
But the design principles I see in operation today are very much oriented towards disposability. Which is a bit of a problem when we're talking about multibillion-dollar systems.
What's the answer? For space, let private enterprise develop their own, market-driven Pull out of the Outer Space Treaty (http://www.state.gov/www/global/arms/treaties/spa ce1.htmlmodel. ), and let's start mining those asteroids! NASA can do science, while the Solar System is pioneered by those imbued with that most useful of human motivations - pure, unadulterated greed.
For defense, I'm not so sure. The bureaucracy is so bloated and elephantine, and so many different factions are constantly trying to keep their rice-bowls from being broken, I'm unsure -what- it would take to reform their procurement methodologies. If September 11th isn't enough of a wakeup call that we need to move both quicker and smarter, I don't know what would serve.
LDAP, Kerberos, SecurID, NDS (bleh), Active Directory (double-bleh!), NIS+/Yellow Pages, RADIUS/TACACS, even. Unified cross-platform logon requires a bit of work, but it can certainly be done.
Go look for those terms on yahoo.com, google.com, freshmeat.net, et. al. You'll find there are many different ways to skin that cat.
for the simple reason that a) there aren't any -writers- on Slashdot, and b) he's the modern equivalent of Bulwer-Lytton, minus the gravitas.
The reason I hate Katz so much is that the rest of the Slashdot crew - with the occasional exception of roblimo - have no pretensions of being -writers-. Yes, they're blurb-posters, and that's what they do. If there's anything serious in their lives, they don't even attempt to pretend that it has anything to do with Slashdot - or the Internet, for that matter.
Katz, on the other hand, has delusions of grandeur. He -thinks- he's a writer, when he's a mere spinner of tendentious, pseudo-intellectual phrases. He -thinks- he's being 'different', 'unique', 'insightful', and 'subversive', when in reality he's simply regurgitating the received wisdom of all the pimply fourteen-year-olds who own computers (paid for by their parents) and have vague ideas of 'freedom' and 'rights', unencumbered by any contact with the realities of life which take place away from keyboards, mice, and monitors.
So, not only is Katz a moron, he's a grandiloquent moron, a puffed-up, pretentious windbag whose tragicomic sense of self-importance is cheapened, and ultimately rendered meaningless, by the ephermeral, shallow nature of both his 'education' and his subject matter. His are tales told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
So, the only 'challenge' Katz poses for me is the sheer agony of picking through his oevure sufficiently to prepare an appropriately condescending and derogatory riposte to his pompous maunderings.
Slashdot Mirror
the first rule is to bathe once/week -at the most-, grow a long, scraggly beard (if you're male), refuse to shave your legs and armpits (if you're female), and ensure you've a ready supply of neo-Marxist drivel to spout whenever anyone complains that someone ought to actually -pay- for equipment, access, etc.
Do the above really well, and you may well be mistaken for either RMS or Esther Dyson!
will -that- make you happy?
on any *NIX I've ever seen - that's all you really need to know in order to be a good BOFH.
};>
On the other hand, it would be fun to hurl pies at him . . .
Since, like, 3 people speak Norwegian, how the hell can you have a 'famous Norwegian linguist'?
I mean, if he's so goddamned famous, why haven't -I- heard of him, huh?
While working to convince many of my friends and colleagues to give Linux a try, one of the most vexing hurdles I've come across is the following:
Me: "Dude, you should really try Linux! It's fast,
it's free, it's really secure - and, best of
all, you get all the source code, so you can
see how it -really- works, and even contribute
your own code, if you want."
Dude: "Is there antivirus software for Linux?"
Me: "Well, no - Linux doesn't have viruses,
per se, so there's no need for antivirus
software!"
Dude: "My bosses won't let us run any boxes
which don't have antivirus software
installed. Let me know when I can buy
antivirus software for Linux."
So, now that we have virii on Linux, we'll soon have antivirus software, and I can show my friends yet another way in which Linux has caught up with Windows!
or something very much like them, in _A Deepness in the Sky_, available in paperback.
If your interviewees haven't seen _Airplane_, you don't want them, anyways.
this doesn't strike me as being a Big Deal, you know?
It's one of Mick Harris' (of Scorn, Napalm Death, etc.) side-projects, available from Isolation Tank:
http://www2.mailordercentral.com/isotank/
Sorry, couldn't resist, yo.
Just saving RMS the trouble.
};>
Give us your coordinates, and we'll be sure and drop you a little love-bouquet from 30,000 feet.
};>
it seems like we can't make any cool, upgradeable large-scale systems, anymore.
a ce1.htmlmodel. ), and let's start mining those asteroids! NASA can do science, while the Solar System is pioneered by those imbued with that most useful of human motivations - pure, unadulterated greed.
What did we do when we needed large, mobile cruise-missile & artillery platforms? Why, we loaded up then-forty-year-old Iowa-class battleships, ships so old that it was tough finding personnel who knew how to work the guns!
The shuttle uses early-70s technology. The B-52, the first prototype of which flew in 1949 (!), is still our #1 conventional heavy bomber, and is a testament to forward-thinking in terms of modularity. But it seems that the trend is towards more monolithic, use-it-and-then-throw-it-away-and-buy-a-new-one systems.
Which is great for the suppliers, but not so great for the consumers (and in the case of NASA and DoD, the taxpayers).
I can generally get about 2 years of useful life out of a desktop PC, perhaps upgrading the RAM, video adaptor and CD/DVD/latest-useful-removeable-media drive along the way. I can get about 18 months of use out of a laptop, upgrading the RAM at some point. I can get 3-5 years out of a car, a (potentially) lifetime of use out of a good watch or a gun.
But the design principles I see in operation today are very much oriented towards disposability. Which is a bit of a problem when we're talking about multibillion-dollar systems.
What's the answer? For space, let private enterprise develop their own, market-driven Pull out of the Outer Space Treaty (http://www.state.gov/www/global/arms/treaties/sp
For defense, I'm not so sure. The bureaucracy is so bloated and elephantine, and so many different factions are constantly trying to keep their rice-bowls from being broken, I'm unsure -what- it would take to reform their procurement methodologies. If September 11th isn't enough of a wakeup call that we need to move both quicker and smarter, I don't know what would serve.
about the power of writing without hyperbole, cant, or sophomoric pretensions of grandeur.
I think the title of this whine should be, "Why don't my trendy, flash-in-the-pan favorite sci-fi wannabes of the month hit the bestseller lists?"
The answer is self-evident. If it's good, the market speaks. If it sucks, well, there's always Slashdot.
;)
just wait until you start getting spam via your major home appliances:
. ht ml
http://www.energy.whirlpool.com/pressrelease_06
can a place without phone service or Internet access really be?
Face it, buster, your parents are 'square'!
http://www.cisco.com/pcgi-bin/tablebuild.pl/airone t-utils-linux
LDAP, Kerberos, SecurID, NDS (bleh), Active Directory (double-bleh!), NIS+/Yellow Pages, RADIUS/TACACS, even. Unified cross-platform logon requires a bit of work, but it can certainly be done.
Go look for those terms on yahoo.com, google.com, freshmeat.net, et. al. You'll find there are many different ways to skin that cat.
Don't run Windows - or any other proprietary OS and/or apps into which you've no visibility.
There, doesn't that feel better? Now run along, and don't forget to toss your tinfoil hat into the recycling bin!
;)
and groups.google.com.
Do I have to tell you -everything-?
but I surely know the location of its anus:
John Katz, the biggest asshole online.
to read this story, but I guess www.ispreview.co.uk is in the process of being DoSed by all these Slashdot readers . . .
for the simple reason that a) there aren't any -writers- on Slashdot, and b) he's the modern equivalent of Bulwer-Lytton, minus the gravitas.
The reason I hate Katz so much is that the rest of the Slashdot crew - with the occasional exception of roblimo - have no pretensions of being -writers-. Yes, they're blurb-posters, and that's what they do. If there's anything serious in their lives, they don't even attempt to pretend that it has anything to do with Slashdot - or the Internet, for that matter.
Katz, on the other hand, has delusions of grandeur. He -thinks- he's a writer, when he's a mere spinner of tendentious, pseudo-intellectual phrases. He -thinks- he's being 'different', 'unique', 'insightful', and 'subversive', when in reality he's simply regurgitating the received wisdom of all the pimply fourteen-year-olds who own computers (paid for by their parents) and have vague ideas of 'freedom' and 'rights', unencumbered by any contact with the realities of life which take place away from keyboards, mice, and monitors.
So, not only is Katz a moron, he's a grandiloquent moron, a puffed-up, pretentious windbag whose tragicomic sense of self-importance is cheapened, and ultimately rendered meaningless, by the ephermeral, shallow nature of both his 'education' and his subject matter. His are tales told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
So, the only 'challenge' Katz poses for me is the sheer agony of picking through his oevure sufficiently to prepare an appropriately condescending and derogatory riposte to his pompous maunderings.