A useful feature that will be used to promote one company.
No, since other companies can come out with their own. The user just checks the ones that he wants to use at any particular time. It's actually a cool technology that other companies have applied to web sites before. It's especially great for something like financial data. Let's say I like CBS marketwatch, but hate their stock details. Well, I just create a smart tag which grabs stock data from Yahoo instead. Of course, now some dipshit at Slashdot will accuse me of "re-editing" someone's site. Get a clue.
The amount of hypocrisy from people here is pretty astounding, though. (I'm not including you — you were reasonable about it, it just seems like you misunderstood it). Whatever happened to the mantra here that the web is for the user, not the web designer? That designers should quit trying to control layout and style, but should instead leave it up to the user? Well, so much for that, because it looks like everybody here now thinks that the user should be forced to accept the designer's every last whim.
What's next, will there be an uprising here to get Mozilla to stop letting users use an alternate stylesheet? Someone should get right on that, otherwise those evil users could distort the heavenly vision of the web designer!
Ahh, it's so fun to watch so many people's so-called principles twist and turn and bend past the point of snapping whenever Microsoft is involved. Old Slashdot message: "We're sick of Microsoft telling users that M$ knows best." New Slashdot message: "M$ can't give people this capability (or give them Unix-compatible sockets), because their users don't know what's best for themselves. We'll decide for ourselves what is best for those dumb users!"
Truly comical...
Ahh, that's good. I actually think it's a neat little program, but the sneakiness of adding the spyware was disturbing, so I just have it on a junk computer that's used for untrusted things. Does their site make that workaround clear to any potential downloaders, or is it something you'd only learn after checking out usenet, forums, etc.?
Anyway, I just thought it was odd that someone would denounce Napster for selling out while promoting something which was using a spyware add-on to make money of their own, all while being more shady about it.
There's a pretty big intersect between the usual pro-Linus and pro-Napster segments here. (And by pro-Napster, I don't mean only Napster, I'm talking about the general idea that people should be able to download any music they want at anytime, whether they've ever purchased it or not.) I've never really seen it resolved, though, nor has their been too much friction between the groups.
Just as an example, here are some quotes from a couple of Slashdot darlings:
"Piracy is bad," says Linus Torvalds, the creator of Linux, when asked about the matter. "Of course you should be able to sue over copyrights. The one good lawsuit in the whole Napster case is the one by Metallica: a suit by the actual authors. While it's probably motivated mostly by money, I can still at least hope that there is a strong feeling of morals there, too."
Larry Wall, developer of the Perl language, has a similar perspective. "Open source should be about giving away things voluntarily," he says. "When you force someone to give you something, it's no longer giving, it's stealing. Persons of leisurely moral growth often confuse giving with taking."
Although both guys often make for good soundbites, I don't expect those two quotes to be making the top ten lists of their fans anytime soon.:)
Wrong. 64-bit WinXP betas have been available for download at MSDN since last year. Beta 2 is the most recent XP beta, and the 64-bit version for it is there for the downloading.
They're way behind the Open Source folks at supporting Itanium.
Wrong. See, they have this little thing called a release schedule. The difference is that RedHat, et al., decided to release everything they have so far the day the Itanium came out, while Microsoft is going to make sure that the OS is actually ready before they release it to the general public. If Microsoft released XP to the public in the same condition that RedHat released 7.1 for the Itanium, they would've been crucified for such incompleteness.
Huh? What corporation controls — without any alternatives — what I can do, say, hear, feel or think? If a corporation tried it, I could go to a competitor. If a Communist regime tries it, the people better learn to actively fight for the regime's downfall or just live with it, because most of them won't be able to emigrate even if they wanted to.
Whenever someone I know has some code that they want to take from a GPL'd work, I just give them the following pointers for getting around it legally without having to redistribute their own source code.
Take whatever source you want to, but in your final project, slip in a few Easter eggs (I've got a few canned routines which are tiny that I give to my friends). If someone stumbles upon them, they get a pop-up dialog of a picture of Richard Stallman's face (with a little extra bit of rabid look in his eyes, thanks to a little Photoshop manipulation), along with a random silly quote of his, like "Security might make sense with banks and military facilities, but in a computer lab, that is a sign of a social breakdown," or him advocating piracy. No sound effects, but suggestions are welcomed. For console based apps, the random quote is just send to stderr — yeah, not nearly as fun, I know, but some mocking of him needs to be present.
Why the mocking? Well, because that's the basis for using the GPL'd source in the first place. You're just taking the GPL'd code as fair use in your parody of GNU software. See, you're not really selling an Emacs clone with enhancements but no source. You're really selling a RMS parody, with the ostensible joke being that it's GNU software that mocks RMS. It just so happens that it works as a utility, but if anyone asks, that wasn't your point at all, you were just out to have a few laughs. And the GPL certainly has no business applying to parodies, so feel free to improve away or distribute all your want without ever distributing a single line of source.:)
Well, Joel's creepy mustache and hairdo do tend to leave some doubts, but some friends of mine at ABC have assured me that he really is an actual person.
Well, most of 'em are true, the movie studios have just always found a way to take them out of context and add a few exclamation points. The taken out of context thing is pretty much assumed, but there was a case a few years ago when one of the major studios got in trouble for cutting random words from a poor review and pasting them back together into a sentence which lauded the film. They ended up retracting the quotes from the ads when people got on their ass about it. Given how many living and breathing junket whores are out there willing to exchange a good review for some nice trinkets and a sushi dinner, these movies must be pretty hideous that they actually had to make up reviewers.
Yeah, there's all sorts of wheelin' and dealin' going on there. I'm not specifically aware of any broadband talks being part of the discussion, but I'd think that'd be another point of dealing.
As far as your other point, I'm pretty much of the opposite opinion. I think the free market should decide the IM and streaming media segments, not the DoJ. Microsoft spent their own money on the development of their Windows Media codecs, so it doesn't seem fair that they'd have to give the technology away for free. They already do license out the technology, which is why other players can use Windows Media files. So it's not something that they're restricting to Windows Media Player only.
It's just like Apple QuickTime and their Sorensen codec. A lot of people complain about having to install QuickTime whenever some new Star Wars trailer comes out, but Apple's spending their own money to license the codec in their own QuickTime player, so I think it's their right to restrict it to those people using their software. I don't like the QuickTime player — I actually hate having to install it, because it has a reputation for mucking things up — but I've got it installed anyway so that I can view certain things, and I don't have any qualms with Apple making me do that. Same with the Real Player. I'm not too fond of it, but I can't listen to my Phil Hendrie archives without it, and I know that it cost Real a good bit of money to create it, so I install it without any bitterness.
As for Real, I don't think they need to think about giving away the store. They should just keep producing their software, and having it (it being both the player and the server software) run on platforms that Windows Media isn't available on is a decent selling point for them. They won't be going away anytime soon anyway, because they've got some good content lined up, especially with their exclusive deals with certain major sports leagues.
Earthlink is tiny? They're the number 3 ISP. MSN has slightly more users.
MSNM doesn't have the same number of users as AIM, it has more.
The 6% for the AOL client browser doesn't forget anything, it is what it is. The 25M you mention is a big number (I believe it's actually closer to 30M now), but the subset of people who use the AOL client browser is smaller — many use the standard IE and Netscape instead. Whether AOL switches to a Mozilla/Gecko-based client or continues with the IE-based client, why would all these people already using the browser of their choice start using the AOL client browser instead? AOL distributing a standalone (non-AOL client) isn't relevant here, because XP will already be shipping with IE6.
I don't think the browser is significant, and AOL has better forms of leverage. One is that Microsoft wants AOL to switch from Real Media to using Windows Media. WM doesn't have nearly the position in the market that IE has; I don't know if they even have 50% yet. Another is that Microsoft wants MSNM users to be able to communicate with AIM users; as we've both said, MSNM definitely doesn't have 50% in the overall IM market. Another leverage point is that Microsoft would like AOL to quit complaining to the DoJ every other week (although AOL would probably like Microsoft to keep quiet about any talking it's doing to regulatory bodies vis-à-vis AOL-Time Warner doings). Microsoft has over 80% browser marketshare even when the AOL client users are taken out of the equation (it's about 86% when you include them), that's why these other things are a higher priority.
But having more users, which ICQ and AIM does combined, doesn't mean that they own the IM market and don't have anything to worry about, which was the point I pasted and was countering. It's like saying that Netscape owned the browser market when they were at 65 percent and dropping.
As to that second thing you asked about, it's a fact.
What strong-arming? Seeing as there aren't clients on the install disc for the thousands of ISPs out there, AOL is looking for a special benefit — having their client being one of the handful that are on the disc. In return, why shouldn't they give up something for the right?
If they don't want to, why should they get the benefit that all those thousands of other ISPs aren't getting? Seems like it would be unfair to the other guys.
Actually the AOL client browser has less than 6 percent of the browser marketshare. A lot of AOL users don't use the client to browse the web, they use IE or Netscape. The point you bring up about MS-only extensions is a good one, but I think you have it a bit skewed. The most important issue about it is that AOL is scared to death that if they start using a Mozilla-based client instead, their customers are going to go nuts that they can't view some of their favorite web sites anymore, and that this will be a really bad time for pissed-off customers coming on the heels of their pricing increase combined with the new MSN program targetting pissed off AOL users by giving them free months and a price cut.
Sorry if it hurts the Mozilla fans' sense of self-esteem, but the browser that the AOL client uses is a very minor issue in this deal. AOL in fact worried about alienating their customers by downgrading them to Mozilla, and unfortunately for them, Microsoft knows this, which means that there is no browser bargaining chip. The disagreements have more to do with multimedia and the DoJ than any non-existant browser war.
Is it really apache.org's etc... fault if a trojan ssh on another isp's box was able to capture a password?
I'd say it's apache.org's fault. The people with access should be running a local copy of ssh, rather than trusting an ISP's version of it. Not just because some hacker might compromise the ISP, but maybe the ISP has a nosy employee or is in competition with apache.org, and one of their own people decides to install a keystroke logger into their version of ssh.
Along the same lines, they should also be connecting directly to apache.org's sshd, not to some sshd along the way and then think it's safe to ssh to apache.org. And naturally, their password for apache.org should be totally unique from any other passwords they're using. Then there's always going to be some people that you give access to who take shortcuts and don't follow the proper procedures, and you've got to deal with them somehow — because not too many people want to (or should) go around canning their own staff, but you have to make them realize how one seemingly little thing can screw things up for everybody else.
There's a lot more to security than just making sure you're patched against the latest exploits, and yeah, it sucks and is a pain in the ass, but your incentive is to look at the tons of sites getting hacked these days and make a conscious decision that you'd rather deal with the pain than to be the next dotpoint on the great defaced sites mirror in the sky.
Cygnus was profitable for several years before being bought by RedHat.
Yep, that's the one answer that everybody gives, but they're not an independent company anymore, so there's no telling how they'd be doing in today's economy. Well, at least it was the one answer until some people around here decided to start calling IBM a GPL-based company, which is a total joke.
I'm sure there are other small consulting firms around the world that do this too.
Then I'm sure it shouldn't be too difficult to name some.:)
Damn, this question really is a sore spot for you guys, isn't it?
Free software is for the good of the community, not the individual.
That pretty much sums it up for me, too, at least as far as the GPL goes (I'm making a distinction here between the GPL and free software, because I don't think the GPL offers freedom the way that the BSD license or public domain software does), which is why I'd discourage it. And just because I discourage it doesn't mean that I think that everyone shouldn't be able to use it if they want to or that there should be some McCarthyistic witchhunt against people who do (or don't).
I'm for the individual, not the collective that I firmly believe the GPL represents. Software aside, I think that the collective is always doomed in the face of free will.
1. If Stallman had his way, you'd be forced to give your neighbor your new recipe. That's not freedom. 2. The part I quoted specifically refers to redistriburing the software, so it's pretty intellectually dishonest for everyone to be clinging to the strawman of "But that's only if you redistribute!!" Like you said, you can't redistribute unless you want to be forced to give away your changes. (If you noticed, the part I quoted refers to That's not freedom. 3. Last time I checked, HP isn't doing all that well, and neither IBM nor HP base their business around GPL products. C'mon, let's see your list of winners for companies which have devoted themselves to the GPL.
The BSD license definitely offers freedom, the GPL clearly doesn't.
Imagine, he said, if recipes were packaged in black boxes, unavailable for nspection.
Maybe someone needs to explain to RMS that not all recipes are available to public inspection. See: Coca-Cola formula, KFC seven herbs and spices formula.
He went on to describe three additional freedoms which distinguish Free from proprietary software: the right to change software to suit user needs; to redistribute the software; and to publish improved versions.
But then it takes away the right to keep the changes to yourself. So much for freedom.
Citing the large number of companies now paying to develop Free software.
Did he also happen to cite the fact that so many of these companies are going tits up lately?
Yes, and Java 1.2 is somehow called Java 2. Everybody knows that Win2K is the successor to NT4 in the NT line, but nobody except possibly the same people who say "M$" ever calls it NT instead of Win2K, 2000, Windows 2000, etc. When someone says NT, they're talking about NT4 and earlier. If they're including Win2K, they say NT-based. Anyone can argue semantics about this, but we're talking about real-world usage here.
Oh, I'd agree with you on that, but Slashdot's reasoning seems to be a bit lacking. First off, people creating new systems aren't going to be buying NT. If they're going the Windows route, they'd be buying Win2K. So, this article doesn't affect those people.
Now, if I'm already using NT and don't want to be subjected the extra fees imposed by this pissant company(*), I'd have to switch operating systems. Except that switching to Linux isn't going to be getting me any bigger insurance discount than if I switch to Win2K. So how is this an incentive?
Anyway, I just found it amusing that the marketing arm of VA Linux (read: Slashdot) would post this now, to take away the heat from the SourceForge fiasco. Maybe some people out there remember that The Register ran a story about the exact same thing over a month ago. (You gonna tell me that scads of people didn't submit it then? If so, I've got a secure RedHat server sitting on some New Jersey beachfront property to sell you;) ).
(*) Why would I refer to them as a "pissant company?" Well, how many insurance agencies are you aware of that have only eight employees? I think everyone here is grown up enough to admit that we'd have never heard of these guys either if not for this one particular policy, a policy that nobody else in the insurance biz seems to be moving to.
Sorry, but I don't think the whole eight employees of Wurzler has much of a say-so when it comes to reality.
Besides, why is Slashdot still fighting over Windows NT, the focus of this article? It's about 5 years old now, I'd think that Slashdot would be more worried about Windows 2000.
Also, it doesn't seem the article's author has done much comparing of security patches offered for holes on company web sites, since he chose to only mention NT's, even though there are a lot more for Debian 2.2 and RedHat 7.x, when you take into account how long they've been out. Oh well, what can one expect from Ziff Davis journalism?
Not for the base ASP.net server controls. Now, someone could use the standard browser capabilities control and extend the base control classes to do what you're talking about, but it would take extra effort and isn't all that different than how people do it today (the outcome, that is, not the methodology). The main point of ASP.net, for me at least, is that it's great for the developer, rather than making things prettier for the user. Stuff like moving from an interpreted scripting language-based model to having the code compiled, whether it's C#, Perl.Net, JScript.Net, etc.; making it easy and encouraging separation of code from content; great caching options; deploying web-apps by simply copying them to a web server, rather than having to worry about re-configuring the server or registering components, and extremely simple state-tracking and validation.
The kind of thing which you're talking about really only occurs with validation, where when you set the requirements that a form element must meet, ASP.net will produce pages (if the browser supports Javascript) that contain Javascript which will perform client-side validation. If the particular browser isn't using Javascript, then the client-side validation isn't used, and only server-side validation will occur after the user submits the form. (Don't worry, server-side validation is still performed even when client-side validation is used, the client-side checking can just prevent an extra trip to the server when the user fills out the form incorrectly.)
Slashdot Mirror
A useful feature that will be used to promote one company.
No, since other companies can come out with their own. The user just checks the ones that he wants to use at any particular time. It's actually a cool technology that other companies have applied to web sites before. It's especially great for something like financial data. Let's say I like CBS marketwatch, but hate their stock details. Well, I just create a smart tag which grabs stock data from Yahoo instead. Of course, now some dipshit at Slashdot will accuse me of "re-editing" someone's site. Get a clue.
The amount of hypocrisy from people here is pretty astounding, though. (I'm not including you — you were reasonable about it, it just seems like you misunderstood it). Whatever happened to the mantra here that the web is for the user, not the web designer? That designers should quit trying to control layout and style, but should instead leave it up to the user? Well, so much for that, because it looks like everybody here now thinks that the user should be forced to accept the designer's every last whim.
What's next, will there be an uprising here to get Mozilla to stop letting users use an alternate stylesheet? Someone should get right on that, otherwise those evil users could distort the heavenly vision of the web designer!
Ahh, it's so fun to watch so many people's so-called principles twist and turn and bend past the point of snapping whenever Microsoft is involved. Old Slashdot message: "We're sick of Microsoft telling users that M$ knows best." New Slashdot message: "M$ can't give people this capability (or give them Unix-compatible sockets), because their users don't know what's best for themselves. We'll decide for ourselves what is best for those dumb users!" Truly comical...
Cheers,
Ahh, that's good. I actually think it's a neat little program, but the sneakiness of adding the spyware was disturbing, so I just have it on a junk computer that's used for untrusted things. Does their site make that workaround clear to any potential downloaders, or is it something you'd only learn after checking out usenet, forums, etc.?
Anyway, I just thought it was odd that someone would denounce Napster for selling out while promoting something which was using a spyware add-on to make money of their own, all while being more shady about it.
Cheers,
What Would Linus Do?
There's a pretty big intersect between the usual pro-Linus and pro-Napster segments here. (And by pro-Napster, I don't mean only Napster, I'm talking about the general idea that people should be able to download any music they want at anytime, whether they've ever purchased it or not.) I've never really seen it resolved, though, nor has their been too much friction between the groups.
Just as an example, here are some quotes from a couple of Slashdot darlings:
Although both guys often make for good soundbites, I don't expect those two quotes to be making the top ten lists of their fans anytime soon. :)
Cheers,
Napster has sold out. Use Bearshare instead.
And you wouldn't consider BearShare to have sold out? When you install it, it also installs OnFlow, a nice little piece of spyware.
Cheers,
As of right now, that is not useable.
Wrong. 64-bit WinXP betas have been available for download at MSDN since last year. Beta 2 is the most recent XP beta, and the 64-bit version for it is there for the downloading.
They're way behind the Open Source folks at supporting Itanium.
Wrong. See, they have this little thing called a release schedule. The difference is that RedHat, et al., decided to release everything they have so far the day the Itanium came out, while Microsoft is going to make sure that the OS is actually ready before they release it to the general public. If Microsoft released XP to the public in the same condition that RedHat released 7.1 for the Itanium, they would've been crucified for such incompleteness.
Cheers,
Huh? What corporation controls — without any alternatives — what I can do, say, hear, feel or think? If a corporation tried it, I could go to a competitor. If a Communist regime tries it, the people better learn to actively fight for the regime's downfall or just live with it, because most of them won't be able to emigrate even if they wanted to.
Cheers,
Whenever someone I know has some code that they want to take from a GPL'd work, I just give them the following pointers for getting around it legally without having to redistribute their own source code.
Take whatever source you want to, but in your final project, slip in a few Easter eggs (I've got a few canned routines which are tiny that I give to my friends). If someone stumbles upon them, they get a pop-up dialog of a picture of Richard Stallman's face (with a little extra bit of rabid look in his eyes, thanks to a little Photoshop manipulation), along with a random silly quote of his, like "Security might make sense with banks and military facilities, but in a computer lab, that is a sign of a social breakdown," or him advocating piracy. No sound effects, but suggestions are welcomed. For console based apps, the random quote is just send to stderr — yeah, not nearly as fun, I know, but some mocking of him needs to be present.
Why the mocking? Well, because that's the basis for using the GPL'd source in the first place. You're just taking the GPL'd code as fair use in your parody of GNU software. See, you're not really selling an Emacs clone with enhancements but no source. You're really selling a RMS parody, with the ostensible joke being that it's GNU software that mocks RMS. It just so happens that it works as a utility, but if anyone asks, that wasn't your point at all, you were just out to have a few laughs. And the GPL certainly has no business applying to parodies, so feel free to improve away or distribute all your want without ever distributing a single line of source. :)
Cheers,
Well, Joel's creepy mustache and hairdo do tend to leave some doubts, but some friends of mine at ABC have assured me that he really is an actual person.
Cheers,
Well, most of 'em are true, the movie studios have just always found a way to take them out of context and add a few exclamation points. The taken out of context thing is pretty much assumed, but there was a case a few years ago when one of the major studios got in trouble for cutting random words from a poor review and pasting them back together into a sentence which lauded the film. They ended up retracting the quotes from the ads when people got on their ass about it. Given how many living and breathing junket whores are out there willing to exchange a good review for some nice trinkets and a sushi dinner, these movies must be pretty hideous that they actually had to make up reviewers.
Cheers,
Yeah, there's all sorts of wheelin' and dealin' going on there. I'm not specifically aware of any broadband talks being part of the discussion, but I'd think that'd be another point of dealing.
As far as your other point, I'm pretty much of the opposite opinion. I think the free market should decide the IM and streaming media segments, not the DoJ. Microsoft spent their own money on the development of their Windows Media codecs, so it doesn't seem fair that they'd have to give the technology away for free. They already do license out the technology, which is why other players can use Windows Media files. So it's not something that they're restricting to Windows Media Player only.
It's just like Apple QuickTime and their Sorensen codec. A lot of people complain about having to install QuickTime whenever some new Star Wars trailer comes out, but Apple's spending their own money to license the codec in their own QuickTime player, so I think it's their right to restrict it to those people using their software. I don't like the QuickTime player — I actually hate having to install it, because it has a reputation for mucking things up — but I've got it installed anyway so that I can view certain things, and I don't have any qualms with Apple making me do that. Same with the Real Player. I'm not too fond of it, but I can't listen to my Phil Hendrie archives without it, and I know that it cost Real a good bit of money to create it, so I install it without any bitterness.
As for Real, I don't think they need to think about giving away the store. They should just keep producing their software, and having it (it being both the player and the server software) run on platforms that Windows Media isn't available on is a decent selling point for them. They won't be going away anytime soon anyway, because they've got some good content lined up, especially with their exclusive deals with certain major sports leagues.
Cheers,
Earthlink is tiny? They're the number 3 ISP. MSN has slightly more users.
MSNM doesn't have the same number of users as AIM, it has more.
The 6% for the AOL client browser doesn't forget anything, it is what it is. The 25M you mention is a big number (I believe it's actually closer to 30M now), but the subset of people who use the AOL client browser is smaller — many use the standard IE and Netscape instead. Whether AOL switches to a Mozilla/Gecko-based client or continues with the IE-based client, why would all these people already using the browser of their choice start using the AOL client browser instead? AOL distributing a standalone (non-AOL client) isn't relevant here, because XP will already be shipping with IE6.
I don't think the browser is significant, and AOL has better forms of leverage. One is that Microsoft wants AOL to switch from Real Media to using Windows Media. WM doesn't have nearly the position in the market that IE has; I don't know if they even have 50% yet. Another is that Microsoft wants MSNM users to be able to communicate with AIM users; as we've both said, MSNM definitely doesn't have 50% in the overall IM market. Another leverage point is that Microsoft would like AOL to quit complaining to the DoJ every other week (although AOL would probably like Microsoft to keep quiet about any talking it's doing to regulatory bodies vis-à-vis AOL-Time Warner doings). Microsoft has over 80% browser marketshare even when the AOL client users are taken out of the equation (it's about 86% when you include them), that's why these other things are a higher priority.
Cheers,
But having more users, which ICQ and AIM does combined, doesn't mean that they own the IM market and don't have anything to worry about, which was the point I pasted and was countering. It's like saying that Netscape owned the browser market when they were at 65 percent and dropping.
As to that second thing you asked about, it's a fact.
Cheers,
What strong-arming? Seeing as there aren't clients on the install disc for the thousands of ISPs out there, AOL is looking for a special benefit — having their client being one of the handful that are on the disc. In return, why shouldn't they give up something for the right? If they don't want to, why should they get the benefit that all those thousands of other ISPs aren't getting? Seems like it would be unfair to the other guys.
Cheers,
Actually the AOL client browser has less than 6 percent of the browser marketshare. A lot of AOL users don't use the client to browse the web, they use IE or Netscape. The point you bring up about MS-only extensions is a good one, but I think you have it a bit skewed. The most important issue about it is that AOL is scared to death that if they start using a Mozilla-based client instead, their customers are going to go nuts that they can't view some of their favorite web sites anymore, and that this will be a really bad time for pissed-off customers coming on the heels of their pricing increase combined with the new MSN program targetting pissed off AOL users by giving them free months and a price cut.
Cheers,
Not sure how that possibly got a +5, Insightful, but here goes.
MSN which isn't very popular anyway
Hmm, unless Juno has more subscribers (I don't have their numbers), MSN has the second largest base of U.S. subscribers. Guess it's not all that unpopular after all.
Given that it's Time Warner-AOL who have stopped the talks, not Microsoft
None of the linked articles say this. Where are you getting this from?
with ICQ/AIM they already own instant messaging
I wouldn't shed too many tears for Microsoft here. MSNM has now had more users than AIM for a couple of months now. AOL wouldn't be doing so much whining about instant messaging lately if they really owned the market.
have a HUGE base of AOL users whose switch from IE to Netscape would be a major defeat for Microsoft
Huge? The AOL browser client has less than 6 percent of the browser marketshare.
Sorry if it hurts the Mozilla fans' sense of self-esteem, but the browser that the AOL client uses is a very minor issue in this deal. AOL in fact worried about alienating their customers by downgrading them to Mozilla, and unfortunately for them, Microsoft knows this, which means that there is no browser bargaining chip. The disagreements have more to do with multimedia and the DoJ than any non-existant browser war.
Cheers,
Is it really apache.org's etc... fault if a trojan ssh on another isp's box was able to capture a password?
I'd say it's apache.org's fault. The people with access should be running a local copy of ssh, rather than trusting an ISP's version of it. Not just because some hacker might compromise the ISP, but maybe the ISP has a nosy employee or is in competition with apache.org, and one of their own people decides to install a keystroke logger into their version of ssh.
Along the same lines, they should also be connecting directly to apache.org's sshd, not to some sshd along the way and then think it's safe to ssh to apache.org. And naturally, their password for apache.org should be totally unique from any other passwords they're using. Then there's always going to be some people that you give access to who take shortcuts and don't follow the proper procedures, and you've got to deal with them somehow — because not too many people want to (or should) go around canning their own staff, but you have to make them realize how one seemingly little thing can screw things up for everybody else.
There's a lot more to security than just making sure you're patched against the latest exploits, and yeah, it sucks and is a pain in the ass, but your incentive is to look at the tons of sites getting hacked these days and make a conscious decision that you'd rather deal with the pain than to be the next dotpoint on the great defaced sites mirror in the sky.
Cheers,
Yep, that's the one answer that everybody gives, but they're not an independent company anymore, so there's no telling how they'd be doing in today's economy. Well, at least it was the one answer until some people around here decided to start calling IBM a GPL-based company, which is a total joke.
I'm sure there are other small consulting firms around the world that do this too.Then I'm sure it shouldn't be too difficult to name some. :)
Damn, this question really is a sore spot for you guys, isn't it?
Cheers,
Free software is for the good of the community, not the individual.
That pretty much sums it up for me, too, at least as far as the GPL goes (I'm making a distinction here between the GPL and free software, because I don't think the GPL offers freedom the way that the BSD license or public domain software does), which is why I'd discourage it. And just because I discourage it doesn't mean that I think that everyone shouldn't be able to use it if they want to or that there should be some McCarthyistic witchhunt against people who do (or don't).
I'm for the individual, not the collective that I firmly believe the GPL represents. Software aside, I think that the collective is always doomed in the face of free will.
Cheers,
The BSD license definitely offers freedom, the GPL clearly doesn't.
Cheers,
Imagine, he said, if recipes were packaged in black boxes, unavailable for nspection.
Maybe someone needs to explain to RMS that not all recipes are available to public inspection. See: Coca-Cola formula, KFC seven herbs and spices formula.
He went on to describe three additional freedoms which distinguish Free from proprietary software: the right to change software to suit user needs; to redistribute the software; and to publish improved versions.
But then it takes away the right to keep the changes to yourself. So much for freedom.
Citing the large number of companies now paying to develop Free software.
Did he also happen to cite the fact that so many of these companies are going tits up lately?
Cheers,
Slashdot did *not* get it wrong.
Slashdot headline: "UK Government Locks out Non-MS browsers.
Reality: People can access the site using Netscape.
Verdict: Slashdot got it wrong.
You cannot access that site from a non-microsoft operating system. Period.
Reality: MacOS and MacOSX users can access the site. Now, timely $150 million donations aside, MacOS/X is not a Microsoft operating system. :) Period.
Verdict: Tony Holyle got it wrong, too.
Cheers,
Yes, and Java 1.2 is somehow called Java 2. Everybody knows that Win2K is the successor to NT4 in the NT line, but nobody except possibly the same people who say "M$" ever calls it NT instead of Win2K, 2000, Windows 2000, etc. When someone says NT, they're talking about NT4 and earlier. If they're including Win2K, they say NT-based. Anyone can argue semantics about this, but we're talking about real-world usage here.
Cheers,
Oh, I'd agree with you on that, but Slashdot's reasoning seems to be a bit lacking. First off, people creating new systems aren't going to be buying NT. If they're going the Windows route, they'd be buying Win2K. So, this article doesn't affect those people.
Now, if I'm already using NT and don't want to be subjected the extra fees imposed by this pissant company(*), I'd have to switch operating systems. Except that switching to Linux isn't going to be getting me any bigger insurance discount than if I switch to Win2K. So how is this an incentive?
Anyway, I just found it amusing that the marketing arm of VA Linux (read: Slashdot) would post this now, to take away the heat from the SourceForge fiasco. Maybe some people out there remember that The Register ran a story about the exact same thing over a month ago. (You gonna tell me that scads of people didn't submit it then? If so, I've got a secure RedHat server sitting on some New Jersey beachfront property to sell you ;) ).
(*) Why would I refer to them as a "pissant company?" Well, how many insurance agencies are you aware of that have only eight employees? I think everyone here is grown up enough to admit that we'd have never heard of these guys either if not for this one particular policy, a policy that nobody else in the insurance biz seems to be moving to.
Cheers,
Sorry, but I don't think the whole eight employees of Wurzler has much of a say-so when it comes to reality.
Besides, why is Slashdot still fighting over Windows NT, the focus of this article? It's about 5 years old now, I'd think that Slashdot would be more worried about Windows 2000.
Also, it doesn't seem the article's author has done much comparing of security patches offered for holes on company web sites, since he chose to only mention NT's, even though there are a lot more for Debian 2.2 and RedHat 7.x, when you take into account how long they've been out. Oh well, what can one expect from Ziff Davis journalism?
Cheers,
Not for the base ASP.net server controls. Now, someone could use the standard browser capabilities control and extend the base control classes to do what you're talking about, but it would take extra effort and isn't all that different than how people do it today (the outcome, that is, not the methodology). The main point of ASP.net, for me at least, is that it's great for the developer, rather than making things prettier for the user. Stuff like moving from an interpreted scripting language-based model to having the code compiled, whether it's C#, Perl.Net, JScript.Net, etc.; making it easy and encouraging separation of code from content; great caching options; deploying web-apps by simply copying them to a web server, rather than having to worry about re-configuring the server or registering components, and extremely simple state-tracking and validation.
The kind of thing which you're talking about really only occurs with validation, where when you set the requirements that a form element must meet, ASP.net will produce pages (if the browser supports Javascript) that contain Javascript which will perform client-side validation. If the particular browser isn't using Javascript, then the client-side validation isn't used, and only server-side validation will occur after the user submits the form. (Don't worry, server-side validation is still performed even when client-side validation is used, the client-side checking can just prevent an extra trip to the server when the user fills out the form incorrectly.)
Cheers,