As usual, their discussion didn't solve anything, but they did highlight the salient points in the ongoing discussion.
I, for one, don't understand why adults believe kids can't distinguish between a game scenario and real life. One "concerned mother" used the example that when kids encounter a roadblock/barricade in a video game, their first response is a violent one (crash it). Encountering the "same" roadblock in real life she said, would thus cause them to have the same first response (violence of some sort). She more or less implied that such kids would run the real roadbloock because they'd seen/crashed one in a virtual situation.
I think kids can distinguish. When you played cops & robbers as kids, did you really think you were shooting-to-kill your playmates? (Those of you that did, are you now a psychopath?)
New WPA security ("improved WEP") any good?
on
Wireless Hacks
·
· Score: 1
The LinkSys WRT54G and client cards support this new thing called WPA -- WiFi Protected Access. According to the info at Linksys, WPA sorta builds on WEP, but improves it by doing regular key rotation (among other things).
Folks who have worked out other improvements over WEP also stressed key rotation.
So is WPA any good?
It requires FW updates on the client cards, or a card that alread supports it (several of the LinkSys "54G" (802.11g) client cards do support it).
The WRT54G router/AP and client card are on sale at Frys right now for $100 (AR) and $60 (AR) respectively. Is this worth it?
All I wanted to do was see what music they have available. They clutter up my system with several unnecessary pieces of bloated software, then REQUIRE a credit card # to simply browse what is available?
WHY iTunes is NO GOOD: _____________________
(1) They require a valid credit card # before you can even begin to browse the "store." How about I give you that number when/if I find something I want to buy?
This would be like The GAP requiring you to hand over your credit card when you cross the threhold of their B&M store. When you give it to them, they swipe the card and copy all the info from it. When you leave, they keep the info but give the card back.
BLECH!
(2) Apple installs a bunch of stuff that is unnecessary on my system:
(2a) "iPod Service" appears in my services list, with an executable within \Program Files\iPod\bin.
I don't have an iPod, I don't need one. I certainly don't want this "service" running. So I nuke it.
(2b) a "qttask.exe" appears in my QuickTime folder and is set to run at startup (with a registry entry in HKLM\software\microsoft\windows\currentversion\run ).
I don't need that crap, so I nuke it as well.
(2c) Another app set to auto-run at startup (same location in the registry tree) is "iTunesHelper.exe" in the iTunes install folder. Why do I need this _always_ running even when I'm not using iTunes?
So I nuke it as well.
Ah things are a bit more comfy now.
So I run the iTunes application again.
(3) It re-installs all this stuff I just disabled, puts back the registry keys, re-installs iPod Service, iTunesHelper, and qttask.exe.
So I nuke them all, and set the NTFS permissions on all files involved to read-only (I nuke the fuckers permanently).
(Oh yeah, they "upgraded" my version of QuickTime without even asking me. I wonder what this will break down the road...)
I run iTunes yet again. No weirdo apps/services any more, and the iTunes app runs just fine, connecting to the Apple site without any problems. (Why did they need all that other cruft running in the background I wonder?)
So now maybe I can use this thing without all the clutter. ALAS! They still want my credit card info before they will let me browse the store!
This sucks.
So I nuke the entire freaking iTunes installation, and burn the installer. I will not use software that is this intrusive; I certainly will not hand over credit card info until I find something I want to purchase...
All I wanted to do was see what music they have available. They clutter up my system with several unnecessary pieces of bloated software, then REQUIRE a credit card # to simply browse what is available?
WHY iTunes is NO GOOD: _____________________
(1) They require a valid credit card # before you can even begin to browse the "store." How about I give you that number when/if I find something I want to buy?
This would be like The GAP requiring you to hand over your credit card when you cross the threhold of their B&M store. When you give it to them, they swipe the card and copy all the info from it. When you leave, they keep the info but give the card back.
BLECH!
(2) Apple installs a bunch of stuff that is unnecessary on my system:
(2a) "iPod Service" appears in my services list, with an executable within \Program Files\iPod\bin.
I don't have an iPod, I don't need one. I certainly don't want this "service" running. So I nuke it.
(2b) a "qttask.exe" appears in my QuickTime folder and is set to run at startup (with a registry entry in HKLM\software\microsoft\windows\currentversion\run ).
I don't need that crap, so I nuke it as well.
(2c) Another app set to auto-run at startup (same location in the registry tree) is "iTunesHelper.exe" in the iTunes install folder. Why do I need this _always_ running even when I'm not using iTunes?
So I nuke it as well.
Ah things are a bit more comfy now.
So I run the iTunes application again.
(3) It re-installs all this stuff I just disabled, puts back the registry keys, re-installs iPod Service, iTunesHelper, and qttask.exe.
So I nuke them all, and set the NTFS permissions on all files involved to read-only (I nuke the fuckers permanently).
(Oh yeah, they "upgraded" my version of QuickTime without even asking me. I wonder what this will break down the road...)
I run iTunes yet again. No weirdo apps/services any more, and the iTunes app runs just fine, connecting to the Apple site without any problems. (Why did they need all that other cruft running in the background I wonder?)
So now maybe I can use this thing without all the clutter. ALAS! They still want my credit card info before they will let me browse the store!
This sucks.
So I nuke the entire freaking iTunes installation, and burn the installer. I will not use software that is this intrusive; I certainly will not hand over credit card info until I find something I want to purchase...
All I wanted to do was see what music they have available. They clutter up my system with several unnecessary pieces of bloated software, then REQUIRE a credit card # to simply browse what is available?
iTunes is NO GOOD: ------------------
(1) They require a valid credit card # before you can even begin to browse the "store." How about I give you that number when/if I find something I want to buy.
This would be like The GAP requiring you to hand over your credit card when you cross the threhold of their B&M store. When you give it to them, they swipe the card and copy all the info from it. When you leave, they keep the info but give the card back.
BLECH!
(2) Apple installs a bunch of stuff that is unnecessary on my system:
(2a) iPod Service appears in my services list, with an executable at \Program Files\iPod\bin.
I don't have an iPod, I don't need one. I don't want this "service" running. So I nuked it
(2b) a "qttask.exe" appears in my QuickTime folder and is set to run at startup (with a registry entry in HKLM/software/microsoft/windows/currentversion/run ).
I don't need that crap, so I nuke it as well.
(2c) Another app set to auto-run at startup (same reg key) is "iTunesHelper.exe" in the iTunes install folder. Why do I need this _always_ running even when I'm not using iTunes?
So I nuke it as well.
Ah things are a bit more comfy now.
So I run the iTunes application again.
(3) It re-installs all this shit I just disabled, puts back the registry keys, re-installs iPod Service, iTunesHelper, and qttask.
So I nuke them all, and set the NTFS permissions on all files involved to read-only (I nuke the fuckers permanently).
I run iTunes again. No weirdo apps/services any more, but they still want my credit card info before they will let me browse the store!
This sucks.
So I nuke the entire f\/cking iTunes installation, and burn the installer. Apple has not gotten any better at making software, IMHO.
I daily use my HP 200LX palmtop. This particular unit is four years old (my second), but the machine has been around since 1992 in its earliest (95LX) incarnation. The 200LX came out around (?) 94?
It's a 11oz 186-based handheld/PDA/palmtop, which runs DOS and HP's custom GUIY environment on top of that. Sleeps/unsleeps in a fraction of a second, lets you switch quickly between multiple apps (no true multitasking, however).
Still works for me!
Ramifications for encryption?
on
Grid Processing
·
· Score: 1
Are processors such as the one proposed by the end of the decade any threat to encryption products with small keys?
I.e., how soon will the average processor available on the street be able to crack a 56-bit DES key? A 128 bit key? Will a 1024 bit key ever be crackable by brute force?
We keep hearing that "all the kings computers and all the kings men" could never crack 1024 bits by brute force in millenia of trying. But does the continued exponential advancement of computing power threaten this state of affairs?
Screen real estate growth unfortunately does not follow Moore's Law, although GUI designers seem to think it does.
At least that's my conclusion based on how each of their design generations eat up more and more pixels.
With the epicenter of UI design centered upon 1 Infinite Loop in Cupertino, naturally Apple wasted more pixels first (see Aqua). Alas, MS seems to be copying that trend.
For example, take this image from the posted screen snaps:
Why is the title bar so tall? There are lots of blueish pixels in the mid-right area that are simply going unused.
Why are there so many blank/white pixels in the right/lower region of the window, and also in the lower left corner?
Why is the window frame/border so wide? I can clearly see the edge of a sheet of paper when it lies atop others on my desk, and it surely isn't 0.5...1.0 cm wide.
Number 2 above reminds me of the way Win2K changed the default display desktop "explorer" windows. They decided it was necessary to infer the "type" of the folder being displayed, and consume a huge, wide column in the left-hand portion of the window. For Most (>80%) windows, it said something ReallyUseful(tm), like "Folder," with a big yellow folder icon. In a few obscure cases, the icon would differ, and the description in the left-hand column would display a bit more info -- perhaps thumbnail previews of pictures in an entirely image-containing directory.
Regarding Number 3 above: I know the U.S. baby boomers are aging en masse, but how big must these visual cues be? At [probably] half way thru my life, my eyes are certainly no longer those of a teen ager. Yet why do I need 20 blue pixels horizontally to distinguish this window's vertical borders (I counted, each is 10pix wide) from others underneath? The content area of this window is 532 pixels wide, so these borders represent ~4% of the content. IMHO this is wasteful.
But mostly, Mostly, that left-hand column in the windoze desktop explorer meant 1/3 of most folder windows were wasted showing blank/white pixels. Ayah.
All of these nits waste space on my dual 20" flat screen display-driven desktop (driven by a Matrox dualie card).
I paid money (lots) for all those pixels, and they are increasingly wasted in an indiscriminate manner. Blech.
P.S.: Of course, it is windoze, and so various Registry entries may allow certain customisations. Unfortunately, that level of control is also decreasing.
due to the way windoze displays file/folder sizes (truncation, not rounding) the size is 4.48MB (not 4.48MB) if you wish to display two digits of accuracy to the right of the decimal point:
Isn't it against the interests of existing credit card companies for the model to change at all?
One reason the micropayment idea doesn't work with the current CC's is that the tax paid to the handlers becomes an inordinately high proportion of the payment when payment itself is small ( $1 ).
If the micropayment idea takes off, won't it pressure the CC monopoly to reduce its tax, thus undercutting their high profits?
Isn't the average jet airliner moving too fast (what, over 600MPH/950KPH) for the mobile handset to keep connection with one cell long enough to be adequately/reliably handed off to the next cell?
I see cell towers every few miles along the freeway. Assuming each is a cell, and that the maximum range of a cell isn't much further than that, won't the phone have a b|tch of a time maintaining contact with any one cell before it passes out of range?
Direct mail advertisers often use lists "rented" from a list provider, paying a lease fee. Certain demographics / list subsets may be quite valuable and are priced appropriately.
If the advertiser is paying for a fixed number of uses of the list, the list provider wants to ensure that the advertiser doesn't go beyond the agreed-upon number of uses. So the lists are seeded with dummy names back to the provider.
If the list provider sees too many mailings on those seed names, the advertiser gets busted.
They've been doing this for at least twenty years (that I know about), but has probly been going on for lots longer...
If your activities depend upon GPS (are not simply assisted or made more convenient by it) what happens when/if GPS fails?
I.e., if 911 emergency services depend upon GPS and map/direction assist systems in order to find your burning house, what happens if GPS fails for some reason?
I know GPS is built to be redundant, but business (or other activities) that _depend_ on GPS should have a "manual" backup when possible.
Slashdot Mirror
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/05/opinion/05ALDR.h tml?pagewanted=print
They also discussed the proposed bill "Protect Children from Video Game Sex and Violence Act of 2003". I'm sure you gamers will like that one.
As usual, their discussion didn't solve anything, but they did highlight the salient points in the ongoing discussion.
I, for one, don't understand why adults believe kids can't distinguish between a game scenario and real life. One "concerned mother" used the example that when kids encounter a roadblock/barricade in a video game, their first response is a violent one (crash it). Encountering the "same" roadblock in real life she said, would thus cause them to have the same first response (violence of some sort). She more or less implied that such kids would run the real roadbloock because they'd seen/crashed one in a virtual situation.
I think kids can distinguish. When you played cops & robbers as kids, did you really think you were shooting-to-kill your playmates? (Those of you that did, are you now a psychopath?)
Folks who have worked out other improvements over WEP also stressed key rotation.
So is WPA any good?
It requires FW updates on the client cards, or a card that alread supports it (several of the LinkSys "54G" (802.11g) client cards do support it).
The WRT54G router/AP and client card are on sale at Frys right now for $100 (AR) and $60 (AR) respectively. Is this worth it?
All I wanted to do was see what music they have available. They clutter up my system with several unnecessary pieces of bloated software, then REQUIRE a credit card # to simply browse what is available?
n ).
WHY iTunes is NO GOOD:
_____________________
(1) They require a valid credit card # before you can even begin to browse the "store." How about I give you that number when/if I find something I want to buy?
This would be like The GAP requiring you to hand over your credit card when you cross the threhold of their B&M store. When you give it to them, they swipe the card and copy all the info from it. When you leave, they keep the info but give the card back.
BLECH!
(2) Apple installs a bunch of stuff that is unnecessary on my system:
(2a) "iPod Service" appears in my services list, with an executable within \Program Files\iPod\bin.
I don't have an iPod, I don't need one. I certainly don't want this "service" running. So I nuke it.
(2b) a "qttask.exe" appears in my QuickTime folder and is set to run at startup (with a registry entry in HKLM\software\microsoft\windows\currentversion\ru
I don't need that crap, so I nuke it as well.
(2c) Another app set to auto-run at startup (same location in the registry tree) is "iTunesHelper.exe" in the iTunes install folder. Why do I need this _always_ running even when I'm not using iTunes?
So I nuke it as well.
Ah things are a bit more comfy now.
So I run the iTunes application again.
(3) It re-installs all this stuff I just disabled, puts back the registry keys, re-installs iPod Service, iTunesHelper, and qttask.exe.
So I nuke them all, and set the NTFS permissions on all files involved to read-only (I nuke the fuckers permanently).
(Oh yeah, they "upgraded" my version of QuickTime without even asking me. I wonder what this will break down the road...)
I run iTunes yet again. No weirdo apps/services any more, and the iTunes app runs just fine, connecting to the Apple site without any problems. (Why did they need all that other cruft running in the background I wonder?)
So now maybe I can use this thing without all the clutter. ALAS! They still want my credit card info before they will let me browse the store!
This sucks.
So I nuke the entire freaking iTunes installation, and burn the installer. I will not use software that is this intrusive; I certainly will not hand over credit card info until I find something I want to purchase...
All I wanted to do was see what music they have available. They clutter up my system with several unnecessary pieces of bloated software, then REQUIRE a credit card # to simply browse what is available?
n ).
WHY iTunes is NO GOOD:
_____________________
(1) They require a valid credit card # before you can even begin to browse the "store." How about I give you that number when/if I find something I want to buy?
This would be like The GAP requiring you to hand over your credit card when you cross the threhold of their B&M store. When you give it to them, they swipe the card and copy all the info from it. When you leave, they keep the info but give the card back.
BLECH!
(2) Apple installs a bunch of stuff that is unnecessary on my system:
(2a) "iPod Service" appears in my services list, with an executable within \Program Files\iPod\bin.
I don't have an iPod, I don't need one. I certainly don't want this "service" running. So I nuke it.
(2b) a "qttask.exe" appears in my QuickTime folder and is set to run at startup (with a registry entry in HKLM\software\microsoft\windows\currentversion\ru
I don't need that crap, so I nuke it as well.
(2c) Another app set to auto-run at startup (same location in the registry tree) is "iTunesHelper.exe" in the iTunes install folder. Why do I need this _always_ running even when I'm not using iTunes?
So I nuke it as well.
Ah things are a bit more comfy now.
So I run the iTunes application again.
(3) It re-installs all this stuff I just disabled, puts back the registry keys, re-installs iPod Service, iTunesHelper, and qttask.exe.
So I nuke them all, and set the NTFS permissions on all files involved to read-only (I nuke the fuckers permanently).
(Oh yeah, they "upgraded" my version of QuickTime without even asking me. I wonder what this will break down the road...)
I run iTunes yet again. No weirdo apps/services any more, and the iTunes app runs just fine, connecting to the Apple site without any problems. (Why did they need all that other cruft running in the background I wonder?)
So now maybe I can use this thing without all the clutter. ALAS! They still want my credit card info before they will let me browse the store!
This sucks.
So I nuke the entire freaking iTunes installation, and burn the installer. I will not use software that is this intrusive; I certainly will not hand over credit card info until I find something I want to purchase...
All I wanted to do was see what music they have available. They clutter up my system with several unnecessary pieces of bloated software, then REQUIRE a credit card # to simply browse what is available?
n ).
iTunes is NO GOOD:
------------------
(1) They require a valid credit card # before you can even begin to browse the "store." How about I give you that number when/if I find something I want to buy.
This would be like The GAP requiring you to hand over your credit card when you cross the threhold of their B&M store. When you give it to them, they swipe the card and copy all the info from it. When you leave, they keep the info but give the card back.
BLECH!
(2) Apple installs a bunch of stuff that is unnecessary on my system:
(2a) iPod Service appears in my services list, with an executable at \Program Files\iPod\bin.
I don't have an iPod, I don't need one. I don't want this "service" running. So I nuked it
(2b) a "qttask.exe" appears in my QuickTime folder and is set to run at startup (with a registry entry in HKLM/software/microsoft/windows/currentversion/ru
I don't need that crap, so I nuke it as well.
(2c) Another app set to auto-run at startup (same reg key) is "iTunesHelper.exe" in the iTunes install folder. Why do I need this _always_ running even when I'm not using iTunes?
So I nuke it as well.
Ah things are a bit more comfy now.
So I run the iTunes application again.
(3) It re-installs all this shit I just disabled, puts back the registry keys, re-installs iPod Service, iTunesHelper, and qttask.
So I nuke them all, and set the NTFS permissions on all files involved to read-only (I nuke the fuckers permanently).
I run iTunes again. No weirdo apps/services any more, but they still want my credit card info before they will let me browse the store!
This sucks.
So I nuke the entire f\/cking iTunes installation, and burn the installer. Apple has not gotten any better at making software, IMHO.
I daily use my HP 200LX palmtop. This particular unit is four years old (my second), but the machine has been around since 1992 in its earliest (95LX) incarnation. The 200LX came out around (?) 94?
It's a 11oz 186-based handheld/PDA/palmtop, which runs DOS and HP's custom GUIY environment on top of that. Sleeps/unsleeps in a fraction of a second, lets you switch quickly between multiple apps (no true multitasking, however).
Still works for me!
Are processors such as the one proposed by the end of the decade any threat to encryption products with small keys?
I.e., how soon will the average processor available on the street be able to crack a 56-bit DES key? A 128 bit key? Will a 1024 bit key ever be crackable by brute force?
We keep hearing that "all the kings computers and all the kings men" could never crack 1024 bits by brute force in millenia of trying. But does the continued exponential advancement of computing power threaten this state of affairs?
Don't forget about Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics. Let's see what they have to say about Hulk.
At least that's my conclusion based on how each of their design generations eat up more and more pixels.
With the epicenter of UI design centered upon 1 Infinite Loop in Cupertino, naturally Apple wasted more pixels first (see Aqua). Alas, MS seems to be copying that trend.
For example, take this image from the posted screen snaps:
Number 2 above reminds me of the way Win2K changed the default display desktop "explorer" windows. They decided it was necessary to infer the "type" of the folder being displayed, and consume a huge, wide column in the left-hand portion of the window. For Most (>80%) windows, it said something ReallyUseful(tm), like "Folder," with a big yellow folder icon. In a few obscure cases, the icon would differ, and the description in the left-hand column would display a bit more info -- perhaps thumbnail previews of pictures in an entirely image-containing directory.
Regarding Number 3 above: I know the U.S. baby boomers are aging en masse, but how big must these visual cues be? At [probably] half way thru my life, my eyes are certainly no longer those of a teen ager. Yet why do I need 20 blue pixels horizontally to distinguish this window's vertical borders (I counted, each is 10pix wide) from others underneath? The content area of this window is 532 pixels wide, so these borders represent ~4% of the content. IMHO this is wasteful.
But mostly, Mostly, that left-hand column in the windoze desktop explorer meant 1/3 of most folder windows were wasted showing blank/white pixels. Ayah.
All of these nits waste space on my dual 20" flat screen display-driven desktop (driven by a Matrox dualie card).
I paid money (lots) for all those pixels, and they are increasingly wasted in an indiscriminate manner. Blech.
P.S.: Of course, it is windoze, and so various Registry entries may allow certain customisations. Unfortunately, that level of control is also decreasing.
... to fix it.
If he's as knowledgeable about electrical wiring as he is about Unix, perhaps something "good" will happen.
due to the way windoze displays file/folder sizes (truncation, not rounding) the size is 4.48MB (not 4.48MB) if you wish to display two digits of accuracy to the right of the decimal point:
4,695,650bytes / 1024 / 1024 == 4.478
round that down to one fewer digit: 4.48
Looks like we're running out of sand here in the U.S.
As in, "What do you need if you have 100 lawyers buried up to their necks in sand?"
"More sand."
With over two hundred million people in the U.S., two million jobs is approaching 1% of the entire population.
1% of people are sitting around making spam phone calls to my house, and will be out of work because people sign up with http://www.donotcall.gov/ ???
I think not!
Now those morons who attempt to drive their 50 foot RV (aka, "Land Barge") up a twisty/windy Colorado mountain road --
WILL ACTUALLY BE DRIVING A BOAT!
What will they think of next?
When the heck is Google going to add a NEAR operator? Altavista has had this since its inception, but Google continues to lack it.
All the freaking time, I get way too many irrelevant "matches" from Google because looks across the entire document for my search terms.
Isn't it against the interests of existing credit card companies for the model to change at all?
One reason the micropayment idea doesn't work with the current CC's is that the tax paid to the handlers becomes an inordinately high proportion of the payment when payment itself is small ( $1 ).
If the micropayment idea takes off, won't it pressure the CC monopoly to reduce its tax, thus undercutting their high profits?
Now they just need to get a real operating system for their handhelds -- something other than blechy Palm.
Isn't the average jet airliner moving too fast (what, over 600MPH/950KPH) for the mobile handset to keep connection with one cell long enough to be adequately/reliably handed off to the next cell?
I see cell towers every few miles along the freeway. Assuming each is a cell, and that the maximum range of a cell isn't much further than that, won't the phone have a b|tch of a time maintaining contact with any one cell before it passes out of range?
Woo hoo! My $33 dividend check is now tax free!
I'm rich. I'm RICH!
"Congress May Overturn FCC's Media Consolidation Plan"
Yeah right.
Congress will also give out tax cuts that affect everyday citizens, not just the uber-rich Gates of the country.
NOT!
Direct mail advertisers often use lists "rented" from a list provider, paying a lease fee. Certain demographics / list subsets may be quite valuable and are priced appropriately.
If the advertiser is paying for a fixed number of uses of the list, the list provider wants to ensure that the advertiser doesn't go beyond the agreed-upon number of uses. So the lists are seeded with dummy names back to the provider.
If the list provider sees too many mailings on those seed names, the advertiser gets busted.
They've been doing this for at least twenty years (that I know about), but has probly been going on for lots longer...
"Remember the Federal government is already
Microsoft's biggest customer."
I thought the Federal Government was now a _subsidiary_ of Microsoft?
If your activities depend upon GPS (are not simply assisted or made more convenient by it) what happens when/if GPS fails?
I.e., if 911 emergency services depend upon GPS and map/direction assist systems in order to find your burning house, what happens if GPS fails for some reason?
I know GPS is built to be redundant, but business (or other activities) that _depend_ on GPS should have a "manual" backup when possible.
too late already, next comes Soylent Green