You would be much more credible in your wild claims if you could spell the word "satellite" correctly, you know.
Not to mention "too", and treating Earth as a proper noun wouldn't go amiss either. (Also, "the Earth" sounds more natural to me, but now I'm getting picky)
*sigh* I'm talking about viruses and malware, not remote exploits - don't worry though, I'm used to people mixing the two up.
There's also the (always ignored) point that most script kiddies "grow up" (you know what I mean) targetting Windows, and so once they've found an IIS exploit they have lots of ready-made 'ware and experience with which to root the box. On the other hand, the vast majority of apache installs are on Linux, for which they generally have neither.
With literally tens of millions of machines to choose from and generally nothing tangible to gain, why bother going for anything but the easiest of targets? That's ignoring the other fact that the vast majority of people targetting machines are just using exploits developed by one of handful of actual crackers, too. Besides which, by far and away the most commonly compromised type of box is the desktop, and the vast majority of those run Windows. It's very much rarer for a server to be compromised, mostly because most of them are maintained by people who know what they're doing, unlike the vast majority of desktops...
Downloading third party software on my Macintosh does not seem to get me into trouble in the same manner as it does on Windows
That'll be because no-one targets the Mac with spyware or viruses, because Windows is a soft enough target and has vastly more market share; it's not worth their while to yet.
Q: Might you add anti-virus/spyware protection in Windows? Gates: It's not a thing you build in. You have to offer a service......Why is that Mr. Gates?
Because if he did, he'd have avs companies and MS-unfriendly tech sites screaming bloody murder about MS using their monopoly to enter new markets, just like they did when they first included a firewall. They can only weather so much of that before people start muttering "anti-trust" and starting court procedings. They're in the middle of getting slapped for that sort of thing here in the EU, I don't suppose they want another one just yet.
And while you're experiencing that warm glow inside, how are you paying for life's little essentials like food and housing if you're not making any money because no-one's paying you/your employer?
Sure, I'd be flattered if I was in that position, but I'd also be worried about my mortgage payments, etc.
So, if they decided to send promo copies to journalists (where 99% of leaks come from), then only the publisher is to blame.
Only the publisher? Not the journalist that actually leaked it?
Sure, you can argue that the publisher was stupid for releasing it to a group that's well known for leaking stuff (assuming that's the case), but that doesn't excuse whoever actually leaked it, imho.
Imagine how hard it would be for the cops to give speeding tickets if every one of us drove a "black sedan".
Yeah; pity about the licence plates though...
Re:We need to keep re-inventing the browser
on
Netscape Turns 10
·
· Score: 1
Leverage XUL.
Two counter points:
1) Using any browser-specific tech is, imho, a bad idea. I don't care if it's IE-specific or Mozilla-specific, you're annoying and possibly locking-out users of other browsers. Perhaps you don't care, but I want the sites I work on to be usable by as many people as possible
2) Eeeewwwww, you said leverage!!!;-)
Better editing controls. Yes, I know what you're thinking: Keep Firefox lean.
No I'm not. I'm thinking "keep it well designed and componentized (at the code level if not the "user-level") to make development and maintainability easier and help keep bugs to a minimum". I'm also thinking "at the same time, don't shy-away from including useful features just because they'll increase resource requirements". Modern PCs have more resources than the average user will ever need, might as well make use of them sensibly.
Oh, and slightly off-topic, but as you mentioned it, I finally got round to downloading and installing Thunderbird again. Something I don't understand at all - mail import for Outlook, Oulook Express, Communicator 4 and Eudora, but not Mozilla? Ah well, maybe next version...
I have an iRiver HP-120 and there's no way I'd ever swap it for an iPod, if only because of the remote control. The main unit sits on my belt in its case, so having a remote with an LCD display is just so uesful there's no way I could use a player that didn't have one.
a Linux user would have to read the email, save the attachment, give the attachment executable permissions, and then run the executable
Yeah, and I've received a couple of viruses for Windows as zipped attachments to emails. I'd have had to save (or open) the zip file, extract the contents, then run the executable.
I still received it, so someone did that.
You may be too young to remember computers before the Internet came along*, but I'm not. I remember viruses back when there were half a dozen or more different home computer systems, and the only way to spread was via infected floppy. People still got them.
If and when Linux gains significant market share, people will target it with viruses and other malware. They may not be able to spread from machine to machine automatically, but they will exist, and they will cause damage. People using Linux are going to get used to typing in the root password when they need to install stuff, so they're going to do it for that little KDE applet that puts the weather forecast in their KDE taskbar, or whatever. That applet is going to install spyware, or have been infected with a virus, or whatever, and it's all going to be installed with root privileges.
It is extremely difficult to protect a machine from a clueless/inexperienced user with the administrative password. I know of no evidence that says that Linux is any different in that respect.
[* Man, do I feel old saying that - but I've been using computers for about 22 years now]
If they're in the default install, does it really matter? Either way, your average non-admin type user is going to get hosed.
Also, it could be argued that as the distribution is providing those apps, they are effectively certifying them as safe to the best of their ability to do so. Hey, we see many comments here railing against the "no warranty" clauses in EULAs, ignoring that the same clause is in the GPL; if MS should be responsible for their OS, why not RedHat, etc? Because it's free? Because they don't write all the code? True, but they choose it all, and have access to the source.
Perhaps it's time one distribution or another started to rationalise the software they ship (and no, I'm not volunteering, merely suggesting it as an idea to improve Linux). No-one needs a dozen text editors or four MTAs.
Well, I believe that you can configure IE to always accept downloads from websites; that's not the default though, so you have to change it yourself to be so insecure. On the other hand, there have been a couple of exploits that have enabled sites to silently(?) install stuff without the user's knowledge. Of course, they've been patched, but this is/., where we harp on about things long after they've ceased to be the case.
Going out to the owners house to fix his goddamned PC afterwork on about two minutes notice
At which point, I'd have told him where to shove his PC. Seriously, I'm currently on a project that's just coming to an end, and is really, really important to my employer. It's also been very tight, with a wooly spec and changing requirements, and has required a great deal of hard work and long hours.
So, when it was announced (by two of the project managers) that one of the higher-ups had declared that we should be in at 6 am on the morning of the go-live, my reaction was literally "Fuck off!". I have an hour commute; even getting a taxi in, I'd have had to be up at about 4, for no extra money (of course), most likely waking my family in the process. I'd worked 7 of the previous 8 weekend days, only taking one off for my birthday, and had been putting in 9 hour days at least every day; in at 6? No.
In the end, I was in at 8, and as predicted, it almost wouldn't have mattered if I'd not been in at all; everything was in the hands of the systems guys at that point. Didn't stop the manager wanting to be seen (by the client) to be making sure that everyone was working as hard as possible, whether it was useful or not.
What good would Kyoto have done if it exempted the country who needs it most?
Well, look at it this way - even if that one country was responsible for 50% of the emissions, you could still cut world-wide emissions by up to 50%.
Besides, I personally don't think "Well, no-one else is bothering, so why should I?" is a good enough reason to not do something. That's just me though, and I can certainly see the attraction.
I can say with 5 years experience of developing applications of varying sizes in Java that that is bullshit. No language or technique guarantees bug-free code; some (like Java) make it easier than others, but none is perfect.
Why not? A few months ago it was one guy's opinion of why Java and all Java programmers suck, and why Python rules.
This is slashdot; the website is paid for (at least in part) by ad impressions, and nothing drives ad impressions like a good flamebait article, to really get people good and pissed and posting like there's no tomorrow...
Re:Limitations of Generics in Java.
on
Java 1.5 vs C#
·
· Score: 1
My mistake; you are indeed correct. I seldom have cause to use an anonymous class, and in those rare occasions when I have done (generally creating an anonymous Comparator), I have of course been doing it to implement a single method.
Re:Limitations of Generics in Java.
on
Java 1.5 vs C#
·
· Score: 1
Java has had anonymous methods for as long as I've been using the language (approx 5.5 years), while C# is (as I understand it) only gaining them in 2.0.
(Not to denigrate C# at all, it's my other language of choice)
I was going to post a question specifically asking about the ending of Diamond Age (something like "What, did you just get bored of it?"), but I see I was beaten to it - several times, in fact:-)
That spoilt the book a little for me; it doesn't so much conclude as just end. I almost feel as though there's supposed to be a second volume, or another few dozen pages or something...
I compete with local programmers as much as off-shore programmers and I see no reason to differentiate
The problem there is that due to differing circumstances in your country and theirs, they are able to work for far less money than you. That makes them a whole lot more attractive on that front, meaning that you have to be a whole lot more attractive on some other front.
In the end, as they gain experience, you'll be forced to compete on price, and then it's either game over, or time to move out there.
Globalisation has the effect of equalising salaries (for the workers, mind, not the bosses) everywhere. That's fine once it's happened, as prices of stuff will have to equalise too - but it'll be hard to be amongst the first industries to be hit by it. *That* is the problem we techies have; we see the bad stuff (lack of job security, loss of potential earnings, etc) without the good stuff (lowering of prices, etc)
I think you should differentiate between 'the RIAA' and 'the RIAA's employees'
True, but as and when the members of the RIAA go out of business, that hurts their employees in much the same way as massive outsourcing of jobs hurts IT workers.
So, what you're saying is that two wrongs make a right? That because of the actions and policies of a few people at board level, it's okay to want an industry to be destroyed, no matter the consequences for the ordinary, hard-working (or not) folks it employs?
Slashdot Mirror
but the signal is trespassing on my property
No it isn't.
You would be much more credible in your wild claims if you could spell the word "satellite" correctly, you know.
Not to mention "too", and treating Earth as a proper noun wouldn't go amiss either. (Also, "the Earth" sounds more natural to me, but now I'm getting picky)
*sigh* I'm talking about viruses and malware, not remote exploits - don't worry though, I'm used to people mixing the two up.
There's also the (always ignored) point that most script kiddies "grow up" (you know what I mean) targetting Windows, and so once they've found an IIS exploit they have lots of ready-made 'ware and experience with which to root the box. On the other hand, the vast majority of apache installs are on Linux, for which they generally have neither.
With literally tens of millions of machines to choose from and generally nothing tangible to gain, why bother going for anything but the easiest of targets? That's ignoring the other fact that the vast majority of people targetting machines are just using exploits developed by one of handful of actual crackers, too. Besides which, by far and away the most commonly compromised type of box is the desktop, and the vast majority of those run Windows. It's very much rarer for a server to be compromised, mostly because most of them are maintained by people who know what they're doing, unlike the vast majority of desktops...
Downloading third party software on my Macintosh does not seem to get me into trouble in the same manner as it does on Windows
That'll be because no-one targets the Mac with spyware or viruses, because Windows is a soft enough target and has vastly more market share; it's not worth their while to yet.
Q: Might you add anti-virus/spyware protection in Windows? Gates: It's not a thing you build in. You have to offer a service......Why is that Mr. Gates?
Because if he did, he'd have avs companies and MS-unfriendly tech sites screaming bloody murder about MS using their monopoly to enter new markets, just like they did when they first included a firewall. They can only weather so much of that before people start muttering "anti-trust" and starting court procedings. They're in the middle of getting slapped for that sort of thing here in the EU, I don't suppose they want another one just yet.
Or $50 or so to buy it...
And while you're experiencing that warm glow inside, how are you paying for life's little essentials like food and housing if you're not making any money because no-one's paying you/your employer?
Sure, I'd be flattered if I was in that position, but I'd also be worried about my mortgage payments, etc.
So, if they decided to send promo copies to journalists (where 99% of leaks come from), then only the publisher is to blame.
Only the publisher? Not the journalist that actually leaked it?
Sure, you can argue that the publisher was stupid for releasing it to a group that's well known for leaking stuff (assuming that's the case), but that doesn't excuse whoever actually leaked it, imho.
Imagine how hard it would be for the cops to give speeding tickets if every one of us drove a "black sedan".
Yeah; pity about the licence plates though...
Leverage XUL.
;-)
Two counter points:
1) Using any browser-specific tech is, imho, a bad idea. I don't care if it's IE-specific or Mozilla-specific, you're annoying and possibly locking-out users of other browsers. Perhaps you don't care, but I want the sites I work on to be usable by as many people as possible
2) Eeeewwwww, you said leverage!!!
Better editing controls. Yes, I know what you're thinking: Keep Firefox lean.
No I'm not. I'm thinking "keep it well designed and componentized (at the code level if not the "user-level") to make development and maintainability easier and help keep bugs to a minimum". I'm also thinking "at the same time, don't shy-away from including useful features just because they'll increase resource requirements". Modern PCs have more resources than the average user will ever need, might as well make use of them sensibly.
Oh, and slightly off-topic, but as you mentioned it, I finally got round to downloading and installing Thunderbird again. Something I don't understand at all - mail import for Outlook, Oulook Express, Communicator 4 and Eudora, but not Mozilla? Ah well, maybe next version...
I have an iRiver HP-120 and there's no way I'd ever swap it for an iPod, if only because of the remote control. The main unit sits on my belt in its case, so having a remote with an LCD display is just so uesful there's no way I could use a player that didn't have one.
From the article:
a Linux user would have to read the email, save the attachment, give the attachment executable permissions, and then run the executable
Yeah, and I've received a couple of viruses for Windows as zipped attachments to emails. I'd have had to save (or open) the zip file, extract the contents, then run the executable.
I still received it, so someone did that.
You may be too young to remember computers before the Internet came along*, but I'm not. I remember viruses back when there were half a dozen or more different home computer systems, and the only way to spread was via infected floppy. People still got them.
If and when Linux gains significant market share, people will target it with viruses and other malware. They may not be able to spread from machine to machine automatically, but they will exist, and they will cause damage. People using Linux are going to get used to typing in the root password when they need to install stuff, so they're going to do it for that little KDE applet that puts the weather forecast in their KDE taskbar, or whatever. That applet is going to install spyware, or have been infected with a virus, or whatever, and it's all going to be installed with root privileges.
It is extremely difficult to protect a machine from a clueless/inexperienced user with the administrative password. I know of no evidence that says that Linux is any different in that respect.
[* Man, do I feel old saying that - but I've been using computers for about 22 years now]
If they're in the default install, does it really matter? Either way, your average non-admin type user is going to get hosed.
Also, it could be argued that as the distribution is providing those apps, they are effectively certifying them as safe to the best of their ability to do so. Hey, we see many comments here railing against the "no warranty" clauses in EULAs, ignoring that the same clause is in the GPL; if MS should be responsible for their OS, why not RedHat, etc? Because it's free? Because they don't write all the code? True, but they choose it all, and have access to the source.
Perhaps it's time one distribution or another started to rationalise the software they ship (and no, I'm not volunteering, merely suggesting it as an idea to improve Linux). No-one needs a dozen text editors or four MTAs.
What is this 'auto download' that you speak of?
/., where we harp on about things long after they've ceased to be the case.
Well, I believe that you can configure IE to always accept downloads from websites; that's not the default though, so you have to change it yourself to be so insecure. On the other hand, there have been a couple of exploits that have enabled sites to silently(?) install stuff without the user's knowledge. Of course, they've been patched, but this is
Going out to the owners house to fix his goddamned PC afterwork on about two minutes notice
At which point, I'd have told him where to shove his PC. Seriously, I'm currently on a project that's just coming to an end, and is really, really important to my employer. It's also been very tight, with a wooly spec and changing requirements, and has required a great deal of hard work and long hours.
So, when it was announced (by two of the project managers) that one of the higher-ups had declared that we should be in at 6 am on the morning of the go-live, my reaction was literally "Fuck off!". I have an hour commute; even getting a taxi in, I'd have had to be up at about 4, for no extra money (of course), most likely waking my family in the process. I'd worked 7 of the previous 8 weekend days, only taking one off for my birthday, and had been putting in 9 hour days at least every day; in at 6? No.
In the end, I was in at 8, and as predicted, it almost wouldn't have mattered if I'd not been in at all; everything was in the hands of the systems guys at that point. Didn't stop the manager wanting to be seen (by the client) to be making sure that everyone was working as hard as possible, whether it was useful or not.
What good would Kyoto have done if it exempted the country who needs it most?
Well, look at it this way - even if that one country was responsible for 50% of the emissions, you could still cut world-wide emissions by up to 50%.
Besides, I personally don't think "Well, no-one else is bothering, so why should I?" is a good enough reason to not do something. That's just me though, and I can certainly see the attraction.
...because they have to stare at the it.slashdot.org colour scheme all day!
I can say with 5 years experience of developing applications of varying sizes in Java that that is bullshit. No language or technique guarantees bug-free code; some (like Java) make it easier than others, but none is perfect.
Bingo!!! What do I win?
Why not? A few months ago it was one guy's opinion of why Java and all Java programmers suck, and why Python rules.
This is slashdot; the website is paid for (at least in part) by ad impressions, and nothing drives ad impressions like a good flamebait article, to really get people good and pissed and posting like there's no tomorrow...
My mistake; you are indeed correct. I seldom have cause to use an anonymous class, and in those rare occasions when I have done (generally creating an anonymous Comparator), I have of course been doing it to implement a single method.
Java has had anonymous methods for as long as I've been using the language (approx 5.5 years), while C# is (as I understand it) only gaining them in 2.0.
(Not to denigrate C# at all, it's my other language of choice)
I was going to post a question specifically asking about the ending of Diamond Age (something like "What, did you just get bored of it?"), but I see I was beaten to it - several times, in fact :-)
That spoilt the book a little for me; it doesn't so much conclude as just end. I almost feel as though there's supposed to be a second volume, or another few dozen pages or something...
I compete with local programmers as much as off-shore programmers and I see no reason to differentiate
The problem there is that due to differing circumstances in your country and theirs, they are able to work for far less money than you. That makes them a whole lot more attractive on that front, meaning that you have to be a whole lot more attractive on some other front.
In the end, as they gain experience, you'll be forced to compete on price, and then it's either game over, or time to move out there.
Globalisation has the effect of equalising salaries (for the workers, mind, not the bosses) everywhere. That's fine once it's happened, as prices of stuff will have to equalise too - but it'll be hard to be amongst the first industries to be hit by it. *That* is the problem we techies have; we see the bad stuff (lack of job security, loss of potential earnings, etc) without the good stuff (lowering of prices, etc)
I think you should differentiate between 'the RIAA' and 'the RIAA's employees'
True, but as and when the members of the RIAA go out of business, that hurts their employees in much the same way as massive outsourcing of jobs hurts IT workers.
So, what you're saying is that two wrongs make a right? That because of the actions and policies of a few people at board level, it's okay to want an industry to be destroyed, no matter the consequences for the ordinary, hard-working (or not) folks it employs?
That's pretty harsh.