>
anyone running a service important enough for security to be more than a casual concern should be using a distro which is secure out of the box. Minimalist distros (Gentoo comes to mind) seem a good solution here.
Gentoo isn't stable enough, and it isn't meant to be. You probably want Debian or one of the 'Enterprise' ones.
>
Would you say that MILLIONS of computers would be compromised?
Perhaps. But there are several mitigating factors.
First, there is a much bigger diversity of GNU/Linux implementations and configurations over there, so the actual potentially vulnerable systems are likely to be much less even if GNU/Linux indeed takes over the world.
Second, GNU/Linux is enabling a return to hosts and X terminals, where the host is likely to be much better adminstrated than multiple clients.
Third, GNU/Linux is more scalable. Less, bigger systems also tend to be better administrated than many small ones.
Fourth, by being a free software implementation of many open standards, GNU/Linux leaves the path open to a bigger OS diversity -- things like the Unices and BSDs. This diversity will also help protecting the Net.
>
How would you get your MILLIONS of users to patch their machines quickly so as to avoid Armaggedon?
aptitude update; aptitude upgrade. Hey, one can even pay someone else to type these commands!
Intel is proprietary, RISC less so. It is just that until now Intel has
failed to amass enough patents and copyrights to enforce
exclusiveness, and moreover has failed to pull the rug from its former
partners like VIA and AMD.
As soon as Intel manages to go 64 bits, either with Itanium
(totally proprietary) or without it, they will renew their attempts at
exclusion.
Actually RISC is less proprietary. They all use OpenFirmware, have
several sources, and SPARC is even an open standard with free software
implementations like the LEO. MIPS too have independent
implementations, like the Chinese Dragon. The PowerPC for one is
finally getting the volumes (Mac OS, GNU/Linux PPC, AmigaOne, Pegasos)
to go after Intel in availability and price.
>
This is only focusing on the iPod and ignoring all other products
No, it's not. It talks about earnings and profits, and at the end of the day that's what counts. Apple is not a free software hacker that can live on Jolt Cola and cold pizza.
Apple still has the forgiveness of its shareholders because of its influence and image. But that can't be forever, no matter how many living dead New Economists try to mystify us.
I still could see Apple rebounding, if it took the plunge and went free software and clones all the way. In fact perhaps either only free software or only clones would already make a difference. You can't build a platform alone nowadays. You just see how long would MS survive if it was to build its own hardware and block clonemakers, or Dell if it was to sell exclusively its own, non-MS W32 OS.
This one quite surprised me. Had never thought about it, really impressive.
If this becomes a trend, then proprietary hardware has its days counted. How long before we have GNU/Linux (or BSD, or whatever) running on Palms and iPods and the such?
Hey, perhaps GNU/Linux will arrive at notebooks from under, not from above!
Just kidding, am typing this in my Debian Lime iBook.
There is no such thing. Dialup just happens to be cheaper if you don't use the Net heavily, and to be universally available. There ain't anything standard about it.
Nor is broadband what people really need. Rid them of the actual dialing time delays, and they will live happily with 128Kbps or even 64Kbps. This would be somewhat cheaper, would make these users less interesting to be targetted by spammers, and would help webdesigner go slow with flash and fancy graphics.
So what we need is competition in the last mile Net connections, so that this bandwidth madness is checked.
Now, perhaps MS users should be required to have firewalls by default, and to give permission for ISPs to routinely check them for virii, spyware and the such? Perhaps partition all ISPs in MS Windows and the sane world, the MS Windows world being firewalled at the ISP so that MS Windows users can only do so much harm to their fellow sufferers?
For shareholders too in the long run. MS as it is looses money in most business by trying to dominate everywhere, and has its future in doubt because it can't possibly adapt to open systems.
The company as it is organised today isn't important, its services are. The services and their users would be much better if the services and products were opened (as in open standards, published interfaces), and this can only be enforced if MS is reduced to several especialised companies instead of today's conglomerate.
When Alpha was struggling, MS helped kill it by porting only part of its portfolio, and making difficult for other people to port theirs.
Now, MS WXP and MS Office... what about countless other apps? And is it as easy for ISVs to translate theirs? Then, can they ship a binary with multilanguage built in as in POSIX systems?
And even if people could translate all that mass of software, will they do proprietary software vendors' work? Perhaps for MS Office and WXP, but I doubt for anything else.
In the end, we still have an edge here. MS actually progressed just a little.
Hope so. I am looking now for a systems programmer, and that will be one of his tasks, perhaps the main one in a few months. Alphora Dataphor is really such an interesting tool. Now if I could convince authors to go free...
>
it is acceptable to read the source of the Rotor implementation
I see. But somehow I'd feel safer if a policy of not looking at all was possible.
All in all, your posts have made me tend to prefer your efforts if and when we come to porting time.
Is there anyone keeping scores on how near each effort is to provide some real portability, especially for database apps and systems programming tools?
>
whenever I read about posts that infringe on privacy in this forum, all the dangerous 1984 references sound like more whining and justification based on more fear, uncertainty, and doubt. I've ceased to take any of it seriously.
This reminds me once again of when X.org tried to go proprietary to preserve its investments (actually its members') to be hoarded by non-members. XFree86 reacted, and after I put them in contact (though I'm sure other, more important people did that too) RMS offered to help them going copyleft ([L]GPL); they got the idea and almost went with it but XFree86 didn't want copyleft.
Perhaps now XFree86 decided to go GPL-incompatible, some even say non-practical even while free, it would be time to go LGPL or even GPL? Thus proprietary vendors would have to either stick with XFree86 and its advertising clause, or pay and thus help develop (X.org|XOuvert|FreeDesktopX).
Copyleft wouldn't hurt the BSDs, BTW. They already use gcc.
Slashdot Mirror
Mod parent up!
Do you realize how many servers MS has? Free software projects are lucky if they have two.
And get black helicopters hovering over your backyard?
You insensitive.
Gentoo isn't stable enough, and it isn't meant to be. You probably want Debian or one of the 'Enterprise' ones.
Perhaps. But there are several mitigating factors.
First, there is a much bigger diversity of GNU/Linux implementations and configurations over there, so the actual potentially vulnerable systems are likely to be much less even if GNU/Linux indeed takes over the world.
Second, GNU/Linux is enabling a return to hosts and X terminals, where the host is likely to be much better adminstrated than multiple clients.
Third, GNU/Linux is more scalable. Less, bigger systems also tend to be better administrated than many small ones.
Fourth, by being a free software implementation of many open standards, GNU/Linux leaves the path open to a bigger OS diversity -- things like the Unices and BSDs. This diversity will also help protecting the Net.
aptitude update; aptitude upgrade. Hey, one can even pay someone else to type these commands!
Nothing is easier than Synaptic and aptitude. It simply eliminates getting a CD or buying a download.
Not only too specific, he has got it reversed.
Intel is proprietary, RISC less so. It is just that until now Intel has failed to amass enough patents and copyrights to enforce exclusiveness, and moreover has failed to pull the rug from its former partners like VIA and AMD.
As soon as Intel manages to go 64 bits, either with Itanium (totally proprietary) or without it, they will renew their attempts at exclusion.
Actually RISC is less proprietary. They all use OpenFirmware, have several sources, and SPARC is even an open standard with free software implementations like the LEO. MIPS too have independent implementations, like the Chinese Dragon. The PowerPC for one is finally getting the volumes (Mac OS, GNU/Linux PPC, AmigaOne, Pegasos) to go after Intel in availability and price.
So with Mozilla getting Gtk+ themes and speed, will Firefox ever succeed it? When?
Whence the 'orang-utan' hifen?
No, it's not. It talks about earnings and profits, and at the end of the day that's what counts. Apple is not a free software hacker that can live on Jolt Cola and cold pizza.
Apple still has the forgiveness of its shareholders because of its influence and image. But that can't be forever, no matter how many living dead New Economists try to mystify us.
I still could see Apple rebounding, if it took the plunge and went free software and clones all the way. In fact perhaps either only free software or only clones would already make a difference. You can't build a platform alone nowadays. You just see how long would MS survive if it was to build its own hardware and block clonemakers, or Dell if it was to sell exclusively its own, non-MS W32 OS.
This one quite surprised me. Had never thought about it, really impressive.
If this becomes a trend, then proprietary hardware has its days counted. How long before we have GNU/Linux (or BSD, or whatever) running on Palms and iPods and the such?
Hey, perhaps GNU/Linux will arrive at notebooks from under, not from above!
Just kidding, am typing this in my Debian Lime iBook.
Let's take a look at your assumptions.
There is no such thing. Dialup just happens to be cheaper if you don't use the Net heavily, and to be universally available. There ain't anything standard about it.
Nor is broadband what people really need. Rid them of the actual dialing time delays, and they will live happily with 128Kbps or even 64Kbps. This would be somewhat cheaper, would make these users less interesting to be targetted by spammers, and would help webdesigner go slow with flash and fancy graphics.
So what we need is competition in the last mile Net connections, so that this bandwidth madness is checked.
Now, perhaps MS users should be required to have firewalls by default, and to give permission for ISPs to routinely check them for virii, spyware and the such? Perhaps partition all ISPs in MS Windows and the sane world, the MS Windows world being firewalled at the ISP so that MS Windows users can only do so much harm to their fellow sufferers?
Hope so. Yet mentioning /mnt/ipod is quite a bit of disinformation.
Sure. The problem in overhyping is the following disillusionment.
For shareholders too in the long run. MS as it is looses money in most business by trying to dominate everywhere, and has its future in doubt because it can't possibly adapt to open systems.
The company as it is organised today isn't important, its services are. The services and their users would be much better if the services and products were opened (as in open standards, published interfaces), and this can only be enforced if MS is reduced to several especialised companies instead of today's conglomerate.
All I heard until now was noise about media players. Nothing about a more general root solution as the poster seemed to imply.
Agreed. And that means, in a sense, we're doomed.
How harsh? A fine and opening MS Windows to Real, Quicktime and the like?
This is next to nothing. Nothing short of breaking up MS and demanding published, open APIs, protocols and file formats will do.
/mnt/ipod? AFAIR my standards, /mnt is for ad hoc temporary mounting directly, without any subdirectories. It should be /media/ipod.
It is just that they won't make it that easy to have an all-Hebrew computer.
When Alpha was struggling, MS helped kill it by porting only part of its portfolio, and making difficult for other people to port theirs.
Now, MS WXP and MS Office... what about countless other apps? And is it as easy for ISVs to translate theirs? Then, can they ship a binary with multilanguage built in as in POSIX systems?
And even if people could translate all that mass of software, will they do proprietary software vendors' work? Perhaps for MS Office and WXP, but I doubt for anything else.
In the end, we still have an edge here. MS actually progressed just a little.
Hope so. I am looking now for a systems programmer, and that will be one of his tasks, perhaps the main one in a few months. Alphora Dataphor is really such an interesting tool. Now if I could convince authors to go free...
I see. But somehow I'd feel safer if a policy of not looking at all was possible.
All in all, your posts have made me tend to prefer your efforts if and when we come to porting time.
Is there anyone keeping scores on how near each effort is to provide some real portability, especially for database apps and systems programming tools?
And that's where the danger is.
This reminds me once again of when X.org tried to go proprietary to preserve its investments (actually its members') to be hoarded by non-members. XFree86 reacted, and after I put them in contact (though I'm sure other, more important people did that too) RMS offered to help them going copyleft ([L]GPL); they got the idea and almost went with it but XFree86 didn't want copyleft.
Perhaps now XFree86 decided to go GPL-incompatible, some even say non-practical even while free, it would be time to go LGPL or even GPL? Thus proprietary vendors would have to either stick with XFree86 and its advertising clause, or pay and thus help develop (X.org|XOuvert|FreeDesktopX).
Copyleft wouldn't hurt the BSDs, BTW. They already use gcc.
I really haven't the time. About data I'd point you to some reading materials: the books mentioned on The Third Manifesto, DBDebunk, some articles at DMoz and an implementation with documentation; about OSs, the GNU Hurd site seems to be unreachable now.