Some previous commenters have clarified the subject of the article, but I'm going a bit farther. Read the article and have a look at the key points.
The things they mention aren't exactly revolutionary, but they are a nice idea. I'm going to use Half-Life (DoD mod) as an example, as that's the game I'm most familiar with. In essence, I as a player, would go to nVidia's website (or whoever hosts it). I'd say that I'm looking for a server running the DoD mod. I want no snipers, normal gravity, and >30 min maps.
Because my unique WonID is registered in their database, it would also match up servers that have players of near equal skill ratings.
As I said, not incredibly revolutionary, but something I would love to see. Imagine playing your favourite game and being able to look for servers that match your preferences (something most games will let you do now), but also by the skill of the other players in that server. Now, instead of being new to a game and joining a "newbie" server that has mid-skill players that seem like experts, you actually be able to see the average skill level of players in a server and compare that to your own.
Personally I think its a great idea and look forward to seeing this become part of all my favourite online-multiplayer-games.
Just found out about ORBZ last week...
on
ORBZ Shuts Down
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· Score: 2
... when they tested my mail server for open relay (which it had been, but was fixed). I was setting up qmail for the first time, and in cleaning up removed a file I shouldn't have (namely rcpthosts). In any case, for those of you who don't know, remove this file, and you're an open relay. I was, and sure enough, a spammer found it and started using it. I caught it when a bunch of bad email addresses bounced to my account (that and my maillog grew by about 2000%). I figured out the problem in about an hour, and closed it up. I also reported the spammer to their ISP (pacbell.net) and cleaned out the queue (over 2000 spams ready to be sent). In any case, someone must have reported me, even though I put up apology pages and comments suggestsion. In case whoever reported me is reading this, I bear you no ill-will, I was an open relay and deserved to be reported. In any case, their test showed I wasn't open, so I never got added to their list.
I would have to agree. While in U, I played around with a lot of commercial apps that we worked with at school (like my copy of powerbuilder on 30+ 3.5" floppies). Now however, I spend more time playing on my Linux box and fufilling my need to play with stuff. Its nice when you're looking for a particular way to do things, find someone who's already solved it, and allows everyone to download it.
Of course I try to give back what I can. I couldn't find a nice way to scan incoming mail on my server (qmail). So, I downloaded f-prot (free) and wrote a perl script to pull out any attachments, scan them, and either dump the message or deliver it, depending on the results of the scan. Once I had it working the way I wanted, I put up a webpage and offered it to anyone who wants to use it!
Well I wouldn't say were exactly "near the left coast after British Columbia and Alberta". We're midwest, or the prairies by most definitions. And while your trying to show off your knowledge of Canada, and Saskatchewan in particular, at least try to get the capital right. I'll give you a hint, its NOT Saskatoon.
The Saskatchewan Gov't (that's in Canada) is working on a project called SHIN. Sask Health Information Network. Basically, getting everyones medical records onto a large database so an individuals records are available anywhere in the province.
In any case, the Priemere at the time, Roy Romanow, referred to it as Sask Health Information Technology System.
Okay, I decided to have a look at Red Hat's stuff for 7.2.
Since its release, there have been 29 security fixes. So, lets have a look at them:
1 fix for syncookie vulnerability (not enabled by default
1 fix for apache-devel where you could trick apache into displaying a directory index
1 fix for OpenSSH, must be enabled by admin to be vulnerable
1 fix for xchat which would allow other IRC users to execute IRC commands as you - not exactly a root exploit
1 fix for uucp - RedHat 7.2 is not vulnerable, down to 28
1 fix for at - RedHat 7.2 is not vulnerable, down to 27
Given that 2 have to be enabled to be vulnerable, we're down to 25.
All in all, almost all vulnerabilities were from different packagea. Only 1 kernal problem. So, you would need to be running ~25 specific packages to be vulnerable. So, any reports using the 29 patches on RedHat's site (see above link) without actually reading the descriptions is going to be way off base. Now the same thing may be true for W2K machines, but I haven't looked to see.
Most were not remotely exploitable, and some weren't even local-root exploitable. Some all you could do was view files!
In any case, at the bottom of the SecurityFocus's page should be slashdot's poll disclaimer:
If you're using these numbers to do anything important, you're insane
Yes, in essence we do have monopolies. Both cable and DSL. DSL is from the local telco, in my case, SaskTel. I'm about to switch from ADSL to cable, but only due to the upstream. Currently I'm paying ~$60/month for a 1.5M/128K connection with 2 static IPs which I've had no complaints with.
However, I'm going to switch to cable modem because here, I can get 1M/1M for $45/month, which is much better for hosting various services. I had bad experiences with cable earlier, frequent outages and such, but a couple of years ago, a member of our local LUG took over the sys admin position, and according to other users, the reliability has since skyroceted:).
Not as bad as you'd think. Most newer AWD vehicles will transfer all power to the rear wheels once a certain speed is reached. For GM, I'm pretty sure its 30Km/h (~ 25mph). While I don't have AWD, the traction control in my '99 Alero turns off at 30kmh. Which is why I've never bothered to turn it off.
True, but as soon as you increase the surface area (which would happen if you managed to break it into smaller chunks), then more of the asteroid is going to burn up in the atmosphere. Break it down small enough, and no impact, just a great night for watching shooting stars.
Yup - the moviegoing public has limited patience for 4 hour films.
I heard somewhere (maybe from my girlfriend who used to manage a theatre) that they will never show a movie that is longer than 3 Hours in a theatre. I don't remember running times, but I noticed it in Braveheart, which came in just under 3 hours at the theatre, but the VHS copy runs about 200 mins.
Sampe point in time where it became a licensed establishment to check ID before serving alcoholic beverages. Same point where the convienance store worker had to check ID before selling tobacco products. Same point where movie theatres and rental places have to check ID based on the rating of the movie.
Its the way it works in the US and Canada (probably others). Simply put, we have a rating systems for games (at least here in Canada). If you're going to have a game that is rate 18, then it is your responsibility as the owner, to make sure no one under 18 plays that game!
Windows is not "getting better at an exponential rate". Its getting better, don't get me wrong, 2000 is a huge improvement over the 9x series, but it still has a long way to go.
I'm not familiar with the crash-report feature, but knowing Microsoft support (and I've talked to them several times at ~$300 per incident) any non-MS app involved will be blamed.
While the Linux community does not seem concerned with money
Personally, I think that's one of the main reasons Linux is doing so well. There are no stockholders pusing for a new release so they can charge $100+ for an upgrade. Instead, code is released when its READY to be released, instead of finding out about HUGE security holes in its most secure version of Windows ever
Linux is directly dependent on the failures/success of Microsoft
Care to back that up with anything at all?
You might get better service from Microsoft, but I never have. I've asked the open source community for help with several problems over the years by posting to various newsgroups or forums, and always gotten detailed helpful information. When we had a problem with an NT4 server crashing, they asked me to resize the pagefile, which didn't change anything. That was their only advice.
Microsoft has never released any software that is as unusable as Linux
Go try Microsoft BOB, or the first version of MS FrontPage. The new installs of RedHat (the distro I use) is far simpler than either of the above mentioned products.
Linux is not yet ready to compete with Windows
Linux IS competing with windows. Check out web server statistics, or the infamous Halloween Papers. If Linux was not competeing, Microsoft wouldn't be worried about it.
Nobody can predict whether it[Linux] will be ready in six months or five years
Yet you can say that Linux will not survive. I can't follow that logic.
I would describe the Linux community as naive, unrealistic, and disorganized. So far they have been giving us inferior service and inferior software
And that's fair, you can describe it any way you like, but the fact remains that Linux is still growing faster in the server market that MS is. Who knows if that trend will continue.
Is that unlike WC2 and SC, you'll be working with a much smaller number of units. No more groups of Bloodlusted Orcs or speed upgraded zealots pounding on your front door. Its going more towards small groups of specialized troups where using special abilites will be of greater importance than pure numbers.
Though I really enjoyed both SC and WC(I & 2) it will be nice to try this out. I'll be picking it up the day it's released, though hopefully I'll make it as a beta tester and get some experience before the rest of the world:)
I'll supply what little info I can. I read the books 7-9 which basically involved the Rebel Alliance... though not really rebels anymore, cleaning up the end of the Empire. Han and Leia were married and had twins, Luke is teach Leia and the kids the ways of the Jedi.
I can't remember all the details, the biggest thing that sticks out is that a blue-skinned alien is heading the Empire, which still has a lot of troops, Star Destoryers and at least one Super Star Destroyer.
Wish I could remember more, as I'd like to read the books again.
Its not an alarm. Its an anti-theft device which is not the same thing. A lot (most?) new cars are coming with these now. I didn't know Hondas did, but GM and VW both have these "key readers" that will not allow the vehicle to start without receiving a (magnetic|electrical|???) signal from the key.
My car, a '99 Olds Alero, has the same thing. It's a nice feature, especially considering I live in the car theft capital of Canada (Regina). It can be a pain for things like car starters and getting extra keys made, but overall I like the idea.
This is not the way to do it, as the article mentions. This may stop Google, but suppose I'm running my own search engine that doesn't follow "robots.txt" rules?
That's the entire point of this contest. To see if an amateur can find a way to get to space, which will in all likelyhood be significantly cheaper (and with a quicker turn-around) then the Government has been able to do.
It may be a long-shot, but hey, if nobody can do it, then they've lost nothing. If someone can, then they've found a cheaper, faster way into space... easily worth the ten million dollar prize.
I agree completely! Here's one I submitted on how to get started in consulting (about a month ago) which IMHO has a lot more relevance to Ask Slashdot than a problem with a specific printer in a specfic environment.
2001-10-22 16:54:41 How do you get started in Consulting? (askslashdot,news) (rejected)
I'm trying to move to self-employed status, and was looking for advice from fellow/.ers, but apparently Ask Slashdot is becoming a tech support bulletin board.
Its an interesting suggestion. Our favourite average person out there "Joe/Jane Sixpack" doesn't do a lot of research before buying a computer. If he/she does any, its to compare prices and features. I've never seen anyone actually investigate other OS options. Not that I deal with the average computer shopper, but I doubt that many do, beyond, "I saw an add for Windows XP, does this computer have that?".
So our average computer shopper doesn't research that end of it. Should they... of course. But, if they don't understand that they should be researching HW/SW/OS, then they won't. I imagine some investigate SW to some degree (Antivirus, maybe an office suite), but I highly doubt any would even think of the OS.
So who is going to educate (en masse) the public. We certainly can't expect MS to do it. Who would expect any business to educate its customers into researching alternatives? Us, the Free SW crowd? Sure, we would, but how? That's the real question. How do we show the general public that there are other options out there. That they don't have to just accept whatever the big retailer installs on their machine.
While there are a lot of IT jobs out there, there's not that many around here (Saskatchewan, Canada). I'm not willing to relocate at this point in my life (just bought a house, girlfriend in school).
I do intend to leave this place, and have exit-interviews with anyone I can to make suggestions on how to improve the environment, but there's not much I can do right now.
As for making my employer extinct, its going to be tough. I work for the Canadian Federal Government.
As much as I'd like to pursue Solaris (and I really would), I have hardly any experience with it (haven't seen it for at least 3 years). We're mostly an MS/Banyan shop, and will soon be converting all our Banyan to MS-W2K. As such, about the only thing my employer will pay for is MS training.
Once my girlfriend finishes school and can start helping out with the bills, I plan to attempt to start my own consulting business. My main goal is to support and setup SOHO type businesses. I'm hoping that I can get most of my potential clients on to at least a Linux backend (nothing against BSD, just more familiar with Linux). I also wouldn't mind doing training, and an MCT does make good money ( ~$1000/day around here).
Until that day, I'll get what I can from my current employer and then move on. I don't think any employer would toss my resume because I had MS certification, I'm just hoping that it will help to get me to the interview stage.
I haven't seen MST3K in a LONG time, and never this particular episode, but these lines got me laughing so hard I had the guy in the next cubicle over giving me funny looks.
There's a select group of people in my office that I go for coffee with, but almost no socializing happens outside of the office. Too many people have been stabbed in the back by co-workers, so there is the element of trust missing. Management (one of the worst backstabbers in our group) has tried some feeble efforts at team building, but cannot treat us with respect on any regular basis. The odd time that praise comes down from above, most of us are looking for an ulterior motive.
Its unfortunate since most of the people here are very skilled, but without trust between us, there is no way people will open up to each other, and thus, no socializing. It makes for a very ugly environment to work in. A co-op student we had about a year ago make this comment about one of the supervisors, "She's the only person I know that will smile to your fact while shoving a knife in your back." He came to this conclusion 4 weeks after working in our office.
Myself, and several others have actually been "hauled into the office" beacuse we tried to point out a flaw in a decision. In my case, I did it in private, explaining how a particular device did not meet our needs and would not provide the needed functionality. I was told to purchase it anyways. We got it, I explained again why it wouldn't work, and was pulled into the office by my supervisor and manager.
I'm not happy, nor are most of the people here. I'm half looking for a new job at the moment, while I take advantage of some training and pursue some more certification (yes, MCSE, but if it makes me marketable, who cares).
Slashdot Mirror
The things they mention aren't exactly revolutionary, but they are a nice idea. I'm going to use Half-Life (DoD mod) as an example, as that's the game I'm most familiar with. In essence, I as a player, would go to nVidia's website (or whoever hosts it). I'd say that I'm looking for a server running the DoD mod. I want no snipers, normal gravity, and >30 min maps.
Because my unique WonID is registered in their database, it would also match up servers that have players of near equal skill ratings.
As I said, not incredibly revolutionary, but something I would love to see. Imagine playing your favourite game and being able to look for servers that match your preferences (something most games will let you do now), but also by the skill of the other players in that server. Now, instead of being new to a game and joining a "newbie" server that has mid-skill players that seem like experts, you actually be able to see the average skill level of players in a server and compare that to your own.
Personally I think its a great idea and look forward to seeing this become part of all my favourite online-multiplayer-games.
... when they tested my mail server for open relay (which it had been, but was fixed). I was setting up qmail for the first time, and in cleaning up removed a file I shouldn't have (namely rcpthosts). In any case, for those of you who don't know, remove this file, and you're an open relay. I was, and sure enough, a spammer found it and started using it. I caught it when a bunch of bad email addresses bounced to my account (that and my maillog grew by about 2000%). I figured out the problem in about an hour, and closed it up. I also reported the spammer to their ISP (pacbell.net) and cleaned out the queue (over 2000 spams ready to be sent). In any case, someone must have reported me, even though I put up apology pages and comments suggestsion. In case whoever reported me is reading this, I bear you no ill-will, I was an open relay and deserved to be reported. In any case, their test showed I wasn't open, so I never got added to their list.
Of course I try to give back what I can. I couldn't find a nice way to scan incoming mail on my server (qmail). So, I downloaded f-prot (free) and wrote a perl script to pull out any attachments, scan them, and either dump the message or deliver it, depending on the results of the scan. Once I had it working the way I wanted, I put up a webpage and offered it to anyone who wants to use it!
I would have oh so loved those support calls...
Guess we would have needed a proctologist on speed dialI've got a problem with my A$$.
Well I wouldn't say were exactly "near the left coast after British Columbia and Alberta". We're midwest, or the prairies by most definitions. And while your trying to show off your knowledge of Canada, and Saskatchewan in particular, at least try to get the capital right. I'll give you a hint, its NOT Saskatoon.
The Saskatchewan Gov't (that's in Canada) is working on a project called SHIN. Sask Health Information Network. Basically, getting everyones medical records onto a large database so an individuals records are available anywhere in the province. In any case, the Priemere at the time, Roy Romanow, referred to it as Sask Health Information Technology System.
Since its release, there have been 29 security fixes. So, lets have a look at them:
- 1 fix for syncookie vulnerability (not enabled by default
- 1 fix for apache-devel where you could trick apache into displaying a directory index
- 1 fix for OpenSSH, must be enabled by admin to be vulnerable
- 1 fix for xchat which would allow other IRC users to execute IRC commands as you - not exactly a root exploit
- 1 fix for uucp - RedHat 7.2 is not vulnerable, down to 28
- 1 fix for at - RedHat 7.2 is not vulnerable, down to 27
Given that 2 have to be enabled to be vulnerable, we're down to 25.All in all, almost all vulnerabilities were from different packagea. Only 1 kernal problem. So, you would need to be running ~25 specific packages to be vulnerable. So, any reports using the 29 patches on RedHat's site (see above link) without actually reading the descriptions is going to be way off base. Now the same thing may be true for W2K machines, but I haven't looked to see.
Most were not remotely exploitable, and some weren't even local-root exploitable. Some all you could do was view files!
In any case, at the bottom of the SecurityFocus's page should be slashdot's poll disclaimer:If you're using these numbers to do anything important, you're insane
However, I'm going to switch to cable modem because here, I can get 1M/1M for $45/month, which is much better for hosting various services. I had bad experiences with cable earlier, frequent outages and such, but a couple of years ago, a member of our local LUG took over the sys admin position, and according to other users, the reliability has since skyroceted :).
Not as bad as you'd think. Most newer AWD vehicles will transfer all power to the rear wheels once a certain speed is reached. For GM, I'm pretty sure its 30Km/h (~ 25mph). While I don't have AWD, the traction control in my '99 Alero turns off at 30kmh. Which is why I've never bothered to turn it off.
True, but as soon as you increase the surface area (which would happen if you managed to break it into smaller chunks), then more of the asteroid is going to burn up in the atmosphere. Break it down small enough, and no impact, just a great night for watching shooting stars.
I heard somewhere (maybe from my girlfriend who used to manage a theatre) that they will never show a movie that is longer than 3 Hours in a theatre. I don't remember running times, but I noticed it in Braveheart, which came in just under 3 hours at the theatre, but the VHS copy runs about 200 mins.
Can anyone confirm/deny the 3 hour rule?
Its the way it works in the US and Canada (probably others). Simply put, we have a rating systems for games (at least here in Canada). If you're going to have a game that is rate 18, then it is your responsibility as the owner, to make sure no one under 18 plays that game!
I'm not familiar with the crash-report feature, but knowing Microsoft support (and I've talked to them several times at ~$300 per incident) any non-MS app involved will be blamed.
While the Linux community does not seem concerned with money
Personally, I think that's one of the main reasons Linux is doing so well. There are no stockholders pusing for a new release so they can charge $100+ for an upgrade. Instead, code is released when its READY to be released, instead of finding out about HUGE security holes in its most secure version of Windows ever
Linux is directly dependent on the failures/success of Microsoft
Care to back that up with anything at all?
You might get better service from Microsoft, but I never have. I've asked the open source community for help with several problems over the years by posting to various newsgroups or forums, and always gotten detailed helpful information. When we had a problem with an NT4 server crashing, they asked me to resize the pagefile, which didn't change anything. That was their only advice.
Microsoft has never released any software that is as unusable as Linux
Go try Microsoft BOB, or the first version of MS FrontPage. The new installs of RedHat (the distro I use) is far simpler than either of the above mentioned products.
Linux is not yet ready to compete with Windows
Linux IS competing with windows. Check out web server statistics, or the infamous Halloween Papers. If Linux was not competeing, Microsoft wouldn't be worried about it.
Nobody can predict whether it[Linux] will be ready in six months or five years
Yet you can say that Linux will not survive. I can't follow that logic.
I would describe the Linux community as naive, unrealistic, and disorganized. So far they have been giving us inferior service and inferior software
And that's fair, you can describe it any way you like, but the fact remains that Linux is still growing faster in the server market that MS is. Who knows if that trend will continue.
Though I really enjoyed both SC and WC(I & 2) it will be nice to try this out. I'll be picking it up the day it's released, though hopefully I'll make it as a beta tester and get some experience before the rest of the world :)
I can't remember all the details, the biggest thing that sticks out is that a blue-skinned alien is heading the Empire, which still has a lot of troops, Star Destoryers and at least one Super Star Destroyer.
Wish I could remember more, as I'd like to read the books again.My car, a '99 Olds Alero, has the same thing. It's a nice feature, especially considering I live in the car theft capital of Canada (Regina). It can be a pain for things like car starters and getting extra keys made, but overall I like the idea.
This is not the way to do it, as the article mentions. This may stop Google, but suppose I'm running my own search engine that doesn't follow "robots.txt" rules?
It may be a long-shot, but hey, if nobody can do it, then they've lost nothing. If someone can, then they've found a cheaper, faster way into space... easily worth the ten million dollar prize.
2001-10-22 16:54:41 How do you get started in Consulting? (askslashdot,news) (rejected) I'm trying to move to self-employed status, and was looking for advice from fellow /.ers, but apparently Ask Slashdot is becoming a tech support bulletin board.
So our average computer shopper doesn't research that end of it. Should they... of course. But, if they don't understand that they should be researching HW/SW/OS, then they won't. I imagine some investigate SW to some degree (Antivirus, maybe an office suite), but I highly doubt any would even think of the OS.
So who is going to educate (en masse) the public. We certainly can't expect MS to do it. Who would expect any business to educate its customers into researching alternatives? Us, the Free SW crowd? Sure, we would, but how? That's the real question. How do we show the general public that there are other options out there. That they don't have to just accept whatever the big retailer installs on their machine.
Their punishment is to help ensure that the monopoly they have continues to the next generation?
I do intend to leave this place, and have exit-interviews with anyone I can to make suggestions on how to improve the environment, but there's not much I can do right now.
As for making my employer extinct, its going to be tough. I work for the Canadian Federal Government.
Once my girlfriend finishes school and can start helping out with the bills, I plan to attempt to start my own consulting business. My main goal is to support and setup SOHO type businesses. I'm hoping that I can get most of my potential clients on to at least a Linux backend (nothing against BSD, just more familiar with Linux). I also wouldn't mind doing training, and an MCT does make good money ( ~$1000/day around here).
Until that day, I'll get what I can from my current employer and then move on. I don't think any employer would toss my resume because I had MS certification, I'm just hoping that it will help to get me to the interview stage.
Thanks for brightning my day!
Its unfortunate since most of the people here are very skilled, but without trust between us, there is no way people will open up to each other, and thus, no socializing. It makes for a very ugly environment to work in. A co-op student we had about a year ago make this comment about one of the supervisors, "She's the only person I know that will smile to your fact while shoving a knife in your back." He came to this conclusion 4 weeks after working in our office.
Myself, and several others have actually been "hauled into the office" beacuse we tried to point out a flaw in a decision. In my case, I did it in private, explaining how a particular device did not meet our needs and would not provide the needed functionality. I was told to purchase it anyways. We got it, I explained again why it wouldn't work, and was pulled into the office by my supervisor and manager.
I'm not happy, nor are most of the people here. I'm half looking for a new job at the moment, while I take advantage of some training and pursue some more certification (yes, MCSE, but if it makes me marketable, who cares).