Here in Canada, we have laws saying exactly who and who cannot call themselves an "Engineer" - even Microsoft is bound to these laws. The reason is accountability.
I've worked in engineering companies in the past, with Sparkys, Civies, Pipers, Mechs and thier attendant underlings. The thing that all of them had in common (other than being able to really screw up a computer. "But I'm an engineer!!!":P) was they were legally accountable to the people they designed systems for, once that P.Eng was appended to thier name.
They are licensed in much that same way a doctor is for providing medical attention. They can be taken to account if they are negligent in thier designs. This is why most bridges, for example, can carry over twice thier rated weight for short periods - the engineer doesn't want to go to jail if someone decides to try such a stunt.
This differs from Software "Engineers" who are rarely, if ever, accountable for the systems they design - EULAs usually see to that. If you needed a license to write software, SorceForge could be (and in reality likely would be) hosted on a C64. It's all about being accounntable for your work.
I saw nary a Sun logo on the eclipse.org page of consortium members.
With IBM, HP(Compaq) and several other *nix vendors - as well a several application vendors that drive Sun harware sales - in the consortium, you'd figure they'd be in from the get-go.
IMHO, this just goes to show that Sun doesn't truly get what OSS is yet (Open Office being the exception to the rule), and what it could do for them. If they would release Java as a true open standard, they'd end up looking like the proverbial cat in the bird cage.
Whoa, whoa whoa. Hold it right there.Alpha patches? For WinXP?
You , sir, are one of two things:
1.- You are an evil cracker who is tempting people into downloading your latest Trojan Badger^WHorse code so you can r007 them and be a 1337 h4x0r. Except they'd actually have to be for NT4 to run at all, you fucking lamer.
2. - You are a Microsoft engineer who has XP running on the Alpha processor. Which means Microsoft still supports the Alpha internaly, and Compaq needn't of killed it. I could have had an EV8!!!
In either case, you can expect your next of kin to recieve a very large bill for beer,.44 magnum shells and dry cleaning. I refuse to pay one red cent towards dragging you into the street by the hair, shooting you and then pissing in the 6 craters I will have just created in your body.
Perhaps "water proof" is just the nicer way of saying it is really "sneeze proof".
...or, taking into account the stereotypical/.er, it's the nicer way of saying the wrist-phone is pr0n surfing proof. Brings a whole new meaning to "WAP" phone.
You make some very good points, friend, very good indeed - wish I had mod points.
For the end user, Windows just works, and works well for the most part. Linux is getting to that point, but all of that is tangental to why Linux is being advocated for beginners.
Most computer users think that a PC comes with Windows, period, full stop - which further entrenches the Wintel hedgeonomy. If beginners start on Linux, they'll know that there's a choice, and will (in the end) be able to run any OS they sit in front of. If people then say to developers "I don't want the choice of OS I use to be made by you!", business logic dictates all of the issues you describe with Linux will just go away, quickly, since those devs want to keep thier customers happy. The choice of then OS ceases to be an issue to developers - which in turn restores choice to the consumer. That's what at issue here - giving the consumer freedom to choose.
And before you flame me or take any of what I've said as flames just know one thing - I would love to know how to use linux but to put it simply, I don't need to. Good day.
I see no flames, and will provide none. The most interesting part is that you "would love to know how to use" Linux, which means you're curious and want to learn. That qualifies as a need in my book - why not yours?
Most (if not all non-.net) Windows XP applications will run on earlier versions of windows. Plus, XP certified apps are more likely to be certified for other versions.
And they advertise this, just below the "Certified for XP" logo?
Right.
Again we see the evil side of Microsoft coming out - the Marketing Department. If my sister were to walk into Office Depot and see that a particular software package had a "Windows XP" logo of some sort on it, she would be inclined to want to upgrade to that version. (Not that shit-canning any Win9x is bad, but I digress...).
XP is a fine OS to be sure, and Microsoft should be promoting it. This, however, is further evidence of Microsoft leveraging thier OS monopoly to feed thier ravenous share holders in a underhanded way. How can I put this... They use the fact that most users of thier software are not quite educated about it, and so can be easily steered into doing what Microsoft wants. Office Depot is buying into that.
Yeah, they can do this legally and all, but using the fact that someone is uneducated about the products they sell in order to sell more is insidious, IMHO. Whatever happened to "An Educated Consumer is Our Best Customer."?
You will have to purchase a copy of the game to get a valid Neverwinter Nights CD-Key. Of course, with this purchase you also get a lovely Neverwinter Nights mapkin, a spiral-bound game manual, and three plastic-coated aluminum-reinforced W1nd0z3 brand coasters.
Heh. Think they know who thier audience is, or what?
"Whadda ya know? Guess we wrote the specs in a way that even amatuers could understand them..." - or some other way to spin Sun/Sun's J2EE into looking better.
If it does not pass, did his comment serve any purpose except to give JBOSS a reason to believe the test was biased?
Biased? Having the JBoss devs play that game would be lame as well. What would be worse for Sun would be the following:
"Fuck. Welp, no sense whining about it.
Now that we know where we're not compliant, break out the code editors, people. Let's fix it all now, and then we can tell Phipps to shove it where the Sun don't shine..."
The Linux 2.2 and Linux 2.4 kernels have a flaw in ptrace. This hole allows local users to obtain full privileges. Remote exploitation of this hole is not possible. Linux 2.5 is not believed to be vulnerable.
It isn't a remote exploit. Anyone who is foolish enough to attempt to h4X0r your b0X0rz with this vulnerability is within the normal attack range of a LART.
Please, do patch any affected machines you have as soon as possible, but don't *ahem* panic.
Seriously, I could see this as being the next big reality TV series.
Please, please $DIETY, make sure there's no TV execs reading this thread. PLEASE!!!! I can see it now...
(Fade in from the final commercial...)
Coder1: OK, so, what happened this week? Who gets voted out of the group? Coder3: Coder7 totally hosed our CVS tree - he should go... Coder7: No I didn't! Hey, Linus hisself uses BitKeeper fercryinoutloud... Coder4: That wasn't as bad to our chances of success as what Coder 5 did. I mean, that robot that could strip any female character naked and then turn her to stone was *lame* in the extreme. Coder5: Not as bad as your trap door that looked like the gotasex guy. Coder6: I say Coder2 goes. He's done the unthinkable. All: ???? Coder6: He ported the whole project to.Net in a day and a half. Coder1: GAH! Heresy! Coder2 it is!"
...the "Desktop Sharing" feature is part of KDE 3.1, so any one who upgrades to that version gets that particular functionality - not just those on SuSE 8.2.
*Looks at the KDE 3.1 menu on his RedHat 8.0 machine*
K-->System Tools-->More System Tools -->DesktopSharing
There could never be enough to provide governments with brains - sorry. Not surplus.
* Bending Unit
Hey, my unit "bends", and the wife likes it that way. Most definately not surplus.
* Condoms
Well, maybe some of the geeks around here have those.
* Beer
???? Surplus beer? Never. I'm Canadian.
* Slashdot Coders
OK. Slashdot "Speel Chekers", duplicate catchers and editors who catch dupes are needed, not more coders - I'll give you that one. But I doubt they're very interesting, so maybe not.
* Windows NT 3.5.1 Licenses
There was, as far as I'm concerned, a surplus once production of those things went above zero units. Interesting? Nope.
Hmmmm - 1 for 8. You need to improve big time, bud.
We Canadians have been paying a levee on any recordable media since the year 2000. Only recently, there was a small disbursment from the Canadian Private Copying Collective, with more due soon. As well, the CPCC wants to significanly raise the levee to the point that it's almost not worth recordong your own CDs.
Interestingly, HP Canada is really opposed to the increase - see this page to learn more. They've formed a group of businesses that have a stake in selling digital media or digital recording devices called the Canadian Coalition for Fair Digital Access - lots of good info on thier site. Pay attention to the links page - it has the latest news on what's up with the CPCC.
A levee like this will produce simmilar results in Germany - the PC makers will end up at war with the media companies. It's already starting in Canada, as you can see...
BTW, that's not a picture of a 112 mile wide, 3000 foot deep impact crater - that's an aerial view of what happened to the server when morcheeba's linkage comment was modded up so the whole of/. could see it.:-P
You must have very strong ethics my friend. Perhaps too strong?
Like it or not, you will at some time or another support Microsoft in this industry. They're just too big and too pervasive to ignore and still put food on the table. (By your logic, SAMBA and WINE should not exist for Linux, since they support products from an un-ethical company, but I digress.)
Realistically, Microsoft isn't going away any time soon - if ever. It takes quite a while to fritter away $40 Billion, and that's just the war chest. IMHO, we can either continue to tilt at windmills or we can be more constructive and try to modify the beasts behaviour. If Microsoft were to stop being so arrogant and paranoid at the same time, they would likely be a pretty cool company (Aside: Look at what's happened to the stuffiest corp of all time - Big Blue). Then, these moral dillemas won't de-rail us from getting our jobs done.
BTW, I'm not saying you should tone down or compromise your ethics in any way - I'm saying that you should try to find more constructive ways to uphold them than possibly hanging your future out dry. We need advocates, not martyrs.
God bless, and best of luck to you - I hope you make a wise decision.
Btw, as I noticed the site had been slashdotted, a thought occured to me. When this happens to a site, does anyone else sit back and imagine a poor, defenseless server shrieking its last, dying breath, before being blown through the stratosphere while melting off slag? No. K.
Heh. I imagine a CAT5 cable glowing a bright cherry red, and a server actually spitting out the connector from the RJ45 plug holding that cable.
The NOC operator plugs it back in, and actually hears "PPPTTTTUI!!!" as it's spat back out again...
What you have demonstrated is that there is now real competition, something that has been absent from the Desktop OS market for far too long.
Customers will start switching unless Microsoft does something - lowering prices, adding more value, reducing TCO - anything to try and keep them in the fold. Capitalism at work.
Actually, someone with a clue should buy them now before, ummm, someone with an interest in seeing Free Software set significantly back figures out that the UNIX IP is pretty much a sitting duck...
Soko
Re:so it can transfer a lot of data quickly....
on
Net Speed Record Smashed
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
Lesse...
10,978Km / c (speed of light) = (about) 0.0036 s
At least 3.6ms latency. Likley in the 5ms range tho, considering cut-through times and propegation delays.
Slashdot Mirror
Here in Canada, we have laws saying exactly who and who cannot call themselves an "Engineer" - even Microsoft is bound to these laws. The reason is accountability.
:P) was they were legally accountable to the people they designed systems for, once that P.Eng was appended to thier name.
I've worked in engineering companies in the past, with Sparkys, Civies, Pipers, Mechs and thier attendant underlings. The thing that all of them had in common (other than being able to really screw up a computer. "But I'm an engineer!!!"
They are licensed in much that same way a doctor is for providing medical attention. They can be taken to account if they are negligent in thier designs. This is why most bridges, for example, can carry over twice thier rated weight for short periods - the engineer doesn't want to go to jail if someone decides to try such a stunt.
This differs from Software "Engineers" who are rarely, if ever, accountable for the systems they design - EULAs usually see to that. If you needed a license to write software, SorceForge could be (and in reality likely would be) hosted on a C64. It's all about being accounntable for your work.
Soko
Boring? (Score:3, Interesting)
Congrats. You have the first oxymoronic post title on Slashdot.
Having your score as the second prime was just icing on the cake.
Soko
...the emerging social phenomena surrounding them, the future of wireless gaming, the study of gaming in academia, blah, blah, blah
Welcome to slashdot.
Soko
(back to alt.sysadmin.recovery. And my Segrams V.O. bottle.)
Seems plausible.
I saw nary a Sun logo on the eclipse.org page of consortium members.
With IBM, HP(Compaq) and several other *nix vendors - as well a several application vendors that drive Sun harware sales - in the consortium, you'd figure they'd be in from the get-go.
IMHO, this just goes to show that Sun doesn't truly get what OSS is yet (Open Office being the exception to the rule), and what it could do for them. If they would release Java as a true open standard, they'd end up looking like the proverbial cat in the bird cage.
Soko
Whoa, whoa whoa. Hold it right there. Alpha patches? For WinXP?
.44 magnum shells and dry cleaning. I refuse to pay one red cent towards dragging you into the street by the hair, shooting you and then pissing in the 6 craters I will have just created in your body.
You , sir, are one of two things:
1.- You are an evil cracker who is tempting people into downloading your latest Trojan Badger^WHorse code so you can r007 them and be a 1337 h4x0r. Except they'd actually have to be for NT4 to run at all, you fucking lamer.
2. - You are a Microsoft engineer who has XP running on the Alpha processor. Which means Microsoft still supports the Alpha internaly, and Compaq needn't of killed it. I could have had an EV8!!!
In either case, you can expect your next of kin to recieve a very large bill for beer,
HAND.
Soko
(Still mourning the Alpha)
There's terrarists right here on /.!!!!
:-).
10) Re:fhnlsfdlkm&5nlkd%Bvbcvbc
by Anonymous Coward
0eefa Uv, V'z jbaqrevat vs lbh guvax gurer'f n shgher sbe EBG13. V'ir urneq vg'f cerggl frpher...
Lbh pna ernq guvf? Qnza!
Paul:
Holy cow! Juvyr lbh znl unir svtherq bhg zl fhcre-frperg EBG13 pvcure, abobql jvyy rire penpx *guvf* zrffntr orpnhfr V fjvgpurq gb bhe hygen-frperg cyna O: nccylvat n Pnrfre pvcure 13 gvzrf
These guys speak EBG13 crypto! Right in the open!!!! T3rr4r! ph34r!!
Anyone have a de-coder ring?
Soko
Perhaps "water proof" is just the nicer way of saying it is really "sneeze proof".
...or, taking into account the stereotypical /.er, it's the nicer way of saying the wrist-phone is pr0n surfing proof. Brings a whole new meaning to "WAP" phone.
Soko
You make some very good points, friend, very good indeed - wish I had mod points.
For the end user, Windows just works, and works well for the most part. Linux is getting to that point, but all of that is tangental to why Linux is being advocated for beginners.
Most computer users think that a PC comes with Windows, period, full stop - which further entrenches the Wintel hedgeonomy. If beginners start on Linux, they'll know that there's a choice, and will (in the end) be able to run any OS they sit in front of. If people then say to developers "I don't want the choice of OS I use to be made by you!", business logic dictates all of the issues you describe with Linux will just go away, quickly, since those devs want to keep thier customers happy. The choice of then OS ceases to be an issue to developers - which in turn restores choice to the consumer. That's what at issue here - giving the consumer freedom to choose.
And before you flame me or take any of what I've said as flames just know one thing - I would love to know how to use linux but to put it simply, I don't need to. Good day.
I see no flames, and will provide none. The most interesting part is that you "would love to know how to use" Linux, which means you're curious and want to learn. That qualifies as a need in my book - why not yours?
Soko
Most (if not all non-.net) Windows XP applications will run on earlier versions of windows. Plus, XP certified apps are more likely to be certified for other versions.
And they advertise this, just below the "Certified for XP" logo?
Right.
Again we see the evil side of Microsoft coming out - the Marketing Department. If my sister were to walk into Office Depot and see that a particular software package had a "Windows XP" logo of some sort on it, she would be inclined to want to upgrade to that version. (Not that shit-canning any Win9x is bad, but I digress...).
XP is a fine OS to be sure, and Microsoft should be promoting it. This, however, is further evidence of Microsoft leveraging thier OS monopoly to feed thier ravenous share holders in a underhanded way. How can I put this... They use the fact that most users of thier software are not quite educated about it, and so can be easily steered into doing what Microsoft wants. Office Depot is buying into that.
Yeah, they can do this legally and all, but using the fact that someone is uneducated about the products they sell in order to sell more is insidious, IMHO. Whatever happened to "An Educated Consumer is Our Best Customer."?
Soko
Hey! I knew that I saw this business model before somewhere! Y'know, early access before the bandwidth dries up.
:^P
Wonder if it works?
Soko
From the Bioware page:
You will have to purchase a copy of the game to get a valid Neverwinter Nights CD-Key. Of course, with this purchase you also get a lovely Neverwinter Nights mapkin, a spiral-bound game manual, and three plastic-coated aluminum-reinforced W1nd0z3 brand coasters.
Heh. Think they know who thier audience is, or what?
Soko
What will he say if it does pass?
"Whadda ya know? Guess we wrote the specs in a way that even amatuers could understand them..." - or some other way to spin Sun/Sun's J2EE into looking better.
If it does not pass, did his comment serve any purpose except to give JBOSS a reason to believe the test was biased?
Biased? Having the JBoss devs play that game would be lame as well. What would be worse for Sun would be the following:
"Fuck. Welp, no sense whining about it.
Now that we know where we're not compliant, break out the code editors, people. Let's fix it all now, and then we can tell Phipps to shove it where the Sun don't shine..."
Soko
The Linux 2.2 and Linux 2.4 kernels have a flaw in ptrace. This hole allows
local users to obtain full privileges. Remote exploitation of this hole is
not possible. Linux 2.5 is not believed to be vulnerable.
It isn't a remote exploit. Anyone who is foolish enough to attempt to h4X0r your b0X0rz with this vulnerability is within the normal attack range of a LART.
Please, do patch any affected machines you have as soon as possible, but don't *ahem* panic.
Soko
Seriously, I could see this as being the next big reality TV series.
.Net in a day and a half.
Please, please $DIETY, make sure there's no TV execs reading this thread. PLEASE!!!! I can see it now...
(Fade in from the final commercial...)
Coder1: OK, so, what happened this week? Who gets voted out of the group?
Coder3: Coder7 totally hosed our CVS tree - he should go...
Coder7: No I didn't! Hey, Linus hisself uses BitKeeper fercryinoutloud...
Coder4: That wasn't as bad to our chances of success as what Coder 5 did. I mean, that robot that could strip any female character naked and then turn her to stone was *lame* in the extreme.
Coder5: Not as bad as your trap door that looked like the gotasex guy.
Coder6: I say Coder2 goes. He's done the unthinkable.
All: ????
Coder6: He ported the whole project to
Coder1: GAH! Heresy! Coder2 it is!"
Soko
...the "Desktop Sharing" feature is part of KDE 3.1, so any one who upgrades to that version gets that particular functionality - not just those on SuSE 8.2.
*Looks at the KDE 3.1 menu on his RedHat 8.0 machine*
K-->System Tools-->More System Tools -->DesktopSharing
Yup, I'm not mistaken. (APT4RPM and KDE For Redhat are great together, BTW.)
SuSE is a great distro, but credit where credit is due, please.
Soko
* RealDolls
You'll only get one from a geek who gets married. Sometimes not even then. Not Surplus
* Commodore 64s
Make nice web servers. Not surplus.
* Brain Transplants
There could never be enough to provide governments with brains - sorry. Not surplus.
* Bending Unit
Hey, my unit "bends", and the wife likes it that way. Most definately not surplus.
* Condoms
Well, maybe some of the geeks around here have those.
* Beer
???? Surplus beer? Never. I'm Canadian.
* Slashdot Coders
OK. Slashdot "Speel Chekers", duplicate catchers and editors who catch dupes are needed, not more
coders - I'll give you that one. But I doubt they're very interesting, so maybe not.
* Windows NT 3.5.1 Licenses
There was, as far as I'm concerned, a surplus once production of those things went above zero units. Interesting? Nope.
Hmmmm - 1 for 8. You need to improve big time, bud.
Soko
We Canadians have been paying a levee on any recordable media since the year 2000. Only recently, there was a small disbursment from the Canadian Private Copying Collective, with more due soon. As well, the CPCC wants to significanly raise the levee to the point that it's almost not worth recordong your own CDs.
Interestingly, HP Canada is really opposed to the increase - see this page to learn more. They've formed a group of businesses that have a stake in selling digital media or digital recording devices called the Canadian Coalition for Fair Digital Access - lots of good info on thier site. Pay attention to the links page - it has the latest news on what's up with the CPCC.
A levee like this will produce simmilar results in Germany - the PC makers will end up at war with the media companies. It's already starting in Canada, as you can see...
Soko
TIFF? 617 Megabyte? You moderators are cruel.
/. could see it. :-P
BTW, that's not a picture of a 112 mile wide, 3000 foot deep impact crater - that's an aerial view of what happened to the server when morcheeba's linkage comment was modded up so the whole of
Soko
You must have very strong ethics my friend. Perhaps too strong?
Like it or not, you will at some time or another support Microsoft in this industry. They're just too big and too pervasive to ignore and still put food on the table. (By your logic, SAMBA and WINE should not exist for Linux, since they support products from an un-ethical company, but I digress.)
Realistically, Microsoft isn't going away any time soon - if ever. It takes quite a while to fritter away $40 Billion, and that's just the war chest. IMHO, we can either continue to tilt at windmills or we can be more constructive and try to modify the beasts behaviour. If Microsoft were to stop being so arrogant and paranoid at the same time, they would likely be a pretty cool company (Aside: Look at what's happened to the stuffiest corp of all time - Big Blue). Then, these moral dillemas won't de-rail us from getting our jobs done.
BTW, I'm not saying you should tone down or compromise your ethics in any way - I'm saying that you should try to find more constructive ways to uphold them than possibly hanging your future out dry. We need advocates, not martyrs.
God bless, and best of luck to you - I hope you make a wise decision.
Soko
Btw, as I noticed the site had been slashdotted, a thought occured to me. When this happens to a site, does anyone else sit back and imagine a poor, defenseless server shrieking its last, dying breath, before being blown through the stratosphere while melting off slag? No. K.
Heh. I imagine a CAT5 cable glowing a bright cherry red, and a server actually spitting out the connector from the RJ45 plug holding that cable.
The NOC operator plugs it back in, and actually hears "PPPTTTTUI!!!" as it's spat back out again...
Wash, Rinse, Repeat.
Soko
Doesn't matter.
What you have demonstrated is that there is now real competition, something that has been absent from the Desktop OS market for far too long.
Customers will start switching unless Microsoft does something - lowering prices, adding more value, reducing TCO - anything to try and keep them in the fold. Capitalism at work.
We win.
Soko
SCO has a market cap of $25.68 Million. IBM could buy them for $100Million and save %90. Or RedHat maybe.
Actually, someone with a clue should buy them now before, ummm, someone with an interest in seeing Free Software set significantly back figures out that the UNIX IP is pretty much a sitting duck...
Soko
Lesse...
10,978Km / c (speed of light) = (about) 0.0036 s
At least 3.6ms latency. Likley in the 5ms range tho, considering cut-through times and propegation delays.
Soko
Tell that to the recipents of the /. effect, why don't you.
Soko
Can't they just *cough* *cough* patch it?
*cough*
Soko