"Conversely, unix machines are typically more stable, and have a far more flexible interface that's more geared up to remote cli usage. Installing something like an IRC server to collect malware is often much easier, and there's usually package management which can be used to easily install any external libraries or additional tools that might be required. There are also typically standard server apps installed and ready to use (ftpd, apache, rcp, tftp etc) which can be used to host malware, for easy download to other compromised machines (most systems have ftp/rcp/tftp clients by default, even windows)."
You forgot one other very important advantage to unix boxes (well, servers specifically)... they're always on and connected to the Internet.
Can someone please explain how to unlock this feature ? Is it similar to the Hot Coffee mod ? Where can I download it ? I've been playing San Andreas for years but have never encountered any kind of drilling mission or mod.
Question is: What is the percentage of RedHat's share among its peer (computer systems) category;
I'm not in a position to answer that with hard numbers, but given how many servers there are out there running Redhat I'd say their "share" is impressive to say the least. I'm a web developer and I've done business with a lot of hosting companies and Redhat Linux is usually the default choice with FreeBSD or Win2k/NT being by-request.
Oh, were you talking about Desktops ? Because you said "(computer systems)" which implied everything to me.
Redhat has never really focused on the Desktop market. When they started to develop "Enterprise Linux" they pretty much did away with everything related to the desktop market.
I would say that Ubuntu is doing an excellent job of marketing to the desktop niche. I've often found myself amazed that a lot of people who I would not expect to even know what Linux is are running Ubuntu and recommending it to others (example: I'm a guitarist and I hang out on the forum at ultimate-guitar.com... quite often someone posts a poll "What operating system do you use ?" and the swarm of people saying "Where's the Linux / Ubuntu option" never ceases to amaze me).
As for your original post:
"In my opinion, Linux distros must provide a means of doing away with text configuration files, but still retain the ability to access them for those who wish. Everybody I have asked to edit some configuration file has loathed the idea. They are just used to pointing and clicking. They look terrified when presented with a configuration file. Some kept asking me where they should save it!"
I have to ask you, what is the last Linux distro that you used ? Because your entire post sounds about 10+ years out of date. Not being able to install a mail server in less than 4 packages ? "up2date postfix" on redhat or "apt-get install postfix" on ubuntu and you're done. Auto downloads the mail server and installs it + any necessary dependencies. There was a time when "dependency hell", particularly on Redhat systems when trying to install RPMs, was a very real nightmare. But that time is loooooong past.
Plus, Ubuntu has all of the graphical configuration tools anyone needs to accomplish anything but you can still use the terminal if you really want to. As a power user I still drop the terminal sometimes when I can do it faster that way. But my wife (who is as computer illiterate as they come) runs Ubuntu on her desktop and I have to "support" her far less than I ever did when she was running Windows. She can configure everything she needs to without even having to know that the shell or text config files even exist. And I can't remember the last time she asked for help, or asked how to do something, with her computer and the problem was a software issue. Oh no wait, yes I can. It was when she was still running Windows XP.
Linux still has a lot of drawbacks (lack of applications, lack of hardware support and drivers from the hardware manufacturers etc.) but "usability" (perhaps "intuitiveness" would be a better term) just isn't one of them anymore.
I don't think price will ever factor into it. Most people pirate Windows or it came with their PC and they don't realize they've paid the MS tax. Of course, as hardware prices lower the MS tax will become more apparent, but if someone wants Windows I don't think paying an extra $100 on a $300 purchase is going to make *most* people consider using something with draw backs such as not being able to run their games or apps.
I think Linux' biggest strengths for mainstream computer users are the following:
1. No malware / virus crap. No having to install an anti-virus program that slows down and bloats up your computer.
2. No registry bloat and having to re-install every 6 months.
3. No Windows genuine advantage and installing stealth updates etc. I remember when MS first released the WGA patch in Windows Update that informed you that your copy was pirated and annoyed the hell out of you. I fell prey to it and so did a lot of other people. I did a bit of reading and learned how to uninstall it and afterwards I set Windows Update to notify me but not auto-install and I started going through the list of updates and unchecked anything related to WGA... but I had to "fix" quite a few relatives' computers and that sort of thing *really* annoys people. No one likes having their lives, routines, property etc. fucked up by "big brother" and MS sure made themselves look like a bully with that tactic. Of course this only applies to people who pirate Windows but that is a large number of people.
4. "coolness" factor for the hormone raging teenage male who wants to show off how leet he is by being different and using something that's kind of 'mysterious' to the average windows user (used to only be a geek trait but I'm amazed how much I'm seeing it in places you wouldn't expect to, like myspace and guitar player forums etc.)
5. Desktop FX and "eye candy". I know that it's cliche on/. to hate such things and condemn them as "un-necessary" and "bloatware" etc. but the fact is that a lot of people like that kind of thing. When I installed Ubuntu on my wife's computer the first thing she asked me is "how do I make it do the squiggly windows like yours used to ?" (I played with it on my desktop for a while but it started to annoy me after a while and I disabled them). I remember watching a couple youtube videos demonstrating Beryl and I read through the comments and a lot of people were saying "wow I'm gonna have to give Linux a try! That's way better than Vista's FX!"
The drawbacks are discussed all the time but I think the most important ones are:
1. Lack of games.
2. Inability to run Windows applications seamlessly.
3. Inability to go to any store, buy a new device or software package and be 100% guaranteed that it will "just work" when you bring it home.
4. The insanely huge amount of software out there that "sort of" works. Even the more feature-full and stable applications that have been in development for years can still annoy you a little. For example, on Windows I ran MSN messenger and ICQ. Unfortunately I am absolutely required to use ICQ because it's for business. On Linux I'm using GAIM and it works pretty well for the most part. Only I can't send messages to people while I'm in "invisible" mode. WTF!... My wife can't use her MSN emoticons and graphics. Sure all us/. techies will roll our eyes at that but they are very important to her and she has actually said she's considered switching back to Windows for that alone (I told her to try running Messenger in VMWare first since she needs to run Windows in VMWare anyway for a few business apps that she needs to use every day and won't work in Wine).
4a. The other part of this is that when you want to install a software package to do something you have to sift through massive repositories and try to sort out the beta and alpha packages that are half developed etc. When I installed Ubuntu I was very impressed that it came with
I was confused on that one, myself. Then I read more closely and he called it his "order of annoyance" (see post subject/title). So Windows was at #1 as "most annoying" and OS X was at #3 as "least annoying".
My main problem with the Floyd Rose is that if I play an open string and bend some other strings at the same time, the open string doesn't hold its pitch - the change in tension on the bent strings makes the open string go out of tune. For blues playing, that can be kind of a bummer, so I tend to use fixed bridges more often.
Backstops were invented to solve that problem. The only problem now is they were only put on certain Ibanez and ESPs and they're hard to find. I've read various theories about why Ibanez doesn't make them anymore (such as the patent is owned by Floyd Rose etc.) but it's all speculation. Anyway if you have an older Ibanez Floyd Rose (like the original Edge produced in the 80's, my personal favourite Floyd ever produced FWIW) you can find them on ebay every once in a while. Expensive as fuck considering what they are though. They probably cost $5 to produce but sell for $150 - $200 USD. So you're looking at spending $300 - $400 just on a bridge if you go that route. But if you're as insane as I am it's worth it. The original Edge is the only Floyd I use. Every other Ibanez has come out with has felt so incredibly inferior to the original, especially the low profile ones.
Joe Satriani and Steve Vai would have absolutely no use for such a guitar. They have professional guitar technicians sitting back stage making sure every single guitar is fully functional and 100% in tune before it is handed to them between songs:P
It's not just because of the locking nut. Floating bridges are held in place by the springs and the strings, which is why they're called floaters. So you need to balance the tension perfectly. The strings need to counter the tension of the strings and vice versa to get the bridge to stay perfectly flat.
I suppose once you get the bridge set up for the very first time and you always use the same gauge then perhaps the automated tuners could, theoretically, get the tension right. But it's not an easy problem to solve. Each time you tune one string the others go out of tune. Thus the only way to set it up is to deliberately tune certain strings sharp so that when you tune the rest to pitch it detunes the strings you tuned sharp. Then once you lock the nut it usually always messes with the tuning even more and you need to use the fine tuners on the bridge. Further frustrating the situation is normal string detuning while new strings stretch. Most guitarists stretch their strings out when they string their guitar for the first time but that's not as easy on a floater since the bridge will move as the strings pull on it.
It would also be nice to have such a feature on a guitar with any kind of floating bridge. A self-balancing, self-tuning floating bridge guitar would save even the most seasoned professionals a lot of time during re-stringing / initial tuning. I change the strings on my guitars once / week and it takes me about 20 minutes / guitar to setup my floaters. Of course it's a trade-off because then I don't have to worry about tuning them until I re-string them again (or if the temperature changes).
But, alas, I'm almost 100% positive (I didn't RTFA) that this particular technology could not be adapted to a floating bridge.
When I was a teenager (about 10 years ago) I played with Linux and fell in love and became a zealot. I had absolutely no experience with Photoshop what-so-ever. I became pretty proficient with The Gimp. learned a lot about raster image editing, layers etc..
A few years ago I was forced to switch to Windows because I was looking for work and at the time the office tools just weren't up to par. I needed a job and I needed to be 100% sure that companies could read my resume with no compatibility issues and Word was, unfortunately, the standard.
To make a long story short I eventually started my own business running commercial web sites. I stuck with Windows mostly because of Internet Explorer but for reasons I can't quite remember I got a copy of Photoshop and became very proficient with it and started to like it. I don't remember why I never used The Gimp on Windows but I remember there being some reason.
In April I finally migrated back to Linux. I wanted to try Ubuntu and I was VERY impressed. However...
I just can not use The Gimp.
And this is coming from someone who used to use it all the time with no problems. I missed Photoshop after moving to Ubuntu sooooooo much that I actually set up a dual boot just for Photoshop.
Here's why... (and maybe The Gimp can do some of these and I just haven't looked hard enough, I'll admit I haven't spend a TON of time trying).
o Slices + Save for web + generate HTML. Fuck, slices PERIOD would be nice. And yes Photoshop can make messy HTML and I always clean it up by hand afterwards but as a web developer this is one of my most used Photoshop features.
o "Save for web" in general. Sure I don't *need* it. But especially when I'm trying to create very small GIF images it's nice to be able to play with the settings and see the palette so I can get the smallest file size possible at the largest possible quality. I pay for bandwidth. This is important.
o Being able to crop to specific width and height without having to break it into 2 steps (crop + resize)... I know this probably isn't a very popular feature but I manually crop a lot of thumbnails all the time and being able to do it in one step effectively doubles my productivity. So it's a HUGE MUST for me.
o All of the layer effects in Photoshop that I use all the time that don't seem to exist in The Gimp (drop shadows, outer/inner blur, stroke etc.). The only thing I can seem to do in The Gimp is adjust the opacity and set the blend mode. So it seems with Gimp you're forced to use script-fu and filters and they create extra layers etc. It's less convenient, takes more time, is not as extensible / adjustable. Gotta guess what your settings will result with and then it's done. If you don't like it you gotta undo and do it all over again. With layer effects in Photoshop you can make a quick adjustment and instantly see the result without applying or committing anything. You can also disable layer effects in Photoshop individually without completely doing away with them.
o Preview JPEG quality when adjusting the quality before a save ("save for web" does this too).
o Ability to save and load selections.
o Actions / history (I actually had to open The Gimp and look because I wasn't 100% sure about this one... I was right, I can't find a "history" dialogue or equivalent). It's nice to be able to jump to a specific point in the history without having to ctrl+z a bunch of times.
o Channels don't work the same. If I duplicate a channel and view only that duplicated channel it's all black in The Gimp. In Photoshop I get a greyscale image that I can work with. Perhaps I'm just not doing something right in The Gimp.
o This is a common complaint and many people would say "it just takes getting used to, The Gimp shouldn't try and be Photoshop etc." but I can not stand The Gimp's multiple windows. This has nothing to do with being used to Photoshop and not being used to The Gimp etc. It's simply a major pain in
It's a sticky situation / tactic for both Google and it's webmasters.
For example, I have a web site that displays the most recent content for returning visitors and the most popular content for visitors who are visiting my site for the very first time. It's also possible for each user to chose which page to see. This is done to increase productivity on the site and to to increase the likelihood of a new visitor becoming a repeat visitor.
When googlebot visits my page I give it the page with the freshest content. I do this for obvious reasons. I want to google to "see" all of the fresh content that my site is offering. I don't consider this to be "cloaking". I'm not trying to trick Google or do anything malicious. Each and every single user has the option of seeing the freshest page and my page is 'smart' in that it detects if a user has visited my site before and decides what page to present the user with.
Google's guide for webmasters says "before doing something, ask yourself... would you do this if search engines did not exist, and could you justify what you are doing to a competitor". That's kind of a grey one. Yes, I can easily justify it to a competitor, most of my "competitors" do the similar things. And yes I do offer those two different pages to all of my surfers so that's completely independent of search engines. And I can justify giving the specific page to Googlebot by saying "well, Googlebot is a returning visitor it just doesn't store cookies so if I don't detect Googlebot and give it the fresh content page it will always see the most popular and then it will appear to Googlebot as if my site is rarely to never updated". I just hope that Google sees it the same way.
And so far I've never had any problems with Google blacklisting me or dropping me from the index. So I'm assuming (hoping?) that Google's algorithms are smart enough to distinguish between "completely different / malicious" and "subtly different" and that each case would be passed to a human for manual inspection before dropping from the index or blacklisting would occur. But my point is that there is a lot of grey area. Spammers and Cheaters ruin it for everyone. They ruin it for Google and they ruin it for the honest webmasters who want to get better rankings without spamming or cheating anyone but have to be extremely careful to make sure that other people would agree with their opinion that what they're doing isn't spamming.
I'd heard the main thing the software did was add the files to your iTunes/Windows media player libraries. A nice idea addition, although again Linux users can probably work out how to add things manually.
While you're probably correct, isn't it still nice that companies are starting to develop those "user friendly" tools for Linux ? Not to mention the existence of such a tool / application is "support" for the platform, and the more companies that "support" Linux the more attention it will get from the mainstream.
No offense (I mean I don't know who you are or what your specialties are) but if someone paid $500 for you to be their slave for a night I am sincerely happy for you that you can't remember what happened.
I see suppressed memories surfacing in a therapy session one day in your future...
What does the normal price range have to do with anything ? I'm sure there are a few people who would pay that much for the set but they are obviously either wealthy collectors with nothing better to do with their insane amount of money or they're die hard fans who ruin it for the rest of us by saving up for ages to be able to afford it rather than protesting the ridiculously over priced piece of plastic by not buying it.
The simple fact is, despite the fact that I LOVE star wars and lego, I'm all kinds of nerd and would absolutely adore to have that set... I wouldn't pay that price even if I were wealthy and had the money. Think about what it actually costs lego to manufacture that set. I've seen similar batman sets going for around $50... the price is so high because it's the "Star Wars" brand and there are a lot of collectors willing to pay that high. I suppose in a sense it's worth it to the collectors. The high price will guarantee that few people will buy it and then a few years after it goes out of production it will see a return because there were only so many made and sold. That doesn't mean the price is any kind of sane for the rest of us.
On the one hand, security through obscurity is a very bad default and sole security policy. On the other hand it can be a nice extra layer of security on top of an already well planned and established security policy.
Let's see what kind of details $_SERVER contains:
1. Absolute path to document_root on server 2. Absolute path to script being executed to process request 3. Contents of $PATH 4. SERVER_ADMIN which is an e-mail address that may not be public information - and apache can be configured, and often is, to not output this on error pages.
Now, having this information alone does not present a huge security risk. Using that information someone isn't going to be able to immediately compromise my system. But I would still prefer that it not be public information. I've taken steps on my servers to limit the amount of information that the web server offers about itself. I don't need software relaying that information to untrusted sources without even telling me about it. Perhaps I'm paranoid, but as a server admin it's my job to be paranoid.
Secondly, it is a privacy concern. Perhaps some of the information is required for a software update but most of that necessary information (such as filesystem paths) can be determined very easily by a script that runs on the server itself without ever transmitting that data to a 3rd party. The way I see it, it is absolutely none of WP's business what directories I installed my software in and what version of apache I'm running etc. (which, unlike the blog url + IP which is very much public information, apache versions, php versions etc. are often kept PRIVATE for security reasons by the admins when they install and configure the software).
Now for the argument that a lot seem to making of "Windows Update sends far more info blah blah"... if I were running anything critical on my personal machine I would run Linux... oh wait, I am and I do. Most web servers exist to run critical web sites or applications etc. that make money and keep businesses afloat. If something happens to them it's a very serious situation. Therefore you take the time to consider carefully what software you run on them and to design your security policies. I can't speak for others regarding their security policies and their choice of software but up until now I had no reason to mistrust word press. After all, it's a) open source and b) a LOT of people use it and trust it so, like PHP, apache, MySQL etc. I trust that exploitable bugs get found relatively quickly and thanks to auto update etc. I am comfortable running the software. My biggest beef is that if it weren't for Slashdot I WOULD NOT HAVE KNOWN ABOUT THIS! In fact, I was just about to install the latest version of word press on one server for an employee to run her blog and had I not read this article first I would have gone ahead and had no idea that it was relaying this kind of information to the WP authors.
I'm not really in a position to say how "most" police departments are organized. However, it is my understanding that, like any organization, police departments are usually broken down into divisions that each deal with their respective speciality. Such as "the bomb squad", "special weapons and tactical", "narcotics and drug enforcement" and, last but not least, "internet crime". In fact, according to TFA this particular investigation was performed by a division called CATCH (Computer and Technology High-Tech Response Unit).
Therefore, if you're worried about your street patrolmen being diverted to perform a raid on this guy's house your concerns are unfounded. Chances are the local internet crime unit (CATCH) in this particular municipality's department was glad to have a crime where there was actual identifiable damage and they could do something. I'm speculating again but I'm sure that the majority of internet crime units deal mostly with cases akin to 16 year-old girls calling them to complain about their myspace page being "hacked". Of course, in this case it was San Diego and so they probably deal with their fair share of "serious" issues like child porn and online credit card fraud etc. but how many such incidents can one single city have to deal with at any given time ? I think it's a pretty safe bet that most internet crime has to be dealt with at the federal level since the crimes transcend borders and thus never get any attention at the municipal level.
Furthermore, government tends to have a funny way of expanding in order to accomplish it's goals. Example: the CIA, NSA and FBI have a hard time sharing data. Solution: create a whole new government department to take care of it. Crime is going up in a city. Solution: hire more cops. In fact, I recently watched a news program that was talking about how the Los Angeles Police Department was relaxing their admission standards in order to recruit more officers. They interviewed a consultant / specialist who works with law enforcement agencies to help them run more efficiently and had even worked in the white house under the Clinton administration and he said "it's the last thing they should be doing, they don't need more cops they just need better organization, management etc." but they still keep throwing money and more cops.
So nothing is being "diverted". There are more than enough patrolmen patrolling your streets to arrest the muggers and house robbers. And the entire internet crime unit probably spends most of it's time filtering phone calls and filing reports for crimes dealing with personal web page defacements and teenage drama on myspace and facebook with the odd "actual crime" where there is an identifiable victim with identifiable damage and a charge can be filed.
If anything, you should be upset that your tax dollars went to finance the raid and that the bogus laws exist to begin with. Not that you are in danger because the police are being "diverted" from more important things. Because they are not.
I question the accuracy of books. The major problem with books is that once a piece of information is found to be false it is extremely difficult to correct the error. It usually requires a completely new edition of the book to be printed and sold.
Of course the Internet has it's own problems. Anyone can publish anything and it's difficult to sift through what's credible and what's not. You might say with books you can limit yourself to credible authors and publishers, but you can do that with the Internet as well.
Both are equally useful and equally useless IMO. As long as humans share information we will also share inaccurate information. The medium is irrelevant.
Look at people like Hitler and Stalin -- they are STILL talked about, even though their legacy is horrific and detested by most people. To me, that's proof that polarization is a key factor in building fame or infamy for those who want it.
Did you just imply that you would be perfectly happy to be remembered in the same vain as Hitler or Stalin ?:\
Not that it has anything to do with Trent Reznor, but Pearl Jam canceled an entire tour in 1994 and boycotted Ticketmaster for adding a surcharge to their tickets and raising the prices of their concerts. So it's not unheard of for major label bands to have issues with "Big Company" with regards to their ticket prices as well, and take action to benefit their fans.
I was hoping my post would be modded funny, not taken seriously.
But I still make a valid point. I'm an old time Linux nerd and I've worked as a *nix admin. I use the command line all the time. And yes there's lots of things that I can accomplish on the command line much faster and more efficiently than if I were to use the GUI. Yet that's besides the point. Telling someone who has never used Linux before, and is considering trying it on his desktop, that the CLI is easier than the GUI is an excellent way to suggest that the GUI is a complete failure. Even if it's not the case it is the most likely way that your statement will be interpreted.
It's amazing I got GTA Vice City to run under Wine but I can't get a simple little dialog-based application to run. It used to run but then a Ubuntu update killed it and now it gives runtime errors about loading the C runtime incorrectly.
I am very impressed by Wine, and this is coming from an old time Linux nerd since 1998, but unfortunately it still has a long ways to go before it will be recommendable to the casual Windows convert. There will always be little caveats like this.
My wife recently switched to Ubuntu after a Windows Update caused her computer to blue screen on boot. She does almost everything in Linux and VMware (two business applications she absolutely can't live without that are windows-only and wouldn't work with wine) but she kept a dual-boot for playing games.
Slashdot Mirror
"Conversely, unix machines are typically more stable, and have a far more flexible interface that's more geared up to remote cli usage. Installing something like an IRC server to collect malware is often much easier, and there's usually package management which can be used to easily install any external libraries or additional tools that might be required. There are also typically standard server apps installed and ready to use (ftpd, apache, rcp, tftp etc) which can be used to host malware, for easy download to other compromised machines (most systems have ftp/rcp/tftp clients by default, even windows)."
... they're always on and connected to the Internet.
You forgot one other very important advantage to unix boxes (well, servers specifically)
Can someone please explain how to unlock this feature ? Is it similar to the Hot Coffee mod ? Where can I download it ? I've been playing San Andreas for years but have never encountered any kind of drilling mission or mod.
What's wrong with "apt-get install postfix" ?
Installs postfix for you and it's up and running. Just like that.
Question is: What is the percentage of RedHat's share among its peer (computer systems) category;
... quite often someone posts a poll "What operating system do you use ?" and the swarm of people saying "Where's the Linux / Ubuntu option" never ceases to amaze me).
I'm not in a position to answer that with hard numbers, but given how many servers there are out there running Redhat I'd say their "share" is impressive to say the least. I'm a web developer and I've done business with a lot of hosting companies and Redhat Linux is usually the default choice with FreeBSD or Win2k/NT being by-request.
Oh, were you talking about Desktops ? Because you said "(computer systems)" which implied everything to me.
Redhat has never really focused on the Desktop market. When they started to develop "Enterprise Linux" they pretty much did away with everything related to the desktop market.
I would say that Ubuntu is doing an excellent job of marketing to the desktop niche. I've often found myself amazed that a lot of people who I would not expect to even know what Linux is are running Ubuntu and recommending it to others (example: I'm a guitarist and I hang out on the forum at ultimate-guitar.com
As for your original post:
"In my opinion, Linux distros must provide a means of doing away with text configuration files, but still retain the ability to access them for those who wish. Everybody I have asked to edit some configuration file has loathed the idea. They are just used to pointing and clicking. They look terrified when presented with a configuration file. Some kept asking me where they should save it!"
I have to ask you, what is the last Linux distro that you used ? Because your entire post sounds about 10+ years out of date. Not being able to install a mail server in less than 4 packages ? "up2date postfix" on redhat or "apt-get install postfix" on ubuntu and you're done. Auto downloads the mail server and installs it + any necessary dependencies. There was a time when "dependency hell", particularly on Redhat systems when trying to install RPMs, was a very real nightmare. But that time is loooooong past.
Plus, Ubuntu has all of the graphical configuration tools anyone needs to accomplish anything but you can still use the terminal if you really want to. As a power user I still drop the terminal sometimes when I can do it faster that way. But my wife (who is as computer illiterate as they come) runs Ubuntu on her desktop and I have to "support" her far less than I ever did when she was running Windows. She can configure everything she needs to without even having to know that the shell or text config files even exist. And I can't remember the last time she asked for help, or asked how to do something, with her computer and the problem was a software issue. Oh no wait, yes I can. It was when she was still running Windows XP.
Linux still has a lot of drawbacks (lack of applications, lack of hardware support and drivers from the hardware manufacturers etc.) but "usability" (perhaps "intuitiveness" would be a better term) just isn't one of them anymore.
I don't think price will ever factor into it. Most people pirate Windows or it came with their PC and they don't realize they've paid the MS tax. Of course, as hardware prices lower the MS tax will become more apparent, but if someone wants Windows I don't think paying an extra $100 on a $300 purchase is going to make *most* people consider using something with draw backs such as not being able to run their games or apps.
... but I had to "fix" quite a few relatives' computers and that sort of thing *really* annoys people. No one likes having their lives, routines, property etc. fucked up by "big brother" and MS sure made themselves look like a bully with that tactic. Of course this only applies to people who pirate Windows but that is a large number of people.
/. to hate such things and condemn them as "un-necessary" and "bloatware" etc. but the fact is that a lot of people like that kind of thing. When I installed Ubuntu on my wife's computer the first thing she asked me is "how do I make it do the squiggly windows like yours used to ?" (I played with it on my desktop for a while but it started to annoy me after a while and I disabled them). I remember watching a couple youtube videos demonstrating Beryl and I read through the comments and a lot of people were saying "wow I'm gonna have to give Linux a try! That's way better than Vista's FX!"
... My wife can't use her MSN emoticons and graphics. Sure all us /. techies will roll our eyes at that but they are very important to her and she has actually said she's considered switching back to Windows for that alone (I told her to try running Messenger in VMWare first since she needs to run Windows in VMWare anyway for a few business apps that she needs to use every day and won't work in Wine).
I think Linux' biggest strengths for mainstream computer users are the following:
1. No malware / virus crap. No having to install an anti-virus program that slows down and bloats up your computer.
2. No registry bloat and having to re-install every 6 months.
3. No Windows genuine advantage and installing stealth updates etc. I remember when MS first released the WGA patch in Windows Update that informed you that your copy was pirated and annoyed the hell out of you. I fell prey to it and so did a lot of other people. I did a bit of reading and learned how to uninstall it and afterwards I set Windows Update to notify me but not auto-install and I started going through the list of updates and unchecked anything related to WGA
4. "coolness" factor for the hormone raging teenage male who wants to show off how leet he is by being different and using something that's kind of 'mysterious' to the average windows user (used to only be a geek trait but I'm amazed how much I'm seeing it in places you wouldn't expect to, like myspace and guitar player forums etc.)
5. Desktop FX and "eye candy". I know that it's cliche on
The drawbacks are discussed all the time but I think the most important ones are:
1. Lack of games.
2. Inability to run Windows applications seamlessly.
3. Inability to go to any store, buy a new device or software package and be 100% guaranteed that it will "just work" when you bring it home.
4. The insanely huge amount of software out there that "sort of" works. Even the more feature-full and stable applications that have been in development for years can still annoy you a little. For example, on Windows I ran MSN messenger and ICQ. Unfortunately I am absolutely required to use ICQ because it's for business. On Linux I'm using GAIM and it works pretty well for the most part. Only I can't send messages to people while I'm in "invisible" mode. WTF!
4a. The other part of this is that when you want to install a software package to do something you have to sift through massive repositories and try to sort out the beta and alpha packages that are half developed etc. When I installed Ubuntu I was very impressed that it came with
I was confused on that one, myself. Then I read more closely and he called it his "order of annoyance" (see post subject/title). So Windows was at #1 as "most annoying" and OS X was at #3 as "least annoying".
My main problem with the Floyd Rose is that if I play an open string and bend some other strings at the same time, the open string doesn't hold its pitch - the change in tension on the bent strings makes the open string go out of tune. For blues playing, that can be kind of a bummer, so I tend to use fixed bridges more often.
Backstops were invented to solve that problem. The only problem now is they were only put on certain Ibanez and ESPs and they're hard to find. I've read various theories about why Ibanez doesn't make them anymore (such as the patent is owned by Floyd Rose etc.) but it's all speculation. Anyway if you have an older Ibanez Floyd Rose (like the original Edge produced in the 80's, my personal favourite Floyd ever produced FWIW) you can find them on ebay every once in a while. Expensive as fuck considering what they are though. They probably cost $5 to produce but sell for $150 - $200 USD. So you're looking at spending $300 - $400 just on a bridge if you go that route. But if you're as insane as I am it's worth it. The original Edge is the only Floyd I use. Every other Ibanez has come out with has felt so incredibly inferior to the original, especially the low profile ones.
Joe Satriani and Steve Vai would have absolutely no use for such a guitar. They have professional guitar technicians sitting back stage making sure every single guitar is fully functional and 100% in tune before it is handed to them between songs :P
It's not just because of the locking nut. Floating bridges are held in place by the springs and the strings, which is why they're called floaters. So you need to balance the tension perfectly. The strings need to counter the tension of the strings and vice versa to get the bridge to stay perfectly flat.
I suppose once you get the bridge set up for the very first time and you always use the same gauge then perhaps the automated tuners could, theoretically, get the tension right. But it's not an easy problem to solve. Each time you tune one string the others go out of tune. Thus the only way to set it up is to deliberately tune certain strings sharp so that when you tune the rest to pitch it detunes the strings you tuned sharp. Then once you lock the nut it usually always messes with the tuning even more and you need to use the fine tuners on the bridge. Further frustrating the situation is normal string detuning while new strings stretch. Most guitarists stretch their strings out when they string their guitar for the first time but that's not as easy on a floater since the bridge will move as the strings pull on it.
It would also be nice to have such a feature on a guitar with any kind of floating bridge. A self-balancing, self-tuning floating bridge guitar would save even the most seasoned professionals a lot of time during re-stringing / initial tuning. I change the strings on my guitars once / week and it takes me about 20 minutes / guitar to setup my floaters. Of course it's a trade-off because then I don't have to worry about tuning them until I re-string them again (or if the temperature changes).
But, alas, I'm almost 100% positive (I didn't RTFA) that this particular technology could not be adapted to a floating bridge.
When I was a teenager (about 10 years ago) I played with Linux and fell in love and became a zealot. I had absolutely no experience with Photoshop what-so-ever. I became pretty proficient with The Gimp. learned a lot about raster image editing, layers etc..
... I know this probably isn't a very popular feature but I manually crop a lot of thumbnails all the time and being able to do it in one step effectively doubles my productivity. So it's a HUGE MUST for me.
... I was right, I can't find a "history" dialogue or equivalent). It's nice to be able to jump to a specific point in the history without having to ctrl+z a bunch of times.
A few years ago I was forced to switch to Windows because I was looking for work and at the time the office tools just weren't up to par. I needed a job and I needed to be 100% sure that companies could read my resume with no compatibility issues and Word was, unfortunately, the standard.
To make a long story short I eventually started my own business running commercial web sites. I stuck with Windows mostly because of Internet Explorer but for reasons I can't quite remember I got a copy of Photoshop and became very proficient with it and started to like it. I don't remember why I never used The Gimp on Windows but I remember there being some reason.
In April I finally migrated back to Linux. I wanted to try Ubuntu and I was VERY impressed. However...
I just can not use The Gimp.
And this is coming from someone who used to use it all the time with no problems. I missed Photoshop after moving to Ubuntu sooooooo much that I actually set up a dual boot just for Photoshop.
Here's why... (and maybe The Gimp can do some of these and I just haven't looked hard enough, I'll admit I haven't spend a TON of time trying).
o Slices + Save for web + generate HTML. Fuck, slices PERIOD would be nice. And yes Photoshop can make messy HTML and I always clean it up by hand afterwards but as a web developer this is one of my most used Photoshop features.
o "Save for web" in general. Sure I don't *need* it. But especially when I'm trying to create very small GIF images it's nice to be able to play with the settings and see the palette so I can get the smallest file size possible at the largest possible quality. I pay for bandwidth. This is important.
o Being able to crop to specific width and height without having to break it into 2 steps (crop + resize)
o All of the layer effects in Photoshop that I use all the time that don't seem to exist in The Gimp (drop shadows, outer/inner blur, stroke etc.). The only thing I can seem to do in The Gimp is adjust the opacity and set the blend mode. So it seems with Gimp you're forced to use script-fu and filters and they create extra layers etc. It's less convenient, takes more time, is not as extensible / adjustable. Gotta guess what your settings will result with and then it's done. If you don't like it you gotta undo and do it all over again. With layer effects in Photoshop you can make a quick adjustment and instantly see the result without applying or committing anything. You can also disable layer effects in Photoshop individually without completely doing away with them.
o Preview JPEG quality when adjusting the quality before a save ("save for web" does this too).
o Ability to save and load selections.
o Actions / history (I actually had to open The Gimp and look because I wasn't 100% sure about this one
o Channels don't work the same. If I duplicate a channel and view only that duplicated channel it's all black in The Gimp. In Photoshop I get a greyscale image that I can work with. Perhaps I'm just not doing something right in The Gimp.
o This is a common complaint and many people would say "it just takes getting used to, The Gimp shouldn't try and be Photoshop etc." but I can not stand The Gimp's multiple windows. This has nothing to do with being used to Photoshop and not being used to The Gimp etc. It's simply a major pain in
I think I'm gonna cross the river and attend the Ann Arbor party. Any other slashdotters over 21 from Windsor ? Wanna car pool ?
:(
Yeah I'm gonna need a ride
It's a sticky situation / tactic for both Google and it's webmasters.
... would you do this if search engines did not exist, and could you justify what you are doing to a competitor". That's kind of a grey one. Yes, I can easily justify it to a competitor, most of my "competitors" do the similar things. And yes I do offer those two different pages to all of my surfers so that's completely independent of search engines. And I can justify giving the specific page to Googlebot by saying "well, Googlebot is a returning visitor it just doesn't store cookies so if I don't detect Googlebot and give it the fresh content page it will always see the most popular and then it will appear to Googlebot as if my site is rarely to never updated". I just hope that Google sees it the same way.
For example, I have a web site that displays the most recent content for returning visitors and the most popular content for visitors who are visiting my site for the very first time. It's also possible for each user to chose which page to see. This is done to increase productivity on the site and to to increase the likelihood of a new visitor becoming a repeat visitor.
When googlebot visits my page I give it the page with the freshest content. I do this for obvious reasons. I want to google to "see" all of the fresh content that my site is offering. I don't consider this to be "cloaking". I'm not trying to trick Google or do anything malicious. Each and every single user has the option of seeing the freshest page and my page is 'smart' in that it detects if a user has visited my site before and decides what page to present the user with.
Google's guide for webmasters says "before doing something, ask yourself
And so far I've never had any problems with Google blacklisting me or dropping me from the index. So I'm assuming (hoping?) that Google's algorithms are smart enough to distinguish between "completely different / malicious" and "subtly different" and that each case would be passed to a human for manual inspection before dropping from the index or blacklisting would occur. But my point is that there is a lot of grey area. Spammers and Cheaters ruin it for everyone. They ruin it for Google and they ruin it for the honest webmasters who want to get better rankings without spamming or cheating anyone but have to be extremely careful to make sure that other people would agree with their opinion that what they're doing isn't spamming.
I'd heard the main thing the software did was add the files to your iTunes/Windows media player libraries. A nice idea addition, although again Linux users can probably work out how to add things manually.
While you're probably correct, isn't it still nice that companies are starting to develop those "user friendly" tools for Linux ? Not to mention the existence of such a tool / application is "support" for the platform, and the more companies that "support" Linux the more attention it will get from the mainstream.
No offense (I mean I don't know who you are or what your specialties are) but if someone paid $500 for you to be their slave for a night I am sincerely happy for you that you can't remember what happened.
I see suppressed memories surfacing in a therapy session one day in your future...
What does the normal price range have to do with anything ? I'm sure there are a few people who would pay that much for the set but they are obviously either wealthy collectors with nothing better to do with their insane amount of money or they're die hard fans who ruin it for the rest of us by saving up for ages to be able to afford it rather than protesting the ridiculously over priced piece of plastic by not buying it.
... I wouldn't pay that price even if I were wealthy and had the money. Think about what it actually costs lego to manufacture that set. I've seen similar batman sets going for around $50 ... the price is so high because it's the "Star Wars" brand and there are a lot of collectors willing to pay that high. I suppose in a sense it's worth it to the collectors. The high price will guarantee that few people will buy it and then a few years after it goes out of production it will see a return because there were only so many made and sold. That doesn't mean the price is any kind of sane for the rest of us.
The simple fact is, despite the fact that I LOVE star wars and lego, I'm all kinds of nerd and would absolutely adore to have that set
Perhaps if the price weren't completely laughable.
He said he was going to hell, not the special level of hell :P
yes and no.
... if I were running anything critical on my personal machine I would run Linux ... oh wait, I am and I do. Most web servers exist to run critical web sites or applications etc. that make money and keep businesses afloat. If something happens to them it's a very serious situation. Therefore you take the time to consider carefully what software you run on them and to design your security policies. I can't speak for others regarding their security policies and their choice of software but up until now I had no reason to mistrust word press. After all, it's a) open source and b) a LOT of people use it and trust it so, like PHP, apache, MySQL etc. I trust that exploitable bugs get found relatively quickly and thanks to auto update etc. I am comfortable running the software. My biggest beef is that if it weren't for Slashdot I WOULD NOT HAVE KNOWN ABOUT THIS! In fact, I was just about to install the latest version of word press on one server for an employee to run her blog and had I not read this article first I would have gone ahead and had no idea that it was relaying this kind of information to the WP authors.
On the one hand, security through obscurity is a very bad default and sole security policy. On the other hand it can be a nice extra layer of security on top of an already well planned and established security policy.
Let's see what kind of details $_SERVER contains:
1. Absolute path to document_root on server
2. Absolute path to script being executed to process request
3. Contents of $PATH
4. SERVER_ADMIN which is an e-mail address that may not be public information - and apache can be configured, and often is, to not output this on error pages.
Now, having this information alone does not present a huge security risk. Using that information someone isn't going to be able to immediately compromise my system. But I would still prefer that it not be public information. I've taken steps on my servers to limit the amount of information that the web server offers about itself. I don't need software relaying that information to untrusted sources without even telling me about it. Perhaps I'm paranoid, but as a server admin it's my job to be paranoid.
Secondly, it is a privacy concern. Perhaps some of the information is required for a software update but most of that necessary information (such as filesystem paths) can be determined very easily by a script that runs on the server itself without ever transmitting that data to a 3rd party. The way I see it, it is absolutely none of WP's business what directories I installed my software in and what version of apache I'm running etc. (which, unlike the blog url + IP which is very much public information, apache versions, php versions etc. are often kept PRIVATE for security reasons by the admins when they install and configure the software).
Now for the argument that a lot seem to making of "Windows Update sends far more info blah blah"
I'm not really in a position to say how "most" police departments are organized. However, it is my understanding that, like any organization, police departments are usually broken down into divisions that each deal with their respective speciality. Such as "the bomb squad", "special weapons and tactical", "narcotics and drug enforcement" and, last but not least, "internet crime". In fact, according to TFA this particular investigation was performed by a division called CATCH (Computer and Technology High-Tech Response Unit).
Therefore, if you're worried about your street patrolmen being diverted to perform a raid on this guy's house your concerns are unfounded. Chances are the local internet crime unit (CATCH) in this particular municipality's department was glad to have a crime where there was actual identifiable damage and they could do something. I'm speculating again but I'm sure that the majority of internet crime units deal mostly with cases akin to 16 year-old girls calling them to complain about their myspace page being "hacked". Of course, in this case it was San Diego and so they probably deal with their fair share of "serious" issues like child porn and online credit card fraud etc. but how many such incidents can one single city have to deal with at any given time ? I think it's a pretty safe bet that most internet crime has to be dealt with at the federal level since the crimes transcend borders and thus never get any attention at the municipal level.
Furthermore, government tends to have a funny way of expanding in order to accomplish it's goals. Example: the CIA, NSA and FBI have a hard time sharing data. Solution: create a whole new government department to take care of it. Crime is going up in a city. Solution: hire more cops. In fact, I recently watched a news program that was talking about how the Los Angeles Police Department was relaxing their admission standards in order to recruit more officers. They interviewed a consultant / specialist who works with law enforcement agencies to help them run more efficiently and had even worked in the white house under the Clinton administration and he said "it's the last thing they should be doing, they don't need more cops they just need better organization, management etc." but they still keep throwing money and more cops.
So nothing is being "diverted". There are more than enough patrolmen patrolling your streets to arrest the muggers and house robbers. And the entire internet crime unit probably spends most of it's time filtering phone calls and filing reports for crimes dealing with personal web page defacements and teenage drama on myspace and facebook with the odd "actual crime" where there is an identifiable victim with identifiable damage and a charge can be filed.
If anything, you should be upset that your tax dollars went to finance the raid and that the bogus laws exist to begin with. Not that you are in danger because the police are being "diverted" from more important things. Because they are not.
I question the accuracy of books. The major problem with books is that once a piece of information is found to be false it is extremely difficult to correct the error. It usually requires a completely new edition of the book to be printed and sold.
Of course the Internet has it's own problems. Anyone can publish anything and it's difficult to sift through what's credible and what's not. You might say with books you can limit yourself to credible authors and publishers, but you can do that with the Internet as well.
Both are equally useful and equally useless IMO. As long as humans share information we will also share inaccurate information. The medium is irrelevant.
Look at people like Hitler and Stalin -- they are STILL talked about, even though their legacy is horrific and detested by most people. To me, that's proof that polarization is a key factor in building fame or infamy for those who want it.
:\
Did you just imply that you would be perfectly happy to be remembered in the same vain as Hitler or Stalin ?
Not that it has anything to do with Trent Reznor, but Pearl Jam canceled an entire tour in 1994 and boycotted Ticketmaster for adding a surcharge to their tickets and raising the prices of their concerts. So it's not unheard of for major label bands to have issues with "Big Company" with regards to their ticket prices as well, and take action to benefit their fans.
I was hoping my post would be modded funny, not taken seriously.
But I still make a valid point. I'm an old time Linux nerd and I've worked as a *nix admin. I use the command line all the time. And yes there's lots of things that I can accomplish on the command line much faster and more efficiently than if I were to use the GUI. Yet that's besides the point. Telling someone who has never used Linux before, and is considering trying it on his desktop, that the CLI is easier than the GUI is an excellent way to suggest that the GUI is a complete failure. Even if it's not the case it is the most likely way that your statement will be interpreted.
It's amazing I got GTA Vice City to run under Wine but I can't get a simple little dialog-based application to run. It used to run but then a Ubuntu update killed it and now it gives runtime errors about loading the C runtime incorrectly.
I am very impressed by Wine, and this is coming from an old time Linux nerd since 1998, but unfortunately it still has a long ways to go before it will be recommendable to the casual Windows convert. There will always be little caveats like this.
My wife recently switched to Ubuntu after a Windows Update caused her computer to blue screen on boot. She does almost everything in Linux and VMware (two business applications she absolutely can't live without that are windows-only and wouldn't work with wine) but she kept a dual-boot for playing games.