What do I do now? R u kidding? I work on computers for a Fortune 5!
That was my last 'outdoor' job, last job period, that wasn't on computers... I realized that I wasn't going to make it in the 'real world' unless I went for a better career. There was only 20 of us or so at that company so they didn't do any of the big company stuff (IE 401k and employee of the xxxx).
Well this may not even be seen since there are so many comments for this story already BUT...
I used to work for a submersible sewage pump company. I was a field and shop tech. This means that I would have to drive out to where the broke pump was, pull it out of the hole, try to fix it there, and if I couldn't, take it back to the shop and do it. These were submersible pumps (Flygt). So they are at the bottom of the well, swimming in sh*t.
Since we were only called out when they broke and not pumping, sh*t would of course be overflowing out of the well, all over the place, by the time we got there. So you would be stomping around in human feces, trying to swing a winch with hook on the end to hook on the pump so you could pull it up out of there and fix it. Of course this would take some time. Sewage is pretty murky so you couldn't see the hook to guide it. You had to swing blindly, feeling for the bang that would happen when you struck the pump with the hook. We would have to swing the winch around quite a few times usually before it would hook.
Now add to that the fact that it would be around 5 degrees F, night, windy, and snowing. So you now have frozen turds on your hands and knees (you had to kneel over the well while trying to hook the pump), plus whatever else people flush (think safe sex, and that time of the month).
Now for the icing. You would drive back with the heat on. Since the heating systems suck in commercial vehicles, you had to put the fan on high with the vents pointing at you. So at this point the sewage would begin cooking in your clothes. Actually the smell of cooked sewage isn't all that bad once you got used to.
And BTW, I never had a problem, but people did die in this job from asphyxiation. Sewer gases at the bottom of an enclosed well can be pretty serious.
I buy the Tivo OR ReplayTV for one reason and one reason only, to make more time for myself.
I am a busy guy (read: Pr0n) and don't have the time to look up shows and watch them when they are on. Tivo or ReplayTV do this for me.
I also like the speedy set up. The Tivo integrates directly with my satellite, automatically updates itself, and basically requires no maintenance on my part. I want to just sit down in front of my TV and watch whatever shows I missed while I was working, looking at pr0n, whatever.
Right off, this means Freevo or similar probably won't work for me. It is too kludgy and time consuming to set up and maintain (key point is patching). Plus the guides in it aren't as good. Lastly, I don't want to maintain extra computers (I already look after 2 Solaris and 3 x86 systems... I don't want any more).
BUT! The other half of the Tivo service that gives me extra time, is the ability to skip commercials. A normal hour of television has about 15-20 mins in ads. I can skip these and fit in another half-hour (commerical free) show!
If you take away the commercial skips, you take away half of the benefit. Now your providing a lesser product, but still charging the same price. To me it is a no-brainer. Either they can lower the price to match, or people (at least those like me) won't buy it, if they do this.
I think this is the main point of a floppy these days isn't it? A backup boot method... Sure you can use bootable CD-roms, but what if your CD-writer is on the machine that got toasted?
Floppies and the drives that run them are simple, cheap, abundant, and effective for what they do. Until there is a replacement that is standard on all PC's, these should always be available.
What NASA needs to do to stay alive is show progress. We managed to fly to the moon in a few short years, yet here we are flying the same trips in the shuttle over and over again for 20 years plus, and gaining little that the public can sink their teeth in to ('fraid to say Hubble doesn't interest most people).
What is needed is for goals to be set, then those goals to be met. NASA needs to pick something that can be done inexpensively, and start doing it. As they show success, public confidence will build, and so will the funding. This is the nature of our economy, and NASA isnt exempt from the rules.
Personally I like the idea to start a base on the moon, which we can later use as a waypoint for future space missions. Use the less expensive launch systems of today, and simply start dropping off the parts to do it with unmanned flights. After a few years or even less, we send up a set of astronauts to put it all together. Then we can start using that as a base. Sending off flight to Mars from the moon is much more economical.
What this type of thing does is give the public 'goals' that NASA can work on and achieve, and actually show some progress for the money spent.
Back to the topic at hand though. Offering a check box on a tax return? You can't get 14.5 billion (2002 NASA budget) that way... It's just too much money.
OT but, as someone who has worked for years in software support, I can tell you that checksumming is not a final answer by any means to tamper notification. These tools can be of more concern for someone who doesn't know what their doing than they are worth...
I was lucky enough to receive the customer call when his binary had a changed checksum. The customer was very obviously concerned about this as it was the primary executable for our software. "What trajons are there for this?". My answer, "None known sir." did not elicit any confidence. A few minutes and a diff check later, there was one small bit of corruption that had occurred in the file. It was obvious too little had changed for the executable to have been altered, so I told him to simply restore from his back up.
Point being is that just because an MD5 checksum is off means little. Integrity checking should always be a part (and only a small part!) of a more substantive system of security.
ReplayTV should be around a long time to come if they remember to refer to their lawyers. Its a sad state of affairs that it has to be like that, but thats the only way to keep from being shut down in that business.
I remember the same thing was the point of using Windows NT instead of Windows 3.11 or 95 years ago. Then, along came SMS, which was supposed to end the desktop administration problems. Then Citrix with its 'Thin Client' technology. And Netware...
With each generation of product aimed at reducing administration, the net effect was more IT jobs. With each revision of these types of desktop administration tools, the products became more complex. Net effect being that you needed a more qualified person to run it correctly.
It is good to note the use of the terrorist rhetoric, "...blueprints for building these weapons...". Talk about riding on the coattails. This seems more like a line out of the evening news than a statement about software security. Spin doctors working overtime on this one.
If they don't define how people will be verified in the first place for their 'e-signature' there will definately be some issues... This article at ABC news states that 50 million people are not going be web literate any time soon. Unless you have to show up in person to verify who you say you are, thats quite a lot of people I can impersonate.
The problem is, right now only some/most have access to a computer. But EVERYONE has access to a pen.
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What do I do now? R u kidding? I work on computers for a Fortune 5!
That was my last 'outdoor' job, last job period, that wasn't on computers... I realized that I wasn't going to make it in the 'real world' unless I went for a better career. There was only 20 of us or so at that company so they didn't do any of the big company stuff (IE 401k and employee of the xxxx).
Well this may not even be seen since there are so many comments for this story already BUT...
I used to work for a submersible sewage pump company. I was a field and shop tech. This means that I would have to drive out to where the broke pump was, pull it out of the hole, try to fix it there, and if I couldn't, take it back to the shop and do it. These were submersible pumps (Flygt). So they are at the bottom of the well, swimming in sh*t.
Since we were only called out when they broke and not pumping, sh*t would of course be overflowing out of the well, all over the place, by the time we got there. So you would be stomping around in human feces, trying to swing a winch with hook on the end to hook on the pump so you could pull it up out of there and fix it. Of course this would take some time. Sewage is pretty murky so you couldn't see the hook to guide it. You had to swing blindly, feeling for the bang that would happen when you struck the pump with the hook. We would have to swing the winch around quite a few times usually before it would hook.
Now add to that the fact that it would be around 5 degrees F, night, windy, and snowing. So you now have frozen turds on your hands and knees (you had to kneel over the well while trying to hook the pump), plus whatever else people flush (think safe sex, and that time of the month).
Now for the icing. You would drive back with the heat on. Since the heating systems suck in commercial vehicles, you had to put the fan on high with the vents pointing at you. So at this point the sewage would begin cooking in your clothes. Actually the smell of cooked sewage isn't all that bad once you got used to.
And BTW, I never had a problem, but people did die in this job from asphyxiation. Sewer gases at the bottom of an enclosed well can be pretty serious.
OK to summarize:
I buy the Tivo OR ReplayTV for one reason and one reason only, to make more time for myself.
I am a busy guy (read: Pr0n) and don't have the time to look up shows and watch them when they are on. Tivo or ReplayTV do this for me.
I also like the speedy set up. The Tivo integrates directly with my satellite, automatically updates itself, and basically requires no maintenance on my part. I want to just sit down in front of my TV and watch whatever shows I missed while I was working, looking at pr0n, whatever.
Right off, this means Freevo or similar probably won't work for me. It is too kludgy and time consuming to set up and maintain (key point is patching). Plus the guides in it aren't as good. Lastly, I don't want to maintain extra computers (I already look after 2 Solaris and 3 x86 systems... I don't want any more).
BUT! The other half of the Tivo service that gives me extra time, is the ability to skip commercials. A normal hour of television has about 15-20 mins in ads. I can skip these and fit in another half-hour (commerical free) show!
If you take away the commercial skips, you take away half of the benefit. Now your providing a lesser product, but still charging the same price. To me it is a no-brainer. Either they can lower the price to match, or people (at least those like me) won't buy it, if they do this.
I was looking forward to writing the W32/flusher.gen virus. I had all my plans in the works. Automatic flushing, and handwashing alarms....
This one is so dry, I needed a water chaser...
Can you boot off a pen drive?
I think this is the main point of a floppy these days isn't it? A backup boot method... Sure you can use bootable CD-roms, but what if your CD-writer is on the machine that got toasted?
Floppies and the drives that run them are simple, cheap, abundant, and effective for what they do. Until there is a replacement that is standard on all PC's, these should always be available.
What NASA needs to do to stay alive is show progress. We managed to fly to the moon in a few short years, yet here we are flying the same trips in the shuttle over and over again for 20 years plus, and gaining little that the public can sink their teeth in to ('fraid to say Hubble doesn't interest most people).
What is needed is for goals to be set, then those goals to be met. NASA needs to pick something that can be done inexpensively, and start doing it. As they show success, public confidence will build, and so will the funding. This is the nature of our economy, and NASA isnt exempt from the rules.
Personally I like the idea to start a base on the moon, which we can later use as a waypoint for future space missions. Use the less expensive launch systems of today, and simply start dropping off the parts to do it with unmanned flights. After a few years or even less, we send up a set of astronauts to put it all together. Then we can start using that as a base. Sending off flight to Mars from the moon is much more economical.
What this type of thing does is give the public 'goals' that NASA can work on and achieve, and actually show some progress for the money spent.
Back to the topic at hand though. Offering a check box on a tax return? You can't get 14.5 billion (2002 NASA budget) that way... It's just too much money.
OT but, as someone who has worked for years in software support, I can tell you that checksumming is not a final answer by any means to tamper notification. These tools can be of more concern for someone who doesn't know what their doing than they are worth...
I was lucky enough to receive the customer call when his binary had a changed checksum. The customer was very obviously concerned about this as it was the primary executable for our software. "What trajons are there for this?". My answer, "None known sir." did not elicit any confidence. A few minutes and a diff check later, there was one small bit of corruption that had occurred in the file. It was obvious too little had changed for the executable to have been altered, so I told him to simply restore from his back up.
Point being is that just because an MD5 checksum is off means little. Integrity checking should always be a part (and only a small part!) of a more substantive system of security.
I guess Apple will have to find a new way to prove the processing power of their chips...
ReplayTV should be around a long time to come if they remember to refer to their lawyers. Its a sad state of affairs that it has to be like that, but thats the only way to keep from being shut down in that business.
I remember the same thing was the point of using Windows NT instead of Windows 3.11 or 95 years ago. Then, along came SMS, which was supposed to end the desktop administration problems. Then Citrix with its 'Thin Client' technology. And Netware...
With each generation of product aimed at reducing administration, the net effect was more IT jobs. With each revision of these types of desktop administration tools, the products became more complex. Net effect being that you needed a more qualified person to run it correctly.
This just looks like more of the same...
It is good to note the use of the terrorist rhetoric, "...blueprints for building these weapons...". Talk about riding on the coattails. This seems more like a line out of the evening news than a statement about software security. Spin doctors working overtime on this one.
If they don't define how people will be verified in the first place for their 'e-signature' there will definately be some issues... This article at ABC news states that 50 million people are not going be web literate any time soon. Unless you have to show up in person to verify who you say you are, thats quite a lot of people I can impersonate. The problem is, right now only some/most have access to a computer. But EVERYONE has access to a pen.