And somehow, you have to give the user a way to navigate all those pages.
Sigh. I gave that as an example of the thrust of what he is talking about. Nevertheless, it *would* be possible to navigate the pages...with the pen you use to do the crosswords. Or by simpy opening the pages; when ambient light touches an open page, the information can change. Brushing you finger (like mouse gestures) could also turn the pages and do suff. You just have to use your imagination which is what Gerlerntner wants you to do, and which is why he wrote what he wrote.
A newspaper is small and static. You get whatever the publisher put there.
Tabloid sized paper is bigger than a 19" monitor, and it would not be static, since the "newspaper" would be networked. When the publisher changes the page, everyone loged into that edition sees the new page...like the web.
A "newspaper" with the scope of the entire 'Net (which we have already in the form of the browser)
Browsers, stuck on laptops or desktops are NOT what Gerlentner wants to see or use.
needs some sort of navigational aid. "Touch here to go see X, touch there to read more on this topic." That is what an operating system does.
As for computers being able to be "Used" like a newspaper: Newspapers don't have nearly the dynamic interface that is required for most applications. It's a passive medium.
I gave the example of a newspaper, because its something that is pervasive, intimately familiar, and imagined by most as being "impossible" to be made into a computer.
Strangely, some people STILL dont get it, and started to say crap like "well, how would you run it? With an OS of course!".
Gerlentner is thinking wider and further ahead and so its not easy to put into words; you have to "work with him" to get his message.
As I take it, his basic point seems to be that both Windows and Linux are based on OS concepts developed at least 30 years ago:
To put what Gelernter is talking about in more clear terms, ask this question; "what if a network connected computer could somehow be the shape of a newspaper?" You could turn its pages, like an old newspaper, but its actual scope would be the size of the internet.
Since its "printed" cheaply like paper, you can almost give them away, like the UK tabloids that are printed in thier millions every day, and sold for 10p.
No one has to learn how to operate them; you just "use it". This is what this and the other futurists are talking about; the elimination of all traces of boxes, keyboards, mice, whirring fans & suchlike.
True, it soulds like science fiction (much like the book in David Lynches version of Dune) but certainly, it would be at the least, surprising if the current shape of computing lasts another 30 years in its present form, and the only way things will change is if people say "outrageous" things like "operatings systems dont matter".
Oh, and write some software maybe. And design some printable super thin smart ink based computers.
and THIS time they'd actually have the numbers to back up their statements!
Implicit in what that AC is saying is that you should not consume the music of RIAA labels.
That means abstaining from buying their music as well as not downloading it. No sales and no attention will fatally injure these organizations.
Nitpicking and word slicing will not.
Philips owns the Compact Disc format, the copyright to the which is about to run out. Even if they sucessfully sue BMG, they cant prevent crippled CDs from being manufactured for very long.
In Extremadura, the regional government paid a local company $180,000 to cobble together a set of freely available software. The resulting disk contains a suite of programs that includes an operating system, word processor, spreadsheet and other applications.
My emphasis.
This CANNOT be accurate; no one gets $180,000 to make "a cobble(d) together... disc" of free software.
I almost fell off my chair when I read that!
Mind you, they (the regional government) saves money even paying this much to one company...then there is the support contract...
When Linux newbies have a lack of HOWTOs and sound support is diffuclt to implement, at best they are going to fool around with Linux for a day or two and then go back to their MP3 collection under Windows.
Debian doesnt need mllions of users; it exists to service a small number of people who want to learn about Linux.
If they did want millions of people to use it, its developers would (for example) make superior installers, so that it can be simply used.
Each distro has its audience. Its highly unlikely that someone switching from Windows will encounter Debian as their first distro in any case.
Bugzilla is a nifty tool, but if the users fill it full of crap because they can't waste their precious time doing a little research then Bugzilla becomes more of a hindrance than a help.
Searching for previous instances of bugs on Bugzilla is so haphazard/useless that the only way to be sure that your bug gets reported is to post it and pray that you are not duplicating.
The interface of Bugzilla is *awful*, the search is dreadful and then, when you actually do the work of submitting a bug carefully, its; "SUX 2BU bgz|4h l00zr, your/bug/ |z0 a nu fea2ure j00 iz +4|k|n l|k3 u 4i|\|+ g0+z n0 c3n+z!!
THEN you get lots of emails from other l00z4az who are submitting the same bug.
The fact that people are submitting the same bug over and over is a clear indication that bugzilla DOESNT WORK VERY WELL, and that it needs to be overhauled from the ground up.
That is a rather serious point. As everything stands now, packages get released with trojans in them. Just imagine the amount of source that would have to be checked if one million engineers were churning out code?
It would be nigh on impossible for, shall we say, Americans to chechk through that much source. There simply arent enough developers to do this. We would end up simply having to trust that the Chinux source/packages were entirely benevolent, or, not use them.
The latter will not be an option by the way, since it will be the defacto world standard. Hmmmmm sounds VERY familiar!
I dont believe that China will be concerned to distraction about the single issue of Microsoft; though it might be the catalyst.
If China has any sense, they are gong to use this to leverage thier position to become the world center of technology. Destroying MS will be a byproduct of that.
Everyone world-wide will turn to China as it becomes the number one source for software. They will Presumably eventualy dominate in the area of CPUs/hardware as well.
The whole idea of Linux, if it were told as a story would be dismissed as implausable. Imagine then, an army of developers accelerating its development beyond our imagination. The effects of such an operating system, in every area, will be profound, to say the least.
But they wont do this; the Chinese Government will understand that by obeying the GPL and releasing the source the American economy can be radically altered, if not disrupted as everyone switches over to "Free Chinux".
We listen to online freeform radio from the USA every day. They have realtime updated playlists. Its simple to find information about the music being played, by a simple right click. We can then check out the t-shirts and CDs.
There should be no charge for streaming online from non commercial entities. Period. Anyone can start a station, and see thier trafic explode if they play good sets. This new tax will dampen down or cap the potential size of audiences, which for independent labels will be a very bad thing.
Anyway, how are they goning to police this?
Streaming is no different to file sharing; its just copying a very long number. There cannot be one law for streaming and no law for P2P filesharing; there should be the same unrestrictive constitutional guarantees for both.
Copyright is Haram. This means that you can put a server in a sharia country, securely tunnel into it and then stream from there. Unfortunately the cost of doing this wont be worth the hassle, much less the threat of having charges to a company in Iran showing up on your credit card bill!
as a reaction to the designed-by-committee state of Mozilla's U
I dont know about anyone else, but I have found the Mozilla interface to be the very definition of easy to use. Everything in it makes sense, and is usable by both me, and my 70 year old Aunt, who took to it like a duck to water.
Anyway, wasnt Chimera created only because Mozilla doesnt look like an OSX application, and not because Mozilla is unusable?
...Perhaps this model, of appointing a key developer as dictator for one release cycle might gain some of the best features of both.
Thats a brilliant idea; whats important is that it is possible to have good usability in OSS software. At least we can try this way of working - this is what is so important.
I don't see how that could come about from open source software
I cant imagine it, so it cannot be done. Riiight.
Design by comitee, by definition, should work better than design by a dictator because it will satisfy the problems that many people percieve, and not just the solve the pet peeves of a single deranged man.
The problem so far has been that the interface designers have a total understanding of the systems that they are trying to interface to people that have zero understanding. What is needed are many, many, focus group sessions to create an OSS interface guidlines document that everyone can refer to (or not) when they build thier applications. Arent Gnome doing something approaching this?
What has been lacking so far is the will to adress this problem. If it were suddenly to become the central focus, OSS would more than likely leap past the other solutions, because it can freely experiment with the tools, test with hundreds of thousands of volunteers until something really usable, in the broadest sense, is created.
The law is in no way code in the sense of "source code". Perhaps you are being confused by the usage of the word "code" which is sometimes used in a legal context.
A machine will not let you off of a speeding ticket if you are caught racing to take your wife to the hospital while she is in the throes of labor. It wont sit with your runaway son at a soda fountain while you come to fetch him. They dont have judgement.
The law is made by people and for people. It needs to be flexible, malleable and powered by human compassion and understanding.
If there are not enough people to manage (not enforce) it then we need more police not machines to take thier place. Certainly, if money can be constantly found to bomb other countries and pay trillions for the arms that they need to do it, this is a realistic option.
Anyone that has been cought by a speed camera at 4AM on a country road knows this to be true, by experience. Giving autonamous machines the power to enforce the law is a very bad idea.
This tells you about A5; the encryption used in GSM phones.
"Gaol" is English for a place used for the incarceration of "criminals". Americans call it "The Hoosegow", "The joint", "The big house", "Pokie", "The Slammer", amongst other things.
The big question, though, is whether they should be allowed to enter the commercial domain, where they could be used by organised crime and terrorism to thwart eavesdropping by police.
Who said that this is the big question? This is not the "big question"; it has already been determined that "terrorists" did not and generally dont use crypto for communication, so thats just a lame excuse to keep the tools crippled (see A5).
Organized crime? just because an infinitessimal number of "organized criminals" (just where the hell are the disorganized criminals? [yes yes, GAOL]) might use crypto to secure thier telephones doesnt mean that the vast majority of people should be denied access, or given access only to cripple ware.
But you know this.
These agenda setting questions are pure bad journalism, plain and simple, and simple minded.
Free version is non-distributable
on
Red Hat 8.0 Released
·
· Score: 5, Informative
From the LBC-announce mailing list:
"I've been getting a number of enquiries about when we'll have a cheap version of Red Hat Linux 8.0.
Unfortunately, Red Hat have moved the goal posts again. In a surprising move they've completely broken with their previous policy of 100% open source. The new distribution contains a few components which are (C) Red Hat and are *not* freely re-distributable. This has produced surprisingly little comment but the effect is that it's no longer possible to re-distribute copies of the standard download version of Red Hat Linux. For the company that has up to now been the champion of Open Source, it's a major direction change.
It's not all bad news though. The problem components are in identified packages and Red Hat have said it's fine to re-distribute as long as they are first removed. I therefore hope that we will be able to do a Threads Linux 8.0. It will no longer be exactly the same as Red Hat, although it will be functionally identical.
This is a well established fact. Like I said elewhere in this thread, its clear that I mean "when it is implimented correctly", as it would make absolutely no sense to imply "OTP is unbreakable when it is implimented poorly".
Basically, there's a reason we like symmetric-key algorithms, and it's mostly to do with usability. If an encryption system is such a pain in the ass that no one uses it, then its impact in the real world will be zero.
I totally agree with you about OTP being a pain in the ass to manage, but as far as its impact in the real world, you could not be more wrong.
Numbers Stations have relied on OTP for decades, and continue to do so till today.
Like anything, it depends how much you want a to protect your communications. If OTP is going to save your life, as in espionage, it becomes much less of a pain in the ass. If you want to encrypt your daily email with the 20 people in your Mozilla address book, then things get very messy very quickly, and of course, you can forget stuff like ecommerce, which instantly become "unwieldly" to put it mildly.
Slashdot Mirror
Saturday Night Live, Chevy Chase in the famous "Landshark" Skit.
...Continued on page 32323243243...94? That would be a lot of page turning!
:]
Google solved that problem in 2012.
And somehow, you have to give the user a way to navigate all those pages.
Sigh. I gave that as an example of the thrust of what he is talking about. Nevertheless, it *would* be possible to navigate the pages...with the pen you use to do the crosswords. Or by simpy opening the pages; when ambient light touches an open page, the information can change. Brushing you finger (like mouse gestures) could also turn the pages and do suff. You just have to use your imagination which is what Gerlerntner wants you to do, and which is why he wrote what he wrote.
A newspaper is small and static. You get whatever the publisher put there.
Tabloid sized paper is bigger than a 19" monitor, and it would not be static, since the "newspaper" would be networked. When the publisher changes the page, everyone loged into that edition sees the new page...like the web.
A "newspaper" with the scope of the entire 'Net (which we have already in the form of the browser)
Browsers, stuck on laptops or desktops are NOT what Gerlentner wants to see or use.
needs some sort of navigational aid. "Touch here to go see X, touch there to read more on this topic." That is what an operating system does.
"durrrr"
As for computers being able to be "Used" like a newspaper: Newspapers don't have nearly the dynamic interface that is required for most applications. It's a passive medium.
I gave the example of a newspaper, because its something that is pervasive, intimately familiar, and imagined by most as being "impossible" to be made into a computer.
Strangely, some people STILL dont get it, and started to say crap like "well, how would you run it? With an OS of course!".
Gerlentner is thinking wider and further ahead and so its not easy to put into words; you have to "work with him" to get his message.
As I take it, his basic point seems to be that both Windows and Linux are based on OS concepts developed at least 30 years ago:
To put what Gelernter is talking about in more clear terms, ask this question; "what if a network connected computer could somehow be the shape of a newspaper?" You could turn its pages, like an old newspaper, but its actual scope would be the size of the internet.
Since its "printed" cheaply like paper, you can almost give them away, like the UK tabloids that are printed in thier millions every day, and sold for 10p.
No one has to learn how to operate them; you just "use it". This is what this and the other futurists are talking about; the elimination of all traces of boxes, keyboards, mice, whirring fans & suchlike.
True, it soulds like science fiction (much like the book in David Lynches version of Dune) but certainly, it would be at the least, surprising if the current shape of computing lasts another 30 years in its present form, and the only way things will change is if people say "outrageous" things like "operatings systems dont matter".
Oh, and write some software maybe.
And design some printable super thin smart ink based computers.
Oops, I meant the CD patent of course.
and THIS time they'd actually have the numbers to back up their statements!
Implicit in what that AC is saying is that you should not consume the music of RIAA labels.
That means abstaining from buying their music as well as not downloading it. No sales and no attention will fatally injure these organizations.
Nitpicking and word slicing will not.
Philips owns the Compact Disc format, the copyright to the which is about to run out. Even if they sucessfully sue BMG, they cant prevent crippled CDs from being manufactured for very long.
In Extremadura, the regional government paid a local company $180,000 to cobble together a set of freely available software. The resulting disk contains a suite of programs that includes an operating system, word processor, spreadsheet and other applications.
My emphasis.
This CANNOT be accurate; no one gets $180,000 to make "a cobble(d) together... disc" of free software.
I almost fell off my chair when I read that!
Mind you, they (the regional government) saves money even paying this much to one company...then there is the support contract...
(4) Profit!
When Linux newbies have a lack of HOWTOs and sound support is diffuclt to implement, at best they are going to fool around with Linux for a day or two and then go back to their MP3 collection under Windows.
Debian doesnt need mllions of users; it exists to service a small number of people who want to learn about Linux.
If they did want millions of people to use it, its developers would (for example) make superior installers, so that it can be simply used.
Each distro has its audience. Its highly unlikely that someone switching from Windows will encounter Debian as their first distro in any case.
Bugzilla is a nifty tool, but if the users fill it full of crap because they can't waste their precious time doing a little research then Bugzilla becomes more of a hindrance than a help.
/bug/ |z0 a nu fea2ure j00 iz +4|k|n l|k3 u 4i|\|+ g0+z n0 c3n+z!!
Searching for previous instances of bugs on Bugzilla is so haphazard/useless that the only way to be sure that your bug gets reported is to post it and pray that you are not duplicating.
The interface of Bugzilla is *awful*, the search is dreadful and then, when you actually do the work of submitting a bug carefully, its; "SUX 2BU bgz|4h l00zr, your
THEN you get lots of emails from other l00z4az who are submitting the same bug.
The fact that people are submitting the same bug over and over is a clear indication that bugzilla DOESNT WORK VERY WELL, and that it needs to be overhauled from the ground up.
That is a rather serious point. As everything stands now, packages get released with trojans in them. Just imagine the amount of source that would have to be checked if one million engineers were churning out code?
It would be nigh on impossible for, shall we say, Americans to chechk through that much source. There simply arent enough developers to do this. We would end up simply having to trust that the Chinux source/packages were entirely benevolent, or, not use them.
The latter will not be an option by the way, since it will be the defacto world standard. Hmmmmm sounds VERY familiar!
How much of the OS has to come from a government before it becomes a "Government based OS"?
I dont have to spell all of this out do I?
I dont believe that China will be concerned to distraction about the single issue of Microsoft; though it might be the catalyst.
If China has any sense, they are gong to use this to leverage thier position to become the world center of technology. Destroying MS will be a byproduct of that.
Everyone world-wide will turn to China as it becomes the number one source for software. They will Presumably eventualy dominate in the area of CPUs/hardware as well.
The whole idea of Linux, if it were told as a story would be dismissed as implausable. Imagine then, an army of developers accelerating its development beyond our imagination. The effects of such an operating system, in every area, will be profound, to say the least.
But they wont do this; the Chinese Government will understand that by obeying the GPL and releasing the source the American economy can be radically altered, if not disrupted as everyone switches over to "Free Chinux".
This will be nothing short of a revolution.
We listen to online freeform radio from the USA every day. They have realtime updated playlists. Its simple to find information about the music being played, by a simple right click. We can then check out the t-shirts and CDs.
There should be no charge for streaming online from non commercial entities. Period. Anyone can start a station, and see thier trafic explode if they play good sets. This new tax will dampen down or cap the potential size of audiences, which for independent labels will be a very bad thing.
Anyway, how are they goning to police this?
Streaming is no different to file sharing; its just copying a very long number. There cannot be one law for streaming and no law for P2P filesharing; there should be the same unrestrictive constitutional guarantees for both.
Copyright is Haram. This means that you can put a server in a sharia country, securely tunnel into it and then stream from there. Unfortunately the cost of doing this wont be worth the hassle, much less the threat of having charges to a company in Iran showing up on your credit card bill!
as a reaction to the designed-by-committee state of Mozilla's U
I dont know about anyone else, but I have found the Mozilla interface to be the very definition of easy to use. Everything in it makes sense, and is usable by both me, and my 70 year old Aunt, who took to it like a duck to water.
Anyway, wasnt Chimera created only because Mozilla doesnt look like an OSX application, and not because Mozilla is unusable?
...Perhaps this model, of appointing a key developer as dictator for one release cycle might gain some of the best features of both.
Thats a brilliant idea; whats important is that it is possible to have good usability in OSS software. At least we can try this way of working - this is what is so important.
I don't see how that could come about from open source software
I cant imagine it, so it cannot be done. Riiight.
Design by comitee, by definition, should work better than design by a dictator because it will satisfy the problems that many people percieve, and not just the solve the pet peeves of a single deranged man.
The problem so far has been that the interface designers have a total understanding of the systems that they are trying to interface to people that have zero understanding. What is needed are many, many, focus group sessions to create an OSS interface guidlines document that everyone can refer to (or not) when they build thier applications. Arent Gnome doing something approaching this?
What has been lacking so far is the will to adress this problem. If it were suddenly to become the central focus, OSS would more than likely leap past the other solutions, because it can freely experiment with the tools, test with hundreds of thousands of volunteers until something really usable, in the broadest sense, is created.
The law is in no way code in the sense of "source code". Perhaps you are being confused by the usage of the word "code" which is sometimes used in a legal context.
A machine will not let you off of a speeding ticket if you are caught racing to take your wife to the hospital while she is in the throes of labor. It wont sit with your runaway son at a soda fountain while you come to fetch him. They dont have judgement.
The law is made by people and for people. It needs to be flexible, malleable and powered by human compassion and understanding.
If there are not enough people to manage (not enforce) it then we need more police not machines to take thier place. Certainly, if money can be constantly found to bomb other countries and pay trillions for the arms that they need to do it, this is a realistic option.
Anyone that has been cought by a speed camera at 4AM on a country road knows this to be true, by experience. Giving autonamous machines the power to enforce the law is a very bad idea.
WMOB The recordings and transcripts (that you REALLY need) of some gangsters wiretapped by the FBI.
Its awesome!
This tells you about A5; the encryption used in GSM phones.
"Gaol" is English for a place used for the incarceration of "criminals". Americans call it "The Hoosegow", "The joint", "The big house", "Pokie", "The Slammer", amongst other things.
The big question, though, is whether they should be allowed to enter the commercial domain, where they could be used by organised crime and terrorism to thwart eavesdropping by police.
Who said that this is the big question? This is not the "big question"; it has already been determined that "terrorists" did not and generally dont use crypto for communication, so thats just a lame excuse to keep the tools crippled (see A5).
Organized crime? just because an infinitessimal number of "organized criminals" (just where the hell are the disorganized criminals? [yes yes, GAOL]) might use crypto to secure thier telephones doesnt mean that the vast majority of people should be denied access, or given access only to cripple ware.
But you know this.
These agenda setting questions are pure bad journalism, plain and simple, and simple minded.
From the LBC-announce mailing list:
"I've been getting a number of enquiries about when we'll have a cheap
version of Red Hat Linux 8.0.
Unfortunately, Red Hat have moved the goal posts again. In a surprising
move they've completely broken with their previous policy of 100% open
source. The new distribution contains a few components which are (C)
Red Hat and are *not* freely re-distributable. This has produced
surprisingly little comment but the effect is that it's no longer
possible to re-distribute copies of the standard download version of Red
Hat Linux. For the company that has up to now been the champion of Open
Source, it's a major direction change.
It's not all bad news though. The problem components are in identified
packages and Red Hat have said it's fine to re-distribute as long as
they are first removed. I therefore hope that we will be able to do a
Threads Linux 8.0. It will no longer be exactly the same as Red Hat,
although it will be functionally identical.
Cheers,
John"
-- The Linux Emporium - the source for Linux in the UK
See http://www.linuxemporium.co.uk/
OTP is not unbreakable.
OTP *is* unbreakable.
This is a well established fact. Like I said elewhere in this thread, its clear that I mean "when it is implimented correctly", as it would make absolutely no sense to imply "OTP is unbreakable when it is implimented poorly".
Basically, there's a reason we like symmetric-key algorithms, and it's mostly to do with usability. If an encryption system is such a pain in the ass that no one uses it, then its impact in the real world will be zero.
I totally agree with you about OTP being a pain in the ass to manage, but as far as its impact in the real world, you could not be more wrong.
Numbers Stations have relied on OTP for decades, and continue to do so till today.
Like anything, it depends how much you want a to protect your communications. If OTP is going to save your life, as in espionage, it becomes much less of a pain in the ass. If you want to encrypt your daily email with the 20 people in your Mozilla address book, then things get very messy very quickly, and of course, you can forget stuff like ecommerce, which instantly become "unwieldly" to put it mildly.