True, the article doesn't really state what the actual encoding was. However, it may be something that could be brute forced, it might be something that requires that knowledge, or it could just be ROT13.
Just because you broke some method of encryption doesn't necessarily make you a good computer science student. What about good design or object oriented techniques? How about math skills and knowledge of discrete mathmatics and its relation to programing language design?
Since I know scripting languages, am I an elite hacker?
Since I can install linux, am I a sys admin?
Since I can make brownies am I Wolfgang Puck?
IMHO breaking the encryption doesn't mean too much.
Occasionally you'll find stuff at pricewatch and other searches for cheaper but I've also noticed a large increase in bait and switch where you'll see something advertised as one price there, but when you get to their site to order it, its price is jacked back up. I was recently looking to get a 20 gig harddrive for a small web server. I found the best price at CompUSA! A 30 dollar rebate brought the price down to 50 dollars. Sure I have to wait 8 weeks for the refund, but it will come, and I have the HD right now, not in a few days after shipping. Lets face it, the days of 3 DVD's for a dollar from 800.com are over. Stores need to make a profit to survive so their's no chance of seeing those kind of deals again.
Can't happen, at least not easily. You need to provide an incredibly simple desktop experience. Gnome and KDE are only a few revisions away but its still not there. You need to hide all the "hard" stuff, like a terminal. Finally, you need to make all that lovely hardware work in linux. Its all well and good that they have apps, but with their linux run on a $600 "state of the art" eMachine from Walmart with a USB scanner and a USB printer?
Will that help Apple or will that help Compaq? The only reason that I know of that people walk into those Gateway Country stores is on word of mouth on "Get a gateway, not a Comcrap" or whatever. But word of mouth isn't as powerful as seeing JUST Compaqs when you are looking at all the PC's in a line. Apple at least is putting their stores in shopping malls and making themselves more visible, but Compaq will be showing the nice low sticker price.
However, will Compaq put up the price when it knows they have less to compete with? Will they have an advantage where people might have been choosing HP simply because it matches the name on their printer? With PC margins and a merger in the works, that might happen.
Again however, don't leave Apple out. I once had a compaq, now I homebuild. I like Windows 2000, very capable OS. XP is not, and thats what everything is now shipping with. For something thats supposed to be intuitive, its surprising not. Linux is not at the home desktop level yet (don't flame me). Apple however, has gone leaps and bounds over where they were five years ago. Their new OS looks very slick and they have an eye on design as well as functionality. As long as they don't screw up in the coming years, look for them to increase market share.
To be honest, I'm sure this isn't going to be the spark that makes either company a huge success. They'll both probably see a small marginal increase in sales and there will just be one less store bought computer to complain about.
ZoneAlarm is already dead. For your average user, its "yells" at you too much and makes you all worried that some ICMP packet may be a hacker. Windows XP, all you have to do is check one checkbox, and it asks you if you want to do it in setup.
Of course, it'll still be one more iteration before microsoft nails down the firewall so it doesn't block everything period (like ident) but compared to using ZoneAlarm, its friendlier.
Were these errors in 8i which was the production release when this all started?
Larry once said that programming a database is more difficult than an OS. Does this absolve any MS exploit that's been found?
I think its a little presumptious (sp.) to say that some program with a server end is "unbreakable". I could always physical hammer the hard disk. However, in terms of exploits vs. complexity, I think Oracle is doing pretty well. Its not like they have CodeRed.
That's not really level ground. You always lock your car door. You can test it by trying to open the door, something you do all the time and where you can always see the results. Your analogy to software is that you turn on a firewall but it doesn't really block packets. Remember, those are everyday occurences that average Joe User will notice. It's not everyday that someone sends some long request with weird characters and "%2cmd.exe" or whatever to your webserver. The example with the slim jim doesn't apply either. Thats saying that every firewall doesn't work on port 113 unless you tell it to. You are making an assumption that the way to break in will be easy to find.
A better example might be that your Honda has some small pin underneath the car that if you use needle nose pliers and turn it 3/4 turn to the left, the door will unlock. Its something that no average person will ever know about, but an experienced "car hacker" may find it and tell their friends. Thats an exploit.
There's always the issue of what about other platforms? Sure, linux isn't exactly known as a 3d gaming platform but Mac's still have a tiny marketshare for gaming. What will Mac be left with?
Because everyone I know with a Visor, including myself, doesn't use the modules. I'm not paying $100 or whatever it costs for a golf module for the Visor. The modules are very expensive and usually there are better alternatives. I bought a cable for $30 to connect my Visor to my cell phone. Much better than $199 for a cell phone module. I think I've used that only twice though. Handspring is making the right move cause they offered no innovation other than springboards which aren't selling. Better to get out now and try something different than to die a horrible PDA death.
Definately. RIT uses a similar system for detecting cheating on code projects. It's not used for labs, us instructors have to look for that. But it definately applies that the people who do the copy and paste thing don't usually last to the upper level courses. If you need to copy someone elses code in order to do basic recursion, do you think you'll make it in the real world?
Definately. All the money is in businesses and what do businesses use?
Windows for workstations. *nix for servers.
Sure there are plenty of NT/2K servers out there, but *nix still has that market. The CLR gives Windows the chance to say, "Hey, it'll run on your hardware, its just as stable (laf) and its fully compatible with all your workstation apps."
I'd say, yeah, I could write the steps to doing email with even text based pine. However, I'd have to walk her through anything at all that was advanced. She could figure out how to do an attachment alot easier with outlook than she could with pine.
No, this is not flame bait, but the guy points out a perfectly valid point: every other OS has the same problem in terms of vulnerabilities. The difference comes from the user base. If you look at the typical linux user vs. the typical windows user, you're looking at two different people. My grandmother could never use linux, and by the same token, could never turn stuff OFF in windows. So if IIS is turned on, or Remote Assistance, she's not going to know a darn thing on how to disable it or secure our machine. Me on the otherhand, I've got the virusscan doing daily updates, the firewall, etc. It's not that windows is any less secure than linux, its just that it COMES less secure and users can't fix it easily.
Re:Comprehensive, but contains a spurious assertio
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Linux on the Desktop
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I have an old compaq thats 233 with 32 megs of ram. It runs Windows 2K at a crawl, but its enough for IE and Word.
Re:What can be done about terrorism?
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More On Tragedy
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The only thing we can do is rebuild. We should make three new WTC Towers. It took 2 years to make em before. We could make the middle one longer than the other two. A big middle finger to those that did this saying "We will go on."
It's a simple thing really. Russia wants a space program but they have no money. They could get money and equipments from, and here's the key point, COMMUNIST CHINA. Of course, the US doesn't want Russia going back to communism or making allies with China whose economy isn't all that stable now adays so we dump money into the Russian space program so that they don't get money from China. Foreign policy at its best.
But software ISN'T mechanical engineering
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Software Aesthetics
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If you are making a bridge, you are given specs for it, you design it, you build it, and you occasionally maintain it. However, once its built its done. With software you make an incredible design for your first specs. Then your asked to add features, maybe change some functionality. It becomes add-on after add-on. And if you need to make changes to a bridge, you don't tear it down, you just build over it. Well, with software, if you equate it to a bridge, you've taken a wooden-covered bridge and you turn it into the Golden Gate, with some cool pillars, maybe a dock, and some weird crane thing on the side that no one knows what it does but its left there "just in case." Quick dirty summary: SOFTWARE EVOLVES TOO FAST TO BE PRETTY
After teaching labs at RIT in these languages, I can tell you that Java is definately a nicer language to use for teaching. As one post mentioned, Java hides the bare bones of computer operation from a student. This is a good thing for a beginning CS major. AP Computer Science in a school should be introducing a student to programming so they may persue it in college. If AP CS taught only C, then you would only get Computer Science and Computer Engineering majors. Using Java, you'll get more people in the IT and Software Engineering fields (my major) as well as CS and CE. If you're a high school student and you're into computers enough to learn C, you don't need that extra push to go into that field. For someone who's life revolves around AOL and Napster, Java is a good start.
Now, once you are in college, why start with Java? Look at syntax. Java syntax is orthogonal and simplistic. If you've ever used polymorphism or inheritance in Java, you know that it takes only a couple of keywords to do it. C++ gets much more complicated. In C++ you have to worry about friend functions, virtual, etc. etc. Java lets you do all that stuff easily. Ever try using threads in C/C++? Compare that to Java and you'll appreciated the addition of the synchronized keyword. Finally, UI. You can make a window in Java and display it in a few lines of code. Sure, you can do the same thing using GTK or QT, but how do you explain moc to a beginner for QT and object oriented C for GTK? Java is much easier to grow accustomed to, particularly when speed is not an issue. Object oriented programming is here to stay, its not a fad, but Java is. Its becoming a server side tool, not an application tool. However, the prior RIT curriculum taught using Eiffel so wide use isn't necessarily a factor. Simply put, use Java to introduce and weed out those that aren't interested. C/C++ may eliminate people that find it too hard before they understand the basics.
The fact is, if you've ever done web programming, you know that you'll never be able to use cutting edge stuff and keep compliant. Take a look at XML/XSL. Netscape's support is horrible. Yes, 6 may have a good XML parser but you can't use if for anything. XML in IE has be usable for over a year. And remember back in the day with javascript 1.2 on netscape and not IE? People are always going to side with who is offering the best stuff at the time. Right now, IE is great and has the best standards compliance. Most people I know still use Netscape 4.7 cause 6 is bloated, slow, and one giant Ad machine. Netscape4.7 doesn't support anything! I'm about as likely to make a website fully 4.7 compliant about as much as I'll be programming for Windows 3.1. If you want web compatibility, program to standards, and the browsers either need to catch up or else fade away.
Diablo II and current games may be addictive, but will you be playing them in a year? A true addictive game you keep playing and playing over and over again. Solitaire and Mahjongg are good examples, but think multiplayer. Goldeneye for the N64 or Bomberman for any system. Those are games that you just keep going back to for more, especially with 4 people.
I work with C, Java, and Perl all the time. I shy away from Java for most major apps though because its a HUGE memory hog and incredibly slow. However, I use it over C++ (when I can't use C easily) because of the elegant design and garbage collection sacrificing speed. This Napster guy makes a point about a speed increase because of the use of copy-by-value and also talks about how cool it is that an "int" is an object. How is this good? If every object is unique, then copy-by-value is good, but the second you have a duplicate, you start eating up memory. An int may only take up one or two bytes of memory in C, how much is an Integer class going to take up in C#? For something as large as the phone database he mentions, thats a lot of wasted space. To me, it looks simply like a fully compiled, less elegant, single platform version of Java. If Microsoft wants to do something, improve the Java VM, don't waste time on languages that are going to be used regularly by five people in the world. ( See ADA, Eiffel, Lisp )
-gtaluvit (prnc. GOT-ta-LUV-it)
Slashdot Mirror
True, the article doesn't really state what the actual encoding was. However, it may be something that could be brute forced, it might be something that requires that knowledge, or it could just be ROT13.
Just because you broke some method of encryption doesn't necessarily make you a good computer science student. What about good design or object oriented techniques? How about math skills and knowledge of discrete mathmatics and its relation to programing language design?
Since I know scripting languages, am I an elite hacker?
Since I can install linux, am I a sys admin?
Since I can make brownies am I Wolfgang Puck?
IMHO breaking the encryption doesn't mean too much.
Occasionally you'll find stuff at pricewatch and other searches for cheaper but I've also noticed a large increase in bait and switch where you'll see something advertised as one price there, but when you get to their site to order it, its price is jacked back up. I was recently looking to get a 20 gig harddrive for a small web server. I found the best price at CompUSA! A 30 dollar rebate brought the price down to 50 dollars. Sure I have to wait 8 weeks for the refund, but it will come, and I have the HD right now, not in a few days after shipping. Lets face it, the days of 3 DVD's for a dollar from 800.com are over. Stores need to make a profit to survive so their's no chance of seeing those kind of deals again.
Can't happen, at least not easily. You need to provide an incredibly simple desktop experience. Gnome and KDE are only a few revisions away but its still not there. You need to hide all the "hard" stuff, like a terminal. Finally, you need to make all that lovely hardware work in linux. Its all well and good that they have apps, but with their linux run on a $600 "state of the art" eMachine from Walmart with a USB scanner and a USB printer?
Will that help Apple or will that help Compaq? The only reason that I know of that people walk into those Gateway Country stores is on word of mouth on "Get a gateway, not a Comcrap" or whatever. But word of mouth isn't as powerful as seeing JUST Compaqs when you are looking at all the PC's in a line. Apple at least is putting their stores in shopping malls and making themselves more visible, but Compaq will be showing the nice low sticker price.
However, will Compaq put up the price when it knows they have less to compete with? Will they have an advantage where people might have been choosing HP simply because it matches the name on their printer? With PC margins and a merger in the works, that might happen.
Again however, don't leave Apple out. I once had a compaq, now I homebuild. I like Windows 2000, very capable OS. XP is not, and thats what everything is now shipping with. For something thats supposed to be intuitive, its surprising not. Linux is not at the home desktop level yet (don't flame me). Apple however, has gone leaps and bounds over where they were five years ago. Their new OS looks very slick and they have an eye on design as well as functionality. As long as they don't screw up in the coming years, look for them to increase market share.
To be honest, I'm sure this isn't going to be the spark that makes either company a huge success. They'll both probably see a small marginal increase in sales and there will just be one less store bought computer to complain about.
ZoneAlarm is already dead. For your average user, its "yells" at you too much and makes you all worried that some ICMP packet may be a hacker. Windows XP, all you have to do is check one checkbox, and it asks you if you want to do it in setup.
Of course, it'll still be one more iteration before microsoft nails down the firewall so it doesn't block everything period (like ident) but compared to using ZoneAlarm, its friendlier.
Were these errors in 8i which was the production release when this all started?
Larry once said that programming a database is more difficult than an OS. Does this absolve any MS exploit that's been found?
I think its a little presumptious (sp.) to say that some program with a server end is "unbreakable". I could always physical hammer the hard disk. However, in terms of exploits vs. complexity, I think Oracle is doing pretty well. Its not like they have CodeRed.
"Anyone perfect must be lieing." - Falling For the First Time
That's not really level ground. You always lock your car door. You can test it by trying to open the door, something you do all the time and where you can always see the results. Your analogy to software is that you turn on a firewall but it doesn't really block packets. Remember, those are everyday occurences that average Joe User will notice. It's not everyday that someone sends some long request with weird characters and "%2cmd.exe" or whatever to your webserver. The example with the slim jim doesn't apply either. Thats saying that every firewall doesn't work on port 113 unless you tell it to. You are making an assumption that the way to break in will be easy to find.
A better example might be that your Honda has some small pin underneath the car that if you use needle nose pliers and turn it 3/4 turn to the left, the door will unlock. Its something that no average person will ever know about, but an experienced "car hacker" may find it and tell their friends. Thats an exploit.
There's always the issue of what about other platforms? Sure, linux isn't exactly known as a 3d gaming platform but Mac's still have a tiny marketshare for gaming. What will Mac be left with?
Because everyone I know with a Visor, including myself, doesn't use the modules. I'm not paying $100 or whatever it costs for a golf module for the Visor. The modules are very expensive and usually there are better alternatives. I bought a cable for $30 to connect my Visor to my cell phone. Much better than $199 for a cell phone module. I think I've used that only twice though. Handspring is making the right move cause they offered no innovation other than springboards which aren't selling. Better to get out now and try something different than to die a horrible PDA death.
Definately. RIT uses a similar system for detecting cheating on code projects. It's not used for labs, us instructors have to look for that. But it definately applies that the people who do the copy and paste thing don't usually last to the upper level courses. If you need to copy someone elses code in order to do basic recursion, do you think you'll make it in the real world?
Definately. All the money is in businesses and what do businesses use?
Windows for workstations. *nix for servers.
Sure there are plenty of NT/2K servers out there, but *nix still has that market. The CLR gives Windows the chance to say, "Hey, it'll run on your hardware, its just as stable (laf) and its fully compatible with all your workstation apps."
I'd say, yeah, I could write the steps to doing email with even text based pine. However, I'd have to walk her through anything at all that was advanced. She could figure out how to do an attachment alot easier with outlook than she could with pine.
No, this is not flame bait, but the guy points out a perfectly valid point: every other OS has the same problem in terms of vulnerabilities. The difference comes from the user base. If you look at the typical linux user vs. the typical windows user, you're looking at two different people. My grandmother could never use linux, and by the same token, could never turn stuff OFF in windows. So if IIS is turned on, or Remote Assistance, she's not going to know a darn thing on how to disable it or secure our machine. Me on the otherhand, I've got the virusscan doing daily updates, the firewall, etc. It's not that windows is any less secure than linux, its just that it COMES less secure and users can't fix it easily.
I have an old compaq thats 233 with 32 megs of ram. It runs Windows 2K at a crawl, but its enough for IE and Word.
The only thing we can do is rebuild. We should make three new WTC Towers. It took 2 years to make em before. We could make the middle one longer than the other two. A big middle finger to those that did this saying "We will go on."
It's a simple thing really. Russia wants a space program but they have no money. They could get money and equipments from, and here's the key point, COMMUNIST CHINA. Of course, the US doesn't want Russia going back to communism or making allies with China whose economy isn't all that stable now adays so we dump money into the Russian space program so that they don't get money from China. Foreign policy at its best.
If you are making a bridge, you are given specs for it, you design it, you build it, and you occasionally maintain it. However, once its built its done. With software you make an incredible design for your first specs. Then your asked to add features, maybe change some functionality. It becomes add-on after add-on. And if you need to make changes to a bridge, you don't tear it down, you just build over it. Well, with software, if you equate it to a bridge, you've taken a wooden-covered bridge and you turn it into the Golden Gate, with some cool pillars, maybe a dock, and some weird crane thing on the side that no one knows what it does but its left there "just in case." Quick dirty summary: SOFTWARE EVOLVES TOO FAST TO BE PRETTY
And I'm sure soon enough that the government will stop this research too.
After teaching labs at RIT in these languages, I can tell you that Java is definately a nicer language to use for teaching. As one post mentioned, Java hides the bare bones of computer operation from a student. This is a good thing for a beginning CS major. AP Computer Science in a school should be introducing a student to programming so they may persue it in college. If AP CS taught only C, then you would only get Computer Science and Computer Engineering majors. Using Java, you'll get more people in the IT and Software Engineering fields (my major) as well as CS and CE. If you're a high school student and you're into computers enough to learn C, you don't need that extra push to go into that field. For someone who's life revolves around AOL and Napster, Java is a good start. Now, once you are in college, why start with Java? Look at syntax. Java syntax is orthogonal and simplistic. If you've ever used polymorphism or inheritance in Java, you know that it takes only a couple of keywords to do it. C++ gets much more complicated. In C++ you have to worry about friend functions, virtual, etc. etc. Java lets you do all that stuff easily. Ever try using threads in C/C++? Compare that to Java and you'll appreciated the addition of the synchronized keyword. Finally, UI. You can make a window in Java and display it in a few lines of code. Sure, you can do the same thing using GTK or QT, but how do you explain moc to a beginner for QT and object oriented C for GTK? Java is much easier to grow accustomed to, particularly when speed is not an issue. Object oriented programming is here to stay, its not a fad, but Java is. Its becoming a server side tool, not an application tool. However, the prior RIT curriculum taught using Eiffel so wide use isn't necessarily a factor. Simply put, use Java to introduce and weed out those that aren't interested. C/C++ may eliminate people that find it too hard before they understand the basics.
I agree, the AIM in Aimster is directly related to AOL Instant Messenger. Makes total sense to me to take it back.
The fact is, if you've ever done web programming, you know that you'll never be able to use cutting edge stuff and keep compliant. Take a look at XML/XSL. Netscape's support is horrible. Yes, 6 may have a good XML parser but you can't use if for anything. XML in IE has be usable for over a year. And remember back in the day with javascript 1.2 on netscape and not IE? People are always going to side with who is offering the best stuff at the time. Right now, IE is great and has the best standards compliance. Most people I know still use Netscape 4.7 cause 6 is bloated, slow, and one giant Ad machine. Netscape4.7 doesn't support anything! I'm about as likely to make a website fully 4.7 compliant about as much as I'll be programming for Windows 3.1. If you want web compatibility, program to standards, and the browsers either need to catch up or else fade away.
Diablo II and current games may be addictive, but will you be playing them in a year? A true addictive game you keep playing and playing over and over again. Solitaire and Mahjongg are good examples, but think multiplayer. Goldeneye for the N64 or Bomberman for any system. Those are games that you just keep going back to for more, especially with 4 people.
I work with C, Java, and Perl all the time. I shy away from Java for most major apps though because its a HUGE memory hog and incredibly slow. However, I use it over C++ (when I can't use C easily) because of the elegant design and garbage collection sacrificing speed. This Napster guy makes a point about a speed increase because of the use of copy-by-value and also talks about how cool it is that an "int" is an object. How is this good? If every object is unique, then copy-by-value is good, but the second you have a duplicate, you start eating up memory. An int may only take up one or two bytes of memory in C, how much is an Integer class going to take up in C#? For something as large as the phone database he mentions, thats a lot of wasted space. To me, it looks simply like a fully compiled, less elegant, single platform version of Java. If Microsoft wants to do something, improve the Java VM, don't waste time on languages that are going to be used regularly by five people in the world. ( See ADA, Eiffel, Lisp ) -gtaluvit (prnc. GOT-ta-LUV-it)