To counter hostile jamming: Use lots of redundancy and spread the signal over the available spectrum. Some form of frequency hopping perhaps. Oh, and lots of redundancy, plus some error checking.
To authenticate: Use existing technology - public/private keypairs, pgp/gpg etc
From the article: When a domestic appliance goes wrong, you can ring a repair man. When your car breaks down you can call the garage. But when your computer system goes wrong, who do you call?
In my experience, most people call their ISP, even for problems that are not internet related. How do I know? I work for an ISP. And they expect their ISP to fix it. They see their ISP subscription as a service contract. When, after some questioning, the ISP helpdesk operator ascertains that the problem is not internet related, or not covered by the support policy, then begins the hard part of convincing the customer. It's often easier to tell the customer to reboot.
Seriously, people can manage to write their address down on a piece of paper without fields and drop-downs, what makes you think that they can't type their address into a box the same way?
Heh! I work in a contact centre. about 20% of my customers can't spell the name of their street. About 10% can't even pronounce it. And yet these people order stuff on "Teh Intarweb" all the time.
In Auckland, New Zealands largest city (Actually a collection of four cities and a dozen towns that grew and merged into one sprawling metropolis) there are people who put down an address like "123 Streetname, Auckland" with no suburb or postal code. There are often several streets with the same name due to Auckland having been separate cities once upon a time (Auckland proper, Manukau, North Shore and Waitakere). These end up "Return to sender".
Saeed read my mind. I would do it slighlty diffently - instead of the input page being presented based on IP_based_guess, I would suggest A dropdown box for country to start with, and that takes them to a form based on that country. You can get the prefered format from each country's post office's website, eg www.nzpost.co.nz - just search the site for something like "addressing guidelines".
how in the name of crikey are [the distribution/kernel vendors] supposed to determine what a "Reasonable limit" would be?
The installation wizard could suggest limits for certain scenarios. Pick the scenario closest to your situation, and make small adjustments if necessary.
How do you know it was a criminal investigation. The investigatee may have been a member of a political party other than the encumbant party. This happens all the time even in so-called democratic countries.
I prefer the children angle - "Child Protection Wand" - won't someone think of the children! Any politician wanting to ban that must be a child hater, maybe even a pedophile!
ObJoke: In soviet russia the children think of you </lame>
Wow. That's almost identical to the reaction my wife got at one place where she worked when someone discovered she's a christian. One antagonist in particular was always accusing her of shoving religion down people's throats when in fact my wife hardly mentioned it.
I've had that from the occassional person myself - both in regard to linux and to christianity, and I try not to push either.
I wasn't talking about pushing FOSS onto people. I keep a knoppix CD at my desk at work. If I overhear someone complain about their windows box at home, I offer them the disk to try out. I won't offer again if they turn it down (no-one ever has) and I don't push it or lecture about how Microsoft is evil (I don't believe they're anywhere near as evil as, say, Monsanto).
I also volunteer at linux instalfests. There are lots of non-pushy ways to help break society's dependency on vendor lock-in.
If users want to shaft Microsoft, they should *stop using Microsoft software!*
I agree, and I would take it one step further. If you really want to shaft microsoft, you should be actively helping anyone and everyone to get off MS dependency. Once enough computer users are no longer MS dependent, MS will suffer.
This is why MS can not stand by and watch FOSS grow. They owe it to their shareholders to stamp out FOSS.
This is why I never do Internet banking from a computer I don't own. While it is probably possible for a hacker to get past my firewall (a separate box running a firewall distro) and then load a keylogger onto my linux desktop, I feel a little bit safer than those running windows.
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It's a crypto problem, not a hardware problem.
Partly. Spread sprectrum is at least in part a hardware problem (in that it requires certain hardware).
If I understand ... You want the receiver to distinguish between an "authorized" broadcast and an "unauthorized" broadcast.
I suspect he also wants to counter hostile jamming. Redundancy and spread spectrum will help towards that goal.
To counter hostile jamming:
Use lots of redundancy and spread the signal over the available spectrum. Some form of frequency hopping perhaps. Oh, and lots of redundancy, plus some error checking.
To authenticate:
Use existing technology - public/private keypairs, pgp/gpg etc
Yesterday,
All those backups seemed a waste of pay.
Now my database has gone away.
Oh I believe in yesterday.
Suddenly,
There's not half the files there used to be,
And there's a milestone hanging over me
The system crashed so suddenly.
I pushed something wrong
What it was I could not say.
Now all my data's gone and I long for yesterday-ay-ay-ay.
Yesterday,
Need for backup seemed so far away.
Seemed my data were all here to stay,
Now I believe in yesterday.
Who's going to get that out first? Slashdot?
/. if they did that.
There would be no more posts on
From the article:
When a domestic appliance goes wrong, you can ring a repair man. When your car breaks down you can call the garage. But when your computer system goes wrong, who do you call?
In my experience, most people call their ISP, even for problems that are not internet related. How do I know? I work for an ISP. And they expect their ISP to fix it. They see their ISP subscription as a service contract. When, after some questioning, the ISP helpdesk operator ascertains that the problem is not internet related, or not covered by the support policy, then begins the hard part of convincing the customer. It's often easier to tell the customer to reboot.
Remember that what most people call "common sense" is actually not common at all. That's why I prefer the term "good sense".
much as I dislike it, in non-geek circles "internet" is www
worse than that. Among non-geeks internet is that blue "e" icon that launches explorer.
Seriously, people can manage to write their address down on a piece of paper without fields and drop-downs, what makes you think that they can't type their address into a box the same way?
Heh! I work in a contact centre. about 20% of my customers can't spell the name of their street. About 10% can't even pronounce it.
And yet these people order stuff on "Teh Intarweb" all the time.
In Auckland, New Zealands largest city (Actually a collection of four cities and a dozen towns that grew and merged into one sprawling metropolis) there are people who put down an address like "123 Streetname, Auckland" with no suburb or postal code. There are often several streets with the same name due to Auckland having been separate cities once upon a time (Auckland proper, Manukau, North Shore and Waitakere).
These end up "Return to sender".
Saeed read my mind.
I would do it slighlty diffently - instead of the input page being presented based on IP_based_guess, I would suggest A dropdown box for country to start with, and that takes them to a form based on that country.
You can get the prefered format from each country's post office's website, eg www.nzpost.co.nz - just search the site for something like "addressing guidelines".
how in the name of crikey are [the distribution/kernel vendors] supposed to determine what a "Reasonable limit" would be?
The installation wizard could suggest limits for certain scenarios. Pick the scenario closest to your situation, and make small adjustments if necessary.
the manufacturer only supports it with the version of the operating system that was originally installed on the laptop.
Oops. I should've known that before I nuked XP and put linux on this laptop. Too late now. I hope I never need support from the manufacturer.
Is he talking about simultaneous tasks or each possible task that you might want to do at different times?
How do you know it was a criminal investigation. The investigatee may have been a member of a political party other than the encumbant party. This happens all the time even in so-called democratic countries.
Well said.
I prefer the children angle - "Child Protection Wand" - won't someone think of the children! Any politician wanting to ban that must be a child hater, maybe even a pedophile!
ObJoke: In soviet russia the children think of you </lame>
Wow. That's almost identical to the reaction my wife got at one place where she worked when someone discovered she's a christian. One antagonist in particular was always accusing her of shoving religion down people's throats when in fact my wife hardly mentioned it.
I've had that from the occassional person myself - both in regard to linux and to christianity, and I try not to push either.
Hi Eugene
How's it going?
Pretty good right now. I hope all is well with you.
An extra benefit is that you will have more people to exchange files with, because they now have software that is compatible with those file formats.
And with these file formats being open, we can switch from one free office suit to another with no lock-in and still read eachother's content.
I wasn't talking about pushing FOSS onto people.
I keep a knoppix CD at my desk at work. If I overhear someone complain about their windows box at home, I offer them the disk to try out. I won't offer again if they turn it down (no-one ever has) and I don't push it or lecture about how Microsoft is evil (I don't believe they're anywhere near as evil as, say, Monsanto).
I also volunteer at linux instalfests. There are lots of non-pushy ways to help break society's dependency on vendor lock-in.
Well of course they hated it. It was different. Duh!
I love your sig:
So, the $500 iMac... NO, not for you - your parents! Imagine XMAS dinner without having to run AdAware first...
I get out of it by only knowing linux. My brother-in-law is the windows support guy in the family.
If users want to shaft Microsoft, they should *stop using Microsoft software!*
I agree, and I would take it one step further. If you really want to shaft microsoft, you should be actively helping anyone and everyone to get off MS dependency. Once enough computer users are no longer MS dependent, MS will suffer.
This is why MS can not stand by and watch FOSS grow. They owe it to their shareholders to stamp out FOSS.
It's good sense not to dis your employer in public.
This guy sounds like he belongs to a cult.
Does he also share McBride's religious beliefs?
This is why I never do Internet banking from a computer I don't own.
While it is probably possible for a hacker to get past my firewall (a separate box running a firewall distro) and then load a keylogger onto my linux desktop, I feel a little bit safer than those running windows.