I know that it's not an easy answer but I'm amazed that companies with well paid, knowledgeble staff still insist on buying second hand cars of the same dealer they bought the first lemon off, leaking oil and all.
The fundamental problem is not the spyware or virus infections, it's the platform allowing it in the first place. I disagree with locking down users - that doesn't always work for the company. Simple privilege escalation ON DEMAND (i.e. not running high by default) is the only way to contain this mess, and that ain't Windows. Anyone using KDE has now gotten used to the fact that they don't need to run teh system as root to make it do anythign they want, including installing new code. Why? Because privilege escalation is well implemented, you know when the system needs more access.
Add training, remove Microsoft, zap 95% or more of the current problems, and that's without mentioning improved stability and much lower license risks (also kinda nukes FAST/BSA's business model but I must admit that doesn't make me feel sorry somehow;-).
Windows: the time for excuses has passed.
Re:I think IBM will cause more trouble than AMD
on
Crossroads for Intel
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· Score: 1
Nah - I just know large systems and what it takes to consolidate servers. Your CIO and CEO don't give a rat's ass about what weird bit of wire sticks out of the back, they want return of investment - and fast.
Intel and Sun don't even come close to the IBM kit - and I don't care about chipsets either. I care about what I can do with it.
As for infrastructure - what chip do you reckon powers a Mac? Hint: it starts with a P.
I have found that particular dangers hide in accusing anyone of being dumb without being in full possession of the fact. I'm not even talking about it being rude (it's the Net;-) - it's an indication of a lack of insight..
I think IBM will cause more trouble than AMD
on
Crossroads for Intel
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· Score: 2, Informative
Their new Power5 chip is a seriously good piece of engineering which will make a rather savage dent in the Intel market when people realise how good it actually is.
Has anyone realised that it has an MTBF of well over half a century? More computing with less power: if you're running lots of blade servers this chip also solves your other big problem: heat.
The moment IBM comes out with pricing that approache Intel (and, frankly, I would be surprised if that isn't coming) anyone competent enough to work out the real TCO (get the REAL facts;-) will not even have to think twice.
IMHO, in comparison Sun or AMD don't even feature as a threat..
That's OK for end users (well, OK, clued up ones), and indeed I do not use anything Microsoft at all other than for some games for the children (and only then if they dont run under Wine or Win4Lin).
However, if you read my post it should be obvious that I meant the irritation to reside especially with those who run systems for a living. The amazing thing is that, during recruitment, great store is made of experience and qualifications and training, but after they have joined the organisation that knowledgebase is never allowed to offer an opinion that doesn't fit in with the 'corporate norm'.
Instead, the PHB attends some vendor sponsored golfing event and comes back all glossy eyed because he 'got the facts' but with some rather important omissions like cost of downtime, patches, enfin, see previous post.
And guess who takes the hit if it doesn't work as the brochure said? Yup - it's you who will be babysitting those boxes and eventually forcibly decide to make a restart a daily feature instead of something you do annually (when you feel like it) just to clear out some potential dead wood.
Choice is not what proprietary vendors want you to have, and they are intelligent enough to go up to a level that is devoid of the requisite knowledge to actually take an informed decision. And naturally, the salesman gets listened to because he is less biased than the internal staff who will be outsourced shortly (after all, it's cheaper to have some call centre on the other end of the planet read you a script starting with "did you reboot" than it is to have someone with a brain doing preventitive maintenance and prevent problems rather than fixing them after it has costed the company money in lost productivity).
The more I think about it, the more I think that teaching board levels at least some basic IT understanding could add serious money to the bottom line. But I fear this will not happen as it would upset the proprietary apple cart too much.
You would too if you had +2 decades worth of fighting with the dreadful engineering that hides behind the glossy brochures you PHB buys from.
I've used DOS from version 3 in all guises (including DoubleDOS), I used GEM, I used Windows from Worries for Workgroups till XP and I'm ab-so-lu-te-ly staggered that in those two decades it has gotten prettier in looks, but worse in quality and waste of computing resources.
I mean, why do I need to give a user a machine running at over 1GHz with at least 512MB of RAM to run a simple word processor? So that it chime "ding" if it has auto-corrected the capitalisation of a TLA? Why do I need an expensive hardware cluster to get uptimes that a home user with a cheapo PC using Linux or BSD would consider normal? Why do I have to force designers to use anything Windows to make their nice Macs interact with my corporate engines?
However, in that time I have also used Solaris, HP-UX, AIX and I've been using Linux since Slackware came on floppies. And yes, I've used OS/2 too, as well as pre-OSX Macs.
Let's just say that on the basis of raw experience quite a few of us have reasons to resent having to fight to simply keep things working instead of focusing on making things work *better*.
Try incorporating downtime, patching, license management and security risk management and insurance in your TCO and see what Facts You REALLY Need To Get. Here's a hint - it won't look good for Microsoft.
I have actually played a football match with it on a show, and the thing still worked afterwards (we just had a mad moment, it happens). The funny thing was that the supplier of "ruggedised" handhelds was not prepared to do the same for evidence. They lost a *lot* of sales that day;-).
I know of some of them being ran over by cars and still working - not much use with a cracked display, but you could still get the data of them afterwards. I don't think my Clie would like that.
But heck no, no use in water - waterproofing was a clear plastic bag then;-)
From the creator of TurboBuzzer (ah, those were the days. Now where's my Zimmerframe?)
Yes, I agree tat something must be done. No, I don't agree that should be an argument to allow submarine patents to become a fundamental part of the core Net infrastructure - that will go a big step to creating the exact have/have not divide we've been trying to prevent. The same problem exists with payments - how are you going to make sure such a payment does not encumber nations with low GDP from sending normal messages?
And no, I don't have any answers either other than RBL + greylisting seems to be a start, together with Vipul's Razor concepts.
BTW, I've seen some people proclaim that spam is not a problem because they only receive a few a day. I have to suffer some extreme cluelessness in the IS department in my company who send back a message "Potential spam" - nicely confirming an address is live. And believe me, that's helping. The spammers, that is: since the idea my spam count has gone up from 95 to a good 150 or so. Sigh. Belive me, at that rate it most certainly is a problem, especially on a Windows platform with Outlook and Exchange, even with SpamBayes installed and well trained.
Although I agree with you questioning the definition, I disagree with your subsequent line of reasoning. An end user should not be expected to have to become a car mechanic to just run a car, but this is precisely what Windows is presently asking.
I've switched people (end users, not techies) to both Mac and Linux, and in both cases there was a general relief of not having to patch so much (I let them try for a month first). "So much" is the defining factor here - it's way, waaay too much for a common end user (and now well beyond the capability of an average modem to cope with, see SecurityFocus.com). To stay with car analogies, the Windows end users now run cars that need a brake fluid change every half mile. And when they ask the dealer they are told that the next car they buy will be better - out in the next couple of years or so.
Ask yourself: would you really, really like to buy another car of that make when there is a growing mountain of evidence that it can be different? Those I switched over didn't want to go back once they passed that first "It's new and scary" hump. That tells me more than marketing campaigns or "facts" give me.
Enough is enough - they had their chance. Anyone responsible for running a business should start to look at the risks they run - and insurances should start to have a good look at how much risk they insure if the business runs Windows.
The Dutch Government sponsored the development of an Open Source, GPL-ed solution that is probably more appropriate and less costly in manpower than the proposed matter (not to mention the human chain of trust that has to be established). Allow me to refer you to the paper and an article in The Register, although the paper is in Dutch.
You can also have a look at the code . The Dutch text surrounding the link to the ZIP file is mainly explaining the ZIP file and showing an MD5 checksum for the archive.
In conclusion, there is verified code out there for expat/remote voting, open and accessible. I would start asking questions if anything less was used. Consider the amount of people you need to trust to make this system democratically sound, and the privacy you need to give up. Conspiracy theorists would at this point strongly suspect alterior motives, and in this case I'd actually agree with them..
Have a look at www.koha.org. Not only is that a decent Open Source library package, it's also written in a way that allows you to access it with a standard web browser. So all you need is a box with a web browser - pretty thin idea;-).
It also makes it academic which OS you use, Mac OSX, Linux, Solaris, even (urgh) Windows - with decent standards compliant code (and I mean OPEN Standards, obviously) it shouldn't matter.
1) for it to work, all components have to be DRM enabled
2) this means you are creating a serial chain of single points of failure, critically dependant on a seriously flawed piece of software called Windows to work
3) it's a technological version 1, worse, it's an MS version 1 hence untrusted
4) it puts an on/off key of the corporate infrastructure in external hands - a bit like the XP serial number which is not always working as expected on rebuild
I know there will be lot of vested interests trying to ram it down our throats, but MS hasn't helped itself in recent months with all their security problems. I think there will be a serious degree of hesitation before this goes anywhere. Make sure you talk about risk - that's all a CEO cares about. That's where the knowledge has to go, and that's why all the FUD is aimed at them: they combine a dangerous lack of knowledge with spending power. A sales persons' dream..
I've had this done years ago (I was one of the first ones to have astigmatism corrected as part of the surgery, and I'm very happy with it. However, I've done some research:
- it works best if you have to do a large correction (I went from -5 to -0.25), results decline in accuracy the smaller the correction - the quality of treatment resides in three factors: (1) accuracy of measurement (duh), (2) accuracy of offset (they need to assess the regrowth to counter that in the surgery) and (3) quality of care (especially after you MUST make sure you have the aftercare taken care of).
The 'trick' in eye surgery is that they actually slightly delay the healing process to ensure you end up with a correction, left alone the eye tends to try and correct (i.e. undo) the damage..
I would strongly advise you to see if you can interview a number of ex patients of the clinic you choose (two weeks 'after' and half a year 'after'). Not all problems show until about half a year later. And yes, you WILL become more light sensitive, a bit like when you have not had enough sleep. So nothing new there then;-).
The problem appears to be MS not focusing on customer needs, but on MS needs. Thus follows spin instead of action.
I agree with your observation that MS has a serious amount of brilliant people working for them, but if they collectively manage to produce something that in the future requires a dual core processor with 1 TB of storage and 1GB of RAM (Longhorn spec) to run a bloody simple word processor than I think we're entitled to ask a couple of hard question with respect to value for money and their understanding of what efficiency actually represents for them.
And their security focus didn't arrive until it started to cost them customers.
If they focused on client needs and thought about some fundamental quality things could improve. Given their addiction to spin I don't see this happen soon.
So I vote with my wallet and run Linux. Simple. Easy - and it does what is says on the tin;-).
If you read through any country catalogue for crypto you will find that there are 'Government' versions of the packages. The sole reason for this is because the algorithms used for Government are different (no idea if they're better, though;-).
Don't be too rash to knock the guy - your judgement appears to be based on a lack of understanding (hereby hopefully corrected;-).
I've seen all the usual goodies mentioned (Ethereal, tcpdump, nmap, nessus) but I found when it comes to detecting a virus infection I find Etherape impossible to beat.
The main reason for that is that etherape actually maps out live traffic patterns (and volume) on a network. I personally am quite surprised it's not a default part of more security bootdisks. You'll spot an infection straightaway as they tend to 'broadcast' on the network.
As for protection, host checksumming has one disadvantage: it's AFTER the fact...
Good luck - you'll need it. You may want to remind your boss that being negligent with CC data might lose you your merchant status, and losing customer date could result in lawsuits from clients or, in EU countries, a harsh fine from data protection regulators. IANAL but frequently involved in cleanign up situation you just described...
Stating that you're bright yourself is substantially different from having an independent organisation state you are. The former will likely (deservedly) yield disbelief, with the latter you have at least a starting point. Get yourself tested by MENSA, and have a browse of their site. And, of course, if you fail you may have to find another reason for being 'different' (evil grin;-)
In the UK there are two legal issues with such an approach (AFAIK, IANAL, depends on how they phrase matters etc etc):
(1) Misleading advertising. They would be asked to take down the ad or re-word it in such a way it made it clear there was still $$ required, but only when someone complained about it.
(2) Contractual obligations or misleading sales: a product has to do "what it says on the tin" (hence the huge amount of exclusions on, for instance, MS products). If what you buy does not agree with what you've been told (or the description states) the transaction can be declared null and void as you could claim you've been deceived. There are limits to this, but in general it tries to offset the, er, 'natural' tendency of sales people to embellish matters;-).
Switched from RH a couple of years ago
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Suse 9.1 Reviews?
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· Score: 1
I used to be a RH user, but I got mainly fed up with playing disc jockey on install. I tend to do a completely fresh install on a box instead of update (my main stuff lives on a core server so it's not a problem). Not that don't keep trying, but I found little to switch back for.
What I like about SuSE is that most of the time I can just kick a DVD in a drive, click a few buttons and go for lunch, coming back to a machine that works (the exceptions usually tend to exotic hardware where it needs some convincing). Even with the CD install I can select from all the available software and install, the fact that RH Pro is an unintegrated heap of CDs is IMO not very helpful - I don't have the time to hunt around for code.
The only thing I haven't tried yet is to use server configs (like BIND and Postfix) from Yast - I normally do this by hand. However, it's something I must investigate because from experience SuSE works best if you let Yast do the thinking;-).
As for 'under the hood' I have always found SuSE to be several factors more useful than RH. SuSE had decent keystrokes for terminal windows from v6 or so, where as RH still needed them defined.
I also feel SuSE is more practical in the way it's engineered, like someone who actually uses it him/herself for work had a solid word in the configs.
Having said all that, I'm still planning to have a look at Debian (already got Sarge on a DVD here) and Gentoo.
The problem is time, which is precisely why I use SuSE Pro 9.1. It just works, and I have yet to be let down by automatic upgrades (well, OK, I've only been running that on auto for the last 2 years or so)
As for experience with Linux, er, Let's just say that I remember installing Slackware from floppies (and I think I may have a cut of the latest version somewhere for boxes that are short on space/resources;-). That by no means makes me an expert - just reasonably able to get myself out of self-dug holes 8-).
OK, I can see a lot of talk about "possible or not", but what about that very fundamental question: what is a machine actually doing with so much horse power?? Don't forget that MS tends to promote 'standardisation' on the premise that your support is then easier (yeah, right).
Now, what I want to know is: why on earth do I need a box with half a Cray One worth of processing capability (and probably an equal demand of power) to do something as simple as word processing? Even the average broadcast video editing suite has less unless it's been a recent install (and I'd use Macs for that, not PCs).
Every fibre in my engineering mind cries out at such a mindless waste of computing power.
Simple example: there is a feature in the DateBk5 app for Palm called 'TapAndHold' which does exactly that, and I'm fairly sure that wasn't just in the latest version (plug: I'm trialling it at the moment - it IMO very good).
Hey! That means the Gorilla project (funded by the registrations) could go for some dosh from M$ - now THAT would be a fun use of money.
Debian distributions are released with names. The current one is called 'Woody', the next release is named 'Sarge'. If you feel more comfortable with version numbers, Sarge will be a v4 (I think, haven't used Debian yet but am planning to try it, as well as Gentoo).
BTW: the 'Guru' title is something that is really bestowed by others, not by yourself. Not that that can't be the case (no opinion, I don't know you;-), but there's a trend not to boast about it. Those that can, do. Those that don't, advertise..
Just imagine if someone finds a way to get an invert from that subsystem, i.e. it won't show anything unless it's non-boring. It's the only way attention will be paid to the fact that such system is far from ideal - who controls the controller? Which political party did the coders work for? Etc etc.
Leaving the 'personal kit' argument aside, you're making critical business functions dependent on unreliable technology for notification. SMS does not carry any warranty on speed of delivery and believe me, it can sometimes take hours to travel between providers. As others suggested, use a pager. That's what it is designed for.
Unless, of course, you want to explain that you had two hours downtime because you wrote some alarm scripts that didn't get to your personal mobile phone. And, by the way, make sure there is a backup for such systems. Email works quite well (if the problem isn't the mail server itself;-), it's amazingly stubborn and resilient - assuming you use a decent MTA to start with..
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I know that it's not an easy answer but I'm amazed that companies with well paid, knowledgeble staff still insist on buying second hand cars of the same dealer they bought the first lemon off, leaking oil and all.
;-).
The fundamental problem is not the spyware or virus infections, it's the platform allowing it in the first place. I disagree with locking down users - that doesn't always work for the company. Simple privilege escalation ON DEMAND (i.e. not running high by default) is the only way to contain this mess, and that ain't Windows. Anyone using KDE has now gotten used to the fact that they don't need to run teh system as root to make it do anythign they want, including installing new code. Why? Because privilege escalation is well implemented, you know when the system needs more access.
Add training, remove Microsoft, zap 95% or more of the current problems, and that's without mentioning improved stability and much lower license risks (also kinda nukes FAST/BSA's business model but I must admit that doesn't make me feel sorry somehow
Windows: the time for excuses has passed.
Nah - I just know large systems and what it takes to consolidate servers. Your CIO and CEO don't give a rat's ass about what weird bit of wire sticks out of the back, they want return of investment - and fast.
;-) - it's an indication of a lack of insight..
Intel and Sun don't even come close to the IBM kit - and I don't care about chipsets either. I care about what I can do with it.
As for infrastructure - what chip do you reckon powers a Mac? Hint: it starts with a P.
I have found that particular dangers hide in accusing anyone of being dumb without being in full possession of the fact. I'm not even talking about it being rude (it's the Net
Their new Power5 chip is a seriously good piece of engineering which will make a rather savage dent in the Intel market when people realise how good it actually is.
;-) will not even have to think twice.
Has anyone realised that it has an MTBF of well over half a century? More computing with less power: if you're running lots of blade servers this chip also solves your other big problem: heat.
The moment IBM comes out with pricing that approache Intel (and, frankly, I would be surprised if that isn't coming) anyone competent enough to work out the real TCO (get the REAL facts
IMHO, in comparison Sun or AMD don't even feature as a threat..
That's OK for end users (well, OK, clued up ones), and indeed I do not use anything Microsoft at all other than for some games for the children (and only then if they dont run under Wine or Win4Lin).
However, if you read my post it should be obvious that I meant the irritation to reside especially with those who run systems for a living. The amazing thing is that, during recruitment, great store is made of experience and qualifications and training, but after they have joined the organisation that knowledgebase is never allowed to offer an opinion that doesn't fit in with the 'corporate norm'.
Instead, the PHB attends some vendor sponsored golfing event and comes back all glossy eyed because he 'got the facts' but with some rather important omissions like cost of downtime, patches, enfin, see previous post.
And guess who takes the hit if it doesn't work as the brochure said? Yup - it's you who will be babysitting those boxes and eventually forcibly decide to make a restart a daily feature instead of something you do annually (when you feel like it) just to clear out some potential dead wood.
Choice is not what proprietary vendors want you to have, and they are intelligent enough to go up to a level that is devoid of the requisite knowledge to actually take an informed decision. And naturally, the salesman gets listened to because he is less biased than the internal staff who will be outsourced shortly (after all, it's cheaper to have some call centre on the other end of the planet read you a script starting with "did you reboot" than it is to have someone with a brain doing preventitive maintenance and prevent problems rather than fixing them after it has costed the company money in lost productivity).
The more I think about it, the more I think that teaching board levels at least some basic IT understanding could add serious money to the bottom line. But I fear this will not happen as it would upset the proprietary apple cart too much.
You would too if you had +2 decades worth of fighting with the dreadful engineering that hides behind the glossy brochures you PHB buys from.
;-).
I've used DOS from version 3 in all guises (including DoubleDOS), I used GEM, I used Windows from Worries for Workgroups till XP and I'm ab-so-lu-te-ly staggered that in those two decades it has gotten prettier in looks, but worse in quality and waste of computing resources.
I mean, why do I need to give a user a machine running at over 1GHz with at least 512MB of RAM to run a simple word processor? So that it chime "ding" if it has auto-corrected the capitalisation of a TLA? Why do I need an expensive hardware cluster to get uptimes that a home user with a cheapo PC using Linux or BSD would consider normal? Why do I have to force designers to use anything Windows to make their nice Macs interact with my corporate engines?
However, in that time I have also used Solaris, HP-UX, AIX and I've been using Linux since Slackware came on floppies. And yes, I've used OS/2 too, as well as pre-OSX Macs.
Let's just say that on the basis of raw experience quite a few of us have reasons to resent having to fight to simply keep things working instead of focusing on making things work *better*.
Try incorporating downtime, patching, license management and security risk management and insurance in your TCO and see what Facts You REALLY Need To Get. Here's a hint - it won't look good for Microsoft.
Damn, too much coffee again
I have actually played a football match with it on a show, and the thing still worked afterwards (we just had a mad moment, it happens). The funny thing was that the supplier of "ruggedised" handhelds was not prepared to do the same for evidence. They lost a *lot* of sales that day ;-).
;-)
I know of some of them being ran over by cars and still working - not much use with a cracked display, but you could still get the data of them afterwards. I don't think my Clie would like that.
But heck no, no use in water - waterproofing was a clear plastic bag then
From the creator of TurboBuzzer (ah, those were the days. Now where's my Zimmerframe?)
Clear down the counter every so often at Spam Gourmet or adjust the anti-spam behaviour with a Pobox account.
Or get your ISP do hold the domain on your behalf
Yes, I agree tat something must be done. No, I don't agree that should be an argument to allow submarine patents to become a fundamental part of the core Net infrastructure - that will go a big step to creating the exact have/have not divide we've been trying to prevent. The same problem exists with payments - how are you going to make sure such a payment does not encumber nations with low GDP from sending normal messages?
And no, I don't have any answers either other than RBL + greylisting seems to be a start, together with Vipul's Razor concepts.
BTW, I've seen some people proclaim that spam is not a problem because they only receive a few a day. I have to suffer some extreme cluelessness in the IS department in my company who send back a message "Potential spam" - nicely confirming an address is live. And believe me, that's helping. The spammers, that is: since the idea my spam count has gone up from 95 to a good 150 or so. Sigh. Belive me, at that rate it most certainly is a problem, especially on a Windows platform with Outlook and Exchange, even with SpamBayes installed and well trained.
Although I agree with you questioning the definition, I disagree with your subsequent line of reasoning. An end user should not be expected to have to become a car mechanic to just run a car, but this is precisely what Windows is presently asking.
I've switched people (end users, not techies) to both Mac and Linux, and in both cases there was a general relief of not having to patch so much (I let them try for a month first). "So much" is the defining factor here - it's way, waaay too much for a common end user (and now well beyond the capability of an average modem to cope with, see SecurityFocus.com). To stay with car analogies, the Windows end users now run cars that need a brake fluid change every half mile. And when they ask the dealer they are told that the next car they buy will be better - out in the next couple of years or so.
Ask yourself: would you really, really like to buy another car of that make when there is a growing mountain of evidence that it can be different? Those I switched over didn't want to go back once they passed that first "It's new and scary" hump. That tells me more than marketing campaigns or "facts" give me.
Enough is enough - they had their chance. Anyone responsible for running a business should start to look at the risks they run - and insurances should start to have a good look at how much risk they insure if the business runs Windows.
The Dutch Government sponsored the development of an Open Source, GPL-ed solution that is probably more appropriate and less costly in manpower than the proposed matter (not to mention the human chain of trust that has to be established). Allow me to refer you to the paper and an article in The Register, although the paper is in Dutch.
You can also have a look at the code . The Dutch text surrounding the link to the ZIP file is mainly explaining the ZIP file and showing an MD5 checksum for the archive.
In conclusion, there is verified code out there for expat/remote voting, open and accessible. I would start asking questions if anything less was used. Consider the amount of people you need to trust to make this system democratically sound, and the privacy you need to give up. Conspiracy theorists would at this point strongly suspect alterior motives, and in this case I'd actually agree with them..
Have a look at www.koha.org. Not only is that a decent Open Source library package, it's also written in a way that allows you to access it with a standard web browser. So all you need is a box with a web browser - pretty thin idea ;-).
It also makes it academic which OS you use, Mac OSX, Linux, Solaris, even (urgh) Windows - with decent standards compliant code (and I mean OPEN Standards, obviously) it shouldn't matter.
Good luck!
1) for it to work, all components have to be DRM enabled
2) this means you are creating a serial chain of single points of failure, critically dependant on a seriously flawed piece of software called Windows to work
3) it's a technological version 1, worse, it's an MS version 1 hence untrusted
4) it puts an on/off key of the corporate infrastructure in external hands - a bit like the XP serial number which is not always working as expected on rebuild
I know there will be lot of vested interests trying to ram it down our throats, but MS hasn't helped itself in recent months with all their security problems. I think there will be a serious degree of hesitation before this goes anywhere. Make sure you talk about risk - that's all a CEO cares about. That's where the knowledge has to go, and that's why all the FUD is aimed at them: they combine a dangerous lack of knowledge with spending power. A sales persons' dream..
I've had this done years ago (I was one of the first ones to have astigmatism corrected as part of the surgery, and I'm very happy with it. However, I've done some research:
;-).
- it works best if you have to do a large correction (I went from -5 to -0.25), results decline in accuracy the smaller the correction
- the quality of treatment resides in three factors: (1) accuracy of measurement (duh), (2) accuracy of offset (they need to assess the regrowth to counter that in the surgery) and (3) quality of care (especially after you MUST make sure you have the aftercare taken care of).
The 'trick' in eye surgery is that they actually slightly delay the healing process to ensure you end up with a correction, left alone the eye tends to try and correct (i.e. undo) the damage..
I would strongly advise you to see if you can interview a number of ex patients of the clinic you choose (two weeks 'after' and half a year 'after'). Not all problems show until about half a year later. And yes, you WILL become more light sensitive, a bit like when you have not had enough sleep. So nothing new there then
Good luck!
The problem appears to be MS not focusing on customer needs, but on MS needs. Thus follows spin instead of action.
;-).
I agree with your observation that MS has a serious amount of brilliant people working for them, but if they collectively manage to produce something that in the future requires a dual core processor with 1 TB of storage and 1GB of RAM (Longhorn spec) to run a bloody simple word processor than I think we're entitled to ask a couple of hard question with respect to value for money and their understanding of what efficiency actually represents for them.
And their security focus didn't arrive until it started to cost them customers.
If they focused on client needs and thought about some fundamental quality things could improve. Given their addiction to spin I don't see this happen soon.
So I vote with my wallet and run Linux. Simple. Easy - and it does what is says on the tin
If you read through any country catalogue for crypto you will find that there are 'Government' versions of the packages. The sole reason for this is because the algorithms used for Government are different (no idea if they're better, though ;-).
;-).
Don't be too rash to knock the guy - your judgement appears to be based on a lack of understanding (hereby hopefully corrected
I've seen all the usual goodies mentioned (Ethereal, tcpdump, nmap, nessus) but I found when it comes to detecting a virus infection I find Etherape impossible to beat.
The main reason for that is that etherape actually maps out live traffic patterns (and volume) on a network. I personally am quite surprised it's not a default part of more security bootdisks. You'll spot an infection straightaway as they tend to 'broadcast' on the network.
As for protection, host checksumming has one disadvantage: it's AFTER the fact...
Good luck - you'll need it. You may want to remind your boss that being negligent with CC data might lose you your merchant status, and losing customer date could result in lawsuits from clients or, in EU countries, a harsh fine from data protection regulators. IANAL but frequently involved in cleanign up situation you just described...
Stating that you're bright yourself is substantially different from having an independent organisation state you are. The former will likely (deservedly) yield disbelief, with the latter you have at least a starting point. Get yourself tested by MENSA, and have a browse of their site. And, of course, if you fail you may have to find another reason for being 'different' (evil grin ;-)
In the UK there are two legal issues with such an approach (AFAIK, IANAL, depends on how they phrase matters etc etc):
;-).
(1) Misleading advertising. They would be asked to take down the ad or re-word it in such a way it made it clear there was still $$ required, but only when someone complained about it.
(2) Contractual obligations or misleading sales: a product has to do "what it says on the tin" (hence the huge amount of exclusions on, for instance, MS products). If what you buy does not agree with what you've been told (or the description states) the transaction can be declared null and void as you could claim you've been deceived. There are limits to this, but in general it tries to offset the, er, 'natural' tendency of sales people to embellish matters
I used to be a RH user, but I got mainly fed up with playing disc jockey on install. I tend to do a completely fresh install on a box instead of update (my main stuff lives on a core server so it's not a problem). Not that don't keep trying, but I found little to switch back for.
;-).
;-). That by no means makes me an expert - just reasonably able to get myself out of self-dug holes 8-).
What I like about SuSE is that most of the time I can just kick a DVD in a drive, click a few buttons and go for lunch, coming back to a machine that works (the exceptions usually tend to exotic hardware where it needs some convincing). Even with the CD install I can select from all the available software and install, the fact that RH Pro is an unintegrated heap of CDs is IMO not very helpful - I don't have the time to hunt around for code.
The only thing I haven't tried yet is to use server configs (like BIND and Postfix) from Yast - I normally do this by hand. However, it's something I must investigate because from experience SuSE works best if you let Yast do the thinking
As for 'under the hood' I have always found SuSE to be several factors more useful than RH. SuSE had decent keystrokes for terminal windows from v6 or so, where as RH still needed them defined.
I also feel SuSE is more practical in the way it's engineered, like someone who actually uses it him/herself for work had a solid word in the configs.
Having said all that, I'm still planning to have a look at Debian (already got Sarge on a DVD here) and Gentoo.
The problem is time, which is precisely why I use SuSE Pro 9.1. It just works, and I have yet to be let down by automatic upgrades (well, OK, I've only been running that on auto for the last 2 years or so)
As for experience with Linux, er, Let's just say that I remember installing Slackware from floppies (and I think I may have a cut of the latest version somewhere for boxes that are short on space/resources
I know that Arabic has quite a number of individual characters (>255 ;-), and goes right to left. How easy was it to adapt Linux to use Arabic?
OK, I can see a lot of talk about "possible or not", but what about that very fundamental question: what is a machine actually doing with so much horse power?? Don't forget that MS tends to promote 'standardisation' on the premise that your support is then easier (yeah, right).
;-).
Now, what I want to know is: why on earth do I need a box with half a Cray One worth of processing capability (and probably an equal demand of power) to do something as simple as word processing? Even the average broadcast video editing suite has less unless it's been a recent install (and I'd use Macs for that, not PCs).
Every fibre in my engineering mind cries out at such a mindless waste of computing power.
Unless, of course, I'm gaming
Simple example: there is a feature in the DateBk5 app for Palm called 'TapAndHold' which does exactly that, and I'm fairly sure that wasn't just in the latest version (plug: I'm trialling it at the moment - it IMO very good).
;-)
Hey! That means the Gorilla project (funded by the registrations) could go for some dosh from M$ - now THAT would be a fun use of money.
Keep 'em comin'
Debian distributions are released with names. The current one is called 'Woody', the next release is named 'Sarge'. If you feel more comfortable with version numbers, Sarge will be a v4 (I think, haven't used Debian yet but am planning to try it, as well as Gentoo).
;-), but there's a trend not to boast about it. Those that can, do. Those that don't, advertise..
BTW: the 'Guru' title is something that is really bestowed by others, not by yourself. Not that that can't be the case (no opinion, I don't know you
Just imagine if someone finds a way to get an invert from that subsystem, i.e. it won't show anything unless it's non-boring. It's the only way attention will be paid to the fact that such system is far from ideal - who controls the controller? Which political party did the coders work for? Etc etc.
Just plain dumb. Ought to be filtered out. Er..
Leaving the 'personal kit' argument aside, you're making critical business functions dependent on unreliable technology for notification. SMS does not carry any warranty on speed of delivery and believe me, it can sometimes take hours to travel between providers. As others suggested, use a pager. That's what it is designed for.
;-), it's amazingly stubborn and resilient - assuming you use a decent MTA to start with..
Unless, of course, you want to explain that you had two hours downtime because you wrote some alarm scripts that didn't get to your personal mobile phone. And, by the way, make sure there is a backup for such systems. Email works quite well (if the problem isn't the mail server itself