An excellent comment. I happen to have been testing my toes on GNU/Linux (I have it running on a separate box) and it seems to me that I have no clue where to find the configuration files that I need. So, I have been reading mailing lists, patiently picking up little tidbits of information that I hope will stick in my mind.
It would be tremendously useful if I were able to see what the configuration tool does. Not only will I be able to show people what I did when I mess up by listing my log, I will also learn what the tool did to my configuration files. (e.g. Inserted/etc/init.d/network: [0019] ifconfig eth0 hw ether 111111111111)This way, I can also learn about the configuration process if I was so inclined.
This remark leaves me clueless. What's wrong with the vision problem? If you have a computer system that can see, wouldn't that be useful?
The problem is, that computers don't see. They look, but they don't really see. They can be told that what's in front of them is Cassandra, but they aren't good enough at being able to distinguish what most everyday items in the world are just by sight.
I had been locked out because my little sister had set the BIOS password and forgot about it. However, I didn't have a PROM programmer in hand. What I DID have was an incompatible BIOS.
So, I took the other BIOS, plugged it in and turned it on. Needless to say, it didn't like my CMOS settings, so it rewrote them. I plugged in my original BIOS, it didn't like my CMOS settings either and it rewrote them. Then, I had a clean default BIOS.
Warning: I'm not responsible if you fry your system doing this.
Another guy (whos name escapes me) wanted to install 60Hz high-voltage lines, and transmit everything from a central powerplant.
Our good friend's name is Nicholas Tesla. The inventory of AC, the transformer, the Tesla coil, and a whole bunch of other wonderful things. He's the person who is always forgotten. Just like that's Grey guy and the telephone...
One of those odd creatures that pops out of time and lands in a place it ought not to be.
You see, I am only 18, and I have noticed this trend from the beginning of my days.
I was a voracious reader, and I got my first computer in a box. Or rather, my father did. It was a good box, a nice box, a box filled with little things and bigger things, all pretty colours. I watched and read out the instructions as my dad soldered the components together and built an Apple ][. An Apple ][ is a comforting thing; it exudes this sort of coziness and warm familiarity. I pounded out stories on WordStar (in mostly gibberish of course, I was only three at the time.) Even my little sister likes to play with it from time to time, we haul it out and stick a television on top whenever we get the urge to play "Zaxxon" or "Mystery House".
I remember nearly drooling (okay, I guess that's normal for a kid of five) when I got to play with my first IBM PC (look ma, no "XT"). Eventually I got my hands on an AT and I am typing on it right his moment.
What saddens me is the fact that few of my generation remembers these things. They seem to drift dreamily through life, noticing only flashes and spurts of the images they pass. The present flutters past them and the past is never known, much less forgotten. Their only experience to the Bard is in school, they have never heard of Homer and the Illiad is foreign to them. Even more present media is unknown: Hitchcock was a nobody, Humphrey Bogart is not a name they know, references to Audrey Hepburn draw a blank. Even quips from television shows but ten or twenty years old draw blank stares. Quoting poets like Tennyson, or Dylan Thomas, or sages like Lao Tsu draw shocking looks from passer-bys.
We are nearing another Dark Age, where past knowledge will disappear just as it did when the Goths sacked Rome; because those that care about the old will be few and far between. People are innundated with messages spouting rhetoric such as, "Forget the old! Come with us, we're new and we're fashionable! Don't do what your parents did!"
This seems to be an unstoppable trend, the media juggernauts racing towards the goal. But we will recover. Historians note that we regained the ancient Greek and Roman epics in the fifteenth century, when old scrolls and sheets of papyrus were found hidden in monestaries and libraries of ancient and old cities.
We must preserve the past, so that the people of the future will be able to find it again, and listen once more to the words of the ancients.
Thanks for all that typing, it's a cool article. But coudn't this get Rob into serious trouble? You know, copyrighted material and all.
Well, no. Rob wouldn't get in trouble at all. Jobu3D (or whomever is behind the pseudonym) might. Witness the disclaimer at the top of the page. (In appropriately fine print...)
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. Slashdot is not responsible for what they say.
You see? No problems...
INCORRECT definition of cracker and hacker
on
CNN on "hackers"
·
· Score: 1
Let us quote from the Jargon File (v4.0.0), a well respected authority on the correct definitions of these pesky words...
:cracker:/n./ One who breaks security on a system. Coined ca. 1985 by hackers in defense against journalistic misuse of {hacker} (q.v., sense 8).
:hacker:/n./ [originally, someone who makes furniture with an axe] 1. A person who enjoys exploring the details of programmable systems and how to stretch their capabilities, as opposed to most users, who prefer to learn only the minimum necessary. 2. One who programs enthusiastically (even obsessively) or who enjoys programming rather than just theorizing about programming. 3. A person capable of appreciating {hack value}. 4. A person who is good at programming quickly. 5. An expert at a particular program, or one who frequently does work using it or on it; as in `a Unix hacker'. (Definitions 1 through 5 are correlated, and people who fit them congregate.) 6. An expert or enthusiast of any kind. One might be an astronomy hacker, for example. 7. One who enjoys the intellectual challenge of creatively overcoming or circumventing limitations. 8. [deprecated] A malicious meddler who tries to discover sensitive information by poking around. Hence `password hacker', `network hacker'. The correct term for this sense is {cracker}.
There now, you see? The poor chap above was right. No need to berate him. Let's try to keep everything civil from now on.
Slashdot Mirror
An excellent comment. I happen to have been testing my toes on GNU/Linux (I have it running on a separate box) and it seems to me that I have no clue where to find the configuration files that I need. So, I have been reading mailing lists, patiently picking up little tidbits of information that I hope will stick in my mind.
It would be tremendously useful if I were able to see what the configuration tool does. Not only will I be able to show people what I did when I mess up by listing my log, I will also learn what the tool did to my configuration files. (e.g. Inserted /etc/init.d/network: [0019] ifconfig eth0 hw ether 111111111111)This way, I can also learn about the configuration process if I was so inclined.
The problem is, that computers don't see. They look, but they don't really see. They can be told that what's in front of them is Cassandra, but they aren't good enough at being able to distinguish what most everyday items in the world are just by sight.
I actually did that to my computer by accident.
I had been locked out because my little sister had set the BIOS password and forgot about it. However, I didn't have a PROM programmer in hand. What I DID have was an incompatible BIOS.
So, I took the other BIOS, plugged it in and turned it on. Needless to say, it didn't like my CMOS settings, so it rewrote them. I plugged in my original BIOS, it didn't like my CMOS settings either and it rewrote them. Then, I had a clean default BIOS.
Warning: I'm not responsible if you fry your system doing this.
"WHAT DO YOU GET WHEN YOU MULTIPLY SIX BY NINE"
Well, okay, that wasn't REALLY the question, but that's what Arthur's subconsciousness claimed it was.
Our good friend's name is Nicholas Tesla. The inventory of AC, the transformer, the Tesla coil, and a whole bunch of other wonderful things. He's the person who is always forgotten. Just like that's Grey guy and the telephone...
IIRC, there was a press release from Microsoft about releasing a whole bunch of *NIX-like tools for ease of administration. *grin*
One of those odd creatures that pops out of time and lands in a place it ought not to be.
You see, I am only 18, and I have noticed this trend from the beginning of my days.
I was a voracious reader, and I got my first computer in a box. Or rather, my father did. It was a good box, a nice box, a box filled with little things and bigger things, all pretty colours. I watched and read out the instructions as my dad soldered the components together and built an Apple ][. An Apple ][ is a comforting thing; it exudes this sort of coziness and warm familiarity. I pounded out stories on WordStar (in mostly gibberish of course, I was only three at the time.) Even my little sister likes to play with it from time to time, we haul it out and stick a television on top whenever we get the urge to play "Zaxxon" or "Mystery House".
I remember nearly drooling (okay, I guess that's normal for a kid of five) when I got to play with my first IBM PC (look ma, no "XT"). Eventually I got my hands on an AT and I am typing on it right his moment.
What saddens me is the fact that few of my generation remembers these things. They seem to drift dreamily through life, noticing only flashes and spurts of the images they pass. The present flutters past them and the past is never known, much less forgotten. Their only experience to the Bard is in school, they have never heard of Homer and the Illiad is foreign to them. Even more present media is unknown: Hitchcock was a nobody, Humphrey Bogart is not a name they know, references to Audrey Hepburn draw a blank. Even quips from television shows but ten or twenty years old draw blank stares. Quoting poets like Tennyson, or Dylan Thomas, or sages like Lao Tsu draw shocking looks from passer-bys.
We are nearing another Dark Age, where past knowledge will disappear just as it did when the Goths sacked Rome; because those that care about the old will be few and far between. People are innundated with messages spouting rhetoric such as, "Forget the old! Come with us, we're new and we're fashionable! Don't do what your parents did!"
This seems to be an unstoppable trend, the media juggernauts racing towards the goal. But we will recover. Historians note that we regained the ancient Greek and Roman epics in the fifteenth century, when old scrolls and sheets of papyrus were found hidden in monestaries and libraries of ancient and old cities.
We must preserve the past, so that the people of the future will be able to find it again, and listen once more to the words of the ancients.
Well, no. Rob wouldn't get in trouble at all. Jobu3D (or whomever is behind the pseudonym) might. Witness the disclaimer at the top of the page. (In appropriately fine print...)
You see? No problems...
Let us quote from the Jargon File (v4.0.0), a well respected authority on the correct definitions of these pesky words...
/n./ One who breaks security on a system. Coined ca. 1985 by hackers in defense against journalistic misuse of {hacker} (q.v., sense 8).
/n./ [originally, someone who makes furniture with an axe] 1. A person who enjoys exploring the details of programmable systems and how to stretch their capabilities, as opposed to most users, who prefer to learn only the minimum necessary. 2. One who programs enthusiastically (even obsessively) or who enjoys programming rather than just theorizing about programming. 3. A person capable of appreciating {hack value}. 4. A person who is good at programming quickly. 5. An expert at a particular program, or one who frequently does work using it or on it; as in `a Unix hacker'. (Definitions 1 through 5 are correlated, and people who fit them congregate.) 6. An expert or enthusiast of any kind. One might be an astronomy hacker, for example. 7. One who enjoys the intellectual challenge of creatively overcoming or circumventing limitations. 8. [deprecated] A malicious meddler who tries to discover sensitive information by poking around. Hence `password hacker', `network hacker'. The correct term for this sense is {cracker}.
:cracker:
:hacker:
There now, you see? The poor chap above was right. No need to berate him. Let's try to keep everything civil from now on.
I like Linus's informative style. Most of the time, we just get to read the guy's interviews.
Very nice indeed. A newbie like me learns quite a bit from reading this type of stuff.
Wow. That's a LOT of stuff to read. This will keep me up all night. *grin*