Alas, the answer to most of these questions is 'it depends.' And then when we get to the what-might-have-been questions, things get even more speculative.
But it still may be instructive to look at a couple of high-profile incidents:
In the Aurora, Colorado shooting, the killer was a methodical, well-prepared lunatic. That's an unusual combination, so there probably isn't much that would have stopped him. Deny him a legal gun, and he could probably find an illegal one. Deny him that, and he could build a bomb to throw into the theater. Deny him that, and he might build a truck bomb. And so on.
In the Gabrielle Giffords shooting in Arizona, the shooter did not put as much effort into preparation. Here, regulations could have changed the equation. In particular, if he hadn't had legal access to a 30-round clip, it's unlikely that he would have had one. Then, there probably would have been fewer bullets fired and fewer people shot.
That's not to say that we should ban 30-round clips - there are other incidents and a number of other trade-offs to consider. In this case, there are already so many in clips circulation that it's unlikely that a ban would be very effective.
But we definitely can talk about it.
(PS - in the middle of our discussion, this post was added. I think he just wanted to demonstrate how to make an infantile post about the issue:-).
'Led to' can be an emotional words, but they are often accurate. People often get their hackles up when they confuse 'led to' with 'was the primary reason'.
For instance - in the incident in Wisconsin, the fact that various policies allowed the perpetrator to obtain a firearm 'led to' there being a shooting. That's something of a tautology, however - a more important question is whether there still would have been a mass murder if he didn't have a gun. And whether as many people would have died. And whether there could have been a policy that would have prevented him from obtaining that firearm. And whether that policy would have caused more problems, in enforcement, curtailment of liberties, and preventing others from using weapons in self-defense. And so on...
None of these questions are easy to answer. Thanks to the emotions that surround these issues, there really isn't a dispassionate source that tries to examine them.
And thus every debate devolves into endless talking points and slogans, with almost all sides making a mess of it.
In an intelligent debate, it would be accurate to say that 'you supported policy A, and policy A led to action B. Do you still support policy A?' And then you could discuss trade-offs B, C and D.
But finding an intelligent debate on the internet may be a bit of a challenge...
Careful - that's a dangerously slippery slope. What if the company donated to planned parenthood? What if the mayor banned atheists from owning businesses?
There's a reason the stock bumpers bend - it's to protect the people and cars the SUV runs into. Those stiff pipe bumpers turn the vehicle into an even more dangerous weapon.
They ought to be outlawed, like in many European countries.
Insipid? Disney's original Winnie the Pooh movie is some of the best animation out there - wonderful art, incredible voices, and an absolutely magical pacing.
Of course it's not going to be as complex as a book, but if Winnie the Pooh doesn't make the cut, then no animation is worthwhile.
This was in the US - they probably expected the car to have automatic, cruise control, and 47 cupholders:-). Especially in Albuquerque, which is a very spread-out city.
Note that in the specific case, the victim actually was a passenger, and the car was stopped when she was burned.
You've reached the same conclusion as the jury in the trial. They found fault with both parties, and split it 80/20.
I've always found that the most compelling evidence against McDonald's is that they admit to requiring an unusually high temperature so that the coffee could be consumed later, presumably when the consumer had reached their destination and was no longer in the car. That was not standard behavior - most other stores served drive-through coffee so that it could be immediately consumed.
- What is the appropriate serving temperature for coffee? 'right after making' and 'right before consuming' are different things.
- What is the appropriate serving temperature for coffee sold through a drive-through window?
- What is the appropriate container and container handling for a hot liquid served in a drive-through?
- Who should know and understand the dangers inherent in the mix of hot liquids and drive-throughs? The corporation that developed and studied it, or the customer?
There are tradeoffs and discussions to be had around each of these points. Basically, the case is not a good example of a frivolous lawsuit.
The iPad has a real chance at making things like this more 'intuitive', but I've watched my wife struggle with simple tasks on her iPod touch. She's very smart (PhD!), but her mind just doesn't take to working in virtual spaces.
An example: keeping a mental model of location within a document. She can handle that with paper quite easily, but doing it on a computer requires enough concentration to take her out of the original task.
Ahh - the red pen interface. Combine it a bit with sticky notes, and you're done. Easy to understand, easily transported.
You'll probably get a few more posts suggesting laptops and tablets, but using those requires a significant investment in self-training and practice. That's something us geeks have forgotten, since we got past that point a long time ago.
I'm not sure how it could be extrapolated to a more general case...
Well, why not watch the video then?
Thank you for your pointless, pedantic answer.
There's a reason you (and every other proponent on this thread) are not providing any answers, and just keep saying 'watch the video'.
Because there isn't an answer.
The video isn't presenting a 'better way to program'. It's presenting a way to enter parameters for a specific set of circumstances. If you've written the simulator for that set of circumstances. Which is the hard part.
But... it's a demo of an interesting tool for solving a specific problem. I'm not sure how it could be extrapolated to a more general case, and the 'tools and implementation' appendix doesn't give any details.
You're running a website that's a discussion forum. You find a tiff-to-jpeg library that you want to use to convert member's avatar photos, so you call the library's 'convert' method.
Congratulations, you've just created a modification. Since the library was licensed under the AGPL, you now need to:
- release the code that calls the API.
- release the code that calls the code that calls the API.
- release any other code called by the code that calls the code that calls the API.
- release your build scripts
- release source for any other libraries you've invoked. That includes anything you purchased from a vendor.
- etc. You pretty much have to release your entire web site.
Now, you may not have any philosophical objections to releasing everything listed above, but just the logistics of determining the licenses of the existing source code could be enough to kill the idea.
Note that this example is not completely theoretical. </dontaskmehowiknowthis>
That's basically it, but note that 'source code' could be interpreted as every last line of code for your web site.
It's part of the murkiness in trying to describe 'modification'. Does that mean code that you've added to the original? When does that stop?
Limiting the definition of modification is the main point of the LGPL. But there isn't an LGPL-like variation of the Affero license. And without that, there are a number of situations where AGPL code is simply unusable, regardless of whether you make any changes.
Jury 'nullification', not 'notification'. There's quite a bit of history there, and not all of it is good; nullification has often been used as a tool to suppress dissent and minorities.
Schneier covers your point on the increasing rate of attack possibilities. You can see some hint of the discussion in the last diagram on this page of figures.
Scale is still a problem... for every source, s/he'll have to
- move them into test mode
- change their NTP source
- run the test
- undo the configuration changes
- hope the system doesn't change between the test and the time they
need the result.
Chances are many of the source systems belong to customers, suppliers and other third parties. Coordinating the testing would be complicated. Tracking the configuration would be even more complicated.
It'll be a lot cheaper for him to take a couple of minutes of outage every few years.
I think the original poster's problems are on a scale much larger than 'fix your software'. He/she is getting data from multiple, disparate systems, and probably does not have any way to tell if a given source supports leap seconds or not. Without that info, there really isn't a fix available.
You might eventually figure out how to scale the Israeli model to the US size.... but at what cost? How much do the Israelis pay per passenger? And what would it cost us?
Don't forget the most important question: is it worth it? Does the expenditure match the threat? (the answer is no, btw).
Slashdot Mirror
Alas, the answer to most of these questions is 'it depends.' And then when we get to the what-might-have-been questions, things get even more speculative.
But it still may be instructive to look at a couple of high-profile incidents:
In the Aurora, Colorado shooting, the killer was a methodical, well-prepared lunatic. That's an unusual combination, so there probably isn't much that would have stopped him. Deny him a legal gun, and he could probably find an illegal one. Deny him that, and he could build a bomb to throw into the theater. Deny him that, and he might build a truck bomb. And so on.
In the Gabrielle Giffords shooting in Arizona, the shooter did not put as much effort into preparation. Here, regulations could have changed the equation. In particular, if he hadn't had legal access to a 30-round clip, it's unlikely that he would have had one. Then, there probably would have been fewer bullets fired and fewer people shot.
That's not to say that we should ban 30-round clips - there are other incidents and a number of other trade-offs to consider. In this case, there are already so many in clips circulation that it's unlikely that a ban would be very effective.
But we definitely can talk about it.
(PS - in the middle of our discussion, this post was added. I think he just wanted to demonstrate how to make an infantile post about the issue :-).
'Led to' can be an emotional words, but they are often accurate. People often get their hackles up when they confuse 'led to' with 'was the primary reason'.
For instance - in the incident in Wisconsin, the fact that various policies allowed the perpetrator to obtain a firearm 'led to' there being a shooting. That's something of a tautology, however - a more important question is whether there still would have been a mass murder if he didn't have a gun. And whether as many people would have died. And whether there could have been a policy that would have prevented him from obtaining that firearm. And whether that policy would have caused more problems, in enforcement, curtailment of liberties, and preventing others from using weapons in self-defense. And so on ...
None of these questions are easy to answer. Thanks to the emotions that surround these issues, there really isn't a dispassionate source that tries to examine them.
And thus every debate devolves into endless talking points and slogans, with almost all sides making a mess of it.
In an intelligent debate, it would be accurate to say that 'you supported policy A, and policy A led to action B. Do you still support policy A?' And then you could discuss trade-offs B, C and D.
But finding an intelligent debate on the internet may be a bit of a challenge ...
Careful - that's a dangerously slippery slope. What if the company donated to planned parenthood? What if the mayor banned atheists from owning businesses?
In short, what about the first amendment?
Glenn Greenwald discussed this at length: http://www.salon.com/2012/07/30/free_speech_and_donations/
There's a reason the stock bumpers bend - it's to protect the people and cars the SUV runs into. Those stiff pipe bumpers turn the vehicle into an even more dangerous weapon.
They ought to be outlawed, like in many European countries.
Insipid? Disney's original Winnie the Pooh movie is some of the best animation out there - wonderful art, incredible voices, and an absolutely magical pacing.
Of course it's not going to be as complex as a book, but if Winnie the Pooh doesn't make the cut, then no animation is worthwhile.
This was in the US - they probably expected the car to have automatic, cruise control, and 47 cupholders :-). Especially in Albuquerque, which is a very spread-out city.
Note that in the specific case, the victim actually was a passenger, and the car was stopped when she was burned.
You've reached the same conclusion as the jury in the trial. They found fault with both parties, and split it 80/20.
I've always found that the most compelling evidence against McDonald's is that they admit to requiring an unusually high temperature so that the coffee could be consumed later, presumably when the consumer had reached their destination and was no longer in the car. That was not standard behavior - most other stores served drive-through coffee so that it could be immediately consumed.
Several key points from the McDonald's case:
There are tradeoffs and discussions to be had around each of these points. Basically, the case is not a good example of a frivolous lawsuit.
The iPad has a real chance at making things like this more 'intuitive', but I've watched my wife struggle with simple tasks on her iPod touch. She's very smart (PhD!), but her mind just doesn't take to working in virtual spaces.
An example: keeping a mental model of location within a document. She can handle that with paper quite easily, but doing it on a computer requires enough concentration to take her out of the original task.
Ahh - the red pen interface. Combine it a bit with sticky notes, and you're done. Easy to understand, easily transported.
You'll probably get a few more posts suggesting laptops and tablets, but using those requires a significant investment in self-training and practice. That's something us geeks have forgotten, since we got past that point a long time ago.
Thank you for your pointless, pedantic answer.
There's a reason you (and every other proponent on this thread) are not providing any answers, and just keep saying 'watch the video'.
Because there isn't an answer.
The video isn't presenting a 'better way to program'. It's presenting a way to enter parameters for a specific set of circumstances. If you've written the simulator for that set of circumstances. Which is the hard part.
Thanks for the link - that is interesting.
But ... it's a demo of an interesting tool for solving a specific problem. I'm not sure how it could be extrapolated to a more general case, and the 'tools and implementation' appendix doesn't give any details.
Cool story!
Well, here on Slashdot it's a cool story - anywhere else, it would probably come off as a bit crazy :-).
Yeah, if you can isolate the AGPL code somehow, you've got a pretty good case for limiting the scope of 'modified code'.
It gets complicated when the AGPL code is a library that you want to link into your code. See my post below for an example of how that might play out.
An example of the downside of the AGPL:
You're running a website that's a discussion forum. You find a tiff-to-jpeg library that you want to use to convert member's avatar photos, so you call the library's 'convert' method.
Congratulations, you've just created a modification. Since the library was licensed under the AGPL, you now need to:
Now, you may not have any philosophical objections to releasing everything listed above, but just the logistics of determining the licenses of the existing source code could be enough to kill the idea.
Note that this example is not completely theoretical. </dontaskmehowiknowthis>
That's basically it, but note that 'source code' could be interpreted as every last line of code for your web site.
It's part of the murkiness in trying to describe 'modification'. Does that mean code that you've added to the original? When does that stop?
Limiting the definition of modification is the main point of the LGPL. But there isn't an LGPL-like variation of the Affero license. And without that, there are a number of situations where AGPL code is simply unusable, regardless of whether you make any changes.
Jury 'nullification', not 'notification'. There's quite a bit of history there, and not all of it is good; nullification has often been used as a tool to suppress dissent and minorities.
Schneier covers your point on the increasing rate of attack possibilities. You can see some hint of the discussion in the last diagram on this page of figures.
Read the book - this is exactly one of Schneier's points.
It's even covered in the available-on-the-web Chapter 1.
Scale is still a problem ... for every source, s/he'll have to
Chances are many of the source systems belong to customers, suppliers and other third parties. Coordinating the testing would be complicated. Tracking the configuration would be even more complicated.
It'll be a lot cheaper for him to take a couple of minutes of outage every few years.
Some quick notes.
I think the original poster's problems are on a scale much larger than 'fix your software'. He/she is getting data from multiple, disparate systems, and probably does not have any way to tell if a given source supports leap seconds or not. Without that info, there really isn't a fix available.
As usual, Glenn Greenwald has covered 'twitter terrorism' and other parts of the never-ending war in all its absurdity: http://www.salon.com/2011/12/20/the_u_s_government_targets_twitter_terrorism/singleton/
You might eventually figure out how to scale the Israeli model to the US size .... but at what cost? How much do the Israelis pay per passenger? And what would it cost us?
Don't forget the most important question: is it worth it? Does the expenditure match the threat? (the answer is no, btw).