Slashdot Mirror


User: tomxor

tomxor's activity in the archive.

Stories
0
Comments
654
First seen
Last seen
Profile
(view on slashdot.org)

Comments · 654

  1. Some sort of weird catch 22 on UK Government Wants "Unsavory" Web Content To Be Removed · · Score: 2

    But the asshat who understands the internet enough not to attempt to sensor it will get my vote. Let the race of the asshats commence.

  2. Old DNS cache? on Crowdsourcing Confirms: Websites Inaccessible on Comcast · · Score: 2

    if you do a compare between two DNS servers then you are bound to also come up with differences that show how outdated one server is compared to the other... There has to be many new domains registered / re-registered and associated / re-accociated with a new IP every minute, if you run the script for long enough between two different snapshots you are bound to find one of these...

    So my appropriately verbose question in response to your post is: how often do you think google and comcast update their DNS servers, and do you think they update at exactly the same time... I know ISPs like to filter stuff... just wondering if your method is sound.

  3. Bravo on Doctors Say New Pain Pill Is "Genuinely Frightening" · · Score: 1

    Two opinions in 1 summary that wasn't painfully biased to read !

  4. Re:Great. Low-quality evolutionary "solutions" on Silicon Brains That Think As Fast As a Fly Can Smell · · Score: 1

    Thanks for this, interesting. +

    Perhaps the argument of the effectiveness of evolutionary processes as a design tool revolves around the specificity of a problem (as gweihir points out below).

    Maybe the more broad the problem the lower the potentials and greater the iterations needed to refine and vice versa.

  5. Diversity !== Convergence ? on A Thermodynamics Theory of the Origins of Life · · Score: 1

    Why does the kind of diversity you argue is lacking mean that a potential in a system under certain conditions cannot converge to form the basis of life?

    All galaxies have the basic properties of being swirly and full of stars... sure there's slight variations on that but that is basically the essence of them... a huge system with massive potential evolved and converged to form structures with those specific properties.

    I don't think the problem is that the the paper is looking at this from the perspective of physics, but more that you are looking at it from the perspective of biological chemistry alone... Looking at chemistry alone everything looks very specific and unique before even delving into biology.

  6. I hope they were clear about the device drivers on South Korean Court Rules That Phone Bloatware Must Be Deletable · · Score: 1

    I dont want some obscure social networking app to just be integrated into my NFC or WiFi driver instead. Seriously though i bet this just pushes them to hide more crap so it's not obvious.

  7. Do any of the truly gifted producers care? on What Makes a Genius? · · Score: 1

    The "Vultures" are no less greedy and manipulative than your description... probably more so. But I wonder if the most gifted artists, thinkers, scientist, mathematicians and so on, actually care. There are far easier ways to make money, If they are as focused and driven as described in the article then it seems likely they care more about attribution than monetary appropriation any more than is necessary to live and fund their work.

    Conversely look at how pop artists and the RIAA bicker over adequately appropriating all of their disproportionate wealth...

    I don't think this disinterest in money is necessarily limited to "Genius" ether though. I'd quite like to see a slashdot poll on this actually... what do you care about more, your work or your pay check?

  8. You mean Andrew Tanenbaum on If UNIX Were a Religion · · Score: 5, Informative

    But lo, in the late 1980s, UNIX succumbed to the sins of venality, demanding too much money from the faithful and so, in 1991 Linus Torvalds nailed his famous source code release to the cathedral door and kicked off the Reformation.

    It was Andrew Tanenbaum who showed the initiative to create a UNIX compatible royalty free OS for the purpose of teaching, Torvalds Linux is surely a derivative of that initiative if not a direct derivative of the Minix book which inspired him. Torvalds deserves a lot of credit for Linux but i think Tanenbaum deserves to have the credit for enabling so many people to learn about UNIX like systems without paying absurd amounts to AT&T.

  9. WTF... +5 insightful for the lazy? on Thieves Who Stole Cobalt-60 Will Soon Be Dead · · Score: 1

    Do you think every crime is as black and white as the premise... don't you have the slightest bit of imagination?

    Their motive is unknown, and their apparent ignorance of the target's value suggests they are very unlikely to be professional criminals... hmm, petty criminals jacking a truck, how many sorry stories could possibly fit that picture. But by all means feel free to stick with your 3 year old perception of the through and through evil "bad guy" living it up in his evil layer with all the mountains of monies he stole. Or is it the ignorant degenerate that deserves to die? who's morals are we judging again?

    For those who feel otherwise, look at it this way: When you use a lethal weapon to commit a crime, you state to the world that you are willing to kill innocent people in order to get what you want, no matter what.

    According to whom?... you have no knowledge of the perpetrator's intent, and as a matter of probability the majority of "lethal weapon" wielding criminals will not only lack intent or willingness to kill but also hot have a lethal weapon at all... All that is needed is the appearance of a threat, most people are not willing to bet their life on the higher probability of a false threat... that's why it works, how do you know they weren't using toy guns? can you kill someone with a toy gun or a banana under a jacket? are you still certain that they deserve to die for wielding a "lethal weapon"?

    I don't know who they are or why they did it or if there was a real potential to cause lethal harm... and my point is that nether do you. Unknown motives should not default to "Super Villain" and breaking the law or being ignorant !== "morally bankrupt moron that deserves to die", not all crime is committed out of greed..."

  10. Re:10 Years of Research & unpressurised on 6TB Helium-Filled Hard Drives Take Flight · · Score: 1

    Then i suppose that means using a lower density fluid like hydrogen would also decrease the shock tolerance? unless it's possible to compensate by changing other characteristics such as actuator stiffness and length.

  11. 10 Years of Research & unpressurised on 6TB Helium-Filled Hard Drives Take Flight · · Score: 5, Informative

    They spent 10 years researching how to reliably seal it into an enclosure...

    Also it is not under the same requirements of a compressed gas canister. The whole point of using helium is for the advantages of it's fluid dynamics compared to a normal air mixture, that's why it's not pressurised.

    I've always wondered why they didn't just use a near vacuum enclosure, but i suppose it's much easier to not deal with pressure difference and use a super low resistance fluid instead at the same atmospheric pressure.

  12. Stupidest Question Ever on Torvalds: Free OS X Is No Threat To Linux · · Score: 1

    This question makes as much sense as asking if free screen wash with a $100,000 car is any threat to a free online recipe for home made screen wash.

    (Excluding the esoteric and technically illegal hackintosh route) Free OS X vs Free Linux is a stupid comparison... one runs on almost all consumer hardware and the other only runs on a very specific brand of hardware. It's free because you pay for the hardware that it runs on...

  13. Re:Windows TCP/IP not BSD derived on FreeBSD 9.2, FreeBSD 10.0 Alpha 4 Released · · Score: 1

    Thanks, informative

  14. Peanut Butter on Police Demand Summary Domain Takedown, Traffic Redirection · · Score: 0

    DDoS Time, Peanut Butter DDoS Time... Peanut Butter DDoS Peanut Butter DDoS Peanut Butter DDoS with a Zombie Army!

  15. Re:Less Personal Risk == Less Hostile Action on Boston Dynamics Wildcat Can Gallop — No Strings Attached · · Score: 1

    How is this similar to an argument for a machine gun... With a robot you can choose not to shoot in the face of doubt even when being fired upon, my argument centers around the removal of personal risk, the argument for an automatic weapon cannot. Just sounds like your dismissing my argument rather than addressing it.

  16. Less Personal Risk == Less Hostile Action on Boston Dynamics Wildcat Can Gallop — No Strings Attached · · Score: 2

    I would argue that developing forms of robotics for the battlefield (autonomous or not) has a huge potential to reduce hostility. Decision making on the battlefield in person has to take into consideration enemies, civilians and friendlies, and a naturally increased hostility is present due to the personal risk involved. With robots you can forget about the personal risk forget about friendlies and concentrate on separating civilians from hostiles, it makes combat one dimension simpler.

    Also robots can be sent into situations that would be suicidal, plain immoral, or not physically possible for human soldiers... go down this street with enemies hiding amongst civilians and don't shoot until you get really close because your more likely to kill a civilian, that's not really a situation you can send a human into successfully without ether huge risk to civilians or a huge risk to friendlies.

    It's a sharp tool that can be used far more accurately than a blunt one such as a bomb. Something that is likely to stop stupid military decisions like preemptive strikes with massive civilian casualties, because there is another option.

    I'm not saying i trust the hands of whoever these tools end up in, but the potential for good is as great as the potential for bad as with most technology.

  17. Re:Windows TCP/IP not BSD derived on FreeBSD 9.2, FreeBSD 10.0 Alpha 4 Released · · Score: 1

    O_o strange, thanks for pointing it out. I was repeating what i read from Wikipedia on the BSD page a long time ago, but it appears to still be there: BSD

    [...]These, in turn, have been incorporated in whole or in part in modern proprietary operating systems, e.g. the TCP/IP (IPv4 only) networking code in Microsoft Windows and a part of the foundation of Apple's OS X.

    Where does this myth come from then, and how did it end up being passed of as fact on wikipedia? perhaps you could correct it for us being as you know the whys and hows. I'm being sincere, no sarcasm here :)

  18. Re:For those wanting a bit more MEAT on FreeBSD 9.2, FreeBSD 10.0 Alpha 4 Released · · Score: 1

    Wow, never new that info was retained in the sources, interesting :)

    Yeah i was a bit confused at the temporary switch in 2006 - 2007 in the timeline that suggested Darwin was the main development branch... i always viewed Darwin as the excerpt that Apple occasionally kept up to date.

  19. Mod Up on German NSA Critic Denied Entry To the US · · Score: 1

    It feels wrong, and you put into words exactly why it's wrong. I wish i hadn't posted so soon.

  20. And the LAW is the LAW on German NSA Critic Denied Entry To the US · · Score: 1

    Reciting it however doesn't make you any less unreasonable than your government.

    Many politicians are completely blind to the difference between Laws, Morality, and Reason, using the former as a synonym for both the later, they are not able to entertain hypothetical thinking about law, because they are ether unable or unwilling to question them. Don't be as single minded as those people, your government is no more concrete than mine.

  21. Re:For those wanting a bit more MEAT on FreeBSD 9.2, FreeBSD 10.0 Alpha 4 Released · · Score: 1

    That's what i thought, but i don't know much about the early OS X before 10.4 ... did it have everything you define as inherited from rhapsody in 10.3? if so perhaps i should ask the author to add a link between the two offending nodes.

  22. For those wanting a bit more MEAT on FreeBSD 9.2, FreeBSD 10.0 Alpha 4 Released · · Score: 2

    I had a look through this timeline tracing from the origin at NeXTSTEP 0.8, and now my brain is slightly melted O_o... but I managed to find all of the inheritance from other systems (excluding integrations between derivatives of itself like Darwin, OS X Server, OS X and iOS etcetera):

    • 1988, NeXTSTEP 0.8, inherited from: 4.3 BSD, Mach 2.0
    • 1989, NeXTSTEP 1.0, inherited from: Mach 2.5
    • 1996 - 1997, OPENSTEP, inherited from: None
    • 1997, Rhapsody DR1, inherited from: 4.4 BSD lite 2
    • 1998, Rhapsody DR2, inherited from: NetBSD 1.3
    • 1999, Mac OS X DR1, inherited from: Mach 3, FreeBSD 3.1
    • 1999, Mac OS X DR2, inherited from: FreeBSD 3.2
    • 2002, Mac OS X 10.1.5, inherited from: FreeBSD 4.5
    • 2003, Mac OS X 10.3 beta, inherited from: FreeBSD 4.8, FreeBSD 5.1
    • 2004, Mac OS X 10.4 beta, inherited from: FreeBSD 5.2.1

    So it looks like mostly FreeBSD and a little of the old Mach, I think NetBSD was used as a means for porting between architectures more than a literal inheritance. interesting how the last bit of FreeBSD was way back in 2004 from FreeBSD 5 (The timeline goes all the way up to present with OS X Mavericks). of course there are probably newer bits of FreeBSD used that are only known internally to Apple.

    Not having looked this closely at the OS X part of this timeline before i found the transition between OPENSTEP and OS X quite confusing... according to the timeline Rhapsody (what OPENSTEP turned into after Apple started working on it) directly became Mac OS X Server and Darwin, but OS X was not derived from any of them itself and seems to be directly linked to Mach 3.

    Then the timeline proceeds with Mac OS X as what appears to be where all of the development is taking place (including inheriting from FreeBSD), with Darwin and OS X Server only ever taking from OS X like mirrors. Then suddenly in 2006 this model changes and the OS X 10.5 beta inherits from Darwin 9.0 beta, when OS X 10.5 and Darwin 9 mature the model goes Darwin -> Mac OS X -> Mac OS X Server... Then in 2007 during the OS X 10.7 beta the model changes again when the server branch is eradicated all together and gets integrated into OS X and OS X gets integrated into Darwin so the model goes OS X -> Darwin again but without the server.

    This suggests OS X didn't inherit from Rhapsody at all until the period between 2006 and 2007, not sure if this is true or not, but interesting none the less. Also makes you wonder how much of the original OPENSTEP was inherited, perhaps it's more that it was not publicly disclosed how much of the technologies became proprietary Apple technologies at the beginning of OS X rather than a lack of direct inheritance at the beginning.

  23. The Natural Environment of the Software Developer on The Changing Face of Software Development · · Score: 3, Funny

    We need a BBC Wildlife style study of the Software Developer narrated by David Attenborough so that we can start legitimately referring to the gender of this species as "male" and "female" accordingly.

  24. Remember the rest of the world please on Snowden Shortlisted For Europe's Top Human Rights Award · · Score: 2

    [...]If you did think it was important, you wouldn't be trivializing it in the face of an issue that has little to no bearing on American citizens. (Failing that, then it's as I stated earlier: You argue just to argue.)

    Part of the reason the leaks have caused so much concern, is due to the NSA's activities extending far beyond the borders of America. However poverty is defined and whether or not it is an issue in America, it's likely to be an issue in other parts of the world that the NSA's influence extended to.

    I'm not siding with girlintraining's opinion, because I happen to think that a single very powerful entity with massive global surveillance operations and potential influence over the world's information is a very dangerous idea that could gravely impact the future of everyone in the world. However I would hope that others would also consider the morality and implications of the NSA's operations beyond their back yard, the location of your countries borders shouldn't have any bearing on the way you value one abstract social ethic against another... Especially since we are talking about the internet and the NSA here.

  25. Re: More Than You Might Think on FreeBSD 9.2, FreeBSD 10.0 Alpha 4 Released · · Score: 1

    This is getting slightly off topic, but it is interesting how FreeBSD code finds it's way into so many other systems, but not too surprising when you consider the fairly widespread opinion of it's high code quality and statistically proven fewest bugs per lines. Darwin has already been mentioned and probably has the closest resemblance. You can also include the AT&T UNIX systems and their many derivatives which have all pulled code from the BSDs into their source tree's at various points, important to note that the literal code inheritance for the 386 derived BSDs of today is BSD -> UNIX and not the other way around, I know i make that point a lot :P A partial view of the history can be seen in the diagram at this site: http://www.levenez.com/unix/

    If you include not only the systems that maintain a fuller closer resemblance to the original FreeBSD userland then smaller components of FreeBSD are likely to have been included in many systems that we aren't aware of... probably the most unlikely that most people would think of is windows, it's TCP/IP stack is derived from FreeBSD. But the same is probably true for GNU, so it's not really useful to try to compare how widely used they are, it's just good that both of them have liberal enough licensing to be so useful in so many different things.