this is Slashdot, and for an article to work it needs to have the details.
You're new here, aren't you? [ot] Seriously, this looks like another one of those pre-paid 'articles' that are becoming more and more common here on/., like the weekly book reviews brought to you by bn.com. [/ot]
Mainframe OSes are written in Assembly. System exits (hooks that IBM leaves open so that users can implement their own code at the system level) are also typically coded in Assembly.
Keep in mind, the size of most old (pre-9672) boxes was due to the enormous water-cooling systems. Al z/Series models nowadays are about as small as 3, maybe 4 racks.
That's just the CPU, however. The z/Series architecture allows all your peripherials (consoles/terminals, NIC/modems, tape drives, DASD a.k.a. hard drives) to be physically separated from your CPU housing. So if you want a terabite of spinning DASD, a silo with 8 tape drives, an OSA network interface, you'll have to empty out our basement.
And let's not even get into sysplexing (the mainframe equivalent of BEOWULF clustering).
Check out the story on The Register that everyone keeps mentioning, and you'll see a clearer example of what I mean. According to the story, Timeline may be able to demand license payments from Microsoft SQL server customers. A Washington court stated that the fact that Microsoft told customers they didn't need any additional licensing didn't remove the customer's obligation for due dilligence. This is all under the terms of Microsoft's standard licensing agreements; no mention is made of what would happen to customers that had separate indemnity contracts.
If anything, this article supports the argument that separate indemnity contracts are crucial when making large investments in other people's code.
And the fact that no one's filed suit on it yet doesn't mean it won't (or can't) happen. consider the SCO v. IBM case right now. If SCO were to (improbably) win the suit, how big a leap of logic would it be for them to turn around and demand licensing fees from Red Hat, Suse, Mandrake, etc, and/or their customers?
1) Will MSFT really provide this indemnity protection? Do they say they will?
Since we're talking non-x86 platforms (z/Series, in particular), MSFT really doesn't enter into it. However, my management indicates that it is standard practice for us to require indemnification clauses on all software purchases. Even if MSFT didn't sign such an agreement with us, a majority of vendors apparently have. Management may argue that the monopolistic nature of MSFT required them to make an exception for Bill and the boys.
2) OTOH, you might try 'speciality' insurance companies.
Unfortunately, this brings Linux's primary selling point, TCO, into question.
Can you provide a reference to the SQL Server lawsuits you mention? I'd like to have it in my arsenel the next time I have a one-on-one with Senior Management:).
At least with RedHat you have the ability to produce the source to prove it's not the suing party's software.
But that still means I'm the one wasting time and resources to defend someone else's code. If I'm using an M$ product, I may not have access to the source code, but then again, I don't need it - M$ is going to court, not me.
My company won't go to Linux until they find a vendor willing to offer indemnity protection against lawsuits claiming we're using copyrighted software. To date, Red Hat has refused to do so. Our opinion is that it's the distro's responsibility, not the end-user. Does the Enterprise edition offer anything like this?
I tried digging this up on Google, but all I find are heavy on the physics mumbo-jumbo. From what I was able to understand, a Cauchy surface is defined as 2 points in time that are intersected by a single timeline only once. The implication seems to be that there are non-Cauchy surfaces as well (points in time that are intersected by the same timeline more than once?). Of course, I could be way off base here...
How does this support your argument that time travel isn't "quite that simple"?
The reviewer throws this phrase around quite a bit, but fails to define what it is. Is this something I should know if I haven't read the book? And what does it have to do with people suddenly being immortal?
Slashdot Mirror
this is Slashdot, and for an article to work it needs to have the details.
/., like the weekly book reviews brought to you by bn.com.
You're new here, aren't you?
[ot]
Seriously, this looks like another one of those pre-paid 'articles' that are becoming more and more common here on
[/ot]
NT
Excellent rebuttal!
The fools! What were they thinking???
At least this review didn't give away the ending.
While congress may have the final word, that doesn't mean the President can't influence the passing of economic programs that fit his own agenda.
....gee, wonder who they named that after?
And let's not forget Reaganomics
...to just rename SPAM to 'Assorted Animal Parts'?
He was the geeky kid from "Fast Times at Ridgemont high"!
I'm honestly shocked that you had to even ask...
Jus' talkin' 'bout Shaftoe...
Perhaps you missed the part where they said they were trying to implement a cross-platform solution? AFAIK, Evolution isn't available on Windows.
Mainframe OSes are written in Assembly. System exits (hooks that IBM leaves open so that users can implement their own code at the system level) are also typically coded in Assembly.
Keep in mind, the size of most old (pre-9672) boxes was due to the enormous water-cooling systems. Al z/Series models nowadays are about as small as 3, maybe 4 racks.
That's just the CPU, however. The z/Series architecture allows all your peripherials (consoles/terminals, NIC/modems, tape drives, DASD a.k.a. hard drives) to be physically separated from your CPU housing. So if you want a terabite of spinning DASD, a silo with 8 tape drives, an OSA network interface, you'll have to empty out our basement.
And let's not even get into sysplexing (the mainframe equivalent of BEOWULF clustering).
The article states "Last month, Maguire's agents renegotiated a record £11 million deal for the sequel."
What's that come to, $22M?
...good luck to the suers chasing down and confronting a zillion individual MS SQL users.
:)
Hard? All they'd have to do is attach an invoice to some Slammer code and voila!
Check out the story on The Register that everyone keeps mentioning, and you'll see a clearer example of what I mean. According to the story, Timeline may be able to demand license payments from Microsoft SQL server customers. A Washington court stated that the fact that Microsoft told customers they didn't need any additional licensing didn't remove the customer's obligation for due dilligence. This is all under the terms of Microsoft's standard licensing agreements; no mention is made of what would happen to customers that had separate indemnity contracts.
If anything, this article supports the argument that separate indemnity contracts are crucial when making large investments in other people's code.
odds are these are much bigger companies than yours
No odds about it:
Amazon - #492
Google - not listed
E*Trade - #686
And the fact that no one's filed suit on it yet doesn't mean it won't (or can't) happen. consider the SCO v. IBM case right now. If SCO were to (improbably) win the suit, how big a leap of logic would it be for them to turn around and demand licensing fees from Red Hat, Suse, Mandrake, etc, and/or their customers?
1) Will MSFT really provide this indemnity protection? Do they say they will?
Since we're talking non-x86 platforms (z/Series, in particular), MSFT really doesn't enter into it. However, my management indicates that it is standard practice for us to require indemnification clauses on all software purchases. Even if MSFT didn't sign such an agreement with us, a majority of vendors apparently have. Management may argue that the monopolistic nature of MSFT required them to make an exception for Bill and the boys.
2) OTOH, you might try 'speciality' insurance companies.
Unfortunately, this brings Linux's primary selling point, TCO, into question.
Can you provide a reference to the SQL Server lawsuits you mention? I'd like to have it in my arsenel the next time I have a one-on-one with Senior Management :).
At least with RedHat you have the ability to produce the source to prove it's not the suing party's software.
But that still means I'm the one wasting time and resources to defend someone else's code. If I'm using an M$ product, I may not have access to the source code, but then again, I don't need it - M$ is going to court, not me.
Will it be enough to keep them afloat?
Is anyone really running Mandrake on a business server? I thought their target market was educational users and the desktop...
My company won't go to Linux until they find a vendor willing to offer indemnity protection against lawsuits claiming we're using copyrighted software. To date, Red Hat has refused to do so. Our opinion is that it's the distro's responsibility, not the end-user. Does the Enterprise edition offer anything like this?
Got it. Thanks muchly.
I tried digging this up on Google, but all I find are heavy on the physics mumbo-jumbo. From what I was able to understand, a Cauchy surface is defined as 2 points in time that are intersected by a single timeline only once. The implication seems to be that there are non-Cauchy surfaces as well (points in time that are intersected by the same timeline more than once?). Of course, I could be way off base here...
How does this support your argument that time travel isn't "quite that simple"?
The reviewer throws this phrase around quite a bit, but fails to define what it is. Is this something I should know if I haven't read the book? And what does it have to do with people suddenly being immortal?
Am I missing something?
They seem to have a working demo on their site....