Accualy I was going to post about that. It seems to me from looking at the Market share graph that apache gained and MS lost out in July of '02. Either way interesting, someone will have to do some research and find out what caused that.
Cool maybe we can culture some weirdness outa it. Some sorta plastic eatting virus that could set us all back into the 50's or so. Or perhaps something that eats silicon. Imagine the amazing self deflating breast implants.
-=This message brought to you by zorton=-
Lameness in vt100 comptable terms
since 1994
Doesn't the move command simply change the inode? I've noticed that many trash bin type arrangements simply change the inode (or whatever). Dosen't this get by the frag problem?
While it's a good example of "hacking" in the purest sense this app does little that isn't already available via quicktime API already. If I'm understanding the technology correctly (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) iTunes plays protected AAC files via the quicktime system. Quicktime pro already allows you to export files it plays into a variety of formats. I just duplicated the basic function of this program via qt_tools (http://www.omino.com/~poly/software/qt_tools/). My test file was Nina Simmone's "Sinner Man". I used qt_export --video 0 --audio=aiff Sinner_man.m4p test.aiff. I then used iTunes to re-encode back to AAC. As far as my ears can tell it's as close to the original as a person could want. However I still had to have my copy of quicktime authorized to playback the file and I still am using quite a few cycles to reconvert the thing into a unprotected AAC.
I think this demonstrates a perfect example of fair use and DRM technology. I can now listen to protected AAC's when I'm booted in linux. Does this type of circumventing enable me to pirate protected AAC's? Nope, not unless I can find a way to authorize files without paying for them. Does it allow me to playback files that I already own on other systems not supported by Quicktime? Yes. Am I a criminal? I doubt it, I think this is what apple is aiming for. Fair Use of your digital media without becoming a pirate. However the tools are here that would enable someone with enough motivation to start redistributing iTMS files in a unprotected form. Quite the catch-22 for someone wanting to distribute digital files across the internet. Once it becomes bits it's tough to keep it in the bottle so to speak.
Or perhaps improve in iTerm and make some sort of exportable framework that allow you to embed in applications......Isn't that the whole point of the GPL?
Take a look at mpeg4. On my machine (OS-X) I use a program called OpenShiiva (http://openshiiva.sourceforge.net/) to dump DVD's. It uses mpeg4 for the container and Xvid or 3vix/AC3 for the audio-video stream. As far as changing frame-rates on the fly I don't know if that type of thing is in the spec or not. As far as subtitles and multiple audio streams I think it will work just fine. However I'm not an expert so feel free to correct me on this. Nice thing about mpeg4 is the mpeg standard. Hopefully you will be able to encode with either Xvid,Divx,3vix,Apple or M$ and playback on any mpeg4 complaint player. Once again your millage may vary, i've read in the 3vix forum that Xvid isn't quite mpeg4 complaint and I would imagine most of the other codecs have similar idiosyncrasies.
On the other hand there is Mov or Quicktime. This format is very mature and will play on most anything that Quicktime supports. It does allow for subtitles and multiple audio streams.
Although I think ogm is the container of choice for anime lovers....
Something that always seems to slip by in all these discussions is the choice of coolant. Why bother with water or anything fancy? How about just simple antifreeze? Put it at like a 40 glycol - 60 distilled water mix and cool the sucker!
I think the thing that intrests me the most about this bug is how it was found. Does anyone have more information on what brought this bug to light?
In a related subject people here need to lay off the samba developers. They are doing a great job at admiting the problem and taking responbility for it. Heck just today I discovered a bug with LinkSys Wireless Router/Switches relating to multicast. I called their tech support folks only to get promissed a call back after we had covered the basic configuration toubles. It is now almost 6:00pm my time, no call back. No accountability with these people. I wasn't even given the persons contact information nor was I given any time they might call me back.
Compare that with OSS....I can remeber countless occasions being frustrated with a piece of software only to discover I had accually uncovered a bug. One simple e-mail to the author and I had a patch along with the stern instructions to e-mail him back if there where any more problems.
No I am not microsoft/novell/apple bashing, I just feel that OSS comes out with more accountibility for their products. Perhaps I would hear back more often from commerical companies if I bought 500 copies of their product a month. But the same goes for about anything that isn't grassroots. Perhaps I just need more money:)
Zorton btw: if anyone with a linksys BEFW11S4 switch can broadcast on any multicast IP and not have it lock up let me know:) I would be curious if it's a configuration problem (although tech support dosen't seem to think so) or a real bug.
As much as i've personally spearheaded various upgrades throughout my time working with computers this article raises a very interesting point.
I can't remember how many times I have had users almost beg me not to do upgrades. It is not as if they didn't care about security concerns or the latest greatest version of the software, it's the trouble of having to re learn how to use the software. My most recent experience was with Quick-books Pro for Macintosh. The small business I worked for had spent approximately 3 years working with a copy of Quick-books Pro 4.0. All the inventory and accounting information had been tweaked to suit this particular business and for the most part everything worked as it should have. From my perspective this outdated copy of Quick-books was a constant thorn in my side. It had numerous bugs and the user interface was awful. Well, one week ago I got a call from the bookkeeper of the business. She was delighted to hear that Inuit had released a copy of Quick-books for OSX! This shocked and surprised me as I was under the understanding that Inuit wasn't going to release any more copies for the mac (not enough demand the phone rep told me). As I headed back into the shop to help do the upgrade I had visions of a improved user interface complete with networking support. To make a long story short they didn't change much. In fact they managed to remove some of the features (perhaps bugs) that my client had come to use quite frequently. The toolbar comes to mind. In the older version of Quick-book Pro the toolbar had about 15 or twenty buttons with icons. It could be moved all around the screen and even disabled if needed. The best part was the ability to add almost any report to it. The owner and bookkeeper of the company had become very used to opening the pending sales report from the toolbar. The new version changed that, you could no longer add reports to the toolbar. You where even limited to less spaces in the toolbar than the older version! After spending a few more minutes working with the newer version I discovered quite a few bugs that where still present. This was definitely not an improvement.
I think this outlines one of the basic problems that programers have in relation to their users. What is obvious to the programer or even the power user is not obvious to the end user. For programer the task up dialing up is as simple as finding the ppp program and telling it to dial. For the end user this logical progression of steps isn't so obvious. Why do they need to know what a dialer is? Why not have the system just work as expected. I find it hard to come up with concrete examples of this problem because most every system I work with is logically laid out. For the client that I work with it is not. He is a mechanic and what is logical for me isn't logical for him.
In my most humble of opinions apple has made great progress in this regard. They have tried to keep their interface consistent across many changes in the underlying operating system. Even when they made drastic changes to their system as in the case of OS-X the user interface was still quite the same. However small things did change. Once again from a computer users perspective moving the status icon for the dialer to the upper right hand corner isn't a big deal. But for my client it is just one more annoying thing he is going to have to relearn.
Computers are tools. I feel that the industry sometimes forgets that with every change we make in the name of progress. I for one love having a updated system and latest technology but for my mechanic friend a simple consistent system is the most valuable asset.
I just tried cleaning the cache and still have a symlink. I think I agree with most of the other users out there. This one smells a bit like jitter bugs. However the discussion boards sometimes do crop up interesting bugs such as this....
The key is in replication, sorta like cold fusion.
Typicaly no, however the/tmp directory has to be world writeable for lots of diffrent apps out there. There was a reference in an older editon of O'Reilly's "System Administration" about a "overzelious" sys admin who changed the/tmp dir to 600 or something similar. As a result it broke vi:)
My sentiments exactly. I can't tell you how many times we have had a LAN party where the game being played was quite dated. Heck I even went so far as to order another copy of TA because my friend who wanted to play it couldn't find his CD.
The problem with the latest greatest game is that is requires the latest greatest hardware. Not to mention the cost of the game is high.
Plus there is the problem gameplay, like another post pointed out games like Pacman are still popular while I have trouble keeping interested in teh latest real time because of simple flaws in the interface.
To quote fight club "I say let's deevolve, let the chips fall where they may". Screw the thousand gibs, the blowing wind on the open field and all the other eye candys and give me a game with the complexity and maturity of empire. Or how bout one that improves on the gameplay and tweeks problems with the UI? Or even better a game that could be played on older hardware and would scale properly on new hardware. That way the guy with the neon bulbs in his case and twelve cooling fans on his graphix card could host for everyone running on their trusty old laptops.
But then again, I'm just a guy with a computer and a few bytes to send.
As far as installing Redhat dual boot I'm pretty sure you will have to reformat your drive. However there are tools that can shrink your partitions without destroying all the data. Partition Magic by powertech comes to mind, but there may be freeware utilites avaiable as well. Check out This HOWTO for a little more information. I would also encorage you to look around metalab and read as many of the docs avaiable for your paticular choice of linux/BSD before you attempt to install. Good luck if you decide to do it.
this is almost exactly what I wanted. I think I just may be able to hack something together using the command line tool, or at the very worst have to code a bit in perl (oh woe is me!:)
Yeah I did see you post earler on. I agree it would work perfectly for PPP but I seldom use PPP. Most of what I use is wireless via PC card or straight eithernet.
I think the underlying problem i'm having is the lack of any ip-d up script or anything like that. It seems to be obvious now after reading some of the comments posted, that the short term solution would be to use Mail app or point something else towards Mail.app's mail dir. I still would like to find out how the location manager does it's thing (Under the apple menu -> location). The API for it seems to be very well documented and perhaps I will end up coding something similar to a interface up script. In the meantime all I will do is install postfix and have it default upon startup to offline mode. Then i'll run a cron job about every minute or to check for up interfaces that have come up (ifconfig -u, and check the routing tables). Not quite as elegant as i've done in the past on a debian system using qmail but should get the job done. I think with a system like that I could grab e-mail from my pop box using another cron job (fetchmail?), and have a offline mail queue ready to go.
What do you think? Has anyone taken a closer look into the location manager's inner workings? I find it difficult to believe apple didn't provide any provision for advanced configuration of the interfaces (changing the MAC address or perhaps the MTU based on diffrent locations and options).
They tend to be troublesome with support. I came from the x86 world and jumped into a wallstreet g3 powerbook. After installing various forms of linux and bsd onto it I discovered the openfirmware version so old I would not be able to use some of the nicer booters. Add into that a host of other hardware problems and i've found myself serverly dischanted.
What enchanted me was the support services that apple has avaiable if you can get to them. My case and point: The holly service manaul
What a great thing! This little manaual not only told me of the two little release buttons that gave access to most everything one would have to upgrade or replace (modem, memeory, hd, even the CPU). But also told me how to dig even deeper while making sure I didn't make obvious mistakes (don't press here you will break a tab).
The trouble with the service manauls is the access. Apple seems to only want service centers to have access, so you end up having to dig around for a long time on their ftp sites in order to get them. Perhaps the idea is if you can't find the service manaul on a resonably oganized ftp site then perhaps you shouldn't be ripping into a laptop anytime soon.
The rest of apple support kinda stinks (IMHO) however. Hardware problems such as mine where difficult to pin point. The people I talked to for support spent a large amount of time working with me to find if the problem was software or hardware related. And when we did discover hardware related troubles they where reluctant to alow me to preform the work myself asking me to send in my machine to a service center.
Bottom line: the little machines are some of the best laptops out there. With great aftermarket support and fairly good apple service I would feel fine dumping 2 grand into a new one if I had it. In a perfect world I would ask for more nerd support, but hey if your gearing your company towards other things perhaps you don't have time to listen to a nerd.
z.
service manual depo: http://home.wanadoo.nl/manual.man/manuals.html
I disagree. I've always found having a console to be handy when all your computers are either working on something or not working on something.
Of course I had consoles before I had any real computing power under my control but still having the control pad and everything sitting right there was nice. Plus one didn't have to make sure he had the latest hardware to run the games. You could be assured the machine would support the games you wanted to buy (although slowdown was common in the past).
The biggest disadvantage I see is the lack of a good resolution display for them. Networking is a definite lack but if the companies could manage to get a broadband standards based implemtation out there i would be quick in line to buy. Heck maybe even HD TV would made them look nice.
Of course there is the lack of disposible income in my current budget but that's another issue:)
I am sorry if some of these comments have been addressed, I do not have time to read every comment on this page.
My experence with viruses has been minimal. In a former life I helped run a Macintosh computer lab, the main problem with viruses was not system erasing/crashing/cracking types, but was instead with simple "I am a virus! fear me!" types. Same thing in the IBM world, I have yet to find one that did anything marginaly cool. I can almost hear my outburst! "Wow! cool, look what this thing did! my BIOS is toast! neet!". My question is: Does the typical virus harm anything? Or is it just simply wasted bytes of data?
As far as linux/free unix's are concerned I agree the community has been blessed by some unknown virus god thusfar. We have not seen much in the way of virus activity. I can remeber a scare a bit ago (about 1 year or so, can't remeber), a worm simply infected all executibles it could grab, problem was you could run the worm with a switch that would remove itself from all infected files. I think this worm was a warning, and I haven't heard from any of my peers about any horrible real time kernel rewritting virus. Are we naive? or is the result simply the result of all the points addressed by fellow slashdot readers? I would tend to agree that the very nature of linux and it's popular distrubution methods inhibit virus activity but do not eliminate it.
The solution in my eyes is simply knowning your system. Linux/Unix/FreeUnix's attract me due to the openness of the systems. If you want to know what a library does write a script to search the system for programs that depend on it, then check the man pages of those programs and see what they do. What about 20 pounds/megs of manuals sitting in a/usr/doc dir? do we really need those on a simple 24/7 firewall? nope, rm those suckers. I think all new linux/unix admins (note: I make a distinction between a linux user and admin, all users should be admins, IMHO) should spend 2 weeks getting to know their filesystem and running system processes. Kill the ones you don't need, lock down the others. As you can see this rant has boiled down to good security practices, don't be lazy people, clean your filesystems up, know what should be where. Then employ tripwire or something similar on as much as you can. Write a script to check the md5 sums of files on the system and report changes. Simply checking binaries works well, do it every night and have it send you a polite e-mail if a change is discovered. This was my primary reason for running a rpm based distrib, I love being able to burn a CD full of my systems rpm's and then verify my installed files vs those on the CD. Simple step in security and works well (note: is not the end all, as weather here in a Alaska advises, dress in layers). Just a bit of work and your system will be one step more secure than those base install types.
These are my thoughts....only a bit of data in the noise.:)
I remeber reading somewhere (might be ESR's article on linuxtoday.com) that the holly MS box had been broken into (mentions of guestbook changes). Sorry don't have a URL but it still seems to be an interesting point
From a local university i've seen this type of plan put into effect. Their idea was to simply alow file sharing/resource sharing servers to exist but deny outside access to the problematic ones untill they get things fixed. Frequently if the IT department finds a server they didn't know about they simply do a quick audit on it (the usuall stuff, check for open ports, check versions on all servers running). If they find a problem they firewall that server out and contact the admin by e-mail letting him/her know what's up. After that some advice about encrypting traffic to and from the box and the like.
A big big thing is to do as outlined above, trust noone execpt the machines you built and maintain yourself. I have heard so many stories about people breaking into well known companies simply by getting a week admin's password and then following the chain on up.
I agree, i'm currently in alaska (and don't plan to move thank you very much) and as i'm typing this the temps are -25F, simply put most LCD based machines would require heaters of some kind. The power requirements wouldn't be much but it would still take a bit for the screen to warm up (you should see a pilot try and display at -45F:)
Of course once you put a computer (that you can control) in a car you can load the thing with sensors and auto scripts all over the place; heat the screen when needed, that type of thing, hell you could automate the whole car heating system
Slashdot Mirror
Accualy I was going to post about that. It seems to me from looking at the Market share graph that apache gained and MS lost out in July of '02. Either way interesting, someone will have to do some research and find out what caused that.
Cool maybe we can culture some weirdness outa it. Some sorta plastic eatting virus that could set us all back into the 50's or so. Or perhaps something that eats silicon. Imagine the amazing self deflating breast implants.
-=This message brought to you by zorton=-
Lameness in vt100 comptable terms
since 1994
Doesn't the move command simply change the inode? I've noticed that many trash bin type arrangements simply change the inode (or whatever). Dosen't this get by the frag problem?
Zorton
While it's a good example of "hacking" in the purest sense this app does little that isn't already available via quicktime API already. If I'm understanding the technology correctly (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) iTunes plays protected AAC files via the quicktime system. Quicktime pro already allows you to export files it plays into a variety of formats. I just duplicated the basic function of this program via qt_tools (http://www.omino.com/~poly/software/qt_tools/). My test file was Nina Simmone's "Sinner Man". I used qt_export --video 0 --audio=aiff Sinner_man.m4p test.aiff. I then used iTunes to re-encode back to AAC. As far as my ears can tell it's as close to the original as a person could want. However I still had to have my copy of quicktime authorized to playback the file and I still am using quite a few cycles to reconvert the thing into a unprotected AAC.
I think this demonstrates a perfect example of fair use and DRM technology. I can now listen to protected AAC's when I'm booted in linux. Does this type of circumventing enable me to pirate protected AAC's? Nope, not unless I can find a way to authorize files without paying for them. Does it allow me to playback files that I already own on other systems not supported by Quicktime? Yes. Am I a criminal? I doubt it, I think this is what apple is aiming for. Fair Use of your digital media without becoming a pirate. However the tools are here that would enable someone with enough motivation to start redistributing iTMS files in a unprotected form. Quite the catch-22 for someone wanting to distribute digital files across the internet. Once it becomes bits it's tough to keep it in the bottle so to speak.
My 2 cents anyway.
Or perhaps improve in iTerm and make some sort of exportable framework that allow you to embed in applications......Isn't that the whole point of the GPL?
Take a look at mpeg4. On my machine (OS-X) I use a program called OpenShiiva (http://openshiiva.sourceforge.net/) to dump DVD's. It uses mpeg4 for the container and Xvid or 3vix/AC3 for the audio-video stream. As far as changing frame-rates on the fly I don't know if that type of thing is in the spec or not. As far as subtitles and multiple audio streams I think it will work just fine. However I'm not an expert so feel free to correct me on this. Nice thing about mpeg4 is the mpeg standard. Hopefully you will be able to encode with either Xvid,Divx,3vix,Apple or M$ and playback on any mpeg4 complaint player. Once again your millage may vary, i've read in the 3vix forum that Xvid isn't quite mpeg4 complaint and I would imagine most of the other codecs have similar idiosyncrasies.
On the other hand there is Mov or Quicktime. This format is very mature and will play on most anything that Quicktime supports. It does allow for subtitles and multiple audio streams.
Although I think ogm is the container of choice for anime lovers....
Zorton
Something that always seems to slip by in all these discussions is the choice of coolant. Why bother with water or anything fancy? How about just simple antifreeze? Put it at like a 40 glycol - 60 distilled water mix and cool the sucker!
I think the thing that intrests me the most about this bug is how it was found. Does anyone have more information on what brought this bug to light?
:)
:) I would be curious if it's a configuration problem (although tech support dosen't seem to think so) or a real bug.
In a related subject people here need to lay off the samba developers. They are doing a great job at admiting the problem and taking responbility for it. Heck just today I discovered a bug with LinkSys Wireless Router/Switches relating to multicast. I called their tech support folks only to get promissed a call back after we had covered the basic configuration toubles. It is now almost 6:00pm my time, no call back. No accountability with these people. I wasn't even given the persons contact information nor was I given any time they might call me back.
Compare that with OSS....I can remeber countless occasions being frustrated with a piece of software only to discover I had accually uncovered a bug. One simple e-mail to the author and I had a patch along with the stern instructions to e-mail him back if there where any more problems.
No I am not microsoft/novell/apple bashing, I just feel that OSS comes out with more accountibility for their products. Perhaps I would hear back more often from commerical companies if I bought 500 copies of their product a month. But the same goes for about anything that isn't grassroots. Perhaps I just need more money
Zorton
btw: if anyone with a linksys BEFW11S4 switch can broadcast on any multicast IP and not have it lock up let me know
As much as i've personally spearheaded various upgrades throughout my time working with computers this article raises a very interesting point.
I can't remember how many times I have had users almost beg me not to do upgrades. It is not as if they didn't care about security concerns or the latest greatest version of the software, it's the trouble of having to re learn how to use the software. My most recent experience was with Quick-books Pro for Macintosh. The small business I worked for had spent approximately 3 years working with a copy of Quick-books Pro 4.0. All the inventory and accounting information had been tweaked to suit this particular business and for the most part everything worked as it should have. From my perspective this outdated copy of Quick-books was a constant thorn in my side. It had numerous bugs and the user interface was awful. Well, one week ago I got a call from the bookkeeper of the business. She was delighted to hear that Inuit had released a copy of Quick-books for OSX! This shocked and surprised me as I was under the understanding that Inuit wasn't going to release any more copies for the mac (not enough demand the phone rep told me). As I headed back into the shop to help do the upgrade I had visions of a improved user interface complete with networking support. To make a long story short they didn't change much. In fact they managed to remove some of the features (perhaps bugs) that my client had come to use quite frequently. The toolbar comes to mind. In the older version of Quick-book Pro the toolbar had about 15 or twenty buttons with icons. It could be moved all around the screen and even disabled if needed. The best part was the ability to add almost any report to it. The owner and bookkeeper of the company had become very used to opening the pending sales report from the toolbar. The new version changed that, you could no longer add reports to the toolbar. You where even limited to less spaces in the toolbar than the older version! After spending a few more minutes working with the newer version I discovered quite a few bugs that where still present. This was definitely not an improvement.
I think this outlines one of the basic problems that programers have in relation to their users. What is obvious to the programer or even the power user is not obvious to the end user. For programer the task up dialing up is as simple as finding the ppp program and telling it to dial. For the end user this logical progression of steps isn't so obvious. Why do they need to know what a dialer is? Why not have the system just work as expected. I find it hard to come up with concrete examples of this problem because most every system I work with is logically laid out. For the client that I work with it is not. He is a mechanic and what is logical for me isn't logical for him.
In my most humble of opinions apple has made great progress in this regard. They have tried to keep their interface consistent across many changes in the underlying operating system. Even when they made drastic changes to their system as in the case of OS-X the user interface was still quite the same. However small things did change. Once again from a computer users perspective moving the status icon for the dialer to the upper right hand corner isn't a big deal. But for my client it is just one more annoying thing he is going to have to relearn.
Computers are tools. I feel that the industry sometimes forgets that with every change we make in the name of progress. I for one love having a updated system and latest technology but for my mechanic friend a simple consistent system is the most valuable asset.
I just tried cleaning the cache and still have a symlink. I think I agree with most of the other users out there. This one smells a bit like jitter bugs. However the discussion boards sometimes do crop up interesting bugs such as this....
The key is in replication, sorta like cold fusion.
Typicaly no, however the /tmp directory has to be world writeable for lots of diffrent apps out there. There was a reference in an older editon of O'Reilly's "System Administration" about a "overzelious" sys admin who changed the /tmp dir to 600 or something similar. As a result it broke vi :)
Considering the last time I saw a fully unmaned cargo jet land (it was landing in some trees).....
But then again perhaps we are ready for this sort of thing.
My sentiments exactly. I can't tell you how many times we have had a LAN party where the game being played was quite dated. Heck I even went so far as to order another copy of TA because my friend who wanted to play it couldn't find his CD.
The problem with the latest greatest game is that is requires the latest greatest hardware. Not to mention the cost of the game is high.
Plus there is the problem gameplay, like another post pointed out games like Pacman are still popular while I have trouble keeping interested in teh latest real time because of simple flaws in the interface.
To quote fight club "I say let's deevolve, let the chips fall where they may". Screw the thousand gibs, the blowing wind on the open field and all the other eye candys and give me a game with the complexity and maturity of empire. Or how bout one that improves on the gameplay and tweeks problems with the UI? Or even better a game that could be played on older hardware and would scale properly on new hardware. That way the guy with the neon bulbs in his case and twelve cooling fans on his graphix card could host for everyone running on their trusty old laptops.
But then again, I'm just a guy with a computer and a few bytes to send.
Check out this site, it should do what you want.
As far as installing Redhat dual boot I'm pretty sure you will have to reformat your drive. However there are tools that can shrink your partitions without destroying all the data. Partition Magic by powertech comes to mind, but there may be freeware utilites avaiable as well. Check out This HOWTO for a little more information. I would also encorage you to look around metalab and read as many of the docs avaiable for your paticular choice of linux/BSD before you attempt to install. Good luck if you decide to do it.
Justin
this is almost exactly what I wanted. I think I just may be able to hack something together using the command line tool, or at the very worst have to code a bit in perl (oh woe is me! :)
Thanks
Yeah I did see you post earler on. I agree it would work perfectly for PPP but I seldom use PPP. Most of what I use is wireless via PC card or straight eithernet.
thanks for everyones input
I think the underlying problem i'm having is the lack of any ip-d up script or anything like that. It seems to be obvious now after reading some of the comments posted, that the short term solution would be to use Mail app or point something else towards Mail.app's mail dir. I still would like to find out how the location manager does it's thing (Under the apple menu -> location). The API for it seems to be very well documented and perhaps I will end up coding something similar to a interface up script. In the meantime all I will do is install postfix and have it default upon startup to offline mode. Then i'll run a cron job about every minute or to check for up interfaces that have come up (ifconfig -u, and check the routing tables). Not quite as elegant as i've done in the past on a debian system using qmail but should get the job done. I think with a system like that I could grab e-mail from my pop box using another cron job (fetchmail?), and have a offline mail queue ready to go.
What do you think? Has anyone taken a closer look into the location manager's inner workings? I find it difficult to believe apple didn't provide any provision for advanced configuration of the interfaces (changing the MAC address or perhaps the MTU based on diffrent locations and options).
Thanks
So in other words the more time you spend rescheduling things the less time you have for executing the code you have scheduled.
:)
Hmm..... sounds like modern business management
They tend to be troublesome with support. I came from the x86 world and jumped into a wallstreet g3 powerbook. After installing various forms of linux and bsd onto it I discovered the openfirmware version so old I would not be able to use some of the nicer booters. Add into that a host of other hardware problems and i've found myself serverly dischanted.
What enchanted me was the support services that apple has avaiable if you can get to them. My case and point: The holly service manaul
What a great thing! This little manaual not only told me of the two little release buttons that gave access to most everything one would have to upgrade or replace (modem, memeory, hd, even the CPU). But also told me how to dig even deeper while making sure I didn't make obvious mistakes (don't press here you will break a tab).
The trouble with the service manauls is the access. Apple seems to only want service centers to have access, so you end up having to dig around for a long time on their ftp sites in order to get them. Perhaps the idea is if you can't find the service manaul on a resonably oganized ftp site then perhaps you shouldn't be ripping into a laptop anytime soon.
The rest of apple support kinda stinks (IMHO) however. Hardware problems such as mine where difficult to pin point. The people I talked to for support spent a large amount of time working with me to find if the problem was software or hardware related. And when we did discover hardware related troubles they where reluctant to alow me to preform the work myself asking me to send in my machine to a service center.
Bottom line: the little machines are some of the best laptops out there. With great aftermarket support and fairly good apple service I would feel fine dumping 2 grand into a new one if I had it. In a perfect world I would ask for more nerd support, but hey if your gearing your company towards other things perhaps you don't have time to listen to a nerd.
z.
service manual depo: http://home.wanadoo.nl/manual.man/manuals.html
I disagree. I've always found having a console to be handy when all your computers are either working on something or not working on something.
:)
Of course I had consoles before I had any real computing power under my control but still having the control pad and everything sitting right there was nice. Plus one didn't have to make sure he had the latest hardware to run the games. You could be assured the machine would support the games you wanted to buy (although slowdown was common in the past).
The biggest disadvantage I see is the lack of a good resolution display for them. Networking is a definite lack but if the companies could manage to get a broadband standards based implemtation out there i would be quick in line to buy. Heck maybe even HD TV would made them look nice.
Of course there is the lack of disposible income in my current budget but that's another issue
Cheers
I am sorry if some of these comments have been addressed, I do not have time to read every comment on this page.
/usr/doc dir? do we really need those on a simple 24/7 firewall? nope, rm those suckers. I think all new linux/unix admins (note: I make a distinction between a linux user and admin, all users should be admins, IMHO) should spend 2 weeks getting to know their filesystem and running system processes. Kill the ones you don't need, lock down the others. As you can see this rant has boiled down to good security practices, don't be lazy people, clean your filesystems up, know what should be where. Then employ tripwire or something similar on as much as you can. Write a script to check the md5 sums of files on the system and report changes. Simply checking binaries works well, do it every night and have it send you a polite e-mail if a change is discovered. This was my primary reason for running a rpm based distrib, I love being able to burn a CD full of my systems rpm's and then verify my installed files vs those on the CD. Simple step in security and works well (note: is not the end all, as weather here in a Alaska advises, dress in layers). Just a bit of work and your system will be one step more secure than those base install types.
:)
My experence with viruses has been minimal. In a former life I helped run a Macintosh computer lab, the main problem with viruses was not system erasing/crashing/cracking types, but was instead with simple "I am a virus! fear me!" types. Same thing in the IBM world, I have yet to find one that did anything marginaly cool. I can almost hear my outburst! "Wow! cool, look what this thing did! my BIOS is toast! neet!". My question is: Does the typical virus harm anything? Or is it just simply wasted bytes of data?
As far as linux/free unix's are concerned I agree the community has been blessed by some unknown virus god thusfar. We have not seen much in the way of virus activity. I can remeber a scare a bit ago (about 1 year or so, can't remeber), a worm simply infected all executibles it could grab, problem was you could run the worm with a switch that would remove itself from all infected files. I think this worm was a warning, and I haven't heard from any of my peers about any horrible real time kernel rewritting virus. Are we naive? or is the result simply the result of all the points addressed by fellow slashdot readers? I would tend to agree that the very nature of linux and it's popular distrubution methods inhibit virus activity but do not eliminate it.
The solution in my eyes is simply knowning your system. Linux/Unix/FreeUnix's attract me due to the openness of the systems. If you want to know what a library does write a script to search the system for programs that depend on it, then check the man pages of those programs and see what they do. What about 20 pounds/megs of manuals sitting in a
These are my thoughts....only a bit of data in the noise.
I remeber reading somewhere (might be ESR's article on linuxtoday.com) that the holly MS box had been broken into (mentions of guestbook changes). Sorry don't have a URL but it still seems to be an interesting point
I agree
From a local university i've seen this type of plan put into effect. Their idea was to simply alow file sharing/resource sharing servers to exist but deny outside access to the problematic ones untill they get things fixed. Frequently if the IT department finds a server they didn't know about they simply do a quick audit on it (the usuall stuff, check for open ports, check versions on all servers running). If they find a problem they firewall that server out and contact the admin by e-mail letting him/her know what's up. After that some advice about encrypting traffic to and from the box and the like.
A big big thing is to do as outlined above, trust noone execpt the machines you built and maintain yourself. I have heard so many stories about people breaking into well known companies simply by getting a week admin's password and then following the chain on up.
I agree, i'm currently in alaska (and don't plan to move thank you very much) and as i'm typing this the temps are -25F, simply put most LCD based machines would require heaters of some kind. The power requirements wouldn't be much but it would still take a bit for the screen to warm up (you should see a pilot try and display at -45F :)
Of course once you put a computer (that you can control) in a car you can load the thing with sensors and auto scripts all over the place; heat the screen when needed, that type of thing, hell you could automate the whole car heating system