What about issues of national security? Do you really want NSA cryptographic published? What about military software for radar
imaging? Isn't there some areas where you expect a government has the responsibility as well as a right to develop without
publishing?
That's Security through Obscurity. However, the prevailing thought is that any system which depends on its workings being hidden is not necessarily a truly secure one, while a truly secure system can stand up to having its internals shown. (Note that I said its internals, obviously not the data it actually operates on.) --
Re:typical katzian little-centric view
on
Review: The Dish
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· Score: 1
Err, do you read the same Jon Katz as I do? I think this is almost his first article that has ever even mentioned the existance of other countries! Sure, he often mentions how bad things are in America, but rarely does he point to how things are done better elsewhere.
I'm surprised to see Katz mention a non-US movie at all. --
It was Guido's former employer, CNRI, which caused the license to be covered under the laws of Virginia. As Guido was working for CNRI, CNRI holds the rights for a significant portion of Python. If and when there is no longer any CNRI code in Python, most likely the license will be changed to something less GPL unfriendly. --
I wrote a program once, and then reimplemented it in many languages and platforms over the years, which is portable to just about every single damn computer on the planet!
I don't have a good name for it yet, but I think I'll probably release it eventually as "hello world". --
He seems to be pretty oblivious to things he doesn't want to see. Besides, to fully study and describe the all your base phenomenon probably requires advanced maths, particularly statistics; it's probably well beyond his ken. Then again, that assumes that he'd do any research at all.:)
(When I mention statistics, I'm referring to the question I've asked about how many people it took to be talking about the all your base phenomenon for it to really take off. I expect that there's an exponential curve to be identified: people saying all your base are belong to us at every chance they get over time.
But how is that sort of thing identified and tracked? To track it, does some net sociologist have to recognise the next all your base before it takes off? Can it be deduced from mail logs?
Nobody I know has been able to answer these questions yet, but they all want to know the answers.) --
Now maybe you might consider a
free market economy the ultimate political choice, but then what alternative do we have to that, centrally controlled distrobution of resources i.e. Soviet Union?
You make it sound as though it's a black and white issue -- either a free-for-all or absolute centralised control.
Don't be silly, there's plenty of room for greys, and it's in the grey where the ideal solutions often lie. --
My younger brother went to Sudbury Valley, after doing rather poorly at a traditional public school. Simply put, he was lacking motivation in a big way, and essentially wan't doing anything.
Now, he's in his second year of political science at American University in DC, and is doing quite well. It definitely is possible to, if you're keen enough, pick up many skills you simply wouldn't be able to acquire in a traditional school.
On the other hand, it's quite easy to get in a position of doing practically nothing whilst at the school.
Although I didn't really approve of it at the time, I'm starting to become more and more convinced of the virtues of that sort of school.
(To keep things balanced, however, I don't think it would work if *every kid* were to go to a school like that. My father analogised it to the UPS vs USPS -- the UPS was more efficient and faster because it could be picky about what it accepted. The USPS, which has to accept, for all practical purposes, everything, could consequently not reach the same level of performance.) --
What I want to figure out is a good synonym for "power cycler" which starts with the letters S and E. After all, Microsoft Certified Power Cycler probably comes closest to what one actually does. (I usually call them that anyways.) --
3. The rails have no switching.. it follows electronic rails (why not do the entire system like this??)
4. rails can not be out in the open.. (electricity like subway tracks)
Using a pantograph, it's easy to switch rails. It can even be done, although less reliably, with a trolley pole. And both of those work fine outside.
I think that switching is possible with trains using a third rail anyways. It's certainly easy enough to visualise, in several ways, even. --
When I started working at my current job, I asked about whether my employer would own rights to code I wrote on my own time, for fun. They seemed pretty cool about it, but basically I was told that as long as I didn't use company resources to do it, it was fine. They even seemed to think it would be OK if I used company machines to test stuff -- we mainly use FreeBSD, Solaris, and Debian (in about that order) at work, and they said it would be OK for me to, for example, see that my stuff compiles and Solaris.
But I do work for reasonably enlightened people, and before I ever did anything that might potentially turn into a conflict of interest, I'd talk to my boss and possibly to a lawyer if I thought it necessary.
The moral of the story: try to work for cool people, and ASK before you do something that might get you into trouble.:) --
Telstra is %51 owned by the government, and while the coalition wants to sell Telstra, it probably will not -- there is an election coming up and most people are apparently not in favour of selling Telstra. If elected (as seems likely now, although far from a certainty) Labour probably will not sell the remaining %51 of Telstra.
It is probably true that Telstra being effectively forced to charge more would equate into more money for the government whether it's sold or retained. --
Australia's ABC is government funded. Its charter, however, includes a provision that the ABC remain independent of the government. It often is quite critical of the current political party in power, and evenhandedly, it often criticises policies which the opposition party advocates (for the next election). --
Ah, yet another holy war, right up there with vi vs emacs.
No, I maintain that it is not a holy war: holy wars always concern personal preference; the tabs vs spaces debate is one of technical interoperability.
...but the way to solve that problem is to fix the editor, not the code.
I disagree, and rather than repeat the arguments myself, I point you here. --
Funny you should harp on CmdrTaco's grammatical mistakes (bad as they are) when you don't realise that pluralising with an apostrophe is never correct. --
You shouldn't use tabs in code. (The exception that makes the rule is that Makefiles require tabs.)
It's better, in a cross-platform portability way, to use individual spaces. If somebody is using an editor which can't automatically change the number of spaces, too bad for him.
Slashdot Mirror
(I'd like to add, btw, that abstaining from driving actually brings an improvement in one's standard of living, not the reverse.)
--
You're an evil, evil man.
--
That's Security through Obscurity. However, the prevailing thought is that any system which depends on its workings being hidden is not necessarily a truly secure one, while a truly secure system can stand up to having its internals shown. (Note that I said its internals, obviously not the data it actually operates on.)
--
I'm surprised to see Katz mention a non-US movie at all.
--
It was Guido's former employer, CNRI, which caused the license to be covered under the laws of Virginia. As Guido was working for CNRI, CNRI holds the rights for a significant portion of Python. If and when there is no longer any CNRI code in Python, most likely the license will be changed to something less GPL unfriendly.
--
I don't have a good name for it yet, but I think I'll probably release it eventually as "hello world".
--
Which ISP is that? Do they operate in Melbourne? :)
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Which Robert Sewell was that? I had a lecturer named Robert Sewell; he worked for Telstra. I don't know what his opinion on Java was, though.
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Sorry, had to bust you on it.
--
(When I mention statistics, I'm referring to the question I've asked about how many people it took to be talking about the all your base phenomenon for it to really take off. I expect that there's an exponential curve to be identified: people saying all your base are belong to us at every chance they get over time.
But how is that sort of thing identified and tracked? To track it, does some net sociologist have to recognise the next all your base before it takes off? Can it be deduced from mail logs?
Nobody I know has been able to answer these questions yet, but they all want to know the answers.)
--
They sure are. To be white trash, you need to have a certain mindset. It has almost nothing to do with race.
--
You make it sound as though it's a black and white issue -- either a free-for-all or absolute centralised control.
Don't be silly, there's plenty of room for greys, and it's in the grey where the ideal solutions often lie.
--
Now, he's in his second year of political science at American University in DC, and is doing quite well. It definitely is possible to, if you're keen enough, pick up many skills you simply wouldn't be able to acquire in a traditional school.
On the other hand, it's quite easy to get in a position of doing practically nothing whilst at the school.
Although I didn't really approve of it at the time, I'm starting to become more and more convinced of the virtues of that sort of school.
(To keep things balanced, however, I don't think it would work if *every kid* were to go to a school like that. My father analogised it to the UPS vs USPS -- the UPS was more efficient and faster because it could be picky about what it accepted. The USPS, which has to accept, for all practical purposes, everything, could consequently not reach the same level of performance.)
--
--
What I want to figure out is a good synonym for "power cycler" which starts with the letters S and E. After all, Microsoft Certified Power Cycler probably comes closest to what one actually does. (I usually call them that anyways.)
--
4. rails can not be out in the open.. (electricity like subway tracks)
Using a pantograph, it's easy to switch rails. It can even be done, although less reliably, with a trolley pole. And both of those work fine outside.
I think that switching is possible with trains using a third rail anyways. It's certainly easy enough to visualise, in several ways, even.
--
Which Robert Sewell is that? I had a lecturer, who works for Telstra, named that. I don't know what his opinion on Java was, though. :)
--
But I do work for reasonably enlightened people, and before I ever did anything that might potentially turn into a conflict of interest, I'd talk to my boss and possibly to a lawyer if I thought it necessary.
The moral of the story: try to work for cool people, and ASK before you do something that might get you into trouble. :)
--
It is probably true that Telstra being effectively forced to charge more would equate into more money for the government whether it's sold or retained.
--
Cool!
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Australia's ABC is government funded. Its charter, however, includes a provision that the ABC remain independent of the government. It often is quite critical of the current political party in power, and evenhandedly, it often criticises policies which the opposition party advocates (for the next election).
--
No, I maintain that it is not a holy war: holy wars always concern personal preference; the tabs vs spaces debate is one of technical interoperability.
I disagree, and rather than repeat the arguments myself, I point you here.
--
Funny you should harp on CmdrTaco's grammatical mistakes (bad as they are) when you don't realise that pluralising with an apostrophe is never correct.
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It's better, in a cross-platform portability way, to use individual spaces. If somebody is using an editor which can't automatically change the number of spaces, too bad for him.
Obviously, indentation is important.
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Well, you did forget a . after the word ``yet''. Not a spelling mistake, but an error nonetheless.
(Not a flame, just reassuring you that you didn't break the laws of irony. :)
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