1. "If we re-decorate the product we can sell it to you again" [: snickering greedily:] "and again and again.... "
2. "If we re-decorate the product enough, the consumer wont realize that they are using the same product."
3. "If we really botch up the product, or get sued for forcing hardware mfgrs. to include it with their equipment, we can just discontinue it and start over."
This is not fair to the consumer but makes sense money-wise. ugh..
TRS-80's kicked ass back in the day:) !!!
I started out with a TRS-80 Color computer -w- 16K Ram and an external (audio)tape drive - upgraded to "extended color basic" a few years later... Ok, o the OS(basic interface) was written by Mirosoft - but they weren't really considered bad guys back then... funny, I seem to remember the trs-80's crashing a lot - displaying @ signs all over the screen... ah... some things never change...
Comp sci(101) - 3rd day of class, the professor gave me the following challange: write a program in pascal ( on old 386 ) that will calculate x^y for number too big to solve with compiler's functions - example 9999^999.
Sounded simple at first.. ended up making a function that multiplies an array of numbers by an array & repeating it until done. Included functions for calculating amount of memory needed, estimating size of equation, time to complete, etc...
Brought it in 1 week later - professor gave me a 4.0 of the course and said I didnt have to come back:)
As far as writing in c++ goes, it would require the student to utilize pointers, arrays, type casting, functions, reserving & freeing heap memory, converting end result to decimal & displaying.
Saying "The Gartner group says so" does not add much credibility to the argument. If I said that the Gartnet group said that your IQ was less than your shoe size would you take their claim at face value ? Or would you assume that they must be correct because they charge for their reports? Perhaps being a person who values time, you might pay them to see proof of this as their conclusions are most likely applicable to someone like you ?
No malice intended... I just dont buy this argument and would be interested in seeing what they are basing their conclusions on.
Funny, the two links in the article that supposedly support the claims do not support it. Has anybody seen any numbers or facts that support this claim ? I'm sorry, but in this day and age, mere opinion is not enough.
Good point, The bios vendors themselves are not the best providers of documentation... ( AMI for one ).. However some computer manufacturers do document changes:
Funny, people like to see higher version numbers - it makes them feel better. Why use product x version 3 when version 4 is available? Version 4 must be better right ? It says "new and improved" - and god forbid if a product is released and never patched..(think again). There seems to be a general misconception that a product with a higher version number or newer release date will work better. Read the mfgr's description of what the product fixes. In fact, if possible, read the entire history of fixes. You may be surprised to see new bugs that did'nt exist in previous versions.. A classic example of this is MS's NT 4 service packs, and Dell's Bios update history - The list goes on...
As far as the necessity of bios updates goes - check to see what the update fixes - although windows has its own set of low level services, it still relies on some bios services.
On the demonstration flight, a user of a Dell Latitude CPx found that the Web site of the Federal Aviation Administration popped up on the screen so fast that the system's performance was nearly indistinguishable from that of a desktop in a corporate office.
The FAA's website (www.faa.gov) weighs in at about 28k. I would certainly expect it to load quickly over a 64k connection!
Also I wonder if the user had the page cached.
it took no time at all to download a 238-kilobyte aviation safety manual
Come on guys, were talking about a 64k connection... this isnt exactly greased lightning.
Take another look at the data refrenced by the article! It actually shows the Windows 2000 was one of the worst as far as security goes. The linux aggregate score does not resemble any of the individual linux distros mentioned. What I would like to know is, How did the author ever draw the conclusion that Windows 2k was more secure ? And what was the point of comparing the score of an os with an aggregate score ? That makes no sense either!
Re:Point to point protocol for Messaging
on
AOL vs. Trillian
·
· Score: 1
In this case, the user would find you by using your email address - from there the messaging clients would reveal their ip addresses. From the user's point of view, there isnt much difference in having to remember a users email address vs. his messaging handle. Dynamic addressing isnt an issue since the protocol would ask the user for his current ip address each time a session is started. It could be an issue if the person is behind a firewall... or is using NAT - since the client would not know what his public ip address is - there are ways around this though:)
Point to point protocol for Messaging
on
AOL vs. Trillian
·
· Score: 1
Being that most messaging sessions are point to point, it would be nice if a new protcol could be set up for point to point communication only. This would eliminate the need for a central server and coincidentally improve security. Each client could initiate their session by sending an email message containing their ip address, authentication requirements, etc... to the other client. Once email is exchanged, the clients could establish a p2p session. This would improve security and be very easy for end users to use.
"The pair hire nomads to search the desert for geological souvenirs from space. Mars rocks can fetch up to $3,000 per gram in auctions."
If I were a 'nomad' living in some underdeveloped country and somebody offered me that kind of money, you better believe I have Mars rocks, Moon rocks, alien bodies, eye witnesses to ufo encounters, craters and even magic beans!
This feature is called CSMA/CD - Carrier Sense Multiple Access / Collision Detection. It is implemented at Layer 2 of the OSI model. This is not such a bad thing. It is used only when 3 or more nodes share the same physical cable - such as Thinnet. It was an efficient way to allow multiple machines to participate on a single wire. The other alternative at the time was token ring - which uses a multi station access unit (MSAU) to act as a "trafic light". While token ring worked well on larger networks (at 4-16mbps), csma/cd worked better in *looser* ethernet environments at 10 mbps. Today it is more common to wire each machine into a switch - this way there is no need for collision detection at all.
Firewire has advantages that make it more suitable for the applications it was designed for. It uses a pair of wires up to 14 feet in length. This is much thinner that an 8 wire cat-5 cable -which 1000base-t requires. It also supports isosyncronous mode - which enables the quality of the data stream to be adjusted to ensure that the data is delivered on time.
There seems to be some confusion about Gigabit Ethernet in some of the posts here. Gigabit Ethernet is a datalink layer protocol(OSI layer 2). It specifies how data should be sent accross the physical layer(OSI layer 1). There are several different standards for Gigabit ethernet depending on the physical media it is to be used with. Cat-5 describes the implementation of the 8 wire cable used.
When making a point to point connection (with 100base-t) the throughput actually doubles to 200Mbps! This is becuase there is no need for collision detction and then the devices can connect in full-duplex mode.
For Cat-5 cabeling to be utilized as suggested, one need not implement the layer 2 implementation verbatim - a streamlined media access layer could be designed for this purpose. Also, IP(internet protocol - OSI layer 3) would not be implemented at all as it is not necessary since we are going from point to point.
Try Multiple IDE controllers. A few factors come to mind regarding performance. The first is the speed of your cpu(s). Unlike scsi drives, IDE's tend to bog down your cpu - I would try throwing a heavy load at the drives, while keeping an eye on the cpu utilization. Another is bus speed. You know the saying, "a chain is only as strong as its weakest link." If your ide controller is plugged into the *shared* pci bus, see what else is on the bus. you may be able to take something off - like a pci video card etc.. If the controller is embedded in the mother then this is probably not the issue. Also - try comparing the throughput of the bus with the throughput of the ide controller(s). One final thing - on the OS level, check read cache, dma settings, etc...
When you reorganize the string of data, and sort by value, you must retain information on how to restore the string to its original order. There is no effiient way to save this "undo" information without negating the benefit gained from compression.
For example:
Given a series of random numbers: 34, 8, 244, 127
If you reorganize them by value: 8,34,127,244
You can create redundancy if the string is large enough - for 8 bit values, a string of 25,600 values should produce a lot of repettition - in this example, there would be an average of 10 repetitions per value (10*256=25,600).
This is nice until you try to decompress the file. Without a record of how to reorganize the values, you are left with junk.
Even if you keep a record with info for reorganizing the data, the overhead needed to store the undo info outweighs the compression benefit.
If you did find an efficient way to to store the undo information, it would be more effective to simply apply this algorithm directly to the random data!
Hello ? I am assuming that this admin thinks that his Microsoft based computers are less vulnerable to viruses and dos attacks ?
For one thing, because of the popularity of windows, windows bases systems are a prime platform for virus writers.
Windows products such as Outlook, Word and Excel have been a nightmare security wise - have we forgotten about the love bug & melissa ?
The biggest factor of all is the user who allows these malicous programs to run on their systems. Keep in mind that windows was designed for the less-sophisticated end user.
I blame the stupid end users who cannot figure out how to use a gui that is simple enough to be operated by an ape. The gui relies on your (huge) visual cortex's ability to memorize things visually. I believe we make gui's because the same stupid end users cannot figure how to navigate through a simple filesystem. The real problem here is that the simpler we design the interfaces, THE LESS BRAIN MASS IS UTILIZED by the end user, and as you would expect, the less they retain. Computers are for smart people - not for dumb people. We should perhaps think of ways to "jolt" the end user's brain into a wakeful state.
It appears that the real issue here is bandwith consumption and not content. If these companies are incapable of providing flat rates for unlimited use, they should charge according to usage - or for usage beyone a given allowance.
I wonder if this infringes in some way on freedom of speech ? - (I'm a computer guy, not a lawyer)
Slashdot Mirror
I think the philosophy is:
:] "and again and again.... "
1. "If we re-decorate the product we can sell it to you again" [: snickering greedily
2. "If we re-decorate the product enough, the consumer wont realize that they are using the same product."
3. "If we really botch up the product, or get sued for forcing hardware mfgrs. to include it with their equipment, we can just discontinue it and start over."
This is not fair to the consumer but makes sense money-wise. ugh..
TRS-80's kicked ass back in the day :) !!!
I started out with a TRS-80 Color computer -w- 16K Ram and an external (audio)tape drive - upgraded to "extended color basic" a few years later... Ok, o the OS(basic interface) was written by Mirosoft - but they weren't really considered bad guys back then... funny, I seem to remember the trs-80's crashing a lot - displaying @ signs all over the screen... ah... some things never change...
Comp sci(101) - 3rd day of class, the professor gave me the following challange: write a program in pascal ( on old 386 ) that will calculate x^y for number too big to solve with compiler's functions - example 9999^999.
:)
Sounded simple at first.. ended up making a function that multiplies an array of numbers by an array & repeating it until done. Included functions for calculating amount of memory needed, estimating size of equation, time to complete, etc...
Brought it in 1 week later - professor gave me a 4.0 of the course and said I didnt have to come back
As far as writing in c++ goes, it would require the student to utilize pointers, arrays, type casting, functions, reserving & freeing heap memory, converting end result to decimal & displaying.
Saying "The Gartner group says so" does not add much credibility to the argument. If I said that the Gartnet group said that your IQ was less than your shoe size would you take their claim at face value ? Or would you assume that they must be correct because they charge for their reports? Perhaps being a person who values time, you might pay them to see proof of this as their conclusions are most likely applicable to someone like you ?
No malice intended... I just dont buy this argument and would be interested in seeing what they are basing their conclusions on.
Funny, the two links in the article that supposedly support the claims do not support it. Has anybody seen any numbers or facts that support this claim ? I'm sorry, but in this day and age, mere opinion is not enough.
Is it just me or does it look like this thing might fly off its little legs if a tornado hit ?
Hell - put a bend in the middle, wait for the next tornado, and you have the world's biggest boomerang !
Wonder how it would stand up to an earthquake ?
Good point, The bios vendors themselves are not the best providers of documentation... ( AMI for one ).. However some computer manufacturers do document changes:
0 &org=psg&doc=MIGR-41214
n load/14220.html
/ matrix50451.html
t m 0 10d.pdf
For example:
IBM
http://www-1.ibm.com/support/manager.wss?rs=0&rt=
COMPAQ
http://www.compaq.com/support/files/server/us/dow
HP
http://h20004.www2.hp.com/keeper_rnotes/bsdmatrix
INTEL
http://www.intel.com/design/motherbd/ad/ad_bios.h
ftp://download.intel.com/design/motherbd/ad/P04-0
As far as the bridge offer goes, I'll pass.
Funny, people like to see higher version numbers - it makes them feel better. Why use product x version 3 when version 4 is available? Version 4 must be better right ? It says "new and improved" - and god forbid if a product is released and never patched..(think again). There seems to be a general misconception that a product with a higher version number or newer release date will work better. Read the mfgr's description of what the product fixes. In fact, if possible, read the entire history of fixes. You may be surprised to see new bugs that did'nt exist in previous versions.. A classic example of this is MS's NT 4 service packs, and Dell's Bios update history - The list goes on... As far as the necessity of bios updates goes - check to see what the update fixes - although windows has its own set of low level services, it still relies on some bios services.
On the demonstration flight, a user of a Dell Latitude CPx found that the Web site of the Federal Aviation Administration popped up on the screen so fast that the system's performance was nearly indistinguishable from that of a desktop in a corporate office.
The FAA's website (www.faa.gov) weighs in at about 28k. I would certainly expect it to load quickly over a 64k connection!
Also I wonder if the user had the page cached.
it took no time at all to download a 238-kilobyte aviation safety manual
Come on guys, were talking about a 64k connection... this isnt exactly greased lightning.
Take another look at the data refrenced by the article! It actually shows the Windows 2000 was one of the worst as far as security goes. The linux aggregate score does not resemble any of the individual linux distros mentioned. What I would like to know is, How did the author ever draw the conclusion that Windows 2k was more secure ? And what was the point of comparing the score of an os with an aggregate score ? That makes no sense either!
In this case, the user would find you by using your email address - from there the messaging clients would reveal their ip addresses. From the user's point of view, there isnt much difference in having to remember a users email address vs. his messaging handle. Dynamic addressing isnt an issue since the protocol would ask the user for his current ip address each time a session is started. It could be an issue if the person is behind a firewall... or is using NAT - since the client would not know what his public ip address is - there are ways around this though :)
Being that most messaging sessions are point to point, it would be nice if a new protcol could be set up for point to point communication only. This would eliminate the need for a central server and coincidentally improve security. Each client could initiate their session by sending an email message containing their ip address, authentication requirements, etc... to the other client. Once email is exchanged, the clients could establish a p2p session. This would improve security and be very easy for end users to use.
Here's the link via the wayback machine.
lol - enjoy !
"The pair hire nomads to search the desert for geological souvenirs from space. Mars rocks can fetch up to $3,000 per gram in auctions."
If I were a 'nomad' living in some underdeveloped country and somebody offered me that kind of money, you better believe I have Mars rocks, Moon rocks, alien bodies, eye witnesses to ufo encounters, craters and even magic beans!
This feature is called CSMA/CD - Carrier Sense Multiple Access / Collision Detection. It is implemented at Layer 2 of the OSI model. This is not such a bad thing. It is used only when 3 or more nodes share the same physical cable - such as Thinnet. It was an efficient way to allow multiple machines to participate on a single wire. The other alternative at the time was token ring - which uses a multi station access unit (MSAU) to act as a "trafic light". While token ring worked well on larger networks (at 4-16mbps), csma/cd worked better in *looser* ethernet environments at 10 mbps. Today it is more common to wire each machine into a switch - this way there is no need for collision detection at all.
Firewire has advantages that make it more suitable for the applications it was designed for. It uses a pair of wires up to 14 feet in length. This is much thinner that an 8 wire cat-5 cable -which 1000base-t requires. It also supports isosyncronous mode - which enables the quality of the data stream to be adjusted to ensure that the data is delivered on time.
There seems to be some confusion about Gigabit Ethernet in some of the posts here. Gigabit Ethernet is a datalink layer protocol(OSI layer 2). It specifies how data should be sent accross the physical layer(OSI layer 1). There are several different standards for Gigabit ethernet depending on the physical media it is to be used with. Cat-5 describes the implementation of the 8 wire cable used.
When making a point to point connection (with 100base-t) the throughput actually doubles to 200Mbps! This is becuase there is no need for collision detction and then the devices can connect in full-duplex mode.
For Cat-5 cabeling to be utilized as suggested, one need not implement the layer 2 implementation verbatim - a streamlined media access layer could be designed for this purpose. Also, IP(internet protocol - OSI layer 3) would not be implemented at all as it is not necessary since we are going from point to point.
Try Multiple IDE controllers. A few factors come to mind regarding performance. The first is the speed of your cpu(s). Unlike scsi drives, IDE's tend to bog down your cpu - I would try throwing a heavy load at the drives, while keeping an eye on the cpu utilization. Another is bus speed. You know the saying, "a chain is only as strong as its weakest link." If your ide controller is plugged into the *shared* pci bus, see what else is on the bus. you may be able to take something off - like a pci video card etc.. If the controller is embedded in the mother then this is probably not the issue. Also - try comparing the throughput of the bus with the throughput of the ide controller(s). One final thing - on the OS level, check read cache, dma settings, etc...
The flaw here is simple,
When you reorganize the string of data, and sort by value, you must retain information on how to restore the string to its original order. There is no effiient way to save this "undo" information without negating the benefit gained from compression.
For example:
Given a series of random numbers: 34, 8, 244, 127
If you reorganize them by value: 8,34,127,244
You can create redundancy if the string is large enough - for 8 bit values, a string of 25,600 values should produce a lot of repettition - in this example, there would be an average of 10 repetitions per value (10*256=25,600).
This is nice until you try to decompress the file. Without a record of how to reorganize the values, you are left with junk.
Even if you keep a record with info for reorganizing the data, the overhead needed to store the undo info outweighs the compression benefit.
If you did find an efficient way to to store the undo information, it would be more effective to simply apply this algorithm directly to the random data!
Hello ? I am assuming that this admin thinks that his Microsoft based computers are less vulnerable to viruses and dos attacks ?
For one thing, because of the popularity of windows, windows bases systems are a prime platform for virus writers.
Windows products such as Outlook, Word and Excel have been a nightmare security wise - have we forgotten about the love bug & melissa ?
The biggest factor of all is the user who allows these malicous programs to run on their systems. Keep in mind that windows was designed for the less-sophisticated end user.
I blame the stupid end users who cannot figure out how to use a gui that is simple enough to be operated by an ape. The gui relies on your (huge) visual cortex's ability to memorize things visually. I believe we make gui's because the same stupid end users cannot figure how to navigate through a simple filesystem. The real problem here is that the simpler we design the interfaces, THE LESS BRAIN MASS IS UTILIZED by the end user, and as you would expect, the less they retain. Computers are for smart people - not for dumb people. We should perhaps think of ways to "jolt" the end user's brain into a wakeful state.
If the patch works as it should... ;)
1. Corrects the way it handles the Content-Disposition and Content-Type header fields in an HTML stream.
2. Patches a vulnerability to a newly discovered variant of the "Frame Domain Verification"
3. Prevents a site from misreporting the name of files that users attempt to download.
More details can be found here
It appears that the real issue here is bandwith consumption and not content. If these companies are incapable of providing flat rates for unlimited use, they should charge according to usage - or for usage beyone a given allowance.
I wonder if this infringes in some way on freedom of speech ? - (I'm a computer guy, not a lawyer)