I don't know if banks are using the same lists. I suspect that they are. I do know that banks put an extended freeze on transactions over $10,000, to allow for "Homeland Security" review. This applies even to activity totally within the United States, regardless of your name.
I reported a problem with Eudora a couple of years ago that Qualcomm support eventually attributed to a "bug" in OpenSSH. While it's true that we'd recently installed a new version of OpenSSH to address a security exposure, pointing out the widespread use of OpenSSH and the fact that every other POP3 client that I used with it worked just fine seemed to have no impact on them. It was quite clear from their responses that they didn't think we should be using OpenSSH - or open anything, as far as I could tell.
That's when I discovered that Thunderbird was reaching the point where it was a quite competent replacement for Eudora. I've taken great delight in pointing that out to anyone who asks about Eudora upgrades.
Symantec is the (proud?) publisher of the absolutely worst piece of software that I've ever used: WinFAX Pro 10.2. Not only did every major mode fail to work in some way, but it disabled my phone system for days after it was installed on a machine on my network. This software was so flawed that it convinced me to abandon the Windows platform altogether.
Earlier this evening I was cleaning up a friend's Windows 2000 machine. After removing a collection of obsolete software, TCP/IP no longer worked. The culprit: Symantec Antivirus. It had left invalid service dependencies in the registry. I had to remove them by hand.
Symantec can't even understand their own software, much less someone else's. Even ignoring the obvious corporate bias, I have no faith that they can begin to understand the actual severity of defects in either IE or Firefox. It would be far better to ask "how many machines have been compromised by this fault?" than to present simple defect counts.
I also switched to MoneyDance after running out of patience with Intuit. Why were there so many bugs in a program that's been out as long as Quicken? Why should I have to endure on-screen spam from a program that I paid real money to purchase?
MoneyDance was a refreshing change. When I had a problem with importing my Quicken data in an earlier version, the lead developer answered my mail almost immediately (even though I hadn't actually purchased the program yet) and had a fix for me within a day. I made requests for enhancements in the newest version and they're there. The mailing list is also full of helpful folks.
It doesn't have quite the range of features that appear in, say, Quicken or Money, but the basics are well-designed, it's really supported, and it runs on Linux, Windows, and Macs. I can't help laughing when I get the renewal letters from Intuit.
I used to work with a guy who would submit the weirdest questions to slashdot.org and then spend the afternoon obsessively refreshing his browser window, waiting to see what sort of flames resulted.
Could be. My 2.4GHz phone frequency hops. That seems to keep it from knocking out the wireless network when the phone is in use. However, if the phone hops through the channel the wireless is using when there's heavy network activity, I get background noise and/or brief dropouts on the phone. It was worse when I had the phone near the AP for a brief period.
I did some throughput tests on the network when I first installed the phone. There was a 10-20% hit with the phone active. (This was with a WaveLan 802.11b RG).
Yes. Same car. The 33mpg tank was at a steady, sedate 60-70mph (my wife was in the car and she doesn't like it when her knuckles turn white), with no city driving.
Car: Audi TT(6spd 225HP 1.8L turbocharged sports coupe). EPA: 20/28. Actual average for a tank has ranged from a low of 24mpg to a high of 33mpg. The 24mpg is a fairly even mix of city and highway driving. That value seems to correspond pretty closely to what one would expect from the EPA numbers. The 33mpg is all highway, of course, in sixth gear, with no turbo.
I used Zinio for a year or so, but gave it up for three reasons:
No Linux client available. When I asked they said that they had "no plans" to support one. I didn't need this potentially restricting my choice of OS.
Annoying customer service. For example, once I'd switched over to digital, I was not able to switch back. Zinio provided a page for this but it was, as far as I could tell after repeated attempts, totally inoperable. I eventually cancelled the subscription and started up a separate paper-based one. Grr...
Page turning through card inserts and other ads with the client got very annoying after a while. It was like paying for popups.
Make better music? Stop hating your customers? I can't tell you how good it made me feel, for example, to hear a few days after purchasing a Nora Jones CD that her producer attributes her success to an "older audience" that doesn't know enough about computers to download music. They even believe their own propaganda these days!
The truth is that despite knowing full well what a computer is and how to use it, I've purchased more CDs in the last year than I ever have. They're almost all from independents, though. There's very little worth buying that comes from the major labels these days. Getting RIAA propaganda as part of the package makes what they're pushing even less attractive.
The article parallels my experience as well. I actually am using Linux as my primary desktop OS now, but I found the transition very painful. This is despite nearly 30 years experience with PCs (yes - starting with the Xerox Alto mentioned in another article today) and a history of past experience with various flavors of *NIX. I wouldn't have had the patience to make this happen if I hadn't taken it on as a crusade after Microsoft helped buy the country (presidency) and so escape from their antitrust conviction.
It's too bad the article had a nasty tone at points, as it had many good (if sometimes dated) points to make about what "out of the box" Linux experience needs to be like for Linux to gain widespread acceptance on the desktop. It's also too bad that so much of the article focused on install. Unfortunately, it doesn't get much better when one starts looking at day to day use of applications. This is really the key aspect of transitioning from Windows to Linux. A few of the replacements are actually better than the Windows versions (Mozilla vs. IE comes to mind). Others are close enough to do the job (GIMP vs. PhotoShop). Some are not quite there (StarOffice vs. MS Office, at least for document exchange). In some cases, there just don't seem to be reasonable substitutes (Street Atlas is one I used to depend on that's now history).
But the real problem is making everything work. "Death by a thousand cuts" expresses it perfectly. The number of times I've had to go looking on forums or contact program authors to figure out how to get things done or found myself fixing application bugs myself boggles my mind. It's only because I made this my hobby off and on for months that I was able to get to where I was satisfied. While I'm very happy now with where I ended up on Linux, I can't in good conscience recommend it yet to friends who aren't willing to invest an equal amount of time - especially friends coming from Windows with a boatload of existing application software (and many people who have been using Windows as long as the author will fall into this category). For someone who expects their desktop computer to "just work," Linux just isn't there yet - much as I love using it.
In my experience, Kapital crashes when trying to import QIF files. Maybe the promised new release will address this, but it's late and Kapital is of limited use to people trying to migrate until then.
Gnucash doesn't crash on QIF imports, but it does leave out the memo field (maybe I'll try to fix that if I can ignore all of the horror stories long enough to build it from source). Also, if you're going to use the QIF import feature and you use split transactions, you'll want to make sure you're using gnucash 1.8.2, not the version (1.8.1) that ships with the latest versions of Mandrake and Red Hat. Otherwise you'll be in for a rather rude surprise due to some import issues.
Moneydance QIF import had some minor problems on my 10 years of data, but it amounted a few duplicates in many thousands of transactions. It was easy to fix by hand.
The problem with using QIF as a storage format (as some have suggested) is that it's not well defined. There's a reason that there is movement away from it...
Well, Microsoft could certainly argue that this whole exercise is a DMCA violation. They tried to send that information encrypted after all. Good thing that group is in Germany and not in the US.
Then we'd really have something to complain about...
I've got my doubts about this memo as well...
on
Even Sun Can't Use Java
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Is it legitimate? I first saw a pointer to this a couple of days ago on fuckedcompany.com. That's hardly a ringing endorsement of legitimacy. Even if it real, is it significant? Not clear.
It looks to me like mostly an attempt to get attention. I have to admit, somewhat reluctantly, that I used have to write memos along these lines when I worked for a company that ships a prominent application server. The fact was that there were only two ways to get attention focused on problems that would keep us from shipping our own product on this app server: 1) Find the developer responsible and persuade him to fix it or 2) Get one of our executives to yell at one of their executives. Often the second approach was the only one that had a chance of working and it required memos like this (complete with specific bug numbers, sweeping generalizations about the support structure, dire warnings about the future and so on). This is corporate politics at its "finest." Quite the technique for building a close working relationship, eh?
Some of the points about application-specific JVM version requirements and footprint have merit (even if they're overstated, in my experience), but generalizing this to "Sun does not eat its own dog food" seems difficult to justify based on the limited examples shown here. How much of Sun's software is actually written in Java, for example? And if Java is such a problem, why has the app server market been growing so quickly?
Slashdot Mirror
I don't know if banks are using the same lists. I suspect that they are. I do know that banks put an extended freeze on transactions over $10,000, to allow for "Homeland Security" review. This applies even to activity totally within the United States, regardless of your name.
I reported a problem with Eudora a couple of years ago that Qualcomm support eventually attributed to a "bug" in OpenSSH. While it's true that we'd recently installed a new version of OpenSSH to address a security exposure, pointing out the widespread use of OpenSSH and the fact that every other POP3 client that I used with it worked just fine seemed to have no impact on them. It was quite clear from their responses that they didn't think we should be using OpenSSH - or open anything, as far as I could tell.
That's when I discovered that Thunderbird was reaching the point where it was a quite competent replacement for Eudora. I've taken great delight in pointing that out to anyone who asks about Eudora upgrades.
Symantec is the (proud?) publisher of the absolutely worst piece of software that I've ever used: WinFAX Pro 10.2. Not only did every major mode fail to work in some way, but it disabled my phone system for days after it was installed on a machine on my network. This software was so flawed that it convinced me to abandon the Windows platform altogether.
Earlier this evening I was cleaning up a friend's Windows 2000 machine. After removing a collection of obsolete software, TCP/IP no longer worked. The culprit: Symantec Antivirus. It had left invalid service dependencies in the registry. I had to remove them by hand.
Symantec can't even understand their own software, much less someone else's. Even ignoring the obvious corporate bias, I have no faith that they can begin to understand the actual severity of defects in either IE or Firefox. It would be far better to ask "how many machines have been compromised by this fault?" than to present simple defect counts.
I also switched to MoneyDance after running out of patience with Intuit. Why were there so many bugs in a program that's been out as long as Quicken? Why should I have to endure on-screen spam from a program that I paid real money to purchase?
MoneyDance was a refreshing change. When I had a problem with importing my Quicken data in an earlier version, the lead developer answered my mail almost immediately (even though I hadn't actually purchased the program yet) and had a fix for me within a day. I made requests for enhancements in the newest version and they're there. The mailing list is also full of helpful folks.
It doesn't have quite the range of features that appear in, say, Quicken or Money, but the basics are well-designed, it's really supported, and it runs on Linux, Windows, and Macs. I can't help laughing when I get the renewal letters from Intuit.
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/01/18/why_hps_regio n_codin.html
Some additional details, including a charming picture, are available in his hometown paper:
1 41513c.html
http://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/1828341p-8
Yes - they were T1 lines.
I used to work with a guy who would submit the weirdest questions to slashdot.org and then spend the afternoon obsessively refreshing his browser window, waiting to see what sort of flames resulted.
Could be. My 2.4GHz phone frequency hops. That seems to keep it from knocking out the wireless network when the phone is in use. However, if the phone hops through the channel the wireless is using when there's heavy network activity, I get background noise and/or brief dropouts on the phone. It was worse when I had the phone near the AP for a brief period.
I did some throughput tests on the network when I first installed the phone. There was a 10-20% hit with the phone active. (This was with a WaveLan 802.11b RG).
Yes. Same car. The 33mpg tank was at a steady, sedate 60-70mph (my wife was in the car and she doesn't like it when her knuckles turn white), with no city driving.
Car: Audi TT(6spd 225HP 1.8L turbocharged sports coupe). EPA: 20/28. Actual average for a tank has ranged from a low of 24mpg to a high of 33mpg. The 24mpg is a fairly even mix of city and highway driving. That value seems to correspond pretty closely to what one would expect from the EPA numbers. The 33mpg is all highway, of course, in sixth gear, with no turbo.
As far as I can tell, the main purpose for using Zinio is digital rights management. The rest is just pocket fluff.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/05/16/gummi_bear s_defeat_fingerprint_sensors/
Shouldn't that be "America's Second-favorite Penguin?"
Make better music? Stop hating your customers? I can't tell you how good it made me feel, for example, to hear a few days after purchasing a Nora Jones CD that her producer attributes her success to an "older audience" that doesn't know enough about computers to download music. They even believe their own propaganda these days!
The truth is that despite knowing full well what a computer is and how to use it, I've purchased more CDs in the last year than I ever have. They're almost all from independents, though. There's very little worth buying that comes from the major labels these days. Getting RIAA propaganda as part of the package makes what they're pushing even less attractive.
The article parallels my experience as well. I actually am
using Linux as my primary desktop OS now, but I found the transition
very painful. This is despite nearly 30 years experience with PCs (yes -
starting with the Xerox Alto mentioned in another article today) and a
history of past experience with various flavors of *NIX. I wouldn't
have had the patience to make this happen if I hadn't taken it on as a
crusade after Microsoft helped buy the country (presidency) and so
escape from their antitrust conviction.
It's too bad the article had a nasty tone at points, as it had many
good (if sometimes dated) points to make about what "out of the box"
Linux experience needs to be like for Linux to gain widespread
acceptance on the desktop. It's also too bad that so much of the
article focused on install. Unfortunately, it doesn't get much better
when one starts looking at day to day use of applications. This is
really the key aspect of transitioning from Windows to Linux. A few of
the replacements are actually better than the Windows versions
(Mozilla vs. IE comes to mind). Others are close enough to do the job
(GIMP vs. PhotoShop). Some are not quite there (StarOffice vs. MS
Office, at least for document exchange). In some cases, there just
don't seem to be reasonable substitutes (Street Atlas is one I used to
depend on that's now history).
But the real problem is making everything work. "Death by a thousand
cuts" expresses it perfectly. The number of times I've had to go
looking on forums or contact program authors to figure out how to get
things done or found myself fixing application bugs myself boggles my mind. It's
only because I made this my hobby off and on for months that I
was able to get to where I was satisfied. While I'm very happy now with
where I ended up on Linux, I can't in good conscience recommend it yet
to friends who aren't willing to invest an equal amount of time -
especially friends coming from Windows with a boatload of existing
application software (and many people who have been using Windows as
long as the author will fall into this category). For someone who
expects their desktop computer to "just work," Linux just isn't there yet -
much as I love using it.
In my experience, Kapital crashes when trying to import QIF files. Maybe the promised new release will address this, but it's late and Kapital is of limited use to people trying to migrate until then.
Gnucash doesn't crash on QIF imports, but it does leave out the memo field (maybe I'll try to fix that if I can ignore all of the horror stories long enough to build it from source). Also, if you're going to use the QIF import feature and you use split transactions, you'll want to make sure you're using gnucash 1.8.2, not the version (1.8.1) that ships with the latest versions of Mandrake and Red Hat. Otherwise you'll be in for a rather rude surprise due to some import issues.
Moneydance QIF import had some minor problems on my 10 years of data, but it amounted a few duplicates in many thousands of transactions. It was easy to fix by hand.
The problem with using QIF as a storage format (as some have suggested) is that it's not well defined. There's a reason that there is movement away from it...
Well, Microsoft could certainly argue that this whole exercise is a DMCA violation. They tried to send that information encrypted after all. Good thing that group is in Germany and not in the US.
Then we'd really have something to complain about...
Is it legitimate? I first saw a pointer to this a couple of days ago
on fuckedcompany.com. That's hardly a ringing endorsement of
legitimacy. Even if it real, is it significant? Not clear.
It looks to me like mostly an attempt to get attention. I have to
admit, somewhat reluctantly, that I used have to write memos along
these lines when I worked for a company that ships a prominent
application server. The fact was that there were only two ways to get
attention focused on problems that would keep us from shipping our own
product on this app server: 1) Find the developer responsible and
persuade him to fix it or 2) Get one of our executives to yell at one
of their executives. Often the second approach was the only one that
had a chance of working and it required memos like this (complete with
specific bug numbers, sweeping generalizations about the support
structure, dire warnings about the future and so on). This is
corporate politics at its "finest." Quite the technique for building a
close working relationship, eh?
Some of the points about application-specific JVM version requirements
and footprint have merit (even if they're overstated, in my
experience), but generalizing this to "Sun does not eat its own dog
food" seems difficult to justify based on the limited examples shown
here. How much of Sun's software is actually written in Java, for
example? And if Java is such a problem, why has the app server market
been growing so quickly?