Uhh right. And you would trust The East Bumblefuck County sheriff to work with the NY state police to find someone related to the attack on the WTC? Yup... there's some good logic. We don't need law enforcement, right?
I know everyone is going to whine and complain... and I'll probably get mod'd down for trolling, but here it goes...
I run a webserver (as a business) and have run shell servers in the past. I don't think ANY of these people who have been on the receiving end of a 2 day DDoS attack. Now, if such a system would be put into place, there would be other advantages than just searching for "key words" in text. It would most likely be a enterprise integrated intrusion detection system used to find and stop DDoS attacks and the such. If these systems could use formulas to determine a DDoS and black hole routes before it can cause thousands of dollars of damage to an ISP, then it would save LOTS of money!
At one provider, I was received a bill of a few grand of bandwidth charges when my shell box was hit with a DDoS for several hours... image what it would cost Yahoo! and such sites in lost revenue.
Also, the FBI isn't interested in your e-mail. Sure, it would allow them to look at it but it's no different than being able to tap your phone now. So what's the difference between tapping your phone and tapping your internet connection? Nothing. There is no difference. They'll need a wire-tapping order to do it, still.. And yes, someone will respond "but they won't need one to do this!" and you're right... they also don't need one to tap your phone, but it's illegal without it. Hence, we would be protected under the same laws as the current wiretapping law.
No, it wouldnt degrade the performance. There is something in Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) called a passive sensor. All network traffic would be forwarded to the passive sensor. This would be an easy task for any router. The hard part is the passive sensor would have to be able to look through as much data as the router/switch could put out (like 20gbit/sec?)
This is one thing I have kind of always wondered about myself. Here's the thing. When a software company (e.g. Microsoft) starts coding a new app, it actually begins several months (if not a year or two) before the idea gets off paper and into the hands of the developers.
Guidelines need to be set, studied and altered to better fit a model. Flowcharts, maybe... what about general funding? Start any kind of project, where you could look at 2 years of full-time development, is going to require some kind of revenue stream. Do you think Windows XP was released after 8 months of coding? Sure, it SEEMS like it was, but sometime back in 1997 Microsoft had the idea to merge Windows 95 and Windows NT. It took them nearly 5 years to accomplish this.
This similar thing can be said for lots of different software. Development doesn't occur overnight. The first draft isn't the BEST draft... there will always be bug fixes and feature additions. In fact, you may start coding an application and half way down the road realize it would be better done some other way and would need to rewrite half of everything you've done. This is something you need to be willing to do from the start of the project.
If we want TiVo to stay around (which means becoming profitable (again?)), then they are going to have to make such strategic partnerships. Sony is a good choice for TiVo, and Sony obviously sees the possibilities TiVo has to offer.
As for price increases in Sony products, I do not think you'll see much (if any). The kicker is the subscription fee. But the point of this kind of relationship is that Sony has the market base for TV's, DVD's, etc... and once people have these devices in their home which are "TiVo ready" then it makes it realy easy for them to dial the 800 number to subscribe. Buying an extra "box" (at $300 a pop) is not worth it to some people. Having the "extra features" in a box they are already buying is a good thing!
Among the arguments in favor of Linux: reports that some versions of Windows contain backdoors designed to grant the U.S. National Security Agency access to users' data.
You mean.. the NSA isn't gonna be able to figure out how the Germans engineer such wonderful cars anymore? This is an outrage! What else does the German gov't have to offer, anyway?
Does this mean that the FreeBSD coders would be able to hack kernel.org and delete the v2.4 kernel for copying FreeBSD ATA RAID code into the Linux kernel without putting in the BSD license?
The simple problem is this. Our public officials have lots of things to do and can not each handle every single question that is posed to them. In order to at least make one feel their message has been received (in one way or another) is to send out auto-responses or form letters.. blah blah.
Even if their Aids were to answer mail personally... there could be, at any one time, a few thousands letters from constituants alone (not to mention non-constituants) and that simply would involve so many man hours to pump out these personalized letters.
Hi, and yeah it *can* be done, but then you're going to complain about how much taxes are and how much of your paycheck you lose and blah blah blah.... if you want the "service" then pay for it... say to your representative "Hi, I am willing to give you an extra $250/yr if you can have someone in your office assist me with my concern"... and when the bill gets passed as state law and there are another 1,000 state employees working for your representatives and you're billed that extra $250/yr extra, I'm sure you'll be sending in letters "Hi, taxes are too high... you need to lower taxes!" and hopefully their response will be, "Aren't you the moron who requested higher taxes?"
Anyway, I think you get my point. There is no way to provide you with a personalized response to your concerns because there isn't enough hours in the day or money in the budget for the manpower to do it. Be lucky you received any response. If you want a personalized response, offer a half million for his/her next campaign.
In fact, that's not a bad idea... there are plenty of Washington lobbyists (tobacco, oil, etc)... maybe the EFF should raise money to be a Washington lobbyist too... and they can raise money to provide campaign contributions to certain representatives to get our views heard.
And I'm not being sarcastic... this may be a good idea!
What about the 6,000 innocent people killed in the WTC and Pentagon attacks? You Hippie! We aren't just bombing every village and marketplace in Afghanistan. It was 3 weeks of intelligence gathering and sharing that gave us the logistical military sites of the Taliban and bin Laden that we're hitting. You ASSUME we're just bombing everything! You ASSUME wrong!
Microwaves! They will fry any electronics or living beings. If we have any idea bin laden is in a hill somewhere, just get a bunch of Microwave dishes and burn him to a crisp. Clean, cheap and no one will know any different because there is no crater. Sure, all the dead animals would be a sign *something* happened but there would be no crater!
There is no way we're going to be able to search every cave in Afghanistan, but we can use Microwaves to cook us some Taliban!
fsck writes "Australian actor Yahoo Serious is fighting Internet portal Yahoo! for the trademark to the word Yahoo, registered with the Australian Trade Marks Office in August.
fsck, actually, according to the webpage, the LAWSUIT between Yahoo Serious and Yahoo! was filed in August, not the trademark by Yahoo! which was originally filed in 1996. Yahoo Serious may lose since he is supposed to (under trademark law) oppose any filing well before the 4 year period. At least, that's the way it works in the U.S... im sure australia has a similar case.
Uhm I heard from a web developer for middleware systems that uses IIS that IIS 6.0 is going to run in kernel memory. Maybe this is a bad thing? Executing ASP code in kernel memory? Just.... maybe?
Okay... I don't think there would be any arguement Linux is better at piping than Windows, but what about *BSD and Solaris? Why weren't they compared in the survey? I'd like to see how BSD compares to Linux, since there are plenty of Linux vs. BSD debates going around.
As a BSD user, I'm looking for another thing to rub in the face of Linux users, because it is common knowledge BSD is better (stack is faster, and of course, FreeBSD had support for the Promise ATA100 RAID controller long before the RedHat people stole the source code w/o putting int he license agreement).
So... can someone do a non-biased testing between Linux, BSD and Solaris?
Maybe there is no way to say the *largest* install base, but you can compare..
In my company (with about 9,000 people), every desktop runs Windows (company standard). Now, I'm not necessarily saying 9,000 computers here run Windows (even halfed it would be 4,500). The real number probably exists between 4500 and 9000. We are like many other companies (some larger) that exist today...
The question shouldn't be what's the largest, but is there a Linux desktop base install the size of a medium sized corporation (let's say, 1000 to 5000 people). I think you'd find that there are very few if any. This is what management is trying to figure out. Management doesn't want to invest in something that could screw them in the end and VERY FEW managers are willing to stick their neck out and be on the "bleeding edge" of technology. (Most managers of bigger companies are very conservative).
Largo, FL is an example of a decent-sized "company" running Linux on the desktop, but look at the number of 800 workstation companies that run Windows, and Largo looks like a grain of sand on the beach.
I strongly agree with Phil's idea of publically available "strong crypto". Of course, this means that anyone can have it including terrorists (and other criminals).
The question: Since most of us believe that restricting strong, public crypto is the wrong way for dealing with problems such as terrorists, what would you suggest as an alternative solution for the government to use in the age of technology where crypto has made traditional wiretapping obsolete?
Yes, I am sure that when we would have flown over Bagdad dropping bombs from our P-52s that their anti-arcraft artillary wouldn't have shot most (if not all) of the aircraft out of the sky. Sure, I mean... those night time images of anti-aircraft missiles and gunfire shooting into the night air at F-117A stealth fighters using laser-guided bombs and nightvision and hitting NOTHING BUT AIR would have been the same result with a bunch of P-52s... yeah... okay.
The U.S. doesn't want to invade and occupy Afghanistan... the British and Soviets did. The U.S. wants to go in, get their man (or men), and "deal" with them... whether be by trial or shot to the back of the head. This is the fundamental difference.
Our technology is also greater than it was 20 years ago (when the Soviets tried). We have stealth, night vision, heat vision, etc... such things change the balance of odds. This is why we were able to take out Iraq so fast. Technology allowed us to be a few steps better, given that their troops were just as equipped, trained and skilled as our troops (which probably isn't the case)... and I'm sure isn't the case here.
On a similar note, the Taliban has about 50,000 men. Currently, the U.S. military consists of 3.5 million men and 3.5 million reservists. Obviously, we outnumber their forces significantly... I don't think we'd have a problem wiping them out if we wanted. I think if they even took out like 250,000 of our troops we'd just turn it into a parking lot and wipe our hands of it.;)
... when I downloaded it from an FTP site in China;)
Re:Okay, sure... good points but incomplete...
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Sorry, darling, but I have a larger knowledge of O/S's than just "Windows is better than Linux". In fact, I know Windows isn't necessarily better than Linux, but *BSD is... and that's why I use FreeBSD for my servers and OpenBSD for my firewalls. I also know that Windows makes a better desktop O/S... for productivity and games. I use it for both so Windows is the best solution for me. Yeah, I know you'll say "there are plenty of games for Linux too!" and all I can say to that is that Loki is going out of business and there aren't THOUSANDS of good games for Linux like there are for windows.
Oh, and btw, I've already been to Linux conventions screaming at them... wearing my FreeBSD hat and OpenBSD T-Shirt... and my M$ cock ring!
Okay, sure... good points but incomplete...
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He mentions Outlook as an e-mail client for windows and that there is Linux alternatives. Sure, mail and pine are great alternatives for MAIL. What about the OTHER functions of Outlook/Exchange? Tasks, Calender, Folder sharing, Centralized Contact database, Journal, notes.... Okay *some* of these things can be fixed by implementing an Imap server and ldap (folder sharing and contact database respectively), but what about everything else? Granted, this can all be done in OTHER programs but the fact that outlook has all of these features in 1 program makes it superior to anything currently on Linux!
Not to mention, how easy is it to setup sendmail, an imap daeemon, an Ldap server? You need REAL TECHNICAL ABILITY. For an IT firm this is fine, but for the general business use it will not work. Most corporations will not be willing to spend hundreds of man hours setting something up and then now have a support contract to fall back on.
Now... what about domain logins? Sure, this can be done under Linux... but it's not a turnkey solution like under Windows 2000. In Windows 2000, start the configuration wizard, make the machine a domain controller and log the other machines onto it. Under linux... uhm kerberos? Sure, now figure out how to use kerberos... modify those config files! Or NIS? NIS+? Even worse... sure, possible, but not a turn key solution!
Now we go to Samba... why use samba? Because it's GREAT! But the original intent of Samba was to allow filesharing between Windows and UNIX (not just Linux). It's great for that and has expanded, but what about access controls? You can control access via samba using/etc/passwd on the server... or by using the db file you can specify in smb.conf... or maybe, if you're a real hacker and AGAIN want to spend hundreds of man hours, you can implement an ACL system based on the same LDAP implementation you used for contact information....
Windows 2000 + Exchange = 8 hours w/ all M$ patches they have released WITH implementation!
Now we go to the firewall on the desktop. First, why would one want such a thing in a corporate environment. And even if we had one, anything under Windows is better than ipchains or iptables. Maybe ipchains and iptables is BETTER but it's also HARDER and more COMPLEX... this is a big difference. It requires a higher level of skill from the end user to configure their firewall for everyday use. Now, I do work in an IT environment and even though I work with some smart people, they still fudge up their ipchains rules at home and ask for help! What about the corporate end user? Yeah, I'd be getting calls all day AND night with a nice queue that grows exponentially.
What about version management? Sure, redhat has it.. but does it come w/ something like SMS where you can rollout patches and programs to every RedHat box on the network with a click of the mouse?
One thing Mr. Valliere didn't mention in all his pricing was the amount of time required to set all these systems up. The number of man hours MUST be included in the cost of setting this up. Even the most skilled IT person with years of Linux experience in all the products I mentioned would take a good 2 to 3 weeks to implement w/ all the hacking and testing. At the same time, admittingly having NEVER really worked with Exchange or Windows 2000 server, I could guarentee a Windows 2000 network with Exchange and Office on the same number of desktops in less than 1 week!
My point being, although I will be mod'd down for trolling, is that although M$ isn't the BEST solution for everyone, it's the BEST solution for most corporate environments because it's 1) easy to implement 2) is designed for the corporation )file sharing, task sharing, calender sharing, etc) and 3) they can get support contracts in case ANYTHING goes wrong!
In some ways you have to agree with Jon (omg I said it). But let me say first off, being that Jon stated he lived just west of New York City (e.g. New Jersey), makes me want even more so to hunt him down. Jon, New Jersey isn't *THAT* big *grin*.
Anyway...
I don't think giving up our civil rights is a good thing. I was just reading the book Secrets & Lies by Bruce Schneier and he said the Supreme Court has said we have the right to privacy. Well, we all have to agree. Just as I have a right to encrypt the love note to my mistress, a terrorist has the right to encrypt a confirmation of attack of some suicidal extremist... despite the *nature* of the contents of the e-mail.
Coming in from the other side of the argument, the problem is that the gov't does NOT have the resources to track every phone conversation and every e-mail sent in the world... or even the U.S. Just the amount of spam transmitted at any given second on the Internet would keep the CIA up for days filtering through it. The likelihood that our individual rights would be violated is highly doubtful just from the sheer magnitude of information.
Honestly, I personally feel we cannot come up with a definitive end to this arguement. Arguements can be made from both sides.. both being valid. Any person that can not see the validity of arguements from both sides is just plain ignorant. (Many posts I have seen so far go against Jon, and prove ignorant). Maybe it's time for investigators to find new ways of gathering vital information... maybe the old ways need to be modified to work with modern public-key encryption... who knows....
I think this must be Linus himself trying to "convince" us BSD is really dying. Yes, Everyone, BSD is DYING. That's why 2 MAJOR NETWORKING APPLIANCES (BigIP F5 and Nokia Checkpoint) both run BSD kernels. This is also why yet ANOTHER company is running a BSD kernel on their appliance. Yes, this proves BSD is dying... with commercial support nonexistant!
Okay... now we know how much Linux is growing. Look at all the commercial hardware appliances that use Linux... uhm okay wait nevermind...
Yes, this proves once and FOR ALL that BSD is dying. YES, BSD IS DYING... DON'T BUY YOUR F5'S AND YOUR CHECKPOINT APPLIANCES BECAUSE BSD IS DYING. Let's not forget that Nokia Checkpoint BSD appliances are a close 2nd place to Cisco PIX for FW appliances... WOW, yes BSD is dead damnit... DEAD!
Okay, forget the ideas of civil liberties that this may cause....
I don't WANT to see a solder with an m4 rifle on the corner. It means WE HAVE A SERIOUS PROBLEM. In Isreal, they do this because the threats of attacks is high and common. If they start doing this here, does this mean a bomb is going to go off everyday? I sure hope not!
Likewise, people have said, "well if we had F-16s in the air we could have shot down the planes." Yes, again, that's all I need is an F-16 in the air to remind me that the world is a dangerous place and we need a couple $20 million aircraft protecting NYC with ATA missiles. Yes, that's a great idea.
The GREAT thing about the U.S. (and Canada for that matter) is that we don't need to have these constant reminders of "war" since this is what these things are for. I prefer living in a state (in the national sense) where I don't have to worry about such things. For the most part, the U.S. is war-resistant and we know this... no one can take down the U.S. through an organized attack scheme. No one has the money or power or resources to do such a thing. Attacks on civilian complexes once every few years isn't a "war" in the traditional sense, and we don't need to see war planes in the air to protect us.
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Uhh right. And you would trust The East Bumblefuck County sheriff to work with the NY state police to find someone related to the attack on the WTC? Yup... there's some good logic. We don't need law enforcement, right?
I know everyone is going to whine and complain... and I'll probably get mod'd down for trolling, but here it goes...
I run a webserver (as a business) and have run shell servers in the past. I don't think ANY of these people who have been on the receiving end of a 2 day DDoS attack. Now, if such a system would be put into place, there would be other advantages than just searching for "key words" in text. It would most likely be a enterprise integrated intrusion detection system used to find and stop DDoS attacks and the such. If these systems could use formulas to determine a DDoS and black hole routes before it can cause thousands of dollars of damage to an ISP, then it would save LOTS of money!
At one provider, I was received a bill of a few grand of bandwidth charges when my shell box was hit with a DDoS for several hours... image what it would cost Yahoo! and such sites in lost revenue.
Also, the FBI isn't interested in your e-mail. Sure, it would allow them to look at it but it's no different than being able to tap your phone now. So what's the difference between tapping your phone and tapping your internet connection? Nothing. There is no difference. They'll need a wire-tapping order to do it, still.. And yes, someone will respond "but they won't need one to do this!" and you're right... they also don't need one to tap your phone, but it's illegal without it. Hence, we would be protected under the same laws as the current wiretapping law.
No, it wouldnt degrade the performance. There is something in Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) called a passive sensor. All network traffic would be forwarded to the passive sensor. This would be an easy task for any router. The hard part is the passive sensor would have to be able to look through as much data as the router/switch could put out (like 20gbit/sec?)
This is one thing I have kind of always wondered about myself. Here's the thing. When a software company (e.g. Microsoft) starts coding a new app, it actually begins several months (if not a year or two) before the idea gets off paper and into the hands of the developers.
Guidelines need to be set, studied and altered to better fit a model. Flowcharts, maybe... what about general funding? Start any kind of project, where you could look at 2 years of full-time development, is going to require some kind of revenue stream. Do you think Windows XP was released after 8 months of coding? Sure, it SEEMS like it was, but sometime back in 1997 Microsoft had the idea to merge Windows 95 and Windows NT. It took them nearly 5 years to accomplish this.
This similar thing can be said for lots of different software. Development doesn't occur overnight. The first draft isn't the BEST draft... there will always be bug fixes and feature additions. In fact, you may start coding an application and half way down the road realize it would be better done some other way and would need to rewrite half of everything you've done. This is something you need to be willing to do from the start of the project.
If we want TiVo to stay around (which means becoming profitable (again?)), then they are going to have to make such strategic partnerships. Sony is a good choice for TiVo, and Sony obviously sees the possibilities TiVo has to offer.
As for price increases in Sony products, I do not think you'll see much (if any). The kicker is the subscription fee. But the point of this kind of relationship is that Sony has the market base for TV's, DVD's, etc... and once people have these devices in their home which are "TiVo ready" then it makes it realy easy for them to dial the 800 number to subscribe. Buying an extra "box" (at $300 a pop) is not worth it to some people. Having the "extra features" in a box they are already buying is a good thing!
Like my eye sight isn't bad enough already!
You mean.. the NSA isn't gonna be able to figure out how the Germans engineer such wonderful cars anymore? This is an outrage! What else does the German gov't have to offer, anyway?
Does this mean that the FreeBSD coders would be able to hack kernel.org and delete the v2.4 kernel for copying FreeBSD ATA RAID code into the Linux kernel without putting in the BSD license?
The simple problem is this. Our public officials have lots of things to do and can not each handle every single question that is posed to them. In order to at least make one feel their message has been received (in one way or another) is to send out auto-responses or form letters.. blah blah.
Even if their Aids were to answer mail personally... there could be, at any one time, a few thousands letters from constituants alone (not to mention non-constituants) and that simply would involve so many man hours to pump out these personalized letters.
Hi, and yeah it *can* be done, but then you're going to complain about how much taxes are and how much of your paycheck you lose and blah blah blah.... if you want the "service" then pay for it... say to your representative "Hi, I am willing to give you an extra $250/yr if you can have someone in your office assist me with my concern"... and when the bill gets passed as state law and there are another 1,000 state employees working for your representatives and you're billed that extra $250/yr extra, I'm sure you'll be sending in letters "Hi, taxes are too high... you need to lower taxes!" and hopefully their response will be, "Aren't you the moron who requested higher taxes?"
Anyway, I think you get my point. There is no way to provide you with a personalized response to your concerns because there isn't enough hours in the day or money in the budget for the manpower to do it. Be lucky you received any response. If you want a personalized response, offer a half million for his/her next campaign.
In fact, that's not a bad idea... there are plenty of Washington lobbyists (tobacco, oil, etc)... maybe the EFF should raise money to be a Washington lobbyist too... and they can raise money to provide campaign contributions to certain representatives to get our views heard.
And I'm not being sarcastic... this may be a good idea!
The Taliban doesn't let anyone have telephones or even computers... so although the theory is (somewhat) good, it won't work in Afghanistan =P
What about the 6,000 innocent people killed in the WTC and Pentagon attacks? You Hippie! We aren't just bombing every village and marketplace in Afghanistan. It was 3 weeks of intelligence gathering and sharing that gave us the logistical military sites of the Taliban and bin Laden that we're hitting. You ASSUME we're just bombing everything! You ASSUME wrong!
Microwaves! They will fry any electronics or living beings. If we have any idea bin laden is in a hill somewhere, just get a bunch of Microwave dishes and burn him to a crisp. Clean, cheap and no one will know any different because there is no crater. Sure, all the dead animals would be a sign *something* happened but there would be no crater!
There is no way we're going to be able to search every cave in Afghanistan, but we can use Microwaves to cook us some Taliban!
fsck, actually, according to the webpage, the LAWSUIT between Yahoo Serious and Yahoo! was filed in August, not the trademark by Yahoo! which was originally filed in 1996. Yahoo Serious may lose since he is supposed to (under trademark law) oppose any filing well before the 4 year period. At least, that's the way it works in the U.S... im sure australia has a similar case.
Uhm I heard from a web developer for middleware systems that uses IIS that IIS 6.0 is going to run in kernel memory. Maybe this is a bad thing? Executing ASP code in kernel memory? Just.... maybe?
Okay... I don't think there would be any arguement Linux is better at piping than Windows, but what about *BSD and Solaris? Why weren't they compared in the survey? I'd like to see how BSD compares to Linux, since there are plenty of Linux vs. BSD debates going around.
As a BSD user, I'm looking for another thing to rub in the face of Linux users, because it is common knowledge BSD is better (stack is faster, and of course, FreeBSD had support for the Promise ATA100 RAID controller long before the RedHat people stole the source code w/o putting int he license agreement).
So... can someone do a non-biased testing between Linux, BSD and Solaris?
Maybe there is no way to say the *largest* install base, but you can compare..
In my company (with about 9,000 people), every desktop runs Windows (company standard). Now, I'm not necessarily saying 9,000 computers here run Windows (even halfed it would be 4,500). The real number probably exists between 4500 and 9000. We are like many other companies (some larger) that exist today...
The question shouldn't be what's the largest, but is there a Linux desktop base install the size of a medium sized corporation (let's say, 1000 to 5000 people). I think you'd find that there are very few if any. This is what management is trying to figure out. Management doesn't want to invest in something that could screw them in the end and VERY FEW managers are willing to stick their neck out and be on the "bleeding edge" of technology. (Most managers of bigger companies are very conservative).
Largo, FL is an example of a decent-sized "company" running Linux on the desktop, but look at the number of 800 workstation companies that run Windows, and Largo looks like a grain of sand on the beach.
I strongly agree with Phil's idea of publically available "strong crypto". Of course, this means that anyone can have it including terrorists (and other criminals).
The question: Since most of us believe that restricting strong, public crypto is the wrong way for dealing with problems such as terrorists, what would you suggest as an alternative solution for the government to use in the age of technology where crypto has made traditional wiretapping obsolete?
Yes, I am sure that when we would have flown over Bagdad dropping bombs from our P-52s that their anti-arcraft artillary wouldn't have shot most (if not all) of the aircraft out of the sky. Sure, I mean... those night time images of anti-aircraft missiles and gunfire shooting into the night air at F-117A stealth fighters using laser-guided bombs and nightvision and hitting NOTHING BUT AIR would have been the same result with a bunch of P-52s... yeah... okay.
The U.S. doesn't want to invade and occupy Afghanistan... the British and Soviets did. The U.S. wants to go in, get their man (or men), and "deal" with them... whether be by trial or shot to the back of the head. This is the fundamental difference.
;)
Our technology is also greater than it was 20 years ago (when the Soviets tried). We have stealth, night vision, heat vision, etc... such things change the balance of odds. This is why we were able to take out Iraq so fast. Technology allowed us to be a few steps better, given that their troops were just as equipped, trained and skilled as our troops (which probably isn't the case)... and I'm sure isn't the case here.
On a similar note, the Taliban has about 50,000 men. Currently, the U.S. military consists of 3.5 million men and 3.5 million reservists. Obviously, we outnumber their forces significantly... I don't think we'd have a problem wiping them out if we wanted. I think if they even took out like 250,000 of our troops we'd just turn it into a parking lot and wipe our hands of it.
... when I downloaded it from an FTP site in China ;)
Sorry, darling, but I have a larger knowledge of O/S's than just "Windows is better than Linux". In fact, I know Windows isn't necessarily better than Linux, but *BSD is... and that's why I use FreeBSD for my servers and OpenBSD for my firewalls. I also know that Windows makes a better desktop O/S... for productivity and games. I use it for both so Windows is the best solution for me. Yeah, I know you'll say "there are plenty of games for Linux too!" and all I can say to that is that Loki is going out of business and there aren't THOUSANDS of good games for Linux like there are for windows.
Oh, and btw, I've already been to Linux conventions screaming at them... wearing my FreeBSD hat and OpenBSD T-Shirt... and my M$ cock ring!
He mentions Outlook as an e-mail client for windows and that there is Linux alternatives. Sure, mail and pine are great alternatives for MAIL. What about the OTHER functions of Outlook/Exchange? Tasks, Calender, Folder sharing, Centralized Contact database, Journal, notes.... Okay *some* of these things can be fixed by implementing an Imap server and ldap (folder sharing and contact database respectively), but what about everything else? Granted, this can all be done in OTHER programs but the fact that outlook has all of these features in 1 program makes it superior to anything currently on Linux!
/etc/passwd on the server... or by using the db file you can specify in smb.conf... or maybe, if you're a real hacker and AGAIN want to spend hundreds of man hours, you can implement an ACL system based on the same LDAP implementation you used for contact information....
Not to mention, how easy is it to setup sendmail, an imap daeemon, an Ldap server? You need REAL TECHNICAL ABILITY. For an IT firm this is fine, but for the general business use it will not work. Most corporations will not be willing to spend hundreds of man hours setting something up and then now have a support contract to fall back on.
Now... what about domain logins? Sure, this can be done under Linux... but it's not a turnkey solution like under Windows 2000. In Windows 2000, start the configuration wizard, make the machine a domain controller and log the other machines onto it. Under linux... uhm kerberos? Sure, now figure out how to use kerberos... modify those config files! Or NIS? NIS+? Even worse... sure, possible, but not a turn key solution!
Now we go to Samba... why use samba? Because it's GREAT! But the original intent of Samba was to allow filesharing between Windows and UNIX (not just Linux). It's great for that and has expanded, but what about access controls? You can control access via samba using
Windows 2000 + Exchange = 8 hours w/ all M$ patches they have released WITH implementation!
Now we go to the firewall on the desktop. First, why would one want such a thing in a corporate environment. And even if we had one, anything under Windows is better than ipchains or iptables. Maybe ipchains and iptables is BETTER but it's also HARDER and more COMPLEX... this is a big difference. It requires a higher level of skill from the end user to configure their firewall for everyday use. Now, I do work in an IT environment and even though I work with some smart people, they still fudge up their ipchains rules at home and ask for help! What about the corporate end user? Yeah, I'd be getting calls all day AND night with a nice queue that grows exponentially.
What about version management? Sure, redhat has it.. but does it come w/ something like SMS where you can rollout patches and programs to every RedHat box on the network with a click of the mouse?
One thing Mr. Valliere didn't mention in all his pricing was the amount of time required to set all these systems up. The number of man hours MUST be included in the cost of setting this up. Even the most skilled IT person with years of Linux experience in all the products I mentioned would take a good 2 to 3 weeks to implement w/ all the hacking and testing. At the same time, admittingly having NEVER really worked with Exchange or Windows 2000 server, I could guarentee a Windows 2000 network with Exchange and Office on the same number of desktops in less than 1 week!
My point being, although I will be mod'd down for trolling, is that although M$ isn't the BEST solution for everyone, it's the BEST solution for most corporate environments because it's 1) easy to implement 2) is designed for the corporation )file sharing, task sharing, calender sharing, etc) and 3) they can get support contracts in case ANYTHING goes wrong!
In some ways you have to agree with Jon (omg I said it). But let me say first off, being that Jon stated he lived just west of New York City (e.g. New Jersey), makes me want even more so to hunt him down. Jon, New Jersey isn't *THAT* big *grin*.
Anyway...
I don't think giving up our civil rights is a good thing. I was just reading the book Secrets & Lies by Bruce Schneier and he said the Supreme Court has said we have the right to privacy. Well, we all have to agree. Just as I have a right to encrypt the love note to my mistress, a terrorist has the right to encrypt a confirmation of attack of some suicidal extremist... despite the *nature* of the contents of the e-mail.
Coming in from the other side of the argument, the problem is that the gov't does NOT have the resources to track every phone conversation and every e-mail sent in the world... or even the U.S. Just the amount of spam transmitted at any given second on the Internet would keep the CIA up for days filtering through it. The likelihood that our individual rights would be violated is highly doubtful just from the sheer magnitude of information.
Honestly, I personally feel we cannot come up with a definitive end to this arguement. Arguements can be made from both sides.. both being valid. Any person that can not see the validity of arguements from both sides is just plain ignorant. (Many posts I have seen so far go against Jon, and prove ignorant). Maybe it's time for investigators to find new ways of gathering vital information... maybe the old ways need to be modified to work with modern public-key encryption... who knows....
I think this must be Linus himself trying to "convince" us BSD is really dying. Yes, Everyone, BSD is DYING. That's why 2 MAJOR NETWORKING APPLIANCES (BigIP F5 and Nokia Checkpoint) both run BSD kernels. This is also why yet ANOTHER company is running a BSD kernel on their appliance. Yes, this proves BSD is dying... with commercial support nonexistant!
Okay... now we know how much Linux is growing. Look at all the commercial hardware appliances that use Linux... uhm okay wait nevermind...
Yes, this proves once and FOR ALL that BSD is dying. YES, BSD IS DYING... DON'T BUY YOUR F5'S AND YOUR CHECKPOINT APPLIANCES BECAUSE BSD IS DYING. Let's not forget that Nokia Checkpoint BSD appliances are a close 2nd place to Cisco PIX for FW appliances... WOW, yes BSD is dead damnit... DEAD!
Okay, forget the ideas of civil liberties that this may cause....
I don't WANT to see a solder with an m4 rifle on the corner. It means WE HAVE A SERIOUS PROBLEM. In Isreal, they do this because the threats of attacks is high and common. If they start doing this here, does this mean a bomb is going to go off everyday? I sure hope not!
Likewise, people have said, "well if we had F-16s in the air we could have shot down the planes." Yes, again, that's all I need is an F-16 in the air to remind me that the world is a dangerous place and we need a couple $20 million aircraft protecting NYC with ATA missiles. Yes, that's a great idea.
The GREAT thing about the U.S. (and Canada for that matter) is that we don't need to have these constant reminders of "war" since this is what these things are for. I prefer living in a state (in the national sense) where I don't have to worry about such things. For the most part, the U.S. is war-resistant and we know this... no one can take down the U.S. through an organized attack scheme. No one has the money or power or resources to do such a thing. Attacks on civilian complexes once every few years isn't a "war" in the traditional sense, and we don't need to see war planes in the air to protect us.