First of all, please put quotation marks around "genius."
Well it's better than being a member of a geek squad.:)
Secondly, for such "great" hardware, Macs sure tend to have design flaws; I've owned two and both were glitchy throughout their lifespan, and both eventually broke down for good (which I've never had a PC do; I have a 20+ year old PC that last time I checked still works).
While Macs certainly are not perfect, my experience is the opposite of yours. I'm currently about to recycle 8 obsolete Macs going back as far as 1989 (IIcx) and they all still work. Meanwhile a bunch of current PCs at work are having all kinds of problems. Our Macs are humming along just fine. That said, there have been some lemon Mac models. You clearly have been unlucky.
As for the support, the only way you can get reasonable support is to pay for it, which is a lousy thing to do to your customers.
You can go to an Apple store any time and ask for Mac help from a mac "genius" (there are you happy?) even if you don't buy Applecare. Plus if you find a fanatical Mac fan, you can often get free help that way;). Do you expect hardware support for free beyond the warranty? Who gives you that? Certainly not Pystar - that's the topic at hand. My point is that you cannot even pay Pystar for good support.
yep. no matter how you look at it, putting pressure on Apple to offer better prices and more hardware configurations can only be a good thing, even if you are Fan Number One.
I figure Apple is not going to bother to sue Pystar. After all, when people see what a load of crap the computer is and how it does not integrate with Apple's wonderful software, people on the fence will realize what a really great *system* Apple has to offer in the Macintosh. People need to realize that Apple is a hardware company and a software company and a service company. The Macintosh is a combination of great hardware, software and support all working together. When you have a problem with Mac OS X or your Macintosh, you pick up the phone and call Apple. Or you walk into an Apple store and ask a genius. Can you do that with Pystar? Hardly.
Spoofing the user agent is no solution, even if it does work. That's what Micro$oft wants you to do so that it appears that more people are using IE than actually are. The numbers game is far more important than the number of users who actually use Firefox.
The best solution is to dump hotmail and move to a better free email client like Gmail or Yahoo.
Does anyone actually want this? Seriously, this is another case of a product without a market. I daresay that no one wants to rent their software. Unfortunately we have a situation where a giant in the market is telling people how to do things. We've seen so many failed companies in the software industry for this reason.
People will just keep using CS3 until the end of time if need be. Since Mac Pros are built like a tank, they will last forever too. So there's a perfect combination. I mean there are actually companies out there still using DOS based computer systems. The same thing will happen to the graphics industry if this comes to pass. Oh and the "old" solution will be much faster than any web based Cthulhulian nightmare that Adobe will conjure up.
Now if they truly end up offering the full power suite for free online, even with ads, then maybe it will catch on. But only if it can outperform a CS3/MacPro combo. It's free to stay with the old software too.
It is almost completely syntax compatible with VB and it has the benefit of compiling for Windows, Mac and Linux. And it even comes with a VB Project Converter to help you along.
There is a strong community of developers and some excellent plugins. Including a database plugin for Valentina which is much more powerful than the built-in database (and than Access).
I was thinking that it should be possible to create a tarpit for junk faxers.
The premise is that almost every junk fax we get at work has 1234567 as the calling telephone number. Using a filter on the incoming number that detects this and similar obviously bogus numbers, the machine could continue to take the fax forever (and not print it of course).
The obvious problem is that it takes up the fax line, but if you have 2 fax lines or set it to be tarpit in the middle of the night (when this crap often arrives), then we might have a solution.
Also, please remember to take junk faxes and recycle them so that other people in the office don't see them. Some of your dumber office-mates might actually respond to the fax.
I also write down the 800 numbers listed on it to call on pay phones when I have the spare time (like waiting at airports) to waste the spammers' money.
During the American Revolution, there were two main elements fighting against the British.
First, there were the guerillas. Fire, run, attack, run, hide. That type of thing.
Second, there was "regular army". Regular army is an actual army - officers, training, disciple, uniforms, showing up for battles, etc.
The guerillas were terrorists, the Continental Army were not.
That's funny, the continental army, commanded by George Washington himself, used the tactics you just described. Hit and run. He knew he could never face the British in a regular fight. It's amazing we won the revolution at all... Oh wait, the French were helping us.
Was any research performed on his maaaad energy transmission ideas?
It's all still top secret even today. All the papers on his ideas that weren't patented "disappeared" after his death.
I'm not sure if it's related, but his death ray was attempted in the 1970s, I believe, at Livermore Labs (or was it Sandia?) and they supposedly could not get it to work. At least that's the public version of what happened - it was also a top secret project.
Wasn't that what scared the hell out of JP Morgan and his metal works?
Definitely, it would have circumvented his monopolization of the copper mines as a means to get his greedy hands in on the profits of *all* power transmitted in the world.
Unfortunately, the 1st world war kicked in before Tesla could do the same in the US. The US government said "hey, all your patents are belong to us", or something like that, thus preventing Tesla from setting the record straight.
While you are correct up to this point, the story does not end there. In 1943, just a few months after Tesla died, the US Supreme Court upheld Tesla's patent. A good explanation is here.
To the nay-sayers who point out that this is simply a celebration of the first transatlantic radio transmission, and thus Marconi should be credited, you should remember that Marconi was claiming that he did indeed invent the radio even though he completely stole Tesla's design. Furthermore it enforces the common myth that Marconi invented the radio when Tesla was the real genius. Tesla simply couldn't muster the funds to demonstrate it first. He was never good at raising money and was being duped by rich robber-barons like JP Morgan who had an interest in putting down his world changing ideas which would reallocate money out of their pockets.
I don't think anyone's complaining about that at all.
Actually I was talking about the original post which said, in part, "(Gregg) said he was definitely supporting it. Now he says he's definitely not. Maybe he'll say he's definitely supporting it again." and some of the early Slashdot replies. But I was unclear about my remark - thanks for pointing that out.
He should have been put more thought into his initial position before announcing it.
Certainly a true statement - and I wish more politicians would do that. However, in the wake of the terrorist attacks, politicians had to take some kind of stand or they would be criticized as "not doing anything". Granted I think this is the fault more of the mob rules politics of today than anyone in particular.
Give Senator Judd a break! Just because he changed his mind on an issue is not a bad thing. He probably just came to his senses after hearing the facts about the issue. You should be happy. I am. Now if he did actually change his mind again, you might have cause to criticize.
What's far worse are politicians who don't change their mind at all. You might as well dismiss the entire concept of debate.
Criticism, as Slashdot readers have proven time and again, is easy and abundant. Taking a stand is much harder. Changing your stand after hearing the arguments is an important part of democracy and free will.
One database is not better than another because it has a bigger checklist of features. If that were true, then we'd all be using Oracle (which is actually a very good RDBMS). MySQL has advantages and disadvantages over PostgreSQL. The same is true for almost any database.
Let's look at your complaints of MySQL lacking features one by one:
This is a nice feature, but *not* necessary. Many times a proper JOIN can be used instead. Alternately you just use multiple SQLs. However, this is the one missing feature of MySQL that I want the most.
no foreign keys
You don't need foreign keys to maintain referential integrity. A proper GUI, among many other things, can enforce this anyway. It is a nice feature, but definitely not needed in a well designed system. Further they slow down performance and I have seen projects where they are not used because of this.
views
These can be nice too, but I personally never use them. They are simply not required in any project I've ever seen. Actually I think views are confusing because they mask the real tables. I think this is a style issue more than anything else, YMMV.
How can this be a "mission critical" SQL database?
Don't get me wrong. I like PostgreSQL too. They are both great and both are very useful in production environments. Why does there only have to be one open source database? The competition is truly healthy for both products and ultimately for us developers.
There is a factor you might be forgetting. On privacy most people care if someone they know is reading their private info. But they don't care quite so much that someone they don't know might be reading it.
I think that people don't care not because they don't know the person reading it, but when they don't know if someone is reading their email at all.
Keystroke loggers could be rendered ineffectual if the crypto software used was also hooked to a fingerprint scanner or a swipe card reader in addition to a password.
This wouldn't stop the FBI. They could obviously take his fingerprint and probably make some kind of cast based on that to replicate it. A swipe card could be subpoenaed in court too.
To all those who are comparing MySQL to PostgreSQL, I'd like to comment on why this is good.
First, competition will make them both better. The whole point of open source is *more* choice, not less. Stop complaining that MySQL is finally catching up to PostgreSQL and use which one you want. They both have their strengths and weaknesses. It's not like they both cannot coexist.
Second, I use MySQL occasionally now because most ISPs seem to support it. PostgreSQL is great, but I cannot use it because my clients have long since chosen their ISPs and it is a major PITA to change for many reasons.
The new open journal, JMLR that replaced the old one is a great solution to the problem. However, I'm dismayed to find that they publish using proprietary formats. Namely PDF and Postscript. Wouldn't it, thus, cost money to save to those formats? I think they should use open standards *only*. Why not use LaTex or just plain old HTML 4? This would better allow scientists from developing countries to publish their work rather than wasting precious money buying licenses of Adobe Acrobat. It seems they are fighting closed proprietary standards in the first place and should not be supporting them.
Furthermore, I could actually read the articles much easier than saving to a file and launching a bloated Adobe application or, gasp, use that annoying PDF plug-in that usually crashes my browser.
And as usual, Motorola and IBM will develop this technology first and promise chips as fast as 25 GHz. But in reality, the first IBM/Moto chips will come at 12 GHz at about the time that Intel releases their 20 GHz chips.
Apple will introduce the chips in it's new iHyperMac which is the size of a quarter with a holographic display but they will be running downclocked to 10 GHz for marketing reasons.
They currently have a $4 billion and some cost overrun. Think about that. NASA has spent (or allocated) $4 billion more than it has, only it's not sure where it spent it. The fuck? No company in the world would be allowed to do that. This is a big boondoggle even by government standards. Think how far $4 billion would go if spent on researching new technologies, rather than poured into supporting old ones.
I don't view this $4 billion overrun as incompetence. I view it as theft. Theft from people who could have spent it on improving the future rather than maintaining the status quo.
I could use the same argument against "defense" spending, which has a vastly larger budget and has zero *direct* return on investment. No one is saying there is any way to be *directly* profitable going into space. The space program is our ticket into the future, possibly on another planet in case something happens to this one - be it our fault, a huge meteor or heck even hostile aliens. Plus many useful spin-off technologies have come out of the space program.
Here's my radical solution. Privatise NASA. Float it on the market. Let it keep all of its assets, gift it five years worth of funding, and wish it good luck. Cut it free of red tape, let it come up with its own projects and it's own standards.
No one is stopping you from starting your own private space company. In fact a few already exist including Orbital.
Why don't you take your brilliant "privitization" theory and apply it to the road system and the military? It won't work there either because they cost money too and reap no profits in return. Face it, R&D costs money and that's exactly what the space program is - a giant R&D program.
We've been promised commercial space exploitation within the next ten years, for at least the past thirty years. It's well past time to put up or shut up.
NASA has launching private satellites into orbit for years.
I propose this not because I think that we shouldn't be in space, but because I want us to get out there and stay out there. If space travel can be sustainable rather than a series of staggeringly expensive proofs of concept, then let's demonstrate that.
No one's stopping you from doing it. PUOSU. BTW, there is this thing called the international space station that is being built right now and people are already inhabiting it. In fact, there have been space stations in orbit since the 1970s. The new ones are getting better and better.
That's how all technology works.
Slashdot Mirror
Nope. No one lies like VW has.
This is unsubstantiated speculation. How do you know that other manufacturers are not lying now and have not been caught yet?
"But they all do it" is not an excuse.
Very true.
Well it's better than being a member of a geek squad. :)
Secondly, for such "great" hardware, Macs sure tend to have design flaws; I've owned two and both were glitchy throughout their lifespan, and both eventually broke down for good (which I've never had a PC do; I have a 20+ year old PC that last time I checked still works).While Macs certainly are not perfect, my experience is the opposite of yours. I'm currently about to recycle 8 obsolete Macs going back as far as 1989 (IIcx) and they all still work. Meanwhile a bunch of current PCs at work are having all kinds of problems. Our Macs are humming along just fine. That said, there have been some lemon Mac models. You clearly have been unlucky.
As for the support, the only way you can get reasonable support is to pay for it, which is a lousy thing to do to your customers.You can go to an Apple store any time and ask for Mac help from a mac "genius" (there are you happy?) even if you don't buy Applecare. Plus if you find a fanatical Mac fan, you can often get free help that way ;). Do you expect hardware support for free beyond the warranty? Who gives you that? Certainly not Pystar - that's the topic at hand. My point is that you cannot even pay Pystar for good support.
Totally agreed.
I figure Apple is not going to bother to sue Pystar. After all, when people see what a load of crap the computer is and how it does not integrate with Apple's wonderful software, people on the fence will realize what a really great *system* Apple has to offer in the Macintosh. People need to realize that Apple is a hardware company and a software company and a service company. The Macintosh is a combination of great hardware, software and support all working together. When you have a problem with Mac OS X or your Macintosh, you pick up the phone and call Apple. Or you walk into an Apple store and ask a genius. Can you do that with Pystar? Hardly.
It's the integration stupid.
Spoofing the user agent is no solution, even if it does work. That's what Micro$oft wants you to do so that it appears that more people are using IE than actually are. The numbers game is far more important than the number of users who actually use Firefox.
The best solution is to dump hotmail and move to a better free email client like Gmail or Yahoo.
Does anyone actually want this? Seriously, this is another case of a product without a market. I daresay that no one wants to rent their software. Unfortunately we have a situation where a giant in the market is telling people how to do things. We've seen so many failed companies in the software industry for this reason. People will just keep using CS3 until the end of time if need be. Since Mac Pros are built like a tank, they will last forever too. So there's a perfect combination. I mean there are actually companies out there still using DOS based computer systems. The same thing will happen to the graphics industry if this comes to pass. Oh and the "old" solution will be much faster than any web based Cthulhulian nightmare that Adobe will conjure up. Now if they truly end up offering the full power suite for free online, even with ads, then maybe it will catch on. But only if it can outperform a CS3/MacPro combo. It's free to stay with the old software too.
Good thing there is REALbasic.
It is almost completely syntax compatible with VB and it has the benefit of compiling for Windows, Mac and Linux. And it even comes with a VB Project Converter to help you along.
There is a strong community of developers and some excellent plugins. Including a database plugin for Valentina which is much more powerful than the built-in database (and than Access).
I was thinking that it should be possible to create a tarpit for junk faxers.
The premise is that almost every junk fax we get at work has 1234567 as the calling telephone number. Using a filter on the incoming number that detects this and similar obviously bogus numbers, the machine could continue to take the fax forever (and not print it of course).
The obvious problem is that it takes up the fax line, but if you have 2 fax lines or set it to be tarpit in the middle of the night (when this crap often arrives), then we might have a solution.
Also, please remember to take junk faxes and recycle them so that other people in the office don't see them. Some of your dumber office-mates might actually respond to the fax.
I also write down the 800 numbers listed on it to call on pay phones when I have the spare time (like waiting at airports) to waste the spammers' money.
During the American Revolution, there were two main elements fighting against the British.
First, there were the guerillas. Fire, run, attack, run, hide. That type of thing.
Second, there was "regular army". Regular army is an actual army - officers, training, disciple, uniforms, showing up for battles, etc.
The guerillas were terrorists, the Continental Army were not.
That's funny, the continental army, commanded by George Washington himself, used the tactics you just described. Hit and run. He knew he could never face the British in a regular fight. It's amazing we won the revolution at all... Oh wait, the French were helping us.
Lessons Learned:
For thieves and low-lifes only:
Does anyone know where I can download that "Caught In The Act" video?
This movie explains why I have doubts about this.
Was any research performed on his maaaad energy transmission ideas?
It's all still top secret even today. All the papers on his ideas that weren't patented "disappeared" after his death.
I'm not sure if it's related, but his death ray was attempted in the 1970s, I believe, at Livermore Labs (or was it Sandia?) and they supposedly could not get it to work. At least that's the public version of what happened - it was also a top secret project.
Wasn't that what scared the hell out of JP Morgan and his metal works?
Definitely, it would have circumvented his monopolization of the copper mines as a means to get his greedy hands in on the profits of *all* power transmitted in the world.
Unfortunately, the 1st world war kicked in before Tesla could do the same in the US. The US government said "hey, all your patents are belong to us", or something like that, thus preventing Tesla from setting the record straight.
While you are correct up to this point, the story does not end there. In 1943, just a few months after Tesla died, the US Supreme Court upheld Tesla's patent. A good explanation is here.
To the nay-sayers who point out that this is simply a celebration of the first transatlantic radio transmission, and thus Marconi should be credited, you should remember that Marconi was claiming that he did indeed invent the radio even though he completely stole Tesla's design. Furthermore it enforces the common myth that Marconi invented the radio when Tesla was the real genius. Tesla simply couldn't muster the funds to demonstrate it first. He was never good at raising money and was being duped by rich robber-barons like JP Morgan who had an interest in putting down his world changing ideas which would reallocate money out of their pockets.
I don't think anyone's complaining about that at all.
Actually I was talking about the original post which said, in part, "(Gregg) said he was definitely supporting it. Now he says he's definitely not. Maybe he'll say he's definitely supporting it again." and some of the early Slashdot replies. But I was unclear about my remark - thanks for pointing that out.
He should have been put more thought into his initial position before announcing it.
Certainly a true statement - and I wish more politicians would do that. However, in the wake of the terrorist attacks, politicians had to take some kind of stand or they would be criticized as "not doing anything". Granted I think this is the fault more of the mob rules politics of today than anyone in particular.
Give Senator Judd a break! Just because he changed his mind on an issue is not a bad thing. He probably just came to his senses after hearing the facts about the issue. You should be happy. I am. Now if he did actually change his mind again, you might have cause to criticize.
What's far worse are politicians who don't change their mind at all. You might as well dismiss the entire concept of debate.
Criticism, as Slashdot readers have proven time and again, is easy and abundant. Taking a stand is much harder. Changing your stand after hearing the arguments is an important part of democracy and free will.
One database is not better than another because it has a bigger checklist of features. If that were true, then we'd all be using Oracle (which is actually a very good RDBMS). MySQL has advantages and disadvantages over PostgreSQL. The same is true for almost any database.
Let's look at your complaints of MySQL lacking features one by one:
no proper transactions
Yes it does! If you use certain table types.
no subselects
This is a nice feature, but *not* necessary. Many times a proper JOIN can be used instead. Alternately you just use multiple SQLs. However, this is the one missing feature of MySQL that I want the most.
no foreign keys
You don't need foreign keys to maintain referential integrity. A proper GUI, among many other things, can enforce this anyway. It is a nice feature, but definitely not needed in a well designed system. Further they slow down performance and I have seen projects where they are not used because of this.
views
These can be nice too, but I personally never use them. They are simply not required in any project I've ever seen. Actually I think views are confusing because they mask the real tables. I think this is a style issue more than anything else, YMMV.
How can this be a "mission critical" SQL database?
How about better performance.
Don't get me wrong. I like PostgreSQL too. They are both great and both are very useful in production environments. Why does there only have to be one open source database? The competition is truly healthy for both products and ultimately for us developers.
What is your platform of choice (yes I see your site uses PHP, good job!)? Are you religious about that like the rest of us?
There is a factor you might be forgetting. On privacy most people care if someone they know is reading their private info. But they don't care quite so much that someone they don't know might be reading it.
I think that people don't care not because they don't know the person reading it, but when they don't know if someone is reading their email at all.
The old addage, ignorance is bliss applies here.
Keystroke loggers could be rendered ineffectual if the crypto software used was also hooked to a fingerprint scanner or a swipe card reader in addition to a password.
This wouldn't stop the FBI. They could obviously take his fingerprint and probably make some kind of cast based on that to replicate it. A swipe card could be subpoenaed in court too.
The affidavit says that Scarfo used a Windows OS.
Coupled with the DOJ ruling, it just goes to prove that M$ Windows is an operating system written for criminals by criminals.
I also love some of thier business practices, and believe business students will be studing these for years to come in universities all over the USA.
Which ones are you referring to?
To all those who are comparing MySQL to PostgreSQL, I'd like to comment on why this is good.
First, competition will make them both better. The whole point of open source is *more* choice, not less. Stop complaining that MySQL is finally catching up to PostgreSQL and use which one you want. They both have their strengths and weaknesses. It's not like they both cannot coexist.
Second, I use MySQL occasionally now because most ISPs seem to support it. PostgreSQL is great, but I cannot use it because my clients have long since chosen their ISPs and it is a major PITA to change for many reasons.
The new open journal, JMLR that replaced the old one is a great solution to the problem. However, I'm dismayed to find that they publish using proprietary formats. Namely PDF and Postscript. Wouldn't it, thus, cost money to save to those formats? I think they should use open standards *only*. Why not use LaTex or just plain old HTML 4? This would better allow scientists from developing countries to publish their work rather than wasting precious money buying licenses of Adobe Acrobat. It seems they are fighting closed proprietary standards in the first place and should not be supporting them.
Furthermore, I could actually read the articles much easier than saving to a file and launching a bloated Adobe application or, gasp, use that annoying PDF plug-in that usually crashes my browser.
And as usual, Motorola and IBM will develop this technology first and promise chips as fast as 25 GHz. But in reality, the first IBM/Moto chips will come at 12 GHz at about the time that Intel releases their 20 GHz chips.
Apple will introduce the chips in it's new iHyperMac which is the size of a quarter with a holographic display but they will be running downclocked to 10 GHz for marketing reasons.
They currently have a $4 billion and some cost overrun. Think about that. NASA has spent (or allocated) $4 billion more than it has, only it's not sure where it spent it. The fuck? No company in the world would be allowed to do that. This is a big boondoggle even by government standards. Think how far $4 billion would go if spent on researching new technologies, rather than poured into supporting old ones.
I don't view this $4 billion overrun as incompetence. I view it as theft. Theft from people who could have spent it on improving the future rather than maintaining the status quo.
I could use the same argument against "defense" spending, which has a vastly larger budget and has zero *direct* return on investment. No one is saying there is any way to be *directly* profitable going into space. The space program is our ticket into the future, possibly on another planet in case something happens to this one - be it our fault, a huge meteor or heck even hostile aliens. Plus many useful spin-off technologies have come out of the space program.
Here's my radical solution. Privatise NASA. Float it on the market. Let it keep all of its assets, gift it five years worth of funding, and wish it good luck. Cut it free of red tape, let it come up with its own projects and it's own standards.
No one is stopping you from starting your own private space company. In fact a few already exist including Orbital.
Why don't you take your brilliant "privitization" theory and apply it to the road system and the military? It won't work there either because they cost money too and reap no profits in return. Face it, R&D costs money and that's exactly what the space program is - a giant R&D program.
We've been promised commercial space exploitation within the next ten years, for at least the past thirty years. It's well past time to put up or shut up.
NASA has launching private satellites into orbit for years.
I propose this not because I think that we shouldn't be in space, but because I want us to get out there and stay out there. If space travel can be sustainable rather than a series of staggeringly expensive proofs of concept, then let's demonstrate that.
No one's stopping you from doing it. PUOSU. BTW, there is this thing called the international space station that is being built right now and people are already inhabiting it. In fact, there have been space stations in orbit since the 1970s. The new ones are getting better and better. That's how all technology works.