for the Nth time: there is no need for the system or the application or the user to know anything. all the system needs to do is to create a virtual session for an executable, where the computer's resources are virtualized for the executable.
Then, for the "nth" time, how does a legitimate application modify and interact with the "real" files ? There are numerous reasons why this will be necessary, from simple editing of documents to applying patches.
The last time I asked this, you said "the user will be able to configure it". My point since, which you are either ignoring or misunderstanding, is that as soon as you allow the user to make such decisions then you a) require additional knowledge and interaction from the user and b) open yourself up to the dancing bunnies problem, essentially returning to the situation we have now.
As for the rest of your comments, regarding Ada and security, you are just plain ignorant of embedded systems and Ada if you think they are unsuitable for general purpose operating systems.
I didn't say they were. I said the fact they weren't being used suggested there was probably a good reason.
Embedded real time operating systems have the strictest performance and security requirements, covering much more ground in those two fields than generic purpose operating systems.
Embedded systems operate in completely different risk profiles (for example, inputs are nearly always minimal, strictly controlled and well-known in advance) and performance constraints (for example, sacrificing low latency for predictable latency in terms of responsiveness) than general purpose systems do. This is before even getting into things like scope of capabilities (embedded systems tend to be quite limited), development cost (relatively high for embedded systems, due to the stricter requirements for correctness) and time to market (longer for embedded systems, again due to stricter requirements).
As I said. Being good at one thing does not imply that you will be good at another thing, even if they are related.
Something more sane, why not observe the Berne Convention, 50 years?
That's 50 years after the author's death. Any copyright term that extends past death is neither sane nor justifiable.
Even if it were just 50 years, it would still be too long. Most works make the majority of their income for the author in the first few years after release, many in the first few months.
Ideally, copyright protection for a work would be split into two aspects - attribution as the creator of the work, and the ability to restrict redistribution. The former would be perpetual, and the latter would expire shortly after it had earned the creator enough money to cover the expenses incurred creating it. That's the only way it can be legitimately seen as an incentive.
Software copyrights are still the very basis allowing open-software to remain open (it is the will of the authors and is protected by copyright).
No, software copyrights are the basis of a small subset of OSS licenses restricting how source code licensed under them can be used, particularly in derivative works.
Code released under something like the BSDL would not be impacted should copyright cease to exist.
Take the Linux kernel that's under development since 1991 - when do you think the copyright on it should expire?
The original code written in 1991 ? Absolutely. How much of that do you think still remains in the contemporary kernel ?
Most folks decided a long time back that the work of their own hands should go to those of their own choosing [...]
So should my employer continued to pay my salary to my family after I die ?
[...] --- and have never truly signed on to the notion that the artist should be compelled to surrender his work to the public domain.
They're not. All that should happen is that the extraordinary protection and privilege they are receiving from the government - ostensibly to encourage them to produce more works - ceases to exist. If for no other reason than because the idea that someone dead can be encouraged to produce more work is patently stupid.
Also if death meant instant public domain, I think there would be a lot more bodyguards in the entertainment industry than there already are.
Why does this ridiculous idea always come up ? Who out there seriously thinks someone is going to commit pre-meditated murder to avoid being sued for copyright infringement ?
No. It is the belief that the US is better than other countries. Not perfect, just better.
IME a disturbing proportion of Americans belief that their society is the pinnacle of human civilisation, unsurpassed both past and present, and unsurpassable by all but America in the future.
Or those fanatical Canadians. The few Canadians at hockey games in the US sing that friggin national anthem louder than the 10 times as many Americans sing theirs.
Well, they're probably a bit more excited to hear it since it doesn't get played at every gathering larger than a few dozen people.
I'm sorry, but $27,750 isn't life ruining, even to someone making only $12/hour.
It's probably going to take someone on a wage like $12/hr at least five years to pay back an amount like that, assuming they don't do anything else except work, survive and service the debt.
Five years without a holiday. Five years without an opportunity pursue higher education. Five years without being to save money for either short- or long-term goals. Five years without any luxuries.
It is also safe to say that the majority of people also speed in their cars, which means since everybody does it, every street should be like the AutoBahn.
Generally speaking, the only places where the majority of people are speeding, are places where the speed limit really should be higher (or the road design should be modified). It's quite uncommon for large numbers of people to dangerously exceed the speed limit.
If you steal a music CD from a store, and then make a bunch of copies and start distributing them, expect the same penalty. The girl is not charged with theft, she's charged with distribution of a copyrighted work.
This is one area of the law where intent is clearly not being given the weighting it deserves.
Most people pirating aren't doing it because they want to distribute, they're doing it because they want to download. With that in mind, they shouldn't be being punished as if their intent was to distribute.
That is what you get these days with the balance of power being held by the Greens and independents. It used to be that the independents and small parties would come up with the looney ideas, but more and more we are seeing the big parties filling that role. EG. The Internet Filter aka The Great Firewall of Australia.
IIRC internet filtering came from an Independent, and without a doubt the only reason either major party continues to give it lip service is to buy the votes of independents on other issues.
HOW DOES THE SYSTEM (OR THE USER) KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN "AN APPLICATION" AND MALWARE ?
Application vendors do not need to specify privilege levels. All applications must be considered not trustworthy, unless proven so or set to be so manually.
So who decides whether or not an application is "trustworthy", how, and when ?
* If it's the user, you still have the dancing bunnies problem.
* If it's the vendor, you still have the incompetent or malicious vendor problem.
* If it's some third party, you have the loss of general-purposeness problem.
Each application installed can only manipulate a copy of the resources, except for the files that it has created...thus, if the application is compromised, the system is not affected.
If applications can only manipulate data and files they have created, how do you deal with multiple applications that need to access and/or modify the same set of data and files ?
Look, in the big picture, "system files" are largely irrelevant - they can be restored from read-only media in a matter of minutes or hours. What matters is the unique data. Protecting the system only really assists the clean-up process, by which time the damage is already done. That's not to say it shouldn't be done, but it's by far a secondary concern.
You also haven't addressed what prevents an application from, say, firing up a network connection to a botnet controller and becoming a DDoS zombie or open relay.
My proposal explicitly does not require decisions from the end users.
Then it requires a centralised, third-party management system of some description, and makes the system no longer general purpose and capable of running arbitrary software.
It's not required.
Then there's nothing to prevent malicious software being installed.
You still haven't understood my proposal.
No, apparently I haven't. In particular I am having trouble seeing how it still allows the user to run whatever software they want, while preventing them from running malicious software, or how it allows them to run software that manipulates their data, while preventing malicious software they have run from doing the same.
Not a good argument. Do you have any specific reasons why Ada is not a viable solution? I bet you don't.
I never said it wasn't a viable solution. I said the distinct lack of products using it suggest there is probably a good reason why it isn't used. Note that these reasons may have nothing whatsoever to do with Ada itself.
Other than that, there is no technical reason that Ada is not suitable for commercial operating systems, especially since complex critical safety kernels and systems are built with Ada.
This isn't really a compelling argument. Just because a tool is really good for one thing (embedded, limited functionality, static, critical systems) doesn't mean it's good at another (general purpose, extensive functionality, dynamic, non-critical systems).
The reason Ada is not adopted is because Microsoft doesn't really care about security; they care about stocks, and security perhaps even goes against that; non-security means a) easy hacking and copying of its products, b) a market generated solely around the deficiencies of its operating system.
Poor security is bad for business, so to say they don't care is just plain stupid. Especially given the extensive and well-documented efforts towards improving security in Windows for the better part of a decade now, including significant refactoring, reimplementation and re-architecting of pretty much every aspect of the system.
Incidentally, most "security products" aren't doing anything to address the "deficiencies of its operating system" (whatever those might be - can you identify some), because they are nearly all there to either a) prevent bad things from happening once the security systems in the OS have already been bypassed (nearly always by an ignorant user and/or third-party software), or b) clean up afterwards. To use the obligatory car analogy, they're airbags, not ABS.
Such a comment can easily backfire with all the video-evidence where Israelic soldiers used palestina kids as human shields.
Even if that's true - which I doubt - it has no relevance to how disingenuous your comment was. There's nothing "special" about women and children dying when they're being proactively put in harm's way.
Ah a well informed person. Do you know the death-rates between the parties in the last 20 years? Every year it is something like: Palestina: 700+ more than 200+ children, more than 200+ woman. Israel: 0-15. Always soldiers.
Your argument is disingenuous. The Palestinians happily use women and children as "soldiers".
An application that is considered potentially harmful, like a web browser, runs in a virtual session. When malware asks for file 'Bar' or a network connection, then it uses the virtual resources.
If the file 'Bar' or the network connection or any other resource is a resource that requires more privileges, then then user IS NOT ASKED through UAT or privilege elevation permission to use the resource, but a virtual resource has been setup APRIORI to be used instead of the real one. The malware thinks it uses the real thing, but it does not.
Then how do legitimate applications access the "real" resources ? If it is the end user that ultimately makes the decision - regardless of whether they do it beforehand (though that adds an additional burden of knowledge making it even more unworkable) or on-demand - then that is not a solution because it will fall victim to the same problem we have today: people are more than happy to do whatever it takes to see the dancing bunnies.
This security setup is created when the application is installed. The user is not involved in any way in the process. New applications can be installed in the context of a running application (say, a new interactive session), but these applications cannot affect anything else in the system. If there is malware installed under a virtual session, then the user can log in another more privileged session to correct the problem.
Your system appears to be completely reliant on a) application vendors to correctly specify the privilege levels they need and b) end users to make educated decisions about whether or not to trust the vendors. Alternatively, c) a tightly-controlled and strictly enforced source of applications that can be installed.
Experience suggests this is not a workable solution for a general-purpose system. Options (a) and (b) simply don't happen and option (c) removes the arbitrary nature of the software that can be used (ie: you get an iPad). If it *was*, we would never have had these problems in the first place, as existing systems have sufficient capabilities to provide essentially all the functionality you are talking about.
Modern systems don't lack the features you desire because people haven't thought of it. They lack them because they haven't been practical to implement. Though the exploding popularity of tightly controlled devices like the iPad and iPhone may change this.
Why isn't it an answer?
Because my point was the lack of general-purpose OSes written in Ada suggests it's not a viable solution for that purpose.
if a programming language is suitable for safe-critical systems, then it certainly is suitable for general purpose operating systems.
Maybe, maybe not. There are numerous and often non-obvious interwoven factors at play in these sorts of situations.
Most Mac Pro users fit the profile, in my experience. A vanishingly small proportion need more hardware than an "xMac" would deliver.
The other way to look at it, of course, is that the entry-level Mac Pro should be about a grand cheaper.
Because it's another choice.
So is the Mac Pro. So is the Mac Mini. So are all the laptop options.
And the price you're talking about puts it right in the middle of the iMac price range. Now, rather than a clear choice based on their budget, they have to weigh up different configurations. You've created a hurdle to jump in the buying process of an iMac.
You mean just like the "hurdle" between choosing a Mac Mini + screen or an iMac ?
It says "promoting technologies that disrupts it's own product lines." You're not talking about a technology that isn't already in Mac product lines. You're taking about a cut-price model of what is already a niche high-end product.
But they *don't* disrupt their own product lines. They fit things into the gaps.
Except you don't elaborate on them. When I ask what features other than internal upgradability, you state that that is the feature, now you say it's coincidental?
No, I said the form factor was the feature. It allows multiple video cards, multiple internal drives, larger (and cheaper) memory configurations and miscellaneous expansion cards.
Um... The whole idea of there being some sort of glaring hole in the Mac lineup implies some sort of reasonably sized bloc of users, yet the best you can come up with is that some pro users might have preferred an xMac.
No, it says there's a hole in the options that forces customers to either go with a less capable machine (iMac or Mac Mini) or spend more than they want to.
I've never heard a single Mac Pro user say they wish there was a lesser model.
That's because you're framing the question to get the answer you want.
Ask how many Mac customers want a single-socket, quad-core capable machine that can take two video cards, two internal hard disks and 16-24GB of RAM for about $1500. Lots of them do, and have been asking Apple to sell one again for the better part of a decade.
Pro users make their livelihood on their machines and what you're seeing as a $1,000+ waste, they see as a $1,000+ investment.
$1000 for something unneeded isn't an investment, it's a waste. $1000 times, say, a couple of hundred machines is a couple of staff worth of waste.
Most will make that back and then some in productivity. The last thing a professional should ever do is skimp on their tools. Tools are cheap, even at $2.5k-$4k+.
Please explain where you think $1000 of extra productivity is coming from for an entry-level Mac Pro vs an "xMac".
Almost no one does internal upgrades any more, apart from the occasional RAM upgrade. And Apple computers are RAM expandable.
Who said anything about upgrades ?
The miniscule proportion of people that want 4 monitors or RAID are well served by the Mac Pro.
Except it costs about a grand or so more than it needs to for that functionality.
No doubt if you bought car purchasers whether they'd like to purchase almost the same spec car for 40% cheaper, they'd say yes too. So what? Taking out one expansion slot, 2 drive bays, and ADDING a couple of RAM slots isn't going to make a product $1000 cheaper.
Everyone else manages to price single-socket workstations with 3-4 expansion slots, 2 internal drive bays and 6 RAM slots around the $1000-$1200 mark. Even allowing for the traditional ~25% "Apple Tax", a base-level machine with those features should be easily doable at $1500.
Nothing. It only prevents the damage done by malware.
How ? How does the computer know whether or not the application trying to access files and/or the network is malware or legitimate ? Or are you saying the data within the virtual session *is* permanently modified ? In which case, like I said earlier, the practical difference to today's systems is zero.
You say "I know what you mean" and then you completely fail to show that you understood what I am proposing. So here it is again, with an example: suppose malware 'Foo' wants to alter the contents of file 'Bar'. 'Foo' opens the file 'Bar', and alters the contents. The operating system kernel though, instead of delivering the original file, it does a copy-on-write on file 'Bar', and therefore the original file 'Bar' is preserved.
So when the next program opens 'Bar' which copy does it get ? How does the OS know which copy to present ? How does the user make a _permanent_ change to 'Bar' and what prevents malware run by the user from making that change ?
How does any of this prevent the malware from opening a network connection ?
Lots of military embedded systems, lots of avionics systems. The F22 software, for example. Some parts of the F16 software kernel. Or the THALES Crotale kernel...really, if you look around, safety-critical and Ada go hand in hand.
Perhaps you missed the "general purpose OS" part of my question ? Listing of a bunch of highly-specialised, embedded applications isn't an answer.
Yet you reject it for a commercial operating system kernel? how strange.
I didn't reject it. Like I said, the industry isn't exactly crawling with general purposes OSes (or software, for that matter) written in Ada.
Apparently you meant just "feature", specifically, having internal expandability.
No, I meant features. That those features result from a non-integrated form factor is an incidental consequence.
Something which the vast majority of PC buyers never take advantage of aside from sometimes RAM upgrades, which the Mac mini and iMac handle just fine.
Who cares about "the vast majority of PC buyers" ? We're talking about a specific demographic.
I already covered RAM. What percentage of PC buyers do you think have three or more monitors, or RAID arrays?
The percentage of people buying Mac Pros ? Well above average. Indeed, we specifically buy Mac Pros for our Radiologists so we can attach three monitors and configure a RAID1 array.
It sure would be nice to save a grand or so per box, though. It'd pay the salaries of a couple more support staff.
The thought that a "large proportion" of Mac and potential Mac buyers want these things is laughable.
Indeed. What's your point ? I never suggested an "xMac" would be a product for the majority of Mac purchasers, simply for a large proportion of Mac Pro purchasers.
The Mac Pro covers the pros.
An "xMac" would cover a significant proportion of them better, in addition to appealing to a wider audience on the whole, but Apple won't do that because it would cannibalise their Mac Pro sales. That's kind of, you know, my whole point .
You're right, you're confused. But not about this. I made it abundantly clear that pro users can be expected to deal with these issues.
I'm confused about why you think people who would never consider buying an "xMac" would in some way be "annoyed" by it. Why would a typical Mac Mini or iMac customer even be looking at an "xMac" ?
Which is a very small number of overall Mac users. The Mac Pro does not make for a large percentage of Mac sales, and of those that would be well served by an xMac, many of them would be equally served by an iMac.
No, they wouldn't. Again, one of my main points. The feature overlap between an "xMac" and an iMac (or Mini) is tiny, because the capabilities that define an "xMac" are completely lacking from them, and people shopping for those features generally wouldn't consider an iMac (or Mini) at all. The overlap between an "xMac" and the entry-level Mac Pro, on the other hand, is significant, and a large proportion of Mac Pro customers would likely choose an "xMac" over a Mac Pro - at a cost savings to them and a profit loss to Apple - hence Apple's reluctance to create such a machine.
The Steve's ideological dislike of general-purpose devices is also a significant factor, but that's not really relevant to this discussion
Besides, your argument has been that Apple has been missing out by not offering an xMac.
No, it hasn't. My argument is that a clear example of how Apple will not cannibalise its own product lines as TFA suggests they do all the time, is the lack of a mid-range tower.
Evaluating reality is not begging the question. If you think even a large minority of PC owners ever even open their cases, you're delusional. And of those that do, most only ever upgrade their RAM, which every Mac supports just fine.
I don't think that, nor did I make even the vaguest suggestion about holding such an opinion.
That's a far cry from your initial claim that there's a "gaping hole in their computer lineup". At best, there's a very small hole that some niche markets like high end gamers (who need to run Windows anyway), hobbyists (who would balk at Apple's controlled systems anyway) and some pro users who want a lower-end Mac Pro, but still higher-end than the iMac (fair enough, but far from a sizable crowd).
Some pro users ? In my experience it's most, and have little reason to consider my experience non-representative. The gaping hole is clear, because $2500 for a machine you can
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Maybe we can finally get a party that is center-right, instead of overrun with right-wing radicals and religious nutjobs.
You have a party that's centre-right, they're called the Democrats.
What you lack is a party that's Centrist or Left.
for the Nth time: there is no need for the system or the application or the user to know anything. all the system needs to do is to create a virtual session for an executable, where the computer's resources are virtualized for the executable.
Then, for the "nth" time, how does a legitimate application modify and interact with the "real" files ? There are numerous reasons why this will be necessary, from simple editing of documents to applying patches.
The last time I asked this, you said "the user will be able to configure it". My point since, which you are either ignoring or misunderstanding, is that as soon as you allow the user to make such decisions then you a) require additional knowledge and interaction from the user and b) open yourself up to the dancing bunnies problem, essentially returning to the situation we have now.
As for the rest of your comments, regarding Ada and security, you are just plain ignorant of embedded systems and Ada if you think they are unsuitable for general purpose operating systems.
I didn't say they were. I said the fact they weren't being used suggested there was probably a good reason.
Embedded real time operating systems have the strictest performance and security requirements, covering much more ground in those two fields than generic purpose operating systems.
Embedded systems operate in completely different risk profiles (for example, inputs are nearly always minimal, strictly controlled and well-known in advance) and performance constraints (for example, sacrificing low latency for predictable latency in terms of responsiveness) than general purpose systems do. This is before even getting into things like scope of capabilities (embedded systems tend to be quite limited), development cost (relatively high for embedded systems, due to the stricter requirements for correctness) and time to market (longer for embedded systems, again due to stricter requirements).
As I said. Being good at one thing does not imply that you will be good at another thing, even if they are related.
Something more sane, why not observe the Berne Convention, 50 years?
That's 50 years after the author's death. Any copyright term that extends past death is neither sane nor justifiable.
Even if it were just 50 years, it would still be too long. Most works make the majority of their income for the author in the first few years after release, many in the first few months.
Ideally, copyright protection for a work would be split into two aspects - attribution as the creator of the work, and the ability to restrict redistribution. The former would be perpetual, and the latter would expire shortly after it had earned the creator enough money to cover the expenses incurred creating it. That's the only way it can be legitimately seen as an incentive.
Software copyrights are still the very basis allowing open-software to remain open (it is the will of the authors and is protected by copyright).
No, software copyrights are the basis of a small subset of OSS licenses restricting how source code licensed under them can be used, particularly in derivative works.
Code released under something like the BSDL would not be impacted should copyright cease to exist.
Take the Linux kernel that's under development since 1991 - when do you think the copyright on it should expire?
The original code written in 1991 ? Absolutely. How much of that do you think still remains in the contemporary kernel ?
I have been, and always will be, against anyone other than the original human creator getting any control over the copyright.
One problem with that position is dealing with collaborative works (movies being the most obvious).
As someone said above, the logical conclusion [...]
No, it's not. Property, labour and ideas are all different concepts.
Most folks decided a long time back that the work of their own hands should go to those of their own choosing [...]
So should my employer continued to pay my salary to my family after I die ?
[...] --- and have never truly signed on to the notion that the artist should be compelled to surrender his work to the public domain.
They're not. All that should happen is that the extraordinary protection and privilege they are receiving from the government - ostensibly to encourage them to produce more works - ceases to exist. If for no other reason than because the idea that someone dead can be encouraged to produce more work is patently stupid.
Also if death meant instant public domain, I think there would be a lot more bodyguards in the entertainment industry than there already are.
Why does this ridiculous idea always come up ? Who out there seriously thinks someone is going to commit pre-meditated murder to avoid being sued for copyright infringement ?
No. It is the belief that the US is better than other countries. Not perfect, just better.
IME a disturbing proportion of Americans belief that their society is the pinnacle of human civilisation, unsurpassed both past and present, and unsurpassable by all but America in the future.
Or those fanatical Canadians. The few Canadians at hockey games in the US sing that friggin national anthem louder than the 10 times as many Americans sing theirs.
Well, they're probably a bit more excited to hear it since it doesn't get played at every gathering larger than a few dozen people.
I'm sorry, but $27,750 isn't life ruining, even to someone making only $12/hour.
It's probably going to take someone on a wage like $12/hr at least five years to pay back an amount like that, assuming they don't do anything else except work, survive and service the debt.
Five years without a holiday. Five years without an opportunity pursue higher education. Five years without being to save money for either short- or long-term goals. Five years without any luxuries.
Sounds pretty ruinous to me.
What they did is illegal, and ignorance of the law is no defense against guilt, but it should be a mitigating factor in determining punishment.
Have you memorised the entire legal code of your country ? Has anyone in your entire life given you the opportunity to even look at it ?
Ignorance of the law should absolutely be a defense against guilt. In modern times, more so than ever.
It is also safe to say that the majority of people also speed in their cars, which means since everybody does it, every street should be like the AutoBahn.
Generally speaking, the only places where the majority of people are speeding, are places where the speed limit really should be higher (or the road design should be modified). It's quite uncommon for large numbers of people to dangerously exceed the speed limit.
If you steal a music CD from a store, and then make a bunch of copies and start distributing them, expect the same penalty. The girl is not charged with theft, she's charged with distribution of a copyrighted work.
This is one area of the law where intent is clearly not being given the weighting it deserves.
Most people pirating aren't doing it because they want to distribute, they're doing it because they want to download. With that in mind, they shouldn't be being punished as if their intent was to distribute.
That is what you get these days with the balance of power being held by the Greens and independents. It used to be that the independents and small parties would come up with the looney ideas, but more and more we are seeing the big parties filling that role. EG. The Internet Filter aka The Great Firewall of Australia.
IIRC internet filtering came from an Independent, and without a doubt the only reason either major party continues to give it lip service is to buy the votes of independents on other issues.
No, application access resources normally.
HOW DOES THE SYSTEM (OR THE USER) KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN "AN APPLICATION" AND MALWARE ?
Application vendors do not need to specify privilege levels. All applications must be considered not trustworthy, unless proven so or set to be so manually.
So who decides whether or not an application is "trustworthy", how, and when ?
* If it's the user, you still have the dancing bunnies problem.
* If it's the vendor, you still have the incompetent or malicious vendor problem.
* If it's some third party, you have the loss of general-purposeness problem.
Each application installed can only manipulate a copy of the resources, except for the files that it has created...thus, if the application is compromised, the system is not affected.
If applications can only manipulate data and files they have created, how do you deal with multiple applications that need to access and/or modify the same set of data and files ?
Look, in the big picture, "system files" are largely irrelevant - they can be restored from read-only media in a matter of minutes or hours. What matters is the unique data. Protecting the system only really assists the clean-up process, by which time the damage is already done. That's not to say it shouldn't be done, but it's by far a secondary concern.
You also haven't addressed what prevents an application from, say, firing up a network connection to a botnet controller and becoming a DDoS zombie or open relay.
My proposal explicitly does not require decisions from the end users.
Then it requires a centralised, third-party management system of some description, and makes the system no longer general purpose and capable of running arbitrary software.
It's not required.
Then there's nothing to prevent malicious software being installed.
You still haven't understood my proposal.
No, apparently I haven't. In particular I am having trouble seeing how it still allows the user to run whatever software they want, while preventing them from running malicious software, or how it allows them to run software that manipulates their data, while preventing malicious software they have run from doing the same.
Not a good argument. Do you have any specific reasons why Ada is not a viable solution? I bet you don't.
I never said it wasn't a viable solution. I said the distinct lack of products using it suggest there is probably a good reason why it isn't used. Note that these reasons may have nothing whatsoever to do with Ada itself.
Other than that, there is no technical reason that Ada is not suitable for commercial operating systems, especially since complex critical safety kernels and systems are built with Ada.
This isn't really a compelling argument. Just because a tool is really good for one thing (embedded, limited functionality, static, critical systems) doesn't mean it's good at another (general purpose, extensive functionality, dynamic, non-critical systems).
The reason Ada is not adopted is because Microsoft doesn't really care about security; they care about stocks, and security perhaps even goes against that; non-security means a) easy hacking and copying of its products, b) a market generated solely around the deficiencies of its operating system.
Poor security is bad for business, so to say they don't care is just plain stupid. Especially given the extensive and well-documented efforts towards improving security in Windows for the better part of a decade now, including significant refactoring, reimplementation and re-architecting of pretty much every aspect of the system.
Incidentally, most "security products" aren't doing anything to address the "deficiencies of its operating system" (whatever those might be - can you identify some), because they are nearly all there to either a) prevent bad things from happening once the security systems in the OS have already been bypassed (nearly always by an ignorant user and/or third-party software), or b) clean up afterwards. To use the obligatory car analogy, they're airbags, not ABS.
Such a comment can easily backfire with all the video-evidence where Israelic soldiers used palestina kids as human shields.
Even if that's true - which I doubt - it has no relevance to how disingenuous your comment was. There's nothing "special" about women and children dying when they're being proactively put in harm's way.
Ah a well informed person. Do you know the death-rates between the parties in the last 20 years? Every year it is something like: Palestina: 700+ more than 200+ children, more than 200+ woman. Israel: 0-15. Always soldiers.
Your argument is disingenuous. The Palestinians happily use women and children as "soldiers".
An application that is considered potentially harmful, like a web browser, runs in a virtual session. When malware asks for file 'Bar' or a network connection, then it uses the virtual resources. If the file 'Bar' or the network connection or any other resource is a resource that requires more privileges, then then user IS NOT ASKED through UAT or privilege elevation permission to use the resource, but a virtual resource has been setup APRIORI to be used instead of the real one. The malware thinks it uses the real thing, but it does not.
Then how do legitimate applications access the "real" resources ? If it is the end user that ultimately makes the decision - regardless of whether they do it beforehand (though that adds an additional burden of knowledge making it even more unworkable) or on-demand - then that is not a solution because it will fall victim to the same problem we have today: people are more than happy to do whatever it takes to see the dancing bunnies.
This security setup is created when the application is installed. The user is not involved in any way in the process. New applications can be installed in the context of a running application (say, a new interactive session), but these applications cannot affect anything else in the system. If there is malware installed under a virtual session, then the user can log in another more privileged session to correct the problem.
Your system appears to be completely reliant on a) application vendors to correctly specify the privilege levels they need and b) end users to make educated decisions about whether or not to trust the vendors. Alternatively, c) a tightly-controlled and strictly enforced source of applications that can be installed.
Experience suggests this is not a workable solution for a general-purpose system. Options (a) and (b) simply don't happen and option (c) removes the arbitrary nature of the software that can be used (ie: you get an iPad). If it *was*, we would never have had these problems in the first place, as existing systems have sufficient capabilities to provide essentially all the functionality you are talking about.
Modern systems don't lack the features you desire because people haven't thought of it. They lack them because they haven't been practical to implement. Though the exploding popularity of tightly controlled devices like the iPad and iPhone may change this.
Why isn't it an answer?
Because my point was the lack of general-purpose OSes written in Ada suggests it's not a viable solution for that purpose.
if a programming language is suitable for safe-critical systems, then it certainly is suitable for general purpose operating systems.
Maybe, maybe not. There are numerous and often non-obvious interwoven factors at play in these sorts of situations.
Your comment referenced "laptops," not just the MacBook Air.
No, it specifically referenced the MBA.
Not surprising that a device designed specifically for maximum portability would be less flexible as far as upgrades.
Yes, exactly. Which is probably exactly the same reason Sony do it.
Ah, radiologists. A huge market!
Most Mac Pro users fit the profile, in my experience. A vanishingly small proportion need more hardware than an "xMac" would deliver.
The other way to look at it, of course, is that the entry-level Mac Pro should be about a grand cheaper.
Because it's another choice.
So is the Mac Pro. So is the Mac Mini. So are all the laptop options.
And the price you're talking about puts it right in the middle of the iMac price range. Now, rather than a clear choice based on their budget, they have to weigh up different configurations. You've created a hurdle to jump in the buying process of an iMac.
You mean just like the "hurdle" between choosing a Mac Mini + screen or an iMac ?
It says "promoting technologies that disrupts it's own product lines." You're not talking about a technology that isn't already in Mac product lines. You're taking about a cut-price model of what is already a niche high-end product.
But they *don't* disrupt their own product lines. They fit things into the gaps.
Except you don't elaborate on them. When I ask what features other than internal upgradability, you state that that is the feature, now you say it's coincidental?
No, I said the form factor was the feature. It allows multiple video cards, multiple internal drives, larger (and cheaper) memory configurations and miscellaneous expansion cards.
Um... The whole idea of there being some sort of glaring hole in the Mac lineup implies some sort of reasonably sized bloc of users, yet the best you can come up with is that some pro users might have preferred an xMac.
No, it says there's a hole in the options that forces customers to either go with a less capable machine (iMac or Mac Mini) or spend more than they want to.
I've never heard a single Mac Pro user say they wish there was a lesser model.
That's because you're framing the question to get the answer you want.
Ask how many Mac customers want a single-socket, quad-core capable machine that can take two video cards, two internal hard disks and 16-24GB of RAM for about $1500. Lots of them do, and have been asking Apple to sell one again for the better part of a decade.
Pro users make their livelihood on their machines and what you're seeing as a $1,000+ waste, they see as a $1,000+ investment.
$1000 for something unneeded isn't an investment, it's a waste. $1000 times, say, a couple of hundred machines is a couple of staff worth of waste.
Most will make that back and then some in productivity. The last thing a professional should ever do is skimp on their tools. Tools are cheap, even at $2.5k-$4k+.
Please explain where you think $1000 of extra productivity is coming from for an entry-level Mac Pro vs an "xMac".
Almost no one does internal upgrades any more, apart from the occasional RAM upgrade. And Apple computers are RAM expandable.
Who said anything about upgrades ?
The miniscule proportion of people that want 4 monitors or RAID are well served by the Mac Pro.
Except it costs about a grand or so more than it needs to for that functionality.
No doubt if you bought car purchasers whether they'd like to purchase almost the same spec car for 40% cheaper, they'd say yes too. So what? Taking out one expansion slot, 2 drive bays, and ADDING a couple of RAM slots isn't going to make a product $1000 cheaper.
Everyone else manages to price single-socket workstations with 3-4 expansion slots, 2 internal drive bays and 6 RAM slots around the $1000-$1200 mark. Even allowing for the traditional ~25% "Apple Tax", a base-level machine with those features should be easily doable at $1500.
Nothing. It only prevents the damage done by malware.
How ? How does the computer know whether or not the application trying to access files and/or the network is malware or legitimate ? Or are you saying the data within the virtual session *is* permanently modified ? In which case, like I said earlier, the practical difference to today's systems is zero.
You say "I know what you mean" and then you completely fail to show that you understood what I am proposing. So here it is again, with an example: suppose malware 'Foo' wants to alter the contents of file 'Bar'. 'Foo' opens the file 'Bar', and alters the contents. The operating system kernel though, instead of delivering the original file, it does a copy-on-write on file 'Bar', and therefore the original file 'Bar' is preserved.
So when the next program opens 'Bar' which copy does it get ? How does the OS know which copy to present ? How does the user make a _permanent_ change to 'Bar' and what prevents malware run by the user from making that change ?
How does any of this prevent the malware from opening a network connection ?
Lots of military embedded systems, lots of avionics systems. The F22 software, for example. Some parts of the F16 software kernel. Or the THALES Crotale kernel...really, if you look around, safety-critical and Ada go hand in hand.
Perhaps you missed the "general purpose OS" part of my question ? Listing of a bunch of highly-specialised, embedded applications isn't an answer.
Yet you reject it for a commercial operating system kernel? how strange.
I didn't reject it. Like I said, the industry isn't exactly crawling with general purposes OSes (or software, for that matter) written in Ada.
Apparently you meant just "feature", specifically, having internal expandability.
No, I meant features. That those features result from a non-integrated form factor is an incidental consequence.
Something which the vast majority of PC buyers never take advantage of aside from sometimes RAM upgrades, which the Mac mini and iMac handle just fine.
Who cares about "the vast majority of PC buyers" ? We're talking about a specific demographic.
I already covered RAM. What percentage of PC buyers do you think have three or more monitors, or RAID arrays?
The percentage of people buying Mac Pros ? Well above average. Indeed, we specifically buy Mac Pros for our Radiologists so we can attach three monitors and configure a RAID1 array.
It sure would be nice to save a grand or so per box, though. It'd pay the salaries of a couple more support staff.
The thought that a "large proportion" of Mac and potential Mac buyers want these things is laughable.
Indeed. What's your point ? I never suggested an "xMac" would be a product for the majority of Mac purchasers, simply for a large proportion of Mac Pro purchasers.
The Mac Pro covers the pros.
An "xMac" would cover a significant proportion of them better, in addition to appealing to a wider audience on the whole, but Apple won't do that because it would cannibalise their Mac Pro sales. That's kind of, you know, my whole point .
You're right, you're confused. But not about this. I made it abundantly clear that pro users can be expected to deal with these issues.
I'm confused about why you think people who would never consider buying an "xMac" would in some way be "annoyed" by it. Why would a typical Mac Mini or iMac customer even be looking at an "xMac" ?
Which is a very small number of overall Mac users. The Mac Pro does not make for a large percentage of Mac sales, and of those that would be well served by an xMac, many of them would be equally served by an iMac.
No, they wouldn't. Again, one of my main points. The feature overlap between an "xMac" and an iMac (or Mini) is tiny, because the capabilities that define an "xMac" are completely lacking from them, and people shopping for those features generally wouldn't consider an iMac (or Mini) at all. The overlap between an "xMac" and the entry-level Mac Pro, on the other hand, is significant, and a large proportion of Mac Pro customers would likely choose an "xMac" over a Mac Pro - at a cost savings to them and a profit loss to Apple - hence Apple's reluctance to create such a machine.
The Steve's ideological dislike of general-purpose devices is also a significant factor, but that's not really relevant to this discussion
Besides, your argument has been that Apple has been missing out by not offering an xMac.
No, it hasn't. My argument is that a clear example of how Apple will not cannibalise its own product lines as TFA suggests they do all the time, is the lack of a mid-range tower.
Evaluating reality is not begging the question. If you think even a large minority of PC owners ever even open their cases, you're delusional. And of those that do, most only ever upgrade their RAM, which every Mac supports just fine.
I don't think that, nor did I make even the vaguest suggestion about holding such an opinion.
That's a far cry from your initial claim that there's a "gaping hole in their computer lineup". At best, there's a very small hole that some niche markets like high end gamers (who need to run Windows anyway), hobbyists (who would balk at Apple's controlled systems anyway) and some pro users who want a lower-end Mac Pro, but still higher-end than the iMac (fair enough, but far from a sizable crowd).
Some pro users ? In my experience it's most, and have little reason to consider my experience non-representative. The gaping hole is clear, because $2500 for a machine you can