Doesn't matter, odds are that the programmer was being dragged in so many different directions at once that consistently focusing on code quality is pretty much an impossibility. And I'm speaking from experience.
Let's try not posting this as an Anonymous Coward by mistake.
This is the same company that employed Dmitry Skylarov, one of the first people to be arrested under the DMCA for breaking the encryption on Adobe's eBook format.
The writing was on the wall as soon as Apple announced that the Xserve line was going away and nothing would be replacing it as a rackmount option. The sad thing is that everything works remarkably well together (we've had 6 servers attached to 6TB of storage using Xsan for years now with no problems) but it's simply no longer a supported solution. And Apple's suggestion to replace the servers with Mac Pros or Mac Minis is simply ridiculous for a handful of reasons. In the mean time, we're looking at hardware from IBM and Oracle and weighing our options.
You also forget that the F-15 airframe is 30 years old. Most airframes in service are 25-30 years old, and it wasn't that long ago that we had one simply disintegrate in mid-air. This necessitated grounding our entire F-15 fleet, with the embarrassing result of the United States having to rely on our Canadian friends to assist in our air defense.
You are right that the F-15 is a very capable aircraft with the best combat record of any American fighter. But right now, we have two options: we can either revive production of the F-15 to replace our aging airframes, or we can field a new aircraft that will be technologically ahead of the curve for another 30 years.
Well, you're making the mistake of thinking that Louisiana is a homogeneous state. It may be true that the majority of the population of Louisiana is Protestant, this really only holds true in the northern and central part of the state. South Louisiana, which gave birth to Mardi Gras, always has and will probably always be majority Catholic.
By the time you reach North Louisiana, that influence has diminished significantly and you'll find that the majority population is now Protestant. It's just that when people think of Louisiana, they think of New Orleans and not much else.
Slashdot did a poll of the readership a longtime back on their political leanings a while back. If I'm adding correctly, roughly 34% of Slashdot is left leaning.
Like the RIAA, they're being dangerously slow to embrace the new technology so widely used by their own customers.
Actually, the entire area of Library Science has been slow to embrace new technology. The two core technologies that I work with daily while writing software for my institution (MARC and Z39.50) were created back in the 1970s. There have been initiatives to move to more modern technologies (MARCXML to replace MARC21 and SRU to replace Z39.50 access) but these are seeing remarkably slow adoption. Hell, OCLC's backend doesn't even support Unicode according to the discussions I've had with their people.
Inputting the record into a MARC editor isn't the hard part. The problem is that the actual rules for how to catalog data are incredibly complex. For example, there are the ALA set of cataloging rules and the AACR2 cataloging rules. The books on these are absolutely huge.
Well, the problem is whether or not the Library of Congress has a record for what you are cataloging. For example, my institution's library consists of a large number of rare books that do not appear in the LoC database. I'm sure there are plenty of other organizations in the same boat as us, which is how OCLC stays in business.
You don't play against the house in poker, you play against the other players sitting at the table. In exchange for providing a table and a dealer, the casino takes a percentage of each pot (each winning hand). Therefore, it's in their best interest to run an honest game.
I'm a Mac user also and it seems like I install a security update about once a month. OS X is good but it's not that good. Hell, it's a few weeks after details of the huge gaping exploit in ARD was announced and there still isnt a security update. The best you can do is remove ARD.
Modernizing doesn't mean we are increasing. We are continuing to comply with our obligations under START II with Russia. We are merely modernizing to make our existing stockpile safer and easier to maintain. Nowhere in the article does it say that we are increasing our stockpile.
Now, what were you saying about ignorant Americans?
That's because they were using something called SQL injection to execute arbitrary code in the database. The reason this only effects Microsoft platforms is because they code they were injecting is quite specific to MS SQL Server.
And this isn't a server configuration problem. This is shoddy coding on the part of the programmers that created the websites that got hacked. The same thing could happen to something running PostgreSQL + PHP + Apache.
To me, it looks more like they are trying to prove that they can compete with, and surpass, all their.Net competition by sheer number of "features"/"capabilities" - which does not make it better. Their.Net framework already scaled horrendously to many types of implementations (like the Service/Customer tracking unit CompUSA used to use - as any of you who worked in Tech or Business Sales can attest to - from fond memories of running a rather simple report, going out for coffee and a quick breakfast, coming back, and still having 10 minutes to wait (of a total 30-40 minutes) - nor were the data sets that big, or the front end complex). Did it ever occur to you that the software in question was probably crap? I've done reporting using.NET and SQL Server over a moderate data set (a few gigabytes) and always had the report generate in a few seconds. The.NET framework would be the last thing I would look at for performance problems.
Also, apple doesn't come with a standard VNC server, instead it uses VNC with some proprietary shit built in, so I had to install vine server to get a remote desktop. Of course, vine server sucks as well, because I can't get it to start on boot, without logging into the server with either the native server admin tools, or locally with a KVM.
You can get a standard VNC client to connect to the built-in VNC server that ships with OSX. It takes some very specific settings, but it can be done. I've done it using TightVNC and UltraVNC on Windows before I finally switched to a Mac on the client side. If you Google around a bit, you should be able to find them.
Oh wait, the X Serve doesn't play nice with a standard KVM. I have an extra mouse and keyboard setting in my rack just for the X Serve.
Are you sure your KVM is standard? I have a 16-Port KVM complete with terminal, keyboard, and trackpad that works fine with the 6 XServes in the rack as well as with the FreeBSD, Linux, and Windows boxes in the rack.
Once you manage to get in the damn thing, if you have any sort of complicated setup at all, you simply CAN'T DO it using the server admin tool. I've usually had to bust into the config files just like any other Unix system. Take a look at the SQL section of the Server Admin tool, its a fucking joke. Also, even if you do start to do some things by hand, shit still doesn't work right.
That's what really sucks about OS X Server. Unless you have really basic needs that Apple envisioned, the GUI tools are useless. On top of that, you can't really customize anything that Apple has provided with the server. I tried compiling a custom PHP5 and installing the module on the stock Apache server only to have it crash Apache. I called Apple Support, and while they said it is technically possible to do what I was trying, they wouldn't provide any support for it. I ended up just compiling my own copy of Apache and PHP5 and saying to hell with the GUI tool.
On the other hand, OS X Server is awesome for managing a network of Macs. That's all about I can really recommend it for.
It should be noted that Bobby Fischer's mother is Jewish. The man was mentally ill, which while not excusing the things he said, at least makes it a little easier to understand.
I understand, that writing a VM can be fun, but I'm just wondering, are there any other reasons for working on this project? What merits it has?
The reason you want a VM is for performance reasons. If you take a look at a high-performance VM like Java's HotSpot VM, it can actually do code analysis while the program is running and then do optimizations on the fly. YARV, which is being developed by the Ruby team, will give Ruby somewhere around a 3x performance increase. I expect to see continued performance increases as they improve YARV.
Also, Parrot isn't intended just for Perl. It's goal is to be a general VM that any language can run on. So if someone writes a compiler for Python, that language will gain any performance improvements that Parrot can offer.
I had the same issue with the nVidia drivers and my last GeForce card. Turned out the hardware was dying and the problems only showed up under load while gaming. After getting a replacement, I've had no issues. That was very much a hardware problem causing instability in Windows.
Slashdot Mirror
Doesn't matter, odds are that the programmer was being dragged in so many different directions at once that consistently focusing on code quality is pretty much an impossibility. And I'm speaking from experience.
Let's try not posting this as an Anonymous Coward by mistake.
This is the same company that employed Dmitry Skylarov, one of the first people to be arrested under the DMCA for breaking the encryption on Adobe's eBook format.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dmitry_Sklyarov
The writing was on the wall as soon as Apple announced that the Xserve line was going away and nothing would be replacing it as a rackmount option. The sad thing is that everything works remarkably well together (we've had 6 servers attached to 6TB of storage using Xsan for years now with no problems) but it's simply no longer a supported solution. And Apple's suggestion to replace the servers with Mac Pros or Mac Minis is simply ridiculous for a handful of reasons. In the mean time, we're looking at hardware from IBM and Oracle and weighing our options.
What version of Visual Studio? I have 2008 and 2010 running on Windows 7 with absolutely zero issues.
You also forget that the F-15 airframe is 30 years old. Most airframes in service are 25-30 years old, and it wasn't that long ago that we had one simply disintegrate in mid-air. This necessitated grounding our entire F-15 fleet, with the embarrassing result of the United States having to rely on our Canadian friends to assist in our air defense.
You are right that the F-15 is a very capable aircraft with the best combat record of any American fighter. But right now, we have two options: we can either revive production of the F-15 to replace our aging airframes, or we can field a new aircraft that will be technologically ahead of the curve for another 30 years.
Well, you're making the mistake of thinking that Louisiana is a homogeneous state. It may be true that the majority of the population of Louisiana is Protestant, this really only holds true in the northern and central part of the state. South Louisiana, which gave birth to Mardi Gras, always has and will probably always be majority Catholic.
By the time you reach North Louisiana, that influence has diminished significantly and you'll find that the majority population is now Protestant. It's just that when people think of Louisiana, they think of New Orleans and not much else.
Slashdot did a poll of the readership a longtime back on their political leanings a while back. If I'm adding correctly, roughly 34% of Slashdot is left leaning.
The only problem is that the "wing-nutters" have all the guns.
This business will get out of control. It will get out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it.
Like the RIAA, they're being dangerously slow to embrace the new technology so widely used by their own customers.
Actually, the entire area of Library Science has been slow to embrace new technology. The two core technologies that I work with daily while writing software for my institution (MARC and Z39.50) were created back in the 1970s. There have been initiatives to move to more modern technologies (MARCXML to replace MARC21 and SRU to replace Z39.50 access) but these are seeing remarkably slow adoption. Hell, OCLC's backend doesn't even support Unicode according to the discussions I've had with their people.
Inputting the record into a MARC editor isn't the hard part. The problem is that the actual rules for how to catalog data are incredibly complex. For example, there are the ALA set of cataloging rules and the AACR2 cataloging rules. The books on these are absolutely huge.
Well, the problem is whether or not the Library of Congress has a record for what you are cataloging. For example, my institution's library consists of a large number of rare books that do not appear in the LoC database. I'm sure there are plenty of other organizations in the same boat as us, which is how OCLC stays in business.
Microsoft currently has ASP.NET MVC in beta right now. Not sure when one can expect a stable release though.
You don't play against the house in poker, you play against the other players sitting at the table. In exchange for providing a table and a dealer, the casino takes a percentage of each pot (each winning hand). Therefore, it's in their best interest to run an honest game.
There's a reason why we love Arkansas and Mississippi in Louisiana. They're the only two states worse than us in education.
I'm a Mac user also and it seems like I install a security update about once a month. OS X is good but it's not that good. Hell, it's a few weeks after details of the huge gaping exploit in ARD was announced and there still isnt a security update. The best you can do is remove ARD.
Modernizing doesn't mean we are increasing. We are continuing to comply with our obligations under START II with Russia. We are merely modernizing to make our existing stockpile safer and easier to maintain. Nowhere in the article does it say that we are increasing our stockpile.
Now, what were you saying about ignorant Americans?
That's because they were using something called SQL injection to execute arbitrary code in the database. The reason this only effects Microsoft platforms is because they code they were injecting is quite specific to MS SQL Server.
And this isn't a server configuration problem. This is shoddy coding on the part of the programmers that created the websites that got hacked. The same thing could happen to something running PostgreSQL + PHP + Apache.
Also, apple doesn't come with a standard VNC server, instead it uses VNC with some proprietary shit built in, so I had to install vine server to get a remote desktop. Of course, vine server sucks as well, because I can't get it to start on boot, without logging into the server with either the native server admin tools, or locally with a KVM.
You can get a standard VNC client to connect to the built-in VNC server that ships with OSX. It takes some very specific settings, but it can be done. I've done it using TightVNC and UltraVNC on Windows before I finally switched to a Mac on the client side. If you Google around a bit, you should be able to find them.
Oh wait, the X Serve doesn't play nice with a standard KVM. I have an extra mouse and keyboard setting in my rack just for the X Serve.
Are you sure your KVM is standard? I have a 16-Port KVM complete with terminal, keyboard, and trackpad that works fine with the 6 XServes in the rack as well as with the FreeBSD, Linux, and Windows boxes in the rack.
Once you manage to get in the damn thing, if you have any sort of complicated setup at all, you simply CAN'T DO it using the server admin tool. I've usually had to bust into the config files just like any other Unix system. Take a look at the SQL section of the Server Admin tool, its a fucking joke. Also, even if you do start to do some things by hand, shit still doesn't work right.
That's what really sucks about OS X Server. Unless you have really basic needs that Apple envisioned, the GUI tools are useless. On top of that, you can't really customize anything that Apple has provided with the server. I tried compiling a custom PHP5 and installing the module on the stock Apache server only to have it crash Apache. I called Apple Support, and while they said it is technically possible to do what I was trying, they wouldn't provide any support for it. I ended up just compiling my own copy of Apache and PHP5 and saying to hell with the GUI tool.
On the other hand, OS X Server is awesome for managing a network of Macs. That's all about I can really recommend it for.
I hear the in-game soundtrack is going to be Guns N' Roses' Chinese Democracy.
It should be noted that Bobby Fischer's mother is Jewish. The man was mentally ill, which while not excusing the things he said, at least makes it a little easier to understand.
If the server doesn't come back up, then it rollbacks the packages and sends an email to both the owner and whoever made the security update.
Just a nitpick, but how is the server supposed to rollback the security update if it can't boot up? Or am I missing something here?
I understand, that writing a VM can be fun, but I'm just wondering, are there any other reasons for working on this project? What merits it has?
The reason you want a VM is for performance reasons. If you take a look at a high-performance VM like Java's HotSpot VM, it can actually do code analysis while the program is running and then do optimizations on the fly. YARV, which is being developed by the Ruby team, will give Ruby somewhere around a 3x performance increase. I expect to see continued performance increases as they improve YARV.
Also, Parrot isn't intended just for Perl. It's goal is to be a general VM that any language can run on. So if someone writes a compiler for Python, that language will gain any performance improvements that Parrot can offer.
I had the same issue with the nVidia drivers and my last GeForce card. Turned out the hardware was dying and the problems only showed up under load while gaming. After getting a replacement, I've had no issues. That was very much a hardware problem causing instability in Windows.