I was using IRC on an university account, and was contacted by them to stop using the service. I explained I was using the IRC for research and would remove it immediately if it was causing a problem, and received an email from the sys admin thanking me for my honesty, and telling me I could contintue using it.
Eiffel is a great language, and Meyer's book is wonderful. However, we live in a C++-centric world when it comes to OOP. Much of this has to do with good marketing by AT&T and bad marketing by Meyers. From my personal experience, I can tell you this--you will live in a world of pain, if you learn Eiffel and then develop in C++. You will learn OOP right--and then see it done wrong. And every day, the hurt will continue. Spare yourself, and succumb to the popular methodologies.
I'm hoping he'll be working on a metadata solution for the Mac OS X filesystem. The transition from 9's file type metadata to X's filename extension has been a big step backwards, and the BeOS is renowned for its handling of metadata. Perhaps Apple hired him with an eye towards imporving things?
Adobe comments on government action under DMCA
Adobe's goal in the Elcomsoft case is to help protect the copyrighted works of authors, artists, developers and publishers. Adobe reported this suspected eBook authors' copyright violation to the U.S. Attorney's office. Based on the information gathered in the investigation (see affidavit ), the U.S. Government chose to take legal action to stop the sale of the for-profit security cracking code, and unilaterally decided to arrest Dmitry Sklyarov.
Elcomsoft found a security weakness and made no effort to communicate what it found to Adobe. Instead, the company distributed a software product for profit that can be used to compromise copyrighted works in the United States, violating U.S. law. Adobe took every measure likely to be successful to get Elcomsoft to cease and desist. Adobe's legal department sent letters to Elcomsoft, their ISP and their credit card clearing house used to offer these products for sale. Adobe forwarded the case to the U.S. Attorney's office only after Elcomsoft failed to respond and/or cease and desist. Our goal has been to stop the sale of the program in the U.S.
Contrary to some reports, the issue is not that Adobe alerted the U.S. government about an expert exposing security weaknesses. In fact, Adobe encourages its customers and the software community, including White Hat security experts, to provide feedback on the performance of its software in order to make improvements. Adobe's concern is that a "digital lock pick" is being distributed to enable others to compromise the copyrighted works of authors, artists, developers and publishers, which is why Adobe alerted the U.S. Attorney's office.
Corporate
Q: How are your customers, the publishing community, responding to this?
A: The Electronic Frontier Foundation considers themselves a leading civil liberties organization that works to protect right in the digital world. We are in constant communication with our customers who are also concerned about issues of privacy and protection of digital property. There is strong support from the publishing community, as evidenced by the statement from the American Association of Publishers. While the laws to enforce the protection of digital media are in their infancy, we believe they are based on the same principles as traditional media--protect the copyrights of authors, artists, developers and publishers while balancing the right to fair use.
Q: What's going on with the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)?
A: We are engaged in discussions with the EFF to work together to address this situation. We believe a mutual frank discussion of how best to resolve the current issues will benefit Adobe and EFF.
Q: As a result of this case, what is Adobe doing to strengthen the security of its products?
A: Security is an ongoing effort at Adobe. The company is committed to strengthening the security of its products by using sophisticated, industry-standard levels of software encryption and working with the software community, including White Hat security experts, to incorporate features to advance the quality of the product.
Legal questions
Q: Elcomsoft claims that eBooks in Adobe PDF are insecure and that the encryption is weak, including ROT-13 which is notorious for its lack of security. Are those claims true?
A: Adobe has never sold ROT-13 as a security product. Adobe incorporates sophisticated, industry-standard levels of software encryption to make our products difficult to compromise. However, no software is 100% secure from a determined, illegal attack. When used legally and in its intended fashion, the Acrobat eBook Reader secures eBooks purchased by locking the eBook to the hardware from which it was purchased. The Elcomsoft software circumvents the security afforded by our software to protect copyrighted works.
I'm not so concerned about which OS is in the booth, as much as I am about new goodies to plug into my machines. What's up with that wireless? And USB, FireWire, etc.?
Slashdot Mirror
Most developers? I would love to live in that world.
I was using IRC on an university account, and was contacted by them to stop using the service. I explained I was using the IRC for research and would remove it immediately if it was causing a problem, and received an email from the sys admin thanking me for my honesty, and telling me I could contintue using it.
Honestly, why does it take 60,000 programmers 60 days to fix an IE URL error?
They were too busy trying to finish up that "Hamlet" draft they've been working on.
Eiffel is a great language, and Meyer's book is wonderful. However, we live in a C++-centric world when it comes to OOP. Much of this has to do with good marketing by AT&T and bad marketing by Meyers. From my personal experience, I can tell you this--you will live in a world of pain, if you learn Eiffel and then develop in C++. You will learn OOP right--and then see it done wrong. And every day, the hurt will continue. Spare yourself, and succumb to the popular methodologies.
this is one of the greatest articles i have seen on slashdot. Thanks to Castolari and the slashdot person repsonsible for seletcing it!
Yeah, I had tetris as an assignment in my first OOP course. We had to implement it in Eiffel. That was more fun than playing it!
I agree, it's a shame he didn't write more. I thought his solo efforts were clever.
The Lisa ran UNIX.
Not entirely Free Software, but go to their website and you can download the frameworks that OmniWeb uses. Very useful stuff.
My Nextstation has an ADB keyboard and mouse.
This reminded me of something I found a while back, a scan of the NeXT Network and System Administration Manual. Good one to add to your collection.
I'm hoping he'll be working on a metadata solution for the Mac OS X filesystem. The transition from 9's file type metadata to X's filename extension has been a big step backwards, and the BeOS is renowned for its handling of metadata. Perhaps Apple hired him with an eye towards imporving things?
Adobe comments on government action under DMCA
Adobe's goal in the Elcomsoft case is to help protect the copyrighted works of authors, artists, developers and publishers. Adobe reported this suspected eBook authors' copyright violation to the U.S. Attorney's office. Based on the information gathered in the investigation (see affidavit ), the U.S. Government chose to take legal action to stop the sale of the for-profit security cracking code, and unilaterally decided to arrest Dmitry Sklyarov.
Elcomsoft found a security weakness and made no effort to communicate what it found to Adobe. Instead, the company distributed a software product for profit that can be used to compromise copyrighted works in the United States, violating U.S. law. Adobe took every measure likely to be successful to get Elcomsoft to cease and desist. Adobe's legal department sent letters to Elcomsoft, their ISP and their credit card clearing house used to offer these products for sale. Adobe forwarded the case to the U.S. Attorney's office only after Elcomsoft failed to respond and/or cease and desist. Our goal has been to stop the sale of the program in the U.S.
Contrary to some reports, the issue is not that Adobe alerted the U.S. government about an expert exposing security weaknesses. In fact, Adobe encourages its customers and the software community, including White Hat security experts, to provide feedback on the performance of its software in order to make improvements. Adobe's concern is that a "digital lock pick" is being distributed to enable others to compromise the copyrighted works of authors, artists, developers and publishers, which is why Adobe alerted the U.S. Attorney's office.
Corporate
Q: How are your customers, the publishing community, responding to this?
A: The Electronic Frontier Foundation considers themselves a leading civil liberties organization that works to protect right in the digital world. We are in constant communication with our customers who are also concerned about issues of privacy and protection of digital property. There is strong support from the publishing community, as evidenced by the statement from the American Association of Publishers. While the laws to enforce the protection of digital media are in their infancy, we believe they are based on the same principles as traditional media--protect the copyrights of authors, artists, developers and publishers while balancing the right to fair use.
Q: What's going on with the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)?
A: We are engaged in discussions with the EFF to work together to address this situation. We believe a mutual frank discussion of how best to resolve the current issues will benefit Adobe and EFF.
Q: As a result of this case, what is Adobe doing to strengthen the security of its products?
A: Security is an ongoing effort at Adobe. The company is committed to strengthening the security of its products by using sophisticated, industry-standard levels of software encryption and working with the software community, including White Hat security experts, to incorporate features to advance the quality of the product.
Legal questions
Q: Elcomsoft claims that eBooks in Adobe PDF are insecure and that the encryption is weak, including ROT-13 which is notorious for its lack of security. Are those claims true?
A: Adobe has never sold ROT-13 as a security product. Adobe incorporates sophisticated, industry-standard levels of software encryption to make our products difficult to compromise. However, no software is 100% secure from a determined, illegal attack. When used legally and in its intended fashion, the Acrobat eBook Reader secures eBooks purchased by locking the eBook to the hardware from which it was purchased. The Elcomsoft software circumvents the security afforded by our software to protect copyrighted works.
I'm not so concerned about which OS is in the booth, as much as I am about new goodies to plug into my machines. What's up with that wireless? And USB, FireWire, etc.?
...With warning labels like 'Intel Inside'.
Sun gushes out Windows builds faster than it does for Solaris. I'm not losing sleep over Java for Windows.
I recommend these articles that speculate on the impact of digital currency (and they're fun to read):
http://www.aci.net/kalliste/money1.htm
http://www.aci.net/kalliste/money2.htm