You could pick your own filename. Yes, there's a lot of people who would only want an automated checker and would end up as victims, but for those that are interested in their own security, there are a lot of simple steps. The checksum could be on a floppy, or a boot block could be stored on a CD, with the checksum checking program(s) on it.
The rootkit can't replace the checksum if it doesn't know what filename to look for. It wouldn't be hard to create a program, that, when installed, can be given different names and could somehow morph so it doesn't always look the same.
I also forgot to mention a program like this could check the BIOS checksum as well.
That's what I was thinking. If I didn't see my familiar grub screen come up, I'd worry.
But then I guess the idea would be to have even grub come up on the VM.
Under those conditions, couldn't one just have a program that creates a checksum of the bootblock on install and checks it regularly? Then you can do an md5 on that program from time to time to make sure it's okay.
So either there is something terribly wrong with that idea, or it's too damned simple for MS -- but maybe they don't want a simple solution. Maybe they'd prefer making everyone believe this is good cause for built in DRM chips that will allow only Windows to boot.
That was my first thought: why is MS researching this? Pure research like this and MS just do not go together.
Honestly, this sounds like the kind of thing they'll think of so they can use it as a reason that all computers should have DRM build into the chipset, which plays right into MS being able to justify why all systems should follow their boot rules that allow only Vista to run. It's just laying the groundwork to force the exclusion of anything but Vista being able to be booted on future systems.
This is also the kind of thing that I don't think many black hats would have come up with on their own due to the amount of research. MS continaully says it is irresponsible for people to publish info on exploits in Winodws before they can patch them, yet they've just gone and published what could be one of the nastiest exploits of any OS to date. If they're doing this, it's for a reason, and experience tells us MS's reasons are good for them and bad for everyone else.
Not you, I agree. What you want is free tools to do professional work, and people would stare blank at you in dismissal, thinking : "this man thinks I will lose hours of time developing free tools for him, he must be mad, I'm not his slave". But you could not understand that, with your very bad attitude.
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. While I understand what you're saying, it wasn't a response like, "Not many users need that feature. We won't be adding it for quite a while," or, "That's a lot of work, and we're doing this for free." It was literally responses like, "Why do you need that? You need to do it differently." It was (and isn't as much now) a very strong attitude of, "We have something great. If the user doesn't see that, they're fsck'ed!"
This has changed quite a bit now. It seems most Linuxers are now aware that there are weak areas
They always were. You are the one that never understood what you where asking for, while they worked to at least get the basics right.
First: I'd really like to know how you, who has seen a few posts, know what I understood and didn't understand years ago. You can't be sure of that. You're not in a position to know.
Actually, as I said other posts, back in the 1980s, I programmed in 6502 Assembler, and even sold to Nibble magazine. I am now making a living as a programmer, but will soon be moving to video. I've seen this from the side of a user who hasn't touched a line of code in a decade and I see it from the inside now. Unfortunately, your comments are very much a symptom of the larger problem. Instead of paying attention to what I said, as a user, about what the problem seems to be as someone who uses FOSS, you are more interested in blaming me and saying I don't know what I'm asking for, and I don't know what I'm doing.
Do you see this? Instead of listening to the point of view of a user and realizing that developers have, whether rightly or wrongly, earned a certain reputation, you are more interested in blaming a user so you can be assure all developers are doing the right thing and are blameless in this. It's a blame the victim mentality and if FOSS is ever to be common on the desktop, that view point and habit of blaming the users *has* to change.
From here on, you take the attitude that I am expecting you and others to be my slaves. You want to look at me as making demands that are unreasonable.
So listen up, and pay attention, because I'm about to tell you things you don't want to hear. I started with Linux because I heard from Linuxers how much better it was than Windows. Linuxers themselves, including developers, were telling me things like "There's programs to do whatever you want to do, just not the same ones as on Windows." I've heard the Linux community, over and over, say how good it is and how much better their software is. I was convinced to try FOSS because of that. And I still hear, over and over, how great FOSS is and how it is much better than commercial programs.
In some cases it is, but often it isn't. If Linuxers are going to keep boasting, they have to produce software that can do what people need. Don't tell me Gimp will do what Photoshop will do when it does not. (And no, I don't use GimpShop, but why should you care? Other than what becomes clear through your post -- that you'd like to label me as an idiot user who doesn't know what he's doing so you can just write me and what I say off and not have to challenge yourself with examining if you're an elitist snot who hates users and considers them all wrong.) Don't tell me that there are word processors that can match Word or Word Perfect (and the Word Perfect for Linux was crippled!) when they don't. (Okay, now they do, but not 5 years ago.)
You, yourself, say, On the other hand, a Linux distro is enough most of the time. Yet, if someone says no it isn't and asks for more, and asks where programs are that meet the needs on FOSS that were already met on Windows, you say they are as
I think you're not only an exception, but on the inside, looking out, with the point of view of a developer. I am a developer, had to become one or starve, but started as a user. As a user, the point of view is quite different. I'm not talking about users asking for outrageous features yesterday. I'm talking in general, in my experience as a user, and in dealing with other users. As someone who was outside, and is now inside in many ways (and working on a F/OSS project or two), I can look back and say the issue we were talking about weren't about adding super features in minutes. Let me give you a recent example: Debian prides itself on being so stable that any upgrades on the Stable branch should never break a system. I found one that stops it from booting and have tried to deal with it. The only developer I've been able to get a response from is more interested in marking the bug report closed than in helping me understand just who is responsible for it. In the past 5-7 years, this is typical of my experience with developers.
Those that do as you say are atypical. You may not see it because you're in that atypical group. I can believe KDE does a lot of use cases. I am sure Gnome does, but then I have to ask, for Gnome and many projects: are the use cases what the developers think up, or what users come up with? In your case, you care about end users. I've noticed several cases where I've tried to get help on a project as an end user and was treated like crap and a year or so later tried to get help and asked about features more in line with programming than with usage and got immediate help, which indicates to me the focus is on the programming, not on ease of use.
One item that *really* bothers me, especially after reading your post is the "use cases" point you keep bringing up. I'm self taught as far as programming goes. I had the chance to start a busines on my own, based on programs I'd have to write (about a decade or more before I had written in 6502 Assembler on an Apple//e). Most of the software was on my own computers, but I wrote it with an eye to selling it (and the entire business) sometime in the future. That's helped a LOT, since it's taken a while and I find I'm always using "--help" on my own programs. I made sure all help messages were easy to understand and follow.
When it came time to write programs that would go on my clients' computers, the first thing I did was plan out what it had to do, then I sat down and figured out how my clients would think about it and what they'd do. I came up with a simple tabbed panel interface, figuring tab panels are easy to follow. I put all the controls they'd use a lot on the first tab. I made sure the "Start" was prominent since often that was all they'd do. Then I made notes of what the user would want to do and how I could make it easy for them. I never thought in terms of how I'd program it. I thought in terms of what my clients would need or want, how they'd think, and how simple I could make it (knowing also that some of them do NOT like using computers).
I went through everything, from a basic, "fire it up, run it, quit" scenario to all the settings a client might want to change and anything they might have trouble with. When it was done, in the next year and a half, I had a total of 6 bugs, one of which was because the user had a failing hard drive, so files written out by my program were bad when read in 2 minutes later. It lead to a few safety features transparent to the users. The next version, written 2 years later had 4 small features added (including a button to activate RealVNC to connect to my system if something went wrong). Most of the problems clients have are more about Windows or failing hardware than my system ("It sent data to the printer, but I get a error about the driver.", or the ever popular, "Why won't it print?" "Is your printer turned on?").
I did this out of instinct. I wanted my program to work as well as possible for those using it. Considering I wrote it after not programming for a decade, I'm proud of the low bug count and low level of complaints about it. What really gets me, especially after hearing you use the term "use cases" and looking it up, is realizing that this is something considered SOP in designing an interface, realizing I did it without training or any prompting, but that many FOSS programmers avoided it and would get nasty about it. That does seem to be changing, but it befuddles me how so many programmers that have been formally trained and coding for much longer than I have don't ever think about how a user will use their program.
And that is EXACTLY the problem with a LOT of FOSS out there. Some is excellent, and some, like OpenOffice, has corporate backing and has to be handled like a professional and not hobby project.
When I last tried Gnome, which was something like 3-5 years ago, I decided against it for one of the reasons you pointed out: it seemed like it was more about programmers trying to outdo and impress each other than about providing a useful and easy to use GUI. I've felt like KDE, from as early as I've seen it, has been focused on providing what the user needs/wants, not on impressing developers. I think that is why KDE is easier to use and why I picked it. I can use console only tools and frequently do when I'm programming, but when I'm not in "programming" mode, I want the computer to bend to my needs, not me bend to its limits.
And that is what I think many developers don't understand because they're too busy writing geek show off code instead of something useful. I think you and I pretty much agree on a lot of that.
Tried it a while back, when I was still doing professional editing. I've had to stop for a while to do a LOT of programming. As an editor, I found it very frustrating. It felt nothing at all like actual editing. Even Premiere felt more like a true video editing station than Cinelerra. I may try it again when I get back to it, but at this point, when I'm back into working on production, I'll be using a Mac. I know that has top quality editing and DVD authoring software and I don't have to waste time creating config files and other things. I can drag and drop, which, when I'm in "creative" mode, is much more appropriate.
Thanks for the suggestion, though. I have high hopes for KDEnlive, if it ever goes anywhere, but it's still not far along.
Exactly. The trouble is there are too many Liuxers who are so busy being intelligent, they don't listen to user comments like that. When I first started using Linux, I kept asking about a word processor that had macros that would let me redefine margins with keystrokes. Every programmer, developer, or even Linux user (and this was 5-7 years ago) kept saying, "Why would you want that?" with a tone of voice that indicated that if it couldn't be done, why should I care. I'd explain that I was a screenwriter, and if you've ever seen a film/video script, you'd know the margins change every few lines (I've counted upto 20 margin changes on a page), and I didn't have time to use the mouse. Then came the "use emacs or vi" thing. I tried to explain while they worked for programming, they did not work for me in "writing" mode. They did not foster creativity. They'd look at me with a blank stare.
It was a general attitude of, "Linux rocks, and if you don't see that, you're lame. If you want to do something that can't be done on Linux, you're doing something wrong. Not me." I also kept trying to find a program that would import Corel Draw's vector graphic files. Again the puzzled, "Why would you want to do that?" response. I explained that I had a LOT of files in that format, including the company logo and other things. Again, the head shaking and asking if I couldn't just redo them.
This has changed quite a bit now. It seems most Linuxers are now aware that there are weak areas. OpenOffice has the office suite thing wrapped up, but there are still areas out there where there are no programs to do more than amateur level work. There's Kino, but if you want to do professional video editing, you're S.O.L. (I've heard Jakshaka or Jakasha or something like that does it, but I've also heard it is really buggy.) Gimp works, but has a frustrating interface, and the developers don't understand why anyone would want anything different. At least someone created GimpShop.
There's also simple things that keep getting excused. I wish I could just plug and unplug my ramdisks, but I have to mount and umount them. If you're a developer, that's not much, but if you're an end user, it's a pain to have to add that step.
Linux will stay off the desktops until more developers look at things like, for example, KDE does: they try to make sure the user has as much as he could want, and it is as accessible as possible. They think about it in terms of what users need, not from what programmers want to do. Which may be why many developers don't like it. (Hey, Linus likes it!)
On the other hand, if you're talking about all those extra features nobody uses, KDE has that, too, just like Windows!
Because you might be a developer who writes programs that other people use, instead of just toys for your own system. And some of those users just might need a cross platform language and GUI. Or you might have to develop in Java for a number of reasons.
The indications are that when one particle is observed, the other entangled particle changes state immediately. Read "In Search of Schrodinger's Cat" for an example. There's other books, but that's the one that comes to mind immediately.
The only reason why I can see them using Ubuntu is the fact that you can have it do a very minimum install.
When I installed most of my systems with Debian Sarge, I used the Net Install disc. I forgot the actual size of the.iso, but I have it on a mini-CD, which means it's no more than 60MB. It takes less than 20 minutes to install, and I can specify to install just a barebones system, which means it does not have ssh, rsync, or a number of other basic utils that I normally use. It's faster to install the bare-bones and apt-get the few other utils I need than to do a larger install. If the intent is a minimal install, that is about as minimal as one can get and certainly is a heck of a lot more stable than Ubuntu.
Why not something more stable? I don't use it because everyone I hear from who has installed it has found a number of bugs in any stable version. If I were going to embed something and go with a Linux distro, I'd at least go for Debian Stable.
I don't follow the pundits, since they are more often off base or stroking their egos than right or even providing useful information. I know Dvorak has a big name, but I can't see why. Almost every article of his I've read, and it isn't many, has been crap with ideas that are based on who knows what. While any columnist will write a few duds now and then, I think it goes beyond chance that the 5-10 columns of his I've read in the past 2 years (and not just the ones on/.) seem more like, "Wouldn't this be a shock if it happened" topics or other possibilities that had nothing to do with reality than anything close to a reasoned expectation.
I think you are overlooking the fact that you may NOT be what people wanted -- at least at the time you were applying. Remember that many jobs are filled by PHBs. They hear Dreamweaver is the standard, so they want people who know that. They don't care if you know HTML, or can wave a wand and magically create a web page in a flash (pun only half intended). All they care about is that they are following a standard so they have some control over what's going on. That way, if you leave, they can easily replace you. They may need you, but they don't want to depend on you. As you pointed out, it was a year later you saw ads saying DW was a disadvantage (I wonder how that was worded?). Maybe you were ahead of the curve, and as all the FOSS people on/. can tell you, most PHBs don't want that. They don't understand it and it threatens them.
If they were smart enough that these things were an issue, you wouldn't see the requirements you mention, including ones like 5 years experience with Windows Server 2003 or 5 years with Java 1.5 (sorry, I just can't bring myself to call version 1.5 something like version 5).
But if changing the focus instead of discussing your original statement, I'm happy for you.
Caffeine is also easily addictive and can have other side effects, like almost any drug or medication (loosely defined as any substance that alters the behavior of one's body). Treating yourself well in the long term makes it much easier to handle short term deadlines easily. I do so and find it easy to handle crunch times (although I plan things with my company to avoid most crunches -- some companies are able to do that and some can't get the hang of it). Others I know, many in their 20s, often don't work out regularly, drink tons of sodas and coffee, don't worry about what they eat, and don't take care of themselves. At twice their age, I have no problem going for a few weeks on small amounts of sleep and pushing for a crunch -- without energy drinks or junk food.
If you take care of your body in the long term, you won't need energy foods and drinks in the short term. If you're going beyond that, then it would be wise to consider a change in job or lifestyle, since it is not healthy and may not have effects immediately, but eventually will wear a person down and have long term health effects.
Maybe your words carried a different message than what you intended.
You have a subjective view of your statement, but it may be that to those who have a different objectivity, it means something other than your intent and desired nuances.
Good point. I used to always rush around and I learned to slow my life down. I do less in a day, but I enjoy life much more. Of course, it helps to figure out who you are, what you want in life, and what is most important to you. Then you can drop off all the crap in your life that you do just for others or because it's "cool".
I spent years working in treatment and seeing the differences between functional and dysfunctional people, as well as happy and unhappy people. I've also found, from observation, those who always have crammed full schedules like looking busy and having all that to do makes them feel important. I have yet to find such a person that really has a true sense of who they are and what they really want in life.
Besides, if you're jumping into everything because "life isn't going to wait around for you to rest," in the long run you'll burn out and need to take even more time to rest in the long run.
I stopped taking all medications and all caffeine a few years ago. I find that I have more energy now and generally feel better than I used to. I will now take aspirin and if I were in need of medication for a serious issue, I'd take it, but I found that once I gave my body time to get used to healing itself for most things, I felt better. For example, I had problems with back pain and congestion/allergies and a runny nose. I found I adapted and was more likely to keep moving in spite of back pain when I stopped taking meds. I also found it was possible to focus and mentally relax many of the needed muscles and "release" the pain.
As for the sinus problems, when I went off meds, I had the "usual" problems a few weeks later, and just gave myself more time to rest. It took a few days, but then I felt fine. About a month later, I had sinus problems again, but they went away faster this time. That happened two or three more times, each time effecting me less and less and lasting less and less. My body had seemingly become conditioned to receiving meds to heal and soon learned to work the natural way. I started feeling better overall and found I had much more energy.
So I'd say my answer is what you don't want to hear: balanced diet and exercise, don't spend all your time in front of the computer (or only at the computer then the pub!), and don't continually push your body beyond what it tells you it can handle. If you do that, then when it comes time for those 48 hour coding sessions, you'll do fine and probably have more energy than most of your co-workers. You can be dependent on energy drinks and such or dependent on good health. I've picked the the latter. I'm not saying you should or have to, but I've found it is easier and works better all around.
I'm not. I had very deep faith and gave it up for Lent one year. I spent years as an athiest, then felt called in another direction. I've seen both sides of the fence. I've also learned that those who don't believe have never really felt that extra connection that is true faith -- if a person has felt it, they know. If not, well, then, they just might drop faith and turn 100% scientific.
That's something someone who thinks they believe, or has learned to act like the believe, or who takes a religious text literally and doesn't question it -- then one day learns something they never expected, can do, but someone who has had a true faith connection is not someone who can drop it and say that only the logical exists. And that is also one of those things that those who don't have it just don't get -- again, like trying to explain the bond you get having sex with someone you love to a virgin who hasn't even dated someone regularly.
Also Alcor does not take in enough money to even cover its expenses. Most members are middle class, but some can afford to donate large sums, which is how Alcor stays solvent.
So they can't cover their expenses well? So what is there to assure a person that Alcor will still be around in even 100 years? What happens to the corpsicles if they go bankrupt?
Well, that same religious feeling is what makes cryonics tick.
I can understand that, at least understand that to one who does not understand faith would think that. Faith and religion is something much deeper. I, and others I know who are quite rational, have seen things that cannot always be explained by science. You've given the basic non-believer view of religion and/or spirituality. In your words, you talk about something you know nothing about. I've given up on trying to explain any matters of faith or religion or spirituality to a non-believer. Trying to explain faith to one who puts it in such logical, scientific terms is like trying to explain color to a blind man, or sex to a virgin. Sure, you can say, "You do this and this, and it feels good and the man does this and the woman does this," but there is no way you can describe the actual emotional connection with another person to someone who has never experienced it. That only comes to those willing to love and get close to someone and to take that "leap of faith."
So, please, don't criticize others for speaking in ignorance when you are doing the same thing.
I was wondering if anyone would even want to waste the time to revive him at all. The world could be too overpopulated, or they could be fed up with cryonauts. Or the economy could have shifted so much he has no current currency.
Or he could wake up in 30 years, travel back in time, start a company to rival his first one, get frozen again, wake up 30 years later (again), marry someone who was a kid when he knew her before, and live happily ever after on the royalties from both his competing companies.
1) He broke into the system, which is a computer owned by the company. While it is electronic, that is tantamount to breaking in to a location.
2) His defense was NOT "I didn't do it," but, "It wasn't enough damage to meet the criteria of the law.
3) The IBM people presented not just bills, but proof of the time worked and what it took to deal with the situation.
4) He broke into the system 9 times. The company has no idea if he stole proprietary data or not, but this puts the company at high risk.
5) He deleted an account, which you don't see an issue with. Deleting an account often involves deleting the home directory, where the account holder would be expected to store documents related to the job.
6) Aside from dealing with a deleted account, the IBM people, in order to deal with it, would have to deal with finding the extent of the damage, tracking his actions when he logged in each of 9 times, finding out if only one account was effected, as well as seeing if it was possible to undelete (or restore from backups) any lost data.
It's not that computer crimes are worse than others, but just as bad. I suggest you flip the case around. Suppose it were your company that you worked hard to build, and you found out that someone had broken in and deleted someone's account. Right away, you have to start making changes. You immediately have to find out if any viruses, worms, or timebombs have been left. You need to know if any confidential information has been leaked. From the moment you find out your computer has been violated, you cannot count on using it in business until someone has told you that there is no sleeping command waiting to do an "rm -Rf/*" when triggered.
If someone breaks into a store, the window has to be repaired, and IS counted as a loss as much as the merchandise. However, usually a physical break in does not mean an entire new security system be put in place.
There is right and there is wrong. Breaking into another person's place of business, whether physically or electronically, hurts the business and is wrong. Equivocating and trying to twist words around to make it seem either right or acceptable are merely a way of not accepting or dealing with the fact that breaking into and vandalizing or stealing from others is wrong.
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You could pick your own filename. Yes, there's a lot of people who would only want an automated checker and would end up as victims, but for those that are interested in their own security, there are a lot of simple steps. The checksum could be on a floppy, or a boot block could be stored on a CD, with the checksum checking program(s) on it.
The rootkit can't replace the checksum if it doesn't know what filename to look for. It wouldn't be hard to create a program, that, when installed, can be given different names and could somehow morph so it doesn't always look the same.
I also forgot to mention a program like this could check the BIOS checksum as well.
Can anyone say dual boot?
That's what I was thinking. If I didn't see my familiar grub screen come up, I'd worry.
But then I guess the idea would be to have even grub come up on the VM.
Under those conditions, couldn't one just have a program that creates a checksum of the bootblock on install and checks it regularly? Then you can do an md5 on that program from time to time to make sure it's okay.
So either there is something terribly wrong with that idea, or it's too damned simple for MS -- but maybe they don't want a simple solution. Maybe they'd prefer making everyone believe this is good cause for built in DRM chips that will allow only Windows to boot.
That was my first thought: why is MS researching this? Pure research like this and MS just do not go together.
Honestly, this sounds like the kind of thing they'll think of so they can use it as a reason that all computers should have DRM build into the chipset, which plays right into MS being able to justify why all systems should follow their boot rules that allow only Vista to run. It's just laying the groundwork to force the exclusion of anything but Vista being able to be booted on future systems.
This is also the kind of thing that I don't think many black hats would have come up with on their own due to the amount of research. MS continaully says it is irresponsible for people to publish info on exploits in Winodws before they can patch them, yet they've just gone and published what could be one of the nastiest exploits of any OS to date. If they're doing this, it's for a reason, and experience tells us MS's reasons are good for them and bad for everyone else.
Not you, I agree. What you want is free tools to do professional work, and people would stare blank at you in dismissal, thinking : "this man thinks I will lose hours of time developing free tools for him, he must be mad, I'm not his slave". But you could not understand that, with your very bad attitude.
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. While I understand what you're saying, it wasn't a response like, "Not many users need that feature. We won't be adding it for quite a while," or, "That's a lot of work, and we're doing this for free." It was literally responses like, "Why do you need that? You need to do it differently." It was (and isn't as much now) a very strong attitude of, "We have something great. If the user doesn't see that, they're fsck'ed!"
This has changed quite a bit now. It seems most Linuxers are now aware that there are weak areas
They always were. You are the one that never understood what you where asking for, while they worked to at least get the basics right.
First: I'd really like to know how you, who has seen a few posts, know what I understood and didn't understand years ago. You can't be sure of that. You're not in a position to know.
Actually, as I said other posts, back in the 1980s, I programmed in 6502 Assembler, and even sold to Nibble magazine. I am now making a living as a programmer, but will soon be moving to video. I've seen this from the side of a user who hasn't touched a line of code in a decade and I see it from the inside now. Unfortunately, your comments are very much a symptom of the larger problem. Instead of paying attention to what I said, as a user, about what the problem seems to be as someone who uses FOSS, you are more interested in blaming me and saying I don't know what I'm asking for, and I don't know what I'm doing.
Do you see this? Instead of listening to the point of view of a user and realizing that developers have, whether rightly or wrongly, earned a certain reputation, you are more interested in blaming a user so you can be assure all developers are doing the right thing and are blameless in this. It's a blame the victim mentality and if FOSS is ever to be common on the desktop, that view point and habit of blaming the users *has* to change.
From here on, you take the attitude that I am expecting you and others to be my slaves. You want to look at me as making demands that are unreasonable.
So listen up, and pay attention, because I'm about to tell you things you don't want to hear. I started with Linux because I heard from Linuxers how much better it was than Windows. Linuxers themselves, including developers, were telling me things like "There's programs to do whatever you want to do, just not the same ones as on Windows." I've heard the Linux community, over and over, say how good it is and how much better their software is. I was convinced to try FOSS because of that. And I still hear, over and over, how great FOSS is and how it is much better than commercial programs.
In some cases it is, but often it isn't. If Linuxers are going to keep boasting, they have to produce software that can do what people need. Don't tell me Gimp will do what Photoshop will do when it does not. (And no, I don't use GimpShop, but why should you care? Other than what becomes clear through your post -- that you'd like to label me as an idiot user who doesn't know what he's doing so you can just write me and what I say off and not have to challenge yourself with examining if you're an elitist snot who hates users and considers them all wrong.) Don't tell me that there are word processors that can match Word or Word Perfect (and the Word Perfect for Linux was crippled!) when they don't. (Okay, now they do, but not 5 years ago.)
You, yourself, say, On the other hand, a Linux distro is enough most of the time. Yet, if someone says no it isn't and asks for more, and asks where programs are that meet the needs on FOSS that were already met on Windows, you say they are as
I think you're not only an exception, but on the inside, looking out, with the point of view of a developer. I am a developer, had to become one or starve, but started as a user. As a user, the point of view is quite different. I'm not talking about users asking for outrageous features yesterday. I'm talking in general, in my experience as a user, and in dealing with other users. As someone who was outside, and is now inside in many ways (and working on a F/OSS project or two), I can look back and say the issue we were talking about weren't about adding super features in minutes. Let me give you a recent example: Debian prides itself on being so stable that any upgrades on the Stable branch should never break a system. I found one that stops it from booting and have tried to deal with it. The only developer I've been able to get a response from is more interested in marking the bug report closed than in helping me understand just who is responsible for it. In the past 5-7 years, this is typical of my experience with developers.
Those that do as you say are atypical. You may not see it because you're in that atypical group. I can believe KDE does a lot of use cases. I am sure Gnome does, but then I have to ask, for Gnome and many projects: are the use cases what the developers think up, or what users come up with? In your case, you care about end users. I've noticed several cases where I've tried to get help on a project as an end user and was treated like crap and a year or so later tried to get help and asked about features more in line with programming than with usage and got immediate help, which indicates to me the focus is on the programming, not on ease of use.
I wish all F/OSS developers felt the same.
One item that *really* bothers me, especially after reading your post is the "use cases" point you keep bringing up. I'm self taught as far as programming goes. I had the chance to start a busines on my own, based on programs I'd have to write (about a decade or more before I had written in 6502 Assembler on an Apple //e). Most of the software was on my own computers, but I wrote it with an eye to selling it (and the entire business) sometime in the future. That's helped a LOT, since it's taken a while and I find I'm always using "--help" on my own programs. I made sure all help messages were easy to understand and follow.
When it came time to write programs that would go on my clients' computers, the first thing I did was plan out what it had to do, then I sat down and figured out how my clients would think about it and what they'd do. I came up with a simple tabbed panel interface, figuring tab panels are easy to follow. I put all the controls they'd use a lot on the first tab. I made sure the "Start" was prominent since often that was all they'd do. Then I made notes of what the user would want to do and how I could make it easy for them. I never thought in terms of how I'd program it. I thought in terms of what my clients would need or want, how they'd think, and how simple I could make it (knowing also that some of them do NOT like using computers).
I went through everything, from a basic, "fire it up, run it, quit" scenario to all the settings a client might want to change and anything they might have trouble with. When it was done, in the next year and a half, I had a total of 6 bugs, one of which was because the user had a failing hard drive, so files written out by my program were bad when read in 2 minutes later. It lead to a few safety features transparent to the users. The next version, written 2 years later had 4 small features added (including a button to activate RealVNC to connect to my system if something went wrong). Most of the problems clients have are more about Windows or failing hardware than my system ("It sent data to the printer, but I get a error about the driver.", or the ever popular, "Why won't it print?" "Is your printer turned on?").
I did this out of instinct. I wanted my program to work as well as possible for those using it. Considering I wrote it after not programming for a decade, I'm proud of the low bug count and low level of complaints about it. What really gets me, especially after hearing you use the term "use cases" and looking it up, is realizing that this is something considered SOP in designing an interface, realizing I did it without training or any prompting, but that many FOSS programmers avoided it and would get nasty about it. That does seem to be changing, but it befuddles me how so many programmers that have been formally trained and coding for much longer than I have don't ever think about how a user will use their program.
Yes, you are right.
And that is EXACTLY the problem with a LOT of FOSS out there. Some is excellent, and some, like OpenOffice, has corporate backing and has to be handled like a professional and not hobby project.
When I last tried Gnome, which was something like 3-5 years ago, I decided against it for one of the reasons you pointed out: it seemed like it was more about programmers trying to outdo and impress each other than about providing a useful and easy to use GUI. I've felt like KDE, from as early as I've seen it, has been focused on providing what the user needs/wants, not on impressing developers. I think that is why KDE is easier to use and why I picked it. I can use console only tools and frequently do when I'm programming, but when I'm not in "programming" mode, I want the computer to bend to my needs, not me bend to its limits.
And that is what I think many developers don't understand because they're too busy writing geek show off code instead of something useful. I think you and I pretty much agree on a lot of that.
Tried it a while back, when I was still doing professional editing. I've had to stop for a while to do a LOT of programming. As an editor, I found it very frustrating. It felt nothing at all like actual editing. Even Premiere felt more like a true video editing station than Cinelerra. I may try it again when I get back to it, but at this point, when I'm back into working on production, I'll be using a Mac. I know that has top quality editing and DVD authoring software and I don't have to waste time creating config files and other things. I can drag and drop, which, when I'm in "creative" mode, is much more appropriate.
Thanks for the suggestion, though. I have high hopes for KDEnlive, if it ever goes anywhere, but it's still not far along.
Exactly. The trouble is there are too many Liuxers who are so busy being intelligent, they don't listen to user comments like that. When I first started using Linux, I kept asking about a word processor that had macros that would let me redefine margins with keystrokes. Every programmer, developer, or even Linux user (and this was 5-7 years ago) kept saying, "Why would you want that?" with a tone of voice that indicated that if it couldn't be done, why should I care. I'd explain that I was a screenwriter, and if you've ever seen a film/video script, you'd know the margins change every few lines (I've counted upto 20 margin changes on a page), and I didn't have time to use the mouse. Then came the "use emacs or vi" thing. I tried to explain while they worked for programming, they did not work for me in "writing" mode. They did not foster creativity. They'd look at me with a blank stare.
It was a general attitude of, "Linux rocks, and if you don't see that, you're lame. If you want to do something that can't be done on Linux, you're doing something wrong. Not me." I also kept trying to find a program that would import Corel Draw's vector graphic files. Again the puzzled, "Why would you want to do that?" response. I explained that I had a LOT of files in that format, including the company logo and other things. Again, the head shaking and asking if I couldn't just redo them.
This has changed quite a bit now. It seems most Linuxers are now aware that there are weak areas. OpenOffice has the office suite thing wrapped up, but there are still areas out there where there are no programs to do more than amateur level work. There's Kino, but if you want to do professional video editing, you're S.O.L. (I've heard Jakshaka or Jakasha or something like that does it, but I've also heard it is really buggy.) Gimp works, but has a frustrating interface, and the developers don't understand why anyone would want anything different. At least someone created GimpShop.
There's also simple things that keep getting excused. I wish I could just plug and unplug my ramdisks, but I have to mount and umount them. If you're a developer, that's not much, but if you're an end user, it's a pain to have to add that step.
Linux will stay off the desktops until more developers look at things like, for example, KDE does: they try to make sure the user has as much as he could want, and it is as accessible as possible. They think about it in terms of what users need, not from what programmers want to do. Which may be why many developers don't like it. (Hey, Linus likes it!)
On the other hand, if you're talking about all those extra features nobody uses, KDE has that, too, just like Windows!
Because you might be a developer who writes programs that other people use, instead of just toys for your own system. And some of those users just might need a cross platform language and GUI. Or you might have to develop in Java for a number of reasons.
Goverment white papers travel slower than the speed of dark.
The indications are that when one particle is observed, the other entangled particle changes state immediately. Read "In Search of Schrodinger's Cat" for an example. There's other books, but that's the one that comes to mind immediately.
That's right: nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, not even information.
Quantam entanglement can.
The only reason why I can see them using Ubuntu is the fact that you can have it do a very minimum install.
.iso, but I have it on a mini-CD, which means it's no more than 60MB. It takes less than 20 minutes to install, and I can specify to install just a barebones system, which means it does not have ssh, rsync, or a number of other basic utils that I normally use. It's faster to install the bare-bones and apt-get the few other utils I need than to do a larger install. If the intent is a minimal install, that is about as minimal as one can get and certainly is a heck of a lot more stable than Ubuntu.
When I installed most of my systems with Debian Sarge, I used the Net Install disc. I forgot the actual size of the
Why not something more stable? I don't use it because everyone I hear from who has installed it has found a number of bugs in any stable version. If I were going to embed something and go with a Linux distro, I'd at least go for Debian Stable.
I don't follow the pundits, since they are more often off base or stroking their egos than right or even providing useful information. I know Dvorak has a big name, but I can't see why. Almost every article of his I've read, and it isn't many, has been crap with ideas that are based on who knows what. While any columnist will write a few duds now and then, I think it goes beyond chance that the 5-10 columns of his I've read in the past 2 years (and not just the ones on /.) seem more like, "Wouldn't this be a shock if it happened" topics or other possibilities that had nothing to do with reality than anything close to a reasoned expectation.
I think you are overlooking the fact that you may NOT be what people wanted -- at least at the time you were applying. Remember that many jobs are filled by PHBs. They hear Dreamweaver is the standard, so they want people who know that. They don't care if you know HTML, or can wave a wand and magically create a web page in a flash (pun only half intended). All they care about is that they are following a standard so they have some control over what's going on. That way, if you leave, they can easily replace you. They may need you, but they don't want to depend on you. As you pointed out, it was a year later you saw ads saying DW was a disadvantage (I wonder how that was worded?). Maybe you were ahead of the curve, and as all the FOSS people on /. can tell you, most PHBs don't want that. They don't understand it and it threatens them.
If they were smart enough that these things were an issue, you wouldn't see the requirements you mention, including ones like 5 years experience with Windows Server 2003 or 5 years with Java 1.5 (sorry, I just can't bring myself to call version 1.5 something like version 5).
I never found it to have that effect on me.
But if changing the focus instead of discussing your original statement, I'm happy for you.
Caffeine is also easily addictive and can have other side effects, like almost any drug or medication (loosely defined as any substance that alters the behavior of one's body). Treating yourself well in the long term makes it much easier to handle short term deadlines easily. I do so and find it easy to handle crunch times (although I plan things with my company to avoid most crunches -- some companies are able to do that and some can't get the hang of it). Others I know, many in their 20s, often don't work out regularly, drink tons of sodas and coffee, don't worry about what they eat, and don't take care of themselves. At twice their age, I have no problem going for a few weeks on small amounts of sleep and pushing for a crunch -- without energy drinks or junk food.
If you take care of your body in the long term, you won't need energy foods and drinks in the short term. If you're going beyond that, then it would be wise to consider a change in job or lifestyle, since it is not healthy and may not have effects immediately, but eventually will wear a person down and have long term health effects.
Maybe your words carried a different message than what you intended.
You have a subjective view of your statement, but it may be that to those who have a different objectivity, it means something other than your intent and desired nuances.
Good point. I used to always rush around and I learned to slow my life down. I do less in a day, but I enjoy life much more. Of course, it helps to figure out who you are, what you want in life, and what is most important to you. Then you can drop off all the crap in your life that you do just for others or because it's "cool".
I spent years working in treatment and seeing the differences between functional and dysfunctional people, as well as happy and unhappy people. I've also found, from observation, those who always have crammed full schedules like looking busy and having all that to do makes them feel important. I have yet to find such a person that really has a true sense of who they are and what they really want in life.
Besides, if you're jumping into everything because "life isn't going to wait around for you to rest," in the long run you'll burn out and need to take even more time to rest in the long run.
I stopped taking all medications and all caffeine a few years ago. I find that I have more energy now and generally feel better than I used to. I will now take aspirin and if I were in need of medication for a serious issue, I'd take it, but I found that once I gave my body time to get used to healing itself for most things, I felt better. For example, I had problems with back pain and congestion/allergies and a runny nose. I found I adapted and was more likely to keep moving in spite of back pain when I stopped taking meds. I also found it was possible to focus and mentally relax many of the needed muscles and "release" the pain.
As for the sinus problems, when I went off meds, I had the "usual" problems a few weeks later, and just gave myself more time to rest. It took a few days, but then I felt fine. About a month later, I had sinus problems again, but they went away faster this time. That happened two or three more times, each time effecting me less and less and lasting less and less. My body had seemingly become conditioned to receiving meds to heal and soon learned to work the natural way. I started feeling better overall and found I had much more energy.
So I'd say my answer is what you don't want to hear: balanced diet and exercise, don't spend all your time in front of the computer (or only at the computer then the pub!), and don't continually push your body beyond what it tells you it can handle. If you do that, then when it comes time for those 48 hour coding sessions, you'll do fine and probably have more energy than most of your co-workers. You can be dependent on energy drinks and such or dependent on good health. I've picked the the latter. I'm not saying you should or have to, but I've found it is easier and works better all around.
I'm not. I had very deep faith and gave it up for Lent one year. I spent years as an athiest, then felt called in another direction. I've seen both sides of the fence. I've also learned that those who don't believe have never really felt that extra connection that is true faith -- if a person has felt it, they know. If not, well, then, they just might drop faith and turn 100% scientific.
That's something someone who thinks they believe, or has learned to act like the believe, or who takes a religious text literally and doesn't question it -- then one day learns something they never expected, can do, but someone who has had a true faith connection is not someone who can drop it and say that only the logical exists. And that is also one of those things that those who don't have it just don't get -- again, like trying to explain the bond you get having sex with someone you love to a virgin who hasn't even dated someone regularly.
Also Alcor does not take in enough money to even cover its expenses. Most members are middle class, but some can afford to donate large sums, which is how Alcor stays solvent.
So they can't cover their expenses well? So what is there to assure a person that Alcor will still be around in even 100 years? What happens to the corpsicles if they go bankrupt?
Well, that same religious feeling is what makes cryonics tick.
I can understand that, at least understand that to one who does not understand faith would think that. Faith and religion is something much deeper. I, and others I know who are quite rational, have seen things that cannot always be explained by science. You've given the basic non-believer view of religion and/or spirituality. In your words, you talk about something you know nothing about. I've given up on trying to explain any matters of faith or religion or spirituality to a non-believer. Trying to explain faith to one who puts it in such logical, scientific terms is like trying to explain color to a blind man, or sex to a virgin. Sure, you can say, "You do this and this, and it feels good and the man does this and the woman does this," but there is no way you can describe the actual emotional connection with another person to someone who has never experienced it. That only comes to those willing to love and get close to someone and to take that "leap of faith."
So, please, don't criticize others for speaking in ignorance when you are doing the same thing.
I was wondering if anyone would even want to waste the time to revive him at all. The world could be too overpopulated, or they could be fed up with cryonauts. Or the economy could have shifted so much he has no current currency.
Or he could wake up in 30 years, travel back in time, start a company to rival his first one, get frozen again, wake up 30 years later (again), marry someone who was a kid when he knew her before, and live happily ever after on the royalties from both his competing companies.
1) He broke into the system, which is a computer owned by the company. While it is electronic, that is tantamount to breaking in to a location.
/*" when triggered.
2) His defense was NOT "I didn't do it," but, "It wasn't enough damage to meet the criteria of the law.
3) The IBM people presented not just bills, but proof of the time worked and what it took to deal with the situation.
4) He broke into the system 9 times. The company has no idea if he stole proprietary data or not, but this puts the company at high risk.
5) He deleted an account, which you don't see an issue with. Deleting an account often involves deleting the home directory, where the account holder would be expected to store documents related to the job.
6) Aside from dealing with a deleted account, the IBM people, in order to deal with it, would have to deal with finding the extent of the damage, tracking his actions when he logged in each of 9 times, finding out if only one account was effected, as well as seeing if it was possible to undelete (or restore from backups) any lost data.
It's not that computer crimes are worse than others, but just as bad. I suggest you flip the case around. Suppose it were your company that you worked hard to build, and you found out that someone had broken in and deleted someone's account. Right away, you have to start making changes. You immediately have to find out if any viruses, worms, or timebombs have been left. You need to know if any confidential information has been leaked. From the moment you find out your computer has been violated, you cannot count on using it in business until someone has told you that there is no sleeping command waiting to do an "rm -Rf
If someone breaks into a store, the window has to be repaired, and IS counted as a loss as much as the merchandise. However, usually a physical break in does not mean an entire new security system be put in place.
There is right and there is wrong. Breaking into another person's place of business, whether physically or electronically, hurts the business and is wrong. Equivocating and trying to twist words around to make it seem either right or acceptable are merely a way of not accepting or dealing with the fact that breaking into and vandalizing or stealing from others is wrong.