f you have to install a 7 meg browser (mozilla) to make your application work why not just ship an application that updates itself over the network? Better yet why not just write a java web start application.
How is installing mozilla on each and every desktop different from installing java on each and every desktop?
With java you can have web-start applications - with mozilla you can have XUL applications.
I may be missing something, but as far as I can see, there is no difference at all.
I was in a situation like this at one place where I worked. I chose to "explore other occupational opportunities." The developers at that company didn't get admin access, nor did they save the company money by working efficiently. I, on the other hand, have got root where I work now. The company policy should not be to hinder it's own employeees, but rather to let them get the work done. If getting my work done requires me to have root, then I should get root, not spend countless hours trying to do the company's tasks DESPITE of all the company's best attempts... I'm not saying that you ARE a cold hearted bastard, cold hearted has nothing to do with it. Actually the cold-hearted, pragmatic approach is to let the developers do their job, even if that job requires them to have root. Developers make the software that the company survives by selling, just like a construction company survives by selling buildings. You have to let the brick-layers lay their bricks, otherwise the building won't get built and nobody gets any money.
I have to agree. This is at most a yellow alert. If I see a remote root exploit I change my server firewall settings to extreme paranoia (drop all packages from everywhere) and upgrade immediately, for bugs that only affect local users I am less worried. If people gain sheel access to my server they already have gotten past my defenses, which are based around keeping people from getting inside, not around keeping them from getting root priviledges once they are inside.
Re:Chatting can indeed be dangerous!!!
on
ICQ Universe
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All the more reason to start using jabber or other similar secure IM protocols. ALso, you might consider starting to encrypt your e-mail. Not that you have anything to hide, but simply because you dislike people (your government in this case) snooping about inside your personal stuff.
Re:The Internet becomes more like the real world..
on
ICQ Universe
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· Score: 1
Of course you yourself could just change your settings so all your friends receive a +1 bonus when you look at them. That way YOU are more likely to see your friends. That was not quite what you were looking for tho. It would be possible to have a new kind of karma modifier, where anyone with more than (say) 20 fans who each have excellent karma would receive an extra +1 modifier, and thus could start at +3. That would not create any kind of social network, but rather foster/. celebrities, which is not a bad thing in itself. The nice thing about this is that it would encourage people not only to karma-whore, but to actually try and be really insightful/interesting/funny in order to gather a fan base.
Yea, but what this comes down to in the actual environment is that you're asking the admin staff to risk having to do extra work, to risk staying late to fix your machine, to risk costing your company money.
There's a flip side to that coin: the admin staff is asking him to do extra work to get stuff done under their rules, to have to stay late to work around the admin staff's rules to actually get anything done, to cost his company extra money.
as rollingcalf says: patents SHOULD only be granted to inventions. The purpose of the patent law is to further invention in business, not hinder it. If I invent something I would like to be able to harvest the fruits of my invention without fear of copycats. THAT is what invention is for, NOT for purposely stopping other people's already existing products. Like Microsoft's patent on scripts in XML documents (I might have misread the patent and the wording might be different and therefore have different consequences, but stay with me while I use this patent as an example, there are others like it), I have lots of XML documents (XHTML to be exact, but that is just one form of XML) which have inline scripting, microsoft DID NOT invent the concept of scripts inside XML documents, therefore they SHOULD NOT be granted a patent on that technology. Even if I misread that specific patent and it wasn't at all about scripts inside XML documents there are still lots of similar examples. Patents should be used to encourage invention, not hinder existing products. Anyone who can show prior art should be able to invalidate any patent at will. That should relieve us of much of this patent madness.
You people (americans) gotta stop this sueing. Can't you see that you are ruining your own legal system? Can't you see that you are ruining a lot of things for yourselves? Stop and think about consequences for one second. If you sue McDonald's about hot coffee all you will get is lukewarm coffee. Stop sueing eachother and start thinking for yourselves god dammit! If you pour hot coffee into your own lap you WILL get burnt! That does not mean that hot coffee is a bad thing, it means that you should be more careful. Please stop sueing and start thinking!
I would have modded you wrong. Sadly there is no "wrong" mod so I'm replying in stead...
Please tell me where you have your information. How is internet acceptance much slower in EU than in US? 81% of the danish population have internet access at home according to Dansk Statistik.
No, but at this point the only reason for that is that they are typically not necessary. In Perl, when I need to get anything done I need to install 10 or 20 CPAN modules. Generally, in Python, they came with the interpreter and I only need to install two or three. This is why no similar thing has emerged.
(This is going on the "People are in general equally smart"... if Python needed such a thing it would exist. It doesn't, therefore it is a reasonable conclusion that it is not needed. It's not "logically rigorous" but it's a fairly good guess.)
I know i'm going to burn karma saying this but...
Does that make python as big and bloated as java? Java comes with loads of stuff, and the java programmers I know generally tend to think that there are no libraries outside those that java ships with. I tend to favor the perl approach. It gives the feeling of openness and freedom to choose what I like. If I suggest googling for a java library that does some task I am labeled a heretic. I'd much rather have a small built-in library and a lot of freedom than a huge library with the lock-in feel that is in java.
This may come down to a matter of taste in which way of life you like better, rather than which way is the best...
The other thing is, if you're expecting to use a library of some kind, check for availability. Python has the edge right now AFAIK but that doesn't matter unless Python has something that Ruby doesn't that you need, or vice versa; for most people my impression is that the necessary modules are there in both languages.
I have never used python, so I can't comment on whether python has more readily available libraries than ruby has, but ruby has a CPAN-like institution called RAA and raa-install (the ruby version of "perl -MCPAN -e shell"). Does python have something similar?
The other cool thing about it is that it completely eschews the entire SysV init system with one of its own, based on dependencies instead of on educated guesses by the sysadmin (read: arbitrary order) as to what order services should start up and shut down in. This lets you speed up booting by starting independent services concurrently instead of waiting for each service to start up individually.
I'm not booting very often, so the speedup isn't that important to me (a speedup is still nice, tho), but the increased ease of configuration is nice indeed!
things are not going to change for the average/. user, but things are going to change for the better for the average user. Now, gator can't legally annoy the hell out of the average joe using his computer. I'd say that is a change for the better.
In my fsck-that statement, I was reffering to that printed words mean nothing. It's the actual freedom that counts.
How so? There are countries where you would not be allowed to write the above statement. Is that freedom? Are you truely free if you are not allowed to print your thoughts? In some countries censorship extends to the level that you would not even be allowed to write the sentence you just wrote. Living on such a country might change your view on whether or not freedom of speech is a part of freedom.
Patents are meant to be used for companies for ensure that technology they invent does not get stolen by other companies. MS didn't invent XML. If your legal system let's them patent it then it is flawed very badly.
I for one are going to ignore this patent outright. Firstly, I'm sitting in europe, safe from the madness that is US law. Secondly, I have prior art. Thirdly, in Denmark buying the most expensive lawyers doesn't make you win cases.
In Denmark we have a concept of an "average person" in our legal system. If you did things that the "average person" should know are stupid then you cannot sue. The average person should know not to put cats in microwaves, yet some people still do equally stupid things and get away with sueing companies for the damages these people do to themselves.
I have no clue how infrared communication works, nor do I care, but I know that when I push the buttons on my remote, the tv should come on.
Do you send angry letters to the company that made your remote when it stops working or do you know enough to change the batteries? what about when you cannot shoot the infrared signal though a wall? Knowing just a little bit about how things work make your life a lot easier.
Do you know exactly how the ignition system on your car works?
I am required by law to know, if I want to have a driver's license. Also I am required to know stuff about how quickly I can bring a car to a full stop at various speeds. I am required to know enough not to hurt myself and others.
Likewise, if a user double-clicks on the IE icon, they may not know that it's IE that opens up, but they know that "the interweb" should come up and their home page should load.
Again, I know enough not to hurt myself or my software. People should know that they are actually putting their software and data at risc when installing untrusted software. We teach our children not to talk to strangers, let's also teach them not to install strange software.
... to use one. See my previous comment on the ease of use of computers. If you do not understand the basic principles of a database then maybe you are not the right person to use one. Computers SHOULD be hard to use! Making it hard to use ensures that people who do not know enough don't screw things up for themselves.
That said, the basic principles of databases aren't that hard to learn. You should go buy a book on the subject. Which book is best is a matter of taste, but ask your local tech bookstore clerk for help. They usually are very helpful.
For most everybody else, it is only necessary to understand enough to do whatever it is they need to do
Trouble is that computers are so incredibly complex. The common user without any expertise just want to accomplish some simple task (look up a recipe for some sauce, or send a letter to her aunt). She doesn't need a machine capable of all the things a PC is capable of. Some thin browser-machine and a thin mail client should do just fine. And for god's sake, DO NOT give this machine all the features of IE and outlook. Most people don't NEED that. Next make some upgraded playstation for those who want to play games. Give it a keyboard and a mouse (in stead of that horrible interface it has now). Make it possible to play online games.
Given so simple devices as these two I just described there should be no risc of people accidentally installing random downloaded stuff, 'cause there is no need for an ability to install stuff at all on your browser-machine, and no need to be able to download anything at all to your play-machine.
Given simpler machines people have less chance to fsck it up for themselves. For believe me, they will fsck it up if they can... Things as complex as PCs are today SHOULD be so hard to use that no normal would WANT to use them. If people who are too stupid to know NOT to double-click on install23.exe in a mail with the subject "your details" have so much trouble finding their (not there) way around computers that they give up and go away, then we don't have to help them when they fsck their computers up...
Please, for the love of god (or just out of pity for helpdesk people) make simple workstations that aren't capable of a lot of things. Make a letter-writer-machine and a browser-machine and a play-machine. There is no need for one machine so complex that normal people can fsck it up.
Slashdot Mirror
f you have to install a 7 meg browser (mozilla) to make your application work why not just ship an application that updates itself over the network? Better yet why not just write a java web start application.
How is installing mozilla on each and every desktop different from installing java on each and every desktop?
With java you can have web-start applications - with mozilla you can have XUL applications.
I may be missing something, but as far as I can see, there is no difference at all.
You don't find it a bit twisted that VA Linux owns a site called Slashdot that posts articles that bashes competitors and calls it "tech news?"
/. called ms bashing "tech news" long before VA bought it.
but if MS office would run on Linux I would drop Windows like a red-headed step child
You should have seen this comming from a mile away: ms office runs easily on linux.
Also, and much more importantly: MSS only does file locking - not merging file content. It can hardly be called a "real" versioning system.
I was in a situation like this at one place where I worked. I chose to "explore other occupational opportunities." The developers at that company didn't get admin access, nor did they save the company money by working efficiently. I, on the other hand, have got root where I work now. The company policy should not be to hinder it's own employeees, but rather to let them get the work done. If getting my work done requires me to have root, then I should get root, not spend countless hours trying to do the company's tasks DESPITE of all the company's best attempts... I'm not saying that you ARE a cold hearted bastard, cold hearted has nothing to do with it. Actually the cold-hearted, pragmatic approach is to let the developers do their job, even if that job requires them to have root. Developers make the software that the company survives by selling, just like a construction company survives by selling buildings. You have to let the brick-layers lay their bricks, otherwise the building won't get built and nobody gets any money.
I have to agree. This is at most a yellow alert. If I see a remote root exploit I change my server firewall settings to extreme paranoia (drop all packages from everywhere) and upgrade immediately, for bugs that only affect local users I am less worried. If people gain sheel access to my server they already have gotten past my defenses, which are based around keeping people from getting inside, not around keeping them from getting root priviledges once they are inside.
All the more reason to start using jabber or other similar secure IM protocols. ALso, you might consider starting to encrypt your e-mail. Not that you have anything to hide, but simply because you dislike people (your government in this case) snooping about inside your personal stuff.
Of course you yourself could just change your settings so all your friends receive a +1 bonus when you look at them. That way YOU are more likely to see your friends. That was not quite what you were looking for tho. It would be possible to have a new kind of karma modifier, where anyone with more than (say) 20 fans who each have excellent karma would receive an extra +1 modifier, and thus could start at +3. That would not create any kind of social network, but rather foster /. celebrities, which is not a bad thing in itself. The nice thing about this is that it would encourage people not only to karma-whore, but to actually try and be really insightful/interesting/funny in order to gather a fan base.
Yea, but what this comes down to in the actual environment is that you're asking the admin staff to risk having to do extra work, to risk staying late to fix your machine, to risk costing your company money.
There's a flip side to that coin: the admin staff is asking him to do extra work to get stuff done under their rules, to have to stay late to work around the admin staff's rules to actually get anything done, to cost his company extra money.
as rollingcalf says: patents SHOULD only be granted to inventions. The purpose of the patent law is to further invention in business, not hinder it. If I invent something I would like to be able to harvest the fruits of my invention without fear of copycats. THAT is what invention is for, NOT for purposely stopping other people's already existing products. Like Microsoft's patent on scripts in XML documents (I might have misread the patent and the wording might be different and therefore have different consequences, but stay with me while I use this patent as an example, there are others like it), I have lots of XML documents (XHTML to be exact, but that is just one form of XML) which have inline scripting, microsoft DID NOT invent the concept of scripts inside XML documents, therefore they SHOULD NOT be granted a patent on that technology. Even if I misread that specific patent and it wasn't at all about scripts inside XML documents there are still lots of similar examples. Patents should be used to encourage invention, not hinder existing products. Anyone who can show prior art should be able to invalidate any patent at will. That should relieve us of much of this patent madness.
You people (americans) gotta stop this sueing. Can't you see that you are ruining your own legal system? Can't you see that you are ruining a lot of things for yourselves? Stop and think about consequences for one second. If you sue McDonald's about hot coffee all you will get is lukewarm coffee. Stop sueing eachother and start thinking for yourselves god dammit! If you pour hot coffee into your own lap you WILL get burnt! That does not mean that hot coffee is a bad thing, it means that you should be more careful. Please stop sueing and start thinking!
I would have modded you wrong. Sadly there is no "wrong" mod so I'm replying in stead...
Please tell me where you have your information. How is internet acceptance much slower in EU than in US? 81% of the danish population have internet access at home according to Dansk Statistik.
No, but at this point the only reason for that is that they are typically not necessary. In Perl, when I need to get anything done I need to install 10 or 20 CPAN modules. Generally, in Python, they came with the interpreter and I only need to install two or three. This is why no similar thing has emerged.
(This is going on the "People are in general equally smart"... if Python needed such a thing it would exist. It doesn't, therefore it is a reasonable conclusion that it is not needed. It's not "logically rigorous" but it's a fairly good guess.)
I know i'm going to burn karma saying this but...
Does that make python as big and bloated as java? Java comes with loads of stuff, and the java programmers I know generally tend to think that there are no libraries outside those that java ships with. I tend to favor the perl approach. It gives the feeling of openness and freedom to choose what I like. If I suggest googling for a java library that does some task I am labeled a heretic. I'd much rather have a small built-in library and a lot of freedom than a huge library with the lock-in feel that is in java.
This may come down to a matter of taste in which way of life you like better, rather than which way is the best...
The other thing is, if you're expecting to use a library of some kind, check for availability. Python has the edge right now AFAIK but that doesn't matter unless Python has something that Ruby doesn't that you need, or vice versa; for most people my impression is that the necessary modules are there in both languages.
I have never used python, so I can't comment on whether python has more readily available libraries than ruby has, but ruby has a CPAN-like institution called RAA and raa-install (the ruby version of "perl -MCPAN -e shell"). Does python have something similar?
The other cool thing about it is that it completely eschews the entire SysV init system with one of its own, based on dependencies instead of on educated guesses by the sysadmin (read: arbitrary order) as to what order services should start up and shut down in. This lets you speed up booting by starting independent services concurrently instead of waiting for each service to start up individually.
I'm not booting very often, so the speedup isn't that important to me (a speedup is still nice, tho), but the increased ease of configuration is nice indeed!
things are not going to change for the average /. user, but things are going to change for the better for the average user. Now, gator can't legally annoy the hell out of the average joe using his computer. I'd say that is a change for the better.
In my fsck-that statement, I was reffering to that printed words mean nothing. It's the actual freedom that counts.
How so? There are countries where you would not be allowed to write the above statement. Is that freedom? Are you truely free if you are not allowed to print your thoughts? In some countries censorship extends to the level that you would not even be allowed to write the sentence you just wrote. Living on such a country might change your view on whether or not freedom of speech is a part of freedom.
Patents are meant to be used for companies for ensure that technology they invent does not get stolen by other companies. MS didn't invent XML. If your legal system let's them patent it then it is flawed very badly.
I for one are going to ignore this patent outright. Firstly, I'm sitting in europe, safe from the madness that is US law. Secondly, I have prior art. Thirdly, in Denmark buying the most expensive lawyers doesn't make you win cases.
which is why Don S. Davis should play Homer ;)
What? You mean coffee is hot?
it still is in countries where you don't get sued for serving hot coffee ;)
Everyone knows why not to put a cat in the oven.
In Denmark we have a concept of an "average person" in our legal system. If you did things that the "average person" should know are stupid then you cannot sue. The average person should know not to put cats in microwaves, yet some people still do equally stupid things and get away with sueing companies for the damages these people do to themselves.
I have no clue how infrared communication works, nor do I care, but I know that when I push the buttons on my remote, the tv should come on.
Do you send angry letters to the company that made your remote when it stops working or do you know enough to change the batteries? what about when you cannot shoot the infrared signal though a wall? Knowing just a little bit about how things work make your life a lot easier.
Do you know exactly how the ignition system on your car works?
I am required by law to know, if I want to have a driver's license. Also I am required to know stuff about how quickly I can bring a car to a full stop at various speeds. I am required to know enough not to hurt myself and others.
Likewise, if a user double-clicks on the IE icon, they may not know that it's IE that opens up, but they know that "the interweb" should come up and their home page should load.
Again, I know enough not to hurt myself or my software. People should know that they are actually putting their software and data at risc when installing untrusted software. We teach our children not to talk to strangers, let's also teach them not to install strange software.
... to use one. See my previous comment on the ease of use of computers. If you do not understand the basic principles of a database then maybe you are not the right person to use one. Computers SHOULD be hard to use! Making it hard to use ensures that people who do not know enough don't screw things up for themselves.
That said, the basic principles of databases aren't that hard to learn. You should go buy a book on the subject. Which book is best is a matter of taste, but ask your local tech bookstore clerk for help. They usually are very helpful.
For most everybody else, it is only necessary to understand enough to do whatever it is they need to do
Trouble is that computers are so incredibly complex. The common user without any expertise just want to accomplish some simple task (look up a recipe for some sauce, or send a letter to her aunt). She doesn't need a machine capable of all the things a PC is capable of. Some thin browser-machine and a thin mail client should do just fine. And for god's sake, DO NOT give this machine all the features of IE and outlook. Most people don't NEED that. Next make some upgraded playstation for those who want to play games. Give it a keyboard and a mouse (in stead of that horrible interface it has now). Make it possible to play online games.
Given so simple devices as these two I just described there should be no risc of people accidentally installing random downloaded stuff, 'cause there is no need for an ability to install stuff at all on your browser-machine, and no need to be able to download anything at all to your play-machine.
Given simpler machines people have less chance to fsck it up for themselves. For believe me, they will fsck it up if they can... Things as complex as PCs are today SHOULD be so hard to use that no normal would WANT to use them. If people who are too stupid to know NOT to double-click on install23.exe in a mail with the subject "your details" have so much trouble finding their (not there) way around computers that they give up and go away, then we don't have to help them when they fsck their computers up...
Please, for the love of god (or just out of pity for helpdesk people) make simple workstations that aren't capable of a lot of things. Make a letter-writer-machine and a browser-machine and a play-machine. There is no need for one machine so complex that normal people can fsck it up.
Ever read the Tech-Slacky Howto? Read it, it's brilliant.
I read halfway through it. I had to stop. The pain I felt for the poor techie was horrible...
uhm... it just did :P