A hacker can interface a broken business process with a broken spreadsheet and make it better, certainly. He might even like it. Graham is wrong here -- nasty little problems can be interesting too.
But if once he's done it you tell him no, the client wants it THIS way. No, now the OTHER way. No, this THIRD way. THEN you're going to upset him. And it's not just hackers who get ticked at that sort of thing. Which of course does happen on every real project.
Software Architect: Arrogant person who designs your system but never gets his or her hands dirty with actual code.
Software Engineer: Someone who spends their time talking to the client and writing specs and (possibly) designs, but still doesn't get their hands dirty with implementation.
If you're lucky, the architect is brilliant and was probably once a hacker. The engineers you need, but they probably aren't hackers.
Both these positions, unlike the position of a hacker, are client-facing (that's why they still have jobs). The architect you bring out with you on sales calls and have him wow the client with his brilliance; he can sketch out the system for the client in no time at all (though whether the system he sketches out is implementable is another question). The engineer takes over at the level of translating business requirements to software requirements.
Anyone who claims to be a productive Software Engineer "using latest-generation tools and languages, design patterns and best practices, object-oriented techniques and integration technologies like message queues, not to mention web services and remoting" is probably a phony, and couldn't define half those terms. If they're an architect and claiming that's how you'll build your system, they're either a phony or they're stalling while they figure out what you want.
There's been a movement for decades among managers to attempt to reduce programming to a set of "best practices" so anyone could be trained to do it, mechanically, as with a bricklayer or assembly line worker. It's gone under names like TQM, MDQ and ISO 9000, and its hallmark is the three-ring binder.
Proponents of this concept have always claimed that programming as an art or craft is dead. And they've always been wrong. Some subset of programming can be done by trained "code monkeys". A larger subset can not. And confusing the two leads to projects that fail big-time. Want to produce yet another set of reports? Go ahead, hire a "code monkey". Want to solve a new and difficult problem? Better go for someone who, even if not a hacker, knows a little about his subject beyond the three-ring binder.
Unfortunately, ignoring the specs and giving the client what they need rather than what they ask for requires that the great hacker know the client's business better than the client. Which is a bit much to ask -- that's beyond "Great Hacker" and into "Rennaissance Man".
EULA? I don't need to agree to anything to use software I bought, let alone hardware. Yeah, there's an Apple logo on the iPod; that means Apple makes it, doesn't mean they get to control what I do with it. There's a Mazda logo on my car, too, but if I want to drop in a turbocharger, there's nothing Mazda can do about it.
I'll assume your GPL point is trolling; the FSF adequately explains the difference between the GPL and an EULA on their site.
They knew. The IBM team discovered differential cryptography (IIRC called it the "T attack") while developing the cipher. NSA already knew about it even then, though, so Biham and Shamir are at least the third set of inventors/discoverers of that technique.
Yes. Microsoft is patenting a process which already exists. Both geocoding and time-coding of images have been done for some time, and one of the explicit purposes of those codes is to allow for organizing images according to time or place.
This patent is like seeing that there's JPEG out there, and patenting "a method for reducing the transmission time of images", said method being to JPEG-compress them first. It's that stupid.
Why would they take legal action when FUD is so much cheaper? How much have they gotten from digital camera manufacturers on their bogus (obvious, expired, and/or submarine) FAT patents, for instance?
And slashdot posters by and large get it right. Now there's something that doesn't occur every day.
A few points both have missed so far, though. One is that a methodical patent search is impossible; patents use such opaque and obfuscatory language (often deliberately) that there's no way you can search for a patent on any given technique you've been using. Further, it may be a submarine patent.
Prior art is largely irrelevant because the patent system is broken; the patent office doesn't seem to check it, even when the prior art is other patents (see, e.g. the LZW patent mess). Part of this is because patents (as I mentioned above) are essentially unsearchable. Prior art works when you've got deep pockets and the lawyers to overcome the assumption of validity. When you're Joe Open Source Programmer, you're screwed as soon as they file a lawsuit (assuming you had the nerve to ignore the C&D), regardless of how much prior art there is.
So, on his recommendations --
1) is good. Not because the patent problem isn't serious, but because there's nothing you can actually do about it. Like Global Thermonuclear War, you just have to plan for it not coming.
2) is pointless. Our own prior art won't prevent the patents from being issued
3) is a mistake. Each patent you discover is more work you have to do to avoid it, if that's even possible, and more chance of getting nailed for willfull infringement. Doing a patent search under these circumstances is like searching for mines with a metal probe.
4) is good -- if you happen to know about the patent, you should avoid it.
5) is fine, if you have allies you can trust. You probably don't.
6) Pointless again. So you terminate their right to use their software. They're either a litigation company which does nothing, a single-product company which is trying to force the world to use their product, or a giant megacorporation. The first two won't use your software anyway, and the last has the lawyers to spit on your termination agreement -- not to mention the programmers to replace your software if necessary. Terminating the rights of patent-users is a feel-good measure only.
Make a division between "IT people" and "business people", then make the assumption that the business person is always right and therefore his annoyance is the fault of the IT person. Write an article about it in a magazine for IT people. That's just trolling.
I think what you're looking at there is an artifact of the originals of the doctored images being JPEG-compressed in the first place. Modifying the image creates discontinuities in the JPEG artifacts, which re-compression will tend to make very evident.
An image well-faked from lossless originals would not exhibit that behavior.
That would only hold if they were aware of the supposed violation at the time they distributed the GPLed code in the first place. They claim that they weren't, and that once they were, contractural obligations prevented them from ceasing to distribute the code. (hard to swallow, but it's a story)
I assure you that the same group will complain about each and every one of the 150+ other compounds as soon as they are used in similar quantitities. And if they aren't as effective, the national fire protection council will add their voices in too.
Headline: TOXIC COMPUTERS CATCH FIRE, KILL CHILDREN AND SENIORS!
If it's just the gas cap, the check engine light should go off after a few starts once you put the gas cap on properly. Might take a cold start.
I have one of those code readers so I can drag down the Windoze laptop, read the codes, look 'em up in my service manual, and determine that "you idiot, it's the gas cap". Then I can reset the code. Though once it was "random engine misfire", which resulted from a bad coil pack... fortunately in warranty.
Never mind anonymous proxies; consider the Linksys Community Network and Default Community Network. Fire a comment through an open AP in or around a major city and you've got damn good anonymity, assuming you personally haven't already been targeted.
Doesn't matter how long the files are offered; if they aren't offered by me I'm not infringing directly. The length of time might go to showing contributory infringement, but you'd still have to show that I knew about it.
Your car analogy, in addition being just plain wrong, doesn't apply. For contributory infringement, I must know about the particular act of infringement. It's not enough to know that people might be using the connection for copyright infringement.
You're not getting it. The RIAA gets to write laws, because they are a great and powerful lobbying association. I don't, because I'm joe geek without a great lobby, a lot of money, or enough charisma to even form a decent cult. So by saying "the law is the law" and suggesting changing the law through the system, you are basically saying to bow down to the RIAA.
It is not, in any case, theft; it is copyright infringement. Different terms for different violations of the law.
As for the law which says downloading is illegal, downloading is direct infringement, a violation of 17 USC 501(a). Sharing is contributory infringement, a violation of the same law but an extension invented by the content owners and blessed by the courts.
Nope, it's ASCAP which will sue the restaurant for a song (Happy Birthday) which was written in the 19th century but has somehow had its copyright survive indefinitely.
Wrong. Some of the DirecTV defendants fought back in the courts -- and the legal system slapped them with $10,000 in _DirectTVs_ legal fees for their troubles.
The game is rigged so that the more you fight the more you lose.
Slashdot Mirror
A hacker can interface a broken business process with a broken spreadsheet and make it better, certainly. He might even like it. Graham is wrong here -- nasty little problems can be interesting too.
But if once he's done it you tell him no, the client wants it THIS way. No, now the OTHER way. No, this THIRD way. THEN you're going to upset him. And it's not just hackers who get ticked at that sort of thing. Which of course does happen on every real project.
Software Architect: Arrogant person who designs your system but never gets his or her hands dirty with actual code.
Software Engineer: Someone who spends their time talking to the client and writing specs and (possibly) designs, but still doesn't get their hands dirty with implementation.
If you're lucky, the architect is brilliant and was probably once a hacker. The engineers you need, but they probably aren't hackers.
Both these positions, unlike the position of a hacker, are client-facing (that's why they still have jobs). The architect you bring out with you on sales calls and have him wow the client with his brilliance; he can sketch out the system for the client in no time at all (though whether the system he sketches out is implementable is another question). The engineer takes over at the level of translating business requirements to software requirements.
Anyone who claims to be a productive Software Engineer "using latest-generation tools and languages, design patterns and best practices, object-oriented techniques and integration technologies like message queues, not to mention web services and remoting" is probably a phony, and couldn't define half those terms. If they're an architect and claiming that's how you'll build your system, they're either a phony or they're stalling while they figure out what you want.
There's been a movement for decades among managers to attempt to reduce programming to a set of "best practices" so anyone could be trained to do it, mechanically, as with a bricklayer or assembly line worker. It's gone under names like TQM, MDQ and ISO 9000, and its hallmark is the three-ring binder.
Proponents of this concept have always claimed that programming as an art or craft is dead. And they've always been wrong. Some subset of programming can be done by trained "code monkeys". A larger subset can not. And confusing the two leads to projects that fail big-time. Want to produce yet another set of reports? Go ahead, hire a "code monkey". Want to solve a new and difficult problem? Better go for someone who, even if not a hacker, knows a little about his subject beyond the three-ring binder.
Unfortunately, ignoring the specs and giving the client what they need rather than what they ask for requires that the great hacker know the client's business better than the client. Which is a bit much to ask -- that's beyond "Great Hacker" and into "Rennaissance Man".
EULA? I don't need to agree to anything to use software I bought, let alone hardware. Yeah, there's an Apple logo on the iPod; that means Apple makes it, doesn't mean they get to control what I do with it. There's a Mazda logo on my car, too, but if I want to drop in a turbocharger, there's nothing Mazda can do about it.
I'll assume your GPL point is trolling; the FSF adequately explains the difference between the GPL and an EULA on their site.
They knew. The IBM team discovered differential cryptography (IIRC called it the "T attack") while developing the cipher. NSA already knew about it even then, though, so Biham and Shamir are at least the third set of inventors/discoverers of that technique.
Yes. Microsoft is patenting a process which already exists. Both geocoding and time-coding of images have been done for some time, and one of the explicit purposes of those codes is to allow for organizing images according to time or place. This patent is like seeing that there's JPEG out there, and patenting "a method for reducing the transmission time of images", said method being to JPEG-compress them first. It's that stupid.
Why would they take legal action when FUD is so much cheaper? How much have they gotten from digital camera manufacturers on their bogus (obvious, expired, and/or submarine) FAT patents, for instance?
And slashdot posters by and large get it right. Now there's something that doesn't occur every day.
A few points both have missed so far, though. One is that a methodical patent search is impossible; patents use such opaque and obfuscatory language (often deliberately) that there's no way you can search for a patent on any given technique you've been using. Further, it may be a submarine patent.
Prior art is largely irrelevant because the patent system is broken; the patent office doesn't seem to check it, even when the prior art is other patents (see, e.g. the LZW patent mess). Part of this is because patents (as I mentioned above) are essentially unsearchable. Prior art works when you've got deep pockets and the lawyers to overcome the assumption of validity. When you're Joe Open Source Programmer, you're screwed as soon as they file a lawsuit (assuming you had the nerve to ignore the C&D), regardless of how much prior art there is.
So, on his recommendations --
1) is good. Not because the patent problem isn't serious, but because there's nothing you can actually do about it. Like Global Thermonuclear War, you just have to plan for it not coming.
2) is pointless. Our own prior art won't prevent the patents from being issued
3) is a mistake. Each patent you discover is more work you have to do to avoid it, if that's even possible, and more chance of getting nailed for willfull infringement. Doing a patent search under these circumstances is like searching for mines with a metal probe.
4) is good -- if you happen to know about the patent, you should avoid it.
5) is fine, if you have allies you can trust. You probably don't.
6) Pointless again. So you terminate their right to use their software. They're either a litigation company which does nothing, a single-product company which is trying to force the world to use their product, or a giant megacorporation. The first two won't use your software anyway, and the last has the lawyers to spit on your termination agreement -- not to mention the programmers to replace your software if necessary. Terminating the rights of patent-users is a feel-good measure only.
Make a division between "IT people" and "business people", then make the assumption that the business person is always right and therefore his annoyance is the fault of the IT person. Write an article about it in a magazine for IT people. That's just trolling.
I think what you're looking at there is an artifact of the originals of the doctored images being JPEG-compressed in the first place. Modifying the image creates discontinuities in the JPEG artifacts, which re-compression will tend to make very evident.
An image well-faked from lossless originals would not exhibit that behavior.
Cell phone use on airplanes is banned by the FCC, so you have no luck there.
Does Canada have laches in patent cases? http://www.converium.com/2103.asp
That would only hold if they were aware of the supposed violation at the time they distributed the GPLed code in the first place. They claim that they weren't, and that once they were, contractural obligations prevented them from ceasing to distribute the code. (hard to swallow, but it's a story)
Is how to rig it, of course. To misquote a phrase, any sufficiently advanced technology can be simulated by a rigged demo :-)
It's for limited resource computing devices. If that doesn't describe the Commodore, I don't know what it does describe!
If he hasn't changed the regular password, it hardly matters if there's a backdoor, does it?
I assure you that the same group will complain about each and every one of the 150+ other compounds as soon as they are used in similar quantitities. And if they aren't as effective, the national fire protection council will add their voices in too.
Headline: TOXIC COMPUTERS CATCH FIRE, KILL CHILDREN AND SENIORS!
If it's just the gas cap, the check engine light should go off after a few starts once you put the gas cap on properly. Might take a cold start.
I have one of those code readers so I can drag down the Windoze laptop, read the codes, look 'em up in my service manual, and determine that "you idiot, it's the gas cap". Then I can reset the code. Though once it was "random engine misfire", which resulted from a bad coil pack... fortunately in warranty.
Never mind anonymous proxies; consider the Linksys Community Network and Default Community Network. Fire a comment through an open AP in or around a major city and you've got damn good anonymity, assuming you personally haven't already been targeted.
Doesn't matter how long the files are offered; if they aren't offered by me I'm not infringing directly. The length of time might go to showing contributory infringement, but you'd still have to show that I knew about it.
Your car analogy, in addition being just plain wrong, doesn't apply. For contributory infringement, I must know about the particular act of infringement. It's not enough to know that people might be using the connection for copyright infringement.
You're not getting it. The RIAA gets to write laws, because they are a great and powerful lobbying association. I don't, because I'm joe geek without a great lobby, a lot of money, or enough charisma to even form a decent cult. So by saying "the law is the law" and suggesting changing the law through the system, you are basically saying to bow down to the RIAA.
It is not, in any case, theft; it is copyright infringement. Different terms for different violations of the law.
As for the law which says downloading is illegal, downloading is direct infringement, a violation of 17 USC 501(a). Sharing is contributory infringement, a violation of the same law but an extension invented by the content owners and blessed by the courts.
No, it isn't. If someone breaks into my WiFi lan and uses that to commit copyright infringement, I am
1) Not guilty of direct infringement (obviously)
2) Not guilty of contributory infringement (because I didn't know about it nor should I have known about it) and
3) Not guilty of vicarious infringement (because I'm not profiting by it)
Merely owning the DSL line doesn't make you legally responsible for everything done across it.
If I deliberately shared it, rather than being hacked, I could avoid liability by invoking the DMCA, if I jumped through the proper hoops.
Nope, it's ASCAP which will sue the restaurant for a song (Happy Birthday) which was written in the 19th century but has somehow had its copyright survive indefinitely.
Wrong. Some of the DirecTV defendants fought back in the courts -- and the legal system slapped them with $10,000 in _DirectTVs_ legal fees for their troubles.
The game is rigged so that the more you fight the more you lose.
They're not thieves. Their behavior is only criminal because of laws written and/or underwritten by the RIAA itself.