I don't know what HOWTOs you guys are reading, but I've been using the LDP for over a year now and for the most part, it's always been up to date.
And even when a HOWTO hasn't been in sync with "the latest version", it's always been enough to point me in the right direction.
For example, the PPP HOWTO, which hasn't been updated in about 18 months...I was trying to hook up a laptop with a null modem cable. Nowhere else on the net could I find ANY information about connecting 2 Linux boxen via null modem. The PPP HOWTO gave me the proper command to use, but it didn't work. Using that as a base, I read the pppd manpage, and realized that I had to add the 'local' option...Wham! Bam! Thank you, Ma'am! 5 mins later, I was up and running.
Sure, it was out of date, but without it, I'd probably still be fumbling with options...All it required was a the application of a couple ounces of grey matter.
Obviously that would be the case...unless you had a quantum login program that could accept all possible passwords simultaneously.;)
Seriously tho, the idea is not that a QC would be able to instantly crack into every 'puter on the 'net. What a QC could do, tho, is decrypt pretty much any encrypted message you threw at it using current encryption techniques, and do it a hell of a lot faster than anything we can do today. Heaven help you tho if the QC got a hold of your passwd file...;)
Invariably, the instant you make any system idiot-proof, Nature makes a better idiot.
Not that I'm saying all newbies are idiots. (I'm not THAT bitter yet), but the smarter you make a system, the more accessible it becomes to those who are, well, idiots. (Or, if you insist on being PC, "non-technical")
Therefore, it could be argued that a measure of the success of your user interface is the intelligence (or lack thereof) of your user base. The more stupid the problems they throw at you, the better your product is.
Those fine boys over at Microsoft figured this out years ago, and actually designed a user interface which LEECHES intelligence from the user (Windows 9x, NT4.0). Thus Microsoft's OSes get the reputation for being easy to use, (Point and Drool) and their marketing boys are assured endless seas of drooling zombies clamoring to purchase the next upgrade....It's really quite innovative.;)
Let's alphabetize the keys! Sure, it will twist your hands into pretzels trying to type out even simple words, but just think of how much easier it will be for newbies to learn!;)
Hey! I've got an idea! Why don't we get rid of that damned Windows key and replace it with the Tux key! =) I'd love to be able to say, "The hotkey to export your file is Tux-F7.";)
I do think we could move the caps lock key tho...over with scroll lock and print screen. Give a hint to all those COBOL programmers out there....
I guess I'm hosed. I grew up with my dad's shotgun in the closet and his Playboys in the bathroom. I've played Quake and watched the season finale of Buffy the Vampire Slayer! I guess I'm going to snap and become a psychopathic homicidal rapist any second now....
Or not. Seriously, what would you rather have? Junior's eyes bugging out on www..com or out scoring crack? I mean, for the most part, it's something he's going to see anyways at some point in his life. Even the most zealous guardians of moral righteousness have to breed sometime.
Of course, our current domain name system is partially to blame for this. Without a.adult /.xxx TLD, many 'honest' porn site operators are forced to pedal their wares (not warez) in the.com namespace. I'm sure that if a.xxx TLD were commissioned, many sites would happily convert over. Blocking.xxx from schools/libraries, etc would be much easier than going through every page on the planet. No, it wouldn't be a perfect solution, but it would make life easier and reduce the need for such draconian censorware.
Moving forward, we need to look at enforcing the distinction between TLDs. If you want blah.org, you should be a registered non-profit organization. If you want.com, you'd better own the trademark (thus getting us out of "I had floorg.com first, but Floorg Inc wants to take it from me!).art for movies / entertainment,.home for personal pages...No commerce allowed..net stays around for ISPs/network services..oss for Open Source projects. (We the geeks demand our own TLD),.ref for scientific / reference materials. The Library of Congress, Project Gutenburg, etc. With a combination of checking credentials on registration and an organization for reviewing complaints ("recommending" that you move your domain name to a new TLD, or simply suspending it if you've been warned before)
Now, if all the money put into developing / purchasing censorware was put into fixing our fsck'd up Domain Name Registration, we'd be in a lot better position.
But, WOW! Think of all the practical applications...those dust bunnies under my bed? Gone. Crime problem? taken care of. House guests who refuse to leave? Poof! Gone in an instant! Sure, I'd be evaporated too, but that would mean I wouldn't have to come in to work on Monday!;)
Having just been to a MS Office 2000 marketing sesison earlier this week (It was free), I think that you're totally off base. Here's why:
1) Microsoft is still working very hard to co-opt the web. And, with Office 2000, they're doing that very well with their funky Captive-X controls. What does that mean to the consumer? You'll soon be seeing a lot more Windows/IE-only areas on the web.
2) They have made HTML the "sister file format" of Office 2000. The theory being that you can now save your file to HTML and have it be functionally/visually identical to saving it in the Word/Excel/Powerpoint/etc file format. Why are they doing this? Because it lets them tie into #1. All of these Office 2000 generated Web pages use Microsoft's 'embrace and extend'ed web technologies.
So, a year from now, when you're no longer recieving Office documents, but URLs to web-documents which can only be viewed/edited using IE5 for Windows, which of your 3 machines will you be using to browse the web?
Oh, and that stupid paperclip is now 3-D looking! Like I didn't have enough CPU cycles to burn...I swear, someone should put together an Office Assistant theme pack for Q3...Fragging the clip would be such a rewarding experience!
Ultimately, what will doom Office are the new, ever-more-destructive OTDs (Outlook/Office Transmitted Diseases) like worm.explorer.zip and Melissa or the raft of Word Macro Virii out there which target the "integrated" Office platform. You thought they were bad before...just wait until they find a way to target the executable code that handles the "self-repairing" and "install on demand" functions of 2000...
Ok. I'm better now. I've heard that there will be some delay on the dual K7 boards....so, I guess I'll just have to wait to get me a Dual-Athlon...or, should that be a Bi-Athlon?
Can they hook it directly into my brain like Intel did with Homer Simpson? I'd like that!
Well then, grab a copy of the Linux source code and fix it! Add all those original concepts which are ricocheting around your brain! I'm sure Linus and Alan will thank you for it.
It's easy to say Linux has a "monolithic kernel based on designs out of an ancient book for an obsolete teaching OS"...what's hard is putting your code where your mouth is. If you have a better idea, post it to the kernel development mailing list and get the ball rolling.
But, if you've never looked at the Linux kernel source code / never followed the kernel dev list, don't be dissing it. A lot of very smart ppl have put a lot of time and considerable thought into it. If you have and you still think it's brain-dead, then roll up your sleeves, suck back the coffee and fix it! Then you won't think it sucks, and you'll have the added benefit of being able to say, "Hey! I fixed that!" to anyone who will listen. Sounds like a pretty good deal to me.
If you think Linux (or some part of it) sucks, at least you have the oppertunity to fix it so it doesn't. That's the freedom of Open Source.
Speaking as an application developer, me and the Linux kernel get along fine. It stays out of my way and lets me get my work done. I've yet to scream any obscenities at it. (The same can't be said for NT and the illustrious Win32 API)
Actually, I was just at a Microsoft Office 2000 info-session (Hey, it was free.) An interesting tidbit at the end, when one of MS's marketroids got up to talk about BackOffice 4.5.."Some hardware vendors are now certifying their NT4 boxes to have 99.9% reliability. That's less than 9 hours / year."
9 HOURS PER YEAR! Now, if you assume that a reboot takes about a minute, and you have your NT box rebooted every 17 hours, that's about right....
According to the blurb on the front page, the FPU is abou 40% faster than the Xeon. I don't know if that's true, but I sure hope it is! (I don't have a K7 on my desk so I can't say for sure...but if someone generous wanted to send me one.....I'd let you know ASAP);)
That's it. I think it's time to toss Bill, Steve and Linus into a ring...(I realize there are others we could throw in as well, but we'll keep things simple here for the sake of argument.) Whoever comes out standing takes control of the x86 OS industry for 5 years...
If I had to, I could put up with 5 years of MacOS if it meant I never had to beat my head against WinNT!
And 5 years of Linux would simply be bliss.;)
Not to mention how much fun it would be to see Mr. Jobs and Mr. Torvalds double-team Mr.Gates. I'd pay good money to see that!
Now, this solution may seem a touch barbaric, but I can't see how it's any worse than the infighting/back-stabbing that's been going on in the industry since the whole IBM/M$ OS/2 fiasco.
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I don't know what HOWTOs you guys are reading, but I've been using the LDP for over a year now and for the most part, it's always been up to date.
And even when a HOWTO hasn't been in sync with "the latest version", it's always been enough to point me in the right direction.
For example, the PPP HOWTO, which hasn't been updated in about 18 months...I was trying to hook up a laptop with a null modem cable. Nowhere else on the net could I find ANY information about connecting 2 Linux boxen via null modem. The PPP HOWTO gave me the proper command to use, but it didn't work. Using that as a base, I read the pppd manpage, and realized that I had to add the 'local' option...Wham! Bam! Thank you, Ma'am! 5 mins later, I was up and running.
Sure, it was out of date, but without it, I'd probably still be fumbling with options...All it required was a the application of a couple ounces of grey matter.
Obviously that would be the case...unless you had a quantum login program that could accept all possible passwords simultaneously. ;)
;)
Seriously tho, the idea is not that a QC would be able to instantly crack into every 'puter on the 'net. What a QC could do, tho, is decrypt pretty much any encrypted message you threw at it using current encryption techniques, and do it a hell of a lot faster than anything we can do today. Heaven help you tho if the QC got a hold of your passwd file...
Invariably, the instant you make any system idiot-proof, Nature makes a better idiot.
;)
Not that I'm saying all newbies are idiots. (I'm not THAT bitter yet), but the smarter you make a system, the more accessible it becomes to those who are, well, idiots. (Or, if you insist on being PC, "non-technical")
Therefore, it could be argued that a measure of the success of your user interface is the intelligence (or lack thereof) of your user base. The more stupid the problems they throw at you, the better your product is.
Those fine boys over at Microsoft figured this out years ago, and actually designed a user interface which LEECHES intelligence from the user (Windows 9x, NT4.0). Thus Microsoft's OSes get the reputation for being easy to use, (Point and Drool) and their marketing boys are assured endless seas of drooling zombies clamoring to purchase the next upgrade....It's really quite innovative.
Let's alphabetize the keys! Sure, it will twist your hands into pretzels trying to type out even simple words, but just think of how much easier it will be for newbies to learn! ;)
;)
Hey! I've got an idea! Why don't we get rid of that damned Windows key and replace it with the Tux key! =) I'd love to be able to say, "The hotkey to export your file is Tux-F7."
I do think we could move the caps lock key tho...over with scroll lock and print screen. Give a hint to all those COBOL programmers out there....
What about sex (9,952,677) and abstinence (47,660)?
I guess I'm hosed. I grew up with my dad's shotgun in the closet and his Playboys in the bathroom. I've played Quake and watched the season finale of Buffy the Vampire Slayer! I guess I'm going to snap and become a psychopathic homicidal rapist any second now....
.adult / .xxx TLD, many 'honest' porn site operators are forced to pedal their wares (not warez) in the .com namespace. I'm sure that if a .xxx TLD were commissioned, many sites would happily convert over. Blocking .xxx from schools/libraries, etc would be much easier than going through every page on the planet. No, it wouldn't be a perfect solution, but it would make life easier and reduce the need for such draconian censorware.
.com, you'd better own the trademark (thus getting us out of "I had floorg.com first, but Floorg Inc wants to take it from me!) .art for movies / entertainment, .home for personal pages...No commerce allowed. .net stays around for ISPs/network services. .oss for Open Source projects. (We the geeks demand our own TLD), .ref for scientific / reference materials. The Library of Congress, Project Gutenburg, etc. With a combination of checking credentials on registration and an organization for reviewing complaints ("recommending" that you move your domain name to a new TLD, or simply suspending it if you've been warned before)
Or not. Seriously, what would you rather have? Junior's eyes bugging out on www..com or out scoring crack? I mean, for the most part, it's something he's going to see anyways at some point in his life. Even the most zealous guardians of moral righteousness have to breed sometime.
Of course, our current domain name system is partially to blame for this. Without a
Moving forward, we need to look at enforcing the distinction between TLDs. If you want blah.org, you should be a registered non-profit organization. If you want
Now, if all the money put into developing / purchasing censorware was put into fixing our fsck'd up Domain Name Registration, we'd be in a lot better position.
Just my 2 fractional monetary units.
But, WOW! Think of all the practical applications...those dust bunnies under my bed? Gone. Crime problem? taken care of. House guests who refuse to leave? Poof! Gone in an instant! Sure, I'd be evaporated too, but that would mean I wouldn't have to come in to work on Monday! ;)
Where do I sign up?
That's a pity. Since in any gathering of humans, the majority is always wrong.
According to the article, "A person weighing 70 kilograms might therefore need to drink at least 100 cups to receive the same dose as the mice."
Wow! And that's hourly!
Ah well...guess I'd better get started now...
99 cups of coffee on the wall,
99 cups of coffee.
If one of those cups should happen to fall,
your radiated corpse will be a stain on the wall...
98 cups of coffee on the wall,
98 cups of coffee....
Having just been to a MS Office 2000 marketing sesison earlier this week (It was free), I think that you're totally off base. Here's why:
1) Microsoft is still working very hard to co-opt the web. And, with Office 2000, they're doing that very well with their funky Captive-X controls. What does that mean to the consumer? You'll soon be seeing a lot more Windows/IE-only areas on the web.
2) They have made HTML the "sister file format" of Office 2000. The theory being that you can now save your file to HTML and have it be functionally/visually identical to saving it in the Word/Excel/Powerpoint/etc file format. Why are they doing this? Because it lets them tie into #1. All of these Office 2000 generated Web pages use Microsoft's 'embrace and extend'ed web technologies.
So, a year from now, when you're no longer recieving Office documents, but URLs to web-documents which can only be viewed/edited using IE5 for Windows, which of your 3 machines will you be using to browse the web?
Oh, and that stupid paperclip is now 3-D looking! Like I didn't have enough CPU cycles to burn...I swear, someone should put together an Office Assistant theme pack for Q3...Fragging the clip would be such a rewarding experience!
Ultimately, what will doom Office are the new, ever-more-destructive OTDs (Outlook/Office Transmitted Diseases) like worm.explorer.zip and Melissa or the raft of Word Macro Virii out there which target the "integrated" Office platform. You thought they were bad before...just wait until they find a way to target the executable code that handles the "self-repairing" and "install on demand" functions of 2000...
YES! YES! YES! YES! YES! YIPEEE!!!
Ok. I'm better now. I've heard that there will be some delay on the dual K7 boards....so, I guess I'll just have to wait to get me a Dual-Athlon...or, should that be a Bi-Athlon?
Can they hook it directly into my brain like Intel did with Homer Simpson? I'd like that!
Well then, grab a copy of the Linux source code and fix it! Add all those original concepts which are ricocheting around your brain! I'm sure Linus and Alan will thank you for it.
It's easy to say Linux has a "monolithic kernel based on designs out of an ancient book for an obsolete teaching OS"...what's hard is putting your code where your mouth is. If you have a better idea, post it to the kernel development mailing list and get the ball rolling.
But, if you've never looked at the Linux kernel source code / never followed the kernel dev list, don't be dissing it. A lot of very smart ppl have put a lot of time and considerable thought into it. If you have and you still think it's brain-dead, then roll up your sleeves, suck back the coffee and fix it! Then you won't think it sucks, and you'll have the added benefit of being able to say, "Hey! I fixed that!" to anyone who will listen. Sounds like a pretty good deal to me.
If you think Linux (or some part of it) sucks, at least you have the oppertunity to fix it so it doesn't. That's the freedom of Open Source.
Speaking as an application developer, me and the Linux kernel get along fine. It stays out of my way and lets me get my work done. I've yet to scream any obscenities at it. (The same can't be said for NT and the illustrious Win32 API)
Actually, I was just at a Microsoft Office 2000 info-session (Hey, it was free.) An interesting tidbit at the end, when one of MS's marketroids got up to talk about BackOffice 4.5.."Some hardware vendors are now certifying their NT4 boxes to have 99.9% reliability. That's less than 9 hours / year."
9 HOURS PER YEAR! Now, if you assume that a reboot takes about a minute, and you have your NT box rebooted every 17 hours, that's about right....
According to the blurb on the front page, the FPU is abou 40% faster than the Xeon. I don't know if that's true, but I sure hope it is! (I don't have a K7 on my desk so I can't say for sure...but if someone generous wanted to send me one.....I'd let you know ASAP) ;)
That's it. I think it's time to toss Bill, Steve and Linus into a ring...(I realize there are others we could throw in as well, but we'll keep things simple here for the sake of argument.) Whoever comes out standing takes control of the x86 OS industry for 5 years...
;)
If I had to, I could put up with 5 years of MacOS if it meant I never had to beat my head against WinNT!
And 5 years of Linux would simply be bliss.
Not to mention how much fun it would be to see Mr. Jobs and Mr. Torvalds double-team Mr.Gates. I'd pay good money to see that!
Now, this solution may seem a touch barbaric, but I can't see how it's any worse than the infighting/back-stabbing that's been going on in the industry since the whole IBM/M$ OS/2 fiasco.