Sponsored by Fanless Media Celebrities!!! Have they booked Vanilla Ice for endorsement deals yet?
Are media centers really taking hold? I mean PVR + media player + home entertainment center sounds like a logical thing to be brought together, but it all seems too pricey for normal human consumption. While I'm at it, does this then bring the concept of "computer as an appliance" closer to reality?
If we're all going in that direction, shouldn't we just get it over with and have a "server closet" in every home? Rack-mounted servers for your music, all your DVDs, and constant family album slideshows on channel 3 or something. Linux of course (with contraband deCSS) and wirelessly controlled with a zaurus.
Couldn't we do all of that now much more cheaply than this media pc?
Your case moves you to contract work with a pseudo-guarantee that you'll then be hired in full-time. That's a bit different than someone jumping strictly to contract work. (your situation sounds like an extended job interview the way they play it)
As I'm mostly introverted, contract work is a bit daunting. Minding your own, doing your work, and not having to do any socializing seems nicer than having to market yourself, do the actual spec work with potentially clueless customers, and in general dealing with the social aspects of the real world.
Of course with that experience comes gained insight and development of "social skills" which in turn makes you both a better person and a more marketable one. Even then, I don't know how far that'll take you.
For those that don't know, this entire book is dedicated to that ever-essential dining room furniture known as a lazy susan.
It sits on top of your dining table and it spins around and around. People put food on this spinning table so diners don't have to go "please pass the (insert supposedly ingestible food item here)"
I guess its inclusion in Excel was just a step above the flight-sim easter egg they once had. If Mozilla can include a kitchen sink, the MS folks took the liberty of including a lazy susan. Er, sorry, pivot table.
Look for OpenOffice to include a Pivot Chair in the next release. I, for one, can't wait to tell them MS folks to implement their own pivot chair -- so they can sit and spin, baby, yeah!
"EA will see that it's policies are not best for the bottom line and they will change"
Perhaps this is how it SHOULD work. However, many people are martyred without result. Companies still have poor work environments -- they just go through the slave traders more. Does it hurt their pockets having to shuffle through employees? Sure. Does it hurt enough to admit they're wrong? I'm assuming you don't make it that far up in the corporate ladder without a boatload of pride...and it's a giant pill to swallow to admit being wrong.
Capitalism (read GREED) has its place...but the well-being of its peons are rarely in its best interest.
We're talking about Electronic Arts, right?
on
A College Guide to EA
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
I suppose colleges are getting funky with their subject matter -- as there are topics covered that make little sense to me. A course in American Idol, for one. At least it's a just a talk and not an entire course.
On the other hand, it may be a decent business-oriented class to follow a relatively successful biz to see the things they got right/wrong along the way. Like a case-study in business...and people can even choose which ones they wish to follow with courses in EA, IBM, MS, GOOG, and maybe one that Aaron Spelling dude.
Or maybe when Microsoft releases longhorn? I'm not a wealthy geek so I try to squeeze as much mileage out of my machines. I run Linux, which gives me stability and features...while still making basic tasks bearable on older hardware.
Before my laptop purchase, I ran RH7.3 on a 400Mhz PII with 10GB and 256MB RAM. Got everything I needed done. It initially had Win98 and I wanted something a bit more modern...without having to shell money for a newer OS let alone upgrades just to meet system requirements.
When would I wish to upgrade? Anytime something good comes out. When CAN I upgrade? When money permits. In the end, there's a satisfying feeling knowing you can get stuff done on an ancient machine while some poor shmuck with newer hardware on XP can barely click on anything because the box is riddled with spyware/crapware.
MS-TechTV: First off, we don't need anyone mentioning G4 in it to imply a Macintosh connection. X-Play will now be known as XP. There will no longer be any mention of alternative operating systems on The ScreenSavers. The show, by the way, will be renamed to Dot-SCR. Martin Sargeant will change the show's name to MS-PowerPoint.
Game consoles other than the X-Box will not be recognized. There will be Halo 2 marathons, nothing else. Microsoft staff will be interviewing and studying Tallarico in order to upgrade Clippy, making the paperclip more obnoxious and annoying.
Not that I care, of course...I've stopped watching the channel about as soon as G4 came in and bastardized the whole thing.
Your observations are valid. I know this from experience and it's incredibly disappointing. People don't know alternatives to Microsoft products. They do use "Microsoft" for software (whether OS or productivity suite) the way people say "coke" for soda.
Another bit of testament that I heard from a respected tech relative of a co-worker was that reformatting and reinstalling an OS is considered routine maintenance. I couldn't help but think to myself that only in a MS-centric mentality could such a thing be acceptable.
A lot of people are task-oriented. They have a task that needs to be done and they wish to accomplish it with little resistance. People don't use computers to learn about computers -- they use it to get tasks done. Unfortunately, that means they'll want to be versed in Word and IE...and just get on with their work instead of trying a variety of different apps.
At the library, we teach courses in MS apps (funded by the b&m gates foundation) and I've always cringed when the classes are called "Word Processing I" when they should be called "Microsoft Word I"
In the end, I guess it's almost arrogant and elitist to think the way we do...but strangely enough, it's out of concern for the general public. After a while, apathy sets in -- and if people choose not to educate themselves (or consider reformatting/reinstalling an OS as routine), let them suffer. Then again, that's really cold, too.:)
I always thought that the VBA and VBS viruses/worms of the late 90's were definitely Shared-Source.:) The ones I've seen usually have props and shoutouts at the top, really lame variable naming conventions, and a serious lack of proper formatting. (the latter may be more due to transit than anything else)
At least one VBS worm did some sort of interesting ROT13ish "encryption" of its main code with varying shifts to avoid detection. Upon launch, it decodes itself and runs an eval() to the decoded string. I thought that was interesting.
But now with exe's and pifs and scrs, it's not so interesting to read anymore. I won't even pretend to have any sort of skillz and will admit that when I receive one of those strange attachments, I save it somewhere deep within ~/ and run strings just to see if there's anything interesting. Occasional shout-outs, but mostly stuff I can't figure out.
The vbs ones were more fun...but the coding style isn't exactly something the GPL crowd would enjoy.
Sun is characterizing Red Hat as Linux. In the long run, it's a rival to Solaris and its popularity in the x86 platform isn't helping Sun's hardware sales either.
I highly doubt that they're all too fond of Linux in general...and if they could take it out of the equation, they'd do so in a heartbeat. I'm sure they want it out of the picture...but is going to attempt to do so one distro at a time starting with RH.
Are we talking about SUN the hardware company or SUN the Solaris folks? Hey, aren't they the ones that bought out the folks that eventually led to Star Office? Wait, I think they mentioned Java Desktop so is the compile-once-run-anywhere SUN?
Oh, Java Desktop is Linux with some java-related enhancements? Boy, these guys must really like Linux to be using it. Didn't they buy Cobalt before...and those things used Linux? I'm glad a large company is getting behind Linux in such a big way.
Wait, now I'm confused...they don't LIKE Linux?
Anyone know what SUN does for a living? Reminds me of a slacker surfer dude with all these different "money-making" schemes they keep pitching. Diversifying sounds more and more like treading water.
The threat of MS-DOS is enough to blackmail me out of most anything.
On a more serious note, what's up with Denial of Service attacks anyway? I guess I'm not informed enough to really offer a technical solution -- but on the client side, DDOS attacks are made with zombie bots/machines...which means an army of unpatched boxen. It's one thing to get yourself flooded out of IRC by some "crew" but a completely different thing to have major sites get killed because of an exploit infecting thousands of machines which should have been patched months ago.
Then again, maybe it's a new bit of revenue for the OSDN folks -- subscribe or your site shall know the power of a good slashdotting.:)
"The average joe just wants something that works, and Firefox is not as compatible with as many websites as IE."
There's a point there -- and even though the blame should be put squarely on developers/designers who don't go by standards, placing blame does nothing for the situation.
However, "something that works" is debatable. Does IE really work? I mean after all the spyware/adware/crapware that it lets in...does it really work? I know quite a few machines that are so heavily infected that IE craps out every few minutes or so. (The machines run NT in a public setting and there's not much funding to go around upgrading things to XP)
Firefox is a better overall product. The open source model makes it more transparent as far as bug hunting goes. Their bounty program helps find/fix bugs quickly. The pop-up blocker rocks. I don't get spyware with it. And you know what? It just works. Sounds like a quality product to me.
Then again, whoever said that dominance in the software industry is determined by the quality of a product?
It's a strange concept, I know, but has firefox become the "underdog" we all want to cheer on? Google took the world by storm with its quality. After all, it once was an underdog to the likes of altavista and yahoo.
Sure, Firefox has its roots in Netscape (which once had its day in the browser wars)...but Netscape rested on its laurels and didn't really pick up again until it got open-sourced. Now firefox definitely fits in the underdog category.
Google's gone public and it's really starting to creep me out with the various directions it's trying for. I almost have a need to fill the "fanboy" void and I'm looking towards Firefox. Not that I'm just jumping on the bandwagon...I've used Mozilla in one way or another for a while (don't feel like wine-ing my way back to IE, thank you)
So the question is -- is firefox the new google -- the upcoming product that's bound to revolutionize how we do things on the web?
Isn't the DMCA more than just the ability to make "backups" of anything? Sure, that's what it sounds like topically but it applies to anything that supposedly circumvents copyright protection.
Granted most of the other popular cases involve circumventing "security" to be able to make backups of something-or-other. On that note, I do dislike the fact that when one of my cd's get uber-scratched and I still wish to listen to the songs, I have to purchase a new one by law...where I could've backed it up instead.
In the end, though, the financial implications of the DMCA is in the forefront of the deCSS issue. Why am I not allowed to watch legally purchased DVDs on my favorite linux distro? I don't believe that has anything to do with backups at all.
I wrote the parody/satire/whatever. Took forever and if you compare it with the original, there are quite a few lines where the meter is off but excusably close enough. It's not exactly one of the easier "traditional" songs to parody.
Ah, and I see it has gotten at least one -1 troll mod now.:)
Finally finished and somewhat appropriate to post it here. Again, my apologies to the ones who wrote the original work...and no need to be upset y'all, it's supposed to be funny.
(chorus sung by DiiDdo of band Yank'n Grope) My fee's all gone, I'm wondering why I sold my soul at all -- The morning mail locked up my Windows, They all call me a troll. Even if they don't, everything I say Gets all hackers' eyes to roll -- Still I tell me that it's not so bad, It's not so bad...
Dear Bill, I wrote but you still ain't respondin' I left e-mail, my URL, and my home IP at the bottom I sent two bug reports last autumn -- you must not a got 'em There probably was a problem with hotmail or somethin Sometimes the packets take the scenic route when you route them but anyhoo, fsck it, what's been up? Man, how's Ballmer? Is he still a dancin' foo, screamin' "developer?" If I have a daughter, guess what I'ma call her -- I'ma name her Clippy. I read about your XP SP2, I'm sorry. I had a friend bork his box over some bitchy driver problem I know you probably hear this everyday but I'm your biggest fan. I even got Software Assurance that the zealots called a scam. I got a room will all your certificates and manuals, man. I like the stuff you did with Java, too, that stuff was phat! Anyways, I hope you get this, man. Hit me back just to chat, truly yours, your biggest fan This is Dan.
Dear Bill, you still ain't ack-ed my note. I hope you have a chance. I ain't mad -- I just think it's fscked up when the shizznit hit the fan. If you didn't want to fix the bugs through Trustworthy Computing you didn't have to, but you coulda posted a work-around for Matthew That's my kid bro, man, he's only eight years old Been a good boy, rebooted as he was told by you for years and you just said "No." That's pretty crappy, man, his drive was going idle. He wanted to be just like you, man! Now he gets more porn than I do! I ain't that mad, though, I just don't like bein lied to. Remember when we met in Vegas? I said that I'd write you And that I've always gots your back. See, man, patching is ok, in a way. I wouldn't have bothered either But my mom's machine got hosed and she's not a control-alt-deleter. I can't relate when people say you're doing wrong So when I have a crappy day, I flame away and bring it on 'cause I don't really know shit else and get confused on what to press I even got wit blizzard and got Warcraft Battlechest Sometimes I get a troll to axe a seal to watch it bleed It's like adrenaline, that is until the game locks up on me. And when you rolled right over Real, man, I respect you cause you did it. The linux folks are jealous -- their uptime is 24/7 but they don't know you like I do, Bill, no one does they don't know what it's like for systems like ours booting up You gotta write me, man. I'll be the biggest fan you'll ever lose. Sincerely yours, Dan -- P.S. I'm glad you beat up OS/2
Dear Mister-I'm-Too-Good-To-Fix-Or-Patch-My-Bugs, this 'll be the last e-mail I ever send your ass It's been so long and Word's still bork -- I don't deserve it? I gotta upgrade to write letters? I almost switched down to Wordperfect! So this is my ogg file I'm sending you, I hope you hear it. I'm running firefox on the information superhighway Hey Bill, I clicked on Bonzi Buddy, will it install in my drive? You know that song by Shawn Colvin, it's called "Sunny Came Home" about that girl who came home with a box of tools and said that it's time for a few small repairs -- she came home with a vengeance? That's kinda how it is, I was one "rescue disk" from switching Now it's too late -- I'm with a million penguins now and happy and all I wanted was a lousy ack or a call I hope you know I trashed ALL of your cd's from my drawer. I loved XP and IE together, think about it -- It's ruined somehow, I hope you can'
It has been ages since I've done anything in pascal...but my programming language progression went from BASIC, QBASIC, then Pascal. I've moved to other languages from there but it was quite the eye-opener. Variables had to be declared, the "uses CRT" was quite the drastic change from what I had been used to (if I remember correctly), and the overall approach was enlightening.
Now there are other languages to learn with (and a few of those aren't just for educational purposes). Java, PHP, and C for example. Even Delphi has kept Pascal alive and relevant.
Back then, I had to find...um...creative ways to be able to program and compile Pascal code. With all the freely available IDEs, compilers, debuggers, etc. around now for all these various languages (especially through OSS), things have become more accessible.
Pascal was the language that brought me out of my BASIC habits...for that I'm definitely grateful.
My Karma's bound to take a beating for this but oh well...
This portable mp3 player seems nice and I've been shopping around for a while but I still haven't found what I'm looking for.
Does it have additional GPS functionality in case I get lost where the streets have no name?
They initially went with Rio but with the faulty hard-drives, the "Rio Lemon" just wasn't going to be popular.
They were also pitched a deal with Microsoft but Bono didn't like the idea of Ballmer dancing to Mysterious Ways...and Hold Me Thrill Me Kiss Me Kill Me for that matter.
I heard the new black ipod is nature-proof and can be used even in places of high elevation.
Asked if the band actually uses the product, Bono admitted that both he and The Edge owned One...but they're not the same.
Alrighty, I'm not a big fan of online games as it is, and am heavily against the subscription-based ones. I can't say I'm fond of stuff like Evercrack where you shell out quite a bit of money for the game, the expansion pack, and then are expected to subscribe for online play.
If in some way they can forego a subscription fee and simply subject its players to advertising, I'm all for it. In a sense, I do think it's pretty cool seeing ads for stuff -- hell, you see it when you're watching sports (so if it's in the game, why not put it in THE game;-)
As long as it's tolerable and affects my bank account positively, go for it. If it doesn't affect pricing significantly, then screw 'em.
I was working on this and never finished it. I figure it's worth posting as incomplete. Apologies and respect to the original work.
My fee's all gone, I'm wondering why I sold my soul at all -- The morning mail locked up my Windows, They all call me a troll. Even if they don't, everything I say Gets all hackers' eyes to roll -- Still I tell me that it's not so bad, It's not so bad...
Dear Bill, I wrote but you still ain't respondin' I left e-mail, my URL, and my home IP at the bottom I sent two bug reports last autumn -- you must not a got 'em There probably was a problem with hotmail or somethin Sometimes the packets take the scenic route when you route them but anyhoo, fsck it, what's been up? Man, how's Ballmer? Is he still a dancin' foo, screamin' "developer?" If I have a daughter, guess what I'ma call her -- I'ma name her Clippy. I read about your XP SP2, I'm sorry. I had a friend bork his box over some bitchy driver problem I know you probably hear this everyday but I'm your biggest fan. I even got Software Assurance that the zealots called a scam. I got a room will all your certificates and manuals, man. I like the stuff you did with Java, too, that stuff was phat! Anyways, I hope you get this, man. Hit me back just to chat, truly yours, your biggest fan This is Dan.
Dear Bill, you still ain't ack-ed my note. I hope you have a chance. I ain't mad -- I just think it's fscked up when the shizznit hit the fan. If you didn't want to fix the bugs through Trustworthy Computing you didn't have to, but you coulda posted a work-around for Matthew That's my kid bro, man, he's only eight years old Been a good boy, rebooted as he was told by you for years and you just said "No." That's pretty crappy, man, his drive was going idle. He wanted to be just like you, man! Now he gets more porn than I do! I ain't that mad, though, I just don't like bein lied to. Remember when we met in Vegas? I said that I'd write you And that I've always gots your back. See, man, patching is ok, in a way. I wouldn't have bothered either But my mom's machine got hosed and she's not a control-alt-deleter.
From personal observation, it's standard procedure to portray yourself as the victim/underdog regardless of how much a dominant monopolistic arrogant bastard individual/organization/company/government you are.
Thus they paint the picture of the starving artist whom we are defrauding. Nevermind the t-shirts and concert ticket sales where artists actually get most of their cut.
Then they equate it to stealing which is easier to grasp than copyright infringement. After all, Joe Sixpack and his kids usually don't deal with copyrights much but they definitely have STUFF that can be stolen. They can relate and stealing is bad.
I do believe the ultimate solution is more quality content. My latest purchase was Manson's "Lest We Forget" with the DVD (can't seem to play it in MDK 10CE, though so I'm not too thrilled). If I believe a band makes good music (and this is definitely personal preference), I'll spend money for their work. I'm also in favor of having bonus content -- videos, pictures, behind-the-scenes footage, etc.
Never underestimate the power of fear. I'm not saying that it's good, but it has definitely been effective. The recording industry's relentless barrage of lawsuits (and settlements) have deterred a significant number of people from "stealing" music.
Will it end piracy? Of course not. Are those p2p networks helping with album sales for obscure artists? Probably. Will it drive down the sales of the next pop artist's album? That's debatable. The thing is the RIAA is seeing less money and it's scared. In turn, they had to react the best way they knew how. "Trade songs online and we'll sue you."
As scummy as we think they are, they'll find a way to exist. It's just unfortunate that the first reaction to adversity is to strike fear amongst the population.
IT managers get very little sympathy in terms of the basic creature comforts that they get. There's usually a lot of bling involved, and some aura of "respect" that comes with the title.
But the bad side...first and foremost, you're expected to be a miracle worker. Something borks, it's your fault. Nevermind any rhyme or reason why you couldn't have foreseen it coming. It's your fault. Worse yet, they want it fixed yesterday, if not sooner. Forget the impossibility of getting the parts until tomorrow -- it needs to be up and running NOW.
Some of the techs you manage will second-guess you. The rest of the company will second-guess everything you do. If things work, you're not doing your job (after all, there aren't any fires to put out). If things don't work, you're not doing your job because it was your job to keep things running and all that time, you were just sitting there doing nothing.
Some higher-up can't use e-mail? It's your neck on the line. Someone forgot to save their document and some tech you manage says it can't be recovered...so they report this to their superior and next thing you know, some VP wants to know why you're even there.
And those are only if you're a clueful manager. If you're clueless...well, you end up being promoted.
Slashdot Mirror
Sponsored by Fanless Media Celebrities!!! Have they booked Vanilla Ice for endorsement deals yet?
Are media centers really taking hold? I mean PVR + media player + home entertainment center sounds like a logical thing to be brought together, but it all seems too pricey for normal human consumption. While I'm at it, does this then bring the concept of "computer as an appliance" closer to reality?
If we're all going in that direction, shouldn't we just get it over with and have a "server closet" in every home? Rack-mounted servers for your music, all your DVDs, and constant family album slideshows on channel 3 or something. Linux of course (with contraband deCSS) and wirelessly controlled with a zaurus.
Couldn't we do all of that now much more cheaply than this media pc?
Your case moves you to contract work with a pseudo-guarantee that you'll then be hired in full-time. That's a bit different than someone jumping strictly to contract work. (your situation sounds like an extended job interview the way they play it)
As I'm mostly introverted, contract work is a bit daunting. Minding your own, doing your work, and not having to do any socializing seems nicer than having to market yourself, do the actual spec work with potentially clueless customers, and in general dealing with the social aspects of the real world.
Of course with that experience comes gained insight and development of "social skills" which in turn makes you both a better person and a more marketable one. Even then, I don't know how far that'll take you.
For those that don't know, this entire book is dedicated to that ever-essential dining room furniture known as a lazy susan.
It sits on top of your dining table and it spins around and around. People put food on this spinning table so diners don't have to go "please pass the (insert supposedly ingestible food item here)"
I guess its inclusion in Excel was just a step above the flight-sim easter egg they once had. If Mozilla can include a kitchen sink, the MS folks took the liberty of including a lazy susan. Er, sorry, pivot table.
Look for OpenOffice to include a Pivot Chair in the next release. I, for one, can't wait to tell them MS folks to implement their own pivot chair -- so they can sit and spin, baby, yeah!
"EA will see that it's policies are not best for the bottom line and they will change"
Perhaps this is how it SHOULD work. However, many people are martyred without result. Companies still have poor work environments -- they just go through the slave traders more. Does it hurt their pockets having to shuffle through employees? Sure. Does it hurt enough to admit they're wrong? I'm assuming you don't make it that far up in the corporate ladder without a boatload of pride...and it's a giant pill to swallow to admit being wrong.
Capitalism (read GREED) has its place...but the well-being of its peons are rarely in its best interest.
I suppose colleges are getting funky with their subject matter -- as there are topics covered that make little sense to me. A course in American Idol, for one. At least it's a just a talk and not an entire course.
On the other hand, it may be a decent business-oriented class to follow a relatively successful biz to see the things they got right/wrong along the way. Like a case-study in business...and people can even choose which ones they wish to follow with courses in EA, IBM, MS, GOOG, and maybe one that Aaron Spelling dude.
Or maybe when Microsoft releases longhorn? I'm not a wealthy geek so I try to squeeze as much mileage out of my machines. I run Linux, which gives me stability and features...while still making basic tasks bearable on older hardware.
Before my laptop purchase, I ran RH7.3 on a 400Mhz PII with 10GB and 256MB RAM. Got everything I needed done. It initially had Win98 and I wanted something a bit more modern...without having to shell money for a newer OS let alone upgrades just to meet system requirements.
When would I wish to upgrade? Anytime something good comes out. When CAN I upgrade? When money permits. In the end, there's a satisfying feeling knowing you can get stuff done on an ancient machine while some poor shmuck with newer hardware on XP can barely click on anything because the box is riddled with spyware/crapware.
MS-TechTV: First off, we don't need anyone mentioning G4 in it to imply a Macintosh connection. X-Play will now be known as XP. There will no longer be any mention of alternative operating systems on The ScreenSavers. The show, by the way, will be renamed to Dot-SCR. Martin Sargeant will change the show's name to MS-PowerPoint.
Game consoles other than the X-Box will not be recognized. There will be Halo 2 marathons, nothing else. Microsoft staff will be interviewing and studying Tallarico in order to upgrade Clippy, making the paperclip more obnoxious and annoying.
Not that I care, of course...I've stopped watching the channel about as soon as G4 came in and bastardized the whole thing.
Your observations are valid. I know this from experience and it's incredibly disappointing. People don't know alternatives to Microsoft products. They do use "Microsoft" for software (whether OS or productivity suite) the way people say "coke" for soda.
:)
Another bit of testament that I heard from a respected tech relative of a co-worker was that reformatting and reinstalling an OS is considered routine maintenance. I couldn't help but think to myself that only in a MS-centric mentality could such a thing be acceptable.
A lot of people are task-oriented. They have a task that needs to be done and they wish to accomplish it with little resistance. People don't use computers to learn about computers -- they use it to get tasks done. Unfortunately, that means they'll want to be versed in Word and IE...and just get on with their work instead of trying a variety of different apps.
At the library, we teach courses in MS apps (funded by the b&m gates foundation) and I've always cringed when the classes are called "Word Processing I" when they should be called "Microsoft Word I"
In the end, I guess it's almost arrogant and elitist to think the way we do...but strangely enough, it's out of concern for the general public. After a while, apathy sets in -- and if people choose not to educate themselves (or consider reformatting/reinstalling an OS as routine), let them suffer. Then again, that's really cold, too.
I always thought that the VBA and VBS viruses/worms of the late 90's were definitely Shared-Source. :) The ones I've seen usually have props and shoutouts at the top, really lame variable naming conventions, and a serious lack of proper formatting. (the latter may be more due to transit than anything else)
At least one VBS worm did some sort of interesting ROT13ish "encryption" of its main code with varying shifts to avoid detection. Upon launch, it decodes itself and runs an eval() to the decoded string. I thought that was interesting.
But now with exe's and pifs and scrs, it's not so interesting to read anymore. I won't even pretend to have any sort of skillz and will admit that when I receive one of those strange attachments, I save it somewhere deep within ~/ and run strings just to see if there's anything interesting. Occasional shout-outs, but mostly stuff I can't figure out.
The vbs ones were more fun...but the coding style isn't exactly something the GPL crowd would enjoy.
Sun is characterizing Red Hat as Linux. In the long run, it's a rival to Solaris and its popularity in the x86 platform isn't helping Sun's hardware sales either.
I highly doubt that they're all too fond of Linux in general...and if they could take it out of the equation, they'd do so in a heartbeat. I'm sure they want it out of the picture...but is going to attempt to do so one distro at a time starting with RH.
Are we talking about SUN the hardware company or SUN the Solaris folks? Hey, aren't they the ones that bought out the folks that eventually led to Star Office? Wait, I think they mentioned Java Desktop so is the compile-once-run-anywhere SUN?
Oh, Java Desktop is Linux with some java-related enhancements? Boy, these guys must really like Linux to be using it. Didn't they buy Cobalt before...and those things used Linux? I'm glad a large company is getting behind Linux in such a big way.
Wait, now I'm confused...they don't LIKE Linux?
Anyone know what SUN does for a living? Reminds me of a slacker surfer dude with all these different "money-making" schemes they keep pitching. Diversifying sounds more and more like treading water.
The threat of MS-DOS is enough to blackmail me out of most anything.
:)
On a more serious note, what's up with Denial of Service attacks anyway? I guess I'm not informed enough to really offer a technical solution -- but on the client side, DDOS attacks are made with zombie bots/machines...which means an army of unpatched boxen. It's one thing to get yourself flooded out of IRC by some "crew" but a completely different thing to have major sites get killed because of an exploit infecting thousands of machines which should have been patched months ago.
Then again, maybe it's a new bit of revenue for the OSDN folks -- subscribe or your site shall know the power of a good slashdotting.
"The average joe just wants something that works, and Firefox is not as compatible with as many websites as IE."
There's a point there -- and even though the blame should be put squarely on developers/designers who don't go by standards, placing blame does nothing for the situation.
However, "something that works" is debatable. Does IE really work? I mean after all the spyware/adware/crapware that it lets in...does it really work? I know quite a few machines that are so heavily infected that IE craps out every few minutes or so. (The machines run NT in a public setting and there's not much funding to go around upgrading things to XP)
Firefox is a better overall product. The open source model makes it more transparent as far as bug hunting goes. Their bounty program helps find/fix bugs quickly. The pop-up blocker rocks. I don't get spyware with it. And you know what? It just works. Sounds like a quality product to me.
Then again, whoever said that dominance in the software industry is determined by the quality of a product?
It's a strange concept, I know, but has firefox become the "underdog" we all want to cheer on? Google took the world by storm with its quality. After all, it once was an underdog to the likes of altavista and yahoo.
Sure, Firefox has its roots in Netscape (which once had its day in the browser wars)...but Netscape rested on its laurels and didn't really pick up again until it got open-sourced. Now firefox definitely fits in the underdog category.
Google's gone public and it's really starting to creep me out with the various directions it's trying for. I almost have a need to fill the "fanboy" void and I'm looking towards Firefox. Not that I'm just jumping on the bandwagon...I've used Mozilla in one way or another for a while (don't feel like wine-ing my way back to IE, thank you)
So the question is -- is firefox the new google -- the upcoming product that's bound to revolutionize how we do things on the web?
Isn't the DMCA more than just the ability to make "backups" of anything? Sure, that's what it sounds like topically but it applies to anything that supposedly circumvents copyright protection.
Granted most of the other popular cases involve circumventing "security" to be able to make backups of something-or-other. On that note, I do dislike the fact that when one of my cd's get uber-scratched and I still wish to listen to the songs, I have to purchase a new one by law...where I could've backed it up instead.
In the end, though, the financial implications of the DMCA is in the forefront of the deCSS issue. Why am I not allowed to watch legally purchased DVDs on my favorite linux distro? I don't believe that has anything to do with backups at all.
I wrote the parody/satire/whatever. Took forever and if you compare it with the original, there are quite a few lines where the meter is off but excusably close enough. It's not exactly one of the easier "traditional" songs to parody.
:)
Ah, and I see it has gotten at least one -1 troll mod now.
Finally finished and somewhat appropriate to post it here. Again, my apologies to the ones who wrote the original work...and no need to be upset y'all, it's supposed to be funny.
(chorus sung by DiiDdo of band Yank'n Grope)
My fee's all gone, I'm wondering why
I sold my soul at all --
The morning mail locked up my Windows,
They all call me a troll.
Even if they don't, everything I say
Gets all hackers' eyes to roll --
Still I tell me that it's not so bad,
It's not so bad...
Dear Bill, I wrote but you still ain't respondin'
I left e-mail, my URL, and my home IP at the bottom
I sent two bug reports last autumn -- you must not a got 'em
There probably was a problem with hotmail or somethin
Sometimes the packets take the scenic route when you route them
but anyhoo, fsck it, what's been up? Man, how's Ballmer?
Is he still a dancin' foo, screamin' "developer?"
If I have a daughter, guess what I'ma call her --
I'ma name her Clippy.
I read about your XP SP2, I'm sorry.
I had a friend bork his box over some bitchy driver problem
I know you probably hear this everyday but I'm your biggest fan.
I even got Software Assurance that the zealots called a scam.
I got a room will all your certificates and manuals, man.
I like the stuff you did with Java, too, that stuff was phat!
Anyways, I hope you get this, man. Hit me back
just to chat, truly yours, your biggest fan
This is Dan.
Dear Bill, you still ain't ack-ed my note. I hope you have a chance.
I ain't mad -- I just think it's fscked up when the shizznit hit the fan.
If you didn't want to fix the bugs through Trustworthy Computing
you didn't have to, but you coulda posted a work-around for Matthew
That's my kid bro, man, he's only eight years old
Been a good boy, rebooted as he was told by you
for years and you just said "No."
That's pretty crappy, man, his drive was going idle.
He wanted to be just like you, man! Now he gets more porn than I do!
I ain't that mad, though, I just don't like bein lied to.
Remember when we met in Vegas? I said that I'd write you
And that I've always gots your back. See, man, patching is ok, in a way.
I wouldn't have bothered either
But my mom's machine got hosed and she's not a control-alt-deleter.
I can't relate when people say you're doing wrong
So when I have a crappy day, I flame away and bring it on
'cause I don't really know shit else and get confused on what to press
I even got wit blizzard and got Warcraft Battlechest
Sometimes I get a troll to axe a seal to watch it bleed
It's like adrenaline, that is until the game locks up on me.
And when you rolled right over Real, man, I respect you cause you did it.
The linux folks are jealous -- their uptime is 24/7
but they don't know you like I do, Bill, no one does
they don't know what it's like for systems like ours booting up
You gotta write me, man. I'll be the biggest fan you'll ever lose.
Sincerely yours, Dan -- P.S.
I'm glad you beat up OS/2
Dear Mister-I'm-Too-Good-To-Fix-Or-Patch-My-Bugs,
this 'll be the last e-mail I ever send your ass
It's been so long and Word's still bork -- I don't deserve it?
I gotta upgrade to write letters?
I almost switched down to Wordperfect!
So this is my ogg file I'm sending you, I hope you hear it.
I'm running firefox on the information superhighway
Hey Bill, I clicked on Bonzi Buddy, will it install in my drive?
You know that song by Shawn Colvin, it's called "Sunny Came Home"
about that girl who came home with a box of tools and said that
it's time for a few small repairs -- she came home with a vengeance?
That's kinda how it is, I was one "rescue disk" from switching
Now it's too late -- I'm with a million penguins now and happy
and all I wanted was a lousy ack or a call
I hope you know I trashed ALL of your cd's from my drawer.
I loved XP and IE together, think about it --
It's ruined somehow, I hope you can'
It has been ages since I've done anything in pascal...but my programming language progression went from BASIC, QBASIC, then Pascal. I've moved to other languages from there but it was quite the eye-opener. Variables had to be declared, the "uses CRT" was quite the drastic change from what I had been used to (if I remember correctly), and the overall approach was enlightening.
Now there are other languages to learn with (and a few of those aren't just for educational purposes). Java, PHP, and C for example. Even Delphi has kept Pascal alive and relevant.
Back then, I had to find...um...creative ways to be able to program and compile Pascal code. With all the freely available IDEs, compilers, debuggers, etc. around now for all these various languages (especially through OSS), things have become more accessible.
Pascal was the language that brought me out of my BASIC habits...for that I'm definitely grateful.
My Karma's bound to take a beating for this but oh well...
This portable mp3 player seems nice and I've been shopping around for a while but I still haven't found what I'm looking for.
Does it have additional GPS functionality in case I get lost where the streets have no name?
They initially went with Rio but with the faulty hard-drives, the "Rio Lemon" just wasn't going to be popular.
They were also pitched a deal with Microsoft but Bono didn't like the idea of Ballmer dancing to Mysterious Ways...and Hold Me Thrill Me Kiss Me Kill Me for that matter.
I heard the new black ipod is nature-proof and can be used even in places of high elevation.
Asked if the band actually uses the product, Bono admitted that both he and The Edge owned One...but they're not the same.
Alrighty, I'm not a big fan of online games as it is, and am heavily against the subscription-based ones. I can't say I'm fond of stuff like Evercrack where you shell out quite a bit of money for the game, the expansion pack, and then are expected to subscribe for online play.
;-)
If in some way they can forego a subscription fee and simply subject its players to advertising, I'm all for it. In a sense, I do think it's pretty cool seeing ads for stuff -- hell, you see it when you're watching sports (so if it's in the game, why not put it in THE game
As long as it's tolerable and affects my bank account positively, go for it. If it doesn't affect pricing significantly, then screw 'em.
I was working on this and never finished it. I figure it's worth posting as incomplete. Apologies and respect to the original work.
My fee's all gone, I'm wondering why
I sold my soul at all --
The morning mail locked up my Windows,
They all call me a troll.
Even if they don't, everything I say
Gets all hackers' eyes to roll --
Still I tell me that it's not so bad,
It's not so bad...
Dear Bill, I wrote but you still ain't respondin'
I left e-mail, my URL, and my home IP at the bottom
I sent two bug reports last autumn -- you must not a got 'em
There probably was a problem with hotmail or somethin
Sometimes the packets take the scenic route when you route them
but anyhoo, fsck it, what's been up? Man, how's Ballmer?
Is he still a dancin' foo, screamin' "developer?"
If I have a daughter, guess what I'ma call her --
I'ma name her Clippy.
I read about your XP SP2, I'm sorry.
I had a friend bork his box over some bitchy driver problem
I know you probably hear this everyday but I'm your biggest fan.
I even got Software Assurance that the zealots called a scam.
I got a room will all your certificates and manuals, man.
I like the stuff you did with Java, too, that stuff was phat!
Anyways, I hope you get this, man. Hit me back
just to chat, truly yours, your biggest fan
This is Dan.
Dear Bill, you still ain't ack-ed my note. I hope you have a chance.
I ain't mad -- I just think it's fscked up when the shizznit hit the fan.
If you didn't want to fix the bugs through Trustworthy Computing
you didn't have to, but you coulda posted a work-around for Matthew
That's my kid bro, man, he's only eight years old
Been a good boy, rebooted as he was told
by you for years and you just said "No."
That's pretty crappy, man, his drive was going idle.
He wanted to be just like you, man! Now he gets more porn than I do!
I ain't that mad, though, I just don't like bein lied to.
Remember when we met in Vegas? I said that I'd write you
And that I've always gots your back. See, man, patching is ok, in a way.
I wouldn't have bothered either
But my mom's machine got hosed and she's not a control-alt-deleter.
From personal observation, it's standard procedure to portray yourself as the victim/underdog regardless of how much a dominant monopolistic arrogant bastard individual/organization/company/government you are.
Thus they paint the picture of the starving artist whom we are defrauding. Nevermind the t-shirts and concert ticket sales where artists actually get most of their cut.
Then they equate it to stealing which is easier to grasp than copyright infringement. After all, Joe Sixpack and his kids usually don't deal with copyrights much but they definitely have STUFF that can be stolen. They can relate and stealing is bad.
I do believe the ultimate solution is more quality content. My latest purchase was Manson's "Lest We Forget" with the DVD (can't seem to play it in MDK 10CE, though so I'm not too thrilled). If I believe a band makes good music (and this is definitely personal preference), I'll spend money for their work. I'm also in favor of having bonus content -- videos, pictures, behind-the-scenes footage, etc.
Never underestimate the power of fear. I'm not saying that it's good, but it has definitely been effective. The recording industry's relentless barrage of lawsuits (and settlements) have deterred a significant number of people from "stealing" music.
Will it end piracy? Of course not. Are those p2p networks helping with album sales for obscure artists? Probably. Will it drive down the sales of the next pop artist's album? That's debatable. The thing is the RIAA is seeing less money and it's scared. In turn, they had to react the best way they knew how. "Trade songs online and we'll sue you."
As scummy as we think they are, they'll find a way to exist. It's just unfortunate that the first reaction to adversity is to strike fear amongst the population.
IT managers get very little sympathy in terms of the basic creature comforts that they get. There's usually a lot of bling involved, and some aura of "respect" that comes with the title.
But the bad side...first and foremost, you're expected to be a miracle worker. Something borks, it's your fault. Nevermind any rhyme or reason why you couldn't have foreseen it coming. It's your fault. Worse yet, they want it fixed yesterday, if not sooner. Forget the impossibility of getting the parts until tomorrow -- it needs to be up and running NOW.
Some of the techs you manage will second-guess you. The rest of the company will second-guess everything you do. If things work, you're not doing your job (after all, there aren't any fires to put out). If things don't work, you're not doing your job because it was your job to keep things running and all that time, you were just sitting there doing nothing.
Some higher-up can't use e-mail? It's your neck on the line. Someone forgot to save their document and some tech you manage says it can't be recovered...so they report this to their superior and next thing you know, some VP wants to know why you're even there.
And those are only if you're a clueful manager. If you're clueless...well, you end up being promoted.
1) Does Windows XP count as 1 flaw or 10?
2) I suppose it can't be more than 5 'cause it has to make room for Windows 2003
3) Where's Didio of yankem grope to tell us all that those *nix flaws are really SCO Unix flaws that they've copied over?
4) FLAWS? I'm all for FLOSS -- ask Perens!
5) ESR waves hand -- "These are not the ports you're looking for."
6) Security Flaws? Ha! Here in Redmond, we call it Innovation(TM) Why do you think we call it Trashwor...um, Trustworthy Computing?