We need to put security on the to-do list for the companies that are building those environments, so it's just another embedded feature.
Since when is security "just another feature". I think we're already aiming too low. Security is a lot closer to the first feature you should get right than anything else. Putting security as "just a feature" means if you have several features, and you have to choose, you can pick features, and not pick security. Isn't that much where we are now? Except that the IDE developers he mentions aren't involved? Getting the IDE environment developers to focus a bit more on security is certainly not a deterrent to security itself, but it means security-as-a-feature-of-ides will only work if:
1) you can't turn off the ide's security features 2) you can turn them off, but they are zero-cost, you never turn them off.
1) Could work if it didn't hamper backwards compatibility, which it will. Notice how much more code with bugs is tied to old ways of doing things, as opposed to redesigns. (Yes you can introduce new bugs with a new approach, but if you're using a new approach, you aren't likely to misunderstand the approach as much as someone else's old approach, when he isn't there to explain anymore)
2) Is laughable, there is no perpetual movement machine, there are no environments where adding checking and validation to all data structures and exchanges will be a zero sum, and count on the unvalidated, unchecked structures to be the sources of bugs. Will developers check as much if they feel it's the compiler's job? How many will understand enough about the compiler to back-check the compiler, and verify that whatever isn't self-validating is being validated?
Making security a less painful option for developers is a good idea, and getting the people who make our tools consider it as important to write tools that write secure code as we consider it important to write secure code is a good step.
But, when was the last time you pushed back a release date a week for security testing? I don't mean you know there's a bug, and you need time to write a fix. I mean you know of a bug, you have the fix, but you wrote it "Today" as in the day you were supposed to hand in the released software. Would whoever you released it to understand?
Of course they should, but they don't, and we don't educate them about it either. Do we really care that much about security? I have my doubts.
You'll also notice a tend about spending far more time checking how you met the requirements of the clientm than following the rules of your "domain". That's because the general assumption that
1) developer knows about the software development field, and the best methods to be had there 2) developer could use the best methods to make a quality product, provided client is willing to pay for that quality product 3) developer doesn't know about client's "domain", and that needs to be emphasised in the documentation, simply because if you don't know that your galvanic bath contains acid, you might try to buy cheap zinc beaters to mix it... (gratituous example taken from non-related field)
The problem is that the documentation is the bible of the project, so very few things outside it get done, at least, get done with sustained effort.
Software security is a sustained effort, which at some point, requires even end user cooperation AND discomfort(yes, if you think your users can be comfy and secure, think again, when they are comfy, they aren't aware, hence they are insecure, and it makes them uncomfy to be aware about security matters, because they feel it's not their job. Security is however, everyone's job, weakest link and all that...)
So not only do you clearly point out that programmers find it a hassle, but doing it right means they have to be hassled, and then they have to hassle other people in turn, to make them aware. To use another unrelated analogy, not only do the developers have to go to the dentist for a root canal, they have to make sure J.Random.Users can't use the system before their root canals too...
Now add to that that engineering quality and elegance is something we all want to give(if only for the bragging rights) in our products, but there is a lot of aspects of the software business which is undiscovered country: how many clients run different versions of OSes, different platform versions, slightly incompatible hardware, special applications for special needs? A lot of them, because the real word isn't very tolerant of monocultures. But unfortunately, pre-qualifying for true compatibility before getting software development work done is something that's very rarely done.
So you have "chaos" on one hand, and discomfort on the other, and a schedule in the middle, and you cannot be surprised the match isn't made in heaven...
Someone else won that money, you buy a stock certificate, whose value is "x piece of y company", that's why they call it "trade". The value of the market sometime fluctuates, but's it's more of a perceived value/goodwill kind of intangible way(and someone has to give real money first, for that to be won, just like someone refusing to give equivalent money, causes it to be lost. When you buy x at y, and have to sell x at y-5, you may have lost, but someone who buys x at y-5 and sells it at y again, gains money. The exchanges have rules that determine how much info they can give over what time, mostly to prevent fowl play, but also to protect their "partners" who supply them with services in exchange for exclusivity etc...
the two are orthogonal, not ordered. You have have free as in beer code that's not free as in speech. Freeware to which you don't get source is one example. But you can also have the source to an app you paid(Custom Software usually follows that model). Just because there's only one word "free" doesn't mean there aren't two different kinds of freedom(there's actually more than two, including "free to redistribute").
gnumeric(I'm not sure, it could be some people friendly to gnumeric in the gnome umbrella) has been working on something like that for some time.
And yes, they'll probably spend more time fixing up the "special cases" proper to Microsoft's understanding of basic and vba, than implementing the language itself. The goal is to import spreadsheets which include vba code without user intervention, hence, they need to be work-around compatible(which means they get the cruft of the bugs, if not the bugs themselves) they can't just design a clean language.
If I'd been them, I'd have attempted to write a with-user-intervention-converter to python or scheme. Just to keep that much cruft away from their code, as a programmer, that'd give me the jeebies. YMMV.
Just which product(s) will be shared source might be of interest to some pundits(I predict IIS being among the first ports on the server side, if it ever happens, simply because there is less server market share to lose there, they're already way behind apache, oracle web server, ibm web server, zeus et al... Windows Media Server is also a candidate, simply because they are licensing it as part of a larger product, but not selling it directly, in a marketspace where the competitors are much more expensive, but offer much more features{real} or are free{apple/darwin streaming server}). On the desktop I have a harder question, is this source thing just an attempt to blindside consumers? They could always say they are open sourcing word viewer after all... Nothing says they have in mind to open the source of a product that actually reads a specific Microsoft format, or that said product has to be unencumbered(patent-wise). Microsoft has always been a master of the "give with one hand take away with the other" I predict more of the same, just where is my only question. Let's not get carried away at least until they have named those products, and listed their intent as regards to data formats et al contained in there.
Why is this important you ask? Well let me put a hypothetical case:
1) you have the source code to office 2) the office file format is encumbered 3) you use the source code to do anything with regards to that file format(read, write, export, clean up, syntax-highlight it doesn't matter) 4) you are in violation of their patent, and can(and likely will) be dragged before a court
It doesn't matter that they opened up their source in this case. Should anyone who hasn't been following, that means that open source benefits end users most when linked to open formats. What this smells like to me, is a PR move related to stock valuation, they announced they would follow the trend, but without naming the products, to gauge the impact on stock price, and they are evaluating which product will be released, based partly on market reactions. If their focus groups say "bad juju" they'll pull up something like ms dos 2.11 or microsoft notepad, and claim they open-sourced it to encourage innovation in the text space [sarcasm]implying that they are leaders in the text-only field[/sarcasm]
There are a lot of technologies that Microsoft started, like WMI, that would actually benefit from an influx of third party developers, actually, the number of technologies at Microsoft that wouldn't grow with an influx of third parties is actually pretty close to zero.
However, if we want our computing to be unfettered, we have to keep insisting on what's really important, and not be swayed by Microsoft's "No" "No" "Maybe" "Yes but only if you give me the Moon first" routine. The data on our computers, belongs to us, the computers, they also belong to us, the software on it provides a useful service, it is true, but it does NOT grant control to Microsoft over that, and we need to react forcefully to anything that lessens our control over our property.
Why do you assume using Microsoft software makes you positively disposed towards the same? Experience usually has shown me the following:
1) user uses Microsoft software, is surprised that alternatives exist, is hopeful that alternatives will be better
2) user uses Microsoft software, feels locked in, due to some characteristic of said software, and doesn't like the locked in feeling. Is hopeful that alternative X will become prevalent, when spoken of X
3) user uses Microsoft software, finds that it's undistinguishable from alternatives, and indeed, wonders what the fuss is about, user just wants to use computer, or would rather not use computer at all, but something easier to use, that answers to vocal commands, and require less maintenance and knowledge than a computer
You do have a point about market-correcting forces, but it helps that in some ways, many of the moves Microsoft makes might help it in the short term, but tend to backlash against it in the long term.
I presume they call it the CPL to mean CounterStrike Professional League, and that's certainly an interesting concept. But aren't most sports leagues amateurs(even the Olympics are technically sponsored amateurs, which is ridiculous on one hand, considering the expenses one has to go through to get there, but makes for less athletes whose biggest claim to fame is the number of logos on their jackets). Now why is it a problem that professionals can't play a game they enjoy, just for money? The article is certainly right about it making no business sense to be a professional in those conditions, but why is it a problem? Is game playing so horrid that you have to pay people to make them do it and get better at it?
Won't admitting that it's not a way to earn money except if you're #1 mean the only people entering will be those who enjoy the game itself, above and beyond? (And who can afford the plane ticket to prove it? Or can find a sponsor to buy them a plane ticket in exchange for a logo on a t-shirt?)
Let me rephrase that, maybe it'll make more sense: Just what does counterstrike gain from having people who earn a living from doing nothing else?
Errr about the title to the article though... Why is Microsoft trying to take a giant step, in a service pack(aka an incremental upgrade) Why not in the original XP? What took em so long? Especially since a lot of people expect incompatibilities in "release" software, not service packs... I agree that security is important, but that just means some software will come with "Warning this will not work if you are using Service Pack X" simply because some third parties won't want to rewrite stuff just to make it compatible with a particular service pack. Especially since the XP-Compatible logo isn't "Compatible with XPSP2RC1 or better"...
His actions accelerated the Borg's finding of Federation Space(not just humans). Of course, he also warned the Federation by having Picard around, and showing them the Borg.
Does that make him a villain? Well if someone shows up and mentions total annihilation of your species without batting an eyelash, would you think him a good guy? Besides, when Q lost his powers, he showed just how "villainous" he could be, well the enemies he made showed actually.
Anonymous Arrestee writes "Today the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that anybody can be compelled at any time to identify themselves, if a police officer asks. People who refuse to identify themselves, even if they are not suspected of a crime, will be arrested. Sound Orwellian? The Supreme Court also said people who are suspected of another crime might not be subject to arrest for not revealing their name.
Am I the only one who reads this as "If we don't suspect you of a crime, you have less rights than if we do?" Or, to put it differently, the police can now ask you to identify yourself, and if you don't cooperate, you're under arrest, but if they already suspected you of something else, you're under arrest for that something else, just not for refusing to identify yourself?
To quote my gut instinct: "WTF?" and "What did that judge eat that morning?" And second, is the second provision just to prevent that ruling form being ruled unconstititional as per fifth amendment? "Refusing to identify yourself BECAUSE you know you're suspected of a crime would be a litmus test of a guilty conscience etc..."?? Any lawyers around?
And people would have to pay to keep their saved games. Not something needed on older Xboxes.
Err and this is a detriment to Microsoft how? You really think people are going to say "Don't buy Xbox2, they charge you to save your games"? Or that Microsoft, like Blizzard's Diablo 2, could allow the save games go on the server, just to prevent cheating, but are still free?
I'm not saying you're not raising a valid point, but I doubt it will be said loudly enough for the lack of HDD to become a non-selling point for Xbox2 except for people who wouldn't buy an Xbox 2 anyways. (I'm sure you could find people who wouldn't buy one, short of being paid to own one.)
Not having the capability inside the box, means Microsoft can always change their minds too, as in "The first megabyte is free, then it's one tenth of a cent per byte." Especially since they control the size of each save game.
MS is changing the architecture, the design, and the graphics chip (ATI, no HD, and non-Intel) which will obviously force emulation (which, according to the article, was being planned) but I would think it would be far more worth it just for a base of titles. I believe the PS2 did *so* well because of the large base of titles that came from the PS1 and I can?t imagine that the XB2 will be debuting with any base if they don?t have backwards compatibility.
Wouldn't Microsoft base their decision for that after asking game companies? Anyone bothered to ask game producers if backward compatibility is something they want? Or something that allows them to relaunch the same game for the XBox2??
Q is certainly a great villain, and one that was dead-on for TNG, especially around Picard and Data(less so around Riker, or Dr. Crusher). Using Q(at least the DeLancie Q) as the basis for the series would kill the spirit of it, he's great "spice" for a series. What makes it interesting is how different he is from the rest, and that he presents challenges in a whole different way than the average Trek Villain.
But for the same reason, Q was a bad choice for a DS9 villain:
1) As the "source" of the Borg, Q was Sisqo's mortal enemy, the two should have had problems being in the same room for about a decade of Sisqo's life. (In fact, considering the damage of the borg, those Star Fleet officers who knew of Q, besides those on the Enterprise, having lost their best friends/shipmates on Wolf 359, might have had similar grief/anger reactions) 2) Sisqo is a more centered, self-contained character than Picard, one less affected by other's perceptions of him. Q's words would have less bite. 3) Sisqo was practically a religious figure of the Bajorans, yet had no special powers. Having him meet Q, a member of a sort of "god-powered college of teenagers", had its Irony, but that's short-lived. Having an all-powerful gaggle of enemies you must placate in order to survive as a species had its moment for TNG, but would doing the same thing again work for a new series?
What else can you do with a power group like the Q? Explore the politics? Mate with them? Join with them somehow? What kind of alliance would an all-powerful group form? An abusive one, most likely...
Oddly enough, Q was to Picard, as Spock was to Kirk... The Vulcans were more physically and mentally powerful, had odd customs, rituals, a sense of superiority, etc.. They even put the Enterprise(NCC-1701A I think) on trial at least once.
Can JMS make an interesting series? Yes, of course, but I bet you a beer his aliens will be a lot more contentious than anything we've seen short of Alien. And I think that will be a good thing.
No. What Trek needs is a writer of JMS's calibre to plan a five-year arc with all manner of arcs, loops, time-travel paradoxes, and an epic scope to blow the viewer's mind in the same way that B5 did.
As much as I agree with you(the scale of the stories influence the interest of the series as a whole), I just have one stipulation: if the story is five-year long, they can't cancel it after only four years. Nothing worse than being excited about how interesting something complex is, and having the best part chopped of. And the last part... is a limit on how good a long series is. If you chop off the end of a five years series, you are just saying it wasn't worth putting on tv at all. Least, that's why I didn't watch Babylon 5 at first, I knew they had a five year series, but as it turned out, not all parts made it to my tv screen yet, and it affected my enjoyment of it.
You're raising an interesting issue about how many of the things about B5 that are interesting is the contrast between B5 society, which is far from utopic, and the current "we fixed all of humanity;'s problems" view of the universe in Star Trek(at least from TNG onwards). Roddenberry's idealism inspired him to try to make a sci-fi utopia abd kinda blinded him to the fact that good stories aren't written about happy people who never have problems between themselves. B5 is quite the opposite, being dark and gloomy even during parties, yet it's enjoyable on a different level. We live problems, small and great ones every day, and can identify with such characters better than with Jean-Luc Picard, Captain of the Federation Flagship.
Not that he was a bad character, I always thought the Picard-Q fight was the brightest point in the series, Picard's humanity being a perfect foil to Q's view of humans as worthless. It's just that there's a whole bunch of humans, and only one Captain(Admiral Selectee) Picard of the Federation Starship Enterprise. Contrast that with the characters on B5, and we're talking doctors, policemen, Ambassadors and Politicians too, but the doctors and soldiers and policemen and "Joe Random Aliens" usually lead the show, with the bigwigs just trying to balance the politics out so war doesn't break out.
Some of the early movies had great material to start with(the Klingons joining the federation could have been a great movie), yet turned out to be not as good as they could be, mostly to leave more room for special effects and fight scenes. The problem is that the Star Fleet/Federation of Planets gimmick means that fight scenes shouldn't be that common, except for the villain of the week, and few things kill a story as fast as a villain of the week. Q was a great villain, he kept coming back, we could defeat him, but never kill him and he went away only when he wanted to. He kept making humans be as human as they could be, only to prove him wrong, and that usually makes for a great story. Few B5 characters needed help in being more human, except maybe for the Vorlons(and with such help, they were downright interesting), and that's probably a design decision on their part(a good one in fact).
Anyone think (like I did) that if this thing could work out, to everyone's satisfaction, that we might finally unify logins for nukes/other cmses? (I so happen to be looking for a way to have the same userbase for a forum(IPB), a phpnuke, a gallery(coppermine) and a few other items on my personal sites, yet I don't dare develop something, since I'd have to retest all the components the minute one of them updates...)
wouldn't that LKP be linux kernel package, and then, errr like an oxymoron? Didn't unixware have some linux compatibility support in that version, based in part on the intel abis?
the only one who misses "reviews" that covered 5 or more competing products at once, especially in the "internal vs external" categories? How can you tell which is a product defect, and which is an advantage of internal vs external, with such limited testing?
cuz humans are pretty much already terradapted(or terraformed, but I think terradapted says what is meant better). Terraforming means(i am not a linguist) to "shape like Terra" humans can't be shaped like Terra, but they are sure fitted, or adapted, to the shape of Terra.
Very funny, but no, your mobile phone can't do 8-way communication with all 8 members of your party like in Diablo, or party-broadcast either. I imagine they're afraid it would take away from their network revenue.
Let me get this straight, your company is uncertain about xbox's future, but is legally unable or otherwise unwilling to support other consoles/hardware platforms. You are worried that while Microsoft's billions in the bank might enable it to write off its entire investment in xbox as a tax-deductible failure in R&D, yet you cannot do the same...
You see many of your competitors in the game development industry deal with several hardware and software platforms, and you also read slashdot, where Multi-Platform could fool visiting aliens into believing is our religion, and yet, you can't figure out that depending on Xbox games for survival, no matter how "superior" Xbox is, is a bad idea.
You really think we can help you with this?
If I had any stake in such a company, or any kind of control over the products, I'd already be working on my own time, on our second non-Xbox-platformed game, just to be on the safe side. Why is it taking your company so long?
Slashdot Mirror
Since when is security "just another feature". I think we're already aiming too low. Security is a lot closer to the first feature you should get right than anything else. Putting security as "just a feature" means if you have several features, and you have to choose, you can pick features, and not pick security. Isn't that much where we are now? Except that the IDE developers he mentions aren't involved? Getting the IDE environment developers to focus a bit more on security is certainly not a deterrent to security itself, but it means security-as-a-feature-of-ides will only work if:
1) you can't turn off the ide's security features
2) you can turn them off, but they are zero-cost, you never turn them off.
1) Could work if it didn't hamper backwards compatibility, which it will. Notice how much more code with bugs is tied to old ways of doing things, as opposed to redesigns. (Yes you can introduce new bugs with a new approach, but if you're using a new approach, you aren't likely to misunderstand the approach as much as someone else's old approach, when he isn't there to explain anymore)
2) Is laughable, there is no perpetual movement machine, there are no environments where adding checking and validation to all data structures and exchanges will be a zero sum, and count on the unvalidated, unchecked structures to be the sources of bugs. Will developers check as much if they feel it's the compiler's job? How many will understand enough about the compiler to back-check the compiler, and verify that whatever isn't self-validating is being validated?
Making security a less painful option for developers is a good idea, and getting the people who make our tools consider it as important to write tools that write secure code as we consider it important to write secure code is a good step.
But, when was the last time you pushed back a release date a week for security testing? I don't mean you know there's a bug, and you need time to write a fix. I mean you know of a bug, you have the fix, but you wrote it "Today" as in the day you were supposed to hand in the released software. Would whoever you released it to understand?
Of course they should, but they don't, and we don't educate them about it either. Do we really care that much about security? I have my doubts.
You'll also notice a tend about spending far more time checking how you met the requirements of the clientm than following the rules of your "domain". That's because the general assumption that
1) developer knows about the software development field, and the best methods to be had there
2) developer could use the best methods to make a quality product, provided client is willing to pay for that quality product
3) developer doesn't know about client's "domain", and that needs to be emphasised in the documentation, simply because if you don't know that your galvanic bath contains acid, you might try to buy cheap zinc beaters to mix it... (gratituous example taken from non-related field)
The problem is that the documentation is the bible of the project, so very few things outside it get done, at least, get done with sustained effort.
Software security is a sustained effort, which at some point, requires even end user cooperation AND discomfort(yes, if you think your users can be comfy and secure, think again, when they are comfy, they aren't aware, hence they are insecure, and it makes them uncomfy to be aware about security matters, because they feel it's not their job. Security is however, everyone's job, weakest link and all that...)
So not only do you clearly point out that programmers find it a hassle, but doing it right means they have to be hassled, and then they have to hassle other people in turn, to make them aware. To use another unrelated analogy, not only do the developers have to go to the dentist for a root canal, they have to make sure J.Random.Users can't use the system before their root canals too...
Now add to that that engineering quality and elegance is something we all want to give(if only for the bragging rights) in our products, but there is a lot of aspects of the software business which is undiscovered country: how many clients run different versions of OSes, different platform versions, slightly incompatible hardware, special applications for special needs? A lot of them, because the real word isn't very tolerant of monocultures. But unfortunately, pre-qualifying for true compatibility before getting software development work done is something that's very rarely done.
So you have "chaos" on one hand, and discomfort on the other, and a schedule in the middle, and you cannot be surprised the match isn't made in heaven...
Someone else won that money, you buy a stock certificate, whose value is "x piece of y company", that's why they call it "trade". The value of the market sometime fluctuates, but's it's more of a perceived value/goodwill kind of intangible way(and someone has to give real money first, for that to be won, just like someone refusing to give equivalent money, causes it to be lost. When you buy x at y, and have to sell x at y-5, you may have lost, but someone who buys x at y-5 and sells it at y again, gains money. The exchanges have rules that determine how much info they can give over what time, mostly to prevent fowl play, but also to protect their "partners" who supply them with services in exchange for exclusivity etc...
the two are orthogonal, not ordered. You have have free as in beer code that's not free as in speech. Freeware to which you don't get source is one example. But you can also have the source to an app you paid(Custom Software usually follows that model). Just because there's only one word "free" doesn't mean there aren't two different kinds of freedom(there's actually more than two, including "free to redistribute").
gnumeric(I'm not sure, it could be some people friendly to gnumeric in the gnome umbrella) has been working on something like that for some time.
And yes, they'll probably spend more time fixing up the "special cases" proper to Microsoft's understanding of basic and vba, than implementing the language itself. The goal is to import spreadsheets which include vba code without user intervention, hence, they need to be work-around compatible(which means they get the cruft of the bugs, if not the bugs themselves) they can't just design a clean language.
If I'd been them, I'd have attempted to write a with-user-intervention-converter to python or scheme. Just to keep that much cruft away from their code, as a programmer, that'd give me the jeebies. YMMV.
Just which product(s) will be shared source might be of interest to some pundits(I predict IIS being among the first ports on the server side, if it ever happens, simply because there is less server market share to lose there, they're already way behind apache, oracle web server, ibm web server, zeus et al... Windows Media Server is also a candidate, simply because they are licensing it as part of a larger product, but not selling it directly, in a marketspace where the competitors are much more expensive, but offer much more features{real} or are free{apple/darwin streaming server}). On the desktop I have a harder question, is this source thing just an attempt to blindside consumers? They could always say they are open sourcing word viewer after all... Nothing says they have in mind to open the source of a product that actually reads a specific Microsoft format, or that said product has to be unencumbered(patent-wise). Microsoft has always been a master of the "give with one hand take away with the other" I predict more of the same, just where is my only question. Let's not get carried away at least until they have named those products, and listed their intent as regards to data formats et al contained in there.
Why is this important you ask? Well let me put a hypothetical case:
1) you have the source code to office
2) the office file format is encumbered
3) you use the source code to do anything with regards to that file format(read, write, export, clean up, syntax-highlight it doesn't matter)
4) you are in violation of their patent, and can(and likely will) be dragged before a court
It doesn't matter that they opened up their source in this case. Should anyone who hasn't been following, that means that open source benefits end users most when linked to open formats. What this smells like to me, is a PR move related to stock valuation, they announced they would follow the trend, but without naming the products, to gauge the impact on stock price, and they are evaluating which product will be released, based partly on market reactions. If their focus groups say "bad juju" they'll pull up something like ms dos 2.11 or microsoft notepad, and claim they open-sourced it to encourage innovation in the text space
[sarcasm]implying that they are leaders in the text-only field[/sarcasm]
There are a lot of technologies that Microsoft started, like WMI, that would actually benefit from an influx of third party developers, actually, the number of technologies at Microsoft that wouldn't grow with an influx of third parties is actually pretty close to zero.
However, if we want our computing to be unfettered, we have to keep insisting on what's really important, and not be swayed by Microsoft's "No" "No" "Maybe" "Yes but only if you give me the Moon first" routine. The data on our computers, belongs to us, the computers, they also belong to us, the software on it provides a useful service, it is true, but it does NOT grant control to Microsoft over that, and we need to react forcefully to anything that lessens our control over our property.
Why do you assume using Microsoft software makes you positively disposed towards the same? Experience usually has shown me the following :
1) user uses Microsoft software, is surprised that alternatives exist, is hopeful that alternatives will be better
2) user uses Microsoft software, feels locked in, due to some characteristic of said software, and doesn't like the locked in feeling. Is hopeful that alternative X will become prevalent, when spoken of X
3) user uses Microsoft software, finds that it's undistinguishable from alternatives, and indeed, wonders what the fuss is about, user just wants to use computer, or would rather not use computer at all, but something easier to use, that answers to vocal commands, and require less maintenance and knowledge than a computer
You do have a point about market-correcting forces, but it helps that in some ways, many of the moves Microsoft makes might help it in the short term, but tend to backlash against it in the long term.
I presume they call it the CPL to mean CounterStrike Professional League, and that's certainly an interesting concept. But aren't most sports leagues amateurs(even the Olympics are technically sponsored amateurs, which is ridiculous on one hand, considering the expenses one has to go through to get there, but makes for less athletes whose biggest claim to fame is the number of logos on their jackets). Now why is it a problem that professionals can't play a game they enjoy, just for money? The article is certainly right about it making no business sense to be a professional in those conditions, but why is it a problem? Is game playing so horrid that you have to pay people to make them do it and get better at it?
Won't admitting that it's not a way to earn money except if you're #1 mean the only people entering will be those who enjoy the game itself, above and beyond? (And who can afford the plane ticket to prove it? Or can find a sponsor to buy them a plane ticket in exchange for a logo on a t-shirt?)
Let me rephrase that, maybe it'll make more sense: Just what does counterstrike gain from having people who earn a living from doing nothing else?
Errr about the title to the article though...
Why is Microsoft trying to take a giant step, in a service pack(aka an incremental upgrade)
Why not in the original XP? What took em so long?
Especially since a lot of people expect incompatibilities in "release" software, not service packs...
I agree that security is important, but that just means some software will come with "Warning this will not work if you are using Service Pack X" simply because some third parties won't want to rewrite stuff just to make it compatible with a particular service pack. Especially since the XP-Compatible logo isn't "Compatible with XPSP2RC1 or better"...
His actions accelerated the Borg's finding of Federation Space(not just humans). Of course, he also warned the Federation by having Picard around, and showing them the Borg.
Does that make him a villain? Well if someone shows up and mentions total annihilation of your species without batting an eyelash, would you think him a good guy? Besides, when Q lost his powers, he showed just how "villainous" he could be, well the enemies he made showed actually.
Am I the only one who reads this as "If we don't suspect you of a crime, you have less rights than if we do?" Or, to put it differently, the police can now ask you to identify yourself, and if you don't cooperate, you're under arrest, but if they already suspected you of something else, you're under arrest for that something else, just not for refusing to identify yourself?
To quote my gut instinct: "WTF?" and "What did that judge eat that morning?" And second, is the second provision just to prevent that ruling form being ruled unconstititional as per fifth amendment? "Refusing to identify yourself BECAUSE you know you're suspected of a crime would be a litmus test of a guilty conscience etc..."?? Any lawyers around?
Err and this is a detriment to Microsoft how? You really think people are going to say "Don't buy Xbox2, they charge you to save your games"?
Or that Microsoft, like Blizzard's Diablo 2, could allow the save games go on the server, just to prevent cheating, but are still free?
I'm not saying you're not raising a valid point, but I doubt it will be said loudly enough for the lack of HDD to become a non-selling point for Xbox2 except for people who wouldn't buy an Xbox 2 anyways. (I'm sure you could find people who wouldn't buy one, short of being paid to own one.)
Not having the capability inside the box, means Microsoft can always change their minds too, as in "The first megabyte is free, then it's one tenth of a cent per byte." Especially since they control the size of each save game.
Wouldn't Microsoft base their decision for that after asking game companies? Anyone bothered to ask game producers if backward compatibility is something they want? Or something that allows them to relaunch the same game for the XBox2??
Q is certainly a great villain, and one that was dead-on for TNG, especially around Picard and Data(less so around Riker, or Dr. Crusher). Using Q(at least the DeLancie Q) as the basis for the series would kill the spirit of it, he's great "spice" for a series. What makes it interesting is how different he is from the rest, and that he presents challenges in a whole different way than the average Trek Villain.
But for the same reason, Q was a bad choice for a DS9 villain:
1) As the "source" of the Borg, Q was Sisqo's mortal enemy, the two should have had problems being in the same room for about a decade of Sisqo's life. (In fact, considering the damage of the borg, those Star Fleet officers who knew of Q, besides those on the Enterprise, having lost their best friends/shipmates on Wolf 359, might have had similar grief/anger reactions)
2) Sisqo is a more centered, self-contained character than Picard, one less affected by other's perceptions of him. Q's words would have less bite.
3) Sisqo was practically a religious figure of the Bajorans, yet had no special powers. Having him meet Q, a member of a sort of "god-powered college of teenagers", had its Irony, but that's short-lived. Having an all-powerful gaggle of enemies you must placate in order to survive as a species had its moment for TNG, but would doing the same thing again work for a new series?
What else can you do with a power group like the Q? Explore the politics? Mate with them? Join with them somehow? What kind of alliance would an all-powerful group form?
An abusive one, most likely...
Oddly enough, Q was to Picard, as Spock was to Kirk... The Vulcans were more physically and mentally powerful, had odd customs, rituals, a sense of superiority, etc.. They even put the Enterprise(NCC-1701A I think) on trial at least once.
Can JMS make an interesting series? Yes, of course, but I bet you a beer his aliens will be a lot more contentious than anything we've seen short of Alien. And I think that will be a good thing.
As much as I agree with you(the scale of the stories influence the interest of the series as a whole), I just have one stipulation: if the story is five-year long, they can't cancel it after only four years. Nothing worse than being excited about how interesting something complex is, and having the best part chopped of. And the last part... is a limit on how good a long series is. If you chop off the end of a five years series, you are just saying it wasn't worth putting on tv at all. Least, that's why I didn't watch Babylon 5 at first, I knew they had a five year series, but as it turned out, not all parts made it to my tv screen yet, and it affected my enjoyment of it.
You're raising an interesting issue about how many of the things about B5 that are interesting is the contrast between B5 society, which is far from utopic, and the current "we fixed all of humanity;'s problems" view of the universe in Star Trek(at least from TNG onwards). Roddenberry's idealism inspired him to try to make a sci-fi utopia abd kinda blinded him to the fact that good stories aren't written about happy people who never have problems between themselves. B5 is quite the opposite, being dark and gloomy even during parties, yet it's enjoyable on a different level. We live problems, small and great ones every day, and can identify with such characters better than with Jean-Luc Picard, Captain of the Federation Flagship.
Not that he was a bad character, I always thought the Picard-Q fight was the brightest point in the series, Picard's humanity being a perfect foil to Q's view of humans as worthless. It's just that there's a whole bunch of humans, and only one Captain(Admiral Selectee) Picard of the Federation Starship Enterprise. Contrast that with the characters on B5, and we're talking doctors, policemen, Ambassadors and Politicians too, but the doctors and soldiers and policemen and "Joe Random Aliens" usually lead the show, with the bigwigs just trying to balance the politics out so war doesn't break out.
Some of the early movies had great material to start with(the Klingons joining the federation could have been a great movie), yet turned out to be not as good as they could be, mostly to leave more room for special effects and fight scenes. The problem is that the Star Fleet/Federation of Planets gimmick means that fight scenes shouldn't be that common, except for the villain of the week, and few things kill a story as fast as a villain of the week. Q was a great villain, he kept coming back, we could defeat him, but never kill him and he went away only when he wanted to. He kept making humans be as human as they could be, only to prove him wrong, and that usually makes for a great story. Few B5 characters needed help in being more human, except maybe for the Vorlons(and with such help, they were downright interesting), and that's probably a design decision on their part(a good one in fact).
Anyone think (like I did) that if this thing could work out, to everyone's satisfaction, that we might finally unify logins for nukes/other cmses? (I so happen to be looking for a way to have the same userbase for a forum(IPB), a phpnuke, a gallery(coppermine) and a few other items on my personal sites, yet I don't dare develop something, since I'd have to retest all the components the minute one of them updates...)
wouldn't that LKP be linux kernel package, and then, errr like an oxymoron? Didn't unixware have some linux compatibility support in that version, based in part on the intel abis?
Nice choice of words, especially since a timeline is something a judge understands quite well...
I know that and you know that, but they don't tell the judge that, that's why it's news.
Maybe some of them have some applications they don't know how to use safely, without plugging holes the size of a house in the firewall perhaps?
Hardware you don't know how to use is likely to be a)costly in time
or
b) a big paperweight
especially in the security department
Of course, education in this field is sadly lacking
the only one who misses "reviews" that covered 5 or more competing products at once, especially in the "internal vs external" categories? How can you tell which is a product defect, and which is an advantage of internal vs external, with such limited testing?
cuz humans are pretty much already terradapted(or terraformed, but I think terradapted says what is meant better). Terraforming means(i am not a linguist) to "shape like Terra" humans can't be shaped like Terra, but they are sure fitted, or adapted, to the shape of Terra.
Very funny, but no, your mobile phone can't do 8-way communication with all 8 members of your party like in Diablo, or party-broadcast either. I imagine they're afraid it would take away from their network revenue.
Let me get this straight, your company is uncertain about xbox's future, but is legally unable or otherwise unwilling to support other consoles/hardware platforms. You are worried that while Microsoft's billions in the bank might enable it to write off its entire investment in xbox as a tax-deductible failure in R&D, yet you cannot do the same...
You see many of your competitors in the game development industry deal with several hardware and software platforms, and you also read slashdot, where Multi-Platform could fool visiting aliens into believing is our religion, and yet, you can't figure out that depending on Xbox games for survival, no matter how "superior" Xbox is, is a bad idea.
You really think we can help you with this?
If I had any stake in such a company, or any kind of control over the products, I'd already be working on my own time, on our second non-Xbox-platformed game, just to be on the safe side. Why is it taking your company so long?