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  1. Er, it's not just Microsoft..... on Office Assistant: Yet Another Security Hole · · Score: 2
    Macs in theory would be vulnerable to a similar exploit. Apple's HTML Help system in Mac OS 8.5 and newer uses AppleScripts linked from mini-web pages to do things like open the memory control panel for me and stuff.

    If you're on a Mac, and you clicked that link, did your Help Viewer open (or move to the front if it already was)? It shouldn't have, but I'm curious.

    Anyway, by replacing some of those scripts or web pages, you could conceivably do much damage to a Mac, too. That said, I do use one of the assistants in the Mac version of Office, the Hoverbot, just because I like the sound effects it makes (and it never gets in the way, unlike the stupid Windows paperclip.

  2. oh, and the guy quoted on MOSR is wrong on Apple Demonstrates A Dual-G4 Power Mac · · Score: 2
    I don't know which Apple official said they never introduce new hardware at WWDC, but obviously he wasn't around for last year's PowerBook launch. D'oh!

  3. wait, it gets better... on Apple Demonstrates A Dual-G4 Power Mac · · Score: 4

    Back in the day ('95-96 or so) there were dual-604e Macs and quad-604e Mac clones that ran Photoshop like nobody's bidness. The G4 was designed from the beginning (unlike the G3) to accept up to 4-way cache-coherency, IIRC. Four G4 cores on a single die were considered quite feasible when Motorola rolled out the design. Mmmmmm...four-way processing....[hrragglhh]

    Hmmm. Could Apple be the first company to introduce a MP laptop?
    (Or has somebody already done so?)

  4. As if WordPerfect wasn't in enough trouble on Corel - Inprise/Borland Merger Off · · Score: 2
    after being unceremoniously dropped for the Mac, now this....what will happen to all those government WP users? And what company will be the next contestant on "The WordPerfect Shuffle"?

  5. Re:Great news! on Unreal Engine Linux Ports Not Dead? · · Score: 2
    The Mac is definitely not being abandoned in business; check out MacCentral's recent series on dual-platform corporations and schools (the series starts here. Companies who use both platforms report better overall productivity. As always, the right tool for the job. Even if certain companies like mine don't quite get it...sigh....

    As for Unreal and UT, I have faith in Westlake, they've done a great job so far on the ports for the Mac they've handled. Between them and companies that already grok the Mac and the value of cross-platform development (i.e. Bungie and Id), gaming on the Mac is finally becoming viable again.

    If I were a serious game developer, why woould I want to use any technology that limited my product to a single platform? What happens when it's no longer the dominant one? With OpenGL, it may be a little slower or harder to code, but it lets me capture that extra 10% market share, plus it brings free good will. Pretty simple choice.

  6. Didn't Disney build one in 1982? on NASA Proposes Launch Of Solar Sail Vehicle For 2010 · · Score: 2
    OK, so it was only a computer simulation, but....

    Oh come on, I can't believe I'm the only person reading /. who actually saw Tron.

  7. shouldn't you build the Polar Lander... on Hump Day Quickies · · Score: 2

    out of A4 card stock? :-]

    And please, tell me the "interface" for the Lego moviemaking kit is FireWire!

  8. Finally, a use for the Cauzin Softstrip reader! on Hyperlinks In The Meat World · · Score: 3
    eBay, here I come!

    Ahhh, yes, the Softstrip. MacUser's 1986 Eddy Award winner for Most Innovative Concept. No, seriously (check near the bottom of the page)

  9. welcome to government service on Employers Logging Keystrokes-What Can You Do? · · Score: 3
    I'm a contractor at NIH, and you can find their suggested startupscreen here. It basically says that it's a government machine, they can do what they want, and although the banner isn't legally required, it does help the government prosecute people if there's a banner in place when you log on.

    As for legality, hey, man, I just work here.

  10. ignorance of the net? on Ask Metallica About Napster · · Score: 5
    In the live chat, you admitted to not being very knowledgable about the Internet or about the technology behind Napster and MP3s. What kind of research on these subjects did you do prior to filing the lawsuit?

  11. mail for the National Institutes of Health is down on I Love You "Virus" Hates Everyone · · Score: 2

    since we use Outlook/Exchange for mail after migrating (partially) away from Novell and Groupwise...never mind that there's a large Mac presence at NIH, and the Mac client is way lame and not compatible with the Windows version (yet).

    Some of this was my employer's idea, as well. (The migration, not the virus.)

    Basically, even though 90% of the machines I support are not affected, everybody has to go without mail because they've turned off the Exchange server. I FUCKING FUCKING FUCKING hate Outlook!

  12. would SimElection be so bad? on Horribly Bad Game Designs · · Score: 2

    Y'know, given the terrible voter turnout in the US in recent decades, maybe we need something to convince people that voting is important, and politics doesn't have to be evil.

    Then again, I admit I'd probably resort to double-dealing and backstabbing to get elected to my virtual office, too. Plus, there would of course have to be the optional intern PWAD....

  13. Re:XML needs to be integrated into Linux on Can XML Replace Proprietary Document Formats? · · Score: 2
    Your buzzword-heavy post concerns me a bit as to its level of trollosity, but in case you're for real, Apple's already done something like what you describe, at least as far as configuration of the system - check out the first few pages of this ArsTechnica article on Mac OS X DP3 for details.

  14. UPDATE: /. effect weighs heavily on gravity site on Physicists Find More Precise Gravity Number · · Score: 3

    ...must be some heavy packets, eh?

  15. balancing capitalism and (pure) communism on Thus Spake Stallman · · Score: 3
    I'm not much of a software developer (mostly homemade things that mostly work), but it's where I'm planning to take my career next -- tech support just doesn't hold the same level of interest it once did, which wasn't much to begin with. Now, I would like to earn money from my code to pay for things like a nice car, more and faster computers, the next Rush album, and other happiness toys. But I'd also like to write useful programs that the world at large can utilize in new and interesting ways. If I were to write the next Photoshop, I would probably try to sell it and make money from it. If I were to write the next ATi driver, OTOH, I would probably be inclined to give it away as free software or open source, depending on what license I wind up preferring.

    I suspect most developers feel this way; not everybody is an 8-hour-a-day code monkey, just in it for the paycheck, but at the same time, you gotta eat and pay for the DSL line and the AirPort Base Station serving it to your machines. (Er, in some cases.)

    RMS is content with remaining on the frontline of the free software fight, and I can't help but admire his ability to remain committed to what many consider a pointless fight (I can't even commit to what I'm going to have for lunch -- pisses off the people in line behind me daily). Other companies (Microsoft, NVIDIA, Sorenson, etc.) prefer the money-making at the expense of personal freedom and satisfaction, i.e. being able to look through the code for a neat hack and saying, "oh, so that's how it's done!" I plan to try and walk a line somewhere in between. I gave to the EFF and complained to my state's leaders about UCITA (MD passed it anyway, bastards), but I could no more get rid of my Macs and their proprietary software than I could quit my job supporting them and live off the land. Anybody else feel they're in a similar position?

  16. JK and HGG? on Will This Genie Ever Go Back In The Bottle? · · Score: 4
    MP3 technology -- a format which jumped from obscurity to ubiquity in 1999 -- was has turned out to be revolutionary.

    "was has"? Sounds like Katz has been reading Dr. Dan Streetmentioner's guide to time-travel grammar....

    Then again, if anybody could be said to be channeling the spirit of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation, it has to be Katz. :-]

  17. Re:This is *not* good at all on Microsoft Break-Up To Be Proposed? · · Score: 2
    The fact of the matter is, Microsoft practically single-handedly turned the PC from the haven of 31337 tech-savvy "gurus" to a domain where anyone could use a computer to browse the internet, write letters and play games. Whilst I know that /.ers seem to think that only they should be allowed to use PCs, Microsoft pushed the idea that everyone could benefit from a PC, and it worked, because people wanted that.

    I forget what the perl syntax is for replacing a string with another string, but I believe you meant to say Apple in place of Microsoft, right?

  18. Just don't do anything secure with it! on Get QNX For Free · · Score: 2
    What with its questionable security...

  19. nitpick - zip isn't the only compression out there on Phillip W. Katz, Creator Of PKZIP, Dead At 37 · · Score: 1
    Nearly all program files downloaded from the Internet have the suffix .zip, meaning they are compressed in the format Katz developed.

    Um, yeah, if you use Windows...most of the files I download end in .sit, .sea, .bin, .hqx, and occasionally .cpt, thanks to Raymond Lau and Bill Goodman (who wrote the original Stuffit and Compactor/Compact Pro, respectively). I bet most /.ers' downloads end in .z, .bz, or .tar, and not .zip.

    Still, it sucks that he is dead. More evidence of the damage alcohol abuse can inflict on a person. What a shame.

  20. Re:WTF?? on UNIX Advertising From Way-back-when · · Score: 2
    That's what I get for not digging deeper...

    http://plan9.bell-labs.com/plan9/faq.html

    And it runs on the 68020, too. Hmmm, I've got a Macintosh LC that isn't doing anything....

  21. WTF?? on UNIX Advertising From Way-back-when · · Score: 2
    Er, I think Netcraft is confused... here's what you get by entering in cm.bell-labs.com:

    cm.bell-labs.com is running Plan9

    Then again, if anybody's going to know how to play tricks with identifying a Unix system by its TCP stack, I'm guessing it's dmr... :-]

  22. Re:DMCA PROTEST - OFFTOPIC on Hands-On Review of PocketPC · · Score: 2

    Not to feed the flames of offtopicness, but in that case, you should consider posting it to the FOSE story on /. today as well. You might get a higher percentage of DC-area readers in that thread.

  23. Ahh, but there was an OS X box there.... on Linux And The G-Men: FOSE 2000 · · Score: 4

    at Apple's booth, hidden in the center part (where all the staff hang out and where they keep the boxes for the displayed machines, etc.). I couldn't get a good look at it but I recognized the OS X file viewer (Finder replacement) layout on screen.

    They were serving all of their machines via an AirPort base station, BTW. And yes, the 22" Cinema Display does inspire dropped jaws.

    I spoke to some of the booth personnel. They said to expect good things from this year's WWDC, including the possibility of more projects being released under the APSL and maybe even precompiled binaries for Linux. No mention of specific products, though. They were tight-lipped about Darwin x86 as well.

    We have lots of Macs here (NIH), and Linux is attracting attention from some of the more computer-savvy scientists (hey, Solaris is expensive) but unfortunately, we also have lots of Novell and NT boxen as well, and lots of less-than-savvy users -- not that there's anything wrong with that. Until there's a replacement for Exchange/GroupWise, we'll never switch, I fear. (hint, hint)

  24. Re:Cool! on Telescope Cluster For SETI · · Score: 2

    Oh sure, I can see it now; accusations flying of people flooding the SETI servers with dozens of virtual satellite dishes, trying to boost their team scores...

  25. You can help! on Linux And The PowerPC Architecture · · Score: 3

    A plea to Linux hackers everywhere - if you're coding on an Intel platform, do the best you can to keep x86-specific things out of your code, so that other Linux/BSD users out there can enjoy the fruits of your labors.

    Remember, there's PPC, SPARC, MIPS, Alpha, and 680x0 ports out there as well. Are you listening, Corel?