There's a guy I talk with on IRC, who usually has
something interesting or humorous to say in his
quit message. One day it was:
"The NSA is always looking for hot new talent, and
fresh young faces. To learn more about the
exciting career opportunities within the NSA,
just pick up your phone and ask the dialtone."
Second: I am completely convinced that RMS would be more than happy to release the DoD from any obligation to the GPL in the case of National Defense.
Linus (and many many others) are the copyright holders. They decide the license for Linux, and they would have to release the government from obligation; undoubtedly there would be several that would refuse.
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Anonymous Coward asks "Hi, I'm an executive of a rather large Internet company, and we just had a suit filed against us because of some file-sharing software we created that happened to be used for sharing MP3s. I'd like to ask the community - What do you think we should do as far as a defense goes?" (insert some random, half-sensical comment from Taco here)
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Haven't you people seen UHF? Don't you remember the part when Philo had his "Secrets of the Universe" show, and taught us all how to make plutonium out of common household items?
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Release full binaries with as much documentation as you can without compromising your proprietary technology. No source is released but Linux users get the opportunity to use something that works.
StarOffice has been like this for years. You acquire a binary that runs reasonably well on Linux but, the source is still closed.
Sorry, but I have to disagree here. While binary-only applications may be okay, binary-only drivers are quite a different matter. If they're talking about drivers in the traditional sense, then that means code compiled into the kernel, or more likely as a module. Remember all the fuss caused by Creative's decision to release SB Live! drivers as binary-only - and then not recompiling for newer kernels and whatnot?
And what if I want to use these drivers on, say, a custom kernel config - like my MOSIX cluster here? insmod will, of course, fail, because the kernel version doesn't match. While I could force it to load anyway, what are the odds that it would work, without a recompile on MY system?
And then of course, there is the simple matter of alternate architectures besides ia32/x86/whateverthehellyouwannacallit. Archs like Alpha have PCI slots, and will even work reasonably well with most PC hardware. But what if the company doesn't provide a Linux/Alpha version? Guess I'm screwed then (yes, I do have an Alpha, in the form of a Multia sitting under my desk). This applies for binary-only applications as well.
While binary-only apps are okay, even tolerable, I do not like binary-only drivers at all. Maybe its just me, but they just have too many associated problems, at least in my view.
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose? Spaceballs!
Jeez, you'd think the copy would be happy. The copy gets the cool new immortal body while you're stuck with the crappy old one.
Not exactly. The copy just lives inside a computer-simulated VR land - and because of the massive loads the simulation of a brain (and a psuedo-body) requires, it runs at a slowdown of approximentally 17x to the real world. Doesn't sound like too much fun to me.
Oh, and by the way, the book is quite good:-)
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose? Spaceballs!
MOSCOW -- A previously obscure maker of vodka announced today that they would begin producing a new brand of vodka, named after the free operating system Linux.
"Like Linux, the 'source code,' or recipe, will be included on each bottle. We will also be selling -- at cost -- brew-at-home kits," a company spokesperson said.
When asked how they intended to make a profit from such a business plan, the spokesperson stated that they would "offer assistance with the brew-at-home kit, for a charge," and that "most people would rather buy a complete bottle anyway."
Linus Torvalds, owner of the Linux operating system trademark, was quoted as saying "It'd be nice to see Linux vodka beat out this other Windows product I've heard about."
However, not all in the free software community felt the same way. Richard Stallman stated that "this Linux vodka would have been nothing without my Emacs editor, used to create the recipe! And of course, all the other GNU tools used in its creation. I would like for it to be renamed as GNU/Linux vodka."
Company executives, however, seemed not to care much at all about Stallman's concerns.
When the "geek community" of Slashdot was asked, many comments seemed rather cryptic. Indeed, there were many posts reading only "F1r5t p0st!" or "Natalie Portman petrified and naked!"
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose? Spaceballs!
Come on. Some supposedly-advanced computer intelligence agency had to use Pagemill to get something that said "ASIO - Test page" in a big font? Oooh, I'm scared of them now!
Given the postulate in the subject of the previous message (Sun's License Sucks Ass...), and the fact that the name of the license is the acronym SCSL, we can say that this acronym expands to the following:
You all remember the article a while back, about Palm Pilot IR ports being used to intercept and play back car-lock codes, right?
Well actually, this isn't really true. IIRC, the car door locks work on what is basically a one-time pad system, with the next sequence determined by an algorithm that was not cracked. Meaning, sure, if you grab your buddy's keys, have it send the signal to your PalmPilot, and then use that signal on the car, it will unlock the car. But the next time you try to use that same recorded sequence, it won't work. What's the point if you have to steal the guy's keys first?:)
This is the way I see things. Large opensource projects usually have maintainers of a certain area - pieces of code and whatnot. Why not have a certain person be the "PR Maintainer" - "all emails should be addressed to foo.bar@project.org. Any media queries sent to the developers will be ignored and deleted unread."
This guy could also maintain the website, for example, or run the announcement mailing list. In fact, I'd be surprised if there aren't major projects out there not doing this already.
You don't have to be a coder to help with the coding;-)
This article isn't that bad, and I even think that the author did a fair job. Really. The guy is a newbie. Fine. While wondering if his computer has a video card may seem a bit silly to all of us geeks, the average Joe Schmoe thinks of his computer as a magical black box - not much can be done to change that. It's a very, very good thing that the guy at least admits he's a newbie, and needs help. And another point in this guy's favor - he's not afraid of the dreaded DOCUMENTATION! I've seen many a [l]user on linux IRC channels that blatantly refuse to read instruction manuals, HOWTOs, or manpages. They just expect everything to work without any effort on their part - this guy at least tries, which IMO is commendable.
Last thing - the guy is truthful. He doesn't attempt to hide his lack of knowledge about computers, or the fact that Linux isn't ready for him yet. He says what is currently right - Linux, especially the install, is NOT for the average person. However, as the article points out, someone who's mucked around with UNIX, or maybe some UNIX and DOS, might even enjoy it.
I hope I'm not repeating too much of what others have said, I didn't read too carefully through the comments:-)
Slashdot Mirror
There's a guy I talk with on IRC, who usually has
something interesting or humorous to say in his
quit message. One day it was:
"The NSA is always looking for hot new talent, and
fresh young faces. To learn more about the
exciting career opportunities within the NSA,
just pick up your phone and ask the dialtone."
...is that he damn well knows what it's like to be flamed. :)
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
with the two guys that founded Google? There's a rather interesting Time article about them.
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
...But can we use this to bring back the ThunderCats?
Thunder-thunder-thundercats!
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
...Google needs only one thing:
pr0n.google.com
And to be the ultimate among Anonymous Cowards:
grits.pr0n.google.com/portman
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Surely you'll bring about the destruction of our species! Don't you remember what the Monolith said? All those worlds are ours - EXCEPT Europa!
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Linus (and many many others) are the copyright holders. They decide the license for Linux, and they would have to release the government from obligation; undoubtedly there would be several that would refuse.
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Malda, scrap the icon of Gates with the Borg laser thingie strapped to his head. It's much, much, MUCH more fitting for this schmuck.
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Would anyone else find it incredibly hilarious to have a Linux box with a flashing red "GURU MEDITATION" box?
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Oops.
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Anonymous Coward asks "Hi, I'm an executive of a rather large Internet company, and we just had a suit filed against us because of some file-sharing software we created that happened to be used for sharing MP3s. I'd like to ask the community - What do you think we should do as far as a defense goes?" (insert some random, half-sensical comment from Taco here)
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Haven't you people seen UHF? Don't you remember the part when Philo had his "Secrets of the Universe" show, and taught us all how to make plutonium out of common household items?
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Sorry, but I have to disagree here. While binary-only applications may be okay, binary-only drivers are quite a different matter. If they're talking about drivers in the traditional sense, then that means code compiled into the kernel, or more likely as a module. Remember all the fuss caused by Creative's decision to release SB Live! drivers as binary-only - and then not recompiling for newer kernels and whatnot?
And what if I want to use these drivers on, say, a custom kernel config - like my MOSIX cluster here? insmod will, of course, fail, because the kernel version doesn't match. While I could force it to load anyway, what are the odds that it would work, without a recompile on MY system?
And then of course, there is the simple matter of alternate architectures besides ia32/x86/whateverthehellyouwannacallit. Archs like Alpha have PCI slots, and will even work reasonably well with most PC hardware. But what if the company doesn't provide a Linux/Alpha version? Guess I'm screwed then (yes, I do have an Alpha, in the form of a Multia sitting under my desk). This applies for binary-only applications as well.
While binary-only apps are okay, even tolerable, I do not like binary-only drivers at all. Maybe its just me, but they just have too many associated problems, at least in my view.
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Great. Soon we'll have standup Katz cutouts repeating "Buy my book! Buy my book!" over and over.
:)
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Do you mean the root virus, or the ROOT virus? :)
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Strawberry pop tarts will combust and jet out flames if left in the toaster for too long. Really. Check it out.
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
I really want a Mini-Me of my own. Not only will he share my world domination plans, but he would fit easily into most overhead storage compartments.
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Not exactly. The copy just lives inside a computer-simulated VR land - and because of the massive loads the simulation of a brain (and a psuedo-body) requires, it runs at a slowdown of approximentally 17x to the real world. Doesn't sound like too much fun to me.
Oh, and by the way, the book is quite good :-)
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
MOSCOW -- A previously obscure maker of vodka announced today that they would begin producing a new brand of vodka, named after the free operating system Linux.
"Like Linux, the 'source code,' or recipe, will be included on each bottle. We will also be selling -- at cost -- brew-at-home kits," a company spokesperson said.
When asked how they intended to make a profit from such a business plan, the spokesperson stated that they would "offer assistance with the brew-at-home kit, for a charge," and that "most people would rather buy a complete bottle anyway."
Linus Torvalds, owner of the Linux operating system trademark, was quoted as saying "It'd be nice to see Linux vodka beat out this other Windows product I've heard about."
However, not all in the free software community felt the same way. Richard Stallman stated that "this Linux vodka would have been nothing without my Emacs editor, used to create the recipe! And of course, all the other GNU tools used in its creation. I would like for it to be renamed as GNU/Linux vodka."
Company executives, however, seemed not to care much at all about Stallman's concerns.
When the "geek community" of Slashdot was asked, many comments seemed rather cryptic. Indeed, there were many posts reading only "F1r5t p0st!" or "Natalie Portman petrified and naked!"
Dear my! What are those things coming out of her nose?
Spaceballs!
Really. Look at the source to the test page. What do you get?
<META NAME="GENERATOR" CONTENT="Adobe PageMill 2.0 Mac">
Come on. Some supposedly-advanced computer intelligence agency had to use Pagemill to get something that said "ASIO - Test page" in a big font? Oooh, I'm scared of them now!
Given the postulate in the subject of the previous message (Sun's License Sucks Ass...), and the fact that the name of the license is the acronym SCSL, we can say that this acronym expands to the following:
/.ers will agree with.
Sun's Crap-Sucking License
which I think many
You all remember the article a while back, about Palm Pilot IR ports being used to intercept and play back car-lock codes, right?
Well actually, this isn't really true. IIRC, the car door locks work on what is basically a one-time pad system, with the next sequence determined by an algorithm that was not cracked. Meaning, sure, if you grab your buddy's keys, have it send the signal to your PalmPilot, and then use that signal on the car, it will unlock the car. But the next time you try to use that same recorded sequence, it won't work.What's the point if you have to steal the guy's keys first?
This is the way I see things. Large opensource projects usually have maintainers of a certain area - pieces of code and whatnot. Why not have a certain person be the "PR Maintainer" - "all emails should be addressed to foo.bar@project.org. Any media queries sent to the developers will be ignored and deleted unread."
;-)
This guy could also maintain the website, for example, or run the announcement mailing list. In fact, I'd be surprised if there aren't major projects out there not doing this already.
You don't have to be a coder to help with the coding
We all know the fact in the subject :)
Hopefully, however, this ruling won't be repealed, and will stand. I'd love that.
Of course, it looks like that day will be the day that the NSA releases its charter to the general public.
Hey,
:-)
This article isn't that bad, and I even think that the author did a fair job. Really.
The guy is a newbie. Fine. While wondering if his computer has a video card may seem a bit silly to all of us geeks, the average Joe Schmoe thinks of his computer as a magical black box - not much can be done to change that. It's a very, very good thing that the guy at least admits he's a newbie, and needs help.
And another point in this guy's favor - he's not afraid of the dreaded DOCUMENTATION! I've seen many a [l]user on linux IRC channels that blatantly refuse to read instruction manuals, HOWTOs, or manpages. They just expect everything to work without any effort on their part - this guy at least tries, which IMO is commendable.
Last thing - the guy is truthful. He doesn't attempt to hide his lack of knowledge about computers, or the fact that Linux isn't ready for him yet. He says what is currently right - Linux, especially the install, is NOT for the average person. However, as the article points out, someone who's mucked around with UNIX, or maybe some UNIX and DOS, might even enjoy it.
I hope I'm not repeating too much of what others have said, I didn't read too carefully through the comments