I don't understand your comparison between OO techniques and the XP methodology. Seems like apples and oranges to me. Can't you write OO code using an XP method? And isn't the use of the XP method *supposed* to result in good, well encapsulated OO code?
It might actually be easier to break the encryption by just stealing your memory card or whatever.
At least (using conventional encryption methods) if you use a large enough key, brute force won't be a practical attack since the info protected is probably somewhat time sensitive (say to at least 100 years or so)...
Nevertheless, what worked well in WWII could find a practical use in todays world.
If Microsoft develops a concept (or Apple in this case I guess) that might be useful to Linux users, we shouldn't develop something similar because instead we should just buy Windows? That is just plain stupid.
Linux is nothing like Windows and it will never be. But there is nothing wrong with adding functionality that people will find useful, although, I can't see why one wouldn't just make an alias to do this instead as another poster mentioned...
So what's wrong with providing a solution to those who want a trashcan? Maybe you are so much more experienced than most users (what 20 years of computer use? AMAZING!!!) but what's wrong with giving people an option?
You only "bastardize" it if you make it mandatory.
Same situation at my company, and it frustrates me to no end. I've suggested using OS tools since I got here, and instead they come in here and plop a 3K copy of JBuilder on my desk! I still use ant and gvim.
I've asked many times, "Why are we paying obscene ammounts of money for shitty software (ahem... BEA WebLogic) when we could get something equilivalent and better for peanuts. They always say...
1. Someone to blame when things go wrong, you can't sue OS developers, they don't have any money. (Do they ever sue these vendors? Nope.)
2. Support, you can always call their support number, what are you going to do with OS software? (Yea, i know how crazy this sounds, and I've tried to explain, but they think those monkeys on the teir 1 support are worth paying 15K a year for)
Same goes for hardware in my company, they just bought 2 50K sun machines which perform about as well as 15K worth of linux boxes.
I've tried to get through to them, but the PHBs do not listen to their technical staff when making these kind of decisions. This, I believe, is the main reason for this problem.
Change is a vital quality in any industry, the ability to change your business to accomidate for the changes that are occuring in the world around you. In this case, the MPAA is resisting change and trying to reverse the situation by changing the world and Mr. Valinti is their leader. Never has it worked before and it won't work again, put copy protection on movies and either people will just stop watching them on TV (yay for blockbuster) or some 14 year old kid will figure out how to bypass whatever stupid technology they implement.
It's not going to work, learn to live within the reality that we call life and change your business to suit. This Valinti guy is the biggest idiot I've ever heard of, you know NBC, ABC, and CBS used to be radio stations right? What happened when TV came along? Well, they became TV stations.
As far as experience goes: Perhaps have less experienced people sit with you while you code, sort of like peer programming but it will be more of a learning experience for them. Encourage them to ask as many questions as possible durring that time. I think this may slow you down a bit for a while but in the end you will have more experienced developers.
At what point in time will the government and big business understand that watermarks and "broadcast flags" will not work? I can't imagine the ammount of money spent on technology that will (and has) failed in persuit of curtailing piracy...
When will they figure out that P2P file sharing networks (not to mention IRC, which apparently they are oblivious to) won't be going away? They need to play the cards life has dealt them and figure out how to use these to their advantage or provide a system that is better and more aligned with their business (selling commercials). The world is about change, did all the radio stations get angry when they invented TV? No, they all became TV stations too!
For example, if you assume all TV brodcasts are going to be pirated. Make it easier for the people downloading these shows by providing them for free on a website and keeping the commercials in the show. If you stream them then they cannot fast forward through commercials. So you basically provide all of your content on demand with commercials (more air time for advertisers thus more expensive commercials). Personally, I'd go watch Alias streamed (if it was a good 300k stream) with commercials rather than sifting around and waiting in queues on IRC or spending days trying to get it on gnutalla. And if we are worried about modem users, they can't download pirated TV anyway, files are too large.
Yea, so the stupid guy left his password sitting around or something. That's his fault. I was thinking that the Italians did some legal or political manuvering here to shut down the site, which would be alarming. But it's simple a case of stupidity instead.
The ISP should restore from backup and tell the idiot to keep his password secret.
I have always wanted to work in your field, yet, as ironic as this is about to sound, I turned down an offer from ILM because I could not afford to live in Silicon Valley being married with one child. Apartments (crappy ones by the way) are 3 times as much as the house payments I currently make and apparently you have to send your kid to private school there. It simply was not doable. Most of the ILMers I spoke to lived with 3 or 4 other ILMers in order to afford the living expense.
If I read your website correctly, you are located in Los Angeles. I am interested to know how you feel about this situation. All of these facilities seem to be in California, where the cost of living prohibits many excellent programmers from working there simply because they have to support a family (not a bad thing). Is it possible that such a facility as yours could exist in a less costly location, or is the vicinity to the film industry too importiant to overlook in this way?
I think it is ready for the shelves, as long as the consumer knows he/she is not buying a Windows box. There will also have to be consideration given by Walmart to putting Linux software on the shelves as well, perhaps even a software kiosk where you get CD's burned with the selected OS software for the price of the CD... People will feel a lot better about uying a computer knowing they can go to Walmart and get their software.
Normal Uninformed Media Article
on
Is Linux Dead?
·
· Score: 2
Sure, this guy who is a reporter hasn't heard much about Linux lately. I'm not surprised. He's a reporter. I haven't heard much about the latest in print media, so it must be dead. That's my totally uninformed and ignorant conclusion of the state of the print media business.
Point is, this guy didn't do his research, his article is based off of the fact that he hasn't heard much about Linux lately. I've heard a lot about it, perhaps it is because I work in this industry? Perhaps it is because I stay on top of the latest news in my industry? Apparently he doesn't, that's fine, but what makes him think he should write an article about it?
Experience and IP are two different things. This guy learned from past experience. Now he can apply that to solve a similar problem. If he hacked in and copied the code, that is different.
If you try to open a door differently each time, pretty soon you will be standing on your head trying to turn a knob with your feet.
This guy needs to do the best job he can for the company that hires him. If he refuses because he did something similar at another company, then you might as well just let him go.
Sure anyone reading this post is smart enough to do as you say. But Ma Smith isn't going to read the manual, she will try to install AOL and it won't work. She will then proclaim that these Wal-Mart computers suck as will all of those like her. In this way, Linux could get a bad reputation among the general public, which is a bad thing.
Then to compound the problem, you will arrive on scene with your "Got Root?" T shirt and call her a F@#king idiot and the community will get an even worse reputation.
There is no excuse for ignorance, but it is also ignorant to expect everyone to do as you would.
I'm a little worried to where this is heading. If these PCs are intended for low budget novice consumers...
A> They might be confused about Lindows (while not infringing on MSs Trademark, it is definitely misleading). How many novice users are going to buy a PC that they think will run all the screensavers and games that a Windows PC will?
B> Giving novice users a choice between Mandrake and Lindows seems strange to me. How will most novice users be able to choose the most appropriate? I think we might just confuse them out of buying a computer, or they will probably choose the Lindows box just because the name sounds familiar.
C> As far as I know Walmart sells Windows PC software (maybe Mac??). Won't user's assume that since they buy their computer from Walmart, that the software they buy from Walmart will work on their computer? Is Walmart planning on selling Linux software somehow as well?
I like the Mandrake thing, but I am a little worried that the inclusion of Lindows will be confusing to the non-technical user who is most likely to buy these boxen. The name of the distro implies that it is analogous to Windows. As far as I have read, it is not. This will only serve to make the general public hate linux because they can't run "regular" software on it.
I make no assumption. Bad developers produce bad code. How can this be false?
I also make no accusation that Microsoft develops bad software, that bugs never occur, and that the quality of MS developers are poor. But that bad software at it's core is the result of poor design and testing. Well designed code can have bugs, that's fine. These can be fixed easially if the software is well designed, coded, and tested.
Now if you really want to make a point, post as a user and let your voice be heard. Attacking another post as AC with a Score of 0 holds no weight if you aren't brave enough to stand up to your claims.
Yes, I am all for engineering certifications for software developers before they are allowed to develop software in certian industries. There are too many people programming computers without the proper training, the result is this "sucky software".
Some software sucks these days. I used to work for a company that built sucky software, I quit. But I learned something very important...
We are still in the beginning days of software development. There is a notion that anyone who is computer literate can program computers. This totally discounts all of the training that one would learn taking CS classes in college. But that fact is largely ignored by many of these companies who jumped on the software bandwagon years ago. As a result, they are slowly discovering what software engineering is all about, but their code is decades out of date in terms of concept and design.
But just look at some of the developers that hire people appropriately trained, the Shuttle Group at Lockheed Martin comes to mind. These guys do not make mistakes or people die. So they employ good software development practices every CS major learned in school and their code just works. All software should be developed using good practices.
I believe that the importance of these practices and concepts are slowly being recognized in the field, but there are still a lot of faux programmers out there. As time passes, the people employing software developers will come to know the value of a properly trained developer and software quality in general will go up.
Slashdot Mirror
So the Chineese can add "Custom Firewall code" to the Windows source???
Why don't they just buy a damn firewall and put their computers behind it? That's what the rest of the world does?
Am I missing something?
Jack-
I don't understand your comparison between OO techniques and the XP methodology. Seems like apples and oranges to me. Can't you write OO code using an XP method? And isn't the use of the XP method *supposed* to result in good, well encapsulated OO code?
Troy
She's a freelance writer, she never mentioned if she has ever been published. In fact, she probably doesn't make enought money to afford the mac :)
It might actually be easier to break the encryption by just stealing your memory card or whatever.
At least (using conventional encryption methods) if you use a large enough key, brute force won't be a practical attack since the info protected is probably somewhat time sensitive (say to at least 100 years or so)...
Nevertheless, what worked well in WWII could find a practical use in todays world.
Troy
So in othe words...
If Microsoft develops a concept (or Apple in this case I guess) that might be useful to Linux users, we shouldn't develop something similar because instead we should just buy Windows? That is just plain stupid.
Linux is nothing like Windows and it will never be. But there is nothing wrong with adding functionality that people will find useful, although, I can't see why one wouldn't just make an alias to do this instead as another poster mentioned...
Wow, you are so special and smart.
So what's wrong with providing a solution to those who want a trashcan? Maybe you are so much more experienced than most users (what 20 years of computer use? AMAZING!!!) but what's wrong with giving people an option?
You only "bastardize" it if you make it mandatory.
Same situation at my company, and it frustrates me to no end. I've suggested using OS tools since I got here, and instead they come in here and plop a 3K copy of JBuilder on my desk! I still use ant and gvim.
I've asked many times, "Why are we paying obscene ammounts of money for shitty software (ahem... BEA WebLogic) when we could get something equilivalent and better for peanuts. They always say...
1. Someone to blame when things go wrong, you can't sue OS developers, they don't have any money. (Do they ever sue these vendors? Nope.)
2. Support, you can always call their support number, what are you going to do with OS software? (Yea, i know how crazy this sounds, and I've tried to explain, but they think those monkeys on the teir 1 support are worth paying 15K a year for)
Same goes for hardware in my company, they just bought 2 50K sun machines which perform about as well as 15K worth of linux boxes.
I've tried to get through to them, but the PHBs do not listen to their technical staff when making these kind of decisions. This, I believe, is the main reason for this problem.
Troy
Change is a vital quality in any industry, the ability to change your business to accomidate for the changes that are occuring in the world around you. In this case, the MPAA is resisting change and trying to reverse the situation by changing the world and Mr. Valinti is their leader. Never has it worked before and it won't work again, put copy protection on movies and either people will just stop watching them on TV (yay for blockbuster) or some 14 year old kid will figure out how to bypass whatever stupid technology they implement.
It's not going to work, learn to live within the reality that we call life and change your business to suit. This Valinti guy is the biggest idiot I've ever heard of, you know NBC, ABC, and CBS used to be radio stations right? What happened when TV came along? Well, they became TV stations.
I hope the robot was alright!
As far as experience goes: Perhaps have less experienced people sit with you while you code, sort of like peer programming but it will be more of a learning experience for them. Encourage them to ask as many questions as possible durring that time. I think this may slow you down a bit for a while but in the end you will have more experienced developers.
At what point in time will the government and big business understand that watermarks and "broadcast flags" will not work? I can't imagine the ammount of money spent on technology that will (and has) failed in persuit of curtailing piracy...
When will they figure out that P2P file sharing networks (not to mention IRC, which apparently they are oblivious to) won't be going away? They need to play the cards life has dealt them and figure out how to use these to their advantage or provide a system that is better and more aligned with their business (selling commercials). The world is about change, did all the radio stations get angry when they invented TV? No, they all became TV stations too!
For example, if you assume all TV brodcasts are going to be pirated. Make it easier for the people downloading these shows by providing them for free on a website and keeping the commercials in the show. If you stream them then they cannot fast forward through commercials. So you basically provide all of your content on demand with commercials (more air time for advertisers thus more expensive commercials). Personally, I'd go watch Alias streamed (if it was a good 300k stream) with commercials rather than sifting around and waiting in queues on IRC or spending days trying to get it on gnutalla. And if we are worried about modem users, they can't download pirated TV anyway, files are too large.
Just a thought.
Yea, so the stupid guy left his password sitting around or something. That's his fault. I was thinking that the Italians did some legal or political manuvering here to shut down the site, which would be alarming. But it's simple a case of stupidity instead.
The ISP should restore from backup and tell the idiot to keep his password secret.
Hi-
I have always wanted to work in your field, yet, as ironic as this is about to sound, I turned down an offer from ILM because I could not afford to live in Silicon Valley being married with one child. Apartments (crappy ones by the way) are 3 times as much as the house payments I currently make and apparently you have to send your kid to private school there. It simply was not doable. Most of the ILMers I spoke to lived with 3 or 4 other ILMers in order to afford the living expense.
If I read your website correctly, you are located in Los Angeles. I am interested to know how you feel about this situation. All of these facilities seem to be in California, where the cost of living prohibits many excellent programmers from working there simply because they have to support a family (not a bad thing). Is it possible that such a facility as yours could exist in a less costly location, or is the vicinity to the film industry too importiant to overlook in this way?
Thanks, loved TFATF by the way!
Troy
They have been selling the Lindows PC for some time on the site, does anyone know how many have sold? What the interest in these are?
I think it is ready for the shelves, as long as the consumer knows he/she is not buying a Windows box. There will also have to be consideration given by Walmart to putting Linux software on the shelves as well, perhaps even a software kiosk where you get CD's burned with the selected OS software for the price of the CD... People will feel a lot better about uying a computer knowing they can go to Walmart and get their software.
Sure, this guy who is a reporter hasn't heard much about Linux lately. I'm not surprised. He's a reporter. I haven't heard much about the latest in print media, so it must be dead. That's my totally uninformed and ignorant conclusion of the state of the print media business.
Point is, this guy didn't do his research, his article is based off of the fact that he hasn't heard much about Linux lately. I've heard a lot about it, perhaps it is because I work in this industry? Perhaps it is because I stay on top of the latest news in my industry? Apparently he doesn't, that's fine, but what makes him think he should write an article about it?
Experience and IP are two different things. This guy learned from past experience. Now he can apply that to solve a similar problem. If he hacked in and copied the code, that is different.
If you try to open a door differently each time, pretty soon you will be standing on your head trying to turn a knob with your feet.
This guy needs to do the best job he can for the company that hires him. If he refuses because he did something similar at another company, then you might as well just let him go.
T
Thats a good point, this should be modded up.
Or she might be nice enough to help you learn what you were doing wrong instead of berating you as you would do to her.
Sure anyone reading this post is smart enough to do as you say. But Ma Smith isn't going to read the manual, she will try to install AOL and it won't work. She will then proclaim that these Wal-Mart computers suck as will all of those like her. In this way, Linux could get a bad reputation among the general public, which is a bad thing.
Then to compound the problem, you will arrive on scene with your "Got Root?" T shirt and call her a F@#king idiot and the community will get an even worse reputation.
There is no excuse for ignorance, but it is also ignorant to expect everyone to do as you would.
So you think that Mandrake will be forced out of existance by Lindows!!! This IS worse than I initially thought!!!
:)
I'm a little worried to where this is heading. If these PCs are intended for low budget novice consumers...
A> They might be confused about Lindows (while not infringing on MSs Trademark, it is definitely misleading). How many novice users are going to buy a PC that they think will run all the screensavers and games that a Windows PC will?
B> Giving novice users a choice between Mandrake and Lindows seems strange to me. How will most novice users be able to choose the most appropriate? I think we might just confuse them out of buying a computer, or they will probably choose the Lindows box just because the name sounds familiar.
C> As far as I know Walmart sells Windows PC software (maybe Mac??). Won't user's assume that since they buy their computer from Walmart, that the software they buy from Walmart will work on their computer? Is Walmart planning on selling Linux software somehow as well?
I like the Mandrake thing, but I am a little worried that the inclusion of Lindows will be confusing to the non-technical user who is most likely to buy these boxen. The name of the distro implies that it is analogous to Windows. As far as I have read, it is not. This will only serve to make the general public hate linux because they can't run "regular" software on it.
Troy
I make no assumption. Bad developers produce bad code. How can this be false?
I also make no accusation that Microsoft develops bad software, that bugs never occur, and that the quality of MS developers are poor. But that bad software at it's core is the result of poor design and testing. Well designed code can have bugs, that's fine. These can be fixed easially if the software is well designed, coded, and tested.
Now if you really want to make a point, post as a user and let your voice be heard. Attacking another post as AC with a Score of 0 holds no weight if you aren't brave enough to stand up to your claims.
Troy
Yes, I am all for engineering certifications for software developers before they are allowed to develop software in certian industries. There are too many people programming computers without the proper training, the result is this "sucky software".
Some software sucks these days. I used to work for a company that built sucky software, I quit. But I learned something very important...
We are still in the beginning days of software development. There is a notion that anyone who is computer literate can program computers. This totally discounts all of the training that one would learn taking CS classes in college. But that fact is largely ignored by many of these companies who jumped on the software bandwagon years ago. As a result, they are slowly discovering what software engineering is all about, but their code is decades out of date in terms of concept and design.
But just look at some of the developers that hire people appropriately trained, the Shuttle Group at Lockheed Martin comes to mind. These guys do not make mistakes or people die. So they employ good software development practices every CS major learned in school and their code just works. All software should be developed using good practices.
I believe that the importance of these practices and concepts are slowly being recognized in the field, but there are still a lot of faux programmers out there. As time passes, the people employing software developers will come to know the value of a properly trained developer and software quality in general will go up.