I'd prefer that as well, but we both know it ain't going to happen. Skype != OSS. Asterisk is OSS therefore there is going to be a problem. Best thing we can hope for is a binary plug-in, or proxy technology.
Then again, maybe they'll change their tune sometime - after all, maybe Skype will incorporate IAX2 into their call routing servers... It could happen...
So, if passwords are baaad (mmmkay?) then why not start using public key cryptography. I'm sure people wouldn't object to carrying a card with a 2048-bit (or higher) key on it, replacing it every 2-3 years. It'd be stored on the chip on the card (similar to the one on credit cards) and could be easily cancelled if it was stolen. The interface for PC's could be really easily designed. Obviously, someone could design a dodgy interface that would copy the code, so maybe a small microprocessor should be on the chip encoding the timestamp of the machine, with the private key, so that the previously stored public key could be verified against. This would also make the sys-admins life easier, as if the password file were compromised by a read request (although obviously not a write attempt) then the data is useless - it's a public key!
Three major problems with this:
1) Making a card that can not only store the 2048-bit private key, but also the 4096-bit public key with a _standard_ interface allowing for much stronger cryptography to be used in the future. It _must_ have an onboard computer, although it can be powered by the host device. RFID could be used, but that may be a privacy risk if you carry it around.
2) Making a standard interface. Sure, you can easily design one, but getting everyone to adopt the same one? It didn't happen with smart cards, it won't work with key cards unless everyone agrees on the approach.
3) Must be cheap to manufacture. Preferably a dollar/euro/pound, so that if it's lost it isn't a big deal to get a new one, and thrifty people don't feel bad about it.
Is this so bad an idea? Sure, it won't become commonplace for home usage etc, but surely in corporate and/or small business environments, it must be a way forward?
Not quite what I had in mind. I don't want to be plugging in random devices into the users computers, the VoIP units are seperate, and I'd prefer it to be a plugin for Asterisk, or maybe a seperate extension etc... Maybe a proxy converting into IAX2?
I hate to say it, but if Skype released proxy software, so that an "exchange" could be held ala Asterisk, I'd be tempted to move my implementation over from Asterisk... More people use Skype than SIP...
What I'd prefer though, is that someone made a Skype SIP gateway. Would make things a hell of a lot better, especially since I could keep PSTN lines, yet save on conference calling and international rates.
Because it's the end of a season. Therefore it can go the way of TNG and Voyager and at the end wake up in a shower scene and pretend it was all a dream... That's acceptable... Well, to me at least... Have a bit of fun with it... Hell, even have a crossover with Farscape. And Seinfeld. I can see it now: They travel through a wormhole by mistake, landing themselves on the other side of the galaxy/universe and encounter the Farscapey ship thing.. Moya! Then they crash land on a planet infested with a crazy virus that makes all the inhabitants praise mighty lord Seinfeld... It could work... Yeah, and Monkey's might flatter my butt!
They've stopped travelling through time - they sorted that out in the first three episodes of Season 4, and the regular actors are actually learning how to act! Hoshi for one suddenly becomes a person! Reid's still a bit of a turnip, but all non-evil british are, and Tucker has started getting interesting with T'Pol, revealing interesting Vulcan thingimibobs (no, not THOSE Vulcan thingimibobs) leaving only Travis to get a character...
Duuuhhhhh! Temporal Cold War is over! And no reason for Riker and Troi to go back? Have you never heard of the reason "BECAUSE THEY CAN"? Sure, it may wreck the timeline a bit, but they can have a hell of a lot of fun doing it;) I'd say bring Barclay back as well, but that's just too far...
You joke about this kind of thing, the first question my father asked when I told him about Asterisk and VoIP was "but we'll have to change it all when we all go onto this IPv6 thing you told me about". Parents! Why don't they understand the OSI model!:)
In fact, the Soviets when sending up Gagarin were shit scared about the Cosmoanuts defecting to the West, so they used an autopilot, and were only going to give the pilot the code to disable it if there was any trouble - otherwise he was just a passenger! Thank god the Soviet Union no longer exists!
I'd rather we (meaning the westernised countries) partner with the Chinese - we know they are honourable in keeping their contracts etc, even though we may disagree on policies. China isn't such a bad place to be - it's far better than Iran and North Korea for example:) I'm not saying we support them, I'm saying we help each other with space programmes etc - we can discuss their agenda when we become friends =)
Signed,
The Eternal Optimist, and Eternal Fool for trusting the Commies.
It's a shame you probably won't have watched the "First Man In Space" documentary a few weeks ago done by the BBC about Yura Gagarin - it appears that although they did intend to seperate the re-entry and orbital modules, it went completely tits up and span out of control. Gargarin would have certainly died if the heat from re-entry hadn't burnt through the wires holding it together... I know we say a lot of crap about the Chinese... But thank god they're not the Soviets...
Not to rub it in, but we haven't been "subjects" since the early 1970's, before if you weren't a Government employee. These days, Queen and State are a formality, there is no basis in law.
Just as a reference, Digital has been in the UK for years, but not HD. In fact, HD isn't even due to launch for a few years... Why? UK audiences are happy with what they have at the moment. It'll take at least 5 years before we get to the level that the US is at, if at all. Of course, we have the benefit of our PAL signal, which is unaffected by DC noise:) Seriously, if you watch an NTSC stream on a US TV versus the UK PAL equivalent with NICAM stereo, the UK will be better every time. HDTV isn't the big jump it is elsewhere. I'm not saying this to rub it in your faces, just because I don't think HDTV will catch in Europe anywhere near as fast as elsewhere, if at all. We have digital TV through Satellite, Cable and Terrestrial - and I'm happy with it.
WMV and why it must not be allowed to continue
on
Comparing Codecs for 2004
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· Score: 2, Interesting
I'm not an Open-Source zealot, in fact I frequently prefer a lot of non-open-source software, but I can definately see why people prefer that method of development. And the creation of a "standard" is exactly why open-source should be used when it is applied to software. For an example, what happens in 200 years time when someone wants to read a Blu-ray/HD-DVD? They can't! WMVv9's specification, AFAIK, has not been publicly released, and so it will quickly be superseeded and forgotten. However, MPEG-2 has been publicly specified and therefore can be read in the future by simply reading and understanding the specification. We use standards so that we don't have to rely on a company, or a person to decode the data for us, without our knowledge of how it works. If something is going to be used to store data for future retrieval, we want to be able to refer back to how it was made. I've not made it clear what I mean, but hopefully people can understand. XviD appears to be not only the most logical choice from a point of view of being a freely available standard that no-one wants control of, just willing to contribute to, it is also of the highest quality and and speed, and goes well with Ogg Vorbis sound, which is also completely open-source. I will not buy any Blu-ray or HD-DVD's whilst they intend on pursuing this course of action. I don't have very good speakers or very good TV anyway, so DVD will do for me:)
I think that Gore would have done a better job than Dubya. Just looking at his track record prior to 2000 (sorry, that involves research!) you can see there are likely to be less conflicts of interest, and Gore was the better candidate in that respect. However, Kerry vs. Bush, as an independant outsider, I'd have voted Bush. Sure, we don't get all the information, and we don't count in US-national politics, but Kerry just seemed to be anti-Bush, not standing on his own laurels. If Clinton does run for 2008 (not Bill, Hilary!) then I hope she will chose Gore as her running mate.
Steady on, I did say that I didn't hate Americans, just the vast majority of your politics. And we're not "holier-than-thou". Although those that speak out like me generally think they are (myself excepted). Maybe I should start thinking that way if people like you are going to respond in that way...
That's fine - we were a little over-protectionist about Black Watch, but that's to be expected. We've heard storied about the US battle fleet, but I won't mention them here, because I know that it just can't be true:)
There's a lot of negativity over here about American cars (in Britain) being generally crap, but to be honest I think they're pretty good. Ok, they corner really crappily, and they are inefficient as hell (you don't need an 8 litre engine, our (European) 3 litre mega-cars get better performance!) but I've never had a smoother more relaxing ride than in an American minivan. I agree with you when you say that CERTAIN motorways/highways throughout America, Britain and elsewhere should be 80/85 restricted, but the fact is that most drivers drive far too close to each other, and there are bound to be more accidents. Hence why it should only be 85 in certain lanes, like the faster-most lanes. The lorry, sorry, truck-lanes should still be restricted. EIther way, good point well made!
Quote: Umm... we want to create 4,000 miles of terrorist in Texas target for... what reason, exactly?
Remark: This is the exact fscking reason why most Brits hate (and I mean HATE) America (not necessarily Americans, we actually like Americans, just really can't stand the country's politics). You want to build a 4000 mile long road that would solve your traffic issues (if you managed somehow to increase the capacity of the exits) and instead of complaining about real issues like how other towns would suffer because of less traffic, and the MASSIVE environmental concerns, you decide to look at... THE TERRORISM ASPECT??? FOR FSCKS SAKE!
Ok, let's pretend I'm Al Qaida. I (or rather, we) want to do most damage to America that I/We can. So we attack a couple of buildings. Kill a couple thousand people. Everybody scared. For this reason they're exactly the same as people like Timothy McVeigh (or however he spells it). What was pure genius (and I don't support them, but this was a brilliant plan) is that they actually got the American people to worry. To sacrifice their own dreams because of terrorism. Everything now has to be thought of now as a potential terrorist target, that you are at war with some very illusive people that may strike at any time. RUBBISH!
Here in the UK, we've been the subject of terror-attacks for the best part of 40 years, with the whole Northern Ireland thing. We don't care about Al Qaida or the IRA or whoever else. We just get on with it (mostly, there are a few jerks out there) and build our millenium domes, our Space Museums, our Olympic bids, our whatever. Sure, we're making ourselves targets, but the fact is that we are not going to be disuaded by some ponce who hates our way of live. We are living our lives, and there's not a lot that can be done to prevent us from doing that. Weapons of Mass Destruction? Weapons of Mass Distraction more like. Notice that in Iraq, the American's get the vast majority of the blame for being insurgents, the British and other countries there are fairly immune to that rap. Not just because there are less of us, but because we respect them, we do our best to accomodate, to leave them alone when we can. Someday, you'll see things our way. The way a lot of your own country do. Let US stand for United States of America, not Unfriendly States of Afraid.
And finally, just to re-iterate. I don't hate Americans, I just can't stand the way you do business:( Or your Government, but then again, ours is not much better - less business, more laziness.
Actually, not to go against you, or anything, but I find Unix actually fairly compliant, and to-standards, as opposed to Windows applications, where every application does things differently. Or at least, apps from different companies do so. The only exception in the Unix World, I have found is EMACS (god forbid it) and lovely lovely ViM.
In fact the best way to improve Unix would be some improvements to access control (presumable acl helps this). What if I want to give two people access to a file but no-one else? I have to create a _group_ for them. Why isn't there an easier way!!!
Oh how I love our Data Protection Act in the UK;) It is illegal for any personal information to be shared between companies (and even divisions of government) without a good reason, that has been ok'd by the subject first - that's right, the Police are not allowed to get your Health records unless it's either a criminal investigation or they have your permission - they can't look "just in case", and neither can anyone else...
Nice idea, but if I buy something, I want to watch it whenever I want, not just in a 24 hour period. VoD is the way forward, but I'm not sacrificing what I already have for it (and that would be the VCR style method - record once, watch many many many times)
I agree, however, I would be prepared to pay 50p per track in an introductory phase, and £5 per album (regardless number of tracks) if it were offered. I'm not joking when I say at those prices, I would spend over a hundred pounds buying digital copies of stuff I don't own. However, I expect to be able to download the music in lossless form as an option (MP3 or others as the norm, Lossless as a free option) and whenever I want, not just once when I purchase it - I want to be able to listen to it on my laptop and on my computer, and to be able to login and download it a la this Steam thing. That's quite a good idea, I think...
Slashdot Mirror
I'd prefer that as well, but we both know it ain't going to happen. Skype != OSS. Asterisk is OSS therefore there is going to be a problem. Best thing we can hope for is a binary plug-in, or proxy technology.
Then again, maybe they'll change their tune sometime - after all, maybe Skype will incorporate IAX2 into their call routing servers... It could happen...
So, if passwords are baaad (mmmkay?) then why not start using public key cryptography. I'm sure people wouldn't object to carrying a card with a 2048-bit (or higher) key on it, replacing it every 2-3 years. It'd be stored on the chip on the card (similar to the one on credit cards) and could be easily cancelled if it was stolen. The interface for PC's could be really easily designed. Obviously, someone could design a dodgy interface that would copy the code, so maybe a small microprocessor should be on the chip encoding the timestamp of the machine, with the private key, so that the previously stored public key could be verified against. This would also make the sys-admins life easier, as if the password file were compromised by a read request (although obviously not a write attempt) then the data is useless - it's a public key!
Three major problems with this:
1) Making a card that can not only store the 2048-bit private key, but also the 4096-bit public key with a _standard_ interface allowing for much stronger cryptography to be used in the future. It _must_ have an onboard computer, although it can be powered by the host device. RFID could be used, but that may be a privacy risk if you carry it around.
2) Making a standard interface. Sure, you can easily design one, but getting everyone to adopt the same one? It didn't happen with smart cards, it won't work with key cards unless everyone agrees on the approach.
3) Must be cheap to manufacture. Preferably a dollar/euro/pound, so that if it's lost it isn't a big deal to get a new one, and thrifty people don't feel bad about it.
Is this so bad an idea? Sure, it won't become commonplace for home usage etc, but surely in corporate and/or small business environments, it must be a way forward?
Not quite what I had in mind. I don't want to be plugging in random devices into the users computers, the VoIP units are seperate, and I'd prefer it to be a plugin for Asterisk, or maybe a seperate extension etc... Maybe a proxy converting into IAX2?
I hate to say it, but if Skype released proxy software, so that an "exchange" could be held ala Asterisk, I'd be tempted to move my implementation over from Asterisk... More people use Skype than SIP...
What I'd prefer though, is that someone made a Skype SIP gateway. Would make things a hell of a lot better, especially since I could keep PSTN lines, yet save on conference calling and international rates.
Because it's the end of a season. Therefore it can go the way of TNG and Voyager and at the end wake up in a shower scene and pretend it was all a dream... That's acceptable... Well, to me at least... Have a bit of fun with it... Hell, even have a crossover with Farscape. And Seinfeld. I can see it now: They travel through a wormhole by mistake, landing themselves on the other side of the galaxy/universe and encounter the Farscapey ship thing.. Moya! Then they crash land on a planet infested with a crazy virus that makes all the inhabitants praise mighty lord Seinfeld... It could work... Yeah, and Monkey's might flatter my butt!
They've stopped travelling through time - they sorted that out in the first three episodes of Season 4, and the regular actors are actually learning how to act! Hoshi for one suddenly becomes a person! Reid's still a bit of a turnip, but all non-evil british are, and Tucker has started getting interesting with T'Pol, revealing interesting Vulcan thingimibobs (no, not THOSE Vulcan thingimibobs) leaving only Travis to get a character...
Duuuhhhhh! Temporal Cold War is over! And no reason for Riker and Troi to go back? Have you never heard of the reason "BECAUSE THEY CAN"? Sure, it may wreck the timeline a bit, but they can have a hell of a lot of fun doing it ;) I'd say bring Barclay back as well, but that's just too far...
You joke about this kind of thing, the first question my father asked when I told him about Asterisk and VoIP was "but we'll have to change it all when we all go onto this IPv6 thing you told me about". Parents! Why don't they understand the OSI model! :)
Yes, Soviets = bad. Russians = not so bad. Americans = too close to call :)
Of course, I'm talking about politics here, generally Russians/Americans are nice people. Generally. I'm speaking generally here.
In fact, the Soviets when sending up Gagarin were shit scared about the Cosmoanuts defecting to the West, so they used an autopilot, and were only going to give the pilot the code to disable it if there was any trouble - otherwise he was just a passenger! Thank god the Soviet Union no longer exists!
I'd rather we (meaning the westernised countries) partner with the Chinese - we know they are honourable in keeping their contracts etc, even though we may disagree on policies. China isn't such a bad place to be - it's far better than Iran and North Korea for example :) I'm not saying we support them, I'm saying we help each other with space programmes etc - we can discuss their agenda when we become friends =)
Signed,
The Eternal Optimist, and Eternal Fool for trusting the Commies.
It's a shame you probably won't have watched the "First Man In Space" documentary a few weeks ago done by the BBC about Yura Gagarin - it appears that although they did intend to seperate the re-entry and orbital modules, it went completely tits up and span out of control. Gargarin would have certainly died if the heat from re-entry hadn't burnt through the wires holding it together... I know we say a lot of crap about the Chinese... But thank god they're not the Soviets...
If it really is 24th jan, it's telling me I'm going to fail my Assembly/Logic Design exam... Thanks guys, just what I needed!?!?!?
Not to rub it in, but we haven't been "subjects" since the early 1970's, before if you weren't a Government employee. These days, Queen and State are a formality, there is no basis in law.
Just as a reference, Digital has been in the UK for years, but not HD. In fact, HD isn't even due to launch for a few years... Why? UK audiences are happy with what they have at the moment. It'll take at least 5 years before we get to the level that the US is at, if at all. Of course, we have the benefit of our PAL signal, which is unaffected by DC noise :) Seriously, if you watch an NTSC stream on a US TV versus the UK PAL equivalent with NICAM stereo, the UK will be better every time. HDTV isn't the big jump it is elsewhere. I'm not saying this to rub it in your faces, just because I don't think HDTV will catch in Europe anywhere near as fast as elsewhere, if at all. We have digital TV through Satellite, Cable and Terrestrial - and I'm happy with it.
I'm not an Open-Source zealot, in fact I frequently prefer a lot of non-open-source software, but I can definately see why people prefer that method of development. And the creation of a "standard" is exactly why open-source should be used when it is applied to software. For an example, what happens in 200 years time when someone wants to read a Blu-ray/HD-DVD? They can't! WMVv9's specification, AFAIK, has not been publicly released, and so it will quickly be superseeded and forgotten. However, MPEG-2 has been publicly specified and therefore can be read in the future by simply reading and understanding the specification. We use standards so that we don't have to rely on a company, or a person to decode the data for us, without our knowledge of how it works. If something is going to be used to store data for future retrieval, we want to be able to refer back to how it was made. I've not made it clear what I mean, but hopefully people can understand. XviD appears to be not only the most logical choice from a point of view of being a freely available standard that no-one wants control of, just willing to contribute to, it is also of the highest quality and and speed, and goes well with Ogg Vorbis sound, which is also completely open-source. I will not buy any Blu-ray or HD-DVD's whilst they intend on pursuing this course of action. I don't have very good speakers or very good TV anyway, so DVD will do for me :)
I think that Gore would have done a better job than Dubya. Just looking at his track record prior to 2000 (sorry, that involves research!) you can see there are likely to be less conflicts of interest, and Gore was the better candidate in that respect. However, Kerry vs. Bush, as an independant outsider, I'd have voted Bush. Sure, we don't get all the information, and we don't count in US-national politics, but Kerry just seemed to be anti-Bush, not standing on his own laurels. If Clinton does run for 2008 (not Bill, Hilary!) then I hope she will chose Gore as her running mate.
Steady on, I did say that I didn't hate Americans, just the vast majority of your politics. And we're not "holier-than-thou". Although those that speak out like me generally think they are (myself excepted). Maybe I should start thinking that way if people like you are going to respond in that way...
That's fine - we were a little over-protectionist about Black Watch, but that's to be expected. We've heard storied about the US battle fleet, but I won't mention them here, because I know that it just can't be true :)
There's a lot of negativity over here about American cars (in Britain) being generally crap, but to be honest I think they're pretty good. Ok, they corner really crappily, and they are inefficient as hell (you don't need an 8 litre engine, our (European) 3 litre mega-cars get better performance!) but I've never had a smoother more relaxing ride than in an American minivan. I agree with you when you say that CERTAIN motorways/highways throughout America, Britain and elsewhere should be 80/85 restricted, but the fact is that most drivers drive far too close to each other, and there are bound to be more accidents. Hence why it should only be 85 in certain lanes, like the faster-most lanes. The lorry, sorry, truck-lanes should still be restricted. EIther way, good point well made!
Quote: Umm... we want to create 4,000 miles of terrorist in Texas target for... what reason, exactly?
:( Or your Government, but then again, ours is not much better - less business, more laziness.
Remark: This is the exact fscking reason why most Brits hate (and I mean HATE) America (not necessarily Americans, we actually like Americans, just really can't stand the country's politics). You want to build a 4000 mile long road that would solve your traffic issues (if you managed somehow to increase the capacity of the exits) and instead of complaining about real issues like how other towns would suffer because of less traffic, and the MASSIVE environmental concerns, you decide to look at... THE TERRORISM ASPECT??? FOR FSCKS SAKE!
Ok, let's pretend I'm Al Qaida. I (or rather, we) want to do most damage to America that I/We can. So we attack a couple of buildings. Kill a couple thousand people. Everybody scared. For this reason they're exactly the same as people like Timothy McVeigh (or however he spells it). What was pure genius (and I don't support them, but this was a brilliant plan) is that they actually got the American people to worry. To sacrifice their own dreams because of terrorism. Everything now has to be thought of now as a potential terrorist target, that you are at war with some very illusive people that may strike at any time. RUBBISH!
Here in the UK, we've been the subject of terror-attacks for the best part of 40 years, with the whole Northern Ireland thing. We don't care about Al Qaida or the IRA or whoever else. We just get on with it (mostly, there are a few jerks out there) and build our millenium domes, our Space Museums, our Olympic bids, our whatever. Sure, we're making ourselves targets, but the fact is that we are not going to be disuaded by some ponce who hates our way of live. We are living our lives, and there's not a lot that can be done to prevent us from doing that. Weapons of Mass Destruction? Weapons of Mass Distraction more like. Notice that in Iraq, the American's get the vast majority of the blame for being insurgents, the British and other countries there are fairly immune to that rap. Not just because there are less of us, but because we respect them, we do our best to accomodate, to leave them alone when we can. Someday, you'll see things our way. The way a lot of your own country do. Let US stand for United States of America, not Unfriendly States of Afraid.
And finally, just to re-iterate. I don't hate Americans, I just can't stand the way you do business
Actually, not to go against you, or anything, but I find Unix actually fairly compliant, and to-standards, as opposed to Windows applications, where every application does things differently. Or at least, apps from different companies do so. The only exception in the Unix World, I have found is EMACS (god forbid it) and lovely lovely ViM.
In fact the best way to improve Unix would be some improvements to access control (presumable acl helps this). What if I want to give two people access to a file but no-one else? I have to create a _group_ for them. Why isn't there an easier way!!!
Oh how I love our Data Protection Act in the UK ;) It is illegal for any personal information to be shared between companies (and even divisions of government) without a good reason, that has been ok'd by the subject first - that's right, the Police are not allowed to get your Health records unless it's either a criminal investigation or they have your permission - they can't look "just in case", and neither can anyone else...
Nice idea, but if I buy something, I want to watch it whenever I want, not just in a 24 hour period. VoD is the way forward, but I'm not sacrificing what I already have for it (and that would be the VCR style method - record once, watch many many many times)
I agree, however, I would be prepared to pay 50p per track in an introductory phase, and £5 per album (regardless number of tracks) if it were offered. I'm not joking when I say at those prices, I would spend over a hundred pounds buying digital copies of stuff I don't own. However, I expect to be able to download the music in lossless form as an option (MP3 or others as the norm, Lossless as a free option) and whenever I want, not just once when I purchase it - I want to be able to listen to it on my laptop and on my computer, and to be able to login and download it a la this Steam thing. That's quite a good idea, I think...