Wrong. It is true that you can't safely assume that the NSA can't break PGP, but this is only possible if the algorithms happen to have some bug and NSA knows it. But this is a very very very unlikely situation*.
If the algorithms used by PGP have no bug known by NSA, no amount of 'playing dirty' will help them. No amount of special hardware will help breaking it**, but gathering the password from social engenireeing will work if you don't know how to use it properly. Also, keeping a non-encripted copy will obviusly help them.
* There is the 'feeling' that RSA will be broken soon, but using it is probably still safer than anything else.
** Unless you can power it with something other than the Sun or use some weard technology, like quantum computing or time travelling.
"On the curiosity side, would someone care to outline exactly what it is the EU is demanding that MSFT do to 'comply'?"
That's why you are so shure, you don't know... I was at first surprised by you saing that MS will comply (that's what everybody - but MS - want). Well, it is not so clear, the EU is demanding that MS publish their APIs and formats (and also that they sell an Windows version without the media player, that is a less important one). Complaining, MS can loose its monopoly on the long run, not complaining, MS will need to pay a big fine and can be forced to leave EU market.
That is a very hard choice, let's see what MS des now.
Does it have any influence...
on
Layoffs at OSDL
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
... of software patents?
It would be very interesting to OSDL to be on countries that doesn't acept software patents.
Windows admins who know what they are doing are also expensive to hire. At least, *nix are more scriptable than Windows, so you may end up with fewer people. Also, you can create on a fast and cheap way a win network with people that don't know what they are doing, one can't do that with *nix. Just don't expect this cheap network to run as cheap as it was created, you'll soon hire several people to put it in order (or reboot everytime) and will need much more hardware.
I don't know what ASAT and ABM means (I didn't RTFA), but conventional weapons launched from orbit into the surface are an example of WMD. Just think about the energi it will have when hit Earth, and all the damage it will make.
Yes, Cuba is stable. It is very stuck on a sub development stage, and won't go anywhere else by the next years. But US is alread being hurt by not dealing with them, remember that all the UN pressure to US trade with Cuba is because not doing so helps Fidel keeping his power.
"Keep in mind also that a patent is frequently used as a defensive mechanism. There's a difference between having a patent with the claims that they have attached, and having something that will lead to a successful suit in open court against an infringing party. Sometimes though just the threat of an expensive lawsuit is enough to get people to back down.
Do you care to explain how using the threat of an expensive lawsuit is a defensive action. The way I see it is a very offensive action to bypass the law system using economical power.
Not sleeping, they have beeing using Windows. Windows is an OS that requires administrative tools even for dumb tasks like running a script on several machines (*nix people are surprised by that every time). When win people ask about administrative tools for *nix, they really mean that, and you'll have a very hard way telling them that you just administrate your system, with no 3rd party tool.
Yes, I know you alread know that, but just beeing surproised will not give them the best impression. Most win people will think that you don't know what you're talking about, when you have to show them that they are the ones that don't know that.
"I suppose it's possible I'm underinformed, but I believe the "BSD subsystem" of OSX is not compiled "into the kernel" and is entirely a compatibility layer on top of it."
"In Secunia's own words:
Please Note. The statistics below should not be used for a direct comparison of how secure two different products are. This is partly due to the fact that a Secunia advisory often cover multiple vulnerabilities. Also certain operating systems bundle a very large number of software packages and are therefore affected by many vulnerabilities that would be counted as a vulnerability in stand alone products for other operating systems / platforms. Other factors such as vendor response times and ability to properly fix vulnerabilities is also important."
So, it makes each one of the 81 IE vunerabilities worst than each one of the 17 FF ones. I.e. You can't compare because you'll be too easy on M$...
Is this really insightfull, or is intended to be funny? The last IE upgrade happened a long time ago, that is not something like waiting an release to undercover the vunerability.
Fist, I never heard about a product that failed because everyone said it would dominate.
Also, who do you want to focus? Are you talking about the kernel? Or the distros? Well, the kernel seems to be very focused, people are writting as much features as they can, no more. Most of the distros also seem focused: there is the "have our support" distros, the easy to network ones, the easy to intall ones, the "loosers, use this" distros that have even their own bad security, and Debian, the distro focused on not focusing. All of them pretty focused and doing one thing well (ok, almost all).
But you probably is just lost on the amusing amount of work going every where and since you can't assimilate all that, you thing it is not focused. Well, welcome to the free software world, where everyone can cooperate and profit. Everyone is much more people than even M$ can hire, so FOSS grow faster...
Ah, and while I am on that, please give your focusing advice to M$, them need that.
"Why must Linux conquer in the end? Microsoft has billions in the warchest, countless corporate alliances, patents, and whatnot."
And linux has all the time it needs, without any economical pressure to go into the market, a very competitive price: "0" and a better develloping model. And all that is not the best part, people are beggining to realize why freedom is valuable (there was a thread about this yesterday). Once that info spread, Linux will win.
They don't invest this much. Really, Microsoft go as far as translating their products on foreingh countries, no more. Most governments won't miss that.
"The way we see it, in five years the PC will mostly be relegated to unwashed hobbyists; and the mainstream user will getting their music from an ipod like device (we have several ipod killers in various stages of development and testing) and their entertainment from media centers and our gaming console."
And where are they getting their working tools from?
If sudenly most of Debian packages are on the non-us branch, I guess people will start to reconsider sofware patents. If we are fast enogh, it may happen before EU changes their minds.
"Established scientific journals are actually of great value, because what is published in these is supposed to be rigorously reviewed by other experts in the field."
First, the peer review before publishing is very weak when compared to the review by other articles. Second, it is done for free. So, what is stopping someone with as much power as a government to do the review?
"And the fact that the information is not "free" does not mean that the information is closed off to the public. It just means that you (or your university, company etc.) need to contribute a small amount to part of the scientific process in order to access it."
$1,000 a year is a lot of money to several people, and with that, you can only get a few periodicals. If you buy then on paper basis, you'll end up spending up to $30 a paper and only having the opportunity to see if it is usefull after you spent the money. The information is closed.
"Anyone who has ever written a scientific article knows that citing something you've pulled of some internet site does not carry much weigth."
What is "some internet site"? The IEEE repository is a internet site. Try searching this book (published on "some internet site") on google scholar and see how many people cite it: http://www-anw.cs.umass.edu/~rich/book/the-book.ht ml
No, MoFo paches get out quicker because they fix just one thing. When you fix a Firefox problem, you don't have to test the hole OS again, but when MS release a patch for Windows, they have.
No program is totaly bugfree (hello world aside). So, a very complex and young program like Firefox has its bugs. IE also has its bugs, but they are more numerous, more dangerous, and needs more time to be corrected (if they get corrected at all).
So, lets answer your question: your dream of using a completely flawless program is impossible. Also, Firefox is new and untested, so, insecure, but it is secure enogh to most people. You still should change from IE to Firefox for security reasons, IE has much more bugs that don't get fixed on the long run (exploits generaly exploit those bugs).
But hopefully they'll get up off their lazy butts and get to work.
It will make no good if they continue to not focus. MS has a huge amount of people working on their projects, probably much more than Apple, Sonny, IBM (FOSS projects), Mozilla, GNU, Linux, etc. But MS still doesn't have more people than Apple, Sonny, IBM (FOSS projects), Mozilla, GNU, Linux together.
While MS refuses to focus the development, it will be late and not inovative.
Slashdot Mirror
Wrong. It is true that you can't safely assume that the NSA can't break PGP, but this is only possible if the algorithms happen to have some bug and NSA knows it. But this is a very very very unlikely situation*.
If the algorithms used by PGP have no bug known by NSA, no amount of 'playing dirty' will help them. No amount of special hardware will help breaking it**, but gathering the password from social engenireeing will work if you don't know how to use it properly. Also, keeping a non-encripted copy will obviusly help them.
* There is the 'feeling' that RSA will be broken soon, but using it is probably still safer than anything else.
** Unless you can power it with something other than the Sun or use some weard technology, like quantum computing or time travelling.
"On the curiosity side, would someone care to outline exactly what it is the EU is demanding that MSFT do to 'comply'?"
That's why you are so shure, you don't know... I was at first surprised by you saing that MS will comply (that's what everybody - but MS - want). Well, it is not so clear, the EU is demanding that MS publish their APIs and formats (and also that they sell an Windows version without the media player, that is a less important one). Complaining, MS can loose its monopoly on the long run, not complaining, MS will need to pay a big fine and can be forced to leave EU market.
That is a very hard choice, let's see what MS des now.
... of software patents?
It would be very interesting to OSDL to be on countries that doesn't acept software patents.
The cost to make is irrelevant, bradcastig or just distributing the CDs, they are making it anyway.
Windows admins who know what they are doing are also expensive to hire. At least, *nix are more scriptable than Windows, so you may end up with fewer people. Also, you can create on a fast and cheap way a win network with people that don't know what they are doing, one can't do that with *nix. Just don't expect this cheap network to run as cheap as it was created, you'll soon hire several people to put it in order (or reboot everytime) and will need much more hardware.
I don't know what ASAT and ABM means (I didn't RTFA), but conventional weapons launched from orbit into the surface are an example of WMD. Just think about the energi it will have when hit Earth, and all the damage it will make.
The #2 is also unavoidable. You can try to play easy, but that can only delay the **AA #2 step (and, with luck, self destruction).
Yes, Cuba is stable. It is very stuck on a sub development stage, and won't go anywhere else by the next years. But US is alread being hurt by not dealing with them, remember that all the UN pressure to US trade with Cuba is because not doing so helps Fidel keeping his power.
You mean that no other country should accept patents from US people? Wow, it will be very interesting to see that...
"Keep in mind also that a patent is frequently used as a defensive mechanism. There's a difference between having a patent with the claims that they have attached, and having something that will lead to a successful suit in open court against an infringing party. Sometimes though just the threat of an expensive lawsuit is enough to get people to back down.
Do you care to explain how using the threat of an expensive lawsuit is a defensive action. The way I see it is a very offensive action to bypass the law system using economical power.
Worse yet, 70% of them have never been arrested. They speech as if beeing arrested was a good indicator.
Yes, I know you alread know that, but just beeing surproised will not give them the best impression. Most win people will think that you don't know what you're talking about, when you have to show them that they are the ones that don't know that.
"I suppose it's possible I'm underinformed, but I believe the "BSD subsystem" of OSX is not compiled "into the kernel" and is entirely a compatibility layer on top of it."
Uh hu! Apple has finished Hurd!?
"In Secunia's own words: Please Note. The statistics below should not be used for a direct comparison of how secure two different products are. This is partly due to the fact that a Secunia advisory often cover multiple vulnerabilities. Also certain operating systems bundle a very large number of software packages and are therefore affected by many vulnerabilities that would be counted as a vulnerability in stand alone products for other operating systems / platforms. Other factors such as vendor response times and ability to properly fix vulnerabilities is also important."
So, it makes each one of the 81 IE vunerabilities worst than each one of the 17 FF ones. I.e. You can't compare because you'll be too easy on M$...
Is this really insightfull, or is intended to be funny? The last IE upgrade happened a long time ago, that is not something like waiting an release to undercover the vunerability.
Fist, I never heard about a product that failed because everyone said it would dominate.
Also, who do you want to focus? Are you talking about the kernel? Or the distros? Well, the kernel seems to be very focused, people are writting as much features as they can, no more. Most of the distros also seem focused: there is the "have our support" distros, the easy to network ones, the easy to intall ones, the "loosers, use this" distros that have even their own bad security, and Debian, the distro focused on not focusing. All of them pretty focused and doing one thing well (ok, almost all).
But you probably is just lost on the amusing amount of work going every where and since you can't assimilate all that, you thing it is not focused. Well, welcome to the free software world, where everyone can cooperate and profit. Everyone is much more people than even M$ can hire, so FOSS grow faster...
Ah, and while I am on that, please give your focusing advice to M$, them need that.
"Why must Linux conquer in the end? Microsoft has billions in the warchest, countless corporate alliances, patents, and whatnot."
And linux has all the time it needs, without any economical pressure to go into the market, a very competitive price: "0" and a better develloping model. And all that is not the best part, people are beggining to realize why freedom is valuable (there was a thread about this yesterday). Once that info spread, Linux will win.
They don't invest this much. Really, Microsoft go as far as translating their products on foreingh countries, no more. Most governments won't miss that.
"The way we see it, in five years the PC will mostly be relegated to unwashed hobbyists; and the mainstream user will getting their music from an ipod like device (we have several ipod killers in various stages of development and testing) and their entertainment from media centers and our gaming console."
And where are they getting their working tools from?
If sudenly most of Debian packages are on the non-us branch, I guess people will start to reconsider sofware patents. If we are fast enogh, it may happen before EU changes their minds.
"Established scientific journals are actually of great value, because what is published in these is supposed to be rigorously reviewed by other experts in the field."
First, the peer review before publishing is very weak when compared to the review by other articles. Second, it is done for free. So, what is stopping someone with as much power as a government to do the review?
"And the fact that the information is not "free" does not mean that the information is closed off to the public. It just means that you (or your university, company etc.) need to contribute a small amount to part of the scientific process in order to access it."
$1,000 a year is a lot of money to several people, and with that, you can only get a few periodicals. If you buy then on paper basis, you'll end up spending up to $30 a paper and only having the opportunity to see if it is usefull after you spent the money. The information is closed.
"Anyone who has ever written a scientific article knows that citing something you've pulled of some internet site does not carry much weigth."
What is "some internet site"? The IEEE repository is a internet site. Try searching this book (published on "some internet site") on google scholar and see how many people cite it:t ml
http://www-anw.cs.umass.edu/~rich/book/the-book.h
No, MoFo paches get out quicker because they fix just one thing. When you fix a Firefox problem, you don't have to test the hole OS again, but when MS release a patch for Windows, they have.
No program is totaly bugfree (hello world aside). So, a very complex and young program like Firefox has its bugs. IE also has its bugs, but they are more numerous, more dangerous, and needs more time to be corrected (if they get corrected at all).
So, lets answer your question: your dream of using a completely flawless program is impossible. Also, Firefox is new and untested, so, insecure, but it is secure enogh to most people. You still should change from IE to Firefox for security reasons, IE has much more bugs that don't get fixed on the long run (exploits generaly exploit those bugs).
But hopefully they'll get up off their lazy butts and get to work.
It will make no good if they continue to not focus. MS has a huge amount of people working on their projects, probably much more than Apple, Sonny, IBM (FOSS projects), Mozilla, GNU, Linux, etc. But MS still doesn't have more people than Apple, Sonny, IBM (FOSS projects), Mozilla, GNU, Linux together.
While MS refuses to focus the development, it will be late and not inovative.
" Just recommending dumping one supplier of software simply to save money is a worry."
Yes, FOSS should be recommended because it creates much better learning possibilities than proprietary software.