In comparing the security back in the day, and modern, much more complicated systems,
how much of a factor is overall complexity in the way things have changed over the years?
Does more complexity (and therefore obscurity) make things harder, or does it make things easier,
since even the people doing the security don't understand what's going on?
In other words, what's
your take on obscurity/security?
It's like kids in school saying they shouldn't have to learn algebra since it is never going
to do them any good in real life... like balancing their checkbook, or knowing how to make change.
You're right, we would still be living in caves if people sat around waiting for
great, really pratical ideas to show up.
I think that having a separate server is definitely the way to go for this kind of thing. Get the jet-engine into a closet somewhere and have
a semi-thin box in your living room.
Now the modern household will have a utility room for the washer and dryer, and a server room for all those backends.
They don't seem to be too god awfully uptight about security -- they assume that if you are behind a NAT router you don't really need to worry about a possible Samba hole --, so that is probably why they didn't wonder about whether to install samba server or not.
That said, it could be handy to get some of those files off your A/V box and onto your... well, some other box running samba client.
If we lived in a police state, armed thugs would not tell you, "You can't detail the flaws of our product." They'd just beat the living crap out of you and then go home, kick back, and drink a cold Coors 20 ouncer.
If the result is the same, does it matter whether it is 20-ouncer popping thugs that prevent you from doing something, or a biased, corporation-serving set of laws and legal system?
Also, in a police state, it wouldn't be thugs, it would be the police.
The same kind of thing happened in France. (Maybe it was on/., it was a few years ago...)
A guy figured out how to manipulate the chip on the smart cards used for credit cards. He contacted whatever company makes the cards to try to get them to hire him. They didn't believe him, so to prove his point he bought about $7.00 worth of metro tickets from an automatic distributor.
And then what?
They busted his ass big time. I think it totally destroyed the guy's career, life, etc. Then the company upgraded their encryption...
Ability to prevent anyone outside IT from intruding directly into the IT employee's time. Act as a gatekeeper unless specifically requested not to by a techie.
Sounds like an OO approach to management...
But yes it's true. The role of gatekeeper is also to be able to synthesize and translate the needs of the (clueless) users. Often the techies have as hard a time understanding them, as they do understanding the techies.
Do you really think this is going to happen? Apart from being free (both as "beer" and as "speech"), Linux is attractive for company/office use because it is much easier to LOCK user only to perform certain tasks. One of the side-effects will be this association imprinted in the Average Joe's mind: "Linux is the system where I cannot play mp3's, download pr0n or play games. It is only good for some dumb office terminal. I will not install it on my home computer in a million years".
I am not promising that this is going to happen, fer sure. If Linux is going to "happen" at home, I just think it will happen at work first.
Whether people like it or not, if they are forced to use it at work, they will become competent. If people are Linux-competent from work, they then (and only then) might consider using it at home. Use at work builds a potential home-user base. I'm not sure there are that many reasons for either Joe Average or Joe Sixpack to switch from MS, yet. They're getting all the pr0n they need from Windows.
You would probably hear the same level of griping about any change in OS. People are so damned attached to their little computer world, that with any change they are lost. They have to write new Post-Its, to replace those where they wrote down how to save a file, etc. It is hell for them.
Another way of looking at this whole thing is to realize that, if Linux is going to fly in the non-geek market, it isn't going to be because all the non-geeks suddenly became geeks. They aren't interested in the same things we are. ("Wow, finally, an OS that ships with a great C compiler!...")
Have to agree. Linux wont be mainstream until John Doe can bring a copy home, install it with a few curses and reboots, and then install all the crappy software/games on "2003 Demo Game PC Gamers" DVD and run them without a huzz.
Linux will not be a home entertainment OS until it becomes used more at work. The way I see it working is like this:
Linux takes over web server market... done;
Linux takes over office server market... coming fairly soon;
Linux slowly works its way onto the office desktop... next few years.
Linux starts to become accepted at home by people who have learned to use it at work (and know what permissions are, stuff like that).
By the time we get to the last step, all the frustrating things for n00bs should be pretty much worked out. I don't think that Linux needs to start by being a home user OS. It will end up that way, if all goes well.
To say it perhaps a bit more clearly -- like mud -- it seems the Economist is just saying that the rise of Linux and FOSS in general could lead customers to replace Oracle DBs with MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc.
It isn't entirely inconceivable, even if there is still a pretty big gap between Pg, Mysql and Oracle.
Every year, people (I mean the teaming masses wallowing in their computer ignorance) are getting slowly smarter about their computers. It is now something of joke, but the grandmother who spends her time sending e-mail and playing bridge is a good example. So basically, the basic users are getting smarter, and more demanding, about computers.
So my question is: why, oh why, would they suddenly decide to give up this machine that they can communicate with, do their taxes with, play Heart$ or whatever on, "surf" the internet with, etc. and trade it in on a bunch of over specialized little boxes with way less computing power? Doing so would be going against the trend of increasing knowledge and computer familiarity.
This is a dream by the manufacturers that have worked themselves into a corner because PC's have become a commodity. This is also Bill Gates' network refrigerator and talking house dream. Oddly enough, in these schemes, the PC just disappears. I don't see any trends going in this direction. The whole PDA thing took off because you can hook them up to your PC.
But I think this is a marketing argument and not even a consumer argument.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, it's a thing of beauty... ;-)
But what about remote X sessions over ssh from Palm OS?
Sorry, but I was being sarcastic. Can't bring myself to do those tags...
Gee! You've ruined my whole day...
How can you be so pessimistic about our great democracy, the greatest democracy in the whole wide world?
I thought I'd give 'em the benefit of the doubt.
That's a pretty goddam big nutshell, if you ask me!
In comparing the security back in the day, and modern, much more complicated systems, how much of a factor is overall complexity in the way things have changed over the years? Does more complexity (and therefore obscurity) make things harder, or does it make things easier, since even the people doing the security don't understand what's going on?
In other words, what's your take on obscurity/security?
Got it!
Thanks!
Why is a good-old friendly sphere called a 2-dimensional sphere?
Did I miss something? Are we living in Flatland?
I am fascinated by the idea of multiple geometrical dimensions.
It's like kids in school saying they shouldn't have to learn algebra since it is never going to do them any good in real life... like balancing their checkbook, or knowing how to make change.
You're right, we would still be living in caves if people sat around waiting for great, really pratical ideas to show up.
I think that having a separate server is definitely the way to go for this kind of thing. Get the jet-engine into a closet somewhere and have a semi-thin box in your living room.
Now the modern household will have a utility room for the washer and dryer, and a server room for all those backends.
They don't seem to be too god awfully uptight about security -- they assume that if you are behind a NAT router you don't really need to worry about a possible Samba hole --, so that is probably why they didn't wonder about whether to install samba server or not.
That said, it could be handy to get some of those files off your A/V box and onto your... well, some other box running samba client.
If the result is the same, does it matter whether it is 20-ouncer popping thugs that prevent you from doing something, or a biased, corporation-serving set of laws and legal system?
Also, in a police state, it wouldn't be thugs, it would be the police.
A guy figured out how to manipulate the chip on the smart cards used for credit cards. He contacted whatever company makes the cards to try to get them to hire him. They didn't believe him, so to prove his point he bought about $7.00 worth of metro tickets from an automatic distributor.
And then what?
They busted his ass big time. I think it totally destroyed the guy's career, life, etc. Then the company upgraded their encryption...
Sounds like an OO approach to management...
But yes it's true. The role of gatekeeper is also to be able to synthesize and translate the needs of the (clueless) users. Often the techies have as hard a time understanding them, as they do understanding the techies.
Red Hat is a Vendor, for example.
I am not promising that this is going to happen, fer sure. If Linux is going to "happen" at home, I just think it will happen at work first.
Whether people like it or not, if they are forced to use it at work, they will become competent. If people are Linux-competent from work, they then (and only then) might consider using it at home. Use at work builds a potential home-user base. I'm not sure there are that many reasons for either Joe Average or Joe Sixpack to switch from MS, yet. They're getting all the pr0n they need from Windows.
You would probably hear the same level of griping about any change in OS. People are so damned attached to their little computer world, that with any change they are lost. They have to write new Post-Its, to replace those where they wrote down how to save a file, etc. It is hell for them.
Another way of looking at this whole thing is to realize that, if Linux is going to fly in the non-geek market, it isn't going to be because all the non-geeks suddenly became geeks. They aren't interested in the same things we are. ("Wow, finally, an OS that ships with a great C compiler!...")
Linux will not be a home entertainment OS until it becomes used more at work. The way I see it working is like this:
By the time we get to the last step, all the frustrating things for n00bs should be pretty much worked out. I don't think that Linux needs to start by being a home user OS. It will end up that way, if all goes well.
To say it perhaps a bit more clearly -- like mud -- it seems the Economist is just saying that the rise of Linux and FOSS in general could lead customers to replace Oracle DBs with MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc.
It isn't entirely inconceivable, even if there is still a pretty big gap between Pg, Mysql and Oracle.
Java did not spawn Javascript. That was a Netscape marketing op.
They might be both... is that possible?
Better rhythm:
A broadband would band all the broads it could band, if a broadband could band broads.I don't know if your metaphor is appropriate, or new, or what... but it is pretty damn funny.
Every year, people (I mean the teaming masses wallowing in their computer ignorance) are getting slowly smarter about their computers. It is now something of joke, but the grandmother who spends her time sending e-mail and playing bridge is a good example. So basically, the basic users are getting smarter, and more demanding, about computers.
So my question is: why, oh why, would they suddenly decide to give up this machine that they can communicate with, do their taxes with, play Heart$ or whatever on, "surf" the internet with, etc. and trade it in on a bunch of over specialized little boxes with way less computing power? Doing so would be going against the trend of increasing knowledge and computer familiarity.
This is a dream by the manufacturers that have worked themselves into a corner because PC's have become a commodity. This is also Bill Gates' network refrigerator and talking house dream. Oddly enough, in these schemes, the PC just disappears. I don't see any trends going in this direction. The whole PDA thing took off because you can hook them up to your PC.
But I think this is a marketing argument and not even a consumer argument.
There's the hot stuff.