First of all is their patches. They sure as hell aren't 100%. So one day your favorite program might work, and the next day it might not. All wihtout you doing anything. This is why businesses take a while to evaluate patches.
Nobody ever gives an example of this happening. It has never happened in my years of administering Windows networks. It's just baseless FUD if you don't give examples!
Secondly, what if there is an exploitable bug(and there will be at least one). Every windows machine out there might be downloading viruses instead of updates.
You'd rather risk having an unpatched machine than downloading "critical updates" from a company you have a chip on your shoulder against?
If someone were to reverse engineer the network interface, and hack a couple DNS servers, they could have all those users downloading whatever they wanted, even illegal things, or viruses, hacks, anything.
Very doubtful. Read up on how Windows Update works sometime.
Plus there's the privacy issues. I konw that right now windowsupdate could send MS anything anyway, but if we all expect it to update any time it wants, we have no controls at all on our system, MS could send an update to lock you out of your own system if they suspect you of something, or just for the hell of it.
Ah, the tinfoil theory. Very credible. "M$ WILL LOCK YOU OUT OF YOUR COMP!!11"
While I don't expect this to actually go through, its important to be wary of just how abusive such a system could be.
It's not abusive. You know why? A lot of us already use Automatic Updates. And, of course, this is optional anyway (so people are bitching about a non-issue, but when has that stopped Slashdot from posting a flamebait article?)
So, let's see. You installed an unnamed critical update for Windows 2000. Then the next day, there were more that showed up. Clearly, they depended on that first update (kind of like when you install IE6, and suddenly the service pack for it shows up).
Then, you go to Windows Update for Windows XP--an entirely different Windows product--and there is a different amount of updates (after you claim there were none, which was probably just because you didn't let it update the Windows Update control when it asks you...the latest is V4).
In other words, all your little "problems" are perfectly explained away.
As far as GNU's hack incident, it's an "insider" now? Looks like historical revisionism to me. It gets me how Slashbots throw out small comments like that and start myths in an attempt to throw off criticism.
Right. Those lazy sysadmins who didn't have all critical hotfixes installed in the first place. I assume you're talking about yourself, which tells me you need to lose your job.
My network went 100% untouched. Automatic Updates is installed and works perfectly. Not a single app has ever stopped working.
People here just need a scapegoat, and that is usually Microsoft. It's a jealousy thing ("everyone uses them because they're FORCED too!!!").
I swear, I'm going to reply to every single moron that posts this who didn't read the article, especially because other morons are modding it up to +5.
Just *gasp* turn auto updates off. That's right. Optional. Non-issue solved.
I keep hearing this FUD. What apps have ever broken after a patch? In all these years and all the computers and networks I have patched, not a SINGLE app has EVER stopped working because some security hole was plugged by a critical update.
"They'll say, 'You can't joke about rape. Rape's not funny.' I can prove to you that rape is funny. Picture Porky Pig raping Elmer Fudd. See? Hey, why do you think they call him Porky?"
Actually, it's more like the lock on your door is faulty so that someone only has to jiggle it to get in. Unlike the burglars, I break into your house to quickly replace the lock on the door then secure it on my way out.
Free software programmers are mostly coding out of some desire to help the community, to give something back, because they enjoy it and because it gives them a little 'fame' online. Yes, you have the right to bitch about their work all you want, but why would you want to?
So they can have a little thing called "user feedback?"
Mozilla has a little something called BugZilla that works out great. They welcome user feedback. Why do you pretend that it's not important?
But flame mails?
Who said a single thing about flame mails?
What possible purpose could they serve other than to make me angry and reduce my motivation to spend my free time coding?
Flame mails should just be ignored if your ego is that fragile. Otherwise, you should listen to your users, or else keep your project on your computer and never release it to the public. Don't put something out there and then complain when people may or may not like it. If you don't listen to user feedback, then clearly you are not interested in making a better product--you're merely interested in impressing your buddies or increasing your stature in certain communities. Whatever works for you, but Linux is now seen as a professional, enterprise-level OS used by major corporations. To many people, it's time to get out of this amateur mindset that users don't matter. It's the precise reason Microsoft is kicking its ass in the desktop market. People blame Microsoft, and meanwhile nobody listens to user feedback to improve projects. Everyone wants to play victim and whiner instead of just fixing the problems, no matter how uninteresting they may be.
Clearly, you have issues. This was a purely silly link and was not offensive in any way. How anyone could be offended by genitals and sexuality and so forth, natural parts of the body, is crazy. Meanwhile, I'm sure you play lots of violent video games, and that's somehow okay. Probably R-rated movies as well full of gunshots and death.
It must suck to live in a world where everything offends you, and you must worry about every domain you click on because you're that uptight.
Running the OS alone doesn't mean you suddenly have earned the right to grip and complain about those who have worked hard to make it possible for you to do so.
Of course it does. I and every other user has the right to gripe and complain and bitch about anything I want.
If people's fragile egos are so damaged by non-programmers pointing out flaws in their software (heaven forbid users not be satisfied!), then keep the software on your private network and never let it see the light of day. Trade it with your programmer buddies; start a mailing list entirely of programmers so nobody who can't program can possibly use it or complain. Because clearly, the objective here is not to please users or offer anything to society. It's all about being closed-off and pretending that nobody can have a voice until some miniscule piece of code has been accepted somewhere.
Funny, I thought the whole point was to offer people a choice. I guess people can't offer suggestions on how to better that choice.
I see. You're the self-proclaimed figurehead for the "whole point of open source." You wanna know how I fix the problems? As a user, I point them out.
If you want Linux to remain an OS strictly for other programmers, then be my guest. Fine. But don't bitch then when you get less than 1% marketshare and nobody knows how to used the damned thing except for the people in USENET lists and IRC channels. Don't complain that Microsoft has all the desktop market and don't whine that "they're being anticompetitive" just because you don't listen to users and they have an entire research department devoted to them.
If that's what you want, go right ahead. Just bare in mind that your position contradicts the idea that anybody can be constructively critical of anything for its own good. It's completely void of any logic. I'm sure it feels good for you to sound so tough and strict by declaring that people who can't program fixes should go run Windows, but it just makes your OS amateurish and closed-off.
I think I'd rather listen to Linus Torvalds--the creator--who wants Linux to succeed in areas like usability and the desktop, rather than you. Seems he has the right idea.
You don't speak for the Open Source Movement, buddy. Don't even presume to tell me what its "whole point" is.
You may view your thinking within Lightwave as free, but only as far as Lightwave will allow you to go. You own the Lightwave software, but who controls the Lightwave software? Beyond what has been built into the software, you have no control. So now your used to the Lightwave program, price goes up, what do you do? Go find another proprietary software package or pay up? Either way, your options have been limited severly. You may never understand RMS, but don't criticize one who fights to break down barriers for all of us.
There are no barriers. You frighteningly make him out to be some sort of heroic crusader. Chill out.
Gues what? Nobody is forcing you to use the proprietary Lightwave. You make a choice to purchase it and use it. If the price goes up, you don't have to buy the new version. In fact, you may go with a cheaper program (it's called "competition") or use a free alternative as well. Or you may decide to buy the new one.
RMS gives the impression that he wants nobody to have that choice. That's why he gets heckled. His presentation is all wrong.
Especially since the majority of the hecklers I've seen here on Slashdot have never contributed a line of open-source code in their lives.
You're right. You must become a programmer first before you get that special "Critical Guy" ID card that lets you interject your opinion about the operating system you use on your own computer. Linux and anything involved is only for programmers, and only they are allowed to discuss and decide its future. All matters are only open to a small cross-section of the community.
You know, if Windows had so many compatibility problems and differing library dependencies as Linux does, every would be screaming bloody murder. It's too much of a hassle sometimes to install an app, because of it's insanely specific version requirements.
Just saying (unchecked my karma bonus accordingly).
Greatest thinkers of our time? A genius? A mind to be treasured and revered?
The guy wouldn't even accept your team's t-shirt, for God's sake. He's done some good stuff, but you revere him like a fanboy. That's always a little dangerous.
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This is a bad idea on soooo many levels
It's an excellent idea.
First of all is their patches. They sure as hell aren't 100%. So one day your favorite program might work, and the next day it might not. All wihtout you doing anything. This is why businesses take a while to evaluate patches.
Nobody ever gives an example of this happening. It has never happened in my years of administering Windows networks. It's just baseless FUD if you don't give examples!
Secondly, what if there is an exploitable bug(and there will be at least one). Every windows machine out there might be downloading viruses instead of updates.
You'd rather risk having an unpatched machine than downloading "critical updates" from a company you have a chip on your shoulder against?
If someone were to reverse engineer the network interface, and hack a couple DNS servers, they could have all those users downloading whatever they wanted, even illegal things, or viruses, hacks, anything.
Very doubtful. Read up on how Windows Update works sometime.
Plus there's the privacy issues. I konw that right now windowsupdate could send MS anything anyway, but if we all expect it to update any time it wants, we have no controls at all on our system, MS could send an update to lock you out of your own system if they suspect you of something, or just for the hell of it.
Ah, the tinfoil theory. Very credible. "M$ WILL LOCK YOU OUT OF YOUR COMP!!11"
While I don't expect this to actually go through, its important to be wary of just how abusive such a system could be.
It's not abusive. You know why? A lot of us already use Automatic Updates. And, of course, this is optional anyway (so people are bitching about a non-issue, but when has that stopped Slashdot from posting a flamebait article?)
NT4 is old, old, old. Anyone who still uses that piece of crap is already risking it.
I'm being a little facetious, but also a little serious! At least upgrade to something that even most Slashdotters like such as Windows 2000.
It pops up an entire balloon that won't go away until you click it.
So, let's see. You installed an unnamed critical update for Windows 2000. Then the next day, there were more that showed up. Clearly, they depended on that first update (kind of like when you install IE6, and suddenly the service pack for it shows up).
Then, you go to Windows Update for Windows XP--an entirely different Windows product--and there is a different amount of updates (after you claim there were none, which was probably just because you didn't let it update the Windows Update control when it asks you...the latest is V4).
In other words, all your little "problems" are perfectly explained away.
As far as GNU's hack incident, it's an "insider" now? Looks like historical revisionism to me. It gets me how Slashbots throw out small comments like that and start myths in an attempt to throw off criticism.
Right. Those lazy sysadmins who didn't have all critical hotfixes installed in the first place. I assume you're talking about yourself, which tells me you need to lose your job.
My network went 100% untouched. Automatic Updates is installed and works perfectly. Not a single app has ever stopped working.
People here just need a scapegoat, and that is usually Microsoft. It's a jealousy thing ("everyone uses them because they're FORCED too!!!").
I swear, I'm going to reply to every single moron that posts this who didn't read the article, especially because other morons are modding it up to +5.
Just *gasp* turn auto updates off. That's right. Optional. Non-issue solved.
So *gasp* turn autoupdates off.
DirectX isn't listed as a "Critical Update." Your driver probably crashed.
You just said your ISAPI fix is trivial.
What's the problem?
I keep hearing this FUD. What apps have ever broken after a patch? In all these years and all the computers and networks I have patched, not a SINGLE app has EVER stopped working because some security hole was plugged by a critical update.
"They'll say, 'You can't joke about rape. Rape's not funny.' I can prove to you that rape is funny. Picture Porky Pig raping Elmer Fudd. See? Hey, why do you think they call him Porky?"
--George Carlin
As if facts and research ever had any place in a Slashdot article.
Actually, it's more like the lock on your door is faulty so that someone only has to jiggle it to get in. Unlike the burglars, I break into your house to quickly replace the lock on the door then secure it on my way out.
This is common knowledge from the last article. Don't expect some sort of karma-whoring +5 for this little quip of yours.
Governments need to sit up and take notice, this is serious stuff.
The government warned people TWICE to install the patch last month.
Free software programmers are mostly coding out of some desire to help the community, to give something back, because they enjoy it and because it gives them a little 'fame' online. Yes, you have the right to bitch about their work all you want, but why would you want to?
So they can have a little thing called "user feedback?"
Mozilla has a little something called BugZilla that works out great. They welcome user feedback. Why do you pretend that it's not important?
But flame mails?
Who said a single thing about flame mails?
What possible purpose could they serve other than to make me angry and reduce my motivation to spend my free time coding?
Flame mails should just be ignored if your ego is that fragile. Otherwise, you should listen to your users, or else keep your project on your computer and never release it to the public. Don't put something out there and then complain when people may or may not like it. If you don't listen to user feedback, then clearly you are not interested in making a better product--you're merely interested in impressing your buddies or increasing your stature in certain communities. Whatever works for you, but Linux is now seen as a professional, enterprise-level OS used by major corporations. To many people, it's time to get out of this amateur mindset that users don't matter. It's the precise reason Microsoft is kicking its ass in the desktop market. People blame Microsoft, and meanwhile nobody listens to user feedback to improve projects. Everyone wants to play victim and whiner instead of just fixing the problems, no matter how uninteresting they may be.
"Wait, wait, wait. So your name is 'Gay Fauker?'"
"*snickers*"
Clearly, you have issues. This was a purely silly link and was not offensive in any way. How anyone could be offended by genitals and sexuality and so forth, natural parts of the body, is crazy. Meanwhile, I'm sure you play lots of violent video games, and that's somehow okay. Probably R-rated movies as well full of gunshots and death.
It must suck to live in a world where everything offends you, and you must worry about every domain you click on because you're that uptight.
Running the OS alone doesn't mean you suddenly have earned the right to grip and complain about those who have worked hard to make it possible for you to do so.
Of course it does. I and every other user has the right to gripe and complain and bitch about anything I want.
If people's fragile egos are so damaged by non-programmers pointing out flaws in their software (heaven forbid users not be satisfied!), then keep the software on your private network and never let it see the light of day. Trade it with your programmer buddies; start a mailing list entirely of programmers so nobody who can't program can possibly use it or complain. Because clearly, the objective here is not to please users or offer anything to society. It's all about being closed-off and pretending that nobody can have a voice until some miniscule piece of code has been accepted somewhere.
Funny, I thought the whole point was to offer people a choice. I guess people can't offer suggestions on how to better that choice.
I see. You're the self-proclaimed figurehead for the "whole point of open source." You wanna know how I fix the problems? As a user, I point them out.
If you want Linux to remain an OS strictly for other programmers, then be my guest. Fine. But don't bitch then when you get less than 1% marketshare and nobody knows how to used the damned thing except for the people in USENET lists and IRC channels. Don't complain that Microsoft has all the desktop market and don't whine that "they're being anticompetitive" just because you don't listen to users and they have an entire research department devoted to them.
If that's what you want, go right ahead. Just bare in mind that your position contradicts the idea that anybody can be constructively critical of anything for its own good. It's completely void of any logic. I'm sure it feels good for you to sound so tough and strict by declaring that people who can't program fixes should go run Windows, but it just makes your OS amateurish and closed-off.
I think I'd rather listen to Linus Torvalds--the creator--who wants Linux to succeed in areas like usability and the desktop, rather than you. Seems he has the right idea.
You don't speak for the Open Source Movement, buddy. Don't even presume to tell me what its "whole point" is.
You may view your thinking within Lightwave as free, but only as far as Lightwave will allow you to go. You own the Lightwave software, but who controls the Lightwave software? Beyond what has been built into the software, you have no control. So now your used to the Lightwave program, price goes up, what do you do? Go find another proprietary software package or pay up? Either way, your options have been limited severly. You may never understand RMS, but don't criticize one who fights to break down barriers for all of us.
There are no barriers. You frighteningly make him out to be some sort of heroic crusader. Chill out.
Gues what? Nobody is forcing you to use the proprietary Lightwave. You make a choice to purchase it and use it. If the price goes up, you don't have to buy the new version. In fact, you may go with a cheaper program (it's called "competition") or use a free alternative as well. Or you may decide to buy the new one.
RMS gives the impression that he wants nobody to have that choice. That's why he gets heckled. His presentation is all wrong.
If you're the only person seeing walls, is that why people call you crazy?
How about "GNU/free?"
Especially since the majority of the hecklers I've seen here on Slashdot have never contributed a line of open-source code in their lives.
You're right. You must become a programmer first before you get that special "Critical Guy" ID card that lets you interject your opinion about the operating system you use on your own computer. Linux and anything involved is only for programmers, and only they are allowed to discuss and decide its future. All matters are only open to a small cross-section of the community.
Come on, that's silly.
You know, if Windows had so many compatibility problems and differing library dependencies as Linux does, every would be screaming bloody murder. It's too much of a hassle sometimes to install an app, because of it's insanely specific version requirements.
Just saying (unchecked my karma bonus accordingly).
Greatest thinkers of our time? A genius? A mind to be treasured and revered?
The guy wouldn't even accept your team's t-shirt, for God's sake. He's done some good stuff, but you revere him like a fanboy. That's always a little dangerous.
Just saying.