If you're on Windows, I'd strongly recommend Proxomitron - a kickass personal web proxy that is able to strip out all the crap. If you're on Linux, there's Privoxy, or you could just use Greasemonkey (although that's possibly overkill).
With Linux, you can always drill deeper. It doesn't work? Try the same steps as with Windows above. If that doesn't work, look at the logs. Run in verbose mode. Run in debug mode. Run through a debugger. Look at the source. You don't have to pray, because you have the tools to solve your problem.
Seconded. One thing I've noticed about use of linux is that I've lost the "it's bust? Have you tried rebooting?" attitude I had as a Windows techie. I now see it as a failure to have to so much as reboot something (unless I'm actually doing kernel work, anyway). As I'm sure you can imagine, windows spyware-fixing sessions are somewhat less than fun...
I must say I'm happier about this than I'd be if scientists only published the sensational stuff. This means we're less likely to get some self-styled lifestyle guru coming along in a couple of years to tell us that the key to job satisfaction is spur-of-the-moment job selection.
You've got a good point - the average govt is not interested in tracking the average punter. However, having a legal and technological infrastructure in place that makes harrassment and surveillance possible means that, if any one individual is playing up, it is possible to make their life a misery.
"Enemy of the state" was a work of fiction, but the infrastructure is largely there already (certainly it is in the UK, where I live - you can't walk two feet from your front door without tripping over a CCTV camera). And it could be abused. Maybe you deserve to be caught if you're smoking a joint, but do you deserve to have your homophobic boss find out you're gay, just cos you pissed off a federal agent?
Mostly I trust our current democratic governments, but that doesn't mean they'll always be trustworthy - look at the Mugabe fiasco in Zimbabwe. I'm not keen on things like this because they are open to abuse and the strength of the democratic system partially relies on people being able to protest without having to worry about being messed about. "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone" is a really bad way to run a democracy.
In closing, it's only paranoia until they really are out to get you.
I think the reason that so much Open Source stuff is just replications of Closed Source stuff is that at the moment (and probably for the forseeable future) Open Source is in catch-up mode. The reason is that, when Open Source does something, it likes to do it right dammit.
At the moment, we've pretty much got the network stack stabilised. The kernel is OK, it's just a matter of fleshing it out and maybe standardising a few things like device driver interfaces (but that can't really happen til we're quite sure none of the hardware manufacturers are going to come up with anything truly odd). The basic command-line systems are as good as they're going to be, and most of the more complex command-line stuff (nmap, smartctl etc) has pretty much hit the "good as it needs to be" limit.
We haven't quite got the hang of graphics. X.org is approaching being there, but it'll take a bit more time to get things completely in order. Windows managers still don't seem quite sure where they're going, and we don't know what they'll look like when they get there. The basic apps on top of that are sorted, but the OpenOffice API is still very much work in progress. The OpenOffice we have today is more of a prototype than anything. And games are pretty much nowhere to be seen.
But just think for a moment about the second-to-last line. An application suite that matches the best that Closed Source can produce is just a prototype, a work-in-progress. Now think about what it could be like once it actually settles down. Now close your mouth, you're gaping.
Open Source is consistently beating Closed Source in the long term. The strength of the "cathedral" model is that it's possible to build high and build fast. The strength of the "bazaar" model is that it's possible to build well, albeit with slightly more of an interval before things come to fruition. However, until the "rising water" of Open Source reaches the necessary level, any attempts to duplicate Closed Source applications are unlikely to be anything more than a scaffolding for later development.
It wasn't even reverse engineering the program
on
McVoy Strikes Back
·
· Score: 2, Informative
If I recall correctly, all that was "reverse engineered" was the client-server protocols. This is the same sort of thing that the EU is currently yelling at Microsoft to release to the world, as keeping it quiet is a great way to lock people in to a product.
If they're the ones producing and distributing the code, the GPL's "no extra restrictions" clause may well come into play. Hope the GPL3 clarifies this stuff a bit.
Guess that means the ISP gets a 'forced market' when it comes to email and hosting domains.
I am eternally grateful to AOL for attempting to pull this stunt. It meant that I was finally able to convince my non-techy mother to give them and their cruddy, nonstandard service the boot.
If you had the power to recommend what Microsoft should do on this issue, what options would you suggest?
What you said would pretty much cover it on the bundling issue. The other major issues I have with Microsoft are their refusal to make formats, protocols and APIs publicly available, and their tendency to put pressure on distributors to ship Windows and only Windows. If they would clean up their act on these issues, I for one would be pretty much prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt on having turned over a new leaf.
It seems to me though that the best decisions MS have made are the ones that have been made by the developers when they've been allowed to get on with things, and the worst ones have been those made entirely by the marketing department!
I've always felt that they key difference between Linux and Windows is that Linux is designed by computer scientists whereas Windows is designed by marketing consultants. In both cases, it really shows...:P
Microsoft may have been unfair to integrate them in the first place, but we do now expect this functionality to be there.
Problem is, Microsoft is still being unfair. They're unfair every single time they sell a bundled copy of all their share with no alternative and no way to remove it. If they provided an appropriately cheaper version to retailers without the bundled stuff, and made it removeable in the standard version, I wouldn't have any sort of problem with them bundling cos there would be alternatives dammit.
The removability isn't an issue in anything we'd recognise as being Linux. I can see how the issue of bundling could become an issue but, in Linux, there's always a recourse. In the case of most Linux distributors, you can download sources and create your own version. If that's not available, you can buy their software, demand sources and then create your own version, thus removing the problem for everyone else.
This probably wouldn't be an issue in most cases as, if enough people asked, I can't imagine that the average Linux distributor wouldn't produce an unbundled version for an appropriately lower price (consumer power in action). Bear in mind that most Linux companies charge for the support not the software, so the appropriately lower price I mentioned earlier would be identical to the standard price - effectively zero.
To conclude, the three scourges of no alternative, no removability and no recourse don't exist in the same way with Linux, and I have trouble seeing how they could come into being.
As always, this is just my opinion and I hope you take it as such. I'm not here to get people riled up.
That's interesting... cos my uni's computing service sends out individual emails to anyone getting portscanned which, as far as I can tell, are individually written (rather than just being automatically produced).
For example: Our traffic logs note that xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx (xxxxx.xxxxxx.cam.ac.uk) was portscanned by 193.195.51.234 (no-dns-yet.demon.co.uk) around 17:00 to 17:20 yesterday.
Are you aware of any reason for the portscan - I believe this is the second one to your system this month?
Stella
I'm at a reasonably large university, so you'd have thought that it'd be fairly representative. Any thoughts? I know they don't notice intrauniversity portscanning - could that be the source of the discrepancy?
As far as I can tell, that's incorrect. What generally happens is that script kiddies run scans by vulnerability rather than by computer - why waste time thoroughly scoping one box out when there are thousands more like it? As a result, portscans of just one computer are fairly rare, and tend to imply malicious intent - the last one was a script kiddie I ended up chatting to who got annoyed at me.
I think the point was less that the DSS were believed to contain revolutionary new insights and more that supposed members of the scientific community were blocking independent access to the data they were working from. That means the scientific approach of peer review and replication of results couldn't come into play. It was the uncertainty that bothered everyone.
Well, when I clicked on the ImageMagic link in the article I got the lovely message "Your IP has been logged. Please enter your email address so we can send you the link you wanted".
I don't want my IP address to be logged. My computer has been portscanned twice in the last week (which is freaking my uni's computer dept out slightly). Apparently I pissed someone off and they're looking for ways to get back at me. The more information on me and my computer that's spread round the net, the easier this is. It's not paranoia if they really are out to get you.
As such, I will hopefully be using anonymous proxies in future, as soon as I figure out how to set up yaph so that the computer dept won't complain.
"An employee suggested to me that we load 3.7 on a few machines here as an evaluation. [...] I made the employee uninstall 3.7 from the machines and lets just say he's not with us anymore."
You kicked an employee out because an evaluation that he suggested didn't work out? That is, pardon my French, completely fucked. The whole reason you do evaluations is so that you don't end up in a position where new products put people's job on the line.
Apart from anything else, from now on if an employee suddenly discovers a product that at a stroke will double productivity, halve costs and save small kittens from drowning, do you think they're going to tell you about it? No, they're going to hide behind conformity, in the hope that that way they'll keep their jobs.
Congrats, you've singlehandedly halted improvement of your company's computing infrastructure. I'm sure it'll mean far less trouble for you, right up to the point where an innovative competitor buys you up and fires everyone.
Since when does P2P == stealing? Some people use it for copyright infringement, yes, but I regularly use it for downloading linux isos and legal media (Art of the Saber rocks).
All this means for me is that I can avoid doing too much damage to the hosting servers, which can only be a good thing for underfunded open source projects and the like.
I doubt many linux developers are doing it for world domination. However, it would be nice to have world compatibility - the ability to open any file format, the availability of linux drivers for hardware and the existence of fewer shoddy websites with ActiveX and broken CSS would all be good things for Linux users. None of these are going to happen in a Microsoft-dominated world. Linux looks to be the best contender for knocking MS off its perch, so I can only hope it does become more popular in the boardroom.
I'd disagree - emotional attachment is a key factor in the production of decent, high-quality children with good functionality and not too many hang-ups. This is important as returning them to the shop if they break is practically impossible.
Here, as well as in previous posts, you have stated that although you consider rights a "white lie", the protection of them is beneficial. To me, this (the positive results) is a certain kind of evidence of their correctness.
If I tell my kids that misbehaving will result in the bogeyman getting them, that is a useful (for me) lie - it'll keep them quiet, dammit. However, this does not in any way mean that the bogeyman is real.
Rights are an idea, but I don't think that makes them any less real or correct.
I'd agree that concepts can well be correct or even real (for a sufficiently fuzzy value of real). However, I'd disagree that the particular concept we're looking at, which I consider to be very much a construct of society, is universal, which I believe was what this discussion started with (I confess I'm losing track slightly:P). If something is a construct of society, it can be expected to vary from society to society. By contrast, if I understand correctly, your view is that rights are built into human nature (can you confirm whether or not I'm correct?).
Western law and government can in many ways be regarded as an experiment to determine if these concepts are correct. The benefits that we see in societies that even flirt with these concepts -- although they have never been implemented fully anywhere -- are already marked.
I'd point out that not all the effects are good. For example, the consequence of the widely-accepted (in America) right to own weapons has resulted in America having one of the highest homicide rates in the world. American citizens' belief that they Have Rights is, in my opinion, a major contributor to the culture of litigation that has arisen. If we're using real-world effectiveness as one possible proof of the correctness of America's conception of universal rights, surely this would damage those rights' claim to universality?
Sadly, I don't think there currently exists a population on the planet that fits the description that I've provided of intelligent freedom-loving individuals, united in the mutual defense of rights (at least not to the extent there should be)
That's not necessarily something to be sad about. A population of intelligent freedom-loving individuals would be effectively ungovernable. Remember, no matter what the average IQ, someone still has to empty the dustbins. A strong-willed intelligent individual is likely to be less happy about that than a remote-control-wielding zombie (lovely phrase btw). And every society needs indians as well as chiefs.
I think one semantic difference we're about to hit is that I don't accept the concept of a universal good. In a moral-relativist universe, it's impossible to point to any one action and label it as good or evil. Save a child from a burning building? Maybe he grows up to be the next Hitler. Destroy a rainforest? Maybe (for a change) farming actually takes hold, bringing a better standard of living to thousands of locals. Things aren't good in themselves; they're beneficial for a person or group or effective for a purpose.
This is relevant because, although being a remote-wielding zombie sucks, being in a society with a decent leavening of them is much more comfortable than being in a society where everyone wants their hand on the steering wheel. In a similar way, belief that everyone has rights is a very good thing for other people to have, but can limit your potential if you accept it.
What actually are the inalienable rights that everyone keeps talking about?
Sorry, I didn't make myself clear enough. That wasn't a rhetorical question - I really am keen to see a complete list of all the rights that people supposedly posess, for two reasons. Firstly, it'll reduce the risk that we end up talking at cross-purposes by giving me a concrete example. Secondly, for any given list, the question arises of why many people don't agree with that list. If universal, inalie
Slashdot Mirror
If you're on Windows, I'd strongly recommend Proxomitron - a kickass personal web proxy that is able to strip out all the crap. If you're on Linux, there's Privoxy, or you could just use Greasemonkey (although that's possibly overkill).
With Linux, you can always drill deeper. It doesn't work? Try the same steps as with Windows above. If that doesn't work, look at the logs. Run in verbose mode. Run in debug mode. Run through a debugger. Look at the source. You don't have to pray, because you have the tools to solve your problem.
Seconded. One thing I've noticed about use of linux is that I've lost the "it's bust? Have you tried rebooting?" attitude I had as a Windows techie. I now see it as a failure to have to so much as reboot something (unless I'm actually doing kernel work, anyway). As I'm sure you can imagine, windows spyware-fixing sessions are somewhat less than fun...
I must say I'm happier about this than I'd be if scientists only published the sensational stuff. This means we're less likely to get some self-styled lifestyle guru coming along in a couple of years to tell us that the key to job satisfaction is spur-of-the-moment job selection.
Well, we can only hope...
You've got a good point - the average govt is not interested in tracking the average punter. However, having a legal and technological infrastructure in place that makes harrassment and surveillance possible means that, if any one individual is playing up, it is possible to make their life a misery.
"Enemy of the state" was a work of fiction, but the infrastructure is largely there already (certainly it is in the UK, where I live - you can't walk two feet from your front door without tripping over a CCTV camera). And it could be abused. Maybe you deserve to be caught if you're smoking a joint, but do you deserve to have your homophobic boss find out you're gay, just cos you pissed off a federal agent?
Mostly I trust our current democratic governments, but that doesn't mean they'll always be trustworthy - look at the Mugabe fiasco in Zimbabwe. I'm not keen on things like this because they are open to abuse and the strength of the democratic system partially relies on people being able to protest without having to worry about being messed about. "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone" is a really bad way to run a democracy.
In closing, it's only paranoia until they really are out to get you.
I think the reason that so much Open Source stuff is just replications of Closed Source stuff is that at the moment (and probably for the forseeable future) Open Source is in catch-up mode. The reason is that, when Open Source does something, it likes to do it right dammit.
At the moment, we've pretty much got the network stack stabilised. The kernel is OK, it's just a matter of fleshing it out and maybe standardising a few things like device driver interfaces (but that can't really happen til we're quite sure none of the hardware manufacturers are going to come up with anything truly odd). The basic command-line systems are as good as they're going to be, and most of the more complex command-line stuff (nmap, smartctl etc) has pretty much hit the "good as it needs to be" limit.
We haven't quite got the hang of graphics. X.org is approaching being there, but it'll take a bit more time to get things completely in order. Windows managers still don't seem quite sure where they're going, and we don't know what they'll look like when they get there. The basic apps on top of that are sorted, but the OpenOffice API is still very much work in progress. The OpenOffice we have today is more of a prototype than anything. And games are pretty much nowhere to be seen.
But just think for a moment about the second-to-last line. An application suite that matches the best that Closed Source can produce is just a prototype, a work-in-progress. Now think about what it could be like once it actually settles down. Now close your mouth, you're gaping.
Open Source is consistently beating Closed Source in the long term. The strength of the "cathedral" model is that it's possible to build high and build fast. The strength of the "bazaar" model is that it's possible to build well, albeit with slightly more of an interval before things come to fruition. However, until the "rising water" of Open Source reaches the necessary level, any attempts to duplicate Closed Source applications are unlikely to be anything more than a scaffolding for later development.
If I recall correctly, all that was "reverse engineered" was the client-server protocols. This is the same sort of thing that the EU is currently yelling at Microsoft to release to the world, as keeping it quiet is a great way to lock people in to a product.
Seconded. There is nothing scarier than jingoism to a political end. Well, maybe an enraged mother bear, but still...
If they're the ones producing and distributing the code, the GPL's "no extra restrictions" clause may well come into play. Hope the GPL3 clarifies this stuff a bit.
Guess that means the ISP gets a 'forced market' when it comes to email and hosting domains.
I am eternally grateful to AOL for attempting to pull this stunt. It meant that I was finally able to convince my non-techy mother to give them and their cruddy, nonstandard service the boot.
If you had the power to recommend what Microsoft should do on this issue, what options would you suggest?
:P
What you said would pretty much cover it on the bundling issue. The other major issues I have with Microsoft are their refusal to make formats, protocols and APIs publicly available, and their tendency to put pressure on distributors to ship Windows and only Windows. If they would clean up their act on these issues, I for one would be pretty much prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt on having turned over a new leaf.
It seems to me though that the best decisions MS have made are the ones that have been made by the developers when they've been allowed to get on with things, and the worst ones have been those made entirely by the marketing department!
I've always felt that they key difference between Linux and Windows is that Linux is designed by computer scientists whereas Windows is designed by marketing consultants. In both cases, it really shows...
Microsoft may have been unfair to integrate them in the first place, but we do now expect this functionality to be there.
Problem is, Microsoft is still being unfair. They're unfair every single time they sell a bundled copy of all their share with no alternative and no way to remove it. If they provided an appropriately cheaper version to retailers without the bundled stuff, and made it removeable in the standard version, I wouldn't have any sort of problem with them bundling cos there would be alternatives dammit.
The removability isn't an issue in anything we'd recognise as being Linux. I can see how the issue of bundling could become an issue but, in Linux, there's always a recourse. In the case of most Linux distributors, you can download sources and create your own version. If that's not available, you can buy their software, demand sources and then create your own version, thus removing the problem for everyone else.
This probably wouldn't be an issue in most cases as, if enough people asked, I can't imagine that the average Linux distributor wouldn't produce an unbundled version for an appropriately lower price (consumer power in action). Bear in mind that most Linux companies charge for the support not the software, so the appropriately lower price I mentioned earlier would be identical to the standard price - effectively zero.
To conclude, the three scourges of no alternative, no removability and no recourse don't exist in the same way with Linux, and I have trouble seeing how they could come into being.
As always, this is just my opinion and I hope you take it as such. I'm not here to get people riled up.
Same here and thanks for the discussion.
I agree completely! Linux should be stripped down to the bare basics immediately!
Oh, wait...
Well, we know they're theorems *now*...
That's interesting... cos my uni's computing service sends out individual emails to anyone getting portscanned which, as far as I can tell, are individually written (rather than just being automatically produced).
For example:
Our traffic logs note that xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx (xxxxx.xxxxxx.cam.ac.uk) was portscanned by 193.195.51.234 (no-dns-yet.demon.co.uk) around 17:00 to 17:20 yesterday.
Are you aware of any reason for the portscan - I believe this is the second one to your system this month?
Stella
I'm at a reasonably large university, so you'd have thought that it'd be fairly representative. Any thoughts? I know they don't notice intrauniversity portscanning - could that be the source of the discrepancy?
As far as I can tell, that's incorrect. What generally happens is that script kiddies run scans by vulnerability rather than by computer - why waste time thoroughly scoping one box out when there are thousands more like it? As a result, portscans of just one computer are fairly rare, and tend to imply malicious intent - the last one was a script kiddie I ended up chatting to who got annoyed at me.
I think the point was less that the DSS were believed to contain revolutionary new insights and more that supposed members of the scientific community were blocking independent access to the data they were working from. That means the scientific approach of peer review and replication of results couldn't come into play. It was the uncertainty that bothered everyone.
Well, when I clicked on the ImageMagic link in the article I got the lovely message "Your IP has been logged. Please enter your email address so we can send you the link you wanted".
I don't want my IP address to be logged. My computer has been portscanned twice in the last week (which is freaking my uni's computer dept out slightly). Apparently I pissed someone off and they're looking for ways to get back at me. The more information on me and my computer that's spread round the net, the easier this is. It's not paranoia if they really are out to get you.
As such, I will hopefully be using anonymous proxies in future, as soon as I figure out how to set up yaph so that the computer dept won't complain.
BOFH has nothing on you. Kudos, but I'm damn glad I don't work with you :P
"An employee suggested to me that we load 3.7 on a few machines here as an evaluation. [...] I made the employee uninstall 3.7 from the machines and lets just say he's not with us anymore."
You kicked an employee out because an evaluation that he suggested didn't work out? That is, pardon my French, completely fucked. The whole reason you do evaluations is so that you don't end up in a position where new products put people's job on the line.
Apart from anything else, from now on if an employee suddenly discovers a product that at a stroke will double productivity, halve costs and save small kittens from drowning, do you think they're going to tell you about it? No, they're going to hide behind conformity, in the hope that that way they'll keep their jobs.
Congrats, you've singlehandedly halted improvement of your company's computing infrastructure. I'm sure it'll mean far less trouble for you, right up to the point where an innovative competitor buys you up and fires everyone.
Since when does P2P == stealing? Some people use it for copyright infringement, yes, but I regularly use it for downloading linux isos and legal media (Art of the Saber rocks).
All this means for me is that I can avoid doing too much damage to the hosting servers, which can only be a good thing for underfunded open source projects and the like.
Those two statements are in no way mutually exclusive...
I doubt many linux developers are doing it for world domination. However, it would be nice to have world compatibility - the ability to open any file format, the availability of linux drivers for hardware and the existence of fewer shoddy websites with ActiveX and broken CSS would all be good things for Linux users. None of these are going to happen in a Microsoft-dominated world. Linux looks to be the best contender for knocking MS off its perch, so I can only hope it does become more popular in the boardroom.
Truthfully, why should I care if a child weighs 300lbs.
You'll sure as hell care if you're sandwiched between two such kids on a long-haul plane flight...
I'd disagree - emotional attachment is a key factor in the production of decent, high-quality children with good functionality and not too many hang-ups. This is important as returning them to the shop if they break is practically impossible.
Here, as well as in previous posts, you have stated that although you consider rights a "white lie", the protection of them is beneficial. To me, this (the positive results) is a certain kind of evidence of their correctness.
:P). If something is a construct of society, it can be expected to vary from society to society. By contrast, if I understand correctly, your view is that rights are built into human nature (can you confirm whether or not I'm correct?).
If I tell my kids that misbehaving will result in the bogeyman getting them, that is a useful (for me) lie - it'll keep them quiet, dammit. However, this does not in any way mean that the bogeyman is real.
Rights are an idea, but I don't think that makes them any less real or correct.
I'd agree that concepts can well be correct or even real (for a sufficiently fuzzy value of real). However, I'd disagree that the particular concept we're looking at, which I consider to be very much a construct of society, is universal, which I believe was what this discussion started with (I confess I'm losing track slightly
Western law and government can in many ways be regarded as an experiment to determine if these concepts are correct. The benefits that we see in societies that even flirt with these concepts -- although they have never been implemented fully anywhere -- are already marked.
I'd point out that not all the effects are good. For example, the consequence of the widely-accepted (in America) right to own weapons has resulted in America having one of the highest homicide rates in the world. American citizens' belief that they Have Rights is, in my opinion, a major contributor to the culture of litigation that has arisen. If we're using real-world effectiveness as one possible proof of the correctness of America's conception of universal rights, surely this would damage those rights' claim to universality?
Sadly, I don't think there currently exists a population on the planet that fits the description that I've provided of intelligent freedom-loving individuals, united in the mutual defense of rights (at least not to the extent there should be)
That's not necessarily something to be sad about. A population of intelligent freedom-loving individuals would be effectively ungovernable. Remember, no matter what the average IQ, someone still has to empty the dustbins. A strong-willed intelligent individual is likely to be less happy about that than a remote-control-wielding zombie (lovely phrase btw). And every society needs indians as well as chiefs.
I think one semantic difference we're about to hit is that I don't accept the concept of a universal good. In a moral-relativist universe, it's impossible to point to any one action and label it as good or evil. Save a child from a burning building? Maybe he grows up to be the next Hitler. Destroy a rainforest? Maybe (for a change) farming actually takes hold, bringing a better standard of living to thousands of locals. Things aren't good in themselves; they're beneficial for a person or group or effective for a purpose.
This is relevant because, although being a remote-wielding zombie sucks, being in a society with a decent leavening of them is much more comfortable than being in a society where everyone wants their hand on the steering wheel. In a similar way, belief that everyone has rights is a very good thing for other people to have, but can limit your potential if you accept it.
What actually are the inalienable rights that everyone keeps talking about?
Sorry, I didn't make myself clear enough. That wasn't a rhetorical question - I really am keen to see a complete list of all the rights that people supposedly posess, for two reasons. Firstly, it'll reduce the risk that we end up talking at cross-purposes by giving me a concrete example. Secondly, for any given list, the question arises of why many people don't agree with that list. If universal, inalie