An electronic circuit board with some components consistent with an improvised explosive device, you say?
Let's see... my cellphone contains an electronic circuit board, a battery and a radio receiver tuned to a specific frequency - all of which could be very useful in improvising an explosive device. Better look out where I leave it or the next thing I know I'll find it's been blown up.
The BBC Executive propose a strategy at launch to enforce compliance with rights which requires users to have Windows XP (or later) as their operating system and Windows Media Player 10 (or later) as their player. This puts a constraint on reach by excluding Windows users with earlier operating systems as well as a minority of consumers who choose Apple and Linux systems.
My take on that is "The Powers that Be propose Windows. We know this will lock others out." but it doesn't say anything about them taking steps to ensure that people using MacOS or Linux aren't locked out. Later on, it says something about "recommending" being more platform agnostic but nothing particularly solid.
Don't know about the US, but here in the UK if a product is not fit for its purpose, you are entitled to a refund/replacement (at your discretion, though some stores don't know that bit), and it doesn't matter whether or not it's been unwrapped. You just have to return it in a "reasonable" timeframe. Technically you don't even need a receipt, but it can save arguments at the counter.
The biggest problems I've had returning things have been when the item was technically fine - it met the manufacturer's specifications to the letter - but it had a design flaw which left it utterly worthless and unfit for purpose. AFAIK, the Sale of Goods Act just says "fit for purpose" - it doesn't say anything about "unfit because it was broken rather than unfit because it was badly designed".
Then you're getting into arguments about whether or not a music CD should be expected to play in a car or a computer... and there things really get awkward. DRM'd CDs have been around long enough that it's reasonable to expect some to have found their way into the secondhand market, so that's not an option for guaranteeing that you're not getting a crippled disk. Boycott or become very good at arguing with the staff at your local record shop appears to be the only option.
Quite correct, but the great majority of folks are never going to upgrade their OS anyway - they'll just plonk down £300 on whatever Dell's advertising in the paper today. That's where the waste comes from.
Though TBH I think that's more a society problem than Microsoft's fault.
They're useful, but I can't help but worry about this read/write limit that people mention, so I use it sparingly.
In theory, that's true. In practise - well, I support a bunch of people who develop embedded hardware for a living. Their firmware images go onto CompactFlash cards, and I think in 5 years we've seen about 1 or maybe 2 fail.
I doubt it. You'd have to develop a card where the transmitter power cannot be changed in software - which means you'd have to do it in firm|hard ware, which would mean you'd be looking at embedded development - something you want to minimise as it's substantially harder, and thus more expensive.
If SCO have developed the opinion that "OSes like HP-US (sic) and Solaris are derivatives of code that they 'own'", then wasn't there something in US law (laches?) that they're obliged to make efforts to remedy the situation as soon as possible, rather than just sit around?
The only small problem is that it requires slightly more intelligence (and some flash memory) in the individual device - something which manufacturers have spent the last 20 years doing their best to avoid.
Free Clue: Those people in the payroll department who ensure you get paid every month. How do you fancy annoying every one of them by forcing them to switch spreadsheets, then announcing that the package which does the actual payroll (yes, there's usually a specialised program, particularly in countries where tax is deducted before you get your wages, because most country's tax laws are complicated enough that it's a lot easier to buy a package than trying to write it all in a spreadsheet) no longer works, you can't find a suitable alternative and they'll have to work it all out manually?
(And don't say "Write one yourself!" - it's a fantastically boring problem, which is precisely why little/no free software handles it, and it would cost substantially more than just buying Windows and an off-the-shelf package).
Good luck encrypting (with any degree of security) the entire operating system right the way up from the bootloader.
Even if you did that, they'd order you to reveal how to decrypt it. You don't reveal how, you get to spend some nice time in prison (certainly in the UK, which is where this is apparently taking place), and the computers are never returned - good luck running your business.
Your participation with their audit is voluntary unless they have sufficient probably cause to justify a warrant, in which case they will be accompanied by a law enforcement agent. And quite frankly, there's no reason why you would want to cooperate with the BSA, even if you know your are 100% in compliance, because of the cost in your time in going through the process.
Technically correct, except that only a complete moron would let someone like the BSA take them to court without consulting a lawyer first. And history suggests that it's far cheaper to settle:
My attorney said it was going to cost our side a quarter million dollars to fight them, and since you're paying their side, too, figure at least half a million. It's not worth it. You pay the fine and get on with your business. What most people do is get terrified and pay their license and continue to pay their licenses. And they do that no matter what the license program turns into. Ernie Ball, taken from http://news.com.com/2008-1082_3-5065859.html
It does all that. Provided your maximum bid is set in stone, with "... and not one single penny more" tacked on the end. Many people will happily think "oh, ok, £1 more" and if the item's interesting enough, before long it's selling at or close to shop price.
Well, it's only anecdotal, but I know someone who bought a Gameboy Advance SP for all of £1 cheaper than the UK RRP. With the added bonus that as he was buying it secondhand, he didn't get a warranty with it. Does happen.
OTOH, I just bought a Canon EOS400D (Digital Rebel XTi) for about £50 cheaper than anywhere I found it in the UK, albeit a refurbished one. That being said, it came direct from the Canon online store, has the same warranty as new and is visually indistinguishable - there's not a mark on it. I'm not sure I'd trust anyone other than the obviously proper stores for expensive stuff like that.
Shame, really. I've finally got to the point in my career where it's my decision as to whether or not it's worth putting down the cash on the latest Enterprise version of Ghost, I'd be quite happy to do so - but the trial version has all the useful bits like multicasting, restoring from network drives etc. disabled.
I know why they did it - plenty of people were using the "trial" version to roll out a bunch of PCs, then just re-downloading it when the next bunch of PCs needed rolling out. Nevertheless, I'm not paying good money for a product without ensuring it will meet my needs - and Symantec seem hell-bent on preventing me from finding out.
See, this is where things are slightly different with Gentoo versus any other Linux distribution.
There's no such thing as "Gentoo Version 3" or whatever. A package is marked stable after it is deemed to be... well, stable. Gentoo does have a mechanism whereby you can ask it to tell you what it proposes to update before it actually goes away and does it (emerge -p), and on any system this is exactly what you should use to make sure you're not trying to do a major update on your database.
The one issue here (and it's open to debate whether or not it's an issue) is that portage is designed with a more traditional Unix mindset - a mindset which says "the operator knows best, if they're telling the computer to do something then the computer should do it unless it's physically impossible, regardless of how silly it may seem".
However, for a lot of the packages I use, I require a recent version. There are plenty of bugs in Samba's domain support which have only been recently fixed. Bacula, a backup tool, is fantastic but the only version in Debian stable has been showing its age for months, if not years.
Possible Solutions:
Run a mix of unstable/stable. What's the point in a supposedly "stable" distro then? Run "stable" and live with the old software. Not an option for me, I can't very well tell my staff that the reason such a feature doesn't work (even though the developers fixed it over a year ago) is because it hasn't hit Debian stable yet. They simply will not accept this. Run unstable. What's the benefit of using Debian if I'm using the unstable branch? Granted, apt-get et al are great tools, but so is portage. Compile my own newer versions of packages (and any dependencies which need updating). Eurgh. The whole point of a tool like portage is that the dependency hell which so often crops up when compiling a major package is effectively eliminated.
None of these are an issue for reasonably mature software where it's unlikely you need the latest version and you're probably better off with a proven version - cf. Apache or Postfix, for instance.
Were the iPod not so popular, there would not be such a choice in programs to use to upload music. Not really an issue for a mass-storage MP3 player, but there's still plenty out there that aren't.
Which works great. Provided your MP3s all have sensible filenames.
I have plenty which don't, but they've all got sensible ID3 tags. Suddenly it's not a case of drilling down the FAT, but reading every damn MP3 to find the ID3 tag and sort by that - and there is no way that can be accomplished on 5,000 songs in "a few seconds" on anything disk based, simply because of the time required to open that many files.
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An electronic circuit board with some components consistent with an improvised explosive device, you say?
Let's see... my cellphone contains an electronic circuit board, a battery and a radio receiver tuned to a specific frequency - all of which could be very useful in improvising an explosive device. Better look out where I leave it or the next thing I know I'll find it's been blown up.
Had you RTFA, you'd know that 2 years is "reasonable".
If we weren't comfortable running black box software, NVidia's Linux drivers would have zero downloads to date.
I see: My take on that is "The Powers that Be propose Windows. We know this will lock others out." but it doesn't say anything about them taking steps to ensure that people using MacOS or Linux aren't locked out. Later on, it says something about "recommending" being more platform agnostic but nothing particularly solid.
Yes, but Sony is a company and this is the USA.
All the rights of an individual with hardly any of the responsibilities.
Don't know about the US, but here in the UK if a product is not fit for its purpose, you are entitled to a refund/replacement (at your discretion, though some stores don't know that bit), and it doesn't matter whether or not it's been unwrapped. You just have to return it in a "reasonable" timeframe. Technically you don't even need a receipt, but it can save arguments at the counter.
The biggest problems I've had returning things have been when the item was technically fine - it met the manufacturer's specifications to the letter - but it had a design flaw which left it utterly worthless and unfit for purpose. AFAIK, the Sale of Goods Act just says "fit for purpose" - it doesn't say anything about "unfit because it was broken rather than unfit because it was badly designed".
Then you're getting into arguments about whether or not a music CD should be expected to play in a car or a computer... and there things really get awkward. DRM'd CDs have been around long enough that it's reasonable to expect some to have found their way into the secondhand market, so that's not an option for guaranteeing that you're not getting a crippled disk. Boycott or become very good at arguing with the staff at your local record shop appears to be the only option.
Quite correct, but the great majority of folks are never going to upgrade their OS anyway - they'll just plonk down £300 on whatever Dell's advertising in the paper today. That's where the waste comes from.
Though TBH I think that's more a society problem than Microsoft's fault.
Yep. I used a bootable CD with an El-Torito floppy emulation and an image of a floppy disk on it.
Yourself?
They're useful, but I can't help but worry about this read/write limit that people mention, so I use it sparingly.
In theory, that's true. In practise - well, I support a bunch of people who develop embedded hardware for a living. Their firmware images go onto CompactFlash cards, and I think in 5 years we've seen about 1 or maybe 2 fail.
I doubt it. You'd have to develop a card where the transmitter power cannot be changed in software - which means you'd have to do it in firm|hard ware, which would mean you'd be looking at embedded development - something you want to minimise as it's substantially harder, and thus more expensive.
If SCO have developed the opinion that "OSes like HP-US (sic) and Solaris are derivatives of code that they 'own'", then wasn't there something in US law (laches?) that they're obliged to make efforts to remedy the situation as soon as possible, rather than just sit around?
You've just invented OpenFirmware.
The only small problem is that it requires slightly more intelligence (and some flash memory) in the individual device - something which manufacturers have spent the last 20 years doing their best to avoid.
Very true.
Free Clue: Those people in the payroll department who ensure you get paid every month. How do you fancy annoying every one of them by forcing them to switch spreadsheets, then announcing that the package which does the actual payroll (yes, there's usually a specialised program, particularly in countries where tax is deducted before you get your wages, because most country's tax laws are complicated enough that it's a lot easier to buy a package than trying to write it all in a spreadsheet) no longer works, you can't find a suitable alternative and they'll have to work it all out manually?
(And don't say "Write one yourself!" - it's a fantastically boring problem, which is precisely why little/no free software handles it, and it would cost substantially more than just buying Windows and an off-the-shelf package).
Good luck encrypting (with any degree of security) the entire operating system right the way up from the bootloader.
Even if you did that, they'd order you to reveal how to decrypt it. You don't reveal how, you get to spend some nice time in prison (certainly in the UK, which is where this is apparently taking place), and the computers are never returned - good luck running your business.
Technically correct, except that only a complete moron would let someone like the BSA take them to court without consulting a lawyer first. And history suggests that it's far cheaper to settle: My attorney said it was going to cost our side a quarter million dollars to fight them, and since you're paying their side, too, figure at least half a million. It's not worth it. You pay the fine and get on with your business. What most people do is get terrified and pay their license and continue to pay their licenses. And they do that no matter what the license program turns into. Ernie Ball, taken from http://news.com.com/2008-1082_3-5065859.html
It does all that. Provided your maximum bid is set in stone, with "... and not one single penny more" tacked on the end. Many people will happily think "oh, ok, £1 more" and if the item's interesting enough, before long it's selling at or close to shop price.
Well, it's only anecdotal, but I know someone who bought a Gameboy Advance SP for all of £1 cheaper than the UK RRP. With the added bonus that as he was buying it secondhand, he didn't get a warranty with it. Does happen.
OTOH, I just bought a Canon EOS400D (Digital Rebel XTi) for about £50 cheaper than anywhere I found it in the UK, albeit a refurbished one. That being said, it came direct from the Canon online store, has the same warranty as new and is visually indistinguishable - there's not a mark on it. I'm not sure I'd trust anyone other than the obviously proper stores for expensive stuff like that.
Was.
Shame, really. I've finally got to the point in my career where it's my decision as to whether or not it's worth putting down the cash on the latest Enterprise version of Ghost, I'd be quite happy to do so - but the trial version has all the useful bits like multicasting, restoring from network drives etc. disabled.
I know why they did it - plenty of people were using the "trial" version to roll out a bunch of PCs, then just re-downloading it when the next bunch of PCs needed rolling out. Nevertheless, I'm not paying good money for a product without ensuring it will meet my needs - and Symantec seem hell-bent on preventing me from finding out.
Actually, I do.
Windows Vista upgrades could, as part of the activation process, demand a valid XP license key (and possibly media) which it then checks against WGA.
All the benefits of proving that it really was used as an upgrade, none of the issues discussed in TFA.
There are still plenty of regular companies running 2K, and I'm sure more than a few with NT4 sitting around.
So, presumably, your versions of rm, chmod, chown, chgrp and mv always prompt you before they change anything?
See, this is where things are slightly different with Gentoo versus any other Linux distribution.
There's no such thing as "Gentoo Version 3" or whatever. A package is marked stable after it is deemed to be... well, stable. Gentoo does have a mechanism whereby you can ask it to tell you what it proposes to update before it actually goes away and does it (emerge -p), and on any system this is exactly what you should use to make sure you're not trying to do a major update on your database.
The one issue here (and it's open to debate whether or not it's an issue) is that portage is designed with a more traditional Unix mindset - a mindset which says "the operator knows best, if they're telling the computer to do something then the computer should do it unless it's physically impossible, regardless of how silly it may seem".
I'd happily run Debian.
However, for a lot of the packages I use, I require a recent version. There are plenty of bugs in Samba's domain support which have only been recently fixed. Bacula, a backup tool, is fantastic but the only version in Debian stable has been showing its age for months, if not years.
Possible Solutions:
Run a mix of unstable/stable. What's the point in a supposedly "stable" distro then?
Run "stable" and live with the old software. Not an option for me, I can't very well tell my staff that the reason such a feature doesn't work (even though the developers fixed it over a year ago) is because it hasn't hit Debian stable yet. They simply will not accept this.
Run unstable. What's the benefit of using Debian if I'm using the unstable branch? Granted, apt-get et al are great tools, but so is portage.
Compile my own newer versions of packages (and any dependencies which need updating). Eurgh. The whole point of a tool like portage is that the dependency hell which so often crops up when compiling a major package is effectively eliminated.
None of these are an issue for reasonably mature software where it's unlikely you need the latest version and you're probably better off with a proven version - cf. Apache or Postfix, for instance.
http://www.ephpod.com/
Were the iPod not so popular, there would not be such a choice in programs to use to upload music. Not really an issue for a mass-storage MP3 player, but there's still plenty out there that aren't.
Which works great. Provided your MP3s all have sensible filenames.
I have plenty which don't, but they've all got sensible ID3 tags. Suddenly it's not a case of drilling down the FAT, but reading every damn MP3 to find the ID3 tag and sort by that - and there is no way that can be accomplished on 5,000 songs in "a few seconds" on anything disk based, simply because of the time required to open that many files.