It's quite pathetic that you cite Wikipedia as "facts" and a book on TCP/IP protocols, both of which have nothing to do with the actual etymology and semantics of the word "Internet" and its transformation into the non-capitalized version "internet".
There have always been internets. An internet is simply several LANs connected via IP routers. Somewhere along the line one big huge internet formed that we refer to as the Internet (notice the capitalization). Today other internets are usually referred to as "intranets".
They are called "intranets", not "internets". It's only you who called them "internets".
Internet was always used to refer to a global system of computers interconnected via TCP/IP. That's why it was always capitalized. As people started using it in a common language, it was converted from "Internet" to "internet".
If you have an Internet-like network which is not part of the global Internet, then you've got yourself an "intranet".
As soon as they take your money, they OWE you the right to play that game or use that piece of software. If it requires online access through one of their servers, they OWE you servers that are operational so you can use the product you paid them money for.
This is so much horseshit that it's not even funny.
As soon as they take your money, they owe you NOTHING else apart from what they agreed to provide (be it servers for online access, support, warranty,...) by the agreement.
It works the other direction too. You owe them NOTHING else apart from what you agreed to when you entered into the licensing agreement (such as your promise you will not reverse engineer, your promise of being okay with them deciding to take down the servers at their discretion, or whatever else you are willing to accept). If you feel like the provisions of the agreement in any way restrict the usage of the product/service from all the possible ways you could use it, and if you don't like it, well tough luck buddy, you should not have entered into the agreement. And should you breach the agreement, the provider should be entitled reasonable damages or other recourse.
You as a consumer have no say in what I as a provider will or will not create (game, product, service). Similarly, I as a provider have no say in what different products you can go out and buy from someone else or create YOURSELF (if you don't like any).
Assuming no patents or other bullshit, that is how a clean supply/demand relationship works!
Here is an example of what I mean (yes, a colleague actual did this once)
If this is Java code and you are saying:
public GettingSome() {...
Then this is a method without a return type. Having such a method in a class ("public class PimpDaddy {...") means that "GettingSome" could only be the constructor, which however MUST be the SAME name as the class name.
Your code would not even compile, which leads to the inevitable conclustion that you are full of shit.
Well that's a little out of context, but there is a short page about "odd" comments in UNIX which includes an explaination of the abovehere.
Good job with putting "You are not expected to understand this." into Google, clicking on the first hit and posting it on Slashdot. Woo-hoo, way to go, Slashdot!!
Many examples, Froogle comes to mind apart from Google News: you can list your business in Froogle for free for now.
And what's up with Google maps?? Do you people all ride bicycles on the sidewalk or what?? No one noticed that there is a serious problem with them?
When I drive and print out the map (with a few adjacent streets just in case I get caught up in traffic or miss a turn), I need to know which streets are one-ways. Google maps don't provide that!
Obviously, when working out turn-by-turn directions, that information is hopefully there for Google to take into consideration, but it certainly makes it a less valuable product against competitors if they don't display the one-ways.
None of the problems you are pointing out are unsolvable. First off, I would take a big grinder. This grinder would grind all the computers into powder. Then, you've got yourself a stream of dust that you can start sorting. You will be very easily sort out the ferrous metal by blowing this dust through a system with electromagnets. I could imagine that if the dust pieces are small enough, spinning those instead of the liquid in a centrifuge would have the same effect.
So far, this process doesn't really produce toxic fumes, since everything is solid. It's like Cinderella sorting stuff. There would be purity problems of course, but there must be other non-dry methods as well to do this pretty precisely, e.g. mix the dust with some chemical, let whatever element bind itself chemically to the liquid and then filter the mixture through a sieve, ridding it of the said liquid. You're back with the dust and a modified liquid (from which maybe you can get that element back out and get back the liquid too, and use in the next cycle!).
I am not a lab chemist, but I wouldn't be surprised if there are numerous processes to do that and that people have devised this long time ago. I don't think reinventing the wheel here on/. is appropriate.
(3) the term `central processing unit' includes a case and all of its contents, such as the primary printed circuit board and its components, additional printed circuit boards, one or more disc drives, a transformer, interior wire, and a power cord;
OMFG, these people are really morons, they dare to start redefining the term CPU to be the entire case as opposed to just the processor chip.
How can this be informative???!! There is a drawing of what parts the computer consists of and an article claiming things. No photos or other 'hard' evidence, none whatsoever.
Apple overcame Compaq/HP/IBM (for a while) and was at the 50% of all computers sold for a certain period of time and far greater % in education.
At 18:43, I sold a PC that I assmebled from parts to a friend. It had a sticker FooBar.
I just achieved superior sales performance that neither Apple nor Compar, HP nor IBM can beat. At some point in time, I sold at a rate of 1 PC per picosecond. During that time, FooBar was the most successful PC selling brand in the world!
Call me a lazy bastard, but the number of key presses really matters to me.
Oh, you're the perfect consumer!! You'll be so lazy that instead of search.msn.com (14) or google.com (10), you'll type msn.com (7). So MS gets the benefit of you visiting an entire portal instead of a search tool, just because of your lazy ass.
This is one of many examples how MS can actually start winning at this race.
While calling him an ignorant idiot might be suitable, I prefer to look at it as arrogance that stems from naivity, typical to someone inexperienced. Surely, at some point, we've all felt that the world is at our knees, but that always changed. Therefore, I believe that this guy should rather be called 'arrogant' and I believe that this is something that will change (or in other words, his 'idiocy' is temporary). Otherwise, any talent he might possess will go wasted.
Remember, the top of this thread was roughly someone saying "I can't believe Samba was developed without breaching any EULAs".
What I'd like to know as a follow-up though is whether you can pull a reverse engineering feat just like Samba even today legally?
Even if the EULA were to prohibit the users from letting other people do e.g. network traffic sniffing (or other reverse engineering), it would still be possible for the engineer to 'go undercover' and do it so that those end users still couldn't be held accountable.
Suppose Samba didn't exist. If one were to implement Samba, it could (with what degree of legal certainty?) be proven that reverse engineering is the sole and only way to figure out the protocol by reverse engineering. Even so, would this be enough or would this evidence be too circumstantial to prove one actually reverse-engineered? And even if it were, wouldn't that mean reverse engineering by sniffing could become illegal? This brings out how ridiculous DMCA is, but doesn't that also suggest that we might be getting close to being slapped with a DMCA also for other for other than copyright prevention 'protocols'...?
So long as there is no law similar in function as DMCA but for non-copyright related reverse engineering, isn't reverse engineering essentially completely legal (given that the end user of the software cannot be reasonably required to prevent his use of the software from exposing it to reverse engineering)?
Yep, so essentially that means that if the EULA is good enough, it will try to not allow the use of the software in an environment where the holder of the license on usage of that software at the same time gives any third party consent to eavesdropping.
This way, the software producer ensures that they can hold the end user accountable for damages incurred by letting (and notice that I used 'letting' not 'actively preventing') someone sniff those packets.
It seems like some of these people spend more time writing about software than actually writing software...
Coding is a monkey job. It is the equivalent of a brick-layer's role in delivering on a housing project: no one denies that expertise is necessary to perform the job, but trends over the past (such as RUP, MSF and even the subsequent growth in outsourcing) prove that it can easily be comoditized.
Writing about software is as important (if not more important) as writing software. Again, the housing project comes to mind as a perfect parallel in explaining why.
Hahahaha, I read this thread thru and you have finally proved yourself as your discussion partner suggests: ignorant, incompetent and most of all, never having been in the real world.
1. You must be lacking in patience or maturity if it takes five or six conversational exchanges and you start calling the other person all kinds of names: "You asshole."
2. You say: "Require?" No. Nothing requires a Web interface.
Another proof you have never been in the real world. In reality, it's very simple: either you can convince the business why they shouldn't require a web interface or you accept reality that it is the requirement and for a reason. If you refuse, you have just proven to your customer that you have nothing useful to offer to them.
3. You criticize "fundamental flaws in a platform" while completely missing the point of the other person pointing out to you that, flaws set aside, different 'platforms' will offer different BENEFITS to the business for which you are developing the application. These benefits can come in different dimensions. You can substitute the word 'benefits' with 'type of value' if you still don't get it.
4. You answer the question "what's the cost of rollout to 50,000 workstations" by saying "if it were a network of Macs, $0". You obviously are not just wrong, but you have failed to understand that to "roll out a desktop application" means a lot of things: 1) to implement a centralized system from which you can control those workstations, then 2) to have the ability to remotely install, diagnose installation failures and roll back if necessary (in software this risk is always there), then 3) to be able to keep track what is installed successfully where and at the same time 4) to scale in terms of number of workstations (i.e.: it should take less than 2 times the effort to roll out onto 50,000 machines than roll out onto 25,000 machines). This rollout aspect of running the technology has to be planned, implemented and most likely also supported by staff or some other ongoing resources, which inevitably leads to the conclusion that there is cost. The fundamental decision to go with a desktop app as opposed to a web-based app approach therefore involves cost. So the web-based platform in this example represents measurable cost savings. And if there are "fundamental flaws" in going the web-based way, you must factor those in as cost into the cost-benefit analysis of alternatives. Eventually, you choose the approach that fits your goals best (be it cost savings, business operations efficiencies or any other metrics that the business requires).
Again, your personal spewing of nonsense proves that you have not just not given any thought to these dimensions of the problem, but indirectly also means that you have truly NEVER been in the real world.
5. You say:
"the first thing I would do is fire the dumbass that came up with that utterly antiquated and absurd list of requirements"
You obviously again don't understand the way it works in the real world. It doesn't matter whether you think the requirements should be. The given requirements which the other person gave you were already constructed with business-oriented cost-benefit analysis in mind and there is absolutely NOTHING you can do about it, because you'll never justify your alternative, which in this case means: if the CRM system runs on AS/400 and is of certain size, it can be easily proven on paper (given more facts) why it doesn't make any sense (=cost) to redo the organization's entire CRM system (possibly a multi-million-dollar investment, depending on the organization) just so that it runs according to the technologically ideal design/platform/implementation. If you refuse to realize objective analyses, then you are the one who should be fired, since you are trying to push the business to invest even more in something that they already have. This way, you provide no value to the organization for which you are trying t
In this case, EULA should not forget to prohibit usage of the software that uses the said protocol in an environment where the user at the same time doesn't agree not to give permission to the network provider to sniff the network.
In other words, if the EULA is well written, it will allow to hold the user acocuntable for damage to the software provider caused by as many forms of potentially hurtful (to the software provider) usages as possible.
I observe and reverse-engineer an over-the-wire file transfer protocol between two computers owned by my friends.
It's not really about the protocol. Even though you are interested in the protocol's innerworkings, you are essentially eavesdropping on a private 'conversation' (of course unless you own the network transport and make the permission to eavesdrop as a part of the network usage agreement).
It appears this case would be treated as eavesdropping, for which I believe there are some pretty uncontested laws in most western-world countries.
Stretching it further, however, I personally believe that e.g. if cell phone towers push GSM/CDMA/TDMA signals through your house, it is nobody's business whether you are eavesdropping or not, they should apply other legal means available to them to prevent the signal from reaching your house if they want you not to listen to it. But that's just my personal opinion.
Slashdot Mirror
Another copy, paste & edit Indian.
original source (where he copy & pasted from)
It's quite pathetic that you cite Wikipedia as "facts" and a book on TCP/IP protocols, both of which have nothing to do with the actual etymology and semantics of the word "Internet" and its transformation into the non-capitalized version "internet".
There have always been internets. An internet is simply several LANs connected via IP routers. Somewhere along the line one big huge internet formed that we refer to as the Internet (notice the capitalization). Today other internets are usually referred to as "intranets".
They are called "intranets", not "internets". It's only you who called them "internets".
Internet was always used to refer to a global system of computers interconnected via TCP/IP. That's why it was always capitalized. As people started using it in a common language, it was converted from "Internet" to "internet".
If you have an Internet-like network which is not part of the global Internet, then you've got yourself an "intranet".
There were NEVER mulitple "Internets".
As soon as they take your money, they OWE you the right to play that game or use that piece of software. If it requires online access through one of their servers, they OWE you servers that are operational so you can use the product you paid them money for.
...) by the agreement.
This is so much horseshit that it's not even funny.
As soon as they take your money, they owe you NOTHING else apart from what they agreed to provide (be it servers for online access, support, warranty,
It works the other direction too. You owe them NOTHING else apart from what you agreed to when you entered into the licensing agreement (such as your promise you will not reverse engineer, your promise of being okay with them deciding to take down the servers at their discretion, or whatever else you are willing to accept). If you feel like the provisions of the agreement in any way restrict the usage of the product/service from all the possible ways you could use it, and if you don't like it, well tough luck buddy, you should not have entered into the agreement. And should you breach the agreement, the provider should be entitled reasonable damages or other recourse.
You as a consumer have no say in what I as a provider will or will not create (game, product, service). Similarly, I as a provider have no say in what different products you can go out and buy from someone else or create YOURSELF (if you don't like any).
Assuming no patents or other bullshit, that is how a clean supply/demand relationship works!
Here is an example of what I mean (yes, a colleague actual did this once)
...") means that "GettingSome" could only be the constructor, which however MUST be the SAME name as the class name.
If this is Java code and you are saying:
public GettingSome() {...
Then this is a method without a return type. Having such a method in a class ("public class PimpDaddy {
Your code would not even compile, which leads to the inevitable conclustion that you are full of shit.
Well that's a little out of context, but there is a short page about "odd" comments in UNIX which includes an explaination of the abovehere.
Good job with putting "You are not expected to understand this." into Google, clicking on the first hit and posting it on Slashdot. Woo-hoo, way to go, Slashdot!!
Second, this is still only BETA. It is GOOD, but it is only BETA.
Google labels products 'Beta' if the project is not generating revenue yet.
Many examples, Froogle comes to mind apart from Google News: you can list your business in Froogle for free for now.
And what's up with Google maps?? Do you people all ride bicycles on the sidewalk or what?? No one noticed that there is a serious problem with them?
When I drive and print out the map (with a few adjacent streets just in case I get caught up in traffic or miss a turn), I need to know which streets are one-ways. Google maps don't provide that!
Obviously, when working out turn-by-turn directions, that information is hopefully there for Google to take into consideration, but it certainly makes it a less valuable product against competitors if they don't display the one-ways.
None of the problems you are pointing out are unsolvable. First off, I would take a big grinder. This grinder would grind all the computers into powder. Then, you've got yourself a stream of dust that you can start sorting. You will be very easily sort out the ferrous metal by blowing this dust through a system with electromagnets. I could imagine that if the dust pieces are small enough, spinning those instead of the liquid in a centrifuge would have the same effect.
/. is appropriate.
So far, this process doesn't really produce toxic fumes, since everything is solid. It's like Cinderella sorting stuff. There would be purity problems of course, but there must be other non-dry methods as well to do this pretty precisely, e.g. mix the dust with some chemical, let whatever element bind itself chemically to the liquid and then filter the mixture through a sieve, ridding it of the said liquid. You're back with the dust and a modified liquid (from which maybe you can get that element back out and get back the liquid too, and use in the next cycle!).
I am not a lab chemist, but I wouldn't be surprised if there are numerous processes to do that and that people have devised this long time ago. I don't think reinventing the wheel here on
(3) the term `central processing unit' includes a case and all of its contents, such as the primary printed circuit board and its components, additional printed circuit boards, one or more disc drives, a transformer, interior wire, and a power cord;
OMFG, these people are really morons, they dare to start redefining the term CPU to be the entire case as opposed to just the processor chip.
How can this be informative???!! There is a drawing of what parts the computer consists of and an article claiming things. No photos or other 'hard' evidence, none whatsoever.
"More, you've accepted a license."
No, I didn't. I didn't sign anything.
Go tell this to those who were sued by the RIAA/MPAA and lost.
By living in the country and voting there, you are directly responsible for creating a social system in which the law says that you did.
Apple overcame Compaq/HP/IBM (for a while) and was at the 50% of all computers sold for a certain period of time and far greater % in education.
At 18:43, I sold a PC that I assmebled from parts to a friend. It had a sticker FooBar.
I just achieved superior sales performance that neither Apple nor Compar, HP nor IBM can beat. At some point in time, I sold at a rate of 1 PC per picosecond. During that time, FooBar was the most successful PC selling brand in the world!
Call me a lazy bastard, but the number of key presses really matters to me.
Oh, you're the perfect consumer!! You'll be so lazy that instead of search.msn.com (14) or google.com (10), you'll type msn.com (7). So MS gets the benefit of you visiting an entire portal instead of a search tool, just because of your lazy ass.
This is one of many examples how MS can actually start winning at this race.
Seriously, I think 90% of the hype has been here on /.
/. moderators who did not mod this as 'funny'.
I am not sure who is more out of their mind, whether it is you or the
No one is saying that a message passed on using a steganographic technique couldn't be encrypted.
You use steganography to pass a message without alerting anyone that a secret message is being passed, not to conceal the message!!
Then, you use encryption to conceal the content of that message.
While calling him an ignorant idiot might be suitable, I prefer to look at it as arrogance that stems from naivity, typical to someone inexperienced. Surely, at some point, we've all felt that the world is at our knees, but that always changed. Therefore, I believe that this guy should rather be called 'arrogant' and I believe that this is something that will change (or in other words, his 'idiocy' is temporary). Otherwise, any talent he might possess will go wasted.
Are you by any chance afraid of something...?
Remember, the top of this thread was roughly someone saying "I can't believe Samba was developed without breaching any EULAs".
What I'd like to know as a follow-up though is whether you can pull a reverse engineering feat just like Samba even today legally?
Even if the EULA were to prohibit the users from letting other people do e.g. network traffic sniffing (or other reverse engineering), it would still be possible for the engineer to 'go undercover' and do it so that those end users still couldn't be held accountable.
Suppose Samba didn't exist. If one were to implement Samba, it could (with what degree of legal certainty?) be proven that reverse engineering is the sole and only way to figure out the protocol by reverse engineering. Even so, would this be enough or would this evidence be too circumstantial to prove one actually reverse-engineered? And even if it were, wouldn't that mean reverse engineering by sniffing could become illegal? This brings out how ridiculous DMCA is, but doesn't that also suggest that we might be getting close to being slapped with a DMCA also for other for other than copyright prevention 'protocols'...?
So long as there is no law similar in function as DMCA but for non-copyright related reverse engineering, isn't reverse engineering essentially completely legal (given that the end user of the software cannot be reasonably required to prevent his use of the software from exposing it to reverse engineering)?
Yep, so essentially that means that if the EULA is good enough, it will try to not allow the use of the software in an environment where the holder of the license on usage of that software at the same time gives any third party consent to eavesdropping.
This way, the software producer ensures that they can hold the end user accountable for damages incurred by letting (and notice that I used 'letting' not 'actively preventing') someone sniff those packets.
It seems like some of these people spend more time writing about software than actually writing software...
Coding is a monkey job. It is the equivalent of a brick-layer's role in delivering on a housing project: no one denies that expertise is necessary to perform the job, but trends over the past (such as RUP, MSF and even the subsequent growth in outsourcing) prove that it can easily be comoditized.
Writing about software is as important (if not more important) as writing software. Again, the housing project comes to mind as a perfect parallel in explaining why.
Hahahaha, I read this thread thru and you have finally proved yourself as your discussion partner suggests: ignorant, incompetent and most of all, never having been in the real world.
1. You must be lacking in patience or maturity if it takes five or six conversational exchanges and you start calling the other person all kinds of names:
"You asshole."
2. You say:
"Require?" No. Nothing requires a Web interface.
Another proof you have never been in the real world. In reality, it's very simple: either you can convince the business why they shouldn't require a web interface or you accept reality that it is the requirement and for a reason. If you refuse, you have just proven to your customer that you have nothing useful to offer to them.
3. You criticize "fundamental flaws in a platform" while completely missing the point of the other person pointing out to you that, flaws set aside, different 'platforms' will offer different BENEFITS to the business for which you are developing the application. These benefits can come in different dimensions. You can substitute the word 'benefits' with 'type of value' if you still don't get it.
4. You answer the question "what's the cost of rollout to 50,000 workstations" by saying "if it were a network of Macs, $0". You obviously are not just wrong, but you have failed to understand that to "roll out a desktop application" means a lot of things: 1) to implement a centralized system from which you can control those workstations, then 2) to have the ability to remotely install, diagnose installation failures and roll back if necessary (in software this risk is always there), then 3) to be able to keep track what is installed successfully where and at the same time 4) to scale in terms of number of workstations (i.e.: it should take less than 2 times the effort to roll out onto 50,000 machines than roll out onto 25,000 machines).
This rollout aspect of running the technology has to be planned, implemented and most likely also supported by staff or some other ongoing resources, which inevitably leads to the conclusion that there is cost. The fundamental decision to go with a desktop app as opposed to a web-based app approach therefore involves cost. So the web-based platform in this example represents measurable cost savings. And if there are "fundamental flaws" in going the web-based way, you must factor those in as cost into the cost-benefit analysis of alternatives. Eventually, you choose the approach that fits your goals best (be it cost savings, business operations efficiencies or any other metrics that the business requires).
Again, your personal spewing of nonsense proves that you have not just not given any thought to these dimensions of the problem, but indirectly also means that you have truly NEVER been in the real world.
5. You say:
"the first thing I would do is fire the dumbass that came up with that utterly antiquated and absurd list of requirements"
You obviously again don't understand the way it works in the real world. It doesn't matter whether you think the requirements should be. The given requirements which the other person gave you were already constructed with business-oriented cost-benefit analysis in mind and there is absolutely NOTHING you can do about it, because you'll never justify your alternative, which in this case means: if the CRM system runs on AS/400 and is of certain size, it can be easily proven on paper (given more facts) why it doesn't make any sense (=cost) to redo the organization's entire CRM system (possibly a multi-million-dollar investment, depending on the organization) just so that it runs according to the technologically ideal design/platform/implementation. If you refuse to realize objective analyses, then you are the one who should be fired, since you are trying to push the business to invest even more in something that they already have. This way, you provide no value to the organization for which you are trying t
Hehe.
In this case, EULA should not forget to prohibit usage of the software that uses the said protocol in an environment where the user at the same time doesn't agree not to give permission to the network provider to sniff the network.
In other words, if the EULA is well written, it will allow to hold the user acocuntable for damage to the software provider caused by as many forms of potentially hurtful (to the software provider) usages as possible.
I observe and reverse-engineer an over-the-wire file transfer protocol between two computers owned by my friends.
It's not really about the protocol. Even though you are interested in the protocol's innerworkings, you are essentially eavesdropping on a private 'conversation' (of course unless you own the network transport and make the permission to eavesdrop as a part of the network usage agreement).
It appears this case would be treated as eavesdropping, for which I believe there are some pretty uncontested laws in most western-world countries.
Stretching it further, however, I personally believe that e.g. if cell phone towers push GSM/CDMA/TDMA signals through your house, it is nobody's business whether you are eavesdropping or not, they should apply other legal means available to them to prevent the signal from reaching your house if they want you not to listen to it. But that's just my personal opinion.
the fact is, if there are a lot of licenses it's easier to find one that suits your project and organization's requirements.
The more kinds of different licenses, the less likely is it for each to be adopted by enough people to gain maturity over time in courts.