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  1. Re:Self-Inflicted Damage on Islamic State "Laptop of Doom" Hints At Plots Including Bubonic Plague · · Score: 1

    The number: 72
    The translation mistake: Raisins not Virgins.

    Can you imagine how pissed off you'd be?!

  2. Re:How about a generic scripting engine? on The JavaScript Juggernaut Rolls On · · Score: 1

    Any language compiler that will emit LLVM rather than machine code can run in the browser via Emscripten to asm.js. So C/C++ is already ready to run in the browser. Other languages use different strategies such as in-browser translation to JS. Python has several stunts for running in the browser now.

    Asm.js was the game changer by getting within 1.5x the C/C++ perf numbers.

  3. Phones in Space! on Privately Built Antares Test Flight Successfully Launched From Virginia · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I like this:

    Antares also carried three coffee cup-size Phonesat satellites - called Alexander, Graham and Bell - into orbit as part of a space technology experiment for NASA's Ames Research Center in California. The tiny 4-inch-wide satellites use commercial smartphones as their main computers.

  4. Android Hijack on Accountability, Not Code Quality, Makes iOS Safer Than Android · · Score: 2

    Unfortunately, Android has been hijacked by the carriers and handset manufacturers. There is no "Android" phone any more, only handset manufacturers (who screw up Android) and the carriers (who have no regard for Android security). Consider ..

    Much of the Android vs iDevice confusion is based on the new Mobile Market:
    1 - Carrier: Verizon, ATT, etc
    2 - Handset Mfgr: Apple, Samsung, etc
    3 - OS: Android & iOS
    Notice that Apple controls 2 out of 3. Google controls 0 out of 3.

    Zero? WTF? Think about it. You get a Samsung phone (2). They "improve" Android, leaving you with a big unknown in terms of OS (3). Carrier: Apple imposes HUGE restrictions on the carriers .. they act as a middle man between the consumer and the carrier. Google, OTOH, has zero control over the carrier.

    We may not like it, but Apple has huge advantage over the security of their devices.

  5. Color me weird. I like both. on EU and US Approve Google-Motorola Deal · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I like both Apple and Google, use lots of both.

    But when I got my latest phone, I decided against Android simply because the handset makers and the carriers pissed all over Vanilla Android to "improve" it.

    So now I get Google building a standard. Unlocked. Updateable. Frequency agile. GSM. Mobile world wide.

    Heck, I even want Google to build their own cellular network or at the least a MVNO.

    This is not a fight between Apple and Google. Its a fight against both of them against the horrid carriers and clueless handset mfgrs.

    Let the battle begin!

  6. Disenfranchised on Ask Slashdot: Which Candidates For Geek Issues? · · Score: 0

    I'd like to vote for a Dem. But one of the other ones. Why don't they have a primary too?

    God, maybe AmericanSelect? Of them I fear.

  7. This will never happen. on Net Companies Consider the "Nuclear Option" To Combat SOPA · · Score: 0

    Won't happen. Amazon give up their store front? Probably 10^6 $/min. Google strand their paying advertisers? I doubt it. Facebook have a DDoS from children without their toys? Really?

  8. Re:Pot calling the kettle black on Net Companies Consider the "Nuclear Option" To Combat SOPA · · Score: 0

    Closing Google is for many people the same as closing the Internet. How to go to a site without a search box?

    Pinboard.in for one. I suppose Yahoo would help too.

  9. Re:Ritual is an understatement on Ask Slashdot: Changing Passwords For the New Year? · · Score: 0

    No. Your email password should be your strongest one. Indeed, if you give me your email password, so I can just view/delete your emails, all I have to do is beam into paypal, for example, and tell it you forgot your password. It sends it to your email account. I delete the email after learning your password to paypal.

    You might think its hard to learn your login name as well as password but many sites simply use your email as your name, or a synonym for it. And if I can search your email account, I can easily find your login name anyway.

    So guard your email login more than the rest. Really.

  10. Re:I do not use the same password for multiple sit on Ask Slashdot: Changing Passwords For the New Year? · · Score: 0

    They don't store the passwords in the /etc/passwd file or use any standard unix tech. They just put them into databases using whatever they want, often plain text. They seldom use salt either, even if encrypted. I was surprised too!

  11. Re:Quit working so hard - use Seed Mapping on Ask Slashdot: Changing Passwords For the New Year? · · Score: 0

    Er.. what about sites that don't allow your generated password?

    I hate it that lots of sites have very different PW requirements.

  12. Haystack on Ask Slashdot: Changing Passwords For the New Year? · · Score: 0

    https://www.grc.com/haystack.htm has an interesting approach.
    Which of these: D0g..................... or PrXyc.N(n4k77#L!eVdAfp9 is the more secure?

  13. Re:Quit working so hard - use Seed Mapping on Ask Slashdot: Changing Passwords For the New Year? · · Score: 0

    Er..what about keyboards that have different geometry? Phones differ, for example.

  14. Mail Account on Ask Slashdot: Changing Passwords For the New Year? · · Score: 0

    The strongest password needs to be your email account.

    Why? "I forgot my password". Doh!

  15. Re:Best deals around on The iPhone's Role In Crippling T-Mobile · · Score: 0

    +1: I currently pay $57.80/month. A bit hard to believe when I found out the vast majority of my friends' cell bill was north of $90 for the same service!

    But for me TMo wins just as well for service. I travel for a month in europe every year so need a mobile phone. Really mobile, like world wide. TMo has been great making sure it all works. They will SIM-unlock a new contract when you need it for travel.

    The huge variation in opinion here has a lot to do with the phone being the most personal of our digital critters. Lots of different requirements and ecologies.

    But, man! Where in the world do normal folks get $80-90/month for a PHONE!

  16. News Flash: Apple's Right & /. A Bunch of Assh on Apple Claims Samsung and Motorola Patent Monopoly · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    Give me a break, Oh Open Superior Life Forms.

    Perform the following experience: Give a Samsung Tablet and an iPad to your Average Idiot, you know, the MARKET for these bright shiny toys. Ask them if they come from the same company. Easily 99% yes, right?

    This is the real battle: Apple builds a great product, forces ATT to their knees to have $15/month non-subscription plans, is about to come out with a world/universal phone that works on ALL networks, and basically takes the power from the lame cell carriers and brick dumb handset manufacturers. You know, innovation, right?

    Then your basic we-make-anything manufacturer, no innovation just machine parts and chips, jumps in with a copy cat. BMW could have made these Android things.

    So slack up know-it-alls, Apple really provided YOU with new freedoms from both the carriers and handset manufacturers who have been fucking you for years.

  17. Miss Grammar Sez: on Canadian Library to Loan Out People · · Score: 1

    Lend, dammit!

  18. Re:You've been Pwned: GMail on Are Google's Best Days Behind It? · · Score: 1

    So do it. Please.

  19. You've been Pwned: GMail on Are Google's Best Days Behind It? · · Score: 1

    You'd better hope not, you're slave to them already, especially by your being chained to gmail.

  20. IPv4i -- string theory extends to extra dimensions on After IPv4, How Will the Internet Function? · · Score: 1

    You clearly have not heard of our solution in the lab: use complex numbers for each octet. This expands the space of addresses to Great Big, although finite due to use of integer values of the real and imaginary part.

    Yes, yes I know what you're saying: it takes more bits, right? Wrong. String theorists have applied extra dimensions to the octet encoding so as to only use 4 bits in this space, with the additional values residing comfortably in The Other Ones.

    Sorry to have left you out of the loop, but we knew we could keep getting by with our current modification to IPv4 .. just add an i.

  21. Sites w/ different p/w capabilities on Passwords Are the Weakest Link In Online Security · · Score: 1

    A definitely non-trivial problem is that different sites have different acceptable passwords. Some don't like special characters. Some don't like 12 characters.

    +1 PKI

  22. Google Lack of Focus on Google Kills Wave Development · · Score: 1

    We had a local talk by folks who attended Google I/O this year. Several of us wondered where the heck Google is headed .. there seems to be little coherence in their offerings. Things don't seem to fit together. Wave was the first one discussed, it just didn't make sense. Apparently the attendees agreed, they grilled Google staff about this and got the answer that all google projects are small independent groups with little required synergy with the rest of the company.

    This certainly lead me away from GAE, for example. I just don't trust them beyond gmail, search, calendar, maps and a few others. Not apps. Not GAE. Not Go.

    Not to say google's "ecology" is lousy, but I certainly wouldn't risk a customer's project on it.

  23. The MIT Way on How Should a Non-Techie Learn Programming? · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Do what MIT does: teach Programming first .. via Scheme!

    Look, there is no "right way" to start. MIT presumes you need to learn about what programming is all about first. Then they teach Java, C/C++, MatLab and so on later on in engineering and science classes. They created a nifty system, Processing(.org), that takes the sting out of Java and uses it to show designers how to hack.

  24. Re:Android and Blackberry anyone? on The Struggle To Keep Java Relevant · · Score: 1

    Kinda interesting that Google limits themselves to 4 languages:
    C/C++
    Java
    JavaScript
    Python
    http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2007/06/rhino-on-rails.html
    "One of the (hundreds of) cool things about working for Google is that they let teams experiment, as long as it's done within certain broad and well-defined boundaries. One of the fences in this big playground is your choice of programming language. You have to play inside the fence defined by C++, Java, Python, and JavaScript."

    And for GAE, JavaScript and Java/Rhino look great.

    I think JavaScript is due for a huge burst of popularity as soon as folks "get it". JS on the server and on the client, and JSON for data/ajax. Brilliant. But it takes a lot to understand JS .. the Good Parts.

  25. Which brought to mind a song... on How to Deal With an Aging Brain? · · Score: 1