I actually watched them present this on CNBC's Bullseye last night. I believe it was the same Tyco rep as seen on the morning show.
From what was discussed, this "Sapphire" is environment safe and it was perfectly safe to come into contact with it, just so long as it wasn't consumed. The host of the show as well as the Tyco rep were splashing their hands in the water as if there were no danger at all. They didn't discuss anything scientific about "Sapphire" itself in the show so I'm just as ignorant as the next ordinary Joe when it comes to how safe it really is. But from all indications from last nights demonstration, it looks very safe.
And this gives corporations and larger businesses the ability to conveniently patch their software the right way (or right by his line of thought) with no threat of attacks (at least reversed engineered cracks).
But as always, where does that leave the home user who is paying bills and can't put up money to _subscribe_ to a service that is mandatory for safe computing. It puts that user right in front of a fire hose with his/her mouth wide open with a cracker armed with malicious code ready to turn on the hose on full blast.
I agree, as I am a recent Gentoo convert. But seriously, you aren't going to convince any beginner or Windows convert to use Gentoo, no matter how good the package management is. It's entirely too much hands on and people will throw a fit at having to compile things instead of double clicking install_aim.exe.
Re:no matter how big of a geek you are...
on
Running for Geeks
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· Score: 1
This is why during my lunch break everyday I leave my little environment of ASP.Net coding, scripting and my bit of server administration (yes, at my job I am a windows monkey) and go lift weights for about 45 minutes. What I've found is that I remain fresh for the rest of the day and my body has it's blood flowing to keep me alert instead of staying put in a chair through the day and feeling lazy. And the best part is that most often times while lifting I'll think of a solution to a problem or a good idea to use in between sets. Physical activity is a great way to clear your mind and regain focus!
When I went to have my knee scoped and was beginning to feel the effects of the anasthesia the pumped in me, the doctors and I had a grand conversation over video games, most notably the quake series. I thought it was pretty comical myself.
Also, my mother is a huge fan of Reader's Digest. Sometime ago when I was in my early teens, she read an article along the same lines as this: that the muscles used in gripping a Nintendo controller and pushing the buttons are the same muscles being used by surgeons during their operations. Thus there was a direct correlation in that children who were playing video games then would be successful surgeons now.
Isn't this one of the reasons Windows takes ages to boot? (many processes all competing for the one disk resource?).
Which version of Windows are you referring to? While risking to sound like a fan boy here, I must say that the OS load times for XP are quite fast compared to previous versions and to most vanilla linux distributions I've tried in the past (Mandrake 9.x, Redhat8/9). Whether or not this is in relation to resolving two processes arguing over access to read from the disk, I don't know. Does anyone have any more information on this?
My roomate from just 3 months ago came back from a Technology in Education class in which his professor told him that "Linux is made by a company named Red Hat". This same professor is looked up to as one of the most technically savvy professors on campus outside of the CS instructors.
Given the fact that both Novell and HP are pushing SuSE for the desktop, providing simple choices and not alot of options makse sense. In fact, SuSE as a distribution may not even try to please hardcore linux enthusiasts a single bit in the near future if both organizations are intent on making it sell as an alternative to Windows for your everyday Joe Sixpack and ESR's Aunt Tillie...
This and baseball is a rather slow paced game compared to most other sports. Having wireless access would allow you to check scores, stats, refresh slashdot for new posts(hehe) rather quickly inbetween innings, during pitching changes, or even during an at-bat if you so wanted since I think the average time between pitches can be about 10-15 seconds(correct me if I'm wrong on that one). This wouldn't be quite so easy at say a basketball game, since a glance at a pda or some other wireless device almost garuntees you miss some sort of action whereas in baseball there are a great many intervals inbetween the ball being pitched or put in to play.
The only way I could be arsed to go watch a baseball game live would be to give me wireless access and to let me bring a laptop in. Of course, I'm sure this isn't the purpose they have in mind. Although, providing wireless access within sporting venues might be quite an interesting way to bring in more fans to games especially in the case of Major League Baseball, who over the course of the past ten years have seen an abysmal drop in attendance.
The problem is that for everyone who is a non-techie and has never handled a large sized database or have been involved in extracting data from relational databases, they don't see the difference at all between a database and a spreadsheet. In the eyes of your average joe user, they both have rows and columns so they both must be used to store rows of information!
A real life example that still gets on my nerves to this day is when a co-worker in different department who knew I was a "computer person" asked me about creating an excel database. After trying to correct her about 3 times to no avail, I just gave up and said "sorry, I don't really work with Microsoft Office" and ran away.
Every single office that I've worked in over the past 3 years *has* to use Microsoft Office because people are so used to and dependant on the Outlook and Excel apps. Also, students are coming straight out of college with only skillsets in MS Office packages. This is only adding onto the justification to use MS Office over anything else and thus is keeping the demand for MS Office so high.
Hopefully Safari or/insert favorite web browser/ will do something similar in the future.
And the organization who owns that browser will then patent the technology and own IP rights over it. It's an inevitability with the current business practices right now.
This might be what he is getting at here. I'm still a youngster and didn't get into computing until the mid 90's, but from what I know the idea used to be the opposite - that software came free (little f) or at very little cost to benefit the very highly priced hardware components that were needed. Apparently Bill is going the reciprocal route and wants the hardware to come free or at a very inexpensive cost to support his high priced software. This would only make since in his vision since such a scenario would result in better bottom line numbers for Microsoft and the evil organization potentially has enough power over the long term to do such a thing.
That's why they are trained to say "so and so set me up" when talking to tech support; I know the techs at the local ISP.
But even so, yeah, I admit this could cause some problems, but a clever tech will out what's going on anyhow.
Not in my neck of the woods. The braniac for an isp tech here came over to setup my cable internet service was throwing fits because he couldn't find the IE icon on my desktop. I simply told him to "use Firefox.... it's not vastly different from Netscape". He still was dumbfounded. Seriously, a browser is a browser is a browser, and this guy who is being paid to setup internet accounts for subscribers cowered when given something other than explorer to work with.
Very disturbing... I won't be calling these guys up for tech support anytime soon.
In a report by the AeA, they contend that American schools don't teach enough math and science anymore."
It's been my experience with higher education that they are just like corporate business. Instead of share prices being the overall objective, it's the enrollment number and retention rate. Since computer science and information systems were the big programs roughly 5 years ago, they were dumbed down to accomodate more enrollment and to keep the lesser skilled and less serious students enrolled. This is just a case of the higher of administration simply looking a bottom line numbers and not on the quality and integrity of education that is being offered.
Of course, this is simply a narrow view from my experience with a couple of universities, but I gather that this is the trend with all universities across the nation.
If you run Outlook or Outlook Express on a Windows machine, you are gambling, and one day you will lose. People are such fucking slow learners.
And I'm supposed to convince management that we shouldn't use our exchange mail server because with each message you click on and view in the preview pane in Outlook you are opening yourself up to a potential virus? It is a valid argument indeed, but the higher ups who have have the entire organization dependant on Outlook for everything will barely consider this notion as they believe the positivies of Outlook outweight the one (but potentially big!) negative of it.
or when that Death Star-sized object pays us a visit.
At which point we will hide behind our moon and send a squadron of George Bush sponsered space monkeys to penetetrate it's interior and fire photon blasters into a two meter hole to destroy it and save the earth.....
So we've recreated the 2nd Red Scare, and this system, or one like it, is the one that is going to find and convict our next Sacco and Vinzetti(sp?).
Basically, we have another instance of the current government administration taking advantage of the fact that our "freedoms are threatened" by terrorism to implement some sort of control and monitoring device on the entire population. I'm almost immune to the talk of it by now though, as we've had countless instances of things like this being proposed.
Apparantly, the report about Dihydrogen Monoxide was written by a then 14-year-old Nathan Zohner who was researching the gullibility of fifty ninth graders.
Nice, law making officials have been put on the same level of discerning information as a class of high school freshman. This gives me great confidence in our legaslative bodies.
These distributions also give the user the option to install these packages or not, whereas Microsoft forcefully installs media player/ie/etc. and provides 2,591 icons and shortcuts to it. Quite a substantial difference the way the two offer the software to their users.
As for everyone running as root and viruses, how is that different from when they run Windows?
A simple suggestion for a not so simple problem. For desktop Linux systems built for the everyday joe user, force the user to run root in a minimalistic environment, such as a bare bones Xwindows session with only configuration tools available. We all know that if root is available with all of the same GUI options available to every other account on the system, then Joe user is going to stay in root the entire time so he doesn't have to keep logging in/out and won't have to use the su and exit commands.
An even better suggestion might be that if the user is to login as root, have them only do it through a command line interface and from programs that ask for a su root login off the start and exit that account when the program finishes. Don't even give them the option of running a full blown XWindows session as root.
I concur with the parent. However, the consumers will end up paying for the wiretapping regadless, whether the ISP's are forced to do the upgrade themselves, or if the FBI funds since the FBI is funded with everyone American's dollars.
Regardless, this is pretty intrusive on the FBI's part. Even though it isn't a blatant intrusion into our private lines located within our home, it may as well be, since our direct line to the internet for 99.9% of the population runs through commercial ISP's. I hope someone cries foul on this proposal in support for the protection of privacy. However, with the state of most American's line of thinking, such a hope is far-fetched.
Slashdot Mirror
two more words - gentoo portage
From what was discussed, this "Sapphire" is environment safe and it was perfectly safe to come into contact with it, just so long as it wasn't consumed. The host of the show as well as the Tyco rep were splashing their hands in the water as if there were no danger at all. They didn't discuss anything scientific about "Sapphire" itself in the show so I'm just as ignorant as the next ordinary Joe when it comes to how safe it really is. But from all indications from last nights demonstration, it looks very safe.
But as always, where does that leave the home user who is paying bills and can't put up money to _subscribe_ to a service that is mandatory for safe computing. It puts that user right in front of a fire hose with his/her mouth wide open with a cracker armed with malicious code ready to turn on the hose on full blast.
I agree, as I am a recent Gentoo convert. But seriously, you aren't going to convince any beginner or Windows convert to use Gentoo, no matter how good the package management is. It's entirely too much hands on and people will throw a fit at having to compile things instead of double clicking install_aim.exe.
This is why during my lunch break everyday I leave my little environment of ASP.Net coding, scripting and my bit of server administration (yes, at my job I am a windows monkey) and go lift weights for about 45 minutes. What I've found is that I remain fresh for the rest of the day and my body has it's blood flowing to keep me alert instead of staying put in a chair through the day and feeling lazy. And the best part is that most often times while lifting I'll think of a solution to a problem or a good idea to use in between sets. Physical activity is a great way to clear your mind and regain focus!
Also, my mother is a huge fan of Reader's Digest. Sometime ago when I was in my early teens, she read an article along the same lines as this: that the muscles used in gripping a Nintendo controller and pushing the buttons are the same muscles being used by surgeons during their operations. Thus there was a direct correlation in that children who were playing video games then would be successful surgeons now.
Which version of Windows are you referring to? While risking to sound like a fan boy here, I must say that the OS load times for XP are quite fast compared to previous versions and to most vanilla linux distributions I've tried in the past (Mandrake 9.x, Redhat8/9). Whether or not this is in relation to resolving two processes arguing over access to read from the disk, I don't know. Does anyone have any more information on this?
Scary.
Given the fact that both Novell and HP are pushing SuSE for the desktop, providing simple choices and not alot of options makse sense. In fact, SuSE as a distribution may not even try to please hardcore linux enthusiasts a single bit in the near future if both organizations are intent on making it sell as an alternative to Windows for your everyday Joe Sixpack and ESR's Aunt Tillie...
This and baseball is a rather slow paced game compared to most other sports. Having wireless access would allow you to check scores, stats, refresh slashdot for new posts(hehe) rather quickly inbetween innings, during pitching changes, or even during an at-bat if you so wanted since I think the average time between pitches can be about 10-15 seconds(correct me if I'm wrong on that one). This wouldn't be quite so easy at say a basketball game, since a glance at a pda or some other wireless device almost garuntees you miss some sort of action whereas in baseball there are a great many intervals inbetween the ball being pitched or put in to play.
The only way I could be arsed to go watch a baseball game live would be to give me wireless access and to let me bring a laptop in. Of course, I'm sure this isn't the purpose they have in mind. Although, providing wireless access within sporting venues might be quite an interesting way to bring in more fans to games especially in the case of Major League Baseball, who over the course of the past ten years have seen an abysmal drop in attendance.
A real life example that still gets on my nerves to this day is when a co-worker in different department who knew I was a "computer person" asked me about creating an excel database. After trying to correct her about 3 times to no avail, I just gave up and said "sorry, I don't really work with Microsoft Office" and ran away.
Every single office that I've worked in over the past 3 years *has* to use Microsoft Office because people are so used to and dependant on the Outlook and Excel apps. Also, students are coming straight out of college with only skillsets in MS Office packages. This is only adding onto the justification to use MS Office over anything else and thus is keeping the demand for MS Office so high.
Hopefully Safari or /insert favorite web browser/ will do something similar in the future.
And the organization who owns that browser will then patent the technology and own IP rights over it. It's an inevitability with the current business practices right now.
This might be what he is getting at here. I'm still a youngster and didn't get into computing until the mid 90's, but from what I know the idea used to be the opposite - that software came free (little f) or at very little cost to benefit the very highly priced hardware components that were needed. Apparently Bill is going the reciprocal route and wants the hardware to come free or at a very inexpensive cost to support his high priced software. This would only make since in his vision since such a scenario would result in better bottom line numbers for Microsoft and the evil organization potentially has enough power over the long term to do such a thing.
That's why they are trained to say "so and so set me up" when talking to tech support; I know the techs at the local ISP.
But even so, yeah, I admit this could cause some problems, but a clever tech will out what's going on anyhow.
Not in my neck of the woods. The braniac for an isp tech here came over to setup my cable internet service was throwing fits because he couldn't find the IE icon on my desktop. I simply told him to "use Firefox.... it's not vastly different from Netscape". He still was dumbfounded. Seriously, a browser is a browser is a browser, and this guy who is being paid to setup internet accounts for subscribers cowered when given something other than explorer to work with.
Very disturbing... I won't be calling these guys up for tech support anytime soon.
Does half of Novell and IBM's staff know how to properly pronounce SuSE? I sure don't :(
It's been my experience with higher education that they are just like corporate business. Instead of share prices being the overall objective, it's the enrollment number and retention rate. Since computer science and information systems were the big programs roughly 5 years ago, they were dumbed down to accomodate more enrollment and to keep the lesser skilled and less serious students enrolled. This is just a case of the higher of administration simply looking a bottom line numbers and not on the quality and integrity of education that is being offered.
Of course, this is simply a narrow view from my experience with a couple of universities, but I gather that this is the trend with all universities across the nation.
And I'm supposed to convince management that we shouldn't use our exchange mail server because with each message you click on and view in the preview pane in Outlook you are opening yourself up to a potential virus? It is a valid argument indeed, but the higher ups who have have the entire organization dependant on Outlook for everything will barely consider this notion as they believe the positivies of Outlook outweight the one (but potentially big!) negative of it.
At which point we will hide behind our moon and send a squadron of George Bush sponsered space monkeys to penetetrate it's interior and fire photon blasters into a two meter hole to destroy it and save the earth.....
Basically, we have another instance of the current government administration taking advantage of the fact that our "freedoms are threatened" by terrorism to implement some sort of control and monitoring device on the entire population. I'm almost immune to the talk of it by now though, as we've had countless instances of things like this being proposed.
Nice, law making officials have been put on the same level of discerning information as a class of high school freshman. This gives me great confidence in our legaslative bodies.
These distributions also give the user the option to install these packages or not, whereas Microsoft forcefully installs media player/ie/etc. and provides 2,591 icons and shortcuts to it. Quite a substantial difference the way the two offer the software to their users.
A simple suggestion for a not so simple problem. For desktop Linux systems built for the everyday joe user, force the user to run root in a minimalistic environment, such as a bare bones Xwindows session with only configuration tools available. We all know that if root is available with all of the same GUI options available to every other account on the system, then Joe user is going to stay in root the entire time so he doesn't have to keep logging in/out and won't have to use the su and exit commands.
An even better suggestion might be that if the user is to login as root, have them only do it through a command line interface and from programs that ask for a su root login off the start and exit that account when the program finishes. Don't even give them the option of running a full blown XWindows session as root.
Regardless, this is pretty intrusive on the FBI's part. Even though it isn't a blatant intrusion into our private lines located within our home, it may as well be, since our direct line to the internet for 99.9% of the population runs through commercial ISP's. I hope someone cries foul on this proposal in support for the protection of privacy. However, with the state of most American's line of thinking, such a hope is far-fetched.