Built into the OS, but flakey and usually out of date.
Bold claims. Back them up. Okay.
I had a big project to do in early 2003, just after I got my iBook. At the time, 1.4.1 was the current Sun version. The best Apple could do at the time was 1.3.1, and there was a beta of 1.4.1 which you could sign up to use. The thing was beyond pathetic. The most visible problem was drawing windows upside down and backwards with large applications. That continued to be a problem with the official 1.4.1 release. I don't remember when Apple brought out 1.4.2, but it was way after Sun did. 1.4.2 was the first version that I haven't seen draw windows upside down.
Apple is currently current, but Sun will be releasing 1.5 soon, and given Apple's history I do not have high hopes that they will be doing it in a timely fashion.
I'm not sure what you define as a "UNIX nerd", but I'd say I fit most sane deffinitions.
OS X is not as powerful, but what it does do it does in 5 minutes with no man pages. It could never meet all of my needs, but there's a niche there that OS X fits perfectly that Linux, frankly, sucks at. Plus, Linux isn't very good at laptops yet. Not when you compare it to Windows and MacOS.
Of course, Linux is very good at other stuff. I'd never do Java development on OS X, and almost all the good open source software supports Linux first and best.
And then OpenBSD on the firewall. Because it's so fucking good at it...
Restricting yourself to one OS is shooting yourself in the foot (if you have the expertise to use more than one OS). They're all bad at something. It doesn't take much to strike a good balance, and most of us have more than one box anyway.
There are sound business reasons for all the big-headline stuff IBM's been doing lately, but I think they're doing it because it's the biggest, best, and cheapest PR anyone's ever heard of.
Sure they're positioning POWER/PowerPC as the only architechture that can challenge x86 in a meaningful way. Sure if they release enough of the firmware and stuff it'll probably be better for some open source stuff than x86 is. Sure they're a services company and this will put them on the back end of even more stuff.
But honestly. Everyone loves them. That's what they really need if they want to entrench themselves everywhere.
At work I use 2K on the desktop for Java and C++ development. I don't like to reboot, getting all the folders and applications open again takes a long time. Uptimes of 2-3 weeks are typical.
I still have to reboot it due to software errors, but I can time it so that it's convenient. Usually what happens is that everything gets too sluggish because the hard drive is trashing. One assumes this is a result of various memory leaks. I haven't seen a blue screen or a reboot I didn't initiate on the thing since I started at that company last year.
I use all UNIX-ish machines at home (OpenBSD, Linux, MacOS). Uptimes with them aren't much longer because of upgrades and patches. The situation is more or less the same; I need to reboot, but I have a bit of flexibility as to when.
Behind a professionally maintained firewall, on a computer provided by my employer, I haven't got a problem with Windows. I might even use it at home if didn't cost so much.
I too have a very hard time believing that someone could go from an exploit to a functioning worm in that period of time. It's also possible they had general purpose code waiting for an exploit so they could finish the "attemptToInfectHost" function.
"Notwithstanding the fundamental inequities involved in encouraging people sign on to the Internet with a single click, and then requiring them to fix flaws in software marketed to them as secure with technical skills they do not possess, many users do choose to protect themselves at their own expense by purchasing antivirus and firewall software. Making this choice is the gold-standard for end user behavior -- they recognize both that security is important and that they do not possess the skills necessary to effect it themselves."
I've never been able to tell, but there are benchmarks that seem to indicate NetBSD is the better performer in a number of key areas. I couldn't say one way or the other, and I've never run them on the same hardware. But if performance is your priority, use Linux or FreeBSD.
OpenBSD is an agressively competent firewall system, and NetBSD is very good for playing with rediculously minimal hardware. The areas where they're good overlap a bit.
Try both. They're both very easy to install on a spare box. Even if you don't end up using them after that, you'll understand Linux or MacOS X (or whatever) better.
I imagine it would be possible to make the chip smart enough to do some kind of cryptographic authentication, but there's no way that would be worth it for inventory.
I kinda hope they get around to it for authentication though. That just makes me nervous.
Absoloutely. The experience is very valuable, and the standard of graduates has dropped a lot ever since the dot-com boom. One needs some real world experience to stand out from the crowd.
And the work is easier than retail crap for vastly greater amounts of money. That's nice too.
My employer has a pretty sweet racket. They keep a few employees that are still in university so they can snap up bright young people without having to sift through hundreds of idiots.
In other news, this is the inaugural post from my new account, created so no one at my office knows I'm talking about them.
Slashdot Mirror
Built into the OS, but flakey and usually out of date.
Bold claims. Back them up. Okay.
I had a big project to do in early 2003, just after I got my iBook. At the time, 1.4.1 was the current Sun version. The best Apple could do at the time was 1.3.1, and there was a beta of 1.4.1 which you could sign up to use. The thing was beyond pathetic. The most visible problem was drawing windows upside down and backwards with large applications. That continued to be a problem with the official 1.4.1 release. I don't remember when Apple brought out 1.4.2, but it was way after Sun did. 1.4.2 was the first version that I haven't seen draw windows upside down.
Apple is currently current, but Sun will be releasing 1.5 soon, and given Apple's history I do not have high hopes that they will be doing it in a timely fashion.
I'm not sure what you define as a "UNIX nerd", but I'd say I fit most sane deffinitions.
OS X is not as powerful, but what it does do it does in 5 minutes with no man pages. It could never meet all of my needs, but there's a niche there that OS X fits perfectly that Linux, frankly, sucks at. Plus, Linux isn't very good at laptops yet. Not when you compare it to Windows and MacOS.
Of course, Linux is very good at other stuff. I'd never do Java development on OS X, and almost all the good open source software supports Linux first and best.
And then OpenBSD on the firewall. Because it's so fucking good at it...
Restricting yourself to one OS is shooting yourself in the foot (if you have the expertise to use more than one OS). They're all bad at something. It doesn't take much to strike a good balance, and most of us have more than one box anyway.
That's the worst thing I've ever heard anyone call a programmer.
There are sound business reasons for all the big-headline stuff IBM's been doing lately, but I think they're doing it because it's the biggest, best, and cheapest PR anyone's ever heard of.
Sure they're positioning POWER/PowerPC as the only architechture that can challenge x86 in a meaningful way. Sure if they release enough of the firmware and stuff it'll probably be better for some open source stuff than x86 is. Sure they're a services company and this will put them on the back end of even more stuff.
But honestly. Everyone loves them. That's what they really need if they want to entrench themselves everywhere.
Yes. And that takes thousands of dollars and laywers in a court room. None of that wholesale, no-judicial-overview stuff that the DMCA makes possible.
At work I use 2K on the desktop for Java and C++ development. I don't like to reboot, getting all the folders and applications open again takes a long time. Uptimes of 2-3 weeks are typical.
I still have to reboot it due to software errors, but I can time it so that it's convenient. Usually what happens is that everything gets too sluggish because the hard drive is trashing. One assumes this is a result of various memory leaks. I haven't seen a blue screen or a reboot I didn't initiate on the thing since I started at that company last year.
I use all UNIX-ish machines at home (OpenBSD, Linux, MacOS). Uptimes with them aren't much longer because of upgrades and patches. The situation is more or less the same; I need to reboot, but I have a bit of flexibility as to when.
Behind a professionally maintained firewall, on a computer provided by my employer, I haven't got a problem with Windows. I might even use it at home if didn't cost so much.
I too have a very hard time believing that someone could go from an exploit to a functioning worm in that period of time. It's also possible they had general purpose code waiting for an exploit so they could finish the "attemptToInfectHost" function.
"Notwithstanding the fundamental inequities involved in encouraging people sign on to the Internet with a single click, and then requiring them to fix flaws in software marketed to them as secure with technical skills they do not possess, many users do choose to protect themselves at their own expense by purchasing antivirus and firewall software. Making this choice is the gold-standard for end user behavior -- they recognize both that security is important and that they do not possess the skills necessary to effect it themselves."
I've never been able to tell, but there are benchmarks that seem to indicate NetBSD is the better performer in a number of key areas. I couldn't say one way or the other, and I've never run them on the same hardware. But if performance is your priority, use Linux or FreeBSD.
OpenBSD is an agressively competent firewall system, and NetBSD is very good for playing with rediculously minimal hardware. The areas where they're good overlap a bit.
Try both. They're both very easy to install on a spare box. Even if you don't end up using them after that, you'll understand Linux or MacOS X (or whatever) better.
You just need a little more initiative.
cloning a proximity card
I imagine it would be possible to make the chip smart enough to do some kind of cryptographic authentication, but there's no way that would be worth it for inventory.
I kinda hope they get around to it for authentication though. That just makes me nervous.
Couldn't one's browser simply be configured to falsify the "Referrer:" header? Or maybe you could just cut and paste the URL so there is no referrer?
Absoloutely. The experience is very valuable, and the standard of graduates has dropped a lot ever since the dot-com boom. One needs some real world experience to stand out from the crowd.
And the work is easier than retail crap for vastly greater amounts of money. That's nice too.
Your UID number is funny.
My employer has a pretty sweet racket. They keep a few employees that are still in university so they can snap up bright young people without having to sift through hundreds of idiots.
In other news, this is the inaugural post from my new account, created so no one at my office knows I'm talking about them.