If the government of a country has the source code of the software to examine for security flaws, doesn't this give MS a defense against liability from future lawsuits?
No.
For example, every medical product sold in America & the UK has been cleared by the very stringent government regulations. People are still able to sue if they have an adverse reaction to those same products.
So the fact that SOME of the source code has been LOOKED at by the government won't offer the slightest defence against lawsuits. If "The government says its okay" was a valid escape clause, lawsuits would probably be halved at a stroke.
Yup. They suck. The last few times I've tried to use a floppy (to transfer a presentation to a non-networked 'puter at work and to have an emergency boot disk) they've both been spat out as corrupt. Two different makes of disk, two different drives, same crappy result.
In fact, I said it was a case of "Six of one, half a dozen of the other" - that's a way of saying "The same, but different."
i.e. When one type of surveillance is mentioned, the US/.ers smugly point out they have no problems, only the UK has to worry about it.
Shortly after, another form of surveillance is mentioned, and the UK/.ers smugly point out they have no problems, only the US has to worry about it.
So, in the end, whichever country you're living in, there are people whose only interest in technology is using it to keep an eye on you. Which makes some of the more extreme reactions that came up in the CCTV thread ("Thank God I don't live there" and "It's not a country, it's one huge jail") rather daft, as it's not a case of surveillance in one place and no surveillance in the other.
It's surveillance in one place and another type of surveillance in the other. Be watched in one place or be listened to in the other.
It's interesting to note that when CCTV cameras in public places in the UK were mentioned on/. the other day, there was an immediate outcry from US people about "Invasion of privacy" and "Thank God the authorities here can't spy on me when I'm outside!"
And then when VoIP gets mentioned, it has to be pointed out that it's being stalled in the US by the authorities complaining that it'll make it harder to spy on people who are in their own homes.
Couldn't you have just stopped the girls yourself? I mean, really... You witnessed the incident? Just stop them; if they won't tell you who they are -- then hold them until police arrive.
Do that, and they'll probably claim you sexually harassed them and get YOU arrested..
It's a 5m long pointy stick for jabbing at theon/off button - yay!!!
No, no, no!
It's THREE 5m long point sticks for jabbing at the Ctrl, Alt, and Del keys:o)
it's in their interest to have their songs played in a context where a) large numbers of people can hear them, and b) if their song isn't playing, someone else's would be.
Neither of these applies to individual downloads.
No, but what DOES apply is that it's to their benefit to make some money out of people getting their music from P2P rather than getting nothing but lawyers' bills.
Nothing they can do will prevent people from sharing files over the Internet. The sooner they stop trying to turn back the clock and learn to embrace new technology instead, the happier we'll all be: We'll have more music available, they'll be making money from a new market (and spending less on lawsuits).
Everybody wins. They just haven't realised it yet.
What does GPLing their software have to do with it? There's nothing to stop them releasing a Linux version of Office that's every bit as closed as the Windows version.
After so many "OSS is bad!" releases from MS, there's no way they could backtrack and open their own code with any credibility. But that doesn't prevent them releasing closed software for Linux if they decided they wanted to, surely?
Well, that narrows it right down. I should have no trouble fixing it now. Thanks for your help.
If you'd been looking at your processes before you would have noticed multiple entries for Firefox (or Mozilla, or whatver) all along
I had been. There weren't. It's a brand new problem. So is the loss of ability to control it from the CLI. Worked fine with 9.1, doesn't want to know with 10.
And, anyway, Firefox is not distributed with Slackware.
Yeah... I know. That's why I had to downlaod it myself. And the relevance of this is..?
I installed Slack 9.1 and loved it. Blisteringly fast, all the applications I fondly remembered from my University's Unix system, and no annoying "Let me do that for you!" software.
And then I uprgaded it to 10, as per the instructions. And it's suddenly slowed down.
It takes way longer to boot, and longer to load applications when they're opened for the first time. After that first time, it's fine, as Slack only uses about 30MB of RAM and I have 500 for it to use for buffering & caching.
I've checked the hdparm settings, they're all fine. I'm not running any services I wasn't before. Why has it become so slow?
And the other niggle is, Firefox doesn't work properly any more either - when I open it, it shows multiple copies of the process running in a ps, and I can't make it go Back or Forward from the command line any more. I even tried upgrading firefox without success.
Any suggestions on fixing these..?
Same goes for me - not really used the newsgroup, but have nothing but good things to say about the Slack crowd on linuxquestions.org
With the possible exception of people who ask "How do I get the scrollwheel to work on my mouse", anyway...:o)
Slashdot Mirror
But I haven't got a laserdisc player...
No.
For example, every medical product sold in America & the UK has been cleared by the very stringent government regulations. People are still able to sue if they have an adverse reaction to those same products.
So the fact that SOME of the source code has been LOOKED at by the government won't offer the slightest defence against lawsuits. If "The government says its okay" was a valid escape clause, lawsuits would probably be halved at a stroke.
Give me a CD RW any day!
Beats me. When did I say it was contradictory?
In fact, I said it was a case of "Six of one, half a dozen of the other" - that's a way of saying "The same, but different."
i.e. When one type of surveillance is mentioned, the US /.ers smugly point out they have no problems, only the UK has to worry about it.
Shortly after, another form of surveillance is mentioned, and the UK /.ers smugly point out they have no problems, only the US has to worry about it.
So, in the end, whichever country you're living in, there are people whose only interest in technology is using it to keep an eye on you. Which makes some of the more extreme reactions that came up in the CCTV thread ("Thank God I don't live there" and "It's not a country, it's one huge jail") rather daft, as it's not a case of surveillance in one place and no surveillance in the other.
It's surveillance in one place and another type of surveillance in the other. Be watched in one place or be listened to in the other.
You pays your money and takes your choice. . .
It's interesting to note that when CCTV cameras in public places in the UK were mentioned on /. the other day, there was an immediate outcry from US people about "Invasion of privacy" and "Thank God the authorities here can't spy on me when I'm outside!"
And then when VoIP gets mentioned, it has to be pointed out that it's being stalled in the US by the authorities complaining that it'll make it harder to spy on people who are in their own homes.
Six of one and half a dozen of the other. . ?
Great... As if contact lenses weren't bad enough, we'll soon be on hands & knees searching the carpet for somebody's Very Compact Disc collection
Do that, and they'll probably claim you sexually harassed them and get YOU arrested..
Nope - 2012. December. The 21st, I believe... so big savings on Xmas presents :o)
It's a 5m long pointy stick for jabbing at theon/off button - yay!!! No, no, no! It's THREE 5m long point sticks for jabbing at the Ctrl, Alt, and Del keys :o)
Yay Roger Waters :o)
So... MS is spending millions of dollars on finding faults with Linux and explaining why MS is better than Linux.
So, people all over the world who think that Windows is the only OS there is will be finding out that there's a convincing alternative.
Coders who think their software works fine will be reading MS's reports about what bugs it's got.
So MS is, in fact, spending millions on giving Linux free publicity and debugging its software.
This is supposed to kill Linux... how, exactly?
Neither of these applies to individual downloads.
No, but what DOES apply is that it's to their benefit to make some money out of people getting their music from P2P rather than getting nothing but lawyers' bills.
Nothing they can do will prevent people from sharing files over the Internet. The sooner they stop trying to turn back the clock and learn to embrace new technology instead, the happier we'll all be: We'll have more music available, they'll be making money from a new market (and spending less on lawsuits).
Everybody wins. They just haven't realised it yet.
What does GPLing their software have to do with it? There's nothing to stop them releasing a Linux version of Office that's every bit as closed as the Windows version.
After so many "OSS is bad!" releases from MS, there's no way they could backtrack and open their own code with any credibility. But that doesn't prevent them releasing closed software for Linux if they decided they wanted to, surely?
I don't know about ALL Nvidia owners - I think I'm going to have to upgrade my Geforce MX400, for instance :o)
I'd guess you botched the update.
Well, that narrows it right down. I should have no trouble fixing it now. Thanks for your help.
If you'd been looking at your processes before you would have noticed multiple entries for Firefox (or Mozilla, or whatver) all along
I had been. There weren't. It's a brand new problem. So is the loss of ability to control it from the CLI. Worked fine with 9.1, doesn't want to know with 10.
And, anyway, Firefox is not distributed with Slackware.
Yeah... I know. That's why I had to downlaod it myself. And the relevance of this is..?
I installed Slack 9.1 and loved it. Blisteringly fast, all the applications I fondly remembered from my University's Unix system, and no annoying "Let me do that for you!" software. And then I uprgaded it to 10, as per the instructions. And it's suddenly slowed down. It takes way longer to boot, and longer to load applications when they're opened for the first time. After that first time, it's fine, as Slack only uses about 30MB of RAM and I have 500 for it to use for buffering & caching. I've checked the hdparm settings, they're all fine. I'm not running any services I wasn't before. Why has it become so slow? And the other niggle is, Firefox doesn't work properly any more either - when I open it, it shows multiple copies of the process running in a ps, and I can't make it go Back or Forward from the command line any more. I even tried upgrading firefox without success. Any suggestions on fixing these..?
Same goes for me - not really used the newsgroup, but have nothing but good things to say about the Slack crowd on linuxquestions.org With the possible exception of people who ask "How do I get the scrollwheel to work on my mouse", anyway... :o)
Indeed, animal testing is a dreadful idea. They get all nervous and give the wrong answers.