I dont' think we're talking about the same device here.
Ok, let's see, on my iPod, firstly the music is stored in a hidden folder "iPod_Control". Sure, readers of Slashdot can find hidden folders, but it's not something the proverbial grandma user could find.
Then we descend into this "iPod_Control" directory. Then into "Music". Let's see...
I have a whole bunch of folders named F00 through to F49. And a whole bunch of dotfiles, named._F00 through to._F49. And they're binary files - from memory, they're what, SQLite files?
Anyhow, inside each of those folders, we have files with random names like "FMXZ.m4a", or "NIXT.m4a". Remind me again how exactly those are "intelligible"?
And of course, those folders don't correspond to albums, or anything like this, of course not, that would be far too intuitive. Instead, if you check the ID3 tags for each of those files, you'll find it's just a fairly random assortment in each folder.
Now, I know from a backend POV, there might well be performance reasons for doing it this way, I'm sure. However, Apple's also taken clear steps to make sure user's don't access their music files directly. Some of it may be some deep-seated phobia that "OH NOES! People can copy music off their iPod!!", while the other part might be they just want to lock you into their ecosystem, and use iTunes.
And if you try and drag a music file to the iPod_Control/Music directory, will it suddenly work? Nope, sorry, you need to use iTunes, or one of the other apps that can write to the iTunes database. Oh, and incidentally, the format of that seems to randomly change at Apple's whim, often just to break compatability with third party applications.
I'm not exactly how you can explain this as "intelligible", or being "easy to navigate". Unless you happen to have a didatic memory, and have memorised your iPod filesystem hierarchy - and can psychically read ID3 tags using your mind, and rearrange them into views in your head.
I wasn't there were plasmid upgrades available for that yet.
Err, when you're depending on afore-said vendors to provide mission-critical systems, and they sold you their systems on the basis of being more secure...yeah, you do have that right to demand that.
And for the record, it was 60 days, which is plenty of time.
Google already had their hand burnt with Microsoft's buggy and security-hopeless software in the China hacking debacle, I'm assuming they didn't particularly want to get shafted and publicly humiliated again for using buggy Microsoft software.
While I agree that things are a lot more cross-platform/inoperable these days, it's still not a 1:1 switch.
Sure, you have Linux distros that try to clone Windows, but these are often still dismal failures.
Ultimately, all the major strengths of Linux - the console, the file-system hierarchy, the security model, the "lots-of-little-tools-joined-together" approach, scripting, package repositories etc. get lost if you try to emulate Windows too much.
Yes, UI is awesome, I'll grant you. I've owned many iPods.
However, the way you get music on is a royal PITA. I mean, seriously, you have a closed, proprietary system, with strangely named files/folders.
The only way to get software on is via iTunes, a slow, unsightly behemoth of a program, that runs like molasses on any platform other than OSX. And even there, on its native platform, it's not exactly greased lightning.
And how exactly do you backup your music easily, or get music off the player, huh?
You compare that to something like a Blackberry, or the Android phones (I own both), where you just drag/drop music to anywhere on there. You can also get music off easily. And it reuses the good old file/directory paradigm, so to say, delete a song, you just browse to that song, and...er....delete it? Lol.
And if you want to manage your music, you're still free to use something like Songbird, or Amarok, or heck even iTunes to search/manage your files. See, you have that freedom. Something that isn't possible with the piece of c*ap that Apple calls iPod music management. Pretty much all music players are moving to the dumb "dump files on the disk" approach - except for those like Apple that are still desperately hanging onto their proprietary locked-in approach.
Actually, another thing might be the general shonky level of hardware...lol...
And it's not "bad" publicity on battery life. It's a known problem. I assume here you mean the Nexus One, Google's flagship Android phone.
As are the issues with touchscreen going out of calibration, and the 3G reception issues.
And the Motorola Droid has had it's series of hardware issues/quirks.
I've gone through two Nexuses - first one had an issue with the camera failing. The second, the GPS radio seems to have failed. And HTC support is a nightmare to deal with, and Google is surprisingly unhelpful. Say what you will about Apple about shonky closed gardens and price gouging, but at least their support is usually good, and they'll bend over backwards to help you (sister has Macbooks, I've had iPods).
Actually, I was replying to "bigtummy". Unless you two happen to be the same person, with two accounts?
But back to your original point - as I said in reply to you up above, my contention wasn't with your english per se. As I readily admitted up there, I'm sure if I tried to argue with you in mandarin, it would come out quite broken. My main point was that your arguments were lacklustre, and seriously lacking in any sort of solid evidence.
Your main point, that somehow China was focusing on "fighting poverty and hunger", instead of democracy was completely backwards.
Firstly, it actually costs the Chinese government more money to try to censor the internet, cover up things like Tibet and Tianamen square, and try to mislead it's own people. All of these are resources that, by your very own admission, should be better spent on say, fighting poverty or given to poor rural Chinese. Not to mention that I still fail to see the link from how a Chinese person viewing a picture of a tank running over a Chinese student will cause them to suddently be poor, or suffer from hunger? You're going to have to explain exactly how that part works.
Secondly, the Chinese government has shown little concern in the way of social equality or justice. Economic growth, yes, absolutely, but economic development or equalising the disparity between the rich and poor seems to run a distant second. Actually, make that third, or maybe fourth, behind a whole bunch of other issues, like maintaining the status quo, and quashing dissent.
So as you can see, my issue isn't with your English, per se, it's mostly with your poor and faulty arguments.
Back to the topic of English - you also seem a bit presumption. Hmm, I don't know how exactly you'd establish whether my Chinese is as good as your English? Is that something that's even comparable? *shrugs* And do you mean my mandarin or my cantonese? I speak and write both, but I wouldn't profess to be comfortable in either, to be honest. But either way, you make an assumption like that without providing any sort of backing. And you're also using a bit of a straw-man argument here.
You're distracting from the main point, which is that your whole "China is focusing on fighting poverty, so it can't be bothered with democracy" argument is completely and utterly flawed.
Hmm, you realise that your broken English and silly insults are a dead giveaway that you're a Chinese troll? Lol.
I mean, "a shameless company eating back its own poop". Look, I understand that some things just don't translate well, and I'm sure if I tried to insult you in mandarin, I'd sound like a five-year-old, but do you realise how silly that sounds? Not because of your poor English, but because you provide absolutely nothing to back your arguments up. You just spout random insults, that make absolutely no sense. That, for a fact, is cross-cultural.
And please, if Google left China, you'd have what, Baidu? Sorry, but I have a lot more faith in the engineering prowess and R&D of Google and their search algorithms. You compare Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook with say, the home-grown clones that have sprung up on the mainland. Because that's essentially what they are - clones. They usually try and copy, pixel for pixel, the look and feel of what they're cloning, yet their functionality is usually sub-par.
Case in point, look at Doit.IM. I thought it was a pretty cool program, until I realised it was a blatant ripoff of Things, another GTD program:
[quote]Update: Reader BrianC400 notifies us in the comment that this app seems like a ripoff of Things. Since Doit.im is developed by some Chinese developers(who have history of ripping off stuffs), surprisingly it seems 80% similar to Things. Anyways, the good thing is that Doit.im is cross-platform and free while Things cost $49.95 and is for Mac OS X only.[/quote]
Haha, gosh, another Chinese Communist Party Lackey *grins*. They're probably paying you what, 10 yuan a day to post here? I jest.
Seriously though, I'm not sure where this ideas above it's station idea comes form? Weird. Reads like some weird Confucianistic moral tale about how people shouldn't be aspirational and should stick to their caste or something. We left those ideas behind what, a thousand years ago?
Anyhow, Google actually does a lot of good - far more than any other tech company, and in fact, far more than any company in many industries, full-stop. They've contributed consistently to the open-source community, and they've consistently been quite transparent in how they operate. They've even publically admitted being wrong on quite a few occasions - e.g. how they handled the Wifi debacle. They're not perfect, as aforesaid debacle shows, but I'd pretty sure they can take the moral high ground here against the CCP. Oh, and they've been *very* consistent from the beginning about how they feel about the free flow of information.
I'd hazard a guess that they might have contributed more to the good of society than either you or I, my friend. When death comes to claim you or I, I'm not sure whether we'd make a bigger footnote in history than Google, sad as that sounds. *shrugs*.
And interesting you should mention phishing. Man, if I had a nickel for every time some Chinese mainland idiot tried to phish or con me, I'd be richer than Ellisson, lol. I mean, take a case in point, look at this idiot, yaocard, from the mainland who tried to pass off fake 2Gb MicroSD cards as 32Gb.
Right, and after I confronted them about their fraud, they first tried to bribe me for USD10 to remove their negative feedback, and then said God would bless my family many times if I removed it. It's actually kind of comical, their attempts at fraud/lying.
And China has standards? Please. I assume here you're referring to how the government in China operates. There's a distinction there to Chinese culture which I have a lot of respect for because...err...I'm Chinese? Haha. The government twists the standards how it sees fit. Unless things have changed since I've been back, they're woefully corrupt, hopelessly bureaucratic, and will engage in thuggish/bullying behaviour to make you comply with whatever serves the official you're currently dealing with.. Hardly the hallmarks of a transparent government that only cares for the wellbeing of its people.
The US Geological Survey team found the mineral deposits, and it's been widely reported in the press. Do you really think, the Afghanistan government is going to sit by and let the US take it? How naive are you? *sigh*. Everybody's eyes are on how the situation will play out. If this was some grand conspiracy, do you really think they'd advertise to the world, oh gee, look, we found mineral deposits?
The Afghanistan government isn't exactly in bed with the US administration - they have their differences, and they've certainly never been afraid to express those.
You're nearly as bad as those idiots who think the Iraq war was for oil. Urgh, I don't get it, don't they teach logic or reasoning in US schools anymore?
They spent hundreds of *billions* on the war. They're *never* going to recoup that on oil. A fifth-grader, at least in my country, could tell you that if you spend $10 to get $2, you're an idiot. That, and the Iraq government already has dibbs on it. Last time I checked, it was a democracy in Iraq - they're not in bed with the US, and there's been quite open disagreements between the US and Iraq's new government. They're not just going to hand it over to us.
And then look at Afghanistan. So what, NATO is part of this grand conspiracy to get Afghanistan's minerals? Please. The whole world knows about the mineral deposits now, and everybody's eyes are on it. I somehow doubt the US, as mighty as it's military might be, can somehow smuggle out a trillion dollars of mineral deposits out of the country. And the Afghanistan government certainly isn't goign to hand it over.
You conspiracy theory nutjobs are really ridiculous. It's nearly as bad as those idiots who think the World Trade Centre was an inside job. Urgh.
The first seems to be simple application of the Darwin-award. It's like Princess Diana, and how she apparently wasn't wearing a seatbelt. Look, boo-hoo, Princess of the People, and all, but seriously, you get into a high-speed car chase and you forget to wear a seatbelt? People that don't wear seat-belts are retarded. And I've not worn my seatbelt before - sometimes I've been rushed and it takes me a minute or so before I realise I forgot, or I was on my parent's property, and driving around in the truck.
In either of those two cases, if something happened, I'd hope I'd be man enough to say, "gee, that was stupid. I forgot to put it on. I deserve what's coming". See, personal responsibility, seems to be a dirty word these days.
Your second case - err, why it may not be your fault, in Sydney, it'd be like intentionally walking around in say Blacktown, or Parramatta (two not so good suburbs) in the middle of the night, with say, decent clothes on. You're just asking for trouble. And the police will have little sympathy for you if you get mugged, and don't really have a reason to be there.
Once, I was in Redfern (another not-so-decent neighbourhood, or it was before), taking street photographs on my SLR, and interviewing the locals. Unmarked police car came up to me, and two cops said, "Mate, we don't want you to be here. We don't want you coming up to the station in ten minutes with a broken nose. Get out of here.". They were a bit tactless, but I do see their point.
And your third example, this is a pet hate. If you illegally park, and your car gets damaged, suck it up. Seriously, I hate people who illegally park. They do it in shopping centres in Australia all the time. It shows a general selfishness, and disregard for other people - it's like, stuff you, I'm really important, so I'm just going to park here because I feel like it. If you car gets damaged, the police won't give a toss, and I doubt insurance will cover you either.
Your argument seems to be that there are bigger fish to fry in China - namely poverty, hunger etc. I'd probably add things like the growing male-female ratio, the general spoit-ness of many of China's one-child-policy children ("Little Emperors"), pollution and rampant degradation of the environment, and a accepted culture of greed and corruption.
And sure, those are bigger issues.
So why exactly is the Chinese government scared that people will say, find search results on Tienanmen Square? Or on Tibet? You realise it's expending a not-inconsequential amount of money and resources into hiding these things from it's people.
You say:
However, they are not the most important issues in China now. In order to fix that, we have to fix poor and hunger now.
So why are they *wasting* more effort into trying to fool their own people? Why not just let the internet be free, which would require less effort, and free up resources for other things? Why waste effort trying to be dishonest? Sorry, but your arguments don't appear to be very coherent or well thought out.
Ok, from your nickname and your English, as well as the slant of your comment, I'm going to take a stab that you're Chinese? You've definitely drunked their kool-aid there.
As another commenter noted, I fail to see how the Chinese government needs to censor and hide things (like say, the Tianamment massacre) from it's own people to help solve poverty and hunger? It takes more effort to do lie and mislead people - effort that could be better redirected to other things.
You claim that they're focused on fixing those things right now. Actually, no, they're not, the CCP couldn't give a flying f*ck what the poor-rich divide is, or what China's Gini coefficient is. Or what long term social impacts say it's, one-child policy is having. They're just interested in maintaining their own power-base. You can argue that Western countries are similar, but I'd have to say, the fact that we value transparency and try to keep our politican accountable definitely goes some way to mitigating that.
You realise that trying to lie and mislead your own public *takes more effort*. By you're own logic, they're wasting efforts trying to fight an arms race here against their own people, simply so that they can save face - when they should be redirecting that money into say, poverty and hunger, like you claim.
And it's well-proven that things like democracy, and free speech lead to better outcomes in the future. If say, the government is corrupt, or they're not doing enough to fight poverty, I can come out here and say it, and make noise. In China, well, I'm pretty sure I'd find myself threatened by a couple of Communist party thugs quite quickly, and maybe they'd try to beat me around a bit.
The Chinese government always tries to say "Oh noes!, You don't understand Chinese culture! You don't understand our people!" They like being oppressed and mislead to. It's like Jackie Chan, and his immature comment that the Chinese people "need to be controlled", as if they're like little children (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/18/jackie-chan-chinese-peopl_n_188541.html).
As a Chinese person, I find that offensive. Now, I know people in the mainland have been sucked in by the hype, and they're happy to not rock the boat as long as the riches keep flowing. It's probably that, and a combination of old-fashioned Confucianism. But at the end of the day, the truth will hit them.
As a sidenote, look at Japan. Sure, there's corruption there, I'm sure, as in any other places. But they subscribe to Confucianism, and the whole deference to power-structures, much as we do. Yet they seem to mix it in with good mix of honour and good conduct (even if some of that is purely cursory, or superficial). You compare that to the rampant greed, corruption and end-justifies-the-means that seems to run rampant back home, and it's quite saddening. Hopefully, as the society improves, that will change.
I'm Chinese (but not from the mainland), but I deal a lot with mainlanders - friends, uni, colleagues etc, my father's businesses etc.
The thing is, they've bought into the kool-aid over there. A lot of them *know* it's censored, but they don't want to rock the boat. And culturally, they're heavily money-centric. So since things are going well, in terms of growing monetary power, they don't really care that they're being censored, or oppressed or whatever (unless of course you're some outlawed political group, or Tibetian, or Falun Gong etc., I suppose). As long as the money keeps flowing, they'll suck it up. So as a people, I have little sympathy for them in terms of censorship, and all when they're essentially complicit in it.
Anyhow, we'll see what happens down the track. Maybe they will open up, but I doubt the current CCP will go down without a fight. Personally, I see more issues with things like the growing sex-ratio imbalance, aging population, pollution problems and rising unemployment/inflation. If those things are enough to convince people that the money will stop, maybe then they'll decided to pipe up.
Look, I don't think the parent means you deserve it, in some grand-cosmic karma scheme or something.
I think what he's referring to is that, well, you have to take responsibility for securing your belongings.
It's simple common-sense. In Australia, if I leave my car unlocked in a car-park, and then come back to find my stuff inside gone, if I go to the police and report it, I doubt they'll have a lot of sympathy for me. They'll probably write me off as an idiot - and rightly so. Everybody makes mistakes, but sometimes *touch wood* you have to take responsibiltiy for them.
So while the story about your wife and you being burglarised is sad - ultimately you're adults, you have to take responsibility for your own mistakes. In this case, it was forgetting to lock the doors. That's not to say theft isn't wrong, but I think it's sad how people today don't seem to want to take responsibility for themselves.
It's like those kids who come out crying, boo-hoo, I'm pregnant, my life is ruined, blah blah blah. Well, whoop-de-doo, you chose to have intercourse, who's fault is that? And you chose to do it without using contraception, even smarter. Idiots.
And you sir, must be an Anonynous Coward...oh wait...you are...
Look, you may or may not have had respect for the last Administration. But this guy decided to leave his family, go over there, and serve his country. He was fighting the Taliban, the same folks who harboured Osama, who err, let's see, bombed the World Trade Centre? I'm Australian, but last time I checked, that incident killed quite a few of you folk.
Look, I know it's hip and trendy for us to sit here comfortably in our offices, and our homes, with air-conditioning, decent food, and nice suits, whilst people on the other side of the world are risking their lives, but seriously mate, get some class...
I think the coward label is most apt here.
Also, corporate apologist? What the heck has that got to do with anything? *sigh* You American left-wing nutjobs really amuse me. You try to see a conspiracy in everything. Is Verizon in cohorts with the Taliban? Or are they in cohorts with Haliburton? Or I don't know, is somebody in cohorts with someobdy else? And where did the Republican tag come from?
And military bootlicker, please...He was just a kid who went over there to defend his country? It's all very well and good to talk down the military while you're sitting comfortably, in your anonymity there, but I'd like you to go up to a war-widom and say that to her face. She'd probably break you into little pieces and make you weep like a little boy....now that'd be a sight..
Err, I've worked some pretty "low-end" jobs. I've done various retail stints for a few years, and I actually still work at a local pool on the weekends now, teaching little kids how to swim. The pay there is terrible, but the work is actually pretty fun.
However, I have to agree with the parent - people who are stuck in low-end retails jobs, year after year, are often there because they're got no other choice. (I'm not talking high-school or college kids getting extra allowance on the side here - I mean people past this). These people don't *want* to be there. Which means they're often either unskilled, uneducated, illegal immigrants, or just plain unlucky etc.
I didn't mind the work when I was there (and I still wouldn't, I hope), and the people were nice. However, the older people who were stuck there, well, often they didn't want to be there, and they certainly don't put a lot of passion into their work. If you were driven, you tended to move on after a while.
Also, to the people making wisecracks about investment bank's above...geez. I work for an IB now, and they're actually pretty nice people ok *grins*. Seriously. Anyhow, it's just a job, and all this c*ap about "thieves", I think it's quite unfair - sure, there's bad apples, but I'm sure that's true about any industry.
Ironically, I get strange looks from one of my friends parents when they find out I still work my old job at the pool. you can't win...
Look, full-disclosure has already been proven to be the method that works. Security through obscurity does not. Because what you're essentially saying here is "shhh....there's a flaw, but let's hope we're the only guys in the world that know about it"....oh please...how naive you are.
Google has already been burnt just recently by Microsoft's shonky security. So in this case, they were probably thinking, gee, whiz, we're about to get hit again...
Because chances are, if Ormandy found it, somebody else probably did as well. I mean, there's people *actively* look for these bugs, and hoping to malicious exploit them. At least this way, people know about it, and can protect themselves - either by shutting down the affected service under Microsoft gets out a patch, or at least staying sharp (e.g. checking logs) for anything that exploits it.
Doesn't the fact this exploit was found actually prove the point, that full-disclosure works? I gurantee you, the clowns at Sophos probably wouldn't have found this, without the heads-up from Ormandy on the issue.
Gosh, I love it how people here love to applaud Microsoft on their *spectacular* security record, and demonise all those who would dare to challenge that.
Please, Google already got bitten with Microsoft's shonky products and poor security in the past, my guess is that Google/Ormandy felt that they were already at risk from this exploit from malicious people in the wild, so they might as well get it out there, so that at least people could be aware of it. It's a public service, for crying out loud.
Remember, just because Ormandy was the first to publicise the exploit, certainly doesn't mean that he was the first to find it. In fact, statistically, the odds are stacked quite against that. Look, full-disclosure has already been proven to be the method that works. And shonky vendors, who are too lazy to look after their users will try and demonise full-disclosure all they like, but at the end of the day, it just looks like them covering their behinds.
You can come out and be a stupid little prat and insult Ormandy all you want, but at the end of the day, you've done...err...squat? I don't remember seeing any security disclosures published by "hairyfeet". Compare to him, and other security researches, I have a feeling both you and I know squat all. I certainly couldn't have found the exploit, even if I was looking.
At least this way, people *know* about the exploit, and it's visible. Better the devil you know, than the one you don't, and all that. Look, if your computer got hit with a drive-by-exploit, and you *didn't* know about about it, are you honestly telling me you'd be happier? You should be thanking security researchers like this, who shine a light on the swiss cheese that is Microsoft's security (yes, this is Windows XP, so perhaps things have improved. I'm not in a position to comment).
Whilst I think the parent needs to learn some rudimentary English skills, and he does come across as a potty-mouth, low-class redneck, I think he does make one good point.
Americans (and I'm sure most Australians) have only themselves to blame. They're not prepared to pay more for locally made goods. Whether you think that's a good thing or a bad thing is moot, the fact remains, people just aren't prepared to put their money where their mouth is.
And the unions are kind of worsening the problem. Like it or not, either you pay them less, or the jobs go overseas. Whether you'd rather that happens, well, that's your call. But at the end of the day, you are shooting yourselves in the foot, sorry.
Btw, to the parent - look, I'm fairly sure you're educated. I mean, you're on Slashdot, so obviously you can use a computer and type whole sentences. But you really should try not to sound like such a disgusting, expletive-spouting uneducated imbecile. You're educated, please try and show it. This isn't a pissing contest, you don't garner any points for sounding like a immature little schoolboy who's trying to prove how "tuff" and all he is by using lots of swear words and bad sentence structure.
The early 9.X releases were dogged by constant crashes in Plasma.
That as well as serious issues with Intel display drivers (I experienced these first-hand, as I have a Lenovo X200 tablet, and before that a Fujitsu T4215, both with Intel graphics).
I also heard that there were issues with the Nvidia display drivers, but I didn't experience these first-hand, as I don't have any Nvidia systems.
Perhaps you're very blessed, or maybe you just don't tweak/use systems to the extend that I or other users do. Either way, I encourage you to read this on Ubuntu's own forums:
I mean, seriously, it's like everybody in Ubuntu/Kubuntu's community either hates KDE and thinks Kubuntu shouldn't exist, or just doesn't think Kubuntu is worth using anymore...*sigh*. It's really sad to see.
Lol, I don't think you've actually proven anything there.
Yes, people criticise every OS release, but the funny thing about the Kubuntu criticism is that:
1. It's dogged it from release to release - from the 6.X days, right through to the current 10.X days. You compare that against the criticism from say, Vista to Windows 7, or say, OSX 10.0 to 10.6, or heck, ironically, even KDE 4.0 to 4.4/4.5. Kubuntu has sucked, I regret to say, from day 1, right through to today, and unless Canonical suddently decideds to devote more resources to it, will continue to. 2. Everybody seems to be claiming the same things - it's not their little pet peeves, like how "Windows XP looks plasticky", or "it runs slow on my ". There are a number of persistent bugs that have dogged it - now, some of there were hardware driver related, but there were consistent show-stopping bugs (i.e. would not even boot) dogging the entire 9.04 and 9.10 releases (alpha, beta and right through to RC). Showstopping bugs in a RC does not bode well. 3. Even the Kubuntu developers themselves know they're under-resourced.
And if you need further confirmation, here it is straight from the horse's mouth. Ubuntu forums:
Gee, the top voted options were "Yes, Canonical should devote more developers/time and resources to Kubuntu.", or "No, Gnome is and should be Canonical's focus."
And coming in third was "Definitely, Kubuntu isn't living up to its potential.".
Coming in fourth, "No, there's simply not enough resources to go around and Gnome deserves priority."
And all the way down in position five was "No, I like Kubuntu the way it is and/or am not significantly affected by bugs or usability issues.", at a pathetic 5% of votes.
I think that pretty much sums up the sentiment of the Ubuntu/Kubuntu community - either they don't care about KDE, or don't think any effort should be given to Kubuntu, or they've basically written off Kubuntu as simply not a KDE distribution of choice.
Hmm, I really hope you know what you're talking about, and aren't just talking out of your rear-end...lol. Have you actually tried to use Kubuntu, then tried a different KDE 4.x distro and compared them?
I've been a KDE fan since the 3.5 days, and a Ubuntu fan from around those days as well. So it was a natural progression to use Kubuntu. I've basically tried every Kubuntu release since 7.04, until around 9.10, when I basically gave up on it. The 8.x branch, from memory, was particularly patchy for me. I've also tried openSUSE for some time, and spent a bit of time with Fedora. Of these, Arch Linux, either with it's stock KDE packages or KDEmod has been the best, and Kubuntu by far has been the worst.
And I'm not sure what you mean by "in the same place", but they most certainly aren't the vanilla KDE packages - part of the whole point of Ubuntu is they add their own patches to the vanilla packages.
Look, if you don't believe me, take a look at these two articles, and in particular the comments on them:
"Kubuntu has always been a little unstable in my experience - even with KDE3, but since the switch to KDE4 it's been nearly unusable. openSUSE and Mandriva, for example, have the resources to work through a lot of the issues that have come up with KDE4, and I think on a whole both have done a great job. Kubuntu seems at a disadvantage, and I can't imagine recommending it to anyone as a good distro to showcase KDE or even linux. It's just too buggy and frustrating. I have a lot of respect for the Kubuntu developers and their efforts, but they have a steep hill to climb."
Or this one:
"That's an appropriate comparison. I have to use Ubuntu at work and it's as if they go out of their way to damage KDE, so that people will get so disgusted with it that they'll switch to Gnome.
The problem with Kubuntu is not that it's being intentionally broken - it's just their shortage of resources. Blaming Kubuntu is stupid, because it's only so much a few guys can do.
It's a shame, really. It would be in KDE upstreams best interest to see that Kubuntu works well, because that's the distro they are going to get the majority of the users from. If you have a company policy specifying "Ubuntu", that's what you are going to use - and install kubuntu-desktop metapackage to get the kde environment."
or this one:
"Your attitude towards Kubuntu might be unfriendly, but it is kind-of deserved imho. Esp if you're a translator I can understand the frustration. I know and respect the two KDE-canonical employees (Aurelien and Riddell) but agree that Ubuntu puts less work in Kubuntu as it's user base would justify."
And there are more. As you can see, my views on Kubuntu's lack of polish is a fairly common one. Perhaps it's improved as of Lucid, I'm not sure. But the one time I did try the Lucid (Beta, mind you) Kubuntu live Cd, it refused to boot (IBM Lenovo X200 Tablet), and when I tried a later RC, it was horrible and broken (particularly plasma).
You know, I'm curious how many of the people complaining about bugginess and memory issues are running say, Kubuntu?
I'm on Arch Linux, and the KDE 4.x branch has been quite stable for me - the odd crash here and there, e.g. of Konsole, particularly early on, but nothing that really blew up the whole desktop.
And it's performed very well on my desktop, much more snappy/responsive than Gnome.
There's a lot of distributions that have done terribly, half-done jobs of packaging KDE. Kubuntu is a prime examble, seriously it's an absolute joke how terrible they've done. Last I heard, apparently it was because Kubuntu only had a single guy or something? That might just be a rumour, but I seriously think Canonical should just shelve the Kubuntu branch, instead of giving KDE a bad name.
Arch has been stable for me, and openSUSE was quite good for KDE as well. Don't know about other distributions, but I've heard that outside of those two, the rest are pretty much a joke - they just do a bad job of packaging KDE, or adding their own half-done patches, and pushing out low-quality KDE desktops.
Slashdot Mirror
heya,
I dont' think we're talking about the same device here.
Ok, let's see, on my iPod, firstly the music is stored in a hidden folder "iPod_Control". Sure, readers of Slashdot can find hidden folders, but it's not something the proverbial grandma user could find.
Then we descend into this "iPod_Control" directory. Then into "Music". Let's see...
I have a whole bunch of folders named F00 through to F49. And a whole bunch of dotfiles, named ._F00 through to ._F49. And they're binary files - from memory, they're what, SQLite files?
Anyhow, inside each of those folders, we have files with random names like "FMXZ.m4a", or "NIXT.m4a". Remind me again how exactly those are "intelligible"?
And of course, those folders don't correspond to albums, or anything like this, of course not, that would be far too intuitive. Instead, if you check the ID3 tags for each of those files, you'll find it's just a fairly random assortment in each folder.
Now, I know from a backend POV, there might well be performance reasons for doing it this way, I'm sure. However, Apple's also taken clear steps to make sure user's don't access their music files directly. Some of it may be some deep-seated phobia that "OH NOES! People can copy music off their iPod!!", while the other part might be they just want to lock you into their ecosystem, and use iTunes.
And if you try and drag a music file to the iPod_Control/Music directory, will it suddenly work? Nope, sorry, you need to use iTunes, or one of the other apps that can write to the iTunes database. Oh, and incidentally, the format of that seems to randomly change at Apple's whim, often just to break compatability with third party applications.
I'm not exactly how you can explain this as "intelligible", or being "easy to navigate". Unless you happen to have a didatic memory, and have memorised your iPod filesystem hierarchy - and can psychically read ID3 tags using your mind, and rearrange them into views in your head.
I wasn't there were plasmid upgrades available for that yet.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Err, when you're depending on afore-said vendors to provide mission-critical systems, and they sold you their systems on the basis of being more secure...yeah, you do have that right to demand that.
And for the record, it was 60 days, which is plenty of time.
Google already had their hand burnt with Microsoft's buggy and security-hopeless software in the China hacking debacle, I'm assuming they didn't particularly want to get shafted and publicly humiliated again for using buggy Microsoft software.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
While I agree that things are a lot more cross-platform/inoperable these days, it's still not a 1:1 switch.
Sure, you have Linux distros that try to clone Windows, but these are often still dismal failures.
Ultimately, all the major strengths of Linux - the console, the file-system hierarchy, the security model, the "lots-of-little-tools-joined-together" approach, scripting, package repositories etc. get lost if you try to emulate Windows too much.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Yes, UI is awesome, I'll grant you. I've owned many iPods.
However, the way you get music on is a royal PITA. I mean, seriously, you have a closed, proprietary system, with strangely named files/folders.
The only way to get software on is via iTunes, a slow, unsightly behemoth of a program, that runs like molasses on any platform other than OSX. And even there, on its native platform, it's not exactly greased lightning.
And how exactly do you backup your music easily, or get music off the player, huh?
You compare that to something like a Blackberry, or the Android phones (I own both), where you just drag/drop music to anywhere on there. You can also get music off easily. And it reuses the good old file/directory paradigm, so to say, delete a song, you just browse to that song, and...er....delete it? Lol.
And if you want to manage your music, you're still free to use something like Songbird, or Amarok, or heck even iTunes to search/manage your files. See, you have that freedom. Something that isn't possible with the piece of c*ap that Apple calls iPod music management. Pretty much all music players are moving to the dumb "dump files on the disk" approach - except for those like Apple that are still desperately hanging onto their proprietary locked-in approach.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Actually, another thing might be the general shonky level of hardware...lol...
And it's not "bad" publicity on battery life. It's a known problem. I assume here you mean the Nexus One, Google's flagship Android phone.
As are the issues with touchscreen going out of calibration, and the 3G reception issues.
And the Motorola Droid has had it's series of hardware issues/quirks.
I've gone through two Nexuses - first one had an issue with the camera failing. The second, the GPS radio seems to have failed. And HTC support is a nightmare to deal with, and Google is surprisingly unhelpful. Say what you will about Apple about shonky closed gardens and price gouging, but at least their support is usually good, and they'll bend over backwards to help you (sister has Macbooks, I've had iPods).
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Actually, I was replying to "bigtummy". Unless you two happen to be the same person, with two accounts?
But back to your original point - as I said in reply to you up above, my contention wasn't with your english per se. As I readily admitted up there, I'm sure if I tried to argue with you in mandarin, it would come out quite broken. My main point was that your arguments were lacklustre, and seriously lacking in any sort of solid evidence.
Your main point, that somehow China was focusing on "fighting poverty and hunger", instead of democracy was completely backwards.
Firstly, it actually costs the Chinese government more money to try to censor the internet, cover up things like Tibet and Tianamen square, and try to mislead it's own people. All of these are resources that, by your very own admission, should be better spent on say, fighting poverty or given to poor rural Chinese. Not to mention that I still fail to see the link from how a Chinese person viewing a picture of a tank running over a Chinese student will cause them to suddently be poor, or suffer from hunger? You're going to have to explain exactly how that part works.
Secondly, the Chinese government has shown little concern in the way of social equality or justice. Economic growth, yes, absolutely, but economic development or equalising the disparity between the rich and poor seems to run a distant second. Actually, make that third, or maybe fourth, behind a whole bunch of other issues, like maintaining the status quo, and quashing dissent.
So as you can see, my issue isn't with your English, per se, it's mostly with your poor and faulty arguments.
Back to the topic of English - you also seem a bit presumption. Hmm, I don't know how exactly you'd establish whether my Chinese is as good as your English? Is that something that's even comparable? *shrugs* And do you mean my mandarin or my cantonese? I speak and write both, but I wouldn't profess to be comfortable in either, to be honest. But either way, you make an assumption like that without providing any sort of backing. And you're also using a bit of a straw-man argument here.
You're distracting from the main point, which is that your whole "China is focusing on fighting poverty, so it can't be bothered with democracy" argument is completely and utterly flawed.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Hmm, you realise that your broken English and silly insults are a dead giveaway that you're a Chinese troll? Lol.
I mean, "a shameless company eating back its own poop". Look, I understand that some things just don't translate well, and I'm sure if I tried to insult you in mandarin, I'd sound like a five-year-old, but do you realise how silly that sounds? Not because of your poor English, but because you provide absolutely nothing to back your arguments up. You just spout random insults, that make absolutely no sense. That, for a fact, is cross-cultural.
And please, if Google left China, you'd have what, Baidu? Sorry, but I have a lot more faith in the engineering prowess and R&D of Google and their search algorithms. You compare Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook with say, the home-grown clones that have sprung up on the mainland. Because that's essentially what they are - clones. They usually try and copy, pixel for pixel, the look and feel of what they're cloning, yet their functionality is usually sub-par.
Case in point, look at Doit.IM. I thought it was a pretty cool program, until I realised it was a blatant ripoff of Things, another GTD program:
https://i.doit.im/
http://culturedcode.com/things/
http://www.addictivetips.com/windows-tips/doit-im-free-awesome-software-for-task-management/
See:
[quote]Update: Reader BrianC400 notifies us in the comment that this app seems like a ripoff of Things. Since Doit.im is developed by some Chinese developers(who have history of ripping off stuffs), surprisingly it seems 80% similar to Things. Anyways, the good thing is that Doit.im is cross-platform and free while Things cost $49.95 and is for Mac OS X only.[/quote]
Or look at fanfou.com - look familiar?
http://shanghaiist.com/2009/06/03/by_june_6_all_gfwed_web_services_wi.php
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Haha, gosh, another Chinese Communist Party Lackey *grins*. They're probably paying you what, 10 yuan a day to post here? I jest.
Seriously though, I'm not sure where this ideas above it's station idea comes form? Weird. Reads like some weird Confucianistic moral tale about how people shouldn't be aspirational and should stick to their caste or something. We left those ideas behind what, a thousand years ago?
Anyhow, Google actually does a lot of good - far more than any other tech company, and in fact, far more than any company in many industries, full-stop. They've contributed consistently to the open-source community, and they've consistently been quite transparent in how they operate. They've even publically admitted being wrong on quite a few occasions - e.g. how they handled the Wifi debacle. They're not perfect, as aforesaid debacle shows, but I'd pretty sure they can take the moral high ground here against the CCP. Oh, and they've been *very* consistent from the beginning about how they feel about the free flow of information.
I'd hazard a guess that they might have contributed more to the good of society than either you or I, my friend. When death comes to claim you or I, I'm not sure whether we'd make a bigger footnote in history than Google, sad as that sounds. *shrugs*.
And interesting you should mention phishing. Man, if I had a nickel for every time some Chinese mainland idiot tried to phish or con me, I'd be richer than Ellisson, lol. I mean, take a case in point, look at this idiot, yaocard, from the mainland who tried to pass off fake 2Gb MicroSD cards as 32Gb.
http://www.toolhaus.org/cgi-bin/negs?User=yaocard&Dirn=Received+by
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=6838353&postcount=33
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=6838938&postcount=34
Right, and after I confronted them about their fraud, they first tried to bribe me for USD10 to remove their negative feedback, and then said God would bless my family many times if I removed it. It's actually kind of comical, their attempts at fraud/lying.
And China has standards? Please. I assume here you're referring to how the government in China operates. There's a distinction there to Chinese culture which I have a lot of respect for because...err...I'm Chinese? Haha. The government twists the standards how it sees fit. Unless things have changed since I've been back, they're woefully corrupt, hopelessly bureaucratic, and will engage in thuggish/bullying behaviour to make you comply with whatever serves the official you're currently dealing with.. Hardly the hallmarks of a transparent government that only cares for the wellbeing of its people.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Oh, you've got to be kidding me...haha...
Sorry, but you're the gullible idiot.
The US Geological Survey team found the mineral deposits, and it's been widely reported in the press. Do you really think, the Afghanistan government is going to sit by and let the US take it? How naive are you? *sigh*. Everybody's eyes are on how the situation will play out. If this was some grand conspiracy, do you really think they'd advertise to the world, oh gee, look, we found mineral deposits?
The Afghanistan government isn't exactly in bed with the US administration - they have their differences, and they've certainly never been afraid to express those.
You're nearly as bad as those idiots who think the Iraq war was for oil. Urgh, I don't get it, don't they teach logic or reasoning in US schools anymore?
They spent hundreds of *billions* on the war. They're *never* going to recoup that on oil. A fifth-grader, at least in my country, could tell you that if you spend $10 to get $2, you're an idiot. That, and the Iraq government already has dibbs on it. Last time I checked, it was a democracy in Iraq - they're not in bed with the US, and there's been quite open disagreements between the US and Iraq's new government. They're not just going to hand it over to us.
And then look at Afghanistan. So what, NATO is part of this grand conspiracy to get Afghanistan's minerals? Please. The whole world knows about the mineral deposits now, and everybody's eyes are on it. I somehow doubt the US, as mighty as it's military might be, can somehow smuggle out a trillion dollars of mineral deposits out of the country. And the Afghanistan government certainly isn't goign to hand it over.
You conspiracy theory nutjobs are really ridiculous. It's nearly as bad as those idiots who think the World Trade Centre was an inside job. Urgh.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Lol, can't tell if your'e being sarcastic or not.
The first seems to be simple application of the Darwin-award. It's like Princess Diana, and how she apparently wasn't wearing a seatbelt. Look, boo-hoo, Princess of the People, and all, but seriously, you get into a high-speed car chase and you forget to wear a seatbelt? People that don't wear seat-belts are retarded. And I've not worn my seatbelt before - sometimes I've been rushed and it takes me a minute or so before I realise I forgot, or I was on my parent's property, and driving around in the truck.
In either of those two cases, if something happened, I'd hope I'd be man enough to say, "gee, that was stupid. I forgot to put it on. I deserve what's coming". See, personal responsibility, seems to be a dirty word these days.
Your second case - err, why it may not be your fault, in Sydney, it'd be like intentionally walking around in say Blacktown, or Parramatta (two not so good suburbs) in the middle of the night, with say, decent clothes on. You're just asking for trouble. And the police will have little sympathy for you if you get mugged, and don't really have a reason to be there.
Once, I was in Redfern (another not-so-decent neighbourhood, or it was before), taking street photographs on my SLR, and interviewing the locals. Unmarked police car came up to me, and two cops said, "Mate, we don't want you to be here. We don't want you coming up to the station in ten minutes with a broken nose. Get out of here.". They were a bit tactless, but I do see their point.
And your third example, this is a pet hate. If you illegally park, and your car gets damaged, suck it up. Seriously, I hate people who illegally park. They do it in shopping centres in Australia all the time. It shows a general selfishness, and disregard for other people - it's like, stuff you, I'm really important, so I'm just going to park here because I feel like it. If you car gets damaged, the police won't give a toss, and I doubt insurance will cover you either.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Actually, you did imply that.
Your argument seems to be that there are bigger fish to fry in China - namely poverty, hunger etc. I'd probably add things like the growing male-female ratio, the general spoit-ness of many of China's one-child-policy children ("Little Emperors"), pollution and rampant degradation of the environment, and a accepted culture of greed and corruption.
And sure, those are bigger issues.
So why exactly is the Chinese government scared that people will say, find search results on Tienanmen Square? Or on Tibet? You realise it's expending a not-inconsequential amount of money and resources into hiding these things from it's people.
You say:
However, they are not the most important issues in China now. In order to fix that, we have to fix poor and hunger now.
So why are they *wasting* more effort into trying to fool their own people? Why not just let the internet be free, which would require less effort, and free up resources for other things? Why waste effort trying to be dishonest? Sorry, but your arguments don't appear to be very coherent or well thought out.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Ok, from your nickname and your English, as well as the slant of your comment, I'm going to take a stab that you're Chinese? You've definitely drunked their kool-aid there.
As another commenter noted, I fail to see how the Chinese government needs to censor and hide things (like say, the Tianamment massacre) from it's own people to help solve poverty and hunger? It takes more effort to do lie and mislead people - effort that could be better redirected to other things.
You claim that they're focused on fixing those things right now. Actually, no, they're not, the CCP couldn't give a flying f*ck what the poor-rich divide is, or what China's Gini coefficient is. Or what long term social impacts say it's, one-child policy is having. They're just interested in maintaining their own power-base. You can argue that Western countries are similar, but I'd have to say, the fact that we value transparency and try to keep our politican accountable definitely goes some way to mitigating that.
You realise that trying to lie and mislead your own public *takes more effort*. By you're own logic, they're wasting efforts trying to fight an arms race here against their own people, simply so that they can save face - when they should be redirecting that money into say, poverty and hunger, like you claim.
And it's well-proven that things like democracy, and free speech lead to better outcomes in the future. If say, the government is corrupt, or they're not doing enough to fight poverty, I can come out here and say it, and make noise. In China, well, I'm pretty sure I'd find myself threatened by a couple of Communist party thugs quite quickly, and maybe they'd try to beat me around a bit.
The Chinese government always tries to say "Oh noes!, You don't understand Chinese culture! You don't understand our people!" They like being oppressed and mislead to. It's like Jackie Chan, and his immature comment that the Chinese people "need to be controlled", as if they're like little children (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/18/jackie-chan-chinese-peopl_n_188541.html).
As a Chinese person, I find that offensive. Now, I know people in the mainland have been sucked in by the hype, and they're happy to not rock the boat as long as the riches keep flowing. It's probably that, and a combination of old-fashioned Confucianism. But at the end of the day, the truth will hit them.
As a sidenote, look at Japan. Sure, there's corruption there, I'm sure, as in any other places. But they subscribe to Confucianism, and the whole deference to power-structures, much as we do. Yet they seem to mix it in with good mix of honour and good conduct (even if some of that is purely cursory, or superficial). You compare that to the rampant greed, corruption and end-justifies-the-means that seems to run rampant back home, and it's quite saddening. Hopefully, as the society improves, that will change.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
The firewall blocks it...? Or it will shortly. I think this is just a stop-gap.
Or maybe it's just to educate people about the HK site.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Probably not going to happen.
I'm Chinese (but not from the mainland), but I deal a lot with mainlanders - friends, uni, colleagues etc, my father's businesses etc.
The thing is, they've bought into the kool-aid over there. A lot of them *know* it's censored, but they don't want to rock the boat. And culturally, they're heavily money-centric. So since things are going well, in terms of growing monetary power, they don't really care that they're being censored, or oppressed or whatever (unless of course you're some outlawed political group, or Tibetian, or Falun Gong etc., I suppose). As long as the money keeps flowing, they'll suck it up. So as a people, I have little sympathy for them in terms of censorship, and all when they're essentially complicit in it.
Anyhow, we'll see what happens down the track. Maybe they will open up, but I doubt the current CCP will go down without a fight. Personally, I see more issues with things like the growing sex-ratio imbalance, aging population, pollution problems and rising unemployment/inflation. If those things are enough to convince people that the money will stop, maybe then they'll decided to pipe up.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Look, I don't think the parent means you deserve it, in some grand-cosmic karma scheme or something.
I think what he's referring to is that, well, you have to take responsibility for securing your belongings.
It's simple common-sense. In Australia, if I leave my car unlocked in a car-park, and then come back to find my stuff inside gone, if I go to the police and report it, I doubt they'll have a lot of sympathy for me. They'll probably write me off as an idiot - and rightly so. Everybody makes mistakes, but sometimes *touch wood* you have to take responsibiltiy for them.
So while the story about your wife and you being burglarised is sad - ultimately you're adults, you have to take responsibility for your own mistakes. In this case, it was forgetting to lock the doors. That's not to say theft isn't wrong, but I think it's sad how people today don't seem to want to take responsibility for themselves.
It's like those kids who come out crying, boo-hoo, I'm pregnant, my life is ruined, blah blah blah. Well, whoop-de-doo, you chose to have intercourse, who's fault is that? And you chose to do it without using contraception, even smarter. Idiots.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
And you sir, must be an Anonynous Coward...oh wait...you are...
Look, you may or may not have had respect for the last Administration. But this guy decided to leave his family, go over there, and serve his country. He was fighting the Taliban, the same folks who harboured Osama, who err, let's see, bombed the World Trade Centre? I'm Australian, but last time I checked, that incident killed quite a few of you folk.
Look, I know it's hip and trendy for us to sit here comfortably in our offices, and our homes, with air-conditioning, decent food, and nice suits, whilst people on the other side of the world are risking their lives, but seriously mate, get some class...
I think the coward label is most apt here.
Also, corporate apologist? What the heck has that got to do with anything? *sigh* You American left-wing nutjobs really amuse me. You try to see a conspiracy in everything. Is Verizon in cohorts with the Taliban? Or are they in cohorts with Haliburton? Or I don't know, is somebody in cohorts with someobdy else? And where did the Republican tag come from?
And military bootlicker, please...He was just a kid who went over there to defend his country? It's all very well and good to talk down the military while you're sitting comfortably, in your anonymity there, but I'd like you to go up to a war-widom and say that to her face. She'd probably break you into little pieces and make you weep like a little boy....now that'd be a sight..
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Err, I've worked some pretty "low-end" jobs. I've done various retail stints for a few years, and I actually still work at a local pool on the weekends now, teaching little kids how to swim. The pay there is terrible, but the work is actually pretty fun.
However, I have to agree with the parent - people who are stuck in low-end retails jobs, year after year, are often there because they're got no other choice. (I'm not talking high-school or college kids getting extra allowance on the side here - I mean people past this). These people don't *want* to be there. Which means they're often either unskilled, uneducated, illegal immigrants, or just plain unlucky etc.
I didn't mind the work when I was there (and I still wouldn't, I hope), and the people were nice. However, the older people who were stuck there, well, often they didn't want to be there, and they certainly don't put a lot of passion into their work. If you were driven, you tended to move on after a while.
Also, to the people making wisecracks about investment bank's above...geez. I work for an IB now, and they're actually pretty nice people ok *grins*. Seriously. Anyhow, it's just a job, and all this c*ap about "thieves", I think it's quite unfair - sure, there's bad apples, but I'm sure that's true about any industry.
Ironically, I get strange looks from one of my friends parents when they find out I still work my old job at the pool. you can't win...
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Silly little man.
Look, full-disclosure has already been proven to be the method that works. Security through obscurity does not. Because what you're essentially saying here is "shhh....there's a flaw, but let's hope we're the only guys in the world that know about it"....oh please...how naive you are.
Google has already been burnt just recently by Microsoft's shonky security. So in this case, they were probably thinking, gee, whiz, we're about to get hit again...
Because chances are, if Ormandy found it, somebody else probably did as well. I mean, there's people *actively* look for these bugs, and hoping to malicious exploit them. At least this way, people know about it, and can protect themselves - either by shutting down the affected service under Microsoft gets out a patch, or at least staying sharp (e.g. checking logs) for anything that exploits it.
Doesn't the fact this exploit was found actually prove the point, that full-disclosure works? I gurantee you, the clowns at Sophos probably wouldn't have found this, without the heads-up from Ormandy on the issue.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Gosh, I love it how people here love to applaud Microsoft on their *spectacular* security record, and demonise all those who would dare to challenge that.
Please, Google already got bitten with Microsoft's shonky products and poor security in the past, my guess is that Google/Ormandy felt that they were already at risk from this exploit from malicious people in the wild, so they might as well get it out there, so that at least people could be aware of it. It's a public service, for crying out loud.
Remember, just because Ormandy was the first to publicise the exploit, certainly doesn't mean that he was the first to find it. In fact, statistically, the odds are stacked quite against that. Look, full-disclosure has already been proven to be the method that works. And shonky vendors, who are too lazy to look after their users will try and demonise full-disclosure all they like, but at the end of the day, it just looks like them covering their behinds.
You can come out and be a stupid little prat and insult Ormandy all you want, but at the end of the day, you've done...err...squat? I don't remember seeing any security disclosures published by "hairyfeet". Compare to him, and other security researches, I have a feeling both you and I know squat all. I certainly couldn't have found the exploit, even if I was looking.
At least this way, people *know* about the exploit, and it's visible. Better the devil you know, than the one you don't, and all that. Look, if your computer got hit with a drive-by-exploit, and you *didn't* know about about it, are you honestly telling me you'd be happier? You should be thanking security researchers like this, who shine a light on the swiss cheese that is Microsoft's security (yes, this is Windows XP, so perhaps things have improved. I'm not in a position to comment).
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Whilst I think the parent needs to learn some rudimentary English skills, and he does come across as a potty-mouth, low-class redneck, I think he does make one good point.
Americans (and I'm sure most Australians) have only themselves to blame. They're not prepared to pay more for locally made goods. Whether you think that's a good thing or a bad thing is moot, the fact remains, people just aren't prepared to put their money where their mouth is.
And the unions are kind of worsening the problem. Like it or not, either you pay them less, or the jobs go overseas. Whether you'd rather that happens, well, that's your call. But at the end of the day, you are shooting yourselves in the foot, sorry.
Btw, to the parent - look, I'm fairly sure you're educated. I mean, you're on Slashdot, so obviously you can use a computer and type whole sentences. But you really should try not to sound like such a disgusting, expletive-spouting uneducated imbecile. You're educated, please try and show it. This isn't a pissing contest, you don't garner any points for sounding like a immature little schoolboy who's trying to prove how "tuff" and all he is by using lots of swear words and bad sentence structure.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
The early 9.X releases were dogged by constant crashes in Plasma.
That as well as serious issues with Intel display drivers (I experienced these first-hand, as I have a Lenovo X200 tablet, and before that a Fujitsu T4215, both with Intel graphics).
I also heard that there were issues with the Nvidia display drivers, but I didn't experience these first-hand, as I don't have any Nvidia systems.
Perhaps you're very blessed, or maybe you just don't tweak/use systems to the extend that I or other users do. Either way, I encourage you to read this on Ubuntu's own forums:
View Poll Results: Should Canonical devote more developers, time and resources to Kubuntu?
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1462668
I mean, seriously, it's like everybody in Ubuntu/Kubuntu's community either hates KDE and thinks Kubuntu shouldn't exist, or just doesn't think Kubuntu is worth using anymore...*sigh*. It's really sad to see.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Lol, I don't think you've actually proven anything there.
Yes, people criticise every OS release, but the funny thing about the Kubuntu criticism is that:
1. It's dogged it from release to release - from the 6.X days, right through to the current 10.X days. You compare that against the criticism from say, Vista to Windows 7, or say, OSX 10.0 to 10.6, or heck, ironically, even KDE 4.0 to 4.4/4.5. Kubuntu has sucked, I regret to say, from day 1, right through to today, and unless Canonical suddently decideds to devote more resources to it, will continue to.
2. Everybody seems to be claiming the same things - it's not their little pet peeves, like how "Windows XP looks plasticky", or "it runs slow on my ". There are a number of persistent bugs that have dogged it - now, some of there were hardware driver related, but there were consistent show-stopping bugs (i.e. would not even boot) dogging the entire 9.04 and 9.10 releases (alpha, beta and right through to RC). Showstopping bugs in a RC does not bode well.
3. Even the Kubuntu developers themselves know they're under-resourced.
And if you need further confirmation, here it is straight from the horse's mouth. Ubuntu forums:
View Poll Results: Should Canonical devote more developers, time and resources to Kubuntu?
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1462668
Gee, the top voted options were "Yes, Canonical should devote more developers/time and resources to Kubuntu.", or "No, Gnome is and should be Canonical's focus."
And coming in third was "Definitely, Kubuntu isn't living up to its potential.".
Coming in fourth, "No, there's simply not enough resources to go around and Gnome deserves priority."
And all the way down in position five was "No, I like Kubuntu the way it is and/or am not significantly affected by bugs or usability issues.", at a pathetic 5% of votes.
I think that pretty much sums up the sentiment of the Ubuntu/Kubuntu community - either they don't care about KDE, or don't think any effort should be given to Kubuntu, or they've basically written off Kubuntu as simply not a KDE distribution of choice.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
Hmm, I really hope you know what you're talking about, and aren't just talking out of your rear-end...lol. Have you actually tried to use Kubuntu, then tried a different KDE 4.x distro and compared them?
I've been a KDE fan since the 3.5 days, and a Ubuntu fan from around those days as well. So it was a natural progression to use Kubuntu. I've basically tried every Kubuntu release since 7.04, until around 9.10, when I basically gave up on it. The 8.x branch, from memory, was particularly patchy for me. I've also tried openSUSE for some time, and spent a bit of time with Fedora. Of these, Arch Linux, either with it's stock KDE packages or KDEmod has been the best, and Kubuntu by far has been the worst.
And I'm not sure what you mean by "in the same place", but they most certainly aren't the vanilla KDE packages - part of the whole point of Ubuntu is they add their own patches to the vanilla packages.
Look, if you don't believe me, take a look at these two articles, and in particular the comments on them:
Kubuntu Gets Some Love
http://www.osnews.com/comments/22113
http://www.osnews.com/comments/22348
Comments like this one:
"Kubuntu has always been a little unstable in my experience - even with KDE3, but since the switch to KDE4 it's been nearly unusable. openSUSE and Mandriva, for example, have the resources to work through a lot of the issues that have come up with KDE4, and I think on a whole both have done a great job. Kubuntu seems at a disadvantage, and I can't imagine recommending it to anyone as a good distro to showcase KDE or even linux. It's just too buggy and frustrating. I have a lot of respect for the Kubuntu developers and their efforts, but they have a steep hill to climb."
Or this one:
"That's an appropriate comparison. I have to use Ubuntu at work and it's as if they go out of their way to damage KDE, so that people will get so disgusted with it that they'll switch to Gnome.
The problem with Kubuntu is not that it's being intentionally broken - it's just their shortage of resources. Blaming Kubuntu is stupid, because it's only so much a few guys can do.
It's a shame, really. It would be in KDE upstreams best interest to see that Kubuntu works well, because that's the distro they are going to get the majority of the users from. If you have a company policy specifying "Ubuntu", that's what you are going to use - and install kubuntu-desktop metapackage to get the kde environment."
or this one:
"Your attitude towards Kubuntu might be unfriendly, but it is kind-of deserved imho. Esp if you're a translator I can understand the frustration. I know and respect the two KDE-canonical employees (Aurelien and Riddell) but agree that Ubuntu puts less work in Kubuntu as it's user base would justify."
And there are more. As you can see, my views on Kubuntu's lack of polish is a fairly common one. Perhaps it's improved as of Lucid, I'm not sure. But the one time I did try the Lucid (Beta, mind you) Kubuntu live Cd, it refused to boot (IBM Lenovo X200 Tablet), and when I tried a later RC, it was horrible and broken (particularly plasma).
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
I still write damn letters sometimes, ok...lol....
There's something to be said for getting a handwritten letter in the mail, and opening it.
My handwriting does suck somewhat, though...haha.
Cheers,
Victor
heya,
You know, I'm curious how many of the people complaining about bugginess and memory issues are running say, Kubuntu?
I'm on Arch Linux, and the KDE 4.x branch has been quite stable for me - the odd crash here and there, e.g. of Konsole, particularly early on, but nothing that really blew up the whole desktop.
And it's performed very well on my desktop, much more snappy/responsive than Gnome.
There's a lot of distributions that have done terribly, half-done jobs of packaging KDE. Kubuntu is a prime examble, seriously it's an absolute joke how terrible they've done. Last I heard, apparently it was because Kubuntu only had a single guy or something? That might just be a rumour, but I seriously think Canonical should just shelve the Kubuntu branch, instead of giving KDE a bad name.
Arch has been stable for me, and openSUSE was quite good for KDE as well. Don't know about other distributions, but I've heard that outside of those two, the rest are pretty much a joke - they just do a bad job of packaging KDE, or adding their own half-done patches, and pushing out low-quality KDE desktops.
Cheers,
Victor