'£300k doesn't even buy you any media! A visit to their head office in North Carolina sees the presentation done from a projector on a desk, with bits of cardboard to stop it wobbling'
OK, I can see a theme emerging here in this thread. I like Linux except a) no support ) no software c) company used cardboard. This is meant to be a joke isn't it?
'Subscriptions take the pain out of purchasing software because they provide everything needed in one all-inclusive price'
'with Linux, there's one thing we can't do - we can't keep the machines from locking up. That almost never happened with Solaris, and when it DID happen Sun would figure out what went wrong and issue a patch for it within a couple of days'
What ever has the Redhat support process come to?
What was their response to your support request?
What exactly was the problem with the machines locking up?
'Your wrong. I tried installing ubuntu on a machine that can run windows xp easily without slow[ing] down'
What logical or causal relationship does your expericence with installing ubuntu have to do with my efforts and the lack of viruses and phishing scams on the Linux desktop.
'The machine was a p3 500 with 512 of ram and ubuntu ran extremely slow[ly]. [I ]would have had to drop to the command line to make it faster'
What apps were you running on the command line to make it faster. I have a dual boot system with the same memory. They both run about the same.
'Plus firefox wasnt working correctly either'
What exactly wasn't firefox doing right. Did you try and install other browsers and get the same results. Try this, add the line MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO=1 to/etc/environment file.
'not all programs are compiled right and don[']t install properly on linux yet'
What programs did you compile and what exactly were the problems installing.
'There are still too many places where you have to drop to a command line'
For the average user there is never a need to invoke the command line. They browse, email and edit documents and view/listen to multimedia.
'Ubuntu's best strength is handling the ordinary task-based day-to-day stuff. Vista has a level of completeness and polish that some people find it hard to do without''
The average user can't tell the difference between the Vindows GUI and a Linux desktop.
'download and compile source code''
Using the default updater and you never get to see source code, unless you are trying to install some obscure application that don't come with the distro.
'You can't tell me that somewhere in a basement in Redmond, men aren't typing away with unix code, creating a small OS that is the beginning of a back-up plan for MS when fit hits the shan'
Except it won't be covered by the GPL. I would have thought they would create their own propriety protocols, 'partner' with a Linux vendor and start selling Microsoft Linux and threatenig other Linux vendors with litigation.
'The predatory stuff they've done is bad, yes...but unlike the GPL, the BSD license doesn't enforce reciprocity, so they haven't done anything in violation of the license by not getting involved in the development of that'
The GPL doesn't enforce anything, if you sell on an app with GPL code then you must include your own source code, else use the lesser GPL. You are not compelled to sell it on. The GPL prevents some company taking code and locking it up in some commercial product, like Windows for instance.
'I am deeply tired of the attitude found primarily among advocates of the GPL which constantly focuses on what other people are doing, or should be doing, rather than focusing on their own back yard. It is smug, arrogant, and dictatorial'
What attitude, and please don't assume you are an authority on GPL advocates or even know what they think. The only think I see GPL advocactes responding to FUD like 'our IP is in Linux' and so on.
'how much should customers have to pay to get at their own data, which happens to reside on Microsoft products?.. Lets take MS's argument seriously for a moment, to see where that leads us'
It leads to this situation. Company A pays company C to do business with company B despite having no contractual arrangement with company C.
The commision ruled in 2004 that Microsoft broke European competition laws and directed them to release complete interoperability documentation on the protocols, MS pretended to not understand what the Commision was on about and released some source code. The Commision also said that MS acted to stifle innovation by tying Media Player to Windows.
The real question is whether a single company should get a lock in on PROTOCOLS, never mind what they should charge for them. Is this an example of the polluted protocols MS talked about in that Valloppillil email.
"By extending these protocols and developing new protocols, we can DENY
OSS projects ENTRY into the MARKET."
'At what point has/will the EU overstepped its bounds'
At what point will MS realise it isn't dealing with the DOJ?
it started with a vendor issue, and then RIM's software did not react well to that issue.
Given the nature of the technology I find the explanation of a 'fail-over' system failing to kick in a tad disingenuous. It's not like a generator kicking in when the mains electricity stops. And what kind of design decisions led to an upgrade triggering outages for the entire North America.
I would have thought they had multiple nodes at multiple locations with no single point of failure. Or at least three redundant and independent systems, a main system, a backup system and a system for testing upgrades. Or is it like most commercial companies they designed the cheapest system possible.
Tell me it's not like the Uks DOH system where power cuts in Kent lead to system outages in the north of england. It takes real genius to design a distributed database that borks because of a power cut. sarcasm.
Mplayer has no problem playing Casino Royale and it comes as standard with every Linux distro out there. The only problem is has is with menu driven DVDs then you select the title with mplayer dvd:// 1 etc. Alternativly use Xine.
'The grid (as was shown by the outage on the east coast a couple years ago) is not very redundant'
Actually the grid used to more redundant until the utility companies stopped building standby generators and connected local systems to a central control station, to save on staff and to save money. They managed this by lobbying in Washington to get the regulations diluted.
The actual blackout was caused by the MS Blaster worm that caused the SCADA units to freeze. These Windows based units are used to provide remote reading of Remote Terminal Units (RTUs). As the operators were unaware that a single generator had tripped out in Ohio, they failed to respond when too much power was been drawn in from a neighboring area. This in turn tripped out other generators in a domino effect. Coincidentally enough ten months previously the SQL worm caused a similar crash of the SCADA units at a nuclear power plant owned by the same company.
Years later a report found (a) Unix to be responsible for the outage and (b) an operator had switched off a key piece of equipment and then went to lunch. This despite the fact that telephone transcripts showed that the operators were fully aware that something was wrong in the minutes preceding the blackout.
Why is it that every time the Internet is mentioned someone brings up that old chestnut of it being built to survive a Nuclear war. Vin Cerf, one of the originators of the Internet has specifically stated that the purpose was to share computers.
'If they fix a significant technical problem, they should get a patent to preserve at least some competitive advantage'
I don't know if you read the same email but it seems patently clear that what was being proposed was breaking ACPI to make it Windows specific and use patents to prevent it being used on Linux. And since Linux is GPL it could not use patented ACPI extensions. Using broken extensions to preserve 'competitive advantage' is the act of a paranoid, greedy, untrustworthy and petty organization'
It's not that I object to "doubleclick.net" it's that downloading slashdot freezes on this and google-analytics. Now if you want to get people to watch the ads then do something about it..
Translation: We'll reinvent the Red Menace to scare them enough to have a new pretext to introduce a police state them Stalin could only have dreamed of.
They talk about a 'vibrant democracy' and in the same breath explain how the middle classes, of all people, are a threat in this here democracy. If this is such a wonderous 'vibrant democracy' then why is its own middle classes threatening revolt.
You're right, there is a potential threat to the social order and it's you who has caused this by creating a society run by and for the benefit of trans-national organizations. Government being reduced to peerforming police action against its own people. Watch out for the Marxist-Islamo-Fascist-Middle class revolution.
"I want this country to realize that we stand on the edge of oblivion. I want everyone to remember why they need us!"
Adam Sutler, Lord High Chancellor of Greater England.
'BW holds Slashdot's moderation system up as a model for maintaining civility in message boards'
The only use I can see of the mod system here on Slashdot is it allows some PR astroturfer to post 'I really like X product' msgs and then get it modded up 5+ interesting by a group of fake disinterested parties. That, and get some real legitimate post modded down as off topic. Eg. Every time someone mentions IExplorer, talk about the Firefox memory leak bug.. and so on..
Slashdot Mirror
'£300k doesn't even buy you any media! A visit to their head office in North Carolina sees the presentation done from a projector on a desk, with bits of cardboard to stop it wobbling'
OK, I can see a theme emerging here in this thread. I like Linux except a) no support ) no software c) company used cardboard. This is meant to be a joke isn't it?
'Subscriptions take the pain out of purchasing software because they provide everything needed in one all-inclusive price'
was: And so it starts (Score:3, it sure does)
'with Linux, there's one thing we can't do - we can't keep the machines from locking up. That almost never happened with Solaris, and when it DID happen Sun would figure out what went wrong and issue a patch for it within a couple of days'
What ever has the Redhat support process come to?
What was their response to your support request?
What exactly was the problem with the machines locking up?
'Your wrong. I tried installing ubuntu on a machine that can run windows xp easily without slow[ing] down'
/etc/environment file.
What logical or causal relationship does your expericence with installing ubuntu have to do with my efforts and the lack of viruses and phishing scams on the Linux desktop.
'The machine was a p3 500 with 512 of ram and ubuntu ran extremely slow[ly]. [I ]would have had to drop to the command line to make it faster'
What apps were you running on the command line to make it faster. I have a dual boot system with the same memory. They both run about the same.
'Plus firefox wasnt working correctly either'
What exactly wasn't firefox doing right. Did you try and install other browsers and get the same results. Try this, add the line MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO=1 to
'not all programs are compiled right and don[']t install properly on linux yet'
What programs did you compile and what exactly were the problems installing.
'Ubuntu may not have something called "shadow copy"'
And you can't restore if the original data is destroyed. Not much use then.
'There are still too many places where you have to drop to a command line'
For the average user there is never a need to invoke the command line. They browse, email and edit documents and view/listen to multimedia.
'Ubuntu's best strength is handling the ordinary task-based day-to-day stuff. Vista has a level of completeness and polish that some people find it hard to do without''
The average user can't tell the difference between the Vindows GUI and a Linux desktop.
'download and compile source code''
Using the default updater and you never get to see source code, unless you are trying to install some obscure application that don't come with the distro.
Interesting website ..
'You can't tell me that somewhere in a basement in Redmond, men aren't typing away with unix code, creating a small OS that is the beginning of a back-up plan for MS when fit hits the shan'
Except it won't be covered by the GPL. I would have thought they would create their own propriety protocols, 'partner' with a Linux vendor and start selling Microsoft Linux and threatenig other Linux vendors with litigation.
was: Re:He's right about one thing...
'The predatory stuff they've done is bad, yes...but unlike the GPL, the BSD license doesn't enforce reciprocity, so they haven't done anything in violation of the license by not getting involved in the development of that'
The GPL doesn't enforce anything, if you sell on an app with GPL code then you must include your own source code, else use the lesser GPL. You are not compelled to sell it on. The GPL prevents some company taking code and locking it up in some commercial product, like Windows for instance.
'I am deeply tired of the attitude found primarily among advocates of the GPL which constantly focuses on what other people are doing, or should be doing, rather than focusing on their own back yard. It is smug, arrogant, and dictatorial'
What attitude, and please don't assume you are an authority on GPL advocates or even know what they think. The only think I see GPL advocactes responding to FUD like 'our IP is in Linux' and so on.
was: Re:My comment refuting his points (Score:2)
It looks like your trying to cast a class to it's base class without first defining a method.
a ges/ClippySuicide.jpg
http://www.faculty.english.ttu.edu/barker/4367/im
'how much should customers have to pay to get at their own data, which happens to reside on Microsoft products? .. Lets take MS's argument seriously for a moment, to see where that leads us'
It leads to this situation. Company A pays company C to do business with company B despite having no contractual arrangement with company C.
The commision ruled in 2004 that Microsoft broke European competition laws and directed them to release complete interoperability documentation on the protocols, MS pretended to not understand what the Commision was on about and released some source code. The Commision also said that MS acted to stifle innovation by tying Media Player to Windows.
The real question is whether a single company should get a lock in on PROTOCOLS, never mind what they should charge for them. Is this an example of the polluted protocols MS talked about in that Valloppillil email.
"By extending these protocols and developing new protocols, we can DENY OSS projects ENTRY into the MARKET."
'At what point has/will the EU overstepped its bounds'
At what point will MS realise it isn't dealing with the DOJ?
it started with a vendor issue, and then RIM's software did not react well to that issue.
Given the nature of the technology I find the explanation of a 'fail-over' system failing to kick in a tad disingenuous. It's not like a generator kicking in when the mains electricity stops. And what kind of design decisions led to an upgrade triggering outages for the entire North America.
I would have thought they had multiple nodes at multiple locations with no single point of failure. Or at least three redundant and independent systems, a main system, a backup system and a system for testing upgrades. Or is it like most commercial companies they designed the cheapest system possible.
Tell me it's not like the Uks DOH system where power cuts in Kent lead to system outages in the north of england. It takes real genius to design a distributed database that borks because of a power cut. sarcasm.
More details(Score:3, Informative)
B) Their failover plan didn't work.
..
What failover plan and assuming what they said really happened
was Re:Pop quiz!
What ever happened to no single point of failure. And since when do you update a live system. Has no one learned anything in the past decade.
Reminds me of when a Mobile phone company upgrades over the weekend and everyone discovered you could make long distance phone calls for free.
I understand that MS put in a bid for DoubleClick. Does that mean if the had suceeded, they would have reported themselves for antitrust violations.
'Online advertising firm DoubleClick Inc. is exploring a sale and is in talks with Microsoft Corp'
I am sure they are sour
One of my roommates bought Casino Royale. To test it, I just grabbed it and ripped it in DVDFab Decrypter
was Re:Gee. (Score:4, free advert)
Mplayer has no problem playing Casino Royale and it comes as standard with every Linux distro out there. The only problem is has is with menu driven DVDs then you select the title with mplayer dvd:// 1 etc. Alternativly use Xine.
'The grid (as was shown by the outage on the east coast a couple years ago) is not very redundant'
I AIP_Daily_2003-08-18.pdf
o rm_crashed_ohio_nuke/
t .hearing/index.html
. fri/
- comm/info-notices/2003/in200314.pdf
.. disabled an automatic periodic triggeri ty/recovery/story/0,10801,87400,00.html
Actually the grid used to more redundant until the utility companies stopped building standby generators and connected local systems to a central control station, to save on staff and to save money. They managed this by lobbying in Washington to get the regulations diluted.
The actual blackout was caused by the MS Blaster worm that caused the SCADA units to freeze. These Windows based units are used to provide remote reading of Remote Terminal Units (RTUs). As the operators were unaware that a single generator had tripped out in Ohio, they failed to respond when too much power was been drawn in from a neighboring area. This in turn tripped out other generators in a domino effect. Coincidentally enough ten months previously the SQL worm caused a similar crash of the SCADA units at a nuclear power plant owned by the same company.
Years later a report found (a) Unix to be responsible for the outage and (b) an operator had switched off a key piece of equipment and then went to lunch. This despite the fact that telephone transcripts showed that the operators were fully aware that something was wrong in the minutes preceding the blackout.
XA/21
http://www.nipc.gov/dailyreports/2003/August/DHS_
MS Blaster
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/08/20/slammer_w
We have no idea what happened
http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/09/04/blackou
transcripts
http://www.cnn.com/2003/fyi/news/09/04/transcript
potential vulnerability of plant computer network to worm infection
http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/gen
an engineer
http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/secur
RTUs
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/41
was: Re:What about a boogeyman attack?
Why is it that every time the Internet is mentioned someone brings up that old chestnut of it being built to survive a Nuclear war. Vin Cerf, one of the originators of the Internet has specifically stated that the purpose was to share computers.
was Re:Isn't it ironic?
'If they fix a significant technical problem, they should get a patent to preserve at least some competitive advantage'
I don't know if you read the same email but it seems patently clear that what was being proposed was breaking ACPI to make it Windows specific and use patents to prevent it being used on Linux. And since Linux is GPL it could not use patented ACPI extensions. Using broken extensions to preserve 'competitive advantage' is the act of a paranoid, greedy, untrustworthy and petty organization'
One thing I find myself wondering about is whether we shouldn't try and make the "ACPI" extensions somehow Windows specific
0 11607/3000/PX03020.pdf
It seems unfortunate if we do this work and get our partners to do the work and the results is that Linux works great without having to do the work
Maybe there is no way to avoid this problem but it does bother me.
Maybe we could define the APIs so that they work well with NT and not the others even if they are open.
Or maybe we could patent something related to this.
http://edge-op.org/iowa/www.iowaconsumercase.org/
Just picture a kangaroo playing soccer ..
It's not that I object to "doubleclick.net" it's that downloading slashdot freezes on this and google-analytics. Now if you want to get people to watch the ads then do something about it ..
Translation: We'll reinvent the Red Menace to scare them enough to have a new pretext to introduce a police state them Stalin could only have dreamed of.
They talk about a 'vibrant democracy' and in the same breath explain how the middle classes, of all people, are a threat in this here democracy. If this is such a wonderous 'vibrant democracy' then why is its own middle classes threatening revolt.
You're right, there is a potential threat to the social order and it's you who has caused this by creating a society run by and for the benefit of trans-national organizations. Government being reduced to peerforming police action against its own people. Watch out for the Marxist-Islamo-Fascist-Middle class revolution.
"I want this country to realize that we stand on the edge of oblivion. I want everyone to remember why they need us!"
Adam Sutler, Lord High Chancellor of Greater England.
'BW holds Slashdot's moderation system up as a model for maintaining civility in message boards'
.. and so on ..
The only use I can see of the mod system here on Slashdot is it allows some PR astroturfer to post 'I really like X product' msgs and then get it modded up 5+ interesting by a group of fake disinterested parties. That, and get some real legitimate post modded down as off topic. Eg. Every time someone mentions IExplorer, talk about the Firefox memory leak bug