Um, I've got an IPv6 address right now from Comcast. Wifi Router gets it's IP address from the upstream advertisements. I get an IPv4 address as well. At any rate the WiFi router configures the clients, or advertises the prefix and the clients do the rest. I'm not sure if this is some sort of trial or what but I can hit all the IPv6 services like www.v6.facebook.com and Google's IPv6 stuff.
I'm feeling pretty lucky then. I know boo, hiss Comcast, but I have to tell you that I've had an IPv6 address for about six months now. The WiFi router gets a/64 address from Comcast. From that point the nodes within the home create their addresses from the advertised prefix from the router, blah blah blah...
Really there isn't that big a difference. The router still gets an IPv4 address too for all those websites that haven't got an IPv6 address or AAAA record. I'm not sure how Comcast handles when an AAAA lookup fails but all my boxen understand and obey. Most of the big names are already using IPv6 as well, Facebook, YouTube, all of Google, Apple, Microsoft, IBM, etc...
At any rate, I understand that a lot of people aren't getting IPv6 at the current moment and last ditch efforts are going to be deployed. Granted widely deployed is the key part. But ISPs are going to roll it out, it is the only long term solution we've got, period. However, how long your ISP will drag its feet is a whole another story. However, I did want you all to know that IPv6 is being rolled out to some Comcast customers right now. Now if this is a test thing and then they bitch slap me into a NAT IPv4 scheme has yet to be seen. But for now it's a pretty seamless IPv6 switch, in fact didn't know they had done it till I started toying with ifconfig in Linux and found a global scope IPv6 address.
I'm not saying that they should. I'm just telling you that in this magical buffer zone within the US, you might as well forget whatever right international law doesn't grant you. My opinion on the matter doesn't amount to squat, so should the government limit and whatever else the crap you said, my reply is, "No they shouldn't" Do they? Uh, yeah. Do you have any recourse to change this? Not a single ghost of a chance in the remotest of dreams. My suggestion, get used to it (or bomb the border station or whatever the else you think will make you happy.)
That in this magical buffer zone...
Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. They don't exist. Sorry.
Interesting, what if the president decides...
Well s/he legally can't. That power is left to the judicial branch of the US government. If the president did do something like that, then as a citizen I'd be looking for someone to be using that whole check and balance thing on the president. So not to say s/he couldn't, just couldn't do so legally.
You're at a border fourth amendment doesn't apply. I know a lot of people who don't like that idea. My suggestion is any one of the following, 1) Don't leave the country. 2) Don't return to the country. 3) Sneak your way in/out of the country. America's borders have gone to shit. Every in the country is pissed about illegal border crossers and the government is putting pressure on the border agents to do something about it, so they have, piss every single person off to the point that I don't think I'll ever pay the outrageous fee for crossing the American border.
Wow who would have thought that some company in America was covering up, down playing, putting the blame on someone else, etc... on some bad news? Did anybody notice that the sky was blue today?!
As funny as this may sound it really illustrates a point that NASA really has to bring home. Make space travel produce usable results here on Earth and understandable to the constituents that are paying the bill. UAVs should have been at the top of that list. First, you'd have to look hard to find someone of the general public that doesn't know what an UAV (unmanned drone for some) is. Second you put the angle of, "NASA. We're making UAVs so damn good they fly on Mars bitches!" people will really see the connection between NASA and shit we use everyday.
Why this hasn't been done before shows that NASA needs to think a little more outside the box of orbiters and golf carts and bring in the whole gamut of resources and knowledge that all branches have access to. Of course, that would be like asking the CIA and the FBI to work together. What is it about the US government that breeds a mentality to not work with other branches?
I don't think anyone is paying attention this deep in a thread.
Who are you trying to convince? I know it's not me as you can see that I've made up my FUD spreading mind.
My point is that the deal extends to Novell and Novell users alone. I honestly don't care how Ubuntu, Fedora, etc... choose to slice, interpret, put into their default install, or whatever else Mono and the agreement/promises that Microsoft has made with Novell. The wording extends to Novell and Novell alone, the rest is just random guesses about how some company will act to other randomly picked companies/projects.
At any rate, Microsoft could be happy go friendly with open source, maybe not. I'm not the CEO so I couldn't tell you and I'm doubtful you can say with any amount of certainty exactly how Microsoft will act with respect to rightfully asserting their patents, if they should choose to do so. Maybe Microsoft won't, who cares? It's not like anything of critical importance depends on Mono, or that anyone would put anything of critical importance without getting some mass rebuttal from the FUDsters like myself, apparently. I really don't see Mono as any major issue at the current moment, nor do I see it as any major contention point any time in the near future, but that's just my humble opinion. I honestly think the whole Mono thing is just so that Microsoft can put a "cross-platform" label on their ads. I want to reiterate that, I believe Mono to be nothing more than just an ad helper for Microsoft, nothing more sinister or benign than that.
What I'm getting at is what will the EU do when Microsoft does something that they are legally entitled to do? Stop them from doing something legal? Punish them for doing something that the same body that will punish them, says that they are there to protect? That applies to more than just the limited scope that you are so intent on focusing on, namely Mono. It's a sticky situation for the EU and I don't believe "Hammer" is the correct wording, maybe more like "discuss very critically." For example how compliant is Office and the ISO OOXML standard? What's the EU doing about it? I'm sure there are some people who are taking care of that, and I'd like to believe that when the next version of Office comes out it will be fully compliant with the ISO OOXML standard so that we can have interoperability with that client.
Also, I have to really call out your ODF "Fact" because Microsoft's implementation of ODF doesn't work with other ODF implementations. Go ahead give it a whirl. FACT: Microsoft added voluntarily to Office an ODF filter that produces ODF files that are not compatible with other ODF implementations. Nothing insidious about that, just a bad implementation that's all. I'm sure someone else of a higher FUD-factor than I would assert that, "M$ is trying to fragment ODF!! OMG!!! blah blah blah."
There again, I'm not trying to spread any FUD here, just saying that the EU puts themselves into positions that are going to be difficult, maybe not that bad; maybe just uncomfortable, to explain to companies that wish to seek patent protection from that governing body.
The EU can do whatever they please, including whatever "Hammer" strategy that you are purposing. However, that's going to send a muddled message to other companies that want to assert/obtain patent protection from that body.
That's all I'm saying, nothing more, nothing less. It could be Oracle, IBM, Apple, or whoever, but you slap a person down for doing something they are legally entitled to do, and companies are going to start questioning how valid said protections are and to what degree they are allowed to exercise those rights. That, a good business environment, does not make.
Some people are wondering why Apache just won't align itself with Oracle and be done with this.
It's not about the GPL vs Apache License.
The true question is the same that faces Mono and.NET.
Is the Java Platform an open standard that anyone can implement or is it an implementation of a standard that Sun/Oracle made up? We all know that in the.NET world that Mono is just an implementation of a Microsoft standard that later became an ECMA (some parts) standard. Apache wants their Harmony project to be under their license not the GPL.
Let's look at this from say a C or C++ view point. Could Apache write a C/C++ compiler and library and put it under the Apache License? The answer is yes, there are a couple of patents out there that they'd have to watch for but without hesitation it is in the realm of most absolutely. Now turn that same logic over to say Java or.NET. You'd find yourself in the realm of Not really or Fat chance.
So in the end is Java truly open or are we just open sourcing something that is controlled by one entity? If you look hard at the OpenSolaris and the OpenOffice.org debates you'll see that there is a common theme going around here. Me thinks that Apache is grandstanding for a point and hoping the current tide (the anti-Oracle movement) helps push Java somewhere, where the person who is truly in control won't let it go in or at least won't care if ASF decides to leave.
I like that it makes you sound like you're spreading some sort of truth without need for any type of fact checking, and I am some angry anti-Microsoft machine who just spouts Fear! Uncertainty, and DOUBT!!!
No really however, Microsoft has passed a couple of ones past the almighty EU and the EU didn't do a thing because... Oh that's right they have to respect the law! Funny thing that law thing is.
Go ahead and check FAT or best yet NTFS encryption. Microsoft isn't palying nice by any means. They're just biding their time, dragging their feet, and opening protocols does not mean that it absolves one of infringing on a patent.
But whatever if you think a bunch of bought politicians will save you, then steady on lad!
Oh and I know this one isn't a Microsoft but it just makes the point that all becomes mute come respecting contracts, Rambus... Cheers!
Novell extended the patent protection to anyone who uses their software.
That's right, anyone who uses Novell's Mono. That right doesn't extend to anyone else.
The EU isn't going to "hammer" Microsoft when Microsoft has "given" ample opportunity to each major distribution to join them. That would make an easy case for Microsoft to make the EU look like the boogyman.
"Oh I'm so sorry that your copy of Windows is now 300 euro more than the last version. Why not call the EU and have them explain why they're forcing us to pass the cost on to the consumer when all we did was try to protect our contracts?"
I merely see Apple picking and choosing what third-party platforms it likes.
True but they are closing off their software to others which isn't all that open. I know it all sounds circular (open to promote things that aren't open?...um?), but the point being is that Apple does understand the open aspect of things, unlike say Microsoft. Apple however is pushing these open stacks as a means to promote their hardware first and foremost. That's not a bad thing in the world of business and go them. However, I liken all their openness to the small snafu that begot WebKit. In the end Apple came through, barely and still continue to limp with the KHTML people, but it really took some points from their whole openness thing.
It is one thing to embrace openness to promote your stack. It is another thing to give parts of your stack back to the open community. Much like Microsoft's contribution to the Linux Kernel for their Hyper-V, I am so glad that they are continuing to support that contribution (oh wait they're not.)
Oracle is another beast altogether. They have taken something that has grown a very fruitful community; and have given reasons to their supporters to provide ammo to the Java detractors. It's something when someone like Miguel de Icaza who likes to bash Java starts quoting James Gosling to support one of his points for disliking Java. That my friend is a clear sign that all is not well (in that, "I'm in my house and I'm surrounded by fire" kind of not well way.)
Hell, at least IBM has a voice in the Java community, albeit a small one that many people carefully listen to and take with a grain of salt, but Oracle is just acting like Open-Source doesn't exist and really could care less (well couldn't say that for sure since Oracle is saying how they feel at all) what feelings or sentiments get stepped on in the process of driving that bottom dollar. That's going to build of an aversion to the Java platform. Maybe at first like how you would shy away from someone with a cold, but it may very well build up to say tuberculosis style aversion. With the way Oracle's running this show we've reached flu stage in record time.
I think Steve Jobs personifies the circle of Apple developers best. The hardware and software work so well because they are so tightly integrated. Style first and substance later. The substance has come slowly in the MacOS X world, slowly poured its way into the iPod -> iPhone -> iPad... That's not to say that Apple has had their shortcomings but employees (developers, mainly) look at the computer as one may look at a stylish coffee maker.
The employees aren't leaving because they're uber-happy, anyone who has written a book about working with Steve Jobs could openly explain that to someone else. The employees stay because they share a common thread with Steve Jobs; beauty of design. It's sort of like that strange love-hate relationship that painters have with the world in general (so to say, but an amazingly short-coming way of putting it).
Java developers are washing their hands of Oracle because of trust issues. Being a Java developer I can attest that Oracle has really dropped the ball on one simple task, communication. In the end Oracle may be getting big contracts and developers will use whatever they are told to use but trust goes a long way. Openly talking about your plans for something is a good way to develop trust, as any woman may openly explain to someone else. Oracle isn't doing a good job at that, in fact, they are pretty much sucking balls at it.
So, Oracle may still do a banged up job at making their bottom dollar look good but they do so at the risk of making all the developers groan at each and every moment of writing code, in the end somebody is going to get tired of the bitching and either fire some talent or start doing small, one-off tasks on some other stack. At that point the small cracks are going to slowly add up and it's going to make universal trust for Oracle take a big nose dive.
PS: I hate Apple, but you got to show some respect for the developers who are truly looking at an OS like a painter would look at a canvas, but their still pure evil.
Absolutely correct. Java still has a few advantages over dotNET within the FOSS community. Neither platform is without some darksides but I would hope that everyone was waking up and understanding that nothing is without a darkside (glibc?). That being said, Java has fallen into the hands of a bunch of pricks known as Oracle. I think we all pinned it correctly when everyone said that Java was being handed over to the only other company that makes MS look good, The other being Apple (that's right I said it! Apple is pure evil, they make Satan look like the f'ing Pope!)
At any rate, Oracle could, most likely, screw us all for future versions of Java and start suing the pants off the OpenJDK community at any given time. The only safety net that we've got is that Sun GPL a lot of code and we can fall back to that. MS hasn't released a single thread open or GPL a single thing. There's nothing to fall back on if MS should screw their promise. However, Oracle is most likely to take a scorched Earth approach when it comes to lawsuits. So as we may have some safety net with Java, will pay for that safety by dealing with one of the most insane companies on Earth, aside from Monsanto, Haliburton and Apple (yeah I really hate Apple that much).
So I wouldn't be sitting there saying Mono is safe. It's not, but maybe the benefits out weigh the risk. Maybe not. That's not to say Java is safe either. It's in the hands of a bunch of assholes right now but you do get some GPL protection. Maybe that's worth something to you, maybe not.
Either way you slice it we're all screwed might as well use Python.
Mod parent up! There is no better way to sum up this article, other than "Yes, we knew that already, but we don't do it that way anymore because we're all lazy."
leading to a purely theological fallback position ("it's just made to look that way by God!")
That's when I fire back with. Oh! I see, God is deceptive. How does it feel to believe in a deceiving being? Wait what's that? God does not deceive? Well last I checked the meaning of deceptive was "Giving an appearance or impression different from the true one; misleading." I think your argument meets that criteria whether or not it is to test our belief in God.
It about that time they start quoting a bunch of stuff from the bible about how God cannot deceive. Which at that point I then point out the circular logic, "So the bible must be true because it says so, and that statement must be true because the bible says it is true? Don't you think you may be just a bit gullible, just a tiny bit?"
Well, I have quite a few tabs open every day on my system. Around 100 - 120 or so. Our help desk ticket system is RSS based. Using live bookmarks I can open all the tickets when I get in into each of their own tabs, that's about 20 to 40 tabs (depends on the day we're having.)
Next I open up all my Google tools, gmail/wave/docs/newsgroups/etc... That's about 10 tabs. Then I pop all the unread stories of Slashdot into slashdot (that's about 10 to 15 tabs, depends on what kind of news day it is). Do the same thing with BBC (That's usually about 20 to 25 tabs.) Then it's a couple of tabs for odd and end stuff. (usually around 20 to 30 tabs.)
Ctrl+W, Ctrl+Tab, Ctrl+K, F6, Ctrl+T, Ctrl+Shift+T all become my friends as I go through my tabs. After I'm done with the page it's a quick Ctrl+W or Ctrl+D/Ctrl+W. I know I'm getting towards the end of the day when most of my tabs are gone. A little Alt+Tab to switch between IDE, help tickets, VNC viewer, our TN-5250 terminal, and Firefox makes up my whole day. It's not often that I use the mouse but I do when simple Page Down/Page Up doesn't satisfy me on a page (Slashdot I'm looking at you most of the time) and when I'm using VNC viewer to show somebody where some function is in MS Office 2007's ribbon.
That's not to say I could go another route about how I organize myself and not open like 110 tabs in the morning and then spend the next nine (yes we work ten hour days) hours fluxing between 40 and 60 tabs, and then towards my tenth hour start reaching only ten to twenty tabs. I could open tabs as I need them but there are two cons to that.
1. I like thinking as my browser as my web inbox. I don't like having to go out and get each item one at a time and with our help desk ticket system, that would be the equal (in pain) of watching Richard Simmons working out to the oldies, not incredibly deadly at first, but at some paint you'll want to kill yourself for some reason you just can fully grasp.
2. I use the five minutes that it takes for the tabs to load to head over to the coffee machine and get my first couple cups of coffee in. (That's right a couple [2] cups of coffee in five minutes, my stomach as it stands has aged three time faster than the rest of me because of this regime.)
Hope that answers your question about people with butt loads of tabs. I know it might not be the best way but it's the way that seems best to work for me. Of course this coming from a person who is absolutely horrible to themselves health-wise. Trust me coffee is the lightest damage I do to myself.
So, as long as it's not in court, a company can tell lies
That's why we here on Slashdot are so confident about Microsoft's pledge to not sue Linux users for $INSERT_RANDOM_PATENT. Because, like BP, they have so much money that they don't need to lie.
Seriously, if that's a question then the answer is a resounding, "yes!" Why would you believe anything a multi-billion dollar company would tell you? The only time you can actually buy what they're saying is when there are some legal repercussions for not telling the truth.
It's not that giant companies are pure evil (unless you're Apple, Inc., then yes you are pure evil) it's just that they get so big that they have serious left-hand-not-knowing-what-right-hand-is-doing-itis. Which in turn falls back to filthy rich CEOs doing an incredibility shitty job at keeping people accountable for their actions. In the end thought it's really because we buy this isolation pile that heads of company's (hell even the heads of most Government's now) tend to use when crap hits the fan. You're in charge, all hell is breaking loose on your watch, you took a risk (directly or indirectly) and it turned out to be the undoing of all life in the Gulf of Mexico; now the only thing that should be going through your mind is how to leave your job in the best of light, after you are done with the relief well.
I'm so tired of this, it's complicated and your little brain cannot understand it or it's an isolated event that will never happen again crap that we've been getting since 2008. At least here in the United States the last president was genuinely too stupid to relay the information to us.
Sorry this rant could go on for a while... I'll just head over here and mumble in the corner.
Having done patches for some of our Linux servers, I can tell you that most structs, unions, etc... are in the order that they are specified in the man page for a given function. Same way with BSD and other open source projects that I've seen.
If you take a look at something like (just picking something) IP, you'll notice the struct is in the same order as the actual packet. Does it have to be that way? No, but it's usually what everyone goes with.
All the examples that I saw on the site seem a bit too generic to be called copying. I know that some of the snippets have a bit of history, aka didn't come from SCO or Linux, but I'm not that buff in kernel programming to know the difference.
Helium created by decay of heavy elements in incredibly rare in the universe, and it's rare on the earth as well
You mean to tell me that Alpha Decay is rare in the universe? I simply don't buy the argument.
those special traps certainly aren't being replenished fast enough for our needs.
I'd like to point out that running out and running low are two different things here. I favor the later whereas everyone wants to be a doom-sayer and favor the former.
"Oh God! We'll never be able to do another MRI ever again!!!" That is the attitude that I'm sick of, that and OMG! Stop the balloons and blimps!!! Really, c'mon let's not be those people.
As hard as we try we will never be in a vacuum of Helium. We might have low points of supply but we simply are not going to run out of something that is insanely abundant everywhere else in this universe. The Earth is not so special that we can have zero Helium.
The method of extraction may differ but one thing that is for sure is that we know about a million different ways to make Helium here on Earth and a lot of them are byproducts of another reaction. That's not to say that prices won't go up or down, but we will never be at a point where we can't have Helium for the 80% of the uses that it is mainly used for. (aka not balloons). Sealant technology for liquid He will only improve and eventually someone will figure out how to hermetically seal liquid He in stage II. Running low will only accelerate that.
because too many people stuffed it into party balloons and party favours and a billion other random uses today.
Okay I've grown really tired of this argument. The Helium that is used in balloons and blimps accounts for an incredibly small amount of the total use. The most single use of Helium is as a coolant. The largest group of uses is as a purging gas or artificial atmosphere (like in arc wielding, silicon mfg., etc...) Just those two together account for 75% of all uses.
Second, Helium is under constant resupply here on Earth, pretty much all helium on Earth today is the radioactive decay of heavy metals in the interior of the Earth.
I understand where people are coming from when they warn of this kind of stuff, but LONG term this stuff resupplies at a pretty decent rate. Hence the reason He is the second most abundant element in the universe. Fine, rise the price, but don't blame it on the balloons.
All of that is under a RAND agreement. Which means that if Microsoft does not like what Mono is doing they can require that Mono pay a fee for the implementation of the ECMA standard.
So, long as they charge the same amount, or give the same terms to anyone else who is working on an implementation of.NET, which is no one else but Mono, MS is within their rights under the RAND.
Ideally; standards can have no patents, have a RAND to ensure equal fees across the board, or have patented tech and then the company sue the pants off everyone (sorta like RAMBUS and the DDR SDRAM standard).
Standards are not a method of protection in any sense. They are more like a recommendation to do things a certain way. The benefits and pitfalls of which are outside of this discussion.
It makes you wonder about all those promises that Microsoft has made to GNOME, Mono, and Linux to not sue. I don't buy any olive branch that Microsoft bares. Microsoft is evil, they will do everything to make it look like they want standards and interoperability, and then do everything in their power to make their product the only product. Seriously, anybody who believes any offer of friendship from MS is seriously gullible.
IPv4 is terribly simple and does its job. IP, mask, gateway.
That's exactly how IPv6 works as well, it also comes with a slew of other options for auto-configuring your network (sort of like APIPA but better). There is also DHCP if you like that. Seriously, there are way too many people putting way too much thought into something as simple as IPv6.
Slashdot Mirror
Um, I've got an IPv6 address right now from Comcast. Wifi Router gets it's IP address from the upstream advertisements. I get an IPv4 address as well. At any rate the WiFi router configures the clients, or advertises the prefix and the clients do the rest. I'm not sure if this is some sort of trial or what but I can hit all the IPv6 services like www.v6.facebook.com and Google's IPv6 stuff.
Been like this for about six months now.
I'm feeling pretty lucky then. I know boo, hiss Comcast, but I have to tell you that I've had an IPv6 address for about six months now. The WiFi router gets a /64 address from Comcast. From that point the nodes within the home create their addresses from the advertised prefix from the router, blah blah blah...
Really there isn't that big a difference. The router still gets an IPv4 address too for all those websites that haven't got an IPv6 address or AAAA record. I'm not sure how Comcast handles when an AAAA lookup fails but all my boxen understand and obey. Most of the big names are already using IPv6 as well, Facebook, YouTube, all of Google, Apple, Microsoft, IBM, etc...
At any rate, I understand that a lot of people aren't getting IPv6 at the current moment and last ditch efforts are going to be deployed. Granted widely deployed is the key part. But ISPs are going to roll it out, it is the only long term solution we've got, period. However, how long your ISP will drag its feet is a whole another story. However, I did want you all to know that IPv6 is being rolled out to some Comcast customers right now. Now if this is a test thing and then they bitch slap me into a NAT IPv4 scheme has yet to be seen. But for now it's a pretty seamless IPv6 switch, in fact didn't know they had done it till I started toying with ifconfig in Linux and found a global scope IPv6 address.
cd ~/sandwich
./configure
make
sudo make install
At least that's what I've been told is the magic sequence.
So you are saying the government should...
I'm not saying that they should. I'm just telling you that in this magical buffer zone within the US, you might as well forget whatever right international law doesn't grant you. My opinion on the matter doesn't amount to squat, so should the government limit and whatever else the crap you said, my reply is, "No they shouldn't" Do they? Uh, yeah. Do you have any recourse to change this? Not a single ghost of a chance in the remotest of dreams. My suggestion, get used to it (or bomb the border station or whatever the else you think will make you happy.)
That in this magical buffer zone...
Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. They don't exist. Sorry.
Interesting, what if the president decides...
Well s/he legally can't. That power is left to the judicial branch of the US government. If the president did do something like that, then as a citizen I'd be looking for someone to be using that whole check and balance thing on the president. So not to say s/he couldn't, just couldn't do so legally.
You're at a border fourth amendment doesn't apply. I know a lot of people who don't like that idea. My suggestion is any one of the following, 1) Don't leave the country. 2) Don't return to the country. 3) Sneak your way in/out of the country. America's borders have gone to shit. Every in the country is pissed about illegal border crossers and the government is putting pressure on the border agents to do something about it, so they have, piss every single person off to the point that I don't think I'll ever pay the outrageous fee for crossing the American border.
Wow who would have thought that some company in America was covering up, down playing, putting the blame on someone else, etc... on some bad news? Did anybody notice that the sky was blue today?!
As funny as this may sound it really illustrates a point that NASA really has to bring home. Make space travel produce usable results here on Earth and understandable to the constituents that are paying the bill. UAVs should have been at the top of that list. First, you'd have to look hard to find someone of the general public that doesn't know what an UAV (unmanned drone for some) is. Second you put the angle of, "NASA. We're making UAVs so damn good they fly on Mars bitches!" people will really see the connection between NASA and shit we use everyday.
Why this hasn't been done before shows that NASA needs to think a little more outside the box of orbiters and golf carts and bring in the whole gamut of resources and knowledge that all branches have access to. Of course, that would be like asking the CIA and the FBI to work together. What is it about the US government that breeds a mentality to not work with other branches?
I don't think anyone is paying attention this deep in a thread.
Who are you trying to convince? I know it's not me as you can see that I've made up my FUD spreading mind.
My point is that the deal extends to Novell and Novell users alone. I honestly don't care how Ubuntu, Fedora, etc... choose to slice, interpret, put into their default install, or whatever else Mono and the agreement/promises that Microsoft has made with Novell. The wording extends to Novell and Novell alone, the rest is just random guesses about how some company will act to other randomly picked companies/projects.
At any rate, Microsoft could be happy go friendly with open source, maybe not. I'm not the CEO so I couldn't tell you and I'm doubtful you can say with any amount of certainty exactly how Microsoft will act with respect to rightfully asserting their patents, if they should choose to do so. Maybe Microsoft won't, who cares? It's not like anything of critical importance depends on Mono, or that anyone would put anything of critical importance without getting some mass rebuttal from the FUDsters like myself, apparently. I really don't see Mono as any major issue at the current moment, nor do I see it as any major contention point any time in the near future, but that's just my humble opinion. I honestly think the whole Mono thing is just so that Microsoft can put a "cross-platform" label on their ads. I want to reiterate that, I believe Mono to be nothing more than just an ad helper for Microsoft, nothing more sinister or benign than that.
What I'm getting at is what will the EU do when Microsoft does something that they are legally entitled to do? Stop them from doing something legal? Punish them for doing something that the same body that will punish them, says that they are there to protect? That applies to more than just the limited scope that you are so intent on focusing on, namely Mono. It's a sticky situation for the EU and I don't believe "Hammer" is the correct wording, maybe more like "discuss very critically." For example how compliant is Office and the ISO OOXML standard? What's the EU doing about it? I'm sure there are some people who are taking care of that, and I'd like to believe that when the next version of Office comes out it will be fully compliant with the ISO OOXML standard so that we can have interoperability with that client.
Also, I have to really call out your ODF "Fact" because Microsoft's implementation of ODF doesn't work with other ODF implementations. Go ahead give it a whirl. FACT: Microsoft added voluntarily to Office an ODF filter that produces ODF files that are not compatible with other ODF implementations. Nothing insidious about that, just a bad implementation that's all. I'm sure someone else of a higher FUD-factor than I would assert that, "M$ is trying to fragment ODF!! OMG!!! blah blah blah."
There again, I'm not trying to spread any FUD here, just saying that the EU puts themselves into positions that are going to be difficult, maybe not that bad; maybe just uncomfortable, to explain to companies that wish to seek patent protection from that governing body.
The EU can do whatever they please, including whatever "Hammer" strategy that you are purposing. However, that's going to send a muddled message to other companies that want to assert/obtain patent protection from that body.
That's all I'm saying, nothing more, nothing less. It could be Oracle, IBM, Apple, or whoever, but you slap a person down for doing something they are legally entitled to do, and companies are going to start questioning how valid said protections are and to what degree they are allowed to exercise those rights. That, a good business environment, does not make.
Some people are wondering why Apache just won't align itself with Oracle and be done with this.
It's not about the GPL vs Apache License.
The true question is the same that faces Mono and .NET.
Is the Java Platform an open standard that anyone can implement or is it an implementation of a standard that Sun/Oracle made up? We all know that in the .NET world that Mono is just an implementation of a Microsoft standard that later became an ECMA (some parts) standard. Apache wants their Harmony project to be under their license not the GPL.
Let's look at this from say a C or C++ view point. Could Apache write a C/C++ compiler and library and put it under the Apache License? The answer is yes, there are a couple of patents out there that they'd have to watch for but without hesitation it is in the realm of most absolutely. Now turn that same logic over to say Java or .NET. You'd find yourself in the realm of Not really or Fat chance.
So in the end is Java truly open or are we just open sourcing something that is controlled by one entity? If you look hard at the OpenSolaris and the OpenOffice.org debates you'll see that there is a common theme going around here. Me thinks that Apache is grandstanding for a point and hoping the current tide (the anti-Oracle movement) helps push Java somewhere, where the person who is truly in control won't let it go in or at least won't care if ASF decides to leave.
Please stop spreading FUD.
I like that it makes you sound like you're spreading some sort of truth without need for any type of fact checking, and I am some angry anti-Microsoft machine who just spouts Fear! Uncertainty, and DOUBT!!!
No really however, Microsoft has passed a couple of ones past the almighty EU and the EU didn't do a thing because... Oh that's right they have to respect the law! Funny thing that law thing is.
Go ahead and check FAT or best yet NTFS encryption. Microsoft isn't palying nice by any means. They're just biding their time, dragging their feet, and opening protocols does not mean that it absolves one of infringing on a patent.
But whatever if you think a bunch of bought politicians will save you, then steady on lad!
Oh and I know this one isn't a Microsoft but it just makes the point that all becomes mute come respecting contracts, Rambus... Cheers!
Novell extended the patent protection to anyone who uses their software.
That's right, anyone who uses Novell's Mono. That right doesn't extend to anyone else.
The EU isn't going to "hammer" Microsoft when Microsoft has "given" ample opportunity to each major distribution to join them. That would make an easy case for Microsoft to make the EU look like the boogyman.
"Oh I'm so sorry that your copy of Windows is now 300 euro more than the last version. Why not call the EU and have them explain why they're forcing us to pass the cost on to the consumer when all we did was try to protect our contracts?"
People are idiots, governments doublely so.
I merely see Apple picking and choosing what third-party platforms it likes.
True but they are closing off their software to others which isn't all that open. I know it all sounds circular (open to promote things that aren't open?...um?), but the point being is that Apple does understand the open aspect of things, unlike say Microsoft. Apple however is pushing these open stacks as a means to promote their hardware first and foremost. That's not a bad thing in the world of business and go them. However, I liken all their openness to the small snafu that begot WebKit. In the end Apple came through, barely and still continue to limp with the KHTML people, but it really took some points from their whole openness thing.
It is one thing to embrace openness to promote your stack. It is another thing to give parts of your stack back to the open community. Much like Microsoft's contribution to the Linux Kernel for their Hyper-V, I am so glad that they are continuing to support that contribution (oh wait they're not.)
Oracle is another beast altogether. They have taken something that has grown a very fruitful community; and have given reasons to their supporters to provide ammo to the Java detractors. It's something when someone like Miguel de Icaza who likes to bash Java starts quoting James Gosling to support one of his points for disliking Java. That my friend is a clear sign that all is not well (in that, "I'm in my house and I'm surrounded by fire" kind of not well way.)
Hell, at least IBM has a voice in the Java community, albeit a small one that many people carefully listen to and take with a grain of salt, but Oracle is just acting like Open-Source doesn't exist and really could care less (well couldn't say that for sure since Oracle is saying how they feel at all) what feelings or sentiments get stepped on in the process of driving that bottom dollar. That's going to build of an aversion to the Java platform. Maybe at first like how you would shy away from someone with a cold, but it may very well build up to say tuberculosis style aversion. With the way Oracle's running this show we've reached flu stage in record time.
I think Steve Jobs personifies the circle of Apple developers best. The hardware and software work so well because they are so tightly integrated. Style first and substance later. The substance has come slowly in the MacOS X world, slowly poured its way into the iPod -> iPhone -> iPad... That's not to say that Apple has had their shortcomings but employees (developers, mainly) look at the computer as one may look at a stylish coffee maker.
The employees aren't leaving because they're uber-happy, anyone who has written a book about working with Steve Jobs could openly explain that to someone else. The employees stay because they share a common thread with Steve Jobs; beauty of design. It's sort of like that strange love-hate relationship that painters have with the world in general (so to say, but an amazingly short-coming way of putting it).
Java developers are washing their hands of Oracle because of trust issues. Being a Java developer I can attest that Oracle has really dropped the ball on one simple task, communication. In the end Oracle may be getting big contracts and developers will use whatever they are told to use but trust goes a long way. Openly talking about your plans for something is a good way to develop trust, as any woman may openly explain to someone else. Oracle isn't doing a good job at that, in fact, they are pretty much sucking balls at it.
So, Oracle may still do a banged up job at making their bottom dollar look good but they do so at the risk of making all the developers groan at each and every moment of writing code, in the end somebody is going to get tired of the bitching and either fire some talent or start doing small, one-off tasks on some other stack. At that point the small cracks are going to slowly add up and it's going to make universal trust for Oracle take a big nose dive.
PS: I hate Apple, but you got to show some respect for the developers who are truly looking at an OS like a painter would look at a canvas, but their still pure evil.
Compare this to iPhone, where every handset works the same.
Yes, that's all we need is everyone / everywhere to have the same exact anything. Because free will and choice is so overrated.
Absolutely correct. Java still has a few advantages over dotNET within the FOSS community. Neither platform is without some darksides but I would hope that everyone was waking up and understanding that nothing is without a darkside (glibc?). That being said, Java has fallen into the hands of a bunch of pricks known as Oracle. I think we all pinned it correctly when everyone said that Java was being handed over to the only other company that makes MS look good, The other being Apple (that's right I said it! Apple is pure evil, they make Satan look like the f'ing Pope!)
At any rate, Oracle could, most likely, screw us all for future versions of Java and start suing the pants off the OpenJDK community at any given time. The only safety net that we've got is that Sun GPL a lot of code and we can fall back to that. MS hasn't released a single thread open or GPL a single thing. There's nothing to fall back on if MS should screw their promise. However, Oracle is most likely to take a scorched Earth approach when it comes to lawsuits. So as we may have some safety net with Java, will pay for that safety by dealing with one of the most insane companies on Earth, aside from Monsanto, Haliburton and Apple (yeah I really hate Apple that much).
So I wouldn't be sitting there saying Mono is safe. It's not, but maybe the benefits out weigh the risk. Maybe not.
That's not to say Java is safe either. It's in the hands of a bunch of assholes right now but you do get some GPL protection. Maybe that's worth something to you, maybe not.
Either way you slice it we're all screwed might as well use Python.
Mod parent up! There is no better way to sum up this article, other than "Yes, we knew that already, but we don't do it that way anymore because we're all lazy."
leading to a purely theological fallback position ("it's just made to look that way by God!")
That's when I fire back with. Oh! I see, God is deceptive. How does it feel to believe in a deceiving being? Wait what's that? God does not deceive? Well last I checked the meaning of deceptive was "Giving an appearance or impression different from the true one; misleading." I think your argument meets that criteria whether or not it is to test our belief in God.
It about that time they start quoting a bunch of stuff from the bible about how God cannot deceive. Which at that point I then point out the circular logic, "So the bible must be true because it says so, and that statement must be true because the bible says it is true? Don't you think you may be just a bit gullible, just a tiny bit?"
Well, I have quite a few tabs open every day on my system. Around 100 - 120 or so. Our help desk ticket system is RSS based. Using live bookmarks I can open all the tickets when I get in into each of their own tabs, that's about 20 to 40 tabs (depends on the day we're having.)
Next I open up all my Google tools, gmail/wave/docs/newsgroups/etc... That's about 10 tabs. Then I pop all the unread stories of Slashdot into slashdot (that's about 10 to 15 tabs, depends on what kind of news day it is). Do the same thing with BBC (That's usually about 20 to 25 tabs.) Then it's a couple of tabs for odd and end stuff. (usually around 20 to 30 tabs.)
Ctrl+W, Ctrl+Tab, Ctrl+K, F6, Ctrl+T, Ctrl+Shift+T all become my friends as I go through my tabs. After I'm done with the page it's a quick Ctrl+W or Ctrl+D/Ctrl+W. I know I'm getting towards the end of the day when most of my tabs are gone. A little Alt+Tab to switch between IDE, help tickets, VNC viewer, our TN-5250 terminal, and Firefox makes up my whole day. It's not often that I use the mouse but I do when simple Page Down/Page Up doesn't satisfy me on a page (Slashdot I'm looking at you most of the time) and when I'm using VNC viewer to show somebody where some function is in MS Office 2007's ribbon.
That's not to say I could go another route about how I organize myself and not open like 110 tabs in the morning and then spend the next nine (yes we work ten hour days) hours fluxing between 40 and 60 tabs, and then towards my tenth hour start reaching only ten to twenty tabs. I could open tabs as I need them but there are two cons to that.
1. I like thinking as my browser as my web inbox. I don't like having to go out and get each item one at a time and with our help desk ticket system, that would be the equal (in pain) of watching Richard Simmons working out to the oldies, not incredibly deadly at first, but at some paint you'll want to kill yourself for some reason you just can fully grasp.
2. I use the five minutes that it takes for the tabs to load to head over to the coffee machine and get my first couple cups of coffee in. (That's right a couple [2] cups of coffee in five minutes, my stomach as it stands has aged three time faster than the rest of me because of this regime.)
Hope that answers your question about people with butt loads of tabs. I know it might not be the best way but it's the way that seems best to work for me. Of course this coming from a person who is absolutely horrible to themselves health-wise. Trust me coffee is the lightest damage I do to myself.
So, as long as it's not in court, a company can tell lies
That's why we here on Slashdot are so confident about Microsoft's pledge to not sue Linux users for $INSERT_RANDOM_PATENT. Because, like BP, they have so much money that they don't need to lie.
Seriously, if that's a question then the answer is a resounding, "yes!" Why would you believe anything a multi-billion dollar company would tell you? The only time you can actually buy what they're saying is when there are some legal repercussions for not telling the truth.
It's not that giant companies are pure evil (unless you're Apple, Inc., then yes you are pure evil) it's just that they get so big that they have serious left-hand-not-knowing-what-right-hand-is-doing-itis. Which in turn falls back to filthy rich CEOs doing an incredibility shitty job at keeping people accountable for their actions. In the end thought it's really because we buy this isolation pile that heads of company's (hell even the heads of most Government's now) tend to use when crap hits the fan. You're in charge, all hell is breaking loose on your watch, you took a risk (directly or indirectly) and it turned out to be the undoing of all life in the Gulf of Mexico; now the only thing that should be going through your mind is how to leave your job in the best of light, after you are done with the relief well.
I'm so tired of this, it's complicated and your little brain cannot understand it or it's an isolated event that will never happen again crap that we've been getting since 2008. At least here in the United States the last president was genuinely too stupid to relay the information to us.
Sorry this rant could go on for a while... I'll just head over here and mumble in the corner.
Having done patches for some of our Linux servers, I can tell you that most structs, unions, etc... are in the order that they are specified in the man page for a given function. Same way with BSD and other open source projects that I've seen.
If you take a look at something like (just picking something) IP, you'll notice the struct is in the same order as the actual packet. Does it have to be that way? No, but it's usually what everyone goes with.
All the examples that I saw on the site seem a bit too generic to be called copying. I know that some of the snippets have a bit of history, aka didn't come from SCO or Linux, but I'm not that buff in kernel programming to know the difference.
Helium created by decay of heavy elements in incredibly rare in the universe, and it's rare on the earth as well
You mean to tell me that Alpha Decay is rare in the universe? I simply don't buy the argument.
those special traps certainly aren't being replenished fast enough for our needs.
I'd like to point out that running out and running low are two different things here. I favor the later whereas everyone wants to be a doom-sayer and favor the former.
"Oh God! We'll never be able to do another MRI ever again!!!" That is the attitude that I'm sick of, that and OMG! Stop the balloons and blimps!!! Really, c'mon let's not be those people.
As hard as we try we will never be in a vacuum of Helium. We might have low points of supply but we simply are not going to run out of something that is insanely abundant everywhere else in this universe. The Earth is not so special that we can have zero Helium.
The method of extraction may differ but one thing that is for sure is that we know about a million different ways to make Helium here on Earth and a lot of them are byproducts of another reaction. That's not to say that prices won't go up or down, but we will never be at a point where we can't have Helium for the 80% of the uses that it is mainly used for. (aka not balloons). Sealant technology for liquid He will only improve and eventually someone will figure out how to hermetically seal liquid He in stage II. Running low will only accelerate that.
because too many people stuffed it into party balloons and party favours and a billion other random uses today.
Okay I've grown really tired of this argument. The Helium that is used in balloons and blimps accounts for an incredibly small amount of the total use. The most single use of Helium is as a coolant. The largest group of uses is as a purging gas or artificial atmosphere (like in arc wielding, silicon mfg., etc...) Just those two together account for 75% of all uses.
Second, Helium is under constant resupply here on Earth, pretty much all helium on Earth today is the radioactive decay of heavy metals in the interior of the Earth.
I understand where people are coming from when they warn of this kind of stuff, but LONG term this stuff resupplies at a pretty decent rate. Hence the reason He is the second most abundant element in the universe. Fine, rise the price, but don't blame it on the balloons.
All of that is under a RAND agreement. Which means that if Microsoft does not like what Mono is doing they can require that Mono pay a fee for the implementation of the ECMA standard. .NET, which is no one else but Mono, MS is within their rights under the RAND.
So, long as they charge the same amount, or give the same terms to anyone else who is working on an implementation of
Ideally; standards can have no patents, have a RAND to ensure equal fees across the board, or have patented tech and then the company sue the pants off everyone (sorta like RAMBUS and the DDR SDRAM standard).
Standards are not a method of protection in any sense. They are more like a recommendation to do things a certain way. The benefits and pitfalls of which are outside of this discussion.
It makes you wonder about all those promises that Microsoft has made to GNOME, Mono, and Linux to not sue. I don't buy any olive branch that Microsoft bares. Microsoft is evil, they will do everything to make it look like they want standards and interoperability, and then do everything in their power to make their product the only product. Seriously, anybody who believes any offer of friendship from MS is seriously gullible.
IPv4 is terribly simple and does its job. IP, mask, gateway.
That's exactly how IPv6 works as well, it also comes with a slew of other options for auto-configuring your network (sort of like APIPA but better). There is also DHCP if you like that. Seriously, there are way too many people putting way too much thought into something as simple as IPv6.