Unfortunately, it doesn't have a "RUNS LINUX" infoband splashed all over it so it will, of course, be ignored by our illustrious geek toy connoisseur CmdrTaco.
Is it me or did they basically say they can figure out a possibility among a set of large possiblities which do not include what actually occurred. Sounds useful. Probing all states? How long would that take? 40+GB of disk and a few hundred MBs of RAM doesn't sound like a quick probe.
I know, I know, I'm ignorant. The article did a poor job trying to explain this as anything but "some surrealist form of computer science".
Oh, and I can finally use this quote:
"In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. But, in practice, there is. " - Jan L.A. van de Snepscheut
Python is great for embedding a scripting control language into complex compiled (C/C++) systems. It's found it's way into many graphics rendering packages and it's used at ILM extensively. I meet people all the time that love Python. I meet more that love Perl and never bother to look at Python. I think Perl just has mindshare and people don't bother to look around.
Just use common sense. It's against the LAW to break into another site.
Send them a professional letter detailing how you're sorry that they didn't choose you but am glad to see that their business is progressing. Politely point out that they have a security flaw that's easily exploited. Tell them up front what data they have exposed and the basic steps to exploit the problem. Let them know that you felt it was important enough to tell them this even though they chose X company over you.
yadda yadda yadda... These problems are all alike: "I want to do the right thing but it's awkwards because of XYZ". If you're a grown up it's something you should have learned to deal with politely and courteously. If they reject you then it's their fault not yours. Certainly don't try to turn it into a flame.
One option that occurs to me is to report them to the Better Business Bureau or some other consumer agency. This approach should only be used when serious problems are ignored (exposing a million credit card numbers, etc). Just remember, unless you feel like it it's pretty hard to help everyone all the time.
So based on an incomplete sample you've discarded a practice without ever trying it. Furthermore, you advise others to do so based on your non-experience. eg: From observing the way one open source project on sourceforge failed (of the many thousands) I could conclude that open source is a fatally flawed methodology.
I've tried it. It's worked well. There are documented examples of it working in expensive production environments (xprogramming.com). Sometimes it doesn't work so well, but at least TRY the practice before you go spewing forth about it.
Finally, a well reasoned response in the midst of the increasing sea of juvenille crap.
I find it incredibly ironic that slashdot is the place of all places where XP gets put down. I wonder how many have programmed in groups before.
Code reviews are wonderful things and pair programming is instant code review. I'd kill to have someone else checking my work as I go along (and vice versa). The few times I was able to try it for small projects the code quality was measurably better. Isn't this site the place where people love to tout "may eyes makes bugs shallow"?
Unit tests are awesome tools. With unit tests and regression suites you ensure that you don't break what you've coded. For the simple scripts that most of the readership code this may not be applicale, but for any reasonably complex system testing is a gigantic hassle and time hole. Unit tests alleviate the need to manually operate tests and check code behavior for correctness (One reason I think Java is really cool, you can code a unit test for each class in the class files). Unit tests can solve the never ending "it works on my machine" problem.
Code refactoring and redesign is continual in XP. You don't write what you don't need. This is different from not thinking about extensibility or design. You actually need an above average sense and feel for design to do this part effectively.
XP doesn't lock you into too many methodologies and you would be foolish to buy 100% into all of it. You'd probably need to adapt parts of it for your environment and resources. XP is really just taking common sense and a really agressive attitude towards programming. Smirking at it while you continue down a path that is proven to be fraught with weaknesses is being short-sighted.
BSD is a true gift with no strings atatched (well, I suppose the license has to continue to be embedded). ie: I can sell it, I can throw it away, I can use it, I can destroy it. Some of these may be construed as bad things by others. (I'd actually like to see what the difference between BSD and public domain is... maybe you can re-license public domain?)
GPL code is a gift with (perhaps well intentioned) strings attached. Argue the virtues of the strings purpose all you want but they are there.
NOTE: I have projects distributed under the GPL. It fits my needs. I actually prefer the BSD license but it didn't fit my needs.
Bottom line: If you believe in something very strongly then work for it, push it, advocate it... but in the end you should not force this belief upon others. Be nice. Making BSD or GPL or commercial license users feel like shit is childish.
Convergence will only come when the form fits the function or is so small as to be unnoticable. Most importanly for portables when storage and battery life are a magnitude better than the current state.
I find your argument somewaht weakened by using 20 years as a comparison. I was using a typewriter 10 years ago and really don't think is was affordable to switch to computers/printers until the mid 90s. They already had Ataris 20 years ago. People still use calculators al the time (I do). 5-10 years is an eternity in computing technologies. You'll have plenty of time (as a consumer) to see these coming and adjust to them. It's not something you have to get ready for.
Actually if you follow the links to the *authors* homepage you'll see that the author has no 'expert' level knowledge of ASP etc. I think it's a simpler explanation.
The very first post on Slashdot set the tone for all of April Fool's. LZip with compression down to %0 of the file size. That ruined any possibility of anything being taken seriously. The ensuing crap that followed didn't help either. I would have thought that intelligent people could have had better execution than on the site that pathetic day.
With all due respect, *I* could have answered all these questions just as well as this person did. It's the party line and we are all familiar with it. Is there really an iota of info in the interview that you didn't already know ahead of time? Just read a few press releases and go through the marketspeak on the MS website and you'd be fully capable of answering questions with stuff like "we have tough competition so we really focus on innovating to give our customers a key edge in delivering success"...
Real answers perhaps but hardly meaningful answers. Then again, this is what I'd expect unless I got info form a 'behind the scenes' source like a friend.
You know, April fools jokes only work when you get tricked into believing the story, or at least there is doubt in your mind that it's maybe legitimate, maybe a crock.
In my part of the country (central Texas) 384kbps (ie ~38KB/s) is probably the affordable norm. Probably anywhere from $40-$75/month (ISP+line). Some ISPs will not cap your downstream so you may get upwards of 900kbps. It quickly becomes very expensive to get an upstream over 384.
Anyways, when people talk about DSL speeds they almost always use 128kpbs to refer to just that. 1.5Mbps is used for the larger figure. A quick look at 5 or 6 pricing schemes will quickly confirm this.
Turnabout: If coders don't like others making money off of them then maybe they should pick a different license. The GPL doesn't forbid this. BSD certainly allows for this. The only way you could forbid this is to include a 'not for commercial' use clause.
How about if someone breaks into Boeing's network and the new airline design is accessible on that network. Furthermore assume that the breakin isn't detected for a few weeks and that lots of work has been done. Now, suppose the person didn't steal anything.
How much do you think it would cost Boeing for this incident? How much would you, as a potential passenger on this aircraft, expect them to spend on this one incident?
This actually occurred several years ago and the estimated cost to Boeing was (IIRC) over $200,000. They had to verify that their data integrity was ok, that work hadn't been tampered with, and so on into the dull sysadmin stuff...
So, yeah, a simple act can cost many times as much as its face value. I don't believe someone would let it stretch as far as your example (and I hope not if it's just M&Ms) but the principle is in place.
What we're going to get are set-top boxes. All-in-one devices that are hooked up to a broadband connection to deliver:
-streaming video
-video on demand
-web
-games
-karoke
-video phone
-video recording (tivo style)
-digital audio/"radio"
-cd-rw/jukebox
-DVD/vcd/divx player
-receiver
-builtin firewall/router
etc.
These are rolling out slowly as we speak. They're about the site of a digital cale box and probably will cost in the $500 range at first. Telecom and entertainment (Blockbuster) type places are probably the most interested companies.
They won't replace computers but they'll be huge leaps and bounds above webtv. We'll see how far the subscription model will take us.
Slashdot Mirror
Unfortunately, it doesn't have a "RUNS LINUX" infoband splashed all over it so it will, of course, be ignored by our illustrious geek toy connoisseur CmdrTaco.
This story reminds me of the Therac-25 X Ray machine accidents (do a google search). Of course, instead of getting test scores mixed up, people died.
Poor QA and safety analysis. Trust in a product that was supposed to be fullproof. Lengthy process to fix the problem and recover damages.
Frankly I think the problem is more that the company behavior was unethical and immoral. An all too common problem when dealing with money and people.
Is it me or did they basically say they can figure out a possibility among a set of large possiblities which do not include what actually occurred. Sounds useful. Probing all states? How long would that take? 40+GB of disk and a few hundred MBs of RAM doesn't sound like a quick probe.
I know, I know, I'm ignorant. The article did a poor job trying to explain this as anything but "some surrealist form of computer science".
Oh, and I can finally use this quote:
"In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. But, in practice, there is. " - Jan L.A. van de Snepscheut
Considering Quad proc motherboards are $1000 and up, no. A quick look on pricewatch would have solved your curiousity.
Python is great for embedding a scripting control language into complex compiled (C/C++) systems. It's found it's way into many graphics rendering packages and it's used at ILM extensively. I meet people all the time that love Python. I meet more that love Perl and never bother to look at Python. I think Perl just has mindshare and people don't bother to look around.
You leave your car unlocked - door hanging wide open - and running while checking your mail... I walk up and jump in and start driving off.
Wheeeeeeeee. I come back and leave it where it was before you're done checking your mail. No harm done... Right? Or have you changed your mind.
Just use common sense. It's against the LAW to break into another site.
Send them a professional letter detailing how you're sorry that they didn't choose you but am glad to see that their business is progressing. Politely point out that they have a security flaw that's easily exploited. Tell them up front what data they have exposed and the basic steps to exploit the problem. Let them know that you felt it was important enough to tell them this even though they chose X company over you.
yadda yadda yadda... These problems are all alike: "I want to do the right thing but it's awkwards because of XYZ". If you're a grown up it's something you should have learned to deal with politely and courteously. If they reject you then it's their fault not yours. Certainly don't try to turn it into a flame.
One option that occurs to me is to report them to the Better Business Bureau or some other consumer agency. This approach should only be used when serious problems are ignored (exposing a million credit card numbers, etc). Just remember, unless you feel like it it's pretty hard to help everyone all the time.
So based on an incomplete sample you've discarded a practice without ever trying it. Furthermore, you advise others to do so based on your non-experience. eg: From observing the way one open source project on sourceforge failed (of the many thousands) I could conclude that open source is a fatally flawed methodology.
I've tried it. It's worked well. There are documented examples of it working in expensive production environments (xprogramming.com). Sometimes it doesn't work so well, but at least TRY the practice before you go spewing forth about it.
Finally, a well reasoned response in the midst of the increasing sea of juvenille crap.
I find it incredibly ironic that slashdot is the place of all places where XP gets put down. I wonder how many have programmed in groups before.
Code reviews are wonderful things and pair programming is instant code review. I'd kill to have someone else checking my work as I go along (and vice versa). The few times I was able to try it for small projects the code quality was measurably better. Isn't this site the place where people love to tout "may eyes makes bugs shallow"?
Unit tests are awesome tools. With unit tests and regression suites you ensure that you don't break what you've coded. For the simple scripts that most of the readership code this may not be applicale, but for any reasonably complex system testing is a gigantic hassle and time hole. Unit tests alleviate the need to manually operate tests and check code behavior for correctness (One reason I think Java is really cool, you can code a unit test for each class in the class files). Unit tests can solve the never ending "it works on my machine" problem.
Code refactoring and redesign is continual in XP. You don't write what you don't need. This is different from not thinking about extensibility or design. You actually need an above average sense and feel for design to do this part effectively.
XP doesn't lock you into too many methodologies and you would be foolish to buy 100% into all of it. You'd probably need to adapt parts of it for your environment and resources. XP is really just taking common sense and a really agressive attitude towards programming. Smirking at it while you continue down a path that is proven to be fraught with weaknesses is being short-sighted.
Exactly.
BSD is a true gift with no strings atatched (well, I suppose the license has to continue to be embedded). ie: I can sell it, I can throw it away, I can use it, I can destroy it. Some of these may be construed as bad things by others. (I'd actually like to see what the difference between BSD and public domain is... maybe you can re-license public domain?)
GPL code is a gift with (perhaps well intentioned) strings attached. Argue the virtues of the strings purpose all you want but they are there.
NOTE: I have projects distributed under the GPL. It fits my needs. I actually prefer the BSD license but it didn't fit my needs.
Bottom line: If you believe in something very strongly then work for it, push it, advocate it... but in the end you should not force this belief upon others. Be nice. Making BSD or GPL or commercial license users feel like shit is childish.
Convergence will only come when the form fits the function or is so small as to be unnoticable. Most importanly for portables when storage and battery life are a magnitude better than the current state.
I find your argument somewaht weakened by using 20 years as a comparison. I was using a typewriter 10 years ago and really don't think is was affordable to switch to computers/printers until the mid 90s. They already had Ataris 20 years ago. People still use calculators al the time (I do). 5-10 years is an eternity in computing technologies. You'll have plenty of time (as a consumer) to see these coming and adjust to them. It's not something you have to get ready for.
Actually if you follow the links to the *authors* homepage you'll see that the author has no 'expert' level knowledge of ASP etc. I think it's a simpler explanation.
http://www.webmin.com/
Pretty hard URL to remember huh? (JK =P)
No, fiction is what hasn't happened yet.
The very first post on Slashdot set the tone for all of April Fool's. LZip with compression down to %0 of the file size. That ruined any possibility of anything being taken seriously. The ensuing crap that followed didn't help either. I would have thought that intelligent people could have had better execution than on the site that pathetic day.
Taking this a step further, the obvious answer is to just write it yourself.
I can't tell whether this is going to be taken seriously or sarcastically.
With all due respect, *I* could have answered all these questions just as well as this person did. It's the party line and we are all familiar with it. Is there really an iota of info in the interview that you didn't already know ahead of time? Just read a few press releases and go through the marketspeak on the MS website and you'd be fully capable of answering questions with stuff like "we have tough competition so we really focus on innovating to give our customers a key edge in delivering success"...
Real answers perhaps but hardly meaningful answers. Then again, this is what I'd expect unless I got info form a 'behind the scenes' source like a friend.
I dunno it's alright. Just pretend it's a sneak peek into what this site will be like every day in a couple years.
You know, April fools jokes only work when you get tricked into believing the story, or at least there is doubt in your mind that it's maybe legitimate, maybe a crock.
This? Well, this is just stupid.
In my part of the country (central Texas) 384kbps (ie ~38KB/s) is probably the affordable norm. Probably anywhere from $40-$75/month (ISP+line). Some ISPs will not cap your downstream so you may get upwards of 900kbps. It quickly becomes very expensive to get an upstream over 384.
Anyways, when people talk about DSL speeds they almost always use 128kpbs to refer to just that. 1.5Mbps is used for the larger figure. A quick look at 5 or 6 pricing schemes will quickly confirm this.
err.. I meant 'must distribute for free'
Turnabout: If coders don't like others making money off of them then maybe they should pick a different license. The GPL doesn't forbid this. BSD certainly allows for this. The only way you could forbid this is to include a 'not for commercial' use clause.
You would think that until you sit in a Starbucks for a couple minutes.
How about if someone breaks into Boeing's network and the new airline design is accessible on that network. Furthermore assume that the breakin isn't detected for a few weeks and that lots of work has been done. Now, suppose the person didn't steal anything.
How much do you think it would cost Boeing for this incident? How much would you, as a potential passenger on this aircraft, expect them to spend on this one incident?
This actually occurred several years ago and the estimated cost to Boeing was (IIRC) over $200,000. They had to verify that their data integrity was ok, that work hadn't been tampered with, and so on into the dull sysadmin stuff...
So, yeah, a simple act can cost many times as much as its face value. I don't believe someone would let it stretch as far as your example (and I hope not if it's just M&Ms) but the principle is in place.
What we're going to get are set-top boxes. All-in-one devices that are hooked up to a broadband connection to deliver:
-streaming video
-video on demand
-web
-games
-karoke
-video phone
-video recording (tivo style)
-digital audio/"radio"
-cd-rw/jukebox
-DVD/vcd/divx player
-receiver
-builtin firewall/router
etc.
These are rolling out slowly as we speak. They're about the site of a digital cale box and probably will cost in the $500 range at first. Telecom and entertainment (Blockbuster) type places are probably the most interested companies.
They won't replace computers but they'll be huge leaps and bounds above webtv. We'll see how far the subscription model will take us.