I will give two possibilities : 1. "universal binary" : compile code for each platform you want to infect. That one might even work on other architectures
Code needs : a. an algorithm to know which OS/Arch an executable is for (and needs to know if a file is an executable in the first place) b. an algorithm to link the appropriate code part.
You have an Win/x86 trojan. He checks for files and finds an PowerPC/Linux ELF. He adds itself to the end of the file, finds a jump in the original code, reroutes it to the PowerPC/Linux part of the virus code. At the end of the virus code, does the appropriate jump so the original program still works.
2. checks for syscalls : IA32 code (usually named x86) remains IA32 code, whatever your OS is. The biggest difference lies in syscalls. have generic code (without syscall) checking what OS is running and set, say, CurrentOS. Each time you need a syscall, do a switch(CurrentOS) and execute the appropriate syscall.
I do not complain about setting up a dual-head system setup, it's even easier than with X-Window.
I'm complaining about the way MS-Windows handles windows across multiple screens, the UI (like a taskbar only on one "main" screen") being inadapted.
Using you flight sim example, how can you start it on the secondary screen ? I didn't found a way to start a full-screen directx app on it, it always take the primary screen, hiding that precious taskbar.
Usually, you can't move your mouse to another screen anyway with such apps but it isn't always the case (Sid Meier's Pirates and Civ IV for example allow to "escape" the game screen). But how to launch new apps from those empty screens ?
Well, have you used an X desktop to compare with ?
Usually when configured as a big desktop, X WM/DE aren't better (yet...), but when used as independent heads, you're getting two taskbars (for those DE using taskbars - I'm personally using WindowMaker at home that has no such thing)
I agree that two desktops are better than one, but the way MS-Windows handles them is a mess for me. I'm a big user of virtual desktops, each one having a dedicated task so I don't have overlapping / hidden windows. Well I'm quite annoyed with the way MS-Windows even a single screen, but starting an app in the left screen and seeing it appear on the right screen, minimizing a window on the right screen, and needing to get it back from the taskbar on the left screen puzzles me.
I guess in multiple heads configurations, Alt-Tab is almost mandatory if you don't want to move constantly your mouse from left to right.
Now, if you don't switch apps... you don't need much of a window manager:)
I guess it was an adaptative Huffman algorithm, or else it sounds weird.
AFAIK, the classical Huffman algorithm essentially can't compress its output at all, it has been proven to be the optimal algorithm when converting a symbol (usually 8bit) in an integer number of bits.
Exactly. And as it is targeted to large data centers, I wonder if they didn't implement some sort of sparse files. Compressing large chunks of 0's sure give you impressive compression ratios...
Your basic point is sound, however AFAIK, biofuel doesn't help much in the "fight" against global warming. It just isn't using fossil materials to produce CO2. Clean source of energies include wind, sun, water (dams, tides, waves), geothermic. Nuclear plants are producing another kind of pollution that isn't causing much global warming (however, nuclear plants are producing large amounts of water vapor, creating clouds, that have an effect, even if much less than CO2 production).
Now, of course, biofuel is a renewable source of energy and as such is better. I also acknowledges that when extracting oil, gases are burned thus producing more CO2.
Does someone know how much carbon in plants comes from air CO2 versus biomass carbon from the ground ? BTW, burning biomass release CO2 in the air, while organic activity (using enzymes to get heat from biomass) could release (much) less ?
Therefore biofuel sure is better, but it isn't a really good answer to the problem, just a lesser evil.
Free as in "paid with your copy of MS-Windows". I will say it's gratis when it is available for other OSes (Mac OS, Linux, FreeBSD, QNX, whatever)
An immaterial product "P" from company "C" can't be said gratis when it only works with another product "Q" also produced by company "C" and that you need to pay.
Try another one, like google.fr, google.de... You might have to chose from a line below the search box "Google.* is available in..." You then will have radio items under the search box Web (all languages), pages in chosen language, pages hosted in chosen country.
No need to get an account...
Re:Damned if they do, damned if they don't
on
Office Delayed, Too
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Microsoft has been blasted in the past for releasing software "too early" in people's opinions. Now, they want to make sure it's completely ready before releasing, and people are complaining that it's "too late".
And there's no contradiction. A release can be both "too early" because it is full of bugs and "too late" because a release date has been advertised that wasn't met. Remember that "Longhorn" should've been released for 4th quarter 2005.
Unlike CD-ROMs, I don't believe you can actually read the sector meta-data
What are you calling meta-data ? CDs also have "merging bits", and what is read as a byte is in fact coded on-disk as 14 bits, and you can't read C2 errors either, that are beyond the 2352 bytes that really are all used as data on an audio CD, an audio sector being 1/75 of a second, 44100/75*2(channels)*2(bytes per sample) = 2352 bytes and it has correction codes in addition too. You can however read subchannels (96 bytes / sector)
When dealing with such low-level technologies, reading bits on disk doesn't mean anything as there really are no bits on the disc, just pits and lands (CD) or magnetic particles (HD) causing little electric variations on a sensor, then no variation is interpreted as 0 and a variation is interpreted as a 1, and you need variations even when writing only 0's as a reference clock.
without some sort of drive-manufacturer-specific tricks.
Now of course, as you cannot change HD platters within different drive with different heads like you can do with a CD, each manufacturer can (and will !) encode differently. It has been reported that hard disks with the same reference wouldn't "interoperate" exchanging the controller part because of differing firmware versions, while the format is standardized for CDs or DVDs.
they actually store near 600 bytes
(that would be 4800 bits) In that light, they're not storing bytes, just magnetizing particles. Bytes are quite high-level. There are probably more than a ten thousands magnetic variations for a 512 byte sector. What you call bytes is already what you can read:) But there is more "meta-data" than that.
Here's an interesting read quickly found on Google just for you:)
Couldn't say admit once and for all that they're thinking MS-Windows and MS-Office are now mature products and that they won't release new versions anymore ?:)
Slashdot Mirror
I will give two possibilities :
1. "universal binary" : compile code for each platform you want to infect. That one might even work on other architectures
Code needs :
a. an algorithm to know which OS/Arch an executable is for (and needs to know if a file is an executable in the first place)
b. an algorithm to link the appropriate code part.
You have an Win/x86 trojan. He checks for files and finds an PowerPC/Linux ELF. He adds itself to the end of the file, finds a jump in the original code, reroutes it to the PowerPC/Linux part of the virus code. At the end of the virus code, does the appropriate jump so the original program still works.
2. checks for syscalls :
IA32 code (usually named x86) remains IA32 code, whatever your OS is. The biggest difference lies in syscalls.
have generic code (without syscall) checking what OS is running and set, say, CurrentOS. Each time you need a syscall, do a switch(CurrentOS) and execute the appropriate syscall.
You're mistaken.
Animal data should be opposed to the usual electrical data (phones, computers).
It is data transmitted using RFC 1149
What did you think the NSA was for ?
Either that or Microsoft's calendar is running five days late...
Prabably Port25 wasn't ready on time and delayed...
I suggest you read my other answer.
I do not complain about setting up a dual-head system setup, it's even easier than with X-Window.
I'm complaining about the way MS-Windows handles windows across multiple screens, the UI (like a taskbar only on one "main" screen") being inadapted.
Using you flight sim example, how can you start it on the secondary screen ?
I didn't found a way to start a full-screen directx app on it, it always take the primary screen, hiding that precious taskbar.
Usually, you can't move your mouse to another screen anyway with such apps but it isn't always the case (Sid Meier's Pirates and Civ IV for example allow to "escape" the game screen). But how to launch new apps from those empty screens ?
Well, have you used an X desktop to compare with ?
:)
Usually when configured as a big desktop, X WM/DE aren't better (yet...), but when used as independent heads, you're getting two taskbars (for those DE using taskbars - I'm personally using WindowMaker at home that has no such thing)
I agree that two desktops are better than one, but the way MS-Windows handles them is a mess for me. I'm a big user of virtual desktops, each one having a dedicated task so I don't have overlapping / hidden windows. Well I'm quite annoyed with the way MS-Windows even a single screen, but starting an app in the left screen and seeing it appear on the right screen, minimizing a window on the right screen, and needing to get it back from the taskbar on the left screen puzzles me.
I guess in multiple heads configurations, Alt-Tab is almost mandatory if you don't want to move constantly your mouse from left to right.
Now, if you don't switch apps... you don't need much of a window manager
I feel sorry for him, given how using MS-Windows with multiple screen is a nightmare... :)
But, looking at the picture, he's only using a single screen anyway...
I guess it was an adaptative Huffman algorithm, or else it sounds weird.
AFAIK, the classical Huffman algorithm essentially can't compress its output at all, it has been proven to be the optimal algorithm when converting a symbol (usually 8bit) in an integer number of bits.
Exactly. And as it is targeted to large data centers, I wonder if they didn't implement some sort of sparse files. Compressing large chunks of 0's sure give you impressive compression ratios...
Oops, I forgot the GNU part in the title of my previous post.
Sorry, RMS.
Really sorry...
NO ! Please don't GNU/free me ! NOOOOOOooo...
FTFA :
Microsoft has urged UK PC vendors not to give customers the opportunity to buy a PC without a pre-installed operating system.
Just pre-install GNU/Linux... See ? Fixed !
Now I agree MS just looks like mafia, but a GNU/Linux distrib like Debian is free (beer + speech) anyway, so it's a cheap answer to the threat...
... to create an alternative ms-windows logo better than the original ! :)
Going by google's general productline, gTunes[:-s] could be a server centric music player
:-)
I guess you meant Gtunes *Beta*
Your basic point is sound, however AFAIK, biofuel doesn't help much in the "fight" against global warming. It just isn't using fossil materials to produce CO2. Clean source of energies include wind, sun, water (dams, tides, waves), geothermic. Nuclear plants are producing another kind of pollution that isn't causing much global warming (however, nuclear plants are producing large amounts of water vapor, creating clouds, that have an effect, even if much less than CO2 production).
Now, of course, biofuel is a renewable source of energy and as such is better. I also acknowledges that when extracting oil, gases are burned thus producing more CO2.
Does someone know how much carbon in plants comes from air CO2 versus biomass carbon from the ground ? BTW, burning biomass release CO2 in the air, while organic activity (using enzymes to get heat from biomass) could release (much) less ?
Therefore biofuel sure is better, but it isn't a really good answer to the problem, just a lesser evil.
In a Wired South Korea, only old Robots Will Feel Right at Home.
;) :)
Now usable for the typical Slashdot crowd
Never have seen a title so easy to fix
Give me my genes back ! Thief ! Pir...flblbl (reduced as a soup of cells)
March has 31 days
I think it's already the 31 in New-Zealand for example.
Those damned timezones !
Neither.
Free as in "paid with your copy of MS-Windows". I will say it's gratis when it is available for other OSes (Mac OS, Linux, FreeBSD, QNX, whatever)
An immaterial product "P" from company "C" can't be said gratis when it only works with another product "Q" also produced by company "C" and that you need to pay.
Well... except as PR !
Does it have a First Post button? Imagine the millions of man-hours per day saved by people hitting that button rather than typing all that manually.
But what would do people with that saved time then ?
So in the business world, if you don't patent your ideas, someone else might.
If you're publishing your "ideas", it's prior art, a further patent would held no value (and the patent shouldn't be granted in the first place)
FTFA : "Such multi-tasking makes dual-core processors a necessity"
Hahaha ! What about requiring a good scheduler ? Multitasking has nothing to do with multi cores...
Marketing push or simply cluelessness ?
Localized Googles are not all like Google.com.
... ..."
Try another one, like google.fr, google.de
You might have to chose from a line below the search box
"Google.* is available in
You then will have radio items under the search box
Web (all languages), pages in chosen language, pages hosted in chosen country.
No need to get an account...
Microsoft has been blasted in the past for releasing software "too early" in people's opinions. Now, they want to make sure it's completely ready before releasing, and people are complaining that it's "too late".
And there's no contradiction. A release can be both "too early" because it is full of bugs and "too late" because a release date has been advertised that wasn't met. Remember that "Longhorn" should've been released for 4th quarter 2005.
Unlike CD-ROMs, I don't believe you can actually read the sector meta-data
:) But there is more "meta-data" than that.
:)
What are you calling meta-data ?
CDs also have "merging bits", and what is read as a byte is in fact coded on-disk as 14 bits, and you can't read C2 errors either, that are beyond the 2352 bytes that really are all used as data on an audio CD, an audio sector being 1/75 of a second, 44100/75*2(channels)*2(bytes per sample) = 2352 bytes and it has correction codes in addition too. You can however read subchannels (96 bytes / sector)
When dealing with such low-level technologies, reading bits on disk doesn't mean anything as there really are no bits on the disc, just pits and lands (CD) or magnetic particles (HD) causing little electric variations on a sensor, then no variation is interpreted as 0 and a variation is interpreted as a 1, and you need variations even when writing only 0's as a reference clock.
without some sort of drive-manufacturer-specific tricks.
Now of course, as you cannot change HD platters within different drive with different heads like you can do with a CD, each manufacturer can (and will !) encode differently. It has been reported that hard disks with the same reference wouldn't "interoperate" exchanging the controller part because of differing firmware versions, while the format is standardized for CDs or DVDs.
they actually store near 600 bytes
(that would be 4800 bits) In that light, they're not storing bytes, just magnetizing particles. Bytes are quite high-level. There are probably more than a ten thousands magnetic variations for a 512 byte sector. What you call bytes is already what you can read
Here's an interesting read quickly found on Google just for you
Couldn't say admit once and for all that they're thinking MS-Windows and MS-Office are now mature products and that they won't release new versions anymore ? :)