Well, as every bot would need a paid account, I don't see the problem for that from CCP perspective...
Its not a problem from -their- perspective, just as GMs and devs secretly running the biggest player alliance in the game isn't a problem from -their- perspective. But it is a problem for the player base, they perceive it as blatant cheating and find it extremely disenfranchising.
It is just delegating the boring parts to bots. I only see that as an improvement. I imagined more a fleet of asteroid miners but well, many grinding activities could benefit from that.
Correct it IS just a different legitimate play-style. But players in competitve games really want to be ABLE to compete. Its already tough to swallow that some guy who playing 8-hours a day triple-boxxing has advantages your average part timer doesn't. But this just skews the equation to intolerable level.
I've always been a fan of multiple rules server. Let people play how they like, with other like minded people. Create a server that allows botting and macro-mining. If you enjoy botting and macro-mining you can play there, to your hearts content. And the people who can't stand it don't have to be bothered by it. And if you get caught trying to bot and macro on the 'pure human' server that doesn't allow it, you're banned from that server, because the players on that server essentially don't want to play a game where they have to compete with people doing that.
My real dream is a server where people can only play 15 hours a week. Sort of like the chinese 'keep the kids in check' rule but universally enforced on all players.
Why? Because then the 'universe' would be filled with people a lot like me. I and thousands like me can't play more than that so its not really a limit for us. I don't begrudge the people who play 60 hours a week, but honestly, I'd rather not compete with them. Competitive games are more fun when your pooled with players in your league, and I'm willing to compete in terms of playing 'better' or 'smarter', but it pisses me off to inevitably fall behind simply because you play 'more'.
Knowing that the leader of largest alliance, or the wealthiest trader, or the most infamous pirate is only on 15 hours a week would make the game a lot more engaging for us 'casuals'.
So let the fleet-botters play, I don't begrudge them their fun, but I don't want to compete with them, so give them their own space to do it; let them compete with others like them, who agree with and/or want/can bot themselves.
And give me my 15 hour/wk server dammit. To know that I've got as much opportunity as the next guy without having to quit my job and abandon my family would really intrigue me. To turn it into a competition between who can accomplish the most in 15 hours/wk would really engage people like me.
True enough. But they -are- there, and they -are- crucial to having apps function in Terminal Services and other enterprise scenarios. MS usually follows them well enough for the enterprise apps. I guess even microsoft needed vista just to enforce discipline on themselves.:)...In a virtual machine, where it can't really do much harm.
Define harm, because I hear this argument all the time. "Linux is so much more secure because you can only trash a users profile." "Virtualization is so much more secure because you can only trash the VM."
That may be true, but really, if I have search-assistant-from-hell dropping popups, and redirecting links, how does it really benefit me if its running in a VM? Its still spamming me with popups.
If my user profile has been been botted and is participating in ddos and spam attacks at someone else whime, how does it really benefit me if its running in a virtualized environment. Its still doing its job.
If my user profile gets ransacked by a virus and all my files and accounts are stolen or trashed, how does it really benefit me that the damage was limited to my user profile or that the software was running in emulation? They got what they wanted.
Sure the 'system' is still clean, and that's worth something when its time to clean up the mess, but far too much damage has still been done.
Also: They give Virtual PC 2007 away, but they don't give XP away. This means you can't buy a Vista upgrade, you have to by the whole thing -- or, if you buy a new computer, you have to buy XP separately.
A valid point there. Personally I think Vista should come with an paired license for 2K or XP in virtualization on that copy of Vista but I'm just one voice.
That said, the functionality is there the only question is the price, and that's par for the course on a proprietary system. Even Apple stopped bundling classic long before a lot of people were done needing it.
Or needs to do validation on the server-side of all game-balance-affecting stuff--which is really the only way to ensure fairness, since clients can always be hacked.
Server-side validation only captures 'illegal commands', it doesn't really capture -automated commands-.
As long as the bots don't do anything Server side validation isn't going to catch squat. It can't easily tell if its a real player at the helm. And it certainly can't tell the difference between player:
click-a, click-b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m
and player
click-X and exploit-script tells server he: click-a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l,m freeing the player some extra time to read status readouts, check the map, check his 6, etc.
nor can it tell the difference between: player oberves condition - click-a, click-b in response and script-bot detects condition - sends 'click-a, click-b' in response.
freeing the player to not have to issue commands at all. (Think of a bot that can farm ore by itself, return it to base, and make a rudimentary attempt to flee an attacker, even if the player is at work.)
Imagine a blob of 10-20 of these bots gate camping, assisted by just one or 2 players who can give the whole blob move/retreat/regroup/attack orders via an out-band channell like IRC.
Again server side validation isn't going to see anything in terms of invalid input.
These are the sorts of uses that hacking the client can be expected to yield, even if you assume the server is hardened and secure against 'malicious' clients.
Well, atleast on the tidbit shown on the article, the CCP representative sounds perfectly rational and professional. Am i missing something here?
Well, the CCP rep did sound vaguely annoyed to me; I could see him rolling his eyes. But then I imagine they roll their eyes at most of the conversations they have.:)
And by the way, how does this guy ended up with the sourcecode on the first place?!
That's still unclear. Some say its just decompiled python that anyone could do themselves easily enough. But he almost alludes to having a source within ccp... so I'm not sure.
Its too bad he's apparently not an english speaker because that invites mockery. And obviously he's not being terrible mature which further damages his image, but at the end of the day what he is asking for is legitimate in my opinion:
All he wants is CCP to acknowledge there are specific issues and to demonstrate that there have been real fixes added. Because he is firmly convinced that people have been botting for years using known exploits and that CCP hasn't made even the slightest effort to curb them.
So he's basically saying if you've fixed it... prove it. "Show me an exploit that used to work that doesn't now. Show me something, ANYTHING, that you've actually fixed in the last year or so related to stopping botters."
"And Improve your processes, so that if we report exploits you acknowledge them, and fix them, instead of just handwaving that security improvements have been added, because I'm not seeing any."
"And if you don't, I'm releasing the source, so we can ALL see for ourselves what you've actually improved over the last year, because I'm tired of watching people bot for YEARS without having to so much as adapt to new anti-bot tactics."
If this guy is just blowing smoke, then CCP really should have no issue publishing some of the hundreds of botting related exploit scenarios that they claim to have fixed over the last several patches...and showing that they no longer worked.
That much they owe their customers. Frankly, I don't really blame CCP for not publicly acknowledging security issues and bringing additional attention to each exploit before its fixed... BUT... I -do- think that the playerbase deserves some honesty -after- the fact.
If they release an exploit fix, publish it, what used to work, and what no longer works. CCP lacks credibility, and this would go a long ways towards helping restore it.
After all we get a better level of security updates disclosure from microsoft. I think all this guy really wants is the same from CCP. And if CCP *hasn't* actually done anything in the last few years to address all the while claiming they have, well... I can see why a segment of the playerbase is boiling mad about it, and wants to blow this into the public eye where they can't sweep it under the rug anymore.
It was on their homepage! You didn't define "significant" very well.
A little common sense will tell you that crapware makers aren't join to jump based on whether something is on the dell homepage. The only thing that is going to matter to them is real volume.
Microsoft had years to fix that properly, and instead allowed "Just run as admin" to be an acceptable solution.
1) Microsoft has LONG put out guides on how the software SHOULD work, where it SHOULD store its files and settings.
2) Developers targeting enterprises have LONG followed those guides. Stuff that works on a Windows 2003 Terminal Server with Citrix tends to work pretty well with Vista because Terminal Servers, and enterprise domains in general weren't going to give admin access to everyone who logs in.
They also had the opportunity to perfect an emulation layer this time around, the way Apple has historically done. And they seem to agree that's a good idea.
1) That would have done not much good. The goal was to stop malware from automatically, silently, and inextricably installing itself.
Sure Vista could virtualize the registry, virtualize the file system, and run legacy software in emulation, and not throw up the uac spam... but all that would result in is the very malware they are trying to block would now be "compatible" with Vista.
Apple was in a different boat. They WANTED all your Classic MacOS software to work as near to seamlessly as possible. They didn't have a malware problem. A big part of Vista was to deliberately BLOCK misbehaving legacy software aka malware, and uac spam was seen as a reasonable compromise of blocking legacy software from doing things it shouldn't, while letting legit but badly behaved software you had to have still function. (In Linux, if I dug up some old legacy app that expected to be run as root and tried running it, it would just die.
2) They do give away Virtual PC 2007, so if you really want XP emulation, you can have it, in a nice nearly completely isolated sandbox.
Most of the complaints against Gimp, in particular, revolve around the lack of professional features, like CMYK.
Most professional complaints against Gimp would be related to professional features. We haven't really even started throwing 'average users' who use stuff like Kodak Easyshare and tools [windows] or iPhoto [mac] to manipulate, share online, and make greeting cards from their pictures.
I was just commenting that I suspect something like Gimp or Krita could fill that role nicely.
They want to organize their photos, share them online, crop/rotate/redeye, email them, etc. And they want it to launch when they plug their camera in, and do everything in one place. Gimp or Krita isn't remotely the right tool for this.
Oh, and there's also Dell support -- I wonder how much that covers?
Like all other Dell support it covers what you bought from Dell. They aren't going to help you with your -other- software or hardware. They don't do that for windows either. If I call dell and say my Razr2 isn't syncing to outlook, they're interest in support ends once they've established its not a defective usb port in the laptop.
And yet, you almost never hear anywhere near the amount of complaining, or comments, about how horrible Apple's 3rd-party support is.
Probably because even in the early 90's while compatibility was at its worst (thanks to ADB, scsi, nubus, whatever they called their video port, etc...) It was a whole other ecosystem. If you had a Mac you didn't even dare -think- it would be compatible with something for "PCs". But if you needed something it was always possible to walk into an Apple reseller and buy a peripheral and software for your mac and know it would work, and be officially supported by somebody.
But even so I've heard plenty of Mac teeth-gnashing in the last few years about OSX exchange support -- office:mac entourage is not it, about blackberry support, about cdma m
I think he's referring to the publicly usable curb lane on streets that do NOT have reserved exclusive bus lanes, the ones which are soul destroying to be in, because the bus in front of you stops every block to pickup/dropoff people, and moves much slower than the lanes to the left which aren't plagued by busses constantly parking.
Yeah, but Asimov didn't envision hackers much in his novels. We know better nowadays; program a robot with the three laws and one would be hacked within a month just to prove it could be done.
Asimov actually imagined that the brains were built from the ground up with those laws embedded and hardwired into the very structure of the brain, they were much more than mere software.
Lets use a car analagy.:)
He viewed the laws of robotics as being an integral design characteristic of the positronic brain, in the same way that the direction your crankshaft turns and cylinder firing order is an integral design characteristic of your car engine. You could no more modify a positronic brain to bypass the laws than you could reprogram your car to run the engine backwards or change the firing sequence.
I said a significant way. As in is a significant part of oem units being shipped. When that happens the 'crapware' makers will port their crap and pay dell to preinstall it.
re:itms Apple's fault.... It does, however, support...
Yes it is apples fault. And 90% of Vista's issues are vender related as well. (From buggy new drivers which account for most of the instability), to programs that were written to assume they were running as admin and wrote their settings in appropriate folders and registry components (which account for most of the UAC spam...)
I'm not blaming Linux that it doesn't support itms; but customers don't care who is at fault. So Linux ends up takes hits for missing itms etc, and Vista takes hits for stability and uac spam, but neither is the fault of the OS.
re: syncing contacts / calendar / photos I'm just going to continue ignoring that -- it's way beyond what a music app should be responsible for. Maybe if it spawned the actual contacts/photos/calendar apps to handle that...
Then stop ignoring it, because those 'actual contacts/photos/calendar apps' DO NOT EXIST.
There is NOTHING that can sync contacts and calendar to an iphone or ipod touch for linux right now.
All the more reason for them to not need Photoshop.
Most camera's come with some 'lite' program (including in some cases stripped down adobe-ware) that handles their photo libraries. That is what average people use. The average user does not need and does not have Photoshop CS3.
Which is why I tend to assume that the initial setup is the hardest part. Borrow a geek for that.
No. I'm talking about the stuff you buy AFTER the initial setup. If it was just initial setup I'd agree with you. People shouldn't need to 'borrow a geek' everytime they buy some new gizmo.
And it is much easier now -- a quick Google search will usually turn up a tutorial.
The quality and applicability of which is hit and miss. And the stream of 'it didn't work for me, I get this error... ' or 'this tutorial is for feisty or fc5, and I have gutsy or debian, or fc6, and such and such doesn't work...' in the comments attached to it are a testament to the frustration.
Not to mention that the tutorials themselves are often 20 steps of apt-get, and creating symlinks, maybe even a make...
People don't want to search for, and follow a tutorial like that. They want to install the disk, press next a few times and start using their toy.
Dell has. Asus has. That's starting to happen...
Absolutely Agreed. It -is- starting to happen, but Linux is still behind even Apple for 3rd party support, and even apple still has plenty of 'gotchas' when it comes to 3rd party software and peripherals. So linux has a ways to go yet.
Question: Are they personal accounting software? Because we've got that on Linux.
Answer: Both personal and small business. But please, stuff like gnucash isn't an option; its still far too basic. And worse, personal/small business accountants have the same issue as Microsoft Office - document exchange and knowledge skills. We don't have 'accounting staff' so we just email it to a bookkeeper or tax advisor who can open it when we need something more complicated done, or we want someone to verify we've done something right, or to fix something we've buggered up, or in the latter case, they are going to do our taxes.
Good luck finding a choice of local bookkeepers or tax preparers who accept linux anything.
I don't think I could live with pre-installed Windows anymore. Entirely too much crapware out of the box,
If linux becomes an OEM pre-installed option in any significant way, we'll rapidly have JUST as much crapware preinstalled.
usually, and unless you're paying extra for some "pro" edition, you're setting yourself up to have to upgrade it later.
Really? I know almost nobody who ever had to upgrade XP Home to XP Pro, especially bona fide home users. (And I know even fewer that actually ever did upgrade even if it would have benefited them.)
Yet most gamers use Windows, and most games are exclusively for Windows, no matter how good Cedega gets at emulating them.
Cegega isn't really helping games on linux. Cedega has basically stepped up and said, Hey devs, you don't need to develop for linux, not only will we make your windows game run, but we'll handle the support so you don't have to. How exactly would that ever motivate Linux ports?
The one or two others vary wildly, but for many people, they will end up being things which are covered -- for example, iPod support in Amarok.
Except of course that Amarok is nowhere near as polished as itunes, doesn't support the itms, doesn't support the ipod touch or iphone unless you jailbreak them, and doesn't support syncing contacts / photos / calendar... its a pretty weak substitute.
And sure linux will recognize your digital camera and let you get your pictures off, and there are endless tools to edit images... but its nowhere near as slick and integrated as OS X or even Windows, and average users do like that.
The reason I declared it having come and gone for "average users" is that it seems to me that most average people need web, email, an office suite, their music collection, and maybe one or two other apps.
Trouble is, I think you've declared it come and gone for 'average users' of 5 years ago. Today average users are more sophisticated, or at least their kids are...
They're doing stuff like im/video chat, touching up their photos (even if its just red eye reduction and resizing/cropping, they/they're kids have cellphones and ipods and itunes accounts with giftcards for music and they want to move the pictures around, load ringtones, sync contacts and calendar. The want to program their logitech harmony univsal home-theatre remote, or update the maps in their gps toy, network sync their fancy new digital photograph frame, or program lego mindstorms, etc...
A lot of the above -can- be done in linux; basic music sync with older ipods does work with amarok; hackers have got all kinds of lego mindstorms options, digital cameras are generally recognized... someones even got a solution out there for the harmony... but you have to compile it yourself and run as root...
That is one of the big linux hurdles: one hase to constantly search for the foss alternative and take ownership of the problem of finding out how to make it work, the instructions and disks in the box don't work.
Not everyone wants every computer peripheral / software purchase to present that... challenge.
I think linux itself is ready for the desktop, but the rest of the world isn't ready for linux to be there. The tipping point comes when the rest
Now, I think that if you can possibly use it (boot Windows once a year for taxes),
First off, if I have to boot windows even once a year for taxes I'm paying for it, so the entire ubuntu price advantage is moot.
Secondly, if I buy a unit with Vista pre-installed, yes there is a cost for Windows, but the OEM pricing for Vista is pretty small. I generally take an oem copy of Windows when I buy a whitebox even if I plan to make the box a ubuntu desktop/server since that copy is so heavily discounted.
Finally, Simply Accounting / Quickbooks Pro are accounting packages, not tax packages. You didn't respond regarding that part of my post specificially, but I wanted to be clear in case you mistook quickbooks for quicktax or something. This software represents an entire class of *daily* use applications, used by tens of millions of 'average people' for which Linux is not suitable.
Ubuntu has basically put it over the edge of being better for average users.
In some cases yeah. My mom, as I think I mentioned, I've switched to Ubuntu. My dad, not a chance. He has an itouch, and needs the accounting software, so ubuntu is a dead end on not one but two fronts.
For now I can swallow: 'Ubuntu has made linux a viable desktop option for many users'.
But there are still too many gaps that can easily affect 'regular average users' for me to swallow 'better for average users'. If the 3rd party responsible for the problem hardware (Apple iPhone) or software (Simply Accounting or Quickbooks...) stepped up and released linux versions Ubuntu would truly be 'over the edge', and that's only going to happen once it reaches a critical mass... so I'm all for getting as many ubuntu installs as possible... but lets not get ahead of ourselves.
Wine is getting better all the time. Which accounting software is this, specifically?
Simply Accounting 2007, 2008 or recent versions of Quickbooks Pro... WineHQ rates any of them as 'totally non-functional' (ie 'garbage'). And really if this is the accounting system for your small business what are you doing even thinking about WINE?... only a complete idiot would run something as mission critical as their books on a TOTALLY UNSUPPORTED PLATFORM, even if it *appeared* to be working.
Currently a minefield anywhere but OS X, in my experience. It may "just work" on Ubuntu very soon, though.
It may just work in Vista too. I did for me. But I agree dual screens in Windows do come with its share of hassles and it doesn't just work for everyone, but "its getting better all the time..." and even at its worst its nothing like the black screens, X won't launch at all even on one screen, and the prompts to go edit configuration files with a command line tool that I get in Ubuntu while trying to make go.
Worst case in windows I only get one screen.
re: wifi... Again, improving all the time.
So when i point of weaknesses in Ubuntu, the counter is that 'its getting better all the time', and this is a reason to switch to Ubuntu. But if you point out the flaws in Vista, which I can counter are also 'getting better all the time' then flaws still count as a reason to switch to Ubuntu?
I don't buy it.:)
Haven't tried that, specifically. I do know that Amarok seems to notice when I plug in things like iPods, and it's ready to deal with them.
Amarok requires you to jailbreak your ipod touch / iphone, which for me is not acceptable. And jailbroken or not, amarok doesn't sync contacts, only music and playlists. And the syncml program which does contacts on older ipods doesn't work with the touch or iphone at all, jailbroken or not.
Because Outlook is so efficient, and easy to interoperate with, and pretty...
It stil interoperates with Exchange servers better than anything else. Which really is the main reason why anyone would want it.
Contrast that with Vista, where there's a fair chance you won't even make it to a basic web&email machine.
Oh come on now. substitute fair for miniscule.
The one friend I know who is forced to use it at school (for a Vista class, no less) claims that it bluescreens frequently -- either every couple hours or several times an hour, he didn't say.
Sure, if you use Vista with hardware that its not compatible with, or on hardware for which the vista drivers are flaky you are going to have issues like that. Use compatible hardware. That's not 'Vista', that's any significantly new OS. And Vista, at the kernel level, is a significantly new OS.
To counter your 'one friend' I've had Vista running on this box now since July 2007, and it hasn't crashed once. An OS is only as stable as its drivers, and its going to take a bit of time for the drivers to catch up to what we've got for XP and Linux.
That said, I -agree- that if that's the hardware you've got, putting vista on it is a bad idea, and you should stick with XP or move to ubuntu. But the reverse is also true... if you've got hardware that doesn't work with ubuntu... you'd be in the same boat... either you wouldn't use ubuntu or you'd get compatible hardware.
I suspect that it is much easier to upgrade the average person to Ubuntu than to Vista.
The reality is that there really is not much REASON to upgrade the average person to either. And if they are buying a new computer then upgrading to Vista is a hardly an issue because it can can pre-installed, and the only concern is whether your existing accessory hardware is good with the OS... but that's true of Ubuntu too.
1. Epson Powerlite 1080UB (projector) = $3000 2. Pair of Martin Logan Quest front speakers = $10000 3. Decent amp = $2000 4. Random center/rear channel speakers = $800 5. PS3 = $400 6. Decent 100" 16:9 screen = $500 7. Random subwoofer = $400
Overall not bad, but the front speakers are by any reasonable measure stupid overkill, IMO.
I'd cut the speakers down by half or even more, and free up at least $5-6000. And then use the funds to add a Wii, upgrade the PS3, and get accessories for both, add a mac mini (which can do everything appletv can do plus its a PC), and allocate a bit more to the center and rears. (Given its a 2000 amp, we've probably got 7.1...so I'd throw $1000 or so at the center and a few hundred at the 4 side/rear satellite speakers.)
And I think I'd still have money left over for a higher end programmable universal remote or something, maybe add some NAS to access from the mac.
Almost everything is easy in Ubuntu, and any issues are easily fixed by searching google (Which is not always the case with Vista, Xp, and other windows OS's I use).
No. I specifically said sync *contacts* to an ipod phone or ipod touch. Amarok and gtkpod sync music and playlists not contacts, and it requires me to jailbreak my device, which is not acceptable to me. (Don't get me wrong I having nothing against modding / hacking hardware/software but in this case I want to be able to update official firmware etc without any issues. That's not a sacrifice I'm willing to make.)
SyncEvolution / SyncML last time I checked only supports 5th gen and older devices, nanos, minis, and shuffles. It doesn't support the new ipod touch or iphone jailbroken or not. (Related to the fact that the new ones changed to running OSX instead of whatever the older ones ran, and the interface is completely different... its not just a 'usb mass storage device'.)
I guess what I am trying to say is: That was a LOT easier than to try and trouble shoot why Vista won't sync with device X in my opinion.
Yes, it was easier because it just took a few minutes of research to decide to completely give up and not waste my time even trying to make it sync, because its not going to work. (At least for now.) At least with Vista, if I have trouble syncing my pod to outlook I know that it -should- work, and that if I figure out the issue it will.
Of course, for the first few months that I had my ipod touch Vista x64 didn't support it at all either, and it wasn't clear when/if Apple would bother adding that support...but as of right now at least Vista x64 is working like a charm; I like it much more than XP.
I do use linux though. I have a headless linux server in my home office, which itself has two more linux servers in VMWare, I've deployed it for clients, and I've even installed it on my mom's old laptop, to give her a modern desktop OS that meets her (basic) needs. (Mom's laptop came with WinME on it...ugh, and she is now happily running Gutsy). And while she does have an ipod, she syncs with my dad's mac where their music library is.) Don't misunderstand me, I like Linux, and don't need to be convinced of Ubuntu's virtues. But I can't deny its shortcomings either.
Your argument basically boils down to "it's not Windows!" Yes, we know that. The only thing that Windows is objectively better it is, well, being Windows.
That's a part of it, for people that have a lot of windows apps that they want to keep using, yes, that's a factor. But EVEN if they are willing to use alternate applications they lose functionality...
In my case for example I'd be perfectly happy to sync my ipod touch contacts with thunderbird or kmial on linux. But I can't. I'd be perfectly happy to purchase drm free music online from the iTMS 'plus' catalog with Amarok or gtkPod, but I can't.
This isn't a case of Windows being better at being windows; obviously I could switch to a Mac, for example, and retain those functionalities, but not Linux.
By the way, that whole dumb "application compatibility" thing works both directions.
Not to the same degree.
1) The context of the argument is that people using windows can switch to linux. So linux apps that don't run on windows aren't exactly a problem.
2) Many more flagship foss/linux apps are available on windows than the other way around.
3) Application substitutability isn't the same. There simply aren't equivalents to simply accounting or quickbooks on linux.
4) Hardware compatibility like that of with syncing to blackberries or iphones is again applications software related, but again, there is no suitable linux software.
They do have Vista, and are unable to access there web-mail provider,
Why exactly would that be? Maybe you just have to trust the web mail site in IE7, or enable popups for that site? I seriously doubt anyone worth using is running a webmail server that doesn't support IE7.
Later on you say:
and the webmail software works fine with Firefox and Opera
Both of which are readily available on Windows.
cope with the Word2007 interface
Word 2007 is not windows. You could install OO.org on Vista too if they can't cope with Word 2007.
or get the laptop to talk to the wireless hub for more than 10 minutes a day
wifi support isn't exactly linux's strongest suit either. ndiswrapper, a mess of comparatively clumsy tools for handling security and managing networks. I'm glad it just worked for you, and it is getting better, but Windows is ahead here, even if you had issues.
Some are experienced IT people who have seen Linux/Unix and know how it could be.
Was this a pro-linux/unix comment or a pro-windows comment? Its much too ambiguous.
Getting linux running smoothly can be just as trying as windows if not more trying.
Most are now in a position to ask the professionals "Is this as good as it gets?" and being told - no, there IS another way.
A different way, with its own slew of canyon-wide pitfalls. Like... nearly all your software won't work, including your accounting software won't run on it at all, period. Or the minefield of setting up dual screens or wifi, or getting your shiny new blackberry or iphone to sync contacts with outlook... oh wait... no outlook...
Sure ubuntu etc have reached the point where you can build a basic web&email machine very quickly and its pretty simple, but go much beyond that and Linux throws plenty of obstacles into your path. Some can be overcome, some can't.
Or is it defined by whether or not the person making the statement had an intent to deceive?
Precisely.
You can say something that's outright false and not be lying. If someone wanders into your offices and tells you he's there to repair the network, and you then mention in passing to someone else that you saw someone come into repair the network, are you lying?
Objectively its a falsehood. He's really there to install keyloggers and case the place out for other security weaknesses. But subjectively, from your point of view you have no intention to decieve or mislead. I might tell you you are mistaken, but I'd never accuse you of lying, unless I had reason to believe you were a conspirator.
Maybe your 4 year old can help me out here =).
Probably not eloquently, but again, yeah, he knows the difference between making a mistake and lying.
Well to be fair the new games do have better graphics. But the problem comes down to the fact that graphics are improving beyond the average persons eye and interpret graphics. Much like sound cards a decade ago.
I think the biggest irony is that in multiplayer competitive people disable all these features anyway because
1) framerate is king 2) getting rid of advanced lighting, bump mapped animated textures, smoke, fog, clouds, falling snow, rain, etc, etc make your opponent easier to spot.
"You're not exactly lying (you can argue you are because you're not actually giving them the photos, or they're not really John, but that's not necessarily the case - they could put the photos up anyway to make it look more legit).
Lying by omission is when an important fact is omitted, deliberately leaving another person with a misconception. This includes failures to correct pre-existing misconceptions. One may by careful speaking contrive to give correct but only partial answers to questions.
Even my 4 year old has no difficulty understanding that weaseling like this is a form of lying.:)
I agree you can engage in social engineering without lying, but its an important and ubiquitous tool of the trade.
As for your uniformed workers, while they don't by definition have to communicate with anyone, odds are they will. And odds are they'll at the very least have a prepared lie to go along with their outfit. Whether or not they use it. Hell, even the guys that went around leaving usb drives probably had a cover story in case someone had confronted them. "I'm just returning it." or "Its got some marketing materials for the new yadda yadda..." or whatever.
my god you people miss the mark by a long shot. the merchant is the CC company providing the funds.
No. Sorry. You are the one way off the mark.
As someone who has owned a business I can assure you, the merchant is the *business owner*. The other party is typically called a "bank", "merchant bank", "merchant account provider", "acquiring bank", or "acquirer"... but the *merchant* is ALWAYS you.
Now, from the "merchant account providers" point of view...
"In the Visa and Mastercard rules, the merchant's processing bank [merchant account provider] is 100% responsible for all the transactions that the merchant performs. This can leave the provider open to millions of dollars of potential losses if the merchant operates in an illegal or risky manner and generates many chargebacks. The providers pass this cost on to the merchant, but if the merchant is fraudulent or simply does not have the money, the provider must pay all the costs to make the card holder whole."
Which is probably what you are talking about. So, Yes, its absolutely true that THEY (the merchant account providers) are liable for any fraudulent charges, and THEY must cover it. If you, as a cardholder phone Visa and ask who pays if your card is stolen, they'll just tell you 'not you'. If you persist they'll tell you that (according to PCI DSS [Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard]) the cost is borne by the bank providing the merchant account ["merchant account provider"].
However, as it says in the above quote, while they are responsible, they *invariably* try to recoup that cost, plus fees, plus fines, from the merchant (that would be YOU). They only get stuck holding the bag and taking a loss, if they CAN'T get the money from you...and that only happens if you're insolvent, or you've fled the country, or something equally drastic. If you are an upstanding reputable business in good standing, they WILL pass that cost on to you, and you WILL pay.
So as far as your card issuer or VISA is concerned yes, the liability rests with the merchant account provider. But you're daft if you don't think they in turn pass that liability to you via your 'merchant account' agreement/contract, and collect on it vigorously.
The most obvious example I know of is social engineering with USB pen drives. A penetration testing company was asked to test corporate security. They did it by leaving a number of USB pen drives around the office. With no lying or scamming, people took the drives, wondered whose it was, plugged it into the computer, and the drive automatically grabbed some data.
That is probably the ONLY example I've seen that DOESN'T involve lying or scamming. Usually 'social engineering' refers to calling in to the receptionist, posing as the IT helpdesk, or something else, and then have them tell you their passwords...or type 'arcane things into a command line'...or run the attachment in an email you send them...and they do it without a 2nd thought. And that, would be a clear case of 'lying' or even 'scamming'.
Phishing sites, email spam from 'John' that says "Check out our Vacation Photos", etc also fall under the wide umbrella of 'social engineering'.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, as every bot would need a paid account, I don't see the problem for that from CCP perspective...
Its not a problem from -their- perspective, just as GMs and devs secretly running the biggest player alliance in the game isn't a problem from -their- perspective. But it is a problem for the player base, they perceive it as blatant cheating and find it extremely disenfranchising.
It is just delegating the boring parts to bots. I only see that as an improvement. I imagined more a fleet of asteroid miners but well, many grinding activities could benefit from that.
Correct it IS just a different legitimate play-style. But players in competitve games really want to be ABLE to compete. Its already tough to swallow that some guy who playing 8-hours a day triple-boxxing has advantages your average part timer doesn't. But this just skews the equation to intolerable level.
I've always been a fan of multiple rules server. Let people play how they like, with other like minded people. Create a server that allows botting and macro-mining. If you enjoy botting and macro-mining you can play there, to your hearts content. And the people who can't stand it don't have to be bothered by it. And if you get caught trying to bot and macro on the 'pure human' server that doesn't allow it, you're banned from that server, because the players on that server essentially don't want to play a game where they have to compete with people doing that.
My real dream is a server where people can only play 15 hours a week. Sort of like the chinese 'keep the kids in check' rule but universally enforced on all players.
Why? Because then the 'universe' would be filled with people a lot like me. I and thousands like me can't play more than that so its not really a limit for us. I don't begrudge the people who play 60 hours a week, but honestly, I'd rather not compete with them. Competitive games are more fun when your pooled with players in your league, and I'm willing to compete in terms of playing 'better' or 'smarter', but it pisses me off to inevitably fall behind simply because you play 'more'.
Knowing that the leader of largest alliance, or the wealthiest trader, or the most infamous pirate is only on 15 hours a week would make the game a lot more engaging for us 'casuals'.
So let the fleet-botters play, I don't begrudge them their fun, but I don't want to compete with them, so give them their own space to do it; let them compete with others like them, who agree with and/or want/can bot themselves.
And give me my 15 hour/wk server dammit. To know that I've got as much opportunity as the next guy without having to quit my job and abandon my family would really intrigue me. To turn it into a competition between who can accomplish the most in 15 hours/wk would really engage people like me.
Which they don't follow themselves.
:) ...In a virtual machine, where it can't really do much harm.
True enough. But they -are- there, and they -are- crucial to having apps function in Terminal Services and other enterprise scenarios. MS usually follows them well enough for the enterprise apps. I guess even microsoft needed vista just to enforce discipline on themselves.
Define harm, because I hear this argument all the time. "Linux is so much more secure because you can only trash a users profile." "Virtualization is so much more secure because you can only trash the VM."
That may be true, but really, if I have search-assistant-from-hell dropping popups, and redirecting links, how does it really benefit me if its running in a VM? Its still spamming me with popups.
If my user profile has been been botted and is participating in ddos and spam attacks at someone else whime, how does it really benefit me if its running in a virtualized environment. Its still doing its job.
If my user profile gets ransacked by a virus and all my files and accounts are stolen or trashed, how does it really benefit me that the damage was limited to my user profile or that the software was running in emulation? They got what they wanted.
Sure the 'system' is still clean, and that's worth something when its time to clean up the mess, but far too much damage has still been done.
Also: They give Virtual PC 2007 away, but they don't give XP away. This means you can't buy a Vista upgrade, you have to by the whole thing -- or, if you buy a new computer, you have to buy XP separately.
A valid point there. Personally I think Vista should come with an paired license for 2K or XP in virtualization on that copy of Vista but I'm just one voice.
That said, the functionality is there the only question is the price, and that's par for the course on a proprietary system. Even Apple stopped bundling classic long before a lot of people were done needing it.
Or needs to do validation on the server-side of all game-balance-affecting stuff--which is really the only way to ensure fairness, since clients can always be hacked.
,m
Server-side validation only captures 'illegal commands', it doesn't really capture -automated commands-.
As long as the bots don't do anything Server side validation isn't going to catch squat. It can't easily tell if its a real player at the helm. And it certainly can't tell the difference between player:
click-a, click-b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m
and player
click-X
and exploit-script tells server he: click-a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l
freeing the player some extra time to read status readouts, check the map, check his 6, etc.
nor can it tell the difference between:
player oberves condition - click-a, click-b in response and
script-bot detects condition - sends 'click-a, click-b' in response.
freeing the player to not have to issue commands at all. (Think of a bot that can farm ore by itself, return it to base, and make a rudimentary attempt to flee an attacker, even if the player is at work.)
Imagine a blob of 10-20 of these bots gate camping, assisted by just one or 2 players who can give the whole blob move/retreat/regroup/attack orders via an out-band channell like IRC.
Again server side validation isn't going to see anything in terms of invalid input.
These are the sorts of uses that hacking the client can be expected to yield, even if you assume the server is hardened and secure against 'malicious' clients.
Well, atleast on the tidbit shown on the article, the CCP representative sounds perfectly rational and professional. Am i missing something here?
:)
Well, the CCP rep did sound vaguely annoyed to me; I could see him rolling his eyes. But then I imagine they roll their eyes at most of the conversations they have.
And by the way, how does this guy ended up with the sourcecode on the first place?!
That's still unclear. Some say its just decompiled python that anyone could do themselves easily enough. But he almost alludes to having a source within ccp... so I'm not sure.
Its too bad he's apparently not an english speaker because that invites mockery. And obviously he's not being terrible mature which further damages his image, but at the end of the day what he is asking for is legitimate in my opinion:
All he wants is CCP to acknowledge there are specific issues and to demonstrate that there have been real fixes added. Because he is firmly convinced that people have been botting for years using known exploits and that CCP hasn't made even the slightest effort to curb them.
So he's basically saying if you've fixed it... prove it. "Show me an exploit that used to work that doesn't now. Show me something, ANYTHING, that you've actually fixed in the last year or so related to stopping botters."
"And Improve your processes, so that if we report exploits you acknowledge them, and fix them, instead of just handwaving that security improvements have been added, because I'm not seeing any."
"And if you don't, I'm releasing the source, so we can ALL see for ourselves what you've actually improved over the last year, because I'm tired of watching people bot for YEARS without having to so much as adapt to new anti-bot tactics."
If this guy is just blowing smoke, then CCP really should have no issue publishing some of the hundreds of botting related exploit scenarios that they claim to have fixed over the last several patches...and showing that they no longer worked.
That much they owe their customers. Frankly, I don't really blame CCP for not publicly acknowledging security issues and bringing additional attention to each exploit before its fixed... BUT... I -do- think that the playerbase deserves some honesty -after- the fact.
If they release an exploit fix, publish it, what used to work, and what no longer works. CCP lacks credibility, and this would go a long ways towards helping restore it.
After all we get a better level of security updates disclosure from microsoft. I think all this guy really wants is the same from CCP. And if CCP *hasn't* actually done anything in the last few years to address all the while claiming they have, well... I can see why a segment of the playerbase is boiling mad about it, and wants to blow this into the public eye where they can't sweep it under the rug anymore.
if eve blocked all the bots all of BOB would stop playing.
;)
But would anyone really miss them?
It was on their homepage! You didn't define "significant" very well.
A little common sense will tell you that crapware makers aren't join to jump based on whether something is on the dell homepage. The only thing that is going to matter to them is real volume.
Microsoft had years to fix that properly, and instead allowed "Just run as admin" to be an acceptable solution.
1) Microsoft has LONG put out guides on how the software SHOULD work, where it SHOULD store its files and settings.
2) Developers targeting enterprises have LONG followed those guides. Stuff that works on a Windows 2003 Terminal Server with Citrix tends to work pretty well with Vista because Terminal Servers, and enterprise domains in general weren't going to give admin access to everyone who logs in.
They also had the opportunity to perfect an emulation layer this time around, the way Apple has historically done. And they seem to agree that's a good idea.
1) That would have done not much good. The goal was to stop malware from automatically, silently, and inextricably installing itself.
Sure Vista could virtualize the registry, virtualize the file system, and run legacy software in emulation, and not throw up the uac spam... but all that would result in is the very malware they are trying to block would now be "compatible" with Vista.
Apple was in a different boat. They WANTED all your Classic MacOS software to work as near to seamlessly as possible. They didn't have a malware problem. A big part of Vista was to deliberately BLOCK misbehaving legacy software aka malware, and uac spam was seen as a reasonable compromise of blocking legacy software from doing things it shouldn't, while letting legit but badly behaved software you had to have still function. (In Linux, if I dug up some old legacy app that expected to be run as root and tried running it, it would just die.
2) They do give away Virtual PC 2007, so if you really want XP emulation, you can have it, in a nice nearly completely isolated sandbox.
Most of the complaints against Gimp, in particular, revolve around the lack of professional features, like CMYK.
Most professional complaints against Gimp would be related to professional features. We haven't really even started throwing 'average users' who use stuff like Kodak Easyshare and tools [windows] or iPhoto [mac] to manipulate, share online, and make greeting cards from their pictures.
I was just commenting that I suspect something like Gimp or Krita could fill that role nicely.
They want to organize their photos, share them online, crop/rotate/redeye, email them, etc. And they want it to launch when they plug their camera in, and do everything in one place. Gimp or Krita isn't remotely the right tool for this.
Oh, and there's also Dell support -- I wonder how much that covers?
Like all other Dell support it covers what you bought from Dell. They aren't going to help you with your -other- software or hardware. They don't do that for windows either. If I call dell and say my Razr2 isn't syncing to outlook, they're interest in support ends once they've established its not a defective usb port in the laptop.
And yet, you almost never hear anywhere near the amount of complaining, or comments, about how horrible Apple's 3rd-party support is.
Probably because even in the early 90's while compatibility was at its worst (thanks to ADB, scsi, nubus, whatever they called their video port, etc...) It was a whole other ecosystem. If you had a Mac you didn't even dare -think- it would be compatible with something for "PCs". But if you needed something it was always possible to walk into an Apple reseller and buy a peripheral and software for your mac and know it would work, and be officially supported by somebody.
But even so I've heard plenty of Mac teeth-gnashing in the last few years about OSX exchange support -- office:mac entourage is not it, about blackberry support, about cdma m
I think he's referring to the publicly usable curb lane on streets that do NOT have reserved exclusive bus lanes, the ones which are soul destroying to be in, because the bus in front of you stops every block to pickup/dropoff people, and moves much slower than the lanes to the left which aren't plagued by busses constantly parking.
Yeah, but Asimov didn't envision hackers much in his novels. We know better nowadays; program a robot with the three laws and one would be hacked within a month just to prove it could be done.
:)
Asimov actually imagined that the brains were built from the ground up with those laws embedded and hardwired into the very structure of the brain, they were much more than mere software.
Lets use a car analagy.
He viewed the laws of robotics as being an integral design characteristic of the positronic brain, in the same way that the direction your crankshaft turns and cylinder firing order is an integral design characteristic of your car engine. You could no more modify a positronic brain to bypass the laws than you could reprogram your car to run the engine backwards or change the firing sequence.
*cough* DELL *cough*
I said a significant way. As in is a significant part of oem units being shipped. When that happens the 'crapware' makers will port their crap and pay dell to preinstall it.
re:itms
Apple's fault.... It does, however, support...
Yes it is apples fault. And 90% of Vista's issues are vender related as well. (From buggy new drivers which account for most of the instability), to programs that were written to assume they were running as admin and wrote their settings in appropriate folders and registry components (which account for most of the UAC spam...)
I'm not blaming Linux that it doesn't support itms; but customers don't care who is at fault. So Linux ends up takes hits for missing itms etc, and Vista takes hits for stability and uac spam, but neither is the fault of the OS.
re: syncing contacts / calendar / photos
I'm just going to continue ignoring that -- it's way beyond what a music app should be responsible for. Maybe if it spawned the actual contacts/photos/calendar apps to handle that...
Then stop ignoring it, because those 'actual contacts/photos/calendar apps' DO NOT EXIST.
There is NOTHING that can sync contacts and calendar to an iphone or ipod touch for linux right now.
All the more reason for them to not need Photoshop.
Most camera's come with some 'lite' program (including in some cases stripped down adobe-ware) that handles their photo libraries. That is what average people use. The average user does not need and does not have Photoshop CS3.
Which is why I tend to assume that the initial setup is the hardest part. Borrow a geek for that.
No. I'm talking about the stuff you buy AFTER the initial setup. If it was just initial setup I'd agree with you. People shouldn't need to 'borrow a geek' everytime they buy some new gizmo.
And it is much easier now -- a quick Google search will usually turn up a tutorial.
The quality and applicability of which is hit and miss. And the stream of 'it didn't work for me, I get this error... ' or 'this tutorial is for feisty or fc5, and I have gutsy or debian, or fc6, and such and such doesn't work...' in the comments attached to it are a testament to the frustration.
Not to mention that the tutorials themselves are often 20 steps of apt-get, and creating symlinks, maybe even a make...
People don't want to search for, and follow a tutorial like that. They want to install the disk, press next a few times and start using their toy.
Dell has. Asus has. That's starting to happen...
Absolutely Agreed. It -is- starting to happen, but Linux is still behind even Apple for 3rd party support, and even apple still has plenty of 'gotchas' when it comes to 3rd party software and peripherals. So linux has a ways to go yet.
Question: Are they personal accounting software? Because we've got that on Linux.
Answer: Both personal and small business. But please, stuff like gnucash isn't an option; its still far too basic. And worse, personal/small business accountants have the same issue as Microsoft Office - document exchange and knowledge skills. We don't have 'accounting staff' so we just email it to a bookkeeper or tax advisor who can open it when we need something more complicated done, or we want someone to verify we've done something right, or to fix something we've buggered up, or in the latter case, they are going to do our taxes.
Good luck finding a choice of local bookkeepers or tax preparers who accept linux anything.
I don't think I could live with pre-installed Windows anymore. Entirely too much crapware out of the box,
If linux becomes an OEM pre-installed option in any significant way, we'll rapidly have JUST as much crapware preinstalled.
usually, and unless you're paying extra for some "pro" edition, you're setting yourself up to have to upgrade it later.
Really? I know almost nobody who ever had to upgrade XP Home to XP Pro, especially bona fide home users. (And I know even fewer that actually ever did upgrade even if it would have benefited them.)
Yet most gamers use Windows, and most games are exclusively for Windows, no matter how good Cedega gets at emulating them.
Cegega isn't really helping games on linux. Cedega has basically stepped up and said, Hey devs, you don't need to develop for linux, not only will we make your windows game run, but we'll handle the support so you don't have to. How exactly would that ever motivate Linux ports?
The one or two others vary wildly, but for many people, they will end up being things which are covered -- for example, iPod support in Amarok.
Except of course that Amarok is nowhere near as polished as itunes, doesn't support the itms, doesn't support the ipod touch or iphone unless you jailbreak them, and doesn't support syncing contacts / photos / calendar... its a pretty weak substitute.
And sure linux will recognize your digital camera and let you get your pictures off, and there are endless tools to edit images... but its nowhere near as slick and integrated as OS X or even Windows, and average users do like that.
The reason I declared it having come and gone for "average users" is that it seems to me that most average people need web, email, an office suite, their music collection, and maybe one or two other apps.
Trouble is, I think you've declared it come and gone for 'average users' of 5 years ago. Today average users are more sophisticated, or at least their kids are...
They're doing stuff like im/video chat, touching up their photos (even if its just red eye reduction and resizing/cropping, they/they're kids have cellphones and ipods and itunes accounts with giftcards for music and they want to move the pictures around, load ringtones, sync contacts and calendar. The want to program their logitech harmony univsal home-theatre remote, or update the maps in their gps toy, network sync their fancy new digital photograph frame, or program lego mindstorms, etc...
A lot of the above -can- be done in linux; basic music sync with older ipods does work with amarok; hackers have got all kinds of lego mindstorms options, digital cameras are generally recognized... someones even got a solution out there for the harmony... but you have to compile it yourself and run as root...
That is one of the big linux hurdles: one hase to constantly search for the foss alternative and take ownership of the problem of finding out how to make it work, the instructions and disks in the box don't work.
Not everyone wants every computer peripheral / software purchase to present that... challenge.
I think linux itself is ready for the desktop, but the rest of the world isn't ready for linux to be there. The tipping point comes when the rest
Now, I think that if you can possibly use it (boot Windows once a year for taxes),
First off, if I have to boot windows even once a year for taxes I'm paying for it, so the entire ubuntu price advantage is moot.
Secondly, if I buy a unit with Vista pre-installed, yes there is a cost for Windows, but the OEM pricing for Vista is pretty small. I generally take an oem copy of Windows when I buy a whitebox even if I plan to make the box a ubuntu desktop/server since that copy is so heavily discounted.
Finally, Simply Accounting / Quickbooks Pro are accounting packages, not tax packages. You didn't respond regarding that part of my post specificially, but I wanted to be clear in case you mistook quickbooks for quicktax or something. This software represents an entire class of *daily* use applications, used by tens of millions of 'average people' for which Linux is not suitable.
Ubuntu has basically put it over the edge of being better for average users.
In some cases yeah. My mom, as I think I mentioned, I've switched to Ubuntu. My dad, not a chance. He has an itouch, and needs the accounting software, so ubuntu is a dead end on not one but two fronts.
For now I can swallow: 'Ubuntu has made linux a viable desktop option for many users'.
But there are still too many gaps that can easily affect 'regular average users' for me to swallow 'better for average users'. If the 3rd party responsible for the problem hardware (Apple iPhone) or software (Simply Accounting or Quickbooks...) stepped up and released linux versions Ubuntu would truly be 'over the edge', and that's only going to happen once it reaches a critical mass... so I'm all for getting as many ubuntu installs as possible... but lets not get ahead of ourselves.
The break it in Robots and Empire.
They also expose something of a loophole in Foundation and Earth.
... well educated university graduates who moved from other parts of Canada for work and to be close to the mountains for recreation.
:)
Well educated university graduates would have made it all the way to Vancouver.
I kid, I kid...
I -strongly- suggest you read Asimov's robot novels, in particular
:)
I, Robot (absolutely NOTHING like the movie)
Caves of Steel
The Naked Sun
Robots of Dawn
Robots and Empire
Asimov is smarter than you give him credit for.
Wine is getting better all the time. Which accounting software is this, specifically?
:)
Simply Accounting 2007, 2008 or recent versions of Quickbooks Pro... WineHQ rates any of them as 'totally non-functional' (ie 'garbage'). And really if this is the accounting system for your small business what are you doing even thinking about WINE?... only a complete idiot would run something as mission critical as their books on a TOTALLY UNSUPPORTED PLATFORM, even if it *appeared* to be working.
Currently a minefield anywhere but OS X, in my experience. It may "just work" on Ubuntu very soon, though.
It may just work in Vista too. I did for me. But I agree dual screens in Windows do come with its share of hassles and it doesn't just work for everyone, but "its getting better all the time..." and even at its worst its nothing like the black screens, X won't launch at all even on one screen, and the prompts to go edit configuration files with a command line tool that I get in Ubuntu while trying to make go.
Worst case in windows I only get one screen.
re: wifi...
Again, improving all the time.
So when i point of weaknesses in Ubuntu, the counter is that 'its getting better all the time', and this is a reason to switch to Ubuntu. But if you point out the flaws in Vista, which I can counter are also 'getting better all the time' then flaws still count as a reason to switch to Ubuntu?
I don't buy it.
Haven't tried that, specifically. I do know that Amarok seems to notice when I plug in things like iPods, and it's ready to deal with them.
Amarok requires you to jailbreak your ipod touch / iphone, which for me is not acceptable. And jailbroken or not, amarok doesn't sync contacts, only music and playlists. And the syncml program which does contacts on older ipods doesn't work with the touch or iphone at all, jailbroken or not.
Because Outlook is so efficient, and easy to interoperate with, and pretty...
It stil interoperates with Exchange servers better than anything else. Which really is the main reason why anyone would want it.
Contrast that with Vista, where there's a fair chance you won't even make it to a basic web&email machine.
Oh come on now. substitute fair for miniscule.
The one friend I know who is forced to use it at school (for a Vista class, no less) claims that it bluescreens frequently -- either every couple hours or several times an hour, he didn't say.
Sure, if you use Vista with hardware that its not compatible with, or on hardware for which the vista drivers are flaky you are going to have issues like that. Use compatible hardware. That's not 'Vista', that's any significantly new OS. And Vista, at the kernel level, is a significantly new OS.
To counter your 'one friend' I've had Vista running on this box now since July 2007, and it hasn't crashed once. An OS is only as stable as its drivers, and its going to take a bit of time for the drivers to catch up to what we've got for XP and Linux.
That said, I -agree- that if that's the hardware you've got, putting vista on it is a bad idea, and you should stick with XP or move to ubuntu. But the reverse is also true... if you've got hardware that doesn't work with ubuntu... you'd be in the same boat... either you wouldn't use ubuntu or you'd get compatible hardware.
I suspect that it is much easier to upgrade the average person to Ubuntu than to Vista.
The reality is that there really is not much REASON to upgrade the average person to either. And if they are buying a new computer then upgrading to Vista is a hardly an issue because it can can pre-installed, and the only concern is whether your existing accessory hardware is good with the OS... but that's true of Ubuntu too.
Here's how I'd spend $18000:
1. Epson Powerlite 1080UB (projector) = $3000
2. Pair of Martin Logan Quest front speakers = $10000
3. Decent amp = $2000
4. Random center/rear channel speakers = $800
5. PS3 = $400
6. Decent 100" 16:9 screen = $500
7. Random subwoofer = $400
Overall not bad, but the front speakers are by any reasonable measure stupid overkill, IMO.
I'd cut the speakers down by half or even more, and free up at least $5-6000. And then use the funds to add a Wii, upgrade the PS3, and get accessories for both, add a mac mini (which can do everything appletv can do plus its a PC), and allocate a bit more to the center and rears. (Given its a 2000 amp, we've probably got 7.1...so I'd throw $1000 or so at the center and a few hundred at the 4 side/rear satellite speakers.)
And I think I'd still have money left over for a higher end programmable universal remote or something, maybe add some NAS to access from the mac.
Almost everything is easy in Ubuntu, and any issues are easily fixed by searching google (Which is not always the case with Vista, Xp, and other windows OS's I use).
No. I specifically said sync *contacts* to an ipod phone or ipod touch. Amarok and gtkpod sync music and playlists not contacts, and it requires me to jailbreak my device, which is not acceptable to me. (Don't get me wrong I having nothing against modding / hacking hardware/software but in this case I want to be able to update official firmware etc without any issues. That's not a sacrifice I'm willing to make.)
SyncEvolution / SyncML last time I checked only supports 5th gen and older devices, nanos, minis, and shuffles. It doesn't support the new ipod touch or iphone jailbroken or not. (Related to the fact that the new ones changed to running OSX instead of whatever the older ones ran, and the interface is completely different... its not just a 'usb mass storage device'.)
I guess what I am trying to say is: That was a LOT easier than to try and trouble shoot why Vista won't sync with device X in my opinion.
Yes, it was easier because it just took a few minutes of research to decide to completely give up and not waste my time even trying to make it sync, because its not going to work. (At least for now.) At least with Vista, if I have trouble syncing my pod to outlook I know that it -should- work, and that if I figure out the issue it will.
Of course, for the first few months that I had my ipod touch Vista x64 didn't support it at all either, and it wasn't clear when/if Apple would bother adding that support...but as of right now at least Vista x64 is working like a charm; I like it much more than XP.
I do use linux though. I have a headless linux server in my home office, which itself has two more linux servers in VMWare, I've deployed it for clients, and I've even installed it on my mom's old laptop, to give her a modern desktop OS that meets her (basic) needs. (Mom's laptop came with WinME on it...ugh, and she is now happily running Gutsy). And while she does have an ipod, she syncs with my dad's mac where their music library is.) Don't misunderstand me, I like Linux, and don't need to be convinced of Ubuntu's virtues. But I can't deny its shortcomings either.
Your argument basically boils down to "it's not Windows!" Yes, we know that. The only thing that Windows is objectively better it is, well, being Windows.
That's a part of it, for people that have a lot of windows apps that they want to keep using, yes, that's a factor. But EVEN if they are willing to use alternate applications they lose functionality...
In my case for example I'd be perfectly happy to sync my ipod touch contacts with thunderbird or kmial on linux. But I can't. I'd be perfectly happy to purchase drm free music online from the iTMS 'plus' catalog with Amarok or gtkPod, but I can't.
This isn't a case of Windows being better at being windows; obviously I could switch to a Mac, for example, and retain those functionalities, but not Linux.
By the way, that whole dumb "application compatibility" thing works both directions.
Not to the same degree.
1) The context of the argument is that people using windows can switch to linux. So linux apps that don't run on windows aren't exactly a problem.
2) Many more flagship foss/linux apps are available on windows than the other way around.
3) Application substitutability isn't the same. There simply aren't equivalents to simply accounting or quickbooks on linux.
4) Hardware compatibility like that of with syncing to blackberries or iphones is again applications software related, but again, there is no suitable linux software.
They do have Vista, and are unable to access there web-mail provider,
Why exactly would that be? Maybe you just have to trust the web mail site in IE7, or enable popups for that site? I seriously doubt anyone worth using is running a webmail server that doesn't support IE7.
Later on you say:
and the webmail software works fine with Firefox and Opera
Both of which are readily available on Windows.
cope with the Word2007 interface
Word 2007 is not windows. You could install OO.org on Vista too if they can't cope with Word 2007.
or get the laptop to talk to the wireless hub for more than 10 minutes a day
wifi support isn't exactly linux's strongest suit either. ndiswrapper, a mess of comparatively clumsy tools for handling security and managing networks. I'm glad it just worked for you, and it is getting better, but Windows is ahead here, even if you had issues.
Some are experienced IT people who have seen Linux/Unix and know how it could be.
Was this a pro-linux/unix comment or a pro-windows comment? Its much too ambiguous.
Getting linux running smoothly can be just as trying as windows if not more trying.
Most are now in a position to ask the professionals "Is this as good as it gets?" and being told - no, there IS another way.
A different way, with its own slew of canyon-wide pitfalls. Like... nearly all your software won't work, including your accounting software won't run on it at all, period. Or the minefield of setting up dual screens or wifi, or getting your shiny new blackberry or iphone to sync contacts with outlook... oh wait... no outlook...
Sure ubuntu etc have reached the point where you can build a basic web&email machine very quickly and its pretty simple, but go much beyond that and Linux throws plenty of obstacles into your path. Some can be overcome, some can't.
Or is it defined by whether or not the person making the statement had an intent to deceive?
Precisely.
You can say something that's outright false and not be lying. If someone wanders into your offices and tells you he's there to repair the network, and you then mention in passing to someone else that you saw someone come into repair the network, are you lying?
Objectively its a falsehood. He's really there to install keyloggers and case the place out for other security weaknesses. But subjectively, from your point of view you have no intention to decieve or mislead. I might tell you you are mistaken, but I'd never accuse you of lying, unless I had reason to believe you were a conspirator.
Maybe your 4 year old can help me out here =).
Probably not eloquently, but again, yeah, he knows the difference between making a mistake and lying.
Well to be fair the new games do have better graphics. But the problem comes down to the fact that graphics are improving beyond the average persons eye and interpret graphics. Much like sound cards a decade ago.
I think the biggest irony is that in multiplayer competitive people disable all these features anyway because
1) framerate is king
2) getting rid of advanced lighting, bump mapped animated textures, smoke, fog, clouds, falling snow, rain, etc, etc make your opponent easier to spot.
"You're not exactly lying (you can argue you are because you're not actually giving them the photos, or they're not really John, but that's not necessarily the case - they could put the photos up anyway to make it look more legit).
:)
Lying by omission is when an important fact is omitted, deliberately leaving another person with a misconception. This includes failures to correct pre-existing misconceptions. One may by careful speaking contrive to give correct but only partial answers to questions.
Even my 4 year old has no difficulty understanding that weaseling like this is a form of lying.
I agree you can engage in social engineering without lying, but its an important and ubiquitous tool of the trade.
As for your uniformed workers, while they don't by definition have to communicate with anyone, odds are they will. And odds are they'll at the very least have a prepared lie to go along with their outfit. Whether or not they use it. Hell, even the guys that went around leaving usb drives probably had a cover story in case someone had confronted them. "I'm just returning it." or "Its got some marketing materials for the new yadda yadda..." or whatever.
my god you people miss the mark by a long shot. the merchant is the CC company providing the funds.
... but the *merchant* is ALWAYS you.
No. Sorry. You are the one way off the mark.
As someone who has owned a business I can assure you, the merchant is the *business owner*. The other party is typically called a "bank", "merchant bank", "merchant account provider", "acquiring bank", or "acquirer"
Now, from the "merchant account providers" point of view...
"In the Visa and Mastercard rules, the merchant's processing bank [merchant account provider] is 100% responsible for all the transactions that the merchant performs. This can leave the provider open to millions of dollars of potential losses if the merchant operates in an illegal or risky manner and generates many chargebacks. The providers pass this cost on to the merchant, but if the merchant is fraudulent or simply does not have the money, the provider must pay all the costs to make the card holder whole."
Which is probably what you are talking about. So, Yes, its absolutely true that THEY (the merchant account providers) are liable for any fraudulent charges, and THEY must cover it. If you, as a cardholder phone Visa and ask who pays if your card is stolen, they'll just tell you 'not you'. If you persist they'll tell you that (according to PCI DSS [Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard]) the cost is borne by the bank providing the merchant account ["merchant account provider"].
However, as it says in the above quote, while they are responsible, they *invariably* try to recoup that cost, plus fees, plus fines, from the merchant (that would be YOU). They only get stuck holding the bag and taking a loss, if they CAN'T get the money from you...and that only happens if you're insolvent, or you've fled the country, or something equally drastic. If you are an upstanding reputable business in good standing, they WILL pass that cost on to you, and you WILL pay.
So as far as your card issuer or VISA is concerned yes, the liability rests with the merchant account provider. But you're daft if you don't think they in turn pass that liability to you via your 'merchant account' agreement/contract, and collect on it vigorously.
Look it up.
The most obvious example I know of is social engineering with USB pen drives. A penetration testing company was asked to test corporate security. They did it by leaving a number of USB pen drives around the office. With no lying or scamming, people took the drives, wondered whose it was, plugged it into the computer, and the drive automatically grabbed some data.
That is probably the ONLY example I've seen that DOESN'T involve lying or scamming. Usually 'social engineering' refers to calling in to the receptionist, posing as the IT helpdesk, or something else, and then have them tell you their passwords...or type 'arcane things into a command line'...or run the attachment in an email you send them...and they do it without a 2nd thought. And that, would be a clear case of 'lying' or even 'scamming'.
Phishing sites, email spam from 'John' that says "Check out our Vacation Photos", etc also fall under the wide umbrella of 'social engineering'.