I have spend quite some time designing just this kind of network. There are some special problems once it scales past a few thousand users.
The main issue is that there isn't, currently, a routing algorithm that can do the job. You have a network, half of which is probably mobile, and the sheer number of 'cell changes' causes so much routing traffic that it threatens to take over the entire network. As for optimum-path routes, forget it. For a start, you never know the entire matrix to be able to do any optimization. By the time you've done the discovery, it's changed. The best basis I've come up with for a workable system is the Simulated Annealing algorithm.
Protocols like 802.11 are good for setting up p2p or p2mp networks, but suck at peer2peer. Trust me. There's this thing called 'hidden terminal syndrome' which basically means that the reciever you're trying to transmit to may be able to see another transmitter that you can't, and so while you're transmitting when you think the air is clear, the reciever is actually getting inteference. This becomes a big problem once your density gets high.
We need some new protocols that can adapt much more flexibly, and are optimized for 'global' bandwidth considerations.
There is also the issue of fairness. Essentially, the only way a distributed network can work is if each person contributes more to the network than they take. But how do you stop the assholes from hacking their transciever to give them priority? The answer is a 'digital currency' system that can enforce the quid-pro-quo nature of the network. You get 'points' for passing messages, and can call those points back in when you need capacity. This also gets into the 'web of trust' problem.
IPV6 is the answer to the address problem. I'm certain that wireless networks will be the 'killer app' for IPV6.
I expect to see a first generation wireless net using 11mb/s DSSS cards, basically geeks going point to point with medium wired networks attached.
Eventually, the density will increase, and head towards two seperate critical points: The point of total coverage, and the point of protocol collapse for the first-gen network.
Depending which happens first, and how far between they are (which is even affected by things like the local geography) rides the success of the system. If it reaches coverage before collapse, it will succeed, because it's usefulness will be enough to make sure the painful transition happens.
It would be nice to have the second-gen protocols ready early, but I doubt it will happen.
Having pointed out the problems, the benefits will be incalculable. For a start, it will save lives, since public infrastructure always goes down during a disaster, (cyclone, hurricane, earthquake) right when it's needed. A distributed system is far more resilient.
In the Magic Bag I have two lightsticks, a first aid kit, solar-powered radio, portable saw, GPS, palmpilot, mobile phone, condoms, survey maps of the city and surrounding national parks, compass, torch, swiss army knife, signalling mirror, various tools, a space blanket, and a towel. But they don't count because I always carry those around with me anyway[1].
For Y2K, I'm adding a bottle of Butterscotch Schnapps, a tub of chocolate mud-cake ice cream, my entire collection of water-weaponry[2], a change of clothes, and a trenchcoat. I plan to keep my SuperSoaker XP70 loaded and nearby at all times, because you never know what kind of weirdoes are out this time of year. My only fear is that I may be outgunned by nerf.
[1] Yeah, so I'm a gizmo klepto. They pack nicely away into the bag, weigh less than you think, and are regularly very useful. Except the saw.
[2] We have the world's biggest waterfight planned.
The knee-jerk reaction I've just seen to this is not what I expect from slashdot.
First, this is not a censorship law. It is an age-verification scheme. The distinction is that the 'censorship' part is already enacted under other legislation, (especially the On-line Services Act of recent fame) restricting the sale of pornography to those 18 or over. (Legal adulthood in this country) which ALREADY applies to any physical vendor in this country. And yours, I'd bet.
This official declaration (not a law. there's a difference, though not much of one) is a direct result of using a bad argument against censorship. Learn from it. Basically, ISP's said 'we can't restrict content, because there's no way to verify age!' To which the legislators said 'Sure there is.' and this is the result. And it would work, if everyone was honest.
The present legislation already says that Rated content must be restricted behind some sort of access-control system. This document just defines what, technically, that means.
Will it work? No. Does it have much effect? No. Porn sites already ask for Credit Card details, from which the rest of the information is obtainable. The reason they ask for it again is to (a) cater for the situations where someone might be legitimately using another's credit card, and (b) so that the 'declaration of correctness' means more more than 'this credit card number is correct'. Still doesn't stop Johnny from using dad's identity.
Some things you've overlooked. This is a technical spec, and it's a pretty good one. (Leaving aside the moral issues for a moment) Privacy implications are catered for. It allows for digital signatures. It knows about cookies! It's what any of us would come up with if asked to design something similar. There is evidence here of a clue on the part of the ABA. That in itself is interesting.
And to be fair to the ABA, it's not their fault. They have been legally required to do this. And within those bounds, they've acted fairly honourably, despite the impossible position they've been put in. From what I've seen, the ABA isn't very keen on doing this job, since they know what a mess it's going to be. (I've got a lot of unrelated beefs with the ABA on spectrum issues, though.)
The recommendation itself is OK. It's a decent, well though out age verification scheme. And though it can't actually work, it performs the social task of telling kids that maybe they're doing something naughty. Never stopped them before, but at least they're aware, and that seems to be the point.
And it admirably performs the job for which it was written: site operators will know exactly the minimum they have to do to keep the government off their backs.
So, don't get mad at this. Get mad at the On-Line Services Act which goes into effect Jan 1st. This is just the spec for how to do passwords. The Act is what sends you to jail for not doing them, and tries to bulk censor international content even for legal adults.
Generally I like Jon's stuff. I can see why he's gone into incandescent rant mode here. He suffers from the curse of believing that people will act rationally, given a chance to reflect.
What Mosaic does is irrelevant. It is just a technical justification do continue doing what the majority really want to do anyway, but can't justify otherwise. It's an artificial way to produce evidence. Drag any student in front of a 'psychological testing machine' and you'll likely get an angry reaction. He scored an 8! Great, now we can punish him, like we always wanted.
US Culture is simply no longer capable of rational discourse or action. Jon has gone to fury because he doesn't want to admit this. Which is funny, because that's the problem. Somewhere, you guys picked up a massive superiority complex, and so you can't actually admit that there's anything wrong with America(TM). The taint is everywhere. It's part of your cultural doctrine.
And since America is perfect, by axiom, then any yawning pit of hollowness inside your soul must be your problem, and anyone shouting "No! This is all wrong!" must be silenced. Because they might be right. And you don't want to think about that.
At least, that's the majority view. And you can't change it, either. It's deep-seated, and reinforced every time they go through the daily American grind or shop at the strip-mall with their babyboomer friends. Something sucked all the life out of your country in the last few decades. I think it was rampant capitalism, or maybe the cold war. Russia seems to have suffered a similar, though more spectacular, fate.
Russia is actually an interesting example. Now that their country has obviously collapsed, they're free to go into crisis-management fix-it mode, and make some of those hard choices. They may very well come out of this strong and vibrant. That would be irony.
So, just do what the physicists do. Wait for the old generation to die, and a new one to take it's place. The kids are the future. Well educated and flexible, they'll rebuild your sagging culture.
Don't you remember any of your industry history? Sun began in the garages of a couple of students who decided to make an open platform workstation, from off-the-shelf parts to a design that anyone could copy. They got as big as they did because the made good gear. And more, they still do[1].
Who remembers the Sunsites? Back before the start of the web, a lot of the big mirrors were running on sun-sponsored equipment and bandwidth.[3]
Look at java. It's as open as it can possibly be without being GPL'ed. I have no doubt that it will be one day, once Microsoft has ceased attempting to 'embrace and extend' it[4].
If you want to compare ideologies, then Sun and the Open Source Community are fairly well aligned. Don't let a couple of minor differences scare you. Sun is just what the Open Source community would be if we all went corporate.
Give them a little more time. Sun is actually about three times bigger than Microsoft, so they might take a while to 'notice' things on a corporate level. And don't be surprised if now that they've noticed us, they want to be friends.
~ Orinoco Come join us: h2g2.com
[1] Wall Street ran their system on Sun gear for a decade, making the company quite profitable, because no-one has more money to spend on good quality gear[2] than the stock exchange.
[2] This is a fundamental point. Sun couldn't care less about software or licences or intellectual property. They're here to make fast hardware. After all, you've always got to have hardware. And as long as people need to buy big computers, there will be Sun.[5]
[3] Sun equipment *built* the internet. (DEC supplied all the terminals:-) In fact, it probably still makes the majority of it.
[4] Consider the recent court action. Sun was happy to have Microsoft licence, distribute, and even extend the capabilities of java on windows. But then Microsoft began shipping versions of 'Java' that failed the Java Compatibility Tests. What Microsoft were fighting for, in court, was to ship a broken version of java out to all its customers, and still call it Sun's Java. The court fees give you an example of exactly what it takes to make Microsoft eat one of their own press releases.
[5] I have a friend who works at sun. No, really. He's a quantum mechanic working in their research division. Sun figures that quantum computing has gone from a case of 'if' to 'when', and therefore should be ready for it. This is absolutely true.
I, like a lot of programmers, have a mane. Long hair. Lots of it. Alan, ye of the flowing locks, what shampoo do you use? What is the manner of your care regime? Or is a comb a scary object, full of fear and loathing? Inquiring minds, y'know.
I've walked both sides of the fence. My last employer was from the "And thou shall always wear a tie, yea even to code" school of thought. More documentation quality control systems than you can shake a stick at, let me tell you.
Where I am now, there's almost no formal documentation. My current project is going much better than any of the 'documented' ones, even though it's approximately 40 times bigger. How? Let me tell you a tale...
Good design documentation is focused. It serves a particular purpose. The person writing it knows what they're writing, and the person reading it know what they're looking for. If the prescribed section headings don't entirely fit, then they'll be thrown out and better headings will be used. Nothing gets in the way of the outcome that the document is being written to satisfy. Nothing.
Most design documentation, however, is done by bored programmers who would rather be coding. It's done to a template they didn't design, with no knowledge of why. It's done too early, by the wrong people, for the wrong reasons.
Fundamentally, there's a difference between documentation as a Tool, and as a Chore.
If the people aren't excited about writing the spec, then don't do it. Hmmm. 'Excited' might not be the right word. Ah, I know. 'Frantic'. That's a much better word. You should be frantic to make sure the project's not going to fail because you missed something. That's the reason for a spec, and don't ever forget it.
Management likes specs because it gives them that 'warm inner glow' that (a) work is happenning, (that they can understand) and (b) they've got something to cover their asses with later.
Orinoco's laws of Software Specifications. 1. The best spec is 1 page long, and a high-school student can read it. This goal is impossible, but worth aiming for. 2. End users can't write specs. If they could, they'd be system architects, and not order-entry clerks. Compiling a wish list of every user is like fulfilling the combined christmas list of a room full of 5-year olds. What they really need is new socks and underpants, but takes a deep knowledge of human nature to understand this. 3. Moreover, End users can't READ technical specs either. Don't show it to them, it will just cause confusion and worry. This causes more documentation. An endless cycle. 4. Management can't read specs either, though they pretend to and like to have a copy. Pander to this need, otherwise they will make your life a living hell. 5. The only people, therefore, who read and will understand the spec are your co-workers and yourself. So keep them in mind. If there's nobody on the project but you, you're only writing for yourself. 6. The full functional spec is only ever used during a billing dispute. If you've hit that point, you've failed anyway. 7. If you haven't already done it at least once, it shouldn't go into the spec. This implies that the spec should be written after the prototype. 8. Once work starts, a spec should be constantly evolving, but not too much. New things should trickle in by everyone's agreement. Major changes are cause enough for stopping and asking "Why wasn't it in there in the first place!" because there's bound to be more. An unchanging spec is dead and useless. 9. Writing code is inherently creative. Any creative endeavor is unpredictable. Never forget that. 10. Specs are like Backups. No-one understands the value of a good spec. until a project has crashed and burned around them for lack of one.
Far better than specs are what I call 'principle documents'. Something nice to nail to the PM's door. Nothing specific, just all the important generalities like "Nothing should take more than 3 seconds to process" for a help-desk system, or "Easy learning curve" for a system used only rarely.
And lastly, all specs should contain some elements of process re-engineering. A modern buzzword which boils down to "Why the hell are you doing it THAT way?!?!"
A good project is just like a good hack. Half of it is social engineering.
Hmm. As usual I spouted off and this is far too long. Apologies.
For one, I'll walk over hot coals for a linux compiler that will do Object Pascal. I've got about 100K lines of code, all of which is back-end business logic for massive multi-dimensional data processing, and I want to run it on Linux BAAAD.
I don't care about UI's and widget sets. We're going to wrap a Java/Web interface around it anyway.
I'll probably get flamed for this, but I personally think that Object Pascal is a better OO language than even Java. (Damn sure it's better than C++) One word: Properties. I _miss_ properties when I'm programming in Java. I shouldn't have to care whether I'm assigning a value to a variable or calling a setter method. That peculiarity of the implementation should be hidden from me, goddamit! Ok, maybe Delphi need's 'interfaces' the same way Java has them, but Java needs Properties.
I truly hope Borland commits to Linux. They've been building the best PC compiler tools for at least a decade, and there's a lot of good code written in their tools that it would be good to port.
Alas, even Katz falls prey to the malaise common to US. Citizens. He quotes Licklider on The Network: "the boon to humankind would be beyond measure." but makes the assumption that "humankind"="The good 'ol US of A"
The demographics of net use in the US is irrelevant. Pretty much everyone there has available access, limited only by personal interest and choice. If you want it really bad, you can get it. There are free access orgs, programmes, charities, friends and friends of friends.
Think upon the demographics of South Africa, Mozambique, Tibet, Papua New Guinea. The argument still rages: is it better to give them sewage systems and electricity, or net access? Maybe it's the same as asking whether you give someone a fish or a fishing line. The net can be a voice to the mute, letting them say "Help us!" and letting us hear.
And even though we're drenched in technology and information, we're still poor in wisdom and culture. Poor in information about things, sometimes bad things, happenning in places out of our sight.
I say, parachute ten thousand ruggedized solar-powered palmpilots with satellite links onto Tibet. Smuggle thousands of the things into East Timor.
That really would be a boon to humankind beyond measure.
Actually, you are allowed to shout "Fire!" in a theatre. If the theatre is burning, then it's probably a very good idea.
Even when it's not actually on fire, you still can shout the words. But you must deal with the consequences. The same applies to libel.
The point is, neither of them actually prevent you from speaking out; they impose penalties for wrongful and harmful use of this ability. The central idea is that you have freedom, but with it comes responsibility.
This is different from censorship, which prevents the speech, rightful or not, from even being assessed. You can't shout "Fire" in a theatre if you've been gagged as a matter of course. Even if it's burning down around you.
Don't confuse laws that punish misuse for laws which prevent use. That way lies repression.
Postscript has one issue which will probably disqualify it from future systems: The Halting Problem.
Any turing machine is subject to the halting theorem, which is basically the fact that you can't tell if a program will finish without running it. (Any 'analysis' of the program to determine halting is essentially another form of running the code) This is different from simple infinite loops (which are easily detectable). An example would be a program which tries to calculate the complete value of Pi. _We_ know that it's irrational, but the program doesn't, the compiler doesn't, and the machine doesn't.
The halting problem means you can't tell how far away the program is from finishing, if it ever will.
Postscript is a language. Thus, it is subject to the Halting problem. You know exactly how long it will take to load a bitmap, but you don't know how long a postscript program will take to finish. Who's had a printer blink away for an hour without producing output or errors?
In an open network, you're therefore resigned to the fact that people can submit 'programs' to your printer. If there are bugs in the printer rendering code, you've got the possibility of a virus or malicious crash. If not, you've got the possibility of a denial-of-service attack because of halting. "Timeouts will solve it" you might say, but then how do you make sure large-but-legal documents don't get killed?
And, job management goes out the window when you can't predict how long a job will take. It's easy to construct a 10k postscript program that takes 100 times longer than a 10Mb file. You can't measure progress, either.
Though postscript is a beatiful system, and widely implemented, it's too much for the task. Much too much. HTML showed us how simple interchange formats can be good. Don't ignore that lesson.
Ideas come unbidden from nowhere. They are often had by many people simultaneously. It is impossible to tell whether a person has truly had the idea, or is just repeating it. Since ideas have no physicality, there is no possibility of witnesses, or evidence. Therefore, ideas are not subject to the legal process. That's the primary problem.
This all came together under patent law in this way: You had an idea. You spent time and money turning it into a product. You patented the product, in which you exchange ownership of the product design for exclusivity of it's use for 17 years. Competitors had the choice of licencing it from you, or redeveloping the product by spending their own resources to create a different implementation of the idea.
The 'idea' is nowhere given protection. Nowhere! Not in original Patent law, or in copyright. Only the expression has protection. The legal concept of 'intellectual property' outside of physical works is very new. Everyone pretends it's an extension of the old system, but that only makes sense if you believe that ideas are property. The problems we're seeing are the results of this assumption: Ideas create devices. Devices are property. Therefore ideas are property. It's a faulty syllogism.
The patent system is generally good. There are only a few tweaks that it needs, most related to the ill-thought-out additions that have been made recently. Specifically, gene and software patents. Genes are 'forces of nature', which were unpatentable until they changed the law to encourage private genetic research. (They should now own up to the consequences, and fix the mess.) Software tries to have it both ways: with patents and copyrights, trying to steal the best features of both. (the ease of copyright for performances, and the intellectual lockout of patents) How can the same code be both a 'written work' and a 'device'? Either category is a poor fit, but using both is abysmal! Algorithms clearly need their own category.
Howver, I resist the idea that patents are broken. The only factor which has really changed since the founding of patent law is the speed of innovation. 17 years is just too long these days, except for truly incredible inventions. We perhaps need a less onerous "3 year" patent.
Of course, if "CmdrTaco's hopes are up so high for this movie that nothing short of a drug induced expierence could fit his expectations", then all we need is to add another $50 of 'expenses', and we can read a review that goes "Th3 (olors! The pre1ty pr5ty col0rs! Moing! ^ll over! Fantasticic!"
Why the vitriol? I've not seen extreme reactions like this outside genuine threat/response situations, which are usually indicative of paranoids attacking concepts which undermine their preconceptions.
I can't see why Jon would provoke this kind of response. It's just not logical. He has been direct, open, and honest. He's bared his soul, and worked to do Good For All. For that, he has my respect.
I have more time for elegant writers than for mean coders.
Of course, there's no way to prove this, since I didn't actually get the idea notarized by an official JP, or even tell anyone.:-) But I thought up the same technique in 1996. June, I think.
Peter Gabriel's "Mercy Street" is a particular favorite song of mine, and (never having seen the videoclip) I like to imagining what it would look like. I'm great at visualizing things...
I was contemplating the line "She pictures the broken glass/pictures the steam" and imagined a smattering of shattered glass falling towards the concrete, frozen in flight. I wanted a scene change by having sunlight glint off the falling glass and whiteout the shot... then fade from white into the next.
How would I do this, I thought, if I wanted to actually make the clip? CGI was my first idea, but seemed unsatisfying. It's hard to do right. I thought of whizzing a camera around really, really fast, but was concerned about the blur.
Then I saw it.. an arc of cameras, All shooting at the same time.
Two months later, I read about this 'amazing new camera technique' invented by this guy in new york, who was going to patent it. Scientific American, from memory. I can get the exact reference if anyone wants.
The first time I saw it used in an ad, I was electrified. It's weird seeing something that up until that moment only existed in your head.
(1) Er, specifically, I think we should generalize.:-) Seriously, the intention was to say that things are going fine, don't get sidetracked. Here are some hypothetical ways to get sidetracked, so don't do 'em. (2) It's easy to be best of breed. That just takes research. Here's a quick idea to improve even our CLI: I use JBuilder a lot at work and have come to depend on it's Code Insight features. (if you type System.out. and wait, you get a list of the methods. Type ( and wait, and you see the parameters and types. Ironically, didn't this first turn up in a MS product? Delphi does it better, though.) Extending a shell to suggest parameters, or maybe bringing back recently used values, might be fun. I'm always having to hit the man pages for less-used programs like ipfwadm. (3) Choice is good, but sometime is less valuable than standardization. Multiple variants of HTML, to pick a random example, could be annoying. (4) Yes, I was overstating. But it made a good lead-in to the kinds of changes that occur when you decide to become commercial. I'm concerned that the whole linux community doesn't understand what commercial dominance would mean. (5) That's exactly the example I had in mind. It distracted the FSF from coding. Same thing happened to GIF's. Remember the sheer miles of verbage that got spewed over that one? I couldn't handle one such 'issue' a month. Besides, big companies are not adverse to pushing a licence agreement to breaking point for their own benefit, since they have laywers specifically for that job. The Sun/MS/Java case in point. (6) I care if the focus of the community shifts to the point where it destroys the ideal. I like money. I like not having to care about it. (7) Talk to some behavioral psychologists. You'd be amazed. The easiest way is to create a popular leader. Hoomans are weird.
Slashdot Mirror
1. Listen to your people.
2. Do what they suggest most of the time.
3. The few times you do something else, explain very clearly why.
Here's the opposite, as practised by too many managers:
1. Assume you know everything.
2. Override all objections.
3. Never tell people your reasons, because it would just 'confuse' them.
I have spend quite some time designing just this kind of network. There are some special problems once it scales past a few thousand users.
The main issue is that there isn't, currently, a routing algorithm that can do the job. You have a network, half of which is probably mobile, and the sheer number of 'cell changes' causes so much routing traffic that it threatens to take over the entire network. As for optimum-path routes, forget it. For a start, you never know the entire matrix to be able to do any optimization. By the time you've done the discovery, it's changed. The best basis I've come up with for a workable system is the Simulated Annealing algorithm.
Protocols like 802.11 are good for setting up p2p or p2mp networks, but suck at peer2peer. Trust me. There's this thing called 'hidden terminal syndrome' which basically means that the reciever you're trying to transmit to may be able to see another transmitter that you can't, and so while you're transmitting when you think the air is clear, the reciever is actually getting inteference. This becomes a big problem once your density gets high.
We need some new protocols that can adapt much more flexibly, and are optimized for 'global' bandwidth considerations.
There is also the issue of fairness. Essentially, the only way a distributed network can work is if each person contributes more to the network than they take. But how do you stop the assholes from hacking their transciever to give them priority? The answer is a 'digital currency' system that can enforce the quid-pro-quo nature of the network. You get 'points' for passing messages, and can call those points back in when you need capacity. This also gets into the 'web of trust' problem.
IPV6 is the answer to the address problem. I'm certain that wireless networks will be the 'killer app' for IPV6.
I expect to see a first generation wireless net using 11mb/s DSSS cards, basically geeks going point to point with medium wired networks attached.
Eventually, the density will increase, and head towards two seperate critical points: The point of total coverage, and the point of protocol collapse for the first-gen network.
Depending which happens first, and how far between they are (which is even affected by things like the local geography) rides the success of the system. If it reaches coverage before collapse, it will succeed, because it's usefulness will be enough to make sure the painful transition happens.
It would be nice to have the second-gen protocols ready early, but I doubt it will happen.
Having pointed out the problems, the benefits will be incalculable. For a start, it will save lives, since public infrastructure always goes down during a disaster, (cyclone, hurricane, earthquake) right when it's needed. A distributed system is far more resilient.
Later.
...Be prepared!
In the Magic Bag I have two lightsticks, a first aid kit, solar-powered radio, portable saw, GPS, palmpilot, mobile phone, condoms, survey maps of the city and surrounding national parks, compass, torch, swiss army knife, signalling mirror, various tools, a space blanket, and a towel. But they don't count because I always carry those around with me anyway[1].
For Y2K, I'm adding a bottle of Butterscotch Schnapps, a tub of chocolate mud-cake ice cream, my entire collection of water-weaponry[2], a change of clothes, and a trenchcoat. I plan to keep my SuperSoaker XP70 loaded and nearby at all times, because you never know what kind of weirdoes are out this time of year. My only fear is that I may be outgunned by nerf.
[1] Yeah, so I'm a gizmo klepto. They pack nicely away into the bag, weigh less than you think, and are regularly very useful. Except the saw.
[2] We have the world's biggest waterfight planned.
The knee-jerk reaction I've just seen to this is not what I expect from slashdot.
First, this is not a censorship law. It is an age-verification scheme. The distinction is that the 'censorship' part is already enacted under other legislation, (especially the On-line Services Act of recent fame) restricting the sale of pornography to those 18 or over. (Legal adulthood in this country) which ALREADY applies to any physical vendor in this country. And yours, I'd bet.
This official declaration (not a law. there's a difference, though not much of one) is a direct result of using a bad argument against censorship. Learn from it. Basically, ISP's said 'we can't restrict content, because there's no way to verify age!' To which the legislators said 'Sure there is.' and this is the result. And it would work, if everyone was honest.
The present legislation already says that Rated content must be restricted behind some sort of access-control system. This document just defines what, technically, that means.
Will it work? No. Does it have much effect? No. Porn sites already ask for Credit Card details, from which the rest of the information is obtainable. The reason they ask for it again is to (a) cater for the situations where someone might be legitimately using another's credit card, and (b) so that the 'declaration of correctness' means more more than 'this credit card number is correct'. Still doesn't stop Johnny from using dad's identity.
Some things you've overlooked. This is a technical spec, and it's a pretty good one. (Leaving aside the moral issues for a moment) Privacy implications are catered for. It allows for digital signatures. It knows about cookies! It's what any of us would come up with if asked to design something similar. There is evidence here of a clue on the part of the ABA. That in itself is interesting.
And to be fair to the ABA, it's not their fault. They have been legally required to do this. And within those bounds, they've acted fairly honourably, despite the impossible position they've been put in. From what I've seen, the ABA isn't very keen on doing this job, since they know what a mess it's going to be. (I've got a lot of unrelated beefs with the ABA on spectrum issues, though.)
The recommendation itself is OK. It's a decent, well though out age verification scheme. And though it can't actually work, it performs the social task of telling kids that maybe they're doing something naughty. Never stopped them before, but at least they're aware, and that seems to be the point.
And it admirably performs the job for which it was written: site operators will know exactly the minimum they have to do to keep the government off their backs.
So, don't get mad at this. Get mad at the On-Line Services Act which goes into effect Jan 1st. This is just the spec for how to do passwords. The Act is what sends you to jail for not doing them, and tries to bulk censor international content even for legal adults.
Generally I like Jon's stuff. I can see why he's gone into incandescent rant mode here. He suffers from the curse of believing that people will act rationally, given a chance to reflect.
What Mosaic does is irrelevant. It is just a technical justification do continue doing what the majority really want to do anyway, but can't justify otherwise. It's an artificial way to produce evidence. Drag any student in front of a 'psychological testing machine' and you'll likely get an angry reaction. He scored an 8! Great, now we can punish him, like we always wanted.
US Culture is simply no longer capable of rational discourse or action. Jon has gone to fury because he doesn't want to admit this. Which is funny, because that's the problem. Somewhere, you guys picked up a massive superiority complex, and so you can't actually admit that there's anything wrong with America(TM). The taint is everywhere. It's part of your cultural doctrine.
And since America is perfect, by axiom, then any yawning pit of hollowness inside your soul must be your problem, and anyone shouting "No! This is all wrong!" must be silenced. Because they might be right. And you don't want to think about that.
At least, that's the majority view. And you can't change it, either. It's deep-seated, and reinforced every time they go through the daily American grind or shop at the strip-mall with their babyboomer friends. Something sucked all the life out of your country in the last few decades. I think it was rampant capitalism, or maybe the cold war. Russia seems to have suffered a similar, though more spectacular, fate.
Russia is actually an interesting example. Now that their country has obviously collapsed, they're free to go into crisis-management fix-it mode, and make some of those hard choices. They may very well come out of this strong and vibrant. That would be irony.
So, just do what the physicists do. Wait for the old generation to die, and a new one to take it's place. The kids are the future. Well educated and flexible, they'll rebuild your sagging culture.
Oh, that's right...
Not always. There is hope. Some people understand.
Don't you remember any of your industry history? Sun began in the garages of a couple of students who decided to make an open platform workstation, from off-the-shelf parts to a design that anyone could copy. They got as big as they did because the made good gear. And more, they still do[1].
:-) In fact, it probably still makes the majority of it.
Who remembers the Sunsites? Back before the start of the web, a lot of the big mirrors were running on sun-sponsored equipment and bandwidth.[3]
Look at java. It's as open as it can possibly be without being GPL'ed. I have no doubt that it will be one day, once Microsoft has ceased attempting to 'embrace and extend' it[4].
If you want to compare ideologies, then Sun and the Open Source Community are fairly well aligned. Don't let a couple of minor differences scare you. Sun is just what the Open Source community would be if we all went corporate.
Give them a little more time. Sun is actually about three times bigger than Microsoft, so they might take a while to 'notice' things on a corporate level. And don't be surprised if now that they've noticed us, they want to be friends.
~ Orinoco
Come join us: h2g2.com
[1] Wall Street ran their system on Sun gear for a decade, making the company quite profitable, because no-one has more money to spend on good quality gear[2] than the stock exchange.
[2] This is a fundamental point. Sun couldn't care less about software or licences or intellectual property. They're here to make fast hardware. After all, you've always got to have hardware. And as long as people need to buy big computers, there will be Sun.[5]
[3] Sun equipment *built* the internet. (DEC supplied all the terminals
[4] Consider the recent court action. Sun was happy to have Microsoft licence, distribute, and even extend the capabilities of java on windows. But then Microsoft began shipping versions of 'Java' that failed the Java Compatibility Tests. What Microsoft were fighting for, in court, was to ship a broken version of java out to all its customers, and still call it Sun's Java. The court fees give you an example of exactly what it takes to make Microsoft eat one of their own press releases.
[5] I have a friend who works at sun. No, really. He's a quantum mechanic working in their research division. Sun figures that quantum computing has gone from a case of 'if' to 'when', and therefore should be ready for it. This is absolutely true.
I, like a lot of programmers, have a mane. Long hair. Lots of it. Alan, ye of the flowing locks, what shampoo do you use? What is the manner of your care regime? Or is a comb a scary object, full of fear and loathing? Inquiring minds, y'know.
I've walked both sides of the fence. My last employer was from the "And thou shall always wear a tie, yea even to code" school of thought. More documentation quality control systems than you can shake a stick at, let me tell you.
Where I am now, there's almost no formal documentation. My current project is going much better than any of the 'documented' ones, even though it's approximately 40 times bigger. How? Let me tell you a tale...
Good design documentation is focused. It serves a particular purpose. The person writing it knows what they're writing, and the person reading it know what they're looking for. If the prescribed section headings don't entirely fit, then they'll be thrown out and better headings will be used. Nothing gets in the way of the outcome that the document is being written to satisfy. Nothing.
Most design documentation, however, is done by bored programmers who would rather be coding. It's done to a template they didn't design, with no knowledge of why. It's done too early, by the wrong people, for the wrong reasons.
Fundamentally, there's a difference between documentation as a Tool, and as a Chore.
If the people aren't excited about writing the spec, then don't do it. Hmmm. 'Excited' might not be the right word. Ah, I know. 'Frantic'. That's a much better word. You should be frantic to make sure the project's not going to fail because you missed something. That's the reason for a spec, and don't ever forget it.
Management likes specs because it gives them that 'warm inner glow' that (a) work is happenning, (that they can understand) and (b) they've got something to cover their asses with later.
Orinoco's laws of Software Specifications.
1. The best spec is 1 page long, and a high-school student can read it. This goal is impossible, but worth aiming for.
2. End users can't write specs. If they could, they'd be system architects, and not order-entry clerks. Compiling a wish list of every user is like fulfilling the combined christmas list of a room full of 5-year olds. What they really need is new socks and underpants, but takes a deep knowledge of human nature to understand this.
3. Moreover, End users can't READ technical specs either. Don't show it to them, it will just cause confusion and worry. This causes more documentation. An endless cycle.
4. Management can't read specs either, though they pretend to and like to have a copy. Pander to this need, otherwise they will make your life a living hell.
5. The only people, therefore, who read and will understand the spec are your co-workers and yourself. So keep them in mind. If there's nobody on the project but you, you're only writing for yourself.
6. The full functional spec is only ever used during a billing dispute. If you've hit that point, you've failed anyway.
7. If you haven't already done it at least once, it shouldn't go into the spec. This implies that the spec should be written after the prototype.
8. Once work starts, a spec should be constantly evolving, but not too much. New things should trickle in by everyone's agreement. Major changes are cause enough for stopping and asking "Why wasn't it in there in the first place!" because there's bound to be more. An unchanging spec is dead and useless.
9. Writing code is inherently creative. Any creative endeavor is unpredictable. Never forget that.
10. Specs are like Backups. No-one understands the value of a good spec. until a project has crashed and burned around them for lack of one.
Far better than specs are what I call 'principle documents'. Something nice to nail to the PM's door. Nothing specific, just all the important generalities like "Nothing should take more than 3 seconds to process" for a help-desk system, or "Easy learning curve" for a system used only rarely.
And lastly, all specs should contain some elements of process re-engineering. A modern buzzword which boils down to "Why the hell are you doing it THAT way?!?!"
A good project is just like a good hack. Half of it is social engineering.
Hmm. As usual I spouted off and this is far too long. Apologies.
For one, I'll walk over hot coals for a linux compiler that will do Object Pascal. I've got about 100K lines of code, all of which is back-end business logic for massive multi-dimensional data processing, and I want to run it on Linux BAAAD.
I don't care about UI's and widget sets. We're going to wrap a Java/Web interface around it anyway.
I'll probably get flamed for this, but I personally think that Object Pascal is a better OO language than even Java. (Damn sure it's better than C++) One word: Properties. I _miss_ properties when I'm programming in Java. I shouldn't have to care whether I'm assigning a value to a variable or calling a setter method. That peculiarity of the implementation should be hidden from me, goddamit! Ok, maybe Delphi need's 'interfaces' the same way Java has them, but Java needs Properties.
I truly hope Borland commits to Linux. They've been building the best PC compiler tools for at least a decade, and there's a lot of good code written in their tools that it would be good to port.
Alas, even Katz falls prey to the malaise common to US. Citizens. He quotes Licklider on The Network: "the boon to humankind would be beyond measure." but makes the assumption that "humankind"="The good 'ol US of A"
The demographics of net use in the US is irrelevant. Pretty much everyone there has available access, limited only by personal interest and choice. If you want it really bad, you can get it. There are free access orgs, programmes, charities, friends and friends of friends.
Think upon the demographics of South Africa, Mozambique, Tibet, Papua New Guinea. The argument still rages: is it better to give them sewage systems and electricity, or net access? Maybe it's the same as asking whether you give someone a fish or a fishing line. The net can be a voice to the mute, letting them say "Help us!" and letting us hear.
And even though we're drenched in technology and information, we're still poor in wisdom and culture. Poor in information about things, sometimes bad things, happenning in places out of our sight.
I say, parachute ten thousand ruggedized solar-powered palmpilots with satellite links onto Tibet. Smuggle thousands of the things into East Timor.
That really would be a boon to humankind beyond measure.
Actually, you are allowed to shout "Fire!" in a theatre. If the theatre is burning, then it's probably a very good idea.
Even when it's not actually on fire, you still can shout the words. But you must deal with the consequences. The same applies to libel.
The point is, neither of them actually prevent you from speaking out; they impose penalties for wrongful and harmful use of this ability. The central idea is that you have freedom, but with it comes responsibility.
This is different from censorship, which prevents the speech, rightful or not, from even being assessed. You can't shout "Fire" in a theatre if you've been gagged as a matter of course. Even if it's burning down around you.
Don't confuse laws that punish misuse for laws which prevent use. That way lies repression.
~Orinoco
Postscript has one issue which will probably disqualify it from future systems: The Halting Problem.
Any turing machine is subject to the halting theorem, which is basically the fact that you can't tell if a program will finish without running it. (Any 'analysis' of the program to determine halting is essentially another form of running the code) This is different from simple infinite loops (which are easily detectable). An example would be a program which tries to calculate the complete value of Pi. _We_ know that it's irrational, but the program doesn't, the compiler doesn't, and the machine doesn't.
The halting problem means you can't tell how far away the program is from finishing, if it ever will.
Postscript is a language. Thus, it is subject to the Halting problem. You know exactly how long it will take to load a bitmap, but you don't know how long a postscript program will take to finish. Who's had a printer blink away for an hour without producing output or errors?
In an open network, you're therefore resigned to the fact that people can submit 'programs' to your printer. If there are bugs in the printer rendering code, you've got the possibility of a virus or malicious crash. If not, you've got the possibility of a denial-of-service attack because of halting. "Timeouts will solve it" you might say, but then how do you make sure large-but-legal documents don't get killed?
And, job management goes out the window when you can't predict how long a job will take. It's easy to construct a 10k postscript program that takes 100 times longer than a 10Mb file. You can't measure progress, either.
Though postscript is a beatiful system, and widely implemented, it's too much for the task. Much too much. HTML showed us how simple interchange formats can be good. Don't ignore that lesson.
Ideas come unbidden from nowhere. They are often had by many people simultaneously. It is impossible to tell whether a person has truly had the idea, or is just repeating it. Since ideas have no physicality, there is no possibility of witnesses, or evidence. Therefore, ideas are not subject to the legal process. That's the primary problem.
This all came together under patent law in this way: You had an idea. You spent time and money turning it into a product. You patented the product, in which you exchange ownership of the product design for exclusivity of it's use for 17 years. Competitors had the choice of licencing it from you, or redeveloping the product by spending their own resources to create a different implementation of the idea.
The 'idea' is nowhere given protection. Nowhere! Not in original Patent law, or in copyright. Only the expression has protection. The legal concept of 'intellectual property' outside of physical works is very new. Everyone pretends it's an extension of the old system, but that only makes sense if you believe that ideas are property. The problems we're seeing are the results of this assumption: Ideas create devices. Devices are property. Therefore ideas are property. It's a faulty syllogism.
The patent system is generally good. There are only a few tweaks that it needs, most related to the ill-thought-out additions that have been made recently. Specifically, gene and software patents. Genes are 'forces of nature', which were unpatentable until they changed the law to encourage private genetic research. (They should now own up to the consequences, and fix the mess.) Software tries to have it both ways: with patents and copyrights, trying to steal the best features of both. (the ease of copyright for performances, and the intellectual lockout of patents) How can the same code be both a 'written work' and a 'device'? Either category is a poor fit, but using both is abysmal! Algorithms clearly need their own category.
Howver, I resist the idea that patents are broken. The only factor which has really changed since the founding of patent law is the speed of innovation. 17 years is just too long these days, except for truly incredible inventions. We perhaps need a less onerous "3 year" patent.
Of course, if "CmdrTaco's hopes are up so high for this movie that nothing short of a drug induced expierence could fit his expectations", then all we need is to add another $50 of 'expenses', and we can read a review that goes "Th3 (olors! The pre1ty pr5ty col0rs! Moing! ^ll over! Fantasticic!"
I'd pay. *grin*
Why the vitriol? I've not seen extreme reactions like this outside genuine threat/response situations, which are usually indicative of paranoids attacking concepts which undermine their preconceptions.
I can't see why Jon would provoke this kind of response. It's just not logical. He has been direct, open, and honest. He's bared his soul, and worked to do Good For All. For that, he has my respect.
I have more time for elegant writers than for mean coders.
Of course, there's no way to prove this, since I didn't actually get the idea notarized by an official JP, or even tell anyone. :-) But I thought up the same technique in 1996. June, I think.
Peter Gabriel's "Mercy Street" is a particular favorite song of mine, and (never having seen the videoclip) I like to imagining what it would look like. I'm great at visualizing things...
I was contemplating the line "She pictures the broken glass/pictures the steam" and imagined a smattering of shattered glass falling towards the concrete, frozen in flight. I wanted a scene change by having sunlight glint off the falling glass and whiteout the shot... then fade from white into the next.
How would I do this, I thought, if I wanted to actually make the clip? CGI was my first idea, but seemed unsatisfying. It's hard to do right. I thought of whizzing a camera around really, really fast, but was concerned about the blur.
Then I saw it.. an arc of cameras, All shooting at the same time.
Two months later, I read about this 'amazing new camera technique' invented by this guy in new york, who was going to patent it. Scientific American, from memory. I can get the exact reference if anyone wants.
The first time I saw it used in an ad, I was electrified. It's weird seeing something that up until that moment only existed in your head.
Ideas. Memories. It's a strange world.
ps. Listen to the song.
(1) Er, specifically, I think we should generalize. :-) Seriously, the intention was to say that things are going fine, don't get sidetracked. Here are some hypothetical ways to get sidetracked, so don't do 'em.
(2) It's easy to be best of breed. That just takes research. Here's a quick idea to improve even our CLI: I use JBuilder a lot at work and have come to depend on it's Code Insight features. (if you type System.out. and wait, you get a list of the methods. Type ( and wait, and you see the parameters and types. Ironically, didn't this first turn up in a MS product? Delphi does it better, though.) Extending a shell to suggest parameters, or maybe bringing back recently used values, might be fun. I'm always having to hit the man pages for less-used programs like ipfwadm.
(3) Choice is good, but sometime is less valuable than standardization. Multiple variants of HTML, to pick a random example, could be annoying.
(4) Yes, I was overstating. But it made a good lead-in to the kinds of changes that occur when you decide to become commercial. I'm concerned that the whole linux community doesn't understand what commercial dominance would mean.
(5) That's exactly the example I had in mind. It distracted the FSF from coding. Same thing happened to GIF's. Remember the sheer miles of verbage that got spewed over that one? I couldn't handle one such 'issue' a month. Besides, big companies are not adverse to pushing a licence agreement to breaking point for their own benefit, since they have laywers specifically for that job. The Sun/MS/Java case in point.
(6) I care if the focus of the community shifts to the point where it destroys the ideal. I like money. I like not having to care about it.
(7) Talk to some behavioral psychologists. You'd be amazed. The easiest way is to create a popular leader. Hoomans are weird.
I can assure you it wasn't me. (I don't even have direct posting rights, let alone deletion abilities.)
If you've still got a copy, feel free to send it to me directly.