but without the ability to buy support for it on that platform, you're not going to get approval to put it on that platform in any sort of business-critical environment.
. . . without the ability to buy support from MySQL for it, that is. Third parties, system integrators, etc. will continue to support whatever their customers pay them for. So while this is a blow for Debian in big enterprise, let's face it, how many big enterprise environments were running straight Debian in the first place? Red Hat's king with SUSE buzzing around their ankles. This won't affect small to mid sized organizations with outside IT people.
So my trojan will be reporting values honored by the DHCP servers. This system is still relying on the information sent by the (possibly infected) machine, so it is not secure in any way.
I think the idea here is to cut off net access for an unpatched machine so it doesn't get infected in the first place. Obviously this is useless against a machine that has already been compromised.
I suppose this means OSS solutions have gained enough traction and have become credible enough that they justify requiring newer hardware to run them, which is good.
Granted. The lowest specs I'd bother installing Win2k on are a 500mhz P3 w/ at least 128mb ram. This is hardly cutting edge. Grandma's 486 DX2-66 running Win95 (oh the pain . ..) is both a.) miraculous its power supply hasn't failed or a cap busted on the mobo and b.) probably much better off running Damn Small Linux anyway.
Increased O2 levels won't be a problem, unless we store the H2 forever. As soon as you burn the H2, you are pulling O2 out of the atmosphere, re-creating H20.
'
Except that when hydrogen gas leaks (and it does, obnoxiously so) the atmosphere can't hold on to it. No reaction is going to use 100% of the hydrogen fed in to it, so over time O2 levels will increase, as many corresponding H2 molecules will have run away into space.
Of course, by the time this causes any problems, it'll be pretty easy to fix--just steal a bit of Hydrogen from Jupiter.
Still, hard drives will have the cheapest $/gig price for a while to come yet. If the 1tb disk in your workstation is only being used for archival purposes, there's no reason it needs to be spinning constantly and can sit there drawing no power with parked heads until the next background archiving/retrieving task (still not as shock resistant as flash, but certainly better than a spinning drive).
I agree with the sentiment here--OSes will never be completely irrelevant. However, the profitability of making them soon will. It's only a matter of time until a Dell or an HP starts selling Linux boxes, fully supported, because they're sick of paying the MS Tax. Once MS is in an environment where it actually has to compete for its OS sales, they'll no longer have the luxury of blowing $7.5 billion over 5 years for their next version. The average consumer doesn't believe in paying for an OS. It came "free" with their computer.
One of the better counter-arguments is that long-run improvements in output depend on the rate of technological progress, and the major open-source works are largely derivative, feeding off of an ecosystem created by the commercial IT industry (including the commercial software industry, eg Apple, AT&T, Microsoft, et al).
That theory perpetuates the strange myth that FLOSS is in some way non-commercial. Lots of people make lots of money off of the likes of Linux and the like, it's just a different business model from selling bits on a disc in a shrink-wrapped box. Commerce and Industry (and a dash of DoD) were the driving forces that created modern IT in the first place.
This is slightly off topic . . . but I just had a diabolical thought . . . If IBM is selling their cell servers like hotcakes, what's to stop clever university researches looking to pinch some pennies from building clusters out of PS3s once they're available in large supply? Considering PS3 is sold at a loss, it'd be such a shame if that happened since those researches probably won't be buying many games or accessories to make up the difference . . .
T-mobile cripples their phones too. On my Nokia, unsigned midlets can't access any network stuff so no e-mail clients and the like. Their "t-zones" service is severely limited, once in a blue moon I can actually get to my gmail account via WAP, but certainly not the Google Maps or Gmail clients Google released as the necessary ports are all blocked (and the above 'unsigned midlet' crap). Nope, I've learned my lesson. All future phones I buy are gonna be unlocked & from a 3rd party.
I'll be more specific. If my account is broken in to and used for money laundering the bank will probably close it and notify me so I can fix it (change acct #s, get my money back, etc.). If they don't notice right away, but I do, I need to report it so I'm not liable. If the scammer uses my bank account for months and months and I don't do anything because I never check the balance or look at my statements . . . well . . . the bank's not going to be very sympathetic.
Acrobat Reader 7 was considerably better than prior versions but is still kindof a beast. If you want a nimble PDF reader and use windows, I'm pretty fond of Foxit.
Why shouldn't the ISPs pick up the ball here? The vast majority of spam comes from zombie boxes and botnets. The owners of the compromised boxes are almost universally unaware, don't know how to fix it, or don't care. An ISP can easily detect a machine sending tons of spam. Disable their account. Make it a law so they can't just get in a tiff and switch providers. Hell, I'd even be all for creating a international blacklist registry of "idiots who get rooted and need to be kept off the Internet."
And before anyone goes "but poor grandma doesn't know what's wrong . . . " Too bad. If a criminal gets ahold of my bank account and starts laundering money, the bank shuts it down. "I didn't know!" and "but banking's so darn complicated!" won't help me even if I can't comprehend a statement or check my account balance from time to time. Ignorance is no defense
5. Perhaps the most important point of all: Bittorrent cannot stream files. The viewer must wait until the file is completely downloaded. With Youtube, they can simply watch their show with no intermediary steps.
Since it's a custom client and they'll likely have at least a few I imagine they can combine direct download with bittorrent--streaming what's actively playing while bittorrent grabs what pieces it can to reduce the load. Once a viewer subscribes to a program, they can deliver video pod-cast style using nothing but bittorrent. They're building the client app, no reason they can't modify the protocol for their purposes.
Sure, at that point you can still do the retarded thing and go "ha ha, so the full install didn't fit and they had to strip it down", but may I point out that the average Linux distro is even bigger than the full XP? SuSE Linux for example (to use an example from everyone's favourite, Novell) comes on a DVD or more than half a dozen CDs. Compressed. So that wouldn't fit there either.
Everyone's already pointed out that SuSE, the entirety of Debian, etc. are only that big because they toss in everything but the kitchen sink. A minimal Debian install takes all of about 10 megs. You can get a feature-rich Debian based distro to fit in about 50 megs.
Not if it's technology to bypass security measures in order to achieve interoperability.
Granted, there's been a few conflicting precedents (DeCSS/libdvdcss) but I think it's well within consumer's rights to watch Tivo-recorded video on whatever OS they darn well please. And on that topic . . . why doesn't Tivo already have a Linux client? It's the native OS on the box itself, after all . . . then again . . . Tivo hasn't shown itself to be particularly supportive of the community that created the base software it depends on. The boxes won't run unsigned code.
That's all, folks. Seriously. Do as much research as you want. Advertisement is what makes the big $$$'s.
But Google's ads do two very important and fairly unique things you won't find (as easily, if at all) in other more traditional forms of advertising:
Exposure to conversion tracking - advertisers can see who liked their ads, what they were searching for when they did, what they looked at on the site, and weather or not they bought anything. Third parties can even set up call tracking.
The system is designed to only show relevant ads to potential customers who are actually looking for the products/services the advertiser provides. Granted, yellow page ads do this too, but printed yellow pages are a bit of a dying medium.
If the IRS really wants to tax these virtual goods, they should explicitly allow for their sale. i.e. have a Blizzard-sanctioned marketplace to trade virtual goods for real money, document the transaction, and send the necessary paperwork (1099, i'd guess). People who earn their own stuff don't have to worry about it, as only the real-currency sale is relevant.
So long as the phone allows over-the-air firmware updates, anything is possible. It wouldn't need to use a java midlet but could run on the phone's native OS. The article also mentions nonstop transmitting as a potential giveaway. Why not have the phone record to local memory (most phones have at least a few megs free, plenty for 15-30mins of phone-quality audio)? It can then store-and-forward on a fixed timeframe to appear less suspecious. (idle GSM phones 'ping' the base station periodically anyway.)
About as safe as Win98 is today. XP will still be the most common desktop OS for years to come. Average users don't upgrade OSes. Heck, they don't even patch them. XP was released in 2001, yet three years later Windows 98 still accounted for more than a quarter of Google page views.
Also, Vista's (theoretically) harder to pirate than XP was and I'd wager that a large part of XPs early adoption was via corp.iso's.
Doubtful. They'd have to be guilty of criminal misconduct. The only thing that comes to mind that'll do that is if the SEC goes after them on suspicion of running a pump-and-dump scheme.
SCO's toast no matter what, but SCO execs are probably safe. It takes a lot to "pierce the corporate veil" and go after execs directly.
That's the thing with these computers..... if it knows there's a missing (round bracket|speech mark|posh bracket), why doesn't it just put the bloody thing in for you and be done complaining? Obviously they're not that smart (you can get a bit of a clue from indentation as to where a posh bracket might be missing from).
Because it's often much more desirable to throw an error than try to plug along and "guess" where the missing syntax piece was supposed to go. Sometimes it's not even missing, but an accidental carriage return got in there and put it on another line. If you're using a long-winded one-liner, (I've been guilty of "rambling" use of pipes and &&s in shell scripts before) the parser will have no way of knowing your intended result. It should complain, not try to figure it out itself and risk getting it completely wrong. (and maybe . . . fail to write files to tape archives, but successfully delete them from disk!)
Hey, if they can manufacture lots and lots of these things (and cheaply) this will make a really big splash. The Peltier Effect is one of the Really Neat Things(tm) in thermodynamics, IMHO. I wonder how well this would work in a solar-power setting. There's one project currently in the works with big reflector dishes aimed at sterling generators. This can allow the same sort of rig, but with entirely solid state equipment.
Building a miniature flying robot with cameras and transmission ability is well within current technology's reach. Stuffing in a battery with enough power to make the thing even vaguely useful is not. So what do they intend to power this with?
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. . . without the ability to buy support from MySQL for it, that is. Third parties, system integrators, etc. will continue to support whatever their customers pay them for. So while this is a blow for Debian in big enterprise, let's face it, how many big enterprise environments were running straight Debian in the first place? Red Hat's king with SUSE buzzing around their ankles. This won't affect small to mid sized organizations with outside IT people.
I think the idea here is to cut off net access for an unpatched machine so it doesn't get infected in the first place. Obviously this is useless against a machine that has already been compromised.
Granted. The lowest specs I'd bother installing Win2k on are a 500mhz P3 w/ at least 128mb ram. This is hardly cutting edge. Grandma's 486 DX2-66 running Win95 (oh the pain . . .) is both a.) miraculous its power supply hasn't failed or a cap busted on the mobo and b.) probably much better off running Damn Small Linux anyway.
Except that when hydrogen gas leaks (and it does, obnoxiously so) the atmosphere can't hold on to it. No reaction is going to use 100% of the hydrogen fed in to it, so over time O2 levels will increase, as many corresponding H2 molecules will have run away into space.
Of course, by the time this causes any problems, it'll be pretty easy to fix--just steal a bit of Hydrogen from Jupiter.
Still, hard drives will have the cheapest $/gig price for a while to come yet. If the 1tb disk in your workstation is only being used for archival purposes, there's no reason it needs to be spinning constantly and can sit there drawing no power with parked heads until the next background archiving/retrieving task (still not as shock resistant as flash, but certainly better than a spinning drive).
I agree with the sentiment here--OSes will never be completely irrelevant. However, the profitability of making them soon will. It's only a matter of time until a Dell or an HP starts selling Linux boxes, fully supported, because they're sick of paying the MS Tax. Once MS is in an environment where it actually has to compete for its OS sales, they'll no longer have the luxury of blowing $7.5 billion over 5 years for their next version. The average consumer doesn't believe in paying for an OS. It came "free" with their computer.
That theory perpetuates the strange myth that FLOSS is in some way non-commercial. Lots of people make lots of money off of the likes of Linux and the like, it's just a different business model from selling bits on a disc in a shrink-wrapped box. Commerce and Industry (and a dash of DoD) were the driving forces that created modern IT in the first place.
This is slightly off topic . . . but I just had a diabolical thought . . . If IBM is selling their cell servers like hotcakes, what's to stop clever university researches looking to pinch some pennies from building clusters out of PS3s once they're available in large supply? Considering PS3 is sold at a loss, it'd be such a shame if that happened since those researches probably won't be buying many games or accessories to make up the difference . . .
T-mobile cripples their phones too. On my Nokia, unsigned midlets can't access any network stuff so no e-mail clients and the like. Their "t-zones" service is severely limited, once in a blue moon I can actually get to my gmail account via WAP, but certainly not the Google Maps or Gmail clients Google released as the necessary ports are all blocked (and the above 'unsigned midlet' crap). Nope, I've learned my lesson. All future phones I buy are gonna be unlocked & from a 3rd party.
I'll be more specific. If my account is broken in to and used for money laundering the bank will probably close it and notify me so I can fix it (change acct #s, get my money back, etc.). If they don't notice right away, but I do, I need to report it so I'm not liable. If the scammer uses my bank account for months and months and I don't do anything because I never check the balance or look at my statements . . . well . . . the bank's not going to be very sympathetic.
Acrobat Reader 7 was considerably better than prior versions but is still kindof a beast. If you want a nimble PDF reader and use windows, I'm pretty fond of Foxit.
Why shouldn't the ISPs pick up the ball here? The vast majority of spam comes from zombie boxes and botnets. The owners of the compromised boxes are almost universally unaware, don't know how to fix it, or don't care. An ISP can easily detect a machine sending tons of spam. Disable their account. Make it a law so they can't just get in a tiff and switch providers. Hell, I'd even be all for creating a international blacklist registry of "idiots who get rooted and need to be kept off the Internet."
And before anyone goes "but poor grandma doesn't know what's wrong . . . " Too bad. If a criminal gets ahold of my bank account and starts laundering money, the bank shuts it down. "I didn't know!" and "but banking's so darn complicated!" won't help me even if I can't comprehend a statement or check my account balance from time to time. Ignorance is no defense
Since it's a custom client and they'll likely have at least a few I imagine they can combine direct download with bittorrent--streaming what's actively playing while bittorrent grabs what pieces it can to reduce the load. Once a viewer subscribes to a program, they can deliver video pod-cast style using nothing but bittorrent. They're building the client app, no reason they can't modify the protocol for their purposes.
Everyone's already pointed out that SuSE, the entirety of Debian, etc. are only that big because they toss in everything but the kitchen sink. A minimal Debian install takes all of about 10 megs. You can get a feature-rich Debian based distro to fit in about 50 megs.
Not if it's technology to bypass security measures in order to achieve interoperability.
Granted, there's been a few conflicting precedents (DeCSS/libdvdcss) but I think it's well within consumer's rights to watch Tivo-recorded video on whatever OS they darn well please. And on that topic . . . why doesn't Tivo already have a Linux client? It's the native OS on the box itself, after all . . . then again . . . Tivo hasn't shown itself to be particularly supportive of the community that created the base software it depends on. The boxes won't run unsigned code.
But Google's ads do two very important and fairly unique things you won't find (as easily, if at all) in other more traditional forms of advertising:
Exposure to conversion tracking - advertisers can see who liked their ads, what they were searching for when they did, what they looked at on the site, and weather or not they bought anything. Third parties can even set up call tracking.
The system is designed to only show relevant ads to potential customers who are actually looking for the products/services the advertiser provides. Granted, yellow page ads do this too, but printed yellow pages are a bit of a dying medium.
If the IRS really wants to tax these virtual goods, they should explicitly allow for their sale. i.e. have a Blizzard-sanctioned marketplace to trade virtual goods for real money, document the transaction, and send the necessary paperwork (1099, i'd guess). People who earn their own stuff don't have to worry about it, as only the real-currency sale is relevant.
So long as the phone allows over-the-air firmware updates, anything is possible. It wouldn't need to use a java midlet but could run on the phone's native OS. The article also mentions nonstop transmitting as a potential giveaway. Why not have the phone record to local memory (most phones have at least a few megs free, plenty for 15-30mins of phone-quality audio)? It can then store-and-forward on a fixed timeframe to appear less suspecious. (idle GSM phones 'ping' the base station periodically anyway.)
About as safe as Win98 is today. XP will still be the most common desktop OS for years to come. Average users don't upgrade OSes. Heck, they don't even patch them. XP was released in 2001, yet three years later Windows 98 still accounted for more than a quarter of Google page views.
Also, Vista's (theoretically) harder to pirate than XP was and I'd wager that a large part of XPs early adoption was via corp .iso's.
Doubtful. They'd have to be guilty of criminal misconduct. The only thing that comes to mind that'll do that is if the SEC goes after them on suspicion of running a pump-and-dump scheme.
SCO's toast no matter what, but SCO execs are probably safe. It takes a lot to "pierce the corporate veil" and go after execs directly.
Because it's often much more desirable to throw an error than try to plug along and "guess" where the missing syntax piece was supposed to go. Sometimes it's not even missing, but an accidental carriage return got in there and put it on another line. If you're using a long-winded one-liner, (I've been guilty of "rambling" use of pipes and &&s in shell scripts before) the parser will have no way of knowing your intended result. It should complain, not try to figure it out itself and risk getting it completely wrong. (and maybe . . . fail to write files to tape archives, but successfully delete them from disk!)
Hey, if they can manufacture lots and lots of these things (and cheaply) this will make a really big splash. The Peltier Effect is one of the Really Neat Things(tm) in thermodynamics, IMHO. I wonder how well this would work in a solar-power setting. There's one project currently in the works with big reflector dishes aimed at sterling generators. This can allow the same sort of rig, but with entirely solid state equipment.
Why in the world do they need 7.5Gb/sec video streaming? Are they ramping up for a hi-def knockoff of Burger King's silly idea?
I've had Corporate "deactivate" when enough hardware was changed as well.
Building a miniature flying robot with cameras and transmission ability is well within current technology's reach. Stuffing in a battery with enough power to make the thing even vaguely useful is not. So what do they intend to power this with?