The issue is I have, at last count, 13 systems with separate passwords. There's a network account, elevated privileges account for server admin, HR systems, online learning systems, expenses system, which is not the same as the travel booking system, etc.
With the company's computer, I can't just install any software I want, so one of the password tracking programs is not an option. So I use the same password for all 13 systems.
So the next issue, not all those systems have the same password requirements. There is one system which does not allow the use of special characters. So while my password always has lower case, upper case, and numeric, I'm always going to be in that 99% with no non-alphanumeric characters. Oh, and I think the max characters limit is around 12.
Of course, writing down passwords is such a bad practice. But there's no way I can afford to burn the cycles to memorize 13 new passwords every 90 days, so I use the same password for all work systems. The same bad password.
after all it would no sillier than allowing someone to use my online service. If the provider cannot lock out multiple simultaneous use then that is their problem.
Just to play evil-corporate-overlord's advocate for a minute, it's not quite the same.
If you loan out a physical book (or other print media), you no longer have it. The published or author has been paid for a single copy, and a single copy is in use.
But for an online service, you could have multiple people concurrently using the single-user service. (I don't know if this is possible with Netflix, or if their system prevents a single account from logging in from multiple locations.)
Back to reality, how long until Netflix changes based on family size/eyeballs? Watching alone in your basement? $8/month. Want to watch with your Canadian girlfriend? $15/month. Family plan? $20/month.
Without RTFA, I guess there isn't much here in terms of humor or science. I mean talk of an experiment with "protocol, parameters, a timeline, and..a deliverable," but no control?
An Excel class was a requirement for CS where I went... It was extremely hard core, not noob how to add a column of numbers, but absolutely crazy excursions into the strangest depths. Stuff so useless all I can remember is the names, like pivot tables and such.
I don't which is more puzzling--that you think pivot tables are useless or that you think they are "crazy excursions into the strangest depths."
If you've got a computer at home, and your kid can't use a word processor by high school, then something is wrong. Even more so, I think something is very wrong when we need courses to teach people to word process or use a spreadsheet. If you need a course to teach something, you must not want to do it very much.
WTF? This should be modded 'Flamebait' not +5 Insightful.
Word processors and spreadsheets can be used to create very complex documents. If your course is teaching how make a bulleted list, yes that is something a high school student should be able to figure out.
But what about a multi-part form with sections are hidden/visible based on drop down and radio button selections in the form? And with a button to post the completed form to a web service?
For all the talk about geeks and nerds here, I get the feeling for many on/. their knowledge is very shallow. If you are using a word processor as a text editor, sure, you'd never need a class for that. If you are using it as an application platform, which it has the capability to be, you might want a class or book or some reference.
If you need a course to teach something, you must not want to do it very much.
So you're expecting people to reinvent calculus, rediscover quantum physics, etc. Basically, universities shouldn't exist in your world. If someone wants to learn something, the last thing they should do is take a course.
> And shame on us for trying to rationalize a double standard.
there's nothing inherently wrong with double standards as long as you don't exclude inseparable externalities. (in which case there never really was a true double standard in the first place)
when people throw shoes at Pres. Bush, it's funny.
when people throw shoes at Stephen Hawking it's not.
I'd have to see someone throw a shoe at Stephen Hawking to be sure.
(And Google does plenty of evil stuff. I'm pretty everyone considers that "Don't be evil" mantra a joke at this point.)
Perhaps I'm missing something, but isn't this like knowing/agreeing to having your phone number in the phone book, and then finding out the phone book is indexed so people can easily find your phone number?
If you don't want your phone number easily accessible, don't put it in the phone book. If you don't want your personal details easily searchable through Google, don't create a public Google profile.
Given that I'd never heard of Google Profiles before this story, I'm guessing the odds are about 100% this story is either a plant by a Google competitor to scare us with the boogy man of privacy, or a plant by Google itself to raise the profile of Profiles.
And now that I have heard of Google Profiles, duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh! First thing on profiles.google.com:
Decide what the world sees when it searches for you. Create a public profile to display the information you care about and make it easy for visitors to get to know you.
How can it be news and/or evil that this information is publicly available, when the main selling point is that this information will be publicly available?
So the Pyramids at Gaza weren't a wonder the day after they where built?
Time has little to do with it. Wikipedia had changed the world, more so then the giant pointy tombs.
How many of each animal did Moses take on the ark?
But seriously, has wikipedia really "transformed the lives of hundreds of thousands of people?" Yeah, I have some place to check when I want to know when "Whomp! There it is!" was released, but I wouldn't say it's transformed my life.
I'm guessing Google picked up on how several of my family members (and many, many other computer users I'm afraid) actually enter URLs: 1. Click browser home button, arrive at google.com 2. Type URL in search box, then click first link (for advanced users: click "I'm feeling lucky") No matter how I try to explain how backwards this is, they keep doing it. Take away the search bar and I can't even argue the sane alternative.
More hits for google.com - more data, ads and more money for them. Only makes sense, really.
You know what this seemingly clumsy approach prevents? The dreaded 404.
And that is just one more reason why it is a bad idea. Why is a 404 dreaded? If a site is down or returning an error code, the user should see that.
I have to deal with this in my employer's IS department. The standard browser is IE and errors redirect the bing. That makes my job a lot harder. If my server isn't responding, I don't need to be directed to a search engine.
Yes, I know I'm not an average user. But what's wrong with even the average user seeing an error message?
It's like replacing the check engine light, temperature gauge, etc. on your car's dashboard with a bike that pops out from the car's boot when it won't start. Yes, sometimes a bike will do in place of a car that won't start. But many times, it won't. And even if the average user can't interpret all the car's gauges, at least they get some feedback more than 'car won't start' and what's wrong with users learning something?
You've taken a system that always gives you some information, and replaced it with a system that sometimes does exactly what is needed, but other times gives you nothing.
When ISPs do this, the general consensus is against it. Why is it different when done in the browser?
Call me old fashioned, but when I need to search, I go to google.com. If I want to go to a URL (and don't have a bookmark/favorite), I type in that URL.
If we do away with the address bar, how do I differentiate going to a URL and searching for a URL (to see what other sites mention that URL)?
I write to you on behalf of Apple Inc. ("Apple") regarding your recent notice letters to application developers ("App Makers") alleging infringement of certain patents through the App Makers' use of Apple products and services for the marketing, sale, and delivery of applications (or "Apps"). Apple is undisputedly licensed to these patents and the Apple App Makers are protected by that license. There is no basis for Lodsys' infringement allegations against Apple's App Makers. Apple intends to share this letter and the information set out herein with its App Makers and is fully prepared to defend Apple's license rights.
Don't think I agree. I think it's because they want to charge people more for matte. I think Apple asks $50 to have a matte screen instead of glossy. I want matte, but I don't want to pay $50.
Do you really want matte? Have you thought this out?
Let's say this for a business use as a monitor or computer you'll use 5 days/week for 44 weeks/yr. And you upgrade to all new hardware every 2 years.
Then $50 is less than 11.5 cents per day. Just saying.
In generally, I'd chalk it up to 2 factors. 1--People lie. Not to pick on the poster I'm replying to, but they say they want matte screens, then they buy glossy even when matte alternatives are available. Who's fault is that?
2--how many folks really know enough to ask if a screen is matte or glossy and know what to do with an answer?
[quote]It is well worth carrying a small laptop instead of a pocket calculator for all the added power you get, unless you're doing simple arithmetic.[/quote] No, it isn't. Unless your level of geekdom is over 9000, that is.
Absolutely. If I go down to the supermarket I might have to compare unit prices, total cash etc - so a small calculator in my pocket is a good idea. I am unlikely to come across anything needing a laptop's power or find it worth carrying one. At geek levels of 8500 or more you may well not be able to resist trying to optimise the queuing at checkouts or simulate the airflow for optimum placement of air-conditioning outlets, freezers and doorways.
For that simple arithmetic use the calc on your mobile phone - you're not going to want to carry a TI or HP calc around just to add grocery bills.
What about the calculator in your head? Someone talking about 'geek level' shouldn't need a calculator for simple arithmetic.
I'd say the differences are interesting--to see one system develop to be led by engineers and another develop to be led by lawyers--but I don't think you can draw any conclusions about one system or society being better than the other. Not from just those facts.
Engineers are not super-human. They don't posses Sherlock Holmes-like powers of deduction or C3PO powers of odds calculation.
Yes, they supposedly can work through problems in a logical manner based on available information. But they're no better than anyone else in determining when the available information is the necessary information. There's no reason to think in a political context engineers are more effective than lawyers in prioritizing concerns.
So this is an interesting fact to note. Nothing more.
when wifey hints that my LPs are taking up too much space, or that there's cables everywhere, i simply say "i'll clean up the cables when i'm done with them, but the LPs are fucking staying".
if you can't assert yourself to someone who is supposedly your equal (ie other half), then it's just not going to work.
Story of my life. I compromised by taking all the cases/cables/parts I don't use at least weekly, and moving them to the basement. Anything I knew wasn't functional, couldn't identify, or had more than triplicate left the house. (How many IDE cables do I need?) Everything else went in a labeled cardboard box on a shelf. I also got rid of driver disks and manuals for any hardware I no longer own.
And she surprised me with a Victrola she had refinished herself. (Which explains all the time she had been spending at her folks.) I think I got the better end of that deal. Plus, with all the computer stuff down in the basement, there's more shelf space for 78s.:)
What's wrong with being held accountable for your actions?
Because the accountants, CEOs, sales people and everyone else in the office aren't held criminally liable for acting in good faith (even if they were wrong). It's only system admins that are held criminally liable for acting in good faith when they are wrong.
Really? So you think this guy acted in good faith?
Tch, they're not really planets, right? I mean, if they're not orbiting a star, then they can't have "cleared the neighborhood of their orbit". Yet one more reason the IAU's current definition is so idiotic. (Besides the fact that it suggests that Mercury is more like Jupiter than it is like Ceres.)
My first thought was also, these are not planets. But I don't know if that's an issue with the IAU definition.
First, obviously not a planet--doesn't orbit a star. But I'd say that's a feature, not a bug, of the definition.
Status as a 'Planet' tells you not only something of the objects origins but also it's current state. These objects share the origins of planets, but have a different current state. We just need a different term to capture that distinction.
I can imagine the arguments in your house if you inflate shit like this.
So, I'll bite. How is being ordered to the point of violence to work for free after you have been fired equivalent to bank robbers or pedos?
It's the fox guarding the hen house. It's not that having him do networking support for free is like robbing a bank. It's that having this criminal do networking for free is like letting/making a bank robber work at a bank.
And we don't need to "unleash the evil" of smallpox. There's a good chance that, somewhere out in a jungle somewhere, is an animal carrying a variant of the smallpox virus (like cowpox) that will have a sudden mutation that allows it to pass to humans. If we don't keep these viruses so we can study them, then when that pandemic hits, you can add a x20 multiplier to the number of people who will die before a vaccine or cure can be developed.
QFT.
And where does anyone get the idea that smallpox released would lead to some worldwide extinction-type event?
We've faced smallpox before, before we had vaccines. Yes, it killed many people. No, it did not kill all or even most people.
Slashdot Mirror
I can see it know...
"You know what this colonial-era interrogation needs? More cow bell!"
Oh great. All my accounts have been compromised AND I have to skip lunch for a couple weeks. ;)
Except I can't install any software I want on the company's computer. You know, for security!
The issue is I have, at last count, 13 systems with separate passwords. There's a network account, elevated privileges account for server admin, HR systems, online learning systems, expenses system, which is not the same as the travel booking system, etc.
With the company's computer, I can't just install any software I want, so one of the password tracking programs is not an option. So I use the same password for all 13 systems.
So the next issue, not all those systems have the same password requirements. There is one system which does not allow the use of special characters. So while my password always has lower case, upper case, and numeric, I'm always going to be in that 99% with no non-alphanumeric characters. Oh, and I think the max characters limit is around 12.
Of course, writing down passwords is such a bad practice. But there's no way I can afford to burn the cycles to memorize 13 new passwords every 90 days, so I use the same password for all work systems. The same bad password.
after all it would no sillier than allowing someone to use my online service. If the provider cannot lock out multiple simultaneous use then that is their problem.
Just to play evil-corporate-overlord's advocate for a minute, it's not quite the same.
If you loan out a physical book (or other print media), you no longer have it. The published or author has been paid for a single copy, and a single copy is in use.
But for an online service, you could have multiple people concurrently using the single-user service. (I don't know if this is possible with Netflix, or if their system prevents a single account from logging in from multiple locations.)
Back to reality, how long until Netflix changes based on family size/eyeballs? Watching alone in your basement? $8/month. Want to watch with your Canadian girlfriend? $15/month. Family plan? $20/month.
Aren't there people out there reading books out loud they could be going after?
Without RTFA, I guess there isn't much here in terms of humor or science. I mean talk of an experiment with "protocol, parameters, a timeline, and..a deliverable," but no control?
Weak sauce.
http://blog.mylookout.com/2011/03/security-alert-malware-found-in-official-android-market-droiddream/
http://blog.mylookout.com/2011/05/security-alert-droiddreamlight-new-malware-from-the-developers-of-droiddream/
An Excel class was a requirement for CS where I went... It was extremely hard core, not noob how to add a column of numbers, but absolutely crazy excursions into the strangest depths. Stuff so useless all I can remember is the names, like pivot tables and such.
I don't which is more puzzling--that you think pivot tables are useless or that you think they are "crazy excursions into the strangest depths."
If you've got a computer at home, and your kid can't use a word processor by high school, then something is wrong. Even more so, I think something is very wrong when we need courses to teach people to word process or use a spreadsheet. If you need a course to teach something, you must not want to do it very much.
WTF? This should be modded 'Flamebait' not +5 Insightful.
Word processors and spreadsheets can be used to create very complex documents. If your course is teaching how make a bulleted list, yes that is something a high school student should be able to figure out.
But what about a multi-part form with sections are hidden/visible based on drop down and radio button selections in the form? And with a button to post the completed form to a web service?
For all the talk about geeks and nerds here, I get the feeling for many on /. their knowledge is very shallow. If you are using a word processor as a text editor, sure, you'd never need a class for that. If you are using it as an application platform, which it has the capability to be, you might want a class or book or some reference.
If you need a course to teach something, you must not want to do it very much.
So you're expecting people to reinvent calculus, rediscover quantum physics, etc. Basically, universities shouldn't exist in your world. If someone wants to learn something, the last thing they should do is take a course.
> And shame on us for trying to rationalize a double standard.
there's nothing inherently wrong with double standards as long as you don't exclude inseparable externalities. (in which case there never really was a true double standard in the first place)
when people throw shoes at Pres. Bush, it's funny.
when people throw shoes at Stephen Hawking it's not.
I'd have to see someone throw a shoe at Stephen Hawking to be sure.
It might be funny.
How is this evil?
(And Google does plenty of evil stuff. I'm pretty everyone considers that "Don't be evil" mantra a joke at this point.)
Perhaps I'm missing something, but isn't this like knowing/agreeing to having your phone number in the phone book, and then finding out the phone book is indexed so people can easily find your phone number?
If you don't want your phone number easily accessible, don't put it in the phone book. If you don't want your personal details easily searchable through Google, don't create a public Google profile.
Given that I'd never heard of Google Profiles before this story, I'm guessing the odds are about 100% this story is either a plant by a Google competitor to scare us with the boogy man of privacy, or a plant by Google itself to raise the profile of Profiles.
And now that I have heard of Google Profiles, duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh! First thing on profiles.google.com:
Decide what the world sees when it searches for you.
Create a public profile to display the information you care about and make it easy for visitors to get to know you.
How can it be news and/or evil that this information is publicly available, when the main selling point is that this information will be publicly available?
TFA is about (old) people complaining about THEIR PERSONNAL prefered (10 years ago) feature being abandonned for lack of actual or widespread usage.
Worse than that, TFA is about old people just complaining. Most of those so-called lost features aren't lost at all.
So the Pyramids at Gaza weren't a wonder the day after they where built?
Time has little to do with it. Wikipedia had changed the world, more so then the giant pointy tombs.
How many of each animal did Moses take on the ark?
But seriously, has wikipedia really "transformed the lives of hundreds of thousands of people?" Yeah, I have some place to check when I want to know when "Whomp! There it is!" was released, but I wouldn't say it's transformed my life.
I'm guessing Google picked up on how several of my family members (and many, many other computer users I'm afraid) actually enter URLs:
1. Click browser home button, arrive at google.com
2. Type URL in search box, then click first link (for advanced users: click "I'm feeling lucky")
No matter how I try to explain how backwards this is, they keep doing it. Take away the search bar and I can't even argue the sane alternative.
More hits for google.com - more data, ads and more money for them. Only makes sense, really.
You know what this seemingly clumsy approach prevents? The dreaded 404.
And that is just one more reason why it is a bad idea. Why is a 404 dreaded? If a site is down or returning an error code, the user should see that.
I have to deal with this in my employer's IS department. The standard browser is IE and errors redirect the bing. That makes my job a lot harder. If my server isn't responding, I don't need to be directed to a search engine.
Yes, I know I'm not an average user. But what's wrong with even the average user seeing an error message?
It's like replacing the check engine light, temperature gauge, etc. on your car's dashboard with a bike that pops out from the car's boot when it won't start. Yes, sometimes a bike will do in place of a car that won't start. But many times, it won't. And even if the average user can't interpret all the car's gauges, at least they get some feedback more than 'car won't start' and what's wrong with users learning something?
You've taken a system that always gives you some information, and replaced it with a system that sometimes does exactly what is needed, but other times gives you nothing.
When ISPs do this, the general consensus is against it. Why is it different when done in the browser?
Call me old fashioned, but when I need to search, I go to google.com. If I want to go to a URL (and don't have a bookmark/favorite), I type in that URL.
If we do away with the address bar, how do I differentiate going to a URL and searching for a URL (to see what other sites mention that URL)?
Full text of Apple's letter to Lodsys:
BY EMAIL AND FIRST-CLASS MAIL
May 23, 2011
Mark Small
Chief Executive Officer
Lodsys, LLC
[Address information removed]
Dear Mr. Small:
I write to you on behalf of Apple Inc. ("Apple") regarding your recent notice letters to application developers ("App Makers") alleging infringement of certain patents through the App Makers' use of Apple products and services for the marketing, sale, and delivery of applications (or "Apps"). Apple is undisputedly licensed to these patents and the Apple App Makers are protected by that license. There is no basis for Lodsys' infringement allegations against Apple's App Makers. Apple intends to share this letter and the information set out herein with its App Makers and is fully prepared to defend Apple's license rights.
[snip]
Very truly yours,
Epstein's Mother
Don't think I agree. I think it's because they want to charge people more for matte. I think Apple asks $50 to have a matte screen instead of glossy. I want matte, but I don't want to pay $50.
Do you really want matte? Have you thought this out?
Let's say this for a business use as a monitor or computer you'll use 5 days/week for 44 weeks/yr. And you upgrade to all new hardware every 2 years.
Then $50 is less than 11.5 cents per day. Just saying.
In generally, I'd chalk it up to 2 factors. 1--People lie. Not to pick on the poster I'm replying to, but they say they want matte screens, then they buy glossy even when matte alternatives are available. Who's fault is that?
2--how many folks really know enough to ask if a screen is matte or glossy and know what to do with an answer?
[quote]It is well worth carrying a small laptop instead of a pocket calculator for all the added power you get, unless you're doing simple arithmetic.[/quote]
No, it isn't. Unless your level of geekdom is over 9000, that is.
Absolutely. If I go down to the supermarket I might have to compare unit prices, total cash etc - so a small calculator in my pocket is a good idea. I am unlikely to come across anything needing a laptop's power or find it worth carrying one. At geek levels of 8500 or more you may well not be able to resist trying to optimise the queuing at checkouts or simulate the airflow for optimum placement of air-conditioning outlets, freezers and doorways.
For that simple arithmetic use the calc on your mobile phone - you're not going to want to carry a TI or HP calc around just to add grocery bills.
What about the calculator in your head? Someone talking about 'geek level' shouldn't need a calculator for simple arithmetic.
He was the only one who had access. Single point of failure. Bad management. He didn't protect the network from himself.
Q.E.D.
Aren't most suicide bombers engineers?
I'd say the differences are interesting--to see one system develop to be led by engineers and another develop to be led by lawyers--but I don't think you can draw any conclusions about one system or society being better than the other. Not from just those facts.
Engineers are not super-human. They don't posses Sherlock Holmes-like powers of deduction or C3PO powers of odds calculation.
Yes, they supposedly can work through problems in a logical manner based on available information. But they're no better than anyone else in determining when the available information is the necessary information. There's no reason to think in a political context engineers are more effective than lawyers in prioritizing concerns.
So this is an interesting fact to note. Nothing more.
when wifey hints that my LPs are taking up too much space, or that there's cables everywhere, i simply say "i'll clean up the cables when i'm done with them, but the LPs are fucking staying".
if you can't assert yourself to someone who is supposedly your equal (ie other half), then it's just not going to work.
Story of my life. I compromised by taking all the cases/cables/parts I don't use at least weekly, and moving them to the basement. Anything I knew wasn't functional, couldn't identify, or had more than triplicate left the house. (How many IDE cables do I need?) Everything else went in a labeled cardboard box on a shelf. I also got rid of driver disks and manuals for any hardware I no longer own.
And she surprised me with a Victrola she had refinished herself. (Which explains all the time she had been spending at her folks.) I think I got the better end of that deal. Plus, with all the computer stuff down in the basement, there's more shelf space for 78s. :)
What's wrong with being held accountable for your actions?
Because the accountants, CEOs, sales people and everyone else in the office aren't held criminally liable for acting in good faith (even if they were wrong). It's only system admins that are held criminally liable for acting in good faith when they are wrong.
Really? So you think this guy acted in good faith?
Tch, they're not really planets, right? I mean, if they're not orbiting a star, then they can't have "cleared the neighborhood of their orbit". Yet one more reason the IAU's current definition is so idiotic. (Besides the fact that it suggests that Mercury is more like Jupiter than it is like Ceres.)
My first thought was also, these are not planets. But I don't know if that's an issue with the IAU definition.
First, obviously not a planet--doesn't orbit a star. But I'd say that's a feature, not a bug, of the definition.
Status as a 'Planet' tells you not only something of the objects origins but also it's current state. These objects share the origins of planets, but have a different current state. We just need a different term to capture that distinction.
I suggest, 'objects formerly known as planets'.
I can imagine the arguments in your house if you inflate shit like this.
So, I'll bite. How is being ordered to the point of violence to work for free after you have been fired equivalent to bank robbers or pedos?
It's the fox guarding the hen house. It's not that having him do networking support for free is like robbing a bank. It's that having this criminal do networking for free is like letting/making a bank robber work at a bank.
And we don't need to "unleash the evil" of smallpox. There's a good chance that, somewhere out in a jungle somewhere, is an animal carrying a variant of the smallpox virus (like cowpox) that will have a sudden mutation that allows it to pass to humans. If we don't keep these viruses so we can study them, then when that pandemic hits, you can add a x20 multiplier to the number of people who will die before a vaccine or cure can be developed.
QFT.
And where does anyone get the idea that smallpox released would lead to some worldwide extinction-type event?
We've faced smallpox before, before we had vaccines. Yes, it killed many people. No, it did not kill all or even most people.