Thanks. You make a good point about the signed/unsigned code.
I'm not quite conviced that there would be no mechanism for loading a memory-resident piece of code, or perhaps a way of patching the code as it is loaded into memory for instance. After all, if you've managed to replace the dashboard with one of your own creation I'd have thought that you could then get control of the loading process (or is that handled entirely by the bios as well?). Anyway - as you rightly point out - it doesn't make much difference if you can't run unsigned code.
Mod chips allow people to alter the contents of the XBox Live harddrive. This means that they could load the hack onto the harddrive, turn off the modchip & reset, log onto XBox Live and cheat. Granted, they'd have to hack the XBox desktop or whatever it's called so that the cheat was memory resident before they loaded the game, which would be difficult, but certainly not impossible.
Most helicopters can disconnect a stopped engine from the blades, allowing them to keep spinning. The pilot then allows the vehicle to fall/glide down until he is quite close to the ground. Then by suddenly increasing the collective pitch he is able to convert the stored rotational energy of the rotors into lift, slowing the vehicle dramatically and achieving (hopefully) a soft landing.
Just imagine! When you're playing a game on XBox Live, they're checking the internal state of your Xbox to see if you've just pressed one of the trigger buttons! Bastards!
All these people ranting about "It's your own fault - using sofware you know is defective..." - I'm sorry, but I don't know of any software that I know to have no defects.
At least IE gets regular fixes through auto-update. Mozilla et al don't tend to do that and also don't tend to *work* as well as IE for most browsing needs. It it's a choice between two bits of software, neither of which I know to be secure, I might as well choose the one which does most other things better.
She owes you a favour. You got them out of the shit big time - however, from the way you've described the incident your ex-boss is now of the impression that she can browbeat you into doing free work for them anytime she pleases. If this happens again, explain that you were willing to once out of the goodness of your heart but now they're going to have to pay you consultancy rates. Your ex-boss may well become hostile at this point, but it's important that you don't cave in. If they are desperate, they'll still hire you, and if they aren't then what the hell are they doing trying to get you to do free work for them anyway?
Oh, and I suggest you try and make the most of your owed favour.
I've recently moved over to largely using Linux at work, and it is rather fustrating the way that the Linux Desktop is fragmented. The thing is, I imagine that many people use a mix of KDE and Gnome apps. I find it irritating that I have to set up file associations twice and things like that. I wish it could just be unified like Windows. And don't get me started on applications that are still using Motif...
But the problem with these forwarded-around things is that once they get into the hands of a spammer, they're a big juicy list of valid emails - and your email address will be on there and there's nothing you can do about it.
Personally I find the mix of mouse and keys works well. I don't find the moving from mouse to keyboard and back again a problem most of the time - I'm a programmer, not a typist. I spend a lot of the time with my fingers off the keyboard anyway. I'm absolutely sure that debugging would be considerably slower without the GUI.
I would spend the time to learn Emacs if I felt that it was considerably superior than the current alternatives, but I don't see why it would be, and otherwise I'm not going to learn a whole new user interface just to use an editor.
Have you actually ever had to use MSVC? I've not used the.Net version yet, but VC6 is great. It's not got a perfect UI, but it's a better C++ dev environment that anything else I've used. I've just moved over to working on Linux at work, and let me tell you, it's been painful. KDevelop is coming along nicely, but it's still nowhere near VC6.
I'd like to know what exactly it is in VC6 which is 'cruft'. Sure, notepad is a lot smaller, but it lacks a compiler, a debugger, project management, undo past save, syntax highlighting, autoindenting, code completion, a comprehensive help system etc... MSVC is much bigger, but then it's much more useful.
The copy protection on B&W caused quite a lot of problems. Try applying a no-CD crack. When I bought B&W it wouldn't run on my W2K system at work (I worked at a games company at the time) without applying a no-cd crack.
I can't remember the last time I ever had dll problems. It was probably back with Windows 95 or something. W2K and XP have dll version management built in. I hear people on/. talk about DLL Hell, but I mainly get the impression that they haven't used Windows since 3.11 or something...
Compare that to the pain you often have to go through to install an RPM on Linux...
It's the same in the UK, but I'm always a little unsure about giving some guy I've never met my bank account number... You should only be able to pay stuff in with it, but even so it makes me nervous...
Nobody is going to switch until Linux is better - specifically more useable for the Desktop user. And at the moment it's not. It's also going to have to be quite a bit better, otherwise people won't view it as being worth the hassle to switch.
No, we still have trial by jury and we still currently have double-jeopardy protection. Blunkett seems to shove lots of extreme bills at parliment in the hope of getting some of the measures through in a toned down form...
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Thanks. You make a good point about the signed/unsigned code.
I'm not quite conviced that there would be no mechanism for loading a memory-resident piece of code, or perhaps a way of patching the code as it is loaded into memory for instance. After all, if you've managed to replace the dashboard with one of your own creation I'd have thought that you could then get control of the loading process (or is that handled entirely by the bios as well?). Anyway - as you rightly point out - it doesn't make much difference if you can't run unsigned code.
cheers,
Tim
How is this free speech?
/. article, but if the US had data protection laws like the EU...
Free license to make a buck, more like...
I know this comes up after every goddamn
Mod chips allow people to alter the contents of the XBox Live harddrive. This means that they could load the hack onto the harddrive, turn off the modchip & reset, log onto XBox Live and cheat. Granted, they'd have to hack the XBox desktop or whatever it's called so that the cheat was memory resident before they loaded the game, which would be difficult, but certainly not impossible.
Most helicopters can disconnect a stopped engine from the blades, allowing them to keep spinning. The pilot then allows the vehicle to fall/glide down until he is quite close to the ground. Then by suddenly increasing the collective pitch he is able to convert the stored rotational energy of the rotors into lift, slowing the vehicle dramatically and achieving (hopefully) a soft landing.
Just imagine! When you're playing a game on XBox Live, they're checking the internal state of your Xbox to see if you've just pressed one of the trigger buttons! Bastards!
Damn them! DAMN THEM ALL!!111!
Since when have Mozilla and pals been perfect?
All these people ranting about "It's your own fault - using sofware you know is defective..." - I'm sorry, but I don't know of any software that I know to have no defects.
At least IE gets regular fixes through auto-update. Mozilla et al don't tend to do that and also don't tend to *work* as well as IE for most browsing needs. It it's a choice between two bits of software, neither of which I know to be secure, I might as well choose the one which does most other things better.
There was a thick layer of fog last night. I'm most irritated.
This is a fucking tech site. What the hell do you expect?
Jeez - better not talk about new technology or the whining poverty-stricken anonymous cowards might start crying again, fer feck's sake.
She owes you a favour. You got them out of the shit big time - however, from the way you've described the incident your ex-boss is now of the impression that she can browbeat you into doing free work for them anytime she pleases. If this happens again, explain that you were willing to once out of the goodness of your heart but now they're going to have to pay you consultancy rates. Your ex-boss may well become hostile at this point, but it's important that you don't cave in. If they are desperate, they'll still hire you, and if they aren't then what the hell are they doing trying to get you to do free work for them anyway?
Oh, and I suggest you try and make the most of your owed favour.
Whoopee doo!
I've recently moved over to largely using Linux at work, and it is rather fustrating the way that the Linux Desktop is fragmented. The thing is, I imagine that many people use a mix of KDE and Gnome apps. I find it irritating that I have to set up file associations twice and things like that. I wish it could just be unified like Windows. And don't get me started on applications that are still using Motif...
But the problem with these forwarded-around things is that once they get into the hands of a spammer, they're a big juicy list of valid emails - and your email address will be on there and there's nothing you can do about it.
How come you don't just do a national sales tax, like most other countries? - a nationally set sales tax level that applies across all states?
Because all of those ideas are completely original, aren't they?
Hmm - chosen people living in the desert, waiting to be freed by a chosen one... where have I heard that before?
Oh yeah - Exodus!
The linked paper seems to be broken, and I'm feeling rather lost in this sea of acronyms...
Personally I find the mix of mouse and keys works well. I don't find the moving from mouse to keyboard and back again a problem most of the time - I'm a programmer, not a typist. I spend a lot of the time with my fingers off the keyboard anyway. I'm absolutely sure that debugging would be considerably slower without the GUI.
I would spend the time to learn Emacs if I felt that it was considerably superior than the current alternatives, but I don't see why it would be, and otherwise I'm not going to learn a whole new user interface just to use an editor.
Have you actually ever had to use MSVC? I've not used the .Net version yet, but VC6 is great. It's not got a perfect UI, but it's a better C++ dev environment that anything else I've used. I've just moved over to working on Linux at work, and let me tell you, it's been painful. KDevelop is coming along nicely, but it's still nowhere near VC6.
I'd like to know what exactly it is in VC6 which is 'cruft'. Sure, notepad is a lot smaller, but it lacks a compiler, a debugger, project management, undo past save, syntax highlighting, autoindenting, code completion, a comprehensive help system etc... MSVC is much bigger, but then it's much more useful.
The copy protection on B&W caused quite a lot of problems. Try applying a no-CD crack. When I bought B&W it wouldn't run on my W2K system at work (I worked at a games company at the time) without applying a no-cd crack.
I can't remember the last time I ever had dll problems. It was probably back with Windows 95 or something. W2K and XP have dll version management built in. I hear people on /. talk about DLL Hell, but I mainly get the impression that they haven't used Windows since 3.11 or something...
Compare that to the pain you often have to go through to install an RPM on Linux...
"With the loss of Farscape, SG1 is possibly the best straight up sci-fi on TV"
Ahh!
Ah ha ha ha!
Oh....
Mercy!
But can you get ReplayTV in the UK?
It's the same in the UK, but I'm always a little unsure about giving some guy I've never met my bank account number... You should only be able to pay stuff in with it, but even so it makes me nervous...
He was talking about the educated middle classes, not the total population.
Nobody is going to switch until Linux is better - specifically more useable for the Desktop user. And at the moment it's not. It's also going to have to be quite a bit better, otherwise people won't view it as being worth the hassle to switch.
No, we still have trial by jury and we still currently have double-jeopardy protection. Blunkett seems to shove lots of extreme bills at parliment in the hope of getting some of the measures through in a toned down form...