suppose you wanted to stay on the forefront of Java based web development, what would you do? I'd make sure I worked near a Starbucks that never closed while I worked on my Geocities website. Java owns you
Is this sponsorship a creative way to get women interested in GNOME, or is it merely sexist? If you ask most males, they'd say its creative, many (I would think) would likely take a sexist view of it. Anyhow this "women in *nix/programming/etc" has been looked at in great depth...
"Women severely underestimate their abilities in many areas, but especially with respect to computers. One study about this topic is Undergraduate Women in Computer Science: Experience, Motivation, and Culture: http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~gendergap/papers/sigcse97 /sigcse97.html
For example, while 53% of the male computer science freshman rated themselves as highly prepared for their CS courses, 0% of the female CS freshman rated themselves similarly. But at the end of the year, 6 out the 7 female students interviewed had either an A or B average. Objective ratings (such as grade point averages or quality and speed of programming) don't agree with most women's self-estimation. I personally encountered this phenomenon: Despite plenty of objective evidence to the contrary, including grades, time spent on assignments, and high placement in a programming contest, I still didn't consider myself to be at the top of my class in college. Looking back objectively, it seems clear to me that I was performing as well or better than many of the far more confident men in my class." (HOWTO Encourage Women in Linux
I don't think that women are genetically built for programming - and I don't mean to sound like a chauvinist, scumbag, etc, but I don't believe that they're cut out for it which is probably why there is a shortage of women in the industry. For those that are in the industry (and I've met many), they tend to be kick ass cool and rather smart as hell, but they often feel the need to emphasize "I'm a woman... blah blah" women's lib stuff... Its like a few have chips on their shoulders. Anyway... back to doing nothing
The U.S. government is humorous. A recently released FBI report about the compromising ties between a Chinese-American Mata Hari and her FBI-agent lover is a stark reminder that after terrorism, the greatest threat to our national security at home is espionage." (source). Couple this with government employees giving data away, and we've got the making of a new way to spy on the US without planting swallows, cobblers, ravens... I wonder how fast after this service is up will we be reading about a government slip-up via that portal... Anyway, this truly isn't anything new. I've used Google's Uncle Sam search plenty times...
Most Windows-based intranet applications are designed to use the Windows Sockets API, which is optimized for use by Windows-based applications. Microsoft provides a WinSock driver for each Windows operating system, and some third parties provide their own implementations.... Microsoft provides a WinSock driver for each Windows operating system No need to think about it for more than a minute.
Drivers that rate poorly in real world use by users will lose their logo certification status, which would be bad news for OEMs and the device manufacturers themselves. So what will Microsoft do when their own drivers rate poorly. Will they give back financially for companies that lose money because of downtime? Let's see... MEGACOMPANY=12,000 employees have to reboot because of let's say winsock.dll. Total downtime was 5 minutes (1 minute reboot 3 minutes for Windows updates another minute to reboot after update). 60,000 minutes lost due to non productivity at lets say minimum wage of 5.00 an hour. MEGACOMPANY just lost 300,000.00 unforseen dollars. Thanks Team MS!
I've used it and prefer it over Jabberd2 what I ended up using.:( My coworkers didn't understand that point and click web based administration (imagine that!). Jive definitely rocks. If the person asking this wants even more security along with VPN's (if he has them) he could set up proxies, etc.. Come to think of it, if he doesn't have VPN security, he may just want to use SASL or TLS. I know I wouldn't want to be sending propietary messages over the net without encryption.
Indeed. I had employees using their AIM, Yahoo accounts on Exodus as well. Well, those employees I trusted. There are a slew of other functions as well including group chats, broadcast messages (via plugins), etc. I stood away from clustering with any servers though since it was meant to be an internal messaging system. The configuration is easy and the only issue I came across was having to explain to the older employees how to accept files and send them. Yes it was as simple as reading the prompts, but hey! We all know how comp-phobes can get... It's definitely worth looking into though. Exodus was the client I chose because it was clean and simple... As for the server I chose Jabberd2 and had it running on Windows SMB 2003 before I tossed it the Windows version for the Linux version since I was doing LDAP, VPN's, and a slew of other things...
Jabber along with Exodus works wonders. When I worked at a small/mid sized (200 employees) business I configured this across the board along via VPN. It was secure, fast, stable and as good as any IM client and server I've come across. I configure employees into groups in accordance with their office (e.g. NY, Miami, Mass, etc.). Workers were able to transfer files when necessary, vent gripes without worrying about snooping, etc.
You should have had something written in concrete on your contract. One of the problems with going to a startup is that there is no guarantee of anything so its always a tough call. I think gone are the days where people caught a wave. Nowadays one would have to be absolutely deranged to chuck salary for options considering the market on tech has been crappy thanks to dot.com days of Critical Path, Worldcom, Metromedia Fiber, etc. I was working for an up and comer who was ahead of the game in the managed services arena. They allowed Metromedia Fiber to buy them for about 2billion at the time... Just a month or two after Metromedia disclosed their woes and I saw many people thrown in the gutter.
Weigh your options: You are hired to perform X function for a startup. Anything extra is on you. If you out of the goodness of your heart decide to give it your all for nothing in return, you are to blame. Business has no heart nor emotion. Option a) take a high salary to perform your task. Perform your task well and obviously (well theoretically) it will show and hopefully you will earn more. Option b) take a moderate salary and work with management to ensure your works pay off in the long run (via options, Sr. position, etc.) Option c) believe business should have a heart and cry foul when you find out that again it doesn't.
On a slightly different note, my brother in law was with Citigroup for 21+ years. He was the Tier 2 Network Engineer at Citibank HQ in NY. They outsourced first, then made a data center in Texas. He was given the opportunity to relocate their however... He had to come on as a new employee. 21 years down the drain. Sayanora. Although he made out with a nice goodbye package, that will run out in about a year. Business nothing personal happens everywhere.
I've seen a documentary on the Discovery Channel about the possibility of a meteorite hitting earth pretty hard. Come to think of it, last week a meteorite struck finland. What's interesting is the United States Air Force has the following:
6.7 Asteroid Mitigation System Brief Description
The asteroid mitigation system protects the Earth/Moon system from earth-crossing objects (ECO) by either
deflecting or fragmenting ECO they no longer pose a threat. Deflection could be accomplished using nuclear
explosive devices.
Scientist have been trying to figure out when something big will hit. Imagine if what hit the moon hit a major city... I'd definitely rather see my tax dollars spent on a project to deter meteorites as opposed to seeing money thrown around with people crying "Al Qaeda" anytime.
Hello... I have an LCD and my laptops... You're missing the point. I would not sit at my computer desk, nor have my laptop on my legs replacing my Aquaos
well on its way to totally revolutionizing the way the TV, film, and broadcast industry is going to be,' adding that he's now looking for 'the Vonage of Internet video.' Not so fast... While Internet broadcasting sounds like a good idea but there are a lot of issues that need to be addressed before companies start dumping millions that route. While there may be a cluster of people that would be willing to watch content, how many people would honestly swap their televisions for glaring at a computer monitor. I for one know I might do so maybe once a month, but its bad enough I work 10 hours a day in front of a monitor and a couple of extra hours afterwards.
Bandwidth constraints: I hope those diving into this idea are aware that unlike VoIP whose packet sizes have small footprints, video is a whole different monster. Unless these companies are willing to dish out for OC12's and better, once they have a market, the network will be saturated if they don't plan accordingly. Now let's take say an OC12 at 622mbs and divide that at a low stream of say video using 64kb, they'd only be able to serve 9952 viewers. That's paltry for say an event like a LiveAid concert... What will happen to a service like this when Net Neutrality sides with providers... (ouch)
After reading 12 of the 17 page MS document I shake my head... Some malware do not run properly in VM. Some packers are known to detect VM environment and prevent the file from normal execution. What about smarter polymorphs which change and adapt not to mention their analysis', tests, etc., did not include a full scope of what malware targets: "Runtime environment simulation is still primitive. For example, we have not implemented Instant Messaging or P2P applications/servers." Couple this with: "The biggest benefit is more rapid response to complex threats. As the synergy between viruses, Trojans, worms, rootkits and exploits grows, waiting for a solution becomes more dangerous." And lest I forget "This two-part article series looks at how cryptography is a double-edged sword: it is used to make us safer, but it is also being used for malicious purposes within sophisticated viruses. Part two continues the discussion of armored viruses and then looks at a Bradley worm - a worm that uses cryptography in such a way that it cannot be analyzed. (source). So what happens when malware writers get a clue and start creating their own forms of crypto to hide their actions. For any company to create a product whether its hardware or software based, they'd only be lying to a degree about their ability to detect complex threats no matter what engine their malware snoopers were using.
You can migrate some of the administrative tools under Windows 2003 SMB server over to XP. But I'm under the assumption you're looking at things from a server perspective. As for firewalls, etc., you have to define if you want a true firewall as opposed to relying on Windows' shabby firewall. If so then I suggest you take a look at Juniper's Netscreen Elite 5X if you're a small business. I mention this instead of Checkpoint or others since I have used many and my best recommendation would be the Netscreen. This comes via way of having to migrate a slew of Checkpoint's along with Rainwall for management to Netscreen. Things were so shoddy with Checkpoint's IPSO, even Checkpoint wouldn't support the financial institute I was doing work for. This forced us to rethink our tools and after months worth of tiger team testing, we went with Juniper.
While I haven't used SuSE since 1998 or so, its nice to see they're coming along. One thing I take note of is the mention of "licensing costs were cited as key reasons for the decision.". I think there are many here who will take a "it's free!" approach to that statement, and that is not necessarily the case. Sure there are tons of free programs available, but most are forgetting the SuSE/Novell issue where SuSE isn't entirely as free as say CentOS, Ubuntu, FreeBSD, etc., there are some minor caveats, OpenExchange, etc. As for replacing x86Sol, I've never taken x86Sol seriously. If you ask me it was unstable, riddled with hardware issues, and had more security issues then Solaris on a Sparc.
I'd thought of installing SuSE using OpenExchange because of the cost factor when I worked at a smaller company but I found I could do just as good using an alternative so I ended up installing CentOS webservers, proxy servers, Solaris 10 for mail and LDAP on a v280, and ended up configuring a nicely equipped intranet for under 5k. I wound up going open source for most tools, e.g. DotProject replaced MS Project server and saved about 4k. SugarCRM replaced SuradoCRM at about 8k. CentOS replaced MS Windows SMB 2003 for about another 4k. I saved the company a lot of money but ended up to my neck in work. Was pretty neat to get things going, and I had originally wanted to use SuSE before they started selling seats for OpenExchange. Its always nice though to see the distros moving up... Right now, I'm back into the telco/communications (VoIP arena to be exact) and I was lucky enough to be in a Linux shop with flexibility to use what we feel gets the job done right... Not what magazines and researchers often sponsored by MS point to as "the perfect solution"
The NNSA is a semi-autonomous arm of the Energy Department and also guards some of the U.S. military's nuclear secrets and responds to global nuclear and radiological emergencies. So I wonder... How long will it be before someone actually utilitizes some of the information that's being stolen. We already know the military was hit for 26.5 million records, and supposedly the Chinese are ramping up their cyberoffense and defense. I'm wondering how long will it be before the ultimate "so that's what they wanted that information for" scenario comes about. It's sickening to see a country that can supposedly defend itself and the world, can't even secure their own networks. Last thing that needs to happen is this new NSA snooping database to get owned as well.
So here would be the nightmare scenario in my eyes... Hackers get DoD information from those 26.5 million VA database and slowly poison them... While the US is straddled in Iraq militarily, some country starts kidnapping those on the NNSA's list and either killing them or torturing them for information (schematics to facilities, etc.) while all this is going on, someone strikes inside the US on such a big scale, Hiroshima looks like a mild 4th of July show.... Scary isn't it?... Luckily for us Americans, the NSA is snooping the planet so never fear they will find the culprits... Unless of course they get pwned too.
? Well? Anyone? Who hasn't trolled up an issue to some extent to get a fix on a certain group of individuals. Military does it, businesses do it, news agencies do it, and the list goes on and on...
There's No Such Thing as Overconfidence
The best in every business are likely to strike most people as irrationally confident, but that's how they got to the top.
Richard Branson, Bill Gates, Michael Dell -- they first believed in themselves, utterly, and let their belief be their guide. Sure they experienced numerous obstacles and setbacks and failures. Confidence allowed them to keep getting up and looking for ways to move forward.
Most importantly, leaders like Branson and Gates prioritized believing in the people around them. Confidence is also not arrogance, and unless your employees think that they're better human beings in general than everyone else, let them believe that they're good enough to do exceptional things.
Legends Never Say They're Sorry
Having a long or frequent memory for mistakes and a short or infrequent memory for successes is a guaranteed way to develop fear of failure. High achievers dwell on what they do well -- and spend very little time evaluating themselves and their performances.
Learn from your mistakes? Of course. The road to success is full of adversity from which we can gain significant insight. The key, however, is to set aside specific, deliberate times for evaluation. Process setbacks, errors, and your performance in general only at times when you have planned to.
The alternative is to get caught up in second-guessing, doubt, and worry whenever things look a bit gray. You excel during the tough moments by having a positive blueprint to look at -- and to have a positive blueprint, you have to spend a lot of time looking at the image of success.
At some point, I will write more comprehensively about those years and these issues....then again, maybe not. For someone on the other side of the fence, she should take a stance on the pros and cons of it all. Maybe she could make others on her side of that fence understand the scope in better fashion. "Maybe not" to me means she doesn't take the issue as serious as she would like some to think since she doesn't seem convincing with her "maybe maybe not" attitude. I can relate to what she states concerning those sued who were making businesses, but how about going after and pressuring those who promote it and condemn it at the same time... For instance, how many MS commercials have you seen promoting MS as something that can "burn and share your music!". How about having those companies explain it all for those who don't know then fining them for not following orders... Supposing you had a locksmith company touting "now you can crack safes too!"... For certain kinds of locksmiths (safe crackers), they need to be registered. Shouldn't they face penalties for scammish advertising... "now you can be a REGISTERED locksmith too!"...
There is a p2p program I used for a second. I found all the songs I wanted to find... Guess what? They all had expiring licenses which allowed me to hear the song for a week. No burning, no sharing, etc. I thought it was a neat idea. I generally look for new things to buy instead of wasting my hard earned money for a 16 track album to find 1 good song. I'd rather have the album anyway. Maybe those in industry should work to create better guidelines. By now they should know telling a whole bunch of geeks, GenX'ers, etc "no you cant!" will only lead to rebellion... Maybe they should try taking a different approach.
The hackers want to break Hollywood on the wheel of their collective ingenuity and show the suits who is in charge....
Big media wants to make money from the internet like it does with every other outlet, or at the very least not have piracy forever draining away their profits.
Isn't it ironic that hollywood is seeing some of their biggest profits in ages, and as time elapses they continue to make more and more money. I know that they do lose money due to piracy, but most of that piracy comes from organized groups with huge copying and distribution capabilities. For those in NYC, how often have you seen "bootleggers" in front if the federal building, state office buildings even near police precints selling pirated copies. Why doesn't hollywood focus on finding the sources of these centers and shutting them down. If the government under hollywoods complaints can go and bother 17 year olds, how difficult would it be for the same government to find out who is buying multirecording DVD burners on a large scale. Let's get real.
Google seems to be playing both sides of the fence here. I wouldn't be surprised if the US Government via Google started inserting crapaganda into China. It would be a plus for Google to get a foot in the door and get Chinese revenue since the market is huge, it would also be a plus for the US government to get in via Google (as the US always seems to do - getting a foot in the door), to unload crapaganda contrary to Chinese laws. Wouldn't be the first time. What you see here (Google in China) is nothing more than tip-toeing from Google to save face on all sides.
Slashdot Mirror
suppose you wanted to stay on the forefront of Java based web development, what would you do? I'd make sure I worked near a Starbucks that never closed while I worked on my Geocities website. Java owns you
I don't think that women are genetically built for programming - and I don't mean to sound like a chauvinist, scumbag, etc, but I don't believe that they're cut out for it which is probably why there is a shortage of women in the industry. For those that are in the industry (and I've met many), they tend to be kick ass cool and rather smart as hell, but they often feel the need to emphasize "I'm a woman... blah blah" women's lib stuff... Its like a few have chips on their shoulders. Anyway... back to doing nothing
The U.S. government is humorous. A recently released FBI report about the compromising ties between a Chinese-American Mata Hari and her FBI-agent lover is a stark reminder that after terrorism, the greatest threat to our national security at home is espionage." (source). Couple this with government employees giving data away, and we've got the making of a new way to spy on the US without planting swallows, cobblers, ravens... I wonder how fast after this service is up will we be reading about a government slip-up via that portal... Anyway, this truly isn't anything new. I've used Google's Uncle Sam search plenty times...
Most Windows-based intranet applications are designed to use the Windows Sockets API, which is optimized for use by Windows-based applications. Microsoft provides a WinSock driver for each Windows operating system, and some third parties provide their own implementations. ... Microsoft provides a WinSock driver for each Windows operating system No need to think about it for more than a minute.
Drivers that rate poorly in real world use by users will lose their logo certification status, which would be bad news for OEMs and the device manufacturers themselves. So what will Microsoft do when their own drivers rate poorly. Will they give back financially for companies that lose money because of downtime? Let's see... MEGACOMPANY=12,000 employees have to reboot because of let's say winsock.dll. Total downtime was 5 minutes (1 minute reboot 3 minutes for Windows updates another minute to reboot after update). 60,000 minutes lost due to non productivity at lets say minimum wage of 5.00 an hour. MEGACOMPANY just lost 300,000.00 unforseen dollars. Thanks Team MS!
I've used it and prefer it over Jabberd2 what I ended up using. :( My coworkers didn't understand that point and click web based administration (imagine that!). Jive definitely rocks. If the person asking this wants even more security along with VPN's (if he has them) he could set up proxies, etc.. Come to think of it, if he doesn't have VPN security, he may just want to use SASL or TLS. I know I wouldn't want to be sending propietary messages over the net without encryption.
Indeed. I had employees using their AIM, Yahoo accounts on Exodus as well. Well, those employees I trusted. There are a slew of other functions as well including group chats, broadcast messages (via plugins), etc. I stood away from clustering with any servers though since it was meant to be an internal messaging system. The configuration is easy and the only issue I came across was having to explain to the older employees how to accept files and send them. Yes it was as simple as reading the prompts, but hey! We all know how comp-phobes can get... It's definitely worth looking into though. Exodus was the client I chose because it was clean and simple... As for the server I chose Jabberd2 and had it running on Windows SMB 2003 before I tossed it the Windows version for the Linux version since I was doing LDAP, VPN's, and a slew of other things...
/slap boss
Jabber along with Exodus works wonders. When I worked at a small/mid sized (200 employees) business I configured this across the board along via VPN. It was secure, fast, stable and as good as any IM client and server I've come across. I configure employees into groups in accordance with their office (e.g. NY, Miami, Mass, etc.). Workers were able to transfer files when necessary, vent gripes without worrying about snooping, etc.
You should have had something written in concrete on your contract. One of the problems with going to a startup is that there is no guarantee of anything so its always a tough call. I think gone are the days where people caught a wave. Nowadays one would have to be absolutely deranged to chuck salary for options considering the market on tech has been crappy thanks to dot.com days of Critical Path, Worldcom, Metromedia Fiber, etc. I was working for an up and comer who was ahead of the game in the managed services arena. They allowed Metromedia Fiber to buy them for about 2billion at the time... Just a month or two after Metromedia disclosed their woes and I saw many people thrown in the gutter.
Weigh your options: You are hired to perform X function for a startup. Anything extra is on you. If you out of the goodness of your heart decide to give it your all for nothing in return, you are to blame. Business has no heart nor emotion. Option a) take a high salary to perform your task. Perform your task well and obviously (well theoretically) it will show and hopefully you will earn more. Option b) take a moderate salary and work with management to ensure your works pay off in the long run (via options, Sr. position, etc.) Option c) believe business should have a heart and cry foul when you find out that again it doesn't.
On a slightly different note, my brother in law was with Citigroup for 21+ years. He was the Tier 2 Network Engineer at Citibank HQ in NY. They outsourced first, then made a data center in Texas. He was given the opportunity to relocate their however... He had to come on as a new employee. 21 years down the drain. Sayanora. Although he made out with a nice goodbye package, that will run out in about a year. Business nothing personal happens everywhere.
;) Finland... Norway... Vad gor du!? Om jag kan inte saga...
Scientist have been trying to figure out when something big will hit. Imagine if what hit the moon hit a major city... I'd definitely rather see my tax dollars spent on a project to deter meteorites as opposed to seeing money thrown around with people crying "Al Qaeda" anytime.
Being I drink about 12-16 cups a day I'm glad to know my alcholism won't be doing much to me. I think I'll have a shot now followed by some starbucks
Hello... I have an LCD and my laptops... You're missing the point. I would not sit at my computer desk, nor have my laptop on my legs replacing my Aquaos
well on its way to totally revolutionizing the way the TV, film, and broadcast industry is going to be,' adding that he's now looking for 'the Vonage of Internet video.' Not so fast... While Internet broadcasting sounds like a good idea but there are a lot of issues that need to be addressed before companies start dumping millions that route. While there may be a cluster of people that would be willing to watch content, how many people would honestly swap their televisions for glaring at a computer monitor. I for one know I might do so maybe once a month, but its bad enough I work 10 hours a day in front of a monitor and a couple of extra hours afterwards.
Bandwidth constraints: I hope those diving into this idea are aware that unlike VoIP whose packet sizes have small footprints, video is a whole different monster. Unless these companies are willing to dish out for OC12's and better, once they have a market, the network will be saturated if they don't plan accordingly. Now let's take say an OC12 at 622mbs and divide that at a low stream of say video using 64kb, they'd only be able to serve 9952 viewers. That's paltry for say an event like a LiveAid concert... What will happen to a service like this when Net Neutrality sides with providers... (ouch)
Sunday, June 11, 2006 That bastard
So Mr Gates thinks he can just fire me at will... Say hello to my little fr........
After reading 12 of the 17 page MS document I shake my head... Some malware do not run properly in VM. Some packers are known to detect VM environment and prevent the file from normal execution. What about smarter polymorphs which change and adapt not to mention their analysis', tests, etc., did not include a full scope of what malware targets: "Runtime environment simulation is still primitive. For example, we have not implemented Instant Messaging or P2P applications/servers." Couple this with: "The biggest benefit is more rapid response to complex threats. As the synergy between viruses, Trojans, worms, rootkits and exploits grows, waiting for a solution becomes more dangerous." And lest I forget "This two-part article series looks at how cryptography is a double-edged sword: it is used to make us safer, but it is also being used for malicious purposes within sophisticated viruses. Part two continues the discussion of armored viruses and then looks at a Bradley worm - a worm that uses cryptography in such a way that it cannot be analyzed. (source). So what happens when malware writers get a clue and start creating their own forms of crypto to hide their actions. For any company to create a product whether its hardware or software based, they'd only be lying to a degree about their ability to detect complex threats no matter what engine their malware snoopers were using.
You apparently don't know much about groups under Windows. You create specific groups for specific resources. Much similar to *nix.
User Access Controls
SANS Top 20 (worth reading)
Windows Server 2003 Security Guide
Overview of the Windows 2003 Server
You can migrate some of the administrative tools under Windows 2003 SMB server over to XP. But I'm under the assumption you're looking at things from a server perspective. As for firewalls, etc., you have to define if you want a true firewall as opposed to relying on Windows' shabby firewall. If so then I suggest you take a look at Juniper's Netscreen Elite 5X if you're a small business. I mention this instead of Checkpoint or others since I have used many and my best recommendation would be the Netscreen. This comes via way of having to migrate a slew of Checkpoint's along with Rainwall for management to Netscreen. Things were so shoddy with Checkpoint's IPSO, even Checkpoint wouldn't support the financial institute I was doing work for. This forced us to rethink our tools and after months worth of tiger team testing, we went with Juniper.
While I haven't used SuSE since 1998 or so, its nice to see they're coming along. One thing I take note of is the mention of "licensing costs were cited as key reasons for the decision.". I think there are many here who will take a "it's free!" approach to that statement, and that is not necessarily the case. Sure there are tons of free programs available, but most are forgetting the SuSE/Novell issue where SuSE isn't entirely as free as say CentOS, Ubuntu, FreeBSD, etc., there are some minor caveats, OpenExchange, etc. As for replacing x86Sol, I've never taken x86Sol seriously. If you ask me it was unstable, riddled with hardware issues, and had more security issues then Solaris on a Sparc.
I'd thought of installing SuSE using OpenExchange because of the cost factor when I worked at a smaller company but I found I could do just as good using an alternative so I ended up installing CentOS webservers, proxy servers, Solaris 10 for mail and LDAP on a v280, and ended up configuring a nicely equipped intranet for under 5k. I wound up going open source for most tools, e.g. DotProject replaced MS Project server and saved about 4k. SugarCRM replaced SuradoCRM at about 8k. CentOS replaced MS Windows SMB 2003 for about another 4k. I saved the company a lot of money but ended up to my neck in work. Was pretty neat to get things going, and I had originally wanted to use SuSE before they started selling seats for OpenExchange. Its always nice though to see the distros moving up... Right now, I'm back into the telco/communications (VoIP arena to be exact) and I was lucky enough to be in a Linux shop with flexibility to use what we feel gets the job done right... Not what magazines and researchers often sponsored by MS point to as "the perfect solution"
The NNSA is a semi-autonomous arm of the Energy Department and also guards some of the U.S. military's nuclear secrets and responds to global nuclear and radiological emergencies. So I wonder... How long will it be before someone actually utilitizes some of the information that's being stolen. We already know the military was hit for 26.5 million records, and supposedly the Chinese are ramping up their cyberoffense and defense. I'm wondering how long will it be before the ultimate "so that's what they wanted that information for" scenario comes about. It's sickening to see a country that can supposedly defend itself and the world, can't even secure their own networks. Last thing that needs to happen is this new NSA snooping database to get owned as well.
... Luckily for us Americans, the NSA is snooping the planet so never fear they will find the culprits... Unless of course they get pwned too.
So here would be the nightmare scenario in my eyes... Hackers get DoD information from those 26.5 million VA database and slowly poison them... While the US is straddled in Iraq militarily, some country starts kidnapping those on the NNSA's list and either killing them or torturing them for information (schematics to facilities, etc.) while all this is going on, someone strikes inside the US on such a big scale, Hiroshima looks like a mild 4th of July show.... Scary isn't it?
At some point, I will write more comprehensively about those years and these issues....then again, maybe not. For someone on the other side of the fence, she should take a stance on the pros and cons of it all. Maybe she could make others on her side of that fence understand the scope in better fashion. "Maybe not" to me means she doesn't take the issue as serious as she would like some to think since she doesn't seem convincing with her "maybe maybe not" attitude. I can relate to what she states concerning those sued who were making businesses, but how about going after and pressuring those who promote it and condemn it at the same time... For instance, how many MS commercials have you seen promoting MS as something that can "burn and share your music!". How about having those companies explain it all for those who don't know then fining them for not following orders... Supposing you had a locksmith company touting "now you can crack safes too!" ... For certain kinds of locksmiths (safe crackers), they need to be registered. Shouldn't they face penalties for scammish advertising... "now you can be a REGISTERED locksmith too!"...
There is a p2p program I used for a second. I found all the songs I wanted to find... Guess what? They all had expiring licenses which allowed me to hear the song for a week. No burning, no sharing, etc. I thought it was a neat idea. I generally look for new things to buy instead of wasting my hard earned money for a 16 track album to find 1 good song. I'd rather have the album anyway. Maybe those in industry should work to create better guidelines. By now they should know telling a whole bunch of geeks, GenX'ers, etc "no you cant!" will only lead to rebellion... Maybe they should try taking a different approach.
The hackers want to break Hollywood on the wheel of their collective ingenuity and show the suits who is in charge. ...
Big media wants to make money from the internet like it does with every other outlet, or at the very least not have piracy forever draining away their profits.
Isn't it ironic that hollywood is seeing some of their biggest profits in ages, and as time elapses they continue to make more and more money. I know that they do lose money due to piracy, but most of that piracy comes from organized groups with huge copying and distribution capabilities. For those in NYC, how often have you seen "bootleggers" in front if the federal building, state office buildings even near police precints selling pirated copies. Why doesn't hollywood focus on finding the sources of these centers and shutting them down. If the government under hollywoods complaints can go and bother 17 year olds, how difficult would it be for the same government to find out who is buying multirecording DVD burners on a large scale. Let's get real.
Google seems to be playing both sides of the fence here. I wouldn't be surprised if the US Government via Google started inserting crapaganda into China. It would be a plus for Google to get a foot in the door and get Chinese revenue since the market is huge, it would also be a plus for the US government to get in via Google (as the US always seems to do - getting a foot in the door), to unload crapaganda contrary to Chinese laws. Wouldn't be the first time. What you see here (Google in China) is nothing more than tip-toeing from Google to save face on all sides.