The problem isn't the X server. It's badly written software or toolkits. Properly written X appications won't smear like that. Xterm doesn't do it. I write X applications and they don't have the problem.
The most likely cause of the problem is that the program has a very slow redraw function, probably due to object-oriented code, and calls that function in full on every Expose event. The way I avoid the problem is to check for events within the redraw loop using XPending(3X11). I check once every N drawing elements, and if I never get events, I increase N within that one redraw, increasing efficiency. If I do get an event, I terminate the redraw and return control to the main event switch statement.
Mozilla Firebird has the problem to a much smaller extent than plain Mozilla, for some reason.
I anticipate your saying, "You had to apply a crude hack." Well, that's not it. It takes time and effort to master X programming; that's a consequence of X's power and flexibility. There's nothing wrong with XFree86's implementation of X that I've run into. X takes the blame for a lot of mistakes by application and toolkit programmers.
Are there third-party vendors recompiling Windows, Office etc? I haven't seen this, although it could be true. My perception is that a given release of a Microsoft product will contain the same binaries no matter which vendor distributes/installs it. That allows for much easier verification that there has been no tampering with the binaries.
As others have pointed out, a given release of an open source package can have different binaries depending on many variables in the release environment, even the time. So the mere fact that a binary has the "wrong" md5 hash doesn't set off any alarm bells.
I don't think you quite understood his scenario. Let's say Vendor X gets a contract to provide a government agency with 800 desktop computers, with Linux, OpenOffice, etc. Meeting a bunch of carefully written specs from that agency's IT department. Vendor X takes Fedora or Gentoo or Debian and customizes it, complete with a "Foo Agency" splash screen, encrypted disk partitions, escrowed bypass for crypto, etc.
How do we know they didn't plant malware in OpenOffice? What geeks will have access to this binary? Geeks won't even know this mini-distro exists. How much do you know about the Linux being used by Burlington Coat Factory, for example?
I'm not saying this argument is airtight, just that you didn't really address it.
I'd guess that cost of labor is part of the picture. Instead of remotely operating switchgear, you send someone to a substation to do it. Instead of remotely reading currents and temperatures, you send someone around in a truck to write down these readings.
I am roughly in agreement with the authors with regard to how things should work. However I think they are using poorly conceived arguments to defend that view.
The Internet doesnt know lots of things a smart network like the phone system knows: Identities, permissions, priorities, etc.
Routers and firewalls are part of the internet, aren't they? Otherwise the comparison makes no sense. Routers can prioritize interactive traffic over ftp. Firewalls enforce one kind of permissions.
What makes the Net inter is the fact that it's just a protocol the Internet Protocol, to be exact. A protocol is an agreement about how things work together.
No, the internet is not synonymous with IP. If it were, then two machines connected by a crossover cable and communicating via TCP/IP would be on the internet, even though they are completely isolated from the outside world. The internet is essentially an assemblage of routers and links.
Adding value to the Internet lowers its value. Sounds screwy, but it's true. If you optimize a network for one type of application, you de-optimize it for others. For example, if you let the network give priority to voice or video data on the grounds that they need to arrive faster, you are telling other applications that they will have to wait.
So, some traffic has to wait. How does that lower the value of the Internet? Traffic lights make some automotive traffic wait. Does that lower the value of the road system? No, it increases the value if the correct design decisions are made.
And as soon as you do that, you have turned the Net from something simple for everybody into something complicated for just one purpose.
What does that mean? Let's say we go from a router with no traffic shaping to one that prioritizes VOIP packets over HTTP. Before: Sending VOIP packets is simple (but they might show up late); sending HTTP packets is simple. After: Sending VOIP packets is simple (and they show up on time); sending HTTP packets is simple. We haven't made the Net more complex from a host perspective.
If all of the Internets value is at its edges, Internet connectivity itself wants to become a commodity. It should be allowed to do so.
It's not looking very commoditized right now. If you're lucky, you have the choice of a local telco for DSL and a local cable company. And of course, dialup if you want. So the authors have got it backwards - what's on the internet is generally a commodity, but access to the internet is a tightly controlled and profitable bottleneck.
We are all connected equally. Distance doesnt matter.
We're not all connected equally. Some links have higher capacity than others. And distance does matter. Overseas connections have higher latency.
Thats exactly why Instant Messaging has failed to achieve its potential: The leading IM systems of today AOL's AIM and ICQ and Microsoft's MSN Messenger are private territories that may run on the Net, but they are not part of the Net. When AOL and Microsoft decide they should run their IM systems using a stupid protocol that nobody owns and everybody can use, they will have improved the Net enormously. Until then, they're just being stupid, and not in the good sense.
AOL, Microsoft and Yahoo use their proprietary messaging protocols and server centralization as strategic pinch points. That isn't stupid, however much we may dislike it. If one of the three could gain an advantage by opening up, wouldn't it do so?
By calling these companies "stupid", the authors confuse the nebulous benefit of IM achieving its potential with the real financial benefits these companies seek.
Either way, when corporate armies are assaulting other corporations or family homes, then you can be sure as hell it is time for resistance i.e. civil war.
Even if the corporate armies are in the right? Even if they're proceeding under a court order? Even if all this has been going on since before you were born, and the general public considers it fine?
Does it bother you that Loss Prevention Officers (Corporate Goons, in your lingo) arrest shoplifters? They're not police. If it does bother you, what is your realistic proposal for a plan that would deter shoplifters while solving the perceived problem?
I wish I could convey to you that most practices in the (civilized, western) world evolved for specific reasons to solve specific problems. If you study the practice (its history, arguments pro and con) and dislike it, and propose a modifed practice that still addresses the problem, you win respect.
If you loudly denounce the practice because it has inconvenienced you or your allies, without showing much understanding of its wider context or purpose, you appear a bit childish.
Of course, that same logic justifies prosecution of witches. Even if you don't believe in the efficacy of witchcraft, you must admit the sinister intent reflected in casting harmful spells.
Your pipebomb isn't information. A virus is. Let's say I deliberately, maliciously, with evil intent, mail an "All Your Base.." type joke to someone, knowing full well that he will "waste resources" sending that joke and variations thereof to others. Isn't that a pretty close analogy to a computer virus? It passes your test for bad intent.
But a virus is just information. Maybe a better analogy is a lie. Vic the virus writer tells you a lie calculated to appeal to your prejudices. You rush out and tell two friends, who tell two friends, etc. Now after adding up the "damage" to "the economy" we might be tempted to put Vic in prison. But really, everyone needs to be more skeptical.
A virus can only work because there is explicit program code on the target machine that makes the virus work. The virus is just information.
Nevermind the watermark every printer has embedded in it that lets the manufacturer uniquely identify any particular printer (They've been doing THAT for years now...)
Do you have a source for that? Any google keywords?
Exactly. It's a contrived example, a typical attempt to hide behind another group rather than clearly stating one's own agenda. Couldn't we take it a step further and invent some far-out scenario where someone dies due to this feature?
But these techniques are all about stopping the non-serious counterfeiter, who allegedly prints 40% of counterfeit money. As the article points out, there's been an explosion in very poor amateur counterfeiting.
And my point is that if you live in a country where such orders are enforced by private persons, you can bet that those private persons are well prepared for the occasional resister. Unless the poster is a David-Koresh like figure lurking in his compound, any resistance he puts up will merely endanger him. Such private enforcers are probably more heavily armed, less trained and less cautious than police.
This person amused me by reaching for a completely hollow "tough guy" response instead of saying the obvious: "It sucks that they can do this. And there's absolutely no recourse."
There's a recurring strand of nonsense on slashdot to the tune of "I'm not gonna take this!" That might get some "Hell Yeah"'s on slashdot, but it won't work for the 5 year old who has to go to bed, or the 10 year old who has to do his homework, or the adult feeling oppressed by a lawful action of his government.
I found it hard to find good pages about this. Most of the news stories are woefully imprecise, not even mentioning if the case is civil or criminal. Here are two decent ones: this and this Scientology case.
Both involve US Marshals because the matter is federal.
But I remember reading about Sheriff's deputies enforcing orders from state courts. It's one of the steps in collecting bad debt, for example.
So I guess the keywords are: raid, "court order", marshals, plaintiff, lawsuit, -charged, -indicted (attempting to find civil rather than criminal cases.)
Let me know if you find the actual law.
The key point that I'm not sure you're focussing on: these raids were undertaken pursuant to a lawful order from a judge. They weren't just the whim of a random private party. The important point is what criteria must be met in order to get the order - not whether law enforcement accompanies the plaintiffs on their raid. If you think that such orders should never be issued, you should make sure you understand the consequences of living in a society where private property is an absolute shield for wrongdoing. Hint: the biggest beneficiaries will be corporations like Walmart, and the biggest losers will be those without property.
I don't think you can call the industry's agents "thugs" when they are lawfully executing a judge's order.
As for secret torts, the framers of the constitution were perfectly happy to allow secret torts in the privacy of ones own home. George and Thomas and Benjamin weren't, after all, control freaks like George III and Crazy John.
Except that there is nothing really new here. Remember the adage of the boy who cried wolf. Nobody in the real world cares when posters on slashdot cry foul, which is all the time (except when they're crying "kewl").
First, how much of your feeling is contingent on whether the raiders are accompanied by law enforcement? Because we do have these raids in the US, and as far as I know they are accompanied by law enforcement. Does that make it OK with you?
If you accept that a person can secretly commit a tort (a civil infraction) against another person, you must accept some mechanism for authorizing raids of this type. Otherwise all kinds of injustices would be committed behind closed doors, and the villains would smugly refuse to let in any investigators.
So before you start jumping up and down, consider that every civilized society has had something like this - it's not new, horrible or threatening. And if the power is being used beyond what's appropriate (which is possible in this case) it's time for the legislature to carefully limit the power, not to throw it out altogether.
I hope you're as young as you sound. Do you really think that the people planning these raids didn't anticipate resistance? Here in the US, they take the court order to the sheriff's department and sheriff's deputies take care of knocking down your door and neutralizing you while the plaintiff's representatives conduct the search. If you're determined to die in a bloody gun battle with law enforcement rather than give up your warez collection, that's fine. Otherwise, you should realize that shooting at lawfully authorized people entering your dwelling is far more serious and dangerous than any copyright issue.
Your assumption that you would prevail in such a battle shows utter naivety, solipsism and underestimation of the opponent.
The obvious thing, which you don't need any specialized knowledge to understand, is that people who routinely enforce such orders will be vastly better equipped and prepared than you are for the type of confrontation you're planning.
Is the government really specifying a new font for all documents? No, only diplomatic notes. It says so in the article.
But I read it on slashdot? That should be your first clue.
Isn't it a waste of government resources to specify such a trivial thing? No. The U.S. clearly values a uniform, professional and modern appearance in its diplomatic correspondence. The article indicates that pressure for this change had been coming from many directions. In general, the government achieves economy by carefully standardizing. Failure to standardize is usually a false economy.
But Times New Roman is so ugly! Why didn't they pick an aesthetically superior typeface like Apple uses? Times New Roman is one of the most common typefaces in business correspondence. It's available on Windows PCs. The U.S. wanted to appear modern and businesslike, not clever and arty.
A 56k connection that downloads continuously for a month will use 18GB of transfer. That's roughly $36 - $90 worth of upstream bandwidth.
Re:Strange that all these media executives
on
Senator Plans P2P Summit
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I agree that it resembles the Reformation; I disagree that "It was all good".
The Catholic church has declined greatly in power since that time. Likewise, if the entertainment industry loses this war, it will be reduced to a shadow of its former self. Of course, the power and scope of the individual citizen will expand in proportion.
...because with a confirmed opt-in system, the sender has PROOF that the user opted in.
Except that it's not really proof. It's a computer file containing an email message, which any spammer could write in three minutes. And by the same token, if the file is genuine, the sender can claim it's fake. Congress was right to focus on violations that are easier to prove or disprove.
This has long been considered the "right way" to do things by people with Clue.
It is a good practice for legitimate list operators, but it is not a good basis for criminal prosecution.
Have you heard about any spammers being arrested?
No. Nor did I expect arrests within mere days of the bill taking effect. I would expect such investigations to take several months, ranging up to a year. I looked for an example on the DOJ websites, and didn't find too many. But here's one example of the lead time between a crime and indictment - more than four months. I would expect spam investigations to take longer, because the investigators will want to collect evidence of many violations rather than charging a spammer with a single count.
Slashdot Mirror
The problem isn't the X server. It's badly written software or toolkits. Properly written X appications won't smear like that. Xterm doesn't do it. I write X applications and they don't have the problem.
The most likely cause of the problem is that the program has a very slow redraw function, probably due to object-oriented code, and calls that function in full on every Expose event. The way I avoid the problem is to check for events within the redraw loop using XPending(3X11). I check once every N drawing elements, and if I never get events, I increase N within that one redraw, increasing efficiency. If I do get an event, I terminate the redraw and return control to the main event switch statement.
Mozilla Firebird has the problem to a much smaller extent than plain Mozilla, for some reason.
I anticipate your saying, "You had to apply a crude hack." Well, that's not it. It takes time and effort to master X programming; that's a consequence of X's power and flexibility. There's nothing wrong with XFree86's implementation of X that I've run into. X takes the blame for a lot of mistakes by application and toolkit programmers.
Are there third-party vendors recompiling Windows, Office etc? I haven't seen this, although it could be true. My perception is that a given release of a Microsoft product will contain the same binaries no matter which vendor distributes/installs it. That allows for much easier verification that there has been no tampering with the binaries.
As others have pointed out, a given release of an open source package can have different binaries depending on many variables in the release environment, even the time. So the mere fact that a binary has the "wrong" md5 hash doesn't set off any alarm bells.
Does that make sense?
I don't think you quite understood his scenario. Let's say Vendor X gets a contract to provide a government agency with 800 desktop computers, with Linux, OpenOffice, etc. Meeting a bunch of carefully written specs from that agency's IT department. Vendor X takes Fedora or Gentoo or Debian and customizes it, complete with a "Foo Agency" splash screen, encrypted disk partitions, escrowed bypass for crypto, etc.
How do we know they didn't plant malware in OpenOffice? What geeks will have access to this binary? Geeks won't even know this mini-distro exists. How much do you know about the Linux being used by Burlington Coat Factory, for example?
I'm not saying this argument is airtight, just that you didn't really address it.
I'd guess that cost of labor is part of the picture. Instead of remotely operating switchgear, you send someone to a substation to do it. Instead of remotely reading currents and temperatures, you send someone around in a truck to write down these readings.
Routers and firewalls are part of the internet, aren't they? Otherwise the comparison makes no sense. Routers can prioritize interactive traffic over ftp. Firewalls enforce one kind of permissions.
No, the internet is not synonymous with IP. If it were, then two machines connected by a crossover cable and communicating via TCP/IP would be on the internet, even though they are completely isolated from the outside world. The internet is essentially an assemblage of routers and links.
So, some traffic has to wait. How does that lower the value of the Internet? Traffic lights make some automotive traffic wait. Does that lower the value of the road system? No, it increases the value if the correct design decisions are made.
What does that mean? Let's say we go from a router with no traffic shaping to one that prioritizes VOIP packets over HTTP. Before: Sending VOIP packets is simple (but they might show up late); sending HTTP packets is simple. After: Sending VOIP packets is simple (and they show up on time); sending HTTP packets is simple. We haven't made the Net more complex from a host perspective.
It's not looking very commoditized right now. If you're lucky, you have the choice of a local telco for DSL and a local cable company. And of course, dialup if you want. So the authors have got it backwards - what's on the internet is generally a commodity, but access to the internet is a tightly controlled and profitable bottleneck.
We're not all connected equally. Some links have higher capacity than others. And distance does matter. Overseas connections have higher latency.
AOL, Microsoft and Yahoo use their proprietary messaging protocols and server centralization as strategic pinch points. That isn't stupid, however much we may dislike it. If one of the three could gain an advantage by opening up, wouldn't it do so?
By calling these companies "stupid", the authors confuse the nebulous benefit of IM achieving its potential with the real financial benefits these companies seek.
--Ophelia, Hamlet
Does it bother you that Loss Prevention Officers (Corporate Goons, in your lingo) arrest shoplifters? They're not police. If it does bother you, what is your realistic proposal for a plan that would deter shoplifters while solving the perceived problem?
I wish I could convey to you that most practices in the (civilized, western) world evolved for specific reasons to solve specific problems. If you study the practice (its history, arguments pro and con) and dislike it, and propose a modifed practice that still addresses the problem, you win respect.
If you loudly denounce the practice because it has inconvenienced you or your allies, without showing much understanding of its wider context or purpose, you appear a bit childish.
Of course, that same logic justifies prosecution of witches. Even if you don't believe in the efficacy of witchcraft, you must admit the sinister intent reflected in casting harmful spells.
Your pipebomb isn't information. A virus is. Let's say I deliberately, maliciously, with evil intent, mail an "All Your Base.." type joke to someone, knowing full well that he will "waste resources" sending that joke and variations thereof to others. Isn't that a pretty close analogy to a computer virus? It passes your test for bad intent.
But a virus is just information. Maybe a better analogy is a lie. Vic the virus writer tells you a lie calculated to appeal to your prejudices. You rush out and tell two friends, who tell two friends, etc. Now after adding up the "damage" to "the economy" we might be tempted to put Vic in prison. But really, everyone needs to be more skeptical.
A virus can only work because there is explicit program code on the target machine that makes the virus work. The virus is just information.
Of course polyester is technically organic. Made of C and H. But I know what you mean.
Exactly. It's a contrived example, a typical attempt to hide behind another group rather than clearly stating one's own agenda. Couldn't we take it a step further and invent some far-out scenario where someone dies due to this feature?
But these techniques are all about stopping the non-serious counterfeiter, who allegedly prints 40% of counterfeit money. As the article points out, there's been an explosion in very poor amateur counterfeiting.
And my point is that if you live in a country where such orders are enforced by private persons, you can bet that those private persons are well prepared for the occasional resister. Unless the poster is a David-Koresh like figure lurking in his compound, any resistance he puts up will merely endanger him. Such private enforcers are probably more heavily armed, less trained and less cautious than police.
This person amused me by reaching for a completely hollow "tough guy" response instead of saying the obvious: "It sucks that they can do this. And there's absolutely no recourse."
There's a recurring strand of nonsense on slashdot to the tune of "I'm not gonna take this!" That might get some "Hell Yeah"'s on slashdot, but it won't work for the 5 year old who has to go to bed, or the 10 year old who has to do his homework, or the adult feeling oppressed by a lawful action of his government.
I found it hard to find good pages about this. Most of the news stories are woefully imprecise, not even mentioning if the case is civil or criminal.
Here are two decent ones: this and this Scientology case.
Both involve US Marshals because the matter is federal.
But I remember reading about Sheriff's deputies enforcing orders from state courts. It's one of the steps in collecting bad debt, for example.
So I guess the keywords are: raid, "court order", marshals, plaintiff, lawsuit, -charged, -indicted (attempting to find civil rather than criminal cases.)
Let me know if you find the actual law.
I don't think you can call the industry's agents "thugs" when they are lawfully executing a judge's order.
Google for the whiskey rebellion.
Except that there is nothing really new here. Remember the adage of the boy who cried wolf. Nobody in the real world cares when posters on slashdot cry foul, which is all the time (except when they're crying "kewl").
First, how much of your feeling is contingent on whether the raiders are accompanied by law enforcement? Because we do have these raids in the US, and as far as I know they are accompanied by law enforcement. Does that make it OK with you?
If you accept that a person can secretly commit a tort (a civil infraction) against another person, you must accept some mechanism for authorizing raids of this type. Otherwise all kinds of injustices would be committed behind closed doors, and the villains would smugly refuse to let in any investigators.
So before you start jumping up and down, consider that every civilized society has had something like this - it's not new, horrible or threatening. And if the power is being used beyond what's appropriate (which is possible in this case) it's time for the legislature to carefully limit the power, not to throw it out altogether.
I hope you're as young as you sound. Do you really think that the people planning these raids didn't anticipate resistance? Here in the US, they take the court order to the sheriff's department and sheriff's deputies take care of knocking down your door and neutralizing you while the plaintiff's representatives conduct the search. If you're determined to die in a bloody gun battle with law enforcement rather than give up your warez collection, that's fine. Otherwise, you should realize that shooting at lawfully authorized people entering your dwelling is far more serious and dangerous than any copyright issue.
Your assumption that you would prevail in such a battle shows utter naivety, solipsism and underestimation of the opponent.
The obvious thing, which you don't need any specialized knowledge to understand, is that people who routinely enforce such orders will be vastly better equipped and prepared than you are for the type of confrontation you're planning.
No, only diplomatic notes. It says so in the article.
That should be your first clue.
No. The U.S. clearly values a uniform, professional and modern appearance in its diplomatic correspondence. The article indicates that pressure for this change had been coming from many directions. In general, the government achieves economy by carefully standardizing. Failure to standardize is usually a false economy.
Times New Roman is one of the most common typefaces in business correspondence. It's available on Windows PCs. The U.S. wanted to appear modern and businesslike, not clever and arty.
Mollie's Job, by Bill Adler, documents the loss of one American manufacturing job and its migration to Mexico. An interesting read.
I like it when someone introduces a note of reality into slashdot.
A 56k connection that downloads continuously for a month will use 18GB of transfer. That's roughly $36 - $90 worth of upstream bandwidth.
I agree that it resembles the Reformation; I disagree that "It was all good".
The Catholic church has declined greatly in power since that time. Likewise, if the entertainment industry loses this war, it will be reduced to a shadow of its former self. Of course, the power and scope of the individual citizen will expand in proportion.
Except that it's not really proof. It's a computer file containing an email message, which any spammer could write in three minutes. And by the same token, if the file is genuine, the sender can claim it's fake. Congress was right to focus on violations that are easier to prove or disprove.
It is a good practice for legitimate list operators, but it is not a good basis for criminal prosecution.
No. Nor did I expect arrests within mere days of the bill taking effect. I would expect such investigations to take several months, ranging up to a year. I looked for an example on the DOJ websites, and didn't find too many. But here's one example of the lead time between a crime and indictment - more than four months. I would expect spam investigations to take longer, because the investigators will want to collect evidence of many violations rather than charging a spammer with a single count.