C++ will just make things more confusing for a new programmer.
That's a good point, but I'd argue two cases against it:
C is a hard language for beginners to learn. Manual pointer handling, 50 ways to shoot your feet off, confusing "=" and "==". None of these trivial language-specific coding issues are things that a learner of "programming" should be troubled with. These days there isn't even any need to - there are plenty of alternatives.
C programmers make terrible C++ programmers. Ask anyone who works with, and designs in, a real OO environment. OK, obviously some C programmers make the leap, but the vast majority still think in C terms, and never get properly into the OO mindset.
C++ also seems to be turning into a buzzword now. "OOh its C, but its got a ++ after it, it must be better!"
Now ? That's a problem from ten years ago. I barely notice it these days -- in fact, few non-geeks still remember there was a C beforehand.
a program runs linearly
They don't. Programs haven't run linearly for a decade; since windowing systems became commonplace. Machine code might still run linearly, but any macroscopic non-trivial "program" these days, even in VB, needs to worry about asynchronous events, let alone threading models. This is all horrible and complicated, and best handled by good class structure in a good run-time environment.
I've written a little PL/1, ported a _huge_ Algol 60 program to FORTRAN, and coded a fair bit in object Pascal(s), C++ and now a little Java. (CORAL, Eiffel and a few weirdies too.)
PL/1 was bloatedness incarnate. It was bloated in places that didn't need to be bloated, and added nothing for their being bloated. The whole thing looked like bad editing on the output of a roomful of skilled language designers; no one piece was bad, but there was no reason why there had to be quite so many ways to do something. No-one had stood up in the meeting and said "Why are we adding that feature ?". A mil-spec Cadillac, if ever there was.
C++ is ugly, but it's ugly for a reason. It's an evolutionary answer to the problem "Take the One True Geek Language and stick objects onto it". It's still one of the world's all-time greatest Hacks, and I still hate it.
The idea of teaching newbies C++ as a first language horrifies me; not because it will produce bad C++ coders, but because it's a very slow way of teaching people advanced OO concepts. It's also going to drive away an awful lot of people who simply don't have the dedication to suffer through their thousandth bad pointer error.
Why not teach Java ? It has a good a claim to being a "competent teaching language" as most others, it gives immediate and satisfying results (unlike some scripting platforms), and it has commercial relevance.
Call me when they can fix the screen size too.
on
Power Up That iMac
·
· Score: 2
iMacs are cute. I'd like one as a decorator, and if it ran Linux I could justify if as having some sort of useful function, even just as a web client.
But make me use a monitor that size ? That's Cruel and Unusual Punishment in my book.
I started working for BT (Horwood House) in '82, and we were well familiar with BT's use of hyperlinking at that time -- Prestel was a really cutting edge solution. 8-)
OTOH, we were still jealous of Xanadu, as they'd invented all the good stuff a few years before us, and we knew it.
Open Source is there to avoid you getting shafted by a discontinued product, it's not an in-perpetuity licence to a free lunch.
If I write an on-line app, it costs me money. Who is going to pay for that ? If I'm selling it, or selling services based on it as an Open Source app, then that's a business and revenue model I can work with. OTOH, the point about the "online" apps that you complain are a "breach" of the GPL is that because they're never distributed, there's no opportunity to generate revenue from them.
Altruism is all very well, and many geeks will happily code for free, but would you like to explain it to my landlord and my catfood supplier too ?
It would be simplicity itself to demonstrate that you do not have the crypto keys
How ?
RIP is fundamentally broken on technical grounds, as well as fundamentally immoral. This is a good example of just why it's unworkable.
Under the current draft of RIP, StealthBarbie here lays you open to prosecution. It's unlikely to happen, but it's no more daft than the conviction of the Cambridge Two.
Governments are expected to behave like arrogant bastards who think they have a God-given right to snoop. The Australian story is interesting and should be run, but it's no surprise that Australia (which is pretty dodgy on this issue already) has just slid one notch further down.
OTOH, if you can't trust Barbie, who can you trust ?
What about people with prosthetic fingers made from Barbie's knee joints ? (Scientific American a month or two back) Should they be worried about what their hands get up to when they're not looking ?
Re:I fail to see what the big deal is...
on
Mattel Spyware
·
· Score: 2
If I want unknown comms going on with my machinery, then I will ask for it. Any company or grouping that installs such unspecified back doors onto my equipment without my permission will be regarded in much the same light as someone installing a copy of BackOrifice.
I trust Mattel just about enough to believe they're not going to deliberately steal my banking details. OTOH, I strongly suspect that they will start snooping marketing demographics on my kids, and history tells us that implementation of such things is often pretty poor - What happens if the next "I Love You" outbreak is actually an exploit for a weakly secured Barbieserver ? Auto-downloaded pr0n startup banners for anyone running Barbieprograms ?
How does this sit with the UK RIP Bill ? If Mattel are sending secret crypto from my machine, what should I do if Jack Straw's stormtroopers turn up on my doorstep demanding the keys ? Send Barbie to jail for two years ?
I think there's a really good T shirt design in here somewhere. Barbie, through a jail cell window, and a caption along the lines of "Strong Crypto - Why can Mattel use it to snoop, but I can't secure my email ?"
Re:explanation from the learning company
on
Mattel Spyware
·
· Score: 1
It's the perfect banner ad
"good" depends on which side of Mattel's marketing department you are.
I ported that algotrithm to the UK and "Laskys", our local equivalent of Electrode Hut.
Laskys, being a bit more up-market, sold HP-85s with built-in thermal printers. If you used Basic's normal "PRINT" function not "DISPLAY" (Rocky Mountain Basic!), then you could spew out rolls of thermal paper. Friends would compete for the shortest marquee display programs that would print large letters sideways onto this stuff, and could hopefully be typed in and run before the shop's sellrats could turf us off.
Not much of a BREAK key on a HP-85, as I remember...
More than that ! The final para also seems to remove your ability to operate a business based on extensions to XrML, in favour of handing it over to ContentGuard.
Here's a good one I've only just discovered (Yes, it's the Borg again). I'm trying to build a cross-platform Java Servlet to move away from ASP, but need to build the first demo on IIS.
A dialog box; "This project requires Microsoft language extensions" and a Yes/No choice for whether to install them. FUD is courtesy of the warning "If you choose No, your project may not compile", so naturally I chose "Yes" - After all, there's no downside to doing so, or they'd have told me about it.
After that, a further dialogue box; "Use of the Microsoft language extensions for Java results in compiled code that will run only on Windows systems with the Microsoft Virtual Machine". However this time, there's only an "OK" button to confirm and even the close button on the dialog doesn't work. I'm stuffed, I now realise I really do not want this option, but I'm stuck with it.
Naturally, after this my own "language" was rather extended.
Collecting IP's, adding cookies etc. don't require you to sign/view/accept an agreement!
That's the point - they ought to. Even cookies on trivial GIFs are significant. DoubleClick only did it on obvious banner ads, but what about those collecting traffic stats from single pixel GIFs ?
It will take a while, but IMHO systems like P3P and APPEL are the inevitable solution to this type of data-mining. The only question is if they'll be adopted - Pr0n sites use RSAC because there's a bad press if they don't, but who is going to rouse the majority against big corporate retailers just doing what comes naturally ?
If I ask to pay in a shop with gold dust (which is awkward for the shop), because I don't trust Gov'mint paper money, they'll treat me as a mad loon and happily lose the business. Will shopping on-line become the same ? If I insist on major anonymity, will I become so awkward to serve that it's simply not worth the effort ? A few paranoid geeks isn't a market worth chasing - only if Mr & Mrs mass-market AOL-user start to demand privacy will it be worth shops supporting it.
One area I've not yet seen discussed is that of XML Schema licensing. These are a huge, and as yet unappreciated, area of IP rights.
What is XML all about ? IMHO, it's both encouraging easy extensibility, and easy distribution of the resulting schemas between parties who wish to communicate.
BizTalk is a well-known example of a schema exchange medium, but what should be a perfect usage for a reliable and proven mechanism like GNU CopyLeft is actually a vague and poorly worded para that gives Microsoft the ability to do whatever they like with your work:
Publishers who upload or otherwise submit contribute schemas or other works to the BizTalk.org library grant Microsoft the right to display, store, transmit, make copies for archive purposes, create derivative works and make these contributed works publicly available in any way they please.
Now speaking personally, I will grant redistribution rights on my own creative work to Microsoft when they start granting theirs to me....
As another example, here's a snippet from the licence for XrML. The bizarre thing here is that my current project is so scared of the implications of this licence that we've adopted a clean room policy to avoid any possible impact on our own future development work - yet one of my coworkers is actually quoted and named on their site as being an advocate of the project !
Modifications to the XrML Specifications:
Subject to the terms and conditions of this License Agreement, ContentGuard grants to You the right to make XrML Modifications, provided that You:
provide ContentGuard copies of all XrML Modifications made by or on behalf of You;
for any XrML Modification made by You which is incorporated by ContentGuard in a later version of the XrML Specifications, assign all right, title and interest in such XrML Modification to ContentGuard and agree that this License Agreement shall constitute such assignment; and
upon written notice from ContentGuard, cease use of any XrML Modification which has not been incorporated into a later version of the XrML Specifications.
Your License Grants to ContentGuard and to Other Licensees:
Subject to the terms and conditions of this License You grant ContentGuard and all other Licensees a world-wide, royalty-free unlimited license to use all XrML Derivative Works that You create. This license includes the right to use, copy and create Derivative Works based on the XrML Derivative Works. You grant to ContentGuard the exclusive right to sublicense XrML Derivative Works that You create.
Heard of it. Can't remember though if it will start immediately on installation, or if it needs to wait for a Windows restart (like everything else !). This is not only a screenshot (which isn't impossible), but it's (allegedly) a screenshot made very soon after the white-hat first connected to the Spammer's machine.
Any BO experts around ? - How quickly can you bring it up and functioning ?
Sealand will inevitably have thin comms links and so will be more exposed than most to a DoS attack. Recent cases have involved ISPs pulling user sites simply for being attacked in this way - they accept the target site is blameless, but pulled it "for the good of the majority of users" and the restoration of their own comms.
How would Havenco respond to such an attack ? Taking the moral highground, or the pragmatic approach of letting individual users be picked off ?
If you are requested to disclose the contents of a server under RIP, will you claim to be in the UK, or outside it ? How strongly will you assert this ?
Yet again it's time to plug Lawrence Lessig's book "Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace".
I've heard this guy speak at HP Labs. Well, he didn't really speak, just beamed Krell rays at us. Probably the smartest person in the room, and that's one very smart roomful of people - He even made me believe that there could be a purpose in having lawyers (although imagine what he might have been as a coder, if he'd not been lured by The Dark Side 8-) )
Back in the beginning, the Net was geeks piping IP traffic to each other. The technology just moved packets, it didn't care what they were, so that's how the "laws" and netiquette operated. Now we have A-T-W and AT&T trying to turn it into glorifed cable TV with programmed content -- If you liked the way it was, then better understand what's going on today.
If you know anything about Utah, you would know how much of an insult that is there
Nothing is a significant insult in the mouth of a 16 year old kid. This is an entirely inconsequential matter, blown out of all proportion.
Maybe this is the worst possible thing that kid could ever have done. Maybe it's entirely justified, by the previous comments in the school newspaper. I simply don't care. 16 year olds simply don't count, as far as their "libels" might "damage the reputation" of others. No-one ought to listen to the derogatory opinions of a kid (that goes with the territory of being a "kid") -- Yes, it's a good thing to listen to kids, especially your own, but they _will_ bad-mouth people without justification and so should never be regarded as capable of causing real hurt by this.
Is America, or Utah, such a wonderful place that the worst crime you have to worry about is to be bad-mouthed by an angry kid ? Here in the UK, we have a more considered opinion.
Slashdot Mirror
C++ will just make things more confusing for a new programmer.
That's a good point, but I'd argue two cases against it:
C++ also seems to be turning into a buzzword now. "OOh its C, but its got a ++ after it, it must be better!"
Now ? That's a problem from ten years ago. I barely notice it these days -- in fact, few non-geeks still remember there was a C beforehand.
a program runs linearly
They don't.
Programs haven't run linearly for a decade; since windowing systems became commonplace. Machine code might still run linearly, but any macroscopic non-trivial "program" these days, even in VB, needs to worry about asynchronous events, let alone threading models. This is all horrible and complicated, and best handled by good class structure in a good run-time environment.
Am I old or something ?
I've written a little PL/1, ported a _huge_ Algol 60 program to FORTRAN, and coded a fair bit in object Pascal(s), C++ and now a little Java. (CORAL, Eiffel and a few weirdies too.)
PL/1 was bloatedness incarnate. It was bloated in places that didn't need to be bloated, and added nothing for their being bloated. The whole thing looked like bad editing on the output of a roomful of skilled language designers; no one piece was bad, but there was no reason why there had to be quite so many ways to do something. No-one had stood up in the meeting and said "Why are we adding that feature ?".
A mil-spec Cadillac, if ever there was.
C++ is ugly, but it's ugly for a reason. It's an evolutionary answer to the problem "Take the One True Geek Language and stick objects onto it". It's still one of the world's all-time greatest Hacks, and I still hate it.
The idea of teaching newbies C++ as a first language horrifies me; not because it will produce bad C++ coders, but because it's a very slow way of teaching people advanced OO concepts. It's also going to drive away an awful lot of people who simply don't have the dedication to suffer through their thousandth bad pointer error.
Why not teach Java ? It has a good a claim to being a "competent teaching language" as most others, it gives immediate and satisfying results (unlike some scripting platforms), and it has commercial relevance.
iMacs are cute. I'd like one as a decorator, and if it ran Linux I could justify if as having some sort of useful function, even just as a web client.
But make me use a monitor that size ? That's Cruel and Unusual Punishment in my book.
I started working for BT (Horwood House) in '82, and we were well familiar with BT's use of hyperlinking at that time -- Prestel was a really cutting edge solution. 8-)
OTOH, we were still jealous of Xanadu, as they'd invented all the good stuff a few years before us, and we knew it.
Open Source is there to avoid you getting shafted by a discontinued product, it's not an in-perpetuity licence to a free lunch.
If I write an on-line app, it costs me money. Who is going to pay for that ? If I'm selling it, or selling services based on it as an Open Source app, then that's a business and revenue model I can work with. OTOH, the point about the "online" apps that you complain are a "breach" of the GPL is that because they're never distributed, there's no opportunity to generate revenue from them.
Altruism is all very well, and many geeks will happily code for free, but would you like to explain it to my landlord and my catfood supplier too ?
It would be simplicity itself to demonstrate that you do not have the crypto keys
How ?
RIP is fundamentally broken on technical grounds, as well as fundamentally immoral. This is a good example of just why it's unworkable.
Under the current draft of RIP, StealthBarbie here lays you open to prosecution. It's unlikely to happen, but it's no more daft than the conviction of the Cambridge Two.
Man bites Dog is a story, Dog bites Man isn't
Governments are expected to behave like arrogant bastards who think they have a God-given right to snoop. The Australian story is interesting and should be run, but it's no surprise that Australia (which is pretty dodgy on this issue already) has just slid one notch further down.
OTOH, if you can't trust Barbie, who can you trust ?
What about people with prosthetic fingers made from Barbie's knee joints ? (Scientific American a month or two back) Should they be worried about what their hands get up to when they're not looking ?
If I want unknown comms going on with my machinery, then I will ask for it. Any company or grouping that installs such unspecified back doors onto my equipment without my permission will be regarded in much the same light as someone installing a copy of BackOrifice.
I trust Mattel just about enough to believe they're not going to deliberately steal my banking details. OTOH, I strongly suspect that they will start snooping marketing demographics on my kids, and history tells us that implementation of such things is often pretty poor - What happens if the next "I Love You" outbreak is actually an exploit for a weakly secured Barbieserver ? Auto-downloaded pr0n startup banners for anyone running Barbieprograms ?
ROFL !
How does this sit with the UK RIP Bill ? If Mattel are sending secret crypto from my machine, what should I do if Jack Straw's stormtroopers turn up on my doorstep demanding the keys ? Send Barbie to jail for two years ?
I think there's a really good T shirt design in here somewhere. Barbie, through a jail cell window, and a caption along the lines of "Strong Crypto - Why can Mattel use it to snoop, but I can't secure my email ?"
It's the perfect banner ad
"good" depends on which side of Mattel's marketing department you are.
Where's the Kalman filter ? We couldn't have got to the Moon without it.
Equally, we'd never have ICBMs and an arms race without it, but when did morality ever stop geeks inventing stuff ?
I ported that algotrithm to the UK and "Laskys", our local equivalent of Electrode Hut.
Laskys, being a bit more up-market, sold HP-85s with built-in thermal printers. If you used Basic's normal "PRINT" function not "DISPLAY" (Rocky Mountain Basic!), then you could spew out rolls of thermal paper. Friends would compete for the shortest marquee display programs that would print large letters sideways onto this stuff, and could hopefully be typed in and run before the shop's sellrats could turf us off.
Not much of a BREAK key on a HP-85, as I remember...
More than that ! The final para also seems to remove your ability to operate a business based on extensions to XrML, in favour of handing it over to ContentGuard.
Here's a good one I've only just discovered (Yes, it's the Borg again). I'm trying to build a cross-platform Java Servlet to move away from ASP, but need to build the first demo on IIS.
A dialog box; "This project requires Microsoft language extensions" and a Yes/No choice for whether to install them. FUD is courtesy of the warning "If you choose No, your project may not compile", so naturally I chose "Yes" - After all, there's no downside to doing so, or they'd have told me about it.
After that, a further dialogue box; "Use of the Microsoft language extensions for Java results in compiled code that will run only on Windows systems with the Microsoft Virtual Machine". However this time, there's only an "OK" button to confirm and even the close button on the dialog doesn't work. I'm stuffed, I now realise I really do not want this option, but I'm stuck with it.
Naturally, after this my own "language" was rather extended.
Collecting IP's, adding cookies etc. don't require you to sign/view/accept an agreement!
That's the point - they ought to. Even cookies on trivial GIFs are significant. DoubleClick only did it on obvious banner ads, but what about those collecting traffic stats from single pixel GIFs ?
It will take a while, but IMHO systems like P3P and APPEL are the inevitable solution to this type of data-mining. The only question is if they'll be adopted - Pr0n sites use RSAC because there's a bad press if they don't, but who is going to rouse the majority against big corporate retailers just doing what comes naturally ?
If I ask to pay in a shop with gold dust (which is awkward for the shop), because I don't trust Gov'mint paper money, they'll treat me as a mad loon and happily lose the business. Will shopping on-line become the same ? If I insist on major anonymity, will I become so awkward to serve that it's simply not worth the effort ? A few paranoid geeks isn't a market worth chasing - only if Mr & Mrs mass-market AOL-user start to demand privacy will it be worth shops supporting it.
One area I've not yet seen discussed is that of XML Schema licensing. These are a huge, and as yet unappreciated, area of IP rights.
What is XML all about ? IMHO, it's both encouraging easy extensibility, and easy distribution of the resulting schemas between parties who wish to communicate.
BizTalk is a well-known example of a schema exchange medium, but what should be a perfect usage for a reliable and proven mechanism like GNU CopyLeft is actually a vague and poorly worded para that gives Microsoft the ability to do whatever they like with your work:
Publishers who upload or otherwise submit contribute schemas or other works to the BizTalk.org library grant Microsoft the right to display, store, transmit, make copies for archive purposes, create derivative works and make these contributed works publicly available in any way they please.
Now speaking personally, I will grant redistribution rights on my own creative work to Microsoft when they start granting theirs to me....
As another example, here's a snippet from the licence for XrML. The bizarre thing here is that my current project is so scared of the implications of this licence that we've adopted a clean room policy to avoid any possible impact on our own future development work - yet one of my coworkers is actually quoted and named on their site as being an advocate of the project !
Modifications to the XrML Specifications:
Subject to the terms and conditions of this License Agreement, ContentGuard grants to You the right to make XrML Modifications, provided that You:
Your License Grants to ContentGuard and to Other Licensees:
Subject to the terms and conditions of this License You grant ContentGuard and all other Licensees a world-wide, royalty-free unlimited license to use all XrML Derivative Works that You create. This license includes the right to use, copy and create Derivative Works based on the XrML Derivative Works. You grant to ContentGuard the exclusive right to sublicense XrML Derivative Works that You create.
But I never read the agreement!
There's some discussion in the P3P spec about the need for a "Safe Zone" to solve just this problem.
This insect had been programmed with basic functions - and in reaction to certain stimuli, it would act in a particular way.
So, the Kevin Warwick emulator is clearly proceeding well.
NewSci article on cyborgia ? - Run straight towards it!
Transponder activated catflap ? - In you go !
What are they gonna do? Give ".fr" to someone else?
Maybe not France, but it could happen to a smaller ccTLD like .cx , Christmas Island.
Ever heard of something called BackOrfice?
Heard of it. Can't remember though if it will start immediately on installation, or if it needs to wait for a Windows restart (like everything else !). This is not only a screenshot (which isn't impossible), but it's (allegedly) a screenshot made very soon after the white-hat first connected to the Spammer's machine.
Any BO experts around ? - How quickly can you bring it up and functioning ?
Sealand will inevitably have thin comms links and so will be more exposed than most to a DoS attack. Recent cases have involved ISPs pulling user sites simply for being attacked in this way - they accept the target site is blameless, but pulled it "for the good of the majority of users" and the restoration of their own comms.
How would Havenco respond to such an attack ? Taking the moral highground, or the pragmatic approach of letting individual users be picked off ?
If you are requested to disclose the contents of a server under RIP, will you claim to be in the UK, or outside it ? How strongly will you assert this ?
Sealand has already managed to fend off Royal Marines and helicopters (although not on the same day).
Yet again it's time to plug Lawrence Lessig's book "Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace".
I've heard this guy speak at HP Labs. Well, he didn't really speak, just beamed Krell rays at us. Probably the smartest person in the room, and that's one very smart roomful of people - He even made me believe that there could be a purpose in having lawyers (although imagine what he might have been as a coder, if he'd not been lured by The Dark Side 8-) )
Back in the beginning, the Net was geeks piping IP traffic to each other. The technology just moved packets, it didn't care what they were, so that's how the "laws" and netiquette operated. Now we have A-T-W and AT&T trying to turn it into glorifed cable TV with programmed content -- If you liked the way it was, then better understand what's going on today.
Amazon have the book. Definitely read this one.
If you know anything about Utah, you would know how much of an insult that is there
Nothing is a significant insult in the mouth of a 16 year old kid. This is an entirely inconsequential matter, blown out of all proportion.
Maybe this is the worst possible thing that kid could ever have done. Maybe it's entirely justified, by the previous comments in the school newspaper. I simply don't care. 16 year olds simply don't count, as far as their "libels" might "damage the reputation" of others. No-one ought to listen to the derogatory opinions of a kid (that goes with the territory of being a "kid") -- Yes, it's a good thing to listen to kids, especially your own, but they _will_ bad-mouth people without justification and so should never be regarded as capable of causing real hurt by this.
Is America, or Utah, such a wonderful place that the worst crime you have to worry about is to be bad-mouthed by an angry kid ? Here in the UK, we have a more considered opinion.