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Networking

Submission + - SPAM: Biggest telecom contract in world split 5 ways

Submitted by alphadogg
alphadogg writes: All five carriers that bid on the U.S. government's 10-year, multibillion-dollar Networx Enterprise program were awarded contracts on Thursday, opening up the federal telecommunications market to more competition than ever before. The Networx Enterprise winners are AT&T, Level 3 Communications, Qwest Government Services, Sprint Nextel and Verizon Business. Networx Enterprise will provide secure, managed and wireless IP services. Networx Enterprise is the second half of the federal government's long-awaited Networx program, which has an estimated value of $20 billion through the next decade. [spam URL stripped]- carriers-awarded-networx-enterprise-contracts.html
Spam

Submission + - First Hand Account of a Botnet Waking Up

Submitted by Talaria
Talaria writes: This is the first hand account, from a large U.S. broadband provider, of what happened when a zombie botnet — their customers' compromised computers — woke up and started attacking. As a total of more than 3000 customer computers woke up and started spewing Russian spam, this security team member details what occurred.
Networking

Submission + - How reliable is FTP?

Submitted by NetKidoo
NetKidoo writes: Hi Slashdot Community, I am a software engineer. Recently there was an incident at my work regarding FTP. When we release our final work product to our clients the usual procedure is as follows: 1. Test the final work product 2. Upload this to an FTP server 3. Download this from FTP Server 4. Do a validation of this downloaded work product. It happened that one of my colleagues objected to my way of doing this. He was of the opinion that this is redundant effort which I was putting to validate the downloaded work product from FTP server. What does the community feel about this? Though logically it appears there can be nothing wrong with this, Can there be any issues if I do not do this so called 'redundant' validation? I would be very interested to hear from the Geeks of slashdot community. Thanks ~Netkidoo
Microsoft

Submission + - Why wont MS listen to me when I report a bug?

Submitted by bsossaman
bsossaman writes: I've been telling them about this for a while and it's still in Vista. Ever try to ping 192.168.1.64? Sure, resolves fine. The problem comes in when you have embedded system programmers that like to pad with zeros and VP's that are unable to think clearly. Try pinging 192.168.001.064. Hmm, didn't think that was the same as 192.168.1.52. Try to start a ping at 192.168.001.008. Hours of fun!
Announcements

Submission + - Flying Dog Brewery releases Open Source Beer

Submitted by
Brianne Covel
Brianne Covel writes: "Denver, CO — May 29, 2007 — Denver's Flying Dog Brewery today announced plans to release what is believed to be the first "open source" beer to hit the market in the U.S. "Open source" is a term most commonly used in the software industry and refers to any program whose source code is made available for use or modification as users or other developers see fit. In this case, Flying Dog's Open Source Beer Project will allow beer drinkers and homebrewers to create or recommend modifications to the recipe. The Open Source Beer Project will start as a Dopplebock but the style may evolve as participants offer ideas and tweak the recipe. "We are encouraging input on every part of the recipe, down to how what variety of hops we should use, how much we should use and when we should add them," said Flying Dog's Head Brewer, Matt Brophy. Flying Dog's Director of Marketing, Neal Stewart says that this is a unique way for consumers to participate in the creation of a new beer. "The Open Source Beer is a truly collaborative project and gives our loyal fans the opportunity to buy a beer that they actually played a major role in creating." The Open Source Beer will be Flying Dog's latest "Wild Dog" release and will hit stores in October. Wild Dogs are extremely limited edition beers that come exclusively in hand filled, corked and labeled 750ml bottles. Only 5000 bottles of the Open Source Wild Dogs will be available to the public. Flying Dog's current Wild Dog is a whiskey barrel-aged version of their popular Gonzo Imperial Porter. For more information on the Open Source Beer Project, please visit www.opensourcebeerproject.com . About Flying Dog Flying Dog is Denver's largest brewery and the second largest craft brewery in the state of Colorado. Their award-winning "litter of ales" are available in 45 states. The Brewery is located at 2401 Blake Street, just 2 blocks north of the baseball stadium. Flying Dog's core values of "purposeful, provocative and irreverent" flow through the veins of the brewery's founding owners, George Stranahan and Richard McIntyre. George and Richard were friends with the "Gonzo Journalist," Hunter S. Thompson who coined the brand's tagline "Good People Drink Good Beer" and with the "Gonzo Artist," Ralph Steadman, who illustrates the brand's packaging. For more information, log on to www.flyingdogales.com. ### Contact and Photos: Neal Stewart, Director of Marketing Flying Dog Brewery 720.272.8325"
United States

Submission + - Russia tests "penetrating" ICBM

Submitted by Adambomb
Adambomb writes: The International Herald and others have reported that Russia has tested a new ICBM specifically designed to trump anti-missile systems. Perspectives may vary depending on individual political experience, but definitely food for thought.
Power

Submission + - Has DIGG seen the SLASHDOT light

Submitted by ScrewTivo
ScrewTivo writes: Power ... or ABUSE of power. Here is proof that DIGG is stuffing the ballot box. Slashdot has an authoritarian method of promoting stories. As a long time member I know that and accept that. Howerver DIGG was to be a social voting network. Well it turns out some have more powerful votes than others. Is this a major misrepresentation of DIGG? I am not sure how long this proof will be visible but here it is:
This article has 32 DIGGS . Go to News -> World & Business -> Political News sort by "most popular" You can go down to the stories with only 4 votes and still not find this article!

It hurts to see Slashdot trying to be like DIGG when really Slashdot should just be a great Slashdot.
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft patent claims: A dealying tactic ?

Submitted by
ppadala
ppadala writes: "PCWorld is reporting that Linux Foundation's Jim Zemlin said Microsoft's recent patent claim against Linux and the open source community is a delaying tactic to merely help protect its profits, according to a column penned May 25 in BusinessWeek.

"What most people don't realize is that the story really isn't about patents at all — it's about a rational actor trying to protect its privileged position," wrote Zemlin, the executive director of the consortium.
"
Security

Submission + - World's smallest hardware firewall?

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: An Israeli startup has squeezed a complete hardware firewall into a USB key. The "Yoggie Pico" from Yoggie Systems runs Linux 2.6 along with 13 security applications on a 520MHz PXA270, a powerful Intel processor typically used in high-end smartphones. The Pico works in conjunction with Windows XP or Vista drivers that hijack traffic at network layers 2-3, below the TCP/IP stack, and route it to USB, where the Yoggie analyzes and filters traffic at close-to-100Mbps wireline speeds. The device will hit big-box retailers in the U.S. this month.
The Almighty Buck

Submission + - True cost of failed Illinois video game legslation

Submitted by Mr. Shotgun
Mr. Shotgun writes: Ars is running a story about how the Illinois state government is going to pay off the legal bills from their recently defeated video game crusade. FTA:

the state was scouring department budgets, looking for the $1 million it cost to defend the unconstitutional legislation in court. Yes, you read that right — the State of Illinois spent one meeeellion dollars of taxpayer money on the litigation even as the state budget was starved for cash in other, more pressing areas. And worse yet, they spent it on a bill which, when introduced, was plainly unconstitutional.


Another write up is available here.
Movies

Submission + - Did "Pirates" help save the 'Biz from pira

Submitted by photomonkey
photomonkey writes: CNN.com reports that Pirates: World's End took in $142M, setting the record for a Memorial Day Weekend premiere. Hollywood's take on the weekend is reported as more than $265M, up $18M from the last Memorial Day Weekend record set in 2004.

Sales thus far into the year are at $3.6B, up 6.4% over last year's.

In the same article, an industry analyst estimates that the summer gross could reach an unprecedented $4B.

Does this mean the end of the MPAA's cries of woe over 'piracy on the intertubes'?
Security

Submission + - US two steps away from Dictatorship?

Submitted by carlmenezes
carlmenezes writes: 1. A "Catastrophic Emergency", 2. Execute National Continuity Policy
The President will then have absolute control. Is this not effectively a dictatorship? Why was this not passed through congress? Why did it not receive the press coverage it deserves?
Programming

Submission + - A Windows-Based Packaging Mechanism

Submitted by
FishWithAHammer
FishWithAHammer writes: "As part of my Google Summer of Code project, I'm working with WinLibre to develop a vaguely Debian-esque software download system for Free/open source software on the Windows platform. My reasoning is that open-source software suffers from poor presentation. Most computer laymen, even those aware of open source software, often don't have any idea how to go looking for it — their Google-fu is lacking — but would use it were it easier to access. What I have proposed is both a Debian-style packaging mechanism (capable of using Windows Installer MSIs or not, as the user wishes) and a software "catalog" that takes the best aspects of Synaptic and Linspire's Click-N-Run system. Seamless, simple installation and removal of programs in as straightforward a way as apt-get (there will be a command-line tool as well). I'm posting to Slashdot to get the ideas of you lot who, while you may not be the target audience, can certainly provide insights that can be of value.

There are areas that I'm personally not familiar with, and while I have done some research I would like the opinions of Slashdotters on some others. While at first I intend to set it up so that WinLibre (and I) run only one repository, I am curious as to how this sort of tool could be most useful to network administrators. Customizable repositories will be available; the code will be under the GPL, after all, so it'd be a little hard for them not to be available.

I'm also interested in the ideas of those who might be in a position to roll together packages. I intend to package a number of open-source language interpreters with the core software to allow special pre- and post-install scripts, as well as removal scripts. C#Script, Perl, and Python are definites, as is a Cygwin sh interpreter. We will have some program requirements — chief among them that no registry changes may be made by the program — but some of them, I fear, will require some flexibility; some programs really do require a way to edit the registry, for example, and I am considering offering some sort of tracked way to make registry changes so they can be rolled back on uninstallation of the program.

I'd love to hear what Slashdotters think of this. Think of it as a wishlist, but you don't get any damn ponies.

Ed Ropple (FishWithAHammer)"
Microsoft

Submission + - New Zealand rejects Office for Macs.

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The NZPA is reporting that the New Zealand Ministry of Education has declined to renew a licensing deal for MS Office on 25,000 Macintosh computers in the countries schools. The Education Minister, Steve Maharey, has even gone to suggest schools use free alternative NeoOffice. However a school Principal has spoken out against the decision, claiming the NeoOffice website warned users to expect problems and bugs, saying: "That's not the sort of software we should be expecting kids in New Zealand to be using."

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