Ok, so the compiler costs money. It costs money to purchase the computer that software runs on. What is the first step of running or compiling any piece of software? Purchase a computer. It seems wrong to get hung up on the the price of purchasing the compiler software while ignoring the investment costs of simply purchasing a computer and internet access. Or in this case the cost of purchasing an iPhone.

There doesn't seem to be anything requiring the compiler to be free.

Don't forget about listening to music, watching movies -- dvd playing is still problematic -- and downloading porn.

Wouldn't it be great if there were a way to make security convenient? Is there anything out there that monitors the type of action being taken and only prompts for credentials when the action looks suspicious? I know that if I authenticate on my linux boxes I won't be asked for my password again if I do something else in a short period of time. It's smart enough to know that if I just typed in my password 10 seconds ago, there's no need to do it again. (Which is a potential hole if there was a program running as the user that monitor requests for passwords and then executed the "bad" code immediately afterwards.)

If there were a way for the OS to monitor my actions and know that if I go to Add/Remove Programs and try to install something, I don't need to be asked for my password. But if the install is automatic from a script or web pages, then prompt.

AV programs use heuristics to determine things that might be viruses, could the os learn or take an intelligent guess (erring on the side of security) as to whether or not an action is really initiated by the user?

After all, if I initiate something, I'm just going to put my password in anyway. No reason to prompt.

I wasn't blaming so much as pointing out that like many blogs, slashdot can be an echo chamber. The same opinions are repeated over and over and treated as if they are held by the majority of people. I was younger then and still thought slashdot had a finger on the pulse of technology. It doesn't. It's really great as a news aggregator and the comments are often a hoot, but it isn't what I thought it was.

I remember when ogg first came out. I read slashdot regularly, saw all the information about how great it was, how since it was free it would be easily adopted by hardware makers who didn't need to pay for the privilege. I bought into the hype. I ripped my cd's to ogg files, paid extra money for a neuros player because it was one of the few players that handled ogg files.

Now, 5 years later I have a large collection of ogg files that are essentially useless. No one in the mainstream uses ogg, despite the superiority and price. Whenever I get a new player, I have to carefully read the specs to see if it will play my oggs. Few do. Luckily I have the cds and I can simply re-rip them to mp3s as I find the time/care too.

My guess is that the same thing will happen with theora. It may be superior. It may be cheaper. But I just don't think it will catch on. It's another example of the slashdot echo chamber.

Shoot, I'll pick up a couple just for weekend fun in my dungeon.

Flash can play multiple formats, so just because you don't like flv doesn't mean you can't use something else, like h264.

I got in just fine not 10 seconds ago.

Nope. Everyone is assuming this is a torrent because it is the most popular form of file sharing. Many of the old school peer to peer file sharing apps *by default* shared your documents folder. You could turn it off, but most people don't.

Many confidential files have been leaked this way. http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/Citigroup-Customer-Data-Leaked-on-LimeWire/

There used to even be guides to tell you what were common digital camera prefixes so you could do a search for CIM*.jpg or DSC*.jpg and browse people's private folders.

If you were a company or nation involved in espionage, getting on a p2p network and searching for files with obvious names would be a good place to start.

http://bizsecurity.about.com/b/2008/07/08/limewire-and-working-at-home.htm

It isn't just limewire of course, that's just the first one I could remember from years ago. There's also eMule and many others.

In addition to firing the person responsible, the entire IT staff should be reviewed if not fired. My guess though is that this is some ceo who specifically told IT that he was exempt from the security rules. C*Os are the biggest security risk because they tell people that the security rules don't apply to them. Remember that cdw? commercial about the boss who infects an entire office because he let's his kid use the company network?

Make sure you understand that you have a very, very, very wide range of users. I deal with non-tech graduate students all the time(the same age as the youngest teachers in the field) and they are not tech savvy. They can myspace and youtube, and maybe superpoke someone on facebook, but that's it. Don't expect the youngest teachers to be the most techy. You'll find good, older teachers near retirement that can give you a run for your money.

Be aware that most k-12 schools have almost no budget. They can get money for hardware/software purchases, but a *good* tech to handle some of the idiosyncrasies of F/OSS is out of their budgets. A 50 computer lab on a 4 year rotation(many schools would kill for computers that new) only costs around $15,000 a year. They'll come with an os installed and maybe a cheap educational copy of office. To hire someone, say 40k-50k a year + benefits, to put a different os on the desktops is a huge expense.

My suggestion would be to start small. Make the decision making process open and transparent. Ask schools to have a cost/benefit analysis of the software purchases. You'll see your biggest savings in server apps, not desktops.

See if you can get schools to have a traveling tech, consolidate servers, etc. This can be difficult. A lot depends on what state you are in. A midwestern state, with lots of small schools with low enrollments(30-50 in a graduating class) may be better served by server consolidation. On the other hand, if you are in a big city where the graduating class is bigger than the entire k-12 school I graduated from, you'll have a bigger budget and a better chance of getting an onsite tech.

Show them security. Student records are highly confidential. Show them how spending less on the server software can increase their security.

It really comes down to knowing your audience and what they want and expect.

Does hosting your own bbs count as peer to peer? I didn't do that, a little before my time, but many people did host files on their bbs boards.

On Windows it is really easy to use the msconfig tool and stop things like the itunes updater, google updater, quicktime assistant, acrobat speedup, tkbell(the realplayer app) and a host of others from starting.

Uncheck what you don't want to start. Decide you really like the updater? Go back and click the check box.

Because I actually tested the beta and compared it to Vista? I'm not saying it is the world's greatest operating system. Eventually, XP will die and neither Mac nor PC are going to be an option where I work. And in the enterprise, there are some good client management reasons to go with windows.

But anyway, on to the comparison of Vista and 7. On a Dell Optiplex 620 with 1 gig of ram, 7 runs faster and is more responsive than Vista. I gained about 30 seconds in boot time and application launches, while not really significantly faster, feel faster. I don't consider a 1 or 2 second load difference really significant.

The interface differences are going to confuse some people, but they'll learn.

Given a choice between XP, Vista and 7, for the very near term I would rate them XP, 7, and Vista in a distant third. But a year from now, we may be hard pressed to find XP drivers for new hardware. In our 2010 purchasing year, XP will be about 9 years old. Considering that the driver model changed, hardware manufacturers are going to have to choose between Vista/7 driver development and developing for a 9 year old os. I'm betting the opt for 7 drivers before XP.

I think the reason that everyone is so happy about 7 is that it means they can skip the oh so very painful Vista release entirely. I know I'm thinking that if we can just hang on to XP for another year, we can avoid Vista and go to 7, which isn't as bad as Vista.

You missed the point of the time capsule idea. :) The fun is for the students of today to add the personal notes about how cool a game is, or how cutting edge a computer is. Then the future kids get to be historians and examine and "unearth" the capsule.

Just about every item preserved in every school sponsored time capsule can be bought on e-bay today or just seen in a museum. That's not the point. The point is to give both sets of students a connection to history, to make it fun and part of their lives instead of just a one day field trip to a museum to see things they don't have a connection to.