Comment Re:IANAPhysicist, but... (Score 1) 292
One standard, starched, American flag...
Oh. Shit.
Submission + - Who gets the unfinished software?
zaunuz writes: What happends to unfinished software, mainly consisting of bits and pieces of perl-code, if the company you wrote it for goes bankrupt? This might be the case where i currently work. For the past year i have been in charge of a fairly big project, but due to poor economical planning higher up in the system, it is quite possible that the company will die before me and my team are finished. If this happends, we would like to continue the project on our own, since it is fairly close to completion, and it would suck to just scrap what we've invested so many hours and cups of coffee into. The creditors are most likely to be the new owners of the code, however, do the creditors care about unfinished code? Afterall, first they'd have to understand what it does. After they've done that, they'd have to finish it themselves. Has anyone else experienced a similar situation?
Submission + - C vs. C++/OOP Paradigm
An anonymous reader writes: I just started work for a small start-up company that does R&D software for media. I quickly discovered that my boss is very resistant to using C++ and object-oriented programming; he insists that we standardize on using C. This goes against the last eight years of my education in being trained to use OOP and also arises concerns for the company in creating and maintaining reusable and scalable software. My boss states that he had bad experiences at previous companies that used C++ and OOP that resulted in less readable code. I suspect that he has little knowledge of the OOP paradigm and its advantages in writing good software. I'm wondering if the Slashdot community can provide some suggestions on how to approach a boss with strong convictions on this issue. Why should we be using C++ vs. C? What are the benefits of OOP? Why is it important for a start-up company to address these issues early on in order to develop good coding practices?
Submission + - Microsoft playing dirty in Virtualization (vmware.com)
An anonymous reader writes: In this whitepaer from VMWare:
( http://www.vmware.com/solutions/whitepapers/msoft_ licensing_wp.html )
They detail the various things Microsoft is doing to ensure they own the virtualization market. This sounds like the usual questionable business tactics that has put Microsoft in trouble with the various competition watchdogs around the world. Is the open source virtualization world concerned about these moves by Microsoft? Has anyone started any legal actions against these activities?
( http://www.vmware.com/solutions/whitepapers/msoft
They detail the various things Microsoft is doing to ensure they own the virtualization market. This sounds like the usual questionable business tactics that has put Microsoft in trouble with the various competition watchdogs around the world. Is the open source virtualization world concerned about these moves by Microsoft? Has anyone started any legal actions against these activities?
Submission + - Asus stuns Computex with $189 laptop (pcpro.co.uk)
slashthedot writes: "As if Intel's cheap laptop release last month wasn't enough, Asus sprang a surprise during Intel's Computex keynote today with the announcement of a $189 laptop.
The notebook uses a custom-written Linux operating system, measures roughly 120 x 100 x 30mm (WDH) and weighs only 900g, boots in 15 seconds from its solid-state hard disk. Asus chairman Jonney Shih claimed the 3ePC would be available in all areas of the world, not only developing nations.
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/114773/asus-stuns-comp utex-with-100-laptop.html"
The notebook uses a custom-written Linux operating system, measures roughly 120 x 100 x 30mm (WDH) and weighs only 900g, boots in 15 seconds from its solid-state hard disk. Asus chairman Jonney Shih claimed the 3ePC would be available in all areas of the world, not only developing nations.
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/114773/asus-stuns-com
Submission + - OpenOffice Virus Found in Use (zdnet.com.au)
eldavojohn writes: "Remember the 'SB/Badbunny-A' virus that wasn't in the wild yet? Well, according to Symantec, it is and it's not caring what platform you're running. The respective behaviors of the designated worm in the wild: "On Windows systems, it drops a file called drop.bad which is moved to the system.ini in the user's mIRC folder, while executing the Javascript virus badbunny.js that replicates to other files in the folder. On Apple Mac systems, the worm drops one of two Ruby script viruses in files called badbunny.rb and badbunnya.rb. On Linux systems, the worm drops both badbunny.py as an XChat script and badbunny.pl as a Perl virus.""
Submission + - Attorney sues website over his online rating (nwsource.com)
An anonymous reader writes: The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is reporting that a local attorney is suing legal startup Avvo.com over a rating that was algorithmically assigned.
The story touches over the controversy of computers grading humans. Such practices are not new: the New York Times earlier this year reported on Google using algorithms to determine applicant suitability.
But what happens when you don't like the result? Can a computer program be considered defamatory?
