Mincer Lightbringer - Slashdot User

London Stock Exchange To Abandon Windows 438

Posted by timothy on Friday July 03, 2009 @09:24AM from the don't-weld-shut-the-doors-then dept.

BBCWatcher writes "Computerworld's Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols reports that the London Stock Exchange is abandoning its Microsoft Windows-based trading platform: 'Anyone who was ever fool enough to believe that Microsoft software was good enough to be used for a mission-critical operation had their face slapped this September when the LSE's Windows-based TradElect system brought the market to a standstill for almost an entire day .... Sources at the LSE tell me to this day that the problem was with TradElect ...'"

Submission + - Richard Stallman says No to Mono. (fsf.org) 4

Submitted by

twitter

on Friday June 26, 2009 @11:22PM

twitter writes: "There's been a lot of fuss about mono lately. After SCO and M$ suing over FAT patents, you would think avoiding anything M$ would be a matter of common sense. RMS now steps into the fray to warn against a serious mistake.
Debian's decision to include Mono in the default installation, for the sake of Tomboy which is an application written in C#, leads the community in a risky direction. It is dangerous to depend on C#, so we need to discourage its use. .... This is not to say that implementing C# is a bad thing. ... [writing and using applications in mono] is taking a gratuitous risk.

"

Comment canceling my moderation (Score 1) 532

by Mincer Lightbringer on Saturday February 21, 2009 @12:14PM (#26941227) Attached to: Ballmer Pleads For Openness To Compete With Apple

(undoing moderation -- i've managed to click the wrong option.)

Submission + - Draconian DRM revealed in Windows 7 4

Submitted by

TechForensics

on Monday February 16, 2009 @08:40AM

TechForensics writes: "A few days' testing of Windows 7 has already disclosed some draconian DRM, some unrelated to media files. A legitimate copy of Photoshop CS4 stopped functioning after we clobberred a nagging registration screen by replacing a .dll with a hacked version. That's not so much a surprise, but what WAS a surprise: Noting that Win7 allows programs like Photoshop to stealthily insert themselves in your firewall exception list. Further, that the OS is crippled towards allowing large software vendors to penetrate your machine. Even further, that that crippling is responsible for disabling of a program based on a modified .dll. Remote attestation, anyone? And then finding that the OS even after reboot has locked you out of your own Local Settings folder; has denied you permission to move or delete the modified DLL; and refuses to allow the replacement of the Local Settings folder after it is unlocked with Unlocker to move it to the Desktop for examination (where it also denies you entry to your own folder). Setting permissions to "allow everyone" was disabled! Re media files, the days of capturing an audio program on your PC are gone if the program originated on your PC. The inputs of your sound card are severely degraded in software if the card is also playing an audio program (tested here with Grooveshark). Under XP you could select "Stereo Mix" or similar under audio recording inputs and nicely capture any program then playing. Microsoft appears to be pandering to Big Music for its own reasons unrelated to consumer satisfaction. This may be the tip of the iceberg. Something *really nasty* is lurking under the surface of Win7. Being in bed with the RIAA is bad enough, but locking your own files away from you is a device so outrageous it may kill the OS for many persons. Many users will not want to experimenting with a second sound card or computer just to record from online sources, or boot up under a Linux that supports ntfs-3g just to control their files. (You never seem to know in Windows 7 when the "Access Denied" message is going to strike.) It is certainly beginning to be crystal clear why the coming WinFS will not be a good thing for userland, and a Very Good Thing for Microsoft and its partners."

Comment Re:the most cost effective applications on the mar (Score 1) 348

by Mincer Lightbringer on Thursday December 11, 2008 @07:07PM (#26083251) Attached to: Best Open Source Alternatives To Enterprise Apps

My explanation wasn't that a product must be OSI approved to be open source. In fact, I haven't explained it yet, so here it goes: "open source" is what complies with the Open Source Definition.

By the definition you're apparently working with, any source is open, as if it can't be opened, it can't even be compiled. This makes your definition meaningless. Unless you can provide a meaningful alternative definition to the term "open source" that has actually been ever used by anyone but you, I'll be forced to believe that you're trolling me.

Apple's New MacBooks Have Built-In Copy Protection 821

Posted by timothy on Wednesday November 19, 2008 @06:46PM from the presumption-from-on-high dept.

raque writes "Appleinsider is reporting that the new MacBooks/MacBookPros have built-in copy protection. Quote: 'Apple's new MacBook lines include a form of digital copy protection that will prevent protected media, such as DRM-infused iTunes movies, from playing back on devices that aren't compliant with the new priority protection measures.' Ars Technica is also reporting on the issue. Is this the deal they had to make to get NBC back? Is this a deal breaker for Apple or will fans just ignore it to get their hands on the pretty new machines? Is this a new opportunity for Linux? And what happened to Jobs not liking DRM?"

BBC's Open Player Claims Not Followed Through 311

Posted by timothy on Friday August 15, 2008 @02:03AM from the working-on-it-working-on-it dept.

ruphus13 writes "BBC's iPlayer was originally built on Microsoft's DRM-protected technology, and has never really been liked by folks like the FSF. The BBC is trying to play nice, though, recently claiming, 'the BBC has always been a strong advocate and driver of open industry standards. Without these standards, TV and radio broadcasting would simply not function. I believe that the time has come for the BBC to start adopting open standards such as H.264 and AAC for our audio and video services on the web.' This article argues that actions speak louder than words, and this is where the BBC falls short. 'The fact that both AAC and H.264 are encumbered with patent licenses that make their distribution under free licenses problematic flies in the face of this definition. It's good to see a major organization like the BBC switching from closely held secretive codecs to more widespread and documented ones. But it would be even better to see them throw their considerable weight behind some truly open formats.'"

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