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Comment This is why I'm waiting (Score 1) 155

This is why I'm waiting for someone to make a dual-DIN Android head unit with the source available so we can rebuild it free of nonsense like unwelcome ads. They don't have to warranty it. Just make some decent hardware and gimme the source, and I'll handle the rest (and sing their praises endlessly).

I could build one but I literally don't want to.

Comment I see no problem here. (Score 1) 52

It's not like verifying the age of people who are under 18 is hard or something. Just because they have almost no digital footprint or legal records to check against and can be talked into posing in front of a webcam pretending to be someone else for thirty seconds for in exchange for an ice cream cone should pose no problems whatsoever.

Comment Windows 8? Seek help. (Score 1, Insightful) 106

If anyone's still running Windows 8 at this late date, please seek professional help. There is no need for you to continue to suffer like this.

If for no other reason than any number of Linux distributions can run readily and well on that same hardware, and we know you're not tethered to needing Microsoft Word around.

Comment Do we really need that? (Score 1) 54

I mean, most of these air filters say right on them the size of the least minuscule particle they'll pass through, generally not significantly more than 10 microns. People are way bigger than that, so I'm pretty sure 99.999% of the filters on the market today will not have a problem filtering humans out of the air.

Comment The coding error... (Score 2) 71

It's a very simple error. You have a codebase that allows high muckity-mucks to make phone calls and yell at people until they delete the parts the the muckity-muck didn't like, and the code didn't stop that from happening. Just completely normal access control things. Totally normal.

Comment Re:Anyone is surprised about this? (Score 1) 63

Unfortunately it *is* stupid that there's no authentication. Something as simple as even a 4-digit PIN check would have been sufficient. There is no need to allow random radio transmitters to apply the brakes, and anyone with the *authorized* equipment would be able to have an emergency override code possibly built right into their gear.

The system, as designed, has *no* such codes at all.

Comment Re:Oh that would NEVER happen to ME (Score 1) 160

The fact that there are so many memory leak and bounds overflow vulnerabilities with C++ programs that are actually out there is something you just can't sweep away.

Yes, we can, because those are largely a problem of discipline and can be greatly reduced with more careful analysis. ...and we can do so by noting carefully that the body of bugs that are not those types is a much larger problem and very sensibly recognize that the core problem is that we need better ways to teach people to be more careful coders, instead of continuing to allow the baseline to be "well, it didn't blow my fingers off when I hit enter" and demanding they use languages that have compile-time checking built in.

Comment Re:Like a bandaid (Score 1) 160

They do so because it's cheap, and it doesn't immediately collapse into recycled wood pulp when exposed to moist, warm air. ...but no one gets excited about inheriting Ikea furniture, nor are there high expectations when buying it, nor does one often seen it featured in magazines that celebrate fine craftsmanship in carpentry.

Don't try and make low-craftsmanship furniture the new standard just because there's even more terrible things on the market. Mediocrity does not become excellence just because it's more widely available.

Comment Re:Like a plastic knife. (Score 2) 160

C++ is very definitely not a plastic knife.

It's a knife with a sharp blade where the handle is also the blade. Double knives FTW!

I'm afraid I'm going to have to call "nonsense" on this. Using a lame metaphor does not excuse people of their personal responsibility to not write code that's functionally just three bugs in a trenchcoat. nor will using Rust stop them from doing so.

Per example, the code for the cat utility is dead simple. Anyone reasonably competent should be able to audit that code to be 100% sure it's safe within a few hours, and yes I'm including time to go look at the reference manual for every single instruction because someone might be unfamiliar with the language. Someone familiar with the language would be able to do this much more quickly. Yet people who apparently can't summon up enough discipline to carefully consider two pages of code are rewriting cat and the other tools that ship with it in Rust "because reasons". This is unlikely to make anything at all safer, but it will probably sell more training classes and manuals.

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