Re: Ah, spirit copiers.
hotwire polystyrene cutters
Is that like a hacksaw handle, a bit of narrow gauge wire and a 9v (?) battery? I think that I made one of those once. Good fun.
2662 publicly visible posts • joined 8 Nov 2007
Yup. Chi^2 test will tell you your PRNG output is bad some portion of the time. In the same way that PKZIP will sometimes be able to compress some truly random data.
I agree with AC. Rejecting results based on how non-random they look reduces available entropy.
is "entropy, sweet entropy?"
Is it really the only thing that there's just not enough of (in /dev/urandom)?
a) use /dev/random, perchance?
b) chain output of a "good" message digest algorithm back into itself?
c) improve (b) by agreeing a nonce and using digest in HMAC mode?
d) "reverse-bias Zener diode" (a magic incantation I remember from many years back)
Flash's initial remit of making animation and context-sensitive graphics applications more amenable to graphic artist types was probably the main reason for its success. It's just a pity that at its heart it was just another general-purpose programming language (ActionScript). If you wanted the interactivity but not the ability to execute arbitrary code, it should be possible to move from a procedural paradigm to a more declarative one. It should be possible to write a provably secure "interactive graphics" platform in this way with a modicum of overheads (automatic stack and heap checks whether you want them or not) and neutering the language to eliminate any other "dangerous" operations (pointers or "evals" come to mine).
Of course Flash (and its design) come from a very different time (perhaps HTML5 is more akin to what I'm thinking of?) but it still begs the question about how it's still a bug-ridden piece of shit even after years of all these high-profile security problems...
re: Is "vegetable" a culinary or biological term?
I think you missed the point there, Ian. The OP said that "vegetable" is a culinary term and you disagreed by talking about fruit. What is this specific biological use of the word "vegetable" that you think that people are abusing? I think that, biologically speaking, "vegetable" is so broad as to be impossible to misapply. I think that, rather, your real beef is with people not knowing what a fruit is (and probably, by extension, the common fruit/veg dichotomy).
Personally I have no problem with a word having two meanings depending on context or field. I know that things like tomatoes (and other crops from the nightshade family apart from stuff like tobacco and potatoes whose fruits are poisonous), all the squash/cucurbit family, rose hips/haws and even beans are technically fruit in the biological/horticultural sense, but I've no problem with these things being "misclassified" in the fruit or veg aisles at the supermarket. No more than I mind people saying that "the Internet is down" or similar.
Reminds me of the saying (no idea who came up with it) that "knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit; wisdom is not using it in a fruit salad."
As it is with fruit, the same could be said for Pluto. Some experts might use a specific definition of what a planet is, but it doesn't stop the general public having their own ideas, too. Who cares if a bunch of astronomers use the word "planet" one way? The only place where the "correct" definition makes any difference would be in exams, pub quizzes and dictionaries and, frankly, none of these holds any sway over me.
Well you might not be able to see back beyond a certain point but people can hypothesise about the earlier stages and design high-energy experiments to test their theories. Apparently in the first few moments of the universe things existed as a "quark soup". Scientists are currently working to discover if it tastes anything like matar paneer. One recently commented, "I really hope it is--that would be super awesome."
Hmmm... I wonder why I got a downvote for the above. I didn't downvote the OP since he's stating an opinion and explaining his view. If I am wrong then a post explaining why would be so much more useful (for everyone) than a knee-jerk downvote...
Those who do not understand Unix are condemned to reinvent it, poorly--Henry Spencer.
But is a simple remediation just setting the /etc/sudoers file to be immutable?
Possibly, but since the bug allows you to append to any file, you'd be just whacking moles, figuratively speaking.
With the ability to append to any file, I could just write a new entry in the password file:
getroot::0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
Then I could log in as user 'getroot' with no password, which should be effectively a synonym for the real root user.
Temporary fixes like this aren't really going to get you very far. Even if you lock down the most sensitive files, you just have to find a shell script that root will run at some point and that doesn't have an exit or exec command at the end of it. A quick check on my Debian system shows that /etc/cron.daily/0anacron fits the bill nicely. I could append something like:
EVIL=/home/frumious/.secret/shellcp /bin/bash $EVIL
chown root $EVIL
chmod +s $EVIL
Then I'd come back the following day and run my new setuid shell ...
bootnote: fucking stupid cloudflare filters kept telling me that I'd been blocked when I was trying to write the above. All because I mentioned "slash etc slash passwd", I think. You guys need to turn off that shit. How are we supposed to discuss articles if we can't even talk about a key *nix file?
i (sic) really hate that "*nix" nonsense. If you mean Unix then say Unix.
There was a time when there were lots of Unix-like systems, but none could be called Unix because it was trademarked and would have resulted in a lawsuit. The whole SCO thing was just the last in a long line of such lawsuits. If you know *nix, you'll know that * is the "Kleene operator", or glob symbol as it's more often known, so it matches most of the alternative names or distros. Xenix comes to mind, but you might consider Posix too. Since it's humans doing the pattern matching rather than machines, stuff like HP-UX and Linux match too.
Anyway, *nix is a much preferable shorthand than "Unix(tm)-like systems".
Is the deliberately holed *nix security model
With respect, I understand your viewpoint but I don't think that the setuid mechanism is fundamentally broken. I think that it's a really elegant solution for the problem of privilege escalation.
All OSes need to have the ability to run protected or kernel-level code and means of making them available via userland in some way or other. Unix-like systems (the hint is in the name) have a unified approach where root can do anything and for the most part, barring obvious programming errors, this works. Neither does the setuid model preclude you from adding extra "boundary checks", as you put it, if you want to (*). If you want more fine-grained control (was it VMS that had "capabilities", for example?) then that can be implemented within the setuid program (or use regular file permissions; though I guess you don't like the user/group idea either).
By design, the *nix model is that if you are root you bypass all security checks.
This is the main thing I disagree with. You are forgetting that root does not exist in isolation. Yes, root can run anything, but setuid programs (and user/group permissions, as above) are the gatekeepers. So in fact, even though you say there's no "security boundary", that's not true: you don't get unfettered access to root, but can only do what the permissions and setuid programs allow. As I said above, these interfaces can be used to express any sort of security model you want.
This bug was particularly stupid since the golden rule of writing setuid programs is (probably, if there were a "golden rule") not to trust any user data, environment variables included. Oh, and for Gods' sake, make sure they're statically linked so that they can't be tricked with an LD_LIBRARY_PATH. So I blame the designers, programmers and review team, not the design of Unix. No-one with an understanding (and it's not difficult to understand) of how the Unix security model works should be making these mistakes. Nor would they be making the complaints that you're making, I feel.
(*) I may follow up on this in another post.
Sharp words between the superpowers. Tanks in East Berlin. And now,
reports the BBC, rumors of a satellite blackout. It's enough to spoil
your continental breakfast.
But the world will have to wait. This is the last day of your $599
London Getaway Package, and you're determined to soak up as much
of that authentic English ambience as you can. So you've left the tour
bus behind, ditched the camera and escaped to Hyde Park for a
contemplative stroll through the Kensington Gardens.
Palace Gate
A tide of perambulators surges north along the crowded Broad Walk.
Shaded glades stretch away to the northeast, and a hint of color
marks the western edge of the Flower Walk.
Well, actually, there is a mechanism, albeit not one you can fiddle with quickly or in both directions. That mechanism is the difficulty level associated with "mining" a bitcoin. The system (IIRC) works to a schedule to make it gradually more difficult, but if there was some sort of central bank equivalent charged with manning the levers, there's no reason why it couldn't push out the schedule for increasing the difficulty. The net result would be equivalent to quantative easing, except that of course it would be be miners printing the "extra" money currency rather than a central bank.
I don't think that Bitcoin could work if the difficulty level was allowed to be reduced since that would be a fast track to devaluing it asymptotically to zero. Still, I wouldn't put it past the ability of some clever designers to come up with a new "alt" currency that does allow a kind of central bank role that could effectively control the rate at which new currency could be created---say by making it index-linked, perhaps?
but are Probendi actively using the trademark or are they just a patent troll?
You know that trademarks and patents are different things, right? IANAL, but I think that the laws around trademarks are such that if you don't actively defend them, you risk losing them. AFAIK there aren't any similar rules for patents so failing to sue for patent infringement (or sitting on it until it becomes more worthwhile to do so) doesn't invalidate your rights as a patent holder. If I'm right on these points then there shouldn't be any such thing as a "trademark troll".
Far from being a troll, I'm pretty sure that Probendi are pretty much forced to take action here.
Misleading headlines seem to be getting to be par for the course here these days. There's no Mussolini angle mentioned in the article at all.
And a sushi knife.
I never heard of koi sushi so I thought maybe they don't taste good. Turns out that people don't eat any freshwater fish due to the risk of getting parasites. The Wikipedia page on raw fish dishes says:
Traditionally, fish that live all or part of their lives in fresh water were considered unsuitable [...] due to the possibility of parasites
I never knew this but now it makes sense to me that certain fish like mackerel (aji, saba), eel (unagi) and maybe others that are commonly seen on sushi are always cooked first...
Apart from historical reference this Confederate flag belongs with that swastika - in the trash.
What's wrong with the swastika? I personally like it. It's just a pity that some nutjobs decided to appropriate it for their own ends and that as a result we've been denied it ever since. Making it illegal is as senseless as making the symbol '福' illegal.
re: hydraulic computers, there was MONIAC but I'm not sure if it counts as hydraulic (involving water pressure in some useful way) or a computer in the usual sense.
What prompted me to reply, though, was that I just recently came across the idea of a hydraulic ram pump. Sounds like it would make an excellent component in this speculative machine.
Now you've got me thinking about powering stuff with water in Minecraft :(
If that was in 1991, then I guess Napoleon XIV must have been some sort of visionary? That came out in 1966 and although the wiki link doesn't mention it, I recall reading that he was denied composition rights (iirc) because it didn't have any of the usual elements of a "song", most notably not having any "notes" (no pun intended, it's all just glissando with no fixed stops). I think that the link here might explain that in point 5... he lost certification from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers.
Also, while I'm talking about pre-dating, how about Blondie (Rapture, 1980) and Gil Scott-Heron (TRWNBT, 1970) as rappers/proto-rappers? And obviously there were tons of electronic artists before the 1983 cutoff (like Bruce Haack, but many before him, too). Less eclectically, Telstar was a massive hit in 1962...
Any astroboffins here? The article got me wondering what happens to the rotational energy of two bodies that get tidally locked. Will that get converted into faster mutual orbit and hence greater distance between the pair? If so, could initial high rotational speeds of the bodies account for the high separation now, or would the effect (if it even exists) be negligible?
has got to be "Okonomiyaki." I'd love to be able to make Hiroshima style, where the ingredients are layered (I don't have a hot plate), but Kansai style is an acceptable substitute and dead easy to whip up. The main ingredients are white cabbage, batter and usually cooked bacon. The Wikipedia link lists plenty of other stuff you can put in (literally, whatever takes your fancy). Just mix up some batter (flour, cold water or stock, egg, seasoning), slice the cabbage and other ingredients, mix, fry, add extras, flip, serve. You can buy special okonomiyaki sauce but I like tonkatsu sauce on it.
It's quick to prepare, but you can always prepare it pre-pub and keep it in the fridge ready to fry later. Definitely worth trying, even if you think you don't like cabbage. Try this and you may change your mind on that.
Well then, he should obviously realise what's going on in the pic. Daddy buys son an Apple Watch (TM'd up the wazoo). Son, being a bit unappreciative of the value of things (or the cost, at least), swallows said gizmo. The aftermath is photographed as dad tries to locate the device by listening for the ticks...
(upvotes for the best explanation of why they both need to be demi-nekkid)
He of the theme tunes of such games as International Karate, Thrust, Zoids, Commando and plenty more, for those who may not have heard of him (for shame!).
I remember reading an article where he talked about using a "Forth-like" notation to code the music and all the technical challenges involved in doing real-time music with just a scant few "time slices" (on a non-preemptive CPU, natch) to play with between all the other game code.
(the past is so bright) ... I gotta wear shades -->
Folks, we NEED to develop spaceflight and space habitats. Planets are just too dangerous to live on.
and
Or failing that, how about a bunch of virgins waiting for you.
Me, I'm leaning towards mine-shafts right now...
But ah with the proper breeding techniques and a ratio of say, ten females to each male, I would guess that they could then work their way back to the present gross national product within say, twenty years."
re cat vs concat, I learned many years ago that the Unix 'cat' command was short for 'catenate' which is an obscure and/or archaic variant of 'concatenate'. Personally, I have no problem with 'catenate' as a synonym for 'concatenate' (and yes, either is probably what the OP meant instead of 'conflate').
/said in an isn't-it-interesting-that-the-thread-talks-about-both-catenation-and-proper-use-of-hyphens* kind of way
(*no doubt that's a proper word in German, but let's not get distracted)
I think it's a mistake rather than language drift. I could take a two-year sabbatical, and the hyphen is acceptable (and normal) usage there, but I'd be back to work two years later (no hyphen).
edit: I didn't see the later post by J.G.Harston that makes the same point, but uses grammar-type words.
In my day they'd have a segment that you were supposed to record using your tape recorder. You could then (theoretically at least) put the tape in your computer's tape recorder and load the program. It might have even displayed pictures on the screen--video over radio, if you will.