Microsoft.

Well, it looks Microsoft is actually going to include something in Longhorn :P

It's RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds and there is a very good article on this at The Register.

Delicious Library was microsofted.

The other question, of course, is whether Microsoft has learned the lessons of tight integration with the OS that IE turned up - those delights such as self-loading Trojans, spyware and adware.

"RSS in the operating system and IE likely means that more people will be saying 'let's start looking for vulnerabilities,'" said Joe Pescatore, the Gartner research director.

Indeed, RSS is pretty indifferent to what it carries as an 'enclosure'. MP3? Fine. Executable file? Sure, why not? (Thus "appcasts" to update your installed applications; just imagine a "pull" RSS for your spyware. Yum.) The security question might seem remote right now, but so did it before IE was incorporated into Windows. And we all know how that turned out.

This is pretty interesting. I can't wait for the first RSS Trojans. They should have cool names like Spamglish or something.

Is Linux For Losers?

Mr. Theo de Raadt apparently has a problem with Linux. He says, "It's terrible. Everyone is using it [Linux] and they don't realize how bad it is. And the Linux people will just stick with it and add to it rather than stepping back and saying, 'This is garbage and we should fix it.'"

Thanks for that wonderful opinion Theo, and let me just briefly explain something. If there's a problem with Linux, the developers do step back and look at it if people are actively bitching about it.

Sour grapes? Maybe. Linux is immensely more popular than all of the open source BSD versions.

De Raadt says that's partly because Linux gets support from big hardware makers like Hewlett-Packard and IBM, which he says have turned Linux hackers into an unpaid workforce.

Linux didn't get support from big hardware makers previously. It only started gaining ground in the past four years. And about turning Linux hackers into an unpaid workforce? That's bullshit. These people volunteer to work on the code. They can decide to say, "Screw this, I'm moving on to other things", and while some people do that, others do not. It's all about choice.

Another great quote from that article...

Lok Technologies, a San Jose, Calif.-based maker of networking gear, started out using Linux in its equipment but switched to OpenBSD four years ago after company founder Simon Lok, who holds a doctorate in computer science, took a close look at the Linux source code.

"You know what I found? Right in the kernel, in the heart of the operating system, I found a developer's comment that said, 'Does this belong here?' "Lok says. "What kind of confidence does that inspire? Right then I knew it was time to switch."

That actually inspires a lot of confidence. It shows that the developers don't think of themselves as the gods of programming. They don't act cocky and will ask questions if unsure. I'd rather have someone like that vs. a programmer who thinks they're the best in the world and who thinks they know it all.

Anyway, that's my rant on these punks :P

Wow. I never thought I'd see someone blow up a rubber glove. Over their head. With their nose. It reminds me of that Family Guy episode where Howie Mandell comes in and blows up a rubber glove then passes out.

Pfft. Microsoft has finally decided to "increase data interoperability" by introducing an XML file format for the next version of Office. I love how they change when forced to. And somehow, they're gonna fuck this up too.

Anyway, I need ideas. I feel I'm out of them. I want to create something but I can't figure out what to create. I just keep getting blank after blank. Anyone have ideas they can spare me?

So yeah, I don't think I did too well on the Calculus exam, but I did get the internet working on Knoppix, the Linux LiveCD distro. It's friggin' sweet.

KDE isn't too bad and I'm getting used to it. My only problem is that I don't know how to switch tabs in Firefox and X-Chat. Ctrl+Tab switches desktops and Alt+Tab switches apps. I've lost a lot of productivity. Anyway, KDE looks sexy and reminds me of Mac OS X sort of. I can't wait to switch to Slackware and begin using KDE.

Also, I found something called C++ Sockets. I think it'll help a lot for the Cobalt Gaming Client. With it, I can hopefully get the server done quickly.