HN user

BitMastro

328 karma
Posts0
Comments195
View on HN
No posts found.

I didn't say that, I said that both went for what was the optimal choice at the time.

Why Apple didn't go for Swift from the start? Because Objective-C was used in NeXT and then OSX and so on.. when the time was right ans Swift was mature it has been introduced.

The same with JIT VM, that, again, are then norm for Java bytecode.

Also Google could not be restrictive on the hardware, since they are not manufacturers and the OS is open source. They restrict to ARM CPUs only? Fine, Intel forks it and ports to x86 anyway.

Smart guys work in both companies and they evaluate pro and cons of every approach anyway.

You're comparing apples and oranges, Apple had the privilege of choosing its own hardware and programming language.

For android they went for java because of popularity, and everyone can use it on their own hardware.

So you have a java based language running on ARM, x86 and MIPS, what would you choose? A proven approach like JIT VM or AOT?

I agree in general with all your point, apart from 4 and 5.

Malware in linux repositories is "practically" impossible. Software is most of the times peer reviewed and patched in different ways by different distros. And if a particular software becomes more popular it also comes under scrutiny by more people that want to change the source to add their own features. All the packages are checksummed and repositories have cryptographic keys to establish authenticity.

Of course bugs and security vulnerabilities exist, but the same applies to other OSes as well. And I do understand that UAC is obnoxious for users, but they didn't care about creating problems for legitimate users with the no-ip case since it was posing danger.

That android report makes two assumption: a very wide definition or malware (also installing java should be considered a malware because toolbar), and the fact that a malware doesn't usually last more than a day before being removed automatically.

I'll give it a try:

privilege separation and permission since the beginning

only super user was allowed to install new software

(simplifying) different distros and different versions created diversity making it difficult for an attack area to be widespread across all installations

typing a password for additional privileges requires more attention than clicking a button

apparmor has been enabled by default since a couple of years, it used to break some stuff but not anymore

(simplifying) new files are not executable, and they don't rely on extensions to determine the associated program

since linux is not the default it requires a learning curve that people using windows don't have, so users are more tech savvy

since the source code is available, more people COULD have a look at security vulnerabilities, and in case of emergency the don't have to wait for someone else to provide a patched binary

That said, I don't consider security on windows to be a disaster. It certainly is improving and in general they also pay a lot more attention to security.

1) Linux and other unixes were created with the idea of privilege separation and permission baked in. Windows had to add it later, while keeping compatibility

2) Linux has a variety of kernels and libraries versions across its base, making it difficult to exploit it uniformly

3) MS is indeed capable of making secure OSes, I don't deny it, but you should not use Xbox, Windows Phone and RT as examples, since all three of them can ONLY install approved software (less for RT, but it's not used by end users in the same way)

4) MS could have used the same approach used by Linux and Android (and partially OSX): have a central approved and monitored repository of software, but giving the possibility to add external software by jumping a few hoops, i.e. inserting a password, or checking a couple of checkboxes before allowing untrusted installations.

5) To prove the point, Android has malware almost exclusively outside of the google play store. Never heard of someone getting malware by using android, while I know an handful of people getting malware on windows (this is anecdotal experience, but I don't have any other data)

6) The shitstorm was raised because on some Secure Boot implementations it was impossible to disable it

no-ip primary use case is certainly not botnets. It's used by dsl users to connect to their home network, or to get an easy to remember address for a vps, or maybe while developing something before getting a proper domain.

Sometime we spend time on a project for the good of the community, and it's ok, because sometimes I give back time, sometimes someone else does and so on.

It's also ok to try to get some money out of your time, if it's desired.

Not ok: use someone else's time to gain personal profit, expect someone else to pay for your actions, etc

I would like to thank you for creating go read and making it open source, it's what I use as RSS reader, using my own free quota of App Engine. I hope I can contribute back some day.

  "30-day trial: This action cost me about 90% of my users. Many were angry and cursed at me on twitter. I agree that it is sad I did not say I was going to charge from the beginning, but I didn't know that I would be paying hundreds of dollars per month either."
Honestly I think the sense of entitlement nowadays is way too high, people use a product that is free and needed weeks or months of your own free time, and then complain about it when you change it.

If you decide to charge for it, you're a greedy bastard, instead if it's free, they say "if you aren't paying, you are the product". Other complain that the product doesn't work, when instead it's a case of PEBCAK. When it's not, it means you're going to say goodbye to a couple of night's sleep or a weekend or too, or maybe it's ONE feature away from being perfect (again).

...sometimes I hate people :(

Maybe a solution could be weighting the vote according to the user history: a user leaving a single vote on a single movie shouldn't be as influential as an user that voted on a wider range of movies over time

The height is calculated automatically for the rows that are visible and you can fix it to a certain amount.

So, as screigh said, you won't have the wormy effect on contact list, artists, songs, etc. because each row is always x pixels. The same happens if you have for example a series of thin and thick rows because they average out.

Another reason why using a set of constants is not common is that we have different screen sizes and different resolutions to deal with, so what looks like a good value for a resolution might not be the best for another.

I see your point, but this layout is used also for variable height images, variable lenght text, compound layouts, etc. The equivalent of pagination on Android is usually done using pull to refresh (horizontal swipe gestures are usually used to change topics more or less).

For something completely client side it is possible either to specify a fixed height or change the smoothScrollbar attribute of the listview (it is more expensive though and not used very much).

Nobody complains, I guess everyone is just used to the way it is. :D

On the other end, pagination is rarely used on Android, and calculating the height of a single row can be more expensive since it has to layout the children hierarchy for a row according to the screen dimensions.

For the OS. Imagine 999 rows containing one line of text and the last one containing a long text spanning maybe 30 lines.

To calculate the scroll accurately you need to calculate the height of 1000 elements to get the full height.

Instead in the common scenario you just calculate the height of the rows displayed on the screen and estimate the height using the average and the count.

Rrrright, so I will consider my GNU/Linux installation not any better than Windows or OsX, since my video driver, my wifi driver, my BIOS, my Ethernet controller firmware and my hard disk firmware are all closed source.

You are lacking perspective if you think that: 1) a completely open source phone is easy to make 2) iOS and Windows phone are on par with Android's level of openness

Edit: people downvoting, state why please

I think applying a newton-raphson approach instead of just choosing a fixed pivot could result in fewer comparisons.

On the other hand, a comparison is a dirty cheap operation, even using bit masks and shifts I doubt it will have a big performance impact, unless we're dealing with very very big arrays.

I didn't downvote you, but these are the facts:

1)The "Play Store" is, like the name says, a store, just like every single store is a distribution channel.

2)While I understand that for some it may look unfair, a contract is a contract, you cannot sign and then ignore the rules of a contract because it's "unfair". You just don't sign it.

3)On iOS the app will not have been accepted in the first place and maybe (I'm just supposing) the developer didn't want to buy a mac, buy an iPhone, learn objective c and pay 100$ a year to make the app for iOS. :P

You're being downvoted, but you're right, when you publish an app on the store you legally sign a contract, and the contract specifies what you can and cannot do.

Don't like the rules? Don't publish on the play store and let people download the app from you website. It's perfectly doable.

Moreover, an official warning was issued more than an year ago reminding play store developers that all IAP should go thought the play store AND more recently, another famous app with more than 150000 users was removed for using PayPal for payment.

Edit: copying a comment from reddit: Go to a store and put your homemade apple pies on their shelves with a PayPal QR code and see if that store too becomes "unfair".

Slightly unrelated, but how does a restraining order behaves when dealing with a broadcast?

For example, if the attacker buys an ad on a newspaper or tv and says something without addressing the victim specifically, is it against the law?