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From: Arthur Bergman Date: 10:50 on 14 Aug 2003 Subject: Terminal.app round inf It is amazing, freakishly so, that one of the (should be) core utilities of MacOS X is so fucking unreliable. Or is it the underlying nextismic cocoa libraries that create the problem? Whenever my computer seems to have a lot of swapping to do, or I resize a big window, it fucking crashes on me. Having usually 20 terminals or so open it is a huge delay until I am up to speed again. So wonderful hardware, unreliable piece of shit software.
From: Leon Brocard Date: 10:16 on 14 Aug 2003 Subject: Openoffice.org Now, before I start, let me say that spreadsheet programs are a wonderful invention. It's amazing how far we've come with them. I can send spreadsheets to people and they can load them, pretend they understand the statistics, and produce pretty graphs. This offloads work from me. This can only be a good thing. Now, in the good old days, we used Excel. If fact, ExcelXP still uses the old Excel95 engine as nobody understands it and it hasn't been hacked upon in years apparently. Excel has arbitrary limits - for example you can only have a maximum of 65,535 rows. It's commercial software that hasn't been updated for a while, so you kind of expect this suckage. I don't have CSVs smaller than 65,535 rows any more... [So I've used Gnumeric in the past, but now it's complaining about locales and failing to load the CSV, sigh] So where do I go? To the new, exciting, open-source, office productivity suite that is OpenOffice.org. No, really, "OpenOffice.org is both an Open Source product and a project". Huh? What? URL eq project? And why are they abbreviating it to OOo? My thought processes go: It's all written in C++, it's open source, they've been working on it for yonks, it can't have any arbitrary limits... How wrong can I be? OOo has a 32,000 row limit. 32,000! That's half of Excel's arbitrary limit! They've noted this as a bug since 2001: http://sc.openoffice.org/row-limit.html I hates Ooo! I hates software! Consider me not impressed, Leon
From: Juerd Date: 09:47 on 14 Aug 2003 Subject: ENOSPC, Mozilla doesn't DWIM /tmp was full at 94% of a very slow download. So Mozilla decided to stop the download completely. As soon as I clicked [OK], the file was unlinked. No chance of resuming the thing. Now I need to start all over. Besides, I told it to save the file in /mnt/foo, not in /tmp. /mnt/foo has more than enough available space.
From: Casey West Date: 20:31 on 13 Aug 2003 Subject: Terminal.app Give me back my Page Up/Page Down keys! It is *nod* unreasonable to want those for other things. I know what you're going to say, they can be remapped in 10.3 Terminal.app. Well no, I've tried it, and it doesn't work. Of all things, you have to use Cmd-P and Cmd-N! This! Is! BROKEN!
From: Scott Francis Date: 17:39 on 13 Aug 2003 Subject: Worm of the Week (or, still waiting for everyone to realize the obvious) --JYK4vJDZwFMowpUq Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="T4sUOijqQbZv57TR" Content-Disposition: inline --T4sUOijqQbZv57TR Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable I finally wrote down some of the thoughts floating around in my head wrt buggy software (Microsoft being the chief distributor of such). The below is taken from http://darkuncle.net/microsoft_rant.html - I've attached it in text format. --=20 Scott Francis || darkuncle (at) darkuncle (dot) net illum oportet crescere me autem minui --T4sUOijqQbZv57TR Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="microsoft_rant.txt" (WARNING: long rant ahead) <rant topic="Microsoft" style="frustrated"> So it looks like the latest Microsoft security hole <http://www.counterpane.com/alert-v20030801-001.html>; (get the patch <http://www.microsoft.com/technet/treeview/?url=/technet/security/bulletin/MS03-026.asp>; if you're unfortunate enough to be responsible for a Windows box) is going to, once <http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~nweaver/sapphire/>; again <http://www.cert.org/advisories/CA-2001-19.html>; (and <http://www.cert.org/advisories/CA-2001-26.html>; again <http://www.aaxnet.com/editor/edit003.html>;), wreak havoc on the entire Internet due to a nice combination of entirely clueless end-users and poorly-written, bug-ridden software in which security is a distant third to bells and whistles and time to market. This one affects every version of Windows since Win95 that hasn't been patched in the past two weeks. Oh, and for bonus points, the worm <http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.blaster.worm.html>; that exploits this hole attempts a DDoS of windowsupdate.com, effectively preventing any of the systems that might otherwise automatically patch themselves from doing so. It was about two weeks between the public announcement of this hole and the appearance of the worm to exploit it (which is about what I predicted; I also predicted, jokingly, that it would be especially evil if the worm DDoS'ed windowsupdate so that users couldn't patch. Maybe I should stop making predictions, or only make pleasant ones, or else start up my own prophecy business.) For my next bold prophecy, I predict that Microsoft will suffer no damage whatsoever from this incident. There will be no lawsuits filed, no measurable loss of business, no public outcry (aside from the usual pundits on tech websites and the slashdot crowd), no demands that MS live up to their "Trustworthy Computing" <http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2002/04/09/trustworthy/>; marketing slogan. This corporation, with its vast market share and nearly complete saturation of the world's computer networks, has been so negligent for so long that the majority of computer users, whether business or personal, have been conditioned to think that this kind of experience is not only normal, but to be expected. Expectations have been so lowered by this pattern of behavior that bloated software full of security holes, released by a company in which security takes a distant third to time-to-market and bells and whistles (read: additional new "features" in every release which, rather than fixing the bugs in the previous release, only serve to introduce NEW problems), has become the norm for computer users and administrators. People think that this is the way that computing is supposed to be, that having your servers raped and your network swamped with zombie traffic from the worm-of-the-week is just the way things are. They don't know to expect any better - and worse still, when someone tries to introduce something better (Linux, BSD, Apache), it is quickly squashed by those with a financial interest in maintaining the status quo, or else by so-called "system administrators" not worthy of the title that can't function without a mouse and a point-and-click interface and installation wizards. I realize that there is currently no alternative to Microsoft (except possibly Apple, which has its own problems (price being chief among them)) that's ready for prime-time (and by this, I mean ready to replace Windows and MS software on the desktops of millions of AOL users and corporate drones that think THE INTARWEB consists of Outlook, Internet Explorer, Powerpoint/Excel/Word documents, and whatever trojan-ridden filesharing software they've managed to sneak onto their computer to create havoc for the MIS help desk this week). That said, I would be happy if we could just eliminate Microsoft and their horrid software, which is a nightmare for administrators, from the server room. If we could relegate Windows and Windows software to the desktop, where it belongs (and occasionally, where it actually does a decent job), a very large portion of the problem would disappear. Anyone running any public-facing, unfiltered service on a Microsoft platform is just plain irresponsible. Especially if that service is httpd or smtpd. There just aren't any excuses for that anymore - MS Exchange and IIS (not to mention their client counterparts, Outlook and MSIE) have the worst track records of any software that performs their respective functions. Not only that, they cost a fortune, are terrible resource hogs, need to be rebooted at least weekly for stability, and are no longer the only options for ease-of-administration (why you'd want somebody administering your network who's so unskilled he/she can't manage without a mouse is a whole other rant, but anyway). There are now point-and-click GUIs for UNIX systems running server software like postfix, exim and apache that have PROVEN track records with regards to not just security, but _correctness_ and ability to easily handle large loads with relatively few resources. There is no longer any excuse for running Microsoft in the server arena (with the possible exception of Outlook's calendaring functionality, which will soon be available in a work-alike free software product for UNIX systems). The sooner businesses realize that running Microsoft software is _the_ main factor in rising IT costs (not to mention liability for business and customer data), the better off we will all be. Microsoft is hardly the only vendor out there putting profits ahead of security, but they're certainly the most egregious offender. And their market saturation means that a small mistake from them costs the rest of us dearly. </rant> --T4sUOijqQbZv57TR-- --JYK4vJDZwFMowpUq Content-Type: application/pgp-signature Content-Disposition: inline -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.1 (FreeBSD) iD8DBQE/OmnLWaB7jFU39ScRArGMAJ9dyq9SRKaCl0IToe0o0CqmWRXgggCgwCdN eNcm3CW460ZI3vtCxc2DpU8= =7wEQ -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --JYK4vJDZwFMowpUq--
From: Ann Barcomb Date: 17:21 on 13 Aug 2003 Subject: I'm also hating hates-software right now... I'm unable to log in with the password which was mailed to me. Obviously, in most mailing lists, there are appropriate places to send administrative requests and complaints, but given the topic of the list, this does seem the best venue to voice my views. So...I'm hating hates-software right now.
From: Ann Barcomb Date: 17:17 on 13 Aug 2003 Subject: websites which require JavaScript I've only just joined the list and I would find it odd if this hasn't already been mentioned. But I hate JavaScript so much I need to say it, even if I'm redundant. JavaScript as an idea is not bad. It can be useful to do things like client-side checking of params to reduce bad requests to the server, or limiting choices based upon previous selections without reloading pages. But that's all it is good for--adding to the experience. Too many people mistake it for required functionality, forgetting the browsers that can't handle JavaScript and the people like myself, who find that 90% of all JavaScript is just crappy bells and whistles I don't want. I really despise sites which require JvaScript to simply view or navigate. There are the sites with onclick submits and no submit button for the form; the ones that display blank pages; and the ones that order you to enable JavaScript, and, if you do, show nothing that even uses JavaScript. It's even worse when the sites are ones you need to use, like the telephone directory (http://www.goudengids.nl) or the train schedule (http://www.ns.nl). It ought to be illegal for anything resembling a public service to do this. A while ago I wrote a form letter which I now mail to the worst offenders. I doubt they pay attention to my letter, given the pissy tone and the fact that I'm just one person, but it makes me feel a bit better. It would make me feel far better, however, if others would also complain, because then maybe they would listen. The letter is below. ------------------------ I am writing to express my disappointment with the redesign of your site, which has chosen to ignore one of the key accessibility guidelines recommended by W3C. I hope that this was done out of ignorance and you will consider it a priority to make your website accessible. I refer to guideline 6.3, which involves making content accessible to users without requiring scripting. This issue is rated at priority 1, meaning that a site which does not comply with this recommendation does not even qualify for the lowest accessibility rating (Conformance Level A) available. Priority 1 is defined as: "A Web content developer _must_ satisfy this checkpoint. Otherwise, one or more groups will find it impossible to access information in the document. Satisfying this checkpoint is a basic requirement for some groups to be able to use Web documents." The web content accessibility guidelines can be perused at: http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10/ Information on fixing the issue I have highlighted is available here: http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT-TECHS/#tech-scripts ------------------------
From: Mark Fowler Date: 16:50 on 13 Aug 2003 Subject: Volume controls on laptops Often I'm in a place where I want my laptop to suddenly not make quiet as much noise as it's annoying someone else (for example when someone thought it might be classy to stick a midi on a webpage I've stumbled across at work - nice one guys.) So, when I realise I'm making too much noise first action is to whap the the 'turn off speaker' button. I then say I'm sorry to whoever I've disturbed. I then press the 'turn volume down button' which causes the laptop to turn the sound back on again at a slightly lower volume and me to get the Glare Of Death from everyone around me. Which idiot decided that the 'make less noise' button should turn the sound back on? Both my Apple iBook and my Thinkpad do the same thing, so it's not just one braindead manufacturer. Apple win the stupidity award though - when sound is turned off I can't even adjust the volume with the graphical menulet thingy - it's disabled until I turn the sound back on again. Gah.
From: Mark Fowler Date: 10:47 on 13 Aug 2003 Subject: Browser Histroy This is my rant. There are many like it, but this one is mine. Browser histories don't work. They come from the day where someone would open _one_ window and browse with that _one_ window. Thus they all store the time the person loaded the page as this translates to the order that the user was viewing the page. So when someone wants to reopen that page that they were at ten pages ago they can do - they just look back though their history and it's the $history[-10] entry. Fast forward to a few years later where most browsers have multiple tabs (and even the crippled ones have multiple windows) and suddenly this is no longer true; The order in which pages are loaded no longer represents the order in which pages are viewed. To illustrate this, imagine a site like http://www.ntk.net/. It's a site with links on it to many other sites. Typically, I view such a site by opening each link on it in a new tab, and then exploring the other site. When I'm done I close the tab and look at NTK again. Now what's the last thing I looked at? The site that was linked off of NTK? Nope. It's NTK itself. But I loaded that _ages_ ago, so it's way back when in my history file, buried under the other hundred or so pages of the linked sites. If I close this window and I can't remember NTK's url, what's the chance of me being able to find the site that I looked at again? Another situation - one that I come across quite often - is that while I'm working I'll google for some documentation that ends up sitting on the virtual desktop next to my text editor for many many days. However, during this time period I'm highly likely to open up another browser window when I'm due a break and check the news, check out things people have been posting to irc, read some cartoons - anything to clear my head for a minute. Despite all this browsing at some point I'll complete the work and close the editor and the documentation I searched for. The problem comes when I come back from my tea break and someone tells me that there was a bug in my code; Suddenly I need to get back at that documentation that I thought I was done with (so I didn't bookmark it.) No-one's touched the computer since I closed the window - it was the last page I was looking at, but I'll be damned if I can find it in my history. It's buried under the hundred or so sites I've looked at in the two days since I opened it. So what can we do about this? Well, it seems to me it would be nice to record when someone was _done_ with a page rather (or as well as) when they started looking at the page. The sensible way to do this would to be to simply record when a page was closed as well as when it was opened. It's not that hard (assuming you have proper session recovery when your browser unexpectedly exits like Galeon et al do.) So why don't browsers do it? This is my rant. One of these days I'll STFU and patch a browser (or someone will tell me there's a browser that does this.) Till then, I'll continue to spread the word.
From: Mark Fowler
Date: 19:28 on 12 Aug 2003
Subject: OmniGaffle paper sizes
While OmniGraffle is a great vector editor (and beats the pants off of
Visio), I can't for the life of me understand why it only comes with a few
paper sizes. I mean, how hard is it to write these things?
$paper_sizes => { a3 => [ 297, 420 ], ... };
This is the problem with closed source software. It's not like I (or
people like me) can patch the software to simply do this.
Bah.
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Generated at 10:28 on 16 Apr 2008 by mariachi