Re: Incoherent E-mails

From: Moe Trin (ibuprofin_at_painkiller.example.tld)
Date: 10/18/05 

Date: Tue, 18 Oct 2005 15:04:28 -0500

In the Usenet newsgroup alt.computer.security, in article
<ylT4f.2699$BZ5.2492@newssvr13.news.prodigy.com>, BillW50 wrote:
>
>"Moe Trin" <ibuprofin@painkiller.example.tld> wrote

>> we don't have any windoze boxes, either at work (an R&D facility) or
>> at home. So, I really could care less what happens to windoze.

>Thus my question... what makes you any kind of Windows expert if you
>just don't care? I at least care and that makes me a bit more of an
>expert than you are, right?

I don't believe I ever claimed to be a windoze expert - but I do have to
exist on the Internet with those systems - which is why we have to port
shift outbound DNS queries (about the only UDP we allow through the
firewalls anymore) out of the source port range of 1024 ~ 1075 (or so).
This allows us to have our upstream block inbound UDP to those ports,
not thus not waste a significant chunk of bandwidth on windoze messenger
spams - you do understand how UDP works, right? So I can complain about
the stupidity of microsoft for including messenger without even rudimentary
security precautions like TTL limits or (even better) using TCP instead of
UDP - because their shoddy concepts cause me (and most of the rest of the
world) to go to extra effort to block crap that shouldn't be a problem in
the first place.

>> I think everyone is aware that most people using computers really
>> shouldn't be - they lack the incentive to learn, and therefore don't -
>> which results in a huge number of cracked or b0rken boxes.

That seems to be what your are replying to

>> However, if that were the only reason, microsoft wouldn't be issuing
>> those monthly updates, would they.

and ignoring this

>In the early beginning I used to be part of the computer elite gods
>as well. But I didn't like the idea that *we* computer elite gods
>*shouldn't* hand over the power of the computer to the masses. Thus
>I branched off and isolated myself so to speak.

However, I have no idea what point you are trying to make.

>Yeah so? There are people who don't get into computers as we do.

and microsoft should take that into account. Certainly the after-market
merchants selling the anti-malware stuff are making a bundle doing things
that shouldn't be required. Why do personal firewalls exist if there is a
firewall included in windoze? They do things that (apparently) microsoft
can't or won't do. Why?

>All they want computers for is to do their bidding for them. I see
>nothing wrong with that, if that is all you want.

The average user doesn't know what he wants. The average user wants fries
with that, if prompted.

>That isn't what I call Windows (tm). What you are talking about is
>windows (lowercase) and GUI.

No - I wrote "X Window System" - also a trademarked product - one that
was in use before microsoft got 3.0 working (FSVO). Or do you think that
windoze 2.0 or windoze-386 (Going boldly where Desqview has been for
years) was a viable product. As far as a GUI front end - go research
Xerox - before Apple stole the concepts for the Mac in the early 1980s.

>It's Paul Allen for starters.

Actually, I was thinking of Mark, who was CEO - but yes, it was Paul's
money.

>And maybe I don't fully understand GPL/BSD licenses. Why don't you tell
>us about it? Although I'd be really surprised if you say something that
>I didn't already know.

Search for an article "Homesteading the Noosphere" by ESR - or better yet
read the book "The Cathedral & The Bazaar" (ISBN 1-56592-726-9). Oh, and
who is in charge of Linux kernel development? Who is in charge of
distribution/sales?

>> The news server I use (giganews) carries 19 separate feeds.
>
>Giganews might be important to you, but I'm still waiting to form
>opinion about them.

Learn to read the 'Path:' header in news articles. They're one of many
companies who provide outsourced Usenet services to ISPs.

>All caused by one employee. So who do you blame, MS or the employee?
>I blame both. Although that one employee actually caused the
>problem.

Oh, so just one employee wrote the patch, QCed, and released it, that
could have been applied to fix the problem six months or more earlier
but did it so sloppily that no one else wanted to use it because it
broke so many other things. Sorry, I don't quite buy that. Malware
infestations don't occur because one individual missed the boat. There
is a minimum critical mass of individuals that didn't do anything to
prevent the problem that is needed for the malware to spread, especially
spread so rapidly. See if you can find a copy of a CERT Summary from
June 1998 (CERT Summary CS-98.06) and read Section 3, first paragraph.

>The problem with standards is they disallow innovation.

Oh, so we shouldn't drive on the right side of the road in most countries.
Obviously, there is also no need for "unleaded regular" gas either, and
why are we using 60 Hertz electrical power in North America?

Standards exist for a reason and should be followed (unless you're microsoft
doing an embrace, extend, and ignore routine) in order to be inter-operable.
Microsoft follows standards (including their own) like an elephant follows
migrating whales - it really can happen by chance, but the chances are very
poor, and microsoft usually goes out of their way to avoid this if at all
possible - after all, they've got to make things incompatible so they can
sell new incompatible stuff to the sheep.

Try explaining why MS-CHAP version 1 was "superseded" by the incompatible
version 2. And why neither is used that often, though CHAP-MD5 has been
around for years and is more widely used.

>The best you can do with RFC is patch the dang thing. It is a sorry ass
>standard today. And it holds us back technology-wise today.

So perhaps we shouldn't be using IPv6, never mind IPv4? And TCP is another
one. What do you propose instead? NETBEUI? (No, not NETBEUI over IP -
this is the older microsoft "standard". Incompatible??? Why would you
think not?)

  1310 The Internet Standards Process. L. Chapin. March 1992. (Format:
       TXT=54738 bytes) (Obsoleted by RFC1602) (Status: INFORMATIONAL)

  1602 The Internet Standards Process -- Revision 2. Internet
       Architecture Board, Internet Engineering Steering Group. March 1994.
       (Format: TXT=88465 bytes) (Obsoletes RFC1310) (Obsoleted by RFC2026)
       (Updated by RFC1871) (Status: INFORMATIONAL)

  2026 The Internet Standards Process -- Revision 3. S. Bradner. October
       1996. (Format: TXT=86731 bytes) (Obsoletes RFC1602, RFC1871) (Updated
       by RFC3667, RFC3668, RFC3932, RFC3979, RFC3978) (Also BCP0009)
       (Status: BEST CURRENT PRACTICE)

Apparently that's just another concept you missed. There are earlier
documents I won't bother to note - as you obviously don't want to know about
why they might exist, or why they have been replaced.

> "A mouse is a device used to point at the xterm you want to type in."
>
>All GUI stuff.

No, we use a keyboard.

[obfuscated URLs]

>Well to some users this can fool them. But to more experience users,
>this is just a foolish attempt. MS has fixed this in Outlook Express
>by only allowing plain text to show through.

while it will happily follow the obfuscatation to the plisher's website.
Sorry - that is not a fix.

>WordStar is a classic

So is a '55 Ford Thunderbird. Notice how they're just _everywhere_
Ad don't you just love the fact that the files from WordStar are usable
in Word Perfect... Word for Windoze... Word...

>and sed isn't. Oops!

What is sed? What does it do? Don't know? Guess not.

>Recycling neurons is one the worst thing you can do for knowledge.
>Yes, some things slip away from me too, but I don't allow it if I
>can help it.

Knowing how to use a piece of software that I will never encounter again
is as useful as knowing the location of the fuse box on the house I was
living in in 1943, or remembering the telephone number of the girl friend
from 1960, or the accounting "charge" number I was using on "time cards"
on that radar project in 1990, or even the pager number of the secretary
who retired last year.

        Old guy

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