Linus Thorvalds is a fucking muppet. How he managed to gather so many clued-in hackers on his project is anyone's guess. I stumpled upon a mail discussion which outlined a large number of development issues (bugs not being fixed and improvements not being included in the code) in the Linux kernel due to Linus not wanting to use source control. This means that he is the only person who can include code into the main source tree, and when he gets swamped, code patches are dropped. He claims to have tried CVS and that it is just no good. He then made comments that indicated he did not understand CVS.
Source control is the heart of software QA.
Generally things have been quiet lately which explains why interesting updates are few and far between. I have been reviewing part of the ORDB code and documentation, which is fun.
I have also been sleeping late. I have not been working out, but I am sticking to my diet no problems.
Oorh, Kris Kenneway stepped down as FreeBSD security officer while I was away. This is not good.
I added about 6 million new Calvin quotes to the jokes page. I added a link to an OpenBSD cvs commit stats page and an article on replacing WEP with IPsec in Highly Recommended.
Placed a £340 order with Amazon and discovered they implemented a change to their order system that I thought about suggesting only a few days ago. Now there is really no point in using their silly 1 Click order system.
I have updated my wanted list to reflect that I just bought a load of stuff.
I meant to spend an hour in Westpoint, but that did not happen. I am however sticking to my planned diet which is nice. I am starting off with a very strict diet which can be relaxed when I have made progress.
Eating salad goes against everything Mick believes in!
I work with a very sick individual:
<ego> http://drew.corrupt.net/lp/ <ego> hahaha <ego> hahaha I can't stop laughing at that. <holsta> There's something wrong with your head. <ego> hahaha <ego> man there is even some beastiality ;) <holsta> So you get off on Lego[tm] porn now? <ego> http://drew.corrupt.net/lp/series4.html <ego> hahah * holsta sends email to abuse@lego.com <ego> omfg that is too gunny <ego> funny even
Two new pictures from my vacation made it past the censor.
I saw my doctor while I was in Denmark. He said I should fix my body before it becomes too difficult to change, and that if I did not, I would be in serious problems by the time I am 40. So, as per the Doctors orders I have made a diet plan (a lifestyle change, really) that I must stick to.
Home again. I think I hate Dublin.
Today I was watching MTV and hacking while the Spirited One napped. During one of the shows I discovered that Wyclef has done a cover/remix of Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here" -- Who does he think he is? I am going to kill him.
Ate dinner at home, and then went to see a less than brilliant movie. The screen was so small it was funny. Five rows of seats, probably fit around 100 people. Even the Irish Film Centre is much bigger.
Made arrangements for Friday and Saturday in Copenhagen. Not many people appear to be showing up on Saturday.
Slept very late, showed her around the streets where I grew up many years ago. The old house did not look like itself anymore. It was nice to use public transport that actually works, however. Busses that run on the exact minute as stated on the timetable. No sooner, no later.
I received email from my brother saying that my dad was in the hospital again. I tried calling, but no joy.
HOLY FUCK. -1 celcius. Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
I took the Spirited One out to dinner at an Italian restaurant, which was very nice.
Feeling slightly stressed as I try to finish the last bits before my flight.
I updated the travelplan slightly. I will have email access during my holiday and will contact the Copenhagen crowd to make further arrangements.
Returning to Dublin Saturday 26th, back in work on Tuesday 29th.
I must have been tired. It was 8:15am before I could drag myself out of bed. Ironically, Uffe sent me email complaining that my diary updates were slow. He wanted to know how the story with Bjarne turned out. You remember Uffe, do you not? He was the one who last year let his diary die. Pfft.
My feelings of the important meeting are neutral -- which is not good. I had great expectactions.
This evening, Bjarne posted to the security group stating that I took a respectful initiative to ending the omicon.dk dispute. He now has respect for me once more. Phew, that was close! He then immediately carried on displaying his total lack of understanding of the basic problem in his product. One gets the impression he sees himself as a rebel, fighting against the masses.
File under "incompetent" on snakeoil.dk.
Ports makefiles will have to wait for tomorrow. I need sleep.
Went to a risk analysis meeting which lasted an hour and a half. I had the frame on my other glasses fixed and bought a load of Dr. Pepper. I paid the outstanding amount of rent to my landlord as my bank seems unable to fix the standing order that pays my rent. Very annoying.
Tomorrow is a very important meeting which is overdue by almost 2 years.
As Bjarne did not contact me, I sent him email today asking if he was interested in omicon.dk. I told him they could have the domain for free. I also asked him to sign a "contract" which said:
Alternativt kan du faxe eller sende mig en kopi af et stykke papir hvor
der staar:
Jeg, Bjarne Østergård, lover hermed Alex Holst, at hvis jeg i
fremtiden finder det nødvendigt at bede om en sikkerhedsevaluering
af mine/vores produkter i dk.ebd.sikkerhed igen, vil jeg altid
svare uddybene og aldrig undvigende paa relevante spørgsmål om
produktet. Jeg forstår at jeg bør gøre dette af ren respekt for
de som gratis bruger tid på at evaluere mit produkt.
Skulle jeg bryde mit ord har det hverken økonomiske eller retslige
konsekvenser. Det betyder blot, at Alex Holst har et skriftligt
bevis på jeg gav et løfte som jeg ikke har holdt.
_______________________________ __________________
(underskrift) (dags dato)
I made it clear that signing the contract was completely voluntary and would not have any impact on my decision to offer him the domain for free.
Bjarne responded about an hour later, saying they could not use omicon.dk as he had discovered another company in Denmark called Omicon. He went on to thank me for the kinder tone in which my original email had been written, and said Gigasoft had just hired an individual with security skills. His tasks will be to translate the program to English and to compare the statements made in the security group against the program code.
If I get some time, I will respond and once more explain that the biggest problem is not in the program code, but rather that Bjarne is making promises that software simply cannot fulfill.
He said that if I removed the "nasty words about his company" from omicon.dk, he would be happy and would respect me again. Omicon.dk is now for sale, and the content has been moved to www.snakeoil.dk.
A "PS" at the end of the letter said my email made him happy.
I note that while he was quick to start an off-topic thread in which he angrily accused me of blackmail and otherwise bashed me, based on less than the absolute truth, he has yet to follow up on the matter and explain the current situation. Such is the nature of humans.
I got up at 5am, slept a little in the afternoon, and went to bed before 6pm.
A couple of threads related to Bjarne and omicon.dk have exploded in dk.edb.sikkerhed over the last couple of days. A large number of individuals have made it to my killfile, including Bjarne just around the time he accused me of blackmail. I am not sure how he arrived at that conclusion. I have not been in contact with him, and he has not been in contact with me.
I have been told Bjarne is going to sue me for damages. He never asked if I was willing to hand over the domain, or at what price. To the best of my knowledge, I am not guilty of a crime. Simply by announcing the namechange of his company by putting an image on his homepage does not entitle him in any special way to a particular domain name. I may be contacting a Danish company called Omicon, which has been in existance since 1999 and offer them the domain. I wonder if Bjarne is going to sue them for damages also. After all, they have been using the name for years, and he just came up with it. I can see why he might be mad.
If Bjarne does sue, I will probably counter with a defamation suit. At no point have I done anything counter to what I said I would do. If I could just say the same for Bjarne, he would not have annoyed me as much as he did.
At most, I am guilty of being annoying towards Bjarne. He decided, I am sorry to say, to pollute dk.edb.sikkerhed with this dispute which goes counter to my personal goals. The entire reason I started writing the FAQ in the first place was to get rid of boring and trivial discussions that were repeated on a weekly basis. Now the crap is overwhelming.
I have not and will not participate in the discussion, primarily because domainname disputes are off-topic in that group. Another reason I have not engaged in the discussion is that a number of people disagree with what I did, and think me a bad person for my actions. I do not really care what they think of me, and you can probably imagine the kind of reaction people would give if I told them this. It would serve no purpose.
A muppet (Bjarne of Gigasoft Denmark fame) was surprised today when he realised I had purchased the Omicon.dk domain name. For the last month or so, the news had been on the Gigasoft Denmark homepage that they were going to change name to Omicon but when I looked, Omicon.dk had not been registered. I spent some time trying to understand why he was so surprised. One of my most recent posts to him clearly said:
Now you've done it. Suffer the consequences.
I wonder which part he did not understand. Bjarne also claimed I was attempting to hide my identity when I registered the domain, and he is absolutely right. I tried to hide by supplying my real name, my real email address and a real, valid street address. Please.
Originally I wanted to use the domain name for a fake company boasting their "ultra secure" products. However, with the multiple meanings of 'con' perhaps I should use the domain name to expose Danish frauds and dishonest marketing of security products.
My actions may seem unreasonable but this muppet has polluted dk.edb.sikkerhed with product adverts "cleverly" disguised as requests for free security evaluations of his commercial products. He was never forthcoming with information about his products, the specifications changed every time he was asked what the software was supposed to do, and he did not listen to the advice of newsgroup contributors. So, indeed, suffer the consequences.
In other news, $EMPLOYER stepped over the line and they too will suffer the consequences. Some employers simply do not know what it takes to keep their staff and after telling them for over a year I have finally had enough.
Jerry bought me a book he thought might restore my faith in humanity. The book is "Darwin Awards II: More True Stories of How Dumb Humans Have Met Their Maker."
I invested in a large bottle of Gaviscon to keep my stomach under control. The contents of regular sized bottle vanished too quickly.
Wow. Out of bed at the stroke of 7.
I called to my old doctor and made an appointment with him while I am in Denmark. He should be able to advise me on the health issues I have been suffering from lately.
Today I will be involved in walkthroughs of one of the current projects my team is working on.
Sleeping early last night failed. Sleeping at all also pretty much failed. I napped from 2pm to 5pm when Mick called me. I was so confused I had to promise I would call him tomorrow. He probably thought it was funny as hell. Excessive confusion resulting from being woken suddenly is actually a sympthom of hypertension.
I think I fell asleep just after midnight.
Did you notice how I finally got around to making my diary Y2K2 compliant, but still have no real message for the crowd?
I went to bed in the morning and got up in the evening. I had a foursome in bed with Tori Amos, Sarah McLachlan and Sade. I am exhausted. Trying to sleep for the night.