Security Hole Striptease

Security Focus ^ | May 27, 2002 | Tim Mullen

[Dominic Harr]

I will grant you IIS; however, you're grossly exaggerating about SQL Server.

IIS is a piece of junk. SQLServer is barely adequate, but even a simple MYSQL instance configured right can blow it out of the water.

MS has made it's sales of SQLServer by doing what ya'll are doing -- fraudulently promising companies that SQLServer can compete. Then those companies get inside it, and are trapped. The ones capable of doing so migrate away from SQLServer, and a small portion -- about 20% of the market -- are stuck, locked in. Which is, of course, your plan.

MS is the Brittnely Spears of software. Use control of distribution channels and industry clout to sell the ignorant on low-quality product.

Certainly that's a proven successful business model. But don't go trying to sell me on the idea that cash makes quality.

[Dominic Harr]

Funny, you won't address the sodomy law issue.

Ah, you missed my entire post on the subject? I'd be happy to repeat --

Anti-trust laws like the Sherman Act are necessary to defend the free market against monopolistic control. Anyone violating them is guilty of attacking the free market. The laws are not anachronisms, they are living, vital parts of what is left of our capitalist system. The 'victim' is our capitalist free-market -- and anyone who values that market.

Which apparently doesn't include you.

Sodomy laws are a 'victimless' crime.

No paralell what-so-ever. Apples and chainsaws.

[Bush2000]

That was back when MS could use coercion as a 'marketing' tactic. They didn't sell products to consumers, they went to retailers and leaned on them to offer only MS products or else suffer retaliation. This is no longer possible.

Please tell us, Harr, how Microsoft beat Lotus 1-2-3. Or Novell (a server product). Or ccMail. Or WordPerfect. Want me to go on? Did MS use coercion to beat these companies? If so, how? MS has never won a capitlist 'free-market' competition. Their products are always also-rans.

See above. Remove finger from rear-end.

When forced to compete, they don't win.

See above. Remove finger from rear.

In my experience.

And we all know how much that's worth. Zippo. Especially on matters dealing with antitrust, cryptography, and .NET.

Then again, this opinion was worth exactly what you just paid for it. Time will tell. MS certainly will not vanish. They'll remain a big company. But their control and monopolization of the tech industry is a thing of the past. And that's a good thing for capitalists.

Get used to their dominance, Harr. They'll be around long after Sun has auctioned off all their real estate and computers.

[Bush2000]

You're clearly not a developer.

Neither are you, crypto-boy.

[Bush2000]

SQLServer is barely adequate, but even a simple MYSQL instance configured right can blow it out of the water.

Stop. See a drug counselor immediately. This is your brain on drugs.

MS has made it's sales of SQLServer by doing what ya'll are doing -- fraudulently promising companies that SQLServer can compete. Then those companies get inside it, and are trapped. The ones capable of doing so migrate away from SQLServer, and a small portion -- about 20% of the market -- are stuck, locked in. Which is, of course, your plan.

That's SLANDER, Harr. Prove it.

MS is the Brittnely Spears of software. Use control of distribution channels and industry clout to sell the ignorant on low-quality product.

Again, you are the Forrest Gump of software development. I, personally, wouldn't trust you to script a web page.

Certainly that's a proven successful business model. But don't go trying to sell me on the idea that cash makes quality.

Why would we bother? You're a disciple of the Scott McNealy and Larry Ellison school of thought.

[parsifal]

But don't you find sometimes that the VISA/EMS bus line often conflicts outernet drive protocols with the old style non-fiberous relay type switches? We had to re-route our routers through a null-void non-synchronous cutout on a dead terminator coil to prompt the sysadmin hardware modulator chip address forwarding failsafe backup. Then, we used the non-save high-register varm bank to reprogram the worm-chipset settings. God it was a mess! parsy.

[bribriagain]

Denial is a dangeous place in Egypt.

[Dominic Harr]

Please tell us, Harr, how Microsoft beat Lotus 1-2-3.

"It ain't done until Lotus won't run".

Remember that famous line? MS used Windows as leverage against Lotus, WordPerfect, Netscape, etc, etc. Illegally, it is now clear.

So MS didn't "beat" Lotus legally.

MS has had to cheat, had to break the law. They've proven unable to win any other way.

[Dominic Harr]

Uh, yeah, what you said.

With ketchup, please.

[Dominic Harr]

Denial is a dangeous place in Egypt.

I don't know, the idea that, "they won in the past, so they'll win in the future" doesn't seem very sound to begin with.

Then add in the conviction, and the coming punishments, and the business restrictions, and the lawsuits, and the current dominance of Java . . .

It's not denial. It's a sound analysis, to my eyes. There is much evidence of a tidal shift.

[PatrioticAmerican]

You can rant all you want, Harr, but the fact remains that Microsoft produces billions in revenue by making customers happy enough to continue to willingly buy their products. Sun's stock price is in the shitter because of their lousy business practices and products. Microsoft is doing very well and always has.

You cannot possibly lay claim that all their revenue, of over $40 billion, is from coercion, illegal practices, and the production of lousy products. Microsoft obviously, but not to you, makes products that work and people are willing to pay for them.

If you want to continue to lay claim otherwise, please do. CSC is a competitor to my company, and I hope you guys produce the most ridiculous proposals for your clients. I always love to win through competition, but if you want me to beat you because of your anti-Microsoft stance, by all means, please continue.

You can continue to challenge my status as a developer, but you are not my hero, and so I won't bother to try to impress you.

[Dominic Harr]

You can continue to challenge my status as a developer, but you are not my hero, and so I won't bother to try to impress you.

Just like with the .NET claim you made, I honestly would like to know some details about your career.

You've said that you're just so good with MS products you've never even had IIS go down on you. Never had SQLServer problems. Never had Exchange or MS Project issues.

That makes you the world's greatest living developer. I talk to lots of developers. Many, many MS developers. And everyone, and I mean everyone, has had problems with MS stuff not working as advertised.

So your claims make you the greatest living MS developer! So naturally I'd be curious to find out just a few details. What was the last project you delivered? I just finished an 'OnCall' system for our Help Desk. It has java applet for the front-end, a servlet for the middle tier and a SQLServer 7 back end (the fella who 'owned' the data, in what he calls the 'Hawk' system, didn't know anything else, and wouldn't use anything else), which gave us several problems that MS tech support couldn't resolve. Most annoying was the way SQLServer handles joins. Then there were problems with IIS. For one thing, we had to spend an additional $800 to buy JRun so IIS could run servlets!

So what's your secret? Are you the best developer in the world? Or are you just making all this up to try and sell MS? You make amazing claims, which you seem unwilling to explain at all.

Even Bush2k can admit part of the truth about IIS, for goodness sake!

[Bush2000]

"It ain't done until Lotus won't run". Remember that famous line? MS used Windows as leverage against Lotus, WordPerfect, Netscape, etc, etc. Illegally, it is now clear.

I've seen this accusation spread repeatedly within the ABM community but I've never seen any verifiable evidence to back up such a claim. Care to prove it? Or is this just more FUD atop more FUD?

[E Rocc]

Software you can't see the source-code for is like food they won't let you see the ingredients list for.

It's their intellectual property. My company won't tell people precisely what's in our products either. If we did we'd be out of business...and our replacements wouldn't be Americans.

Our brains, ingenuity, and creativity give Americans advantages over the rest of the world, with its cheap labor and raw materials. We're insane if we gut the laws that allow us to protect our intellectual property.

-Eric

[Bush2000]

Hint: Harr wants MS to fail. It's that simple.

[Dominic Harr]

the ABM community

Heeheehee.

There it is again, any critics of MS must be bigots!

Haahaahaha!

[Dominic Harr]

It's their intellectual property.

Absolutely.

And you do agree that your customers have no way of knowing what, if any, really bad things are hidden in the software?

A company could build in all sorts of nasty things, either on purpose or on accident, agreed?

So I repeat -- software you can't review the source-code for is like a sausage that they refuse to tell you what meat is in it.

[Bush2000]

Tell us, Harr: What is so special about software that makes it unlike, say, pharmaceuticals? Drug manufacturers don't release the contents of the blueprints of their drugs to customers. Nobody disputes that their products can do great harm; nor do they dispute that they do great good.

[Bush2000]

Heeheehee. There it is again, any critics of MS must be bigots! Haahaahaha!

I take it from your non-response that you don't have any evidence to back up your claim. It's gotten so hard to distinguish between your lies and your occasional nuggets of truth (for example, when you say "I must have been mistaken") that it's far easier to simply apply Occam's Razor and assume the former.

[PatrioticAmerican]

"software you can't review the source-code for is like a sausage that they refuse to tell you what meat is in it. "

And you have the time to review the 44,000,000+ lines of code in Windows XP? You argument makes no practical sense. Second, are you expert enough to understand the complexity of the operating system and all of its subsystems? Ya, know, it is not written in Java. ;>

You don't know the metal in the frame of your care or engine, the metal of the aircraft you last flew in, or the pesticides used in that last green bean you ate, so why try to hammer Microsoft for not sharing their internal secrets?

Face it, you HATE Microsoft, and your efforts show your bias. You have stated in many ways that you want them out of business.