Text 22573, 80 rader
Skriven 2006-10-15 11:24:13 av Alan Zisman (1:123/789.0)
  Kommentar till text 22562 av CHARLES ANGELICH (1:123/140)
Ärende: Vista anti-piracy
=========================
On Sun, 15 Oct 2006 01:30:00 -0400, CHARLES ANGELICH -> ALAN ZISMAN wrote:


 AZ>> I don't have any real information of the size of the
 AZ>> graphics database used by Google Earth, but I'd suspect
 AZ>> it's too large to be burned to DVD...

 CA> Yes, at certain "zoom levels" it would be:

 CA> http://tinyurl.com/ydr4vk

Interesting link-- thanks... where it's not entirely accurate in
its estimates is in the assumption that Google Earth provides
equally-detailed images of the whole Earth... in fact, it's pictures
(at maximum resolution) vary in quality depending where you're
looking... for instance, I get a reasonably high-res image of
my house in Vancouver, and much lower resolution of my house in the
(30 miles north of Vancouver) small town of Sechelt... images in
the tiny town of Wells BC (about 400 miles further north- population
200, where my daughter spent the summer) are even lower quality.

The result is a much smaller database than the maximum estimated,
with images biased greatly towards where people live-- and, I suspect,
biases towards North America/UK/some major other cities- primarily
European.

It would be interesting to assemble data on the biases in Google Earth
coverage...


 AZ>> I know I have an old CD-ROM disk created (around 1997 or AZ> so)
 CA> from a University of BC geography department project AZ> that took
 CA> aerial photos of the greater Vancouver region-- AZ> quality was on a par
 CA> with Google Earth's, but for a much AZ> smaller area... since the
 CA> contents of about 7 CDs fit on a AZ> DVD, a DVD would hold only a small
 CA> fraction of the images AZ> needed.

 CA> Someone (I forget who) is manufacturing combo HD and Blu-ray DVD drives
 CA> which puts one DVD up to 52 gigs. We'll get there.
 CA> :-)

And I look forward to the day!

 AZ>> Comparing Win2000 and Linux, however, gets more complex-- AZ>
 CA> Win2000 will be immediately familiar to more users and be AZ> able to
 CA> run the wide range of Windows software and AZ> peripherals without a lot
 CA> of fussing... Linux, however, AZ> wouldn't have the same vulnerabilities
 CA> to Windows viruses AZ> and other malware and so wouldn't require the
 CA> same level of AZ> care and fussing to remain malware-safe.

 CA> The "security by obscurity" status of linux is changing as we type.


Windows (all versions pre-Vista) are inherently more insecure than
both Mac OS X and Vista due to the crippling of Limit user accounts
and the openness of (Windows) Administrator-level accounts, allowing
nasty executibles to have permission to run underneath the user's
awareness.

While the vast number of Windows systems (compared to OS X or Linux)
make them a more tempting target for attack, this design decision by
Microsoft ensures that attacks are more likely to be successful.

Houses in rich neighbourhoods may be more tempting to burglars than
houses in poor neighbourhoods-- but houses in any neighbourhood with
all the doors and windows wide open are more likely to be successfully
burgled. (You can't even call it 'broken into').

Microsoft's addition of the poorly-implemented 'User Access Control'
in Vista is a tacit admission that OS X and Linux are more securely
designed in this area.



email Alan: alan (at) zisman (dot) ca

Alan's website: www.zisman.ca

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