QuadCEM/QuadBlog

How many times have you found yourself in the position where you needed to send a large group of files (esp. over e-mail or uploading to a website) and WinZip (for instance) just wouldn’t compress it enough to make it feasible for transfer?  The only option you’d have would be to span the files over multiple chunks that need to be reassembled on the other end.  But what if there were programs out there that compressed at a much better ratio?  Well there certainly are, but how much better are they?  And at what cost?  (more…)

Be sure to read (and re-read) the new Microsoftopoly page!

“When it comes right down to it, there’s one main reason that Microsoft is in the position they’re in today — their businessmen.  It certainly isn’t their software, and there’s no way that it’s their executive charm (although Steve Ballmer does seem to have an awkward boyish glow at times).  One might even go so far as to say that Microsoft itself would not be here today if not for their business guys.  It seems that Microsoft is more of a company that sells software, not a software company.  For the majority of their products, they will typically buy other peoples’ software out, load it full of MS logos and slap a price tag on it.  They never do anything innovative, and rarely ever come up with any software ideas on their own.  As stated before:  Microsoft is a company that sells software … not a software development company.”

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At this point, even the legal system is starting to realize that the RIAA is just making a mockery of the court systems. The RIAA continues to launch lawsuits by misapplying copyright laws with unjustifiable, extortionate amounts of money against the P2P offenders. The first file-sharing conviction ever, which forced a single mother from MN to pay $222,000 for having 24 songs available to download on KaZaA, was “recently” thrown out by the judge. (more…)

Microsoft has once again proven that they are ten cents short of a dime, but still manage to throw their money around. Recall a previous post, Microsoft gets raped by ODF, where ODF was accepted to be used as the default file format by the state agencies of Massachusetts. Microsoft made a big stink about this, they said it was “inconsistent and discriminatory”, and they stood their ground. Guess what other file format is now going to be used alongside ODF in Massachusetts? (more…)

I guess the RIAA speaks for no one but themselves when they insist that their artists are being deprived because of illegal file sharing. What they really mean to say is, “I won’t be able to afford my third Ferrari this year because of you guys, so I’ll sue you for it.” (more…)

With all the talk about highly critical Microsoft blunders and botch-ups floating around lately it’s good to finally read some good news in the technology world. The Dept. of Homeland Security is providing Stanford University, Coverity, and Symantec with $1.24 million to find bugs in numerous open-source applications. (more…)

US-CERT released their 2005 Cyber Security Bulletin last week, claiming that Windows had 812 reported flaws and Unix/Linux had 2,328. This might come as a shock to you at first glance … and it is quite shocking; especially if you read their Technical Cyber Security Alerts page for the past two years (I’m not including 2006). Twenty-one of their reports mention vulnerabilities to Microsoft by name, and how many for Unix/Linux? Not one.

You might be thinking that something doesn’t add up here. Let’s breeze by Secunia and take a look at their stats to make sure we’re on the right track. Just to be fair (and so you don’t think I’m being biased towards Unix-based systems) I’m going to take the lowest stats for MS systems and I’ll use a bunch of different *nix systems (not just the highest or lowest). Also, I’m only using the latest versions of the different OS’s. Here we go: (more…)

Okay, so maybe they didn’t get completely raped, but it’s still funny to see the “almighty” Microsoft get stepped on from time to time. In case you haven’t heard the story of Peter Quinn, I’ll give you a rundown.

Quinn was the CIO (Chief Information Officer) for Massachusetts until he recently quit his position. Much to the chagrin of Microsoft, Quinn was pushing a mandatory ODF (OpenDocument Format) initiative for all state agencies in Massachusetts. Why was Microsoft mad about this? Because they don’t support the OpenDocument Format (read: no one would be using Microsoft’s own personal, licensed document format anymore). (more…)

So if you haven’t at least heard about the latest record company debacle then you must be living in China or North Korea. In their feeble attempt to stop piracy, Sony came up with the idea of using the popular “computer fraud” method to help protect their empire. On their latest CDs with DRM, the disks contain highly dangerous software (a rootkit) that is installed without the user’s knowledge. (more…)

Check out some good software on the Good Software page! (updated)

“As I always say, there’s only one type of software that is worth actually spending money on … one that requires a subscription (constant updates) to function well; no one should ever pay for any other kind of software. Any software that is worth using was created recreationally by real programmers that are just doing what they love, and software like that never has a price tag. Not to say, however, that programmers should never get paid for their work; if a company comes to you wanting you to take time out of your schedule to do work for them then they’d better do something for you in return.”

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