From: cross@spitfire.i.gajendra.net   
      
   In article ,   
   John Dallman  wrote:   
   >In article <10co28b$isl$1@reader2.panix.com>,   
   >cross@spitfire.i.gajendra.net (Dan Cross) wrote:   
   >   
   >> I've said this before in this group, but the homogeneity of   
   >> modern computing does not strike me as a universally good thing.   
   >> There are economies of scale one can leverage, to be sure, but   
   >> just as monocultures aren't robust against external threats in   
   >> biological systems, I can't help but think that the same is true   
   >> of computing systems.   
   >   
   >Yup. I much enjoyed freaking out my old boss the day the ILOVEYOU e-mail   
   >virus hit. Lots of people at work were reading their mail on Windows and   
   >got hit. I was reading mine using Netscape on an HP-UX PA-RISC box and   
   >read the Visual Basic virus code with some interest. Some explaining that   
   >neither HP-UX nor Netscape could run this code, so I was safe, was   
   >necessary.   
   >   
   >Some years later, when I had a new boss, the old one spotted me reading a   
   >book about how buffer overflows and other security holes actually work.   
   >He was concerned, and felt that staff should not know these things. My   
   >new boss gave me a meta-instruction: if doing something reasonable   
   >worries the old boss, keep on doing it.   
      
   This idea that people would be discouraged from understanding   
   how attack vectors work seems incredibly regressive to me.  How   
   misguided.  New boss's advice seems sound!   
      
   >> It felt like there was a time when we had built hetergeneous   
   >> systems that were at least reasonable to manage; these days, I   
   >> think we'd know how to do much better.  But the diversity of   
   >> systems and platforms common 30 years ago are mostly gone, and   
   >> we're left with essentially three buckets: Windows, Linux, and   
   >> a small sliver of "everything else".  Not great.   
   >   
   >The heterogeneity shows up at different levels these days. VMware tried   
   >to enforce a monopoly, and now lots of different virtualisation systems   
   >are getting more popular. Tintri is taking market share from NetApp, and   
   >so on.   
      
   Perhaps, but where the juicy bits are (the applications and   
   access to their data, etc) is pretty much Linux all the way   
   down.   
      
   	- Dan C.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)