vomitcuddle

My biggest issue with all the investment in blockchain-derived technologies that aren't cryptocurrency related is that it's hard to apply proof-of-work systems to real world problems. How do you incentivize people for mining blocks? How do you ensure you have enough distributed computing power, so that a single actor can't take over the entire network? The company using a blockchain to track diamonds is a good example. Do I get diamonds for mining blocks? Then what's the point? Companies like Everledger claiming to run a "private blockchain" are only using the word as marketing bullshit, because that effectively becomes a centralized database/linked list.

nothing stopping them from storing precomputed hashes for every registered gmail address and using them as a lookup table

Volvo Car Corporation and Volvo Trucks are owned by different companies

>Android doesn't have that

Android has Nexus and Google Play Edition phones.

> The man committed genocide and numerous other crimes against humanity.

the amerikan founding fathers have committed acts of genocide (and numerous other crimes) against Native Americans and Africans and yet someone decided it would be a good idea to print them on dollar bills

I only realized it when I first started taking Ritalin and it decreased my appetite to the point where I was having only one meal a day.

http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/12/this-is-yo...

sounds like you could use a schedule, so you don't always feel like you should be doing things.

pick different days of the week/times for socialising and learning things. stick to them once you find the right balance.

ADD and wheat allergy. When I accidentally eat gluten, it completely destroys my ability to concentrate for a day or more.

I'm upset that in the year 2014 we still think that having the package maintainers patch ancient software instead of providing latest upstream versions is a good idea. I'm a big fan of the *BSD package management model - they give you a stable core, you pick your own (upstream, possibly bleeding-edge) versions of everything else.

I think I trust my compiler to generate clean assembly more than I trust a commercial company like Synology to write secure software

Sorry. Not a dorky paranoid liberal type here. Me, i don't see any use for cryptocurrencies outside of darknet contraband trade/money laundering. Any politician excited about cryptocurrencies would probably use them to receive untraceable bribes. The idea that a public company (i'm talking about Mt. Gox) can hold an asset that can magically disappear without a trace and still receive bankruptcy protection from the government (without the ceo being arrested for theft) is a joke.

i admit it's nice from an engineering standpoint and maybe if this imaginary liberal (does that word even mean anything concrete anymore?) utopia some people seem to be living in was true, it would actually be useful to people who don't want to wait 45 minutes at the supermarket checkout for their crypto-monopoly-money transaction to confirm.

Unless you're only serving static files (on a 10Gbit+ connection) or are still running Apache/IIS, the web server is not the bottleneck, it's either your (Python/Ruby/Node/...) code or the underlying database.

you can set it up to send email notifications when an update is available

No need for extensive Linux experience: Use a secure password for DSM, turn off "EZ-Internet" and other DynDNS-like services, make sure it's connected to your router and not directly to the Internet, don't forward any ports, don't enable DMZ or similar functionality on your router, keep up-to-date with DSM updates, make sure other computers on your network are malware-free (there could be a piece of PC malware exploiting synology devices found on the local network), keep multiple backups in different locations (online and offline) of your most valuable data.

These are just best practices, since we don't know anything about this particular piece of malware yet. They should cover most threats and worst-case scenarios.

If you need access to your Synology device from outside your home network, use a VPN or an SSH tunnel.

I agree, but I can buy two entry-level Synology DiskStations for the price of one C2550 CPU+MB bundle. I really like that CPU and I would buy it in a heartbeat to replace my Synology, if the price didn't include the "GenuineIntel tax".

Compared to a good (i don't really consider Debian "good", since the 2006 OpenSSL screwup) Linux distro: you control your own software, you can make sure it's kept up-to-date and the binaries come from a trusted source (and you can build them yourself, if you want to).

Just took a look at my logs. Was it an IPv6 address?

I'm guessing this only affects you if you have their EZ-Internet service enabled that exposes the NAS to the public internet. Or if you exposed it yourself on your firewall.

I've had a Synology NAS for almost a year now. I really like the UI, but the software stack they're using under the hood (Apache, PHP, MySQL, etc.) has a massive attack surface, if not routinely kept up-to-date.

Here's an nmap trace from my Synology DiskStation: amber@leysritt ~ % nmap -A <redacted>

  Starting Nmap 6.46 ( http://nmap.org ) at 2014-08-03 23:06 BST
  Nmap scan report for <redacted>
  Host is up (0.011s latency).
  Not shown: 987 closed ports
  PORT     STATE SERVICE     VERSION
  22/tcp   open  ssh         OpenSSH 5.8p1-hpn13v11 (protocol 2.0)
  | ssh-hostkey:
  |   1024 <redacted> (DSA)
  |   2048 <redacted> (RSA)
  |_  256 <redacted>  (ECDSA)
  80/tcp   open  http        Apache httpd
  |_http-generator: ERROR: Script execution failed (use -d to debug)
  |_http-methods: No Allow or Public header in OPTIONS response (status code 301)
  |_http-title: Did not follow redirect to http://<redacted>:5000/
  111/tcp  open  rpcbind     2-4 (RPC #100000)
  | rpcinfo:
  |   program version   port/proto  service
  |   100000  2,3,4        111/tcp  rpcbind
  |   100000  2,3,4        111/udp  rpcbind
  |   100003  2,3         2049/udp  nfs
  |   100003  2,3,4       2049/tcp  nfs
  |   100005  1,2,3        892/tcp  mountd
  |   100005  1,2,3        892/udp  mountd
  |   100021  1,3,4      33154/tcp  nlockmgr
  |   100021  1,3,4      38187/udp  nlockmgr
  |   100024  1          44039/tcp  status
  |_  100024  1          53309/udp  status
  139/tcp  open  netbios-ssn Samba smbd 3.X (workgroup: REDACTED)
  161/tcp  open  snmp?
  445/tcp  open  netbios-ssn Samba smbd 3.X (workgroup: REDACTED)
  515/tcp  open  printer
  548/tcp  open  afp         Netatalk 2.2.3 (name: redacted; protocol 3.3)
  | afp-serverinfo:
  |   | Server Flags: 0x8f79
  |   |   Super Client: Yes
  |   |   UUIDs: Yes
  |   |   UTF8 Server Name: Yes
  |   |   Open Directory: Yes
  |   |   Reconnect: No
  |   |   Server Notifications: Yes
  |   |   TCP/IP: Yes
  |   |   Server Signature: Yes
  |   |   ServerMessages: Yes
  |   |   Password Saving Prohibited: No
  |   |   Password Changing: No
  |   |_  Copy File: Yes
  |   Server Name: redacted
  |   Machine Type: Netatalk2.2.3
  |   AFP Versions: AFP2.2, AFPX03, AFP3.1, AFP3.2, AFP3.3
  |   UAMs: Cleartxt Passwrd, No User Authent, DHX2, DHCAST128
  |   Server Signature: redacted
  |   Network Address 1: redacted
  |_  UTF8 Server Name: redacted
  631/tcp  open  ipp         CUPS 1.5
  | http-methods: Potentially risky methods: PUT
  |_See http://nmap.org/nsedoc/scripts/http-methods.html
  |_http-title: Not Found - CUPS v1.5.4
  2049/tcp open  nfs         2-4 (RPC #100003)
  3689/tcp open  daap        mt-daapd DAAP 0.2.4.1
  5000/tcp open  http        Apache httpd
  |_http-generator: ERROR: Script execution failed (use -d to debug)
  |_http-methods: No Allow or Public header in OPTIONS response (status code 302)
  | http-robots.txt: 1 disallowed entry
  |_/
  |_http-title: Did not follow redirect to https://redacted:5001
  5001/tcp open  ssl/http    Apache httpd
  |_http-generator: ERROR: Script execution failed (use -d to debug)
  |_http-methods: No Allow or Public header in OPTIONS response (status code 301)


  | http-robots.txt: 1 disallowed entry
  |_/
  |_http-title: Did not follow redirect to https://redacted/webman/index.cgi
  | ssl-cert: Subject: commonName=synology.com/organizationName=Synology
  Inc./stateOrProvinceName=Taiwan/countryName=TW
  | Not valid before: REDACTED
  |_Not valid after:  REDACTED
  |_ssl-date: REDACTED
  | tls-nextprotoneg:
  |   spdy/3
  |   spdy/2
  |   http/1.1
  |_  x-mod-spdy/0.9.4.2-465a04f
  Service Info: OS: Unix

  Host script results:
  |_nbstat: NetBIOS name: redacted, NetBIOS user: <unknown>, NetBIOS MAC: <unknown>
  (unknown)
  | smb-os-discovery:
  |   OS: Unix (Samba 3.6.9)
  |   Computer name: redacted
  |   NetBIOS computer name:
  |   Domain name:
  |   FQDN: redacted
  |_  System time: redacted
  | smb-security-mode:
  |   Account that was used for smb scripts: guest
  |   User-level authentication
  |   SMB Security: Challenge/response passwords supported
  |_  Message signing disabled (dangerous, but default)
  |_smbv2-enabled: Server supports SMBv2 protocol

  Service detection performed. Please report any incorrect results at
  http://nmap.org/submit/ .
  Nmap done: 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 40.47 seconds

It's sad that most of the open-source NAS solutions are so bad compared to their commercial counterparts. FreeNAS (and related forks) sacrifice too much flexibility and don't offer anything that you can't easily do yourself with a Linux/BSD server distro.

I'd love to work on an open-source, security-oriented, user-friendly DSM "clone" with the right kind of people. If this sounds like fun or it sounds like something you're currently working on - shoot me an email: amber@fastmail.jp

I also wish there was such a thing as a nice, inexpensive ARM board (~$100) with plenty of SATA ports and upgradable RAM (so you can run huge ZFS pools on it) that you can install your own OS on...

>2) Do not be discouraged by project politics (if applicable).

Yeah, too bad this only applies if you're a white male.

cosmic ray bit flip?

XFS and its lack of data journaling (it only journals its own metadata) is notorious for corrupting data on power loss and kernel crashes. It performs well only under specific workloads and hardware setups.

Why choose it as the default filesystem in an enterprise-oriented distro?

It requires Linux-specific kernel APIs like cgroups and udev, not POSIX.

Most *BSD systems are mostly or fully POSIX compliant.

Not everyone has a "I just moved to a foreign country and have to make a living somehow" moment.

Any specific advice for a person who found school easy and now has problems challenging themselves further in live?

"Not Open Source" is the wrong term. It's an extreme example of a cathedral project. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cathedral_and_the_Bazaar .

Slightly off-topic, but Android is another good example of a project where the LICENSE is open, but the ethos behind the project are not. The source code releases are licensed under the Apache License, but they're aimed at device manufacturers. Not at users. Not at developers. Not at ROM makers. Google doesn't care about your stinkin' custom ROM.

How many people outside of Google do you know who have contributed a (non-security) patch upstream to Android? Can you clone the Android source from a public VCS to see what is being worked on in the next, yet unannounced release? Where was the Honeycomb source code before Ice Cream Sandwich got released?

If someone decided to fork Android, what kind of changes could they make and still remain compatible with apps designed for Google's version of Android? APIs and compatibility definition documents serve as Google's insurance against forking.

Someone ought to invent a pejorative term for this kind of projects. It may be an open source project. But does it represent the same collaborative ethos as the Linux Kernel, Mozilla or GNU? No.

This isn't about free software vs open source. This is about open source serving a purely commercial interest (having the Google ecosystem on as many third-party devices as possible) vs innovation and collaboration.

Any respectable person calling themselves a hacker would not call these "shut-in" projects truly open.

With I/O being the top bottleneck in modern databases and web applications, a lot of what people call "unpredictable performance" or "virtualization overhead" has mostly to do with sharing (and thin provisioning) storage devices between multiple servers/nodes.

I think there would be a huge market for a performance-oriented VPS provider who could provide each node with its own, dedicated hard drives/SSDs. All major virtualisation tech (KVM/Xen) already supports raw disk mode.

Obviously, space and SATA ports inside servers are an expensive commodity with off-the-shelf hardware, so this project would require at least some custom hardware to offer competitive pricing. I think the tiny mPCIE SSDs sometimes found in laptops would be a good area to explore.

Having more fine grained permission controls for power users would be good, but it wouldn't be enough to fix Android's current security model. Most people don't read the permission list (even the simplified one) when installing a new app. Most people aren't power users who would take the time to understand and fiddle with Privacy Guard-like controls.

Granting all-or-nothing permissions at install time is not a viable security model for a consumer-oriented operating system. It could work in an enterprise environment where each new app has to be approved by management and go through a lengthy 'certification' process. However, unlike enterprise apps, Android has otherwise decent security based on the Linux kernel and proven, rock-solid app sandboxing.

Android needs to split the current permission list into two categories. Basic ones (like Internet access) that could be granted at install time and privacy-oriented ones (Camera, Location, etc.) that the user gets prompted for, just like on iOS.

Breaking existing apps could be avoided by feeding them empty or fake data (Location not available, Camera in use by another app, etc.) and providing new APIs to detect rejected permission prompts for developers who decide to update their apps.

Users have a right to privacy and the operating system shouldn't require sysadmin-level knowledge to let them protect their data.

That's exactly what it does. It feeds the application with fake or no data. There's no other way to do it due to Android's (in my opinion fundamentally flawed) security model.

Similar, more mature projects based around other languages: Erlang: http://erlangonxen.org C#: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmos_(operating_system) C#: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SharpOS_(operating_system)

It's made of cardboard. You don't need a laser cutter to cut cardboard. Just use some fr&ckin' scissors. Also, just because someone won't sell millions of these things, doesn't mean they can't source materials at a price cheaper than buying them from Amazon. $3 worth of Velcro per unit? Seriously?

Some people here are really eager to burst somebody's bubble. Gosh.