Date: Sun, 10 Mar 2002 12:58:08 -0600 From: "Mike Meyer" <mwm-dated-1016218689.6dbf45@mired.org> To: "Nickolay A.Kritsky" <nkritsky@internethelp.ru>, Paul Robinson <paul@iconoplex.co.uk>, Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> Cc: Peter Leftwich <Hostmaster@Video2Video.Com>, Miguel Mendez <flynn@energyhq.homeip.net>, Cliff Sarginson <csfbsd@raggedclown.net>, chat@FreeBSD.ORG, Mike Meyer <mwm@mired.org> Subject: Re: Re[4]: http://users.uk.freebsd.org/~juha/ Message-ID: <15499.44224.110718.925695@guru.mired.org> In-Reply-To: <1505738070.20020310181837@internethelp.ru> References: <20020306191854.C2150-100000@earl-grey.cloud9.net> <3C86C11C.8A31C8BB@mindspring.com> <15494.52528.125952.145716@guru.mired.org> <3C86D7D6.C11D7E@mindspring.com> <15494.58407.33613.314390@guru.mired.org> <8457986570.20020307135407@internethelp.ru> <15495.57385.993281.469551@guru.mired.org> <20020308113108.G32897@iconoplex.co.uk> <15497.12783.643757.175742@guru.mired.org> <20020309144158.K32897@iconoplex.co.uk> <15498.28088.976841.7441@guru.mired.org> <3C8A75A1.C567BB02@mindspring.com> <15498.34475.395754.932338@guru.mired.org> <3C8AFE22.72C005FA@mindspring.com> <3C8B0473.D544FB8@mindspring.com> <20020310164125.P32897@iconoplex.co.uk> <1136028208.20020310182327@internethelp.ru> <1505738070.20020310181837@internethelp.ru>
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Hello all, Nickolay A.Kritsky <nkritsky@internethelp.ru> types: > Hello Mike, > MM> You can learn that using your own system. Wanna learn how to break > MM> into a generic install of FreeBSD? Install one, and go to work on > MM> it. It's no less interesting/fun/educational than trying to break into > MM> someone elses, and a lot less likely to get you into trouble. > If I want to learn how to break into a generic install of FreeBSD, I > would follow your advice. But what if I want to learn how to break > into non-generic (web-hosting, complex mail server, load balancing > server) computer system installed on highly non-generic hardware (HP, > IBM, Cisco) with IDS'es, firewalls, sysadmins reading their logs and > sniffing interfaces? I cannot say which task is more educational, but the > second is much more fun/interesting. For me. So you're basically stealing computer time for "joy riding". If you really wanted to learn about those things, you could probably do it without breaking the law. Most of the sysadmins I've known wouldn't mind you trying to break in, so long as you told them about it before and afterwards. In fact, the policy for the more englightened of them was that the first person to report a hole granting a privilege was to give the person that privilege permanently. > BTW, do you really think, that all that is called "illegal" must be > avoided by any means possible? No offense meant. I just want to > understand your way of thinking? No, I don't think that's the case. On the other hand, I know what I had to go through to get access to strange hardware, and it just wasn't that painfull. All it took was some balls and respect. Nickolay A.Kritsky <nkritsky@internethelp.ru> types: > Hello Mike, > Sunday, March 10, 2002, 1:03:23 AM, you wrote: > MM> Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> types: > >> Mike Meyer wrote: > >> > In that case, you've got to purchase proprietary hardware to do it, > >> > and it's liable to be expensive. But wanting to satisfy your > >> > curiousity doesn't justify your stealing from other people. > >> He's right. Computers that are running software take more > >> electricity than those running the idle loop. This works > >> because idle loops aren't software, and because CPU cycles > >> cost money when you use them to do work, but cost nothing > >> when there is no work to do. > >> 8-). > MM> Assuming, of course, that they were running an idle loop, and not > MM> doing real work. People don't normally spend 8 figures on computers > MM> that they then let sit idle a lot. > Why then, they buy such computers and put a buggy > ftp/telnet/you_name_it daemon there? Thinking of humans as "normals" > is one dangerous delusion. :) Granted. Terry's parody assumed they were running idle loops 100% of the time; I just wanted to point that out. Paul Robinson <paul@iconoplex.co.uk> types: > On Mar 9, Mike Meyer <mwm-dated-1016143406.b4e49c@mired.org> wrote: > > One other comment - how many of you who felt like you had to break > > into computers to gain access to them thought about simply asking for > > access? > See my other post about splitting into two camps. By definition people on > this list will have fallen into the camp that went out and wanted to develop > their own Unix. You mean the post I already debunked? > It's a FreeBSD mailing list, so I think that's a safe > assumption. These days I have Unix everywhere I look. When I'm at > work, I'm playing with Unix. FreeBSD is on my laptop, and my PDA > runs Linux, so I'm never more than a few seconds away form a bash > prompt. I've got my Unix fix sorted out 24x7. In my living room I > have Sparc and VAX kit, and have the money to buy the hardware I > want to play with. Since we're talking about people developing their own, we're talking about pre-FreeBSD, and pre-386 hardware. Like I said, I was pretty generous with accounts during that era - at least when I could be. > But if I go back a few years (OK, make it about 7-8 years) then I can > remember not having access to any hardware whatsoever. My main desktop > machine was an original XT (in 1995?) and I was trying to save a few hundred > for an old-ish 386DX. I would have done anything to have had a DX4-100. The > idea of owning a Pentium was something that was so farfetched and ridiculous > at the time I never gave it serious consideration. Such luxury. You had a machine that could run Unix, if in an ugly fashion. My first machine was a z80 with a cassette drive. I worked three summers to buy a moderately good camera and darkroom gear, then sold them all to pay for that computer. > However, the point is I was young (al;most certainly foolish) and > from a relatively poor family. Can you not possibly understand, that > when I discovered I could very easily and quickly get access to IBM > S/360s, Crays, AS/400s, SunOS boxes, that I might possibly have > considered the risk would have been worth it? Oh yeah, and in my > case it got me laid once as well. :-) You know what it was like to be in your position. I was there, back when a US$1,000 home computer was an 8008 with 256 bytes of RAM. I managed to get access to similar hardware - S/370s, PDP-11's, VAXen, Sun's and Crays - by proving to the people who owned them that I could do worthwhile work on them. And I still played with the z80 box at home, and gave away accounts on some of that hardware to anyone who would ask. > I would never recommend hacking these days as access is too cheap and easy, > but I would never condone somebody who hacked just to look. I think there > are people on this list for whom access was just too easy. They never had > that situation where they were young and wanted access but couldn't get it, > as many here would have been in the ground floor and had access from the > beginning through their professional lives. I assume you mean "condemn", not "condon". True, that's been possible since I was old enough to legally work. But it's still possible. All it takes is the courage to go after what you want legally rather than illegally. > And motives do make a difference. If somebody is about to shoot you, and I > shoot them first, does that make me as much of a murderer as if I shot them > because I was insane and wanted to know what it felt like to shoot people? > If you think both crimes deserve the same punishment, then perhaps you need > to re-evaluate your sense of 'justice'. No, one is justifiable homicide and the other is murder. On the other hand, the comparison you're looking at would be more like accidently running over someone vs. shooting them in cold blood, the new one being "manslaughter". No, it's not murder. But the victim is just as dead. If you think the fact that the person who did it didn't mean to kill anyone means they shouldn't be punished, then you should re-evaluate your sense of 'justice'. Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> types: > Mike Meyer wrote: > > Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> types: > > > Mike Meyer wrote: > > > > In that case, you've got to purchase proprietary hardware to do it, > > > > and it's liable to be expensive. But wanting to satisfy your > > > > curiousity doesn't justify your stealing from other people. > > > He's right. Computers that are running software take more > > > electricity than those running the idle loop. This works > > > because idle loops aren't software, and because CPU cycles > > > cost money when you use them to do work, but cost nothing > > > when there is no work to do. > > > 8-). > > Assuming, of course, that they were running an idle loop, and not > > doing real work. People don't normally spend 8 figures on computers > > that they then let sit idle a lot. > Apparently, you were not around when they charged for CPU > seconds, and each student was required to pre-buy them for > their lab time, and the machines didn't have "HLT" instructions > that saved "wear-and-tear" on the CPU, and the administrators > either didn't understand that idle resources cost the same > amount of money to maintain, or they didn't care. I don't know who you're talking to, but I think both Terry and I were around during the period when they charged for CPU seconds. I know I was, and from what Terry has said elsewhere, I get the impression he was. What you're missing is that the charges were all just "funny money". They weren't a way to collect funds; they were a way to allocate the - very limited - resources available to everyone who wanted some of them. The machine in question was almost *never* idle. When the remote job entry stations shut down was when the large memory-hungry (which back then meant wanting a megabyte of core) jobs got to run. Their wsa always a job ready to run. Someone stealing cycles was *not* stealing them from an idle loop, but usually from someone's research project. > Until the system is fully loaded, the cycles are not a scarce > (and therefore contended) resource. It costs the same to run > a DEC 20 with or without people running programs on it, so the > cycles might as well be doing computation. First, the system doesn't have to be fully loaded for adding a job to perturb other jobs on the system. If there's one big memory-hungry job, and you kick it out of memory by asking the system to run your command processor - well, you're just delayed someone's project. > > One other comment - how many of you who felt like you had to break > > into computers to gain access to them thought about simply asking for > > access? I tended to give it away whenever I could, and I know other > > places that had similar policies. For that matter, the university I > > attended seriously undercharged for CPU time, so you could buy lots of > > CPU time for not a lot of cash. > Apparently, you had the cash, and your university didn't put > quotas on the total amount of CPU time you could use, total, > no matter how much you paid. Your conclusions are completely and totally false. I didn't have the cash, and my university did put strict quotas on the total amount of CPU time you could use. I found professors who would gladly give me time from their budgets if I would do some work on their projects for them, or if they thought my project was interesting enough. > People who came after the charge-for-CPU cycles really had it > a lot easier than those who came before. The PC broke the > stranglehold, making it impossible for the big iron to be used > as a profit center any more. The local universities big iron was *not* a profit center; it was a cost center. I guarantee it. When UCB installed a Cray, they lost money on it on a such a regular basis that the only way they could affort it was to let Cray use it as a regional training machine. > It's quite amusing to see that people are still teaching -- and > learning, and then entering the workforce using -- software design > that makes usability such an afterthought... as if the "sell the > documentation" model were still the fundamental basis of software > economics. And people wonder why MS is so draconian about having > their software "phone home"... when they're obviously trying to > extend the lifetime of a dying revenue model. I think you're confused. MS made a name for itself by creating software that was easy to use. Their revenue model is based on upgrade sales, not tech support. They would refuse to sell tech support if they could get away with it. <mike -- Mike Meyer <mwm@mired.org> http://www.mired.org/home/mwm/ Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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