IE vs. Firefox

[Buffy]

Online banking is not more secure with IE than it could be with firefox, its sad that banks settle for that IE junk thinking that their protocols are "secure"...

Too true. The real reason the banks used it was 1) Microsoft convinced the CIO that all other browsers were dead, and 2) its easier for lazy programmers to code to a single proprietary standard that does have a few bells and whistles that that speed up the programming (most of these are based on the evil ActiveX technology thats at the root of IEs insecurity in the first place). Oh well!

 

Cheers,

Buffy

[alexander]

most of these are based on the evil ActiveX technology thats at the root of IEs insecurity in the first place

oh, come on, only 80% of spyware abuses ActiveX because its such a bad protocol to begin with. As to lazy programmers, its too bad that we have those, i guess you refer to the ones that will program to get paid to go a store and spend it all, you are right. I cant wait for the world where 90% of commercial websites will be written in PHP and not any proprietary, closed-source language based on a microsoft platform, or since i'm already here, a Java engine...

[C1ay]

I cant wait for the world where 90% of commercial websites will be written in PHP and not any proprietary, closed-source language based on a microsoft platform, or since i'm already here, a Java engine...

 

I kinda like Perl too for CGI. Combined with Apache it makes for a very mature, secure system. PHP has come a long way for doing database stuff but it still doesn't have the modules available that Perl has like PGP and SSH. There are some methods by which these can be used with PHP but not with the mature integration they have with Perl. Anything's better than IIS, ActiveX and VBScript though.

[alexander]

I kinda like Perl too for CGI. Combined with Apache it makes for a very mature, secure system. PHP has come a long way for doing database stuff but it still doesn't have the modules available that Perl has like PGP and SSH. There are some methods by which these can be used with PHP but not with the mature integration they have with Perl.

ok, Perl is not an OO programming language, and many programmers are used to OOrientation and thus probably wont switch to Perl, Perl is great for linux scripting application, but it allows for too much code obfuscation and thus can be very perplexing, not the case with Python or PHP, especially not Python. Perl has a great string parsing engine, but then again, PHP people said, why mess with it, and they included the same regular expression and string parsing engine as Perl. Database connectivity is also a big part of the website, and what a better language to choose for databasing than PHP which has an awesome support for any/all databases natively, especially SQL based...

PGP - proc_open() allows your script to interoperate with other scripts that run as "co-processes". In particular, this is useful for passing passphrases to programs like PGP, GPG and openssl in a more secure manner.

SSH or any other system command - string exec ( string command [, array &output [, int &return_var]] )

[C1ay]

ok, Perl is not an OO programming language

 

So, who said good languages have to be OO?

 

it allows for too much code obfuscation and thus can be very perplexing

 

Anything can be misused. I am not saying that either is better than the other, just that they both have niches. The list of modules for Perl exceeds 7500. It will do many things that PHP won't. That doesn't make it better though, just different. Perl lacks much of the elegance that PHP has for doing database stuff. OTOH PHP lacks much of the math and statistics stuff for doing analysis.That's why Perl was written as an extraction and reporting language, that's what it's good at. All I'm saying is that each should be used where it is needed.

[alexander]

So, who said good languages have to be OO?

exactly, good language doesnt have to be, but good language for big applications is better when it has OO because it allows for better code reusability, and since we are talking about banking here, the platform will probably be pretty huge, to an OO language will be a bit better. But good language does not have to be OOriented, I code in php4, C (sometimes), Perl (also on occasion), and Python (also procedural, cuz i never do anything that is very big)

 

Anything can be misused.

agreed with the only exception of maybe Python, that cant be obfuscated, because it just cant...

I am not saying that either is better than the other, just that they both have niches.

True, Perl is a good language, but just like anything else, the language is only as god as the programmer who writes in it (with the only exception of Java, and Microsoft .net languages as well as ASP)

The list of modules for Perl exceeds 7500.

Very popular hacker language, i'll consider seriously using it when 5 comes out... but yeah there's loads of stuff written for perl, the thing is PHP was originaly written in Perl, so they are like brother languages, synthax wise also...

It will do many things that PHP won't. That doesn't make it better though, just different. Perl lacks much of the elegance that PHP has for doing database stuff. OTOH PHP lacks much of the math and statistics stuff for doing analysis.That's why Perl was written as an extraction and reporting language, that's what it's good at. All I'm saying is that each should be used where it is needed.

Again, i think that the best solution to all that is running PHP and Perl side by side, maybe with Python in the middle for the best results, better security, best seeds, and loads of functionality, because with Linux, Perl can do anything, Python also has its tricks up its slieve and PHP makes an awesome web interface for all of it ... :)

[C1ay]

How many people do you know that bought a 50 pack of black CDs explicitly to be used for Knoppix and Gentoo Live?

 

Not only have I done that, I've gone to multiple stores like Best Buy and Circuit City so I could reboot the demo boxes on the floor with them and leave them that way. It's kind of neat to watch from the next isle as people walk up and say things like, "Wow, is this the new Windows?" :)

[alexander]

Not only have I done that, I've gone to multiple stores like Best Buy and Circuit City so I could reboot the demo boxes on the floor with them and leave them that way. It's kind of neat to watch from the next isle as people walk up and say things like, "Wow, is this the new Windows?"

Lol, I gotta do that sometime, LinuxWorld expo coming up, maybe i can reboot one of the windows demo PCs, if they have them, into knoppix.... which reminds me that i need to burn a few Knoppix cds... i wonder... hmm, just thought of a goal for tomorrow... :)

What i have done though is reboot a high school classroom into knoppix before microsoft applications class, actually 2 classrooms and on more than one occasion...