In the future, as more moronic private consortia like i2o spring up and
try to proprietize hardware standards, etc., there might be certain
sympathetic manufacturers or engineers who will slip standards documents
our way. Be aware that there is software out there which tags documents
with embedded labels; each postscript copy of a given spec might have a
serial number somewhere in it. Not explicit serial numbers, either, but
modulations in white space which are entirely invisible. Adobe has done
work on these systems, as, I think, has Xerox. And of course there exists
commercially-available software to do this. If you want to see an example
of this in action, just take a look at clarinet's news feeds and run some
articles through perl, converting each white-space character to some
visible character.
If you, a good-natured Linux hacker, mysteriously have some sort of
potentially secret documentation show up in your mailbox someday, please
be careful before sending copies of said documentation to everyone and
their grandmother. Convert the pdf to ascii, and then run it through a
rigorous regexp regularizing all white space. Be aware also that in a
Clancy novel, he describes a(n imaginary) system which actually changes
the word layout in innocuous ways to achieve the same effect. Best is to
get two disparate copies, ensure their uniformity, and failing that, write
the corresponding software yourself, or forward the docs with admonitions
of secrecy to someone who can. All it will take is a few very public
firings to put the fear of Gates into those sympathetic engineers who
might otherwise assist us in our glorious struggle to reach free-software
nirvana.
Is the i2o thread over yet?
-- Todd Graham Lewis Manager of Web Engineering MindSpring Enterprises (800) 719-4664, x2804 Linux! tlewis@mindspring.net