On 12/05/2011 12:02 PM, James E. LaBarre wrote:
On 12/05/2011 11:44 AM, [email protected] wrote:
Consider, however, exactly what you're talking about here: You're
granting random code, written by "someone", to run as root on a device
with no real administrator tools, which holds all your phone numbers and
email accounts, and can directly cause you to lose money (ie, a
premium-txt dialing trojan). It's totally possible for a root app from
the market to install undetectable crap in your phone, and it can be
nearly impossible to get RID of that crap later. Root enables
everything up to kernel modules and from that point the sky is the
limit.
While we're ranting: this is one of the major reasons I don't like the
so-called "smartphones". Sure, you've paid whatever jacked-up price for
the device, but you really don't have the right to use the device which
YOU PAID FOR as you see fit. They gouge you for fees, yet you probably
don't even own the rights to YOUR OWN data. Sorry, the thing that
brought me into the FLOSS community is probably *more* open
specifications than it is open source. I'm not a programmer, so the code
itself is less use *personally*, but the practice of openly and freely
documented data and file specifications benefits me every day. I've been
at too many companies where their data, etc were locked in proprietary
formats, and somehow the locked-down format of smartphones seems a few
dangerous steps backwards.
The idea that you have to hack your smartphone (or any other similar
device) to gain functionality that by all rights should have been yours
in the first place is simply unacceptable.
Ok, the rant space has gotten a bit off topic here, lets try to stay
with the question as asked.
-Sean
--
Sean Dague Learn about the Universe with the
sean at dague dot net Mid-Hudson Astronomical Association
http://dague.net http://midhudsonastro.org
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