North Korea's Home-Grown Operating System Mimics OS X 252
CambodiaSam sends the latest on "Red Star OS," North Korea's attempt at a home-grown operating system. Previously, it had closely resembled Microsoft Windows, but a new update now strongly mimics Apple's OS X.
"Despite living in a country very much shut off from the outside world, many people in North Korea do have access to technology - including mobile phones. However, devices are heavily restricted. Internet access, for instance, is locked down, with most users able to visit only a handful of sites mostly serving up state-sponsored news. The Red Star OS is peppered with North Korean propaganda, and its calendar tells users it is not 2014, but 103 — the number of years since the birth of former North Korean leader Kim Il-sung. An earlier version of Red Star OS was made available worldwide in 2010 after a Russian student posted it online. The latest version is believed to have been released some time in 2013."
Seconds since 1970 (Score:5, Insightful)
Are we really any different? All hail the Unix gods.
Re: (Score:3)
Confessions Of an Ex-SLASHDOT BETA user (Score:5, Funny)
Day 1: It wouldn't stop, the redirecting. At first I thought it was malware. Had my first drink in a long time.
Day 2: Barely had the strength to carry on as the BETA REDIRECTIONS continue.. trying not to talk to hallucinations at the bar and in the bathroom which laugh at me about these redirections.
Day 3: Discovered the BETA redirections were random, and while at first they looked somewhat usable, when I looked at me and my monitor screen in the mirror, a horrible woman with flesh hanging off of her body looked back, trying to lead me into a dance as the word BETA appeared across her rancid breasts.
Day 4: These BETA corridors go on FOREVER! On the plus side, I've taken up disassembling vehicles to corner this BETA beast and sacrifice myself rather than lead others to discovering it. I ate some red snow.
Day 5: Finding it harder to concentrate. I've ate some more of the red snow. The taste is starting to grow on me.
Day 6: This typewriter is the only entertainment I have, apart from throwing things at the walls, trying to get some response from the BETA which is now taking over my mind.
Day 7: Hahahahahha! Would you believe it? I'M STILL BEING REDIRECTED TO SLASHDOT BETA PAGES! AHAHhahahaah! Type, type, ding, ding! Wooo!
Day 8: The hallucinations are actually real! Would you believe it? They have offered to help me if I agree to work for them. I'm thinking about patenting this delicious red snow, the taste is unreal!
Day 9: Having black out sessions where I cannot remember large passings of time. Found some makeup, thought I'd paint a joker smile on my face to amuse the people only I can see!
Day 10: Productive today, part of what I wrote for my new screenplay:
I cannot opt out of Slashdot BETA!
I cannot opt out of Slashdot BETA!
I cannot opt out of Slashdot BETA!
I cannot opt out of Slashdot BETA!
I cannot opt out of Slashdot BETA!
I cannot opt out of Slashdot BETA!
I cannot opt out of Slashdot BETA!
I cannot opt out of Slashdot BETA!
I cannot opt out of Slas
(drops of blood on paper)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I heard MyCleanPC [spam.com] will remove Slashdot beta!
Re:There's a solution - at least for now (Score:4, Informative)
Re:There's a solution - at least for now (Score:5, Informative)
Re:There's a solution - at least for now (Score:5, Informative)
Re:There's a solution - at least for now (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:3)
1. judged over a period of time to be of the highest quality and outstanding of its kind.
Re:There's a solution - at least for now (Score:4, Insightful)
Instead, its going to look like somenobody's blog
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Let's not overstate the quality of the "classic" interface. The fact that it still barfs over unicode and HTML is unforgivable. And after you submit a message, you are left in limbo, without a button to get back to where you were. And the browser back button method results in a "are you sure you want to resubmit this form" dialog!
Lets not get misty eyed over an old interface just because it's familiar.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
I mean, how could you ever leave? Then you wouldn't be able to bitch and moan about how Slashdot revision X is intrinsically worse than Slashdot revision X-1. And honestly, where else would you have such a ready and receptive audience to your petty squabbles, paranoid rants, and nihilistic cynicism?
hacker news.
Re: (Score:3)
I came back to this site after a 10 year absence and I didn't notice any major revisions while I was gone.
I get the people always complain about site changes and then quickly get over it when they figure out how to use new features. But the beta layout is truly horrible. Like on a basic, aesthetic level, it's terrible.
Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
Mod up. Yep. and i'm willing to burn my excellent karma supporting this off-topic war.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
As am I! Kill this abomination. You fucked up Slashdot/Dice. Admit it, kill the beast, and we can all get back to beating on ACs.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:4, Interesting)
I guess its a way to get more ad revenue or something. It cant be for aesthetic or usability reasons.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
And in a last ditch effort to save the classic site, all my mod points will be burnt promoting these off topic protest posts.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
May the person who directed that it be redesigned die in a fire.
Not for the redesign itself, but for INSISTING on it instead of dropping it and admitting it was a fuckup. Their departure from this mortal coil would reduce oxygen wastage.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe you can explain to me why there isn't a news item for the beta, to provide a proper forum? Cowardice?
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
Mod up. Yep. and i'm willing to burn my excellent karma supporting this off-topic war.
War? On the one hand, you've got slashdot users, who know what they like. On the other side, you've got Dice employees, who have been tasked with creating something new.
Oh, does the beta display unicode properly? If not, what good is it? If it does, have they tested it on links?
Honest questions, as I've never ever seen the beta site; with javascript disabled, I even missed the previous interface update, as the non-js version hasn't changed in years....
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Interesting)
Oh, does the beta display unicode properly? If not, what good is it? If it does, have they tested it on links?
No, the beta site doesn't display JACK FUCKING SHIT properly. It's a menagerie of uselessness with random fonts, difficult to follow comment threads, random fonts, no real division between the forced comment titles and the comment itself (WTF, seriously?), random fonts, and just a general shitshow.
I don't know if you can even put links in comments anymore let alone unicode.
But at least there are random changes in the fonts so we can challenge our patience trying to read the comments.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
The Apple puck mouse thinks that the beta is painful and unusable.
That's how bad it is.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's do this. Burn the redesign into the fucking ground!
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:4, Insightful)
I too would like to score +5 Insightful! Boo, beta!
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
Boycott (Score:5, Interesting)
I propose that we boycott stories and only discuss the abomination that is Slashdot Beta.
Moderators - only spend mod points on comments that discuss Beta
Commentors - only discuss Beta
Keep this up for a few days and we may finally get the PHBs attention.
Re:Boycott (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Boycott (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope you're promoting those comments because it's probably the only way the dipshits who run this place will get the message.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
Slashdot Beta ruins the foundation of Slashdot, the discussion system.
Dice: listen to your users and abandon the project. Accept your losses and move on before your users move on to other sites.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm actually quite worried now. My favourite site might die. Yeah, my favourite, because despite everything wrong I do spend a lot of time here. If the classic site ever goes away it's dead, and with the beta as default it's likely to make a lot of people leave. ACs in particular are going to get fed up pretty fast.
Don't do it Dice, don't kill Slashdot.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
How is this not modded +5, Funny? Slashdot, die? It's been the undead zombie for years, and everyone knows it.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone want to host a new /.?
Seriously. Slashcode is still out there. A few developers could polish it up and post a story here to announce the new site.
Any reason this hasn't happened yet?
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:4, Interesting)
It will take some serious bandwidth to serve the new Slashdot. A central server will not be sufficient. A distributed design is needed, one that is both scalable and secure. Perhaps some BitTorrent foundation can be used. Ideally, the new Slashdot would exist "in the network," but not on any one server. Such schemes were proposed in FreeNet.
But if the Classic mode is officially killed, Slashdot will be forked; I have no doubt about that. I am reading /. in Classic mode, with JavaScript disabled (using NoScript.) If that function is no longer available, I will never see the "other" Slashdot; I'm certainly not going to enable JS for that.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know. Ars' current layout is busy and nigh unreadable. Reddit is fucking Reddit. Hacker News has been brought up and is okay I guess, but glancing at it the front page layout is a pain, and I care about almost none of the news on it (while Slashdot's focus seems to gel with me). Any other frequent suggestions?
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
I just had the displeasure of trying the beta for the first time because of the comments here. I don't like it either (and I like even Windows 8, so come on!); the worst part is that the comments are in a VERY narrow box, and all the useless framing takes up a significant chunk of space.
Also it seems to require Javascript, but I know that even on this site I'm in the minority with that particular dislike.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Interesting)
and a third.
Come on Slashdot. Please don't become a second digg.
And no, I won't mail you to tell you this. I used to feel 'part of' slashdot and would have mailed you with my personal mail address in the blink of an eye, but not any longer. You look to much like SEO toting PHB's now, so you'll never get my current mail address.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Interesting)
another anti beta vote here. I'll seriously consider leaving if the beta becomes the "only" option, my only option will be hacker news and fuck DICE for screwing over one of best tech/geek news sites on the internet.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
another anti beta vote here. I'll seriously consider leaving if the beta becomes the "only" option, my only option will be hacker news and fuck DICE for screwing over one of best tech/geek news sites on the internet.
Indeed I have never signed up but have been coming here for so many years it is not funny. As I told them in the feedback email they wanted the day the BETA crap goes live is the last I will ever be here.
HA!! captcha is molests which is sort of how I feel after getting a beta page my slashdot experience was molested...
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm still waiting for an "Ask Slashdot: Once Slashdot beta has been foisted on me, what site should I use instead". I'm only partially joking. I actually want to know the answer.
... Beta (Score:3)
. . . in both eye-sockets.
Re:Fuck BEta (Score:5, Interesting)
HERE, HERE!
We should arrange a protest. Basically every time we get a beta redirect, instead of posting something related to the article you write a protest post against the beta site. And in addition encourage others to do the same. Also, don't forget to email them your opinion about the beta site, the link is at the top of every page now. Let our voices be heard!
Serious question (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
East Asian languages use square characters and don't have spaces between words. Furthermore there is no problem splitting words over more than one line. Kerning for Latin characters tends to stick to the square grid for consistency.
Try the Meiryo font, it looks pretty good.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Asian languages use spaces since, well, not sure ... certainly at least since they saw europeans use them, but I assume much longer.
Hint: there are plenty of old japanese paintings, drawings etc. available whre you see "space" characters since roughly 1400.
So yes, they have spaces between words.
Re: (Score:3)
That is one feature of CJK fonts. Most characters are square (same width as height), originally aligned along a grid. When you want to typeset western languages like English, you need to figure out how those foreign letters match into this East Asian typographic grid. The result is the division of characters into full-width and half-width. As a result, the Roman characters in East Asian fonts are often half-width, which looks jarring to us (full-width would look even worse to us). Unfortunately, CJK punctua
Culture (Score:2)
It's worth noting that an important part of the culture that the kims enforced on north korea is "self reliance". Everyone is taught from a very young age that you can't depend on foreigners, and that everything should be produced in country. It makes sense, even without the massive censorship, that they'd do this whereas, say, China wouldn't.
*NB this is an understanding I've mostly gained from reading the axis of evil tour, not from expertise or in-depth sociological research
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Actually, that theory has been disproven a long time ago, see Mercantilism. The idea is that the more trade there is, the more people can specialize, the more productive, and everybody is better off. See Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations. Or any introduction book to economics.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M... [wikipedia.org]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A... [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:2)
Actually, that theory has been disproven a long time ago, see Mercantilism. The idea is that the more trade there is, the more people can specialize, the more productive, and everybody is better off. See Adam Smithâ(TM)s Wealth of Nations. Or any introduction book to economics.
What proof? You're confusing global capitalism with "the one true way". That's religion, not science.
Re: (Score:2)
I might be making an incorrect link between "everything should be produced in country." and "It makes sense".
But if that is true, then the second half of the sentence falls apart. China is very eager to control and censor information – in particular political information. They have been pushing their own phone OS, Linux package, favoring internal social media site over external ones. Etc. They might be a bit more rational, knowing greater freedom means economic growth, but the impulse is still there.
W
Re: (Score:2)
But if they do that then people might realize that the Kims aren't some holy family blessed by the communism gods to protect them from the barbarous world around them.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Everyone is taught from a very young age that you can't depend on foreigners
sure, except what they "produced" is linux, which is a product of decades of work by largely the west but capitalist pigs throughout the world.
Re: (Score:2)
It's worth noting that an important part of the culture that the kims enforced on north korea is "self reliance". Everyone is taught from a very young age that you can't depend on foreigners, and that everything should be produced in country.
Which is why Red Star was written from scratch instead of just being a skin on top of an open source operating system.
No one said it was logical. This junta threatened to nuke Washington DC with bombs that might be able to land in South Korea, if the wind is blowing in a favorable direction and they cross their fingers may even go off. Hell they even like Denis Rodman I mean how much more proof do need that they are mentally unstable?
Yawn (Score:3, Funny)
Gosh, an OS that mimics another GUI? Would never happen in the 'west'?
Is the source code included? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Is the source code included? (Score:4, Funny)
If not, Dear Leader is going to get some serious f-bombs dropped on him by Linus and Richard.
It is almost worth sending a request to the govenment of North Korea for the a copy of the source code as per the gpl's license just to see what happens...
Firstly to see if you get a response, and secondly to see how many US govenment watch lists you get put on.
and if I don't get response i could always sick Stallmen on them...
Home grown? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3)
I would be surprised if they had the resources to write an entire OS from scratch.
Why? *nix has been reimplemented or ported many times in many computer languages on many different computer architectures. Both Unix and Linux were originally written and maintained by a small number of people, and the same goes for many other capable operating systems. I seem to recall that Unix version 6 or 7 was ported to new architectures several times by 1 or 2 people in three to four months. Writing a new GUI has been done in about one person-year. Both the design and code for *nix like operating
Re: (Score:2)
Also if you don't get it done by deadline you get shot and turned into dog food.
Maybe Obama could take some lessons from GL.
Also when you go to N Korea don't eat the dog food.
Slashdot morphing into Kuro5hin? (Score:5, Insightful)
imo soon /. with their beta design, will create a mass exodus of users and the end game is a ghost town like Kuro5hin, if any of you remember it.
Re:Slashdot morphing into Kuro5hin? (Score:4, Informative)
That may be for the best.
The answer to a zombie infection is a headshot.
Alternative calendars (Score:3)
North Korea is hardly unique in using alternative calendars. Japan uses dates based on the emperor's reign. You can set windows to use it.
Made available since... (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Fuck you, slashdot (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Fuck you, slashdot (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Fuck you, slashdot (Score:5, Informative)
From the "never used linux" dept. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
What is your opinion of beta?
four percent is not "many" (Score:2)
"Despite living in a country very much shut off from the outside world, many people in North Korea do have access to technology - including mobile phones."
I keep seeing this claim, that "many" people have cell phones. This is a country where 10% of the population have a landline. North Korea claims they have 1 million cell phone subscribers, but really, do you believe that?
Even if it were true, that's about four percent of the population, which does not fit any dictionary definition of "many" I have ever se
Can anybody identify exactly what it is? (Score:2)
Surely this is based on some Linux simulation of OS/X, can anybody identify it?
I find it hard to believe NK took KDE and modified it themselves to look like OS/X, rather than basing it on work already done.
Weird (Score:2)
"Previously, it had closely resembled Microsoft Windows, but a new update now strongly mimics Apple's OS X."
Sounds like it was written by the Gnome developers.
Awful beta (Score:5, Insightful)
Why change for the sake of change? Why are site visitors to be forced into something awful and unwanted? The new beta is awful. There is no other way to put it. If I am forced into the beta I will simply leave - forever.
Fuck the beta (Score:5, Interesting)
Beta Comment (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, My. (Score:5, Insightful)
Beta beta beta (Score:5, Insightful)
I rather enjoy the fact that almost none of the higher moderated comments have anything to do with the story itself and rather about Slashdot Beta. Goes to show how much people hate what this will do to Slashdot.
Beta will kill Slashdot and drive users away (Score:5, Insightful)
I have been a regular visitor to Slashdot for around 15 years. For that, I get the checkbox to disable ads, though I browse with Javascript disabled so my browser does not slow down.
I come here for the discussions, and often read comments at +5, changing that only if I find a discussion interesting and warrants reading at a lower level.
The new beta uses JQuery for the comment threshold selector, and changes that on the fly. This means all the comments are loaded, but not visible, and processing any page with considerable number of comments will slow down MY computer! If I have a few tabs open to read later, my computer will be unusable.
If they insist that I enable Javascript to browse the site at the threshold I want, then they will lose me as a long time. I imagine that others long timers will hate the site too.
Dice have to remember that this site has two unmatched features, interlocked: a moderation system that is good at cutting down the trolling, spamming, and noise, and a comment section that is frequented by many people who are passionate about technology and other nerdy stuff.
If they manage to aggravate a lot of their users, the comment section will no longer be attractive to the audience. Perhaps we should revive kuro5hin?
I wrote the above in a feedback form that I filled a while ago, and I am emailing this comment to their feedback@slashdot.org.
Please send them feedback too.
And mod this up so Dice can see what they are getting themselves into.
Re: (Score:2)
Are you suggesting that Tim Cook is about to lose an uncle?...
Re:Mimic? (Score:5, Funny)
So what is it, really? A pirated copy? Based on Windows? OSX? Linux? Something unique?
It's about a dictatorial regime imposing a new version of its software on what it sees as a captive population of users, with a generic new user interface obviously copied from somewhere else.
Oh sorry, you meant Red Star, not Slashdot Beta! No idea. Looks like Linux.
Re:Mimic? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Mimic? (Score:5, Funny)
You must be confused and offtopic. Today's comments are dedicated to saying fuck BETA.
Re: (Score:3)
Looks like someone confused an OS with a WindowManager again.
Looks like someone confused a desktop environment with a window manager again.
Re: Year 103 (Score:2)
1) Not sure why you're that worried about it, it seems to be to be just a comment, like one odd thing that they saw.
2) Mild irony, for Taiwan it is also year 103. Go to any Post office, official office, or even read an expiration date on an item you just bought. Why 103? Sun-Yat-Sen [wikipedia.org] and Chinese Democracy. Yes, Chinese democracy wasn't just a bad Guns and Roses album, but a real thing, at least until outside forces messed with it. And like you had year 10 of the Qing Dynasty here, now you have year 103 of th
Re: (Score:3)
I think it's funny how they mock the N. Korean government for presenting Kim Il Sung as a god and yet they are all too happy with their year 2014 that pushes some ordinary human being, who may not have even existed
...and who, if he did exist, was born a few more than 2,014 years ago in any case. :-)
Re:Dates (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
#3803. You've been at slashdot for more than a while. What is your view of beta Slashdot?
From what I've read here, my view is "I'd like to avoid it if at all possible". If I can temporarily try it, and revert (and complain) if it really sucks, I might try it just to make sure they haven't "improved" it as much as, say, nbcnews.com has "improved" recently.
Re:Dates (Score:5, Insightful)
#3803. You've been at slashdot for more than a while. What is your view of beta Slashdot?
From what I've read here, my view is "I'd like to avoid it if at all possible". If I can temporarily try it, and revert (and complain) if it really sucks, I might try it just to make sure they haven't "improved" it as much as, say, nbcnews.com has "improved" recently.
Tried it. It hasn't "improved" quite to the the extent of nbcnews.com, but it's definitely an "improvement" in that sense. (More shiny, less useful; too many big pictures. I'm waiting for headlines like "15 ways to improve your .Net skills" or "5 weird ways LISP can simplify your code" or....)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
In a Monty Python movie you'd now qualify for a free flight off the cliff, you know that, right?