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In defense of John
Even if I can get past the fact that I'm not in the mood to pay good money to use a public kiosk, all of the kiosks already come with operating systems booted up.

And infected (or pre-installed by intention) with who-knows-what in the way of malware, including keyboard snoopers so that that emergency banking transaction you ran just got a whole lot more interesting.

Admittedly, there's really no ultimate solution to the "designed to snoop" kiosk. Like the fake ATM machines going around a while back, at some point you have to trust the hardware. However, a machine that has no nonvolatile storage of its own is a step in the right direction.

Having stayed in hotels where the only Internet access was through a shared machine, and having had to do banking transactions from it, I'll vote for one that at least lets you run your own OS. Precious few trojan kiosks are going to fake Knoppix.
Posted by: Yagotta B. Kidding   Posted on: 10/18/05 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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In defense of John  Yagotta B. Kidding | 10/18/05
You said it  george_ou | 10/18/05
Are you sure?  Patrick Jones | 10/18/05
I do  Erik1234 | 10/18/05
Every night? (NT)  Patrick Jones | 10/18/05
Only when I forget to save something! (NT)  Erik1234 | 10/19/05
I Do 2  IceTheNet@... | 10/19/05
I would rather have John's version  Patrick Jones | 10/18/05
USB much slower  george_ou | 10/18/05
How slow could it be?  Patrick Jones | 10/18/05
Should be possible  Yagotta B. Kidding | 10/19/05
It is possible  IceTheNet@... | 10/19/05
Freudian slip?  Real World | 10/18/05
Hehe, sorry for the typo  george_ou | 10/18/05
from bad to worse....  cicuta | 10/21/05
Off base with Java bashing  Erik1234 | 10/18/05
Java's new sloagan?  george_ou | 10/18/05
sorry  zijiang | 10/18/05
Compiling it for the x86 and Windows means it will run on 99% of the kiosks  george_ou | 10/18/05
Would you please  Linux Advocate | 10/18/05
Every one I've seen  george_ou | 10/18/05
Why is speed the basis  jacarter3 | 10/18/05
Why do Java proponents always ignore speed?  george_ou | 10/18/05
Why limit your market and options?  B.O.F.H. | 10/18/05
It depends on the application  woot! | 10/19/05
Asymptotic vs multiplier vs constant difference  Erik1234 | 10/18/05
possible vs reality  balsover | 10/18/05
Missed one  Yagotta B. Kidding | 10/19/05
Do you have any links?  Erik1234 | 10/19/05
It was years ago  Yagotta B. Kidding | 10/19/05
Agree for the most part  CobraA1 | 10/18/05
Get rid of the HD  Erik1234 | 10/18/05
Interesting segue...  jacarter3 | 10/18/05
USB with your data, already here....  jdevora | 10/18/05
Why C++?? Use Java  JavaRules | 10/18/05
Because it's too bulky and slow  george_ou | 10/18/05
Show me a fast Java applet or application  george_ou | 10/18/05
Moving the goalposts?  Robert Crocker | 10/18/05
Most C/C++ apps use 10 MBs of RAM  george_ou | 10/18/05
What WinWord.exe version are you using  Erik1234 | 10/18/05
I'm talking Word 2003 no data loaded  george_ou | 10/18/05
No GUI loaded either?  Robert Crocker | 10/19/05
Shared Memory does fly..  Patrick Jones | 10/19/05
Can you guys not do math?  george_ou | 10/19/05
Goeoge Ou is limited to Windows XP but here are the req's for XP and Java.  B.O.F.H. | 10/19/05
MSOffice memory footprint  Yagotta B. Kidding | 10/19/05
What part of 64 MB physical RAM do you not understand?  george_ou | 10/19/05
Just opened a Java app  Patrick Jones | 10/20/05
Just started WinWord.exe  Patrick Jones | 10/19/05
How much free memory did you lose  Yagotta B. Kidding | 10/19/05
9MB free mem lost  george_ou | 10/19/05
Not on my computer  george_ou | 10/19/05
Where did I call you a name?  Patrick Jones | 10/20/05
Saying it doesn  movie-crew | 10/20/05
I see your point  John Carroll ZDNet Moderator | 10/18/05
I always prefer my laptop  george_ou | 10/18/05
Re: I always  John Carroll ZDNet Moderator | 10/18/05
Amazing  Robert Crocker | 10/19/05
Just add "CPU/RAM/Display/Keyboard/Mouse"  george_ou | 10/18/05
Though it costs a bit more, you could also use a smartphone.  B.O.F.H. | 10/18/05
One more thing  John Carroll ZDNet Moderator | 10/18/05
computer module/core  Robert Crocker | 10/19/05
poor little george_ou  No_Brain_To_Think | 10/18/05
You lier or idiot!  joemartn | 10/19/05
Hmm let me see here  Scrat | 10/19/05
Obviously your ZDNet handle sums you up.  IT Scion | 10/19/05
Poor little California Public School Student  tshinder@... | 10/24/05
You might regret this..  Mikael_66 | 10/19/05
HD = 300Mbps  GrahamA_z | 10/19/05
You know the difference between bit and Byte?  george_ou | 10/19/05
Ouch, someone just got burned!  Scrat | 10/19/05
B/s vs b/s = BS  GrahamA_z | 10/19/05
Even old hard drives spit out 80 mbps  george_ou | 10/19/05
Pass on what ever you were smoking  george_ou | 10/19/05
You are probably correct for the personal computer desktop  petrasys@... | 10/19/05
You can guarantee no DLL problems with static linking of DLLs  george_ou | 10/19/05
Missing the point  teme | 10/19/05
1/1000 is possible for PCs too  george_ou | 10/19/05
I'll quit tomorrow and be right over  jmills@... | 10/25/05
I wish I made 100K!  Patrick Jones | 10/20/05
"Costs", not "gets paid"  Justin James | 10/21/05
Which part of the country  jmills@... | 10/25/05
2 cents  Sheeva | 10/20/05
One powerful solution -- RIA - Rich Client hybrid  khakman | 10/20/05
USB key with OS and apps  jgroetsema@... | 11/10/05
Stand-alone Apps  pete1978 | 11/10/05

What do you think?

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