Re: PCI DSS & Firewalls

Marcus J. Ranum <[email protected]>, Friday, April 3, 2009 9:06:53 AM

>  Chris - you're better than this. Stop being an apologist for
>  mediocrity.


I wouldn't put it that way myself, but I also wouldn't argue the fine points of the definition.  We live in a world of varying perfection and - while it is a wonderful thing to effect perfection where possible - it falls on us to devise solutions that also have a positive impact on mediocrity and even, where possible, function in the presence of incompetence.  It wouldn't be defensible for me to take this position unless there were others out there railing for perfection, but we're never short of such voices in our field.

>  All of us understand that you can do a half-assed job, or that
>  you can throw up your hands and say "things suck but I'll do the
>  best that I can in the circumstances."  We all know that. But
>  please don't adopt defeatism as policy.


I leave it for others to judge, but I would hope that accepting defeatism is not a descriptive that would apply to me.  Rather,  I would say that I accept situations the way they are when I show up and do what I can to improve them.  Whether it is accurate to say that a given situation sucks is a qualitative judgement that really requires a great deal of insight into the back story regarding how it got to the current state, and whether through lack of patience or attention span (I embrace my ADD) I only care about the past as it applies to the options for the future.

Sure I often find myself in the position to be accused of 'defending mediocrity', but it's not in the context of giving up and accepting defeat.  It's just the only way I know to limit the options I focus on to the ones that could actually appear in the real world.

-chris