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Re:No Space in GarageBand by LakeSolon · 2004-01-07 07:06 · Score: 1 · on Rumors of iPod mini, 100 Million Songs, Xserve G5 All True

At least it wasn't "garageBand" instead. Then anyone who's ever touched Java(Script) would start to twitch and drool uncontrollably.

It's obviously a class, not an object. Sun's Java Naming Conventions.

~Lake

Memory bottleneck (was: Future prognosis for HT) by davecb · 2004-01-07 01:53 · Score: 4, Interesting · on Hyper-Threading Explained And Benchmarked

One of the reasons for hyperthreading (aka chip multithreading) is the slowness of memory and cache.

If you refer back to Marc Tremblay's CMT Article, you'll see that one of the approaches is to run one thread until it blocks on a memory read, then run another until it blocks and so on, repeating for as many threads as it takes to soak up all the wasted time waiting for the memory fetches.

The Sun paper on their plans for it is here. Have a look at page 5 for the diagram.

--dave (biased, you understand) c-b

Re:Future prognosis for HT by sql*kitten · 2004-01-06 23:42 · Score: 4, Insightful · on Hyper-Threading Explained And Benchmarked

Unfortunately, historically CPU speed has increased faster than memory bandwidth. That's why we've had ever more layers of cache added to our systems, to make up for the relative deficiency.

Aye. Sun has big plans for CMT, which one of their sales reps was quick to tell us all about, up to 32 SPARC cores on one chip. That'll work well in the lots-of-small-tasks model where you can take advantage of direct access (say between disk cache and network card) on FirePlane with very simple code (like a webserver) that can execute out of the processor's cache. But we're heavy database users, and the first question he got asked was, are you seriously telling us Sun is about to makes its memory bandwith an order of magnitude greater? He couldn't answer that question. Now, that means either he was clueless, or Sun is jumping on the Intel benchmark bandwagon.

Re:J2EE, mainframes by bckrispi · 2004-01-06 19:17 · Score: 1 · on Microsoft Rolls Out New Anti-Linux Ad Campaign

Tomcat does not come close to implementing the J2EE spec, so why would Apache need a license from Sun?

Bzzt! JSP's and Servlets are indeed part of the J2EE Spec, and they are covered by the same EULA that you cited. I found the answer to my licensing question for Apache. You should read it, as it appears to blow several of your arguments out of the water.

No, but Sun has claimed that Java is "open" in the "open standards", and that is just not true. An "open standard" is a standard anybody can implement, with no licensing restrictions. ANSI C is an open standard. IEEE Scheme is an open standard. Java is not an open standard.

No, Java is not an open standard by that definition, nor do I recall Sun ever claiming anything to this effect. Feel free to prove me wrong. My point is that even though Java is proprietary Intellectual Property (*oooooh there's that word*), Sun has made it a point that they include the Industry at Large, including to a large part, the OSS community, when it comes to guiding the future of the language and platform. Is your argument based on the "If it's not OSS, it's gotta suck" mentality? If so, I'm wasting my breath.

Actually, the fact that Sun is quietly putting these restrictions into their licenses and not asserting them is what makes them particularly worrisome. IP rights like that become particularly destructive if people (like you) come to believe that the standard can be implemented freely only to find out later that they were wrong.

I admitted that I didn't read the EULA before I posted my original comment. If I were to implement the spec for a commercial product, you can bet your arse that It would be corporate lawers, not myself, who would iron out any legalities before the first line of code was written. How "quietly" is Sun putting in these restrictions if they are spelled out at the top of the EULA in relatively plain English?

And Fortune 500 companies have so much money to throw around that their purchases don't even tell you whether something is cost effective or even works.

Yikes!!!! What fortune 500's have you worked for??? Yeah, they have money, but over the past 3 years, their IT bugets have been slashed across the board. Cost effectiveness and ROI (weather percieved or actual) of a solution is paramount. WTF do you think all of our jobs are going to Bangalore???

In different words, there is no logical connection between a company's use of Linux and a company's use of Java.

Well, let's talk about TCO then... Let's say I want to deploy a distributed enterprise Java application. I'll start with the OSS portion first. Linux Enterprise Distro of Choice, Database (either PosgreSQL or MySql), A Tomcat instance plugged into Apache, and JBoss as my EJB container. I can download and deploy these solutions for free, I'll pay for support if I need it. The application will be developed using Eclipse and the necessary plugins (again, all OSS). Now comes the nasty part... I need to install a Hideous, Closed Source, Imperialistic Java Runtime Environment. And let's see.... the cost of that is again..... FREE!!!! I don't have to pay Sun to use Java to deploy my app; it doesn't need to go through a certification process; in all actuality, from this standpoint, Java is just as economical and "Free" as the oss part of my solution. Java plays very nicely with OSS, both from a licensing standpoint, and from a development standpoint. This is why you're seeing enterprises that switch to a Linux/OSS model using Java so much. So I refute your claim that there is no connection.

Re:Does certification actually matter? by ChaseTec · 2004-01-06 17:02 · Score: 3, Insightful · on JCert Is Dead

Disclaimer: I'm a Sun Certified Java & Solaris Instructor

And beyond that, do you folks think that certification provides a decent learning path.
You've apparently had a bad experience somewhere. Are you a MCSE by any chance? ;)Joking aside, certification should provide you a good opportunity to show the learning paths you've been down already. You shouldn't learn to get certified. If you take the Sun Java certs you'll see the it's designed to see if you actually use Java for what's being tested; Such a wide area of questions is asked that you are not expected to score very high. If you look at Sun's percentages to pass they are around 50-60% because you have to have been using Java for a while to come into contact with that much material.

If I learn just from books, it seems like I will only learn some aspects of a topic, and will neglect other chunks. A classroom and teacher help to provide a more well rounded learning experience.
Yes and no, it's all a matter of the course, teacher, and test. There used to be many course out there that were designed to get someone MSCE certified in a week or two. This explains why I had to show a MSCE how to install a cpu (slot 1) a couple years back when I was working tech support. One of the Sun courses I teach that raises a lot of certification questions is SL-275 for previous programmer that are new to Java. It's the course that supports the Certified Java Programmer exam. When people ask how much study they need after that course I typically tell them one solid month of using Java and 1 week of study time.

I don't want to pay $1000 for the actual certification test,
Sun's range from $150 to around $400 for most.

and don't care too much about becoming certified. I just want to learn useful stuff.
And with todays surplus of people wanting tech job every little bit that gives you a chance to get an interview helps because it's a sure thing that everyone else has a resume saying that they know stuff.

Re:I thought Sun did something like this already.. by David+McBride · 2004-01-06 13:04 · Score: 1 · on Xgrid Clustering Software and Demo

You might be thinking of Sun Grid Engine, an open-source project sponsored by Sun which does cluster-level load balancing and other tricks.

Cheers,

David

Re:J2EE, mainframes by bckrispi · 2004-01-06 09:26 · Score: 1 · on Microsoft Rolls Out New Anti-Linux Ad Campaign

Well, I stand corrected on the licensing issue. A full listing of licensees can be found here. Notably absent from this list is Apache, so I assume that they have worked out a special arrangement w/ Sun, since Tomcat is the servlet/jsp engine embedded in the J2EE RI.

However, I'm standing ground on the comparison between MS & Sun w.r.t. Java technology. I'm not going to argue the case of weather or not Java should be open source. But what Sun is doing, licensing the spec and allowing other companies to build their products around that spec, and compete on their relative merits, is a far, far cry from what MS does with its IP. Sun has never claimed that Java is "open" in the Open Source sense of the word. What they can claim, is that the technology is developed implemented, and deployed in an open, industry accepted manner. Keep in mind that many of the fortune 500 who are embracing Linux/OSS also have large investments in Java technology.

I cannot agree with your statement regarding the "legal minefield" of Java technology. What IP/Licensing cases (except JBoss/Apache - which was an affirmation of the LGPL) can you recall from the past year?

Re:Not just linux by tomhudson · 2004-01-06 09:14 · Score: 1 · on Microsoft Rolls Out New Anti-Linux Ad Campaign

They (Microsoft) are ignoring linux on the desktop because Sun is their real enemy there - $100 per end-user per year, including apps, licensing, and tech support 24/7 beats anything Microsoft can come up with in regards to lower TCO.

This will kill them where their real bread and butter are - Office and its' add-ins.

I was looking at theri (Sun's) full-page add in this weeks' Computing Canada - impressive AND simple. Easy enough that even a PHB will immediately grasp it as a way to save $$$.

Here's a link for those who haven't heard about it yet. Here's a quote regarding $$$ and support for those too lazy to click on the link:

... all of this costs just $100 per employee per year, based on the number of employees in your company. So guess what? You're going to save a ton of money on buying and auditing software licenses. You're not going to need an army of global services people to integrate it either. We've done the integration for you. And implementation is a snap, too, with a single installer and automatic quarterly upgrades for the whole thing.
This is like the Ginzu knife commercial where the guy shouts, "But wait, there's more!" And more is the Java Desktop System, a highly stable alternative to the Microsoft desktop environment, that's cheaper, and way, way, way more secure because it includes support for defense agency-grade Java Card technology.
The Java Desktop System complements the Java Enterprise System perfectly as a lightweight, easily managed front end with all of the familiar functionality you've come to expect on the desktop, without the viruses or $400 price tag. The Java Desktop System is part of our bigger strategy of mobility with security, getting the power of the network out to folks where they need it, and doing so securely and affordably.

PHB summary:

No blue screens of death
No windows viruses
Cheaper
Includes update service
More secure
$$$Profit$$$

Re:J2EE, mainframes by ajagci · 2004-01-06 08:22 · Score: 1 · on Microsoft Rolls Out New Anti-Linux Ad Campaign

Here is the license for the specification that you agree to when you download the specification (emphasis added):

Copyright 1994-2004 Sun Microsystems, Inc. ("Sun") hereby grants you a fully-paid, non-exclusive, non-transferable, worldwide, limited license (without the right to sublicense), under the Sun's applicable intellectual property rights to view, download, use and reproduce the Specification only for the purpose of internal evaluation, which shall be understood to include developing applications intended to run on an implementation of the Specification provided that such applications do not themselves implement any portion(s) of the Specification.

That explicitly tells you that you can't implement the specification without a license from Sun.

I suspect all the major J2EE providers have a license from Sun. The only successful attempt at an open source implementation was bullied by Sun into agreeing to Sun's legal terms (and even that implementation still required Sun's proprietary Java 2 implementation to run on anyway).

Sun is deliberately deceiving people when they claim that Java is open on the one hand and then publish specifications under such licenses on the other. Sun is creating a legal minefield around Java. Don't get lured in--it will blow up in your face.

Re:J2EE, mainframes by ajagci · 2004-01-06 08:22 · Score: 1 · on Microsoft Rolls Out New Anti-Linux Ad Campaign

Here is the license for the specification that you agree to when you download the specification (emphasis added):

Copyright 1994-2004 Sun Microsystems, Inc. ("Sun") hereby grants you a fully-paid, non-exclusive, non-transferable, worldwide, limited license (without the right to sublicense), under the Sun's applicable intellectual property rights to view, download, use and reproduce the Specification only for the purpose of internal evaluation, which shall be understood to include developing applications intended to run on an implementation of the Specification provided that such applications do not themselves implement any portion(s) of the Specification.

That explicitly tells you that you can't implement the specification without a license from Sun.

I suspect all the major J2EE providers have a license from Sun. The only successful attempt at an open source implementation was bullied by Sun into agreeing to Sun's legal terms (and even that implementation still required Sun's proprietary Java 2 implementation to run on anyway).

Sun is deliberately deceiving people when they claim that Java is open on the one hand and then publish specifications under such licenses on the other. Sun is creating a legal minefield around Java. Don't get lured in--it will blow up in your face.

Re:J2EE, mainframes by bckrispi · 2004-01-06 07:50 · Score: 1 · on Microsoft Rolls Out New Anti-Linux Ad Campaign

J2EE, for example, manages to be as bloated and proprietary as anything from Microsoft.

Not true at all. There are dozens of J2EE implementations not produced by Sun (IBM Websphere, BEA WebLogic, Allaire JRun, JBoss, Oracle 9i Application Server, etc.). Companies pay Sun to have their products certified J2EE compliant, but it costs nothing to implement the specification (which is openly distributed) in terms of licensing. Is the spec bloated? Well, it aint' small, but I'd prefer the term "feature rich". We're talking about scalable distributed enterprise computing. Show me an architecture that does this that isn't top-heavy.

Re:Sun to blame for Win98 retiremnt by gilh · 2004-01-05 03:41 · Score: 2, Informative · on Windows 98 Phased Out

The court order didn't specify the any product had to be retired. It specified that the product had to be brought into compliance with the agreements between the parties and which had Microsoft violated.

According to this open letter from Sun, Microsoft even asked for (and were granted) an extension to the agreement date.

Re:What about Sun's lawsuit? by gilh · 2004-01-05 03:36 · Score: 1 · on Windows 98 Phased Out

Read the Open Letter From Jonathan Schwartz for an idea of Sun's rebuttle to this claim.

Re:Already? by NicolaiBSD · 2004-01-02 04:59 · Score: 3, Informative · on Sun Opens Cobalt Code

They got chilisoft out of the aquisition of Cobalt. Chilisoft have coded an ASP engine for UNIX which Sun now sell as Sun Java System Active Server Pages 4.0.

Re:Cobalt Cube? by vasqzr · 2004-01-02 02:59 · Score: 2, Informative · on Sun Opens Cobalt Code

It's rack-mountable. So if you're a hosting company you can stick a ton of them in a small place. Hence the name 'RAQ'

Re:That's really interesting... by herrvinny · 2003-12-31 11:51 · Score: 1 · on Finding MD5 Collisions With Chinese Lottery

Install one. Java Installation Site. Here's the SDK, if you want it. It comes with a JVM. And yes, Sun's JVM runs in Mozilla.

Re:OF? by colinleroy · 2003-12-30 03:44 · Score: 2, Informative · on Writing an End to the Bio of BIOS?

Same for Sun and other archs. That's a standard.

Re:why help a megacorporation like apple? by Ohreally_factor · 2003-12-29 19:29 · Score: 0, Offtopic · on Konqueror Compiled For Mac OS X; KOffice Next

I use and love OS X, but have you checked out Sun's Looking Glass?

Looks mighty promising.

OK, back to the trolling in progress.

Re:Stone Age by Pete · 2003-12-29 13:01 · Score: 1 · on KDE 3.x Installation On Solaris Discussed

Heh. When I'm really working on an X11 machine, I use ratpoison. I tell you what, it really helps you to focus entirely on the work and not get distracted ;-).

BTW, in keeping with the subject line of this thread - did anyone else notice that in the article, the writer talks about installing KDE3, but then supplies a screenshot referring to KDE2.2/KOffice1.1? If I didn't already think it a pretty weak article, I'd find that kind of a lazy screenshot substitution mistake to be quite amusing. :-)

Pete.

Re:Stone Age by Pete · 2003-12-29 13:01 · Score: 1 · on KDE 3.x Installation On Solaris Discussed

Heh. When I'm really working on an X11 machine, I use ratpoison. I tell you what, it really helps you to focus entirely on the work and not get distracted ;-).

BTW, in keeping with the subject line of this thread - did anyone else notice that in the article, the writer talks about installing KDE3, but then supplies a screenshot referring to KDE2.2/KOffice1.1? If I didn't already think it a pretty weak article, I'd find that kind of a lazy screenshot substitution mistake to be quite amusing. :-)

Pete.

Off-topic but highly interesting by thanasakis · 2003-12-29 09:58 · Score: 1 · on KDE 3.x Installation On Solaris Discussed

It seems that one of Sun's goals is to enter the desktop market as a serious player.Check out project looking glass. They mention translucent windows and 3D windowing capabilities in the whitepapers. They sure are exploring an interesting possibility there.

Can the usability of the desktop be enhanced using a 3D window space paradigm instead of a 2D???

Re:but ... by carsont · 2003-12-29 09:02 · Score: 2 · on KDE 3.x Installation On Solaris Discussed

Try here for instructions on how to use TrueType fonts in Solaris. It's basically the same as using any other font: throw them in a directly, make a 'fonts.dir', then xset +fp .

Anti-aliasing isn't in Xsun yet to my knowledge, though. They added Xrender support in one of the HW updates to Solaris 9 (4/03, maybe? I forget), but anti-aliasing for Xft isn't there yet, as they say vaguely here.

You can always use XFree86 on Solaris, though I've never tried it.