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• Speed is rarely the primary issue - For most projects, things like reliability, speed of development, features, and cost of development are more important than execution speed.
• Profilers are rarely used - Spending a couple of days profiling and tuning your code will make much, much, much more difference than using C++ over Java. Despite that, there are a lot of developers who never touch profilers.
• Computers get faster; people don't - Thanks to Moore's Law, 18 months from now you code will be twice as fast. It will not be twice as usable, twice as robust, or have twice as many features, and programmers will not be twice as productive. Generally, if I can trade CPU time for programmer time without harming project goals, I'm glad to do it.

Really, I agree with many of your points in the abstract. As a language for top-tier, ass-kicking developers who are wise, subtle, and wily, Java has a lot of annoying constraints.

They did this for a reason though. For a lot of real-world software development, you have to do the work with painfully small amounts of time, money, and talent. So they banned a number of things that it takes an expert to use wisely. E.g., pointers, multiple inheritance, allowing unreachable code, preprocessor macros, raw memory allocation, random memory access, self-modifying code, and so on. As cool as those features are in the hands of a genius, they are plain dangerous in the hands of a mediocre developer. And 99% of the time, the genius will be doing what Java would be doing anyhow; it's only the 1% of the time that it sucks.

That's why I'd much rather inherit a bunch of J. Random Programmer's code in Java than almost any other language. There will be little impressive wizardry in it, but there are also unlikely to be many sections that will make me bleed through my eye sockets.

And you're also right about some of the other feature lacks; the whole primitive type thing is just ugly, and it's clear that they haven't heard about the whole mutable/immutable thing yet. Really, it saddens me that they are just now catching up with a lot of the things that NeXT was doing right with Objective C 5-10 years ago.

But as far as getting things done in the real world for server side stuff goes, it seems perfectly adequate for all the OO work I do. And to be fair to them, they're making a fair bit of progress; the java.lang.ref package, for example, answered a lot of my gripes about pointers and garbage collection.

One thing I didn't understand in your post was the section "lack of parametrised types"; could you talk more about that?

I over-reacted, but whenever someone mentions C++ someone says, hey - why not use java and all your problems will go away, I get a little tired of it.

Me too. As far as I can tell, these are people who have never done any serious work in Java. Or if they have, then Java is the only language they've used on a serious project.

Luckily, these people get what they deserve. Eventually they will be dumb enough to say things like this to a boss, who will be dumb enough believe them. And then when their optimistically-scheduled, poorly-scoped, under-budgeted project goes up in flames, they will get fucked with the sandpaper condoms. The smart ones learn after the first time that no tool is perfect for every job. The dumb ones, of course, talk trash about last tool and find the next perfect tool to talk about.

Having the program die horribly would probably suffice, but the high-voltage shock to the nipples would be even better. Immediate catastophic failure is a far more useful reaction to bugs during development than limping along, papering over the cracks.

And people call Java a bondage-and-discipline language! Heh. Maybe we should dress this idea up in a lot of fancy talk about neuropsychology and maximizing feedback loop efficiency and see if we can get VCs to cough up a few million dollars to get us going.

Ten bucks says "kludge" means what I thought it meant.

You dickhead.

Agreed. ESR continually annoys me. In part, he has brought this on himself: his annotations to the "halloween documents" are weak snipes at MSFT, he compares Bill Gates to Hitler, and he openly calls MSFT and Bill Gates the enemy.

I think a lot of this comes from a lack of perspective. Bruce Perens seems to have mellowed since his look-at-me resignations from SPI and OSI. Hopefully, ESR will do the same. I'm fascinated by ESR and RMS: full-time free software advocates.

This is the best interview I've read in a long time. It's a shame that Slashdot has painted it with the anti-MSFT brush.

He has done some good stuff, and a lot of bogus stuff, his 'nya nya nya nya' bullshite when his VA stock was "worth" about $40 million was basically unforgivable, as is this stupidity in the jargon file:
W2k Bug
Yeah, Eric, you got that one right!

And remember what he said about Y2K?

I admire and like Eric--he's an uber-hacker--but I think in his zeal to sell "Open Source", he's become too confident in his theories.

No, you are living in ignorance. Hacking and cracking are the same thing, but this dumb "cracking" word was invented later. Check the Jargon File, sense 8:

[deprecated] A malicious meddler who tries to discover sensitive information by poking around. Hence `password hacker', `network hacker'. The correct term for this sense is cracker.

Note the word 'deprecated'. ESR may have decided to deprecate this sense of the word, but I have not, and I don't recognize his authority to do so. That was a political move, not a factual move.

--

Y'know, I've always wanted to play those clock-speed dependent 286 games again.

But seriously, Ogg's been Ogged. Frauenhofer is making a kamikaze attack without regard to future repercussions. The irony is wonderful.

I forsee the rattling will continue. The Ogg Vorbis format will exit beta and enter into the Internet's various mirroring services and freenet-style anti-censorship services, the company Xiph will get sued out of existance, the CODEC will survive, plugins for Xamp and Winamp will abound, business as usual will continue. Anyone remember why we should be using PNGs instead of GIFs?? right. do you? same deal.

Mr. Granade's description of the term "warez" and similar terms come across as more impartial and informative than the current Jargon File entry.

Kudos to Mr. Granade for the work.

The story is told here, in The Jargon File: http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/entry/ping. html

-Andy

I listened to ESR talk about selling "Open Source" to the organization and that was exactly one of his main points. When you buy from a third party they usually have a contractual responsibility to support the product. But on the flip side, YOUR COMPANY IS HELD HOSTAGE to that third party for bug fixes and support. And we all know that tech companies NEVER go out of business, right? Using Free Software, on the other hand, leaves you many more options, as mentioned by the previous poster.

So when the next PHB makes a big deal about some vendor having "support", turn around and ask him why he wants the company held hostage to a third party for mission critical software.

The motivation for the GNU project started when RMS wanted to fix and enhance a printer driver but he was denied access to the source code. So he, and some of the worlds most compotent computer engineers, had to live with it until the vendor made the changes. It happens.

Don't be fooled with grandiose promises of support. I think we all know what a frustrating experience it can be trying to get "support" for something. While it is true that money talks and the more money your company has invested in the support contract the better service you'll get, it is also true that the more money you invest in the project the less you can afford to not have in house control over the internals.

For an interesting essay on the economics of "Open Source" software read ESR's "The Magic Cauldron".

http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/writings/magic-cauldron /magic-cauldron.html

-Derek

[I would have moderated Blade's post as(+3, Flamebait Deluxe). It is irresistible!]

The Linux model is not a good vehicle for big business because the usenet model of support only works for a couple of dozen computers. We shall never see nationwide installations of Linux in the 10k + range until there is a very large Linux company.

The problem is not the model of support, as you allege, but the priorities of management. You may be correct in suggesting that more companies would consider deploying Linux if there were a dominant distribution with "stifling power", but this just means that IT managers are concerned about the wrong things. IT departments ought ideally to exist for the purpose of creating and maintaining their organization's IT infrastructure (regardless of whether these arise from vendor ineptitude or unorthodox requirements in the organization) -- and not for the purpose of coordinating foreign intervention (i.e., yelling at vendors and hiring consultants) when problems arise.

A small development team can still hope to craft a custom GNU/Linux system with long-term value that addresses the organization's needs precisely because GNU/Linux development is fragmented (which means that sources remain accessible in every respect) and because there is not a dominant player (which means that the evolution of the system is still reasonably transparent). Consider, for example, the Linux deployment by Lans Carstensen's team at the Dreamworks animation studio.

Now, the only way we are going to get such a large Linux company that the corps feel they can trust to fix their problems is if Red Hat, SuSE, Caldera, Corel etc become one. Divided, they are small and weak. Together they are strong.

If a company with expansive resources such as you seem to advocate should emerge, it could (according to Eric Raymond's analysis) assert effective ownership of parts of GNU/Linux simply becoming the maintainer or primary developer of those parts. Consider, for example, the case of Red Hat, who keep various Linux, GCC, and GNOME developers on payroll. If such a company then chose to release new versions of free software only in conjunction with a new distribution (thus diminishing availability, accessibility) and without coordinating its efforts with other developers (thus diminishing transparency of the evolution of the software), the aforementioned virtues of GNU/Linux would be in doubt (regardless of whether the company did this maliciously) and many would find good reason to choose a different platform.

I expect that in ten years, after a struggle between these companies involving bankruptcies, mergers and hostile takeovers there shall emerge one true Linux company, if you like a MS of the Linux world, without quite the same stifling power.

Gosh, I hope you are wrong about there being only one "Linux company" but I know you are wrong to claim that such a company would be less stifling. And, now, repeat after me: diversity, distributedness, and transparency are good. :) A single, almighty "Linux company" is not likely to give you any of those things.

Only then will corps be able to make large scale deployments of Linux with the proper assurance and support.

The fact that some people think that Linux is a poor choice because it is fragmented is a good indication of just how perverse the mainstream IT perspective is. I hope I live to see the day in which avoiding responsibility gives way to meeting requirements as the modus operandi of technology managers in every company.

Sounds cool, doesn't it? But now companies could start being able to restrict what you hook up to your computer. Sony does like HP right now? Now Trinitrons won't work on your Pavilion PC.

As I understand it, this would be a violation of the Clayton Act, similar to some of the arguments against Microsoft. However, if Sony developed their own proprietary interlink system (see connector conspiracy), and made it difficult for other people to develop to that spec (as Intel did with Slot 1), they could effectively accomplish the same task, although the ground is murky there.

IANAL, so this is all supposition based on similar fiascoes I've seen in the past, at best vaguely remembered.

it would have been better in every way just to expand area codes to four digits.
Can anyone think of any reason the telcos didn't take this approach?

(b) Memory space in phone machinery. Lots of telephone equipment has the ability to memorise or process phone numbers. In adding an extra digit, you're forcing the obsolescence of any equipment which can't cope with the extra digit. This would probably turn into an infrastructure nightmare.

I mostly agree with this paragraph:

The media cover technology poorly as a rule, but their shallow portrayal of gaming culture as destructive and profane is a particular scandal, more so all the time as gaming becomes sophisticated, creative and intellectually challenging.

I don't think people's reactions to video games in general meet the requirements for "moral panic" (are those like kernel panics? ;)) mentioned in the article. I will grant you that people have reacted rather negatively to first person shooters and (in the past, at least) to D&D, but {first_person_shooters, RPGs} is a proper subset of the set Gaming. i.e. (fps && D&D) != Gaming

Even when it comes to fps && D&D, I don't think we've quite met the standard (given in the article) for moral panic. When it comes to gaming in general, we certainly haven't. If people are so terribly concerned, why aren't they trying to ban the sale of PS2's? What about the upcoming D&D movie? (my friends and I are going to K.C. to see it--if the Christian Coalition attacks us, I'll be sure to let ya know.)

I think Katz has a couple nice ideas in there somewhere, but not really enough info to flesh out a three-piece article. The Jargon File defines this kind of article as content-free.

I think you'll find that the most cryptic programming langage is actually Intercal. APL is easy by comparison.

Some Slashdot followers really need to get the "all journalists are fools" stick out of their asses.

Indeed. All? Surely Sturgeon's Law applies.

My impression, from references in things like Austin Powers and Midtown Madness 2 (which has some really awful "brit-isms", but also treats you to an 'upper class women' calling your fellow drivers tossers, amongst others) that wank does at least double-duty.

There's the one I know and love (right-handed), which is a reference to masturbation, and this other more vague 'crap' or something similar, as in the The Wonderful Wank-o-meter or the jargon file entry.

I would agree with c*nt being probably the most offensive here (UK) too - a sound yelling from my dad when I first discovered the word and called my sister one at age 7 has seen to that with me :)
It is an ugly word though.

[oh yeah - I am a britfag, blah blah blah, two world wars, whatever - save you the bother]

It's a unix thing: fsck - filesystem consistency check and interactive repair

Links if it was a serious question...

man page for openbsd fsck

jargon file: fsking

now, why don't you explain to everyone how your grand scheme of solving the problems faced by new users is best done at the OS level.

By an easier installation system, something more like windows'? Redhat is heading that direction, though their disk druid tool is complete dung.

Whups, right, sorry. You can't. Or are you still confusing OS with interface? Or maybe you're confusing linux with an OS that gives a shit about new users?

Operating systems don't care about anything. We don't have AI yet, so computers don't have emotions. Linux users do however seem to care about increasing "market share", so they WOULD seem to care about new users.

As for the definition of OS, or Operating System, the definition in the Jargon File (Thank you, ESR) begins "The foundation software of a machine; that which schedules tasks, allocates storage, and presents a default interface to the user between applications." Arguably, in this day and age, the installation system and the windowing system can be considered parts of the operating system, whether they run in user space or not (and of course, on unix, they do.)

Perhaps I should have said "Is best done at the application level" but my statement is not too far off from using proper definitions.

I believe that anything like Scour, Napster, or Usenet is largely doomed because the majority of the leeches and non-leeches are so dang stupid, that any content out there is likely to be 95% worthless because it is so banal.

"High-tech work takes on significance that transcends the rhetoric of efficiency, productivity and 'value added,' as it is used to make lives meaningful by aligning them with progressive forces."

Well, not for me.

"High-tech work takes on significance that transcends the rhetoric of efficiency, productivity and 'value added,' as it is used to make lives meaningful by aligning them with progressive forces."

Well, not for me.

What about obfuscated OISC?

You've heard of RISC, Reduced Instruction Set Computers? Well, here is the concept taken to its logical extreme -- an emulator for a computer with just one (1) instruction (Subtract and Branch if Negative)! Sample programs in the OISC machine language are included.

ESR has an OSIC emulator.

Just make damn sure that when you debug you mount a scratch monkey

Wooho. I invoke Godwin's Law. This thread is over.

Well, technically, they're correct. ESR's home page *is* about hacking.

However, Websense is guilty of generalizing in their categorization. ESR's home page is categorized as "hacking." When I checked it later from another location, it appears that there is nothing even marginally illegal on ESR's page or linked to by it, but it does have the word "hacking" in there somewhere, albeit in the old-school context of "clever programming."

I have seen other generalizations in categorizing, including Freedom and Accuracy in Reporting, and ironically the Bill of Rights being blocked as "activism." This is a form of soft censorship, in that Websense dodges the accusation since the decision to block is on the part of the administrator, and the administrator dodging the blame because they did not make the categorization, and it's an all-or-none deal.

If I understand it right, it's a good idea: optimal loop unrolling is performed in a different manner on different platform.

This way, you have the actual loop in the bytecode, which can be unrolled and translated very efficiently for the specific architecture.

While I believe that nothing could beat a human being when it come to coding to one specific architecture, I believe optimizers can do a damn good job when it comes to support several architectures. Example?

Take a simple loop in ANSI C, compile with the optimizer. Then unroll by hand the very same loop (using something like the Duff's Device). Compare the results. On a single architecture a human can take in account the CPU characteristics, and do the best optimization, but if you have to support several architectures, unrolling by hand could result in better bytecode for some, but worse bytecode for all the others.

So, having an intermediate language (I wouldn't call it "assembly") designed with optimizers in mind should be a Good Thing(TM).

If I remember correctly, one of the mistakes in designing the JVM is that a great deal of information is left out when compiling to bytecode, so JIT compilers can only do a less-than-optimal job (and you pay it in speed). I don't know if the Amiga virtual machine is better at this, but I bet it is.

-jerdenn

-jerdenn

--
Spelling by m-w.com.

Linus Torvalds has spurred a love of beer amongst Linux users according to Jargon.org, he really loves Guiness. Wierd, really given the Guiness used to flavour their beer with dead horses in the early years IIRC.

Oh what is a Linux geek to do? Boycott Guinness? Offend the founding father, Oh! Agony!

That's it. Im switching to BSD, Penguins like beer but Demons drink a mixture of sulpur and brimstone, as far as I know no one has tried to register sulphur-and-brimstone-really-sucks.com!

I send them links to descriptions of both cracker and hacker but the response was:

I made all the changes and deletions except 'hacker'. My editors and I don't think anyone would understand the term 'cracker'.

Well, if they (media) do not use word 'cracker' because nobody understand it then it is obvious nobody understands this word (I do not know much people which when absorbing information from general media use dictionary).

I send them links to descriptions of both cracker and hacker but the response was:

I made all the changes and deletions except 'hacker'. My editors and I don't think anyone would understand the term 'cracker'.

Well, if they (media) do not use word 'cracker' because nobody understand it then it is obvious nobody understands this word (I do not know much people which when absorbing information from general media use dictionary).

Borken's been in the jargon file for a while, and "b0rken" is a common variant. What made you think it was yours?

INTERCAL

I spit on you bougois pigs and your computers. Belch. Tomorow, I will own the world.

He has very little technical knowledge and hasn't contributed anything significant himself, only his annoying comments.

Maybe you've heard of Fetchmail? Emacs? Python? Do some research before talking out of your ass.

As Treasurer of the Bucknell University ACM (Association for Computing Machinery), myself and the other officers help to persuade industry, faculty, and students computer experts or evangelists to (of OOP, OSS, Linux, etc) come to Bucknell to give a presentation. In the past year or so, we've had guests like Dan Quinlan of Transmeta, speaking on the Linux Standards Base, Ralph Droms (inventor of DHCP), a faculty member at Bucknell, John 'Maddog' Hall (Linux International executive director) on the Flexibility of the Linux OS, and many others. Currently, Eric S. Raymond has added us to his mailing list and will probably come Spring semester to talk about his ideals and beliefs when it comes to software.

What are our methods of obtaining guests? First, it helps to have some connections with someone related to the person you'd like a have speak at your school. Second, being at a top-notch college like Bucknell University tends to give some incentive, perhaps, for people to visit. Finally, persistance does pay off occassionally; if there's someone you really want, make sure you remind them via email or vmail every so often that you'd be absolutely delighted to have them grace you with their presence ;-D

Good luck!

I don't know if I'd be comfortable to know that a section of code I wrote went into a heart monitor. What if I screwed something up and the monitor failed to alert the nurse of a problem?

You could save yourself from those considerable worries if you remember to mount a scratch monkey when testing your software. But, seriously, the more important a medical device is, the simpler it's made. From what I see, most of the medical applications of software are for patient record databases, schedulers, AI-based data mining for research, etc. There are also programs to take data from patient monitors and jazz it up, but it's not the case of having a desktop PC running your life support machine.

"Have you stopped beating your wife yet?"

MU!

Bad pun! Defenestrate him!

What bugs the hell out of me is the all-too-common usage of 'email' as a singular noun. I see all the time people saying 'I'll send him an email' or 'I have 3 emails'.

Yuck yuck yuck yuck yuck. The noun 'email' is plural, and should be used exactly the same way as the plural noun 'mail'. You check your email, you send a piece of email, you send some email if you insist on a shorter way of saying the previous. This used to be standard usage before about 1993 or so (see Sep tem ber that never ended), but sadly seems to be the minority usage now.

---

The jargon file seems to prefer "email" however.

"grok" has been in use in geek circles a lot longer than terms like "1337" or "404". If you were ignorant of the meaning, you no longer have an excuse; here's the Jargon File entry for it.
--
Build a man a fire, and he's warm for a day.

Well, if Sturgeon's Law holds, then probably more like fifteen hundred are worth a flip. It is, however, possible that Sturgeon was being highly optimistic.

That was my point. There are enough PHBs in the world that won't consider anything other than Microsoft. So a machine that can do pretty things, even if it's a PC must be a 'games machine' or some other niche, non-productive antithesis of capitalism. See the jargon file entry on the Amiga Persecution Complex.

Here's two questions:

1. From which (if any) of the commonly accepted principles of FS/OSS development does your project deviate?
2. How much time do you spend writing code vs doing more administrative/moderation tasks?

thanks. cbd.

You may be surprised to discover that Eric Raymond agrees with you.

The Magic Cauldron: When To Be Open, When To Be Closed