Slashdot Mirror

Mark Hood writes " Eric S. Raymond (where does he get the time to do all this?) has a new project - "an open-source distributed archiving system for use at large software archive sites". Basically it's a web-based catalog, with full details of packages, files etc which ought to make large archives (eg Sunsite) more maintainable. It's a great idea - and apparantly more urgent than I though, as ESR believes Sunsite will become unmaintainable by the end of this year. The Trove Project is currently in the design phase, but it's the sort of thing that benefits everyone, so pitch in if you can help! "

Intrepid reviewer Rick Franchuk has returned with another review, this time of the JavaScript Sourcebook. Yes, in full living text, read about how organization can sink or make a book. And, maybe, you can learn how to the mouseover as well. So, click below to read Rick's incisive review.

Another Slashdot denizen wrote to me and asked if he could do the honors of reviewing the next book I had on my list, which was to be TCP/IP Network Administration, another O'Reilly treasure trove. (Can ORA produce bad books? Yes, but I haven't bought any of 'em so I can't write about 'em!)

Since Eric will be doing the write-up for TNA (gotta love that acronym ;), I thought I'd mention a book that I wasn't too impressed with, the JavaScript Sourcebook.

REVIEW: JavaScript Sourcebook Gordon McComb (Wiley Computer Publishing ISBN 0-471-16185-3)

Nutshell
Review: Gordon is a talented coder and packs a wad of code gems into his work, but the organization of the book leaves a lot to be desired.
Rating: 5/10 Rick Franchuk - TranSpecT Consulting The Scenario

There's been some projects I've put together which required a little Jscript knowing, so I did what I usually do... head to the book store (deductions, deductions, deductions! ;). JavaScript was (is?) a very trendy technology, so naturally there were 6.02×10²³ different titles to choose from.

I pulled it off the shelf and gave it a quick thumb test, flipping through the pages to determine if the book would contain the information I was interested in knowing. It seemed complete, CD included all the source code (not that I've ever used a CD from a book), and appeared to cover the topics I was seeking enlightenment on.

At the time I bought it, I knew very little about Jscript (experience with the standard, packaged image-replacement onmouseover scripts and whatnot), so I was looking for a book that could achieve both the task of teaching me Jscript fundamentals and provide specifics about my area of interest. I'd already had considerable exposure to OO Programming, so thinking in terms of objects and methods wasn't foreign.

What's Bad?

Where everything here falls down is organization. The book feels as though it was thrown together by a novice editor. The index is not nearly as complete as it could be, given the bulk of data within the pages, and I found it frustrating trying to work my way through the book as a novice Jscriptor. Eventually, I picked up everything I needed to know from the steaming pile of examples strewn throughout... Computer novices and non-coders would probably have a harder time of it, and could easily get discouraged from Jscript altogether.

To make things more interesting, some of the code samples don't work quite as advertised, particularly if using any flavor of MSIE. That's not surprising, a lot of Jscript features were broken or left out of earlier MSIE revisions, and the book does suffer from that curious outdatedness common to all published computer texts. Some mention is made in the end of 'new' features in Netscape 3.0, which should give you an idea of when it was printed (for you 'Net newcomers, that's 1996.)

What's Good?

The book does pack a lot of handy codelettes in, all the way up to a primitive jscript-based adventure game engine. In fact, there's far more examples in there than the average webtech would probably ever find a use for. A full reference of the Jscript language particulars is included (up to date as of its printing) which also helps a would-be scriptor along.

So What's In It For Me?

I still use the book from time to time, primarily for looking up methods within the Jscript class information or to see how Gordon would tackle a particular or similar problem. However, other texts could give you a more complete examination of the language (like the JavaScript - The Definitive Guide from ORA, which apparently now has a 3rd revision printed in 1998) or a more down-and-dirty answer book (say perhaps The Netscape ONE Reference from SAMS). You might want to save your money and buy one of these other texts.

However, you can grab this at Amazon. Table of Contents

1. Introducing JavaScript
2. What JavaScript is All About
3. Stuff You Should Know: Basic Programming
4. Overview of JavaScript Programming

   Core JavaScript

5. Objects
6. Properties
7. Methods and Functions
8. Expressions
9. Statements
10. Variables
11. Events

    JavaScript in the Real World

12. Defining Functions, Objects, and Methods
13. How Do I?
14. "Plug-and-Play" Routines
15. Fixing Broken JavaScript Programs
16. Using JavaScript in Frames
17. Using JavaScript and Forms

    Extending JavaScript

18. Using JavaScript with Advanced HTML
19. Using CGI with JavaScript
20. Working with Java and Netscape Plugs-Ins
21. Using JavaScript for Sound, Animation, and Graphics
22. All About HTML
23. JavaScript Additions in Netscape 3.0

    Appendix A
    Appendix B

Nir Arbel has taken some time out of his reading of this vertiable compendium of software construction to give us a review of Object Oriented Software Construction, 2nd Edition. So, click below to read more about this behometh of words. Review of Object Oriented Software Construction, 2nd Edition
Author: Dr. Bertrand Meyer
Reviewed by:Nir Arbel

I have to be honest. I have not read the entirety of "Object Oriented Software Construction / 2nd Edition," although I did read most of it. The enormity of this thirteen hundred page behemoth is my official excuse. But first, a short introduction for the book and a good deal of why you, and myself as well, should read this book, cover-to-cover.

Object Oriented Software Construction / 2nd Edition, often acronymized by its fans to OOSC2E, was written by Dr. Bertrand Meyer, which is the designer of the Eiffel programming language, and head of Interactive Software Engineering, whose primary product is an Eiffel integrated development environment which they call Eiffel Bench. They have recently released a Linux port of their latest version of this product.

Now for the important stuff. OOSC2E is a must-read book for anyone who takes their programming seriously. This, however, might not be automatically gleaned out of its name. Object-orientation has generated as much mistrust and disbelief as it did praise and following. Take the hackers' development community and try to relate the object-oriented development model to it. Chances are you'd instinctively disregard this option as impractical, and there would be quite much to support this notion. For instance, the hacker's attitude of "everyone's code is everyone's code" seems to stand in opposition to the Object Oriented model's principle of "hide everything but that which should be absolutely necessarily exposed", but that may be a simple misinterpretation of this directive. The hiding principle's aim is not to support the anti-GNU notion of private code, but rather to help avoid misuse of code. I have no idea whether a true object-oriented development model would work for a disorganized group of hackers, but after reading the better half of OOSC2E, I'm not at all sure it's not worth a try. Furthermore, I am utterly convinced that the object-oriented method would yield numerous benefits in any software project large enough, if it were correctly implemented. But enough about Object Orientation. On with the book.

One thing that sets OOSC2E apart from other books that discuss the same subject is the non-condescending, all-telling manner of Dr. Meyer's writing. While many other books which deal with Object-Orientation hit you on the head with dry methodologies and principles, with little or not attempt to explain why you should even bother putting in the extra effort to correctly implement Object-Orientation, OOSC2E is written for the skeptic; for those of us who heard a bit too much about it and are beginning to suspect it to be a red herring. A conspiracy brought upon the heads of die-hard coders to diminish their belief in their abilities. Dr. Meyer does a brilliant job of stressing the importance of the Object Oriented method. First he begins with describing which areas in software development most direly need improvement at the moment, which he does by example, he then goes on to present feasible and reasonable solutions for the problems presented at their simplest and most abstract form. Then he goes on to define a set of more specific rules, from which he derives a set of principles. Thus endeth the book's introduction. By the time you traverse this part of the book (which is rather massive, actually), you're almost guaranteed to have acquired a better understanding of why and how the software development process should be improved.

Starting with the second part of the book, Dr. Meyer takes the reader through the process of implementing the principles that concluded the first part of the book. He does this by developing a rather simple, coherent notation which would allow the reader to better understand the ideas presented in the book. Little by little the notation is developed. Add a language construct here; insert a rule there. By the end of the book you have something which might as well be a programming language, although many programmers would consider it to be too simplistic to be of any use. There's also a dirty little secret concerning the notation which is kept from the reader until the very last page of the book, but most readers would catch on to it very quickly, if not while reading this review. If you'd rather find out for yourself then skip on to the next paragraph, as this may be considered a spoiler. As the book ends, the reader is told that the notation that was so meticulously developed as the book progressed is in fact Eiffel. Many would consider this a shameless commercial plug, since Dr. Meyer's company, as noted earlier, sells an Eiffel development environment. This would also explain why he chose to keep this a secret from the reader until the very last page of the book. Many would resent buying a book that claims to teach the Object-Oriented method, then discover that a good part of it teaches you Eiffel. But Morality aside, spreading Eiffel thin all through the book does nothing to harm its effectiveness. It may be argued that it's a big plus, because by the time you reach the last page, not only have you gained a better understanding of the programming practice as a whole, you've also learned another programming. Fact is that Eiffel is simple enough to aid the learning process rather than hamper it.

Luckily enough, the good writing that characterizes the first part of the book also carries over to the rest of it. But clarity of presentation alone does not make a book the classic that OOSC2E is. The book is virtually paved with mind-blowing and intellectually exciting ideas and concepts. So much that you'll often find yourself smacking your forehead and wonder why certain things have been, and still are, done so differently. Every page oozes uncompromising perfectionism. Ironically, that is exactly why some readers would find this book exasperating at times. One should understand that Dr. Meyer's point of view on the Object Oriented method is just that -- a point of view. There are many other conflicting views expressed by people no less creditable. And whenever the book comes to a debated or debatable point the reader often has to deal with a dogmatic, rather fanatic rationalization of the author's opinions. It is important to remember as one reads the book, not to take everything written as gospel. Dr. Meyer makes many, many excellent points and makes perfect sense most of the time. Just beware of the times he doesn't.

Another group of readers that may find this book exasperating is that composed of programmers of non-Eiffel, Object-Oriented languages, for the same perfectionism discussed in the previous paragraph. The book is filled with many examples taken from other programming, such as C++, Java and Ada, usually under the rubric of "how not to do things correctly". For instance, while it's true that automatic garbage collection is a very powerful programming aid, saying that its absence is unthinkable (C++ implementations, for example, almost never feature automatic garbage collection) may irritate programmers of languages which do not answer to Dr. Meyer's strict criteria, which have, in many cases, proved their usefulness as object-oriented programming tools.

A final note: A thorough read of this book may send you on the search for a good Eiffel tool. As mentioned earlier, ISE does sell a Linux version of their Eiffel Bench, but since I know many of you guys feel religious about the GNU license and since the Linux version is still rather unstable due to it being rather new, you might fancy an alternative. I can recommend two: SmallEiffel, which is a GNU-licensed Eiffel compiler, and Sather, which is a different language based on Eiffel. Sather, mind you, was originally conceived as a free product, which means that everything Sather is freely downloadable, including the language standard, the programmer's manual, tons of additional documentation, a compiler (which works just fine on Linux as far as I can tell), an Emacs major-mode and lots and lots more. It's quite a gem, really. Grab it over here.

Nir Arbel has taken some time out of his reading of this vertiable compendium of software construction to give us a review of Object Oriented Software Construction, 2nd Edition. So, click below to read more about this behometh of words. Review of Object Oriented Software Construction, 2nd Edition
Author: Dr. Bertrand Meyer
Reviewed by:Nir Arbel

I have to be honest. I have not read the entirety of "Object Oriented Software Construction / 2nd Edition," although I did read most of it. The enormity of this thirteen hundred page behemoth is my official excuse. But first, a short introduction for the book and a good deal of why you, and myself as well, should read this book, cover-to-cover.

Object Oriented Software Construction / 2nd Edition, often acronymized by its fans to OOSC2E, was written by Dr. Bertrand Meyer, which is the designer of the Eiffel programming language, and head of Interactive Software Engineering, whose primary product is an Eiffel integrated development environment which they call Eiffel Bench. They have recently released a Linux port of their latest version of this product.

Now for the important stuff. OOSC2E is a must-read book for anyone who takes their programming seriously. This, however, might not be automatically gleaned out of its name. Object-orientation has generated as much mistrust and disbelief as it did praise and following. Take the hackers' development community and try to relate the object-oriented development model to it. Chances are you'd instinctively disregard this option as impractical, and there would be quite much to support this notion. For instance, the hacker's attitude of "everyone's code is everyone's code" seems to stand in opposition to the Object Oriented model's principle of "hide everything but that which should be absolutely necessarily exposed", but that may be a simple misinterpretation of this directive. The hiding principle's aim is not to support the anti-GNU notion of private code, but rather to help avoid misuse of code. I have no idea whether a true object-oriented development model would work for a disorganized group of hackers, but after reading the better half of OOSC2E, I'm not at all sure it's not worth a try. Furthermore, I am utterly convinced that the object-oriented method would yield numerous benefits in any software project large enough, if it were correctly implemented. But enough about Object Orientation. On with the book.

One thing that sets OOSC2E apart from other books that discuss the same subject is the non-condescending, all-telling manner of Dr. Meyer's writing. While many other books which deal with Object-Orientation hit you on the head with dry methodologies and principles, with little or not attempt to explain why you should even bother putting in the extra effort to correctly implement Object-Orientation, OOSC2E is written for the skeptic; for those of us who heard a bit too much about it and are beginning to suspect it to be a red herring. A conspiracy brought upon the heads of die-hard coders to diminish their belief in their abilities. Dr. Meyer does a brilliant job of stressing the importance of the Object Oriented method. First he begins with describing which areas in software development most direly need improvement at the moment, which he does by example, he then goes on to present feasible and reasonable solutions for the problems presented at their simplest and most abstract form. Then he goes on to define a set of more specific rules, from which he derives a set of principles. Thus endeth the book's introduction. By the time you traverse this part of the book (which is rather massive, actually), you're almost guaranteed to have acquired a better understanding of why and how the software development process should be improved.

Starting with the second part of the book, Dr. Meyer takes the reader through the process of implementing the principles that concluded the first part of the book. He does this by developing a rather simple, coherent notation which would allow the reader to better understand the ideas presented in the book. Little by little the notation is developed. Add a language construct here; insert a rule there. By the end of the book you have something which might as well be a programming language, although many programmers would consider it to be too simplistic to be of any use. There's also a dirty little secret concerning the notation which is kept from the reader until the very last page of the book, but most readers would catch on to it very quickly, if not while reading this review. If you'd rather find out for yourself then skip on to the next paragraph, as this may be considered a spoiler. As the book ends, the reader is told that the notation that was so meticulously developed as the book progressed is in fact Eiffel. Many would consider this a shameless commercial plug, since Dr. Meyer's company, as noted earlier, sells an Eiffel development environment. This would also explain why he chose to keep this a secret from the reader until the very last page of the book. Many would resent buying a book that claims to teach the Object-Oriented method, then discover that a good part of it teaches you Eiffel. But Morality aside, spreading Eiffel thin all through the book does nothing to harm its effectiveness. It may be argued that it's a big plus, because by the time you reach the last page, not only have you gained a better understanding of the programming practice as a whole, you've also learned another programming. Fact is that Eiffel is simple enough to aid the learning process rather than hamper it.

Luckily enough, the good writing that characterizes the first part of the book also carries over to the rest of it. But clarity of presentation alone does not make a book the classic that OOSC2E is. The book is virtually paved with mind-blowing and intellectually exciting ideas and concepts. So much that you'll often find yourself smacking your forehead and wonder why certain things have been, and still are, done so differently. Every page oozes uncompromising perfectionism. Ironically, that is exactly why some readers would find this book exasperating at times. One should understand that Dr. Meyer's point of view on the Object Oriented method is just that -- a point of view. There are many other conflicting views expressed by people no less creditable. And whenever the book comes to a debated or debatable point the reader often has to deal with a dogmatic, rather fanatic rationalization of the author's opinions. It is important to remember as one reads the book, not to take everything written as gospel. Dr. Meyer makes many, many excellent points and makes perfect sense most of the time. Just beware of the times he doesn't.

Another group of readers that may find this book exasperating is that composed of programmers of non-Eiffel, Object-Oriented languages, for the same perfectionism discussed in the previous paragraph. The book is filled with many examples taken from other programming, such as C++, Java and Ada, usually under the rubric of "how not to do things correctly". For instance, while it's true that automatic garbage collection is a very powerful programming aid, saying that its absence is unthinkable (C++ implementations, for example, almost never feature automatic garbage collection) may irritate programmers of languages which do not answer to Dr. Meyer's strict criteria, which have, in many cases, proved their usefulness as object-oriented programming tools.

A final note: A thorough read of this book may send you on the search for a good Eiffel tool. As mentioned earlier, ISE does sell a Linux version of their Eiffel Bench, but since I know many of you guys feel religious about the GNU license and since the Linux version is still rather unstable due to it being rather new, you might fancy an alternative. I can recommend two: SmallEiffel, which is a GNU-licensed Eiffel compiler, and Sather, which is a different language based on Eiffel. Sather, mind you, was originally conceived as a free product, which means that everything Sather is freely downloadable, including the language standard, the programmer's manual, tons of additional documentation, a compiler (which works just fine on Linux as far as I can tell), an Emacs major-mode and lots and lots more. It's quite a gem, really. Grab it over here.

Pierce wrote in to tell us that the Gnome v0.20 RPMs have been pulled offline while they try to solve a problem that apparently is breaking apps compiled against older GTKs. So everyone should either try the tar.gz files, or hold off a few days while the Gnomes work it out.

The battle for the X desktop has never been fiercer. And the major contenders for the easy-to-use integrated desktop of the future is being waged between KDE and Gnome. Kevin Forge has written in with his "Twisted View" on the situtation. The following is an editorial by Slashdot reader Kevin Forge

I have noticed on Slashdot and on all other open forums ( except for the KDE lists themselves :) that whenever KDE is mentioned a flamewar immediately starts up and burns for several days. I think it's about time we got a few facts straight on the legal issues involved then we can discus the implications for the Linux/GNU community.

1. What is wrong with the KDE License ?
   Nothing. It is GPL and according to the rules of the GPL can be enforced on distributions that ship QT as part of the package ( All distributions that ship KDE ship QT and even debian includes QT as an optional install )
2. What is wrong with the QT License ?
   It demands money from people who use it to write closed source proprietary programs ( ~$1200 ). It dose not allow you to distribute modified versions of QT itself. All modifications, enhancements and bug fixes must be sent to Troll Tech for inclusion in the official product.
3. But isn't it dangerous to base something as important as a desktop environment on a none free product ?
   Yes. Troll May be bought by another company ( who shall remain nameless in it's Redmond home ) bent on destroying KDE. This distraction would work by releasing buggy versions of QT ( beyond the norm :) or stopping development of QT or changing to a more restrictive and expensive license ( Like Motif ). It is worth noting that in each of this situations KDE can simply continue using the last gratis QT Libs ( you cannot change a software license retroactively ) for around 18 months. That is the current best estimate as to when Harmony ( the QT replacement ) will be in a position to take over from QT completely. This calculation is made at the current development rate with little interest from anyone else.
4. What of the FreeQT Foundation ?
   The existence of this body negates most of the above sited dangers. If Troll Tech is bought, QT becomes stagnant or the QT License is changed then it will revert to a BSD license ( which we all know is as free as the LGPL in most ways ).

Now we can get to the mater of the relationship between Gnome and KDE. Nobody wanted a desktop environment. Nobody cared about one. The Linux establishment looked at CDE and just puked. then they were thankful it cost a lot of money and won't be popular to Linux users.

Then along came the KDE crew who did care about a Linux desktop and got the ball rolling. Before the rest of the Linux world saw what was happening KDE is robust and almost stable. I have clocked KDE running for as many as 5 days and data loss has only occurred on the Solaris port ( that bug is fixed ). However being based on a none free proprietary toolkit made it a danger in many eyes. Thus they set off on a mad rush to build a replacement for KDE before it got entrenched in the Linux community.

With this in mind Gnome has landed more financial support than any other single project in Linux history ( Including the Kernel ). It has someone doing daily builds and RPMs, SRPMs and DEB packages. All this to prevent Linux from being dependent upon Troll Tech or QT.

Meanwhile with the 50 ton Gorilla called Gnome rushing on the KDE developers are redoubling their efforts to maintain as clear a technological and stability lead as possible.

The end result is that if Gnome had been started when KDE was and by the same people it would not be where it is today. It would be a sick and weak toy like all the other halfhearted desktop projects that came before ( TKDesk, Lestif and a bunch of others that just dropped flat ). So because of the shortcomings of the QT license we now have a desktop for which people have already uninstaled CDE and another which should by definition be nicer when it get's done. However when Gnome get's to the level of today's KDE, KDE will have moved on to bigger and brighter things so there will be a technological battle between them for at least a few years.

I can't help but draw the analogy of the US BasketBall team in the last Olympics that simply crushed everything in the path. What people miss is that they grew strong playing against each other in the NBA. So too will KDE and Gnome grow strong trying to outdo each other on Linux thus making them a formidable teem for use against other OSs. There is now Gnome-KDE mailing list specifically created for making sure Gnome and KDe comply with the same standards for application interaction and certain L&F similarities.

PS : I ask that any comments on technological issues ( speed, stability, usability etc. ) be made AFTER using a resent snapshot of both KDE and Gnome.

The battle for the X desktop has never been fiercer. And the major contenders for the easy-to-use integrated desktop of the future is being waged between KDE and Gnome. Kevin Forge has written in with his "Twisted View" on the situtation. The following is an editorial by Slashdot reader Kevin Forge

I have noticed on Slashdot and on all other open forums ( except for the KDE lists themselves :) that whenever KDE is mentioned a flamewar immediately starts up and burns for several days. I think it's about time we got a few facts straight on the legal issues involved then we can discus the implications for the Linux/GNU community.

1. What is wrong with the KDE License ?
   Nothing. It is GPL and according to the rules of the GPL can be enforced on distributions that ship QT as part of the package ( All distributions that ship KDE ship QT and even debian includes QT as an optional install )
2. What is wrong with the QT License ?
   It demands money from people who use it to write closed source proprietary programs ( ~$1200 ). It dose not allow you to distribute modified versions of QT itself. All modifications, enhancements and bug fixes must be sent to Troll Tech for inclusion in the official product.
3. But isn't it dangerous to base something as important as a desktop environment on a none free product ?
   Yes. Troll May be bought by another company ( who shall remain nameless in it's Redmond home ) bent on destroying KDE. This distraction would work by releasing buggy versions of QT ( beyond the norm :) or stopping development of QT or changing to a more restrictive and expensive license ( Like Motif ). It is worth noting that in each of this situations KDE can simply continue using the last gratis QT Libs ( you cannot change a software license retroactively ) for around 18 months. That is the current best estimate as to when Harmony ( the QT replacement ) will be in a position to take over from QT completely. This calculation is made at the current development rate with little interest from anyone else.
4. What of the FreeQT Foundation ?
   The existence of this body negates most of the above sited dangers. If Troll Tech is bought, QT becomes stagnant or the QT License is changed then it will revert to a BSD license ( which we all know is as free as the LGPL in most ways ).

Now we can get to the mater of the relationship between Gnome and KDE. Nobody wanted a desktop environment. Nobody cared about one. The Linux establishment looked at CDE and just puked. then they were thankful it cost a lot of money and won't be popular to Linux users.

Then along came the KDE crew who did care about a Linux desktop and got the ball rolling. Before the rest of the Linux world saw what was happening KDE is robust and almost stable. I have clocked KDE running for as many as 5 days and data loss has only occurred on the Solaris port ( that bug is fixed ). However being based on a none free proprietary toolkit made it a danger in many eyes. Thus they set off on a mad rush to build a replacement for KDE before it got entrenched in the Linux community.

With this in mind Gnome has landed more financial support than any other single project in Linux history ( Including the Kernel ). It has someone doing daily builds and RPMs, SRPMs and DEB packages. All this to prevent Linux from being dependent upon Troll Tech or QT.

Meanwhile with the 50 ton Gorilla called Gnome rushing on the KDE developers are redoubling their efforts to maintain as clear a technological and stability lead as possible.

The end result is that if Gnome had been started when KDE was and by the same people it would not be where it is today. It would be a sick and weak toy like all the other halfhearted desktop projects that came before ( TKDesk, Lestif and a bunch of others that just dropped flat ). So because of the shortcomings of the QT license we now have a desktop for which people have already uninstaled CDE and another which should by definition be nicer when it get's done. However when Gnome get's to the level of today's KDE, KDE will have moved on to bigger and brighter things so there will be a technological battle between them for at least a few years.

I can't help but draw the analogy of the US BasketBall team in the last Olympics that simply crushed everything in the path. What people miss is that they grew strong playing against each other in the NBA. So too will KDE and Gnome grow strong trying to outdo each other on Linux thus making them a formidable teem for use against other OSs. There is now Gnome-KDE mailing list specifically created for making sure Gnome and KDe comply with the same standards for application interaction and certain L&F similarities.

PS : I ask that any comments on technological issues ( speed, stability, usability etc. ) be made AFTER using a resent snapshot of both KDE and Gnome.

Allright the news is just filled with stuff on TMS, so let's get them out of the way in a lump. Cappella wrote in to tell us that the SPA has denied MS a seat again. Tjl wrote in to send us this story where you can read that apparently Clinton is backing the DOJ on TMS. Static (aka Wade Bowmer) wrote in to send us a bird's eye view of MS's legal situation.

Dr. DOS writes " Copyright bill passed which which outlaws technologies that can crack copyright protection devices. "

John Lazzaro sent us a link to This Techweb Article about reverse engineering future Intel CPUs. Brian Dial sent us a link to a A Security Site that some of you might like. Anthony David sent us A piece he wrote discussing software development and the like. René Fichter wants to know if there is any demand for an Open Source Graphical MUD. He's been working on one called Daenor that he's considerring opening the source to. Henrik Abelsson sent us a link to Denounce, a hilarious site that runs fake Press Releases. Very cool. An anonymous read submitted Realaroma. Its moderately entertaining. Finally Darren Ginter sent us an article about Signing Bonus's and the computer industry for those of us who thought that only Sports stars get such things.

bdu sent us This Link where you can read a Wired article about putting a price on free software. They cover it pretty well, and actually mention Slashdot (linking with the cursed www *grin*)

Dr. DOS sent us a link to the BMW C1, which is supposedly going to be out in a few years. It's sorta a motorcycle/mini car thing (Sorta like in Terry Gilliam's Ultra cool Brazil). If you're looking for a distraction, this is a good one.

Ok, I'm warning everyone right up front that this is the sort of editorial that might raise a lot of eyebrows, and might start tempers going. Kevin Forge has written a piece on the Crusher App- an application that is superior to its rivals. Specifically, he talks about the Crusher App, and why Oracle is staying away from Linux. What Kevin suggests strikes me as quite possible, not necessarily with Oracle, but with other companies as well, and that's why I'm posting it. Its a major obstacle for Open Source to overcome. Read Kevin's bit, and let's hear what you have to say.

The following is an editorial by Slashdot Reader Kevin Forge

The crusher app.

when you have a user who is also a programer your product becomes more powerful and more stable on an exponential basis since increased stability and power equate to increased support and Increased support means more power and stability. This is why the Credits file in Linux 2.1.99 lists 242 names while 2.0.33 lists 200 ( I counted N:'s and may well be wrong since it's the 1st time I am using grep ). This is also true of Apache, EMacs and all the other Open Source stars.

This brings me to the mater of Oracle. Why dose Oracle claim "lack of demand", "wasted expenditure" and other such things nobody really believes when asked about a Linux port ? ( Most of the programers on this list agree that porting Oracle to Linux would be a trivial undertaking ). Bare with me a little while I approach the matter from Oracle's perspective.

Oracle knows a few things the rest of us haven't considered or have chosen to ignore. They understand the dynamics of the software market and the GNU culture as well as anybody else.

So why doesn't Oracle just release the source code for it's SQL server and charge for support and service in the GNU model ? Simple they already make millions selling support. They make money off the Oracle database in all the ways it's possible to make money off software.

Selling the product on a per machine and similar licenses.

custom development for large entities.

Leasing the source code to "select customers".

Writing books ( I may be mistaken but there are some Oracle SQL books written by people at Oracle ).

Selling support to customers large and small.

Oracle already has a large share of the SQL market so the market share incentive is moot. Simply put Oracle would make less money if it's SQL was Open source.

So if they won't open why not port to Linux? This would be pretty easy since Oracle SQL is cross platform by design, and would have an immediate impact on the bottom line when those frustrated Linuxen start buying Oracle SQL.

I have read a lot of talk of "The killer app", however there is also the little known concept of "The crusher app" (TM).

A Crusher App is one which is far better in every way. It is more powerful, It has more features, It is more stable, It is easier to use, It is more secure and of course comes with full source code, no price tag and is fully compatible with software connected to competing products.

Oracle knows full well that Linux is well on it's way to becoming such a crusher app. They also know that with wider acceptance 1 or more of the GPLd SQL servers will develop into a crusher app. The other fact of which Oracle is aware is that a significant portion of it's customers are ready and willing to adopt Linux for mid range and small servers but have not done so simply because they have built a significant base on Oracle's software and there is no Oracle SQL for Linux ( Running another Oracle in emulation mode doesn't count ). However rest assured that Oracle has a native Linux version of it's software hidden in a dark corner as insurance for the possibility that Linux will become the largest server software anyway.

With all this taken into consideration what is Oracle's plan ? Quite simply to delay the completion of the GNU revolution as long as possible. While that stay of execution is in force they will be able to continue raking in money by the truckload and when the revolution overtakes them they will already have moved on to a less profitable but still sustainable business model. What if the company simply dies in this revolution ? Not Likely. Oracle has enough existing contracts, cash reserves and other assets to keep going for a few more years at least. Plenty of time to rebuild the Company and modify the business model

Tomorrow on flamebait. Corel :)

(Important Note From Rob:Many of the conversations here have been great lately: minimal flaming, rational arguements, and all around quality. Let's make this another one. Good conversations are the best part about Slashdot, and they don't happen unless everyone plays nicely. There are a lot of people reading Slashdot these days, and everything you post here reflects not only on you, but on Linux).

Ok, I'm warning everyone right up front that this is the sort of editorial that might raise a lot of eyebrows, and might start tempers going. Kevin Forge has written a piece on the Crusher App- an application that is superior to its rivals. Specifically, he talks about the Crusher App, and why Oracle is staying away from Linux. What Kevin suggests strikes me as quite possible, not necessarily with Oracle, but with other companies as well, and that's why I'm posting it. Its a major obstacle for Open Source to overcome. Read Kevin's bit, and let's hear what you have to say.

The following is an editorial by Slashdot Reader Kevin Forge

The crusher app.

when you have a user who is also a programer your product becomes more powerful and more stable on an exponential basis since increased stability and power equate to increased support and Increased support means more power and stability. This is why the Credits file in Linux 2.1.99 lists 242 names while 2.0.33 lists 200 ( I counted N:'s and may well be wrong since it's the 1st time I am using grep ). This is also true of Apache, EMacs and all the other Open Source stars.

This brings me to the mater of Oracle. Why dose Oracle claim "lack of demand", "wasted expenditure" and other such things nobody really believes when asked about a Linux port ? ( Most of the programers on this list agree that porting Oracle to Linux would be a trivial undertaking ). Bare with me a little while I approach the matter from Oracle's perspective.

Oracle knows a few things the rest of us haven't considered or have chosen to ignore. They understand the dynamics of the software market and the GNU culture as well as anybody else.

So why doesn't Oracle just release the source code for it's SQL server and charge for support and service in the GNU model ? Simple they already make millions selling support. They make money off the Oracle database in all the ways it's possible to make money off software.

Selling the product on a per machine and similar licenses.

custom development for large entities.

Leasing the source code to "select customers".

Writing books ( I may be mistaken but there are some Oracle SQL books written by people at Oracle ).

Selling support to customers large and small.

Oracle already has a large share of the SQL market so the market share incentive is moot. Simply put Oracle would make less money if it's SQL was Open source.

So if they won't open why not port to Linux? This would be pretty easy since Oracle SQL is cross platform by design, and would have an immediate impact on the bottom line when those frustrated Linuxen start buying Oracle SQL.

I have read a lot of talk of "The killer app", however there is also the little known concept of "The crusher app" (TM).

A Crusher App is one which is far better in every way. It is more powerful, It has more features, It is more stable, It is easier to use, It is more secure and of course comes with full source code, no price tag and is fully compatible with software connected to competing products.

Oracle knows full well that Linux is well on it's way to becoming such a crusher app. They also know that with wider acceptance 1 or more of the GPLd SQL servers will develop into a crusher app. The other fact of which Oracle is aware is that a significant portion of it's customers are ready and willing to adopt Linux for mid range and small servers but have not done so simply because they have built a significant base on Oracle's software and there is no Oracle SQL for Linux ( Running another Oracle in emulation mode doesn't count ). However rest assured that Oracle has a native Linux version of it's software hidden in a dark corner as insurance for the possibility that Linux will become the largest server software anyway.

With all this taken into consideration what is Oracle's plan ? Quite simply to delay the completion of the GNU revolution as long as possible. While that stay of execution is in force they will be able to continue raking in money by the truckload and when the revolution overtakes them they will already have moved on to a less profitable but still sustainable business model. What if the company simply dies in this revolution ? Not Likely. Oracle has enough existing contracts, cash reserves and other assets to keep going for a few more years at least. Plenty of time to rebuild the Company and modify the business model

Tomorrow on flamebait. Corel :)

(Important Note From Rob:Many of the conversations here have been great lately: minimal flaming, rational arguements, and all around quality. Let's make this another one. Good conversations are the best part about Slashdot, and they don't happen unless everyone plays nicely. There are a lot of people reading Slashdot these days, and everything you post here reflects not only on you, but on Linux).

Tim Otten wrote in to tell us about the latest news on Adobe's attempt to get PGML to be a standard for vetor net graphics. I personally would like to see a vector format standardized, but as we see with PNG (a format superior in many ways to what we use today) the world is slow to accept change.

Nir Arbel writes " Some guy calling himself Phooky actually took the time to program a Tetris mod for Quake II. It's available at this site. I didn't quite know what to expect, but eventually it turned out to be a plain vanilla Tetris game, making minimal use of Quake II engine features , such as light-sourcing for the blocks and a few sound FX. Nevertheless, a fine example of how mad the world we live in is. "

Nir Arbel wrote in to tell us that Cnet has awarded Apache the 'best Internet server application of the year'. Sorta related is Craig Boesch who wrote in with a link to covalent.net who recently released the Raven SSL module for Apache. It's a commercial program, but 7% of every purchase goes back to Apache. I really love seeing companies release cool commercial add ons to cool programs, and giving something back.

I haven't been keeping up on Gimp news lately apparently because Garrett wrote in to tell us that Gimp News is running a caption that says 10 Days Until 1.0! Very cool. Also worth noting is WilberWorks has some content on their web page now.

This Article has quotes from Deja News founder Steve Madere on Linux. He speaks the truth:It's faster, less bloated, and x86 hardware is cheaper. That's the priceless combination that keeps us coming back for more. Thanks to Jorge Forte for sending this one our way.

For those of you out of touch with the emulation scene, SNES9x was the coolest of the super nintendo emulators. It was getting fairly usable before the author got sick of being ripped off and quit a few months ago. According to Garrett and this page development will now continue, with open source distribution! This is kinda rare on emulation scene, but it is definately cool news.

Eric Anderson writes "IBM has licensed the picoJava processor from Sun. It intends to make chips for other companies as well as its own use. The picoJava chip is significant in that it directly executes all java bytecodes without running a virtual machine. It is still compatible with other programming languages, of course. It is also an unusual processor in that it uses a "random access stack" with, and I quote, "dribble" instead of a set of registers.

To read more go to the IDG article"

It took a long time, but it finally was cracked! Des2 fell earlier today, and although Slashdot's team didn't win, we should all be very proud- we tested over 1% of the total keys and ended up 7th overall. Now everyone can shift those clients back to RC5/64. Prize money mostly goes to the FSF which makes everyone happy I'm sure. Thanks to Brian D. Wilson who got me this scoop before just about anyone else on the net!

Eric Anderson writes "Netscape Enterprise Developer has a good article of WWW databases in which it praises the free (free beer, not free speach) MySQL database system over Oracle, IBM, etc. Linux is also praised as a server platorm, though this is not the point of the article. Another example of the mainstream accepting linux." Recently I've been familiarizing myself with MySQL for a 'secret' project with me a roommate, as well as for the Slashdot Rewrite. I'm really amazed at how cool and fast this app is. Can't wait to see how it holds up to some serious pressure.

Eric Anderson sent in this link where you can read about Sun's statement filed with the court saying that MS Java is incompatible, and that violates license agreements. This thing needs to be resolved soon if Java is going to have a future that's for sure.

Sergio Bruder wrote in to tell us that a new WindowMaker is available. 13.1 can be grabbed at from the usual place. LibPropList is now seperate, so Grab it too. And remember to visit the WindowMaker Development Sitefor WindowMaker fixes until Alfredo gets back from mars .

Eric Anderson sent us this story over at the current issue of SunWorld which discusses the Compaq/Digital purchase. I think the scariest part of this whole thing is that Compaq can afford to do this.

Wow. An MSNC article on Linux. Everyone should go and read that, just for the sheer juxtaposition of interests. Thanks to Christopher Carlson for this one.