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I know we are supposed to hate MS, but when .NET was released, Terranium provided just that (and still does). You create "creatures" in .NET languages and add them into the Terranium ecosystem to compete to survive with everyone else's creatures.

From the homepage:

"Terrarium is a multiplayer ecosystem game developed using the .NET Framework. Developers can create their own creatures and add them into the game on their own client machine. Teleporters on each client transfer the creatures between clients in the Terrarium peer-to-peer network. As a creature developer, you can program either herbivores or carnivores. Herbivores are capable of eating plants, of course, while carnivores are capable of eating both herbivores and other carnivores. Once a creature is in the Terrarium ecosystem and competing for resources, this website can be used to compare its vital statistics against those of other creatures. The objective of Terrarium is to develop a creature that out-survives the rest. Terrarium is also an excellent example of the capabilities of the .NET Framework. It uses Windows Forms and DirectX for a super-rich UI experience. And XML Web Services provide the community infrastructure for the game, enabling peer discovery, reporting, and auto-update of new versions."

Well, if I follow the given URL I get redirected to http://www.windowsforms.net/Forums/Login.aspx?Retu rnUrl=%2FAdmin%2FAccessDenied.aspx.

Wasn't this sort of already done with the GotDotNet Terrarium Project, it's not as intelligent but it sounds like the same idea.

I was not basing my comparison of the GUI speed on server side benchmarks. The Windows API is not object oriented or even good.

Where the hell did I mention the Windows API? If you're talking about Windows Forms, it is a part of the .NET framework. See? To clarify, it IS object oriented and, however subjective this statement may be, it IS good.

Even if I was talking about the Windows API, I'm still not entirely sure of what you're on about. Passing IDs? You mean handles? Yeah it's not object oriented - it doesn't have to be, it's written in C: a procedural language. I suppose the Linux Kernel developers must really suck in your eyes, 'cause they're not OOP monkeys.

And if you want to talk about wasting programmer time, compare the time it takes to implement a simple tree control in Swing compared to the time it takes to implement something similar in Windows Forms. That's FORMS, not API.

This is a compounded advantage compared to Swing with the current state of JITC. When JITC is as good as C compilers, Swing will be faster than native widgets because of the ability to inline function calls of the API.

Yeah, Java code will get faster as the Java JITC gets better, but so will .NET code as the .NET just-in-time compilation improves. I've heard (but can't substantiate at this moment in time) that when you install the .NET framework, the code is actually compiled from MSIL to native code (as in, native code not bytecodes that are then JITC at runtime) to a certain degree. How can Java possibly compete with this? Of course, this may very well be a 'windows-only' thing.

But faster than native widgets? I very, very much doubt it - but we'll see.

On the general speed of Java verses CLI, I only admit my findings as some evidence since there is no real good evidence. Sure my evidence is flawed, but I stated it out right so as to not decieve anyone. I didn't make an unsupported claim like you did.

You're right, my bad. My claim was unsupported. However I do know that on my system, it takes an eternity for simple things like a Swing JFileDialog to appear.

I didn't intend to mislead or deceive anyone. It was a mistake, I admitted it in a previous post, I'm admitting it now.

I don't care about ISO/ANSI/ECMA standards because by and large they mean less than I've seen from Java. There are few, if any, C++ compilers that are up to spec. Even if they were, the standard class library is too little to be usefull. There are standard text based IO streams, but you have to use some third party library for anything else you need or write your own. The end cost for developing C/C++ programs is much greater than Java because of this. These third party libraries can't really be taught in school because there are usually 3-8 different competing libraries that are all considered on equal footing in the marketplace.

There's a lot that isn't taught in schools.

Comparing Java to C/C++ is a waste of time. Yes, Java is easier to program with. No, it can't do everything. Live with it. As for cost, it really depends on the sort of application.

Boost adds a lot of functionality to the standard C++ library - not nearly as much functionality as the Java runtime, but then it's not quite so high level either. As I said, you're barking up the wrong tree.

What language do you think is used for low level native Java methods?

Java changes quicker than C/C++ because it's not an ECMA standard.

I don't know about you, but Java changing a lot says to me that it has a lot of problems.

Ah the futilities of arguments between us techie types :)

Mono and Portable.NET really shine in allowing former Windows developers to get involved with Linux and still have a comfortable and semi-familiar place to start.

I don't see Mono or Portable.NET as cross-platform technologies (unless you mean cross-platform across Unices) because Mono and Portable.NET grew up on Unix and will be used here the most. Besides, Microsoft has simply created too many API's and hence the barrier to a *quality* cross-platform development environment is too great.

Rather, Mono and Portable.NET will be good for rapid prototyping and as a conversion tool for Windows Application developers. Is also important for providing an alternative when the great migration begins of Smart Clients begin from Windows to Linux.

As for the rest of the article: Yah, I'm sure the Microsoft developers who created .NET are enthusiastic about Mono, but the higher-ups (see: PHB's) have no love for Mono or Linux.

1. Newsgroups: Most microsoft technologies have a newsgroup in the microsoft.public.* hierarchy that are read not only by Microsoft employees but by dozens of regular developers who just want to help others who are having problems. I personally monitor microsoft.public.xml and microsoft.public.dotnet.xml where I answer a lot of questions and pass many of those I can't answer to the actual devs who work on the applications and APIs in question.
   
   
2. Online Communities: There are a number of strong online communities where Windows developers congregate to share information, tips and tricks. These range from Microsoft sponsored sites like GotDotNet, ASP.NET, and Windows Forms.NET that are run by MSFT employees who participate actively in these communities to independent sites like 4 Guys from Rolla, Code Project, Dev Hood, DevelopMentor and CodeGuru
   
   
3. Microsoft Websites: Few places beat MSDN as a source of information about Microsoft technologies. By the way, if you are into XML check out my Extreme XML column
   
   
4. Mailing Lists: There are number of mailing lists hosted by various parties about Microsoft technologies. The ones I've seen with the most vibrance have been the DevelopMentor mailing lists and the ASP Friends lists