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JavaOne report
Over at LWN, there is a report from JavaOne writtern by Nelson Minar - things looks really promising with Linux and Java. Definately worth a read for both Linux users and *BSD users.
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The article states that Java 3D for linux is forthcoming, implying that it is not available yet. It is (not a production release, though), and I've been using it for about a couple weeks now, and its very stable and clean, and other than my machine being horrendously outdated, it performs well. See the blackdown.org site for more information.
--
"And is the Tao in the DOS for a personal computer?"
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
Maybe it's Jobs' fault, too. The Mac platform could have been much more widespread if jobs didn't decide to cut the clones. Obviously, Jobs didn't believe Apple could be the PPC Microsoft (and for a good reason: he was scared shitless of BeOS) so he wanted Apple to have much better control over their profits. So, the clones died and Apple has a much better profit margin, but the Mac marketshare is about 5% (worldwide, in US is about 10%) of the personal computer market. Obviously, Macs are considered expensive. For the same reason, there is not much hope for extending the market share, rather to leverage the very loyal customer base.
Well, Sun wants more, and wants something different: I bet Linux will be much better supported, sicne it's rapidly increasing marketshare. Windows is much better supported for obvious reasons. Solaris is much better supported for (differeent) obvious reasons.
There is a Java 2 platform being developed by Sun, for BeOS. That means Sun expects BeOS to increase it's marketshare, too. Maybe not in the PCs but in the IAs. Who knows? But the point is, Sun looks at an OS that will be widespread in the long run, and Linux (Servers and desktops) and BeOS (desktops and IAs) have a good shot at it.
IMHO
Sigged!
This is really off topic, but how do I get vim syntax highlighting working when telneting into my FreeBSD box? I sort of have it work, as the keywords are underlined and bold. I just can't get it to be color.
Thanks,
-Jon
this is my sig.
(This is version 0.1. Don't be too hard on me.)
Cast:
Catrin Van der Waals, a young nerd and the heroine of our story
Naomi Doltson, Catrin's imbecilic assistant
Rob Malda, a geek who occupies a vague position of authority
David Duchovny, tall, dark and handsome star of the X Files
Catrin is at her desk. She surreptitiously pulls a photograph from the top drawer.
Catrin: Oh David, what I wouldn't give to be Tea Leoni right now.
Enter Naomi
Naomi: Hi Catrin (giggle) Whatcha looking at?
Catrin: (hastily shoves the picture back in the drawer) Nothing... I wasn't looking at anything. And that's Ms. Van der Waals to you.
Naomi: Oh. For a second I thought you were drooling.
Catrin: (instinctively touches her lower lip) Remind me why I hired you again.
Naomi: You didn't hire me, Rob did.
Catrin: Of course. I forgot; your remind him of a blonde Natalie Portman.
Naomi: Yep, he said I was teen of age, and pouting of... (Catrin interrupts)
Catrin: I know, I know. I still say a blonde Natalie Portman is an oxymoron.
Naomi: (tilting head like a cute, but very stupid puppy) What's an oxymoron?
Catrin: (sighs in a frustrated manner) Go talk to Rob for a while. Please?
Naomi exits.
Catrin: I've got to get out of here. Maybe I'll go to that reading of Beowulf at Javaland tonight.
to be continued...
--
--
The geeks shall inherit the earth.
You may not be grateful to Sun for designing Java, but I am.
And I am too, don't make any mistake about it. But I am not grateful for having been handed a proprietary fingertrap masqueradeing as a public standard.
You say "We could have have done that quite well by ourselves, thank you." Are you serious?
By "we" I mean anyone who is willing to contribute their language design work to the public. For example, Larry Wall or Guido Van Rossum (designer of Python). Yes, I'm serious.
How many more brilliant languages are you planning to design and implement?
You are wasting both our time by not reading before you reply. I wrote: "I don't care much about their code. I could have written it myself, and better." And I stand by that since I've done such things before. But I won't do it for Java because Java is not yet free, as in speech. Some others are willing to rewrite Sun's bloated, unreliable code, and my hat goes off to them. I'm not one.
I hope that my interests and Sun's will continue to coincide
You seem to have missed the entire point of "free" as in speech.
If you can reimplement Sun's JDK on your own, as you claim, then I would be truly grateful to you as well. Many organizations have tried, but Sun's JDK still seems to work better than the alternatives.
That's wrong. IBM's implementation is better. Microsoft's is too. Blackdown is darn good and is now intertwined with Sun's - Sun gets the benefit of expert programmers there, working for free. Kaffee is good too: though not yet caught up to the others, it probably will, and pass them. The problem is, even when Kaffee does catch up, Sun will intentionally move the goal posts. Are you aware that Sun charges big bucks for access to the Java compatibility test suite? Can you think of any good reason for this other than a desire to lock out the open source movement?
The licenses are clear. If I don't want the code under those terms, then I don't use it.
But that sounds so much like the situation with Microsoft. "If you don't like it, don't buy it". The problem is, Sun is trying to get us into a position where we *don't* have a choice, and I object to that seriously.
As a language, Python is just as good - it does what Java is supposed to do, and does it without the bloat. But Sun has inserted Java into the niche that Python could have occupied. Should we be grateful for that?
--
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
You don't. Trust me, you really don't.
Standards set by committes stagnate in development -- the turn-around time is slow, and the number of improvements or changes are minimal. The only standards that really work arfe those set by actively developing organizations.
If and when Sun decides that Java is a "complete" language (i.e., no more major additions or modifications to the core language), then that might be a good time to turn it over to something like the ISO. Until then, it needs to stay in the hands of Sun or others who have an active interest in the language's development.
Can Sun be more open and responsive? Quite probably. But an international standards organization would do a far worse job than Sun currently does.
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Poor psychology. You aren't going to persuade Sun to make you a gift when you clearly will show no gratitude anyway.
So you think being nice is the way to get Sun to come across? Hey, maybe you're right. But don't bet your life on it. Notwithstanding the fact that much that much of our free OS originated at Sun, we already know that Sun is not being nice. Witness their dance around the standards bodies. So we should be nice, yes, but also, we need some powerful pursuasion.
Get this clear: Sun is not giving us anything by designing Java and giving it to us. We could have done that quite well by ourselves, thankyou. *We* are giving Sun something by elevating their trademark and reputation to a lofty position - by agreeing to make Java a true, public standard.
If Java is always going to be proprietary to Sun, then we will be no better off with Sun as master than with Microsoft as master. Do get that clear. As long as Java is proprietary, we are much better of to deny it the full status it seeks, and to work instead with things that are truly public standards: the Linux kernel, Python, TCP/IP, all of GNU, etc. etc. Java only becomes useful to us in the long run if Sun lets go completely, so don't think about being nice when so much depends on it. It's not a matter of being nice, it's a matter of what our long term goals are.
You evidently feel entitled to their code, and you're not.
I don't care much about their code. I could have written it myself, and better. It's the design, the standard, etc that I care about. Now if they want us to work on their code and make it better than it is, because frankly, you can see from the outside that it sucks, they will have to open it up the rest of the way.
As Larry Wall said, those of leasurely moral development often confuse giving with taking. Since giving is good, some think taking must also be good. Are you grateful even to the FSF?
What a question. Of course I am. FSF gave us the GPL. FSF doesn't play games with standards. Now ask any member of the FSF whether they're "grateful" to Sun.
By the way, when Java first came out I was an ardent supporter and I really saw it as the way forward. I believed what Sun said, about not trying to keep control of it and keeping only the trademark. That was quite a few years ago. I've had a chance to study the whole thing very closely. Did you? Do you know about the ISO and ECMA affairs? Have you read the Sun Community Source Licencse? Didn't think so.
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Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
I dont look at it as a matter of choice. I look at it as a matter of intelligence.
;)
One of them is smart, one of them is less smart, and the third is just plain stupid.
Bowie J. Poag
Bowie J. Poag
In what way is [Microsoft's] J-- better than the JDK?
Faster and more stable. Note: I detest Microsoft, Its business practices, and its founder and its founder's dog. Yet I'm not going to deny what's true.
The language specification and API cannot be made un-free.
Not the existing APIs, no, but the new APIs coming up, that's where the problem lies. That's why so many of us have a problem with Sun's behaviour at the moment.
--
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
"I'm happy to say that Sun sounds like they're fairly serious about Linux support."
NOW? How many years has it been? Sun has been so boneheaded with java, which was once considered a threat to Windows as a platform. Now it's just another language. Consider all the signs:
1) A lot of the Sun java team quit right after it became a hit. This would have been unthinkable at MS. What does McNealy do, not hand around the stock option cookies?
2) When java was taking off, linux support was lacking badly, and sun didn't give a shit. With the world's biggest volunteer hacker base aching to help, ignore them. Nice move.
3) Sun invented java, and its own java products were among the least popular for development (compare symantec and visual j++). And it insisted on controlling java as its proprietary property.
If they had been smart, linux+java could have been a formidable combination a few years ago. Instead, they are still being myopic at this stage.
Well, you can check freshmeat more then once in a while you know..
From their web site. There is a new version with bug fixes for many of the problems reported on the Discussion page.
URL: http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/linuxjdk
Hetz (Heunique)
Hmmmmm. x86 only, simultaneous release for Win/Solaris/Linux but *not* Mac OS X, no official BSD port, and no mention of J2EE for the Mac. And this after fearless leader Steve Jobs appeared onstage during the keynote. Good to see nothing ever changes at Sun. Maybe if they focused a little more on promoting widespread Java use instead of focusing on killing Microsoft.....
I use Macs for work, Linux for education, and Windows for cardplaying.
I agree, Sun has taken their sweet time to support Java on Linux. It's been a source of frustration for years, for Sun employees as well as the Linux community. That's why I asked at the presentation "why did it take so long?". The nervous laughter in the room was quite telling. The reply ("limited resources") is not the full story, of course, but it's probably all they can say publically. I believe the real reason is Sun can't decide if Linux is a competitor or an ally.
The good news is that Sun is now going to do Linux releases. The bad news is that Java is still more proprietary than open. Java is still the best technology for Internet programming, so I'm going to continue to use it. At the same time I'll cheer on Sun to make their technology more open, and cheer on IBM and others for giving Sun some pressure in control of the Java platform.
direct article link. Since it doesn't seem to be there in the blurb at the top...
There's a AWT on GTK port on the SCSL site, but they don't intend to do anything with it.
Why the heck not? Because they're Sun, that's why, and they don't really care if linux users want a GTK version badly enough to write it for them.
They have no plans to compromise on SCSL to be more GPL friendly.
Is that a surprise? They will continue to have no such plans until they get it forced on them.
I asked "why did it take so long to support Linux?", the answer I got was "limited resources".
That's disingenuous. If they needed more resources they could easily have gotten them by making the SCSL GPL-compatible. The real reason is: "we thought Solaris needed a little help".
--
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
First off, the actual article is here. The Slashdot link just takes you to their front page (which seems to be happening more and more on Slashdot.
I really hope that the tighter Linux support for Java means that someone sits down and comes up with the right way to install a JRE under Linux. I'm tired of having to untar a binary tree and then screw around with web server configs forever to get it to work.
It really is time for Sun to start releasing RPMs with good post-install scripts (or Debian packages for that matter).
The J2SETM Platform on Linux, Update and Roadmap
___
- Just got back from the first day of JavaOne. I'm happy to say that Sun sounds like they're fairly serious about Linux support. Lots of Linux visibility at the conference, several talks and BOFs. The biggest news I heard is that Java 1.4 ("Merlin") should be released simultaneously on Windows, Solaris, and Linux.
That they'll all be simultaneous for 1.4 isn't exactly new news - they've been saying it for about 2 months now. It's also possible you might see a point release (eg J2SE 1.3.X) which is simultaneous for all 3. Btw, Sun haven't done the final release for J2SE 1.3 on Solaris yet either, and the final release for Linux is only going to be about a month later than for Solaris.J2SE 1.4 is winding it's way through the Java Community Process - see the (incomplete) specification lead.
- Yay! Pretty much all the standard J2SE and J2EE stuff should be coming out for Linux, including Hotspot (client & server), Java plug-in, etc.
Btw, the Linux beta already has HotSpot Client and Server. AFAIK the current Linux Java port is not the same code-base as the Solaris one, but they're going to merge them.- x86 releases only for now.
AFAIK Sun are leaving non x86 Linux ports to Blackdown who are already working on them...Personally, I don't really see why we need more IDE's for Java. I'm perfectly happy with vim+syntax highlighting.
Some helpful links for the unbathed masses:
IBM's Java AlphaWorks SDK For Linux
IBM's VisualAge Java SDK For Linux
Sun's "Java 2" SDK for Linux
Get crackin',
Bowie J. Poag
Bowie J. Poag
If anyone is helping Linux gain respect as a Java platform, IBM is doing the most. Their JVMs are the only ones that show the Linux can do the job. Going through the JavaOne site, I do not see anything that reflects this..