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Culture of UNIX and Windows Programmers

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the get-your-juices-going dept.

bebonzo writes "Joel Spolsky, 'Joel on Software' has an interesting review of Eric S. Raymond's book about 'The Art of UNIX programming'. Quote:"What are the cultural differences between Unix and Windows programmers? There are many details and subtleties, but for the most part it comes down to one thing: Unix culture values code which is useful to other programmers, while Windows culture values code which is useful to non-programmers." About slashdot: "slashdot-karma-whoring sectarianism..."" He's harsh on some points, but pretty on the money. Except about us. Nobody karma whores. Update Note to self, never post before coffee. Yes, its a dupe. get over it.

2 of 382 comments (clear)

  1. The essential difference by heironymouscoward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Is not about the command line or GUI.

    It is that Microsoft's own development teams have always programmed with inside knowledge of the OS, able to bypass the official API whenever necessary.

    This was explained to me by the director of a large bank in Brussels that abandoned a huge Windows-based project after finding that COM+ and MSMQ could not talk to each other, and this after spending time with the actual developers at Microsoft to resolve the issues.

    Each Microsoft application is written "to the metal", reimplementing huge pieces of code that should be abstracted into layers.

    Many of the security issues in Windows software stem from this design model: a typical Linux security issue can be fixed by a single patch in one layer, but typical Windows security issues reappear in application after application.

    And this is where the Unix model is strong: it is all about layers, formal documented interfaces, and clean separation. When Microsoft decided to add MSIE to the operating system, they were not just screwing their competitors, they were setting themselves up for a fall.

    Good software must be built in layers, with formal and definite separation between layers. Microsoft is learning this now, mainly because it simply cannot make its current designs secure.

    --
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  2. CVS for newsposts by HBK-4G · · Score: 4, Informative

    CmdrTaco et al need some sort of CVS on submitted newsposts. Check-out a selected submission, nobody else can touch it. With some work and the tying in of keywords, it could also be a dupe-submission checker of sorts.