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Google Ports Box2D Demo To Dart
mikejuk writes with an excerpt from an article at i-programmer about a neat graphics demo written in Dart: "One of the difficulties in getting a new computer language accepted by a wider audience is that there is doubt that it is real. Is it a toy language that just proves a concept or can it do real work? In the case of Dart, which is Google's replacement for JavaScript, the development is speeding ahead at a rate that is impressive but worrying. To prove that Dart is already a language that can be used, we now have a port of the well known 2D physics engine Box2D, the one Angry Birds uses, to Dart."
Box2D has previously been ported to Javascript. Source is available at Google Code (under the Apache license). Note that you'll need Chromium to run the demos.
Note that you'll need Chromium to run the demos
As a web developer and after all the nuisance old IE's gave me and other web developers back in the day, this is really what's stupid with Chromium and Google's approach. They're mimicking the old Microsoft here - make your own "standards" and break the web by making features and sites that only work Google's browser. I seriously thought we would had been past that and the old IE's were the last browsers that didn't adhere to standards. IE9 is now fully standards compliant, and what does Google do? Oh yes, break the web AGAIN.
This isn't the only time they're introduced non-standards compliant features, either. Another example is NaCl, or Native Client, which tries to mimic Microsoft's ActiveX, and again, only works in Chrome. But with all the security headaches. It seems like Google is going out of it's way to copy all the stupid mistakes Microsoft made. I guess Google is at the same point now than Microsoft was back then - antitrust issues, breaking web standards and constant flow of news of how they're done wrong again. It's like Microsoft all again.
They're mimicking the old Microsoft here - make your own "standards" and break the web by making features and sites that only work Google's browser.
From Dart's wikipedia page:
Google will offer a cross compiler that compiles Dart to ECMAScript 3 on the fly, for compatibility with non-Dart browsers.
And, in fact, dartc already cross compiles Dart code to plain Javascript. Once it's integrated into browsers, use it or don't use it.
It's like Microsoft all again.
Right, that's a stretch. You conveniently cherry pick details here. For example, NaCl is released under a BSD license with source code readily available. Are you saying the same was true of ActiveX since it's launch?
My work here is dung.
The same problem that there would be with lots of people if Microsoft started suddenly introducing their own "standards" again. There's still some issues because of all that bs 10 years ago, but now it has almost gone away. There really isn't any need to broke the web again. And how to create something better? Work out a standard of it.
What a great idea! I'll hop to it right now!
Situation: there are n+1 competing standards.
My work here is dung.
The article mentions, box2d-js. The more current port is box2dweb: http://code.google.com/p/box2dweb/
"If they have both, tell them we use Linux. And if they have that, tell them the computers are down." -Dave Chapelle
Is this a programming language with an existing shell script interpreter style implementation, too? If so, then I might have actual use for it. Basically, that means a light-weight interpreter (light enough to use it during system boot up to run rc scripts, so not more bloated than bash in its basic form) could be named in the script like having "#!/bin/dart" on the first line, and it would execute the file however it is designed to run them. I'm not talking about using in a browser here. For extended features beyond shell script code, it should have modules (in binary .so files or in Dart) that it can load.
I'm just starting to use Lua for this kind of thing now. Lua was intended as an embedded language, but has a shell script style interpreter which is pretty much a nice example of simple embedding. If they put Dart in a browser, and implemented it cleanly in the process, then a shell script embedding should be trivial. Have they done that?
I'd be more impressed if they make Dart do all these kinds of things (including directly run in a web server) than by implementing Box2D in it. That would mean a clear separation of execution from environment, something that Javascript only partially succeeded doing. Something that Lua did succeed at, but I still want a C-like syntax class for.
Oh, and I would definitely love to have a clean integer-only typing available, something I consider a major problem with Javascript.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Well, Google is the new Microsoft!
So pointing out that MS screwed up in the past and using concrete examples that another company is making the same mistake is somehow MS propaganda? MS did some crap (works, Vista, IE 7, patent crap threatening without stating exactly what is being infringed, etc), they did some good things (Win 95-8 (for it's day was really cool if not exactly that stable), Win 7, .Ne/VS I'd put in that list), but regardless saying someone other than MS is being stupid doesn't make you an MS shill.
Nobody ever claimed such.
However, just because someone has reached a conclusion you don't like doesn't make them mentally deranged or a paid astroturfer. If you believe a position to be wrong, it's so much more persuasive to respond to the points one by one rather than shoo them off with personal attacks, which only serves to please those who already agreed with you.
"Sufferin' succotash."
Am I really the only one on Slashdot who dislikes JavaScript? Every time I have to work with JS, I feel like shooting myself in the head -> Little IDE support, no type safety, no compile phase... These things make it extremely hard to work on a large application base. In fact, at work we have a custom Java -> JavaScript compiler, which makes things a lot more manageable. Most of the bugs we get in our issue tracker are related to the web interface which is still written in plain JavaScript.
I actually commend google on trying to fix this part of the web. I am not sure if this is the correct approach, but we have to start somewhere.
the development is speeding ahead at a rate that is impressive but worrying.
Worrying because...?
Advice: on VPS providers
Slashdot posts cannot be censored or filtered off the site. We don't do that here. They can't even be taken back by the author after you've pressed "submit" and believe me, I've put a few I'd like to have back. On the balance I prefer it this way, and well, as the post accepted page says, you should have thought of that before you pressed "submit".
Shill posts detract. Pointing out shill posts detract. But there's nothing to be done. There are financial interests involved, and they will spam. There are folks who want to white-knight slashdot as a forum for Truth, and I'm guilty of that now and then even though I know that's not what it's for. As a wise someone once said (and I paraphrase), "the value of a free thing approaches zero over time". The moderation system works.
Dart looks to be interesting tech. No doubt Google will look to make it an open standard that anyone can implement - even IE. And that will move us closer to the day that all apps are web apps, which cannot be anything but a good thing. It's time that the client architecture was unhooked from the application ecosystem at the network layer. In fact, it's at least 15 years past time for that. That was the goal of X Windows (not to be confused with the upstart), back in the day (onion, belt, lawn, etc).
Help stamp out iliturcy.
I don't understand what the big fuz is about. It's not like they wrote a AAA game engine in dart, it's just an over hyped physics approximator. The demos aren't even interactive (and one performs @5fps). For all you know (no, not really) the bytecode it loads is just a predefined animation. So what if they are trying to do it wrong? Let them go that way, as long as they don't break support for the standardized www framework, I have no problem with them wasting cycles.
There are enough devs out there, with enough intellectual lucidness, that can see through the hype and understand that nacl and dart are non viable solutions. For everyone else, happy grinding fella. I'm not going to get involved with this.
-- no sig today
Anonymous Coward is a known Google shill.
I still don't see how the poster was promoting a specific company by pointing out there mistakes but okay I'll give you that new accounts going off pushing a particular idea might be astro-turfing. One could argue a lot of new accounts get away with pushing No-Company (TM) products though as in it is okay to go off on Richard Stallman like rants of craziness as long as you are pushing FOSS without being labelled an astro-turfer. Techies have their preferred tech and likely will post about what they care about. So I'd say with something this subtle give the guy/girl the benefit of the doubt.