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Java-Clone Announced
Thomas Charron wrote to us with the latest Microsoft-Java
">news. Transvirtual, a "closely held start-up funded by Microsoft" has cloned aspects of Java. This new software called "Kaffe" will let programmers write Java that will run only on Windows. What's interesting is that on their homepage, Transvirtual seems committed to working with the Open Source idea - partnering with Cygnus. Does anyone have details clearing up these seeming contradictions?
Update: 06/14 08:51 by H : Click below: Tim Wilkinson from Transvirtual e-mailed me. Here's the salient points: Everything they are doing with MS is Open Source, and runs all platforms it can, and they are not funded by Microsoft. They were incredibly misquoted by the Wall Street Journal.
1. Everything we're doing in conjunction with M$ is Open Source.
1. Everything we're doing in conjunction with M$ is Open Source.
2. All the extensions we're implementing are cross-platform - they don't just run under Windows as the WSJ article implied (okay, COM integration is a problem if you've got no COM on your platform to integrate with I'll give you that). If developers use Delegates they'll work on Linux (or whatever) and J/Direct is just another JNI-style interface anyway. We're looking at providing some Win32 compatiblity libraries for commonly used J/Direct Win32 library calls.
3. M$ have *not* invested in us - we approached them to about making Kaffe run both Sun and M$ Java and they paid for the work to happen - but we insisted that the result would be put in the Open Source Kaffe version so users had the choice to use, or not to use, the extensions.
They've never had an original idea. Copy, copy, copy, copy...and who cares about the law?
Microsoft = Slow. Java = Slow. MS Java = Really Slow.
This is just Microsoft's evil revenge upon Sun for testifying against them in the DOJ hearings anyway.
Java is nice because it's portable, in every other way it sucks (slow bloated kooky programming language). What is the point of making something just as bad that will only run on one OS?
Kaffe would segfault more often than not, on compiles, etc. ( at least for me. )
Never had much luck getting it to run well, whereas the Blackdown JDK port / build was much more solid.
Would fall in line pretty closely with Microsoft's quality standards.
considering their size and worth, the get it
just fine and dandy. It's just that commercialism
and science don't seem to mix very well.
Their main goal is to make profits, not to
advance humanity.
This is the worst case of /.FUD yet. Sure Linux is a good unix-works-a-like OS, and sure OSS is a good idea, but the closed minded "if its not Linux its CRAP" attitude is truly pathetic. Like it or not there are some non-linux things out there that are actualy good!
/. if its going to have any credibilty beyond the hard core linux/OSS is the answer to everything crowd.
In this case it took me 5 minutes of research while runniong a compile at work to find that Kaffe is not windows only, and that it apparently runs on a bunch of platforms. (and speaking of good-but-not-linux things theres aBeOS port underway) A little effort towards what real journalists call "checking your sources" is needed on
Neither VB nor COM support inheritance, therefore neither are truly Object Oriented.
I'd like to believe that doing something for
the good of all is ultimately more profitable
than shoveling crap, which seems to be the
consensus of MS around these parts.
Microsoft is resentful of Java for many more reasons than a rivally with Sun. The primary reason they hate it is they will not tolerate any company or person competing with them. Any company that shows even a tiny bit of success in the computer industry is immediately targeted to be taken over, ripped off, or squashed.
How any programmer believes they can thrive in a market in which this type of unethical and illegal anti-competitive behavior by a monopolist is tolerated is beyond me.
What you say makes a lot of sense and fortunately COM is (being?) ported to UNIX, and seeing as COM is an open standard now Java with COM support will be handy.
It won't buy microsoft much in the longterm as anything useful they do like ODBC is being ported to UNIX quicker and quicker as the UNIX vendors and service providors see the opportunity as MS popularity wanes.
Aaron (TheJackal)
import algo.pascal.ada.*
The benefits over the C++ are the following:
- No pointers in the syntax.
- No header files, (Java imports are not quite the same thing)
- Automatic (and explicit) garbage collection
The most significant reason for its portability is because, simply, it is an interpreted language.The Java language is a subclass of the ada language
not really, java is actualy more similer to smalltalk than any thing else.
if his comment was informative then at the very least mine is insightfull. the sad truth is though that it will prolly be marked as flamebait for some unknown reason.
It always amuses me to hear people say that C++ is "a generation behind" Java (i.e., "newer = better"), when pretty much all of the good ideas in Java existed not only before Java but before C++ as well.
Java is syntacticly similar to C/C++. The original java compiler was even based off of a C++ compiler.
So what it means is that it's time to start being sceptical about future products from Transvirtual, and maybe fork Kaffe.
Most of the Java APIs are simply better designed and easier to use than C++ and Windows APIs.
Even Qt with it's preprocessing class annotations isn't as easy to use as Java.
Java2D is much better than GDI/GTK, it's virtually display postscript in many ways. Using Java2D and Java Advanced Imaging, you can problem a Gimp clone in a few days.
With respect to garbage collection, there are real time extensions being defined, and exact GC with hard-real-time limits has been known about for atleast 10 years in academia.
Three Examples of apps I use:
JEdit - basically emacs in Java, with extensions in Java instead of lisp
Together/J - GUI UML/CASE tool
NetBeans - Java IDE
Sure, you can use C on the server side, but for most tasks, it is overkill and error prone. Thats why my web pages are done in scripting languages.
Java gives you the safety of typed-languages, the near ease of scripting languages, and near C performance.
Example of scalability: Mail.com, has 5 million free email users, and runs completely on the Java Web Server.
Microsoft wouldn't need to license anything if they intended to go the GPL route.
If they intend to move Kaffe' into the VC++ spot, GPL could reasonably open up their operating system, or cause so many licensing headaches that that would be cheaper. It's far more sensible (from the Microsoft point of view) to get a separate license for the Transvirtual product and go for it. After all, the only reason to do any of this is to get Sun out of their hair.
I'm glad that MS will be playing in the Java arena but I'm worried about their plans to steer the language in the same way they were trying to do with Sun's VM. If that's their game, the GPL would get in the way. If I had the source, and they broke a feature ("do it this way -- Sun's way doesn't work, see?") then I could fix it. If they keep the source but give me a working VM with embrasures and extensions, I can't eliminate the extensions, and I can't repair the embrasures.
I'll predict that the MS VM will be the next locking-in product, forcing developers to build a Windows-Only version of their software or else live with unneccessary limits to their program design (like those imposed by MFC). Of course, like all addictive substances, the first hit will be free...
On your second question: No, unless the authors of the patch transferred the copyright to the original authors. Transvirtual has always been clear at stating that their commercial version was fully copyrighted by them.
A slight clarification -- it's not strictly necessary for a copyright assignment to be made. Another option is to have patch submitters *license* the patch to the GPLed project under a GPL-compatible license (X-style etc.) which allows for *proprietary* use as well. The patched code can then be re-licensed commercially by the main developers, and if the patch has any independent value to the submitter, s/he looses no rights at all, since copyright is retained (to the patch only, of course!).
Just a thought...
They can if they have the agreement of all copyright holders. If you have the copyright on a work, you can say "you can use this under the GPL, or if you're a left-handed francophone." You aren't bound by the licensing terms under which you release it to others.
Of course, they need the agreement of all copyright holders. They can only "choose" to do this if no significant parts have been added by third parties, because those parties would retain copyright.
That would be rather dangerous for a company to do.
First of all, the fall-out would be rather immense. The open-source community would feel cheated, and undoubtedly managed to generate a good deal of bad publicity for the company.
Secondly, there would undoubtedly be an effort to write an open source clone of the product. Normally this isn't a big problem for companies, but with the base code out under the GPL, something with all the features of the commercial version would likely be ready in months.
For the above reasons, it would be suicide for any company to do what you suggest.
Are you really as ignorant as you sound?
"many companies out there that are using Java now."
No, there are many companies who claim to be using Java as a marketing ploy. Oracle et al. just make those announcements to make fools like you excited about Oracle.
"select a package and view its contents, without installing it. Can Microsoft do that?"
Yes. Windows Update.
"Microsofts days are numbered"
What the hell are you smoking? How many billions of dollars do they have in the bank? No matter what happens in the computing world, Microsoft will either buy it, adopt it, borg it, or kill it. If Linux becomes very sucessfull, you will see a whole boat-load of MS apps for linux. I hate to be the one to break it to you, but MS most likely will -never- go away.
"With Intel soon (I hope) to be releasing a 64 CPU, and Windows 2000 not being 64bit OS they will have to play catchup to create a 64 bit OS. Linux has this"
Don't you think that the day the Merced comes out, Windows will support it fully? I'll give you a big, big hint: Intel has been sending engineers to Redmond for -years- concerning this. Intel NEEDS Windows to run as quickly as possible on the Merced. Remeber, it's still a Windows world.
Frankly, I like Linux, but this is exactly the kind of "we're the bada**s of the world and were's so cool we can just sit around and stroke our egos" attitude that gives MS a chance. If anything, the Linux community should be even more paranoid now than ever.
well faster isnt always needed, for alot of things java is just as fast as c/c++. and if you are really worried about it then just use a java to native compiler, they are getting better all the time.
perl? man you are just out of touch arent you.
Hence you couldn't write a device driver in Java, or an OS.
i think maybe you missed the chapter on JavaOS which is an operating system written in java (jointly between sun and ibm) also of note is the fact that it's device drivers are also written in java.
pointers are only needed ot do low-level hardware programming if your using c/c++ since it makes it hard to do so otherwise.
Hear! hear!
...any GUI-related incompatibilities are moot, at least in this context.
As for client side, all the hoopla seems to have migrated to XML.
python can do anything java can do.
and its free and it comes with source code.
LETS HAVE A WAR ABOUT IT
YAH
In short pointers are not a bad thing, just a scary thing to many people.
Nope, pointers are a bad thing in a general purpose programming language because it is extremely hard to use them without errors in large scale programs.
Dylan doesn't have pointers, but it is extremely powerful because methods are first-class objects. You have the functionality of pointers without the danger, and it is very easy to use.
Java is a generation behind Dylan (and maybe Dylan is a generation behind some of the functional programming languages). I would much rather see people at least using Dylan because Java is clearly sticks-and-stones programming language technology. It ignores a lot of programming language research from the past 20 years. Integers aren't objects in Java. Give me a break.
What does java have, as a language, that C++ does not? (note that GC doesn't count as there are good C++ GCs)
two biggies C++ does have and Java does not are multiple inheritance and genericity (or templates, if you will). the usefullness of mi can be debated, but I think anyone will have to agree that template based container classes (like the STL has) are way better than untyped containers like the Collection classes implement.
if you're looking for the 'next' OO language, Java surely isn't it. from what I can see, it doesn't actually add anything to the features found in the places where the Java designers got their.. 'inspiration', it just has less and calls that more. I'd be looking at Eiffel much sooner than Java.
I wonder though, why, given that Java is interpreted, is it still such a mundane language? why is it still exactly as anal as a compiled language?
if you're going to run interpreted on a VM anyway, you might as well get some of the fun things like Python and Perl have in. either that or go to the other extreme, like Eiffel. luckily there's JPython and Eiffel-to-java compilers, so you can sneak in both through the back door. produce Java code without coding Java..
Bullshit! Lots of features does not a good
language make. The reason Java is cool is that
it does not include all the crap that is in C++.
Java really is a lot better than C++ because it
lets a developer focus on getting the code right,
one does not have to worry about the language
shooting them in the foot.
Coffee is native to the Ethiopian region of Africa. Kaffe is an Ethiopian word.
You punks,
Do give java networked libraries a try, touch the RMI stuff, it's like California weed, once you've tried it you realize everything else is cat's piss.
"hey! I like cat piss!"
--my dog, who is smart enough to be coding serious java--
krm
That's the point to us. To people that just use Windows, it's just an easy to use OOP language with garbage collection.
Who cares if it's OSS or not? Heck, if M$ released M$ Office source, *it* wouldn't get ported to other OSs....it's too tied to Windows. M$ can "embrace" OSS if they want, without any danger to their "it can only run on Windows" techniques.
I know. 86 million people have said this. Probably 95% of Java programming happens on Windows. If Microsoft makes a propriatory Windows-only Java clone and releases the dev kits for free with Windows, and puts out good docs, you bet they'll be all over. Besides, even "pure Java" isn't to the state of running perfectly on all OSses. Java is the big thing now. Hence, M$ wants to tie it to Windows. Same as Perl and all other "platform-independent" languages.
Everyone keeps underestimating M$. Yesterday, everyone was talking about what M$ "tried" to do to Java. I said that they weren't going to give up any time soon. Sure enough, today this comes out.
Why is why you'd get two (maintained, at least for a while) different code branches...GPLd and closed. With M$ distributing the closed version with Windows...well, you'd have to perfectly duplicate every single feature for compatibility.
Darn, I didn't even think of that. Betcha that you're pretty close to being right. That sounds similar to the "slow takeover" schemes that M$ favors....yeah, closing the code would be faster than they usually try to do stuff. Wow. Good thinking.
Yeah? Some people should *read the other posts* regarding commercial versions of GPL'ed apps being allowed. And maybe *read the initial posting*...hmmm..."it all works except for COM"...hmmm...
Ya. Used to be just Windows people running around with FUD from M$ screaming that Linux was failing, and Windows was the way to go. There's all this media hype about Linux, and to try to add more meat to stories, they sort of imply that M$ is "helpless in the face of Linux". Now there's a bunch of Linux "advocates" running around doing the same thing the Windows "advocates" did once. Fact -- M$ may die, but it will be very slow. It would take multiple disasters of epic proportions to eat away their cash stores.
Ummm...I don't know *anyone* (well, aside from a very few...Corel and whatnot) that is doing heavy serious Java development. Java still has too many stability/compatibility/speed problems. Okay, maybe in two years. But not now.
Think about it. Adobe does Photoshop in Java. First thing all the jackals that run around it are going to do is release C/C++ based image editing programs that run at least twice as fast.
Going to Java leaves you open on too many fronts, and the cross-platform compatability (There are lots of Windows Java apps that don't work right on the Mac) *still* isn't perfect enough to be worth it.
Admittedly, Internet-based programs are being done in Java. I'm sure the Visual Basic crowd, never caring about speed or bloat, will happily adopt Java.
Besides, I can't *stand* garbage collection. It just *feels* wierd. *I've* never had problems with memory leakage. I think the demise of C++ is predicted a bit too soon.
Yeah. Big Linux commercial market, let me tell you. Gotta to make sure to port to Linux, yessirre.
The Mac software market is bigger than Linux, my friend (more people, plus less free software to compete with). And there are *tons* of software dev houses that have completed ports to the Mac, then not released them because they didn't think the market was strong enough to warrant the release cost.
Windows is still the game in town for commercial software. I mean, Windows supports about 3 big word processors, right? And you expect Linux to support at least 2 (given that Corel already ported)?
Sorry for the heavy Linux bent, but Linux is the next largest market after the Mac, and I can guarantee you that there aren't lots of Mac ports because of ease in porting...as I said, the porting development is the small cost. Tech support infrastructure, retail deals, and so on...that's the problem.
And there's a reason we act like this regarding M$. M$ is incredibly wily, and ends up hurting consumers. So, we're paranoid. And M$ would happily do whatever they wanted if everyone was like you. M$ is the tobacco industry of software. Never turn your back on them for an instant.
Yeah. Internet Explorer wasn't too bad either until Netscape sorta slogged down on dev. Microsoft does what it has to to get control of a market (while idiots that don't look at MS's past run around saying "Why are you complaining about MS? MS is the best thing that ever happened to us!")
MS will make MS Java really nice and everything until it's the only choice. *Then* they start tying in Windows-only stuff, charging fees out the nose, and so on. Its only happened in every single market MS has ever taken over. Give it away free, get control, then gouge the end user and use the market for even more power and leverage for expanding into new markets. It works because of people like you that don't reject MS point-blank. They do wonderfully from a business point of view. Its just that things aren't so nice from a tech view.
Of course they can release a closed version, it's their code, they can do what they want with it! Just because their code already has been released under the GPL doesn't mean they can't release it again, under a different license, as long as they haven't used other peoples code. Lots of project use dual (or more) licenses, eg Perl, Ghostscript.
You obviously have played a little bit with the language,
;-). However I am not a GUI professional and my friends tell me that the swing API is now superior in functionality to teh WIN32 apis (jtree, jthis jthat) all very integrated, and maybe, but that is not my opinion, it is a matter of time before swing overtakes MS _even_ in gui design (remember clunky, slow windows 2.0?;-)
but your post strikes me as a little ignorant at the same time.
You talk about OS optimization on speed I assume, servlets and EJB are really fast on teh servers because they always execute as native code, even though they are _distributed_ as interpreted code.
Also the cygnus native compiler now compiles java code to native linux executable, pretty neat.
Now if you are talking about API's it's a different story and frankly I would say this:
1- If you are going to code GUI, heck even though I do java all the time professionaly and there is just no way I go back i would stay clear of swing, java is NOT optimal for GUIs (use VB
2- If you do server side web development then I am sorry but the library of java have no peer in the industry today. There is not a product that comes close to the RMI, servlet and EJB integration. It is the wave of the future, the web applications are, and there I have a hard time seeing MS even being _relevant_. Apache linux and java have a great future in front of them.
regards
tom kemper
This is about the funniest thread going online now.
Apparently, none of those who are screaming have even bothered to go to the website. No wonder the anti-MS movement is stalling - the level of shrill panic without any real information is deafening.
There are tons of replies to this story talking about "why a Windows only clone?", when that isn't even what the product IS..... is the paranoia so heavy now that the truth isn't important anymore?
"Transvirtual Technologies offers the first truly "run anywhere" Java(TM) Technology implementation. Our Java Virtual Machine, Kaffe, runs on virtually any Internet appliance or embedded system. Kaffe is the only JVM that can run both Sun and Microsoft Java (including Windows extensions) on any platform. Compact and extensible, easy to install and configure, Kaffe is the optimal choice for rapid cross-platform development."
Is that clear enough?
That must be some good rock
granted the marketing hype surrounding java is ugly. However java is huge in the coporate world,
it is a fantastic language for distributed computing and ejb's make's com look silly with their stupid threading models. All of the major rdbms players are moving towoards java in a big way(oracle sybase informix) yes, you are never going to write low level systems code in java (that is what c with it's pointers is for) For buisness app's, particularly server side (rmi and corba) people are fleeing from c++ because of it's baggage and increased development time. The OMG adopted ejb's as there default component model for corba. I love slashdot but sometimes the systems programming/ perl bias can get tiresome. I am not saying that Java is the best thing since sliced bread, however to dismiss it as nothing but marketting hype is assanine. java is fast on it's way to becoming the default for object oriented buisness apps and distributed systems.
Note that I have no connection Microsoft, Transvirtual, and don't even use Java very much. What follows is largely my own speculation.
First, let's go back to Visual J++. Let's ask ourselves what exactly were Microsoft's proprietary extensions to Java? First, they added stuff to the standard library to access native libaries, and second -- and this is the kicker -- they added some keywords to make writing COM objects much, much easier.
Now, let's hop back a bit, and look at MS's other language offerings. There are basically two of them: Visual Basic and Visual C++. It's really easy to use COM objects from VB; this is basically what COM is for. But if you want to write a COM server to componentize a program, then Visual Basic is entirely the wrong choice. It's just not fast, robust or powerful enough.
Which leaves Visual C++. However, MS has discovered that poor design has consequences that can't be patched over completely. It's sheer screaming agony to write those easy-to-use-from VB COM objects w/ Visual C++ -- all the wizards and templates in the universe can't change the fact that we are working with basically broken tools (COM and MFC and Win32 APIs, oh my). This difficulty is Bad News for MS; the more pain it takes to use Windows, the more likely people will look to alternatives.
This is where Java comes in. It has more OO nature. It has full garbage collection. It has no pointers. It is strongly typed. It looks familiar to C++ programmers. It has the hype machine of the century. And it's a different language, so you have a chance to leave all that old cruft behind.
Of course, there's that pesky VM and "write-once, run anywhere" promise, but if you can make it easy -- as seductive -- to call COM objects, then you are just as tied to the platform, because COM is Windows-specific.
Hence the changes in J++. (It also explains why they were so easy to turn off; they weren't out to encourage platform-dependence by making syntax changes, but with an easy hook into Windows. It cost them nothing to look like a good citizen by providing a single check-box off switch.)
Unfortunately, MS misjudged both the popular sentiment and how much Scott McNealy hates them, and they lost both popular support and part of the lawsuit. But not the important piece of the lawsuit -- they still have the right to use clean-roomed versions of Java.
This is where Transvirtual comes in. They have a GPL'd, clean-room implementation of the JVM. MS can pay them to implement the modifications to Java they desperately need -- VC++ is a dead end and they know it, and they need a replacement for it bad.
I'm betting that these changes will almost certainly be GPL'd. Why? This is because GPL'ing the changes to the Transvirtual's JVM is just good business sense.
It doesn't matter to MS if the COM hooks are public or not -- the lure to use Windows only is all the COM objects available for it, not the syntax.
GPLing the changes will buy you instant and total protection from charges of being closed and proprietary, because the GPL is the most anti-closed license there is. Plus, a JVM that is libre-free and MS-sanctioned JVM will most likely kill the market for competing JVMs on Win32.
Yeah, it is... I'm wondering if it was trademarked in any way shape or form... Imagine an open source vendor sueing microsoft over a trade mark dispute... and winning.
Writing java apps that only run in Windows? Pardon me for asking, but what's the point? The point of Java was "write once run everywhere"...
Bad Microsoft. No soup for you.
Oh, the interest in visual tools was a totally seperate thought.. my apologies for letting myself ramble..
;-)
>Personally, I LOVE Java
Yeah, I've got lots of friends who love it as well... I just can't seem to get into it... I do like the garbage collection and better memory control... It always seems a little slow to me and functions calls like:
System.out.println
instead of
printf
annoy me a little..
And I suppose that the "visual" programmers who want OO design wouldn't want to use Visual C++? Does all this interest in "visual" design tools signify an increased lazyness in coders?
Or is it more about moving past the basics onto more advanced applications without having to focus on remember the code for a specific UI? Most VB apps I've seen are hardly advanced applications, so I'd have to go with the earlier.
----------------------
News about the "Open Source" Kaffe distribution
can always be found at:
http://www.kaffe.org/
and also at:
http://www.transvirtual.com/
And mailing lists? ...
------------------
Kaffe is still under development. IMO, they should not be calling themselves 1.x, but that was a marketing decision by TVT. It is reasonably stable and should most things. When was the last time you tried it?
It's unfortunate that the Linux community appears to be sinking more effort into porting and tuning Sun's proprietary Java implementation rather than working to get a free one.
Ok, folks, here are some facts on Kaffe:
There are two versions, the Open Edition and the Transvirtual edition. The open edition is GPL'd and other has a proprietary license. The code base of the two projects are totally separate. Transvirtual donated most of the code to the open edition, and continues to provide many updates. There are a few proprietary features that aren't availabe in the open edition (such as a DOS (?!?) AWT), but not many. People who contribute to the Kaffe open edition are not automatically contributing to the proprietary version. Only if you voluntarily decide to let Transvirtual use will it be included in the proprietary version.
Obviously I'd rather not see a proprietary version at all, but I think Tim Wilkenson has done a pretty good job of trying to find a model that lets him make money and contribute to the free software community as well. Originally, Kaffe was under a BSD license, and some people ripped him off by not releasing their changes as free software. He was planning on taking Kaffe proprietary as a result, but decided to release it as GPL instead. In this case, the GPL protects both the commerical interests of Transvirtual and the free software community.
So Kaffe will remain available as a free software product. If Microsoft hires TVT to write some Windows specific changes to it, these may or may not be released as free software, but this will not affect the main body of the Kaffe open edition code.
>The point of J++ and any other Windows dependent
:|
>Java clone is to make the cost of moving from
>Windows too great for people to switch to another
>OS.
That is the whole point isn't it? Microsoft is protecting it's monopoly market position by getting aspiring Java developers to use proprietary and non-portable tools.
J++, DirectX, ASP, COM/DCOM/COM+, MFC. All very proprietary technologies and related as to underlying purpose - killing crossplatform capablility.
It's painfully obvious.
Codifex Maximus ~ In search of... a shorter sig.
Posted by Zathuras:
It doesnt make much sense... one of the boons of Java was the cross-platform programming potential... so what value is a Windows dependent Java clone? Why not just program in C++ or VC++ or something?
PS: My first post! Whee!
Here is a link to a CNNfn article that is a little better informed. It even has some comments from Sun.
"Remember, there never were pineapple-almond cookies here."
I promise everyone that I will never use this cheap step back ward.
Last one in jail is a fascist.
Hmmm... Looks like they have an open source, free version and a closed-source commercial version.
This is, of course, fine. They can release their code under two licenses. If they don't hold the copyright on all of the GPL code they are using the the commercial version, however, they've got a problem...
--
> Now I hate to defend Microsoft, but they did have one (1) original idea: BASIC.
*Cough*! Maybe you should tell that to Tom Kurtz and John Kemeny, of Dartmouth University...
For some real history...
People here are missing the point. Microsoft is trying to weaken Java. What if all of a sudden all these java programmers who mainly use java in Windows convert to the proprietary version? Now these programs that could run on multiple platforms are tied back into windows. Not every java programmer is going to go use this proprietary version but they don't need them all. They only need a significant portion of them to undermine the strength and popularity of a competing standard. Big Bill doesn't like people to use anything but his stuff. Remember that because once you start to walk down the path of the darkside its nearly impossible to get out.
In Republican America phones tap you.
Yes, it was, but some developers merely like Java for it's OO design, and don't really CARE about platform dependence. It's like VB for the non VBers.. ;-P
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
http://www.transvirtual.com/ports.html
It does indeed run under Windows, very well, in fact. They most likely don't SUPPLY a Windows version due to their relationship with Microsoft currently.. Microsoft will most likely embrace and extend the commercial version, which they can do with to their hearts content with no source being open..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Please look at it closer next time. Microsoft is developing based on the CLOSED version of Kaffe (YES, it IS there). Nearly 95% of Kaffe's source was developed by the two guys who own transvirtuals, hence, they can themselves use the source in ANY closed source environment they want to..
The GPL does NOT donate the source to the public domain..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Err, OO doesn't mean Visual. Not even close.. They are two seperate and distinct things.. C++ is OO, and you can code without using a Visual editor. Same with SmallTalk, etc..
VB is Visually based AND OO, but not very robust. Personally, I LOVE Java, but not becouse of anything visual. It just like the approach the language uses. Personally, I don't use it for UI apps, but server backends..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Err, I don't think you caught on.. Kaffe has two flavors.. GPL and private. Microsoft is paying them to extend their private version so that microsoft can then use it without ANY OF THE LICENSING issues that are associated with Sun. Microsoft really IS involved here.. The guys who run Transvirtual are now pretty much owned by Microsoft, and I really don't think they quite yet understand that they're sleeping with a rattler..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
You are wrong here..
The guys who OWN transvirtual contibuted the majority of the code that is in Kaffe. They OWN that code, and can do whatever the hell they want with it.. They can put it in another program without opening the source.. It's THEIRS.. GPL != public domain.. They will NOT end up open sourced..
The problem here is people WILL use it becouse Microsoft may push it on them. And as they go, the pointy haired bosses go, and eventually, we're stuck with it..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Cloned? Heck no, they handed over the raw source to incorperate in.. ;-P
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Yeppers.. But there is also a 'commercial' version that Microsoft is 'embracing and extending' to use NON portable things. Read up on the web page regarding the 'free' Open Source version, and the 'Open Source for Cash' version.
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Agreed here. But once there is 'MsKaffe' and 'Kaffe', it can only be bad things.. More then one version of simular products can lead to confusion and mistrust..
;-P
MsKaffe has a major security hole, suddenly, every time that Kaffe is mentioned, it's linked, even though it may have NOTHING to do with it..
That's what worries me..
Yes, it is their right. Many people have rights legally, but I don't think that they are right. They HAVE the right, but I don't think they ARE right..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Yes, but the information regarding Kaffe DIDN'T take into consideration that Microsoft bought up a good hunk of Transvirtual. They are now in a position to use Kaffe, NOT release the source, and 'choke and kill' Kaffe.. Heck, they may starty to pollute the Kaffe source, as they 'own' the major developers..
I think the developers hearts are in the right place, but I think Microsoft is going to screw them in the long run, and hopefully not Kaffe in the proccess..
Heck, this COULD be the case that blows the GPL out of the water, if the developers and Microsot ever come to heads..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
I'm what I would consider a fairly proficient C programmer. Ten years of experience in both desktop and embedded systems tells me that I have a fairly good grasp on how to use the language and what its limitations are.
Why is it such a bad thing to have pointers? I understand how, when used wrong or poorly, they can lead to Bad Things but in general I have found them very powerful elements of programming.
If someone could enlighten me I'd appreciate it. Simiarly with garbage collection. I thought that was an indication of an interpreted language; that compiled languages used a stack, BSS and data areas to get the job done.
Kaffe is open sourced under the GPL. Which is interesting, since that means (to the best of my understanding)
that TransVirtual could not use its own code to make a Windows version of Kaffe unless it releases that
Windows version as an open source project.
Don't forget that the owner of the code can release it under multiple licences.. i.e. "You may use this code under the terms of the GNU GPL, but if you are not prepared to accept those terms, then you may instead elect to use the code under this alternative licence".
The reason this can't happen with Linux is that there are so many authors, all of whom would have to agree to the alternative licence.
--
Kaffe is a GPL'd jvm (yes it IS a java virtual machine, not "cloning some aspects of java", its just a clean room implementation) that has been available on tons of different platforms from the beginning. Transvirtuals web page even says so. This doesn't make anything java related run on windows alone or any platform alone for that matter. Journalists just obviously don't know the meaning of research anymore....
Yes, Linux is basically a UNIX clone.
However, Microsoft's marketing speel has always been about 'innovation' when, in fact, they've probably hindered the course of technological innovation more than any other company on the face of the planet.
It's hard for even the brightest of the little guys to win the race when they get stepped on three feet from the start line.
C++ isn't as good a language as Java. It's a generation behind and, unlike C, isn't the ultimate in its particular style. Therefore, programmers will eventually want to move on to the next language.
Visual design tools are merely acknowledging that the proper way to lay out a GUI is graphical, in much the same way that creating images is a lot easier graphically. With them, it's easy to slap an interface onto whatever you've got. This means that dull stuff as well as cool stuff has a GUI.
Who would use Kaffe when they could get the real mccoy from Sun for free
Id software for one (well almost). While they where evaluating using java for QII (long time ago now) JC was talking to transvirtual about using Kaffe...but it never happened, for technical (coding in java at that time) reasons.
peterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
Compaq has licensed Kaffe for the Linux-based Itsy Pocket Computer
found this browsing their site (down the bottom of the page or search for compaq)...anyone know about this one?
peterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
It looks like they cloned Microsofts J++ APIs, too. The reason why MS funded them is probably because they might have to remove all Sun code from their VM as a result of the MS-Sun-Java trial.
I still dont care about Kaffe. The best way to ensure compatibility is to use Sun's VM or a VM based on Sun's (like the IBM VM). And if I need a open-sourced VM, I'll take Japhar or the one by the Mozilla guys. I cant see any need for Kaffe, a slow semi-proprietary Java implementation. Perhaps that's why they sold out - because MS was the only interested company...
Try Delphi.
exactly. the object model is alot better too!
"The lie, Mr. Mulder, is most convincingly hidden between two truths."
--
And Justice for None
Sorry, but this hasn't been true for years. No one writes COM servers with MFC anymore -- we use the Active Template Library (ATL) instead. With ATL you can write small, elegant, robust COM servers in C++ without having to reinvent the wheel each time.
The most rabid believers in American Exceptionalism are the exact same people whose policies are destroying it.
I don't know about Microsoft's involvement, but it has been clear for a long time that Microsoft resents Sun's dominance in the Java world. I'm sure they'd be happy to have a non-Sun-controlled JVM. Whether or not they care enough having a non-Sun-controlled JVM to fund a GPLed development, I don't know.
Sun's control of Java was predicated on the idea that nobody else was smart enough to write their own. They should have known better. Someone else did, and now Sun has no way of keeping MS from putting in their own incompatible extensions.
About Transvirtual's being a tightly-held MS-funded startup, well, maybe now, but they've been releasing free software for two years or so. I suspect that the article is seriously garbled on this aspect.
Thanks
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
"Kaffe is available under the Open Source initiative and comes with complete source code, distributed under the GNU Public License (GPL).
"Alternatively, the Kaffe OpenVM Custom Edition can be licensed from Transvirtual - an ideal solution for companies who cannot accept GPL code in their products."
Christopher A. Bohn
cb
Oooh! What does this button do!?
oh so instead of downloading java apps we'll have C apps with the security problems, memory leaks etc. And please don't compare scripting languages to java. That's just silly
---
Hell, I wish Sun could have hired OJ himself to take care of Mircosoft.. I'm sure the lawers would be useful later, though.
Can they really do this? I thought the GPL was written to keep free software free. If Kaffe version X is under GPL, then nobody, including the major authors should be able to make version X+1 closed. This would be like me taking the Emacs sources, adding in a handfull of features and then releasing a binary-only version of my Emacs.
JET Program: see Japan, meet intere
We're writing a video game written entirely on Linux using Java (see http://www.divunal.com) and Kaffe is the JVM I'm currently using to run the server.
It's faster and better than blackdown, and more Sun-spec compliant in many places (even the AWT) than the Sun JVM is. All of my Java-apps run on it.
AFAIK, Kaffe doesn't even really run on Windows... although I assume it must if that's what this article is about - but it was originally an OpenSource project running on all the free Unices.
It's a wonderful JVM... if you're into java, I highly recommend checking it out. Good JIT, nice support for JDK 1.1.
Glyph Lefkowitz - Project leader, Twisted Matrix Labs
Writer, Programmer - Not a member of the TSU
If Transvirtual is the copyright holder on Kaffe, then they can do as they please. Currently released copies cannot be recalled. If Transvirtual (by their own will, or by the will of their purported hypothetical masters from Redmond) decide to change the copyright on the next version, that is their right.
This is not M$ stealing and subverting code. At worst, it is M$ buying a copyright and perverting subsequent versions.
--
Infuriate left and right
It is unnecessarily verbose, partly due to the C style syntax (Smalltalk manages the same functionality with a much smaller language), and it is slow, but it is just great to see a 'real' programming language with high level features becoming popular at last.
A little about Kaffe's history: It
started as an open source project, and to my
knowledge still is. While Sun was holding back
on making their code available to Linux porters
Kaffe people were hard at work making an
alternative available.
This religious MS bashing is not something I want
to contribute to, but the trend of MS investing
in startup companies is scary. As someone who's
in the second year of a startup, I can tell you
that the cash infusion can be very important to
the company. With a very small outlay of cash
MS is able to buy part of the startup, and
probably get a seat on the board. That means they
can control what the startup does.
I believe most innovation comes from startups. To
be able to control them is a huge amount of power.
Great strategy for MS: fund startups, get the
hungriest and hardest working on your side.
Time to decide: do you care about free software/open source, or do you just hate Microsoft? Too many slashdotters would chop off their own noses just to get at Bill Gates, backing outcomes that would damage the free software movement if only it would be a defeat for Microsoft.
In the case of Java, Sun wasn't interested in giving users freedom: Scott McNealy wanted to usurp Bill Gates' position and become Bill Gates himself. Everyone would run Java, and Sun would control Java, just as firmly as Microsoft now controls Windows. Everyone would have to supply Java, and everyone would have to pay Sun. Instead of a Microsoft tax on the Internet, we would have a Sun tax.
Kaffe is GPLed (and yes, there is also a non-free version). To the extent that Microsoft seems to be helping with that, great; it is only a tactical move on MS's part, but no matter; it is as important to break Sun's control over Java as it is to break MS's control over the desktop.
Kaffe is not 100% Java compliant. (Either that, or Sun's JVM is not 100% compliant). I wrote some Java apps that didn't work correctly with Kaffe, but they were fast!
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
Kaffe means "coffee" in Swedish, but I presume both words are homonyms of the word that came from the culture that originally invented coffee (that's a mouthful). The Swedish word just happen to be spelled the same way as the original.
But which country invented coffee, and what language does the word come from? It should be in the FAQ methinks.
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die
On the Register
You want something VB-ish in look and feel that doesn't suck as a language, eh?
Try Delphi.
I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
Kaffe is an open source JVM. It's been around for years and runs on Linux. Check out blackdown.org for more info.
Unfortunately (fortunately, maybe?) I doubt the GPL will be invoked at all here. If Microsoft's aim is to remove one possible equivalence with Windows (cloned Java support + MS extras) from non-MS OS'es, they'll simply force Transvirtual to stop releasing their portion of the source under the GPL. (Unless, of course, the GPL has a clause somewhere which prevents changing the license.) Since according to the Kaffe FAQ, Transvirtual actually holds the copyrights to most of the source, this would effectively kill Open-Sourced Kaffe.
In any case, I seriously doubt Microsoft will allow any of its "improvements" to Kaffe to be open-sourced. The aim of giving a language/protocol/device Windows-specific features is to give Windows a bigger feature set than competing OS'es, and if Linux et al. get these features through Kaffe, Windows gets no edge. It's not like Microsoft to throw money at a project for the general good. :P
-W-
-W-
Is it all journey, or is there landfall?
--Ellison & van Vogt, 'The Human Operators'
By "the security model" I presume you mean the applet "sandbox". Applets aren't what Java is really about anymore - it was nice back when Netscape adapted the technology, though.
...)
Hooks into the OS are provided via JRI (old native API, no longer used), RNI (Micros~1 only), JNI (standard since 1.1.x), J/Direct and COM (Micros~1 VM only).
Native compilers for Java exist, but largely targeting the Windows platform (IBM, Symantec, Metrowerks, Tower/J,
1. Kaffe has existed for a *long* time. This is not a new thing. 2. Kaffe is GPL'd! "Closely held"? Pshaw. 3. Kaffe is ported to many platforms. Actually more than any other VM, as far as I know. Talk about off the mark. Some people should read the company's website before writing article. --John Keiser
See http://www.kaffe.org/ for all the information you need. Pay attention to the links in the FAQ, particularly the bits that talk about the relationship between Kaffe and Transvirtual.
N
it may be time to fork the tree (or be ready to) and proceed with Open Kaffe (GNU Kaffe? some other name?)
Yes, with due respect to Transvirtual, it's way to dangerous to leave the majority of the the JVM code copyrighted by a company that can so easily be attacked/controlled by openSW-unfriendly forces, be they from Redmond or anywhere else. The copyright holder decides the form of licence, and right now it's GNU, but will it stay that way after a controlling interest in Transvirtual changes hands? Even if it stays GNU, it won't do to leave control of the CVS in the hands of anything other than a not-for-profit and democratic organization. Forking the tree now is the easiest way to get what we want and need.
How about LAVA (Linux jAVA; Liberated jAVA for non-linux platforms)?
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
I can't seem to figure out what in the world the use of this is. Is it "bad" to have something run on more than one OS. If it works on more than one, that should be thought of as a feature, not really a reason to make a new language. Is this really going to be that different from java? If so, is it going to be easier to use? I guess what im saying is, is there even a need for something like this? If MS wants to put time/money into something maybe it would be better in somehting that is already platform specific, namely their own Windows APIs. Oh well... Microsoft will be Microsoft...
prosebeforehos.com
Yea, this outta be a big hit. Aren't one of the main reasons java has become so popular is because it runs on every/almost-every platform? And as for these companies, is it just me or does it seem that company's are like dogs? You have to train them, NO NO , port, P-O-R-T, no proprietary, NO!
Your Momma's so fat she makes emacs look like nano!
Isn't Kaffe the brand name of the Java interpreter that comes with most RedHat distributions currently? As far as I know, it's 100% java compliant (except for a few Sun APIs).
æeee!
Java is used in EVERYTHING not just PCs. It will run on everything from embeded systems to super computers, the same binary on all of them. It doesnt need need native hooks, those are in the java VM program, not the binary.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
ditto.. I just can't get some apps to work right because of setup issues. I have not been able to get aol instant messanger to work right so I went to there tik version.
Only 'flamers' flame!
The company I am working for, is going to start there next app in Java. I have not heard all the details, but I know that there are many companies out there that are using Java now. Oracle is one I believe.
However many companies are moving to web based technology which Linux is an area that Linux excels at. Programs like kpackage and kfm allow a user to visit a web site select a package and view its contents, without installing it. Can Microsoft do that? No and Java wont help. API's like QT and GTK make writing GUI apps really easy.
Microsofts days are numbered. I do not believe that Windows 98 did as well as windows 95, adn that windows 2000 will far as well as either of them, unless it is really really something. With Intel soon (I hope) to be releasing a 64 CPU, and Windows 2000 not being 64bit OS they will have to play catchup to create a 64 bit OS. Linux has this. This is when Microsoft will fall. Why run 32 bit OS on 64 bit processor? By this time the Linux 'kinks' will be resolved. Linux will have an easy install (I never thought it was that difficult thou). Linux will have an easy desktop enviroment ( I should say easier, if not several choices of them). Linux will have great SMP (I think it is already working prety good. )
Only 'flamers' flame!
with many others I was so dumb to sign a source license to the JVM. I'm tainted and people like me touching free efforts could seriously jeopardize their codebase.
The lesson: don't agree to the "Sun Community" Source License for the JVM. Probably don't agree to same for Jini as well. It's not open source and exposure to Sun's source code is likely to disqualify for helping out in great (and probably fun) projects like Japhar and GNU classpath.
(disclaimer: IANAL).
Why is it that M$ is allowed to continue?
I'm sure someone somewhere is wondering the same thing about you. Microsoft makes money. Duh.
And no, Java for Windows only doesn't defeat the ENTIRE purpose of Java. Some people like the language for reasons other than cross-platform propaganda.
I remember hearing rumors of this a while back. I also remember when the guys at Sun came up with Java. And despite my personal opinions on Java, I thought that is was very cool that you could easily write Java code and use it anywhere on any machine -- not just one using Windows. So, outside of Microsoft adding tons of their own "features" to the language, what's the point? Just to really aggitate us? It's gotta be... :-)
Actually, much of the code in kaffe is owned by the guys at TransVirtual. They have a commercial version of the product already that is closed source. As long as they don't use GPL'ed code that they didn't write then they can do anything they want with their code, including selling it to Micro$oft if they wish.
---
Now I hate to defend Microsoft, but they did have one (1) original idea: BASIC.
Not hardly. BASIC existed way before Microsoft (it was developed as a learning tool for Fortran). Microsoft wasn't even the first implementation, it was available on other systems before Microsoft did Altair BASIC in 1975, for example the DEC and HP minicomputers. In fact, Altair BASIC wasn't even the first BASIC dialect for microcomputers, just the first reasonably full featured one that became commercially successful. When Bill Gates was a student at Harvard, he worked as an intern at one of DEC's research labs, working on, surprise-surprise, DEC's BASIC interpreter for the PDP-11. Not surprisingly, Altair BASIC looked very similar to DEC's BASIC.
"They've never had an original idea. Copy, copy, copy, copy..."
Linux, on the other hand, is a wholly original work, bearing no resemblance to any pre-existing software, commercial or free
One thing to be clear on. The cat is out of the bag. The world may never see another public release of Kaffe source code from transvirtual, but that doesn't stop other individuals or groups from forking off the existing code base and improving it with ongoing maintainance & development.
Did anybody read that article? The WSJ did not say that MS invested in Transvirtual. It did say that they were "funded by Microsoft", which is accurate: "we approached them about making Kaffe run both Sun and M$ Java and they paid for the work to happen."
It did not say that Kaffe would run only on Windows, but that "the additions from Microsoft allow programmers to write Java software that will run only on the Windows operating system" (emphasis mine). This is accurate: with J/Direct, direct calls to win32 APIs is possible. Of course, this is only possible under Windows.
In other words, the concerns raised by the article are entirely legitimate. It is possible to write software for Kaffe that will only run on Windows, and that will not work with Sun's Java.
I read the update. It makes things seem even worse, not better.
Without the clarification, we could at least hope that the MS crap would remain confined to the TV's proprietary JVM, and the open one would remain pretty much conformant to 100% Pure Java.
Now we see that the open version is being seduced to the "purloin and pervert" (embrace+extend) side of the force.
2. All the extensions we're implementing are cross-platform - they don't just run under Windows as the WSJ article implied (okay, COM integration is a problem if you've got no COM on your platform to integrate with I'll give you that). [That's hardly cross-platform, then, is it?] If developers use Delegates [I don't recall those being part of standard Java] they'll work on Linux (or whatever) and J/Direct is just another JNI-style interface anyway. [Which we need....why?] We're looking at providing some Win32 compatiblity libraries for commonly used J/Direct Win32 library calls.
[Oh, joy, more Win32 crAPIs. And they'll work just how on end-swapped or 64-bit word machines?]
The GPL'd Kaffe tree is about to become hopelessly contaminated. Somebody fork it now, please!
(sorry about the double post)
-- Alastair
"Java that will run only on Windows"
.kaf (or whatever) files too.
.java extension just to sow chaos and confusion, as part of their usual "purloin and pervert" (uh, "embrace and extend") tactics.)
An oxymoron. There's no such thing. If it only runs on Windows, then at best it's a "Java-like language". I wonder if the next "Explorer.Worm" targets
(Although MS will probably stick with the
-- Alastair
The Kaffe that's already out there under GPL is available to anyone and will continue so. New versions don't have to be GPL'd, however.
Given the above concerns about Microsoft and Transvirtual, it may be time to fork the tree (or be ready to) and proceed with Open Kaffe (GNU Kaffe? some other name?) independantly of whatever MS/TV do.
-- Alastair
I read the update. It makes things seem even worse, not better.
Without the clarification, we could at least hope that the MS crap would remain confined to the TV's proprietary JVM, and the open one would remain pretty much conformant to 100% Pure Java.
Now we see that the open version is being seduced to the "purloin and pervert" (embrace+extend) side of the force.
2. All the extensions we're implementing are cross-platform - they don't just run under Windows as the WSJ article implied (okay, COM integration is a problem if you've got no COM on your platform to integrate with I'll give you that). That's hardly cross-platform, then, is it? If developers use Delegates I don't recall those being part of standard Java they'll work on Linux (or whatever) and J/Direct is just another JNI-style interface anyway. Which we need....why? We're looking at providing some Win32 compatiblity libraries for commonly used J/Direct Win32 library calls.
Oh, joy, more Win32 crAPIs. And they'll work just how on end-swapped or 64-bit word machines?
The GPL'd Kaffe tree is about to become hopelessly contaminated. Somebody fork it now, please!
-- Alastair
Now, folks, I hope you understand that this article (paragraph?) is putting Kaffe in completely the wrong light. Transvirtual is currently the primary distributor of open-source Java. Their JVM supports more platforms than any other!! News.com has outdone itself.
I think what Hemos is trying to point out is the confusion there would be if Microsoft is really involved. So let's discuss that point--would M$ actually support an open-source project?!
What's so incedible about being misquoted by a newspaper?.....
How typical.
Why is it that M$ is allowed to continue? I
hope that *nobody* upgrades to Office2000 just
to prove a point. I hope people start thinking
for themselves soon instead of following
blindly like a lemming, thinking they need to
upgrade to Office2000 just to continue "being
productive", whatever that means.
Java for windoze-only. Doesn't that really
just defeat the ENTIRE purpose of Java?
And doesn't anybody in M$ see that? Guess
not. They have their anti-competition blinders
on again.
-Mike
--- witty signature
Dave Williams
Well,
Color me unimpressed with the GUI apps. All three are programmer's tools and one is a GUI version of EMACS. Not exactly state of the art in GUIs.
As far as the server side apps, I agree with you about C code, although in order to get the performance you suggest, it has to be native, not byte code. I would also wonder just how platform independent Mail.com really is. Most high performance database code is heavily optimized. I would bet there would be a heavy porting effort if Mail.com wanted to move to another platform.
I wasn't really dissing Java the language, just the notion of cross-platform GUIs.
Dave Williams
For me, it was nurse-maiding a troop of coding monkeys who were only doing programming as a stepping stone into management.
I think C++ is a fantastic language, but it is a very sharp instrument which needs skill to wield well.
--
Dunx
Converting caffeine into code since 1982
This to me seems to be bad journalism. If you look at http://www.transvirtual.com/downloads.ht ml you will see that they don't even supply a Windross version.
Also if you read the article you can see that the journalist was very confused:
Java, which lets electronic devices communicate even if they run on different software,
Ho hum. probably a staff journalists first foray into the IT field.
Joe
--
Yeah, it does seem that they are shooting themselves in the foot by making this not-quite-compliant clone... I think they are trying to get back into the browser war by making _more_ proprietary stuff that can only be read with exploder...
BTW: Doesn't this whole Java whoopteedoo resemble the UCSD P-System of times before (my first pascal compiler ran on that...) WHere you had a bunch of machines emulating one "virtual" machine (the pseudo system as it was called), so you had theoretical portability....
I also remember that the same things that are making java a mess today (slowness, adding of propriaraty features) were the ultimate downfall of P-System... History repeats itself!
---
Play Six Pack Man. I
Sorry to be a nag, but graphics do not make a difference... The UCSD P-SYSTEM was as much of a "virtual machine" as Java. It had virtual hardware devices which were implemented as abstractions of some physical device on some physical computer. It had an instruction set for a mythical processor with registers, a machine state, and the whole 9 yards... The interface of the time was text, so that was the way it worked. The interface of today is the GUI, so that's how Java works... The basic technology is the _same_ . The core of the system is a program running nativly on some arbitrary processor that emulates a some nonexistant but standard machine (for java it's the "java vrtual machine" for the p-system it was the p-machine). Having read all the low level documentation on the implementation and programming of the p-machine, i can fairly confidently say that Java is a recycling of the same idea, with some new "technologies" adding a questionable amout of value. (as far as i can tell, OOP and the GUI have only slowed stuff down, and created unnecesary bloat)
Phew... Sorry to be a nitpick... Maybe the current sprintlink network outage is just making me grumpy =:-)
---
Play Six Pack Man. I
A few reasons why someone might want to program in Java, even without bytecode portability:
;) ).
1. Enforced object-oriented style (this can be good or bad, depending on your personal philosophy).
2. Forced exception handling in many cases (again -- personal preference).
3. Simplicity and speed of development
4. Fairly consistent API for GUI design (compared to platform-specific windowing APIs).
5. No memory management worries (Forget Kevin Mitnick, most programmers need to worry more about freeing their mallocs.
This is not a "Java is better" case, just a few answers to the question.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
I'd love to flame your position on C++.
:)
But I just spent the last week cleaning up memory leaks from a programmer who is new to C++.
So I can't.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
A direct result of the court ruling I guess.
I'm interested to see if TransVirtual posts anything on their website about this, since news.com seems to not have the whole picture.
Here's what I know:,/p>
The bottom line: it sounds like a publicity play with nothing particularly new or interesting happening.
Yes, there are non-Sun implementations of Java. Yes, some of them work on Windows. No, this isn't anything new. Perhaps, M$ is making Kaffe support its little non-standard extensions. But, it doesn't really matter since no one will want to use them anyway. And they'll be open sourced as a twisted little bit of irony.
I have used the free version of kaffee and found that it does NOT run things quite the same way that Sun's JVM does . Small differences could be attributed to a process of reverse engineering the API's incorrectly . Still , I get the sense that there is a fundamentally different engine involved . I will say this . Kafee ( as shipped with RedHat ) does run things quickly .
Is the pay-for version closer to Sun's implementation ? Is there a significant difference ?
P.S. Many people who do go to the site simply do not post after finding out that the hype was somewhat incorrect . This may not be in the best interests of the community but it seems a little boring to post something when there is literally nothing to post ( nothing exciting about the evil empire so to speak ) .
squireson@bigfoot.com
One of the points of Java is cross platform yes. But Java is limited in some ways due to the security model. Now if you were a windows only coder, hooks into the OS would be a very nice thing to have. But the current Java implementation doesn't allow that. I would love to write native "java-style" code to a native OS for optimization (optimisation for you euros) reasons. I want the best of both worlds. I learned Java after C/C++ and love the simplicity of the code compared to it's parent.
RB
i prefer mine without thanks.
BLAMMO shaken not stirred
How blatant this attack on something wonderful is. I wish Sun could have hired OJ's lawyers to keep Microsoft away from anything Java for good.
Calling out bogus battery capacity claims.
Moderate this up!
/.). I have found that VB can do quite a lot alone - when combined with VC++ DLLs, performance really goes through the roof. Now, don't say I am an idiot VB coder who doesn't know jack - I like C/C++ - I hate MFC, and it is near impossible to code under Windoze without MFC (thanks to the crappy OS), unless you like huge case statements/event loops. The syntax of the language doesn't bother me much (though pointers are a drag - but I do like 'em!), it is just the interface to create "pretty" apps for Windoze.
This is what I have been saying for a long time - I am a long time BASIC programmer who current does a lot of work in VB (when not reading
I would like to see something like VB (IDE wise), to allow one to create forms and graphically "point-click-draw" the interface, then click on a control to enter code for that object's events/methods. VC doesn't cut it.
I have been working in Java lately, and loving every minute of it (right now under Windoze using Notepad and command line compilation - the command line is _not_ something I fear. Hopefully soon I will do my coding under Linux), but it is a pain to make a GUI interface using a text editor (though not impossible, just slow). I like the GC of Java, but it would be nice if it could be turned off in some manner to allow you to do it yourself (same with pointers - give the coders options - although it could break the security model - same with GC, now that I think about it).
The way the language looks doesn't matter - whether it is styled on BASIC or C or Pascal - but for some reason, we think that if it is styled on BASIC, then it must be a toy language. It is like saying Chinese is inferior to English because the ideograms look funny, and so must not be good...?
One last point - in VB (5 & 6), when compiling to EXE (with compile to native code turned on), the VB code is first converted to C/C++ (internally - the converted file is not written anywhere AFAIK), then ran through the VC++ compiler to create the EXE. Sometimes, the OBJ file(s) are left behind (they are supposed to be deleted - if you look at the directory you are compiling to, sometimes you can see them created then deleted by VB, sometimes they get left behind).
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
While we are talking about COM, what about mozilla's XP-COM?
Basic
I made a living for a couple years writing p-system code (my employer lost lots of money on it though).
UCSD p-System is exactly analogous to Java in the portability sense. We shipped a single binary to customers on p-System machines of several architecture and it ran. We did have some headaches with physical disk formats though.
There was definitely random file I/O. The DBMS we wrote wouldn't work without it. And while it didn't have graphics it had direct screen addressing; I think there was a gotoxy(x,y) in the run time library.
By the way, I did this work in 1983 and 1984, so it's not surprising that there was no graphics. Graphics systems were expensive and incompatible those days. On the hardware we worked on (8088s mostly) p-System was slow enough without a big fat graphics virtualization library.
BTW, as far as I know, p-System had the first real dynamic linking capability.
Normally refusing to get bought out by M$ will result in your company going bust within two years. It is better to sell your soul to M$, get 4x the value of your product, than it is to resist. I don't know how well this works when the people are writing GPLed software though, or are doing it just for the fun and experience.
So Microsoft want a clean room Java implementation, and they want to have hooks into every part of their OSs to give that Java implementation more power.
So who here want to start doing the same for other operating systems? Why not create hooks for GTK+ (which is slowly become cross-platform itself) to get a powerful GUI system? Hooks for Gnome and KDE? Hooks for all the Linux / MacOS / BeOS etc OS calls? It can be done, without taking out any of the functionality of Java.
In fact, creating GUI hooks to GTK+ sounds like a good idea, you wouldn't lose much cross-platform compatability there either. What platforms is GTK+ available on currently? I know of Linux, Windows, AmigaOS (soon).
I remember once that some people were doing a Java front-end to gcc, so that Java apps could be compiled natively. How is this going, or has work been abandoned? That would be a terrible shame, because I like the clean, easy to program style of Java, but I think the virtual machine implementations just slow it down too much. I know that you can natively compile with products for Windows.
USCD was a virtual teletypewriter, so to speak - it was based on 70s technology - as opposed to Java, which is a full virtual machine, with graphics, printing, sound, etc. (unfortunately it took 'till 1.2 aka 2 before printing actually worked, but anyway...) There's no comparison.
Female Prison Rape in NY
The point is it might not just be one bugfix. It might be thousands of little ones. Large scale violation of the GPL might provoke a class-action suit (although of course the GPL has not yet been tested in court).
Female Prison Rape in NY
Duh. Yes it does. It's called JNI.
Female Prison Rape in NY
Now I hate to defend Microsoft, but they did have one (1) original idea: BASIC.
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Now my trust in Microsoft's failure is complete.
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Java's already been neutralized as a threat to Microsquish. Java + COM isn't news, it isn't interesting, and I don't know why it even made it into todays articles.
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Java has already failed. It's not portable, it's not secure, it doesn't perform, and it's not a very good language in the first place!
How it reached this point may be a good thing to study for the next time someone tries to knock MicroSquish off their perch, but Java the language is nothing more than a C++ for the 90's. (Which may not be fair to C++, but I don't care.)
let MicroSquish buy up and subvert every Java vendor out there. It DOESN'T MATTER.
If you want to make a difference, don't use Java, just write in C, Python, Perl, or any of a dozen other decent languages, but write for a NON-MICROSQUISH PLATFORM.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
A quote from www.kaffe.org:
"Kaffe mostly complies with JDK 1.1, except for a few missing parts."
Bewildering.
Kaffe has been around for a while. It is the JVM distributed with RedHat, but if I am not mistaken it does not contain the full suite of Java classes. It is limited to Personal Java 1.1. I don't get the "introducing a product called Kaffe", since it was introduced a while back.
I am using Blackdown and playing with the TYA JIT. So far, it's worked out fine for me.
Let M$ throw money at the wind on stupid things like this. Who would use Kaffe when they could get the real mccoy from Sun for free as well, which is the only source for Swing which has begun to replace the AWT.
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Oooooooh...
"There is no surer way to ruin a good discussion than to contaminate it with the facts."
fact is, micros~1 has had the fastest implementation of java for years, and Sun has been desperately trying to catch up.
Jeez people.
VB is much lower level than Java. Unless you don't know how to use VB.
You can simulate pointers in VB with copymemory() and the long datatype easily. You can use the windows API to your heart's content and have all the freedom of a C programming.
In java, you can access native libraries, but only by complying with JNI naming standards....and even then, you can't get a C application to directly modify your java application's memory or things like that. Java is much, much higher level, you can't be sure how memory is mapped, and you can't pass objects as raw memory mapped files to native functions.
VB also has a much faster native compiler. With all the Java IDEs coming out that are basically clones of the IDE style VB pioneered, Java is becoming what VB already is - except crossplatform support.
Please people, Java doesn't even support 2 button mice. F**** apple.
Use C++ style syntax in Java. The all time best move ever. Lets say we create a language with all of VB's features, but with C style syntax...people would immediately say, ahh now that's a real programming language.
What makes people think something is lower level or is a 'real language' is less how the language works, but what it looks like.
The VB language relies a lot on the IDE and unlike C++, it doesn't describe every single thing going on to detail...it presumes many things from the IDE. But since it's built on ActiveX, it doesn't really need to describe much.
Java & Javabeans are pretty much the same - the code just looks nicer - much nicer.
After years of saying NO. Microsoft decided to conceed to their developers' demands. (sign of the times i guess).
COM+ supports inprocess implementation inheritance.
This most probably means VB7 will support interface inheritance.
Glad you agree ;)
/. people seem to complain about the speed of windows or something (maybe they don't use X), but then have no problem with Java.
I used to write most of my apps in VB, complementing VB code sometimes with C++ code written in ATL (as activex components). Usually tho, I found I didn't have a need. VB supports everything I could possibly want (except X platform), certainly, it supports more of what i need than Java does. Try access the parallel port from pure X platform Java for example - very difficult.
Lately, I've been working on both MFC and Java. MFC is *almost* as simple as VB in terms than you can draw forms, and write 'events' (which are really just overidden class members. You just need to know a lot about C++ and C functions as well as the Windows API.
Java is a beutiful language, but it's slow, limited, and is too immature for many things - but I can see it will continue to grow.
What I think is funny is that a lot of
I see a lot of Java, VB and C++ in my future.
IMHO Windows Software is usually much faster than X software. Ever used DirectX BTW?
You imply in your statement than MS is slow like java...uh NO!
And you've never used the MS Java SDK have you?
Microsoft Java is about 5X faster than Sun's version. Just try using the JavaMedia player with java.exe and then with jview.exe, jview(MS) lays videos without skipping.
Microsoft's Java VM is one of the fastest(if not, the fastest) VM out there.
I don't get what you mean when you talk about VB looking immature.
If you talk about Java + J/Direct, then *maybe* cause in that case Java has the ability to use all the features of VB (even advantaced collections like VB's dictionary object - which however is in Java2).
The advantage Java has over VB in the case where it can use ActiveX components is it's language, style and simplicity. It still lacks low level abilities like pointers which you can emulate in VB. (Try passing a StringBuffer pointer to a C function and expecting it to be a contiguous char array).
Many of the features of Java were 'borrowed' from VB. Big examples of this are the VB like IDEs coming out (VB did pioneer this).
Personally, I'm not going towrite a windows app in pure Java if I can't even support 2 or 3 button mice!!!
The com and lpt port support also still sucks.
I don't know about this "New" Kaffe, it's been around for a while. As a matter of fact, I'm running the Linux version at home as my Java VM (it's smaller and faster than the Blackdown port), and it has been on the RedHat distributions since at least 5.1.
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