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U.S. Army Testing Jini
ion-flux writes "Sun Microsystems said several army bases in the U.S. are testing Jini to quickly create tactical operation centers which control, execute,
and monitor battlefield maneuvers." No matter how smart you are, when you're under fire (literally) you can't deal competently with complex interoperability procedures. Of course, back in my Army days, we didn't even dream about things like Jini. Sure would have made our lives easier (and safer).
Um, if Nobody cares, why are you posting about it? (Unless, of course, you are the "Nobody" referred to in your post.) Otherwise, why are you participating in this little shared piece of our culture? WTF?
Geeky modern art T-shirts
Preamble to The Constitution of the United States of America We the People of the United States,in order to form a more perfect nation, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote general welfare, and secure the blessing of liberty to oruselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish the Constitution of the United States of America. Makes me stop and pause for a moment every time I recite or hear these words. I'm a proud USMC reservist, American citizen, NRA member, and more than anything else, I'm DAMN proud to use an equally open, free, and right OS. It may be a few weeks old but 2.3.13 is in my heart and on my system.
The military live off our taxes, so as long as we pay taxes, we're doing our bit (and the military are blowing it on $400 hammers).
Even though this strays us yet furthur off the current topic (what was it again?), I want to show that I agree that using Java technology on the battlefield may not be a wise decision. Im not completely brain washed by the military (yet), so I can and do often find faults in their decisions.
Even furthur off topic though, we started the Vietnam war so it was our duty to try to end it. If it wasnt for the protestors, it would have ended much quicker since we would have been able to send a larger force in early in the war. By sending more troops we would have saved lives and still gained the military practice that made the Vietnam War so valuable.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
People join the army because a) they like following orders, or b) they like giving orders. I don't know which is worse.
Yup, the American military protect us from the Russian military, the Chinese military and the Iraqi military, and they protect them from us. My oh my, what a cozy arrangement all the military have, don't they?
It seems to me that it would prove useful to investigate the use of this ability to generate coherent signals from a processor as a method of connecting wireless devices. Your Jini laptop could use the processor as a resource and interact as it wished with other Jini. Phone lines could be identified electronically by the phone company, detectable by any technician or competent person with access to tools.
Perhaps such things will come about. I remember reading an article once about networks of processors with switchable gates that could adapt to their surroundings; as I remember, they communicated through electromagnetic signals - interference, perhaps. Very strange; when they moved the processors, they stopped working. Ah, it was in Discover magazine [...] at one point; I'd recommend reading it with this information in mind; a room could be wired with a network of low-power sensors, for instance.
Cool.
Java may be slow (although this will become less of a problem as computer speeds increase) but I don't agree that it is unstable. On the contrary, Java's lack of pointers, run-time type checking, and garbage collector make Java programs much less likely to crash than C/C++ programs.
Of course, this assumes you are running your Java programs as programs, and not as applets in Netscape or IE...
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
Now THAT'S satire!
This is the most hackneyed myth in American culture - the notion that somehow America has fought for freedom, and that our armed forces are defneding that freedom.
Firstly, American soldiers haven't fought to directly defend American lands or citizens in over a century.
Secondly, the citizens of many central American countries would vigorously disagree with your statement that Americans are kepping the world "free". It is not an understatement to say that the American military was involved in numerous murders, assassinations, and other dirty work, particularly during the 80's.
Sorry if it appears that I am smearing the entire American military establishment, but I can't believe that in post-Vietnam America, people still buy into the Norman Rockwell-esque vision of the saintly American soldier.
Now I don't know about some of the people here, but in my experience, Java has disproven all of these things. The only reasons I can think of for these people believing all this FUD are:
1) They use Linux which doesn't have a great Java implementation yet. I don't know about this one. I don't use Linux, so I don't know how good Java is there, although I've heard people say it's great, so I doubt this is it.
2) They haven't actually used Java, so they take their oppinions from Java FUD distributers.
3) They tried it out a little, but saw things like no operator overloading or multiple inheritance and said, "This sucks." even though those features aren't really needed, and it simplifies things not to have them.
4) It's proprietary (a big no-no here). Let's trash it with a bunch of other FUD.
Java isn't the end all or be all of computer languages, but it is a great thing. It's more secure than many other languages, and it's just as stable and robust as many of them. It's simpler to use than C/C++, so it's easier to get things done quicker.
What I find ironic, is that the great freedom fighters of Linux and Open Source here (Linux is better and more stable than Windows! Switch for the better!) will so easily reject such a great thing as Java is (even though using it is a change for the better. How hypocritical of you all). The only difference I see between the two, is that you have people going "Linux is the only way. Abandon your evil MS ways or you will be cast into the abyss of OS Hell!" while promoters of Java admit its weaknesses and admit that it's not the best thing there ever was or will be.
By the way, for all you "Java GUI sucks" and "Java will only be used as servlets and on web pages" people, take a gander at This page It's my favorite text editor. That's all I have to say for now. Sorry for rambling on so long.
"I am convinced that only two things are infinite, space, and the stupidity of man, and I'm not sure about the former."
- Albert Einstein
Plain and simple folks, it was an INVASION.
The United States invaded Vietnam and other surrounding SE Asian nations (Cambodia).
The invasion was turned away by a technically inferior, though far more DEDICATED army of peasants. Hurts, don't it??
Shell script, perl, and VB are also dog slow, but they are still useful. I wouldn't write a ray tracer in java, but a network client could easily be written in java ( or perl for that matter ), and the portability would offset the "speed" loss ( which is negligeable, since bandwidth is the main limitation in this example )
Java has its uses, but writing games, ray tracers, and speed-critical apps are not among those uses. Some applications that are not at all speed critical, where java is very useful include network clients.
As for Perl ? It's here to stay. I've just written a GUI FTP client for perl that's less than 1000 lines long. It took me about two days to get a working prototype. Let's see you do that in C++.
Perl has some extremely useful features that make several tasks almost trivial ( for example, you can actually manipulate strings without going crazy. ) How many lines of code does it take to implement perl -npe 's/]*>//g' in C++ ?
Guess the Army guys got tired of rebooting their tanks after running Windows CE for 5 mins...
- If at first you DO succeed, you're working too hard.
I've noticed. For that matter, I approve. :-)
Being an active dity military member, I remember when we used to have old, vietnam war era radios. (this was just like 5 years ago). It was called the PRC-77. It was big, heavy (used transistors, as I recall)and really reliable. If you needed secure commo you put on another heavy part callrd a KY-68. The system worked. Since then the SINGCARS system was fielded. It has a cool keypad, led display, etc. For secure commo, you just "filled" it using a little black box. (ANCD-data transfer device"). This was supposed to make life alot easier. It didn't. In fact, during the gulf war, everyone just transmitted "in the red". (unsecure)Well, the military just fielded a new family of SINGCARS radios, the E model. It's small, compact, light-weight, and get this-IT DOESN'T WORK ! In my unit at least 50% of our radios are inoperable, and they are brand new. It sometimes takes hours, or is impossible to establih secure communications, and I dont think JINI is going to make it better, just the opposite. Just my 2 cents....
yes, we do. the more their stuff sucks, the better we like it.The best military is equipped with 5 cent squirt guns, machines running on windows, with only Solitaire as installed software. now if every military organisation would use this, and only this, there would be a whole lot less war in this world.
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
Excuse me, what the hell are you talking about?
Have you ever coded a single line in Java?
Write, test, compare , and then come and post in slashdot.
---> Did you know Linux stands for Linux Is Not UniX ?
I met a Brazilian a few months ago who was worried about how safe any American city was due to all the gunplay. The next day I saw in a newspaper from his Brazilian town that 30 people had died of gunshots in one day (no mention of how many wounded), and it was in the back of the paper with minor news. 30 is much more than most American states, much less their cities.
Since Rob was in the army, I think his comments are more credible than
some of these ACs who have never served. A person who is willing to give
their life for the cause of freedom is a person who I admire. Go ROB!!!
With that aside, JINI technology may fail the java is to complicated for
cheap low end user products. Its like using a oil drill for a tooth pick.
They should start out with something small that resembles java and is
compatible with java but is geared towards small scale devices. I am not
psychic but I don't believe people want to by a toaster to surf the web.
On the other hand it would be cool if I could plug my keyboard into the TV
and download the necessary files to make it a temporary word processor. Or
turn my remote control into a virtual keyboard. Or maybe plug my
playstation to my TV, tv to the network, and download new games playing
with my remote control as the joystick with out downloading new driver
software, the devices would just know how to interact correctly. If they
play their cards right we won't even need a playstation and you can play
directly over the network thru the TV. But I don't think we have evolved
as a society to accept that technology yet. Plus it takes a long time to
replace all of those cheap devices into those new JINI enabled devices.
Even if Sun succeeds in making Java the most stable platform of all, they will not remove that disclaimer. It doesn't mean it's unstable, it just means Sun is not responsible for life and death situations. Nor should they be.
I don't really think that not having all the source code is obscurity. If they didn't allow for exploits to be posted etc, that would be obscurity. I agree totally with open source, but if a person has the source code, it's alot eaiser to find exploits then if a person dosen't. Or at least that is my experince.
Case Study:
.01% of the time, that can still save thousands of lives.
Artillery unit A (our side) puts some rounds down range. The enemy (battery b) uses radar to find out where the rounds came from, and fires right back at A. At this point, A better pack up the LAN and guns and run or they die. Once they get some place safe, they have to put the LAN back together. Sometimes this can take hours, and the people who are tasked with doing that are too busy trying to fire back to remember what ifconfig does. Having Jini available as your first choice could cut this time dramatically.
Even if JINI only works
"Let him go, Ralph. He knows what he's doing." --Otto Mann (simpsons)
Putting complicated equipment on the soldier himself will seriosuly complicate matters.
This article has seen a large number of subjective posts. Let's stick to the facts.
/.'ers realized this.)
JINI does not depend on a specific hardware platform, it only depends on the existence of a stable Java implementation. Now, many of us know that Java's AWT and Swing libraries have significant flaws and really can't be called stable by slashdot standards. But JINI does not require the AWT. As others have said, why would you want to surf the Web on your toaster? Even if you did, Win CE would take care of that for you. Win CE still uses WinMain(), I believe, which requires you to create a "window" before your application can be considered "behaved". JINI != Win CE.
Now what does JINI do, then? Well, start with the fundamentals of Java: multithreading, garbage collection, dynamic code loading, platform independence, decent speed, and stability (as long as you don't use AWT). Null pointers and buffer overflows are hardly an issue when Java is implemented properly. Now add to that the benefit of JINI: automatic and reliable networking. It sounds just right for an environment where you don't have time to make sure your targeting computer has downloaded the coordinates from your high-security digital messenger device. It has to work perfectly every time.
Now, let's look at where Java and JINI may fail. How big can a JINI network be before the devices start running out of RAM? Since any device can connect to any other device, each device on a "subnet" must know that each other device exists. If we went past the limit, would the whole network shut down? Would single devices mysteriously disappear? The military must consider this VERY CAREFULLY, because if the devices communicate via RF then it might be trivial for an enemy to shut down the network on a nearby ship just by broadcasting a few signals.
Encryption is very important in this application. Every device would have to have its own public-key encryption implementation. But in reality, that's probably a plus for the military since any device of this kind, JINI or not, would have to support strong encryption, and there are already plenty of pretty good Java encryption implementations.
(BTW--slightly related--I got that free FireCracker kit from x10.com and it's neat for controlling one light but if I used it for the whole house, anyone else who happened to have their own "clicker" could shut down all the lights in my house from 100 feet away. I hope most
I have to believe Linux wouldn't quite fit the bill. By the time the kernel and the required supporting utilities were slimmed down to fit into 128K or so, it would no longer be Linux.
regardless of how advanced or mature their technology is.
Juln
yeah...just wait till they try to rocket jump.
Juln
You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.
The project that I'm working has just about finished an EJB (Enterprise Java Bean)-based server product. We're talking about 40K lines of code which does some highly cool stuff that I can't talk about just yet. It is hosted by a Pure Java application server called Weblogic. Our team of 4 people has been able to build this product incredibly quickly, with remarkable stabilty. We're also able to handle hundreds of simultaneous clients with response times Meanwhile, the group working on the client is building in C++. The client is a relatively simple program: send XML to the server, get back XML from the server, put some stuff on-screen based on the results, and repeat as necessary. The client group is woefully behind schedule, working in their "real" language.
So, either I'm on a team of uber-geniuses compared to a team of untrained monkeys, or maybe, just maybe, building real-world applications is far easier, with excellent performance and scalability in Java.
You decide.
-jon
Remember Amalek.
er, uh, did you maybe forget to take your lithium lately? sheesh! and we wonder why stuff like columbine and the JCC in LA keeps happening...
Hmm... funny that. I've written a lot of defence software. Everything from mine warfare systems to counter-terrorist stuff to desktop simulators. One lot was written on SCO unix. Most unstable, unsupported POS you could imagine. My current work is Java based and is being used today in real war situations (yes, deployed on the big two way range).
Of the two, the Java is the most stable and best piece of software according to the users. Now, to give you an idea of exactly how much better Java is in a defence environment that native code - the original app was 200K lines of code written in 8 weeks (and an estimated 800 litres of Coke/Jolt to accompany it). That was a piece of code for a tender for a paid prototype software. They were so impressed that 6 weeks after signing the contract the system went operational with almost minimal changes. Now this is not just your average army unit either - the local Special Forces (Oz SAS - US equivalent of the Rangers/SEALs). The success of this is such that we roll out new versions of the software every 6 weeks which they happily install and run with. Try doing that with native code software (Yes, we used to do really big monolithic Ada/C software here as well so I do know how long it takes).
Sun, by contrast, has never given up control of the language. Is sun going to decide to raise prices or terminate a license on the DOD in the middle of an operation?
That has got to be the biggest POS that I have read in a long time. Maybe you should actually look at Java at some time. Sun controls the language specification. They aren't the only supplier of runtime environments or development environments. There is no dependency on Sun. How can you pull a license to a specification when one was never granted in the first place? What do you think the CLASSPATH, Blackdown and other similar projects are all about. You might as well argue about what would happen if Borland pulled the license on Delphi in the middle of an operation, or MS with VB (there is more military code written in VB than ADA).
Next time, grab a clue stick before talking about something you obviously have NFI about.
Life is complete only for brief intervals in between toys or projects -- John Dalton
The same could be said for joining a corporation.
:)
If you think soldiers should vote on whether to take cover or advance I'm glad you aren't interested in a military career.
I think you're joking, but you bring up a good point anyway.
Many probably aren't interested in a career in waste disposal or processing either, but that's no excuse for dissing those that are. There's this weird thing called "service" that some folks actually believe in, and that helps get the unpleasant tasks of society accomplished. More politicians should believe - they are the real cause of misapplications of military force.
Java is simply what someone thought of as an "improved" C++, but it isn't really,
I also agree regarding genetic programming. This is the future - humans must be removed from the coding process.
What the PR flacks at Sun failed to mention is that the US military TESTS all kinds of things that never get used in actual operational situations. That's why they call it "testing". Remember DARPA? Their purview is "high risk, high payoff technologies." Most of what they test never works, but they test anyway, because until you do, all you have is the hot air of various Slashdot users and corporate PR weenies...
I got yer black heliopters, swinging. See you at the South Pole, Kommander.
Mogens Glistrup, a Danish politician, used to root for downsizing the Danish military to an answering machine that said "We surrender" in Russian.
I guess that should be in chinese now. Or maybe it should be one of those touch-tone boxes, and you could choose the language from a menu.
The Army is testing it, but Sun's website makes it seem like it's years away...just how complete/robust is the version the Army is using? Do we really want the armed forces using Jini v0.01 or whatnot?
They are not blowing it on $400 hammers. Ever wonder where the military garners their money for advanced weapon research, especially the secret stuff like stealth technology? Just like when hospitals charge you $90 for an asparin. They spread the costs around on their expense forms to cover up the REALLY expensive, sensitive projects.
Dude, it's just a binfmt-esque hack... and it's even being phased out because binfmt does precisely the same thing, while being somewhat more general about it...
---
DNA just wants to be free...
That's true to a point but I think that one of the main reasons is that both aircrafts and nuclear power facilities are very time-critical applications.
Nah, I've seen the same thing of Motorola real-time contollers. It's a standard clause on any sort of embedded component, and doesn't have anything to do with the capabilities or limitations of the product. Everything has bugs, and Sun is just covering their butts.
Jini in a bottle
make your wish come true
(and power your army!)
Insert mind here.
It would take your toaster longer to start up (with less than 20k of code) than it would to make a piece of dark, crispy toast. Your car would "crash" more often than if you were in a demolition derby. Your computer would case to run any usefual applications. All you would have left is text and images scrolling on your desktop -- nmaybe with some animations of fire or explosions. I'm not looking forward to that day -- even NT is more reliable than Java...
This is my Jini. There are many like it but this one is mine.
If it wasn't for people like roblimo, you wouldn't be able to live in a free world. You might take it for granted but with no standing army we would easily fall to a country like China. I don't know about you but I sure as hell don't want to live in a Communist Regime. You also just seem mad that your little prick ass couldn't make it past the first week of boot camp, much less the first day. People join the army to serve their country. What do you do? Sit around all day and post degrading comments on slashdot? You need to get a life, if the idea of people serving their country is depressing to you. Your a sick sad little man.
The navy tried to use NT for command, control, communications, and intelligence ( C3I ) on a ship - and it needed to be towed back to port.
Java and Jini are immature technologies that should not be used in a life and death environment under any circumstances. The DOD uses CORBA extensively for interoperability, and CORBA is a proven, open, non-proprietary standard. Java and Jini are both owned and controled by Sun, which is another reason to be hesitant when using them. The most common programming languages in use by the DOD, Ada, C, C++, are standards that have no notion of ownership - anyone may provide an implementation of them. Sun, by contrast, has never given up control of the language. Is sun going to decide to raise prices or terminate a license on the DOD in the middle of an operation?
I would not feel comforable going into battle and knowing that my life might depend on a 'Jini enabled' Java based device - and neither should anyone in the armed forces.
(sorry if this went out twice, accidentally punched "submit") Doesn't the Java license have a clause that says it shouldn't be used in life-or-death situations, i.e. nuclear power plant controls, aircraft traffic control, etc, since Java is still an 'unstable' technology? Isn't WAR one of these sorts of life-or-death situations?
Just look at the Trade Federation's experiences with JINI, to see why it should be avoided. Their failure to secure Naboo is directly attributable to JINI technology.
Sure it's slow as hell right now, and unstable. But think of Linux 4 years ago. As machines become faster, java will also be more stable. Your are also showing your ignorance of java by saying that java applets, are java.
Java sucks and will probably always suck on computers. But on imbeded devices such as small NC's and set top boxes your crazy if you would take WinCE over java. Your need to read a bit more about java before your open your mouth, and show the world your ignorance.
Hey all you ACs, you are a bunch of typical lazy shitheads who enjoys the benefits of all who have served their country and even sacrificed their lives. You don't have to like the military or want to be part of it in order to appreciate their contributions. Admitedly military service is not for everyone, but at least have enough respect to recognize what they've accomplished.
Go back to your self-indulgent stink hole of an existance.
besides.your'e not even brave enough to get an account here. Typical.
I thought I was the only one noticing these "When *I* was in THE ARMY..." things being tacked onto some posts. I think I've only seen it once or twice before this, but i t really is annoying. We don't know if he voluntarily joined, I mean, maybe he did ROTC for money for college or something, but it's pathetic. I was all set to post "They let a geek like you into the Army?" but you basically beat me to the point.
Well, having been programming Jini in a military setting for the past few months, I think I have a better idea here than most posters about how successful Jini will be on the battlefield. From our testing, we've seen Jini is amazingly reliable and could possibly be implemented in the distant future. One caveat: we haven't done much security testing yet and I have a feeling this could be the downfall. How hard will it be to impersonate a lookup server and effectively have the power of BackOrifice for Jini?
But the point here is that Jini is definitely worth at least testing with. When you see it work seemlessly, it really is impressive. Especially having seen Microsoft's poor excuse for plug-n-play. (Though, when I saw a Sun representative speak about Jini, he insisted it be called Plug-n-Go - I wonder why? hehe) The book Core Jini just came out recently, which really helps a lot for advanced Jini programming. I have a feeling that a lot of those old articles you read about the weaknesses of Jini weren't written by fully prepared authors.
Also, just because Java and Jini are not exactly "free" languages (not in the monetary sense) doesn't mean the military shouldn't use it. I mean c'mon, the military has a very good reason for not being Open Source. I don't think that warrants much more discussion.
To summarize: I've seen Jini work with my own eyes in a military setting and it's impressive. Once the security issue is settled, some of these posters may be singing a different tune.
Oh, and I haven't been brainwashed by Sun. I know CORBA works too, but Jini has a full source download unlike CORBA and a few other features that make it superior (besides experience and lack of testing).
Very few of them were overwhelmed with patriotic sitrrings.
As a former soldier, I can tell you that a certain aspect of the military is simply a welfare program with a rigorous physical fitness component.
Sorry about my obscene language. I do truly have a large vocabulary, but I feel that this description truly shows what I think about Java. Java may be the future of web scripts, but for real applications it cannot hold a candle to compiled languages such as C++. C++ is the future. While it may not still be called C++ in a few years, it will be another language that is the same thing only with more features. I would rather go back to using Pascal or even Cobol and Fortran than be stuck using Java or Perl. While I think languages such as Lisp may become more prominent once genetic algorithms are used more, I dont think Java will ever be a widely used language in the future. At least I sure hope not.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
I can certainly understand the reasons for keeping open source software out of mission critical military situations. However, unless the military is going to take action to put a military level barricade around Sun's source repository (which would include extensive background checks for employees to prevent foreign agents from getting access to the source), then using a closed source solution is NOT safer than an open source solution, and may even be MORE of a hazard.
A presentation on this subject was made at JavaOne. The PDF file with the slides can be found at http://industry.java.sun.com/javaone/99/event/0,17 68,742,00.html
I can't help pondering if this meant the US Army is being deliberately closed-mouth, or if the Reuters reporter was was merely stating the fact that whichever one "official" he picked at random happened to be in the latrine when called...
They had a talk at the JavaOne conference about this very thing. The talk was extremely interesting, especially since I'd been going to a lot of differnet Jini talks throughout the week...it's a cool technology.
/just/ for devices. Any Java OBJECT can be put in the lookup service. That can be ANYTHING! :)
And before I go on, it's Jini, not JINI.
Three guys gave the talk; Dennis Reedy from Sun, Dr. David Usechak from the US Army, and Leo Yeung from IBM. The talk was titled Using Jini Technology as the Integrating Architecture for Next Generation Battlefield Systems.
Basically this is for mobile command units, four trucks (I'm trying to remember) that fit together some how with workstations on the inside as well as routers and so forth. Basically, this command unit has to move about every 2+ hours. One problem is that once they move they need over an hour to set back up again; feed the twisted pair about, and get all the software connected. What a pain in the ass huh? So they said Jini was perfect for them. Any device or application can find each other if they need to. If they set it up right everything will work how it really should. For instance, when you plug in a phone to a phone jack, you expect to hear the dialtone when you lift it off the hook right? That's how computers should work on the network. Also, keep in mind, that the Jini Lookup Service isn't
It makes me giddy anytime I think about it.
The presenters gave a very well thought out speech and do know what they're talking about. I have faith that this project will be successful.
Ribo
I wear pants.
Vaccine!! Vaccine!! Vaccine!!
Court Marshall!! Court Marshall!!
Maybe they already found a way to incorporate Jini into nano-chips contained within the Anthrax vaccine. No wonder.
:. Ultimate Control Dedicated/VM Servers
Actually the US government did not send in more soldiers because of the Chinese, not because of protesters. They did not want "another Korea." The protests only became large after the US had been in the war for 5 years and had lost 20,000 American lives.
That was then, this is now: Did USA come to East Timor's aid when Indonesia invaded? Nope. Would they have given a rat's ass about Kuwait if Kuwait didn't have a lot of oil? Nope.
Weapon technology is often sold to all sides in a conflict, and your precious army is sent in to protect commercial interests. War is no longer some "serve the country" thing, it's serve the buck.
But, hey, just buy the propaganda that what happened fifty years ago has any relevance when it comes to today's military apparatus. The only people profiting from today's wars are the arms merchants who get to replenish the bombs wasted on e.g. Yugoslavia, with no responsibility for the civilian lives taken by their cluster bombs going off long ater. They just count the dollars the governments are more than willing to spend.
> While I do fault Lisp for being interpreted Since when is Lisp "interpreted"? I must be missing something. Lisp compilers do exist since almost 40 (!!!) years. I have been using since 15 years almost exclusively native code Lisp compilers.
in case you havent realized it yet, the US Army rarely has any comments on things such as this.
>besides.your'e not even brave enough to get an >account here. Typical.
And getting an account at slashdot is JUST SO SCARY.
Standing in the Sunlight Howling at the Moon
Heh, good one:).
how much your trivial existance owes to the military? The very fact that you're sitting at a computer and able to express such narrow-mindedness is a direct derivative of military research and development.
Modern digital computing and ARPANET [>Internet] are all ex-military research projects. The list is endless.
So, Rob, way to go dude. Some people are proud to do their bit. Others just sit at home and whack off.
Lazy sp99
Which as I recall [1] doesn't have a standing
army.
However I very much do respect the sacrifices
of those who belong to the armed services.
Honest!
(Just trying to liven things up)
-- AC for this one
[1] Note that this is from a foggy memory of
a long loud conversation with a Local in
a pub in Cork many moons ago.
"Since they do have some similarities, they must both be completely equal." That wasn't what was said nor, in my view, suggested. As for the rest, well it certainly wasn't the detailed explication that I thought you might have given your obvious distaste for the language. Still, I must assume your reasons are valid for the kinds of applications you develop and you arrived at your conclusions after extensive testing. And the same for Lisps' unlisted benefits that overcome being interpreted, and for QBasic being better suited to your development tasks than Java. Indeed.
I think that its sick when snot nosed punks such as you think that military service is a waste of time. You are just as bad as those idiots who protested against the Vietnam War. Military service is one of the single most important things a person could do during his life. We have the benefit of living in such a free and safe country because of all the brave men that have served and are serving in the military. I have tried to join both the Marines and Navy, but alass I cannot because of eczema, a form of skin disorder. But since I cannot join I am not going to turn around and say that military service in not worth while just because I am not part of it. While military service is not for everyone, every member of our Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, National Guard, and Coast Guard deserve every American's respect. We are the greatest nation since Rome, and they have made us that way.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
"we didn't even dream about things like Jini."
Was that meant to be a play on "I Dream of Genie"? If so, well done!
As a side note, the issue of perception came up in another thread, the Brazillian who worried about "unnecessary" violence in American cities then ignoring the "real" local killings, it does touch on a very important issue of perceived vs actual crime levels. Studies have shown that often a public's fear of events is way out of proportion with the actual frequency (thus the popularity of travel insurance when the airline industry has the best statistical passenger=mile safety record). Given the rather consistent message coming from Hollywood, it's not surprising that the rest of the world thinks the US consist of right-wing gun-totting ex-military thugs (die hard, etc) or mindless love-sick clueless dorks (sleepless in seattle etc). The reality is that the average person around the world would be pretty much indistinguihable as most societies converge to a norm given comparative social-economic levels. However the perception (or taken to the extreme - cultural mythology) is a very important driver for a lot of individual actions. Witness the US glorious history in westerns with the calvery opening up the frontier that has extended through 2 world wars and many regional conflicts. This has resulted in giving the US a global absolute advantage in organised violence, especially with the continual recruitment of citizen soldiers (a la Roman Empire style) based on an personal commitment to freedom. We should all salute the US model where the common solider is prepared to give up their lives so that their commander-in-chief can play around with interns. Now IMHO that is a strong military system based on its own internal memes which will persist and remain vigilant to its mission regardless of perceptions or reality of civilian leadership.
LL
Robotic soldiers controlled by thousands of the best Quake players in the country. We shall be unstopable!!!!! There is a legion waiting!!
But my dad, both grandfathers, and five out of six uncles served in the military (WWII and Vietnam) so that lame pissants like me and other AC's could shoot our mouths off without being thrown in jail by even lamer pissants like Hitler and Giuliani^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^HMussolini.
My dad and most of the uncles, by the way, joined up primarily for college tuition, and only secondarily to serve their country -- although they all served honorably and my uncle Dave dropped more napalm on more kids than you could shake a stick at, by way of protecting democracy from free speech (or from Abbie Hoffman, or something -- he's a little vague on that point).
Yeah, a standing army is a great way to avoid getting invaded. I agree that we should have one, and I agree wholeheartedly that we should have some respect for those who volunteer to serve. The problem is, a standing army is also great when you want to drop napalm on somebody's kids on the Pacific Rim for no good reason. Worse yet, the military sometimes develops a weird notion that they're the ones who should really be running things; see South America for some shining examples of what military notions of duty and honor (which are indispensible within the military itself) can do to enrich civilian life.
This is the MILLENIUM, all you pseudo-"patriotic" dupes can't see what's RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOUR EYES, can you?! This technology is being developed by KlinTTon and her husband only to hand it over to the U.N.! You'll never see any benefit from it, you'll never taste the freedom it could have bought you -- no, you'll be gunless, bareassed and alone in a forced labor camp wondering what went wrong while you serve your new African and Oriental masters.
The United States military is no longer a patriotic organization, and since it was unconsitutionally misused in the Great Jew War against Germany it has not been a patriotic organization. If you "proudly served", you are my enemy and the enemy of all true Americans, because you weren't serving your own people or even your own race. You are a criminal and cannot be trusted.
how many patches did they have to use to get that sun software working?
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Bitchslapped? Give Rob a bitchslap from bitchslapped.com.
Your arguments are true... but irrelevant. By extension of that logic everything would be written in assembly or C. However, while I'm truly a C bigot ;), I do write many little administrative tasks as shell scripts. People actually use Perl (gasp!) in web server applications. Need I point out that Perl "will always be slow compared to native alternatives"?
;)
Different tasks lend themselves to optimization for machine performance, speed of development, simplicity, manageability, executable size, portability, etc.
So, yes, Java will always be slow[er], but I guess I'm prepared to deal with it.
Geeky modern art T-shirts
You mention the similarities that Java has with both Lisp and C++. I could to the same and talk about the similarites betwean Linux and Windows. Since they do have some similarities, they must both be completely equal.
While I do fault Lisp for being interpreted, its benefits far overwiegh this one downfall. And the similarites betwean C++ and Java are almost only in syntax and OOP use. Java is both slow and has no increased functinality over C++. Like I said, Java and Perl are the future of simple web scripts, but that is where there uses end. Of course you can make good applications with it, but you can do the same with QBasic. In fact, I think I would rather go back to QBasic than use Java regularly. Now as for GWBasic, that im not sure about.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
"If you expect a nation to be ignorant and free, you expect what never was and never can be." - Thomas Jefferson