I've always felt that the solution to all the language wars would be if people learned different programming languages preferrably from different programming paradigms. A Perl bigot wouldn't go on and on about how truly OO Perl was if he knew about SmallTalk and neither would a C bigot rhapsodize about C's text-handling abilities if given Perl.
The problem is narrow-minded programmers who learn 1 langauge or 1 paradigm (functional, Object Oriented, procedural, etc) and refuse to open their minds to any alternatives no matter how well suited they would be to solving the task at hand.
Remember people, programming languages are merely tools and like most tools they are good at performing specific tasks and not-so-good at performing other. A hammer is great at removing nails stuck in a wall but would be useless at unscrewing the back of your VCR. Use the right tool for the job and keep in mind that your favorite tool is not always the right one.
This is the classic "who do I sue when Linux blows up?" fallacy.
Actually you are wrong. The poster of the "Ask Slashdot" is asking about Support Contacts which a number of Linux vendors provide as opposed to Warranty which no software vendor provides whether it is Open or Closed source.
Enterprise support is usually provided by third parties as opposed to the actual OS vendor, for instance there is a sizable list of companies that provide support contracts for Microsoft software. Then again some companies like Sun provide their own enterprise support contracts which happens to be one of the largest support service providers in the industry.
As for the Ask Slashdot, here's a list of companies that provide Enterprise support.
I will agree with you completely if you can explain to me why our "professional in the industry" insists on teaching like this because "that's how it's done in the industry".
That isn't how it's done in industry. Frankly I don't understand why anyone should introduce Java via GUI programming and even worse JavaBeans. If you want to see what real Java code looks like, look around Sun's site for the example programs used in the Java tutorial(the only source you need to learn Java) and take a gander at those.
You may also search on Google for Open Source Java applications, there are lots of them.
Java was a great idea let down by a flawed implementation and a flawed corporate strategy IMHO. What I think is that whilst the language itself isn't really going anywhere fast, the idea behind it will live on.
Simply because all the C hackers and Perl users on Slashdot aren't using Java does not mean that it isn't going anywhere fast. I haven't seen a new Linux app coded in Lisp or Smalltalk in a while, this doesn't mean they are dead.
And it seems as though Microsoft have learned the lesson from this that Sun didn't, so I expect C# to go places Java never will.
C# will be a Microsoft only language which already puts it behind Java in places it can go. Standardization of the syntax of the language is useless if all the underlying DCOM/COM+/.NET infrastructure exists only on Windows.
On the other hand, I recently wrote a testing tool for a multibillion dollar corporation that sells SCM software to several Fortune five hundred companies, over the summer and noticed that Java is almost Write Once Run Anywhere as originally promised by Sun. The company I worked for supports six different platforms and is considering supporting Linux as a seventh. Their languages of choice for building tools for cross-platform development were Perl and Java. The chances of them switching all that to C# and losing over 50 per cent of their customers? ZERO
Of course the actual apps were written in Motif/MFC depending on the platform
As anyone who has read Fredrick Brook's classic Mythical Man Month knows, software development is best done with the following time allotments
1/3 planning
1/6 Coding
1/4 unit testing
1/4 sytem and integration testing
Most of the time spent developing software is spent planning,designing algorithms and testing , initial coding takes very little time with respect to the other factors. For anyone to claim that debugging and testing are not or should not be major parts of the development process is sheer nonsense.
Y'know, this kind of crap doesn't help the Geek Community At Large overcome the image of being a bunch of fanatical morons
Hemos took a lot of liberty with my submission including changing the title as well as cutting of some technical analysis at the end of my submission.
Basically the gist of my submission was that Microsoft is taking a heavyhanded and incorrect approach to attempting to solve the problems with Outlook viruses and the like. Specifically, instead of coming up with some Draconian all-or-nothing security policy why not introduce more granular access levels to Whistler?
For example, I currently run ZoneAlarm and it prompts whenever a program I haven't given permission tries to access the Internet (in fact I found a Trojan this way). ZoneAlarm has three permission settings Always Deny, Always Allow, and Always Ask. I wouldn't mind seeing such functionality moved to the OS and made even more granular so that programs have very explicit permissions as to what they can do (similar to java.policyfiles). Outlook should not be able to tweak the registry nor delete files (via the ILOVEYOU virus) regardless of whether it is signed by Microsoft or not.
Basically I am proposing something similar to Access Control Lists for executables on the OS, after all, there already is a central repository of information (the registry) so adding that data shouldn't be too hard.
Whistler will have the option to only run signed applications. You can turn this off.
The average user does not tweak defaults, especially when the menu options are as hidden as they are in Microsoft products. After all there has been an option to turn of scripting support in Outlook for several years yet Melissa and ILOVEYOU
theoretically caused billions of dollars in damage because people do not change the default settings.
Anyway, how many non-computer savvy people are going to run an executable if Windows pops up a suitably scary error message up? After all Microsoft effectively killed Dr DOS with phony error messages. If Microsoft decides to implement this policy it is very conceivable that all the major software houses will get Windows Certified(TM)
thus pressurizing smaller shops to do the same. Where does this then leave independent developers?
Nailer asks: With kernel 2.4 in the final stages of bug hunting, and on track for a December release, I thought it might be pertinent to discuss the future of Linux. What now?
Slashdot is comprised primarily of Linux users not Linux developers. Questions like this are better sent to mailing lists frequented by the people who make these decisions than to a bunch of armchair critics. This article is similar to asking a bunch of random Windows users where Windows™ development should go and expecting a coherrent answer.
What exactly is the purpose of the KDE foundation?
The GNOME foundation is easy for me to understand, it is a means for companies with talented teams of developers to contribute to the GNOME project, similar to the way IBM works with Open Source developers on the Apache project and has many members on the Apache Foundation's steering comittee (if it's called that) and Netscape works with Mozilla and has a lot of it's developers guiding Mozilla's development. In fact the GNOME press release expressly states that it is modelled after the Apache Foundation
On the other hand, the KDE foundation makes very little sense to me. KDE is an Open Source project, not a commercial endeavour, so why does it need a huge multi-corporation PR-team? Interestingly the KDE press release goes out of its way to state that this is merely a marketing (i.e. propoganda) machine. I'm sorry but I'm a developer, and the idea of an Open Source project forming large ties with commercial entities for the express purpose of out-marketting another Open Source project feels awkward and doesn't sit right with me.
Am I the only one that is slightly disturbed by this?
What are you talking about? Here's an example of cross-langauge object reuse in 1 line of code.
var xmlDoc = Server.CreateObject("Microsoft.XMLDom");
The above code instantiates a C++ XML parser in javascript and the object can beused transparently as if it is a regular Javascript object. I dare you to show me equivalent functionality using CORBA.
Relatively painless cross-langauge object reuse has been a reality in Windows programming for some time. The advances of.NET aren't transparent cross language object reuse (because it already exists) but support for more languages and cross-language object inheritance.
I said:
Java shackles developers by forcing them to use the Java[tm] platform for all development in all three tiers of a client-server application if they plan to use the Java[tm] language for any aspect development
You said:
Not true. CORBA has bindings right now for just about as many languages as.NET is planning to support, and these systems can all interoperate. In fact, Java's network and component specifications are going towards a more language neutral format with RMI over IIOP and the next generation CORBA specs and products that allow IIOP access to EJBs and deployment of EJB-like services in any language.
CORBA is a broken specification, and this has lead to the creation of the CORBA Component Model based on EJB which is modelled after DCOM and MTS.
With.NET objects created in C++ can inherit from objects created in any other language including Java. In.NET, local (none networked) cross-langauge object reuse is easily done unlike in broken-ass CORBA.
In.NET security, transactions, high availability, failure recovery, naming services, are clearly defined and built into the architecture unlike in CORBA where different ORBs have different behavior since the base CORBA specification is so loose and most services are optional and thus unsupported.
The.NET platform is an improvement for Visual C++ and Visual Basic programmers, but it is yet another proprietary Microsoft platform which will tie the developer to Windows, albeit possibly a.NET-ized notion of Windows.
I love Java, but this is simply bullshit. The main purpose of.NET is the exact opposite. It's purpose is to allow developers to actually use COM and the Windows API without being shackled to VB and Visual C++.
Currently there are plans for.NET to support the following languages APL, CAML, Cobol, Haskell, Mercury, ML, Oberon, Oz, Pascal, Perl, Python, Scheme, and Smalltalk. In fact, Rational is planning to create a Java-language compiler that targets the.NET common language runtime. The details are available on the MSDN site.
Obviously this scares Sun and that's why they are publishing this propaganda because it begins to show the truth that Java shackles developers by forcing them to use the Java(TM) platform for all development in all three tiers of a client-server application if they plan to use the Java™ language for any aspect development (yes, I know about JNI, but it is currently subpar).
Of course the correct response to this is: Its Free Software - don't whine - patch! If Netscape management is more worried about shipping than fixing some bugs then fork for god's sake! I would rather them ship a 90% compliant browser than ship nothing and leave us with NS4 on UNIX.
I can't believe you got modded up as insightful. The article gives props to Mozilla which is the Open Source project not Netscape. The problem is that Netscape is ignoring all the fruits of the Open Source nature of Mozilla by refusing patches and the like to standards compliance problems.
I agree that for a site that pushes Open Source micheal should have pushed Mozilla instead of IE but it seems you are under the mistaken assumption that Mozilla and Netscape 6 are the same project which is untrue.
They want to do something that will impress their classmates from MIT or UCLA or Caltech or wherever.
MIT and Caltech must be really overrated if all it takes to impress the students who graduate from there is a job doing web scripting and 3 tier applications that any high schooler can do with PHP, ASP or Perl.
Then again, maybe you guys simply hired the bottom of the barrel.
If they get sick of it they can always join a slacker company and work 40 hours/week.
Such as i2, Trilogy, Cisco or Microsoft, huh?
<sarcasm>
Of course, your hotshit web development shop makes these companies look like mom-N-pop shops. <sarcasm>
The more I read about Ars Digita, the less impressed I am. From the trivial bootcamps and gross overpayment for monkey work (web scripting, pah) to the fact that some of you think using fuck in code is a mark of professionalism, I had mentally filed Ars Digita as yet another hotshit startup that won't last the next half decade.
From the descriptions I've gotten of ArsDigita both from employees and boot camp attendees, the place is a hackers playground where and software engineering and computer science practices are paid lip service. Particularly amusing is the fact that you guys think that your online degree program which is merely a glorified course in Web Development is equivalent to a degree from MIT *LOL*
The article had me going for a while until it started revealing to many Open Source factoids that only a regular reader of Slashdot or other Open Source tabloid would be aware of (intimate details of GNOME vs. KDE, Free Software vs. Open Source, CueCat hacks, Qt being "non-free", etc), the overly antagonistic attitude of the email also struck me as false especially if this was an email going out to the whole company when it is a known fact that several employees use Linux.
The real kicker was this phrase:
Turn your Internet Explorer to http://www.mozilla.org/, and laugh. This is the product
of "thousands" of hard working open source coders. We did that same work, and
more, in-house with less than 50 people working on the codebase.
This is simply not possible. I have friends that have worked at MSFT and they state unequivocably that viewing source code from competing Open Source projects is expressly prohibited so that there is no risk of GPLed code making its way into MSFT products either accidentally or intentionally. The thought that Bill Gates would request that people look at Mozilla source even as a joke is highly unlikely.
Sega will now be a software company, and could write S/W for all consoles including indremeda...
The fact is selling consoles is an expensive, money losing proposition. No one (not Sony, Nintendo, or Sega) has ever made money on the actual consoles and has instead has had to use restrictive licensing practices (e.g. game developers pay a tax for each copy sold) to maintain revenues.
Considering that Indrema has plans to be friendly with the Linux community, it is unlikely that they will use restrictive licenses to gain revenues and thus may end up D.O.A. with no potential profit generator.
You really need to think before posting. Most of the security compromises you list for Linux are _local_ compromises. That means, you must already have a shell to do them.
And your point? The Microsoft crack was most likely a Trojan (i.e. local compromise) as a opposed to deliberate network hack into the system. Secondly you are incorrect in stating that I listed mainly local compromises, there a liberal smattering of both types of compromises in my links (defaced web page count, SANS top ten list, rootshell exploits, etc).
Frankly resorting to personal attacks when it is clear that you didn't bother checking the links in my post, shows who indeed is the person who doesn't think before posting.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
Win-Win? Not so sure...(Kevin Mitnick)
on
Microsoft Cracked
·
· Score: 3
If it's a outside job and the crackers beat MS' secuity, now the whole world+dog knows that MS software sucks in protecting data.
From all the articles, it looks like this was a Trojan that may have been secreted during the execution of some email attachment. Knowing MSFT, they'll probably spin this as a virus similar to Melissa or ILOVEYOU and the general public will stop blaming them.
After all, no one is calling for their heads after Melissa and ILOVEYOU even though the main reason they caused so much damage is the lack of security built into Outlook and the ease of using Virus Building Script. Instead we'll probably get a lot of hacker crackdowns with this breakin, perhaps another Kevin Mitnick type case where he got reamed for seeing Sun's Solaris source. It's very possible to see the culprits doing massive jail time for supposedly causing MSFT zillions of dollars in lost revenue by merely looking at the source like Sun did with Kevin Mitnick. This is especially possible in the current climate of UCITA and the DMCA. I wouldn't consider that a win, would you?
I'd expected more mature responses to MSFT being hacked than childish attacks either blaming NT like the above post or claiming that MSFT being hacked is good for Open Source like others I've seen. Frankly *nix and Windows are roughly equivalent in default security (except for OpenBSD) and only through the machinations of a good sys admin is either OS properly secured.
For those that believe *nix is somehow more inherrently secure than Windows here are a few sources that may refute that claim The major security issues in Windows are Outlook (disable preview pane, be careful with attachments) and Internet Explorer (disable Javascript). Doing that and using a firewall like ZoneAlarm is most of the securing that a typical Windows box needs. On the other hand due to the use of insecure C libraries (str* functions, *scanf functions, etc) most of the services that are enabled by default in a typical Linux install are insecure (especially RedHat the primary consumer Linux OS in the U.S.). Take a quick look at security sites like Attrition.org, CERT, SANS, rootshell, SecurityFocus, etc and check the results. Defacements of Linux sites has been rising at a steady rate and now there are more defacements of Linux sites than NT sites. CERT regularly has more Linux and Unix security advisories than for Windows. The SANS (System Administration, Networking, and Security) Institute top ten list of security holes has more entries for *nix than Windows.
A quick search of the terms "linux" and "windows" on Rootshell's seearch engine come up with 84 downloadable exploits for Linux versus 39 for Windows.
The above post is not intended to be flamebait (I run Win2K but plan to reinstall Linux on my second machine so I am a Linux user) but as a counterpoint to the above post which was rated +5 when I replied to it.
All I care about... (Score:3)
by Ron Harwood (harwoodr-AT-technologist.calm) on Monday October 23, @01:58PM EST (#3),br>
(User #136613 Info) http://theGEEK.org ...is getting the maximum horsepower for the minimum price... everything else (with the exlusion of stability, of course) is a moot point.
I don't care how they get me there... as long as it's cheap and damn fast.
The above comment is pointless, clueless and adds nothing to discussing the technical merits of AMD's next generation chip design vs. Intel's. I don't understand how this completely irrelevant comment is (+3 insightful) instead of (-1 offtopic) in a technical discussion.
Frankly, I have always been of the opinion that if you have nothing to say, then don't say anything instead of shooting your mouth off and having people doubt your intelligence. There is no one forcing you to post to slashdot, so there is no reason to post irrelevant crap to technical discussions simply because you have nothing technical to add.
The problem with requirements elicitation is that it usually implies that the project isn't a spontaneously scratched itch, but instead a commercial or near-commercial product. Eliciting requirements usually means you have a customer and that the development team or developer-customer liason has exhaustively questioned all the potential users.
The purpose of a Software Requirements Specification is to enable the developers understand the customer's problem domain and learn what the needs of the customer are.
Since most Open Source projects are written by the customer(s), it is usually redundant for them to create an SRS that describes the needs of the user.
Although an SRS is not truly necessary when creating a product where the developers are the customer it can still be beneficial for a variety of reasons including
Being a reference point for the entire team when implementing features and wondering what behavior should be exhibited on certain events.
It is a good way to handle feature creep since it is a formalized list of features. Only things in the SRS are implemented and if a new feature comes along that everyone wants, it should be retroactively added to the SRS.
It gives developers an idea of the size and scope of their project.
Priority levels for different features can be set by using the
must-will-should rule. Any feature description preceded with a must is absolutely necessary, any feature preceded with a will is important but not absolutely necessary while features preceded with should are typically wishlist features.
Both Java and Python are much much nicer to program in than C++.
This isn't flaming, but you obviously haven't done any C++ programming. I have to take a java class in college right now, and even the instructor takes every chance he gets to point out how java is inferior to C++.
Sad, how I jump at this flamebait but here goes. Your instructor is the kind of clueless academic that makes me realize that the way CS in colleges is taught seriously needs to be overhauled. Before you attempt to question my C++ creds, I will establish that I am currently using C++ to implement the server end of this project. That said, let's go over why you think Java sucks.
1.)
Java sucks because everything is passed by reference: When you take upper level classes and concepts like the call stack are explained to you, you will realize that passing Objects around by value is expensive, inefficient and wasteful. Even in C/C++ non-primitives are usually passed by reference either via pointers or explicit references.
2.)
Java sucks because it forces you to write code to handle potential errors in a program: This reason is so illogical it does not deserve an answer.
Between C# and Java most of the developer mindshare for cross-platform server applications has been staked out. This language has to have a whole lot more going for it than simply being Open Source. It is battling incredible odds against entrenched languages/platforms, powerful companies with tons of research and development staff(Sun, MSFT, IBM, etc), several thousand developers, and the natural inertia that keeps people from trying anything new.
It seems to me from reading the page that their major claim to fame is that they are Open Source and as all those who have watched GNU Hurd development goes, being Open Source does not automatically imply mindshare.
PS: What the heck do they mean by the New Internet? Sounds like a rehash of every major Sun, MSFT, etc launch of the past few months/years.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
Read the article, only affects slander/libel
on
Anonymity
·
· Score: 2
Of course anonymous speech should be held to the same standards as a publicly known speaker. Slander, Libel, and insighting violence, etc. are all exceptions as we know.
Well according to the article on Excite the ruling only affects defamation of character which is (slander/libel) and is already an exception to free speech.
Slashdot Mirror
I've always felt that the solution to all the language wars would be if people learned different programming languages preferrably from different programming paradigms. A Perl bigot wouldn't go on and on about how truly OO Perl was if he knew about SmallTalk and neither would a C bigot rhapsodize about C's text-handling abilities if given Perl.
The problem is narrow-minded programmers who learn 1 langauge or 1 paradigm (functional, Object Oriented, procedural, etc) and refuse to open their minds to any alternatives no matter how well suited they would be to solving the task at hand.
Remember people, programming languages are merely tools and like most tools they are good at performing specific tasks and not-so-good at performing other. A hammer is great at removing nails stuck in a wall but would be useless at unscrewing the back of your VCR. Use the right tool for the job and keep in mind that your favorite tool is not always the right one.
Grabel's Law
Actually you are wrong. The poster of the "Ask Slashdot" is asking about Support Contacts which a number of Linux vendors provide as opposed to Warranty which no software vendor provides whether it is Open or Closed source.
Enterprise support is usually provided by third parties as opposed to the actual OS vendor, for instance there is a sizable list of companies that provide support contracts for Microsoft software. Then again some companies like Sun provide their own enterprise support contracts which happens to be one of the largest support service providers in the industry.
As for the Ask Slashdot, here's a list of companies that provide Enterprise support.
- Caldera Systems, Inc.
- Red Hat
- Rebel.com
I'm sure there are a bunch of others but these are the ones I know off the top of my head.Grabel's Law
I will agree with you completely if you can explain to me why our "professional in the industry" insists on teaching like this because "that's how it's done in the industry".
That isn't how it's done in industry. Frankly I don't understand why anyone should introduce Java via GUI programming and even worse JavaBeans. If you want to see what real Java code looks like, look around Sun's site for the example programs used in the Java tutorial(the only source you need to learn Java) and take a gander at those.
You may also search on Google for Open Source Java applications, there are lots of them.
Grabel's Law
Java was a great idea let down by a flawed implementation and a flawed corporate strategy IMHO. What I think is that whilst the language itself isn't really going anywhere fast, the idea behind it will live on.
Java is used by almost every major player in every major industry in the U.S. and beyond. Personal Java runs on the myriad embedded systems with their own JVM and even American Express credit cards. Java servlets and JSP run myriad websites from mail.com to First Union . Enterprise Java Beans and it's associate web server platforms has spawned a cottage industry of server platform developers that include IBM, Bea, Allaire and more. Java ships with a free fully functional CORBA orb which allows for rapid development of robust, multi-tiered distributed applications.
Simply because all the C hackers and Perl users on Slashdot aren't using Java does not mean that it isn't going anywhere fast. I haven't seen a new Linux app coded in Lisp or Smalltalk in a while, this doesn't mean they are dead.
And it seems as though Microsoft have learned the lesson from this that Sun didn't, so I expect C# to go places Java never will.
C# will be a Microsoft only language which already puts it behind Java in places it can go. Standardization of the syntax of the language is useless if all the underlying DCOM/COM+/.NET infrastructure exists only on Windows.
On the other hand, I recently wrote a testing tool for a multibillion dollar corporation that sells SCM software to several Fortune five hundred companies, over the summer and noticed that Java is almost Write Once Run Anywhere as originally promised by Sun. The company I worked for supports six different platforms and is considering supporting Linux as a seventh. Their languages of choice for building tools for cross-platform development were Perl and Java. The chances of them switching all that to C# and losing over 50 per cent of their customers? ZERO
Of course the actual apps were written in Motif/MFC depending on the platform
Grabel's Law
heh - that's *IF* you believe everything you read. and what happened to the other 1/6th??
1/4 + 1/4 = 1/2
1/3 + 1/6 = 1/2
1/2 + 1/2 = 1
What other 1/6th were you talking about?
Grabel's Law
- 1/3 planning
- 1/6 Coding
- 1/4 unit testing
- 1/4 sytem and integration testing
Most of the time spent developing software is spent planning,designing algorithms and testing , initial coding takes very little time with respect to the other factors. For anyone to claim that debugging and testing are not or should not be major parts of the development process is sheer nonsense.Grabel's Law
Y'know, this kind of crap doesn't help the Geek Community At Large overcome the image of being a bunch of fanatical morons
Hemos took a lot of liberty with my submission including changing the title as well as cutting of some technical analysis at the end of my submission.
Basically the gist of my submission was that Microsoft is taking a heavyhanded and incorrect approach to attempting to solve the problems with Outlook viruses and the like. Specifically, instead of coming up with some Draconian all-or-nothing security policy why not introduce more granular access levels to Whistler?
For example, I currently run ZoneAlarm and it prompts whenever a program I haven't given permission tries to access the Internet (in fact I found a Trojan this way). ZoneAlarm has three permission settings Always Deny, Always Allow, and Always Ask. I wouldn't mind seeing such functionality moved to the OS and made even more granular so that programs have very explicit permissions as to what they can do (similar to java.policy files). Outlook should not be able to tweak the registry nor delete files (via the ILOVEYOU virus) regardless of whether it is signed by Microsoft or not.
Basically I am proposing something similar to Access Control Lists for executables on the OS, after all, there already is a central repository of information (the registry) so adding that data shouldn't be too hard.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
Whistler will have the option to only run signed applications. You can turn this off.
The average user does not tweak defaults, especially when the menu options are as hidden as they are in Microsoft products. After all there has been an option to turn of scripting support in Outlook for several years yet Melissa and ILOVEYOU theoretically caused billions of dollars in damage because people do not change the default settings.
Anyway, how many non-computer savvy people are going to run an executable if Windows pops up a suitably scary error message up? After all Microsoft effectively killed Dr DOS with phony error messages. If Microsoft decides to implement this policy it is very conceivable that all the major software houses will get Windows Certified(TM) thus pressurizing smaller shops to do the same. Where does this then leave independent developers?
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
Nailer asks:
With kernel 2.4 in the final stages of bug hunting, and on track for a December release, I thought it might be pertinent to discuss the future of Linux. What now?
If you are truly interested in Linux kernel development and the future of the OS, why not just just subscribe to the Linux Kernel mailing list, browse the archive or read the digests on Kernel traffic?
Slashdot is comprised primarily of Linux users not Linux developers. Questions like this are better sent to mailing lists frequented by the people who make these decisions than to a bunch of armchair critics. This article is similar to asking a bunch of random Windows users where Windows™ development should go and expecting a coherrent answer.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
What exactly is the purpose of the KDE foundation?
The GNOME foundation is easy for me to understand, it is a means for companies with talented teams of developers to contribute to the GNOME project, similar to the way IBM works with Open Source developers on the Apache project and has many members on the Apache Foundation's steering comittee (if it's called that) and Netscape works with Mozilla and has a lot of it's developers guiding Mozilla's development. In fact the GNOME press release expressly states that it is modelled after the Apache Foundation
On the other hand, the KDE foundation makes very little sense to me. KDE is an Open Source project, not a commercial endeavour, so why does it need a huge multi-corporation PR-team? Interestingly the KDE press release goes out of its way to state that this is merely a marketing (i.e. propoganda) machine. I'm sorry but I'm a developer, and the idea of an Open Source project forming large ties with commercial entities for the express purpose of out-marketting another Open Source project feels awkward and doesn't sit right with me.
Am I the only one that is slightly disturbed by this?
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
What are you talking about? Here's an example of cross-langauge object reuse in 1 line of code.
.NET aren't transparent cross language object reuse (because it already exists) but support for more languages and cross-language object inheritance.
var xmlDoc = Server.CreateObject("Microsoft.XMLDom");
The above code instantiates a C++ XML parser in javascript and the object can beused transparently as if it is a regular Javascript object. I dare you to show me equivalent functionality using CORBA.
Relatively painless cross-langauge object reuse has been a reality in Windows programming for some time. The advances of
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
I said:
.NET is planning to support, and these systems can all interoperate. In fact, Java's network and component specifications are going towards a more language neutral format with RMI over IIOP and the next generation CORBA specs and products that allow IIOP access to EJBs and deployment of EJB-like services in any language.
.NET objects created in C++ can inherit from objects created in any other language including Java. In .NET, local (none networked) cross-langauge object reuse is easily done unlike in broken-ass CORBA.
.NET security, transactions, high availability, failure recovery, naming services, are clearly defined and built into the architecture unlike in CORBA where different ORBs have different behavior since the base CORBA specification is so loose and most services are optional and thus unsupported.
Java shackles developers by forcing them to use the Java[tm] platform for all development in all three tiers of a client-server application if they plan to use the Java[tm] language for any aspect development
You said:
Not true. CORBA has bindings right now for just about as many languages as
CORBA is a broken specification, and this has lead to the creation of the CORBA Component Model based on EJB which is modelled after DCOM and MTS.
With
In
PS: If you are interested I've written a paper comparing CORBA, DCOM and RMI which points out the myriad shortcomings of CORBA.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
The .NET platform is an improvement for Visual C++ and Visual Basic programmers, but it is yet another proprietary Microsoft platform which will tie the developer to Windows, albeit possibly a .NET-ized notion of Windows.
.NET is the exact opposite. It's purpose is to allow developers to actually use COM and the Windows API without being shackled to VB and Visual C++.
.NET to support the following languages APL, CAML, Cobol, Haskell, Mercury, ML, Oberon, Oz, Pascal, Perl, Python, Scheme, and Smalltalk. In fact, Rational is planning to create a Java-language compiler that targets the .NET common language runtime. The details are available on the MSDN site.
I love Java, but this is simply bullshit. The main purpose of
Currently there are plans for
Obviously this scares Sun and that's why they are publishing this propaganda because it begins to show the truth that Java shackles developers by forcing them to use the Java(TM) platform for all development in all three tiers of a client-server application if they plan to use the Java™ language for any aspect development (yes, I know about JNI, but it is currently subpar).
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
Of course the correct response to this is: Its Free Software - don't whine - patch! If Netscape management is more worried about shipping than fixing some bugs then fork for god's sake! I would rather them ship a 90% compliant browser than ship nothing and leave us with NS4 on UNIX.
I can't believe you got modded up as insightful. The article gives props to Mozilla which is the Open Source project not Netscape. The problem is that Netscape is ignoring all the fruits of the Open Source nature of Mozilla by refusing patches and the like to standards compliance problems.
I agree that for a site that pushes Open Source micheal should have pushed Mozilla instead of IE but it seems you are under the mistaken assumption that Mozilla and Netscape 6 are the same project which is untrue.
Mozilla is NOT Netscape
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
They want to do something that will impress their classmates from MIT or UCLA or Caltech or wherever.
MIT and Caltech must be really overrated if all it takes to impress the students who graduate from there is a job doing web scripting and 3 tier applications that any high schooler can do with PHP, ASP or Perl.
Then again, maybe you guys simply hired the bottom of the barrel.
If they get sick of it they can always join a slacker company and work 40 hours/week.
Such as i2, Trilogy, Cisco or Microsoft, huh?
<sarcasm> Of course, your hotshit web development shop makes these companies look like mom-N-pop shops. <sarcasm>
The more I read about Ars Digita, the less impressed I am. From the trivial bootcamps and gross overpayment for monkey work (web scripting, pah) to the fact that some of you think using fuck in code is a mark of professionalism, I had mentally filed Ars Digita as yet another hotshit startup that won't last the next half decade.
From the descriptions I've gotten of ArsDigita both from employees and boot camp attendees, the place is a hackers playground where and software engineering and computer science practices are paid lip service. Particularly amusing is the fact that you guys think that your online degree program which is merely a glorified course in Web Development is equivalent to a degree from MIT
*LOL*
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
The real kicker was this phrase:
-
Turn your Internet Explorer to http://www.mozilla.org/, and laugh. This is the product
of "thousands" of hard working open source coders. We did that same work, and
more, in-house with less than 50 people working on the codebase.
This is simply not possible. I have friends that have worked at MSFT and they state unequivocably that viewing source code from competing Open Source projects is expressly prohibited so that there is no risk of GPLed code making its way into MSFT products either accidentally or intentionally. The thought that Bill Gates would request that people look at Mozilla source even as a joke is highly unlikely.Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
Sega will now be a software company, and could write S/W for all consoles including indremeda...
The fact is selling consoles is an expensive, money losing proposition. No one (not Sony, Nintendo, or Sega) has ever made money on the actual consoles and has instead has had to use restrictive licensing practices (e.g. game developers pay a tax for each copy sold) to maintain revenues.
Considering that Indrema has plans to be friendly with the Linux community, it is unlikely that they will use restrictive licenses to gain revenues and thus may end up D.O.A. with no potential profit generator.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
You really need to think before posting. Most of the security compromises you list for Linux are _local_ compromises. That means, you must already have a shell to do them.
And your point? The Microsoft crack was most likely a Trojan (i.e. local compromise) as a opposed to deliberate network hack into the system. Secondly you are incorrect in stating that I listed mainly local compromises, there a liberal smattering of both types of compromises in my links (defaced web page count, SANS top ten list, rootshell exploits, etc).
Frankly resorting to personal attacks when it is clear that you didn't bother checking the links in my post, shows who indeed is the person who doesn't think before posting.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
If it's a outside job and the crackers beat MS' secuity, now the whole world+dog knows that MS software sucks in protecting data.
From all the articles, it looks like this was a Trojan that may have been secreted during the execution of some email attachment. Knowing MSFT, they'll probably spin this as a virus similar to Melissa or ILOVEYOU and the general public will stop blaming them.
After all, no one is calling for their heads after Melissa and ILOVEYOU even though the main reason they caused so much damage is the lack of security built into Outlook and the ease of using Virus Building Script. Instead we'll probably get a lot of hacker crackdowns with this breakin, perhaps another Kevin Mitnick type case where he got reamed for seeing Sun's Solaris source. It's very possible to see the culprits doing massive jail time for supposedly causing MSFT zillions of dollars in lost revenue by merely looking at the source like Sun did with Kevin Mitnick. This is especially possible in the current climate of UCITA and the DMCA. I wouldn't consider that a win, would you?
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
I'd expected more mature responses to MSFT being hacked than childish attacks either blaming NT like the above post or claiming that MSFT being hacked is good for Open Source like others I've seen. Frankly *nix and Windows are roughly equivalent in default security (except for OpenBSD) and only through the machinations of a good sys admin is either OS properly secured.
For those that believe *nix is somehow more inherrently secure than Windows here are a few sources that may refute that claim The major security issues in Windows are Outlook (disable preview pane, be careful with attachments) and Internet Explorer (disable Javascript). Doing that and using a firewall like ZoneAlarm is most of the securing that a typical Windows box needs. On the other hand due to the use of insecure C libraries (str* functions, *scanf functions, etc) most of the services that are enabled by default in a typical Linux install are insecure (especially RedHat the primary consumer Linux OS in the U.S.). Take a quick look at security sites like Attrition.org, CERT, SANS, rootshell, SecurityFocus, etc and check the results. Defacements of Linux sites has been rising at a steady rate and now there are more defacements of Linux sites than NT sites. CERT regularly has more Linux and Unix security advisories than for Windows. The SANS (System Administration, Networking, and Security) Institute top ten list of security holes has more entries for *nix than Windows. A quick search of the terms "linux" and "windows" on Rootshell's seearch engine come up with 84 downloadable exploits for Linux versus 39 for Windows.
The above post is not intended to be flamebait (I run Win2K but plan to reinstall Linux on my second machine so I am a Linux user) but as a counterpoint to the above post which was rated +5 when I replied to it.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
All I care about... (Score:3)
...is getting the maximum horsepower for the minimum price... everything else (with the exlusion of stability, of course) is a moot point.
by Ron Harwood (harwoodr-AT-technologist.calm) on Monday October 23, @01:58PM EST (#3),br> (User #136613 Info) http://theGEEK.org
I don't care how they get me there... as long as it's cheap and damn fast.
The above comment is pointless, clueless and adds nothing to discussing the technical merits of AMD's next generation chip design vs. Intel's. I don't understand how this completely irrelevant comment is (+3 insightful) instead of (-1 offtopic) in a technical discussion.
Frankly, I have always been of the opinion that if you have nothing to say, then don't say anything instead of shooting your mouth off and having people doubt your intelligence. There is no one forcing you to post to slashdot, so there is no reason to post irrelevant crap to technical discussions simply because you have nothing technical to add.
Just my $0.02
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
The purpose of a Software Requirements Specification is to enable the developers understand the customer's problem domain and learn what the needs of the customer are. Since most Open Source projects are written by the customer(s), it is usually redundant for them to create an SRS that describes the needs of the user.
Although an SRS is not truly necessary when creating a product where the developers are the customer it can still be beneficial for a variety of reasons including
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
Sad, how I jump at this flamebait but here goes. Your instructor is the kind of clueless academic that makes me realize that the way CS in colleges is taught seriously needs to be overhauled. Before you attempt to question my C++ creds, I will establish that I am currently using C++ to implement the server end of this project. That said, let's go over why you think Java sucks.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
Between C# and Java most of the developer mindshare for cross-platform server applications has been staked out. This language has to have a whole lot more going for it than simply being Open Source. It is battling incredible odds against entrenched languages/platforms, powerful companies with tons of research and development staff(Sun, MSFT, IBM, etc), several thousand developers, and the natural inertia that keeps people from trying anything new.
It seems to me from reading the page that their major claim to fame is that they are Open Source and as all those who have watched GNU Hurd development goes, being Open Source does not automatically imply mindshare.
PS: What the heck do they mean by the New Internet? Sounds like a rehash of every major Sun, MSFT, etc launch of the past few months/years.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
Of course anonymous speech should be held to the same standards as a publicly known speaker. Slander, Libel, and insighting violence, etc. are all exceptions as we know.
Well according to the article on Excite the ruling only affects defamation of character which is (slander/libel) and is already an exception to free speech.
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance