The problem with smart TVs is that they get designed and build and sold and then the market changes and you're stuck with all these build in apps that are pointless. Whereas if you just get a really nice TV for a cheaper price then attach a Roku, Fire Stick, Chromecast, etc, then you can update that device and get new applications and technologies far more cheaply. Especially true with the first generation of smart TVs that were impossible or very difficult to upgrade or add new channels to. Another example, the smart TV might only do 802.11b, whereas most media players under $100 are much faster and more flexible.
The bells and whistles in some cars become obsolete very quickly. Built in satellite radio service, for a service that became defunct before the auto was less than a year old... An iPhone connector but you decided to get an Android instead. Better for the auto to have some generic common or standardized connectors, then attach your own navigation system, radio system, media player, etc.
The attitude in the summary is just stupid. "Surprising that an old language"... but then ignoring that C is in second place. And really there have not been great languages coming out after Java and no realistic replacements for C. Sure, there are scripting languages but that's a different niche. Not everything that runs programs is on the Web or a PC.
The new programming paradigm that Java excels at is to stop programming and just tie together existing frameworks and libraries like it's one giant lego monolith. Of course somewhere someone has to write the stuff in those libraries; which is more Java and if you get low level enough it's C.
Python replaces some of this but comes with it's own headache (gotta make sure your customers can run it and are configured with the right versions, etc. C# has many problems and is a clumsy hybrid, and also never really caught on outside of the OSX/iOS/NeXT worlds. C++ is stuck in the middle, not quite being as easy as Java and too much feature creep to replace C. Swift is too new, not very portable, etc.
What really happens is that people have a language that works, so stick with it. Why through out ten years worth of code base just because there's something newer? An utter waste of time. The vast majority of commercial programmers never start writing code from scratch but instead are fixing bugs or adding features to an existing product.
Wow, have things gotten that cheap in the desktop world? I've never seen a useful laptop that cheap. Even towers at that price are vastly underpowered (the entry level price on a Dell or such, good enough to run a browser and not too much else). Though I agree once you buy all the accessories to add to the $300 device that it will cost a lot more in practice.
The point is not to be a PC but to be a tiny form factor device for specialized purposes, especially intend for people who need PC-style architecture because they're scared of alternatives. A streaming media stick maybe, or a hobby system, things like that. Stick it in your suitcase. The same things people would buy a Gumstix or Raspberry price only more expensive and can run Windows for a warm fuzzy. Can probably run a lot of games too.
Yes, the use case is not great because there are proven solutions that are cheaper. It's the Intel+Windows factor that they're counting on I suspect.
This assumes that time is money, which is false. That $150 comes out of one's normal salary and spending 15 hours of your own free time on this does not earn you any more or less money. To earn that $150 you have to work real hours on a real job. $150 is $150, it's a lot of money, you don't sneeze at that even if you're making a decent salary. The time is money adage only applies if you are hiring someone to set this up for you.
Next you could say $1000 is only a week's salary so don't quibble about it and just bite the bullet. But any sane person would say this is far too expensive for an OS license. There's a dividing line between what people consider as inexpensive and what is considered too expensive, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with hourly wages or comparison to cups of coffee or a price of a night out at the movies. If you've got a choice of "$400 with Windows versus $300 with Linux" the choice is not that hard for people who understand how to use Linux. The only time to pay a premium is if you get a premium product in return.
Actually that observation wasn't even true in the past. A lot of mainframes had very fast and complex I/O processors with central CPUs that weren't necessarily faster (depending upon what models you bought).
That was the plan when smart phones were new. "Don't bring your phone to the office", a simple plan and the only ones complaining were hipsters. A year later all the IT groups were scrambling to figure out how to coexist peacefully with smart phones.
This reminds me of the breakup of Yugoslavia when there was a letter to the editor in a local US newspaper. The writer was of Serbian descent who was born and raised in the US. However the letter claimed that Serbians were within their right to exclude and expel non-Serbians because otherwise they could be subject to a democracy that they disagreed with. That was the most twisted view of democracy I've seen from someone raised in a democratic country.
Defining "freedom" is hard. Ie, I want my friends and myself to be able to do what we want, but everyone else in our area still has to do what we tell them to do.
Sometimes people will declare a certain principle is freedom and then disallow even a majority vote from changing that principle; and whether that is freedom or not depends upon how strongly someone believes in that principle. Ie, no slavery is an important principle and it makes sense that a majority voting for slavery is voting against freedom. But if someone says the free market is an important principle for freedom and the majority votes for limited regulation to avoid abuse there are some who will claim that is not freedom and disallow it.
Overall there's the freedom of the individuals versus the freedom of the group and these are in conflict with each other.
Pragmatism is important for politics. Governments run by idealists run into serious problems. Idealists can take a good concept and run it into the ground, with "less is better" evolving into "zero is best".
So 20,000 libertarians move in, what's to stop 20,000 war hawks from moving in or 20,000 people in favor of regulations, etc? Eventually people need to learn to live with each other even if they have different ideas, and learn to live with policies accepted by the people as a whole.
Reminds me of the opposite strategy that has occured in not too distant past: if the other side doesn't agree with you and prevents you from having an overwhelming political majority then force them to move to a different state.
The biggest problem is that Exchange really works best with Outlook, so that corporate reliance on Exchange means that they're helping Microsoft sell Office and discourage competition. Then since corporations assume everyone uses Outlook they feel no hesitation in using Exchange features that are not portable to other clients.
Microsoft really does not support the concept of open and flexible APIs as everything they do is intended to lock in users.
Problem is that there's not enough local goods for local consumption. US used to be much more self reliant. Then we started getting cheap ass plastic goods from China. So who knows if today we can be self reliant anymore.
Yes, knowledge workers are still strong in America, the corporations just don't realize this. They think that just because a foreign company claims to be able to do everything they ask for that it will actually happen. IBM is expanding world wide because it is also much less technical than it used to be. It no longer needs as many real knowledge workers. They don't need the best workers anymore they just want the cheapest ones because they think that 4 workers for the price of one is a good deal.
Another way to fix it is to make it expensive for US companies to have all its workers overseas. Add back in tariffs (which makes free market zealots cry but we can sell those tears for a profit). Promote American made goods to American consumers. Treat any corporation with more overseas workers than domestic workers as a foreign company. Force the corporations' executives to live and work in the country where they have the most workers. Promote unionization in other countries, promote environmental laws in other countries, promote workers rights in other countries, and the desirability of moving operations overseas will dry up. Create free trade with countries that have good treatment of workers and restrict free trade with countries that exploit their workers.
It does actually. There's nerd chic now. People in the past who would never ever be called nerds are calling themselves that. The definitions of "nerd" in the past practically required them to be outcasts. I'd say a lot of the new nerds are really recovering nerds, able to fit in with mainstream culture better.
Yes but that's the state of copyright. If you tell these few people to get a clue and go away but you're still left with Disney with a lock on its own copyrights then nothing's been achieved except to kick the little guys.
Similar to patent law, if all the big players use patents to go after everyone else then it's only fair and rationale for the tiny companies to do the same. You have to fix things starting at the top.
For corporate use, it's almost all using Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Outlook, and a browser, with some less frequent use of Plan and Access. In other words, Microsoft Office is the primary thing keeping corporations on Windows. Out of those Outlook is the real sticking point because the others do very well with alternatives like Open/Libre Office. The reason Outlook is such a bitch to discard is that so many corporations sold their souls to Exchange on the servers.
However, so many corporate workers are getting calendar and mail on the smart phones. That's really digging into the "windows only" mentality.
What's needed is official IT support for Linux. I know when I use Linux under VMWare I have to be very careful about which automatic updates I accept because they have often broken my system or configuration at times. So filtering updates through IT means someone else can be the guinea pig and also be able to provide help when my system goes belly up. But it's hard enough to even get decent OSX support from IT.
Slashdot Mirror
And that's why they invented Embedded C++, to force C++ programmers to stop using certain features.
You are quite right. C# is even less portable. ("no it isn't!" say fans)
The problem with smart TVs is that they get designed and build and sold and then the market changes and you're stuck with all these build in apps that are pointless. Whereas if you just get a really nice TV for a cheaper price then attach a Roku, Fire Stick, Chromecast, etc, then you can update that device and get new applications and technologies far more cheaply. Especially true with the first generation of smart TVs that were impossible or very difficult to upgrade or add new channels to. Another example, the smart TV might only do 802.11b, whereas most media players under $100 are much faster and more flexible.
The bells and whistles in some cars become obsolete very quickly. Built in satellite radio service, for a service that became defunct before the auto was less than a year old... An iPhone connector but you decided to get an Android instead. Better for the auto to have some generic common or standardized connectors, then attach your own navigation system, radio system, media player, etc.
I put the stereo on Rhythm and Blues method myself.
The attitude in the summary is just stupid. "Surprising that an old language"... but then ignoring that C is in second place. And really there have not been great languages coming out after Java and no realistic replacements for C. Sure, there are scripting languages but that's a different niche. Not everything that runs programs is on the Web or a PC.
The new programming paradigm that Java excels at is to stop programming and just tie together existing frameworks and libraries like it's one giant lego monolith. Of course somewhere someone has to write the stuff in those libraries; which is more Java and if you get low level enough it's C.
Python replaces some of this but comes with it's own headache (gotta make sure your customers can run it and are configured with the right versions, etc. C# has many problems and is a clumsy hybrid, and also never really caught on outside of the OSX/iOS/NeXT worlds. C++ is stuck in the middle, not quite being as easy as Java and too much feature creep to replace C. Swift is too new, not very portable, etc.
What really happens is that people have a language that works, so stick with it. Why through out ten years worth of code base just because there's something newer? An utter waste of time. The vast majority of commercial programmers never start writing code from scratch but instead are fixing bugs or adding features to an existing product.
Wow, have things gotten that cheap in the desktop world? I've never seen a useful laptop that cheap. Even towers at that price are vastly underpowered (the entry level price on a Dell or such, good enough to run a browser and not too much else). Though I agree once you buy all the accessories to add to the $300 device that it will cost a lot more in practice.
The point is not to be a PC but to be a tiny form factor device for specialized purposes, especially intend for people who need PC-style architecture because they're scared of alternatives. A streaming media stick maybe, or a hobby system, things like that. Stick it in your suitcase. The same things people would buy a Gumstix or Raspberry price only more expensive and can run Windows for a warm fuzzy. Can probably run a lot of games too.
Yes, the use case is not great because there are proven solutions that are cheaper. It's the Intel+Windows factor that they're counting on I suspect.
Hobbyists. Or systems that don't need to be a full blown desktop (ie, streaming to a TV?).
That's why you keep phoning yourself.
This assumes that time is money, which is false. That $150 comes out of one's normal salary and spending 15 hours of your own free time on this does not earn you any more or less money. To earn that $150 you have to work real hours on a real job. $150 is $150, it's a lot of money, you don't sneeze at that even if you're making a decent salary. The time is money adage only applies if you are hiring someone to set this up for you.
Next you could say $1000 is only a week's salary so don't quibble about it and just bite the bullet. But any sane person would say this is far too expensive for an OS license. There's a dividing line between what people consider as inexpensive and what is considered too expensive, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with hourly wages or comparison to cups of coffee or a price of a night out at the movies. If you've got a choice of "$400 with Windows versus $300 with Linux" the choice is not that hard for people who understand how to use Linux. The only time to pay a premium is if you get a premium product in return.
Actually that observation wasn't even true in the past. A lot of mainframes had very fast and complex I/O processors with central CPUs that weren't necessarily faster (depending upon what models you bought).
That was the plan when smart phones were new. "Don't bring your phone to the office", a simple plan and the only ones complaining were hipsters. A year later all the IT groups were scrambling to figure out how to coexist peacefully with smart phones.
This reminds me of the breakup of Yugoslavia when there was a letter to the editor in a local US newspaper. The writer was of Serbian descent who was born and raised in the US. However the letter claimed that Serbians were within their right to exclude and expel non-Serbians because otherwise they could be subject to a democracy that they disagreed with. That was the most twisted view of democracy I've seen from someone raised in a democratic country.
DMCY?
Defining "freedom" is hard. Ie, I want my friends and myself to be able to do what we want, but everyone else in our area still has to do what we tell them to do.
Sometimes people will declare a certain principle is freedom and then disallow even a majority vote from changing that principle; and whether that is freedom or not depends upon how strongly someone believes in that principle. Ie, no slavery is an important principle and it makes sense that a majority voting for slavery is voting against freedom. But if someone says the free market is an important principle for freedom and the majority votes for limited regulation to avoid abuse there are some who will claim that is not freedom and disallow it.
Overall there's the freedom of the individuals versus the freedom of the group and these are in conflict with each other.
Pragmatism is important for politics. Governments run by idealists run into serious problems. Idealists can take a good concept and run it into the ground, with "less is better" evolving into "zero is best".
So 20,000 libertarians move in, what's to stop 20,000 war hawks from moving in or 20,000 people in favor of regulations, etc? Eventually people need to learn to live with each other even if they have different ideas, and learn to live with policies accepted by the people as a whole.
Reminds me of the opposite strategy that has occured in not too distant past: if the other side doesn't agree with you and prevents you from having an overwhelming political majority then force them to move to a different state.
The biggest problem is that Exchange really works best with Outlook, so that corporate reliance on Exchange means that they're helping Microsoft sell Office and discourage competition. Then since corporations assume everyone uses Outlook they feel no hesitation in using Exchange features that are not portable to other clients.
Microsoft really does not support the concept of open and flexible APIs as everything they do is intended to lock in users.
Problem is that there's not enough local goods for local consumption. US used to be much more self reliant. Then we started getting cheap ass plastic goods from China. So who knows if today we can be self reliant anymore.
And the citizens are being told to just hold on a while, trickle down is bound to happen any day now.
Yes, knowledge workers are still strong in America, the corporations just don't realize this. They think that just because a foreign company claims to be able to do everything they ask for that it will actually happen. IBM is expanding world wide because it is also much less technical than it used to be. It no longer needs as many real knowledge workers. They don't need the best workers anymore they just want the cheapest ones because they think that 4 workers for the price of one is a good deal.
Another way to fix it is to make it expensive for US companies to have all its workers overseas. Add back in tariffs (which makes free market zealots cry but we can sell those tears for a profit). Promote American made goods to American consumers. Treat any corporation with more overseas workers than domestic workers as a foreign company. Force the corporations' executives to live and work in the country where they have the most workers. Promote unionization in other countries, promote environmental laws in other countries, promote workers rights in other countries, and the desirability of moving operations overseas will dry up. Create free trade with countries that have good treatment of workers and restrict free trade with countries that exploit their workers.
Restricting workers rights to organize is a very communist thing to do :-)
It does actually. There's nerd chic now. People in the past who would never ever be called nerds are calling themselves that. The definitions of "nerd" in the past practically required them to be outcasts. I'd say a lot of the new nerds are really recovering nerds, able to fit in with mainstream culture better.
Little ball of hate.
Yes but that's the state of copyright. If you tell these few people to get a clue and go away but you're still left with Disney with a lock on its own copyrights then nothing's been achieved except to kick the little guys.
Similar to patent law, if all the big players use patents to go after everyone else then it's only fair and rationale for the tiny companies to do the same. You have to fix things starting at the top.
For corporate use, it's almost all using Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Outlook, and a browser, with some less frequent use of Plan and Access. In other words, Microsoft Office is the primary thing keeping corporations on Windows. Out of those Outlook is the real sticking point because the others do very well with alternatives like Open/Libre Office. The reason Outlook is such a bitch to discard is that so many corporations sold their souls to Exchange on the servers.
However, so many corporate workers are getting calendar and mail on the smart phones. That's really digging into the "windows only" mentality.
What's needed is official IT support for Linux. I know when I use Linux under VMWare I have to be very careful about which automatic updates I accept because they have often broken my system or configuration at times. So filtering updates through IT means someone else can be the guinea pig and also be able to provide help when my system goes belly up. But it's hard enough to even get decent OSX support from IT.
I was disappointed with Naked Lunch, so I didn't get my hopes too high this time.