Actually there was an attempted military coup in North Korea in November 2012 (Citation: http://intelnews.org/2013/03/15/01-1217/) . Looks like the Party can't trust the military anymore. Hence, we have North Korea declaring war (that they cannot possibly hope to win).
Strange the grandparent attributes the declaration of war to Us actions. The US were simply not letting North Korea get away with the same provocations they did in the past. After 60 years of bad behavior and criminal acts from North Korea the patience of the US and South Korea have finally run out. However Jeremiah Cornelius would like to ignore the kidnappings (of South Koreans and Japanese actresses), assassinations, murders, drug running, weapon proliferation, DMZ shootings and axe attacks, and brutal oppression of the NK people by the NK leadership. Instead Jeremiah continues his bankrupt crusade to demonize the US at every opportunity, by selectively choosing facts. Shame on you JC ! and your ilk.
Given the stated motivation of the perpetrators would "cyber-jihadi" be more accurate?
It shows clearly what is motivating the attackers (a desire to impose Sharia on the web - no criticism of Islam allowed, even if completely true) and it excludes those who merely are using the internet in a way the Government doesn't like (since they are not jihadis).
Note: The movie "Innocence of Muslims" is mostly factually correct - according to *Islamic* scriptures. It may have shitty production values, but it does describe Mohammed's actions accurately according to Islamic Scripture. Here's a fact check of the Innocence of Muslims movie: http://www.pi-news.org/2012/09/fact-check-the-innocence-of-the-muslims/
Now you know that the movie is not slanderous, but accurate, aren't you disgusted that Hillary Clinton and the Obama Administration used it as an excuse to cover the attack in Benghazi and hide their gunrunning to Islamic groups? (Anyone who votes for the incompetent and duplicitous Hilliary in 2016 is insane!).
Unlike most Western laws, Sharia defines "slander" is anything a Muslim doesn't want you to hear - even if completely true (actually, especially if it is *true*). Islamists do not want the West to understand the scriptures of Islam and the life of Mohammed - they want to present a whitewashed version instead because the reality of Islamic doctrine would offend Western sensibilities. That's why there are so many Islamist apologists going around using 'taqiyya' and the even more insidious 'tawriya'. Here is a citation for the meaning of these words: http://www.islam-watch.org/authors/139-louis-palme/1095-knowing-four-arabic-words-may-save-our-civilization-from-islamic-takeover.html
The actions of cyber jihadis is not often only to do vandalism but it is in-fact to provoke the reaction you predict from politicians, who will criminalize broad swathes of internet activity under 'terrorism' laws. This reaction serves the goal of Sharia by eliminating Free Speech criticism of Islam. It is the same way that Hilliary Clinton stupidly was manipulated into supporting UN Resolution 16/18 which also supports Sharia and attacks Free Speech. Please also see Stephen Coughlin's excellent analysis of the manipulation of the West at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkAZUvQAzkc
The stink is the corruption of your thinking from a lack of economic understanding and the numbers involved in the situation. What you are advocating for the US will lead to a collapse in the same way, and for many of the same reasons, as the Soviet economy collapsed in 1991. Let us pretend that you could tax the rich as your post suggests. The result is explained very nicely by Bill Whittle in "Eat the Rich": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=661pi6K-8WQ
The problem is not defence spending (as the grandparent suggested). It is entitlement spending. Take a look at the proportion of Government Spending as a fraction of GDP under Obama. We can understand some money used to buffer the credit crisis but the spending growth is *accelerating* (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending#United_States_of_America). Either he doesn't understand economics at all or he is trying to crash the system so it can be reformed (I lean toward the latter; why close the White House to tours, it saves nearly nothing compared to the four holidays the Obamas have had in the last three months; the point is to make the US people suffer in a way they notice the pain, so that the Administration will be granted a blank check/cheque of political credit to continue their ideological agenda). You can argue with me on an ideological basis but you can't argue on economics and the facts. Successive US Administrations are overspending at an unsustainable rate. This could be corrected quite easily (I believe simply raising the age for Government retirement benefits from 65 to 67 would do it overnight), but neither of the two main political parties is willing to stand up to the unreasonsable demands of voters to do it. The kind of utopian demands that you are making. However, the reality cannot be postponed indefinitely.
As far as the 1.4 T$ wars fighting a distraction war against a minimally powerful and relatively (to real genocidal leaders in Asia and Africa) harmless dictator and the Afghan Government (at least, before they were replaced by American puppets and labeled 'insurgents' so they could be lumped with the phantom group, the few dozen member 'All Queda'). Those parts can be left in for Trolling success.
Ok, now we have a worldview that is not only incorrect, it is bizarrely counter-factually conspiratorial, and then accuses me of being a troll. Dude, it is clear you have zero understanding not only of economics but also recent history, current events and global geopolitics. If all you can do is stupid demonization and fantasy theories then we can't really even begin to debate (typical of Left-wing supporters, this tactic is described here: http://frontpagemag.com/2013/jamie-glazov/bullies-how-the-lefts-culture-of-fear-and-intimidation-silences-america/). I'm sure our fellow readers with any modicum of *factual knowledge* understand how false your statements are.
The US has *always* pushed to have military bases as close to the "enemy" as possible
If by "close" you mean "within the same country". Then you are correct. If I took your statement at face value "as close to the enemy as possible", then it is false in a literal sense. The US uses small 'tripwire' forces on the border but generally stations its forces much further back. In Korea the major airbases are south of Seoul, and at Pusan (as far away from North Korea as you can get, without going swimming).
why we had so many troops in Germany when East Germany was still with the USSR
Well, I suggest you go and look at the respective NATO and Warsaw Pact Orders of Battle (including unit locations). The US was in a defensive posture and the Warsaw Pact was completely in an offensive posture. The bases the Soviets had could turn out from their bases and be over the border in minutes. It was not by choice the US spent all that money defending Europe from ungrateful Europeans. The Warsaw Pact really were poised for a rapid invasion to the Rhine, and thence through to the French Channel ports (the Soviet plans also show this was to be proceeded by a massive nuclear bombardment - despite the public statements of the Soviets to the contrary [good ol' "maskirovka" in action])
I don't buy it. Sounds more like you are making excuses for pushing your opinion as fact, when it is neither fact, nor correct.
.. and I'm not selling it. All I'm saying are the facts as I know them - and I know *a lot* about modern military history (besides formerly being in the military I have always had an particular interest in the numerical modelling of war - in fact, that is what got me into software development originally). You don't have to take my word for it, I'm not trying to base my argument on presumed authority, I'm just letting you know that I have followed the situation for a long time. Please take out a map for yourself and plot the positions of major US units and bases in the Korean theatre. See what I mean? The US forces are in theatre, and from a global perspective they are close, but from a tactical perspective they are actually not "as close" as they could possibly be.
Finally what matters to China is not US land power. That is a red herring. What matters for geopolitical power projection is not how many or where US forces are in Korea. What matters is naval and air power. In the last day the Chinese have just demonstrated a hovercraft landing with their Marines on disputed territory just 80 km off the coast of Malaysia (that is, far far south of China). They are attempting to annex all islets right up to their neighbours' coastlines so that they can extract all the resources of the South China Sea. This is a massive land grab. Perhaps the North Korea maneuver is to keep the US distracted while China pegs out the extents of its seizures.
A measly Trillion dollars for removing Saddam, fighting and defeating Al Qaeda branches in Iraq and Afghanistan, kicking out the Pakistani puppet Taliban, installing some loss-hostile regimes, scaring Gaddafi into giving up his WMD, killing bin Laden himself, and *best of all* turning much of the Muslim world from cheering 9/11 into realising that jihadis are also as hazardous for their health as ours. Then there was employment for a million US servicemen for over a decade. Then there was the huge technology spin offs that keep US companies in the forefront of innovation and keep talented US citizens employed.
These days the US will spend a little less on defense but has reduced influence because of its increasingly introspective geopolitical strategy (set by the politicians, not the military). Rather than supporting allows it sells them out (eg. Poland and Romainia on missile defence), and arms jihadis hoping to curry influence (Libya, Syria), refuses to listen to please for liberty (Iran 2009), and sells out its own values (apologizing shamefully in Cairo in 2009; Hiliary Clinton disgracefully working against the 1st Amendment rights of US citizens in UN HRC Resolution 18/18).
The Trillion dollars on wars that made not only the US but the whole world safer (imagine the chaos of the world at the moment if the jihadis had not been drawn and destroyed to the honeypot in Iraq - and don't be fooled by pop analysis, Iraq created far fewer jihadis than it destroyed).
Instead, the new leftist Administration is planning to spend 60 trillion in unfunded entitlements. Please see *the numerical facts* http://www.justfacts.com/nationaldebt.asp
So for those around the world who believe the lie that the US is bankrupting itself because of the wars it waged I would like you to examine the *figures* closely. The US military is not the source of the problem. The source of the problem are social programmes. These are large bribes made by politicians to get votes. Mostly made by the Democratic Party. The transfer of wealth from the productive sector of the US economy to the non-productive is what allows for wealth distribution and social programmes. So of this is necessary. However, the promises made far exceed the ability of those in the US who work and pay taxes (government employment is a non-contributor to this, sorry). This is what some Republicans and all Libertarians have been saying for years. Some think the conservatives are against social programmes because they are "mean, greedy old white men". No, the truth is the conservatives are numbers based (rather than primarily ideologically based like progressives/Democrats). That means the conservatives have been trying to stave off that bankruptcy. The Obama Administration has been accelerating spending far beyond what was needed for the bailout of the great recession. From a conservative point of view it looks like Obama is trying to crash the economy so that the US can be made in the image he wants (no surprise if you know who Obama's Marxist political mentors were).
So, the whole "expensive wars" and "cut the military and increase social programmes" is a diversion to keep those who are not numerically and fact focussed occupied. Please also note that while defense spending and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are massive in absolute terms, they are among the cheapest wars the US had ever fought in relative terms. This is because the US free-market economy had grown so much faster than defence spending that it made it cheap for the US to wage wars that other countries simply could not afford. You see, that is the secret to power (which China has learned). Focus less on redistribution of wealth and more on creating it for everyone (with sensible and adequate regulation and protections from exploitation, of course). As (Democratic) President Kennedy once stated in his speech, "A rising tide lifts all boats" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_rising_tide_lifts_all_boats). To bad
No. China would assume a US-friendly South Korea would dominate the poorer North Koreans, and lead to massive US buildup of ground troops at the China border.
Utterly false. The US has massively reduced forces in Korea over the last decade or so. If North Korea fell I think the DoD would leave a few people in their current bases in the South (eg. Pusan). Perhaps some small 'tripwire' forces in the North, but certainly nothing to threaten the vast expanse of China. Your statement is just not credible I'm afraid. The Chinese would take umbrage at any US forces only because it means they could not bully a unified Korea (as it has been increasingly doing to its other neighbours, eg. Vietnam).
Funny how you bash China for supporting a country the US embargoed, but not the US for "causing" the poverty through embargo. Does the same hold true for Cuba?
I've been to Cuba. The Government there is horrific and should not have free reign. The Cubans are sick of their Government and hold no grudges against Americans (although they think the Americans are hostile to them; because of the Cuban Government propaganda they don't fully understand why the US wants to remove the Cuban Government). The Cubans would love to go to America, they were so desperate to do so that they would go in boats and tires until the US stopped them. The Cubans would also love to ditch their government and have real lives and jobs. However, they live in a communist dictatorship that brutally oppresses them if they say this. The people have to watch what they say or they can be tortured or killed. Is it moral for the US to impose the embargo in order to exert pressure against the Cuban Communist Government? well, I believe it is. Socialist systems simply don't work. I little bit of social welfare works, up to the limit of what the productive sector produces is fine. But look at Venezuela and Cuba and now the US, social programmes that spend more than the productive sector can produce are ultimately unsustainable and collectivist ownership stifles innovation and merely reduce everyone to an equal level of poverty. The State owns the buildings in Cuba, the state can't afford to maintain them and so beautiful old buildings in Havana collapse daily because no-one owns them so they don't maintain them. For this reason I think the US has some justification in trying to remove the Cuban Government. If only US citizens could go to Cuba themselves, they would see a beautiful people with great potential being stifled by a collectivist Government. They would understand that left-wing dictatorships are just as bad (and sometimes worse) than right-wing ones. Unfortunately the US people are moving against individualism and instead moving toward collectivism. That's why the US economy is going down the tubes (the unfunded liabilities of government entitlements and social programmes completely dwarf defence spending - yet the leftists government and media only talk about reducing the latter; all aspects of spending [including defence] should be looked at for trimming waste).
The North Koreans are not poor because of the embargo (which doesn't restrict what the NKs can produce themselves; and doesn't really restrict what China can bring in), they are poor because centrally planned economies are less efficient than individualist ones (eg. a mostly free market system with sensible regulation). The US embargo makes sense because the NKs would otherwise widely disperse their high-quality counterfeit US dollars, and their proven narco trade (provides money for elites), and their weapons (they are bad enough in exporting ballistic missiles, and will soon proliferate nuclear weapons beyond Iran if they could). Note: the previous leader of North Korea had no problems getting fresh lobster and champagne shipped to his luxury train daily as he entertained 'captivated' young ladies. The elites of North Korea have no problem getting electronics and luxury cars. The problems of North Korea are not the e
Ah, you are changing your tune from a neo-imperialist agenda of "giving" NK to China (quote: "Then give NK to China. What's the problem with that? Promise piles of "aid" to NK, and let China annex or run it.") to not giving it to China. It's a bit confusing what your position actually is. Surely a re-unified Korea is the one that makes practical and moral sense? yes? and NK is not in a position to do this, yes? that means the South Koreans must do it, yes? and China's meddling (which aggravated the poverty of the North) means it ought to contribute to reconstruction (as in, an Asian "Marshall Plan") given the fact that they are now so wealthy.
Notice how the alarmist meme-de-jour is now "global climate change" and not "global warming" as it was for the last decade? nor "global cooling" as it was in the 1970's? by using "global climate change" any claim can now be made - doesn't matter whether there are temperature rises or falls the elites can pass any regulations and taxes (eg. carbon taxes etc) they like and the meme supports their increasing control over you. Sorry to take the soapbox here, I just wanted to point out that now that the data has shown the global surface temperatures have stabilised over the last decade (we're in an interglacial period but still around 8 degrees C cooler than the average of geological history) that the wording used by those that seek to control us has already adapted. A nice smooth transition of meme without fuss, so we won't notice. I'm just pointing this out for folks that still have their eyes open. The rest of you can stay in your peaceful slumber while your mental prison gets re-arranged around you.
If your software doesn't have to work or provide utility to human society then you can make it take zero resources and run in zero time. Now it turns out that Java is *very* fast. It turns out that Java's abstractions are up to the developer. N00bs, and those on the lecture circuit, add way to much abstractions. I add the right amount. *one layer of indirection for parts that may be extended*. That is all that is needed.
Furthermore, through use of Java and XML you can rapidly built systems through massive re-use (and nifty stuff like JAXB which takes much of the pain of using XML away). This allows equally massive *savings* in energy through vastly reduced development time.
You know, something that has been solved long ago in the form of LISP code-generating macros. Sigh.
LISP is a nice language. Good luck getting everyone to use it. Other languages were invented for a reason, they were easier for teams of non-fanbois to be productive and get real shit done. Deal with it (please).
So, nice try at grinding your pro-LISP axe. But a bit of a fail considering the holistic situation (both in terms of energy use and software development reality).
Yet another fork of display technology projects for FOSS?
Are they trying to solve the problem by parallelizing the problem: break it into lots of little pieces and work simultaneously on them to arrive at a solution sooner?
Or is this a case of egos, where "those guys don't know anything I'll start anew and do it right"?
What matters is delivered stable technology. It doesn't have to be perfect or massively extendable: just stable, performant and delivered.
I believe NK belongs to "Korea". The Chinese have *zero* right to take that away.
What needs to happen is reunification but where the South does not have the complete burden; since the Chinese are responsible for propping up that evil system that would have collapsed long ago they ought to contribute financially to normalization of NK. I can't see the Chinese agreeing to this though.
So you are smiling with "mild content". Would be be so kind as to go past your posture of 'unearned moral' superiority and point out the historical fallacies in my presentation of facts that I understand them? Please don't appeal to emotional aspects, I tried to avoid them in my statements. "Just the facts please, ma'am".
It's been an entertaining discussion - but I think we're at an impasse - I think I've demonstrated some scenarios in which Java either lacks expressive tools or fails to offer the same guarantees that native C++ can offer.
... and I agree with you. For low latency applications there is clearly an issue. While you are correct in saying Java is not good for everything, and have provided an example, it usually happens that most Slashdotters take the specialized requirements you describe and then decide Java is junk and C++ should be the first choice for modern development. In that way many developers do themselves as disservice.
Next time I'll try and state more clearly that Java isn't good for everything, just most things IMHO (I believed I stated that up front, but will have to be more explicit).
Thanks for your clear explanations and pleasant style. Well met Mr Thinly Sliced!
China wants North Korea as a buffer zone. Having a reunified Korea lead by the democratic South is not what it wants - that's why it continues to prop up the Norks, despite the latter being insane.
China doesn't want to be an enemy. It is a competitor though, so in some sense it already feels as if it is in a shadow war with the US (and the rest of the World, in fact). Here's an article discussing the huge amount of espionage that the Chinese Government is organizing: http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htintel/articles/20130328.aspx
China knows it cannot win a kinetic war against the US and its allies. It is instead planning to set up all the pieces beforehand (eg. technology, modern arms and a knowledge of US military secrets) and have a strong regional force so that the US will hesitate to intervene in any dispute. The plan of China is already to enforce its ridiculous "9-line" claim, by force if necessary.
However, China is concerned about the supply lines to keep its industry going. It is contributing to global peacekeeping like the Somalia anti-piracy operation (which also helps train the PLA Navy for eventual power projection in the Indian Ocean). If China stops trampling on the Exclusive Economic Zone of its neighbours then its rise will be a positive thing. At the moment it is running around roughshod over its neighbours, so it is increasingly viewed negatively by its neighbours (who used to be neutral or friendly). That is why Vietnam asks US *military forces* to visit (no doubt a surprise for any readers with their mind still stuck in the paradigms of the 1970's), of course the US is still in Japan and Korea. Then we have Burma/Myanmar peeved with the Chinese (and their crap quality weaponry) so turning toward the Russians; then we have the Philippines who kicked the US out asking to have the US back. The funny thing was that China was afraid of a US-lead anti-China alliance even though none existed. By stupidly throwing its weight around it has in-fact got it's neighbours annoyed and they are asking the US to guarantee their protection (thereby starting to create such an anti-China alliance). I know that the Chinese feel that it is "their time to take their rightful place in the World", and this is somewhat true, but they are so terribly clumsy about it they don't realise they are acting as their own worst enemy.
Note to Chinese readers, we like you and don't want to fight you, so please chill a little. We know you don't want to be pushed around, please realise no-one else wants China to push them around either. Compete hard, but compete fair.:)
Who knows what is really going on in North Korea. At least South Korea and the US have finally learned that lesson that appeasement of the Norks is not a permanent solution and doesn't move along the road to peace. Hopefully the US will one day wake up that appeasement also won't work for the Muslim Brotherhood either. Fortunately the Egyptian people are fighting back to retain the few liberties they have, taking it to "morality police" that have been whipping women: http://www.raymondibrahim.com/from-the-arab-world/egypt-morality-police-thrashed-for-whipping-woman/
Hmm. In Vietnam the US destroyed the Vietcong and withdrew. Nearly half a decade later the North Vietnamese continued their original aim, invade South Vietnam. In terms of South East Asia it was an eventual defeat for the US-led Free World. In terms of the overall strategic geopolitical situation it was a huge win. Communist expansion was stopped. Eventually, with no more victories Soviet Communism collapsed (although it did leave its evil seed in many Universities around the World).
In Iraq the US defeated Saddam, smashed Al Qaeda and the Mahdi Army. Installed a new democratic regime (very imperfect, but that is always going to be a problem in an Islamic country due to the political nature of Islam). The strategic mistake the US made was to withdraw and leave too few forces, and an even bigger strategic mistake was to accept an Iraqi Constitution where Sharia was enshrined. This was a fatal mistake that will haunt the Iraqi people (although it already affects the Assyrians, the Islamicist have nearly completed their ethnic cleansing of them ; and yet, the Obama Administration says nothing about the rights of freedom for all people).
In Afghanistan a few hundred US Special Forces with Afghan Northern Alliance soldiers toppled the Pakistani puppet regime called the Taliban. Smashed Al Qaeda, killed jihadis that were drawn to the honeypot from all over the World. Made the same mistake as Iraq in allowing a Constitution with Sharia.
The US never leaves the battlefield in defeat. The problem is they win well enough that they can't see the point in staying. So they leave (probably prematurely, but hey, it makes good campaign speeches even if it makes zero geopolitical sense).
North Korea is not like Vietnam (Russia and China are weaker relative to US power than they were previously). Furthermore, the South Korean Army is much much better equipped than the North. In any fight the Northern regime will surely topple. China might like to intervene but in the age of tactical nuclear weapons their main advantage, massed infantry assaults, is not a strength.
In short, learn proper history please (not the pop history that doesn't match the *actual* facts). The North Koreans would come apart even faster than the massive Iraqi Army if push comes to shove. The only real question is how much damage they could do to Seoul before they went down. Note also that the South apparently isn't that keen on reunification - the evil regime in the North have turned the country into a complete basket case that the South are not that keen to have to fix.
I think the complexity of writing a Java compiler makes it a terrible choice for constructing DSLs.
Well, you have a choice of Groovy or one of the other languages if you must invent a DSL for yourself. The performance hit of those generally is noticeable.
The Oracle HPC paper put the overhead at 1-1.5 (i.e. Java at 40-50% of the gcc Fortran version). They used Fortran as a benchmark for Java. There were no areas of outperformance and that was with a rather mediocre Fortran compiler. Your own paper doesn't support your theory. Choose a benchmark favorable to Java and in many areas it does well.
I believe the debate was whether Java was faster than C++. In some areas Java is faster than C++. Nothing is faster than FORTRAN (which is the reason it is still used for time critical applications). This is due to FORTRAN's lack of things like pointer-aliasing that prevent some optimizations in C++. The paper supports my point:)... and the JVM has only gotten faster in the last five years.
I'm not arguing development time isn't important. I'm arguing what the word "fast language" is not about development time. Cars are important, refrigerators are important. The fact that a fridge is important does not make it a car.
Sorry man, I don't grok the intent of the last sentence. Could you please clarify?
you get development speed faster than C++ without taking order of magnitude performance hits and pick up mostly cross platform; I'd agree with you.
That was my point. So, happily, we agree. For enterprise work the speed to develop is usually more important than the runtime performance (although that can't suck too much).
The things that make Java safer than C/C++ for commercial development are the things that knock it out of the game for systems programming.
Not really. The reason Java is not used for systems programming is that there are good enough languages already in systems programming and an enormous legacy codebase that you would need to integrate with. In theory you could write an operating system in Java (with a sprinkling of C/assembler for register access; just as the Linux kernel has a sprinkling of ASM, IIRC). The reason Java is not used is not because of performance, it is because replacing the millions of lines of C just to change development language is not sufficient.
Just to pick a simple example where Java is a problem... C++ is far better at dealing casually with data structures at the bit level where the packing / unpacking needs to happen fast. I wouldn't want to try and write a router in Java.
I've done lots of device control in Java where I had to do bit-level packing and unpacking (eg. controlling traffic speed radars, shift-register based LED signs, NTCIP signs, control the timing registers and readout of astronomically priced astronomical CCD cameras, control GPS clocks, etc). Java was perfectly fine and perfectly performant at this. You can't write any old Java and have it perform well. You do have to use the profiler to check you are not slowing anything down (fortunately the awesome JVisualVM comes free with the JDK, or can be downloaded separately from http://visualvm.java.net/).
With the exception of pretty good cross platform, Java is a compromise. There is a lot of advantage in the standard language being pretty good at a lot of things and not fantastic at any of them. But let's not pretend this tradeoffs aren't happening.
All engineering is about compromise. I'm not saying Java is the perfect language in any domain. I'm saying that it is a good-enough language for any domain that makes it sensible as a first 'go to' choice. IMHO you should won't go wrong if in your solution architecture you select Java as your choice of development language and only then consider other languages if Java is inadequate. The benefits of re-use of your existing Java code, and re-use of the huge number of libraries (for just about any problem domain) outweigh (IMHO) many of the alternatives. In my work I have never encountered a performance problem with Java
But that's not a java library - it's a java veneer on top of a native library.
And C++ is a veneer on top of some hand-crafted assembly in its library. And all are a veneer over whatever was used to build the operating system. The argument is not particularly relevant. The reason it is a veneer over a native library is that the native libraries already exist and are being re-used - this is common pattern for all application level languages.
I notice you didn't mention realtime Java. I'll ask again - if the Java VM doesn't have jitter - why do the realtime specification and VM's exist? (since realtime is all about predictability).
Yes, realtime is all about predictability - not throughput. The VM has jitter, just like the operating system. The JVM spec is so you don't miss deadlines, no matter what you scheduled period is.
Did you perchance use JVisualVM to look at what your program was doing? what was it doing when spending time? sometimes the hotspot will become obvious (eg. a library call that you can use a faster alternative to).
When tracing the VM using sysprof I can see the VM is trapping a signal to do it's housekeeping every X iterations which halts all running threads. This is on both OpenJDK1.8 and Suns JDK 1.8.
What was the delay? It should have been sub-millisecond. It is definitely not the source of the 40 ms delay that you see.
I'm not sure whether you are aware of this, but to get low jitter you must yield. Otherwise you get a thread hogging the VM and it doesn't get a chance to do its housekeeping. You can get better performance by putting a try { Thread.sleep(1) } catch(InterruptedException ex) {// Ignore the interruption } in you main loop. That yields and lets the VM, other apps, operating system do their housekeeping periodically. If you don't do this it appears the VM will give you more CPU but then pulls the rug out from under you when it can no longer wait to process all the things it has accumulated. By introducing a little jitter you stave off large pauses. This worked for me, at least, and I couldn't believe how simple it was to do.
One thing I forgot to mention. You've seen the JOAL library, yes? That's what I'm using for audio. Works great. I get to stay with the niceness of Java, get 3D sound effects, and its portable. As I mentioned in an earlier post, the strength of Java is in its vast wealth of libraries.
Unnecessary memory allocations increase the cache pressure on the CPU introducing extra memory stalls and forcing the VM to interrupt threads.
I intend my processes to be interruptable. That gives me low jitter.
Lowest audio output latency with Java in no-allocation loop is around 40 ms on a core2 2.4Ghz - same machine with C++ and I'm down in the sub-milliseconds. It's that big a difference.
That is a big difference indeed. Is it possible for you to go into a little more detail of why you get 40 ms in Java? How granular are your units of work.
Well, I'm sure it's good enough for you, but when you start putting some actual logic into your flight sim for your fluid dynamics and attempt to do this with low latency you'll start to see the jitter problems with Java.
Nobody solves the Navier Stokes equations in real time. Flight models are surprisingly light weight (in runtime use, not in complexity) in fact there used to be a demo using the NASA F-16 flight model in very old versions of Java that ran very smoothly (one of the old JoGL demos on an old JVM and old machines, and ran beautifully). Again, I think you are buying into a myth that C++ is required for even something as heavy as a flight sim (where a lot more than mere flight modelling goes on).
Where I see jitter is in the IEEE 1278.1 comms. The jitter is caused by the network - and this is vastly below the latency across the intertubes. I also use a dead reckoning algorithm to compensate for dropouts, latency/jitter spikes. Please also note that at a 60 Hz frame rate a human cannot distinguish any visual activity that occurs faster than 17 ms. In general, most people are ok to around 40 ms. It is only when you get spikes much longer than this that people notice. So that is why your result seems surprising. Another interesting metric is that to render a quarter-million triangle F-16C Block 52 model and a GLSL shader physics based atmospheric transmission model with a Intel 2600k chip and a Radeon 5970 (dual-GPU, but quite old) I can get over 700 fps (limited by the GPU, not Java and not the CPU). The CPU core responsible is mostly twiddling its thumbs during this activity. The other cores have more work doing the network protocol and aerodynamics, but it is all pretty light weight (all AI activity is performed on the server, so the client machine doesn't have much to do).
There's a reason that modern games are still written in C++ rather than a managed language - when you need to extract performance in a predictable way you want determinism. Managed languages can't provide that guarantee.
The IL-2 Sturmovik simulator was mostly written in Java. It did use C++ for heavy lifting because the JVMs of the era were slow. That is simply not the case anymore. Minecraft is a very popular multiplayer game written in Java. Bohemia Interactive's Take On Helicopters and Armed Assault III have Java APIs for modding, so at least some parts must be in Java (even if an integration layer) - which means when you attach Java it still runs with acceptable jitter (because of course, the jitter is determined by the 'weakest link' not the average of components). And as I will repeat, my *experience* with using Java for a game is that the CPU-components run as smooth as silk and I have low jitter. The CPU is always waiting for the GPU (in fact, some of my synchronization is doing deliberate yields [introducing jitter] while waiting for the GPU to be ready for the next frame).
So, the fact that you are having *huge* 40 ms latencies sounds *extremely* fishy to me. So I'm curious about what you are doing that makes the latency so enormous. I'm saying latency here based on the word you used. You do know that jitter is variation in latency yes? It is jitter that is the killer, not latency. Both jitter and latency can be compensated for by proper buffering, of course. Are you streaming from disk without any buffering or a
* Java's GUI toolkit (swing) allocates memory all over the place meaning all the hard work you put into a no-allocation loop in your code is wasted when using a JTabbedPane allocates massive amounts of memory just by moving your mouse over it.
This is true if you are dealing with smartphones. In that case GCJ is an alternative, or C++. However, it is hard to find a *current* system that is so memory limited that this is an issue.
* Related to the point above - in code with strict scheduling deadlines, you can't use dynamic memory allocation (this goes for C++ as well as Java), but using any of the standard Java libraries and/or objects allocates memory all over the place. You can use things like the Javolution collections to get around these issues.
Multimedia is soft realtime. You simply spend memory to read ahead. If you are talking about controlling stepping motors in software (which I've done in the past), then it is a problem. If you are controlling stepping motor device driver hardware then it is not a problem. Sorry, I just can't see a case where you need a hard realtime requirement and C++ would make a difference compared to Java. You would always do any hard realtime in hardware when you are worried about microsecond jitter (since it is the *operating system* that screws your jitter up, the difference in userspace Java vs C++ is neglible if you have idle cores ready to respond to work)
But let us suppose for a moment you do have a hard-realtime requirement in your software. Then I would say, "Go ahead and use C++ if you think it would make a difference". It turns out that the amount of software that would fit this niche is small and getting smaller. But again I will remind you that the difference in determinism between C++ and Java is negligible if you have ever cared to measure them on a modern desktop O/S. It is the O/S that is the major source of jitter that will break your realtime requirements, not the software stack you are using.
* Java suffers from predictability problems. Jitter introduced by the system management threads and mutexes causes stalls to threads that you have no control over. There is a realtime Java VM, but it's not really "Java" as you can't use standard Java libraries and classes.
All multi-threading systems suffer this, do they not? This is one of the reasons that increasing the number of threads does not increase performance linearly (in general) even if you have one core per thread. However, the efficiency loss of multi-threading doesn't matter because total throughput increases. As I mentioned in my earlier post, having 8 cores at 20% utilization has vastly better jitter than the comparable single threaded C++ program in the same niche (DCS:World). I would assume that there are plans to add threads to the C++ codebase of that product, but I would imagine it is so complex to do (retrofit to an existing C++ program) that even after several years it has not yet happened. One cannot simply dismiss the superior language constructs for synchronization when it comes to development effort. By having these (portable) language constructs it makes it easier to get massive multi-threading working correctly in Java relative to C++, and hence the jitter goes down and total throughout goes up. Conclusion, for less effort you get better total throughput with Java (assuming your problem can be parallelized; as most complex applications can).
* Java doesn't allow management of packed arrays of structs. This means you can't do things like cache optimization of data structures. You can kind of get there by using nio buffers and ugly map to offset style things, but it's just ugly and unwieldy. Cost for no reason.
I'm glad you concede that NIO can solve the problem. Yes, they are slightly unnatural compared with the simplicity of most of Java. However, I would argue that they are a lot more safer and portable than fudging around with poi
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Actually there was an attempted military coup in North Korea in November 2012 (Citation: http://intelnews.org/2013/03/15/01-1217/) . Looks like the Party can't trust the military anymore. Hence, we have North Korea declaring war (that they cannot possibly hope to win).
Strange the grandparent attributes the declaration of war to Us actions. The US were simply not letting North Korea get away with the same provocations they did in the past. After 60 years of bad behavior and criminal acts from North Korea the patience of the US and South Korea have finally run out. However Jeremiah Cornelius would like to ignore the kidnappings (of South Koreans and Japanese actresses), assassinations, murders, drug running, weapon proliferation, DMZ shootings and axe attacks, and brutal oppression of the NK people by the NK leadership. Instead Jeremiah continues his bankrupt crusade to demonize the US at every opportunity, by selectively choosing facts. Shame on you JC ! and your ilk.
Yes. Brilliant!
Given the stated motivation of the perpetrators would "cyber-jihadi" be more accurate?
It shows clearly what is motivating the attackers (a desire to impose Sharia on the web - no criticism of Islam allowed, even if completely true) and it excludes those who merely are using the internet in a way the Government doesn't like (since they are not jihadis).
Note: The movie "Innocence of Muslims" is mostly factually correct - according to *Islamic* scriptures. It may have shitty production values, but it does describe Mohammed's actions accurately according to Islamic Scripture. Here's a fact check of the Innocence of Muslims movie:
http://www.pi-news.org/2012/09/fact-check-the-innocence-of-the-muslims/
Now you know that the movie is not slanderous, but accurate, aren't you disgusted that Hillary Clinton and the Obama Administration used it as an excuse to cover the attack in Benghazi and hide their gunrunning to Islamic groups? (Anyone who votes for the incompetent and duplicitous Hilliary in 2016 is insane!).
Unlike most Western laws, Sharia defines "slander" is anything a Muslim doesn't want you to hear - even if completely true (actually, especially if it is *true*). Islamists do not want the West to understand the scriptures of Islam and the life of Mohammed - they want to present a whitewashed version instead because the reality of Islamic doctrine would offend Western sensibilities. That's why there are so many Islamist apologists going around using 'taqiyya' and the even more insidious 'tawriya'. Here is a citation for the meaning of these words:
http://www.islam-watch.org/authors/139-louis-palme/1095-knowing-four-arabic-words-may-save-our-civilization-from-islamic-takeover.html
The actions of cyber jihadis is not often only to do vandalism but it is in-fact to provoke the reaction you predict from politicians, who will criminalize broad swathes of internet activity under 'terrorism' laws. This reaction serves the goal of Sharia by eliminating Free Speech criticism of Islam. It is the same way that Hilliary Clinton stupidly was manipulated into supporting UN Resolution 16/18 which also supports Sharia and attacks Free Speech. Please also see Stephen Coughlin's excellent analysis of the manipulation of the West at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkAZUvQAzkc
The stink is the corruption of your thinking from a lack of economic understanding and the numbers involved in the situation. What you are advocating for the US will lead to a collapse in the same way, and for many of the same reasons, as the Soviet economy collapsed in 1991. Let us pretend that you could tax the rich as your post suggests. The result is explained very nicely by Bill Whittle in "Eat the Rich":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=661pi6K-8WQ
The problem is not defence spending (as the grandparent suggested). It is entitlement spending. Take a look at the proportion of Government Spending as a fraction of GDP under Obama. We can understand some money used to buffer the credit crisis but the spending growth is *accelerating* (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending#United_States_of_America). Either he doesn't understand economics at all or he is trying to crash the system so it can be reformed (I lean toward the latter; why close the White House to tours, it saves nearly nothing compared to the four holidays the Obamas have had in the last three months; the point is to make the US people suffer in a way they notice the pain, so that the Administration will be granted a blank check/cheque of political credit to continue their ideological agenda). You can argue with me on an ideological basis but you can't argue on economics and the facts. Successive US Administrations are overspending at an unsustainable rate. This could be corrected quite easily (I believe simply raising the age for Government retirement benefits from 65 to 67 would do it overnight), but neither of the two main political parties is willing to stand up to the unreasonsable demands of voters to do it. The kind of utopian demands that you are making. However, the reality cannot be postponed indefinitely.
As far as the 1.4 T$ wars fighting a distraction war against a minimally powerful and relatively (to real genocidal leaders in Asia and Africa) harmless dictator and the Afghan Government (at least, before they were replaced by American puppets and labeled 'insurgents' so they could be lumped with the phantom group, the few dozen member 'All Queda'). Those parts can be left in for Trolling success.
Ok, now we have a worldview that is not only incorrect, it is bizarrely counter-factually conspiratorial, and then accuses me of being a troll. Dude, it is clear you have zero understanding not only of economics but also recent history, current events and global geopolitics. If all you can do is stupid demonization and fantasy theories then we can't really even begin to debate (typical of Left-wing supporters, this tactic is described here: http://frontpagemag.com/2013/jamie-glazov/bullies-how-the-lefts-culture-of-fear-and-intimidation-silences-america/). I'm sure our fellow readers with any modicum of *factual knowledge* understand how false your statements are.
The US has *always* pushed to have military bases as close to the "enemy" as possible
If by "close" you mean "within the same country". Then you are correct. If I took your statement at face value "as close to the enemy as possible", then it is false in a literal sense. The US uses small 'tripwire' forces on the border but generally stations its forces much further back. In Korea the major airbases are south of Seoul, and at Pusan (as far away from North Korea as you can get, without going swimming).
why we had so many troops in Germany when East Germany was still with the USSR
Well, I suggest you go and look at the respective NATO and Warsaw Pact Orders of Battle (including unit locations). The US was in a defensive posture and the Warsaw Pact was completely in an offensive posture. The bases the Soviets had could turn out from their bases and be over the border in minutes. It was not by choice the US spent all that money defending Europe from ungrateful Europeans. The Warsaw Pact really were poised for a rapid invasion to the Rhine, and thence through to the French Channel ports (the Soviet plans also show this was to be proceeded by a massive nuclear bombardment - despite the public statements of the Soviets to the contrary [good ol' "maskirovka" in action])
I don't buy it. Sounds more like you are making excuses for pushing your opinion as fact, when it is neither fact, nor correct.
.. and I'm not selling it. All I'm saying are the facts as I know them - and I know *a lot* about modern military history (besides formerly being in the military I have always had an particular interest in the numerical modelling of war - in fact, that is what got me into software development originally). You don't have to take my word for it, I'm not trying to base my argument on presumed authority, I'm just letting you know that I have followed the situation for a long time. Please take out a map for yourself and plot the positions of major US units and bases in the Korean theatre. See what I mean? The US forces are in theatre, and from a global perspective they are close, but from a tactical perspective they are actually not "as close" as they could possibly be.
Finally what matters to China is not US land power. That is a red herring. What matters for geopolitical power projection is not how many or where US forces are in Korea. What matters is naval and air power. In the last day the Chinese have just demonstrated a hovercraft landing with their Marines on disputed territory just 80 km off the coast of Malaysia (that is, far far south of China). They are attempting to annex all islets right up to their neighbours' coastlines so that they can extract all the resources of the South China Sea. This is a massive land grab. Perhaps the North Korea maneuver is to keep the US distracted while China pegs out the extents of its seizures.
A measly Trillion dollars for removing Saddam, fighting and defeating Al Qaeda branches in Iraq and Afghanistan, kicking out the Pakistani puppet Taliban, installing some loss-hostile regimes, scaring Gaddafi into giving up his WMD, killing bin Laden himself, and *best of all* turning much of the Muslim world from cheering 9/11 into realising that jihadis are also as hazardous for their health as ours. Then there was employment for a million US servicemen for over a decade. Then there was the huge technology spin offs that keep US companies in the forefront of innovation and keep talented US citizens employed.
These days the US will spend a little less on defense but has reduced influence because of its increasingly introspective geopolitical strategy (set by the politicians, not the military). Rather than supporting allows it sells them out (eg. Poland and Romainia on missile defence), and arms jihadis hoping to curry influence (Libya, Syria), refuses to listen to please for liberty (Iran 2009), and sells out its own values (apologizing shamefully in Cairo in 2009; Hiliary Clinton disgracefully working against the 1st Amendment rights of US citizens in UN HRC Resolution 18/18).
The Trillion dollars on wars that made not only the US but the whole world safer (imagine the chaos of the world at the moment if the jihadis had not been drawn and destroyed to the honeypot in Iraq - and don't be fooled by pop analysis, Iraq created far fewer jihadis than it destroyed).
Instead, the new leftist Administration is planning to spend 60 trillion in unfunded entitlements. Please see *the numerical facts*
http://www.justfacts.com/nationaldebt.asp
So for those around the world who believe the lie that the US is bankrupting itself because of the wars it waged I would like you to examine the *figures* closely. The US military is not the source of the problem. The source of the problem are social programmes. These are large bribes made by politicians to get votes. Mostly made by the Democratic Party. The transfer of wealth from the productive sector of the US economy to the non-productive is what allows for wealth distribution and social programmes. So of this is necessary. However, the promises made far exceed the ability of those in the US who work and pay taxes (government employment is a non-contributor to this, sorry). This is what some Republicans and all Libertarians have been saying for years. Some think the conservatives are against social programmes because they are "mean, greedy old white men". No, the truth is the conservatives are numbers based (rather than primarily ideologically based like progressives/Democrats). That means the conservatives have been trying to stave off that bankruptcy. The Obama Administration has been accelerating spending far beyond what was needed for the bailout of the great recession. From a conservative point of view it looks like Obama is trying to crash the economy so that the US can be made in the image he wants (no surprise if you know who Obama's Marxist political mentors were).
So, the whole "expensive wars" and "cut the military and increase social programmes" is a diversion to keep those who are not numerically and fact focussed occupied. Please also note that while defense spending and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are massive in absolute terms, they are among the cheapest wars the US had ever fought in relative terms. This is because the US free-market economy had grown so much faster than defence spending that it made it cheap for the US to wage wars that other countries simply could not afford. You see, that is the secret to power (which China has learned). Focus less on redistribution of wealth and more on creating it for everyone (with sensible and adequate regulation and protections from exploitation, of course). As (Democratic) President Kennedy once stated in his speech, "A rising tide lifts all boats" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_rising_tide_lifts_all_boats). To bad
No. China would assume a US-friendly South Korea would dominate the poorer North Koreans, and lead to massive US buildup of ground troops at the China border.
Utterly false. The US has massively reduced forces in Korea over the last decade or so. If North Korea fell I think the DoD would leave a few people in their current bases in the South (eg. Pusan). Perhaps some small 'tripwire' forces in the North, but certainly nothing to threaten the vast expanse of China. Your statement is just not credible I'm afraid. The Chinese would take umbrage at any US forces only because it means they could not bully a unified Korea (as it has been increasingly doing to its other neighbours, eg. Vietnam).
Funny how you bash China for supporting a country the US embargoed, but not the US for "causing" the poverty through embargo. Does the same hold true for Cuba?
I've been to Cuba. The Government there is horrific and should not have free reign. The Cubans are sick of their Government and hold no grudges against Americans (although they think the Americans are hostile to them; because of the Cuban Government propaganda they don't fully understand why the US wants to remove the Cuban Government). The Cubans would love to go to America, they were so desperate to do so that they would go in boats and tires until the US stopped them. The Cubans would also love to ditch their government and have real lives and jobs. However, they live in a communist dictatorship that brutally oppresses them if they say this. The people have to watch what they say or they can be tortured or killed. Is it moral for the US to impose the embargo in order to exert pressure against the Cuban Communist Government? well, I believe it is. Socialist systems simply don't work. I little bit of social welfare works, up to the limit of what the productive sector produces is fine. But look at Venezuela and Cuba and now the US, social programmes that spend more than the productive sector can produce are ultimately unsustainable and collectivist ownership stifles innovation and merely reduce everyone to an equal level of poverty. The State owns the buildings in Cuba, the state can't afford to maintain them and so beautiful old buildings in Havana collapse daily because no-one owns them so they don't maintain them. For this reason I think the US has some justification in trying to remove the Cuban Government. If only US citizens could go to Cuba themselves, they would see a beautiful people with great potential being stifled by a collectivist Government. They would understand that left-wing dictatorships are just as bad (and sometimes worse) than right-wing ones. Unfortunately the US people are moving against individualism and instead moving toward collectivism. That's why the US economy is going down the tubes (the unfunded liabilities of government entitlements and social programmes completely dwarf defence spending - yet the leftists government and media only talk about reducing the latter; all aspects of spending [including defence] should be looked at for trimming waste).
The North Koreans are not poor because of the embargo (which doesn't restrict what the NKs can produce themselves; and doesn't really restrict what China can bring in), they are poor because centrally planned economies are less efficient than individualist ones (eg. a mostly free market system with sensible regulation). The US embargo makes sense because the NKs would otherwise widely disperse their high-quality counterfeit US dollars, and their proven narco trade (provides money for elites), and their weapons (they are bad enough in exporting ballistic missiles, and will soon proliferate nuclear weapons beyond Iran if they could). Note: the previous leader of North Korea had no problems getting fresh lobster and champagne shipped to his luxury train daily as he entertained 'captivated' young ladies. The elites of North Korea have no problem getting electronics and luxury cars. The problems of North Korea are not the e
Ah, you are changing your tune from a neo-imperialist agenda of "giving" NK to China (quote: "Then give NK to China. What's the problem with that? Promise piles of "aid" to NK, and let China annex or run it.") to not giving it to China. It's a bit confusing what your position actually is. Surely a re-unified Korea is the one that makes practical and moral sense? yes? and NK is not in a position to do this, yes? that means the South Koreans must do it, yes? and China's meddling (which aggravated the poverty of the North) means it ought to contribute to reconstruction (as in, an Asian "Marshall Plan") given the fact that they are now so wealthy.
True about the video.
Notice how the alarmist meme-de-jour is now "global climate change" and not "global warming" as it was for the last decade? nor "global cooling" as it was in the 1970's? by using "global climate change" any claim can now be made - doesn't matter whether there are temperature rises or falls the elites can pass any regulations and taxes (eg. carbon taxes etc) they like and the meme supports their increasing control over you. Sorry to take the soapbox here, I just wanted to point out that now that the data has shown the global surface temperatures have stabilised over the last decade (we're in an interglacial period but still around 8 degrees C cooler than the average of geological history) that the wording used by those that seek to control us has already adapted. A nice smooth transition of meme without fuss, so we won't notice. I'm just pointing this out for folks that still have their eyes open. The rest of you can stay in your peaceful slumber while your mental prison gets re-arranged around you.
If your software doesn't have to work or provide utility to human society then you can make it take zero resources and run in zero time. Now it turns out that Java is *very* fast. It turns out that Java's abstractions are up to the developer. N00bs, and those on the lecture circuit, add way to much abstractions. I add the right amount. *one layer of indirection for parts that may be extended*. That is all that is needed.
Furthermore, through use of Java and XML you can rapidly built systems through massive re-use (and nifty stuff like JAXB which takes much of the pain of using XML away). This allows equally massive *savings* in energy through vastly reduced development time.
You know, something that has been solved long ago in the form of LISP code-generating macros. Sigh.
LISP is a nice language. Good luck getting everyone to use it. Other languages were invented for a reason, they were easier for teams of non-fanbois to be productive and get real shit done. Deal with it (please).
So, nice try at grinding your pro-LISP axe. But a bit of a fail considering the holistic situation (both in terms of energy use and software development reality).
Yet another fork of display technology projects for FOSS?
Are they trying to solve the problem by parallelizing the problem: break it into lots of little pieces and work simultaneously on them to arrive at a solution sooner?
Or is this a case of egos, where "those guys don't know anything I'll start anew and do it right"?
What matters is delivered stable technology. It doesn't have to be perfect or massively extendable: just stable, performant and delivered.
I believe NK belongs to "Korea". The Chinese have *zero* right to take that away.
What needs to happen is reunification but where the South does not have the complete burden; since the Chinese are responsible for propping up that evil system that would have collapsed long ago they ought to contribute financially to normalization of NK. I can't see the Chinese agreeing to this though.
So you are smiling with "mild content". Would be be so kind as to go past your posture of 'unearned moral' superiority and point out the historical fallacies in my presentation of facts that I understand them? Please don't appeal to emotional aspects, I tried to avoid them in my statements. "Just the facts please, ma'am".
It's been an entertaining discussion - but I think we're at an impasse - I think I've demonstrated some scenarios in which Java either lacks expressive tools or fails to offer the same guarantees that native C++ can offer.
... and I agree with you. For low latency applications there is clearly an issue. While you are correct in saying Java is not good for everything, and have provided an example, it usually happens that most Slashdotters take the specialized requirements you describe and then decide Java is junk and C++ should be the first choice for modern development. In that way many developers do themselves as disservice.
Next time I'll try and state more clearly that Java isn't good for everything, just most things IMHO (I believed I stated that up front, but will have to be more explicit).
Thanks for your clear explanations and pleasant style. Well met Mr Thinly Sliced!
China wants North Korea as a buffer zone. Having a reunified Korea lead by the democratic South is not what it wants - that's why it continues to prop up the Norks, despite the latter being insane.
China doesn't want to be an enemy. It is a competitor though, so in some sense it already feels as if it is in a shadow war with the US (and the rest of the World, in fact). Here's an article discussing the huge amount of espionage that the Chinese Government is organizing:
http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htintel/articles/20130328.aspx
China knows it cannot win a kinetic war against the US and its allies. It is instead planning to set up all the pieces beforehand (eg. technology, modern arms and a knowledge of US military secrets) and have a strong regional force so that the US will hesitate to intervene in any dispute. The plan of China is already to enforce its ridiculous "9-line" claim, by force if necessary.
However, China is concerned about the supply lines to keep its industry going. It is contributing to global peacekeeping like the Somalia anti-piracy operation (which also helps train the PLA Navy for eventual power projection in the Indian Ocean). If China stops trampling on the Exclusive Economic Zone of its neighbours then its rise will be a positive thing. At the moment it is running around roughshod over its neighbours, so it is increasingly viewed negatively by its neighbours (who used to be neutral or friendly). That is why Vietnam asks US *military forces* to visit (no doubt a surprise for any readers with their mind still stuck in the paradigms of the 1970's), of course the US is still in Japan and Korea. Then we have Burma/Myanmar peeved with the Chinese (and their crap quality weaponry) so turning toward the Russians; then we have the Philippines who kicked the US out asking to have the US back. The funny thing was that China was afraid of a US-lead anti-China alliance even though none existed. By stupidly throwing its weight around it has in-fact got it's neighbours annoyed and they are asking the US to guarantee their protection (thereby starting to create such an anti-China alliance). I know that the Chinese feel that it is "their time to take their rightful place in the World", and this is somewhat true, but they are so terribly clumsy about it they don't realise they are acting as their own worst enemy.
Note to Chinese readers, we like you and don't want to fight you, so please chill a little. We know you don't want to be pushed around, please realise no-one else wants China to push them around either. Compete hard, but compete fair. :)
It turns out that before Christmas there was an attempted coup in North Korea:
http://www.prepperpodcast.com/alleged-coup-attempt-against-north-korean-leader-in-pyongyang/#axzz2Otcit6Ei (translated from Korean)
Who knows what is really going on in North Korea. At least South Korea and the US have finally learned that lesson that appeasement of the Norks is not a permanent solution and doesn't move along the road to peace. Hopefully the US will one day wake up that appeasement also won't work for the Muslim Brotherhood either. Fortunately the Egyptian people are fighting back to retain the few liberties they have, taking it to "morality police" that have been whipping women:
http://www.raymondibrahim.com/from-the-arab-world/egypt-morality-police-thrashed-for-whipping-woman/
Hmm. In Vietnam the US destroyed the Vietcong and withdrew. Nearly half a decade later the North Vietnamese continued their original aim, invade South Vietnam. In terms of South East Asia it was an eventual defeat for the US-led Free World. In terms of the overall strategic geopolitical situation it was a huge win. Communist expansion was stopped. Eventually, with no more victories Soviet Communism collapsed (although it did leave its evil seed in many Universities around the World).
In Iraq the US defeated Saddam, smashed Al Qaeda and the Mahdi Army. Installed a new democratic regime (very imperfect, but that is always going to be a problem in an Islamic country due to the political nature of Islam). The strategic mistake the US made was to withdraw and leave too few forces, and an even bigger strategic mistake was to accept an Iraqi Constitution where Sharia was enshrined. This was a fatal mistake that will haunt the Iraqi people (although it already affects the Assyrians, the Islamicist have nearly completed their ethnic cleansing of them ; and yet, the Obama Administration says nothing about the rights of freedom for all people).
In Afghanistan a few hundred US Special Forces with Afghan Northern Alliance soldiers toppled the Pakistani puppet regime called the Taliban. Smashed Al Qaeda, killed jihadis that were drawn to the honeypot from all over the World. Made the same mistake as Iraq in allowing a Constitution with Sharia.
The US never leaves the battlefield in defeat. The problem is they win well enough that they can't see the point in staying. So they leave (probably prematurely, but hey, it makes good campaign speeches even if it makes zero geopolitical sense).
North Korea is not like Vietnam (Russia and China are weaker relative to US power than they were previously). Furthermore, the South Korean Army is much much better equipped than the North. In any fight the Northern regime will surely topple. China might like to intervene but in the age of tactical nuclear weapons their main advantage, massed infantry assaults, is not a strength.
In short, learn proper history please (not the pop history that doesn't match the *actual* facts). The North Koreans would come apart even faster than the massive Iraqi Army if push comes to shove. The only real question is how much damage they could do to Seoul before they went down. Note also that the South apparently isn't that keen on reunification - the evil regime in the North have turned the country into a complete basket case that the South are not that keen to have to fix.
I think the complexity of writing a Java compiler makes it a terrible choice for constructing DSLs.
Well, you have a choice of Groovy or one of the other languages if you must invent a DSL for yourself. The performance hit of those generally is noticeable.
Many thanks :)
The Oracle HPC paper put the overhead at 1-1.5 (i.e. Java at 40-50% of the gcc Fortran version). They used Fortran as a benchmark for Java. There were no areas of outperformance and that was with a rather mediocre Fortran compiler. Your own paper doesn't support your theory. Choose a benchmark favorable to Java and in many areas it does well.
I believe the debate was whether Java was faster than C++. In some areas Java is faster than C++. Nothing is faster than FORTRAN (which is the reason it is still used for time critical applications). This is due to FORTRAN's lack of things like pointer-aliasing that prevent some optimizations in C++. The paper supports my point :) ... and the JVM has only gotten faster in the last five years.
I'm not arguing development time isn't important. I'm arguing what the word "fast language" is not about development time. Cars are important, refrigerators are important. The fact that a fridge is important does not make it a car.
Sorry man, I don't grok the intent of the last sentence. Could you please clarify?
you get development speed faster than C++ without taking order of magnitude performance hits and pick up mostly cross platform; I'd agree with you.
That was my point. So, happily, we agree. For enterprise work the speed to develop is usually more important than the runtime performance (although that can't suck too much).
The things that make Java safer than C/C++ for commercial development are the things that knock it out of the game for systems programming.
Not really. The reason Java is not used for systems programming is that there are good enough languages already in systems programming and an enormous legacy codebase that you would need to integrate with. In theory you could write an operating system in Java (with a sprinkling of C/assembler for register access; just as the Linux kernel has a sprinkling of ASM, IIRC). The reason Java is not used is not because of performance, it is because replacing the millions of lines of C just to change development language is not sufficient.
Just to pick a simple example where Java is a problem... C++ is far better at dealing casually with data structures at the bit level where the packing / unpacking needs to happen fast. I wouldn't want to try and write a router in Java.
I've done lots of device control in Java where I had to do bit-level packing and unpacking (eg. controlling traffic speed radars, shift-register based LED signs, NTCIP signs, control the timing registers and readout of astronomically priced astronomical CCD cameras, control GPS clocks, etc). Java was perfectly fine and perfectly performant at this. You can't write any old Java and have it perform well. You do have to use the profiler to check you are not slowing anything down (fortunately the awesome JVisualVM comes free with the JDK, or can be downloaded separately from http://visualvm.java.net/).
With the exception of pretty good cross platform, Java is a compromise. There is a lot of advantage in the standard language being pretty good at a lot of things and not fantastic at any of them. But let's not pretend this tradeoffs aren't happening.
All engineering is about compromise. I'm not saying Java is the perfect language in any domain. I'm saying that it is a good-enough language for any domain that makes it sensible as a first 'go to' choice. IMHO you should won't go wrong if in your solution architecture you select Java as your choice of development language and only then consider other languages if Java is inadequate. The benefits of re-use of your existing Java code, and re-use of the huge number of libraries (for just about any problem domain) outweigh (IMHO) many of the alternatives. In my work I have never encountered a performance problem with Java
But that's not a java library - it's a java veneer on top of a native library.
And C++ is a veneer on top of some hand-crafted assembly in its library. And all are a veneer over whatever was used to build the operating system. The argument is not particularly relevant. The reason it is a veneer over a native library is that the native libraries already exist and are being re-used - this is common pattern for all application level languages.
I notice you didn't mention realtime Java. I'll ask again - if the Java VM doesn't have jitter - why do the realtime specification and VM's exist? (since realtime is all about predictability).
Yes, realtime is all about predictability - not throughput. The VM has jitter, just like the operating system. The JVM spec is so you don't miss deadlines, no matter what you scheduled period is.
Did you perchance use JVisualVM to look at what your program was doing? what was it doing when spending time? sometimes the hotspot will become obvious (eg. a library call that you can use a faster alternative to).
When tracing the VM using sysprof I can see the VM is trapping a signal to do it's housekeeping every X iterations which halts all running threads. This is on both OpenJDK1.8 and Suns JDK 1.8.
What was the delay? It should have been sub-millisecond. It is definitely not the source of the 40 ms delay that you see.
I'm not sure whether you are aware of this, but to get low jitter you must yield. Otherwise you get a thread hogging the VM and it doesn't get a chance to do its housekeeping. You can get better performance by putting a try { Thread.sleep(1) } catch(InterruptedException ex) { // Ignore the interruption } in you main loop. That yields and lets the VM, other apps, operating system do their housekeeping periodically. If you don't do this it appears the VM will give you more CPU but then pulls the rug out from under you when it can no longer wait to process all the things it has accumulated. By introducing a little jitter you stave off large pauses. This worked for me, at least, and I couldn't believe how simple it was to do.
One thing I forgot to mention. You've seen the JOAL library, yes? That's what I'm using for audio. Works great. I get to stay with the niceness of Java, get 3D sound effects, and its portable. As I mentioned in an earlier post, the strength of Java is in its vast wealth of libraries.
Unnecessary memory allocations increase the cache pressure on the CPU introducing extra memory stalls and forcing the VM to interrupt threads.
I intend my processes to be interruptable. That gives me low jitter.
Lowest audio output latency with Java in no-allocation loop is around 40 ms on a core2 2.4Ghz - same machine with C++ and I'm down in the sub-milliseconds. It's that big a difference.
That is a big difference indeed. Is it possible for you to go into a little more detail of why you get 40 ms in Java? How granular are your units of work.
Well, I'm sure it's good enough for you, but when you start putting some actual logic into your flight sim for your fluid dynamics and attempt to do this with low latency you'll start to see the jitter problems with Java.
Nobody solves the Navier Stokes equations in real time. Flight models are surprisingly light weight (in runtime use, not in complexity) in fact there used to be a demo using the NASA F-16 flight model in very old versions of Java that ran very smoothly (one of the old JoGL demos on an old JVM and old machines, and ran beautifully). Again, I think you are buying into a myth that C++ is required for even something as heavy as a flight sim (where a lot more than mere flight modelling goes on).
Where I see jitter is in the IEEE 1278.1 comms. The jitter is caused by the network - and this is vastly below the latency across the intertubes. I also use a dead reckoning algorithm to compensate for dropouts, latency/jitter spikes. Please also note that at a 60 Hz frame rate a human cannot distinguish any visual activity that occurs faster than 17 ms. In general, most people are ok to around 40 ms. It is only when you get spikes much longer than this that people notice. So that is why your result seems surprising. Another interesting metric is that to render a quarter-million triangle F-16C Block 52 model and a GLSL shader physics based atmospheric transmission model with a Intel 2600k chip and a Radeon 5970 (dual-GPU, but quite old) I can get over 700 fps (limited by the GPU, not Java and not the CPU). The CPU core responsible is mostly twiddling its thumbs during this activity. The other cores have more work doing the network protocol and aerodynamics, but it is all pretty light weight (all AI activity is performed on the server, so the client machine doesn't have much to do).
There's a reason that modern games are still written in C++ rather than a managed language - when you need to extract performance in a predictable way you want determinism. Managed languages can't provide that guarantee.
The IL-2 Sturmovik simulator was mostly written in Java. It did use C++ for heavy lifting because the JVMs of the era were slow. That is simply not the case anymore. Minecraft is a very popular multiplayer game written in Java. Bohemia Interactive's Take On Helicopters and Armed Assault III have Java APIs for modding, so at least some parts must be in Java (even if an integration layer) - which means when you attach Java it still runs with acceptable jitter (because of course, the jitter is determined by the 'weakest link' not the average of components). And as I will repeat, my *experience* with using Java for a game is that the CPU-components run as smooth as silk and I have low jitter. The CPU is always waiting for the GPU (in fact, some of my synchronization is doing deliberate yields [introducing jitter] while waiting for the GPU to be ready for the next frame).
So, the fact that you are having *huge* 40 ms latencies sounds *extremely* fishy to me. So I'm curious about what you are doing that makes the latency so enormous. I'm saying latency here based on the word you used. You do know that jitter is variation in latency yes? It is jitter that is the killer, not latency. Both jitter and latency can be compensated for by proper buffering, of course. Are you streaming from disk without any buffering or a
* Java's GUI toolkit (swing) allocates memory all over the place meaning all the hard work you put into a no-allocation loop in your code is wasted when using a JTabbedPane allocates massive amounts of memory just by moving your mouse over it.
This is true if you are dealing with smartphones. In that case GCJ is an alternative, or C++. However, it is hard to find a *current* system that is so memory limited that this is an issue.
* Related to the point above - in code with strict scheduling deadlines, you can't use dynamic memory allocation (this goes for C++ as well as Java), but using any of the standard Java libraries and/or objects allocates memory all over the place. You can use things like the Javolution collections to get around these issues.
Multimedia is soft realtime. You simply spend memory to read ahead. If you are talking about controlling stepping motors in software (which I've done in the past), then it is a problem. If you are controlling stepping motor device driver hardware then it is not a problem. Sorry, I just can't see a case where you need a hard realtime requirement and C++ would make a difference compared to Java. You would always do any hard realtime in hardware when you are worried about microsecond jitter (since it is the *operating system* that screws your jitter up, the difference in userspace Java vs C++ is neglible if you have idle cores ready to respond to work)
But let us suppose for a moment you do have a hard-realtime requirement in your software. Then I would say, "Go ahead and use C++ if you think it would make a difference". It turns out that the amount of software that would fit this niche is small and getting smaller. But again I will remind you that the difference in determinism between C++ and Java is negligible if you have ever cared to measure them on a modern desktop O/S. It is the O/S that is the major source of jitter that will break your realtime requirements, not the software stack you are using.
* Java suffers from predictability problems. Jitter introduced by the system management threads and mutexes causes stalls to threads that you have no control over. There is a realtime Java VM, but it's not really "Java" as you can't use standard Java libraries and classes.
All multi-threading systems suffer this, do they not? This is one of the reasons that increasing the number of threads does not increase performance linearly (in general) even if you have one core per thread. However, the efficiency loss of multi-threading doesn't matter because total throughput increases. As I mentioned in my earlier post, having 8 cores at 20% utilization has vastly better jitter than the comparable single threaded C++ program in the same niche (DCS:World). I would assume that there are plans to add threads to the C++ codebase of that product, but I would imagine it is so complex to do (retrofit to an existing C++ program) that even after several years it has not yet happened. One cannot simply dismiss the superior language constructs for synchronization when it comes to development effort. By having these (portable) language constructs it makes it easier to get massive multi-threading working correctly in Java relative to C++, and hence the jitter goes down and total throughout goes up. Conclusion, for less effort you get better total throughput with Java (assuming your problem can be parallelized; as most complex applications can).
* Java doesn't allow management of packed arrays of structs. This means you can't do things like cache optimization of data structures. You can kind of get there by using nio buffers and ugly map to offset style things, but it's just ugly and unwieldy. Cost for no reason.
I'm glad you concede that NIO can solve the problem. Yes, they are slightly unnatural compared with the simplicity of most of Java. However, I would argue that they are a lot more safer and portable than fudging around with poi