Just ignore them and treat them as a non-entity when it comes to any international cooperation.
Incorrect. Your approach would work if Iranians kept to themselves. They don't. They created and arm Hezbollah in Lebanon, permanently distabilising that state and cotinually threatening Israeli civilians. They used to support the terrorist organuisation Hamas (although there has been a falling out recently). Iran infiltrated Iraq during the outsting of Saddam and introduced shaped penetrator weapons for killing US troops. They supported Moqtada Al Sadr's Mahdi Army causing chaos in Iraq. They supply and fund Bashir Al Assad's brutal regime killing over 30,000 people in Syria. They provide rockets and drones to Hezbollah, used to start the 2006 war and recently flying a drone into Israel towards the reactor at Dimona. The Iranian Quds Force has been caught performing or training terrorist acts against Israeli civilians in Bulgaria, Georgia, India, Argentina, and Thailand (where the Iranian cell were caught). Oh yeah, and the pronouncements from time to time where officials state that Israel should be wiped off the face of the earth.
Once Iran gets a nuke it won't get better (and make no mistake, despite their obfuscation all the evidence points for them working toward a capability for a weapon, and the times that Ahmadinejad and the generals slip up and actually say so in public [despite it supposed to be a secret]). Once Iran has a nuke it will almost certainly invade and annex Bahrain and several islands in the straight of Hormuz. There will be a nuclear arms in the Arabian/Persian Gulf as Saudi Arabia, the UA, Kuwait etc all get nukes so they don't share the same fate. Letting Iran get nukes is far far worse than stopping them (eg. via repeated and thorough air strikes on their production facilities).
The last time the Iranian public got serious about instituting governmental changes was in 1979
Incorrect, the public wanted a change in 2009 with the Green Revolution http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009%E2%80%932010_Iranian_election_protests
This was brutally (and that word is both accurate and not used lightly here) suppressed by the fascist religious government and their Basiji thugs. Leading protest organizers were not tried and thrown in jail, they were executed for "waging war against God". Please check your facts before you post on Slashdot in defence of the indefensible Iranian religio-fascist state.
The hardline Islamists played the protesters for fools in 1979. While the protesters were busy holding US hostages and spouting clever slogans the Islamists were actually organizing themselves to take over the government.
Correct. The Iranian popular revolution was usurped by a theocratic "counter-revolution". Ordinary Iranians I meet and hang out with love their country and are proud of its history. They absolutely *hate* their government but have no way to get them out of office (the elections are not democratic, free or fair) and because the goverment believes they are on a mission from god they believe they have the right to use unlimited force on their civilians (and the civilians of other countries).
People go on about Muslim extremists being a tiny minority within the Muslim community so why don't these non-violent Muslims actually make an attempt to nullify the violent extremists in their midst? If they don't try to stand up to the minority damaging the entire Muslim faith then don't expect any sympathy, understanding, or help from anyone.
The Muslims that do stand up are killed for not being "muslim enough". You simply can't appease muslim extremists (eg. wahhabis and salafis). There is no concession we can make that will stop their violence. They will always seek to impose islam and sharia around the globe. Hence they must be resisted and, more importantly, de
Bullshit. You wanna see the real historical facts? How about you see this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7ByJb7QQ9U to get some reality in your thinking.
Then consider why the Israelis treat Gazan's for advanced procedures in Israeli hospitals despite the rockets coming from Gaza to the civilians in Sderot and Ashkelon. There are extremists on both sides (although the Israeli Government deals with Israeli extremists using the courts; compared to Hamas throwing Fatah supporters off buildings [check Youtube for the video]) yet you choose to use a libel of "progrom". See this fellow for why you are completely and utterly wrong and why you are being played for a fool: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIesXORjBps http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TA3OzSCdCUk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xU9CauJP4Pg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Gzyeo1Z1I4
You think you have a humanitarian conscience and are defending the poor Palestinians but thanks to some slick propaganda you have the aggressor backwards and are defending an intolerant, fascist, theocratic movement (Hamas). I bet you would like to see the Palestinian "One State" solution come to pass where they push every last Jew (and even the bulk of Israelis who are effectively modern and secular) into the sea. Your morality is backwards and I hope you take the time to examine the *historical* facts to get it all sorted out. I'm not anti-Palestinian by any means (having been there), nor anti-Israeli - but I do recognize your statements and woefully ignorant about the historical and contemporary facts on the ground. You are looking at the situation by squinting your eyes to fit your preconception - open your eyes and examine the object facts where they can be found.
Oh yeah, "poor Palestinians". How come they can afford to buy iPhones for twice the normal price yet it is not even available in Israeli? Citation: http://www.jpost.com/Sci-Tech/Article.aspx?id=287940 Simply put, you have been suckered to believing their propaganda "victim" line. Sucker.
Actually the US withheld munitions from Israel at the start of the 1967 conflict (when Israel struck first after seeing the Egyptians massing for an attack). This has prompted the Israelis to develop their own arms industry, which is now the most technologically advanced in the World. Talk about "blowback".
> Iranian drones recently were used to spy on Israeli nuclear facilities
Hezbollah launched Iranian-built drones to provoke confrontation with Israel. The target was southern Israel and possibly the reactor at Dimona. This was a symbolic mission, all Israel's nukes are probably hidden at other places (eg. Ramat David) so it was more for "show" than "spying". Hezbollah would not have done this without their paymaster's (Iran) assent. My belief is that this raid was to try and distract from the fact that Hezbollah and Iran have both sent fighters into Syria to support the brutal repression of the Al Assad regime - and they are getting heat for it. Hezbollah poses as a party for the common man yet it has revealed itself as a mere puppet of Iran (not really news there) that is happy to send snipers to kill Syrian civilians going about their daily business.
So I believe the article summary is a little misleading. The drone was not on a spy mission, it seemed to be a propaganda mission really.
> While Iran does not have a world-class military like the United States, it does have the capabilities to cause damage if it wants to.
Iran can cause damage in the same way that a stubbed toe does. Annoying but relatively inconsequential. There was a report yesterday that even the air force of the United Arab Emirates can take out the air force of Iran. What would be painful for the US is a ground invasion (although there a contingency plans for this I don't believe that the US intends a ground invasion), and the economic shock where the price of oil goes up on jitters, again. Hmm, so oil companies and traders make more money and everyone else pays more - see a trend here? Fortunately Saudi Arabia (Iran's real arch-foe) would try and mitigate by pumping more oil to contain price rises, as it has done in the past to prevent too much pain to the West (not entirely altruistic, of course, too much pain and modern nuke plants make more sense than fossil fuel ones).
> Are their deaths "acceptable" because they knowingly accepted additional risk to their persons when they volunteered for military service?
What planet are you on? the danger is part of the contract that a volunteer serviceman accepts in exchange for good employment, pensions, all sorts of benefits, educational programmes, medical care, training etc etc. I'm an ex-serviceman (from my own country) and fully knew what I was signing on for - all my comrades did to. That doesn't mean we had a deathwish, it is just a factor of the job. However, your statement is wolly-headed bullshit. It is not a matter of whose lives are worth more. It is a matter that military personnel over the World understand that it is their job to shield the rest of the populace from harm's way - and that can take a degree of sacrifice on several ways (from hardship to physical risk).
> Far more Americans have been killed and wounded in stupid foreign wars than have been killed by Muslim terrorists attacking targets in the USA.
Surely you have sufficient imagination to understand what would have happened if the US had not responded to the attacks on it, and had not gone for the root of the problem (as in troublesome or potentially troublesome countries). Would you prefer the US had waited and fought every battle on its soil while the jihadis trained uninterrupted in their madrassas in Afghanistan and Pakistan (and while Saddam threatened neighbours and committed genocide againsts his Shia and Kurdish countrymen)? Are you so anti-Western in outlook that you can't see the good that has come from those engagements. One of the best things from those wars is that the people of the Middle East could see Al Qaeda for you they really are. Al Qaeda went from heroes resisting the US into the crazed zealots in the perception of Middle Easterners. Being associated with Al Qaeda is no longer spoken with pride and reverence and is now an insult. That is one of the best long-term benefits of those wars. It is so important to win the long-term mind game and those wars helped it far more than they hindered it (even if the political left refuse to see reason on this).
>The idea that people from Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia would travel thousands of miles and give up their lives to kill U.S. citizens simply because they hate our lifestyle and religions is ludicrous.
Ok, here you show total ignorance of the Wahhabi and Salafist doctrines. You statement is verifiably false. They do hate Western liberal civilization for its own sake. Why was Malala Yousafzai shot? her attacker said because they wanted to stop Western ideals (as in women's rights and the education of girls). It is part of their doctrine. The overall doctrine is to restore the Caliphate and subjugate the entire world to Islamic Rule (Islam means "submission", after all). Now while I have zero problem with Muslims I do take umbrage at their doctrines. All Muslims believe that sooner or later Islam will take over the world, some believe in helping this process along by any means possible. The restoration of the Caliphate is completely incompatible with Western civilization as we know it (womens rights, free speech, homosexuals rights, womens education, etc). The jihadis believe they are "doing God's work" and it is completely justified to travel across the globe and perform homicide bombings. If you don't understand this then you haven't been paying attention to what they have been saying (especially when we get peeks behind closed doors).
> He didn't read The Constitution, get angry because "There's too much freedom in America" and then decide to attack.
Any non-Islamic person or country is a target. In fact, any Muslim who is not "islamic enough" also is a legitimate target for attack (hence the Shia vs Sunni battles raging all over the place at the moment). America (and the West) will always be seen as a legitimate target for attack until it becomes an Islamic state. So yeah, they do see "too much freedom in America". Again, if you are unaware of th
> I'd argue that Iraq was a distraction at best, though.
Good points. While your above statement on Iraq is a common view (and hence, often repeated) I believe it is wrong. Even without the WMD fiasco I believe it was entirely morally justified in removing Saddam Hussein's clearly *evil* regime. The great Christopher Hitchens thinks so too, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ke2OLLlPho (plus please check out some of the other Youtube videos where he talks about Iraq since he visited there a number of times - eg. his horrible account of the mass graves and getting covered in "people dust" that stuck to his sunscreen).
Getting rid of Saddam stopped him waging war on his neighbours (although the attack on Iran was encouraged by the US; but also consider Iraq's attack on Kuwait and determination to get it back when the opportunity presented itself again) and the genocides committed against his own Shia population and the Kurds (where he did use nerve gas WMDs). So I think it is pretty hard to argue against the war in Iraq, especially as it now puts the civilized world on a good footing to confront the messianic WMD ambitions of Iran (and Iran is a real threat to Western liberal civilization if you have been following its political statements at all).
Actually, despite the massively unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, it is because the US chose to fight jihadis on foreign soil. Both Iraq and (especially) Afghanistan are fights out of the way of the general US populace and suck up jihadis from all over the World into a meat grinder where NATO has the complete upper hand. Despite the "if you kill on you'll just anger more" bullshit the fighting overseas has actually worked and killed many of the enemies of civilization.
As long as you keep killing jihadis overseas and have moderate security checks you'll be reasonably safe (nothing is perfectly safe). There is no need to accept the humiliation of the TSA security theatre. It is not the TSA that has kept you safe, it is the killing of the violent extremists overseas that has - they are drawn like moths to a flame - this was a very smart move of the US to do this (even if most people don't grok it and the wars remain deeply unpopular due to superficial 'reasons'). The West is at war at the moment not against terror, but against the revival of a Caliphate that will not accept the progress of the Enlightenment. That is what is at stake (and has nothing to do with meekly accepting the fascism of the TSA).
> Longer than Oracle Java, I'd bet good money.
There is very little actual difference between 'Oracle' Java and OpenJDK. They share the same source base. The primary difference is legal: license conditions and ownership.
lol. I've had to write Java applications to run on cheap single board computers that have the same amount of RAM as a PS3 (that is, fsck all by modern standards - so little you'd have trouble buying such a small amount for a PC these days). The Job Security is the fact it runs anywhere (both a large run of hardware scales, and operating systems).
> The "Write Once Run Everywhere" idea is a good one, but it will never be realized by Java.
As a practitioner in the field I have to disagree with you. Too bad you're an AC so we can't debate this properly and you can provide better evidence for your assertion. The rest of your post is without merit - it is hyperbole, since it either applies to all software or ignores the fact that the Free Software OpenJDK is where the real innovation is and Oracle has been shown not to hold the reigns.
Incorrect. They cannot sue OpenJDK. Sun had an explicit grant in the license for their JDK which allows compatible implementations to use all their patents. OpenJDK was created under these conditions. The restriction is that the trademark "Java" cannot be used unless you have passed the Test Compatibility Kit to ensure that the Java Write Once Run Anywhere promise is upheld. This is what shafted Microsoft's incompatible implementation in year's past (since it broke that promise to users).
Google were sued by Oracle for breaching copyright (in a clearly ridiculous case). This does not apply to OpenJDK because it was created under the Gnu General Public License (GPL). So OpenJDK will remain free forever - which is the whole point of the GPL (companies can't change their mind and shaft users; Stallman foresaw that possibility after his printer driver travails with Xerox way back in 1980).
So be happy, you can confidently rely on OpenJDK being around for decades.
It will also be awesome when OpenJDK is ported to Android (it'll probably never make it to iOS due to Apple blocking it, which is a real shame). The IcedRobot project is attempting to do this. Just image, if you could write your application in Java and it would work nearly seamlessly on all the Windows, Linux, Unix, Mac, BSD and Android devices you have to look after. Sure, there are gotchas on each platform but you are usually 99% of the way there (at least, that has been my experience) and your unit and integration tests allow you to quickly find and address any platform quirks.
For all its flaws (and it certainly has them) Java's goal of having a single enterprise-quality language (and, far more importantly, a broad amount of *standardized* libraries ) available on all platforms is a great thing. Only those companies with an vested interest in keeping the IT world silo-ed in islands resist such standardization. Sure, innnovate in your own languages but don't try and balkanize or block standard Java on your platform. Most of us want to amortize their development investment across multiple platforms (and the broadest swathe of the market), and making us use niche tools just for only your platform is painful for us. Our ideal is to develop once and sell everywhere. Portability is what made C great, and for modern development is the single most important feature of Java as a language for huge-scale development projects (nothing else comes close; other languages are portable but their libraries are often not).
Go RedHat!
ps. queue the Java haters. For me the language is less important than the goal: Write Once Run Everywhere (& Test Everywhere, this is the real world after all). Skilled Java developers can get pretty damn close to this ideal.
The make more money is probably not in more OS sales. It is more likely that moving people onto Win8 means people are more likely to purchase software through Microsoft's Store where they get a cut. That is way more money. It also explains why Win8 is so cheap - they're trying to move people into their Store (and get that cut of *all* the action as Apple does).
They can't 'spin hay into gold' without people to do it for them (since often the person hiring has a different set of skills than you provide). If you are skilled they need you at least as much as you need them.
Plus, with regard to the 'gold' thing, apart from behemoths, most companies will not last long without productive people (some companies only have enough to make payroll for a few months).
I also believe that there are more companies out there than truly skilled individuals. It is easier for a good individual to get a good job than for a good company to fill all positions with good individuals. That means there is a 'balance of power' in hiring that is not tilted too much either way.
VirtualBox, VMWare and Parallels all have hardware accelerated graphics modes. The DirectX/OpenGL API level is limited and you can't usually use more than 512 MB of VideoRAM but for many games it is ok - just don't try running DCS:World/DCS:A-10C or LockOn:Flaming Cliffs (all resource hungry combat flight simulators) on them.
You are right that no recent game will run well with software rendering (old games like those in MAME are ok though). You are wrong that VM environments only have software rendering. VMs are generally great for intense GPU, CPU and network use, they just suck really bad for disk I/O (so don't virtualize your database server if you have a decent DB workload).
VMWare and Parallels definitely support hardware accelerated video. Although there are some restrictions like the graphics API level (eg DX9 features) and limited amount of VRAM that can be accessed (usually 512MB no matter how much your hardware has). For many games this is enough.
> Iran has bent over backwards to accommodate UN (i.e. USA) demands for access to its facilities, but EVERY TIME Iran has compromised, the USA and Israel create another hoop for them to jump through.
False. Iran routinely denies international inspectors access to sites of interest. Right now they are cleaning up the Parchin site because it appears it has evidence of nuclear weapons research. They are systematically removing the soil (visible by satellite). They wouldn't need to do this is they weren't working on weapons. They also were found to have developed a computer simulation for the explosion needed for a fission trigger. Iran wants nuclear weapons and is lying about it. Iran doesn't feel the need to obey international norms - they are on a "mission from Allah", after all. It appears that the Iranian Prime Minister Ahmadinejad personally feels that a nuclear confrontation with Israel would being the return of the 12th "hidden" imam. Once Iran has nukes they would not be afraid of their proxies (ya know the terrorists Hezbollah) from using them if it killed all the Jews as the escatological writings of Islam state. Even worse, once Iran gets a bomb then the Saudis, Egypt and UAE will feel the need to develop them to counter Iran. Incidentally, once Iran gets a bomb they will almost certainly invade and annex Bahrain - under the cozy cover of their nuclear umbrella (whatchoo gonna do about it? we gotz nukes and we not afraid to use them!).
Still thing the UN and US are being unreasonable trying to stop Iran before it gets to this point? Iran has had over a decade to open up and come clean. Meanwhile it works on a bomb (it is obviously to anyone who bothers to read the facts) - while it makes nice statements to lull suckers into a sense of security while it works to arm itself with the weapons of (Islamic) Armageddon. One would have to squint pretty hard to find the UN and US as unreasonable here, since they are very well aware of facts you don't appear to know. Wake up, Iran is the biggest threat facing the World today. Not China. Not even Al Queda come close. Iran is a great source of instability in the Middle East (its Shia vs Arabian Sunni proxy war is tearing the place up), and it exports terror worldwide (bombing attacks in Bulgaria, Georgia, India, Thailand [where the Iranians were caught - so we know it was them], Argentina years ago etc etc).
> Demands of "the world"? LOL Demands of Israel and the USA.
Don't be daft. Follow the facts. Iran is a real threat. When they get a bomb next year "the world" will finally wake up to the monstrous Iranian menace they pussy-footedly allowed to arm itself. Don't listen to me, listen to the reason of "The Hitch": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0n-STlCzn8s.
I'm not a Zionist at all. Neither am I an apologist for terrorism from any quarter. I do however follow the impeccable reasoning of Christopher Hitchens, who you will find at odds with your rhetoric. Here's something for you to consider with regard to "War Crimes". Every Israeli officer is issued with the Rules of War which they often keep in their uniform pocket. They are inculcated with the need to obey the Rules of War.
In Operation Cast Lead there were lots of war crimes investigated by the Israeli military and there were three prosecutions by the Israelis against their own soldiers (one was a soldier forcing a civilian to use an ATM card; one was a soldier using a boy to move an object in case it had a bomb; and I can't remember the other off-hand). The Israelis tried to play by the rules of war as far as it was possible. Richard Goldstone initially thought that the Israelis had breached the Rules of War and put it in his report. Later he realised that the Israelis were playing by the Rules of War and that many of the allegations against them were unverifiable (that is, false). This is why he expressed regret for his report. In contrast not only did Hamas break the Rules of War, they did not even bother to investigate their own war crimes - not to mention that fact that their entire modus operandi is in fact a war crime. Yet suckers like yourself don't bother to investigate the facts. Read Hamas' charter or listen to their pronouncements in Arabic (not the English statements that hook in suckers like you) but their actual plans in Arabic. Once you investigate the *facts* you will realise that you are being played as cover for terrorists. View Christopher Hitchens or Pat Condel who both used to be on the political left but now realise that the left is completely morally bankrupt on this issue (Pat Condel only recently coming to the conclusion after many years that the left's anti-Americanism is so strong they convince themselves that the US and Israel are at fault no matter what happens in the region - and that many people who are concerned for humanitarian reason oppose Israel based on the faulty information they are fed (plenty of lies coming out of Gaza).
So yeah, I have a balanced view. I realise the actions of zionists in Israel are bad. However, the Israeli government is fighting them. Hamas on the other hand are nothing except extremists who have a racial and genocidal agenda. Yet somehow you want to defend them and are willfully blind to the yawning moral chasm between them and the Israeli position. Please. Read. The. Facts.
More facts. Notice how the Palestinian people cheered in the streets during the 9/11 attacks. They don't support your Western ideals of humanism, free speech, non-violent conflict resolution, womens rights, rights of homosexuals etc. So why would you defend these people against Israel, who does champion those rights (Israeli Arabs have the same rights as non-Arabs, homosexuals are not prosecuted, women have full rights, government is by democratic election [contrast Hamas throwing Fatah members off buildings to maintain power; of course Hamas don't hold elections now they are in control of Gaza] etc). How can you defend these people if you care about human values and dignity? How can you oppose those who stand up for these 'Western' human values in that tough region (that is, why oppose Israel when they uphold Western values, often requiring force to defend them from terrorists). Check your facts.
For your convenience here is a starter. If you view with an open mind you might learn something. There is no peace in Palestine because the Palestinians are holding out for a One State Solution where there are no Jews left in the region. Israel however continues to make peace offers, but lately has stopped since there is no point (when I visited a politically moderate friend there he explained that basically the terrorist actions of the Palestinians have basically polarized almost all those that used to used to believe in the Palestinian cause).
Israel ignores the UN because its resolutions and commissions have been increasingly provably biased in an anti-Israeli manner, eg.see the incorrect conclusions of the Richard Goldstone's report on Operation Cast Lead where Goldstone eventually realised it was not Israel deliberately committing the war crimes - but the UN wanted to hear otherwise. I'm not saying Israel is perfect, but the UN is so corrupted these days that the only sane course of actions for the Israelis is to ignore it (as the Palestiniansm US, Russia, China etc do when it suits them). It is an act of self-preservation.
> As for your point, if you as an employer had to choose between a programmer with one useful language, and one with four, which would you choose?
Well, as a practitioner in the field I find that the role of any individual in most large projects tends to be pretty specialised. Especially in the enterprise world (where a lot of the money is - I'm a consultant). It is nice to know a lot of languages, and I do, but to be useful it is not the language that actually matters - it is your depth of knowledge of the libraries. For example, a Java practitioner often needs to have a good knowledge of Spring, Hibernate/JPA/JDBC, Swing, a webtoolkit of some kind (GWT, vaadin) and HTML (of course), XML/JAXB, JAX-WS, plus common tools and techniques: eclipse/netbeans/ IntelliJ; ant/maven/; dependency injection/IoC; Junit and TDD; SOA etc etc etc.
My point is that a good developer can learn the syntax of a new language in an afternoon. A developer that is effective and useful must know a lot more than that - because their colleagues will be using a lot of tools and techniques. So, back to your question of one language or four, well it depends on the depth of knowledge. I'd much rather hire a person who knew one language but also knew the standard techniques and tools than someone who could write little programs in lots of languages. The depth of knowledge of the surrounding tools is what makes an experienced programmer different from an inexperienced programmer who only knows the language.
Depth of knowledge is more important IMHO than having a breadth of languages. Good design is all about *minimizing complexity* where it is possible - which means you try not to use any more languages in any given project than you have to (it is a dead giveaway about someone's design ability if they mistakenly try to use lots of languages to solve one problem). Software maintenance is costly and using lots of languages pushes up that cost - so using lots of languages frivolously is a design mistake.
All those factors means if you want to start out with a single language that you can learn to do *anything* in, on just-about *any platform*, then you will probably conclude that Java is the choice to use. It may not be the best choice in any particular situation, but it is the best overall choice for ay situation if you want to be a developer with *deep* knowledge. This is why the computing world (especially the enterprise) uses Java so extensively (according to Tiobe's index at least - and you can see a clear dip as Java projects are deferred due to the economic slump; it will pick up again as the economy improves though).
Once you get the deep experience in the toolset/ecosystem of choice then learning additional languages is for academic amusement really. IMHO it is then better to stop concentrating on expanding the number of programming languages and instead much better to improved programming tools/libraries, techniques and even more importantly (and almost invisible to most new programmers) the application domain (often called 'the business'). Learning communication - both a technical writing methodology (I like the psychology based "Information Mapping") and interpersonal skills are also things that can be learned and practiced. It is *far* better to learn those (and they are learned and practiced like anything else) once you have a good general purpose programming language under your belt.
So, this is why I consider it better to learn one general purpose language in depth (and my recommendation is always Java since it has the broadest deployability and applicability) and then move on to learn all the other skills that matter to create successful poducts and participate or lead productive teams. The purpose of this Slashdot thread was what should an experienced dev do to get more modern - hence my advice to 'learn Java', which actuallymeans learning the breadth of libraries, tools and tecchniques that Java devs now consider to be fairly standard (in a way most other development systems do not).:)
Your post is interesting - and you are justifiably proud of your son. However, rememeber the thread is about what an existing experienced programmer should do (probably a lot mor etime limited - which means he has to start with a single strong choice, hence my suggestion).
I was going to suggest Java as well. Java will let you cover the Web (Google Web Toolkit or Vaadin), Windows, Linux, Mac, Unix and, with a change of libraries, the fast approaching one billion Android devices too. You could extend your Visual C++ skills into cross-platform C++, but the constructs and standard libraries are not nearly as modern in design as Java.
Java is not the most exciting language out there for many, but it does allow you to get things done in relatively quick time - which suits businesses pretty well.
Thank you very much. It makes it worthwhile to post knowing that some people enjoy learning about all sorts of random stuff (as I do too:) ).
Lol, you are so right about the MS shillbots, but I think they're mostly about how Visual Studio (VS) is supposed to be the shizzle (no thanks, I'd rather be truly cross-platform).
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Just ignore them and treat them as a non-entity when it comes to any international cooperation.
Incorrect. Your approach would work if Iranians kept to themselves. They don't. They created and arm Hezbollah in Lebanon, permanently distabilising that state and cotinually threatening Israeli civilians. They used to support the terrorist organuisation Hamas (although there has been a falling out recently). Iran infiltrated Iraq during the outsting of Saddam and introduced shaped penetrator weapons for killing US troops. They supported Moqtada Al Sadr's Mahdi Army causing chaos in Iraq. They supply and fund Bashir Al Assad's brutal regime killing over 30,000 people in Syria. They provide rockets and drones to Hezbollah, used to start the 2006 war and recently flying a drone into Israel towards the reactor at Dimona. The Iranian Quds Force has been caught performing or training terrorist acts against Israeli civilians in Bulgaria, Georgia, India, Argentina, and Thailand (where the Iranian cell were caught). Oh yeah, and the pronouncements from time to time where officials state that Israel should be wiped off the face of the earth.
Once Iran gets a nuke it won't get better (and make no mistake, despite their obfuscation all the evidence points for them working toward a capability for a weapon, and the times that Ahmadinejad and the generals slip up and actually say so in public [despite it supposed to be a secret]). Once Iran has a nuke it will almost certainly invade and annex Bahrain and several islands in the straight of Hormuz. There will be a nuclear arms in the Arabian/Persian Gulf as Saudi Arabia, the UA, Kuwait etc all get nukes so they don't share the same fate. Letting Iran get nukes is far far worse than stopping them (eg. via repeated and thorough air strikes on their production facilities).
The last time the Iranian public got serious about instituting governmental changes was in 1979
Incorrect, the public wanted a change in 2009 with the Green Revolution http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009%E2%80%932010_Iranian_election_protests This was brutally (and that word is both accurate and not used lightly here) suppressed by the fascist religious government and their Basiji thugs. Leading protest organizers were not tried and thrown in jail, they were executed for "waging war against God". Please check your facts before you post on Slashdot in defence of the indefensible Iranian religio-fascist state.
The hardline Islamists played the protesters for fools in 1979. While the protesters were busy holding US hostages and spouting clever slogans the Islamists were actually organizing themselves to take over the government.
Correct. The Iranian popular revolution was usurped by a theocratic "counter-revolution". Ordinary Iranians I meet and hang out with love their country and are proud of its history. They absolutely *hate* their government but have no way to get them out of office (the elections are not democratic, free or fair) and because the goverment believes they are on a mission from god they believe they have the right to use unlimited force on their civilians (and the civilians of other countries).
People go on about Muslim extremists being a tiny minority within the Muslim community so why don't these non-violent Muslims actually make an attempt to nullify the violent extremists in their midst? If they don't try to stand up to the minority damaging the entire Muslim faith then don't expect any sympathy, understanding, or help from anyone.
The Muslims that do stand up are killed for not being "muslim enough". You simply can't appease muslim extremists (eg. wahhabis and salafis). There is no concession we can make that will stop their violence. They will always seek to impose islam and sharia around the globe. Hence they must be resisted and, more importantly, de
Bullshit. You wanna see the real historical facts? How about you see this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7ByJb7QQ9U to get some reality in your thinking.
Then consider why the Israelis treat Gazan's for advanced procedures in Israeli hospitals despite the rockets coming from Gaza to the civilians in Sderot and Ashkelon. There are extremists on both sides (although the Israeli Government deals with Israeli extremists using the courts; compared to Hamas throwing Fatah supporters off buildings [check Youtube for the video]) yet you choose to use a libel of "progrom". See this fellow for why you are completely and utterly wrong and why you are being played for a fool:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIesXORjBps
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TA3OzSCdCUk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xU9CauJP4Pg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Gzyeo1Z1I4
You think you have a humanitarian conscience and are defending the poor Palestinians but thanks to some slick propaganda you have the aggressor backwards and are defending an intolerant, fascist, theocratic movement (Hamas). I bet you would like to see the Palestinian "One State" solution come to pass where they push every last Jew (and even the bulk of Israelis who are effectively modern and secular) into the sea. Your morality is backwards and I hope you take the time to examine the *historical* facts to get it all sorted out. I'm not anti-Palestinian by any means (having been there), nor anti-Israeli - but I do recognize your statements and woefully ignorant about the historical and contemporary facts on the ground. You are looking at the situation by squinting your eyes to fit your preconception - open your eyes and examine the object facts where they can be found.
Oh yeah, "poor Palestinians". How come they can afford to buy iPhones for twice the normal price yet it is not even available in Israeli? Citation: http://www.jpost.com/Sci-Tech/Article.aspx?id=287940 Simply put, you have been suckered to believing their propaganda "victim" line. Sucker.
Actually the US withheld munitions from Israel at the start of the 1967 conflict (when Israel struck first after seeing the Egyptians massing for an attack). This has prompted the Israelis to develop their own arms industry, which is now the most technologically advanced in the World. Talk about "blowback".
> Iranian drones recently were used to spy on Israeli nuclear facilities
Hezbollah launched Iranian-built drones to provoke confrontation with Israel. The target was southern Israel and possibly the reactor at Dimona. This was a symbolic mission, all Israel's nukes are probably hidden at other places (eg. Ramat David) so it was more for "show" than "spying". Hezbollah would not have done this without their paymaster's (Iran) assent. My belief is that this raid was to try and distract from the fact that Hezbollah and Iran have both sent fighters into Syria to support the brutal repression of the Al Assad regime - and they are getting heat for it. Hezbollah poses as a party for the common man yet it has revealed itself as a mere puppet of Iran (not really news there) that is happy to send snipers to kill Syrian civilians going about their daily business.
So I believe the article summary is a little misleading. The drone was not on a spy mission, it seemed to be a propaganda mission really.
> While Iran does not have a world-class military like the United States, it does have the capabilities to cause damage if it wants to.
Iran can cause damage in the same way that a stubbed toe does. Annoying but relatively inconsequential. There was a report yesterday that even the air force of the United Arab Emirates can take out the air force of Iran. What would be painful for the US is a ground invasion (although there a contingency plans for this I don't believe that the US intends a ground invasion), and the economic shock where the price of oil goes up on jitters, again. Hmm, so oil companies and traders make more money and everyone else pays more - see a trend here? Fortunately Saudi Arabia (Iran's real arch-foe) would try and mitigate by pumping more oil to contain price rises, as it has done in the past to prevent too much pain to the West (not entirely altruistic, of course, too much pain and modern nuke plants make more sense than fossil fuel ones).
> Are their deaths "acceptable" because they knowingly accepted additional risk to their persons when they volunteered for military service?
What planet are you on? the danger is part of the contract that a volunteer serviceman accepts in exchange for good employment, pensions, all sorts of benefits, educational programmes, medical care, training etc etc. I'm an ex-serviceman (from my own country) and fully knew what I was signing on for - all my comrades did to. That doesn't mean we had a deathwish, it is just a factor of the job. However, your statement is wolly-headed bullshit. It is not a matter of whose lives are worth more. It is a matter that military personnel over the World understand that it is their job to shield the rest of the populace from harm's way - and that can take a degree of sacrifice on several ways (from hardship to physical risk).
> Far more Americans have been killed and wounded in stupid foreign wars than have been killed by Muslim terrorists attacking targets in the USA.
Surely you have sufficient imagination to understand what would have happened if the US had not responded to the attacks on it, and had not gone for the root of the problem (as in troublesome or potentially troublesome countries). Would you prefer the US had waited and fought every battle on its soil while the jihadis trained uninterrupted in their madrassas in Afghanistan and Pakistan (and while Saddam threatened neighbours and committed genocide againsts his Shia and Kurdish countrymen)? Are you so anti-Western in outlook that you can't see the good that has come from those engagements. One of the best things from those wars is that the people of the Middle East could see Al Qaeda for you they really are. Al Qaeda went from heroes resisting the US into the crazed zealots in the perception of Middle Easterners. Being associated with Al Qaeda is no longer spoken with pride and reverence and is now an insult. That is one of the best long-term benefits of those wars. It is so important to win the long-term mind game and those wars helped it far more than they hindered it (even if the political left refuse to see reason on this).
>The idea that people from Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia would travel thousands of miles and give up their lives to kill U.S. citizens simply because they hate our lifestyle and religions is ludicrous.
Ok, here you show total ignorance of the Wahhabi and Salafist doctrines. You statement is verifiably false. They do hate Western liberal civilization for its own sake. Why was Malala Yousafzai shot? her attacker said because they wanted to stop Western ideals (as in women's rights and the education of girls). It is part of their doctrine. The overall doctrine is to restore the Caliphate and subjugate the entire world to Islamic Rule (Islam means "submission", after all). Now while I have zero problem with Muslims I do take umbrage at their doctrines. All Muslims believe that sooner or later Islam will take over the world, some believe in helping this process along by any means possible. The restoration of the Caliphate is completely incompatible with Western civilization as we know it (womens rights, free speech, homosexuals rights, womens education, etc). The jihadis believe they are "doing God's work" and it is completely justified to travel across the globe and perform homicide bombings. If you don't understand this then you haven't been paying attention to what they have been saying (especially when we get peeks behind closed doors).
> He didn't read The Constitution, get angry because "There's too much freedom in America" and then decide to attack.
Any non-Islamic person or country is a target. In fact, any Muslim who is not "islamic enough" also is a legitimate target for attack (hence the Shia vs Sunni battles raging all over the place at the moment). America (and the West) will always be seen as a legitimate target for attack until it becomes an Islamic state. So yeah, they do see "too much freedom in America". Again, if you are unaware of th
> I'd argue that Iraq was a distraction at best, though.
Good points. While your above statement on Iraq is a common view (and hence, often repeated) I believe it is wrong. Even without the WMD fiasco I believe it was entirely morally justified in removing Saddam Hussein's clearly *evil* regime. The great Christopher Hitchens thinks so too, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ke2OLLlPho (plus please check out some of the other Youtube videos where he talks about Iraq since he visited there a number of times - eg. his horrible account of the mass graves and getting covered in "people dust" that stuck to his sunscreen).
Getting rid of Saddam stopped him waging war on his neighbours (although the attack on Iran was encouraged by the US; but also consider Iraq's attack on Kuwait and determination to get it back when the opportunity presented itself again) and the genocides committed against his own Shia population and the Kurds (where he did use nerve gas WMDs). So I think it is pretty hard to argue against the war in Iraq, especially as it now puts the civilized world on a good footing to confront the messianic WMD ambitions of Iran (and Iran is a real threat to Western liberal civilization if you have been following its political statements at all).
Actually, despite the massively unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, it is because the US chose to fight jihadis on foreign soil. Both Iraq and (especially) Afghanistan are fights out of the way of the general US populace and suck up jihadis from all over the World into a meat grinder where NATO has the complete upper hand. Despite the "if you kill on you'll just anger more" bullshit the fighting overseas has actually worked and killed many of the enemies of civilization.
As long as you keep killing jihadis overseas and have moderate security checks you'll be reasonably safe (nothing is perfectly safe). There is no need to accept the humiliation of the TSA security theatre. It is not the TSA that has kept you safe, it is the killing of the violent extremists overseas that has - they are drawn like moths to a flame - this was a very smart move of the US to do this (even if most people don't grok it and the wars remain deeply unpopular due to superficial 'reasons'). The West is at war at the moment not against terror, but against the revival of a Caliphate that will not accept the progress of the Enlightenment. That is what is at stake (and has nothing to do with meekly accepting the fascism of the TSA).
> Longer than Oracle Java, I'd bet good money.
There is very little actual difference between 'Oracle' Java and OpenJDK. They share the same source base. The primary difference is legal: license conditions and ownership.
lol. I've had to write Java applications to run on cheap single board computers that have the same amount of RAM as a PS3 (that is, fsck all by modern standards - so little you'd have trouble buying such a small amount for a PC these days). The Job Security is the fact it runs anywhere (both a large run of hardware scales, and operating systems).
> The "Write Once Run Everywhere" idea is a good one, but it will never be realized by Java.
As a practitioner in the field I have to disagree with you. Too bad you're an AC so we can't debate this properly and you can provide better evidence for your assertion. The rest of your post is without merit - it is hyperbole, since it either applies to all software or ignores the fact that the Free Software OpenJDK is where the real innovation is and Oracle has been shown not to hold the reigns.
Meh. I use Postgresql. Technically betterer, legal betterer. There is no problem.
Incorrect. They cannot sue OpenJDK. Sun had an explicit grant in the license for their JDK which allows compatible implementations to use all their patents. OpenJDK was created under these conditions. The restriction is that the trademark "Java" cannot be used unless you have passed the Test Compatibility Kit to ensure that the Java Write Once Run Anywhere promise is upheld. This is what shafted Microsoft's incompatible implementation in year's past (since it broke that promise to users).
Google were sued by Oracle for breaching copyright (in a clearly ridiculous case). This does not apply to OpenJDK because it was created under the Gnu General Public License (GPL). So OpenJDK will remain free forever - which is the whole point of the GPL (companies can't change their mind and shaft users; Stallman foresaw that possibility after his printer driver travails with Xerox way back in 1980).
So be happy, you can confidently rely on OpenJDK being around for decades.
This is excellent news.
It will also be awesome when OpenJDK is ported to Android (it'll probably never make it to iOS due to Apple blocking it, which is a real shame). The IcedRobot project is attempting to do this. Just image, if you could write your application in Java and it would work nearly seamlessly on all the Windows, Linux, Unix, Mac, BSD and Android devices you have to look after. Sure, there are gotchas on each platform but you are usually 99% of the way there (at least, that has been my experience) and your unit and integration tests allow you to quickly find and address any platform quirks.
For all its flaws (and it certainly has them) Java's goal of having a single enterprise-quality language (and, far more importantly, a broad amount of *standardized* libraries ) available on all platforms is a great thing. Only those companies with an vested interest in keeping the IT world silo-ed in islands resist such standardization. Sure, innnovate in your own languages but don't try and balkanize or block standard Java on your platform. Most of us want to amortize their development investment across multiple platforms (and the broadest swathe of the market), and making us use niche tools just for only your platform is painful for us. Our ideal is to develop once and sell everywhere. Portability is what made C great, and for modern development is the single most important feature of Java as a language for huge-scale development projects (nothing else comes close; other languages are portable but their libraries are often not).
Go RedHat!
ps. queue the Java haters. For me the language is less important than the goal: Write Once Run Everywhere (& Test Everywhere, this is the real world after all). Skilled Java developers can get pretty damn close to this ideal.
The make more money is probably not in more OS sales. It is more likely that moving people onto Win8 means people are more likely to purchase software through Microsoft's Store where they get a cut. That is way more money. It also explains why Win8 is so cheap - they're trying to move people into their Store (and get that cut of *all* the action as Apple does).
They can't 'spin hay into gold' without people to do it for them (since often the person hiring has a different set of skills than you provide). If you are skilled they need you at least as much as you need them.
Plus, with regard to the 'gold' thing, apart from behemoths, most companies will not last long without productive people (some companies only have enough to make payroll for a few months).
I also believe that there are more companies out there than truly skilled individuals. It is easier for a good individual to get a good job than for a good company to fill all positions with good individuals. That means there is a 'balance of power' in hiring that is not tilted too much either way.
VirtualBox, VMWare and Parallels all have hardware accelerated graphics modes. The DirectX/OpenGL API level is limited and you can't usually use more than 512 MB of VideoRAM but for many games it is ok - just don't try running DCS:World/DCS:A-10C or LockOn:Flaming Cliffs (all resource hungry combat flight simulators) on them.
Actually VMWare, Parallels and VirtualBox all have hardware-accelerated graphics modes. eg a trivial Google search to check the facts would have netted you this: http://www.virtualbox.org/manual/ch04.html#guestadd-video
You are right that no recent game will run well with software rendering (old games like those in MAME are ok though). You are wrong that VM environments only have software rendering. VMs are generally great for intense GPU, CPU and network use, they just suck really bad for disk I/O (so don't virtualize your database server if you have a decent DB workload).
VMWare and Parallels definitely support hardware accelerated video. Although there are some restrictions like the graphics API level (eg DX9 features) and limited amount of VRAM that can be accessed (usually 512MB no matter how much your hardware has). For many games this is enough.
> Iran has bent over backwards to accommodate UN (i.e. USA) demands for access to its facilities, but EVERY TIME Iran has compromised, the USA and Israel create another hoop for them to jump through. False. Iran routinely denies international inspectors access to sites of interest. Right now they are cleaning up the Parchin site because it appears it has evidence of nuclear weapons research. They are systematically removing the soil (visible by satellite). They wouldn't need to do this is they weren't working on weapons. They also were found to have developed a computer simulation for the explosion needed for a fission trigger. Iran wants nuclear weapons and is lying about it. Iran doesn't feel the need to obey international norms - they are on a "mission from Allah", after all. It appears that the Iranian Prime Minister Ahmadinejad personally feels that a nuclear confrontation with Israel would being the return of the 12th "hidden" imam. Once Iran has nukes they would not be afraid of their proxies (ya know the terrorists Hezbollah) from using them if it killed all the Jews as the escatological writings of Islam state. Even worse, once Iran gets a bomb then the Saudis, Egypt and UAE will feel the need to develop them to counter Iran. Incidentally, once Iran gets a bomb they will almost certainly invade and annex Bahrain - under the cozy cover of their nuclear umbrella (whatchoo gonna do about it? we gotz nukes and we not afraid to use them!).
Still thing the UN and US are being unreasonable trying to stop Iran before it gets to this point? Iran has had over a decade to open up and come clean. Meanwhile it works on a bomb (it is obviously to anyone who bothers to read the facts) - while it makes nice statements to lull suckers into a sense of security while it works to arm itself with the weapons of (Islamic) Armageddon. One would have to squint pretty hard to find the UN and US as unreasonable here, since they are very well aware of facts you don't appear to know. Wake up, Iran is the biggest threat facing the World today. Not China. Not even Al Queda come close. Iran is a great source of instability in the Middle East (its Shia vs Arabian Sunni proxy war is tearing the place up), and it exports terror worldwide (bombing attacks in Bulgaria, Georgia, India, Thailand [where the Iranians were caught - so we know it was them], Argentina years ago etc etc).
> Demands of "the world"? LOL Demands of Israel and the USA.
Don't be daft. Follow the facts. Iran is a real threat. When they get a bomb next year "the world" will finally wake up to the monstrous Iranian menace they pussy-footedly allowed to arm itself. Don't listen to me, listen to the reason of "The Hitch": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0n-STlCzn8s.
I'm not a Zionist at all. Neither am I an apologist for terrorism from any quarter. I do however follow the impeccable reasoning of Christopher Hitchens, who you will find at odds with your rhetoric. Here's something for you to consider with regard to "War Crimes". Every Israeli officer is issued with the Rules of War which they often keep in their uniform pocket. They are inculcated with the need to obey the Rules of War.
In Operation Cast Lead there were lots of war crimes investigated by the Israeli military and there were three prosecutions by the Israelis against their own soldiers (one was a soldier forcing a civilian to use an ATM card; one was a soldier using a boy to move an object in case it had a bomb; and I can't remember the other off-hand). The Israelis tried to play by the rules of war as far as it was possible. Richard Goldstone initially thought that the Israelis had breached the Rules of War and put it in his report. Later he realised that the Israelis were playing by the Rules of War and that many of the allegations against them were unverifiable (that is, false). This is why he expressed regret for his report. In contrast not only did Hamas break the Rules of War, they did not even bother to investigate their own war crimes - not to mention that fact that their entire modus operandi is in fact a war crime. Yet suckers like yourself don't bother to investigate the facts. Read Hamas' charter or listen to their pronouncements in Arabic (not the English statements that hook in suckers like you) but their actual plans in Arabic. Once you investigate the *facts* you will realise that you are being played as cover for terrorists. View Christopher Hitchens or Pat Condel who both used to be on the political left but now realise that the left is completely morally bankrupt on this issue (Pat Condel only recently coming to the conclusion after many years that the left's anti-Americanism is so strong they convince themselves that the US and Israel are at fault no matter what happens in the region - and that many people who are concerned for humanitarian reason oppose Israel based on the faulty information they are fed (plenty of lies coming out of Gaza).
So yeah, I have a balanced view. I realise the actions of zionists in Israel are bad. However, the Israeli government is fighting them. Hamas on the other hand are nothing except extremists who have a racial and genocidal agenda. Yet somehow you want to defend them and are willfully blind to the yawning moral chasm between them and the Israeli position. Please. Read. The. Facts.
More facts. Notice how the Palestinian people cheered in the streets during the 9/11 attacks. They don't support your Western ideals of humanism, free speech, non-violent conflict resolution, womens rights, rights of homosexuals etc. So why would you defend these people against Israel, who does champion those rights (Israeli Arabs have the same rights as non-Arabs, homosexuals are not prosecuted, women have full rights, government is by democratic election [contrast Hamas throwing Fatah members off buildings to maintain power; of course Hamas don't hold elections now they are in control of Gaza] etc). How can you defend these people if you care about human values and dignity? How can you oppose those who stand up for these 'Western' human values in that tough region (that is, why oppose Israel when they uphold Western values, often requiring force to defend them from terrorists). Check your facts.
For your convenience here is a starter. If you view with an open mind you might learn something. There is no peace in Palestine because the Palestinians are holding out for a One State Solution where there are no Jews left in the region. Israel however continues to make peace offers, but lately has stopped since there is no point (when I visited a politically moderate friend there he explained that basically the terrorist actions of the Palestinians have basically polarized almost all those that used to used to believe in the Palestinian cause).
Israel ignores the UN because its resolutions and commissions have been increasingly provably biased in an anti-Israeli manner, eg.see the incorrect conclusions of the Richard Goldstone's report on Operation Cast Lead where Goldstone eventually realised it was not Israel deliberately committing the war crimes - but the UN wanted to hear otherwise. I'm not saying Israel is perfect, but the UN is so corrupted these days that the only sane course of actions for the Israelis is to ignore it (as the Palestiniansm US, Russia, China etc do when it suits them). It is an act of self-preservation.
> As for your point, if you as an employer had to choose between a programmer with one useful language, and one with four, which would you choose?
Well, as a practitioner in the field I find that the role of any individual in most large projects tends to be pretty specialised. Especially in the enterprise world (where a lot of the money is - I'm a consultant). It is nice to know a lot of languages, and I do, but to be useful it is not the language that actually matters - it is your depth of knowledge of the libraries. For example, a Java practitioner often needs to have a good knowledge of Spring, Hibernate/JPA/JDBC, Swing, a webtoolkit of some kind (GWT, vaadin) and HTML (of course), XML/JAXB, JAX-WS, plus common tools and techniques: eclipse/netbeans/ IntelliJ; ant/maven/; dependency injection/IoC; Junit and TDD; SOA etc etc etc.
My point is that a good developer can learn the syntax of a new language in an afternoon. A developer that is effective and useful must know a lot more than that - because their colleagues will be using a lot of tools and techniques. So, back to your question of one language or four, well it depends on the depth of knowledge. I'd much rather hire a person who knew one language but also knew the standard techniques and tools than someone who could write little programs in lots of languages. The depth of knowledge of the surrounding tools is what makes an experienced programmer different from an inexperienced programmer who only knows the language.
Depth of knowledge is more important IMHO than having a breadth of languages. Good design is all about *minimizing complexity* where it is possible - which means you try not to use any more languages in any given project than you have to (it is a dead giveaway about someone's design ability if they mistakenly try to use lots of languages to solve one problem). Software maintenance is costly and using lots of languages pushes up that cost - so using lots of languages frivolously is a design mistake.
All those factors means if you want to start out with a single language that you can learn to do *anything* in, on just-about *any platform*, then you will probably conclude that Java is the choice to use. It may not be the best choice in any particular situation, but it is the best overall choice for ay situation if you want to be a developer with *deep* knowledge. This is why the computing world (especially the enterprise) uses Java so extensively (according to Tiobe's index at least - and you can see a clear dip as Java projects are deferred due to the economic slump; it will pick up again as the economy improves though).
Once you get the deep experience in the toolset/ecosystem of choice then learning additional languages is for academic amusement really. IMHO it is then better to stop concentrating on expanding the number of programming languages and instead much better to improved programming tools/libraries, techniques and even more importantly (and almost invisible to most new programmers) the application domain (often called 'the business'). Learning communication - both a technical writing methodology (I like the psychology based "Information Mapping") and interpersonal skills are also things that can be learned and practiced. It is *far* better to learn those (and they are learned and practiced like anything else) once you have a good general purpose programming language under your belt.
So, this is why I consider it better to learn one general purpose language in depth (and my recommendation is always Java since it has the broadest deployability and applicability) and then move on to learn all the other skills that matter to create successful poducts and participate or lead productive teams. The purpose of this Slashdot thread was what should an experienced dev do to get more modern - hence my advice to 'learn Java', which actuallymeans learning the breadth of libraries, tools and tecchniques that Java devs now consider to be fairly standard (in a way most other development systems do not). :)
Your post is interesting - and you are justifiably proud of your son. However, rememeber the thread is about what an existing experienced programmer should do (probably a lot mor etime limited - which means he has to start with a single strong choice, hence my suggestion).
I was going to suggest Java as well. Java will let you cover the Web (Google Web Toolkit or Vaadin), Windows, Linux, Mac, Unix and, with a change of libraries, the fast approaching one billion Android devices too. You could extend your Visual C++ skills into cross-platform C++, but the constructs and standard libraries are not nearly as modern in design as Java.
Java is not the most exciting language out there for many, but it does allow you to get things done in relatively quick time - which suits businesses pretty well.
Thank you very much. It makes it worthwhile to post knowing that some people enjoy learning about all sorts of random stuff (as I do too :) ).
Lol, you are so right about the MS shillbots, but I think they're mostly about how Visual Studio (VS) is supposed to be the shizzle (no thanks, I'd rather be truly cross-platform).
Cheers!