I happen to like FPS games. I also happen to hate FPS games on consoles because I much prefer using a mouse over a joystick to aim. Chalk it up to my inability to learn how to use the console controller correctly or chalk it up to the inadequacy of the controller for these kinds of games. Either way, I still prefer playing with a mouse. This is a huge reason I don't play many console games.
The list of books in that search that are even remotely related to what the OP was asking is very short. I count 7 total results (of 48) in that list that _might_ be useful. Of which, only 1 actually sounds like it might be what the OP wants:
How To Succeed In The Enterprise Software Market (Hardcover): Useless, its about the industry, not about writing the software.
Scaling Software Agility: Best Practices for Large Enterprises (The Agile Software Development Series): Useless, it describes how to use agile practices in large enterprise level software teams.
Groupware, Workflow and Intranets: Reengineering the Enterprise with Collaborative Software (Paperback): Useless, it just describes how various, existing enterprise level software categories are supposed to work together.
Metrics-Driven Enterprise Software Development: Effectively Meeting Evolving Business Needs (Hardcover): Possibly useful, if he wants to know how to use metrics to help write the software. I have a feeling this doesn't give him techniques for writing enterprise software specifically though, which sounds more like what he wants.
SAP R/3 Enterprise Software: An Introduction: Useless, it's an SAP manual.
Essential Software Architecture (Hardcover): Possibly, can't tell from the description whether there is enough enterprise specific information to be useful.
Large-Scale Software Architecture: A Practical Guide using UML: Aha! Something that sounds like what the guy is asking for.
(Not that I'm saying the books are useless in general, I'm just not sure they're what this guy/girl is looking for.)
I think this guy/girl is looking for something along the lines of this comment but in "accepted" book format. It doesn't look like the search returns a "handful"....
On a slightly related point here, my problem with games is I suck... pretty badly. I get to a certain point in a game that I can't get past after trying 50 times and I give up. It's not fun anymore, its repetitive and I hate repetitive.
So yes, I'm a quitter, and yes I suck. However, I like playing games. If you want to sell me more games, provide cheat codes so I can cheat my way out of the parts that are too hard. Provide difficulty settings so I can turn down the difficulty of the game in certain parts and turn it up in others. I don't care if it's cheating, I don't care what you think. I don't give a rats ass about any "honor" in winning the game, or in not cheating, or anything of that nature. I play them for enjoyment, not for personal accomplishment.
If you make games that I can't get through, I won't buy them. I'm not saying you have to make games at my level, I'm just saying help a brother out and provide me a couple of tools so that I can enjoy the game too.
*(Of course, I'm not referring to cheating in a game where you play against others. That's a different story. Then I can just find a server with people who suck as badly as I do.)
... If Creative sues the Free Software and Open Source communities over this, then I'll get a crap....
And what are you going to do with this crap? Throw it like a monkey at Creative? Perhaps put it in a bag, drop it on Creative's doorstep and light it on fire? Or maybe buy a fan and stand outside the USPTO's offices throwing said crap at the fan in a graphic demonstration of how you think this patent will affect tech?
Nope, I'm not confusing encryption with obfuscation. In fact, I don't know where you could get that idea, since neither my post nor the one I replied to mentions obfuscation at all.... Both are quite clearly about class file encryption.
To your unrelated point however, yes, there are some obfuscators that do make it difficult, though not impossible, to comprehend decompiled byte code. Though obfuscation comes with its own array of potential issues, especially in remote applications or those that rely on reflection.
The crux is that at some point in time, you have to deliver the encrypted class to the JVM in an unencrypted format. Intercepting this delivery is incredibly easy (no expert knowledge required, the details for doing so are detailed in the article above), at which time someone can just write the unecrypted class file out to disk (or wherever they wish). Voila! All your IP are belong to us.
Ummm, browsers don't render ASP or JSP, just HTML. Web site authors use ASP or JSP to dynamically render HTML. But the dynamic generation happens at the server, not the browser. So a browser would never know (or care) whether a site used ASP or JSP.
I think you actually fall into your own category of people not wise enough to know what you are doing. Somewhat of a paradox, no?
While I applaud your apparent patriotism and support for American jobs, I can't help but snicker at this. I am reminded of a friend I used to know who was a VERY staunch vegetarian, she wouldn't even eat food that had been prepared on the same grill or in the same pan as a meat product. And yet she wore LEATHER shoes.
So yes, you have a God given right to buy from whom you like. So I will assume that you only buy "American made" products from companies in the United States?
Do you drive a car or truck? Was it made in America? That's a loaded question since there really is no such thing anymore, I can't think of an automobile company that doesn't assemble vehicles from parts made or assembled in another country. Your vehicle may indeed have been put together here in the U.S. but a large portion of the parts are assembled or manufactured in other countries, essentially "outsourced".
Don't get me wrong, I hate outsourcing as much as the next guy, I work in tech and worry about the job prospects, but this is natural market evolution. It happened in manufacturing a couple (a few?) decades ago. Now it's happening to tech. The country adjusted back then, it will adjust now. Will the process be painful? I think it already is. But I have hope that the outcome will be positive.
So while I applaud your sentiment, I think we need to be realistic and consistent.
Not to jump into your guys' troll fest here but I thought I would point out for info that passing off processing to other langauges/runtimes/etc is pretty easy in Java.
You can simply use native calls or invoke another process (you can call any executable from within Java). Native calls allow you to directly call into other compiled languages (I've usually seen C as that other compiled language). Additionally, you can invoke any executable, passing input just like a command line and reading output just like a command line.
Although I will say that I think your point is rather moot since you argue that you can pass off processing to get the benefits of "object oriented programming in the complicated parts, inheritence, reusability, speed of a compiled language" from a scripting language, but you pretty much have all that in Java already, so there would be no need to do so from Java. You would need another compelling reason to pass of processing in order to make your argument. So the fact that you could or could not invoke other processes or hand off processing doesn't really matter from Java.
Anyway, please continue, sorry for the intrusion....:-)
You *must* work for the financial department of the CA government:
I am looking at a possible 1.5% *decrease* in wages 12/31/2003 *and* 12/31/2004 (that's a 3% decrease)
That is NOT, I repeat NOT, a 3% decrease. When you take a 1.5% decrease you are now making 1.5% less than you were. When you take another 1.5% decrease you are taking 1.5% percent from your *lower* salary. That is most definately NOT 3% less than your starting salary.
Did you happen to work for Enron or Worldcom before you came to our great state?
Re:Java, success, failure
on
Java vs .NET
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· Score: 1
No. PHP, Python, and Perl are not just languages, they are platforms with extensive standard libraries. They rival, and in some cases exceed, what is available for Java, both in scope and quality.
The "langauges" PHP, Python and Perl may or may not semantically be better than Java. That's not what I'm arguing. It's the "platform" that is J2EE that PHP, Python and Perl are nowhere close to (nor are they intended to be). The main point is that your comparison is off. Examine the list of features provided by the J2EE platform (even the small subset I provided in my post). There is no equivalent in PHP, Perl or Python in scope, quality and maturity. I'm not talking regular expressions or data structures. I'm talking enterprise level functionality that is not in those languages nor in the "platform" (although I hesitate to call it that since they are really just runtimes) that support them. Please offer concrete examples of the "enterprise level" equalivalent features in these languages (or the "platforms" that support them).
Sun created the threat to Microsoft's market by trying to push into that space with Java.
I'm not arguing who started what. You stated that.NET and C# do not compete with J2EE and Java, which is simply inaccurate. Noone is portraying Sun as an innocent bystander. Pick your side for whose right and whose wrong (which should be that neither are), the fact remains they compete.
Your response is completely illogical. I didn't say that nobody was using Java, I said I think its popularity in the open source world has peaked.
It's illogical to point out that some of the most useful and well supported set of tools, libraries and applications for Java are entirely open source when you state that Java's popularity in open source has peaked? I fail to see your point. There is a TREMENDOUS amount of open source work going on with Java and J2EE (the most obvious of which are Jakarta and JBoss, not to mention NetBeans and Eclipse). I don't see either their popularity, nor their usefulness waning.
If Sun had made the platform open (not open source, just open standard)
I see you are unfamiliar with the JCP. By its definition, its a community process. Comparably, it has worked very well and allowed input from many industry sources and experts. Saying that the platform is not open is simply untrue.
it could have been a huge success in the open source world
It hasn't? JBoss is not a success? Jakarta is not helpful nor successful? NetBeans is not a decent IDE (or Eclipse)? The Java Foundry at SourceForge is not teaming with projects?
people have serious license worries about it
Again, simply not true. If you refer to JBoss' difficulties in getting certified, this is another topic entirely unrelated to license issues. Since you offer no evidence or example, I assume you have none. What possible license worries are you referring to? And who are these "people" that are worried about them? Besides not being able to re-distrbiute the J2EE runtime there aren't any restrictions on Java that should concern an individual developer or a corporation doing development with Java. I think this is evidenced by the MASSIVE amount of companies and developers currently working in Java.
I would be interested to know how you differentiate between those projects or products developed in the commercial world, and those that are done in the "open source" world? Things like JBoss are good examples of open source products that mirror commercial ones. One might argue that 90% of open source products mirror commercial ones.
Re:Java, success, failure
on
Java vs .NET
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· Score: 1
I'm not positive this isn't a troll (although it's already been modded up to +3), but I'll bite:
What Java has become instead is a semi-open server-side platform. It's quite successful at that, but it is only one of many platforms in that space. PHP, Perl, Python, and.NET will continue to exist in that space as well and probably take away market share.
I don't think it's accurate to portray PHP, Perl or Python as "platforms". I think what you meant to do was compare "Java the language" with PHP, Perl and Python rather than "Java the platform" with PHP, Perl and Python. While I won't argue the language semantic merits with you, I will argue the "platform" issue.
J2EE is a platform that enables robust, scalable, distributed applications, i.e. "enterprise level" applications. It has facilities for multi-phase commit distributed transactions, automatic failover, clustered redundancy, highly configurable and integrated security features, runtime maintenance of application servers and applications, tightly integrated (and transparent) messaging protocols with support for SOAP and distributed inter-tier communication, as well as remote management via proprietary protocols or SNMP. This is just a small subset of the features provided by the J2EE platform. To my knowledge (someone correct me if I'm wrong) none of the languages you stated have backing platforms that provide any of these features anywhere near the level that J2EE provides.
My point is that while the spaces that PHP, Perl and Python occupy may intersect with that occupied by J2EE, J2EE plays in a wholly different class..NET however, is attempting to play on the same field as J2EE.
The title of the article is misleading, it's hard to compare Java (the language) with.NET (the platform). As I have seen some other posters say, Java != J2EE. A more accurate comparison would be J2EE vs..NET, or Java vs. C#.
Now, about.NET,.NET is simply more of what Microsoft has always given us: a proprietary platform completely controlled by Microsoft. It's not primarily an alternative to Java, it's simply what Microsoft programmers will move to from MFC and Win32.
This is fairly misguided as well..NET is meant to be a direct threat to Java and the J2EE platform. C# is also intended to be accesible to current VB developers as well as C and C++ people while at the same time looking and operating enough like Java to lure current Java developers. I'm not implying conspiracy, Microsoft has stated as much, its smart business: move people off your own, possibly aging languages to a new wizbang platform with a new wizbang language, gain industry momentum, thus luring shops and developers using other technologies (such as Java and J2EE) to yours.
And because Sun's restrictive licenses on both the implementation and the specification of Java, I suspect Java has seen its best days in the open source world.
I point you to the Apache foundation and it's Jakarta sub-project for a shining example of Java in the "open source world". Just because the "certification" of a J2EE platform is expensive to get does not in any way imply that Sun, nor Java, do not embrace, or depend upon, open source. I think one of the main reasons Java has been so successful is because of the free development tools (NetBeans, Eclips, JDeveloper, even JBuilder now), the freely available specifications, it's commitment to interoperabilty (both operating environments as well as other languages and runtimes) and it's almost absolute lack of distribution regulations that have made it so succesful. Yes, the spec is very tightly controlled by the JCP, of which Sun is only one member. I'm not implying Sun or Java is a model of open source, but I am saying that it has struck a f
It's called "Day of the Triffids". These living plants crash land on earth (in a meteor I believe) and move around for 50 minutes in the most hilarious "lurching" manner. It looks like they're humping the ground. Then humans figure out that spraying them with salt water causes them to shrivel up and die. Planet earth is saved by the most abundant resource it has.
Someone else already mentioned it, but the same "satirical nod" was given in "Mars Attacks!" where the martians are foiled by high pitched music.
... if you think the taxpayer will see any benefit.
Do you honestly think Uncle Sam won't happily appropriate whatever funds are left over into something else? (Like pr0n delivered daily to Gee Dubyas office... by naked women... wearing earmuffs... and toting apple pies... with beef jerky... ummmm, beeef jerrky)
Let me almost agree with you by rephrasing slightly:
You have to know a good buy when you see one.
Don't get me wrong, I go to Fry's all the time, I love that place. But you have to watch what you buy there. A lot of big items are returned or refurbished. Only as of late (last 6-14 months) have they started telling people this (those little white stickers). I got a TV one time (back when I was in college) that when it broke and I sent it to the manufacturer for warranty work, they wouldn't work on it cause they had seen it TWICE already! Needless to say, I was pissed.
I buy things like keyboards, mice, routers, software, CD/RW, etc from there. But never would I buy anything large or expensive.
I started building my own computers in 1998 after I bought one of those "white box" systems of which you speak.
The price was great and the specs looked great compared to other similarly priced systems. When I got it, I found that everything inside was junk. Ultra cheap memory, crappy hard drive, no-name shit-bag mobo, ultra crappy video card, etc. Needless to say I was very disappointed. I believe things have improved in the "white box" deparment since then, but you still get what you pay for.
When you build your own you get a few benefits:
You know exactly what's in there. No searching around for obscure drivers for no-name parts that no one has ever heard of.
You get top quality in every part you use (up to your budget).
Buy the "retail" version of a part and it will almost always come with a one year warranty.
Personal satisfaction!
No small time vendor to go out of business and not honor your warranty or provide service.
A computer with better specs than the "white box" system for roughly the same price that is 2-3 times better in quality.
So while it may not be the cheapest option outright, I believe you get the most for your money in the long run. I build 5-10 computers a year now for family and friends (and occasionally myself...).
Some tips when building your own:
Beware of online retailers, some are reputable, some are not. When I built my first computer I bought at the lowest price I could find from all over the country. I got more than a few parts that were obviously returns from previous purchases. It cost money to return and some would not take back. Be careful who you buy from. (I found a local dealer who is as cheap or cheaper than what I can find online that I always buy from now.)
Do your homework on parts. Visit tech sites like Tom's Hardware, anandtech and others to find out what parts match what you are looking for.
Be careful of OEM buys. It usually means they come with no accessories (like cables, drivers, software bundles, connectors, etc). Often the price of the extra stuff will make up for the difference in price between retail and OEM.
Also remember that retail boxed items usually come with a warranty. OEM usually does not.
Tax often offsets shipping. Nowadays a lot of online retailers will charge tax even if they don't have to and pocket the money. Buying locally you pay tax yes, but it's often the same cost or cheaper than shipping.
Make sure you know what you are doing. Building a pc is NOT rocket science, especially with jumperless motherboards, but there are often little details that you may never have heard of or considered that can cause damage or frustrating hours of downtime. (40 vs 80 pin IDE cables. Master vs. slave jumper settings on drive. AGP slot vs. card voltage, proper cooling fans, etc.)
Stay the fuck away from Fry's!
One note here, when you add a monitor into the equation, things get a little trickier. It's often VERY hard to build a system with a monitor for the same price as one you buy "white box". I invested in a nice monitor a while ago and it's lasted me 5 years (still going strong). I figure with the frequency I would have to replace a "white box" system upgrading my monitor as I go, it paid for itself over time.
For reference, I just put together a DAW with ASUS P4T mobo, 1.8GHz P4, 512MB RDRAM, 2x40GB EIDE 7200RPM hard drives, GeForce 440 MX video, DVD/CD, ethernet, case for under $1000. I don't think I could find something that REALLY compared for anywhere near that price.
Put your entire complex on one SSID and one channel - each WAP will form a BSS, and devices should seamlessly roam between them.
To which MarkKomus replies:
If you have WAP's on different sides of buildings they most likely won't interfere with each other. Just keep the WAPs with the same channel as far apart as possible.
LowneWulf states:
Other peoples' devices shouldn't interfere with yours unless there is a LOT of devices.
Which is rebutted by MarkKomus:
Interference from WAP's and other devices that may be owned by tenants! Here could be your big problem.
I need to know who has more money or a bigger house so I can know who to believe!
Slashdot Mirror
I happen to like FPS games. I also happen to hate FPS games on consoles because I much prefer using a mouse over a joystick to aim. Chalk it up to my inability to learn how to use the console controller correctly or chalk it up to the inadequacy of the controller for these kinds of games. Either way, I still prefer playing with a mouse. This is a huge reason I don't play many console games.
- How To Succeed In The Enterprise Software Market (Hardcover): Useless, its about the industry, not about writing the software.
- Scaling Software Agility: Best Practices for Large Enterprises (The Agile Software Development Series): Useless, it describes how to use agile practices in large enterprise level software teams.
- Groupware, Workflow and Intranets: Reengineering the Enterprise with Collaborative Software (Paperback): Useless, it just describes how various, existing enterprise level software categories are supposed to work together.
- Metrics-Driven Enterprise Software Development: Effectively Meeting Evolving Business Needs (Hardcover): Possibly useful, if he wants to know how to use metrics to help write the software. I have a feeling this doesn't give him techniques for writing enterprise software specifically though, which sounds more like what he wants.
- SAP R/3 Enterprise Software: An Introduction: Useless, it's an SAP manual.
- Essential Software Architecture (Hardcover): Possibly, can't tell from the description whether there is enough enterprise specific information to be useful.
- Large-Scale Software Architecture: A Practical Guide using UML: Aha! Something that sounds like what the guy is asking for.
(Not that I'm saying the books are useless in general, I'm just not sure they're what this guy/girl is looking for.)I think this guy/girl is looking for something along the lines of this comment but in "accepted" book format. It doesn't look like the search returns a "handful"....
On a slightly related point here, my problem with games is I suck... pretty badly. I get to a certain point in a game that I can't get past after trying 50 times and I give up. It's not fun anymore, its repetitive and I hate repetitive.
So yes, I'm a quitter, and yes I suck. However, I like playing games. If you want to sell me more games, provide cheat codes so I can cheat my way out of the parts that are too hard. Provide difficulty settings so I can turn down the difficulty of the game in certain parts and turn it up in others. I don't care if it's cheating, I don't care what you think. I don't give a rats ass about any "honor" in winning the game, or in not cheating, or anything of that nature. I play them for enjoyment, not for personal accomplishment.
If you make games that I can't get through, I won't buy them. I'm not saying you have to make games at my level, I'm just saying help a brother out and provide me a couple of tools so that I can enjoy the game too.
*(Of course, I'm not referring to cheating in a game where you play against others. That's a different story. Then I can just find a server with people who suck as badly as I do.)
... If Creative sues the Free Software and Open Source communities over this, then I'll get a crap. ...
:-)
And what are you going to do with this crap? Throw it like a monkey at Creative? Perhaps put it in a bag, drop it on Creative's doorstep and light it on fire? Or maybe buy a fan and stand outside the USPTO's offices throwing said crap at the fan in a graphic demonstration of how you think this patent will affect tech?
Just joshing...
Nope, I'm not confusing encryption with obfuscation. In fact, I don't know where you could get that idea, since neither my post nor the one I replied to mentions obfuscation at all.... Both are quite clearly about class file encryption.
To your unrelated point however, yes, there are some obfuscators that do make it difficult, though not impossible, to comprehend decompiled byte code. Though obfuscation comes with its own array of potential issues, especially in remote applications or those that rely on reflection.
This approach to "security" in Java is so trivially easy to circumvent that its worthless.
/ 01-qa-0509-jcrypt.html
There are a number of papers and articles detailing why this type of approach to "IP security" is so misguided. One such article is here: http://www.javaworld.com/javaworld/javaqa/2003-05
The crux is that at some point in time, you have to deliver the encrypted class to the JVM in an unencrypted format. Intercepting this delivery is incredibly easy (no expert knowledge required, the details for doing so are detailed in the article above), at which time someone can just write the unecrypted class file out to disk (or wherever they wish). Voila! All your IP are belong to us.
*sniff* ... *sniff*
:-)
Anyone else smell astroturf?
Ummm, browsers don't render ASP or JSP, just HTML. Web site authors use ASP or JSP to dynamically render HTML. But the dynamic generation happens at the server, not the browser. So a browser would never know (or care) whether a site used ASP or JSP.
I think you actually fall into your own category of people not wise enough to know what you are doing. Somewhat of a paradox, no?
What about those that don't have the money or time to sue? Individuals, small companies, etc?
Plus, I think you've proven one of the points made in the article:
At the same time, the cost of protecting one's brand goes up.
Lawsuits cost money....
I can't believe the grandparent got modded +5 insightful. Is everyone that reads Slashdot still in college or highschool?
The parent post brought to you by the letters "t" and "b", and the punctuation mark ".".
Wasn't it "Craptastic?"
They're in quicktime, so I can't watch them from my linux box, but I am DYING to see these movies:
2 0Demo
http://washlet.com/seethewashlet.asp#Interactive%
They're demos of the washlet.
While I applaud your apparent patriotism and support for American jobs, I can't help but snicker at this. I am reminded of a friend I used to know who was a VERY staunch vegetarian, she wouldn't even eat food that had been prepared on the same grill or in the same pan as a meat product. And yet she wore LEATHER shoes.
So yes, you have a God given right to buy from whom you like. So I will assume that you only buy "American made" products from companies in the United States?
Do you drive a car or truck? Was it made in America? That's a loaded question since there really is no such thing anymore, I can't think of an automobile company that doesn't assemble vehicles from parts made or assembled in another country. Your vehicle may indeed have been put together here in the U.S. but a large portion of the parts are assembled or manufactured in other countries, essentially "outsourced".
Don't get me wrong, I hate outsourcing as much as the next guy, I work in tech and worry about the job prospects, but this is natural market evolution. It happened in manufacturing a couple (a few?) decades ago. Now it's happening to tech. The country adjusted back then, it will adjust now. Will the process be painful? I think it already is. But I have hope that the outcome will be positive.
So while I applaud your sentiment, I think we need to be realistic and consistent.
Actually, I think you mean one AND one.
Not to jump into your guys' troll fest here but I thought I would point out for info that passing off processing to other langauges/runtimes/etc is pretty easy in Java.
:-)
You can simply use native calls or invoke another process (you can call any executable from within Java). Native calls allow you to directly call into other compiled languages (I've usually seen C as that other compiled language). Additionally, you can invoke any executable, passing input just like a command line and reading output just like a command line.
Although I will say that I think your point is rather moot since you argue that you can pass off processing to get the benefits of "object oriented programming in the complicated parts, inheritence, reusability, speed of a compiled language" from a scripting language, but you pretty much have all that in Java already, so there would be no need to do so from Java. You would need another compelling reason to pass of processing in order to make your argument. So the fact that you could or could not invoke other processes or hand off processing doesn't really matter from Java.
Anyway, please continue, sorry for the intrusion....
That is NOT, I repeat NOT, a 3% decrease. When you take a 1.5% decrease you are now making 1.5% less than you were. When you take another 1.5% decrease you are taking 1.5% percent from your *lower* salary. That is most definately NOT 3% less than your starting salary.
Here:
$100 *
$100 - $1.50 = $98.5
$98.5 *
$98.5 - $1.48 = $97.02
$100 - $97.02 = $2.98
$2.98 / $100 = 2.98% ( != 3%)
Did you happen to work for Enron or Worldcom before you came to our great state?
The "langauges" PHP, Python and Perl may or may not semantically be better than Java. That's not what I'm arguing. It's the "platform" that is J2EE that PHP, Python and Perl are nowhere close to (nor are they intended to be). The main point is that your comparison is off. Examine the list of features provided by the J2EE platform (even the small subset I provided in my post). There is no equivalent in PHP, Perl or Python in scope, quality and maturity. I'm not talking regular expressions or data structures. I'm talking enterprise level functionality that is not in those languages nor in the "platform" (although I hesitate to call it that since they are really just runtimes) that support them. Please offer concrete examples of the "enterprise level" equalivalent features in these languages (or the "platforms" that support them).
I'm not arguing who started what. You stated that
It's illogical to point out that some of the most useful and well supported set of tools, libraries and applications for Java are entirely open source when you state that Java's popularity in open source has peaked? I fail to see your point. There is a TREMENDOUS amount of open source work going on with Java and J2EE (the most obvious of which are Jakarta and JBoss, not to mention NetBeans and Eclipse). I don't see either their popularity, nor their usefulness waning.
I see you are unfamiliar with the JCP. By its definition, its a community process. Comparably, it has worked very well and allowed input from many industry sources and experts. Saying that the platform is not open is simply untrue.
It hasn't? JBoss is not a success? Jakarta is not helpful nor successful? NetBeans is not a decent IDE (or Eclipse)? The Java Foundry at SourceForge is not teaming with projects?
Again, simply not true. If you refer to JBoss' difficulties in getting certified, this is another topic entirely unrelated to license issues. Since you offer no evidence or example, I assume you have none. What possible license worries are you referring to? And who are these "people" that are worried about them? Besides not being able to re-distrbiute the J2EE runtime there aren't any restrictions on Java that should concern an individual developer or a corporation doing development with Java. I think this is evidenced by the MASSIVE amount of companies and developers currently working in Java.
I would be interested to know how you differentiate between those projects or products developed in the commercial world, and those that are done in the "open source" world? Things like JBoss are good examples of open source products that mirror commercial ones. One might argue that 90% of open source products mirror commercial ones.
I don't think it's accurate to portray PHP, Perl or Python as "platforms". I think what you meant to do was compare "Java the language" with PHP, Perl and Python rather than "Java the platform" with PHP, Perl and Python. While I won't argue the language semantic merits with you, I will argue the "platform" issue.
.NET however, is attempting to play on the same field as J2EE.
.NET (the platform). As I have seen some other posters say, Java != J2EE. A more accurate comparison would be J2EE vs. .NET, or Java vs. C#.
J2EE is a platform that enables robust, scalable, distributed applications, i.e. "enterprise level" applications. It has facilities for multi-phase commit distributed transactions, automatic failover, clustered redundancy, highly configurable and integrated security features, runtime maintenance of application servers and applications, tightly integrated (and transparent) messaging protocols with support for SOAP and distributed inter-tier communication, as well as remote management via proprietary protocols or SNMP. This is just a small subset of the features provided by the J2EE platform. To my knowledge (someone correct me if I'm wrong) none of the languages you stated have backing platforms that provide any of these features anywhere near the level that J2EE provides.
My point is that while the spaces that PHP, Perl and Python occupy may intersect with that occupied by J2EE, J2EE plays in a wholly different class.
The title of the article is misleading, it's hard to compare Java (the language) with
This is fairly misguided as well. .NET is meant to be a direct threat to Java and the J2EE platform. C# is also intended to be accesible to current VB developers as well as C and C++ people while at the same time looking and operating enough like Java to lure current Java developers. I'm not implying conspiracy, Microsoft has stated as much, its smart business: move people off your own, possibly aging languages to a new wizbang platform with a new wizbang language, gain industry momentum, thus luring shops and developers using other technologies (such as Java and J2EE) to yours.
I point you to the Apache foundation and it's Jakarta sub-project for a shining example of Java in the "open source world". Just because the "certification" of a J2EE platform is expensive to get does not in any way imply that Sun, nor Java, do not embrace, or depend upon, open source. I think one of the main reasons Java has been so successful is because of the free development tools (NetBeans, Eclips, JDeveloper, even JBuilder now), the freely available specifications, it's commitment to interoperabilty (both operating environments as well as other languages and runtimes) and it's almost absolute lack of distribution regulations that have made it so succesful. Yes, the spec is very tightly controlled by the JCP, of which Sun is only one member. I'm not implying Sun or Java is a model of open source, but I am saying that it has struck a f
It's called "Day of the Triffids". These living plants crash land on earth (in a meteor I believe) and move around for 50 minutes in the most hilarious "lurching" manner. It looks like they're humping the ground. Then humans figure out that spraying them with salt water causes them to shrivel up and die. Planet earth is saved by the most abundant resource it has.
Someone else already mentioned it, but the same "satirical nod" was given in "Mars Attacks!" where the martians are foiled by high pitched music.
How kind of someone to take the time to tell them that...
... if you think the taxpayer will see any benefit.
... by naked women ... wearing earmuffs ... and toting apple pies ... with beef jerky ... ummmm, beeef jerrky)
Do you honestly think Uncle Sam won't happily appropriate whatever funds are left over into something else? (Like pr0n delivered daily to Gee Dubyas office
You have to know a good buy when you see one.
Don't get me wrong, I go to Fry's all the time, I love that place. But you have to watch what you buy there. A lot of big items are returned or refurbished. Only as of late (last 6-14 months) have they started telling people this (those little white stickers). I got a TV one time (back when I was in college) that when it broke and I sent it to the manufacturer for warranty work, they wouldn't work on it cause they had seen it TWICE already! Needless to say, I was pissed.
I buy things like keyboards, mice, routers, software, CD/RW, etc from there. But never would I buy anything large or expensive.
The price was great and the specs looked great compared to other similarly priced systems. When I got it, I found that everything inside was junk. Ultra cheap memory, crappy hard drive, no-name shit-bag mobo, ultra crappy video card, etc. Needless to say I was very disappointed. I believe things have improved in the "white box" deparment since then, but you still get what you pay for.
When you build your own you get a few benefits:
- You know exactly what's in there. No searching around for obscure drivers for no-name parts that no one has ever heard of.
- You get top quality in every part you use (up to your budget).
- Buy the "retail" version of a part and it will almost always come with a one year warranty.
- Personal satisfaction!
- No small time vendor to go out of business and not honor your warranty or provide service.
- A computer with better specs than the "white box" system for roughly the same price that is 2-3 times better in quality.
So while it may not be the cheapest option outright, I believe you get the most for your money in the long run. I build 5-10 computers a year now for family and friends (and occasionally myself...).Some tips when building your own:
- Beware of online retailers, some are reputable, some are not. When I built my first computer I bought at the lowest price I could find from all over the country. I got more than a few parts that were obviously returns from previous purchases. It cost money to return and some would not take back. Be careful who you buy from. (I found a local dealer who is as cheap or cheaper than what I can find online that I always buy from now.)
- Do your homework on parts. Visit tech sites like Tom's Hardware, anandtech and others to find out what parts match what you are looking for.
- Be careful of OEM buys. It usually means they come with no accessories (like cables, drivers, software bundles, connectors, etc). Often the price of the extra stuff will make up for the difference in price between retail and OEM.
- Also remember that retail boxed items usually come with a warranty. OEM usually does not.
- Tax often offsets shipping. Nowadays a lot of online retailers will charge tax even if they don't have to and pocket the money. Buying locally you pay tax yes, but it's often the same cost or cheaper than shipping.
- Make sure you know what you are doing. Building a pc is NOT rocket science, especially with jumperless motherboards, but there are often little details that you may never have heard of or considered that can cause damage or frustrating hours of downtime. (40 vs 80 pin IDE cables. Master vs. slave jumper settings on drive. AGP slot vs. card voltage, proper cooling fans, etc.)
- Stay the fuck away from Fry's!
One note here, when you add a monitor into the equation, things get a little trickier. It's often VERY hard to build a system with a monitor for the same price as one you buy "white box". I invested in a nice monitor a while ago and it's lasted me 5 years (still going strong). I figure with the frequency I would have to replace a "white box" system upgrading my monitor as I go, it paid for itself over time.For reference, I just put together a DAW with ASUS P4T mobo, 1.8GHz P4, 512MB RDRAM, 2x40GB EIDE 7200RPM hard drives, GeForce 440 MX video, DVD/CD, ethernet, case for under $1000. I don't think I could find something that REALLY compared for anywhere near that price.
LowneWulf states:
To which MarkKomus replies: LowneWulf states: Which is rebutted by MarkKomus: I need to know who has more money or a bigger house so I can know who to believe!