Ok, I'm about to sound either (a) guru-like or (b) just really patronising. So I know you're not going to like this, but...
Stop. Forget it. Forget distribution, cross-platform, whatever. Unless you're doing a major, million-dollar project for some telecoms company or something, you really can't justify the use of ORBs or any other distributed nasties like that.
In your question, you don't mention your requirements once. Or rather, you don't mention the users at all. What do they want? I'll lay money that they didn't say something like "We want a payroll system, oh and we want CORBA/DCE/Whatever distributed processing and we want loads more machines than we actually need".
Sorry to be dismissive, but I've worked on a number of projects that were 'distributed' or 'cross-platform' for no apparent reason. They all went way over time and way way over budget, and never really worked 100% anyway.
If you *really* want cross-platform, use Java. If you *really* want distributed processing, use plain old sockets and a simple text-based request/reply protocol like HTTP, or roll your own.
Go back to your requirements and ask yourself what technology you really need to meet the needs of the users. Then ask yourself again. Think about it.
In the words of Kent Beck and others at his level, "Do The Simplest Thing That Could Possibly Work".
The WikiWikiWeb is probably *the* finest resource of information for professional object developers that I've ever found. The knowledge laid out there by its little community has completely changed the way I view (and do) software development -- and for the better.
The Java IDE has been something of a mess for a while, so it's good to see it get cleaned up a bit. Sensible decision from Sun too (shocker).
[cue plug-my-favourite spout] So this leaves us with Kawa (nice and simple), JBuilder (hideously unstable) and VisualAge (a proper object development environment).
I wish more IDEs for "object" languages took the VisualAge approach and didn't act like Java is really just a different C or C++. It's not! It's a different Smalltalk.
This is why VisualAge's environment, built on the VisualAge Smalltalk product, works so much better than the rest for serious object development. I know a lot of people seem to think it's weird - but I think this is the fence you have to climb over to get away from all that C-style worrying about source files and compilers and all that old stuff.
I've been writing code for a living for 10 years or so. For a while now, I've been reading the various Slashdot discussions about Java. The signal-to-noise ratio is really low.
1. Java execution speeds are now approaching and in some cases exceeding those of compiled C and C++. If you don't believe it's possible, you don't understand optimization.
2. Our developers compile on NT or Linux, pick up the binaries and run them on our Solaris servers. Or the OS/390 mainframe upstairs. They love it and it saves them time and effort (and that means money too).
3. The IBM JDK for Linux works fine. There are some minor issues. Who cares? Stop worrying about it! Get on with the coding.
4. Java has more in common with Smalltalk than with C or C++. That's why serious object developers use Java and not C++.
If you want to write professional object software now, on PCs or mainframes, Java is your best choice. Smalltalk second. Then maybe Eiffel or Python if you're not bothered about performance, JPython if you are. C and C++ are not in the picture. Don't even think about Perl.
Now don't get me wrong - I love Open Source, and Linux is one of the best things to happen in personal computing for years and years. I would love to see a genuinely free JDK, and I wish I had the time to do it.
Free or not, Java gives you the chance to write clean, elegant and most importantly *simple* code for object systems that work.
Anyway that's my advocacy spout over with. One more thing though: some Linux people here spread FUD about Java the way MS spreads FUD about Linux. It's sad to see. We should be above that by now.
Apologies for ranting,
Nice posters of Web topology that you can buy
on
Web: 19 Clicks Wide
·
· Score: 1
Have a look at these chaps. Similar map sort of thing, but looks better. (No, I don't work for them;)
Sun have had processors around for a while now which have been designed to execute Java bytecodes directly, so this aspect of the new design isn't a big deal (calm down, Javaphobics).
The interesting stuff is the VLIW aspect, lending itself to bytecode environments in general (not just Java) as well as hardware-optimised multimedia stuff.
Basically it looks like they're making a stab at a new *style* chip architecture, not just overclocking some knackered design a la Intel.
I'm guessing the Java-related is at least in part due to the marketing guys wanting a hook on it.
As for the guy who said 'whatever happened to SPARCs?', well really, pay attention;)
After reading all the above stuff about Dvorak I thought I'd try it on NT (yes, I know). NT's (and I assume 95/98's) supplied Dvorak keymaps only make sense (for #, ~ and the pounds-sterling symbol) on US keyboards. They don't seem to supply one for the UK layout. This is patently daft. Boo!
Needless to say, NT's keymap files are hideous binary things - even DLLs. No chance of fixing that then. Oh for xmodmap...
Slashdot Mirror
Ok, I'm about to sound either (a) guru-like or (b) just really patronising. So I know you're not going to like this, but...
Stop. Forget it. Forget distribution, cross-platform, whatever. Unless you're doing a major, million-dollar project for some telecoms company or something, you really can't justify the use of ORBs or any other distributed nasties like that.
In your question, you don't mention your requirements once. Or rather, you don't mention the users at all. What do they want? I'll lay money that they didn't say something like "We want a payroll system, oh and we want CORBA/DCE/Whatever distributed processing and we want loads more machines than we actually need".
Sorry to be dismissive, but I've worked on a number of projects that were 'distributed' or 'cross-platform' for no apparent reason. They all went way over time and way way over budget, and never really worked 100% anyway.
If you *really* want cross-platform, use Java. If you *really* want distributed processing, use plain old sockets and a simple text-based request/reply protocol like HTTP, or roll your own.
Go back to your requirements and ask yourself what technology you really need to meet the needs of the users. Then ask yourself again. Think about it.
In the words of Kent Beck and others at his level, "Do The Simplest Thing That Could Possibly Work".
The WikiWikiWeb is probably *the* finest resource of information for professional object developers that I've ever found. The knowledge laid out there by its little community has completely changed the way I view (and do) software development -- and for the better.
The Java IDE has been something of a mess for a while, so it's good to see it get cleaned up a bit. Sensible decision from Sun too (shocker).
[cue plug-my-favourite spout] So this leaves us with Kawa (nice and simple), JBuilder (hideously unstable) and VisualAge (a proper object development environment).
I wish more IDEs for "object" languages took the VisualAge approach and didn't act like Java is really just a different C or C++. It's not! It's a different Smalltalk.
This is why VisualAge's environment, built on the VisualAge Smalltalk product, works so much better than the rest for serious object development. I know a lot of people seem to think it's weird - but I think this is the fence you have to climb over to get away from all that C-style worrying about source files and compilers and all that old stuff.
Just my 0.0^2.
I've been writing code for a living for 10 years or so. For a while now, I've been reading the various Slashdot discussions about Java. The signal-to-noise ratio is really low.
1. Java execution speeds are now approaching and in some cases exceeding those of compiled C and C++. If you don't believe it's possible, you don't understand optimization.
2. Our developers compile on NT or Linux, pick up the binaries and run them on our Solaris servers. Or the OS/390 mainframe upstairs. They love it and it saves them time and effort (and that means money too).
3. The IBM JDK for Linux works fine. There are some minor issues. Who cares? Stop worrying about it! Get on with the coding.
4. Java has more in common with Smalltalk than with C or C++. That's why serious object developers use Java and not C++.
If you want to write professional object software now, on PCs or mainframes, Java is your best choice. Smalltalk second. Then maybe Eiffel or Python if you're not bothered about performance, JPython if you are. C and C++ are not in the picture. Don't even think about Perl.
Now don't get me wrong - I love Open Source, and Linux is one of the best things to happen in personal computing for years and years. I would love to see a genuinely free JDK, and I wish I had the time to do it.
Free or not, Java gives you the chance to write clean, elegant and most importantly *simple* code for object systems that work.
Anyway that's my advocacy spout over with. One more thing though: some Linux people here spread FUD about Java the way MS spreads FUD about Linux. It's sad to see. We should be above that by now.
Apologies for ranting,
Have a look at these chaps. Similar map sort of thing, but looks better. ;)
(No, I don't work for them
Sun have had processors around for a while now which have been designed to execute Java bytecodes directly, so this aspect of the new design isn't a big deal (calm down, Javaphobics).
;)
The interesting stuff is the VLIW aspect, lending itself to bytecode environments in general (not just Java) as well as hardware-optimised multimedia stuff.
Basically it looks like they're making a stab at a new *style* chip architecture, not just overclocking some knackered design a la Intel.
I'm guessing the Java-related is at least in part due to the marketing guys wanting a hook on it.
As for the guy who said 'whatever happened to SPARCs?', well really, pay attention
After reading all the above stuff about Dvorak I thought I'd try it on NT (yes, I know).
NT's (and I assume 95/98's) supplied Dvorak keymaps only make sense (for #, ~ and the pounds-sterling symbol) on US keyboards.
They don't seem to supply one for the UK layout. This is patently daft. Boo!
Needless to say, NT's keymap files are hideous binary things - even DLLs. No chance of fixing that then. Oh for xmodmap...