Pfff, just what we need, loads of hysteria over a browser that is only a week out in the wild.
Why do we need all those fortune tellers? "Why Microsoft's Zune scares Apple to the core" is of the same author (a former editor of Windows Magazine). The other guy, a man who wrote "Has Apple tripped up with Safari?" had his previous blog entry explaining how to run XP Solitaire under Vista!
Should it really mean that Safari has a chance then? hmmmm. Being standards compliant is one of the virtues of the little beast.
Hey folks, it's just one amongst the browsers. Mac OS X runs more than a handfull of browsers. Do we hear mac addicts scream in agony over so much choice? No. So why go berserk over Safari for Windows?
-- If you're reading this there's 99% chance you're wasting your time on Slashdot. -- If you're writing this there's 100% chance you're wasting your time on Slashdot.
Software is made in layers, mostly. It is not always written with layers, but it 'is' layers. The stack is sometimes reordered, but it's layers all the same. Domain + Rules, Presentation + Manipulation, Implementation + Persistence. The layers that change the most often are technical layers like presentation + manipulation + implementation. All the rest is relatively stable. When you go for open source, you decide when to change the technical layers. You decide how loose the coupling is between the changing/non-changing layers. When you go monopolist, they decide when to change the technical layer. And mostly they decide how loosely coupled the layers are. Now which choice is best?
There is something that struck me reading the article. He says
Most average Windows users have no idea how rich a software base the Mac has grown in recent years. There is a good reason why. First class developer tools are included with every Mac, for free. The frameworks on which you build your software are really mature and rich and powerful. Also the abstraction of the OS/GUI is on the right level. This results in having less than half as many developers finishing a fine piece of desktop software in a fraction of the time you get something done for Linux or Windows. I don't even mention the fun. Don't forget that the same kind of tools made it possible for Tim Berners Lee to finish the first-ever working server/browser/editor in three months time - 16 years ago!. (read the sixth paragraph of his bio).
Don't forget we are now 16 years later, and NextStep has grown into Mac OS X.
IT is a hard world, and with massive amounts of cash involved. The truth is often burried deeply in a shower of propaganda that makes honest efforts and genius technology almost lost - "like tears in the rain"...
The site is know to be pro Apple. But A LOT of things you read there are true. The guy from RDM has some good inside information, and historical correctness overall. Especially covering the Quicktime debacle in the late nineties, I know he is right. The author is not bashing, or getting awfully personal. And although he might not be 100% correct with his figure material, he blows away some smokescreens and uncovers misinformation, and exposes the truly destructive business practices of our sweet little giant.
After you read the articles, come back and let me tell you that I have a 1999 PowerMac 20GB HD running 10.4 with 512 MB RAM, and it performs faster and smoother than with 10.3. No upgrades attached except the RAM.
But is makes me jump to a conclusion, albeit favoritism, namely that students with easy access to a Mac, will switch more easily too. What you don't know, you won't love.
Except for the usual suspects (environmental issues, patents, lawyers, and don't forget the shareholders) Apple differs enormously from an Evil Empire. iPods do not suck, they even improve. Mac OS X is faser on each iteration. The goal is user experience and good taste. The mindset is doing things right. The issue is "survive". Still, there is a long way to go, before this attitude blows away joe average. It still is David vs. Goliath, a foot in the door, a scratch in Microsofts wallpaper. As long as they keep this same focus, I am not considering this leadership as evil. I don't see greed, I see vision.
As far as i know, the idea of combining two technologies to create a new one, is not patentable. Like a bed on wheels, whoopy! When is this nonsense is going to make everyone realize that this sucks resources out of this nation, like a leech sucks blood.
The article seems a well orchestrated and well aimed bashing at iThings Apple. Just at the moment it really brings something new (iPhone). For starters, you can load and play other media than protected AAC and video on your iPod / iPhone. The article falsely claims this is not the case.
You cannot post reactions to this article, so take a wild guess of what its purpose really is.
I prefer Apple fair play over Microsoft's Control Freakin' DRM.
New York Times? I did not expect it coming from that angle.
If you don't vote, you agree with the majority of the voters, whatever they vote for. You agree in advance. You will only have to blame yourself for the outcome.
...as with the assumption that Spotlight is a copycat. Spotlight is not a technology but the idea of indexing content. I first saw it on a NeXT machine in 1994, where the "service" called Librarian ("Spotlight") uses the well documented Indexing Kit (a framework installed with the OS!) to index entire folders. Developers could expose the content in the documents created by their apps, as "better" candidates for Librarian, to control how these documents would get indexed.
Virus writers, malware and adware writers are not that different from burglars.
Nobody claims Mac OS X or Linux to be super secure. Especially not Apple or any engineer for that matter. Hence the number of security updates. But the process is very transparent for everybody, user, engineer, hacker or cracker.
Of course social engineering works regardles of platform. I agree that the number of infections has to do with the popularity of the platform.
But the speed and the ease of infection has to do with the platform. I still think that most crackers are lazy, and take the road of the least resistance, just as burglars do. (To answer another post here: The Honda Accords with a poor alarm system will get stolen first.)
Overall, it is easier to compromise a Windows platform than a Unix platform. And after all many of these problems, although application specific (eg. Outlook), exist because of architectural (read: OS) flaws.
Most kind of attacks or hijacks indicate that Windows gives instant cracker satisfaction and "reward".
The one example you mention, is still only a social engineering hazard, where the user is responsible for what he allows to run on his system. At least on a Mac for instance, out of the box, no app has access to the system without an explicit confirmation of an administrator - which I think is the least Apple could do to protect the user from her/himself.
It still can get a lot better.
Let's hope that computers get safer - and users more aware of the dangers that lie in trusting this technology.
Yes of course you can! There are numerous utilities that integerate with iTunes. It may be difficult to program a front-end to your distributions system. But it is easy to make the distributed songs appear as a special playlist in the left panel of iTunes.
LimeWire does just that. Piece-'o-cake. Now what's the difference? An MP3 is an MP3.
The step to sync with the iPod you get for free. So what's the problem?
These Frenchies don't think before they speak? Or they do not know bits from bytes. They use "octets". Maybe there you have it.
I would ask them to vertically organise domain expert groups in their department, with users (domain experts), analysts and IT project leaders at level one, technical analists at level two and programmers at level three. The groups form a single unit of competence. And I always talk about roles, not persons, to be clear. Then I would horizontally organize formal and informal communication channels at each level, where each level is in touch with its counterpart in other domain units. At each level there is a support team to provide the means to standardize and keep an eye on productivity and focus.
Your IT department organisation can be graphically represented as a field of stacks of three checker discs, with a large sheet of paper thru the stacks at each level starting at the bottom, representing the support and communication channels.
The most important thing is that users are full time member of the groups, are directly involved an take their part of responsability in the IT processes.
There should be no us and them. No choosing sides.
And if ever you need a consultant, treat him as one of yours.
Besides what Hollywood tells you in a fine movie full of suspense, real burglars break in using the easiest entrance first. That is why "Apple gets more popular => there will be more viruses" is a cheap and wrong statement. Or for that matter, "Windows gets all the viruses because of it's market dominance", sounds really funny to me. Follow the path of the least resistance. Even if I start a regular program on my Mac for the first time, it asks me if, since it is the first time I run it, if I really want to do that... Social Engineering on both sides of the fences! No system is 100% safe. But some are a lot safer than others.
Like most of the people reply, I would pick Java, because of the maturity of the community and the value of the open source products built with it. The most valuable thing about Java is that you will have access to a vast amount of quality code, OO frameworks, design patterns and different project organisation schemes. This exposure to the work of highly skilled professionals will be your benefit and your advantage if you pick Java. I don't say that it does not exist for C#, only I haven't seen a lot, unless it were ports of Java-first projects, or look-a-likes. If you're smart, you will detect the discipline behind a project, and learn that too. Besides Java, any OO language - used for a lot of active open source projects - is a valid choice if your goal is learning. As some of the posters pointed out, jumping from one OO language to another surely isn't the hardest part of the job.
Slashdot Mirror
Pfff, just what we need, loads of hysteria over a browser that is only a week out in the wild.
Why do we need all those fortune tellers? "Why Microsoft's Zune scares Apple to the core" is of the same author (a former editor of Windows Magazine). The other guy, a man who wrote "Has Apple tripped up with Safari?" had his previous blog entry explaining how to run XP Solitaire under Vista!
Should it really mean that Safari has a chance then? hmmmm. Being standards compliant is one of the virtues of the little beast.
Hey folks, it's just one amongst the browsers. Mac OS X runs more than a handfull of browsers. Do we hear mac addicts scream in agony over so much choice? No. So why go berserk over Safari for Windows?
Move on, use your browser and be happy.
Quicktime is not ugly, it is well architected. Where do you get this?2 107 654 405
Windows isn't friendly to Quicktime, and that's an understatement.
http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=206
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=60
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=30
If you're reading this there's 99% chance you're wasting your time on Slashdot. --
If you're writing this there's 100% chance you're wasting your time on Slashdot.
I believe you are right. .. but the last thing:
Wikipedia might not be a Bible, it does not claim to be.
Whatever it is, it's yours too.
If you have better information, if you have soem expertise, change the entry in Wikipedia.
Please?
Software is made in layers, mostly. It is not always written with layers, but it 'is' layers. The stack is sometimes reordered, but it's layers all the same. Domain + Rules, Presentation + Manipulation, Implementation + Persistence. The layers that change the most often are technical layers like presentation + manipulation + implementation. All the rest is relatively stable. When you go for open source, you decide when to change the technical layers. You decide how loose the coupling is between the changing/non-changing layers. When you go monopolist, they decide when to change the technical layer. And mostly they decide how loosely coupled the layers are. Now which choice is best?
Please will all persons here that actually use MS Office on their PDA raise there hands please?
...
Anybody else?
Thank you sir, you may lower your hand.
Don't forget that the same kind of tools made it possible for Tim Berners Lee to finish the first-ever working server/browser/editor in three months time - 16 years ago!. (read the sixth paragraph of his bio).
Don't forget we are now 16 years later, and NextStep has grown into Mac OS X.
Oh yeah, and where do your facts come from?
m mand=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9011523
p ple_Mac_OS_10_4_Tiger/0,139023442,139190318,00.htm
;-)
IT is a hard world, and with massive amounts of cash involved.
The truth is often burried deeply in a shower of propaganda that makes honest efforts and genius technology almost lost - "like tears in the rain"...
The site is know to be pro Apple. But A LOT of things you read there are true. The guy from RDM has some good inside information, and historical correctness overall. Especially covering the Quicktime debacle in the late nineties, I know he is right. The author is not bashing, or getting awfully personal. And although he might not be 100% correct with his figure material, he blows away some smokescreens and uncovers misinformation, and exposes the truly destructive business practices of our sweet little giant.
Oh and wait, who's on crack here?
"Vista can run just fine on computers from the same timeframe if you can find one that supports 256-512mb of RAM"
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?co
"The hardware is middle of the road, and OSX is not well known for performance in any areas"
http://www.zdnet.com.au/reviews/software/os/soa/A
After you read the articles, come back and let me tell you that I have a 1999 PowerMac 20GB HD running 10.4 with 512 MB RAM, and it performs faster and smoother than with 10.3. No upgrades attached except the RAM.
So happy I still party like it's 1999.
Well, yes, the headline is blatantly wrong.
But is makes me jump to a conclusion, albeit favoritism, namely that students with easy access to a Mac, will switch more easily too.
What you don't know, you won't love.
Except for the usual suspects (environmental issues, patents, lawyers, and don't forget the shareholders) Apple differs enormously from an Evil Empire. iPods do not suck, they even improve. Mac OS X is faser on each iteration. The goal is user experience and good taste. The mindset is doing things right. The issue is "survive". Still, there is a long way to go, before this attitude blows away joe average.
It still is David vs. Goliath, a foot in the door, a scratch in Microsofts wallpaper.
As long as they keep this same focus, I am not considering this leadership as evil. I don't see greed, I see vision.
As far as i know, the idea of combining two technologies to create a new one, is not patentable. Like a bed on wheels, whoopy!
When is this nonsense is going to make everyone realize that this sucks resources out of this nation, like a leech sucks blood.
The article seems a well orchestrated and well aimed bashing at iThings Apple. Just at the moment it really brings something new (iPhone).
For starters, you can load and play other media than protected AAC and video on your iPod / iPhone. The article falsely claims this is not the case.
You cannot post reactions to this article, so take a wild guess of what its purpose really is.
I prefer Apple fair play over Microsoft's Control Freakin' DRM.
New York Times? I did not expect it coming from that angle.
Guess we'll read more of this crap any time Zune.
Customers also insult staffmembers or for that matter, anyone in the proximity, without restraint, for issues that are not directly their fault.
Insulting is the problem, not IT, nor the user.
I would advise Apple Inc to change to the relevant iPhoned, iPhoneToo or illPhone.
Although the latter? Nah...
If you don't vote, you agree with the majority of the voters, whatever they vote for. You agree in advance. You will only have to blame yourself for the outcome.
Googling for "Hugo Lueders" Microsoft gives 917 results
Googling for "Hugo Lueders" -Microsoft gives 663 results
Biased? Com' on!
...as with the assumption that Spotlight is a copycat. Spotlight is not a technology but the idea of indexing content. I first saw it on a NeXT machine in 1994, where the "service" called Librarian ("Spotlight") uses the well documented Indexing Kit (a framework installed with the OS!) to index entire folders. Developers could expose the content in the documents created by their apps, as "better" candidates for Librarian, to control how these documents would get indexed.
I don't agree.
Virus writers, malware and adware writers are not that different from burglars.
Nobody claims Mac OS X or Linux to be super secure. Especially not Apple or any engineer for that matter. Hence the number of security updates. But the process is very transparent for everybody, user, engineer, hacker or cracker.
Of course social engineering works regardles of platform.
I agree that the number of infections has to do with the popularity of the platform.
But the speed and the ease of infection has to do with the platform.
I still think that most crackers are lazy, and take the road of the least resistance, just as burglars do. (To answer another post here: The Honda Accords with a poor alarm system will get stolen first.)
Overall, it is easier to compromise a Windows platform than a Unix platform.
And after all many of these problems, although application specific (eg. Outlook), exist because of architectural (read: OS) flaws.
Most kind of attacks or hijacks indicate that Windows gives instant cracker satisfaction and "reward".
The one example you mention, is still only a social engineering hazard, where the user is responsible for what he allows to run on his system. At least on a Mac for instance, out of the box, no app has access to the system without an explicit confirmation of an administrator - which I think is the least Apple could do to protect the user from her/himself.
It still can get a lot better.
Let's hope that computers get safer - and users more aware of the dangers that lie in trusting this technology.
Otherwise said:
Burglars break in houses with the most vulnerable alarm system, not because of the popularity of the alarm system.
This is clearly one in a row. Follow the money and the ads.
Should become "Apple's iPod survives sustained Clone funded Media Attack"
'nuf said.
Yes of course you can! There are numerous utilities that integerate with iTunes. It may be difficult to program a front-end to your distributions system. But it is easy to make the distributed songs appear as a special playlist in the left panel of iTunes.
LimeWire does just that. Piece-'o-cake. Now what's the difference? An MP3 is an MP3.
The step to sync with the iPod you get for free. So what's the problem?
These Frenchies don't think before they speak? Or they do not know bits from bytes. They use "octets". Maybe there you have it.
I would ask them to vertically organise domain expert groups in their department, with users (domain experts), analysts and IT project leaders at level one, technical analists at level two and programmers at level three. The groups form a single unit of competence. And I always talk about roles, not persons, to be clear.
Then I would horizontally organize formal and informal communication channels at each level, where each level is in touch with its counterpart in other domain units. At each level there is a support team to provide the means to standardize and keep an eye on productivity and focus.
Your IT department organisation can be graphically represented as a field of stacks of three checker discs, with a large sheet of paper thru the stacks at each level starting at the bottom, representing the support and communication channels.
The most important thing is that users are full time member of the groups, are directly involved an take their part of responsability in the IT processes.
There should be no us and them. No choosing sides.
And if ever you need a consultant, treat him as one of yours.
Besides what Hollywood tells you in a fine movie full of suspense, real burglars break in using the easiest entrance first. That is why "Apple gets more popular => there will be more viruses" is a cheap and wrong statement.
Or for that matter, "Windows gets all the viruses because of it's market dominance", sounds really funny to me.
Follow the path of the least resistance.
Even if I start a regular program on my Mac for the first time, it asks me if, since it is the first time I run it, if I really want to do that... Social Engineering on both sides of the fences!
No system is 100% safe. But some are a lot safer than others.
Why? Read post #14719140
Like most of the people reply, I would pick Java, because of the maturity of the community and the value of the open source products built with it. The most valuable thing about Java is that you will have access to a vast amount of quality code, OO frameworks, design patterns and different project organisation schemes. This exposure to the work of highly skilled professionals will be your benefit and your advantage if you pick Java. I don't say that it does not exist for C#, only I haven't seen a lot, unless it were ports of Java-first projects, or look-a-likes.
If you're smart, you will detect the discipline behind a project, and learn that too.
Besides Java, any OO language - used for a lot of active open source projects - is a valid choice if your goal is learning. As some of the posters pointed out, jumping from one OO language to another surely isn't the hardest part of the job.