I've had a couple folks write for details on the book, and it turns out I had the title wrong. If any of you are looking for the book, it's Dealing With People You Can't Stand
by Dr. Rick Brinkman and Dr. Rick Kirschner ISBN 0-07-007838-6.
I like this idea, but wouldn't want to see it used exclusively... I'e also seen shops where there was only one competent person and everyone hated them him even though he wasn't a prima donna, and was actually nice. Sometimes, the reverse of what this whole article was about is true, and you've got an office full of prima donnas and one decent person:). I'd hate to see that person screwed because of everyone else's short-sightedness.
And we get back to the issue of how to give programmers job performance ratings. It's a never-ending argument. Unfortunately, the LOC standard is often used, next the reuse standard... hardly ever on the functionality/genius of the code. Hell, I'd love to work in a comments-to-code factor too:)
I think I did suggest that, but with a more experienced programmer. I think your way would work at least as well, as long as they're not paired with someone they could bully, or someone that's very submissive. I think the prima donna would insult their partner to everyone, and claim he was doing all the work. That's the one fear I'd have about pairing them with a peer. It might make the prima donna worse, and make their co-worker angry or bitter, or even worse -- scared to code anything.
I know you're speaking from experience, but stop generalizing, eh?
I know it sounded that way, I'm sorry. I can only really speak about those I've known, and that's all I did. I fully concur that it's not restricted to younger programmers, and certainly not just programmers. I didn't mean to generalize, and I apologize for writing it that way.
Speaking of the guy that wrote the Linux book -- do we know each other? I also know a late-20s early-30s guy that wrote a Linux book and was a horror to be around after that. I also know several younger programmers that are constantly overlooked because of their age when they're far more talented than many of their co-workers.
What bothers me most about working anywhere at any job is really how people treat one another. Rather than helping one another, they attack and plot against one another. It doesn't advance the species, ya know? But I guess that'll get me pegged as a liberal Star Trek fan:)
Interestingly enough, I've seen corporate environments where the arrogant idiot in marketing gets much further ahead the the arrogant genious in development.
Doesn't that piss you off? The company sees their "value" directly because they can point to direct dollars they've supposedly created. A lot of companies forget the marketing guy is selling the work of the engineers... and we're back to the old argument of "without engineers, there's no product to sell" vs. "without marketing, there's no one to sell the product." The other thing that pisses me off -- who gets laid off first? The programmers! You know when you see a company maintaining their marketing people and decreasing their numbers of engineers that they're headed for fuckedcompany.com.
In this case, though, as other people have said, age does NOT correlate to one's workplace attitude. Older programmers sometimes have a "I'm more important because I've worked longer" mentality that pollutes their interactions with younger co-workers.
Hallelujah, brother. I've met plenty of those too. Interestingly, I think the cause is often the same -- they're scared of what others know. And another comment sure to get me in trouble -- government workers seem to be the worst offenders at the "seniority makes me special" game.
The best solution is to prevent people from being prima donnas in the first place because it's a hard thing to convince someone with an oversize ego that something is wrong with them.
I agree with this, and though my suggestions might have sounded mean or hateful, I didn't intend them that way. I'd like to see the prima donnas, especially those that are truly gifted, become even better at what they do. My suggestions were mostly oriented not at punishment, but at improving whatever it is about them that makes them difficult to work with. I don't want them to go away -- I want them to be nice:).
You're right, I did leave that out. The type of person I was describing typically isn't good enough to teach anyone anything, though. As several other replies pointed out, I wasn't clear that I was referring to the "Think They Know It All" type rather than a truly competent individual.
Let me clear this up -- I'm not a manager, and have turned down management positions because I think it would be miserable, and I really like the programming. I don't mean that the assholes should be told what to do -- usually a real challenge or partnering them with someone they can also learn from is good not only for them, but those around them... i.e. the experienced person they're paired with can also learn.
Right on. There's a book called, I think, How to deal with difficult people and it described exactly those two personalities. The Category 1 you described was called the "Know It All" and the Category 2 was the "Think They Know It All". I agree with you that the Category 1 is at least redeeming in what they can bring to a project, but the Category 2 folks should be helped out of their situation (at the very least). I've found most of the Category 2 types are like what I've described: They've always been the big fish, but they were in very small ponds before. The most common type is the one that's gaining decent skill at one thing, but doesn't yet know enough to understand how tiny a fraction of the real IT world that one thing is... They think they know it all. The type I was describing was the Category 2, and I wasn't clear about that.
I have to agree with what you've said. I've met a few managers that were worse than the worst prima donna programmer I've ever met. What makes them worse is that they usually have power to go with their ego, and can enforce their problems on other people.
I would also add to what you've said that I think most of those like your description weren't that great at programming to start with, and that may be one of the reasons they were drawn to management. I can't imagine a "true" techie wanting to be away from the fun stuff.
Sounds like the Prima Donna is an exceptionally talented programmer, and not, as you say, a one-trick pony. Ego problems aren't confined to young people, you know. But maybe I should just shut up and let the older, wiser and bitter speak.
Can't let those young 'uns get all uppity now!
I'm annoyed you got modded down. You made a good point, and I hope someone else can mod you back up. I was speaking strictly from my own experience and not trying to rehash what the article was calling prima donna. If a person is as the description you quoted, they're clearly not a beginner:). I'd like to point out that the article was written from the point of view of a recruiter/manager... those typically the worst at identifying whether a programmer is smart or talented. They frequently mistake ego for intelligence.
I'm not an old person myself. I'm also young by most standards (I'm 33, and have only been a professional programmer for 11 years). I consider myself a good middle-of-the-line programmer in terms of experience, neither a beginner nor a seasoned pro. I guess what I meant to describe was what the book calls not a Know-It-All, but a Think-They-Know-It-All.
As for the young'uns getting uppity, some of the most outstanding programmers I've met were beginners. I guess it was the attitude of the assholes (young and old) I dislike, and made it seem like I meant all young programmers. I apologize for that. But in my experience, all prima donnas that don't have the right to be because they're not that good were young. I'm sorry I sounded like I meant all young programmers.
In a nutshell, the article offers these solutions:
Let them telecommute
Have them design prototypes rather than production apps
Let them know you're interviewing others
Be honest in a review
Fire them
As a full-time programmer, I have to admit, I don't see a slew of other options. I've dealt with prima donnas, and have probably been one myself at some point. Frankly, the best cure I've seen for it is age: Almost all prima donnas I know are under 25 and haven't worked more than one or two jobs. They haven't yet come into contact with those that are more skilled yet, or haven't been given a big enough challenge yet. A good programming butt-kicking goes a long way.
I also have found that most places suffering from prima donnas are also suffering from a lack of older, good programmers. This tends to reinforce the attitude of the troublemaker -- they think they're the best because it might be true where they are. If possible, pairing them off with a mature, more experienced programmer might give them a dose of the Total Perspective Vortex.
The one last suggestion, and it's mean and may be counter-productive: Make them code in a language they don't know yet. Most prima donnas I know are one-trick ponies, and a tough task in an unfamiliar language may show them they're not infallible.
That said, and the part that will get me modded down into hell, is that every prima donna I've met was a recent college comp-sci graduate at the time. They're only great because their world is so small, and they haven't had to deal with real-world programming and real-world people yet. I guess it goes back to my earlier suggestion: the best cure is age.
I use non-Microsoft tools to do Windows development. But this is MSDN. It's the documentation. How do you get around that? Even though the writer only mentioned it's for the subscriber downloads, you know it's coming for the regular library too. That's what's driving me crazy. I hate to lie. I also hate to give my personal information to someone that doesn't need it. What choice do they leave? I have to either comprimise my ethics or compromise my personal information. Using Mingw and Borland still don't get me the correct API docs.
Nothing really insightful here, but I personally hate to lie. I think one of the problems with what we've become is that too many are willing to lie at the drop of a hat. But now MS narrows my choices to two I don't like: register with my real information, or lie.
I despise click-throughs that give me the choice to "register now" or "register later". I have to lie because there is no "don't register" choice. I have to agree to license agreements where part is written in a language I don't speak. When I click "Agree", it's another lie. How can I agree to what I don't understand. Some writer wrote an excellent column on that, but I don't remember who.
I'm a Windows programmer for a living and I use MSDN. But I will not create a real Passport account. Again, I will lie, as much as I hate it. The only choices they give are unpalatable. Even worse than their monopoloy, even worse than their licenses, they make you comply, lie, or do without. When they're the only source of Win32 documentation, what's the choice going to be? I hate it.
I completely understand; I had the same problem with 3.1, 3.5, and 3.51. When I made sure it was all HCL, though, the problems went away. I also run NTx on generic stuff. I have also had better luck with Linux and hardware in that if it runs at all, it runs solidly. I think we both suffer from wishful thinking that "standard" hardware means "standard" hardware. But apparently it doesn't and some vendor may leave certain features unimplemented, badly implemented, or what-have-you. Also, MS may handle certain thing incorrectly in their code, and thus don't HCL something that brings out that mishandling.
Was all that hardware on the HCL? Or was it generic crap that you had lying around? Would you complain if OpenBSD didn't work with your NIC correctly if it weren't on the supported hardware list?
You're absolutely right it shouldn't. But the real cause there is most likely the sound driver or the mp3 player's use of it. That's exactly what I was talking about:)
The bit about Netscape taking down Windows... Once again I'd wager the coders did something bad with privileged code. The equivalent portion in Linux may not be privileged. Are you talking even about the same kind of crash?
...There has never been a MDAC released by Microsoft that didn't crash windows? IE never crashed windows? MS-Office never crashed windows? Give me a break.
I was referring to a clean box, and said so clearly in my original post. There are plenty of sloppy coders working in the apps division of MS. The MDAC installs are among the most awful installs of anything available. No argument from me there.
If you can't expect Microsoft themselves to be able to write software that doesn't crash windows how do you expect your average VB programmer to?
I don't:). The average VB programmer is a beginner and doesn't know much more than drag-and-drop window building and basic event-handling. I'd guesstimate that fewer than 5% of VB programmers understand how Windows actually works. I'll also say that most VB apps can't crash Windows, either, because they don't have access to anything privileged.
The fact of the matter is that it's awfully difficult to write an app for windows that won't take down the system occationally. If for no other reason then you are using DLLs and you have no idea what's in them. How many apps depend on wininet.dll or the vb runtime or MSVCxxx Dlls?
Bullshit. I write system services and plenty of system-privilege apps that don't crash Windows. The *app* may crash until I get it finished, but that's not what you said. Anyone writing code that depends on wininet or the MSVC runtime and MFC dlls, frankly, is asking for what they get. But if you use the interfaces correctly, these don't crash Windows either. There are bugs in the common libraries to be sure, but that can be said for common Linux libraries as well, can't it? Of course the massive advantage with most Linux libraries is that the source is available. But my original post wasn't focused on the availablility of source.
You know I went to install the MS soap toolkit the other day and it insisted that I install IE5.5 and some service pack or another, then the rope.dll wouldn't register properly so I had to go download a later version and register it by hand. Just to be able to work with XML I had to download over thirty megabytes of stuff. So If I write an app using this toolkit is it my fault if the app crashes or is it possible that somewhere along that 30 megabytes of crap I installed on my machine something was broken?
Yep, it is your fault. All that shit is not necessary to work with XML. There are some reasonably good third-party libs that don't require all that crap. You apparently know as well as I do that developers using all that crap (besides the existence of that crap itself) are the cause of the problem. The most useful frame of mind I've found for writing Windows apps is "think small". Write with the fewest dependencies and libs possible. That pretty much leaves out developing in VB or using MFC, and avoiding the C runtime if possible. ATL is an excellent library, though, and there are some outstanding compilers out there if you prefer BASIC (check out http://www.powerbasic.com".
You're right that most applications can't be uninstalled that way. That's *another* symptom of the problem. As to the shared dlls in common folders, note I said most of the good developers aren't writing their apps that way. Granted, you may have file associations that need tending. I personally feel Windows ought to handle that by itself, and to a small degree it does with the "Open With" dialog. Other info stashed in the registry generally amounts to exactly squat; it's no more harmful than having an unused config file on a unix box.
How should we go about dealing with the multitudes of shared libraries without driving ourselves mad or descending into the DLL Hell that makes Windows machines so unreliable?
DLL hell is a small part of the problems Windows faces, but most of the better programmers started putting their libraries either in their app directory or static linking... Most every app on my Windows machine can be uninstalled by deleting a directory. But don't blame Windows instability on DLL hell. DLL hell is just another symptom of the same thing that causes the instability.
What makes Windows boxes unstable, plain and simple, is faulty drivers and applications. Out of the box, the NT series has been rock-solid even since 1.0 (version 3.1). The Windox 9x series has also been way more reliable than it has the reputation for. Drivers provided directly by Microsoft have traditionally been very stable, even if not very feature-rich. The drivers provided by third-parties, however, tend to suck overall. I would estimated 50% of instability problems I see are related to VIDEO drivers.
The big thing people forget when they compare stability of Windows and other OSes is that in monolithic kernels, the drivers are provided by the guys that know the kernel, thus are typically more stable. I cannot say the same for many Windows drivers. In addition, something like a FreeBSD web server is hardly comparable to an end-user Windows machine, yet this is always the example held up by the anti-Windows crowd. Add MP3 software, graphics apps, kids' games, a crappy sound and video card, and all the other stuff people put on user machines and then see how stable the other OS is.
I'm not blind. I know that on the whole Windows boxes are not so stable. I'm a professional Windows developer. I can say from first-hand knowlege that the bulk of problems with Windows is due to lazy, unknowledgeable, or sometimes hurried and overtaxed programmers. It's a real problem. I also keep a FreeBSD boot around and I'm very pro-GNU/Linux and especially pro FreeBSD. But I program Windows as my work, and know that the instability blamed on Windows itself rarely has anything to do with code written by Microsoft.
I WANT COPIES OF MS DOS 1,2,3,4,5 WIN 1.0 (exists?),2,3; NT 1,2,3,4
There was no NT 1, 2, or 3. NT started with version 3.1 (there was also a 3.1AS). The versions of NT went 3.1, 3.5 (very short-lived), 3.51, 4.0, Win2K. Also, and trust me on this, you don't want a copy of MS-DOS 4.x <g>. It was the worst of them all. As for Windows 1.0, look here:http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?View Item&item=1241862826.
A week or two will pass. The ACCC will announce they've had a meeting with representatives from the major film distributors and now that they understand the purpose of zoning, they find no threat to consumers. They will not repeat the explanation given them by the studios. The issue will be forgotten. Some studio bank accounts show a slight "discretionary fund" drop in balance.
Slashdot Mirror
4 AM Saturday afternoon? :)
I've had a couple folks write for details on the book, and it turns out I had the title wrong. If any of you are looking for the book, it's
Dealing With People You Can't Stand
by Dr. Rick Brinkman and Dr. Rick Kirschner
ISBN 0-07-007838-6.
I like this idea, but wouldn't want to see it used exclusively... I'e also seen shops where there was only one competent person and everyone hated them him even though he wasn't a prima donna, and was actually nice. Sometimes, the reverse of what this whole article was about is true, and you've got an office full of prima donnas and one decent person :). I'd hate to see that person screwed because of everyone else's short-sightedness.
And we get back to the issue of how to give programmers job performance ratings. It's a never-ending argument. Unfortunately, the LOC standard is often used, next the reuse standard... hardly ever on the functionality/genius of the code. Hell, I'd love to work in a comments-to-code factor too :)
Get them to program in pairs.
I think I did suggest that, but with a more experienced programmer. I think your way would work at least as well, as long as they're not paired with someone they could bully, or someone that's very submissive. I think the prima donna would insult their partner to everyone, and claim he was doing all the work. That's the one fear I'd have about pairing them with a peer. It might make the prima donna worse, and make their co-worker angry or bitter, or even worse -- scared to code anything.
Are you sure you're not my boss? Sounds like you're describing me :)
I know you're speaking from experience, but stop generalizing, eh?
I know it sounded that way, I'm sorry. I can only really speak about those I've known, and that's all I did. I fully concur that it's not restricted to younger programmers, and certainly not just programmers. I didn't mean to generalize, and I apologize for writing it that way.
Speaking of the guy that wrote the Linux book -- do we know each other? I also know a late-20s early-30s guy that wrote a Linux book and was a horror to be around after that. I also know several younger programmers that are constantly overlooked because of their age when they're far more talented than many of their co-workers.
<blush>
What bothers me most about working anywhere at any job is really how people treat one another. Rather than helping one another, they attack and plot against one another. It doesn't advance the species, ya know? But I guess that'll get me pegged as a liberal Star Trek fan :)
Interestingly enough, I've seen corporate environments where the arrogant idiot in marketing gets much further ahead the the arrogant genious in development.
Doesn't that piss you off? The company sees their "value" directly because they can point to direct dollars they've supposedly created. A lot of companies forget the marketing guy is selling the work of the engineers... and we're back to the old argument of "without engineers, there's no product to sell" vs. "without marketing, there's no one to sell the product." The other thing that pisses me off -- who gets laid off first? The programmers! You know when you see a company maintaining their marketing people and decreasing their numbers of engineers that they're headed for fuckedcompany.com.
In this case, though, as other people have said, age does NOT correlate to one's workplace attitude. Older programmers sometimes have a "I'm more important because I've worked longer" mentality that pollutes their interactions with younger co-workers.
Hallelujah, brother. I've met plenty of those too. Interestingly, I think the cause is often the same -- they're scared of what others know. And another comment sure to get me in trouble -- government workers seem to be the worst offenders at the "seniority makes me special" game.
The best solution is to prevent people from being prima donnas in the first place because it's a hard thing to convince someone with an oversize ego that something is wrong with them.
I agree with this, and though my suggestions might have sounded mean or hateful, I didn't intend them that way. I'd like to see the prima donnas, especially those that are truly gifted, become even better at what they do. My suggestions were mostly oriented not at punishment, but at improving whatever it is about them that makes them difficult to work with. I don't want them to go away -- I want them to be nice :) .
Learn from Them
You're right, I did leave that out. The type of person I was describing typically isn't good enough to teach anyone anything, though. As several other replies pointed out, I wasn't clear that I was referring to the "Think They Know It All" type rather than a truly competent individual.
Let me clear this up -- I'm not a manager, and have turned down management positions because I think it would be miserable, and I really like the programming. I don't mean that the assholes should be told what to do -- usually a real challenge or partnering them with someone they can also learn from is good not only for them, but those around them... i.e. the experienced person they're paired with can also learn.
Right on. There's a book called, I think, How to deal with difficult people and it described exactly those two personalities. The Category 1 you described was called the "Know It All" and the Category 2 was the "Think They Know It All". I agree with you that the Category 1 is at least redeeming in what they can bring to a project, but the Category 2 folks should be helped out of their situation (at the very least). I've found most of the Category 2 types are like what I've described: They've always been the big fish, but they were in very small ponds before. The most common type is the one that's gaining decent skill at one thing, but doesn't yet know enough to understand how tiny a fraction of the real IT world that one thing is... They think they know it all. The type I was describing was the Category 2, and I wasn't clear about that.
I have to agree with what you've said. I've met a few managers that were worse than the worst prima donna programmer I've ever met. What makes them worse is that they usually have power to go with their ego, and can enforce their problems on other people.
I would also add to what you've said that I think most of those like your description weren't that great at programming to start with, and that may be one of the reasons they were drawn to management. I can't imagine a "true" techie wanting to be away from the fun stuff.
Sounds like the Prima Donna is an exceptionally talented programmer, and not, as you say, a one-trick pony. Ego problems aren't confined to young people, you know. But maybe I should just shut up and let the older, wiser and bitter speak.
Can't let those young 'uns get all uppity now!
I'm annoyed you got modded down. You made a good point, and I hope someone else can mod you back up. I was speaking strictly from my own experience and not trying to rehash what the article was calling prima donna. If a person is as the description you quoted, they're clearly not a beginner :). I'd like to point out that the article was written from the point of view of a recruiter/manager... those typically the worst at identifying whether a programmer is smart or talented. They frequently mistake ego for intelligence.
I'm not an old person myself. I'm also young by most standards (I'm 33, and have only been a professional programmer for 11 years). I consider myself a good middle-of-the-line programmer in terms of experience, neither a beginner nor a seasoned pro. I guess what I meant to describe was what the book calls not a Know-It-All, but a Think-They-Know-It-All.
As for the young'uns getting uppity, some of the most outstanding programmers I've met were beginners. I guess it was the attitude of the assholes (young and old) I dislike, and made it seem like I meant all young programmers. I apologize for that. But in my experience, all prima donnas that don't have the right to be because they're not that good were young. I'm sorry I sounded like I meant all young programmers.
In a nutshell, the article offers these solutions:
As a full-time programmer, I have to admit, I don't see a slew of other options. I've dealt with prima donnas, and have probably been one myself at some point. Frankly, the best cure I've seen for it is age: Almost all prima donnas I know are under 25 and haven't worked more than one or two jobs. They haven't yet come into contact with those that are more skilled yet, or haven't been given a big enough challenge yet. A good programming butt-kicking goes a long way.
I also have found that most places suffering from prima donnas are also suffering from a lack of older, good programmers. This tends to reinforce the attitude of the troublemaker -- they think they're the best because it might be true where they are. If possible, pairing them off with a mature, more experienced programmer might give them a dose of the Total Perspective Vortex.
The one last suggestion, and it's mean and may be counter-productive: Make them code in a language they don't know yet. Most prima donnas I know are one-trick ponies, and a tough task in an unfamiliar language may show them they're not infallible.
That said, and the part that will get me modded down into hell, is that every prima donna I've met was a recent college comp-sci graduate at the time. They're only great because their world is so small, and they haven't had to deal with real-world programming and real-world people yet. I guess it goes back to my earlier suggestion: the best cure is age.
I use non-Microsoft tools to do Windows development. But this is MSDN. It's the documentation. How do you get around that? Even though the writer only mentioned it's for the subscriber downloads, you know it's coming for the regular library too. That's what's driving me crazy. I hate to lie. I also hate to give my personal information to someone that doesn't need it. What choice do they leave? I have to either comprimise my ethics or compromise my personal information. Using Mingw and Borland still don't get me the correct API docs.
Nothing really insightful here, but I personally hate to lie. I think one of the problems with what we've become is that too many are willing to lie at the drop of a hat. But now MS narrows my choices to two I don't like: register with my real information, or lie.
I despise click-throughs that give me the choice to "register now" or "register later". I have to lie because there is no "don't register" choice. I have to agree to license agreements where part is written in a language I don't speak. When I click "Agree", it's another lie. How can I agree to what I don't understand. Some writer wrote an excellent column on that, but I don't remember who.
I'm a Windows programmer for a living and I use MSDN. But I will not create a real Passport account. Again, I will lie, as much as I hate it. The only choices they give are unpalatable. Even worse than their monopoloy, even worse than their licenses, they make you comply, lie, or do without. When they're the only source of Win32 documentation, what's the choice going to be? I hate it.
I completely understand; I had the same problem with 3.1, 3.5, and 3.51. When I made sure it was all HCL, though, the problems went away. I also run NTx on generic stuff. I have also had better luck with Linux and hardware in that if it runs at all, it runs solidly. I think we both suffer from wishful thinking that "standard" hardware means "standard" hardware. But apparently it doesn't and some vendor may leave certain features unimplemented, badly implemented, or what-have-you. Also, MS may handle certain thing incorrectly in their code, and thus don't HCL something that brings out that mishandling.
Was all that hardware on the HCL? Or was it generic crap that you had lying around? Would you complain if OpenBSD didn't work with your NIC correctly if it weren't on the supported hardware list?
You're absolutely right it shouldn't. But the real cause there is most likely the sound driver or the mp3 player's use of it. That's exactly what I was talking about :)
The bit about Netscape taking down Windows... Once again I'd wager the coders did something bad with privileged code. The equivalent portion in Linux may not be privileged. Are you talking even about the same kind of crash?
I was referring to a clean box, and said so clearly in my original post. There are plenty of sloppy coders working in the apps division of MS. The MDAC installs are among the most awful installs of anything available. No argument from me there.
If you can't expect Microsoft themselves to be able to write software that doesn't crash windows how do you expect your average VB programmer to?
I don't :). The average VB programmer is a beginner and doesn't know much more than drag-and-drop window building and basic event-handling. I'd guesstimate that fewer than 5% of VB programmers understand how Windows actually works. I'll also say that most VB apps can't crash Windows, either, because they don't have access to anything privileged.
The fact of the matter is that it's awfully difficult to write an app for windows that won't take down the system occationally. If for no other reason then you are using DLLs and you have no idea what's in them. How many apps depend on wininet.dll or the vb runtime or MSVCxxx Dlls?
Bullshit. I write system services and plenty of system-privilege apps that don't crash Windows. The *app* may crash until I get it finished, but that's not what you said. Anyone writing code that depends on wininet or the MSVC runtime and MFC dlls, frankly, is asking for what they get. But if you use the interfaces correctly, these don't crash Windows either. There are bugs in the common libraries to be sure, but that can be said for common Linux libraries as well, can't it? Of course the massive advantage with most Linux libraries is that the source is available. But my original post wasn't focused on the availablility of source.
You know I went to install the MS soap toolkit the other day and it insisted that I install IE5.5 and some service pack or another, then the rope.dll wouldn't register properly so I had to go download a later version and register it by hand. Just to be able to work with XML I had to download over thirty megabytes of stuff. So If I write an app using this toolkit is it my fault if the app crashes or is it possible that somewhere along that 30 megabytes of crap I installed on my machine something was broken?
Yep, it is your fault. All that shit is not necessary to work with XML. There are some reasonably good third-party libs that don't require all that crap. You apparently know as well as I do that developers using all that crap (besides the existence of that crap itself) are the cause of the problem. The most useful frame of mind I've found for writing Windows apps is "think small". Write with the fewest dependencies and libs possible. That pretty much leaves out developing in VB or using MFC, and avoiding the C runtime if possible. ATL is an excellent library, though, and there are some outstanding compilers out there if you prefer BASIC (check out http://www.powerbasic.com".
You're right that most applications can't be uninstalled that way. That's *another* symptom of the problem. As to the shared dlls in common folders, note I said most of the good developers aren't writing their apps that way. Granted, you may have file associations that need tending. I personally feel Windows ought to handle that by itself, and to a small degree it does with the "Open With" dialog. Other info stashed in the registry generally amounts to exactly squat; it's no more harmful than having an unused config file on a unix box.
How should we go about dealing with the multitudes of shared libraries without driving ourselves mad or descending into the DLL Hell that makes Windows machines so unreliable?
DLL hell is a small part of the problems Windows faces, but most of the better programmers started putting their libraries either in their app directory or static linking... Most every app on my Windows machine can be uninstalled by deleting a directory. But don't blame Windows instability on DLL hell. DLL hell is just another symptom of the same thing that causes the instability.
What makes Windows boxes unstable, plain and simple, is faulty drivers and applications. Out of the box, the NT series has been rock-solid even since 1.0 (version 3.1). The Windox 9x series has also been way more reliable than it has the reputation for. Drivers provided directly by Microsoft have traditionally been very stable, even if not very feature-rich. The drivers provided by third-parties, however, tend to suck overall. I would estimated 50% of instability problems I see are related to VIDEO drivers.
The big thing people forget when they compare stability of Windows and other OSes is that in monolithic kernels, the drivers are provided by the guys that know the kernel, thus are typically more stable. I cannot say the same for many Windows drivers. In addition, something like a FreeBSD web server is hardly comparable to an end-user Windows machine, yet this is always the example held up by the anti-Windows crowd. Add MP3 software, graphics apps, kids' games, a crappy sound and video card, and all the other stuff people put on user machines and then see how stable the other OS is.
I'm not blind. I know that on the whole Windows boxes are not so stable. I'm a professional Windows developer. I can say from first-hand knowlege that the bulk of problems with Windows is due to lazy, unknowledgeable, or sometimes hurried and overtaxed programmers. It's a real problem. I also keep a FreeBSD boot around and I'm very pro-GNU/Linux and especially pro FreeBSD. But I program Windows as my work, and know that the instability blamed on Windows itself rarely has anything to do with code written by Microsoft.
I WANT COPIES OF MS DOS 1,2,3,4,5 WIN 1.0 (exists?),2,3; NT 1,2,3,4
There was no NT 1, 2, or 3. NT started with version 3.1 (there was also a 3.1AS). The versions of NT went 3.1, 3.5 (very short-lived), 3.51, 4.0, Win2K. Also, and trust me on this, you don't want a copy of MS-DOS 4.x <g>. It was the worst of them all. As for Windows 1.0, look here:http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?View Item&item=1241862826.
A week or two will pass. The ACCC will announce they've had a meeting with representatives from the major film distributors and now that they understand the purpose of zoning, they find no threat to consumers. They will not repeat the explanation given them by the studios. The issue will be forgotten. Some studio bank accounts show a slight "discretionary fund" drop in balance.