So we took a seriously stylish, state-of-the art media tablet and put a whole lot of fun in it. With the WePad, you can browse the Internet, watch YouTube, check your e-mail, chat with friends on Facebook, and much, much more. You can even get some work done, if you absolutely must. Most importantly, we created an open system, so that everyone can participate.
We built a platform based on two established, well-known technologies, Android and Linux, meaning that software developers can dream up apps for anything you may want to do with your WePad (and even some things you might never have dreamed possible yourself). It's quick and simple - and needless to say, any app that already exists for Android also runs on the WePad. Right out of the box.
ok, you can only pre-order it, but surely those crazy Germans aren't touting vapourwar (apparently the grad unveiling is at a show in May, cost 449.
While it may be a little annoying for developers, ultimately if it makes the user experience better, it has succeeded.
While its unsurprising developers don't like this, no-one's thought to ask the users what they think yet. And I believe there's a lot more users out there than developers.
As for Android, I know you can do some C++ dev on it (thank goodness), but the majority of the user libraries were in Java, and they definitely encourage you to do all development in Java.
Hey, you can still put the comments in Swahili, but last I looked C had a small set of keywords that just happened to be the same as English words. We'll gloss over the use of punctuation marks as they don't fit into this argument:)
well, what they should have done is released all the libraries used to create iPhone apps in a specialised VM of their own, and ensures people had to code in the corresponding language only.
Like MS demanding Win7 apps be written in a managed language (ie C#) or Android in Dalvik/Java. iPhone demands C/C++/ObjC. What's the big deal here?
I suppose it makes sense - there's an 'app store' for android, but what about stores for apps that are built for a particular device, or have capabilities offered by a particular carrier?
In these cases, I think its a good thing to allow multiple app stores for the phones. Android is not like the iPhone in this regard - but then, if you have an iPhone, there's only 1 type of device you have.
to be fair, even Windows has the exit button on the top left, you just have to double-click on it to make it work (which, in itself could be considered a good safety feature from accidentally single-clicking.)(Unfortunately single-clicking has a bug that makes it display some lines of text)
who said anything about the count being personal computers only.
As for Fedora, the link in TFA (yes, I had to go read TFA to check you were wrong, thanks for that) counts the number of Fedora installs by tracking IPs making yum requests, downloads, opt-in phone-home calls, (they recognise requests from behind NAT and proxies as being offset by users with dynamic IPs, though they say they think corporate users behind NAT make up a larger number than personal users)
For example, they get 50,000 direct downloads from unique IPs per week. Not bad.
The most interesting thing I saw was their maps showing the last 7 days - x86_64 was a little stronger in the west, and x86 stronger in eastern Europe, India and China. OK, not that surprising, but interesting nevertheless - 64bit seems to be more popular.
The Midori programming model includes Bartok, an MSR project that endeavored to create a lightweight compiled and managed runtime system that was more efficient than the.NET Framework
So maybe its not quite.NET after all. Anyhow, I think this research project is something that they;'re using to take the good ideas out of - especially where they apply to cloud computing as MS doesn't really have much there yet and they see it as a great way of making you pay for a subscription to their software instead of a one-off purchase.
As for C/C++, there's a reason game programmers write in those languages and not.NET, though you do see some more strategy-based games coming out made in XNA, they're not at the cutting edge. Games sell either as mass-market, run-everywhere flash-type things (eg little games on your iPhone), or big super-graphically based ones. There's not that much market for.NET games that fall somewhere in the middle.
What are you smoking? Windows kernel itself hasn't really been vulnerable to anything, it's the third party software
but there have been several security updates for the kernel, so its more a case of what are you drinking?
(the MS koolaid, obviously).
As for 3rd party apps, yes, that true there are way more vulnerabilities in them, but that mostly applies to the Windows userland apps. I can tell how many vulnerabilities there are in Windows simply by looking at my update history - all those critical updates aren't distributed for fun.
Yeah, its definitely a children's show. that's why its broadcast on pre prime-time slot on holidays, and then on Saturdays in the 5-6pm slot. That's typically before the sports start. Incidentally, its the same time-slot that the A-Team was broadcast, so you can kind of see the target audience age (and the reason why there's always some form of totty sidekick present for the Dads who have to watch it with their kids)
However, I think the 'modern' doctor series have done remarkably well in appealing to an older audience as well.
not to mention the theme itself, go read up on how it was actually made in the days before synthesisers and music-editing computer software. It was practically made before electronics were commonplace.
And you tell that they spliced individual notes together on analogue tape to the youth of today who expect to click the 'make music' button on your favourite music package and they won't believe you... (after saying "what's analogue tape")
no, never looked at PHPBB, or PHPNuke, but that doesn't mean Bugzilla, Mantis, dotProject, MediaWiki, etc are not nearly as bad.
Have you looked at some dreadful Java code? I can't claim PHP makes for worse code than Java, I prefer to go by coder ability rather than any inherent language flaws.
It's perfectly suited for Joe's Burgers 4 page website, but when something more 'advanced' is needed, PHP just doesn't cut it.
At risk of defending PHP, it does cut it. That's the thing - look on sourceforge and you'll see hundreds of good PHP webapps. Now, sure, you'd never use it for anything else, but if you're writing a web application, then PHP is an excellent choice - very easy to install, easy to admin.
Its perhaps the midset that says you need something more complex and featured to do the tasks that are required that is Java's problem. Think about all the web apps you've ever seen. They're not that complex (except the crap one that are), all they need to do is manipulate data via a GUI (ie html page) and shove it into a DB. And vice-versa. Occasionally making some interpretation of that data. You do not need Java for that, especially when its so difficult to install glassfish/Tomcat/JREs/etc.
Don't knock those PHP apps, they're doing stuff right - despite being written in PHP! Look to them to see where your Java apps are going wrong.
Yeah, everything most enterprises need should be web-based anyways---but the guts behind that would still be... what? VB.NET? Heh!
today... hmm... oh, yes I know!!!
Cloud-based web-services of course. I read about it on a management consultant report, so it must be true.
C/C++ most likely would be a better choice - less fluffing about with language toys means more real work getting done, especially when that means you can ignore the current latest buzzword b*ll*cks the other languages are pandering to with bloated, poorly-implemented and designed frameworks that are there so your job can be outsourced to India....
To be honest, if you want a better language choice for internal apps, I would recommend PHP over Java. Yep, you hear that right. See - I've used these Enterprise apps written in Java and they are by and large complete pants. I also use some OSS PHP apps to solve my specific needs, and by and large, they're wonderful. So, either the language is at fault or the development process.
For example, I use Siebel at work (Oracle Java Enterprise $1000 per-seat cr*p) and I also use Mantis (OSS PHP $0 per seat). Mantis kicks the arse of Siebel, some teams refused to use Siebel once they got Mantis (cue management battle).
So, really, you can use these huge, bloated, expensive piles of nonsense. Or you can use a smaller more targetted application. Even written in PHP its simple to maintain and manage, and simple to write in the first place. I'd say you can write these little apps in Java, but I don't think its quite designed for that - better to go with a simpler language from the start (and no, it doesn't *have* to be PHP).
not quite true... some of them do know what they're doing.. unfortunately, they're swamped by so much project process, project managers, 'architects', designers, consultants, mandatory frameworks, and suchlike that their contributions are insignificant in the end result.
you forgot the 'committee' stage that gave us stuff like Enterprise Java Beans.
and the lack of progress in required features like Generics (though to be fair, a stable language is a good thing as you can learn it and concentrate on building stuff with it, rather than continually re-learning it. But that assumes you have all the good building-block stuff in it from near the start) you also forgot the performance and resource usage of it, especially in the early days (and see EJB) that really gave it a bad name.
And, of course, you did mention the marketed 'easyness' of coding it, such that everyone thought you could hire cheapass, crap coders who'd write excellent code in it. Which is also why we have enterprise monstrosities written almost solely in Java.
Java turned into corporate enterprise horribleness. I for one will not be upset to see it go. Now.. C#, if it wasn't that we have gobs of Ram and multi-core 3Ghz CPUs, it too would be tarred with the same brush. EJB == Microsoft Pattern and Practices; Same cheapass coders required to use it; XML for everything and more; its only a matter of time before we have the same monstrosities written using it (though they will be prettier)
Yeah, but.... a lot of companies have dropped their SVG support after MS (or was it Adobe) decided to stop supporting their SVG plugin.
Now IE9 will have native SVG support, that just means *most* browsers will have it (ie not IE7 or 8), which still means that it is not widespread enough for adoption. Maybe in a few years when everyone has migrated from IE8 to 9, but you know how long that will be. In the meantime, all the other browsers will be running something much better like webGL and MS will be still playing catchup.
That is mostly because Internet Explorer didn't properly support PNG until the GIF patent expired.
which is not so much a problem with patents, or workarounds, but with monopoly power of a product - in this case IE6.
Fortunately, this would not be an issue anymore as IE seems to be headed to the folder marked "niche browser", but it is still an issue with other monopolistic products - eg if there was something that was patented but used by Windows that only the open source community wanted to replace, but MS couldn't give a rats ass about, that product would continue to resist change. FAT32 for example.
Credit cards have a minimum fee too - like 50c, so the 2% is a lot more for small payments.
Which is why the $10 minimum is the amount generally used - the merchant pays that 50c on your $1 purchase, it turns into a net loss for them.
Also the $10 minimum is often (£10 here in the UK) the smallest amount you can charge before the card will phone home for authorisation. Less than that, they don't bother - so you can use a stolen card with impunity for small amounts (ok they do random authorisation)
Slashdot Mirror
Surely you mean the WePad
So we took a seriously stylish, state-of-the art media tablet and put a whole lot of fun in it. With the WePad, you can browse the Internet, watch YouTube, check your e-mail, chat with friends on Facebook, and much, much more. You can even get some work done, if you absolutely must. Most importantly, we created an open system, so that everyone can participate.
We built a platform based on two established, well-known technologies, Android and Linux, meaning that software developers can dream up apps for anything you may want to do with your WePad (and even some things you might never have dreamed possible yourself). It's quick and simple - and needless to say, any app that already exists for Android also runs on the WePad. Right out of the box.
ok, you can only pre-order it, but surely those crazy Germans aren't touting vapourwar (apparently the grad unveiling is at a show in May, cost 449.
While it may be a little annoying for developers, ultimately if it makes the user experience better, it has succeeded.
While its unsurprising developers don't like this, no-one's thought to ask the users what they think yet. And I believe there's a lot more users out there than developers.
ahem. I mean Windows Mobile 7, not Windows.
As for Android, I know you can do some C++ dev on it (thank goodness), but the majority of the user libraries were in Java, and they definitely encourage you to do all development in Java.
Hey, you can still put the comments in Swahili, but last I looked C had a small set of keywords that just happened to be the same as English words. We'll gloss over the use of punctuation marks as they don't fit into this argument :)
well, what they should have done is released all the libraries used to create iPhone apps in a specialised VM of their own, and ensures people had to code in the corresponding language only.
Like MS demanding Win7 apps be written in a managed language (ie C#) or Android in Dalvik/Java. iPhone demands C/C++/ObjC. What's the big deal here?
I suppose it makes sense - there's an 'app store' for android, but what about stores for apps that are built for a particular device, or have capabilities offered by a particular carrier?
In these cases, I think its a good thing to allow multiple app stores for the phones. Android is not like the iPhone in this regard - but then, if you have an iPhone, there's only 1 type of device you have.
to be fair, even Windows has the exit button on the top left, you just have to double-click on it to make it work (which, in itself could be considered a good safety feature from accidentally single-clicking.)(Unfortunately single-clicking has a bug that makes it display some lines of text)
who said anything about the count being personal computers only.
As for Fedora, the link in TFA (yes, I had to go read TFA to check you were wrong, thanks for that) counts the number of Fedora installs by tracking IPs making yum requests, downloads, opt-in phone-home calls, (they recognise requests from behind NAT and proxies as being offset by users with dynamic IPs, though they say they think corporate users behind NAT make up a larger number than personal users)
For example, they get 50,000 direct downloads from unique IPs per week. Not bad.
The most interesting thing I saw was their maps showing the last 7 days - x86_64 was a little stronger in the west, and x86 stronger in eastern Europe, India and China. OK, not that surprising, but interesting nevertheless - 64bit seems to be more popular.
Android is literally first breakthrough for Java out of the server niche and I think that deserves a bit more of the praise.
I can think of words other than 'praise' for this aspect of Android .....
Right, but if Midori replaces Windows, what's going to happen to PC gaming
Bubble Bobble?
I doubt it.
eg. from TFA:
The Midori programming model includes Bartok, an MSR project that endeavored to create a lightweight compiled and managed runtime system that was more efficient than the .NET Framework
So maybe its not quite .NET after all. Anyhow, I think this research project is something that they;'re using to take the good ideas out of - especially where they apply to cloud computing as MS doesn't really have much there yet and they see it as a great way of making you pay for a subscription to their software instead of a one-off purchase.
As for C/C++, there's a reason game programmers write in those languages and not .NET, though you do see some more strategy-based games coming out made in XNA, they're not at the cutting edge. Games sell either as mass-market, run-everywhere flash-type things (eg little games on your iPhone), or big super-graphically based ones. There's not that much market for .NET games that fall somewhere in the middle.
What are you smoking? Windows kernel itself hasn't really been vulnerable to anything, it's the third party software
but there have been several security updates for the kernel, so its more a case of what are you drinking?
(the MS koolaid, obviously).
As for 3rd party apps, yes, that true there are way more vulnerabilities in them, but that mostly applies to the Windows userland apps. I can tell how many vulnerabilities there are in Windows simply by looking at my update history - all those critical updates aren't distributed for fun.
they were... 47 years ago.
I suppose times have changed, along with tastes and expectations.
Yeah, its definitely a children's show. that's why its broadcast on pre prime-time slot on holidays, and then on Saturdays in the 5-6pm slot. That's typically before the sports start. Incidentally, its the same time-slot that the A-Team was broadcast, so you can kind of see the target audience age (and the reason why there's always some form of totty sidekick present for the Dads who have to watch it with their kids)
However, I think the 'modern' doctor series have done remarkably well in appealing to an older audience as well.
not to mention the theme itself, go read up on how it was actually made in the days before synthesisers and music-editing computer software. It was practically made before electronics were commonplace.
And you tell that they spliced individual notes together on analogue tape to the youth of today who expect to click the 'make music' button on your favourite music package and they won't believe you... (after saying "what's analogue tape")
and 1 outside Earls' Court in London
no, never looked at PHPBB, or PHPNuke, but that doesn't mean Bugzilla, Mantis, dotProject, MediaWiki, etc are not nearly as bad.
Have you looked at some dreadful Java code? I can't claim PHP makes for worse code than Java, I prefer to go by coder ability rather than any inherent language flaws.
It's perfectly suited for Joe's Burgers 4 page website, but when something more 'advanced' is needed, PHP just doesn't cut it.
At risk of defending PHP, it does cut it. That's the thing - look on sourceforge and you'll see hundreds of good PHP webapps. Now, sure, you'd never use it for anything else, but if you're writing a web application, then PHP is an excellent choice - very easy to install, easy to admin.
Its perhaps the midset that says you need something more complex and featured to do the tasks that are required that is Java's problem. Think about all the web apps you've ever seen. They're not that complex (except the crap one that are), all they need to do is manipulate data via a GUI (ie html page) and shove it into a DB. And vice-versa. Occasionally making some interpretation of that data. You do not need Java for that, especially when its so difficult to install glassfish/Tomcat/JREs/etc.
Don't knock those PHP apps, they're doing stuff right - despite being written in PHP! Look to them to see where your Java apps are going wrong.
Yeah, everything most enterprises need should be web-based anyways---but the guts behind that would still be... what? VB.NET? Heh!
today... hmm... oh, yes I know!!!
Cloud-based web-services of course. I read about it on a management consultant report, so it must be true.
C/C++ most likely would be a better choice - less fluffing about with language toys means more real work getting done, especially when that means you can ignore the current latest buzzword b*ll*cks the other languages are pandering to with bloated, poorly-implemented and designed frameworks that are there so your job can be outsourced to India. ...
To be honest, if you want a better language choice for internal apps, I would recommend PHP over Java. Yep, you hear that right. See - I've used these Enterprise apps written in Java and they are by and large complete pants. I also use some OSS PHP apps to solve my specific needs, and by and large, they're wonderful. So, either the language is at fault or the development process.
For example, I use Siebel at work (Oracle Java Enterprise $1000 per-seat cr*p) and I also use Mantis (OSS PHP $0 per seat). Mantis kicks the arse of Siebel, some teams refused to use Siebel once they got Mantis (cue management battle).
So, really, you can use these huge, bloated, expensive piles of nonsense. Or you can use a smaller more targetted application. Even written in PHP its simple to maintain and manage, and simple to write in the first place. I'd say you can write these little apps in Java, but I don't think its quite designed for that - better to go with a simpler language from the start (and no, it doesn't *have* to be PHP).
not quite true... some of them do know what they're doing.. unfortunately, they're swamped by so much project process, project managers, 'architects', designers, consultants, mandatory frameworks, and suchlike that their contributions are insignificant in the end result.
you forgot the 'committee' stage that gave us stuff like Enterprise Java Beans.
and the lack of progress in required features like Generics (though to be fair, a stable language is a good thing as you can learn it and concentrate on building stuff with it, rather than continually re-learning it. But that assumes you have all the good building-block stuff in it from near the start)
you also forgot the performance and resource usage of it, especially in the early days (and see EJB) that really gave it a bad name.
And, of course, you did mention the marketed 'easyness' of coding it, such that everyone thought you could hire cheapass, crap coders who'd write excellent code in it. Which is also why we have enterprise monstrosities written almost solely in Java.
Java turned into corporate enterprise horribleness. I for one will not be upset to see it go. Now.. C#, if it wasn't that we have gobs of Ram and multi-core 3Ghz CPUs, it too would be tarred with the same brush. EJB == Microsoft Pattern and Practices; Same cheapass coders required to use it; XML for everything and more; its only a matter of time before we have the same monstrosities written using it (though they will be prettier)
Turned out it was generated by (if I recall correctly) an MSN application of some kind.
I suppose that's one way to boost your user count :)
Yeah, but.... a lot of companies have dropped their SVG support after MS (or was it Adobe) decided to stop supporting their SVG plugin.
Now IE9 will have native SVG support, that just means *most* browsers will have it (ie not IE7 or 8), which still means that it is not widespread enough for adoption. Maybe in a few years when everyone has migrated from IE8 to 9, but you know how long that will be. In the meantime, all the other browsers will be running something much better like webGL and MS will be still playing catchup.
That is mostly because Internet Explorer didn't properly support PNG until the GIF patent expired.
which is not so much a problem with patents, or workarounds, but with monopoly power of a product - in this case IE6.
Fortunately, this would not be an issue anymore as IE seems to be headed to the folder marked "niche browser", but it is still an issue with other monopolistic products - eg if there was something that was patented but used by Windows that only the open source community wanted to replace, but MS couldn't give a rats ass about, that product would continue to resist change. FAT32 for example.
Credit cards have a minimum fee too - like 50c, so the 2% is a lot more for small payments.
Which is why the $10 minimum is the amount generally used - the merchant pays that 50c on your $1 purchase, it turns into a net loss for them.
Also the $10 minimum is often (£10 here in the UK) the smallest amount you can charge before the card will phone home for authorisation. Less than that, they don't bother - so you can use a stolen card with impunity for small amounts (ok they do random authorisation)