"And with it the market for PC software will shrink while the market for web applications and services will grow."
What are the 5 top-selling web applications and services? If you're not selling something in a market, you're not in that market. Companies like Google are really in the advertising business even if they use web applications to sell the ads.
".. centralised management of apps has been shown to be far easier than having to deliver upgrades to several thousand PCs."
Sure, but remember that network management exists so that people who contribute more directly to the bottom line can get their work done. So the key question is whether the web based applications are superior to their desktop counterparts, not whether upgrades are a pain in the ass for the IT department.
"Plug-in and working thin clients that are solid-state and last for many years."
Let's wait until somebody actually offers a thin client at a lower cost than a PC, sells a few million of them and then we'll see a few years later if they are really easier to use, more reliable, virus-proof, and never need to be upgraded.
By the way, PC's are also solid-state devices since they don't contain vacuum tubes.
So you think Apple is dominating consumer electronics just because the iPod is dominating the portable music market? What about TVs, DVD players, PDAs, Video game consoles etc. I'll bet the entire portable music market makes up less the 10% of the consumer electronics market.
"Already happening with audiobooks, podcasting, and soon videos. Some people just can't see the future, I guess."
Right. Audiobooks are huge. HUGE!
"The iPod halo effect has already been proven as happening."
"As for the iPod, it's Apple's vehicle for controlling digital media, which is where portable devices are headed--movies, music, eBooks, and more."
Why is it that so many people assume that digital is so different than analog when it comes to the marketplace? There was never a single company that dominated analog consumer electronics and its not going to happen with digital either.
Apple really has a single product that is available in different models. They made a deal for an itunes compatible phone, but it's not an Apple phone and its too early to tell how successful it will be.
Let's at least wait until Apple has a hit outside the portable music market before we crown it the king of all digital media.
"It also gives Apple a foot in the door to introducing people to OS X."
This is just the latest in a long history of wishful thinking by Apple zealots.
"The most annoying thing with that language is that it is very similar to Java, but is using different classes. Understandable since it is M$ behind it and they got slapped by Sun for incompatible Java."
You mean a different language uses different classes? Who would have thought it?
"And still, don't forget Ada." I wish I could. Ada's a great language to use if your OS is written in Ada. Otherwise, don't bother.
In particular, I like Ada's unchecked conversion which should be called "brain-dead" conversion. If you convert a 16 bit value to a 32 bit one, the upper word is just garbage. I guess punishing the programmer for politically incorrect usage was more important than doing a conversion that made sense.
The business model for search still hasn't been proven. Neither Google or Yahoo has made a profit over their lifetime.
The iPod is a nice product but it only competes with MS on a second-order basis. It's companies like Sony and Rio that should be concerned. Of course, having the leading product in one niche of the consumer electronics market doesn't make you a key player. Where are the Apple TVs, DVD Players, Digital cameras, etc?
Actually, MS thought "outside the box" when they designed Microsoft Transaction Server (MTS) in 1996. MTS was a run-time environment for middle-tier components and Sun was so impressed with it they incorporated its basic ideas into EJB which was released 3 years later.
Well, sometimes the term "selling out" has a literal as well as a figurative meaning. If these guys are such angels they made sure they still had a controlling interest after going public and wouldn't release that control even if it meant losing their individual fortunes.
It's rather easy to talk about "doing no evil" when the money is flowing in. It's only when things go south that you really find out what you're made of.
"but in 3 years when those college students are full time employees at a large corporation, odds are they will still be working on and contributing back to those Open Source projects and others."
You've made a lot of assumptions: 1. they will graduate 2. they will find a job 3. they will want to do programming for nothing after spending 40 hrs/week doing it for pay.
If they buy into the "proprietary software is evil" argument, they should probably just drop out of school, get a job that leaves them a lot of free time and just program free/OSS out of love.
"Nothing is stopping you from writing a perfect clone of TeX -- all the details are published."
Why on earth would I want to do that?
"However, nobody knows what bit 3 in byte 7 of MS's.doc format does, so you can't clone it. Or make any other software be able to read all the data in the file."
So Open Office's claim of MS Word file-format compatibility is a lie?
"That would be a disaster for IBM and any other GPL-relying company."
No. It would be a disaster for the "free" software movement. IBM would simply stop is PR-based "free" software support and continue with business as usual. The "free" software movement has nothing IBM needs.
"Shallow learning curves do mean increased productivity for the novice. They don't translate to increased productivity for ALL users or ALL applications."
That is true, but a program's steep learning curve doesn't imply greater productivity for experienced users than one with a shallow learning curve either. You have to be an expert in both programs to make a valid comparison.
"I think his point was we should learn the grammar of our language. Not depend upon a computer to catch "errors". "
Or perhaps we should just write everything by hand rather than depending on a computer to cut/paste, or print. A computers only value is to accelerate our work. We don't need it to teach us to be responsible learners.
What I love about these Linux to Windows comparisons is that when we talk about features and capabilities, Linux fans point to whole distributions, but when we talk about hardware requirements or viruses, suddenly it's just the kernel.
Early Windows versions ran on a 16-bit CPU without an MMU. So if we're going to talk strictly about minimum resources Linux lost that battle right at the starting gate.
It's not a Linux limitation, it's Unix limitation.
"It's fun, it's profitable, and I'm certainly making a living at working with tools at least 5 years ahead of where they'd be without such open source tools.
Come on. What open source tools are 5 years ahead of proprietary ones?
Slashdot Mirror
"And with it the market for PC software will shrink while the market for web applications and services will grow."
What are the 5 top-selling web applications and services? If you're not selling something in a market, you're not in that market. Companies like Google are really in the advertising business even if they use web applications to sell the ads.
".. centralised management of apps has been shown to be far easier than having to deliver upgrades to several thousand PCs."
Sure, but remember that network management exists so that people who contribute more directly to the bottom line can get their work done. So the key question is whether the web based applications are superior to their desktop counterparts, not whether upgrades are a pain in the ass for the IT department.
"Plug-in and working thin clients that are solid-state and last for many years."
Let's wait until somebody actually offers a thin client at a lower cost than a PC, sells a few million of them and then we'll see a few years later if they are really easier to use, more reliable, virus-proof, and never need to be upgraded.
By the way, PC's are also solid-state devices since they don't contain vacuum tubes.
"It's already happening, with the iPod."
So you think Apple is dominating consumer electronics just because the iPod is dominating the portable music market? What about TVs, DVD players, PDAs, Video game consoles etc. I'll bet the entire portable music market makes up less the 10% of the consumer electronics market.
"Already happening with audiobooks, podcasting, and soon videos. Some people just can't see the future, I guess."
Right. Audiobooks are huge. HUGE!
"The iPod halo effect has already been proven as happening."
Wake us when Apple's PC share reaches 10%.
"As for the iPod, it's Apple's vehicle for controlling digital media, which is where portable devices are headed--movies, music, eBooks, and more."
Why is it that so many people assume that digital is so different than analog when it comes to the marketplace? There was never a single company that dominated analog consumer electronics and its not going to happen with digital either.
Apple really has a single product that is available in different models. They made a deal for an itunes compatible phone, but it's not an Apple phone and its too early to tell how successful it will be.
Let's at least wait until Apple has a hit outside the portable music market before we crown it the king of all digital media.
"It also gives Apple a foot in the door to introducing people to OS X."
This is just the latest in a long history of wishful thinking by Apple zealots.
"The most annoying thing with that language is that it is very similar to Java, but is using different classes. Understandable since it is M$ behind it and they got slapped by Sun for incompatible Java."
You mean a different language uses different classes? Who would have thought it?
"And still, don't forget Ada."
I wish I could. Ada's a great language to use if your OS is written in Ada. Otherwise, don't bother.
In particular, I like Ada's unchecked conversion which should be called "brain-dead" conversion. If you convert a 16 bit value to a 32 bit one, the upper word is just garbage. I guess punishing the programmer for politically incorrect usage was more important than doing a conversion that made sense.
"Google has been profitable over their lifetime for sure..."
Since Google was privately held until its IPO we can't really know, but you'd be surprised how much money can be burned by a major start-up.
"I view FOSS as a resume builder for a dream software engineering job."
Your "dream software engineering job" must not be FOSS-based. If it were, why should they pay you to do what you're already doing for free?
The business model for search still hasn't been proven. Neither Google or Yahoo has made a profit over their lifetime.
The iPod is a nice product but it only competes with MS on a second-order basis. It's companies like Sony and Rio that should be concerned. Of course, having the leading product in one niche of the consumer electronics market doesn't make you a key player. Where are the Apple TVs, DVD Players, Digital cameras, etc?
Kai-Fu Lee and the iPod represent MS's biggest problems, they have nothing to worry about.
Actually, MS thought "outside the box" when they designed Microsoft Transaction Server (MTS) in 1996. MTS was a run-time environment for middle-tier components and Sun was so impressed with it they incorporated its basic ideas into EJB which was released 3 years later.
Well, sometimes the term "selling out" has a literal as well as a figurative meaning. If these guys are such angels they made sure they still had a controlling interest after going public and wouldn't release that control even if it meant losing their individual fortunes.
It's rather easy to talk about "doing no evil" when the money is flowing in. It's only when things go south that you really find out what you're made of.
"but in 3 years when those college students are full time employees at a large corporation, odds are they will still be working on and contributing back to those Open Source projects and others."
You've made a lot of assumptions:
1. they will graduate
2. they will find a job
3. they will want to do programming for nothing after spending 40 hrs/week doing it for pay.
If they buy into the "proprietary software is evil" argument, they should probably just drop out of school, get a job that leaves them a lot of free time and just program free/OSS out of love.
"Nothing is stopping you from writing a perfect clone of TeX -- all the details are published."
.doc format does, so you can't clone it. Or make any other software be able to read all the data in the file."
Why on earth would I want to do that?
"However, nobody knows what bit 3 in byte 7 of MS's
So Open Office's claim of MS Word file-format compatibility is a lie?
"That would be a disaster for IBM and any other GPL-relying company."
No. It would be a disaster for the "free" software movement. IBM would simply stop is PR-based "free" software support and continue with business as usual. The "free" software movement has nothing IBM needs.
"The document format is application specific."
And TeX isn't? Just because a document uses only ascii characters doesn't mean it's format isn't application specific.
"Shallow learning curves do mean increased productivity for the novice. They don't translate to increased productivity for ALL users or ALL applications."
That is true, but a program's steep learning curve doesn't imply greater productivity for experienced users than one with a shallow learning curve either. You have to be an expert in both programs to make a valid comparison.
I assume you didn't run a true Unix directly on the Apple II. That would be quite impossible.
"I think his point was we should learn the grammar of our language. Not depend upon a computer to catch "errors". "
Or perhaps we should just write everything by hand rather than depending on a computer to cut/paste, or print. A computers only value is to accelerate our work. We don't need it to teach us to be responsible learners.
What I love about these Linux to Windows comparisons is that when we talk about features and capabilities, Linux fans point to whole distributions, but when we talk about hardware requirements or viruses, suddenly it's just the kernel.
Early Windows versions ran on a 16-bit CPU without an MMU. So if we're going to talk strictly about minimum resources Linux lost that battle right at the starting gate.
It's not a Linux limitation, it's Unix limitation.
You're right. I know bnothing about Linux.
You forgot cat and ls.
"It's fun, it's profitable, and I'm certainly making a living at working with tools at least 5 years ahead of where they'd be without such open source tools.
Come on. What open source tools are 5 years ahead of proprietary ones?
My mistake. I was referring to RHL release numbers.
So, what can you do when the 2.6 kernel runs with 4MB?