I was going to write, well they will when netscape crashes for the fourth time in an hour, but actually you're right. Very few "Joe Users" know that IE and netscape are both browsers, or which browser they are currently using, and one was even worried that he couldn't use hotmail at another computer because "it wasn't installed there." The same goes for operating systems.
People on slashdot often don't realize how little normal users know about computers when they say, "but installing distro #.0 is extremely easy" - most users don't know what an OS does at all, and would probably believe me if I said "you don't really need an operating system", and if I asked "what browser do you have installed, windows or word", I guess most of them would not realize I was fooling them.
I'm afraid that as long as users are this ignorant, they will always let the OEMs choose an OS for them, and we'll never wean any of them off Windows. Which is necessary, not because Windows is bad, but because a (near) monopoly is bad.
Well, you should be used to that kind of behavior if you're using Netscape. At work I installed Netscape (to test applets in), and it took me a long time to clean up the mess it made (shortcuts to all kinds of Netscape crap everywhere, browser and mailclient set to default (without asking of course), "smart" download manager installed). Terribly rude, even worse than RealPlayer.
You're confusing two issues. You're saying that C++ is cleaner than Java because you must write cleaner code in C++. Actually, Java is cleaner than C++, so people get away with writing sloppy Java code. While if you don't know exactly what you're doing in C++, you're going to get screwed. I wouldn't say that is a virtue of C++.
Also, you imply that C/C++ programmers are in general better programmers than Java programmers. I agree, but again, that's not a virtue of C/C++, or the fault of Java. You just need more experience to use C/C++. That's because you need to do more things in those languages. Things that *can* be automated. Manual MM is the *last* thing I miss from my C/C++ era.
What planet do you live on? Java is becoming THE lplatform for enterprise development, with companies like IBM, Oracle, and BEA fighting for the application server market. The company I work for is doing Java consulting for the three biggest Dutch banks. Almost every web browser runs Java, and and the end of this year there will be 20 million mobile phones world-wide that run Java. LIMITED SCOPE, AS IF!!! You could sooner claim that c is limited, because it's only used for kernels and other low-level stuff.
At the JavaOne conference last week I already saw a 3D game written with Java-3D (no native calls) that was definitely comparable to Q2 graphics-wise. I also heard somebody say that Carmack said that we was considering Java for future projects (yes I find this hard to believe too).
Actually, I heard this year the number of Java programmers has surpassed the number of VB programmers (although it's hard to get reliable numbers). There are approx. 2.5M Java programmers world-wide.
In Java you cannot write something once and then use it for different types, so you start copying the code and modify it slightly for each type. In C++ you can write it once and use templates.
Good news! Generics for Java is coming! Unfortunately it will take a little while (in v1.5, probably early 2003) but there's already a pretty good compiler out for download that you can use. I believe generic classes will run on on 1.3+ VMs - you just need the new compiler.
What about Ruby? I don't know Python, but Ruby is pretty easy to learn, and you can do lots of things with it. It also has an interactive mode, so you can see the results of an expression immediately.
Personally, I'm glad I started with (C64) basic though. As long as you make the switch to a real language before you're 15, (and don't use VB), it won't cause any long-term damage, I think.
Multiple inheritance is an ugly thing? No way! Multiple inheritance in C++ is ugly as hell, but MI in Eiffel is truly beautiful. Look at a couple of the collection classes is you want to see a sensible and useful application of MI that would have been much uglier without MI.
By the way, Java has multiple inheritance of interfaces, but not of implementation. If it didn't have any MI, Java would be unusable. Even so, not having multiple inheritance of implementation is annoying, and programmers have to code around it, using ugly concepts like inner classes.
<Java Specific>A typical case where implementation inheritance is useful, is when you have a class that needs to extend a WindowAdapter, because you want to be notified when a window is closed. Unfortunately, your class is already extending something. So, you code around it, using an inner class (ugly), or implementing WindowListener and creating empty methods for the six methods in WindowListener that you DON'T need.</Java Specific>
Eiffel is a great language for learning OO-concepts. It is also one of the cleanest languages around. Disliking *one* of the IDEs is hardly a reason to switch to another language.
I would say that JBuilder is definitely a serious competitor to Forte. They have a free edition which is not too bad, and they also have a professional and enterprise edition which have lots of useful features. JBuilder was voted best IDE on the JavaOne conference last week. You need at leas 256MB though...
There's also NetBeans, which is based on Forte (or the other way around), and which is open source.
By the way, if you're a VB developer, why not move to.NET? Then you can easily switch between different languages like VB, C# and Eiffel# (and there are more languages coming up).
I still play Alpha Centauri. I'm involved in an epic play-by-email game which has recently entered its third year. And every now and then I fire up a single player game.
The earth setting of Civ 2 is nice, but the inane diplomacy and the tedious micromanagement really put me off after the first couple of years.
Can't wait for Civ 3 though. Trade and diplomacy, great! But I'll miss the creepy SF setting of SMAC.
Slashdot Mirror
True, but that position would have more characters than the perl script.
Well, W2K doesn't run smoothly on 128MB either. Add some extra memory, that should solve it, your cpu is fast enough.
If it wasn't for Pong, I'd be watching Survivor and Jerry Springer. Thanks!!!
Nader has nothing to do with this. And did Dubya ever have a real job?
Java on the client side will hopefully (have grammar nazis given up on this one?) start to blossom with Java Web Start (example game, specs).
Probably the DMCA. It's the Swiss army knife of laws. You can make anything illegal with it.
People on slashdot often don't realize how little normal users know about computers when they say, "but installing distro #.0 is extremely easy" - most users don't know what an OS does at all, and would probably believe me if I said "you don't really need an operating system", and if I asked "what browser do you have installed, windows or word", I guess most of them would not realize I was fooling them.
I'm afraid that as long as users are this ignorant, they will always let the OEMs choose an OS for them, and we'll never wean any of them off Windows. Which is necessary, not because Windows is bad, but because a (near) monopoly is bad.
Well, you should be used to that kind of behavior if you're using Netscape. At work I installed Netscape (to test applets in), and it took me a long time to clean up the mess it made (shortcuts to all kinds of Netscape crap everywhere, browser and mailclient set to default (without asking of course), "smart" download manager installed). Terribly rude, even worse than RealPlayer.
>Did they take sexual preference into account?
Since the subjects were aged 8-11, I think they didn't.
128 bits? Hey, this might be a good way to fill up the IPv6 address space...
ISE Eiffel (CTO is Bertrand Meyer) are the inventors of Eiffel, and they've got the best-known, commercial IDE+compiler.
Pebbles are a feature of their IDE, and there's support for in their GUI library, but that's it.
Here are a lot of useful Eiffel links, including links to the free OS SmallEiffel compiler.
You're confusing two issues. You're saying that C++ is cleaner than Java because you must write cleaner code in C++. Actually, Java is cleaner than C++, so people get away with writing sloppy Java code. While if you don't know exactly what you're doing in C++, you're going to get screwed. I wouldn't say that is a virtue of C++.
Also, you imply that C/C++ programmers are in general better programmers than Java programmers. I agree, but again, that's not a virtue of C/C++, or the fault of Java. You just need more experience to use C/C++. That's because you need to do more things in those languages. Things that *can* be automated. Manual MM is the *last* thing I miss from my C/C++ era.
What planet do you live on? Java is becoming THE lplatform for enterprise development, with companies like IBM, Oracle, and BEA fighting for the application server market. The company I work for is doing Java consulting for the three biggest Dutch banks. Almost every web browser runs Java, and and the end of this year there will be 20 million mobile phones world-wide that run Java. LIMITED SCOPE, AS IF!!! You could sooner claim that c is limited, because it's only used for kernels and other low-level stuff.
At the JavaOne conference last week I already saw a 3D game written with Java-3D (no native calls) that was definitely comparable to Q2 graphics-wise. I also heard somebody say that Carmack said that we was considering Java for future projects (yes I find this hard to believe too).
Actually, I heard this year the number of Java programmers has surpassed the number of VB programmers (although it's hard to get reliable numbers). There are approx. 2.5M Java programmers world-wide.
Good news! Generics for Java is coming! Unfortunately it will take a little while (in v1.5, probably early 2003) but there's already a pretty good compiler out for download that you can use. I believe generic classes will run on on 1.3+ VMs - you just need the new compiler.
What about Ruby? I don't know Python, but Ruby is pretty easy to learn, and you can do lots of things with it. It also has an interactive mode, so you can see the results of an expression immediately.
Personally, I'm glad I started with (C64) basic though. As long as you make the switch to a real language before you're 15, (and don't use VB), it won't cause any long-term damage, I think.
Multiple inheritance is an ugly thing? No way! Multiple inheritance in C++ is ugly as hell, but MI in Eiffel is truly beautiful. Look at a couple of the collection classes is you want to see a sensible and useful application of MI that would have been much uglier without MI.
By the way, Java has multiple inheritance of interfaces, but not of implementation. If it didn't have any MI, Java would be unusable. Even so, not having multiple inheritance of implementation is annoying, and programmers have to code around it, using ugly concepts like inner classes.
<Java Specific>A typical case where implementation inheritance is useful, is when you have a class that needs to extend a WindowAdapter, because you want to be notified when a window is closed. Unfortunately, your class is already extending something. So, you code around it, using an inner class (ugly), or implementing WindowListener and creating empty methods for the six methods in WindowListener that you DON'T need.</Java Specific>
At least we finally get genericity in 1.5...
Eiffel is a great language for learning OO-concepts. It is also one of the cleanest languages around. Disliking *one* of the IDEs is hardly a reason to switch to another language.
I would say that JBuilder is definitely a serious competitor to Forte. They have a free edition which is not too bad, and they also have a professional and enterprise edition which have lots of useful features. JBuilder was voted best IDE on the JavaOne conference last week. You need at leas 256MB though...
There's also NetBeans, which is based on Forte (or the other way around), and which is open source.
By the way, if you're a VB developer, why not move to .NET? Then you can easily switch between different languages like VB, C# and Eiffel# (and there are more languages coming up).
Yeah, I love big words!
Sure! As long as it's not Alaska...
I still play Alpha Centauri. I'm involved in an epic play-by-email game which has recently entered its third year. And every now and then I fire up a single player game.
The earth setting of Civ 2 is nice, but the inane diplomacy and the tedious micromanagement really put me off after the first couple of years.
Can't wait for Civ 3 though. Trade and diplomacy, great! But I'll miss the creepy SF setting of SMAC.