I'd say you have excellent job prospects. If you were at one time a good programmer, and you're willing to invest 3-6 months of free time to "get back on the bike", you'll be fine.
As others have suggested, pick up a good intro book to Java, and maybe a couple O'Reilly books on some deeper aspects of the language (Java Network Programming is good, as is Java Servlets). After learning from those, I'd say you're ready to start looking for a job op.
I'd also suggest that to reacquaint yourself with the discipline of programming, get a book on Patterns or Extreme Programming. Both are good areas to be familiar with in today's market, and learning about these topics will make you feel more like a "real" programmer again;-).
Oh, and write lots of code. Take examples in the books you read and enhance them. Have some examples in your arsenal for the interviews...
Geez dude, chill.
It's a friggin' joke. We should all be able to laugh at ourselves a little. Ever see "Will & Grace"? "The Bird Cage"? I think it's OK to be gay and funny...:-).
The Scarab project is a fairly interesting effort to create a good bug tracker. This is from a group who used Bugzilla as a tool, so i think they saw the opportunity to observe what that did right and wrong.
I've used Bugzilla a lot, and it's OK, but it is far from perfect. It started out as a very ad-hoc tool, and has evolved organically from there (and it shows). I wouldn't use it by preference, but I don't see a lot of other alternatives (other than Scarab, which I'd evaluate first).
I'm sorry, but unless the piece is grossing misrepresenting the point of view being put forth here, I have to disagree totally.
An OS is *not* something that gets between a user and what they want to do. Instead, it's the tool that provides consistent services to both the user and the applications running on it.
An OS provides:
- device access
- task management (multitasking)
- one or more interfaces for the user (yes, I think interfaces are becoming a part of the OS. Live with it.)
How would Rankin's ideas be implemented if *not* for an OS? How would a system be consistent and user-friendly without an OS+interface?
I think the biggest problem here is that BIND is *so* widespread (maybe even more so than sendmail?), when a bug breaks, it is immediately a major exploit waiting to happen.
When the latest BIND 4/8 bugs hit, people were reporting attempts to exploit the bug almost immediately. That's really bad.
So, is it OK to do this in an attempt to give the good guys a jump on the bad guys? Maybe. I'm very leery of any circumstance where bugs are actively hidden. I do believe that disclosure is key in any security situation. That having been said, I don't think that a closed list which agrees to discuss bugs locally before full disclosure is all bad.
The other interesting thing, reading the briefs, is how many different arguments are being made here:
1) Source code == free speech
2) Restrictions on linking are restraint of free press
3) The DCMA circumvention clauses are not a valid use of constitutional power
Wow, in one case, all three of these (very important) pieces of case law are getting argued. This could set a lot of precedents in all the areas Your Rights Online cares about.
Hell, let's file a Slashdot brief. I want to be in on the action.:-).
But seriously, each of these points is outlined by experts and concerned parties in the area, with relevant citations of law, and (best of all) easy to read explanations of *why* these points are relevant.
Can the MPAA lawyers counter this? Well, they are going to try like hell to do so... and they have every reason to expend a *lot* of money on this case now that the stakes are clear. But for now, I'm encouraged by how support is rallying for the good guys.
The interesting thing in reading the briefs (I skimmed most of them just now) is how high they aim. The law professors brief cuts to the chase -- they encourage the DCMA to be ruled unconstitutional, and they have plenty of cites to bolster the opinion.
Is this the case that will nix this darn thing? God, I hope so. The DCMA is so clearly overbroad -- and that is obvious to any number of people in a variety of fields (CS, IP law, consumer protection). Now, with this case, it seems these very knowledgable people have an opportunity to make these opinions known and specifically target a court that may be able to rule on the bigger issue (not just DeCSS, but the DCMA).
gee, it's almost like this was planned...:-). I guess 2600 is smarter than you think ("See, we get them to sue us... then we can bring the DCMA to court! Yeah, great idea!").
It's not a great tool for hundreds of classes (but then again, no UML tool is), but for a simple and very effective reverse-engineering tool, JVision is very good. I also found their tech support to be excellent.
This tool supports forward and reverse engineering of classes, and pretty good diagraming support. It's a lot faster than ArgoUML, and a lot cheaper than TogetherJ or Rational Rose:-).
The most common SAX idiom I've seen (holds true for all event-based parsers, including XML::Parser in Perl when I was using that) is to do event handling, building up intermediate data structures as branches of the total tree are evaluated.
For example, given this:
Bob
admin
I'm going to hit the beginning of the "object" tag, and create an intermediate data structure (let's call it ObjectNode). As I continue to hit the start of the param tag, I'll pass that information on to the current object node. Once
I hit the end tag of object, I pop that node off the stack and transform it into the final object I'm interested in (in this case, I finally end up create a com.razorsys.User object from my little
XML-object-serialization example).
What this shows is a way to do the sort of "remember where I was" stuff DOM gives you, without creating an entire tree. I believe some parsers out there actually do this for DOM parsing -- they really underneath have a pseudo-DOM, and build full branches only when they are requested. Much quicker and less memory intensive.
Anyway... I endorse use of SAX. I'd stay away from JDOM or JAXP, but that's only because I like to stay language-neutral when it makes sense. Using just SAX means I can probably move my parsing code to a variety of languages and keep most of the logic...
Reading this is a real eye-opener. This brief is so well-written, even I (who hate legalese) could read it. Moreover, it elegantly illustrates just *why* code is speech, why any other view is a slippery slope towards eroding protections, and why it is in the best interests of the court to overturn the previous ruling and just give up on any attempt to litigate this matter.
Not to mention the list of people on this -- it's like a "who's who" of CS/IS. The only person they missed was CmdrTaco:-).
OK, so the ad should use "or", not "and" -- or say "please know two of the following". Like I said, not a real ad, just an example.
...and when I say I grill candidates, I mean I ask them a lot of questions, off the cuff for the most part. I want them to show me that they "think outside the box" and aren't afraid to say "gosh, I don't know that". Questions I would ask are:
- If their resume lists Java and C++:
- What do you think of the two languages?
- How do you think they compare?
- How "strictly" OO do you think they are?
- Is Java the total answer to C++?
- If they have any Web experience:
- What do you think the challenges are to
developing in the "Web world"?
- What's the "killer" technology in Web development (answer: none. There are no silver bullets)
- Tell me your favorite design pattern
- (Candidate doesn't know what patterns are, I give them the five-minute tutorial). *Now* tell me what you think.
I despise nit-picky tests of supposed intelligence and programming ability, but I do demand people show an ability to think and respond. I also want to see that they enjoy the craft of programming and will actually *want* to learn and will enjoy their work.
I'm not sure what the problem is that you're having. Is it that you're looking for resumes with specific technologies and not finding them? If so, perhaps you just need to expand your search (find "Web developers", not "PHP coders"), and then ask some good questions in the interview to see if they can handle picking up something new... or perhaps they already know PHP, but didn't mention it on the resume in favor of brevity?
I know my resume does *not* list everything I know... not by a far cry. I just don't believe in having a 4 page resume (it's already two pages, and that's sticking to the important stuff).
Of course, this *is* a tough market. I'm always looking for good Web or Java people -- they exist, but most of them have jobs they already are quite comfortable with. The dot-com blowout probably displaced some folks, but if they were any good, someone else probably snapped them up.
In any case, stick with it, and be prepared to do a fair amount of legwork... you can't just search a job board for "PHP and Perl and MySQL" and expect candidates to drop in your lap. Actually, the best results I've ever gotten have come from ads placed in local papers that were very specific, like:
"Exciting Web development firm seeks creative, driven programmers with experience in Perl, C/C++, Java, XML and OO technologies. Extreme programming and OO design skills a plus."
So in that ad (not a real ad!) I made sure to mention a few good programming languages, figuring I wouldn't hire someone who didn't know *one* of those. I also mentioned some programming disciplines of interest, to let the really good candidates know I'm not a PHB, but might actually know something about the art of programming.
Then I interview the hell out of them. If they can even answer 20% of what is thrown at them, they are at least trainable to be the sort of person I want. If they answer 100% of the questions, they are either godlike or trying to BS me. Those who BS never get the job... those who say "Damn, I don't know that one" might get the job. If they actually *want* to know the answer, they are almost 100% likely to get the job.
Oh... obviously this hiring strategy requires a lead programmer who is really good. Get a headhunter to find this person if you must, but *get them*. Pay them well. Give them options. Whatever it takes, that is the cornerstone of the technical portion of the company, he will train those raw recruits into talented professionals.
I hate to post genuine information, but () try the Quantum site itself. They have numerous technical FAQs that could have the information you need, and they appear to take suggests for more questions:
http://www.quantum.com/support/knowledge_base.ht m
Also, another example of how impatient people using the Web already are: I have never ever bothered to get an NYTimes free registration to read articles like this, not because of privacy concerns, but because it takes more time than I desire to spend.
...and this is to read articles in the NYTimes, which is about as close to God's newspaper as most people would imagine (not my opinion, but probably a prevailing one). If I don't care about their content, then what *would* be compelling? I know I'd ignore CNN, Cnet, etc the minute they did registrations -or- non-banner ads.
I rather doubt this is going to work well at all. People are getting used to freely available information, and they are not going to react well to this annoying stuff.
Hotwired tried interstitial ads way back (1997?) and they bombed bad. Lasted about a month at best, then they had to abandon that idea. We all know how much we *love* popup ads, so that's not going to please anyone.
In short, who is going to buy stuff from people who do this? Not me. I mean, I get amused by TV ads sometimes, but usually I *change the channel*. In an ADD-obsessively-hyperactive world, that impulse will be that much stronger.
Damn. THey would have to go and do this *after* I spend the money to buy my wife one of these things. Oh well, I got the cheap model (MPTrip, only $89+tax), I'm glad I didn't go for the more over-the-top models that were like $200-$300. I'll just buy something spiffy in about 6 months, and hopefully the CD-R "records" I burn in that period will work on all machines. I should make sure all the MP3s have ID3 tags, and probably put WinAmp playlists in all the directories too...
1) I'll believe it when I see it -- MSFT freely
emits new strategies and plans and then drops
them a year later. It's a basic FUD strategy to
paralyze the enemy in indecision (because MSFT
can afford to waste time and money, so long as it
keeps them on top -- it's like a defense budget)
2) I hardly trust MSFT to get it right
3) I sure as hell don't trust them to actually
manage and handle the whole thing
4) Open-source hackers will steal the best
ideas and implement them better;-)
One thing that strikes me on reading all of this is how the GUI deliberately restricts and channels the actions the user may perform -- "Here is the metaphor, you must make your actions fit this model".
Both Aqua and.NET very much present a set of actions, a set of ways to show your data and interact with it (I reserve comments on Nautilus, I can't really draw any conclusions on it from the article). For instance,.NET offers different "levels" of user (Basic, Intermediate, presumably "Expert"). Within these, it seems like you can edit some aspects of what that levels means in your interactions with the GUI.
But what happens when the desired action isn't made available? When I decide I'd like to be able to drag one document on top of another and concatenate them? (cat doc1 doc2 > doc3 in good old CLI world). I cannot.
It seems like the "dream" GUI really is the CLI / pipe metaphor taken to the next level -- put data in this widget, output it to that widget, send the results of that to my Web site. If only that were possible and easy to use! *That* is the next stage for me -- a visual environment where I am free to hook up components in a meaningful way, and save that "hookup" as a new widget of it's own (The "spell check, reformat, ftp" widget).
I tend not to buy a lot of books on specific programs or technologies, especially when they seem to be in a state of constant change. A good example is J2EE -- how often does Sun revise that puppy? I get a book on servlets, and then *boom*, the next revision of the spec is out. I really, really wish books came with upgrades:-).
As far as this book, does it cover Apache 2.0 at all? I haven't examined that release in depth, but don't quite a few core things change (especially the module interface)?
APache definately needs more reference materials, though -- whenever I want to do something somewhat sophisticated, I have to grovel around the net to find a Slashdot article or someone's web page on how to do it:-) Materials on httpd.apache.org are definately getting out of date...
Obviously, this is completely useless. Why would I ever pay $45 to listen to stuff I already *bought*? No way, that's 3-4 more CDs worth of new stuff. Not to mention the annoying "insert random CD" stuff -- my time is worth too much to me (and to my wife ) for me to be jerked around with ca-ca like that.
Any utility this service had is *gone*. I hope it goes flat on it's face, because it will show the RIAA that it's not going to break into online music if it doesn't learn to "get it".
Unfortunately, this will probably be pointed to as an example of how the poor RIAA is being so screwed by hackers that they can't make any money -- "look, we *tried* to sell them music, but they keep stealing it and not paying us".
Oh well... online music will happen whether they want it or not. Too many geeks dig tunes.
Well, since I forwarded this article to my DBA, only to find out *he* posted it, let me clarify things:
This is software being deployed to customer sites, so it's not just in-house work. What we would like to do is support both Oracle or DB2 as a database option for our product. The application uses a fairly generic set of tables, and the SQL used is also pretty vanilla (although we would like to tune it for better performance, so this is where we may have problems supporting multiple DBs).
So, anyone out there ever tried this? It's not just a conversion, it is potentially a case where we have to support multiple database systems...
These units are very nice looking (a friend has two), can be bolted together to make larger units (you would need two units, which at $250 each, may be more than what you want to spend!), and hold
the CDs quite nicely. They also deliver them to your door assembled.
Other solutions I'm pursuing are custom-built shelves (the key thing is that they not be too deep -- about 7" deep is the maximum you can go), or a hybrid solution -- normal bookshelf with "inserts" to slot CDs into (this would alleviate the "depth" problem).
I sympathize with you... I hope *someone* out there has a better solution, because for me $500 is out of the question.
Wow, I never realized AXKit does XSP. Very cool indeed. I will have to look into that, since I need a more lightweight solution in some hosting situations I'm working on now.
Slashdot Mirror
I'd say you have excellent job prospects. If you were at one time a good programmer, and you're willing to invest 3-6 months of free time to "get back on the bike", you'll be fine. ;-).
As others have suggested, pick up a good intro book to Java, and maybe a couple O'Reilly books on some deeper aspects of the language (Java Network Programming is good, as is Java Servlets). After learning from those, I'd say you're ready to start looking for a job op.
I'd also suggest that to reacquaint yourself with the discipline of programming, get a book on Patterns or Extreme Programming. Both are good areas to be familiar with in today's market, and learning about these topics will make you feel more like a "real" programmer again
Oh, and write lots of code. Take examples in the books you read and enhance them. Have some examples in your arsenal for the interviews...
Geez dude, chill. :-).
It's a friggin' joke. We should all be able to laugh at ourselves a little. Ever see "Will & Grace"? "The Bird Cage"? I think it's OK to be gay and funny...
No way. Two days in space and they'd be clawing each other's eyes out fighting over show tunes and interior decorating. ;-).
The Scarab project is a fairly interesting effort to create a good bug tracker. This is from a group who used Bugzilla as a tool, so i think they saw the opportunity to observe what that did right and wrong.
I've used Bugzilla a lot, and it's OK, but it is far from perfect. It started out as a very ad-hoc tool, and has evolved organically from there (and it shows). I wouldn't use it by preference, but I don't see a lot of other alternatives (other than Scarab, which I'd evaluate first).
I'm sorry, but unless the piece is grossing misrepresenting the point of view being put forth here, I have to disagree totally.
An OS is *not* something that gets between a user and what they want to do. Instead, it's the tool that provides consistent services to both the user and the applications running on it.
An OS provides:
- device access
- task management (multitasking)
- one or more interfaces for the user (yes, I think interfaces are becoming a part of the OS. Live with it.)
How would Rankin's ideas be implemented if *not* for an OS? How would a system be consistent and user-friendly without an OS+interface?
I just can't see it?
I think the biggest problem here is that BIND is *so* widespread (maybe even more so than sendmail?), when a bug breaks, it is immediately a major exploit waiting to happen.
When the latest BIND 4/8 bugs hit, people were reporting attempts to exploit the bug almost immediately. That's really bad.
So, is it OK to do this in an attempt to give the good guys a jump on the bad guys? Maybe. I'm very leery of any circumstance where bugs are actively hidden. I do believe that disclosure is key in any security situation. That having been said, I don't think that a closed list which agrees to discuss bugs locally before full disclosure is all bad.
The other interesting thing, reading the briefs, is how many different arguments are being made here:
:-).
1) Source code == free speech
2) Restrictions on linking are restraint of free press
3) The DCMA circumvention clauses are not a valid use of constitutional power
Wow, in one case, all three of these (very important) pieces of case law are getting argued. This could set a lot of precedents in all the areas Your Rights Online cares about.
Hell, let's file a Slashdot brief. I want to be in on the action.
But seriously, each of these points is outlined by experts and concerned parties in the area, with relevant citations of law, and (best of all) easy to read explanations of *why* these points are relevant.
Can the MPAA lawyers counter this? Well, they are going to try like hell to do so... and they have every reason to expend a *lot* of money on this case now that the stakes are clear. But for now, I'm encouraged by how support is rallying for the good guys.
The interesting thing in reading the briefs (I skimmed most of them just now) is how high they aim. The law professors brief cuts to the chase -- they encourage the DCMA to be ruled unconstitutional, and they have plenty of cites to bolster the opinion.
:-). I guess 2600 is smarter than you think ("See, we get them to sue us... then we can bring the DCMA to court! Yeah, great idea!").
Is this the case that will nix this darn thing? God, I hope so. The DCMA is so clearly overbroad -- and that is obvious to any number of people in a variety of fields (CS, IP law, consumer protection). Now, with this case, it seems these very knowledgable people have an opportunity to make these opinions known and specifically target a court that may be able to rule on the bigger issue (not just DeCSS, but the DCMA).
gee, it's almost like this was planned...
It's not a great tool for hundreds of classes (but then again, no UML tool is), but for a simple and very effective reverse-engineering tool, JVision is very good. I also found their tech support to be excellent. :-).
This tool supports forward and reverse engineering of classes, and pretty good diagraming support. It's a lot faster than ArgoUML, and a lot cheaper than TogetherJ or Rational Rose
The most common SAX idiom I've seen (holds true for all event-based parsers, including XML::Parser in Perl when I was using that) is to do event handling, building up intermediate data structures as branches of the total tree are evaluated.
For example, given this:
Bob
admin
I'm going to hit the beginning of the "object" tag, and create an intermediate data structure (let's call it ObjectNode). As I continue to hit the start of the param tag, I'll pass that information on to the current object node. Once
I hit the end tag of object, I pop that node off the stack and transform it into the final object I'm interested in (in this case, I finally end up create a com.razorsys.User object from my little
XML-object-serialization example).
What this shows is a way to do the sort of "remember where I was" stuff DOM gives you, without creating an entire tree. I believe some parsers out there actually do this for DOM parsing -- they really underneath have a pseudo-DOM, and build full branches only when they are requested. Much quicker and less memory intensive.
Anyway... I endorse use of SAX. I'd stay away from JDOM or JAXP, but that's only because I like to stay language-neutral when it makes sense. Using just SAX means I can probably move my parsing code to a variety of languages and keep most of the logic...
I know of at least one area where you really want to do this realtime: when the events you're correlating require a realtime response.
;-).
Like, say, trying to correlate events from a network monitor and deciding if a massive DOS / hack attack is hitting you.
Reading this is a real eye-opener. This brief is so well-written, even I (who hate legalese) could read it. Moreover, it elegantly illustrates just *why* code is speech, why any other view is a slippery slope towards eroding protections, and why it is in the best interests of the court to overturn the previous ruling and just give up on any attempt to litigate this matter.
:-).
Not to mention the list of people on this -- it's like a "who's who" of CS/IS. The only person they missed was CmdrTaco
OK, so the ad should use "or", not "and" -- or say "please know two of the following". Like I said, not a real ad, just an example.
...and when I say I grill candidates, I mean I ask them a lot of questions, off the cuff for the most part. I want them to show me that they "think outside the box" and aren't afraid to say "gosh, I don't know that". Questions I would ask are:
- If their resume lists Java and C++:
- What do you think of the two languages?
- How do you think they compare?
- How "strictly" OO do you think they are?
- Is Java the total answer to C++?
- If they have any Web experience:
- What do you think the challenges are to
developing in the "Web world"?
- What's the "killer" technology in Web development (answer: none. There are no silver bullets)
- Tell me your favorite design pattern
- (Candidate doesn't know what patterns are, I give them the five-minute tutorial). *Now* tell me what you think.
I despise nit-picky tests of supposed intelligence and programming ability, but I do demand people show an ability to think and respond. I also want to see that they enjoy the craft of programming and will actually *want* to learn and will enjoy their work.
I'm not sure what the problem is that you're having. Is it that you're looking for resumes with specific technologies and not finding them? If so, perhaps you just need to expand your search (find "Web developers", not "PHP coders"), and then ask some good questions in the interview to see if they can handle picking up something new... or perhaps they already know PHP, but didn't mention it on the resume in favor of brevity?
I know my resume does *not* list everything I know... not by a far cry. I just don't believe in having a 4 page resume (it's already two pages, and that's sticking to the important stuff).
Of course, this *is* a tough market. I'm always looking for good Web or Java people -- they exist, but most of them have jobs they already are quite comfortable with. The dot-com blowout probably displaced some folks, but if they were any good, someone else probably snapped them up.
In any case, stick with it, and be prepared to do a fair amount of legwork... you can't just search a job board for "PHP and Perl and MySQL" and expect candidates to drop in your lap. Actually, the best results I've ever gotten have come from ads placed in local papers that were very specific, like:
"Exciting Web development firm seeks creative, driven programmers with experience in Perl, C/C++, Java, XML and OO technologies. Extreme programming and OO design skills a plus."
So in that ad (not a real ad!) I made sure to mention a few good programming languages, figuring I wouldn't hire someone who didn't know *one* of those. I also mentioned some programming disciplines of interest, to let the really good candidates know I'm not a PHB, but might actually know something about the art of programming.
Then I interview the hell out of them. If they can even answer 20% of what is thrown at them, they are at least trainable to be the sort of person I want. If they answer 100% of the questions, they are either godlike or trying to BS me. Those who BS never get the job... those who say "Damn, I don't know that one" might get the job. If they actually *want* to know the answer, they are almost 100% likely to get the job.
Oh... obviously this hiring strategy requires a lead programmer who is really good. Get a headhunter to find this person if you must, but *get them*. Pay them well. Give them options. Whatever it takes, that is the cornerstone of the technical portion of the company, he will train those raw recruits into talented professionals.
I hate to post genuine information, but () try the Quantum site itself. They have numerous technical FAQs that could have the information you need, and they appear to take suggests for more questions:
t m
http://www.quantum.com/support/knowledge_base.h
Also, another example of how impatient people using the Web already are: I have never ever bothered to get an NYTimes free registration to read articles like this, not because of privacy concerns, but because it takes more time than I desire to spend.
...and this is to read articles in the NYTimes, which is about as close to God's newspaper as most people would imagine (not my opinion, but probably a prevailing one). If I don't care about their content, then what *would* be compelling? I know I'd ignore CNN, Cnet, etc the minute they did registrations -or- non-banner ads.
I rather doubt this is going to work well at all. People are getting used to freely available information, and they are not going to react well to this annoying stuff.
Hotwired tried interstitial ads way back (1997?) and they bombed bad. Lasted about a month at best, then they had to abandon that idea. We all know how much we *love* popup ads, so that's not going to please anyone.
In short, who is going to buy stuff from people who do this? Not me. I mean, I get amused by TV ads sometimes, but usually I *change the channel*. In an ADD-obsessively-hyperactive world, that impulse will be that much stronger.
So, in short: nice idea, won't work.
Damn. THey would have to go and do this *after* I spend the money to buy my wife one of these things. Oh well, I got the cheap model (MPTrip, only $89+tax), I'm glad I didn't go for the more over-the-top models that were like $200-$300. I'll just buy something spiffy in about 6 months, and hopefully the CD-R "records" I burn in that period will work on all machines. I should make sure all the MP3s have ID3 tags, and probably put WinAmp playlists in all the directories too...
...and all of this sounds nifty, but:
;-)
1) I'll believe it when I see it -- MSFT freely
emits new strategies and plans and then drops
them a year later. It's a basic FUD strategy to
paralyze the enemy in indecision (because MSFT
can afford to waste time and money, so long as it
keeps them on top -- it's like a defense budget)
2) I hardly trust MSFT to get it right
3) I sure as hell don't trust them to actually
manage and handle the whole thing
4) Open-source hackers will steal the best
ideas and implement them better
One thing that strikes me on reading all of this is how the GUI deliberately restricts and channels the actions the user may perform -- "Here is the metaphor, you must make your actions fit this model". .NET very much present a set of actions, a set of ways to show your data and interact with it (I reserve comments on Nautilus, I can't really draw any conclusions on it from the article). For instance, .NET offers different "levels" of user (Basic, Intermediate, presumably "Expert"). Within these, it seems like you can edit some aspects of what that levels means in your interactions with the GUI.
Both Aqua and
But what happens when the desired action isn't made available? When I decide I'd like to be able to drag one document on top of another and concatenate them? (cat doc1 doc2 > doc3 in good old CLI world). I cannot.
It seems like the "dream" GUI really is the CLI / pipe metaphor taken to the next level -- put data in this widget, output it to that widget, send the results of that to my Web site. If only that were possible and easy to use! *That* is the next stage for me -- a visual environment where I am free to hook up components in a meaningful way, and save that "hookup" as a new widget of it's own (The "spell check, reformat, ftp" widget).
I tend not to buy a lot of books on specific programs or technologies, especially when they seem to be in a state of constant change. A good example is J2EE -- how often does Sun revise that puppy? I get a book on servlets, and then *boom*, the next revision of the spec is out. I really, really wish books came with upgrades :-).
:-) Materials on httpd.apache.org are definately getting out of date...
As far as this book, does it cover Apache 2.0 at all? I haven't examined that release in depth, but don't quite a few core things change (especially the module interface)?
APache definately needs more reference materials, though -- whenever I want to do something somewhat sophisticated, I have to grovel around the net to find a Slashdot article or someone's web page on how to do it
Obviously, this is completely useless. Why would I ever pay $45 to listen to stuff I already *bought*? No way, that's 3-4 more CDs worth of new stuff. Not to mention the annoying "insert random CD" stuff -- my time is worth too much to me (and to my wife ) for me to be jerked around with ca-ca like that.
Any utility this service had is *gone*. I hope it goes flat on it's face, because it will show the RIAA that it's not going to break into online music if it doesn't learn to "get it".
Unfortunately, this will probably be pointed to as an example of how the poor RIAA is being so screwed by hackers that they can't make any money -- "look, we *tried* to sell them music, but they keep stealing it and not paying us".
Oh well... online music will happen whether they want it or not. Too many geeks dig tunes.
Well, since I forwarded this article to my DBA, only to find out *he* posted it, let me clarify things:
This is software being deployed to customer sites, so it's not just in-house work. What we would like to do is support both Oracle or DB2 as a database option for our product. The application uses a fairly generic set of tables, and the SQL used is also pretty vanilla (although we would like to tune it for better performance, so this is where we may have problems supporting multiple DBs).
So, anyone out there ever tried this? It's not just a conversion, it is potentially a case where we have to support multiple database systems...
I'm in the exact same situation, and a possible solution is found here:
http://www.boltz.com/
These units are very nice looking (a friend has two), can be bolted together to make larger units (you would need two units, which at $250 each, may be more than what you want to spend!), and hold
the CDs quite nicely. They also deliver them to your door assembled.
Other solutions I'm pursuing are custom-built shelves (the key thing is that they not be too deep -- about 7" deep is the maximum you can go), or a hybrid solution -- normal bookshelf with "inserts" to slot CDs into (this would alleviate the "depth" problem).
I sympathize with you... I hope *someone* out there has a better solution, because for me $500 is out of the question.
Wow, I never realized AXKit does XSP. Very cool indeed. I will have to look into that, since I need a more lightweight solution in some hosting situations I'm working on now.