Whether or not one particular AJAX program is ready to replace Word 2003 (it's clearly not) is really beside the point. Really - you are a perfect example of someone who can't see the forest for the trees. You're so stuck on one particular example you're missing out on what's important.
Thin client platforms have come and gone; they made sense in an era where clients were not powerful enough, client software was terribly expensive(Do you know what an Unix license used to cost in those days?).
People have obscenely powerful computing resources at their hands. And there is a plethora of choices available in the software arena. Common software such as word-processors and spreadsheets are ubiquitous. Making geography irrelevant is totally irrelevant to this discussion. I can store documents created in my Word processor anywhere in the web. I dont need a fancy Ajax weblication to keep them accessible anywhere. Removable media is extremely affordable; I dont even need a damned net connection. Considering all these factors, this is a paradigm shift allright, but it is regressive instead of being progressive.
That's a crap analogy. You're comparing a Public utility which is regulated, supported and managed by a government body with some random private software vendor on the internet.
The electricity boards aint perfect, but you can be reasonably sure that they'll exist 2 years from now, will not be bought over by Microsoft/Oracle/$bigcompany, the prices will remain relatively stable, and will not be ddosed into submission by random skript-kiddies.
Ajax-based office suites are a farce. I can see some benefit in application delivery platforms as in Java WebStart and MS Clickonce , where apps are locally cached and can be available offline. However the "you'll-always-depend-on-the-server" approach of the Ajax crowd is retarded. It may work for purely network-based apps such as email/IM, but falls apart very quickly for UI-intensive apps. I hope software vendors realize this, before rewriting IDEs, Photo editors, office apps and CAD tools in Ajax.
- Produce a 30-day trial for OS X, running on VMWare player. They could tie up with VMware, to produce a one-click OS X/Mac experience for all the unwashed masses. However, I'm not sure if the video hardware can deliver the same experience under virtualization. - Put this puppy on a CD, and hand them out liberally
I respect Richard Grimes' writing, as a.NET programmer. However, I cant figure out his rants on.NET's directions.
This issue is largely irrelevant;.NET was never promoted as a systems programming environment - a few tasks such as network programming and higher-level services may have some benefits, but throwing out well-tested subsystems because of a new framework is asinine. There are tons of things MS is building with.NET - for example, I assume ASP.NET is a fairly large codebase, and it's completely built with.NET(no pedantic comments about ISAPI filters pls..) And their research team is building a C#-based OS called Singularity from the ground-up. I'd like a few more things to be.NETized, but my expectations are lesser than Mr.Grimes'.
Cognos is probably overkill for canned reporting. Something like Reporting services should be good enough. Adhoc querying on the other hand, may need some BI tools like Cognos.
Sheer luxury. Real men use a custom PS1 with time,date,moonphase,uptime,uid,hostname,directory, Mom's birthday, local pizzeria's phone number, latest IRC message, among other things. Save those keystrokes !
Another retarded slashdot comment/moderation. Newsflash for you:
YOU DONT NEED THE IDE FOR.NET DEVELOPMENT!
The.NET Framework SDK has always contained all the compilers, build tools, and everything one needs to get started. And there's a complete free software stack of.NET development tools, including Nant, NProf, Ncover, Testdriven.NET, Nunit, SharpDevelop, CruiseControl.NET, Log4Net, Subversion and a dozen others I've missed. I've regularly seen people sticking with emacs and the above tools, for their entire development work.
And guess what, if you need a nice,shiny IDE, MS is giving portions of the IDE too! The Express editions get most of the functionality, except for some enterprise features. The cost of development tools should negligible, in a large-scale organisation atleast. VS.NET 2005 is worth the money, IMHO. Its not a VB6 world anymore, guys. There're legitimate reasons to bash MS, but this is not one of them.
Well, its not that hard. What broke a lot of things for us was the new Website template introduced in the ASP.NET 2.0 betas. To put it short, they changed the entire deployment model, and this pissed off a number of people. MS did a u-turn, and launched this. This made the migration work flawlessly, and you also get all the benefits of ASP.NEt 2.0 without code changes:) Read Scott Guthrie's blog frequently; there's good stuff there.
Side-by-side installation hasnt been a problem either. Both frameworks can co-exist, with a few tweaks here and there. The language (C#) has gotten a bit nicer. More shortcuts, faster development, and overall superb IDE support(VS.NET 2005). The deprecated features have been done for a reason, and overall the changes make sense. While the performance is a bit better, I dont know if its enough to make a business case. If I can, I would wait a bit more, till a Vista release; especially if I'm doing WinForms apps.
Yes, MS has magically created a gigantic wireless mesh spanning the entire world, and everyone'll have free low-latency bandwidth! FREE! yes! FREE PHONE CALLS! CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW? NOW!!11232
That's kinda ironic, considering Indians speak lots of languages/dialects.. there's no Indian language. Yes, the national language is Hindi, however practically every Indian state has its own language.
As far as I know, Cairo is just a 2D graphics lib; Avalon's scope is a little more than that - it atleast includes both 2D/3D, a markup language for UI development, animations, audio/video support,text handling, among other things. And it was originally targeted for Vista(Longhorn), though back-ports exist for XP/2003.
I still have trouble believing that the computer I am typing right now has billions of transistors, working in precision.
I see these developments as more or less inevitable. The first compiler-writer did not have a compiler. Same for machine tools, automobiles and various other enterprises. We all start small. Scaling up is limited only by imagination.
The problem is the competition is already far ahead.
Why would anybody want to play with this, when something like this is being cooked up?
Windows Forms already does a bit of layout management, with its docking features, and that's good enough for most people.
VB apps are not known for speed
as opposed to Java apps? sorry that's not been my experience.
I agree about the design part, though.
I hope they've fixed its memory-hogging nature. Overall, I found it slower than Eclipse,more crashy, and generally bloated. I havent looked at recent builds though.
I agree with your basic premise - we *could* use free software. However, most decision-makers dont think like you do; and chances of sharing your tools are also "statistically never" as you put it, if you live in the real world. Unless they include the tools developed in non-working hours.
Slashdot Mirror
Thin client platforms have come and gone; they made sense in an era where clients were not powerful enough, client software was terribly expensive(Do you know what an Unix license used to cost in those days?).
People have obscenely powerful computing resources at their hands. And there is a plethora of choices available in the software arena. Common software such as word-processors and spreadsheets are ubiquitous. Making geography irrelevant is totally irrelevant to this discussion. I can store documents created in my Word processor anywhere in the web. I dont need a fancy Ajax weblication to keep them accessible anywhere. Removable media is extremely affordable; I dont even need a damned net connection. Considering all these factors, this is a paradigm shift allright, but it is regressive instead of being progressive.
That's a crap analogy. You're comparing a Public utility which is regulated, supported and managed by a government body with some random private software vendor on the internet.
The electricity boards aint perfect, but you can be reasonably sure that they'll exist 2 years from now, will not be bought over by Microsoft/Oracle/$bigcompany, the prices will remain relatively stable, and will not be ddosed into submission by random skript-kiddies.
Ajax-based office suites are a farce. I can see some benefit in application delivery platforms as in Java WebStart and MS Clickonce , where apps are locally cached and can be available offline. However the "you'll-always-depend-on-the-server" approach of the Ajax crowd is retarded. It may work for purely network-based apps such as email/IM, but falls apart very quickly for UI-intensive apps. I hope software vendors realize this, before rewriting IDEs, Photo editors, office apps and CAD tools in Ajax.
If I were Apple, I'd do something like this
- Produce a 30-day trial for OS X, running on VMWare player. They could tie up with VMware, to produce a one-click OS X/Mac experience for all the unwashed masses. However, I'm not sure if the video hardware can deliver the same experience under virtualization.
- Put this puppy on a CD, and hand them out liberally
That's the max I'd expect them to go.
Classic slashdot. A ridiculously biased summary, and the last point is completely irrelevant to the subject.
Hell yeah! CTO doesnt 'get' blogging!
I wish more people were as blunt and forthcoming as Mr.Vogels.
I respect Richard Grimes' writing, as a .NET programmer. However, I cant figure out his rants on .NET's directions.
.NET was never promoted as a systems programming environment - a few tasks such as network programming and higher-level services may have some benefits, but throwing out well-tested subsystems because of a new framework is asinine. There are tons of things MS is building with .NET - for example, I assume ASP.NET is a fairly large codebase, and it's completely built with .NET(no pedantic comments about ISAPI filters pls..) And their research team is building a C#-based OS called Singularity from the ground-up. I'd like a few more things to be .NETized, but my expectations are lesser than Mr.Grimes'.
This issue is largely irrelevant;
Cognos is probably overkill for canned reporting. Something like Reporting services should be good enough. Adhoc querying on the other hand, may need some BI tools like Cognos.
Sheer luxury. Real men use a custom PS1 with time,date,moonphase,uptime,uid,hostname,directory, Mom's birthday, local pizzeria's phone number, latest IRC message, among other things. Save those keystrokes !
YOU DONT NEED THE IDE FOR .NET DEVELOPMENT!
The .NET Framework SDK has always contained all the compilers, build tools, and everything one needs to get started. And there's a complete free software stack of .NET development tools, including Nant, NProf, Ncover, Testdriven.NET, Nunit, SharpDevelop, CruiseControl.NET, Log4Net, Subversion and a dozen others I've missed. I've regularly seen people sticking with emacs and the above tools, for their entire development work.
And guess what, if you need a nice,shiny IDE, MS is giving portions of the IDE too! The Express editions get most of the functionality, except for some enterprise features. The cost of development tools should negligible, in a large-scale organisation atleast. VS.NET 2005 is worth the money, IMHO. Its not a VB6 world anymore, guys. There're legitimate reasons to bash MS, but this is not one of them.
Side-by-side installation hasnt been a problem either. Both frameworks can co-exist, with a few tweaks here and there. The language (C#) has gotten a bit nicer. More shortcuts, faster development, and overall superb IDE support(VS.NET 2005). The deprecated features have been done for a reason, and overall the changes make sense. While the performance is a bit better, I dont know if its enough to make a business case. If I can, I would wait a bit more, till a Vista release; especially if I'm doing WinForms apps.
You must be knew hear. You speell "ridiculous" corretly.
Animals hunt in herds and packs too. Are they a society too?
Yes, MS has magically created a gigantic wireless mesh spanning the entire world, and everyone'll have free low-latency bandwidth! FREE! yes! FREE PHONE CALLS! CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW? NOW!!11232
wow. people are so naive.
Heh. that's like learning Karate to kick a blind 98-year old cripple.
Dude, stop picking on twitter.. He's like that dude from the movie Antitrust, he provides a lot of entertainment ;)
That's kinda ironic, considering Indians speak lots of languages/dialects.. there's no Indian language. Yes, the national language is Hindi, however practically every Indian state has its own language.
Also, Jon Smirl's excellent roundup of Linux graphics is worth reading.
As far as I know, Cairo is just a 2D graphics lib; Avalon's scope is a little more than that - it atleast includes both 2D/3D, a markup language for UI development, animations, audio/video support,text handling, among other things. And it was originally targeted for Vista(Longhorn), though back-ports exist for XP/2003.
MS started Avalon over D3D way back in 2003. I'm not contradicting your post, just making a factual observation.
I still have trouble believing that the computer I am typing right now has billions of transistors, working in precision.
I see these developments as more or less inevitable. The first compiler-writer did not have a compiler. Same for machine tools, automobiles and various other enterprises. We all start small. Scaling up is limited only by imagination.
Why would anybody want to play with this, when something like this is being cooked up?
Windows Forms already does a bit of layout management, with its docking features, and that's good enough for most people.
VB apps are not known for speed
as opposed to Java apps? sorry that's not been my experience. I agree about the design part, though.
I hope they've fixed its memory-hogging nature. Overall, I found it slower than Eclipse,more crashy, and generally bloated. I havent looked at recent builds though.
People have survived ML, Lisp variants, m4 and other assorted macro processing languages. One more isnt going to hurt.
I agree with your basic premise - we *could* use free software. However, most decision-makers dont think like you do; and chances of sharing your tools are also "statistically never" as you put it, if you live in the real world. Unless they include the tools developed in non-working hours.
I didn't know support for sockets is a requirement for a language implementation.
I think you posted to the wrong thread - the thread you want is here :P
Wow.
Maybe some of us like things to be better?
Maybe some of us think they'll correct themselves if we point this out again & again?
Maybe it's just that we're nerds, and cant tolerate *OBVIOUS* mistakes, especially when it's trivial to prevent?
You know, if you keep missing these posts, you might as well subscribe to the remaining sections too right ?
Just a thought.