"gmail" is a dead trademark (service mark, specifically), according to the US Patent & Trademark office. It was registered in 1999 to a guy named Milo Cripps, but it was abandoned the next year. Google has not registered it (as opposed to, say, "Froogle").
I understand the distinction you're making. I deny, however, that the words "compiled" and "interpreted" capture that distinction.
It seems from your own description that "executes in a platform-independent virtual machine" and "does not execute in a platform-independent virtual machine" would be an improvement.
Sun's Java implementation does compile to native code. It just happens to do so on-the-fly. (This is what just-in-time compilation is all about.) To call a language "compiled" or "interpreted" is a waste of time. That's just an implementation detail.
True, but this has nothing to do with implementing the Java language. The JLS is free to read and implement. You can't call the implementation "Java" unless you get the Sun seal of approval, but, really, who cares?
Yeah, I was waiting for someone to make this point. NCSA Mosaic was not the first web browser. Tim Berners-Lee wrote the first browser, called "WWW," for NeXTSTEP....which just goes to show, as if it hasn't already been demonstrated enough, how far ahead of its time NeXT was.
1) GNUStep isn't a window manager. GNUStep is an implementation of OPENSTEP (more or less, the core development libraries that were part of NeXTSTEP). OPENSTEP is now (more or less) the "Cocoa" libraries in MacOS X.
2) WindowMaker is the window manager with which the GNUStep AppKit works best.
3) WindowMaker is not the official Gnome WM. There was some talk about making it that, but it never came to pass.
I guess it depends on what you mean by "breakthrough." Generally, though, the word (at least in the present context) refers to an original innovation that represents an significant advance in the field.
MacOS introduced us to the "WIMP" GUI. (Of course, I know that Xerox got there first, but not in terms of impact.) Everyone has copied it since. That's why it was a breakthrough.
X copied the GUI and added some engineering cleverness (modularity, network transparency) that MacOS lacked. But I think it's fairly clear that nothing about X represented as significant a change to the way we think about computing as the MacOS. X (as well as Windows) ows its existence to MacOS.
Or do you think it was always obvious to people working with computers that clicking stuff on a screen, using a strange rodent-looking contraption would be a popular way of interacting with the machine? Sure, it seems like old hat now -- but at the time... I remember when I first saw graphical screen fonts on a friend's black and white Mac. Incredibly cool.
I think he misses the strength of his own argument (or, rather, the strength of the premise of his argument): a company which makes software and makes money by selling service (customer support and the like) for that software implicitly agrees that the software is not easy enough to use that a manual is sufficient -- or sufficiently well built that it expensive support contracts are unnecessary. (Without that implicit agreement, the company has no business model at all.)
Some people will say this is true of all software, but I don't believe it. I think it's true of all software developed with the current, horrible development practices of pretty much every software menufacturer in the world. But it certainly doesn't have to be that bad.
Other web-based clones of this game exist on the Internet. Most of these versions were created in one of two ways: using the inconsistent and limited implementations of DHTML in current browsers, or using Java,
which can be buggy and may result in horrendous lag time.
Emphasis added
Because, of course, nothing written using the Mozilla libraries could possibly be buggy...
With DRI the 3d pipeline bypasses X. There is some resource usage by X for font/pixmap caches but it is negligible and wouldn't have caused the slowdowns seen here...
People just want a scapegoat and X happens to be the handiest thing to point a finger at. The real problem is that very few people understand X and even fewer people contribute to the XFree86 team.
Why do you think DRI bypasses X? Answer: because of X's limitations; because all X calls necessarily involve IPC; because X is inherently slow (by comparison, mind you -- I don't mean it's horribly slow).
The "X bashers" have a point. And a lot of people who do understand X quite well (Zawinski comes to mind) have said the same things.
P1) To "most people," money is very important -- so important, in fact, that in order to give it up, they must be offered something they find even more important.
P2) The value of the freedom (about which RMS writes) is in question and not desired strongly enough by "most people" to persuade them to give up large sums of money.
C) Therefore, "most people" will not give up their money for RMS's notion of freedom.
So, in other words, you're attacking an ethical position with a merely practical argument. It's like saying, "Most people won't be persuaded by the statement, 'Thou shall not kill,' so obviously the statement is ethically incorrect (or irrelevant?)."
Don't you see that whether or not people are *convinced* has no philosophical importance at all? The art of persuasion without agumentation is called sophistry, not philosophy.
RMS doesn't have a coherent ethical position, but at least he *admits* it. And his position, such as it is, isn't exactly *bad*. Immanual Kant, who knew more about these matters than I (or Mr. DiscoStu), believed very strongly that people's ethical impulses are most often correct, even though most people have no idea how to *argue* in favor of them.
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"gmail" is a dead trademark (service mark, specifically), according to the US Patent & Trademark office. It was registered in 1999 to a guy named Milo Cripps, but it was abandoned the next year. Google has not registered it (as opposed to, say, "Froogle").
I understand the distinction you're making. I deny, however, that the words "compiled" and "interpreted" capture that distinction.
It seems from your own description that "executes in a platform-independent virtual machine" and "does not execute in a platform-independent virtual machine" would be an improvement.
This, of course, is utter tripe.
Sun's Java implementation does compile to native code. It just happens to do so on-the-fly. (This is what just-in-time compilation is all about.) To call a language "compiled" or "interpreted" is a waste of time. That's just an implementation detail.
True, but this has nothing to do with implementing the Java language. The JLS is free to read and implement. You can't call the implementation "Java" unless you get the Sun seal of approval, but, really, who cares?
Why isn't it modded up?
Because it's false.
Good reason, eh?
MS already takes a substantial loss on each XBox unit sold. I'm not sure they would be willing to take an even larger loss...
Yeah, I was waiting for someone to make this point. NCSA Mosaic was not the first web browser. Tim Berners-Lee wrote the first browser, called "WWW," for NeXTSTEP.
1) GNUStep isn't a window manager. GNUStep is an implementation of OPENSTEP (more or less, the core development libraries that were part of NeXTSTEP). OPENSTEP is now (more or less) the "Cocoa" libraries in MacOS X.
2) WindowMaker is the window manager with which the GNUStep AppKit works best.
3) WindowMaker is not the official Gnome WM. There was some talk about making it that, but it never came to pass.
Films also are not regulated by *law*, but by industry rules.
The MPAA is not a government organization.
Damnit, I was ready to back you up, until you claimed what a great example film ratings are. It's your worst example.
Why? Because those restrictions have no *legal* force at all.
The best examples are, of course, other laws -- like drinking age laws, seatbelt laws, &c.
That is -- if you think laws like those are worthwhile.
I guess so...
I guess it depends on what you mean by "breakthrough." Generally, though, the word (at least in the present context) refers to an original innovation that represents an significant advance in the field.
MacOS introduced us to the "WIMP" GUI. (Of course, I know that Xerox got there first, but not in terms of impact.) Everyone has copied it since. That's why it was a breakthrough.
X copied the GUI and added some engineering cleverness (modularity, network transparency) that MacOS lacked. But I think it's fairly clear that nothing about X represented as significant a change to the way we think about computing as the MacOS. X (as well as Windows) ows its existence to MacOS.
Or do you think it was always obvious to people working with computers that clicking stuff on a screen, using a strange rodent-looking contraption would be a popular way of interacting with the machine? Sure, it seems like old hat now -- but at the time... I remember when I first saw graphical screen fonts on a friend's black and white Mac. Incredibly cool.
No.
Not MacOS X. MacOS.
The original one. *That* is the one he's talking about.
I think he misses the strength of his own argument (or, rather, the strength of the premise of his argument): a company which makes software and makes money by selling service (customer support and the like) for that software implicitly agrees that the software is not easy enough to use that a manual is sufficient -- or sufficiently well built that it expensive support contracts are unnecessary. (Without that implicit agreement, the company has no business model at all.)
Some people will say this is true of all software, but I don't believe it. I think it's true of all software developed with the current, horrible development practices of pretty much every software menufacturer in the world. But it certainly doesn't have to be that bad.
By not caring.
Seriously.
If an API change breaks an app, so what -- as long as the change is The Right Thing? Let the vendor change the application.
Linux (by which I mean the main kernel development) is not a commercial venture, and it doesn't *have* to pander to commercial interests.
Another one!
Heh-heh. For especially low values of "efficient."
Emphasis added
Because, of course, nothing written using the Mozilla libraries could possibly be buggy...
Ah -- I was missing your use of "allows." My apologies -- you are correct.
Your understanding of BSD is wildly inaccurate.
Who the hell moderated this up?
Why do you think DRI bypasses X? Answer: because of X's limitations; because all X calls necessarily involve IPC; because X is inherently slow (by comparison, mind you -- I don't mean it's horribly slow).
The "X bashers" have a point. And a lot of people who do understand X quite well (Zawinski comes to mind) have said the same things.
Whatever... Justifiable homicide isn't exactly a clear-cut case, but anyway...
Your objection to my example may or may not be valid, but even if it were undeniably true, it still wouldn't invalidate my argument.
Your argument, then, goes roughly like this:
P1) To "most people," money is very important -- so important, in fact, that in order to give it up, they must be offered something they find even more important.
P2) The value of the freedom (about which RMS writes) is in question and not desired strongly enough by "most people" to persuade them to give up large sums of money.
C) Therefore, "most people" will not give up their money for RMS's notion of freedom.
So, in other words, you're attacking an ethical position with a merely practical argument. It's like saying, "Most people won't be persuaded by the statement, 'Thou shall not kill,' so obviously the statement is ethically incorrect (or irrelevant?)."
Don't you see that whether or not people are *convinced* has no philosophical importance at all? The art of persuasion without agumentation is called sophistry, not philosophy.
RMS doesn't have a coherent ethical position, but at least he *admits* it. And his position, such as it is, isn't exactly *bad*. Immanual Kant, who knew more about these matters than I (or Mr. DiscoStu), believed very strongly that people's ethical impulses are most often correct, even though most people have no idea how to *argue* in favor of them.