> I don't know about you, but I'm all for fleecing Uncle Bill.
Tell me about it. The plan is to let MS pay AS to develop an in-process fork, and then use that code (which will be under the AL/GPL) to bring a fork to MacPerl (and maybe VMS, too).
Don't be a silly person. I believe Sarathy is more to be trusted than anyone I've known to involved with Perl (aside from Larry himself).
But then again, even though I only use Microsoft products for about an hour a week, I am on ActiveState's payroll too, so I guess I am not to be trusted, either.
# I met the product manager in charge of all of QuickTime. She believes # that if you make something for Linux it has to be GPL'ed. I tried to # explain that it didn't, but she didn't believe me. That is why she won't # let her people do it
Balderdash. Product managers don't make decisions about what products will be created and for what platforms, especially with something as important as QuickTime. People like Steve Jobs do that.
# There are a lot of low-level things that still # deal heavily with 68k code. Fortunately, I don't # think the speed hit is terribly great anymore.
It isn't. It was, of course. But for the most part, the 68K code that remains is about as harmful to Mac OS' speed and reliability as a monolithic kernel is harmful to Linux' portability.
First you say Rhapsody was killed, which is clearly untrue (`uname` in Mac OS X even returns "Rhapsody":).
You obviously don't know much about the current Mac OS: yes, MANY things still run in 68K emulation, as everyone knows, though it is getting less with each new OS release. Of course, much of what is left in 68K is left in 68K because there is little or no advantage to being PPC. You also seem to be hinting that there is something wrong with using Carbon APIs instead of Cocoa APIs, which doesn't make any sense from a technological viewpoint.
Then, you say the Blue Box is defunct, which is just plain wrong. It is in Mac OS X Server and is a key part of the Mac OS X strategy, since most software won't be updated to Carbon when Mac OS X comes out (despite the first public release of the Carbon SDK hitting FTP servers a couple of weeks ago).
Anyway, like SheepShaver, when the Blue Box crashes, you can keep working. You just need to restart the Blue Box.
You don't have any idea what you are talking about, and you'd be better off just keeping quiet.
# sourceXchange is that HP program to link up # developers with software projects. what easier # way to find good developers than to ask the OSS # community?
Um, the awards are for NON-technical contributions. Maybe some really good developers will be nominated, of course, but I wouldn't think a good place to look for developers is nominees for a non-technical award.
# Slashdot used to be better but is now getting diluted by all kinds of # crap, including this dumb, pointless satire. I am finding it harder to # recommend slashdot as much as I used to. Time to look out for a better # news/discussion site.
I have no problem with intelligent satire like this. I just wish Slashdot would lay off the silly stuff about South Park, Satr Wars, and school shootings.
# A democratic politician is willing to compromise with others that have # different views. Otherwise we would be having much more wars and # disbutes in the world.
# He wrote parts of books, but he was doing that to # make money, nothing more, nothing less.
How completely ignorant. Tom has devoted more time and energy to writing and giving away free software and documentation than almost everyone on Slashdot ever will.
I don't want to start a war here, but the simple fact is that for some common definitions of "free", Tom is MORE interested in providing free software than RMS is.
# While I did truthfully find this essay amusing, I # think that RMS deserves much more respect than # this.
All the more reason to "disrespect" him in this way, then.
As I am sure many others here did, I saw the Weird Al VH1 special the other night, and Coolio was shown complaining about how his song was too serious for Al to lampoon it. The obvious response is: "well, then your song is really the one that most needs to be lampooned."
# Funny, but I've found most perl documentation to # be guilty of providing correct but largely # useless (or at least opaque) answers.
That makes no sense to me. Are you saying that where you look up the behavior of substr(), it launches into a discussion about the weather patterns of the Denver area? If it gives the behavior of substr(), it is hard for me to see how that is useless.
*shrug* On the one hand it is an overreaction. On the other, it is good to have "extremists" around. Much as I dislike RMS' politics, I think it is great that he espouses them. His ideas, right or wrong, are fascincating. Similarly, it is good to have people attack his ideas, even if they go overboard. 'sall good, as long as we are honest, as long as we are a bit mellow. We all just need to be a bit laid back about the whole thing. Tom is not too laid back, but we need to be laid back about what he does and says, as we need to be laid back about what RMS does and says.
# The man pages that come with Perl are good, but are absolutely useless # for someone who is trying to learn the language.
That's your opinion. I learned the language primarily from the man pages. That's not to say there isn't room for more free docs. The greatest need is for a good free Perl tutorial, which is being worked on.
# I think Stallman wanted # some good documentation for beginners, and what he was talking about was # a free replacement for the _O'Reilly_ books.
Well, then the man pages are perfect, since they are both free and constitute the majority of the best-selling ORA book, "Progamming Perl". That is, the Camel book is taken almost entirely from the man pages. Of course, the man pages can use some work... but they are getting work. Tom and others have been working hard at cleaning them up. perl5.005_57 (recent development release) had some major cleaning up and fixing. And these changes will remain free and will be used in the next edition of the ORA Camel book.
Tom gets greatly annoyed by RMS and the GPL and FSF, and for excellent reason. But perhaps Tom can learn something from his own satire: we need to laugh at ourselves more. RMS and Tom and ESR and everyone else. RMS should read this and laugh, and an equally intelligent satire of Tom should make Tom laugh, too.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, if you like completely broken and non-compliant HTML.
I mean, I love Google, but it is NOT hard to produce proper HTML, and it makes it less useful.
check it out ...
> I don't know about you, but I'm all for fleecing Uncle Bill.
Tell me about it. The plan is to let MS pay AS to develop an in-process fork, and then use that code (which will be under the AL/GPL) to bring a fork to MacPerl (and maybe VMS, too).
Sounds good to me.
Don't be a silly person. I believe Sarathy is more to be trusted than anyone I've known to involved with Perl (aside from Larry himself).
But then again, even though I only use Microsoft products for about an hour a week, I am on ActiveState's payroll too, so I guess I am not to be trusted, either.
So, in other words, you have not researched this, and you are ignorant, and we should pay no attention to you.
# I met the product manager in charge of all of QuickTime. She believes
# that if you make something for Linux it has to be GPL'ed. I tried to
# explain that it didn't, but she didn't believe me. That is why she won't
# let her people do it
Balderdash. Product managers don't make decisions about what products will be created and for what platforms, especially with something as important as QuickTime. People like Steve Jobs do that.
# There are a lot of low-level things that still
# deal heavily with 68k code. Fortunately, I don't
# think the speed hit is terribly great anymore.
It isn't. It was, of course. But for the most part, the 68K code that remains is about as harmful to Mac OS' speed and reliability as a monolithic kernel is harmful to Linux' portability.
Dude, you are ignorant.
:).
First you say Rhapsody was killed, which is clearly untrue (`uname` in Mac OS X even returns "Rhapsody"
You obviously don't know much about the current Mac OS: yes, MANY things still run in 68K emulation, as everyone knows, though it is getting less with each new OS release. Of course, much of what is left in 68K is left in 68K because there is little or no advantage to being PPC. You also seem to be hinting that there is something wrong with using Carbon APIs instead of Cocoa APIs, which doesn't make any sense from a technological viewpoint.
Then, you say the Blue Box is defunct, which is just plain wrong. It is in Mac OS X Server and is a key part of the Mac OS X strategy, since most software won't be updated to Carbon when Mac OS X comes out (despite the first public release of the Carbon SDK hitting FTP servers a couple of weeks ago).
Anyway, like SheepShaver, when the Blue Box crashes, you can keep working. You just need to restart the Blue Box.
You don't have any idea what you are talking about, and you'd be better off just keeping quiet.
# I wish i DIDN'T.
Oh, bite me.
# Oh, the irony. Who's "that guy" again? :)
I wish I knew.
Every large ISP perpetually repackages and disseminates substantial portions of the WHOIS database, no matter what your definition of "substantial".
# Does that mean we can't nominate Tom Christiansen # for his years of advocacy work just because he's
# also a technical contributor?
No. It just means that awardees will be awarded for non-technical contributions.
Hm. Do I like the Red Sox because I like Macs, or vice versa?
My mail address is right here, so you could try, I suppose. But I can think of a lot of people who wouldn't appreciate it.
# We just needed a better scripter, some MIT geek who wouldn't get caught.
I could have done it without being caught, but I was hungry.
# sourceXchange is that HP program to link up
# developers with software projects. what easier
# way to find good developers than to ask the OSS
# community?
Um, the awards are for NON-technical contributions. Maybe some really good developers will be nominated, of course, but I wouldn't think a good place to look for developers is nominees for a non-technical award.
# Slashdot used to be better but is now getting diluted by all kinds of
# crap, including this dumb, pointless satire. I am finding it harder to
# recommend slashdot as much as I used to. Time to look out for a better
# news/discussion site.
I have no problem with intelligent satire like this. I just wish Slashdot would lay off the silly stuff about South Park, Satr Wars, and school shootings.
# A democratic politician is willing to compromise with others that have
# different views. Otherwise we would be having much more wars and
# disbutes in the world.
What world are you living in?
# He wrote parts of books, but he was doing that to # make money, nothing more, nothing less.
How completely ignorant. Tom has devoted more time and energy to writing and giving away free software and documentation than almost everyone on Slashdot ever will.
# Why is tom c against free software?
I don't want to start a war here, but the simple fact is that for some common definitions of "free", Tom is MORE interested in providing free software than RMS is.
# While I did truthfully find this essay amusing, I
# think that RMS deserves much more respect than
# this.
All the more reason to "disrespect" him in this way, then.
As I am sure many others here did, I saw the Weird Al VH1 special the other night, and Coolio was shown complaining about how his song was too serious for Al to lampoon it. The obvious response is: "well, then your song is really the one that most needs to be lampooned."
# Funny, but I've found most perl documentation to
# be guilty of providing correct but largely
# useless (or at least opaque) answers.
That makes no sense to me. Are you saying that where you look up the behavior of substr(), it launches into a discussion about the weather patterns of the Denver area? If it gives the behavior of substr(), it is hard for me to see how that is useless.
*shrug* On the one hand it is an overreaction. On the other, it is good to have "extremists" around. Much as I dislike RMS' politics, I think it is great that he espouses them. His ideas, right or wrong, are fascincating. Similarly, it is good to have people attack his ideas, even if they go overboard. 'sall good, as long as we are honest, as long as we are a bit mellow. We all just need to be a bit laid back about the whole thing. Tom is not too laid back, but we need to be laid back about what he does and says, as we need to be laid back about what RMS does and says.
# The man pages that come with Perl are good, but are absolutely useless
... but they are getting work. Tom and others have been working hard at cleaning them up. perl5.005_57 (recent development release) had some major cleaning up and fixing. And these changes will remain free and will be used in the next edition of the ORA Camel book.
# for someone who is trying to learn the language.
That's your opinion. I learned the language primarily from the man pages. That's not to say there isn't room for more free docs. The greatest need is for a good free Perl tutorial, which is being worked on.
# I think Stallman wanted
# some good documentation for beginners, and what he was talking about was
# a free replacement for the _O'Reilly_ books.
Well, then the man pages are perfect, since they are both free and constitute the majority of the best-selling ORA book, "Progamming Perl". That is, the Camel book is taken almost entirely from the man pages. Of course, the man pages can use some work
Tom gets greatly annoyed by RMS and the GPL and FSF, and for excellent reason. But perhaps Tom can learn something from his own satire: we need to laugh at ourselves more. RMS and Tom and ESR and everyone else. RMS should read this and laugh, and an equally intelligent satire of Tom should make Tom laugh, too.
... nah, I have work to do today. :)
Hmmmm
Why the hell should you care how Tom spends his time? And if you don't like it, don't read it.