More proof that consumer-oriented books are gaining traction, now that computers and related technologies are in the mainstream. Much bigger potential audience. A lot of developer info is available for free these days, too, which makes a developer-oriented book a harder sell. It will be interesting to see what the bestsellers are in the next few years.
Of course, there will always be developer-oriented material, especially innovative series like "Head First" that buck convention. (You either love or hate that series.)
He is suing because Google has indexed unauthorized mirror sites
Really, it comes down to this: he's suing Google because he can't sue those mirror sites. They're just following the Lawyer's Axiom of Transitivity: if A is related to B and B is related to C then if A sues B and B has no money, then A must sue C.
I hope they do this carefully and with lots of planning, because it's so easy to end up in "DLL hell" (or "shared library hell") if you don't. It would be nice to keep the option to install these apps completely separately so that you can upgrade one without affecting the other. Sure, more disk and more memory, but these things are cheap today and continue to get cheaper.
Yes and no. If the majority of people are using Windows and IE, there's a better argument for building browser extensions and other client-side Microsoft technologies (like Windows itself). Move people to other browsers and you take that away.
If you like SQL Server, you should check out SQL Anywhere Studio. The developer edition is free, so give it a try. Not only can you run ASA (the database part of SQL Anywhere Studio) on Windows and CE, you can also run it on Linux/Unix -- something you won't get from SQL Server.
People often equate J2EE with web applications and so do the J2EE-vs-LAMP comparison without the right information. J2EE is more than just web applications. You can build non-web clients that use the J2EE component model (they can even be built in other languages and use CORBA mappings). J2EE provides connections to legacy systems. J2EE supports asynchronous messaging. You can do pretty much everything transactionally with J2EE as well, so that if something fails along the way you can rollback your changes.
Actually, comparing J2EE to LAMP is wrong in another way. A J2EE server can run on Linux. An Apache web server is often used as a front end to a J2EE server (especially when you integrate the app server within an already-existing web server infrastructure). You could use MySQL (though I think you'd better off using ASA, but I'm biased) as long as you make sure to use transactional tables. There goes the "LAM" part of "LAMP".
So really, you're comparing the Java-based J2EE framework against similar Perl/PHP/Python frameworks. At least, that's what you should be comparing. Maybe for pure web apps the latter are better. I don't know, but you have to compare oranges to oranges.
True, but if you're in a business (like book writing) where you want people you don't know to contact you, it's far from ideal. That's why whitelists don't appeal to me.
But it would be more on-topic if you had replied to the actual story about the IsNot patent application. Someone reading this story without having read that one would find your reply confusing.
It will be interesting to see if this patent application actually gets rejected or not by the patent office.
And now back to your regularly scheduled programming...
From the patent application: Such a language construction is ungrammatical, requires more typing and violates the philosophy on which BASIC rests. It would be helpful therefore, if a single more intuitive operator could perform the function that the combination of the two operators Is and Not typically performs.
Microsoft is simultaneously announcing the publication of an updated version of The Elements of Style, revised specifically for Visual BASIC programmers.
"We're concerned with the literacy rates among VB programmers," says Microsoft chairman Bill Gates. "How can programmers learn to write correctly in English when they're exposed on a day-to-day basis with ungrammatical programming constructs?"
Not everyone agrees with the initiative. Some people are expressing concern that Microsoft is concentrating on grammatical correctness at the expense of program correctness. Stay tuned for further details on this exciting development in the annals of programming history.
I suspect that he means make a version of the Emulator (or the newer Simulator) that is more tightly integrated with the system I don't think you'd necessarily want a Palm device to suddenly appear on your screen, I think you'd want Palm applications to work seamlessly with the other applications on the system. Interesting thought, for sure, and definitely a challenge. The main obstacle would be a legal one, not a technical one -- getting the ROM images to install in the emulator/simulator. Doubt PalmSource would let you do it without actually licensing the OS.
Another book on programming interviews (from the interviewee's viewpoint) is Programming Interviews Exposed. Seems like a decent book for preparing for Microsoft-style interviews.
I always forget to check who actually submitted the content
Perhaps the solution is to make this kind of thing more explicit via some kind of ratings system whose value would be displayed at the top of an entry. Multiple ratings, probably: content could be rated as could the individual contributors. Similar features exist on Amazon and eBay, of course. The problem would be figuring out how to make such a system work, because they are definitely susceptible to manipulation.
The key is understanding what a servlet is. A servlet is an instance of a Java class that is invoked in response to an HTTP request. In other words, it's custom Java code for handling and responding to HTTP request by web browsers and other clients. Think the Java equivalent of CGI applications. If you like Java, servlets (and the JSP technology that is built on top of them -- JSP pages compile into servlets) are a nice way to build dynamic websites.
You can use Tomcat in standalone mode or by hooking it up to a web server like Apache -- it ships with a module for the latter that directs servlet requests from Apache to Tomcat and back.
It's getting easier to find hosting services that offer servlet support, and they usually run Tomcat to do it. Personally, I use KGB Internet, but check the list of servlet ISPs for other alternatives.
No, no, I'm interested in the actual notation -- the sheet music. When I last looked at Sibelius, you needed a special "Internet edition" to publish your sheet music on a website. Finale always offers a completely free application that others can use to view your music.
Last time I checked, Sibelius didn't let me distribute my files on the Internet without buying an extra license. I did like what I saw when I tried it, though, perhaps I'll go expore it again -- maybe the licensing has improved.
On Windows I've been using a Yamaha UW-500 audio/midi capture device (USB, works well with the laptop so I can capture piano and voice). What are the hardware options for doing this kind of stuff under Linux?
(I also use Finale for notation, but that's separate. Perhaps the most frustrating piece of software I've ever used...)
And I should point out that my site is small potatoes, so it's interesting that I get crawled so much. I only get about 500-600 page impressions on a normal day, although the other day the Firefox release caused my How to detect Firefox page (since reworked as How to detect Internet Explorer to be more politically correct) site to get over 8000 hits. But that's unusual.... if only I could make it a daily event!
Anyhow, I think Google is actively looking for and indexing small sites. Probably makes sense. Economists always say that small businesses as the engines that run the economy, maybe the analogy applies to small websites as well.
Sure, I see crawlers on my site all the time sometimes hitting the same URL over and over again. Do I understand their repetitive behavior? No.
Google gives a partial answer to this on their GoogleBot page:
In general, Googlebot should only download one copy of each file from your site during a given crawl. Occasionally the crawler is stopped and restarted, and it may recrawl pages that it has recently retrieved. These recrawls should happen infrequently.
If they're playing around with new indexing algorithms then I would expect to see more of these multiple hits.
Slashdot Mirror
More proof that consumer-oriented books are gaining traction, now that computers and related technologies are in the mainstream. Much bigger potential audience. A lot of developer info is available for free these days, too, which makes a developer-oriented book a harder sell. It will be interesting to see what the bestsellers are in the next few years.
Of course, there will always be developer-oriented material, especially innovative series like "Head First" that buck convention. (You either love or hate that series.)
EricPalm Database Programming: The Free Electronic Version
He is suing because Google has indexed unauthorized mirror sites
Really, it comes down to this: he's suing Google because he can't sue those mirror sites. They're just following the Lawyer's Axiom of Transitivity: if A is related to B and B is related to C then if A sues B and B has no money, then A must sue C.
EricWhy the Vioxx recall reduced spam (parody)
I hope they do this carefully and with lots of planning, because it's so easy to end up in "DLL hell" (or "shared library hell") if you don't. It would be nice to keep the option to install these apps completely separately so that you can upgrade one without affecting the other. Sure, more disk and more memory, but these things are cheap today and continue to get cheaper.
EricHow to detect Internet Explorer
I'm doomed to watch teenagers innovate my career out from under me and die sad and alone
Or you can hire a bunch of teenagers to stay up all night and work while you go home to your spouse and kids. It's all about balance.
EricYes and no. If the majority of people are using Windows and IE, there's a better argument for building browser extensions and other client-side Microsoft technologies (like Windows itself). Move people to other browsers and you take that away.
EricHow to detect Internet Explorer (pretty relevant)
If you like SQL Server, you should check out SQL Anywhere Studio. The developer edition is free, so give it a try. Not only can you run ASA (the database part of SQL Anywhere Studio) on Windows and CE, you can also run it on Linux/Unix -- something you won't get from SQL Server.
EricPeople often equate J2EE with web applications and so do the J2EE-vs-LAMP comparison without the right information. J2EE is more than just web applications. You can build non-web clients that use the J2EE component model (they can even be built in other languages and use CORBA mappings). J2EE provides connections to legacy systems. J2EE supports asynchronous messaging. You can do pretty much everything transactionally with J2EE as well, so that if something fails along the way you can rollback your changes.
Actually, comparing J2EE to LAMP is wrong in another way. A J2EE server can run on Linux. An Apache web server is often used as a front end to a J2EE server (especially when you integrate the app server within an already-existing web server infrastructure). You could use MySQL (though I think you'd better off using ASA, but I'm biased) as long as you make sure to use transactional tables. There goes the "LAM" part of "LAMP".
So really, you're comparing the Java-based J2EE framework against similar Perl/PHP/Python frameworks. At least, that's what you should be comparing. Maybe for pure web apps the latter are better. I don't know, but you have to compare oranges to oranges.
EricJavaScript is not Java
True, but if you're in a business (like book writing) where you want people you don't know to contact you, it's far from ideal. That's why whitelists don't appeal to me.
EricPalm Database Programming: The Free Electronic Edition
But it would be more on-topic if you had replied to the actual story about the IsNot patent application. Someone reading this story without having read that one would find your reply confusing.
It will be interesting to see if this patent application actually gets rejected or not by the patent office.
And now back to your regularly scheduled programming...
EricHow to detect Internet Explorer
From the patent application: Such a language construction is ungrammatical, requires more typing and violates the philosophy on which BASIC rests. It would be helpful therefore, if a single more intuitive operator could perform the function that the combination of the two operators Is and Not typically performs.
Microsoft is simultaneously announcing the publication of an updated version of The Elements of Style, revised specifically for Visual BASIC programmers.
"We're concerned with the literacy rates among VB programmers," says Microsoft chairman Bill Gates. "How can programmers learn to write correctly in English when they're exposed on a day-to-day basis with ungrammatical programming constructs?"
Not everyone agrees with the initiative. Some people are expressing concern that Microsoft is concentrating on grammatical correctness at the expense of program correctness. Stay tuned for further details on this exciting development in the annals of programming history.
EricMore humor here
I suspect that he means make a version of the Emulator (or the newer Simulator) that is more tightly integrated with the system I don't think you'd necessarily want a Palm device to suddenly appear on your screen, I think you'd want Palm applications to work seamlessly with the other applications on the system. Interesting thought, for sure, and definitely a challenge. The main obstacle would be a legal one, not a technical one -- getting the ROM images to install in the emulator/simulator. Doubt PalmSource would let you do it without actually licensing the OS.
EricPalm Database Programming -- The Free Electronic Version
Another book on programming interviews (from the interviewee's viewpoint) is Programming Interviews Exposed. Seems like a decent book for preparing for Microsoft-style interviews.
EricJavaScript is not Java, damn it!
Or, better yet: CSI is to science like The Apprentice is to business.
Ericthey may also promote an inaccurate view of science
Unlike Alias. Or Star Trek. Or (insert name of favorite show).
Isn't CSI just a darker "Quincy, M.E."? Or am I showing my age?
EricReading C Declarations: A Guide for the Mystified (speaking of showing your age)
Design pattern fans should check out Pattern Hatching: Design Patterns Applied by John Vlissides, one of the Gang of Four. Short, but interesting reading.
EricHow to detect Internet Explorer
I always forget to check who actually submitted the content
Perhaps the solution is to make this kind of thing more explicit via some kind of ratings system whose value would be displayed at the top of an entry. Multiple ratings, probably: content could be rated as could the individual contributors. Similar features exist on Amazon and eBay, of course. The problem would be figuring out how to make such a system work, because they are definitely susceptible to manipulation.
EricCheck your HTTP headers here
Tomcat is many things:
The key is understanding what a servlet is. A servlet is an instance of a Java class that is invoked in response to an HTTP request. In other words, it's custom Java code for handling and responding to HTTP request by web browsers and other clients. Think the Java equivalent of CGI applications. If you like Java, servlets (and the JSP technology that is built on top of them -- JSP pages compile into servlets) are a nice way to build dynamic websites.
You can use Tomcat in standalone mode or by hooking it up to a web server like Apache -- it ships with a module for the latter that directs servlet requests from Apache to Tomcat and back.
It's getting easier to find hosting services that offer servlet support, and they usually run Tomcat to do it. Personally, I use KGB Internet, but check the list of servlet ISPs for other alternatives.
Ericwho has a Java-powered website
Don't get too close to the pharmacy counter if you have a pacemaker...
EricSpeaking of drugs: Vioxx is Prozac for Laywers
No, no, I'm interested in the actual notation -- the sheet music. When I last looked at Sibelius, you needed a special "Internet edition" to publish your sheet music on a website. Finale always offers a completely free application that others can use to view your music.
Last time I checked, Sibelius didn't let me distribute my files on the Internet without buying an extra license. I did like what I saw when I tried it, though, perhaps I'll go expore it again -- maybe the licensing has improved.
On Windows I've been using a Yamaha UW-500 audio/midi capture device (USB, works well with the laptop so I can capture piano and voice). What are the hardware options for doing this kind of stuff under Linux?
(I also use Finale for notation, but that's separate. Perhaps the most frustrating piece of software I've ever used...)
EricAnd again, you can encourage users to try out Firefox using the techniques I describe in How to detect Internet Explorer. But do it gently!
EricRemember Police Academy? Now you can dub martial arts movies yourself, in the privacy of your own home...
And I should point out that my site is small potatoes, so it's interesting that I get crawled so much. I only get about 500-600 page impressions on a normal day, although the other day the Firefox release caused my How to detect Firefox page (since reworked as How to detect Internet Explorer to be more politically correct) site to get over 8000 hits. But that's unusual.... if only I could make it a daily event!
Anyhow, I think Google is actively looking for and indexing small sites. Probably makes sense. Economists always say that small businesses as the engines that run the economy, maybe the analogy applies to small websites as well.
EricJavaScript is not Java
Sure, I see crawlers on my site all the time sometimes hitting the same URL over and over again. Do I understand their repetitive behavior? No.
Google gives a partial answer to this on their GoogleBot page:
If they're playing around with new indexing algorithms then I would expect to see more of these multiple hits.
EricHow to (gently) detect Internet Explorer