I'll have to look for it again because I didn't bookmark it.
OK, I found mention of it on Mark Reinhold's blog, which links to JSR-270, the Java 6 Release Contents specification.
To be exact, it says
An appendix to this specification motivates and defines a policy for the removal of existing features from the platform.
Per that policy, this specification proposes the removal of the javax.sound.midi package in a future release of the platform. This package is not often used and typical implementations of it require a large data file, about half a megabyte in size, which is a significant component of minimal Java Runtime Environment (JRE) download bundles.
This proposal does not mean that the javax.sound.midi package will be removed in Java SE 6. This proposal is merely the first step in the feature-removal process defined below. This proposal serves as a warning that this package may be removed in a future release of the platform, but whether it is actually removed, and in which release, is a decision for future expert groups.
Apple is selling music players and needs a way to get music to users easily so they will buy said music players. The providers of said music are a cartel convicted of abuse multiple times. The cartel required DRM and Apple pushed back on how restrictive it is and prices. Does anyone think it would be better if Apple refused to do business with them and let Microsoft dominate the DRM market? Apple needed to be there to stop MS from using the incompatibility of DRM'd songs against their OS offering. There is nothing hypocritical about saying it would be better for everyone (except the RIAA) if DRM was no more, either voluntarily or by law. Does anyone complain that OpenOffice reads and writes.doc files, all while they talk about how bad it is people are locked in that format?
This is, of course, completely ignoring the fact that Apple prevents other companies from using its DRM. Example: Apple threatened to sue RealNetworks under the DCMA when they reverse engineered Fairplay.
While Apple may claim they use DRM because the industry said to, that hasn't stopped them from using it to maintain their iPod+ITMS monopoly.
In the Apple case, the OS is not a separable part of the system with intrinsic value of its own, except in the contrived case where you are not going to run MacOS on your Mac. They don't get additional revenue by "sneaking" an unneeded copy onto your new machine - it's just part of the machine.
It's not as contrived as you think. The PowerPC Mac Mini made an excellent web server system, except that OSX suffers from weird problems that cause server apps such as MySQL and Apache to perform much worse than they do under Yellow Dog Linux on the same system. We're talking in terms of orders of magnitude here.
Which brings us back to the OS problem. Particularly during the PPC era, there were other OSes that would run on Macs. In other words, you paid "the Apple tax" every time you bought a new computer, even if you immediately wipe the machine and install Linux, or migrate your OSX installation from your previous machine that you're decommissioning.
On the other hand, I can and have bought ia32 and ia64 computers without Windows pre-installed on them. I was given that choice, something that Apple doesn't give you.
As a side note, OSX can, in theory, be run in a virtual machine under VMWare. Apple, however, tries to make it extremely difficult to do so. It's a lock-in of the worst sort and as a/. reader, I'm surprised you put up with it. If every OS did this, we could kiss VMs goodbye. Then again, as long as open source exists, this will never happen.
I don't have a problem paying for the software that I want to run - do you?
I call straw man:
I can keep using the Windows XP license I already have...
I have a problem with paying for software that I already own, something I would do if I were to buy a new computer from either Apple* or from one of the major PC manufacturers.
* For the sake of argument, this is assuming that I already own a Mac with a reasonably recent version of OSX or having purchased a recent upgrade. I don't actually own a Mac, even though I have considered buying one.
And as long as I buy my hardware from Apple, I'm not going to be forced to buy the OEM copy included with a new PC.
Yes, you don't get an OEM copy of Windows. Instead, you're forced to pay for an OEM copy of OSX included as part of the system's price, much like Windows is included as part of the system price of, say, a Dell.
Why did Sierra (Leisure Suit Larry, Kings Quest, Police Quest, Space Quest) and Lucasarts (The Dig) ever give up on the Adventure game in the first place, and why can't they save it?
Well, this is how it worked:
LucasArts noticed that it made a lot more money on mediocre Star Wars titles than they did from their best selling adventure games... although the move away from point-n-click with Grim Fandango and Escape From Monkey Island probably didn't help their sales.
The creative minds behind Sierra, Ken and Robert Williams, sold the company in 1996; leaving the company altogether in 1997. Since then, Sierra has made four "adventure" games: 1998: King's Quest: Mask of Eternity - a King's Quest game that was really more of an FPS than an adventure game 1998: Quest for Glory V: Dragon Fire - a Quest for Glory game that was more of an RPG than an adventure game 1999: Gabriel Knight 3: Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned - The only good one of the bunch... not surprising, as it is the only one whose series creator was still with Sierra 2004: Leisure Suit Larry: Magnum Cum Laud - a third rate Leisure Suit Larry game derided by series creator Al Lowe, who was not involved with the game's creation
Vivendi bought Sierra's parent company in 1999 and, over the years, shut down all of its studios, including Sierra's main branch in 2004.
Sierra is dead, even though Vivendi continues to use the name. Rumor has it that you will never see the name Vivendi on any products in North America; they will all be published under the Sierra name instead.
You keep using that word ("everything"). I do not think it means what you think it means.
You're right, there are some things that stayed the same. For example, prescript and postscript... assigning values to a variable (but NOT to an element of an array or hash, that syntax has changed)
However, the list of what HAS changed appears to be much longer: Array manipulation, renaming operators, OO, Regex, the list goes on...
Why not try writing some Perl 6 code? I did that a couple of years ago. Perl 6 feels very perlish to me, even more natural than Perl 5.
To answer your question, there are several reasons, some not actually related to the way the code looks: 1. The language is still subject to change. 2. Libraries, libraries, libraries. Perl 5 has lots of them. Does Perl 6? 3. I don't want to use a language that relies on a VM. If I did, I'd consider using C# or Java.
Several operators have been given new names to increase clarity and better Huffman-code the language, while others have changed precedence.
is not a strong enough justification to change operators in a non-backward compatible way. It takes everything you've learned and throws it out the window. What is the incentive to me, as a developer, to learn Perl 6 over another language, since I have to relearn everything from scratch?
Also, why continue to call it Perl if the entire language's syntax changed? It would be like Microsoft calling what is now C# "Visual C++ 7," except that C++ has an ISO standard.
P.S. I'm aware that Microsoft still makes Visual C++ and that the latest version is 8.
What I find annoying is that core language features are changing operators for no reason other than to change operators.
Example: -> is changing to . The reason given is
-> becomes., like the rest of the world uses.
Which also forces . to change to ~ (also.= is now ~=) Which also forces =~ to change to ~~
That's three major operators in the language changed with the justification that the rest of the world does one of them differently. Except, by definition, people who already knew perl.
I brought this up in a previous article about Open Office, but I think it's relevant to what you said, so I'm bringing it up again. I know this example isn't exact, since it's actually OO.o running on Windows, but this dialog is going to panic a lot of normal users.
"What do you mean it doesn't save my documents right?"
Or, if they click No, then anyone they send this document to that uses MS Office ends up replying with "I couldn't open the document you sent. My computer says it's invalid."
It sounds to me like you're completely misinterpreting what the grandparent said about the "sad bunch of nerds" (and yes, it was nerds in the grandparent's post, not geeks).
In context, this is specifically talking about the people who create googlebombs to link to a site using terms that do not appear in (or even apply to) the site itself.
For example, if I buy up a bunch of expiring domains and start linking to slashdot.org with links saying things like "hot xxx bestiality porn", should it start showing up in searches for those?
How about for "microsoft is great" "linux sucks donkey balls" "optimized for Internet Explorer 6" "french military victories," etc...?
As for the baby wipes, Google's existing Pagerank system should have already taken care of that by pushing it far down the results list. Huggies and the like are way more likely to be near the top than porn.
...how does an ISP recognize BitTorrent traffic? As far as I can tell, it's really easy to change the port numbers used by the BitTorrent tracker and by the end user. I now that my uTorrent client is set to randomize a port and then use uPnP to ask my router to open it.
So, if the tracker port number changes and the client port number changes, how is it being blocked?
How about making REFERENCES work in a column definition when InnoDB is in use? Right now, you have to go out of your way and create an index on the column, then specify the constraint after that.
Why isn't the parser smart enough to do that automatically when it runs into REFERENCES in a column definition?
Slashdot Mirror
OK, I found mention of it on Mark Reinhold's blog, which links to JSR-270, the Java 6 Release Contents specification.
To be exact, it says
I can just see the next stupid warning label:
Warning: Placing in a public area may get you fined for causing a bomb scare.
The funny part is that the first library that is under consideration for removal (in java 7) isn't a deprecated one.
javax.sound.midi, so that the size of the installer can be cut down due to the removal of the generic soundbank shipped with Java.
You are aware that source code is usually larger than compiled output... right?
Yes, PS2s outsold Wiis.
Have you noticed, though, how hard it is to find a Wii? Nintendo can't produce them fast enough to keep them on shelves.
Next year, I expect this statistic to be completely different.
This is, of course, completely ignoring the fact that Apple prevents other companies from using its DRM. Example: Apple threatened to sue RealNetworks under the DCMA when they reverse engineered Fairplay.
While Apple may claim they use DRM because the industry said to, that hasn't stopped them from using it to maintain their iPod+ITMS monopoly.
Which brings us back to the OS problem. Particularly during the PPC era, there were other OSes that would run on Macs. In other words, you paid "the Apple tax" every time you bought a new computer, even if you immediately wipe the machine and install Linux, or migrate your OSX installation from your previous machine that you're decommissioning.
On the other hand, I can and have bought ia32 and ia64 computers without Windows pre-installed on them. I was given that choice, something that Apple doesn't give you.
As a side note, OSX can, in theory, be run in a virtual machine under VMWare. Apple, however, tries to make it extremely difficult to do so. It's a lock-in of the worst sort and as a
* For the sake of argument, this is assuming that I already own a Mac with a reasonably recent version of OSX or having purchased a recent upgrade. I don't actually own a Mac, even though I have considered buying one.
Oh, my answer was 42.
LucasArts noticed that it made a lot more money on mediocre Star Wars titles than they did from their best selling adventure games... although the move away from point-n-click with Grim Fandango and Escape From Monkey Island probably didn't help their sales.
The creative minds behind Sierra, Ken and Robert Williams, sold the company in 1996; leaving the company altogether in 1997. Since then, Sierra has made four "adventure" games:
1998: King's Quest: Mask of Eternity - a King's Quest game that was really more of an FPS than an adventure game
1998: Quest for Glory V: Dragon Fire - a Quest for Glory game that was more of an RPG than an adventure game
1999: Gabriel Knight 3: Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned - The only good one of the bunch... not surprising, as it is the only one whose series creator was still with Sierra
2004: Leisure Suit Larry: Magnum Cum Laud - a third rate Leisure Suit Larry game derided by series creator Al Lowe, who was not involved with the game's creation
Vivendi bought Sierra's parent company in 1999 and, over the years, shut down all of its studios, including Sierra's main branch in 2004.
Sierra is dead, even though Vivendi continues to use the name. Rumor has it that you will never see the name Vivendi on any products in North America; they will all be published under the Sierra name instead.
The more you tighten your grip, MPAA, the more movie downloads will slip through your fingers.
However, the list of what HAS changed appears to be much longer:
Array manipulation, renaming operators, OO, Regex, the list goes on... To answer your question, there are several reasons, some not actually related to the way the code looks:
1. The language is still subject to change.
2. Libraries, libraries, libraries. Perl 5 has lots of them. Does Perl 6?
3. I don't want to use a language that relies on a VM. If I did, I'd consider using C# or Java.
Also, why continue to call it Perl if the entire language's syntax changed? It would be like Microsoft calling what is now C# "Visual C++ 7," except that C++ has an ISO standard.
P.S. I'm aware that Microsoft still makes Visual C++ and that the latest version is 8.
Of course, an important side note is that under Linux, drivers are kernel modules and distributed with the kernel source.
Try having a device that requires a driver not present as a kernel module and see what luck you have with a major kernel upgrade.
Example: -> is changing to . The reason given is Which also forces . to change to ~ (also
Which also forces =~ to change to ~~
That's three major operators in the language changed with the justification that the rest of the world does one of them differently. Except, by definition, people who already knew perl.
I brought this up in a previous article about Open Office, but I think it's relevant to what you said, so I'm bringing it up again. I know this example isn't exact, since it's actually OO.o running on Windows, but this dialog is going to panic a lot of normal users.
"What do you mean it doesn't save my documents right?"
Or, if they click No, then anyone they send this document to that uses MS Office ends up replying with "I couldn't open the document you sent. My computer says it's invalid."
It sounds to me like you're completely misinterpreting what the grandparent said about the "sad bunch of nerds" (and yes, it was nerds in the grandparent's post, not geeks).
In context, this is specifically talking about the people who create googlebombs to link to a site using terms that do not appear in (or even apply to) the site itself.
For example, if I buy up a bunch of expiring domains and start linking to slashdot.org with links saying things like "hot xxx bestiality porn", should it start showing up in searches for those?
How about for "microsoft is great" "linux sucks donkey balls" "optimized for Internet Explorer 6" "french military victories," etc...?
As for the baby wipes, Google's existing Pagerank system should have already taken care of that by pushing it far down the results list. Huggies and the like are way more likely to be near the top than porn.
or they could win it.
...how does an ISP recognize BitTorrent traffic? As far as I can tell, it's really easy to change the port numbers used by the BitTorrent tracker and by the end user. I now that my uTorrent client is set to randomize a port and then use uPnP to ask my router to open it.
So, if the tracker port number changes and the client port number changes, how is it being blocked?
I like yours better. It makes more sense. :D
Windows, open Pod Bay Doors.doc.
"I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that."
How about making REFERENCES work in a column definition when InnoDB is in use? Right now, you have to go out of your way and create an index on the column, then specify the constraint after that.
Why isn't the parser smart enough to do that automatically when it runs into REFERENCES in a column definition?
What's to stop a company for counter-suing (for libel/slander if nothing else) and including legal fees in their request for damages?
To be honest, if said person only knew one DBMS and not the other, they're not qualified to answer those questions anyway.