As a european this just sounds like the usual Americal judicial logic: laws that demand things from entities over whom the laws has no jurisdiction.
Consider MPAA vs. The Pirate Bay:
MPAA: You have violated paragraphs A, B and C of the third amendment of the fifth subsection of the ACMD! Cease and desist! TPB: This is not America you schmucks, we don't care. MPAA: But, but... we are Americans! TPB: Up yours.
Just because you have a law doesn't mean people and companies in other countries (or states in this case) have to follow them.
However, I can see that this is slighly more complicated since there might be federal laws that also play a role here.
As I read the first comment I thought "well, that's not it, look at what Norman and Weiser are saying", and then I scrolled down, and there it was, my comment. Well said.
You refer to Norman's The Invisible Computer, which is one of the best accounts of the ideas that started with Mark Weiser which he named Ubiquitous Computing.
Ubiquitous computing names the third wave in computing, just now beginning. First were mainframes, each shared by lots of people. Now we are in the personal computing era, person and machine staring uneasily at each other across the desktop. Next comes ubiquitous computing, or the age of calm technology, when technology recedes into the background of our lives. Alan Kay of Apple calls this 'Third Paradigm' computing.
I belive UbiComp is the next thing, and that the iPod, among other things such as TiVo:s and whatnot are the first signs of what is to come. UbiComp is not just entertainment applicances though, rather, it's an idea that computers need not be big machines that do lots of things, there doesn't need to be a computer at all, as such. Instead we can make computable things, that do one thing, and does it well. Computers don't have to look like computers, they can be invisible, inside the thing. It's the logical next step: mecanical -> electronic -> computable.
/Theo, Interaction designer (a field of human Computer Interaction, which also incorporates Ubiquituos Computing)
The com/net/org/uk/se/whatever TLDs have become quite pointless, so why not? Why should I have to remember if my favourite site happend to choose org, net, uk or se, instead of the ubiquitous com? The TLDs don't add any information. My site is registered under net, even though it's a company, and based in Sweden. I just thought it looked neat.
Perhaps the country codes are apropriate in some cases, but seriously, when did you visit www.volvo.se last? Or ikea.se? I guess you go to their com-equivalents. nu is popular here in Sweden, because "nu" means "now", so you can construct sentences with the names, like del.icio.us has with us. nu stands for Nuie, which is a small island in the pacific. So I would say even country TLDs don't add information.
If two companies or organisations happen to have the same name, how does the current TLD-scheme help? How do I know which has registered com? which has net or org? Most likely one of them would register the name under all the TLDs they could, as fast as possible. Instant TLD pointlessness!
The TLDs don't add anything but confusion, so to hell with them, I say.
I would not recommend PHP nor Ruby on Rails, for the same reason I wouldn't recommend learning to program in J2EE. The problem is that programming in that environment will teach the students odd habits and ways of solving problems that are not used in desktop application enivornments.
Students will not learn about MVC, event handling, and will get into the habit of treating everything as a request-response loop. It can be quite hard to later try to write an event-driven desktop application.
The web application environment is seriously limited and there's isn't very much to do about it as things are now. Spring for J2EE has made things better, but it's still not good. Perhaps Flash and emerging trends like AJAX will push things to the next level, but until then programming for the desktop will teach you so much more.
Even though J2EE and Ruby on Rails are both OO environments, there isn't very much OO to the development, in my opinion. The frameworks are OO and you use objects, but the actions you write are procedural, everything takes place in an execute-method and you are instructed not to use instance variables... the model is quite OO, but writing POJOs won't teach you very much, and writing data access code is not helpful for a beginner. The views are not OO in any way.
Of course I'm assuming that we're talking about learning to program in an object-oriented language/environment. However, I don't think that learning to program in functional or declarative is very helpful for beginners.
Java is a good language to know, but as someone once said about the problems of using it as teaching language:
"There are four problems with teaching Java as a first language: 'public, static, void, main'."
The point being that you have to explain quite a lot about object oriented programming before you can even start to explain the easy parts, or say to the students "ignore this for now, I will explain later", which never works, it only confuses them.
I agree that Python or Ruby are better choices for beginners, who can then learn public, static, void, private, protected, abstract, final and other advanced OO concepts in Java quite quickly, as soon as they have learned for, while, if, classes, methods and objects.
There has been four bombings in London this morning, not seven or six as previously reported. The confusion seems to be caused by one of the bombs affecting both Liverpool Street Station, Moorgate and Aldgate East stations, which are close and all were used as exits by survivors and injured. All are in east central London.
The other underground bombs were at Tavistock Square (near King's Cross Station in north central London) and Edgware Road (northwest central London).
The bombed bus was near Russel Square in central London, although different media report different locations, all in the vicinity of Russel Square. Russel Square is also close to Tavistock Square.
It seems likely, however, that users would be able to use Windows on Macs running on Intel. This may motivate some devious users to steal Mac software, which would be a new type of problem for Apple
I'm confused by this logic. How would running Windows on a Mac lead to people stealing Mac software?
And how is this a new problem? Fair enough, it's claimed that there isn't as much software piracy on the Mac as on Windows, but it must still constitute more than half of the install base? At least for home users. I don't know anyone who has paid for Office or Photoshop, for example. It can't be that much difference, can it?
Thank you for saying that. I browsed through the comments shaking my head, but finally someone said what was on my mind:
It amazes me that people try to write big projects in PHP. It must be absolute hell. OO in PHP is just a joke. To me it seems like an afterthought, "hey, that OO thing seems popular, let's add some syntax sugar to emulate it in PHP". Because it's just that, syntax sugar.
PHP works nicely for small sites, doing some quick and dirty hacks (but without having that nice quick-and-dirty-enabling syntax of Perl), and some simple database querying. It works, but just that.
But try to implement Model 2 in PHP, the horror! (not to mention Model 2X...), it's simply not up to it.
I've written small sites in PHP, works fine because I can do things quickly and without much thought. I've written medium-sized database-driven sites in PHP, and that gives me a headache. Trying to layer the application, abstract away the database and the subsystems, it's a pain. I do web programming for a living, and PHP is not even an option in most cases.
Theo Hultberg / Iconara
--
Hey, I've already got bad karma, so what can you do?
If you have a good idea, write it down, put it in an envelope, wrap duct tape around it, and mail it to yourself. Make sure that the date the date stamp on the envelope is legible when you get the envelope in the mail. Don't open it. Store it in a safe location.
When you need to prove that you had an idea first, you have quite a solid proof. Musicians do this all the time, some authors too.
Slashdot Mirror
As a european this just sounds like the usual Americal judicial logic: laws that demand things from entities over whom the laws has no jurisdiction.
Consider MPAA vs. The Pirate Bay:
MPAA: You have violated paragraphs A, B and C of the third amendment of the fifth subsection of the ACMD! Cease and desist!
TPB: This is not America you schmucks, we don't care.
MPAA: But, but... we are Americans!
TPB: Up yours.
Just because you have a law doesn't mean people and companies in other countries (or states in this case) have to follow them.
However, I can see that this is slighly more complicated since there might be federal laws that also play a role here.
Hydrogen power is, and will always be, 10 years into the future.
You refer to Norman's The Invisible Computer, which is one of the best accounts of the ideas that started with Mark Weiser which he named Ubiquitous Computing.
From http://www.ubiq.com/hypertext/weiser/UbiHome.htmlAlso see Wikipedia/Ubiquious Computing
I belive UbiComp is the next thing, and that the iPod, among other things such as TiVo:s and whatnot are the first signs of what is to come. UbiComp is not just entertainment applicances though, rather, it's an idea that computers need not be big machines that do lots of things, there doesn't need to be a computer at all, as such. Instead we can make computable things, that do one thing, and does it well. Computers don't have to look like computers, they can be invisible, inside the thing. It's the logical next step: mecanical -> electronic -> computable.
The com/net/org/uk/se/whatever TLDs have become quite pointless, so why not? Why should I have to remember if my favourite site happend to choose org, net, uk or se, instead of the ubiquitous com? The TLDs don't add any information. My site is registered under net, even though it's a company, and based in Sweden. I just thought it looked neat.
Perhaps the country codes are apropriate in some cases, but seriously, when did you visit www.volvo.se last? Or ikea.se? I guess you go to their com-equivalents. nu is popular here in Sweden, because "nu" means "now", so you can construct sentences with the names, like del.icio.us has with us. nu stands for Nuie, which is a small island in the pacific. So I would say even country TLDs don't add information.
If two companies or organisations happen to have the same name, how does the current TLD-scheme help? How do I know which has registered com? which has net or org? Most likely one of them would register the name under all the TLDs they could, as fast as possible. Instant TLD pointlessness!
The TLDs don't add anything but confusion, so to hell with them, I say.
T#
I would not recommend PHP nor Ruby on Rails, for the same reason I wouldn't recommend learning to program in J2EE. The problem is that programming in that environment will teach the students odd habits and ways of solving problems that are not used in desktop application enivornments.
/environment. However, I don't think that learning to program in functional or declarative is very helpful for beginners.
Students will not learn about MVC, event handling, and will get into the habit of treating everything as a request-response loop. It can be quite hard to later try to write an event-driven desktop application.
The web application environment is seriously limited and there's isn't very much to do about it as things are now. Spring for J2EE has made things better, but it's still not good. Perhaps Flash and emerging trends like AJAX will push things to the next level, but until then programming for the desktop will teach you so much more.
Even though J2EE and Ruby on Rails are both OO environments, there isn't very much OO to the development, in my opinion. The frameworks are OO and you use objects, but the actions you write are procedural, everything takes place in an execute-method and you are instructed not to use instance variables... the model is quite OO, but writing POJOs won't teach you very much, and writing data access code is not helpful for a beginner. The views are not OO in any way.
Of course I'm assuming that we're talking about learning to program in an object-oriented language
Java is a good language to know, but as someone once said about the problems of using it as teaching language:
"There are four problems with teaching Java as a first language: 'public, static, void, main'."
The point being that you have to explain quite a lot about object oriented programming before you can even start to explain the easy parts, or say to the students "ignore this for now, I will explain later", which never works, it only confuses them.
I agree that Python or Ruby are better choices for beginners, who can then learn public, static, void, private, protected, abstract, final and other advanced OO concepts in Java quite quickly, as soon as they have learned for, while, if, classes, methods and objects.
The other underground bombs were at Tavistock Square (near King's Cross Station in north central London) and Edgware Road (northwest central London).
The bombed bus was near Russel Square in central London, although different media report different locations, all in the vicinity of Russel Square. Russel Square is also close to Tavistock Square.
map of locations
I'm confused by this logic. How would running Windows on a Mac lead to people stealing Mac software?
And how is this a new problem? Fair enough, it's claimed that there isn't as much software piracy on the Mac as on Windows, but it must still constitute more than half of the install base? At least for home users. I don't know anyone who has paid for Office or Photoshop, for example. It can't be that much difference, can it?
Thank you for saying that. I browsed through the comments shaking my head, but finally someone said what was on my mind:
It amazes me that people try to write big projects in PHP. It must be absolute hell. OO in PHP is just a joke. To me it seems like an afterthought, "hey, that OO thing seems popular, let's add some syntax sugar to emulate it in PHP". Because it's just that, syntax sugar.
PHP works nicely for small sites, doing some quick and dirty hacks (but without having that nice quick-and-dirty-enabling syntax of Perl), and some simple database querying. It works, but just that.
But try to implement Model 2 in PHP, the horror! (not to mention Model 2X...), it's simply not up to it.
I've written small sites in PHP, works fine because I can do things quickly and without much thought. I've written medium-sized database-driven sites in PHP, and that gives me a headache. Trying to layer the application, abstract away the database and the subsystems, it's a pain. I do web programming for a living, and PHP is not even an option in most cases.
Theo Hultberg / Iconara
-- Hey, I've already got bad karma, so what can you do?
This is just another proof (amongst many) that the american society is sick.
When you need to prove that you had an idea first, you have quite a solid proof. Musicians do this all the time, some authors too.