Rumor has it that Perl6 will essentially allow you to "use" a dialect -- so, dialects of Perl6 are essentially libraries. There's probably going to be one to make Perl6 look like Perl5, allowing some of the cleaner pure-Perl stuff to compile directly as Perl6. And on top of all that, Perl6, like Java, will have a bytecode engine -- and that bytecode engine, Parrot, already runs some gimped versions of python, some toy languages, and the old classics like bf.
Is there something inherent to Java that prevents people from trying to do things like this?
I'm not saying you're wrong, of course. Whoever originally designed Java would probably froth at the mouth at the mere mention of multiple inheritance. I guess that's why I've always liked Perl -- nothing stops you from being formal, but at the same time, nothing gets in your way of quickly throwing together wonderfully sloppy hacks. You can "use strict", but no one forces you to. I suspect that having a strict Java file do "import sys.util.AnalRetentiveJava" would annoy the Sun folks.
Java was pretty pervasive in everything Sun did, and with good reason: If I developed a sexy new programming language, I'd use it for everything, too. So, most of Sun's contributions have felt half-assed without Java. OpenOffice... great, but you need Java to run it. Netbeans... great, runs on Java.
I bet people wouldn't be so forgiving if it was an "open source" toolkit for writing applications on top of Flash.
This move completes it. It's also roughly equivalent to Microsoft releasing the Windows source code, as well as C#,.NET (including ASP.NET), and Visual Studio.NET. Hell, it's roughly equivalent to Microsoft funding Wine development.
It must be the all-nighter and the ridiculous amounts of caffeine in my system, but I'm glad someone else is genuinely happy and excited. I mean, c'mon, Slashdot, a tagging keyword of "finally"? As if Sun was somehow obligated to do this? (Do you see Microsoft doing the same with C#/.NET?) I was expecting some half-assed Shared-Source-like crap that hardly changes anything from the way it was before, and they're diving in headfirst with GPL.
Let's go do some research, and find out every individual elected to office via insecure voting machines. Attempt to find individuals only where a voting machine screwup could've changed the outcome of the election -- that is, if a person got 80% of the votes, and only 20% of the votes came from voting machine, assuming my math is right, the voting machines are irrelevant. However, given the same scenario, but 50% voting machines, the outcome could easily be affected.
Then let's find out every action they took (including their own votes, if they're in congress) which they're allowed to take because of their office.
Now, declare that they have not been elected, and treat all of their actions as null and void. You can cherrypick to some extent, of course -- if they enacted some leash laws, you're not required to buy a dog just to disobey. But it would send a powerful message if, when doing your taxes, you refuse to accept any tax breaks they enacted, and attempt to send in more than they want.
In otherwords, civil disobedience. Starts with bullshit laws, but we're now moving onto bullshit lawmakers. I don't want to spend another second in this corporatocracy. Take it back!
Perhaps. But if "errors" result in 0 votes, even with that small a portion of the population, I suspect foul play. Foul play on any scale doesn't follow the rules of statistics -- except, of course, that far more people are impacted by the result.
If they're talking to somebody, I'd also be willing to bet that they can demand that Windows not be installed and have either FreeDOS or RedHat pre-installed
Ah, but can they do this and actually get a discount?
It's pretty meaningless if they can't, because it basically means they're paying for a copy of Windows that they'll never get to see. And if Dell has signed a contract that prevents actually removing the Microsoft tax, then these people will go elsewhere.
It comes down to: If big corps force Dell to offer Linux, end-users will be able to buy Dell computers with Linux. If they go elsewhere to avoid the Microsoft tax, Dell will start running into trouble, and end-users may start jumping ship as well -- certainly, whoever Wall-Mart switches to would become big enough to make themselves a viable option for end-users (Aunt Tillies).
I'll be happy to debate every one of your points with you, but not with Anonymous Coward. Someone want to take credit for this mess? (Dvorak, is that you?)
No, you didn't. Not here. Not a single of your comments in this thread has so much as a question mark. I just checked. Am I wrong?
I don't know if you asked legitimate questions of the community before, but if you had an attitude then at all similar to your attitude now, I'm not surprised people didn't want to help. This is not a personal attack, just an observation, take it however you like.
Then I get FUD thrown at me by you and your "friends" as well as personal attacks and other fallacies.
Forgive me for stooping to your level, but you started it.
Please, check your facts before you imply that Mono is necessary for writing portable Linux apps without touching kernel code. You are the only Linux developer I've ever talked to that made such a ludicrous claim.
I get told that "Visual BASIC sucks, use Python instead" and now that "Sun and Microsoft do not help developers like you because their online resources and books they publish are not as good as the works written by flamelords of whom you now are in communication with."
Search for those phrases, I dare you. They weren't said until you just said them now.
I invite you to actually read what was said, and try to hear what we are really saying, and not what you expect us to say.
I'm going to ignore your second paragraph for now. Your use of uncyclopedia suggests that your whole post is, itself, a satire. If you really think I'm a troll and you're not, let's both agree to not act like trolls. I'll start with this post.
You are basically saying gamers don't update their systems (thus the pre-install distro solution).
It's a lot easier to take a working box and update it than to take a brand-new box and make it work. It took me at least as long to make XP work with my nvidia raid as it took me to get Linux working with the same -- so again, the difference is buying a brand-new system and having it work.
ID software - lol - they were rolling in so much dough they did a LOT of experiements. They are hardly a mainstream example of what game developers do - how many Linux games has EA came out with?
Let's try to stay on topic.
ID (not EA) decided to experiment with Linux, even where it wasn't profitable. They may not keep this up forever, but it means they've experimented with it. It means they can do cross-platform games, even Linux games, if they really want to. It means that if they come up with a good reason for doing Linux, they won't back away because it's too hard, or because they think it somehow makes their game open source, or any of the thousands of FUD reasons people don't even give it a try. In fact, they have enough experience that it'll take them significantly fewer resources to try it.
So, someone running an experiment is a good thing for that individual or company.
And Aunt Tilly being moot was my main point. Look at how much we can debate about Linux and Gamers -- I think we can both agree that if, by some miracle, gamers all went to Linux, that would have a powerful impact. I'm not telling you it's going to happen, I'm saying: if you're a Linux developer, and you care about Linux on the desktop, gamers are one place to focus. Developers are another.
First, it's not as hard as you say it is. Once you know your way around (and you obviously don't), upgrading is actually significantly easier than it is on Windows. For one thing, my nvidia driver upgraded automatically last week, and I hardly noticed -- nVidia does not provide any way, shape, or form of automatic updates on Windows, last I checked.
Second, you like to tweak your stuff -- why are you still on Windows? How much tweaking can you really do without custom kernel patches? Can you tune Windows' swappiness? How about selecting a better filesystem -- oh wait, your choices are NTFS, UDF, or FAT, and you probably didn't know about UDF. How about... Getting the picture yet?
Third, I realize we may not be there yet -- my Linux daemontools-like driver crashes on amd64, for instance. I'm simply stating that you are a far more relevant group than Aunt Tilly, and we should be working on making the process easier for you, rather than for Aunt Tilly. You should be happy about that.
You expect users to abide to developer's change, but you did not address as of why it make sense for developers to make such a change, besides the fact that they think Linux is so damn good that it will immediately make sense for them.
Actually, I did, but I didn't claim we won the war. I'm simply stating that Aunt Tilly is not a problem, and that these three groups are. I'm not saying that they will cause a revolution, simply that if there's a revolution, it's far more likely to be them than Aunt Tilly, and in fact, no matter how many Aunt Tillies switch to Linux on their own, it won't mean a thing till we get those groups I mentioned.
It is simply very difficult to port all of the specialized software packages to Linux because it doesn't make any sense for them spend extra development effort to convert it to Linux (yes it does cost company dollars to convert programs to Linux). Their user base are 99.9999% on Widnows platform.
Except that it does make business sense to develop your app initially and exclusively for Linux. If it's a killer app, people will use it. Trust me, when you're enough of a niche, your users are on whatever platform you say they are -- I know people who still run DOS programs because any replacement software would likely not be as slick, and would cost thousands of dollars.
On the other hand, it's far more likely for someone to start with a cross-platform app than a Linux-only app, unless they really have that kind of stranglehold on their user base.
Fine: Python. Ruby. Whatever. Not a single one of those will require "kernel hacking".
I'm looking forward to Perl6, but language wars aside, your main argument seems to be "allowing thousands of apps to run", which is what Wine does. No one's arguing against the obvious benefits for legacy software (of Wine or Mono), but if you're intentionally developing for Linux anyway, I don't see why this opens huge doors for you that weren't already there with QT or WxWindows or one of the other tens of toolkits that are already cross-platform. What is so magical about WinForms?
Oh, and I refuse to reply directly to abradsn, but for the record: There was a point besides spelling. The point is that claiming that Mono suddenly lets you code on Linux without kernel hacking is like saying AJAX finally lets you do rollovers without Flash. (Hint: We could do that before anyone called it AJAX.)
Notice how instead of trying to help me learn, you use personal attacks on me instead.
Notice how you didn't exactly give an opening for us to teach you anything, other than (for instance) Java 2.0 doesn't have the performance issues that Java 1.1 did. Or, if you try really hard, maybe you'll get that we're trying to teach you things like what to expect from any OS, and what kind of attitude you should come into forums and IRC with.
Hint: Actually ask a question if you want help. Call us hate-mongering flame-happy nerds, and we'll probably flame you.
If only the open source community had helped me in 1995 - 2000 I would have been coding in Java or Python by now.
Are you actually implying that Microsoft is helping you now? Or Sun?
I'd rather have source code be my "manual" than get the kind of "help" Microsoft tries to give me.
Aunt Tilly is an interesting statistic, nothing more. Look at what she does -- she browses the web, uses wireless. Apparently she needs to edit sudoers for some bullshit reason -- but I think it's bullshit for you to even bring it up; an ordinary Linux user does NOT have to do anything with sudoers, and in fact, I've touched the file maybe once, and I do far more with my box than Aunt Tilly ever will.
But regardless, look at what she doesn't do.
She doesn't spend between $50 and $500 a month on new games.
She doesn't make decisions about what new software a multi-million-dollar company is buying and deploying on hundreds of desktops.
She doesn't develop software... period, not to mention software that is so intricately bound to some quirk in the Windows API that she causes headaches for Microsoft itself when they try to fix their OS.
She, as so many people have made so perfectly clear, doesn't care what OS she runs, so long as it works. Thus, if Linux were taking over in a big way, she might buy an Ubuntu machine and not even know it. She certainly wouldn't be having these "Aunt Tilly" issues you so colourfully describe if Linux came preloaded on her computer and already set for her wireless card.
If "Earth from Space" doesn't work on her computer, and Linux has sufficient marketshare, she'll complain to the Smithsonian, not to her OS. The Smithsonian would be forced to use actual web standards, not made-up proprietary ones.
She doesn't impact, in any real way, the success or failure of Linux, other than perhaps word-of-mouth, and whether she tolerates websites going down or her credit card information being stolen.
The people who would need to use Linux are: gamers, business executives, IT people, and software developers, not necessarily in that order. These people are the only people who will actually make a conscious decision one way or the other, and they're certainly in a way to make other key people sweat.
For instance, let's say a large company suddenly decides to go pure-Linux, but they've been buying from Dell. They switch to someone else. As one company after another does this, Dell will either be forced to start selling computers without an OS (and at an actual, legitimate discount from the Windows ones), or even start preloading Linux, or they'll lose business and someone else will fill the gap. With enough companies doing this, it becomes viable for an OEM to decide it's cheaper to support their few home users by preloading Linux and supporting that than to deal with Microsoft. Home users will be faced with a choice -- actually spend $250+ on an OS, or switch. My feeling is, Aunt Tilly, given the choice, won't want to spend $250 on something she doesn't care about anyway. Many of them may even notice how nicely their work computers run, and will take Linux home with them.
Another scenario: Gamers, who have long built their own systems or ordered ludicrously expensive ones from the likes of Alienware, discover Linux -- cheaper for the custom-built, and available in a shiny case from a game-specific OEM, already pre-configured and tuned (so none of your "ndiswrapper" complaints). They start running so many games under Cedega that game developers decide it's cheaper to support Linux directly, with cross-platform games, than to keep dealing with the nightmare that is Cedega and actual Windows support. Eventually, games no longer run under Windows, and gamers either dual-boot or switch completely. Anyone who cares about that demographic starts developing Linux versions at least, if not exclusively, for all their major apps, so eventually, non-gamers start to switch, going to their gamer friends for technical help.
Finally: Software developers discover Linux. Be it some killer language or some killer tool, or simply the fact that Linux provides none of the hassle of Windows, and really isn't lacking anything -- even today -- that a software developer would want for his job, they start to switch. They start
People around here are acting like Mono supports WinForms for the first time.
Apparently, these people either never heard of Mono before, or assumed it was an STD. Really, nothing has changed -- it's just getting a little better and a little more complete. Basically, it's like Wine, only it might take on a life of its own outside of simply allowing Windows programs to work elsewhere.
I doubt it, though. Right now, my money's on Perl6.
You know, this has been my major concern with Mono -- moronic Visual Basic programmers migrating to Linux. And if spelling isn't enough:
Linux can really use more easy to use and easy to develop applications without having to learn kernel hacking and methods that exist only for Linux.
Most software I use can be compiled with very little modification between Linux or OS X (using X11). I'm a Linux developer and I rarely touch kernel code, and then, only for fun. We have a local radio station that's running entirely on Ubuntu, without touching the kernel.
Implying that Linux development requires kernel hacking is worse than moronic -- it's infectiously moronic. You're spreading FUD, intentionally or not.
And may I ask, what is it that's stopped you from doing exactly what you described, but with Java instead of Mono/.NET?
That may be good advice. I'm not going to comment on that.
You're flat-out wrong to say that you're giving anything away for free. It is entirely possible to sell open source software without making the sourcecode available for download to absolutely everyone. Now, the last time someone tried this, retards like the (anonymous) parent decided that they were breaking the GPL and cracked into their servers to get the source code, generally harassed the fuck out of them because people have this idea that GPL==free.
No, GPL == Libre != free. The fact that so much libre software is free certainly doesn't mean that freeware is necessarily libre -- if you think otherwise, consider that most spyware is "free". And once you get that, maybe you'll understand that libre software isn't necessarily free, any more than free software is necessarily libre.
Most of the people I know that are not in the computer biz have a hard time just wrapping their mind around the concept of a directory hierarchy and the difference between a file and a folder.
Not that people should have to be able to compile stuff to get Linux to work, but at least the concept of a directory hierarchy should be covered in school. Shit, they teach us algebra and chemistry, why not basic computer science?
That's actually the right approach. The fact that Windows doesn't work with hardware foo is likely the fault of its manufacturer, bar. What people don't get is that the same is true for Linux. Yet, when hardware doesn't work with Linux, they send angry letters to their geeks, or to the Ubuntu forums, or to Slashdot. When hardware doesn't work with Windows, they send angry letters to the hardware manufacturer, or accept that it's somehow their fault.
Although, the problem here is it really only helps with things like the nvidia drivers, where you're required to compile it on your own machine -- the vast majority of the stuff would be better precompiled.
That is why we remember the date. That and the fact that we refer to it as 9/11, whereas we refer to other incidents by names such as "Pearl Harbor".
It is also a big event because it's new. We already know tons of people die in car accidents, so we're cynical and jaded to that -- but 9/11 is a change, so we notice it, and thousands of people died, so it shocks us.
I would much rather have a decent FPS that gets most of the basics right (headshots should count, for instance -- Quake 3 fails it) than one with EVERYTHING.
You're talking about a game which implements every single thing you like about every single game that exists, and then saying "That's a good game, a great game is that and more."
Sorry, no. Spend five years implementing ridiculous customizable options, 20 DIFFERENT weapons (as a "bare minimum"), and all of your other demands? I'd rather have them spend five years giving me a decent plot (Halo 2), inventing new concepts (the Gravity Gun), polishing technical issues (loading times = no), and generally making a better, unique game.
Yes, there will be games like what you described -- the various Unreal Tournament games, mods, etc. Maybe the Battlefield games will be close to right. And then there will be games that say "You know what? No snipers. If a target is far enough away to snipe you, you get to take cover." Or maybe "No rocket launchers, no superweapons. Pistols all the way." And these will also be the games that say "Oh yeah, we're also an RTS, didn't we tell you? By the way, the Commander says to go here." Or "Hurt? Take some cover and wait for your shield to regenerate. No more sneaking around jumping at shadows because you're stuck at 10 health and a shot in your big toe will kill you."
Or take Portals -- you really don't need guns at all in that game.
In short, the games that appeal less to purists like you will be the truly great games that invent a feature which you'll be the first to complain when nobody else has it.
But really, think about it. You yourself admit a fixed gun emplacement adds spice to a multiplayer game. There are other ways to achieve the same effect, and you do not need a fixed gun emplacement to have a decent game.
Slashdot Mirror
So what's to stop them from having both?
Rumor has it that Perl6 will essentially allow you to "use" a dialect -- so, dialects of Perl6 are essentially libraries. There's probably going to be one to make Perl6 look like Perl5, allowing some of the cleaner pure-Perl stuff to compile directly as Perl6. And on top of all that, Perl6, like Java, will have a bytecode engine -- and that bytecode engine, Parrot, already runs some gimped versions of python, some toy languages, and the old classics like bf.
Is there something inherent to Java that prevents people from trying to do things like this?
I'm not saying you're wrong, of course. Whoever originally designed Java would probably froth at the mouth at the mere mention of multiple inheritance. I guess that's why I've always liked Perl -- nothing stops you from being formal, but at the same time, nothing gets in your way of quickly throwing together wonderfully sloppy hacks. You can "use strict", but no one forces you to. I suspect that having a strict Java file do "import sys.util.AnalRetentiveJava" would annoy the Sun folks.
Java was pretty pervasive in everything Sun did, and with good reason: If I developed a sexy new programming language, I'd use it for everything, too. So, most of Sun's contributions have felt half-assed without Java. OpenOffice... great, but you need Java to run it. Netbeans... great, runs on Java.
.NET (including ASP.NET), and Visual Studio .NET. Hell, it's roughly equivalent to Microsoft funding Wine development.
I bet people wouldn't be so forgiving if it was an "open source" toolkit for writing applications on top of Flash.
This move completes it. It's also roughly equivalent to Microsoft releasing the Windows source code, as well as C#,
Thanks, Sun!
It must be the all-nighter and the ridiculous amounts of caffeine in my system, but I'm glad someone else is genuinely happy and excited. I mean, c'mon, Slashdot, a tagging keyword of "finally"? As if Sun was somehow obligated to do this? (Do you see Microsoft doing the same with C#/.NET?) I was expecting some half-assed Shared-Source-like crap that hardly changes anything from the way it was before, and they're diving in headfirst with GPL.
Hell yes.
Thank you, Sun!
Let's go do some research, and find out every individual elected to office via insecure voting machines. Attempt to find individuals only where a voting machine screwup could've changed the outcome of the election -- that is, if a person got 80% of the votes, and only 20% of the votes came from voting machine, assuming my math is right, the voting machines are irrelevant. However, given the same scenario, but 50% voting machines, the outcome could easily be affected.
Then let's find out every action they took (including their own votes, if they're in congress) which they're allowed to take because of their office.
Now, declare that they have not been elected, and treat all of their actions as null and void. You can cherrypick to some extent, of course -- if they enacted some leash laws, you're not required to buy a dog just to disobey. But it would send a powerful message if, when doing your taxes, you refuse to accept any tax breaks they enacted, and attempt to send in more than they want.
In otherwords, civil disobedience. Starts with bullshit laws, but we're now moving onto bullshit lawmakers. I don't want to spend another second in this corporatocracy. Take it back!
Perhaps. But if "errors" result in 0 votes, even with that small a portion of the population, I suspect foul play. Foul play on any scale doesn't follow the rules of statistics -- except, of course, that far more people are impacted by the result.
Ah, but can they do this and actually get a discount?
It's pretty meaningless if they can't, because it basically means they're paying for a copy of Windows that they'll never get to see. And if Dell has signed a contract that prevents actually removing the Microsoft tax, then these people will go elsewhere.
It comes down to: If big corps force Dell to offer Linux, end-users will be able to buy Dell computers with Linux. If they go elsewhere to avoid the Microsoft tax, Dell will start running into trouble, and end-users may start jumping ship as well -- certainly, whoever Wall-Mart switches to would become big enough to make themselves a viable option for end-users (Aunt Tillies).
Linux-flavored Wine?... That fresh-kernel taste. Yum. If only it was kaffe.
I'll be happy to debate every one of your points with you, but not with Anonymous Coward. Someone want to take credit for this mess? (Dvorak, is that you?)
No, you didn't. Not here. Not a single of your comments in this thread has so much as a question mark. I just checked. Am I wrong?
I don't know if you asked legitimate questions of the community before, but if you had an attitude then at all similar to your attitude now, I'm not surprised people didn't want to help. This is not a personal attack, just an observation, take it however you like.
Forgive me for stooping to your level, but you started it.
Please, check your facts before you imply that Mono is necessary for writing portable Linux apps without touching kernel code. You are the only Linux developer I've ever talked to that made such a ludicrous claim.
Search for those phrases, I dare you. They weren't said until you just said them now.
I invite you to actually read what was said, and try to hear what we are really saying, and not what you expect us to say.
I'm going to ignore your second paragraph for now. Your use of uncyclopedia suggests that your whole post is, itself, a satire. If you really think I'm a troll and you're not, let's both agree to not act like trolls. I'll start with this post.
No need to get personal.
It's a lot easier to take a working box and update it than to take a brand-new box and make it work. It took me at least as long to make XP work with my nvidia raid as it took me to get Linux working with the same -- so again, the difference is buying a brand-new system and having it work.
Let's try to stay on topic.
ID (not EA) decided to experiment with Linux, even where it wasn't profitable. They may not keep this up forever, but it means they've experimented with it. It means they can do cross-platform games, even Linux games, if they really want to. It means that if they come up with a good reason for doing Linux, they won't back away because it's too hard, or because they think it somehow makes their game open source, or any of the thousands of FUD reasons people don't even give it a try. In fact, they have enough experience that it'll take them significantly fewer resources to try it.
So, someone running an experiment is a good thing for that individual or company.
And Aunt Tilly being moot was my main point. Look at how much we can debate about Linux and Gamers -- I think we can both agree that if, by some miracle, gamers all went to Linux, that would have a powerful impact. I'm not telling you it's going to happen, I'm saying: if you're a Linux developer, and you care about Linux on the desktop, gamers are one place to focus. Developers are another.
You're absolutely right, except you apparently didn't finish reading my sentence: and then, only for fun.
I don't need to touch kernel code at all. Sometimes I like to anyway.
As you are posting anonymously, I invite you to actually read the rest of my comment. If that doesn't help, read some of my other rebuttals.
I wholeheartedly agree, but this is not the place or the time for this discussion. Read the fucking subject line, at least!
First, it's not as hard as you say it is. Once you know your way around (and you obviously don't), upgrading is actually significantly easier than it is on Windows. For one thing, my nvidia driver upgraded automatically last week, and I hardly noticed -- nVidia does not provide any way, shape, or form of automatic updates on Windows, last I checked.
Second, you like to tweak your stuff -- why are you still on Windows? How much tweaking can you really do without custom kernel patches? Can you tune Windows' swappiness? How about selecting a better filesystem -- oh wait, your choices are NTFS, UDF, or FAT, and you probably didn't know about UDF. How about... Getting the picture yet?
Third, I realize we may not be there yet -- my Linux daemontools-like driver crashes on amd64, for instance. I'm simply stating that you are a far more relevant group than Aunt Tilly, and we should be working on making the process easier for you, rather than for Aunt Tilly. You should be happy about that.
Actually, I did, but I didn't claim we won the war. I'm simply stating that Aunt Tilly is not a problem, and that these three groups are. I'm not saying that they will cause a revolution, simply that if there's a revolution, it's far more likely to be them than Aunt Tilly, and in fact, no matter how many Aunt Tillies switch to Linux on their own, it won't mean a thing till we get those groups I mentioned.
Except that it does make business sense to develop your app initially and exclusively for Linux. If it's a killer app, people will use it. Trust me, when you're enough of a niche, your users are on whatever platform you say they are -- I know people who still run DOS programs because any replacement software would likely not be as slick, and would cost thousands of dollars.
On the other hand, it's far more likely for someone to start with a cross-platform app than a Linux-only app, unless they really have that kind of stranglehold on their user base.
Fine: Python. Ruby. Whatever. Not a single one of those will require "kernel hacking".
I'm looking forward to Perl6, but language wars aside, your main argument seems to be "allowing thousands of apps to run", which is what Wine does. No one's arguing against the obvious benefits for legacy software (of Wine or Mono), but if you're intentionally developing for Linux anyway, I don't see why this opens huge doors for you that weren't already there with QT or WxWindows or one of the other tens of toolkits that are already cross-platform. What is so magical about WinForms?
Oh, and I refuse to reply directly to abradsn, but for the record: There was a point besides spelling. The point is that claiming that Mono suddenly lets you code on Linux without kernel hacking is like saying AJAX finally lets you do rollovers without Flash. (Hint: We could do that before anyone called it AJAX.)
Notice how you didn't exactly give an opening for us to teach you anything, other than (for instance) Java 2.0 doesn't have the performance issues that Java 1.1 did. Or, if you try really hard, maybe you'll get that we're trying to teach you things like what to expect from any OS, and what kind of attitude you should come into forums and IRC with.
Hint: Actually ask a question if you want help. Call us hate-mongering flame-happy nerds, and we'll probably flame you.
Are you actually implying that Microsoft is helping you now? Or Sun?
I'd rather have source code be my "manual" than get the kind of "help" Microsoft tries to give me.
I really don't think so.
Aunt Tilly is an interesting statistic, nothing more. Look at what she does -- she browses the web, uses wireless. Apparently she needs to edit sudoers for some bullshit reason -- but I think it's bullshit for you to even bring it up; an ordinary Linux user does NOT have to do anything with sudoers, and in fact, I've touched the file maybe once, and I do far more with my box than Aunt Tilly ever will.
But regardless, look at what she doesn't do.
She doesn't spend between $50 and $500 a month on new games.
She doesn't make decisions about what new software a multi-million-dollar company is buying and deploying on hundreds of desktops.
She doesn't develop software... period, not to mention software that is so intricately bound to some quirk in the Windows API that she causes headaches for Microsoft itself when they try to fix their OS.
She, as so many people have made so perfectly clear, doesn't care what OS she runs, so long as it works. Thus, if Linux were taking over in a big way, she might buy an Ubuntu machine and not even know it. She certainly wouldn't be having these "Aunt Tilly" issues you so colourfully describe if Linux came preloaded on her computer and already set for her wireless card.
If "Earth from Space" doesn't work on her computer, and Linux has sufficient marketshare, she'll complain to the Smithsonian, not to her OS. The Smithsonian would be forced to use actual web standards, not made-up proprietary ones.
She doesn't impact, in any real way, the success or failure of Linux, other than perhaps word-of-mouth, and whether she tolerates websites going down or her credit card information being stolen.
The people who would need to use Linux are: gamers, business executives, IT people, and software developers, not necessarily in that order. These people are the only people who will actually make a conscious decision one way or the other, and they're certainly in a way to make other key people sweat.
For instance, let's say a large company suddenly decides to go pure-Linux, but they've been buying from Dell. They switch to someone else. As one company after another does this, Dell will either be forced to start selling computers without an OS (and at an actual, legitimate discount from the Windows ones), or even start preloading Linux, or they'll lose business and someone else will fill the gap. With enough companies doing this, it becomes viable for an OEM to decide it's cheaper to support their few home users by preloading Linux and supporting that than to deal with Microsoft. Home users will be faced with a choice -- actually spend $250+ on an OS, or switch. My feeling is, Aunt Tilly, given the choice, won't want to spend $250 on something she doesn't care about anyway. Many of them may even notice how nicely their work computers run, and will take Linux home with them.
Another scenario: Gamers, who have long built their own systems or ordered ludicrously expensive ones from the likes of Alienware, discover Linux -- cheaper for the custom-built, and available in a shiny case from a game-specific OEM, already pre-configured and tuned (so none of your "ndiswrapper" complaints). They start running so many games under Cedega that game developers decide it's cheaper to support Linux directly, with cross-platform games, than to keep dealing with the nightmare that is Cedega and actual Windows support. Eventually, games no longer run under Windows, and gamers either dual-boot or switch completely. Anyone who cares about that demographic starts developing Linux versions at least, if not exclusively, for all their major apps, so eventually, non-gamers start to switch, going to their gamer friends for technical help.
Finally: Software developers discover Linux. Be it some killer language or some killer tool, or simply the fact that Linux provides none of the hassle of Windows, and really isn't lacking anything -- even today -- that a software developer would want for his job, they start to switch. They start
People around here are acting like Mono supports WinForms for the first time.
Apparently, these people either never heard of Mono before, or assumed it was an STD. Really, nothing has changed -- it's just getting a little better and a little more complete. Basically, it's like Wine, only it might take on a life of its own outside of simply allowing Windows programs to work elsewhere.
I doubt it, though. Right now, my money's on Perl6.
"Windows Forums"?
You know, this has been my major concern with Mono -- moronic Visual Basic programmers migrating to Linux. And if spelling isn't enough:
Most software I use can be compiled with very little modification between Linux or OS X (using X11). I'm a Linux developer and I rarely touch kernel code, and then, only for fun. We have a local radio station that's running entirely on Ubuntu, without touching the kernel.
Implying that Linux development requires kernel hacking is worse than moronic -- it's infectiously moronic. You're spreading FUD, intentionally or not.
And may I ask, what is it that's stopped you from doing exactly what you described, but with Java instead of Mono/.NET?
Oh well, there's always the decent stuff: Beagle.
That may be good advice. I'm not going to comment on that.
You're flat-out wrong to say that you're giving anything away for free. It is entirely possible to sell open source software without making the sourcecode available for download to absolutely everyone. Now, the last time someone tried this, retards like the (anonymous) parent decided that they were breaking the GPL and cracked into their servers to get the source code, generally harassed the fuck out of them because people have this idea that GPL==free.
No, GPL == Libre != free. The fact that so much libre software is free certainly doesn't mean that freeware is necessarily libre -- if you think otherwise, consider that most spyware is "free". And once you get that, maybe you'll understand that libre software isn't necessarily free, any more than free software is necessarily libre.
Not that people should have to be able to compile stuff to get Linux to work, but at least the concept of a directory hierarchy should be covered in school. Shit, they teach us algebra and chemistry, why not basic computer science?
That's actually the right approach. The fact that Windows doesn't work with hardware foo is likely the fault of its manufacturer, bar. What people don't get is that the same is true for Linux. Yet, when hardware doesn't work with Linux, they send angry letters to their geeks, or to the Ubuntu forums, or to Slashdot. When hardware doesn't work with Windows, they send angry letters to the hardware manufacturer, or accept that it's somehow their fault.
Welcome to Gentoo Linux.
Although, the problem here is it really only helps with things like the nvidia drivers, where you're required to compile it on your own machine -- the vast majority of the stuff would be better precompiled.
Duh! It looks like an emergency number!
That is why we remember the date. That and the fact that we refer to it as 9/11, whereas we refer to other incidents by names such as "Pearl Harbor".
It is also a big event because it's new. We already know tons of people die in car accidents, so we're cynical and jaded to that -- but 9/11 is a change, so we notice it, and thousands of people died, so it shocks us.
I would much rather have a decent FPS that gets most of the basics right (headshots should count, for instance -- Quake 3 fails it) than one with EVERYTHING.
You're talking about a game which implements every single thing you like about every single game that exists, and then saying "That's a good game, a great game is that and more."
Sorry, no. Spend five years implementing ridiculous customizable options, 20 DIFFERENT weapons (as a "bare minimum"), and all of your other demands? I'd rather have them spend five years giving me a decent plot (Halo 2), inventing new concepts (the Gravity Gun), polishing technical issues (loading times = no), and generally making a better, unique game.
Yes, there will be games like what you described -- the various Unreal Tournament games, mods, etc. Maybe the Battlefield games will be close to right. And then there will be games that say "You know what? No snipers. If a target is far enough away to snipe you, you get to take cover." Or maybe "No rocket launchers, no superweapons. Pistols all the way." And these will also be the games that say "Oh yeah, we're also an RTS, didn't we tell you? By the way, the Commander says to go here." Or "Hurt? Take some cover and wait for your shield to regenerate. No more sneaking around jumping at shadows because you're stuck at 10 health and a shot in your big toe will kill you."
Or take Portals -- you really don't need guns at all in that game.
In short, the games that appeal less to purists like you will be the truly great games that invent a feature which you'll be the first to complain when nobody else has it.
But really, think about it. You yourself admit a fixed gun emplacement adds spice to a multiplayer game. There are other ways to achieve the same effect, and you do not need a fixed gun emplacement to have a decent game.