I've seen stuff like this before. Poorly architected system gets rewritten in another programming language. This is a no-fault, blameless way of throwing out the old, useless system and replacing it with something that is, hopefully, better.
If you claim that the old system is too crufty for a reasonable maintenance cycle, then someone might get their feelings hurt and strive to defend the old code. A language change is more politically acceptible because C++ can't defend itself from being bashed.
The truth will set you free, however. If the old system is bad because you have a bad architect and that architect is setting the architecture for the new system, then after great expense, you will still have a loser.
If the old system is crufty because of six years of scope drift and the current architect is good, then figure out why the old system is crufty and incrementally refactor it until the maintenance cycles become reasonable again.
Good point. Multi-threaded development is more difficult and should be left to the smarter programmers. The alternatives given in that original kiro5han article are bogus with regards to solving the problems that multi-threaded development is intended to solve.
Also, there is the problem of choosing multi-threading inapropriately because of its coolness factor. I remember once this job interview where the interviewers were concerned about hiring developers who are multi-threading gurus. Their situation was a tool oriented MFC application with multiple GUI threads. I asked why you would ever want to do that.
I didn't get the job but I still wonder what possible reason could there be for multiple GUI threads outside of game programming. I can easily see the need for one GUI thread and muliple background threads but why multiple GUI threads that have synchronization needs?
The Blogosphere (a collective term encompassing all weblogs) isn't really addressable so how can it be measurable? It's not like there is a URL to "the blogosphere" and how would you know if you have successfully polled all blogs on the Internet? This appears to be a subtle commercial for LiveJournal.
IMHO, the most successful startup companies have CEO as the top sales position. For the CEO position, technical and business knowledge/expertise take a back seat to charisma and leadership skills.
There is a very good chance that neither of you will be CEO by the time the company goes public. The more VC funding you take, the more control you give up. Lose too many seats on the board and you will be removed.
Microsoft makes tools that can be used to drive the development of a variety of cool things, and enables MySpace indirectly with Internet Explorer.
A quick visit over to netcraft shows that they use Windows 2003 for their app servers. Although most of the site is built using Cold Fusion, I did find this link for their browse capability.
Re:One other thing to try... Glucosamine
on
Preventing RSI?
·
· Score: 1
In addition to some of these...
I switched from using the mouse with my right hand to using it with my left hand.
If there is a CLI and a GUI way to perform a task, then I always use the CLI way. I only use the GUI way if there is no easy CLI way to do it (e.g. drawing a diagram).
I, too, felt that the original author was saying that, for the purposes of web site design, ugliness = simplicity which I don't agree with. For me ugliness = busyness (i.e. excessive extraneous elements).
Only, with this article, it's yahoo and google that are being targeted and not Microsoft. From the article...
The preferred exit strategy has changed in Silicon Alley as well. The first time around, initial public offerings of stock were the holy grail of Internet executives, a mentality that resulted in countless paper millionaires who were never able to cash out their shares.
The more common exit these days is to follow in the footsteps of the photo-sharing service flickr or the social bookmarking company del.icio.us, both of which were bought by Yahoo for undisclosed sums.
This NY Times article speaks to that. For these under 30 somethings in NYC, success is not so much about doing something new as it is about doing something that another company, with deep pockets, wants. The exit strategy is being acquired.
I have been publishing my GPG key for over a year now and I have yet to have anyone send me an encrypted email.
The poster was being funny but he does have a serious point. Adoption of GPG is most probably not very high. My guess as to why is the high degree of knowledge required to use GPG. When creating a key, the user is asked a lot of questions the answer, to which, he or she most probably doesn't know without a fairly good understanding of asynchronous encryption technology and PKI. Key management is also a bear.
There is a very nicely written 41 page user document that comes with GPG. To use GPG without any prior knowledge of PKI, you pretty much have to read that document.
I don't have one but I am always on the lookout for stuff like this so I checked out the product literature when it first came out. I invite all Nokia 770 owners to correct any erroneous statements in this post.
The Nokia 770 seems to be an always online device. It doesn't seem to do a lot when there is no Internet connection available. That covers work, home, and local coffee shop but what about in transit or at the beach? Not a lot of public wifi there.
You can get an office productivity suite for the Origami device so there is something that you can do with it between access points.
I'll place my order for the Nokia 770 the day it comes with Open Office (and can still be purchased for $350).
If you are familiar with it, then you already know that option compare is not available for C#. C# string comparisons using the equals operator are always case sensitive.
Other posts have covered C#'s using block. Case sensitivity in string comparisons can be controled through a VB.NET language construct called option compare. When one of the first lines in a VB file is option compare binary, then string comparisons are case sensitive. When that line is option compare text, then string comparisons are case insensitive. It allows the developer to be able to postpone the decision of case sensitivity because you can always switch it by changing that one line of code.
Never, ever, ever, ever start a beginner programmer with Java.
I used to be on the adjunct faculty at the University of San Francisco. One of the classes that I would teach was a programming paradigms class to MIS students. I would introduce them to a simple command line balance check book program and go over it line by line. The first time that I taught it, I presented the example code in Java and got immediate push back from the students. It turns out that they didn't like or appreciate the curly braces.
I only wish we still had command line interpreters around. It was so nice when beginners could execute their instructions directly OR add them to a program. It made playing around and learning so much quicker.
Clicking on a wizard isn't the same thing as programming. To really understand what's going on and get used to writing programs, it's essential to type every letter of the code yourself.
Your argument is against the VS.NET IDE and not the VB.NET language. If you just use the always freely available SDK and avoid the VS.NET IDE, then you will have to code every letter and you will learn a lot more about.NET too.
There is a lot of devil in the details of that almost, however. C# has developer API comments yet VB.NET does not. VB.NET has more support for shadowing than C#. C# has useful convenience functions like using that VB.NET does not. VB.NET has convenience functions for late binding (considered harmful) and case-insensitive string comparisons that C# does not. C# has more object oriented features such as operator overloading that VB.NET does not. The list goes on and on.
...and mod the chicken little post down. Even with the near instantaneousness of the web, India is still 12.5 time zones away, both temporally and culturally. It is much better to send very detailed and non-ambiguous specifications off shore due to the long feedback loop. That delay has serious opportunity costs that offset any savings in wages.
That is why all of the Indian companies are CMM level 5 certified or better. They already understand their value proposition.
Okay, I think that I get where you are coming from. In the world of visual interface design, this is called external consistency. Sun makes the claim that the Swing look and feel is externally consistent with the Java platform which makes sense to multi-OS users because they want the application to look the same no matter what OS they are running it on. That claim makes no sense to single-OS users (e.g. your mother) because it means for them that they have to learn a new look and feel without a good reason.
Just out of curiosity, I would be interested to know if your mother had a computer running Windows 95/98/ME and had to upgrade to XP. If so, then what was her feelings regarding that change in look and feel?
If you are developing only for one platform, SWT has an advantage in host compatibility, including integration with host features, such as use of ActiveX controls under Windows.
I guess that I assumed you already recognized this. After all, why would you (from your original post) say...
If you remember that most of the applications don't have to be run on all platforms, but only on some specific ones.
...if true platform neutrality was a reality in your recommendation of SWT? If the issue truly is only one of...
most of the users are on Windows, and there is a standard look&feel Swing does not follow
...then all you have to do make your swing app have the windows look and feel is to use the com.sun.java.swing.plaf.windows.WindowsLookAndFeel pluggable LookAndFeel class.
Swing is ugly, period. Why? Because it does not follow user's preferences and standard look&feel.
The biggest preference that all users have is price. They want the software to be as affordable as possible. If it costs me $500K to develop a Windows application where I expect there to be 5K users and $100K profit, then I have to charge $120 per license. If I have to spend the same amount to develop the same app on Mac OS X and I expect there to be about 500 users, then I have to charge $1,200 per license. That's a lot of money and most users won't pay that much so guess what? I end up not developing the Mac OS X version.
With Swing, I have the same development costs but the potential to sell to a larger market. I still pay $500K and expect $100K profit. I now have a target that is 5.5K in size. Per license cost is now $109. That's a 13% savings for the Windows user and a 91% savings for the Mac user. As a user, I would gladly give up the ability to make my scrollbar red if I could save that much money.
About two years ago, my familly needed a simple budget aware checkbook application. Since it is such a simple application, I chose to make it a learning opportunity and so I wrote it twice; once in Swing and the other in SWT.
Both looked and acted great in Windows. The same was not true, however, when I tested under Knoppix. The swing app performed the same. The SWT app looked like sh*t and tended to freeze up for no reason that I could account for.
One of the big advantages of Java is the flexibility of the native platform neutrality. Because the SWT's app's stability and usability varied greatly depending on platform, I have to recommend against it.
What I got out of this Joel on Software - Why I Hate Frameworks discussion group is this. Trying to use a complex framework just to do something simple is wasteful. Who could disagree with that? If the original poster is trying to meet the needs of developers who need to build a tool that can be completely described in twenty five words or less, then that person is wasting his time with frameworks.
If, on the other hand, that poster is trying to come up with a framework to meet the needs of developers who are charged with building an application that is so complex that no single human being could ever completely understand it, then a complex framework just might be the only viable path to solution.
In that spirit, permit me to introduce to you my anti-Joel on Software discussion group topic...
Why I Like Frameworks. I needed to build a 33 story skyscraper so I went to my local construction company. I made an appointment with a representative where I showed him my plans. The first 3 floors would serve as an indoor mall. The next 7 floors would function as apartments. The upper 23 floors would be reserved for corporations. He took one look at the plans reached into his desk and handed me a hammer. What's this? I asked. You don't need no complicated frameworks, he said. They take too long to learn and your brain will start hurting. Aren't you feeling anxious because you can't see any tangible evidence of your progress yet? Here's a hammer. Get some boards and some nails and start building.
Slashdot Mirror
I've seen stuff like this before. Poorly architected system gets rewritten in another programming language. This is a no-fault, blameless way of throwing out the old, useless system and replacing it with something that is, hopefully, better.
If you claim that the old system is too crufty for a reasonable maintenance cycle, then someone might get their feelings hurt and strive to defend the old code. A language change is more politically acceptible because C++ can't defend itself from being bashed.
The truth will set you free, however. If the old system is bad because you have a bad architect and that architect is setting the architecture for the new system, then after great expense, you will still have a loser.
If the old system is crufty because of six years of scope drift and the current architect is good, then figure out why the old system is crufty and incrementally refactor it until the maintenance cycles become reasonable again.
Good point. Multi-threaded development is more difficult and should be left to the smarter programmers. The alternatives given in that original kiro5han article are bogus with regards to solving the problems that multi-threaded development is intended to solve.
Also, there is the problem of choosing multi-threading inapropriately because of its coolness factor. I remember once this job interview where the interviewers were concerned about hiring developers who are multi-threading gurus. Their situation was a tool oriented MFC application with multiple GUI threads. I asked why you would ever want to do that.
I didn't get the job but I still wonder what possible reason could there be for multiple GUI threads outside of game programming. I can easily see the need for one GUI thread and muliple background threads but why multiple GUI threads that have synchronization needs?
The Blogosphere (a collective term encompassing all weblogs) isn't really addressable so how can it be measurable? It's not like there is a URL to "the blogosphere" and how would you know if you have successfully polled all blogs on the Internet? This appears to be a subtle commercial for LiveJournal.
IMHO, the most successful startup companies have CEO as the top sales position. For the CEO position, technical and business knowledge/expertise take a back seat to charisma and leadership skills.
There is a very good chance that neither of you will be CEO by the time the company goes public. The more VC funding you take, the more control you give up. Lose too many seats on the board and you will be removed.
A quick visit over to netcraft shows that they use Windows 2003 for their app servers. Although most of the site is built using Cold Fusion, I did find this link for their browse capability.
http://browseusers.myspace.com/browse/browse.aspx? &MyToken=2d8ec518-6e53-4dc1-a3ff-9b0656788162
Thus, they are also using .NET
In addition to some of these...
I, too, felt that the original author was saying that, for the purposes of web site design, ugliness = simplicity which I don't agree with. For me ugliness = busyness (i.e. excessive extraneous elements).
Only, with this article, it's yahoo and google that are being targeted and not Microsoft. From the article...
The preferred exit strategy has changed in Silicon Alley as well. The first time around, initial public offerings of stock were the holy grail of Internet executives, a mentality that resulted in countless paper millionaires who were never able to cash out their shares.The more common exit these days is to follow in the footsteps of the photo-sharing service flickr or the social bookmarking company del.icio.us, both of which were bought by Yahoo for undisclosed sums.
This NY Times article speaks to that. For these under 30 somethings in NYC, success is not so much about doing something new as it is about doing something that another company, with deep pockets, wants. The exit strategy is being acquired.
I agree and have recently gone into more detail about this in a blog entry.
Where do I go to find this software?
The poster was being funny but he does have a serious point. Adoption of GPG is most probably not very high. My guess as to why is the high degree of knowledge required to use GPG. When creating a key, the user is asked a lot of questions the answer, to which, he or she most probably doesn't know without a fairly good understanding of asynchronous encryption technology and PKI. Key management is also a bear.
There is a very nicely written 41 page user document that comes with GPG. To use GPG without any prior knowledge of PKI, you pretty much have to read that document.
I don't have one but I am always on the lookout for stuff like this so I checked out the product literature when it first came out. I invite all Nokia 770 owners to correct any erroneous statements in this post.
The Nokia 770 seems to be an always online device. It doesn't seem to do a lot when there is no Internet connection available. That covers work, home, and local coffee shop but what about in transit or at the beach? Not a lot of public wifi there.
You can get an office productivity suite for the Origami device so there is something that you can do with it between access points.
I'll place my order for the Nokia 770 the day it comes with Open Office (and can still be purchased for $350).
If you are familiar with it, then you already know that option compare is not available for C#. C# string comparisons using the equals operator are always case sensitive.
Other posts have covered C#'s using block. Case sensitivity in string comparisons can be controled through a VB.NET language construct called option compare. When one of the first lines in a VB file is option compare binary, then string comparisons are case sensitive. When that line is option compare text, then string comparisons are case insensitive. It allows the developer to be able to postpone the decision of case sensitivity because you can always switch it by changing that one line of code.
I used to be on the adjunct faculty at the University of San Francisco. One of the classes that I would teach was a programming paradigms class to MIS students. I would introduce them to a simple command line balance check book program and go over it line by line. The first time that I taught it, I presented the example code in Java and got immediate push back from the students. It turns out that they didn't like or appreciate the curly braces.
I only wish we still had command line interpreters around. It was so nice when beginners could execute their instructions directly OR add them to a program. It made playing around and learning so much quicker.try python
Your argument is against the VS.NET IDE and not the VB.NET language. If you just use the always freely available SDK and avoid the VS.NET IDE, then you will have to code every letter and you will learn a lot more about .NET too.
There is a lot of devil in the details of that almost, however. C# has developer API comments yet VB.NET does not. VB.NET has more support for shadowing than C#. C# has useful convenience functions like using that VB.NET does not. VB.NET has convenience functions for late binding (considered harmful) and case-insensitive string comparisons that C# does not. C# has more object oriented features such as operator overloading that VB.NET does not. The list goes on and on.
That is why all of the Indian companies are CMM level 5 certified or better. They already understand their value proposition.
Yea. Me too.
Okay, I think that I get where you are coming from. In the world of visual interface design, this is called external consistency. Sun makes the claim that the Swing look and feel is externally consistent with the Java platform which makes sense to multi-OS users because they want the application to look the same no matter what OS they are running it on. That claim makes no sense to single-OS users (e.g. your mother) because it means for them that they have to learn a new look and feel without a good reason.
Just out of curiosity, I would be interested to know if your mother had a computer running Windows 95/98/ME and had to upgrade to XP. If so, then what was her feelings regarding that change in look and feel?
It has been my own experience that SWT doesn't play so well on non-windows platforms. Even the original article implies this...
If you are developing only for one platform, SWT has an advantage in host compatibility, including integration with host features, such as use of ActiveX controls under Windows.I guess that I assumed you already recognized this. After all, why would you (from your original post) say...
If you remember that most of the applications don't have to be run on all platforms, but only on some specific ones. ...if true platform neutrality was a reality in your recommendation of SWT? If the issue truly is only one of...
most of the users are on Windows, and there is a standard look&feel Swing does not followThe biggest preference that all users have is price. They want the software to be as affordable as possible. If it costs me $500K to develop a Windows application where I expect there to be 5K users and $100K profit, then I have to charge $120 per license. If I have to spend the same amount to develop the same app on Mac OS X and I expect there to be about 500 users, then I have to charge $1,200 per license. That's a lot of money and most users won't pay that much so guess what? I end up not developing the Mac OS X version.
With Swing, I have the same development costs but the potential to sell to a larger market. I still pay $500K and expect $100K profit. I now have a target that is 5.5K in size. Per license cost is now $109. That's a 13% savings for the Windows user and a 91% savings for the Mac user. As a user, I would gladly give up the ability to make my scrollbar red if I could save that much money.
About two years ago, my familly needed a simple budget aware checkbook application. Since it is such a simple application, I chose to make it a learning opportunity and so I wrote it twice; once in Swing and the other in SWT.
Both looked and acted great in Windows. The same was not true, however, when I tested under Knoppix. The swing app performed the same. The SWT app looked like sh*t and tended to freeze up for no reason that I could account for.
One of the big advantages of Java is the flexibility of the native platform neutrality. Because the SWT's app's stability and usability varied greatly depending on platform, I have to recommend against it.
What I got out of this Joel on Software - Why I Hate Frameworks discussion group is this. Trying to use a complex framework just to do something simple is wasteful. Who could disagree with that? If the original poster is trying to meet the needs of developers who need to build a tool that can be completely described in twenty five words or less, then that person is wasting his time with frameworks.
If, on the other hand, that poster is trying to come up with a framework to meet the needs of developers who are charged with building an application that is so complex that no single human being could ever completely understand it, then a complex framework just might be the only viable path to solution.
In that spirit, permit me to introduce to you my anti-Joel on Software discussion group topic...
Why I Like Frameworks. I needed to build a 33 story skyscraper so I went to my local construction company. I made an appointment with a representative where I showed him my plans. The first 3 floors would serve as an indoor mall. The next 7 floors would function as apartments. The upper 23 floors would be reserved for corporations. He took one look at the plans reached into his desk and handed me a hammer. What's this? I asked. You don't need no complicated frameworks, he said. They take too long to learn and your brain will start hurting. Aren't you feeling anxious because you can't see any tangible evidence of your progress yet? Here's a hammer. Get some boards and some nails and start building.