I don't think you are understanding the purpose of a standard.
Of course they can come up with something better by starting fresh, tailoring it for their environment, and taking advantage of the passage of time since the standard.
I could improve the whole language pretty easily too, but we need to agree on some standards for lots off reasons (I don't think I need to explain them on/.). You should have a very, very good reason before you start undermining standards.
The STL is now generally accepted (more so than std::string, and much more so than std::iostreams).
I am a C++ developer, and I recognize that KDE/Qt are better in most ways than Gnome/GTK+, but this release is not acceptable to me.
Unfortunately, when TrollTech tries to find the right balance between it's own interests and those of its community, I think it tries to error on its side, but ends up hurting both itself and the community.
Other frameworks are migrating towards the C++ standard, but Qt seems to be migrating away from it, ensuring a lack of interopability of code and skills.
Other technologies are trying to open up to more languages, but TrollTech has decided that C++ (their own version of C++) is all that anyone needs. Even as a C++ developer, I recognize that this is a bad strategy.
Other open-source projects are moving towards cross-platform (eg. AbiWord and Gnumeric will both be available for Windows soon), but TrollTech continues to keep 90+% of the market (ie. Windows) away from open-source Qt developers and their software.
I hate to tell you this, but they are doing the opposite of what you (and many other C++ developers) are hoping for.
Instead of slowly migrating towards standard C++, the way that other frameworks have, they are taking deliberate steps towards a more proprietary language.
For example, in QT4, they are moving to new template containers, but instead of using the STL (which even MFC developers tend to use) they having decided to develop their own container classes.
Yes, refactoring is sorely missing in Visual Studio and for C++ in general. I think I heard that Visual Slick Edit now supports some refactoring for C++ but it's kind of expensive, particularly if you want to use it on more than one platform.
Regarding your question, the answer for VC6/MFC6 would be definately no. The VC7.1 compiler is much better and is much more like the standard C++ that is supported in GCC 3.4. MFC71, unlike VC71, is backward compatible, but they must never-the-less have made some changes to it to make it work with the new compiler. I wonder if MFC71 is compatible with VC71's strict conformance mode?
I guess what I'm saying is that you might be able to refactor an MFC71 app with Eclipse, but probably not an MFC6 one.
Keep in mind that MFC is proprietary stuff. Even if you own a copy I'm not sure what the license says about modifying it (ie. to work with a different compiler).
I don't know about the others, but Red Hat never suggested that Fedora was meant for random users. It's for hackers and people experienced with Linux, isn't it? I've never heard them say otherwise. So why is it being reviewed in the Washington Post?
In this case I meant opening to the satisfaction of the Linux community, so they would be willing to include it in the main distributions and they would feel comfortable making it an important part of the GUI environments.
To take a technology that is controlled by Sun for the purposes of their bottom line and make it integral to Linux would be a mistake. If you think that Java is not controlled by Sun, well, who gets to make the decision about open sourcing it?
We have the same problem with TrollTech. They are continuing to develop their own custom language, divergent from standard C++.
I'm not blaming these companies for trying to make money. Rather I'm complimenting the companies and individuals who have remained true to the values of Linux, even when this meant not using some very attractive technologies. Don't get me wrong, I'm a pragmatist, but sometimes political values can end up being very practical.
Sure Java is used lots on Linux, but that's not the point.
The point is to imagine how much more Java would be used with Linux if Sun had opened it.
If Sun had opened Java at the beginning then it would have become very much part of Linux. Java would probably even be part of Gnome and maybe part of KDE. You could call this fragmentation because many of these programs would be written to Gnome/KDE API's, but these are programs that can't be portable anyway.
I believe that both Linux and Java would have benefitted hugely in this scenario, but not Solaris and maybe not Sun. And I guess that's the problem with technologies that aren't open: Java is managed for the benefit of Sun, not for the benefit of Java or Linux (if it were otherwise the shareholders would have a thing to say about it).
Change is very difficult - that's what lock-in is all about. Sit an intelligent Windows user or developer down on debian and they will be completely lost. Soon they'll be back on Windows.
So, since the vast majority of potential Linux users are only familiar with Windows, Linux must become more like Windows (at least in terms of interfaces) if it wants to grow.
It doesn't mean that the Windows' way was better - better has nothing to do with it. The Windows' way is simply more familiar, and that is very important.
Many a developer has chosen to use MFC/ATL for C++ development. It's kind'a like open source in that the source is available and it comes with the compiler.
But it isn't really open so you get burned in the end: MS can withold or charge extra for them at any time. So, now you have a framework that is bad by today's standards, but is no longer being improved, and you have to pay extra for it if you want to use it with the new version of visual studio.
Don't get me wrong - v7.1 of the VC++ compiler and STL quite good and conform quite well to the standard. But MFC/ATL and other proprietary libraries are not a good idea. Better to use wxWidgets or something with a really open license.
That is great - exactly what I've been looking for. Now I can get Real support on my Windows machines without the crap.
BUT, unfortunately, with this announcement today, I'm going to try to start being nice to Real. This might even mean joining their stupid club.
I rationalize it like this. Yes Real's software is extremely obnoxious, but they are in the unfortunate position of having to make money now from their product (as opposed to MS).
For most people Windows comes pre-installed on their computer, and Dell (or whoever) didn't pay too much to Windows for the license. And they probably need Windows anyway for some other applications.
But to get MS Office means sending a lot more of your money to MS, or pretending you're a teacher or something like that. And if you do buy MSOffice you're going to start spreading MSOffice documents. If you install some cross-platform MSOffice alternative you'll be one (giant) step closer to moving to a free OS.
AbiWord on Windows is quite good. I'm sorry that Gnumeric doesn't run on Windows.
It's great that this technology can now be incorporated directly into distributions, but I'm sorry that this couldn't be done with NoMachines rather than against them.
The vast majority of companies don't create Linux products, they create Windows products, so any company that creates new software for Linux should be appreciated, even if that software is closed source.
I'm definately not suggesting that any company involved in Linux should be given a free ride, I'm just saying that we shouldn't celebrate having outflanked a company that was contributing something to Linux.
BTW, I don't know anything about NoMachines in particular. Also, generally I think that the necessity of software being open source and free depends on where it fits into your system. Personally I don't mind close source applications, but I like to have my GUI toolkit open and free.
I'm sorry that Evolution isn't cross-platform. It's nice to have applications that can work on both Windows and Linux, both from a practical point of view (Windows client is unavoidable) and because it is useful for transitioning people to Linux.
I agree with Miguel's idea that the whole Gnome should become cross-platform and be partially integrated with Mozilla. I've seen many GTK+ apps that run really well and look quite good on Windows (eg. Gaim, AbiWord).
It's not as if SWT does the same thing as Swing and only exists because people/companies couldn't get along. It is fundamentally different than Swing so having a second primary GUI toolkit is justified.
In C++ there are tons of GUI toolkits/API's, and this is a bad situation, but I wouldn't want there to be only one. Ideally, C++ would have 2 or (at most) 3 primary toolkits, one for native widgets, one for cross-platform widgets, and maybe one that draws it's own widgets.
There is another possible role for SWT. There is no standard GUI for dotNet (Windows Forms is not cross-platform and is not part of the standard). Perhaps IBM could submit SWT to the EMCA as a toolkit for dotNet (there is a dotNet version of SWT)?
First off, thanks to all the people who contributed to GCC.
I think that version 3.4 for C++ was a very important release. It's great that there are now a series of compilers for Windows and Linux that are highly standards compliant and reasonably compatible with each other. I am referring to GCC and VC71 on Windows, and GCC and Intel on Linux.
The decision of the GCC people to focus on correctness and standards compliance before optimization was correct in my opinion.
On the other hand, I'm concerned that the most exciting ideas from last years GCC conference do not appear to be on the GCC roadmap, and are not mentioned in the proceedings of this years conference (pls correct me if I'm wrong). http://people.redhat.com/lockhart/.gcc04/ MasterGCC -2side.pdf
The ideas I'm referring to are LLVM and the compile server. I know that development on LLVM is progressing well, but I haven't heard anymore about it becoming part of GCC. The 'compile server' idea involved starting a single process that managed the compilation of all the translation units in a module, rather than running GCC once for each TU.
I realize these are big changes - are they on the horizon for 4.0?
I don't have time to respond to all that you've said, but I'll make a few quick comments:
I would take the info you are presenting more seriously if you weren't anonymous.
Regarding accountability, I agree that it is very important. If the teachers spent $900M on "living it up" then that is beyond outrageous, it is criminal, and they should never have been allowed to. But I think you should provide some evidence.
Something doesn't add up in your story. You say that all they were trying to do was increase accountability. But in this period tons of money dissapeared from the school system. Building stopped being repaired, teachers salaries got frozen, students starting having to pay for more things themselves, classes got bigger, auxilary staff (including pyshiatrists, etc) got axed.
Increasing accountability in the face of waste should have had the opposite effect.
The "rae days" were never meant to be sustainable. They were a short term measure during the recession.
As for going bankrupt, you've forgotten that Rae's time in power almost exactly coincided with the last bad recession we've had.
During a recession you are supposed to stimulate the economy and the only way to do that is to increase the debt by borrowing from 'elsewhere'. You can cut taxes or increase spending, it doesn't matter, as long as you are bringing money into the economy from elsewhere.
So it made sense for Rae to do that. You could argue that Rae did it far too much. Perhaps that is true - I don't know the right amount. But for the Tories to keep running a deficit and stimulating the economy during good times made no sense at all.
Same in the US. I forgive Bush Sr. for running a deficit because he governed during the same recession. But Reagen and Bush Jr. should not have been running huge deficits.
Some of what you said is true, some isn't, but here's something we can all probably agree on. Nobody has it better here in Ontario than the doctors (my wife is a GP).
Their union is much smaller than the teachers, but just as powerful. The last gov't to take on the OMA was the NDP and they got thrashed. The Tories just did everything the OMA wanted.
The organization most affected by the recent ruling against the National Citizens Coalition is not the NCC itself, it is the CMA which outspends everyone on advertising.
The doctors have guaranteed lifetime employment no matter how good or bad they are at their job. They can do outrageous things and still not lose their license (details of proceeding against doctors can be seen on the OMA website).
They can work as little or as much as they want, unless you work on salary for a hospital, and they get paid many multiples of what teachers get.
Recently my wife got an offer in the mail from the organization that arranges housecalls in Ontario. It was offering her as little/much work as she wanted. She would get a driver, and get paid $200/hour net. So, even the worst doctor in the province (no, I'm not referring to my wife) can make $200 an hour, right out of school, whenever and however much they feel like it.
I think I'll quit my job as a software developer and become her driver.
For anyone interested, here's (my interpretation of) the political and economic context in which this happened. This is a big win for OpenOffice, and I think this contextual information is relevant to the school boards decision to stop using MS Office.
Ontario, the most populous province in Canada, has had almost a decade of right- wing government: tax cuts and spending cuts. The economy has, on the whole, been pretty good but the debt and deficit have continued the rapid rise that began with the 89-93 recession.
Over this period the government has fought its main battles with the powerful teachers union to try and save money on their education budget.
In the recent election, both the incumbent right-wing party and the centrist party lied outrageouslly about what they could do in spite of the state of the budget. It seems that you have to do this to get elected these days. (The only party that told the truth about the budget got clobbered.)
The centrist party won the election and then had to come thru on its promises, which included a better relationship between gov't and teachers. This was clearly impossible, so they had to look at every conceivable way to save money without hurting teachers or letting any more schools fall apart. As usual, this exercise in cost cutting didn't yield even a fraction of what was promised, but it did get them to drop MS Office.
So, maybe debts, deficits, cuts, and politians aren't all bad.
But don't expect to see anything similar in big businesses. In my time doing systems consulting I found that, while government, small businesses, retail, and manufacturing were pretty strapped, most sectors of big business were wallowing in cash. The amount that these big companies are wasting on MS software is a tiny fraction of what they waste on all sorts of other things.
The issue isn't forking, the issue is how to generate revenue.
It's the usual balancing act: open sourcing software would have many benefits, but what effect will it have on revenue? For a company with revenue problems this is a legitimate concern.
Forking isn't a big deal that they are making it out to be. They are using it as an excuse. Yes, yes, I know what MS tried to do to Java - note that not open sourcing it didn't stop them.
Ah, I didn't know that. I see now that his comments are +1 for karma, and they have a starting score of 1. Why the starting score of 1, I thought that all comments started at 0?
Slashdot Mirror
I don't think you are understanding the purpose of a standard.
Of course they can come up with something better by starting fresh, tailoring it for their environment, and taking advantage of the passage of time since the standard.
I could improve the whole language pretty easily too, but we need to agree on some standards for lots off reasons (I don't think I need to explain them on
The STL is now generally accepted (more so than std::string, and much more so than std::iostreams).
On the one hand I agree that wxWidgets is very good.
On the other hand I think that GTK on Windows looks good and works well.
wxWidgets is particularly good if you are writing in C++ or Python. GTK is particularly good for C.
Both are good options.
Hey, I'm honored to be getting so much attention from the moderators.
Seems to be a battle between those who find it 'overrated' and those who find it 'interesting'.
But I didn't mean to troll. I probably should have chosen a different subject though.
I am a C++ developer, and I recognize that KDE/Qt are better in most ways than Gnome/GTK+, but this release is not acceptable to me.
Unfortunately, when TrollTech tries to find the right balance between it's own interests and those of its community, I think it tries to error on its side, but ends up hurting both itself and the community.
Other frameworks are migrating towards the C++ standard, but Qt seems to be migrating away from it, ensuring a lack of interopability of code and skills.
Other technologies are trying to open up to more languages, but TrollTech has decided that C++ (their own version of C++) is all that anyone needs. Even as a C++ developer, I recognize that this is a bad strategy.
Other open-source projects are moving towards cross-platform (eg. AbiWord and Gnumeric will both be available for Windows soon), but TrollTech continues to keep 90+% of the market (ie. Windows) away from open-source Qt developers and their software.
I hate to tell you this, but they are doing the opposite of what you (and many other C++ developers) are hoping for.
Instead of slowly migrating towards standard C++, the way that other frameworks have, they are taking deliberate steps towards a more proprietary language.
For example, in QT4, they are moving to new template containers, but instead of using the STL (which even MFC developers tend to use) they having decided to develop their own container classes.
Yes, refactoring is sorely missing in Visual Studio and for C++ in general. I think I heard that Visual Slick Edit now supports some refactoring for C++ but it's kind of expensive, particularly if you want to use it on more than one platform.
Regarding your question, the answer for VC6/MFC6 would be definately no. The VC7.1 compiler is much better and is much more like the standard C++ that is supported in GCC 3.4. MFC71, unlike VC71, is backward compatible, but they must never-the-less have made some changes to it to make it work with the new compiler. I wonder if MFC71 is compatible with VC71's strict conformance mode?
I guess what I'm saying is that you might be able to refactor an MFC71 app with Eclipse, but probably not an MFC6 one.
Keep in mind that MFC is proprietary stuff. Even if you own a copy I'm not sure what the license says about modifying it (ie. to work with a different compiler).
Too bad there is so much MFC code around.
I don't know about the others, but Red Hat never suggested that Fedora was meant for random users. It's for hackers and people experienced with Linux, isn't it? I've never heard them say otherwise. So why is it being reviewed in the Washington Post?
What about the other two distro's?
In this case I meant opening to the satisfaction of the Linux community, so they would be willing to include it in the main distributions and they would feel comfortable making it an important part of the GUI environments.
To take a technology that is controlled by Sun for the purposes of their bottom line and make it integral to Linux would be a mistake. If you think that Java is not controlled by Sun, well, who gets to make the decision about open sourcing it?
We have the same problem with TrollTech. They are continuing to develop their own custom language, divergent from standard C++.
I'm not blaming these companies for trying to make money. Rather I'm complimenting the companies and individuals who have remained true to the values of Linux, even when this meant not using some very attractive technologies. Don't get me wrong, I'm a pragmatist, but sometimes political values can end up being very practical.
Sure Java is used lots on Linux, but that's not the point.
The point is to imagine how much more Java would be used with Linux if Sun had opened it.
If Sun had opened Java at the beginning then it would have become very much part of Linux. Java would probably even be part of Gnome and maybe part of KDE. You could call this fragmentation because many of these programs would be written to Gnome/KDE API's, but these are programs that can't be portable anyway.
I believe that both Linux and Java would have benefitted hugely in this scenario, but not Solaris and maybe not Sun. And I guess that's the problem with technologies that aren't open: Java is managed for the benefit of Sun, not for the benefit of Java or Linux (if it were otherwise the shareholders would have a thing to say about it).
Change is very difficult - that's what lock-in is all about. Sit an intelligent Windows user or developer down on debian and they will be completely lost. Soon they'll be back on Windows.
So, since the vast majority of potential Linux users are only familiar with Windows, Linux must become more like Windows (at least in terms of interfaces) if it wants to grow.
It doesn't mean that the Windows' way was better - better has nothing to do with it. The Windows' way is simply more familiar, and that is very important.
The perils of proprietary lbraries.
Many a developer has chosen to use MFC/ATL for C++ development. It's kind'a like open source in that the source is available and it comes with the compiler.
But it isn't really open so you get burned in the end: MS can withold or charge extra for them at any time. So, now you have a framework that is bad by today's standards, but is no longer being improved, and you have to pay extra for it if you want to use it with the new version of visual studio.
Don't get me wrong - v7.1 of the VC++ compiler and STL quite good and conform quite well to the standard. But MFC/ATL and other proprietary libraries are not a good idea. Better to use wxWidgets or something with a really open license.
That is great - exactly what I've been looking for. Now I can get Real support on my Windows machines without the crap.
BUT, unfortunately, with this announcement today, I'm going to try to start being nice to Real. This might even mean joining their stupid club.
I rationalize it like this. Yes Real's software is extremely obnoxious, but they are in the unfortunate position of having to make money now from their product (as opposed to MS).
What are you talking about?
For most people Windows comes pre-installed on their computer, and Dell (or whoever) didn't pay too much to Windows for the license. And they probably need Windows anyway for some other applications.
But to get MS Office means sending a lot more of your money to MS, or pretending you're a teacher or something like that. And if you do buy MSOffice you're going to start spreading MSOffice documents. If you install some cross-platform MSOffice alternative you'll be one (giant) step closer to moving to a free OS.
AbiWord on Windows is quite good. I'm sorry that Gnumeric doesn't run on Windows.
It's great that this technology can now be incorporated directly into distributions, but I'm sorry that this couldn't be done with NoMachines rather than against them.
The vast majority of companies don't create Linux products, they create Windows products, so any company that creates new software for Linux should be appreciated, even if that software is closed source.
I'm definately not suggesting that any company involved in Linux should be given a free ride, I'm just saying that we shouldn't celebrate having outflanked a company that was contributing something to Linux.
BTW, I don't know anything about NoMachines in particular. Also, generally I think that the necessity of software being open source and free depends on where it fits into your system. Personally I don't mind close source applications, but I like to have my GUI toolkit open and free.
Abiword works on Windows. Actually, it works very well on Windows.
I am using TBird. It's quite good, but it doesn't have all the features that Evolution does.
I'm sorry that Evolution isn't cross-platform. It's nice to have applications that can work on both Windows and Linux, both from a practical point of view (Windows client is unavoidable) and because it is useful for transitioning people to Linux.
I agree with Miguel's idea that the whole Gnome should become cross-platform and be partially integrated with Mozilla. I've seen many GTK+ apps that run really well and look quite good on Windows (eg. Gaim, AbiWord).
It's not as if SWT does the same thing as Swing and only exists because people/companies couldn't get along. It is fundamentally different than Swing so having a second primary GUI toolkit is justified.
In C++ there are tons of GUI toolkits/API's, and this is a bad situation, but I wouldn't want there to be only one. Ideally, C++ would have 2 or (at most) 3 primary toolkits, one for native widgets, one for cross-platform widgets, and maybe one that draws it's own widgets.
There is another possible role for SWT. There is no standard GUI for dotNet (Windows Forms is not cross-platform and is not part of the standard). Perhaps IBM could submit SWT to the EMCA as a toolkit for dotNet (there is a dotNet version of SWT)?
First off, thanks to all the people who contributed to GCC.
/ MasterGCC -2side.pdf
I think that version 3.4 for C++ was a very important release. It's great that there are now a series of compilers for Windows and Linux that are highly standards compliant and reasonably compatible with each other. I am referring to GCC and VC71 on Windows, and GCC and Intel on Linux.
The decision of the GCC people to focus on correctness and standards compliance before optimization was correct in my opinion.
On the other hand, I'm concerned that the most exciting ideas from last years GCC conference do not appear to be on the GCC roadmap, and are not mentioned in the proceedings of this years conference (pls correct me if I'm wrong).
http://people.redhat.com/lockhart/.gcc04
The ideas I'm referring to are LLVM and the compile server. I know that development on LLVM is progressing well, but I haven't heard anymore about it becoming part of GCC. The 'compile server' idea involved starting a single process that managed the compilation of all the translation units in a module, rather than running GCC once for each TU.
I realize these are big changes - are they on the horizon for 4.0?
I don't have time to respond to all that you've said, but I'll make a few quick comments:
I would take the info you are presenting more seriously if you weren't anonymous.
Regarding accountability, I agree that it is very important. If the teachers spent $900M on "living it up" then that is beyond outrageous, it is criminal, and they should never have been allowed to. But I think you should provide some evidence.
Something doesn't add up in your story. You say that all they were trying to do was increase accountability. But in this period tons of money dissapeared from the school system. Building stopped being repaired, teachers salaries got frozen, students starting having to pay for more things themselves, classes got bigger, auxilary staff (including pyshiatrists, etc) got axed.
Increasing accountability in the face of waste should have had the opposite effect.
The "rae days" were never meant to be sustainable. They were a short term measure during the recession.
As for going bankrupt, you've forgotten that Rae's time in power almost exactly coincided with the last bad recession we've had.
During a recession you are supposed to stimulate the economy and the only way to do that is to increase the debt by borrowing from 'elsewhere'. You can cut taxes or increase spending, it doesn't matter, as long as you are bringing money into the economy from elsewhere.
So it made sense for Rae to do that. You could argue that Rae did it far too much. Perhaps that is true - I don't know the right amount. But for the Tories to keep running a deficit and stimulating the economy during good times made no sense at all.
Same in the US. I forgive Bush Sr. for running a deficit because he governed during the same recession. But Reagen and Bush Jr. should not have been running huge deficits.
Some of what you said is true, some isn't, but here's something we can all probably agree on. Nobody has it better here in Ontario than the doctors (my wife is a GP).
Their union is much smaller than the teachers, but just as powerful. The last gov't to take on the OMA was the NDP and they got thrashed. The Tories just did everything the OMA wanted.
The organization most affected by the recent ruling against the National Citizens Coalition is not the NCC itself, it is the CMA which outspends everyone on advertising.
The doctors have guaranteed lifetime employment no matter how good or bad they are at their job. They can do outrageous things and still not lose their license (details of proceeding against doctors can be seen on the OMA website).
They can work as little or as much as they want, unless you work on salary for a hospital, and they get paid many multiples of what teachers get.
Recently my wife got an offer in the mail from the organization that arranges housecalls in Ontario. It was offering her as little/much work as she wanted. She would get a driver, and get paid $200/hour net. So, even the worst doctor in the province (no, I'm not referring to my wife) can make $200 an hour, right out of school, whenever and however much they feel like it.
I think I'll quit my job as a software developer and become her driver.
And you want to rag on the teachers!
For anyone interested, here's (my interpretation of) the political and economic context in which this happened. This is a big win for OpenOffice, and I think this contextual information is relevant to the school boards decision to stop using MS Office.
Ontario, the most populous province in Canada, has had almost a decade of right- wing government: tax cuts and spending cuts. The economy has, on the whole, been pretty good but the debt and deficit have continued the rapid rise that began with the 89-93 recession.
Over this period the government has fought its main battles with the powerful teachers union to try and save money on their education budget.
In the recent election, both the incumbent right-wing party and the centrist party lied outrageouslly about what they could do in spite of the state of the budget. It seems that you have to do this to get elected these days. (The only party that told the truth about the budget got clobbered.)
The centrist party won the election and then had to come thru on its promises, which included a better relationship between gov't and teachers. This was clearly impossible, so they had to look at every conceivable way to save money without hurting teachers or letting any more schools fall apart. As usual, this exercise in cost cutting didn't yield even a fraction of what was promised, but it did get them to drop MS Office.
So, maybe debts, deficits, cuts, and politians aren't all bad.
But don't expect to see anything similar in big businesses. In my time doing systems consulting I found that, while government, small businesses, retail, and manufacturing were pretty strapped, most sectors of big business were wallowing in cash. The amount that these big companies are wasting on MS software is a tiny fraction of what they waste on all sorts of other things.
The issue isn't forking, the issue is how to generate revenue.
It's the usual balancing act: open sourcing software would have many benefits, but what effect will it have on revenue? For a company with revenue problems this is a legitimate concern.
Forking isn't a big deal that they are making it out to be. They are using it as an excuse. Yes, yes, I know what MS tried to do to Java - note that not open sourcing it didn't stop them.
Ah, I didn't know that.
I see now that his comments are +1 for karma, and they have a starting score of 1.
Why the starting score of 1, I thought that all comments started at 0?
Excellent response. And the fact that it got modded up (and after the item has already moved into the 'older stuff' section) speaks volumes.