With Microsoft, who gives a shit? Remember their "big security push"? Nothing came of it. Everyone who has a clue knows you can't just "bolt on" security in a couple of months. It was all about marketing, not product. Just like monkey-boy's "developers, developers, developers" - all hype, no content.
I beg to differ. Windows XP SP2 was released; have you noticed that quite a few recent vulnerabilities in Windows XP affect versions prior to SP2, but not SP2 itself? That sounds like progress to me. Furthermore, I worked there as an intern during the final days before SP2 was released. They're definitely considering security in new areas.
And regarding the "developers" line, compare Visual Studio 2002/2003 with 2005 (in beta; you can download the free express edition betas here). You probably aren't excited about it, but I am, and so are a lot of other developers. There's definite content for us.
My god all I've heard about that game makes it sound exactly like crack. And all my friends are telling me to get it too! I have so much homework and not enough time, but ohh the peer pressure...
Re:Lazy IE Only Scripted Webpages...
on
Firefox In Print
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· Score: 1
IE fudges sites and this hides errors, I want to see errors in pages I develop, then I can fix them.
All browsers fudge sites to some extent, otherwise only fully compliant pages would display (I'm assuming by fudging you mean 'fixing' the HTML so that it'll display). Just take a look at Slashdot's many unclosed P elements; if it weren't fudged you probably wouldn't see much. If you really want to see errors I recommend W3's Validator. And if you're writing a web page, please use it. Writing validating web pages to begin with isn't hard. It's a lot harder to fix existing non-validating pages.
Being a Windows user and being interested in Linux are not mutually exclusive things.
I first tried Linux back in high school after hearing about it from friends and even bought a copy of Red Hat Linux 6.2. I've installed Slackware after seeing it mentioned a lot on the Internet, and Gentoo I discovered one day probably through Slashdot, and after reading their installation guide I thought "cool, I'll give it a try." In fact, I'm downloading GoboLinux right now after being reminded of it through the last link in this story.
Exposure is a good thing. You can't gain supporters if you deny potential supporters the chance of learning about you. And yeah, I'm a Windows user.
And they're doing this by adding ANOTHER set of graphics APIs to Windows, to complement the ones we have now, and the ones we had five years ago, and the ones we had five years before that, and the ones we had five years before THAT?
That may be true in the high performance DirectX area (D3D and DDraw revisions frequently made large changes to the API), but in the normal application area we've been stuck with GDI since Windows was conceived. Only relatively recently has GDI+ come into play, although at a high level it's simply an OO wrapper around GDI, and likewise, MFC graphics classes are also GDI wrappers. At the core, Windows basically supports GDI for normal applications and DirectDraw/Direct3D for high performane graphics, and so the situation then isn't as complex as you make it to be. GDI itself currently is very underpowered when you compare it to things the Mac OS can do, so it makes sense to finally revise the API after 20 years of usage.
I can't possibly describe Avalon's capabilities here, but as a simple example, in GDI you draw rectangles, lines, etc., whereas in Avalon you define visual objects and Avalon automatically renders them as needed. In computer games and other applications that need a deeper level of control Avalon won't be that appropriate (although IIRC you can do simple 3D in Avalon), but for normal applications I think it'll be awesome. Death to GDI!
Of course after rereading my post it does seem like Windows has a bunch of graphics APIs. Just remember that all that application-side ones are reducible to the ancient and horribly underpowered GDI.
I think I'll be in the same boat as you. I switched from IE to Firefox back when it was at 0.8, but later switched back to IE after a variety of Firefox bugs made for an annoying browsing experience. One of those bugs was improper HTML editing, and I haven't switched back to 1.0 because it still exists. However, with a vulnerability like this in IE that lacks a patch, I think I'll have to switch back. It's simply too dangerous.
That's pretty amusing. A virus scanner that relies on a component that may be a vector for viruses and trojans, and a known vector for spyware.
Embedding IE is simple for the programmer, but the security settings are so confusing for the user that it's possible to inadvertantly tighten security too much for local applications, which causes the errors that you speak of. After the existence of security holes themselves, I think the next worst part about IE is its incredibly confusing set of security settings, especially on the Group Policy side. It's difficult to secure something when you don't understand how its security works.
Surprisingly enough, some of the earlier VB IDEs (and possibly up to whatever version that came prior to VB.NET) had this spread-out layout. It made usage incredibly annoying.
I know it's a joke, but when you need to do stuff like kernel debugging, testing stuff with GDI, yes, you need Admin privileges. It's unavoidable. However (I worked there as an intern this past summer), they do emphasize non-admin accounts when possible, and certainly for application-level work it's doable. I did it at work, and I do it at home.
A lot of people complain about Microsoft making Windows unusable with non-admin privileges, but I honestly am using it fine with such privileges. Sure, every once in a while I need to install an application, in which case I right-click the installer and select Run As (I think press Shift if you don't see that menuitem), and games are notoriously bad for requiring admin privileges to do CD checking, but stuff like running Word, coding in VS.NET, and surfing are entire doable without admin privileges.
As an aside, I've found that with games, cracking the game and making their entire directory world writable works almost all the time if you want to run as non-admin. Although it's even nicer when they don't require CD checking such as *ducks* Steam HL2 and UT2004.
Interestingly, the University of Washington, which is across the lake from Microsoft, has made Firefox the default on all CS computers, and possibly on all campus computers as well. IE is still available, but Firefox starts by default.
some people don't have to study to get good grades
At the same time I hope readers of this comment will also realize that some people do have to study and do homework for good grades and to learn. Sometimes people seem to observe others doing well academically without any apparent work and see that as an excuse for slacking off.
The parent poster can do well in school without homework. Cool! I can't, and I realize that. Don't make the mistake of believing otherwise if you're like me.
Heh I like that. There's discipline in your family, something that's all too lacking in my uncle's family. Here's what I observe:
TV content is restricted, but the hours are not. The kids have turned into walking cartoon TV guides. It's truly freaky when they know the times of every cartoon we ask them.
Irrational discouragement of outdoor/physical activities for fear of getting sick.
Encouragement of computer usage, but really with completely disregard of how it's used. One of my cousins plays Starcraft for hours on end, ALONE.
No social interaction. They don't hang out with friends, and there's no parental encouragement for such interaction. They're going to become social outcasts at this rate, incapable of dealing with other humans as already evidenced by one of them through unfamiliarity with something called 'friendly competition'. You simply don't cry when you lose against someone in a computer game.
Parental ignorance. They both go to a private school, and while some private schools may be decent, this one seems like crap to me. One of them is in 7th grade but is doing stuff that's just beyond addition and multiplication. The other is in 4th grade but can't add. The parents notice these problems (mainly because we tell them), but they don't notice just how big of a problem it is. The money wasted on tuition at this particular school already exceeds the money that will be needed for their college educations.
In general, they don't notice how close to being plants their kids are (and both seem to suffer from ADD). They do nothing about it, and this is the worst part of that household to me.
I'm not a parent yet, but a lot of these things seem like obvious no-no's. Without discipline and rules it seems like kids will degenerate into a low-energy oozing state without any capacity for activity. I've seen them watch TV before. They become like living room fixtures, unmoving, unblinking, and glued to a glowing screen.
I'm not sure if this is on topic anymore, but basically the problem with computer usage can be generalized to a problem of excess, in other words, a lack of constraints and restrictions. Enforce discipline and rules. Don't let them become zombies with computers, or any other activity or device for that matter. The same applies even to academics. Kids who study math 24/7 may become very knowledgeable in math, but they're usually crap as humans as a result.
What happened to the days when there was SOME barrier to entry, that at least made you put a LITTLE thought and energy into feeling important enough that people should read your every thought?
Check out Xanga sometime. There are some absolutely atrocious blogs, and some of the writing resembles that of middle schoolers. Yes, I was shocked to realize they go to the same university as I do. The barriers to setting up a blog are really low already, so although MS might make the situation worse, it can't get much worse. Or maybe I overestimate people...
I still can't fathom WHY Microsoft doesn't have something like this builtin to XP.
Really, this is an OS problem, and MS should provide a solution, you shouldn't have to reply on 3rd party providers to fix a shortcoming of the OS!
The ultimate solution would be to make Windows more secure by default. Yes, you can make it difficult for spyware to enter, but only if you make modifications (run as regular user, keep patched regularly, use Firefox, if using IE modify a crapload of settings to make it as secure as it can be, etc.). Regular users don't know how to do these things, and it'd be really nice if a couple of those things were done automatically. Actually, it'd be more than nice; it's imperative that they be done for the sake of security.
The solution isn't to bundle a spyware remover with Windows. The solution is to eliminate the security flaws that allow spyware to enter in the first place. And I'm not talking about buffer overflows and such, but fundamental security blunders such as the introduction of ActiveX. The former are a nuisance that are difficult to avoid (just look at all the flaws in IE, Firefox, etc.), but the latter is simply inexcusable since they're purposely designed. Microsoft didn't accidentally create ActiveX; they planned and implemented it without realizing the security implications.
If anyone's ever looked at IE's security model, even if it's theoretically safe it's confusing as hell for people even like me. The concepts of zones and many different unclear settings that affect security turns securing IE into a trial-and-error process. When people suggest rewriting IE there's usually an implication of rewriting stuff to fix buffer overflows and other annoying bugs. I suggest rewriting IE to eliminate the confusing security model and ActiveX, which in turn would likely eliminate many potential bugs that arise from confusion.
Does that mean I have to install XP, download SP2. Burn the SP2 archive onto a CDROM, reinstall XP with the network cable disconnected, and then patch? Geez that'll get old fast
You can slipstream the SP2 patch into SP1 or a plain Windows XP CD. This will allow straight installation of Windows XP + SP2 already integrated. This basically involves running the SP2 installer on a copy of CD files, and then burning the resulting files to another CD. This page has more information on slipstreaming SP2. This comment has reached its end.
Erm, if you look at the article summary and the article itself, it says that Attackers successfully compromised the Dell Windows XP computer using Service Pack 1 nine times, and the Dell Windows 2003 Small Business server once. Windows XP SP2 is what many would consider a collection of patches, so yes, it seems to have done something.
IM clients piss me off, always in your face. They have pop ups, blink in your tool bar, whatever to get your attention. Then to top it off there are 4 major IM's and the good multi-im clients tend to have bugs and not support all the features. There is a good console multi-IM client that works well under screen, but has proxy issues.
If you're an IRC user you can try Bitlbee, an IRC gateway to AIM, IRC, MSN, Yahoo, and ICQ. You can even try it right now by connecting to irc.bitlbee.org (I think port 6666 since they're possibly still having problems on 6667 for strange reasons), or testing.bitlbee.org:6667. Sure, you miss out on some features such as sending files and detailed AIM user information, but you get to use your favorite IRC client as well as do scripting.
The server is open-source so you can download and run it locally if you're paranoid; there's a Windows port but I don't know how well that works. There's even a Gentoo package.
How about combo boxes, that only show X number of items. and you have to scroll to see the last 3.
RealPlayer installation and I think configuration was notorious for this. All the visible items would be unchecked, but scrolling down would reveal a shitload of checked garbage. Deliberate misleading of users, and it annoyed me enough to cast RealPlayer into the pit with spyware.
Even if, technically, the 3d engine is less complex than Doom 3, it adds much more to the game than Doom 3 ever did.
That's the first thing I noticed playing the game the night it was released (ohhh school suffered greatly the day after). Doom 3 tried to generate atmosphere through the lack of light and the monster placement that was obviously designed to scare you. After a while it degenerated into one big black scare job to me, and wasn't very interesting as a result.
On the other hand, I felt that HL2 did an awesome job of generating atmosphere, without the darkness. That last part was especially interesting to notice. When was the last time you were scared in a computer game while in broad daylight? Or in a peaceful zone? And to continue onto gameplay, when was the last time you had an idea of killing an enemy in the middle of a firefight, and that creative idea that would've been impossible in older games simply worked? Yes, I'm talking about the physics engine, and I haven't seen gameplay this varied since wielding a cursed blanket in NetHack.
I'm willing to sacrifice bump mapping everywhere for the ability to throw bladed flying machines at enemies.
Good list. Refactoring and method references are in VS.NET 2005, so your complaint is valid there. However, I rarely experience crashes (maybe once every few months), including at home, school, at my internship, and even with the beta.
Regarding method search dropdown (which I'm interpreting as IntelliSense in VS.NET), are you trying to use it with C++? It's always been crappy with Visual C++, so Eclipse might be better in that regard, but it works wonderfully with C#, and comes up in even more situations with 2005.
As for navigation and the UI, you can customize menus, toolbars, and keyboard shortcuts. I customize the toolbars but the rest of the UI is fine with me, so it's likely a subjective thing.
One potential problem I'm seeing is when thousands of hardware manufacturers want and insist on proprietary drivers for Linux. What happens if the driver interface changes? Will they spend the time and energy to port their drivers to the new interface? I agree that fixed interfaces result in legacy code, but you really need some sort of stable platform if companies are to develop Linux drivers, and they refuse to submit them to the kernel tree.
The pointers showing instead of values in the variable watcher is a good example of what.Net offers that is useless.
If you can, try to get a hold of the VS.NET 2005 beta. I personally think 2003 is good, but I was completely blown away by what 2005 has to offer. Yes, other IDEs may have had it earlier (refactoring in Eclipse, for instance), but I happen to code in C# and do a lot of.NET stuff, so it does not matter that such features have existed elsewhere. The problem you mentioned is one of the things that are fixed; 2005 will also include things such as refactoring, revisions of the.NET languages, and absolutely insane IntelliSense.
To make this thread more productive, what exactly about VS.NET is it that you do not like? I haven't used Eclipse lately, though from what I remember it was great for Java development. What does Eclipse offer now that VS.NET doesn't?
6 more hours at work before I can get home. This is going to be the slowest day ever...
Dude, 6 hours is nothing. I accidentally marked the wrong date on my calendar for Half-Life release, and spent Sunday afternoon anticipating it. Midnight came and I was ready to burst, but then I was wondering why it wasn't activated. Then I noticed I was off by 24 hours;(
Slashdot Mirror
With Microsoft, who gives a shit? Remember their "big security push"? Nothing came of it. Everyone who has a clue knows you can't just "bolt on" security in a couple of months. It was all about marketing, not product. Just like monkey-boy's "developers, developers, developers" - all hype, no content.
I beg to differ. Windows XP SP2 was released; have you noticed that quite a few recent vulnerabilities in Windows XP affect versions prior to SP2, but not SP2 itself? That sounds like progress to me. Furthermore, I worked there as an intern during the final days before SP2 was released. They're definitely considering security in new areas.
And regarding the "developers" line, compare Visual Studio 2002/2003 with 2005 (in beta; you can download the free express edition betas here). You probably aren't excited about it, but I am, and so are a lot of other developers. There's definite content for us.
My god all I've heard about that game makes it sound exactly like crack. And all my friends are telling me to get it too! I have so much homework and not enough time, but ohh the peer pressure...
IE fudges sites and this hides errors, I want to see errors in pages I develop, then I can fix them.
All browsers fudge sites to some extent, otherwise only fully compliant pages would display (I'm assuming by fudging you mean 'fixing' the HTML so that it'll display). Just take a look at Slashdot's many unclosed P elements; if it weren't fudged you probably wouldn't see much. If you really want to see errors I recommend W3's Validator. And if you're writing a web page, please use it. Writing validating web pages to begin with isn't hard. It's a lot harder to fix existing non-validating pages.
Oh, no worries then :)
Being a Windows user and being interested in Linux are not mutually exclusive things.
I first tried Linux back in high school after hearing about it from friends and even bought a copy of Red Hat Linux 6.2. I've installed Slackware after seeing it mentioned a lot on the Internet, and Gentoo I discovered one day probably through Slashdot, and after reading their installation guide I thought "cool, I'll give it a try." In fact, I'm downloading GoboLinux right now after being reminded of it through the last link in this story.
Exposure is a good thing. You can't gain supporters if you deny potential supporters the chance of learning about you. And yeah, I'm a Windows user.
And they're doing this by adding ANOTHER set of graphics APIs to Windows, to complement the ones we have now, and the ones we had five years ago, and the ones we had five years before that, and the ones we had five years before THAT?
That may be true in the high performance DirectX area (D3D and DDraw revisions frequently made large changes to the API), but in the normal application area we've been stuck with GDI since Windows was conceived. Only relatively recently has GDI+ come into play, although at a high level it's simply an OO wrapper around GDI, and likewise, MFC graphics classes are also GDI wrappers. At the core, Windows basically supports GDI for normal applications and DirectDraw/Direct3D for high performane graphics, and so the situation then isn't as complex as you make it to be. GDI itself currently is very underpowered when you compare it to things the Mac OS can do, so it makes sense to finally revise the API after 20 years of usage.
I can't possibly describe Avalon's capabilities here, but as a simple example, in GDI you draw rectangles, lines, etc., whereas in Avalon you define visual objects and Avalon automatically renders them as needed. In computer games and other applications that need a deeper level of control Avalon won't be that appropriate (although IIRC you can do simple 3D in Avalon), but for normal applications I think it'll be awesome. Death to GDI!
Of course after rereading my post it does seem like Windows has a bunch of graphics APIs. Just remember that all that application-side ones are reducible to the ancient and horribly underpowered GDI.
I think I'll be in the same boat as you. I switched from IE to Firefox back when it was at 0.8, but later switched back to IE after a variety of Firefox bugs made for an annoying browsing experience. One of those bugs was improper HTML editing, and I haven't switched back to 1.0 because it still exists. However, with a vulnerability like this in IE that lacks a patch, I think I'll have to switch back. It's simply too dangerous.
That's pretty amusing. A virus scanner that relies on a component that may be a vector for viruses and trojans, and a known vector for spyware.
Embedding IE is simple for the programmer, but the security settings are so confusing for the user that it's possible to inadvertantly tighten security too much for local applications, which causes the errors that you speak of. After the existence of security holes themselves, I think the next worst part about IE is its incredibly confusing set of security settings, especially on the Group Policy side. It's difficult to secure something when you don't understand how its security works.
Surprisingly enough, some of the earlier VB IDEs (and possibly up to whatever version that came prior to VB.NET) had this spread-out layout. It made usage incredibly annoying.
Unix utilities. Very useful collection of Unix utilities for Windows. Includes stuff like tar, unzip, grep, and wget.
I know it's a joke, but when you need to do stuff like kernel debugging, testing stuff with GDI, yes, you need Admin privileges. It's unavoidable. However (I worked there as an intern this past summer), they do emphasize non-admin accounts when possible, and certainly for application-level work it's doable. I did it at work, and I do it at home.
A lot of people complain about Microsoft making Windows unusable with non-admin privileges, but I honestly am using it fine with such privileges. Sure, every once in a while I need to install an application, in which case I right-click the installer and select Run As (I think press Shift if you don't see that menuitem), and games are notoriously bad for requiring admin privileges to do CD checking, but stuff like running Word, coding in VS.NET, and surfing are entire doable without admin privileges.
As an aside, I've found that with games, cracking the game and making their entire directory world writable works almost all the time if you want to run as non-admin. Although it's even nicer when they don't require CD checking such as *ducks* Steam HL2 and UT2004.
Interestingly, the University of Washington, which is across the lake from Microsoft, has made Firefox the default on all CS computers, and possibly on all campus computers as well. IE is still available, but Firefox starts by default.
some people don't have to study to get good grades
At the same time I hope readers of this comment will also realize that some people do have to study and do homework for good grades and to learn. Sometimes people seem to observe others doing well academically without any apparent work and see that as an excuse for slacking off.
The parent poster can do well in school without homework. Cool! I can't, and I realize that. Don't make the mistake of believing otherwise if you're like me.
Heh I like that. There's discipline in your family, something that's all too lacking in my uncle's family. Here's what I observe:
I'm not a parent yet, but a lot of these things seem like obvious no-no's. Without discipline and rules it seems like kids will degenerate into a low-energy oozing state without any capacity for activity. I've seen them watch TV before. They become like living room fixtures, unmoving, unblinking, and glued to a glowing screen.
I'm not sure if this is on topic anymore, but basically the problem with computer usage can be generalized to a problem of excess, in other words, a lack of constraints and restrictions. Enforce discipline and rules. Don't let them become zombies with computers, or any other activity or device for that matter. The same applies even to academics. Kids who study math 24/7 may become very knowledgeable in math, but they're usually crap as humans as a result.
What happened to the days when there was SOME barrier to entry, that at least made you put a LITTLE thought and energy into feeling important enough that people should read your every thought?
Check out Xanga sometime. There are some absolutely atrocious blogs, and some of the writing resembles that of middle schoolers. Yes, I was shocked to realize they go to the same university as I do. The barriers to setting up a blog are really low already, so although MS might make the situation worse, it can't get much worse. Or maybe I overestimate people...
I still can't fathom WHY Microsoft doesn't have something like this builtin to XP.
Really, this is an OS problem, and MS should provide a solution, you shouldn't have to reply on 3rd party providers to fix a shortcoming of the OS!
The ultimate solution would be to make Windows more secure by default. Yes, you can make it difficult for spyware to enter, but only if you make modifications (run as regular user, keep patched regularly, use Firefox, if using IE modify a crapload of settings to make it as secure as it can be, etc.). Regular users don't know how to do these things, and it'd be really nice if a couple of those things were done automatically. Actually, it'd be more than nice; it's imperative that they be done for the sake of security.
The solution isn't to bundle a spyware remover with Windows. The solution is to eliminate the security flaws that allow spyware to enter in the first place. And I'm not talking about buffer overflows and such, but fundamental security blunders such as the introduction of ActiveX. The former are a nuisance that are difficult to avoid (just look at all the flaws in IE, Firefox, etc.), but the latter is simply inexcusable since they're purposely designed. Microsoft didn't accidentally create ActiveX; they planned and implemented it without realizing the security implications.
If anyone's ever looked at IE's security model, even if it's theoretically safe it's confusing as hell for people even like me. The concepts of zones and many different unclear settings that affect security turns securing IE into a trial-and-error process. When people suggest rewriting IE there's usually an implication of rewriting stuff to fix buffer overflows and other annoying bugs. I suggest rewriting IE to eliminate the confusing security model and ActiveX, which in turn would likely eliminate many potential bugs that arise from confusion.
Does that mean I have to install XP, download SP2. Burn the SP2 archive onto a CDROM, reinstall XP with the network cable disconnected, and then patch? Geez that'll get old fast
You can slipstream the SP2 patch into SP1 or a plain Windows XP CD. This will allow straight installation of Windows XP + SP2 already integrated. This basically involves running the SP2 installer on a copy of CD files, and then burning the resulting files to another CD. This page has more information on slipstreaming SP2. This comment has reached its end.
ARG! The patches! They do nothing!
Erm, if you look at the article summary and the article itself, it says that Attackers successfully compromised the Dell Windows XP computer using Service Pack 1 nine times, and the Dell Windows 2003 Small Business server once. Windows XP SP2 is what many would consider a collection of patches, so yes, it seems to have done something.
IM clients piss me off, always in your face. They have pop ups, blink in your tool bar, whatever to get your attention. Then to top it off there are 4 major IM's and the good multi-im clients tend to have bugs and not support all the features. There is a good console multi-IM client that works well under screen, but has proxy issues.
If you're an IRC user you can try Bitlbee, an IRC gateway to AIM, IRC, MSN, Yahoo, and ICQ. You can even try it right now by connecting to irc.bitlbee.org (I think port 6666 since they're possibly still having problems on 6667 for strange reasons), or testing.bitlbee.org:6667. Sure, you miss out on some features such as sending files and detailed AIM user information, but you get to use your favorite IRC client as well as do scripting.
The server is open-source so you can download and run it locally if you're paranoid; there's a Windows port but I don't know how well that works. There's even a Gentoo package.
How about combo boxes, that only show X number of items. and you have to scroll to see the last 3.
RealPlayer installation and I think configuration was notorious for this. All the visible items would be unchecked, but scrolling down would reveal a shitload of checked garbage. Deliberate misleading of users, and it annoyed me enough to cast RealPlayer into the pit with spyware.
Great response.
Even if, technically, the 3d engine is less complex than Doom 3, it adds much more to the game than Doom 3 ever did.
That's the first thing I noticed playing the game the night it was released (ohhh school suffered greatly the day after). Doom 3 tried to generate atmosphere through the lack of light and the monster placement that was obviously designed to scare you. After a while it degenerated into one big black scare job to me, and wasn't very interesting as a result.
On the other hand, I felt that HL2 did an awesome job of generating atmosphere, without the darkness. That last part was especially interesting to notice. When was the last time you were scared in a computer game while in broad daylight? Or in a peaceful zone? And to continue onto gameplay, when was the last time you had an idea of killing an enemy in the middle of a firefight, and that creative idea that would've been impossible in older games simply worked? Yes, I'm talking about the physics engine, and I haven't seen gameplay this varied since wielding a cursed blanket in NetHack.
I'm willing to sacrifice bump mapping everywhere for the ability to throw bladed flying machines at enemies.
Good list. Refactoring and method references are in VS.NET 2005, so your complaint is valid there. However, I rarely experience crashes (maybe once every few months), including at home, school, at my internship, and even with the beta.
Regarding method search dropdown (which I'm interpreting as IntelliSense in VS.NET), are you trying to use it with C++? It's always been crappy with Visual C++, so Eclipse might be better in that regard, but it works wonderfully with C#, and comes up in even more situations with 2005.
As for navigation and the UI, you can customize menus, toolbars, and keyboard shortcuts. I customize the toolbars but the rest of the UI is fine with me, so it's likely a subjective thing.
One potential problem I'm seeing is when thousands of hardware manufacturers want and insist on proprietary drivers for Linux. What happens if the driver interface changes? Will they spend the time and energy to port their drivers to the new interface? I agree that fixed interfaces result in legacy code, but you really need some sort of stable platform if companies are to develop Linux drivers, and they refuse to submit them to the kernel tree.
The pointers showing instead of values in the variable watcher is a good example of what .Net offers that is useless.
If you can, try to get a hold of the VS.NET 2005 beta. I personally think 2003 is good, but I was completely blown away by what 2005 has to offer. Yes, other IDEs may have had it earlier (refactoring in Eclipse, for instance), but I happen to code in C# and do a lot of .NET stuff, so it does not matter that such features have existed elsewhere. The problem you mentioned is one of the things that are fixed; 2005 will also include things such as refactoring, revisions of the .NET languages, and absolutely insane IntelliSense.
To make this thread more productive, what exactly about VS.NET is it that you do not like? I haven't used Eclipse lately, though from what I remember it was great for Java development. What does Eclipse offer now that VS.NET doesn't?
6 more hours at work before I can get home. This is going to be the slowest day ever...
Dude, 6 hours is nothing. I accidentally marked the wrong date on my calendar for Half-Life release, and spent Sunday afternoon anticipating it. Midnight came and I was ready to burst, but then I was wondering why it wasn't activated. Then I noticed I was off by 24 hours ;(