And seriously, how is a GUI better? Take the MS Word preferences which I battled yesterday. A tiny window filled with twelve tabbed screens which jump around at random, each containing more than a dozen settings and frequently sub-dialogues. And no useful reference documentation which explains what these bloody settings actually do. A GUI is better because you can layout the interface intuitively so a program can be used without resorting to reading documentation - generally a sign of good and productive software. Great example, now please provide an example where a command line interface would be superior to manage the same number of preferences for a word processor?
I would also choose jquery over all of them and not just for Ajax. It basically provides the power of CSS for the DOM, which allows you to build stuff like an accordianin in only 10 lines of javascript!
Are you seriously comparing the speed and productivity of eclipse to VS.NET??
I didn't even think Java fanbois would believe that one.
EJB is the worst example of a complex, over architectured solution to a simple problem in existence! Its a totally unnecessary technology - notice how no one else has bothered wasting their time with anything remotely similar?
Have you looked at Mac prices since the Intel transition? All across the lines, the machines are extremely price-competitive. The iMac and Macbook are within 10% of a comparable PC, and the PowerMac severely undercuts a comparable PC (even if you build it yourself!). Just about the only machine that still carries a premium is the Macbook Pro. Not only that, you cannot get anything remotely close to the form factor and build quality of an iMac for any money. I would consider an iMac a bargain in comparison to an equivalently priced PC!
[quote] Aside from the usual Slashdot Microsoft Haters, if you ask your average user "What would you rather give up: Windows and Office or Google Search?" what do you think they would say? [/quote]
It may be a sarcastic question but you will be surprised at the answer. Google was the first search engine where it is sometimes quicker and required less effort to find an answer than it is to ask the person next to you.
As a developer 'Google Search' is invaluable. Not being a heavy user of Office, Google Docs & Spreadsheets actually suits me better than Office. It is quick to load, use, publish and you can even edit a document at the same time as someone else! The best thing about all Google's services is that I have access to my stuff wherever I go: home, work, internet cafe, friends house, etc.
Incidentally average users (aka noobs) will know how to surf the web better than office. My parents can send emails and surf the web without any problems, though they are not nearly as comfortable as using office.
I'm not ready to give up Windows yet but that is only because I have decided on.NET development. VS.NET 2005 and SQL Server are the only things keeping me on Windows!
I agree. MS VS.NET 2005 is the most productive platform to develop any db app with, be it a Windows App or an web one. VS.NET 2005 is simply amazing - I consider to be one of the best products MS has ever released!
Looking ahead to the next generation of developer technology of C# 3.0,LINQ,XAML/WPF/E and its quite clear that it will be the most productive platform for years to come. I just hope that Mono can keep up as it would be nice to be able to run my apps cross platform. Because although MS has said that WPF/E will be able to run on OSX, I would still sleep better at night if there existed an open source runtime.
Im also not a fan of windows (OSX boy) but we have a number of 2003 servers at work and they never need a reboot unless an update requires one, hardware is added or some system application software is installed. Reboots are so rare that MS even forces you to enter a comment everytime you want to manually reboot.
Likewise with my winxp desktop and laptop, I only ever have to reboot because of security updates (which granted are more frequently than any other OS's I own). I never shutdown my pc's (they go to sleep everynight), and I only have had a handful of BSOD's in over 5 years of use and a couple of them were the result of faulty hardware.
I also hate to defend MS but BS is BS no matter the subject!
Novell did not need a cash injection they need a sustainable business model. This is why they bought Suse, they are looking for a sustainable business model cause it seems that there is nothing they can do to bring back Netware. Why they haven't opensourced Netware I still don't understand.
Check out the link, for a company with a market cap of only 2.10B they have nearly 1.6B in current assets. This ration is almost unheard of in a technology company. The reason why they have such a small market cap is the lack of forseeable revenue.
Personally if I was them I would be stopping all non-profiting ventures and hire a ton of talenented programmers to cut code and outsource as consultants. That model appears to be working well for IBM.
I've seen so many opensource products become a victim of the original Mozilla philosophy by trying to do too much. If we have learned anything from the popularity of Firefox its that people want software that is easy to use and works well for its main purpose. Why can't we just focus on implementing the features that will satisfy most people i.e. a solid integrated mail and calendaring solution.
We'll anyway it hasn't been mentioned but I think Google is the only one that gets it these days, they make isolated products that work extremely well, then after they are solid products they work on integrating them. Gmail, Google Calendar and Google docs & spreadsheets is actually pretty well integrated and also work great as stand alone products. As an example if google sees a date in your email one of the functions available is to add this event to your calendar with one click. Likewise if someone sends you a word or excel document you have the option to view or edit it online. Apart from being convenient it is also the quickest way to view a word or excel document in an email and whats even better is that you can do all this without Word or Excel which is pretty much a first. It also has the benefit or being accessible anywhere and on any device that has a browser and an Internet connection. You also get built in IM with Gmail. I actually prefer it to Outlook/Exchange. There are still a few features that are missing for it to be an option in the enterprise but I believe that a lot of small businesses will see the value and eventually standardize on google products.
The main problem is that Google's products are not opensource so we are still at the mercy of a corporation. Though the Google way is a good example how to build a successfull competitive solution even up against the MS Network monopoly.
The issue is not what Novell intentions were or what they were thinking at the time when entering the deal, it's what the deal now allows MS to achieve. Novell just got pawned as they have now just strengthened MS ability to print FUD about Linux.
This deal was a trojan from the start. Before the ink was even dry Ballmer was screaming that they were finally getting economic return from the use of their IP in Linux and that anyone not using Suse will have an 'undisclosed balance sheet liability'. There was not a peep about how great this deal is that it now allows MS and Suse operating systems to work better, which was meant to be the *purpose* of the deal anyway.
This is not about interoperability this is about Novell paying MS a royalty (even though its only symbolic) for them to sell Suse/Mono which contains 'MS Patents'. This covenant only covers Suse customers and not the rest of the open source community.
If they believe that Suse/Mono does not contain patents then why are they paying MS a royalty?
This fiasco clearly shows the ideals of these two 'opensource' companies. Redhat is driven by both the idealism of open source and basis its revenue model on the value proposition and technical superiority of its products.
Novell on the other hand is a stagnated giant, it only turned to Linux in a bid to generate some revenue to comabat the decline in its directory sales. Novell is clearly driven by profit as is demonstrated by this deal with MS. With this deal Novell is no longer just competing on the strength and value proposition of its products, it has created an artificial barrier (FUD / illusion customer protection) where they are now hoping customers will consider their products of greater value as it has this 'added' protection. If Novell really believed in open source and not as just a way to make profit it would have open sourced NDS a long time ago simarily to what redhat had done with its acquisition and opensourcing of Netscape directory services.
Now I have to ask what is with the 3 year exclusive deal with MS? Surely this is not a restriction MS has imposed on itself? This must've been a directive from Novell, which makes me think that Novell is more than a puppet in this MS sponsored charade.
Sun is losing money and has been for quite some time now. This is the result of their customers switching over from their expensive proprietary Unix setup to commodity hardware and 'open source' Linux. Being the largest provider of open source software themselves it is not a good sign of profits derived from producing open source software.
Google benefits from open source software as a consumer as it lets them run their applications on royalty free software. Note that Google in turn doesn't release their applications as open source. They contribute back to the community but do not release their 'crown jewels' as open source.
IBM and HP has the best model to capitalize on open source software as they make money on consulting services and hardware sales.
Properties and indexes go a long way in creating nice intuitive DOM for your libraries, e.g:
document.elements[0].firstChild.attributes["foo"]. nodeValue = "Hello C#";
document.getElements().get(0).getFirstChild().getA ttributes().get("foo").setNodeValue("Hello Java!");
What is easier to read is left up as an exercise for the reader.
Steve Ballmer just a few days ago all but promised to sue people who use linux unless they are using SUSE.
Where do you come up with this shit? Nothing else has changed except that MS has provided a covenant not to sue Novell customers. That actually makes the potential number of people/companies MS can sue smaller.
And may I ask, what is it that's stopped you from doing exactly what you described, but with Java instead of Mono/.NET?
If people can't see the productivity differences between c# and java languages than they either don't know c# or they are too blinded by their anti-MS hatred that they are unable to acknowledge good technology, in the future the difference will only widen with C# 3.0/LINQ. A full implementation of ASP.NET/ADO.NET/Windows Forms (which is what Mono is setting out to achieve) will allow thousands of applications to run on other platforms (Linux,OSX,etc).
With all the 'death to Novell' posts here about this deal I have yet to read one informative comment on what the real motivations are for MS making this deal. On the outside of this deal it seems that MS is Santa Clause and is giving away 300+ million and a 'covenant not to sue' which would be worth less than the paper its printed on - which would only come in handy if you run out of toilet paper. I call this stupid money because I cant see how MS is going to get their ROI from this investment. If I was Novell I would also take this handout for the bad PR they get for making a deal with the devil, they also get a 300+M and endorsement/certification that this would be the best distro to work with MS products.
So what benefits *exactly* are MS getting from all this?
I for one thinks this has more to do with an endorsement of cross platform.NET (mono) than it does to do with virtualisation.
Steve Jobs could shit in a box, Jonathan Ives will shape it into a cube, they will sell several million units and get a ton of attention. Time would have the iShit on the cover and Walt Mossberg will say that it is the ultimate in human excrement.
Slashdot Mirror
Windows.Forms,WPF,WCF
Hilarious, thanks!
I would also choose jquery over all of them and not just for Ajax. It basically provides the power of CSS for the DOM, which allows you to build stuff like an accordianin in only 10 lines of javascript!
Are you seriously comparing the speed and productivity of eclipse to VS.NET??
I didn't even think Java fanbois would believe that one.
EJB is the worst example of a complex, over architectured solution to a simple problem in existence! Its a totally unnecessary technology - notice how no one else has bothered wasting their time with anything remotely similar?
[quote]
.NET development. VS.NET 2005 and SQL Server are the only things keeping me on Windows!
Aside from the usual Slashdot Microsoft Haters, if you ask your average user "What would you rather give up: Windows and Office or Google Search?" what do you think they would say?
[/quote]
It may be a sarcastic question but you will be surprised at the answer. Google was the first search engine where it is sometimes quicker and required less effort to find an answer than it is to ask the person next to you.
As a developer 'Google Search' is invaluable. Not being a heavy user of Office, Google Docs & Spreadsheets actually suits me better than Office. It is quick to load, use, publish and you can even edit a document at the same time as someone else! The best thing about all Google's services is that I have access to my stuff wherever I go: home, work, internet cafe, friends house, etc.
Incidentally average users (aka noobs) will know how to surf the web better than office. My parents can send emails and surf the web without any problems, though they are not nearly as comfortable as using office.
I'm not ready to give up Windows yet but that is only because I have decided on
Amen!
I agree. MS VS.NET 2005 is the most productive platform to develop any db app with, be it a Windows App or an web one. VS.NET 2005 is simply amazing - I consider to be one of the best products MS has ever released!
Looking ahead to the next generation of developer technology of C# 3.0,LINQ,XAML/WPF/E and its quite clear that it will be the most productive platform for years to come. I just hope that Mono can keep up as it would be nice to be able to run my apps cross platform. Because although MS has said that WPF/E will be able to run on OSX, I would still sleep better at night if there existed an open source runtime.
Amen dude!
Im also not a fan of windows (OSX boy) but we have a number of 2003 servers at work and they never need a reboot unless an update requires one, hardware is added or some system application software is installed. Reboots are so rare that MS even forces you to enter a comment everytime you want to manually reboot.
Likewise with my winxp desktop and laptop, I only ever have to reboot because of security updates (which granted are more frequently than any other OS's I own). I never shutdown my pc's (they go to sleep everynight), and I only have had a handful of BSOD's in over 5 years of use and a couple of them were the result of faulty hardware.
I also hate to defend MS but BS is BS no matter the subject!
Novell did not need a cash injection they need a sustainable business model. This is why they bought Suse, they are looking for a sustainable business model cause it seems that there is nothing they can do to bring back Netware. Why they haven't opensourced Netware I still don't understand.
Check out the link, for a company with a market cap of only 2.10B they have nearly 1.6B in current assets. This ration is almost unheard of in a technology company. The reason why they have such a small market cap is the lack of forseeable revenue.
Personally if I was them I would be stopping all non-profiting ventures and hire a ton of talenented programmers to cut code and outsource as consultants. That model appears to be working well for IBM.
I've seen so many opensource products become a victim of the original Mozilla philosophy by trying to do too much. If we have learned anything from the popularity of Firefox its that people want software that is easy to use and works well for its main purpose. Why can't we just focus on implementing the features that will satisfy most people i.e. a solid integrated mail and calendaring solution.
We'll anyway it hasn't been mentioned but I think Google is the only one that gets it these days, they make isolated products that work extremely well, then after they are solid products they work on integrating them. Gmail, Google Calendar and Google docs & spreadsheets is actually pretty well integrated and also work great as stand alone products. As an example if google sees a date in your email one of the functions available is to add this event to your calendar with one click. Likewise if someone sends you a word or excel document you have the option to view or edit it online. Apart from being convenient it is also the quickest way to view a word or excel document in an email and whats even better is that you can do all this without Word or Excel which is pretty much a first. It also has the benefit or being accessible anywhere and on any device that has a browser and an Internet connection. You also get built in IM with Gmail. I actually prefer it to Outlook/Exchange. There are still a few features that are missing for it to be an option in the enterprise but I believe that a lot of small businesses will see the value and eventually standardize on google products.
The main problem is that Google's products are not opensource so we are still at the mercy of a corporation. Though the Google way is a good example how to build a successfull competitive solution even up against the MS Network monopoly.
The issue is not what Novell intentions were or what they were thinking at the time when entering the deal, it's what the deal now allows MS to achieve. Novell just got pawned as they have now just strengthened MS ability to print FUD about Linux.
This deal was a trojan from the start. Before the ink was even dry Ballmer was screaming that they were finally getting economic return from the use of their IP in Linux and that anyone not using Suse will have an 'undisclosed balance sheet liability'. There was not a peep about how great this deal is that it now allows MS and Suse operating systems to work better, which was meant to be the *purpose* of the deal anyway.
No they are all RDBMS's. SQL Server is the marketing term MS used to call their RDBMS.
This is not about interoperability this is about Novell paying MS a royalty (even though its only symbolic) for them to sell Suse/Mono which contains 'MS Patents'. This covenant only covers Suse customers and not the rest of the open source community.
If they believe that Suse/Mono does not contain patents then why are they paying MS a royalty?
This fiasco clearly shows the ideals of these two 'opensource' companies. Redhat is driven by both the idealism of open source and basis its revenue model on the value proposition and technical superiority of its products.
Novell on the other hand is a stagnated giant, it only turned to Linux in a bid to generate some revenue to comabat the decline in its directory sales. Novell is clearly driven by profit as is demonstrated by this deal with MS. With this deal Novell is no longer just competing on the strength and value proposition of its products, it has created an artificial barrier (FUD / illusion customer protection) where they are now hoping customers will consider their products of greater value as it has this 'added' protection. If Novell really believed in open source and not as just a way to make profit it would have open sourced NDS a long time ago simarily to what redhat had done with its acquisition and opensourcing of Netscape directory services.
Now I have to ask what is with the 3 year exclusive deal with MS? Surely this is not a restriction MS has imposed on itself? This must've been a directive from Novell, which makes me think that Novell is more than a puppet in this MS sponsored charade.
Sun is losing money and has been for quite some time now. This is the result of their customers switching over from their expensive proprietary Unix setup to commodity hardware and 'open source' Linux. Being the largest provider of open source software themselves it is not a good sign of profits derived from producing open source software. Google benefits from open source software as a consumer as it lets them run their applications on royalty free software. Note that Google in turn doesn't release their applications as open source. They contribute back to the community but do not release their 'crown jewels' as open source. IBM and HP has the best model to capitalize on open source software as they make money on consulting services and hardware sales.
Properties and indexes go a long way in creating nice intuitive DOM for your libraries, e.g: document.elements[0].firstChild.attributes["foo"]. nodeValue = "Hello C#";
document.getElements().get(0).getFirstChild().getA ttributes().get("foo").setNodeValue("Hello Java!");
What is easier to read is left up as an exercise for the reader.
Where do you come up with this shit? Nothing else has changed except that MS has provided a covenant not to sue Novell customers. That actually makes the potential number of people/companies MS can sue smaller.
If people can't see the productivity differences between c# and java languages than they either don't know c# or they are too blinded by their anti-MS hatred that they are unable to acknowledge good technology, in the future the difference will only widen with C# 3.0/LINQ. A full implementation of ASP.NET/ADO.NET/Windows Forms (which is what Mono is setting out to achieve) will allow thousands of applications to run on other platforms (Linux,OSX,etc).
With all the 'death to Novell' posts here about this deal I have yet to read one informative comment on what the real motivations are for MS making this deal. On the outside of this deal it seems that MS is Santa Clause and is giving away 300+ million and a 'covenant not to sue' which would be worth less than the paper its printed on - which would only come in handy if you run out of toilet paper. I call this stupid money because I cant see how MS is going to get their ROI from this investment. If I was Novell I would also take this handout for the bad PR they get for making a deal with the devil, they also get a 300+M and endorsement/certification that this would be the best distro to work with MS products.
.NET (mono) than it does to do with virtualisation.
So what benefits *exactly* are MS getting from all this?
I for one thinks this has more to do with an endorsement of cross platform
Anyone have any plausible ideas?
Does anyone think that this is a 2 pronged attack of endorsing Mono under the cover of attacking Linux?
Because it is a story on Apple and /. is a closet Apple cult!
What REAL competitor? it is a rebadged gigabeat. The difference is that M$ can afford to lose money and spend millions on advertising.