Microsoft's goals for 2006

[Frank ess]

After takin' a swig o' grog, Leonardo da Jinn belched out this bit
o'
wisdom:


Who cares? VB is a corporate lock-in language.

shhhh

 

[Leonardo da Jinn]

After takin' a swig o' grog, Leonardo da Jinn belched out this bit o' wisdom:


Who cares? VB is a corporate lock-in language.

If you say so. I've programmed in many /current/ languages
(and OS's) and consciously decided on VB6 for my
personal diddling. It is simply more productive (for me)
and I don't regret the decision at all. Slight regret I didn't
go with .NET, but oh well.

For client-GUI programming: "what is better"

Is there a free package that does Voice Recognition?
Is it blazing fast with graphics?
Can the grid fields handle 30,000 plus entries?

My assumption is that Linux has no Dev. Env.
that comes close to Visual studio / VB6, or
even C++ for that matter.

If so, I'd check out links.

 

[Paul Hovnanian P.E.]

Paul Allen wrote:
Leonardo da Jinn wrote:
Noodles Jefferson wrote:

Monaghan took the hamburger, threw it on the grill, and I said "Oh
wow"...

Top Ten Goals For Microsoft in 2006

[...]
2. ****ing kill Java.

They tried that. Sun sued the crap out of them and won.


For how much? A $100 million, right?

Chump change... The http://GatesFoundation.org
(if I remember this right) gave $100 million to the cure
of Elephantiasis in the same timeframe.

It wasn't about money, but rather about preventing Microsoft from
flooding the market with their proprietary version of Java. Sun
won, big time, although it's not clear what that win means for
their long-term survival. Java's on what, it's third GUI toolkit?
I was just thinking about learning Swing, and now it's out and
something else is in. That's a platform without a long-term
strategy. :-(

Except that Java Server Pages are hotter than tamales.

ASP.NET will let you program in numerous languages.

Why is that a good thing?

Because it allows people/companies to use what
they know best.

Companies that make the correct choice will be rewarded. Those that make
the wrong one will go out of business. That's how free enterprise works.

In the final analysis, languages don't make much difference to
experienced developers. Its the functionality of the underlying APIs
that make the difference.

..NET has shortcomings on two levels: It allows people that can't advance
beyond stuff like VB to stay in business, and the runtime and libraries
suffer from the shortcomings of the target OS.
Mono may fix the latter, but it won't put the VB shops out of business.

Nothing says some company or project can't
choose to use /one/ language. Impose whatever
standards they wish. Some other company choses
a different language. Works for both companies.

In JSP they have no choice.


Ummm... the idea of multiple languages working together
is an old one.

So, what do we need .NET for?

VB.NET is quite an equal citizen. I would trust VB code
over the pitfalls newbie programmers can get into with C++.

Don't get people's issue with VB. It is based on very
old information. VB6 was/is productive as hell. Compiled
fast, robust. VB.NET is undoubtedly more so or MS
will fix it.

Fast != Correct

The productivity attribute has its down side as well. Cute 'point and
click' development environments encouraged a lot of people to get into
the coding business who would have been better off selling hamburgers.

 

[Leonardo da Jinn]

:

Paul Allen wrote:
Leonardo da Jinn wrote:
Noodles Jefferson wrote:

Monaghan took the hamburger, threw it on the grill, and I said "Oh
wow"...

Top Ten Goals For Microsoft in 2006

[...]
2. ****ing kill Java.

They tried that. Sun sued the crap out of them and won.


For how much? A $100 million, right?

Chump change... The http://GatesFoundation.org
(if I remember this right) gave $100 million to the cure
of Elephantiasis in the same timeframe.

It wasn't about money, but rather about preventing Microsoft from
flooding the market with their proprietary version of Java. Sun
won, big time, although it's not clear what that win means for
their long-term survival. Java's on what, it's third GUI toolkit?
I was just thinking about learning Swing, and now it's out and
something else is in. That's a platform without a long-term
strategy. :-(

Except that Java Server Pages are hotter than tamales.

ASP.NET will let you program in numerous languages.

Why is that a good thing?

Because it allows people/companies to use what
they know best.

Companies that make the correct choice will be rewarded. Those that make
the wrong one will go out of business. That's how free enterprise works.

Depending on the task at hand, VB isn't /incorrect/.

In the final analysis, languages don't make much difference to
experienced developers. Its the functionality of the underlying APIs
that make the difference.

In general yes.That is /THE/ main argument *FOR* VB.

But VB is more terse than C++ for instance,
which requires header files to maintain sync with code, etc.

VB's "Free code and controls, and 3rd party products"
is a huge market.

.NET has shortcomings on two levels: It allows people that can't advance
beyond stuff like VB to stay in business,

You think that is a real shortcoming?
But you just said that VB was just another language.

and the runtime and libraries
suffer from the shortcomings of the target OS.
Mono may fix the latter, but it won't put the VB shops out of business.

If you have something better you are always free
to compete.

So, what do we need .NET for?

It is an old idea that was forgotten.

Fast != Correct

I didn't /only/ say fast. I said much more.
Fact is, really disiplined SE would indicate use
of CASE modeling tools, etc.. goes on and on.

Many times SQL is the language that causes
more trouble than C++, Java, or VB, and for DB
access it is pretty much SQL.

If your application is VERY DB intensive it makes
sense to use DB modeling tools and form systems.

If you are programming embedded controllers you
probably want to use C++ or macro assembler.

Web work requires knowledge of HTML, CSS, JS
and the rolling thunder of variant functionality
in different browsers.

Ugly world...

To me, VB isn't part of the ugliness.
I need to shoot a movie of my program in operation.

The productivity attribute has its down side as well.

Perhaps, in macro, but not for me personally.

Cute 'point and
click' development environments encouraged a lot of people to get into
the coding business who would have been better off selling hamburgers.

Large programming projects are more of a managment issue
than a technical issue and require people of varying aptitudes
and intelligence.

Too many really /smart/ programmers on a project
can easily fail. Seen it numerous times.
At Oracle, one such project tanked to the tune
of 50 million. Takes wise management.

For me, personally, I needed/need a robust
dev. env., debugger, and controls to give me
all the normal effects. (splitter windows, task tray
icons, multi-tasking, IPC, form controls, etc..)
Plus voice recognition.

 

[=?iso-8859-1?Q?Lin=F8nut?=]

After takin' a swig o' grog, Leonardo da Jinn belched out this bit o' wisdom:

For client-GUI programming: "what is better"

Is there a free package that does Voice Recognition?
Is it blazing fast with graphics?
Can the grid fields handle 30,000 plus entries?

My assumption is that Linux has no Dev. Env.
that comes close to Visual studio / VB6, or
even C++ for that matter.

Linux fits retty much all of the above. (Not sure about grid controls,
as that is a thing I never need.)

But you and I are in completely different programming areas, and are
probably locked into each our own little worlds of coding.

For what it's worth, I use Visual Studio quite heavily (C/C++). I like
it for debugging, but for everything else I prefer a good text editor, a
good layout editor (e.g. Glade), and good old C/C++.

I would much rather trust STL objects than objects djinned up by
Microsoft. I like standards. Go figure.

 

[Jinn Wins]

After takin' a swig o' grog, Leonardo da Jinn belched out this bit o' wisdom:


Linux fits retty much all of the above.

I highly doubt that.
Any movies of the environment in action?

(Not sure about grid controls,
as that is a thing I never need.)

But you and I are in completely different programming areas, and are
probably locked into each our own little worlds of coding.

In general.

For what it's worth, I use Visual Studio quite heavily (C/C++). I like
it for debugging, but for everything else I prefer a good text editor, a
good layout editor (e.g. Glade), and good old C/C++.

I used it for years. MFC, all that.
Biggest project was a 100+ frame app to manage Oracle Replication.

I would much rather trust STL objects than objects djinned up by
Microsoft. I like standards. Go figure.

I like functionality. Standards lead to committees and committees
lead to ulcers.

 

[Robert]

are to continue selling poor quality, overpriced software, continue stealing
technology from other companies, figuring out how to smash Google, and
stealing the gaming market by selling the Xbox 360 at a loss.

This is no joke.

Robert

 

[Jinn Wins]

are to continue selling poor quality, overpriced software,

No, they are the low price leader in most categories.

continue stealing
technology from other companies,

Doubtful they get away with much.
Linux on the other hand is mostly stolen.

figuring out how to smash Google, and

Hope they do. Google is one ****ed outfit from
most that I see.

stealing the gaming market by selling the Xbox 360 at a loss.

So? They are allowed. They also have the hottest game products
and I assume they figure on making money on them too, eh?

This is no joke.

The level of your misinformation?

No, it isn't.

 

[Charlie Tame]

You don't "Have" to buy Microsoft's products if you don't want to, by
contrast your money is being GIVEN to Halliburton in overpriced and
unfulfilled no-bid contracts without you having any control over the
situation. A matter of priorities perhaps?

Charlie

 

[Dennis M. Hammes]

Linux on the other hand is mostly stolen.

Wrote that in "Microsoft" BASIC, did you.

--
-------(m+
~/)_|
If a pome falls in the middle of a library and
the Bishop can't read it, does it still say, "Iamb"?
http://scrawlmark.org

 

[Jinn Wins]

You don't "Have" to buy Microsoft's products if you don't want to, by contrast your money is being GIVEN to Halliburton in
overpriced and unfulfilled no-bid contracts without you having any control over the situation. A matter of priorities perhaps?

Charlie

No shit.
Plus I think it is worth noting that the Gates Foundation
is seemingly one of the top philanthropic foundations in
the world. http://GatesFoundation.com

 

[Paul Hovnanian P.E.]

Paul Hovnanian P.E. wrote:
[snip]

In the final analysis, languages don't make much difference to
experienced developers. Its the functionality of the underlying APIs
that make the difference.

In general yes.That is /THE/ main argument *FOR* VB.

But VB is notorious for its inconsistent object architecture and screwey
side effects. Millions (billions?) of lines of code have been written
that depends on these bugs. So, when VB goes to .NET there ar two
possibilities:

The .NET classes will incorporate these bugs so that existing VB code
will continue to run as originally designed., or

The .NET classes will be written in a clean, logical manner. This will
break many existing VB apps, requiring vendors to either rewrite their
products or just port them as is and wait for the sh*t to hit the fan.

[snip]

You think that is a real shortcoming?
But you just said that VB was just another language.

That depends on what Microsoft does with all he VB inconsistencies when
it gets ported to .NET. If they save the syntax but clean up the class
libraries, they are going to put thousands of spaghetti coders out of
business.

 

[Jinn Wins]

Paul Hovnanian P.E. wrote:
[snip]

In the final analysis, languages don't make much difference to
experienced developers. Its the functionality of the underlying APIs
that make the difference.

In general yes.That is /THE/ main argument *FOR* VB.

But VB is notorious for its inconsistent object architecture and screwey
side effects.

If you say so.

Millions (billions?) of lines of code have been written
that depends on these bugs. So, when VB goes to .NET there ar two
possibilities:

The .NET classes will incorporate these bugs so that existing VB code
will continue to run as originally designed., or

The .NET classes will be written in a clean, logical manner. This will
break many existing VB apps, requiring vendors to either rewrite their
products or just port them as is and wait for the sh*t to hit the fan.

I've looked at .NET a bit. What they did with VB, point by point,
I agree with, but decided to not bother porting since there are too many
differences.

They invented VB quite early, and it was bad for a long time.

[snip]

You think that is a real shortcoming?
But you just said that VB was just another language.

That depends on what Microsoft does with all he VB inconsistencies when
it gets ported to .NET. If they save the syntax but clean up the class
libraries, they are going to put thousands of spaghetti coders out of
business.

This is all old news... .NET is what? 5 years old.

IMO, MS made the right decisions with VB.NET, but
it really is a big change to merge all the languages
under a single runtime.

 

[Paul Hovnanian P.E.]

[snip]

I've looked at .NET a bit. What they did with VB, point by point,
I agree with, but decided to not bother porting since there are too many
differences.

The problem is that VB.NET doesn't appear to 'break' old, bad VB code.

I used to work with a group of people who supported an old, crusty VB
app. It had been 'rescued' from one of the old MS Basic systems that
supported GOTOs, global variables and spaghetti code. The app had grown
and grown over the years and nobody could figure out how the damned
thing worked. Nobody dared touch it anymore.

About a year or so ago, they moved the source into VB.NET. Guess what?
It still works.

They invented VB quite early, and it was bad for a long time.

What do you mean 'was'? It still supports spaghetti code.

 

[Jinn Wins]

[snip]

I've looked at .NET a bit. What they did with VB, point by point,
I agree with, but decided to not bother porting since there are too many
differences.

The problem is that VB.NET doesn't appear to 'break' old, bad VB code.

I confess that I have run their conversion wizard only a few times.
It seems to mark most of the constructs that need marking.

I used to work with a group of people who supported an old, crusty VB
app. It had been 'rescued' from one of the old MS Basic systems that
supported GOTOs, global variables and spaghetti code. The app had grown
and grown over the years and nobody could figure out how the damned
thing worked. Nobody dared touch it anymore.

People say that by default. People are whiners.
In numerous cases, a well placed and commented GOTO
is clearer than the alternatives.
There is no code that a bright programmer can't
figure out. People are lazy.

About a year or so ago, they moved the source into VB.NET. Guess what?
It still works.


What do you mean 'was'?

I mean that at this point it is completely compiled, very fast,
very bug-free, a full ActiveX source and sink, plenty of
everything necessary to create fully articulated Windows programs.
Plenty of third party products, free code, examples, tutorials, etc.

It still supports spaghetti code.

So does C++, so does Java.
Poorly formed code assemblies can be created in any language.

Most programmers will scream spaghetti the minute
they have to look at another programmer's code.
So what? Comb out the spaghetti. People are lazy whiners.

In .NET, VB is fairly equal with C#, seems,
and they've taken the hard path of actually fixing things.

I really think MS deserves some credit for that.
They could have been less bold, but I feel they took
the high road on most of those decisions.

The thing I don't get about .NET is:
"Why doesn't MS port it to other pizza boxes"

Clearly it could be ported to any processor
and hardware configuration.

The whole architecture would support transparently
running /your-app/ on any toaster it was ported to.
With optimized JIT compiled machine code on
every platform.

Architecturally, quite elegant.
I suggest reading some of the white papers if you haven't.

 

[Dennis M. Hammes]

Jinn Wins wrote:

[snip]

I've looked at .NET a bit. What they did with VB, point by point,
I agree with, but decided to not bother porting since there are too many
differences.

The problem is that VB.NET doesn't appear to 'break' old, bad VB code.

I used to work with a group of people who supported an old, crusty VB
app. It had been 'rescued' from one of the old MS Basic systems that
supported GOTOs, global variables and spaghetti code. The app had grown
and grown over the years and nobody could figure out how the damned
thing worked. Nobody dared touch it anymore.

About a year or so ago, they moved the source into VB.NET. Guess what?
It still works.

They invented VB quite early, and it was bad for a long time.

What do you mean 'was'? It still supports spaghetti code.

Thass okay. So does Tommy.

http://scrawlmark.org/g/arrlines.jpg

--
-------(m+
~/)_|
If a pome falls in the middle of a library and
the Bishop can't read it, does it still say, "Iamb"?
http://scrawlmark.org