Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary
Steve Jobs (1955 - 2011)
R.I.P. Steve Jobs.
Two creations that have changed a lot of things.
Today when I opened Spring Framework web site I noticed a poll question shown in the image at left (results shown only), it intrigued me to know which web controller was most used. As I like Spring MVC I thought, umm, it is going to be last, but to my surprise it is second after Struts (well, here about Struts it must be fair to know if it is Struts 1 or Struts 2 or it is both). This tells me that I chose a solid technology and I will use it in my studies until my employer or a client likes to use it somehow. Another clue about the good and solid web framework Spring MVC is given in this blog entry entitled Today I'm attending a local ArcReady event in Indianapolis,
my home town (www.ArcReady.com). The topic of the day is Web 2.0.
As I've mentioned in the past, Web 2.0 is one of those nebulous
topics that if you ask ten people to define, you'll get eleven
answers. In fact, I'm working on a book to help define Web 2.0
and am finding that there are a variety of answers to the "what
is Web 2.0" question. There are also a large number of similarities
between people's definitions.
As points to ponder, consider the following statements. In your
opinion, Which of these are accurate?
- Web 2.0 is AJAX
- Web 2.0 is Software as a Service
- Web 2.0 is all about the Web as a platform.
- Web 2.0 is about empowering users
- In a Web 2.0 world, breadth of information is more important
than accuracy
- In a Web 2.0 world, the user should be viewed as a co-developer
- Flashing interfaces are a requirement of Web 2.0
If you thought that these were all true, then you and I disagree.
AJAX is a technology. Web 2.0 is built on technology; however, it is
not *the* technology.
Sofware as a Service generally falls into the Web 2.0 world. The Web
as a platform is also considered a part of Web 2.0; however, Web 2.0
is about more than just the Web as a platform.
Web 2.0 is absolutely about empowering users. This is one concept
where most industry leaders will agree.
Where you might find differing opinions is on whether breadth of
information is more important than accuracy. If, however, you look
at some of the leading Web 2.0 sites such as Wikipedia, Twitter, and
Facebook, you'll see that breadth does in fact seem to be a stronger
characteristic than accuracy.
The idea of the user as a co-developer should be scary to you as a
developer. In fact, this concept is becoming true. If you consider
your task as a developer to be the building Web applications, then you
begin to see that the users are getting more involved in this. This
can be at the level of adding content that changes the page. It can
also
be at the level of grabbing services and mashing them together with
other
services. The end-user is getting more involved. More importantly, the
tools are getting easier to use to build sites, so if you cut out the
users, you might end up having them cut you out.
Finally, the last bullet was about Web 2.0 equating to flashy
interfaces.
While most Web 2.0 sites have flashy interfaces, you will find that
most
industry leaders agree that it is the social interaction and aspects
that
are more indicative of a Web 2.0 application than the actual flashy
interfaces. Having said that, users are looking for "sizzle".
Do you disagree with my opinions? If so, swing by the feedback forum
and
let me know your thoughts.
Until next week!
Brad!
---------------------------
Bradley L. Jones
www.CodeGuru.com
webmaster@codeguru.com
---------------------------
GPL Java could not have come at a better time to make a run at the Linux desktop, thanks in part to Microsoft releasing Vista. Whatever one's feeling about Microsoft, they are often a trend setter. So far, when it comes to moving away from harder to work with, bug prone, and security hazardous languages like C and C++ for desktop application development, Microsoft has been ahead of the game. The shift away from C++ to Visual Basic was the start of the trend, but with Vista, and Microsoft's movement towards "All new desktop applications should be written as managed code in .NET", the ante is now significantly higher. Developers in the world of Windows desktop applications are now being encouraged to write their new applications in managed .NET code that makes their lives easier and less error prone, as well as avoids major causes of security holes like buffer overflows. Linux desktop programmers, however, are still doing most of their work in C or C++, where they are still managing memory by hand, still getting routine segmentation faults because of memory management problems, and still dealing with the security hassles of C and C++. The time is definitely ripe for a change in the way developers write desktop applications for the Linux platform. In fact, that change is long overdue.
If Linux desktop application developers are going to make the transition to more productive managed languages, like Windows developers are doing, there are only two real platform choices they have: The Novell sponsored Mono project, or Java.
To me, Java seems like a much more solid choice for several reasons. For one, it has a substantial head start on Mono, with over five more years of development behind it than Mono. Java is already a very stable and mature platform, where as Mono is still evolving quite rapidly. Also, Java has a vast collection of open source tools and libraries available to help with just about any type of development that one might want to do--something that Mono can't even begin to match yet. Furthermore, Java has a much larger development community in place already, and remains the most popular language for open source projects on SourceForge, as well as on FreshMeat.net, where Java has 5383 projects compared to only 284 for C#--making Java nearly 19 times more popular than C#. And finally, Mono is doomed to always lag behind the official .NET implementation due to the fact that Microsoft's actual implementation is completely closed source. Now that Java is open source under the GPL, the open source GPL version will always be up to date, since it will be the "official" implementation. Mono also has a hidden licensing trap that Java does not. Because the class libraries are licensed under the MIT license, which has virtually no restrictions on what can be done with the software, companies can conceivably patent their improvements or modifications on the libraries and then enforce those patents on anyone else making use of of the improvements or modifications. There is an interesting article on NewsForge about this problem. It's a little old, but still good reading.
(http://www.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=02/02/19/1651244)
OK, granted I may be a bit biased in favor of Java. But I think my above points were at least reasonably objective as to why Java makes the best choice for the future of the Linux desktop. With the open sourcing of Java under the GPL, Sun has removed that final barrier to entry, since all of the performance, or "it doesn't look native" arguments are no longer valid.
And finally, both Linux and Java benefit from using Java on the Linux desktop, since both of them want the same thing, and can mutually contribute towards the same goal. Both Linux and Java want greater desktop market share. Java can give this to Linux by providing a more productive, more secure, and easier to debug platform for writing applications, as well a platform so that applications written in it can also run on Windows. This helps protect the developer's investment in a minority platform when it comes to the desktop. And Linux has something to offer Java as well: a second chance at becoming a major player in the desktop application arena. Linux is slowly but surely gaining desktop market share. Java can help it grow, and also grow with it. It could be that desktop Java and desktop Linux are a match made in heaven.
I HEAR and I FORGET.
I SEE and I REMEMBER.
I DO and I UNDERSTAND.
"Your Intellectual Type is Precision Processor. This means you're exceptionally good at discovering quick solutions to problems, especially ones that involve math or logic. You're also resourceful and able to think on your feet. And that's just some of what we know about you from your test results."
- A robot may not harm a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
- A robot must obey the orders given to it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
- A robot must protect its own existence, as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.
The JDT compiler was originally written for VAME, and modified for Eclipse. It was built on what the developers call "The Three Rules of Compilation," patterned after Asimov's rules of robotics:
- Correctness: A compiler may not harm a source program.
- Efficiency: A compiler must be fast, except where speed would conflict with the first law.
- Friendliness: A compiler must assist the user to correct programming errors, as long as such assistance does not conflict with the first and second laws.
