Monday, January 27, 2003

XML: Just Add Water. Clear methods steaming toward easy-to-use Web services language. [Technology News from eWEEK and Ziff Davis] Hard work of programming web services leaving you thirsty?  Water is a new language designed to quench your thirst.  I wish I had time to go to the well... 11:24:27 PM    comment []

Unblocking Object Use. Third-party developers are forced to modify or rebuild the basic architectures of their products. [Technology News from eWEEK and Ziff Davis] Object storage is very intriguing to me.  Storing data with metadata sounds like what we've been trying to do with content management and document management systems for years.  Object storage sounds like more efficient (faster?) storage of content and document stores. 11:17:35 PM    comment []

You can sit there like an idiot, or you can open your mouth and remove all doubt.  Unfortunately, I tend to open my mouth.  You've been warned. 9:08:27 PM    comment []

Dearth of Tools Hampers Linux. An IDE could be the missing link that's keeping Linux from being widely deployed in the enterprise. [Technology News from eWEEK and Ziff Davis] I'll admit that the Microsoft "Visual" IDE is a sweet suit (couldn't resist), but I am not sure it's the thing keeping Linux out of the enterprise.  Isn't the real problem the lack of enterprise applications (and commercial applications in general) for Linux?  Maybe they know more about product development than I do.   Why wouldn't the answer to this problem be some kind of API bridged Windows library calls to Linux libraries?  All you would have to do is change your build (make) files if you had mostly identical library calls.  Sort of like an adapter.  Then, porting Windows code to Linux would be much easier.  Just, rebuild from source.  Wouldn't that help product companies get their software onto Linux, and thereby increase the number of enterprise applications available for Linux? As for the enterprise developer, does the IDE really matter that much?  If you are a developer, I'm sure you can learn to use other tools.  The real challenge is learning the libraries and the way X Windows works.  Isn't that always the problem with a new platform -- learning API calls and the way to apply them.  So, wouldn't it be nice to use the same API on both platforms?  Guess what -- there are cross-platform libraries.  For just one example, look at Borland's CLX library that comes with Kylix.  You can write your C++ referencing the CLX library with C++ Builder for Windows, and port it to Linux using Kylix.  Same goes for Pascal with Delphi and Kylix. Another answer?  Java.  Think about it -- that's why Java was created.  To make a robust, common runtime environment and common API so developers could write once, run anywhere.  I know that people think Java is ugly and too slow.  Well, look at what Apple has done for Java on its platform!  Not too shabby.  Java is not the only game in town for cross-platform work.  Oh no.  What about Python?  What about Perl?  GUI -- look at wxWindows or TK.  You could even use Lisp!  Ever think of that? So, to recap...  for C/C++ folks, use a cross-platform library from the get go and stop coding directly to the OS.  For people who don't need the ultimate in speed, use an interpreted, cross-platform language.  If you must write code that targets a platform, don't make it impossible to port by using every specialized, OS-specific API call available. 6:55:06 PM    comment []

Teen's Web Browser Wows Top Geeks. Sixteen-year-old Adnan Osmani seems like a typical teen boy interested in computers. But the ultrafast Web browser he created has some MIT and Intel tech researchers drooling. Others are more than a bit skeptical. Karlin Lillington reports from Ireland. [Wired News] It sounds like this kid applied a divide and conquer algorithm to loading content from the Web.  What's most amazing is that this is a high school student.  Kid's brilliant in my mind. One thing I found funny in the article is that the writer referred to Borland C++ as an "older language" than Visual Basic.  I guess that's technically true of C++, but I thought it was funny how "Borland" was smacked in there too.  As if the "Borland C++" was different from other C++.  I guess if you count the libraries... 5:02:53 PM    comment []

Markov poetry. Randomly generated output using Markov chains and my own weblog as source material. I consider it a poem. (933 words) [dive into mark] Too funny.  Mark randomly walking all over his web with Python. 4:21:13 PM    comment []

© Copyright 2004 Tom Pierce.