News and commentary from the cross-platform scripting community.
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Mail Starting 9/12/97 | |
I wrote this a while back while on vacation but it got lost when I switched from Claris Emailer to Mulberry.
From: wesf@mail.utexas.edu (Wesley Felter);
Sent at 9/13/97; 10:07:44 PM;
Re:Free the Mac OSIf Apple freed the Mac OS, I don't think it'd become a competitor to Linux. I think it'd become part of Linux. There are many commercial OSes, but few free ones. The reason is that you really only need one free UNIX. Linux is weird because it has the same strategy as Microsoft: Assimilate all software. But this strategy works for Linux where it doesn't work for Microsoft. The secret is the GPL: when new GPL source code is released, someone either ports it to Linux or makes it part of the kernel. Why have to choose between several OSes that have different features when you can have one OS with all features?
The strategy behind Linux can work for Mac OS. Why rewrite all the broken parts as new modern code? Just take the toolbox and make it into a "blue box" that runs on top of the Linux kernel. Fredlabs could proably do this pretty easily. Rhapsody has a few nice features, but not enough to challenge a Linux/Mac OS combination.
Joe Palmer, designer of the BeBox, says it's dark in the box. I think my next dark-inside box is going to have an x86-compatible processor, because they have the OSes. Now that BeOS is coming for Intel, the only OS that doesn't run on Intel is classic Mac OS, which will be at a dead end in a few years. I've wished for years that another chip, maybe PowerPC, maybe Alpha, maybe ARM, could change the situation, but it hasn't happened yet. --Wes
P.S. Newton Inc. has the right idea: they're giving away development tools.
Remember Guy Kawasaki's book, "How to Drive Your Competition Crazy"? From the way things are going at Apple, I believe that they must be reading his new book, "How to Drive Your Customers Crazy".
From: filmat11@gate.net (Phil Manhard);
Sent at 9/13/97; 11:47:11 AM;
Apple these days...What a ride! I'm feeling a little queasy myself....
When people believed that all the heavenly bodies revolved around the earth, they had great difficulty explaing the movement of some bodies. Some bodies would go one way for a while, then switch back, then go the other way again. Frequently, the only explanation for such movement was angels or demons. Once the realization was made that the earth was not the center of the universe, it became much easier to explain the motion of the heavens.
From: petej@clickvision.com (Peter M. Jansson);
Sent at 9/12/97; 11:44:47 PM;
OrbitsAt one time, many people also believe that the mentally ill were possessed by demons, or touched by the hand of God. Myths of werewolves may have been invented to explain gruesome behavior by some people, because people couldn't otherwise account for such savage behavior. Modern theories of mental illness now provide explanations for a lot of this behavior, as well as treatment for some of it, so we don't need the myths as much.
I'm guessing that there's something afoot at Apple that's undisclosed, and nobody has guessed what it is, and when it becomes known, we'll be able to understand Apple's and Steve Jobs' behavior (although we still might not agree with it). For example, you can't tell one person you'll ship PowerPC-based machines for years to come when the chip suppliers appear to be dropping out (unless you have another chip supplier lined up). I think Doc Searls was really on the money, and when we see the "new art", it will provide a rationalization for this behavior.
You said DLLs are coded in C or C++. Delphi can create DLLs too. Much faster than doing it in C or C++. Only disadvantage I think is that they tend to be larger than when written in C or C++. But if they stay on the server it doesn't matter. If you can create something in an hour rather than 4 hours it's worth the small cost, I think. And for a beginner Delphi is much easier to learn than C or C++.
From: luke@tymowski.org (Luke Tymowski);
Sent at 9/12/97; 1:18:39 PM;
DLLs and Frontier 5Hot dog! Frontier 5 is closer to life. I'm looking at scripting/db web stuff now for our company and I'm trying to slow things down for Frontier. (I want to use Frontier not IntraBuilder, Cold Fusion, or WebHub, or the Borg's ASP approach). We're a Windows shop.
From: luke@tymowski.org (Luke Tymowski);
Sent at 9/12/97; 1:10:24 PM;
frontier 5 and file pathsAbout file paths. With Win32 we can use in our own projects the method \\\snowwhite\proj\web\homepage\index.html
Snowwhite is the machine name, and proj etc are folder names. This approach is better than hardcoding drive letters because you may remap your network drives or people can map their drives differently and the app won't break. I've used this approach for several years now (since Win95) and it's much better than hardcoding drive letters. I think this is close to the Mac approach to referring to a file path.
But if you're coming up with a scheme for both Mac and Windows perhaps the URL approach is best.
My name is Steve Kirks, a computer consultant and IT Manager at Dial US, a local/long distance telephone company in Sprinfield, MO. I have worked with the Mac, Windows 3.1/95/NT and three different versions of Un*x over the last five years.
From: stevek@dialus.com (Steve Kirks);
Sent at 9/12/97; 11:21:20 AM;
Apple's Master Plan?I wrote you a short note a couple of weeks back regarding the Apple/Power Computing buyout, contending that the 'Mac' was not the future of Apple, but an 'Apple' computer was the future of Apple.
Check MacCentral's coverage of an annoucement by Digital about a new StrongARM chip. Could this be the cornerstone of an Apple eMate on steroids (NC?)
You make the call. Love your mail and simple, yet elegant website. How far will flattery get me?