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+-   State of Ruby VM's: Ruby Renaissance-> on Friday November 20, @05:17PM igrigorik

Submitted by igrigorik on Friday November 20, @05:17PM
programming
igrigorik writes "In a short span of just a couple of years, the Ruby VM space has evolved to more than just a handful of choices: MRI, JRuby, IronRuby, MacRuby, Rubinius, MagLev, REE and BlueRuby. Four of these VM's will hit 1.0 status in the upcoming year and will open up entirely new possibilities for the language — Mac apps via MacRuby, Ruby in the browser via Silverlight, object persistence via Smalltalk VM, and so forth. A detailed look at the past year, the progress of each project, and where the community is heading. It's an exciting time to be a Rubyist."
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+-   If the Comments Are Ugly, the Code Is Ugly-> on Monday November 16, @09:47AM itwbennett

Submitted by itwbennett on Monday November 16, @09:47AM
programming
itwbennett writes "What do your comments say about your code? Do grammatical errors in comments point to even bigger errors in code? That's what Esther Schindler contends in a recent blog post. 'Programming, whether you're doing it as an open source enthusiast or because you're workin' for The Man, is an exercise in attention to detail,' says Schindler. 'Someone who writes software must be a nit-picker, or the code won't work.... Long-winded 'explanations' of the code in the application's comments (that is, the ones that read like excuses), indicate that the developer probably didn't understand what he was doing.'"
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+-   Are You a Blue Collar or White Collar Developer?-> on Sunday November 15, @10:13AM jammag

Submitted by jammag on Sunday November 15, @10:13AM
jammag writes "Some developers have gone to four-year universities where they've also studied subjects like history and sociology, while other coders go to vocational schools and focus purely on writing great software. So why, asks a longtime developer, is there a stigma attached to not having a four-year degree, when 'blue collar' coders might be better trained? Why does the software industry keep emphasizing this difference — and generally giving better pay to four-year grads? Isn't being a developer about real skill level, not the piece of paper on the wall?"
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Comments: 1 +-   Google under fire for calling their language "Go" on Thursday November 12, @03:28AM Norsefire

Submitted by Norsefire on Thursday November 12, @03:28AM
google
Norsefire writes "Since releasing their "Go" programming language yesterday, Google are under fire for using the same name as another programming language that was first publicly documented in 2003. "Go!" was created by Francis McCabe and Keith Clark — the first of which published a book about the language in 2007, and he is not happy."
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+-   Finally, some Larrabee source code-> on Tuesday November 10, @03:58PM MauricioAP

Submitted by MauricioAP on Tuesday November 10, @03:58PM
programming
MauricioAP writes "I just come across an implementation of a non-numerical code in Larrabee ..."the example of regular-expression matching, arguably one of the hardest non-numerical workloads to parallelize, and map it onto LRBni, Larrabee's instruction set. I show that a good mapping of this code onto LRBni is possible""
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+-   EU Objects to Oracle's Purchase of Sun-> on Tuesday November 10, @04:37AM eldavojohn

Submitted by eldavojohn on Tuesday November 10, @04:37AM
database
eldavojohn writes "The EU has presented both companies with a statement of objections. Despite Marten Mickos' (former MySQL CEO) promoting the deal, the statement seems to focus entirely on what many have feared: MySQL Vs Oracle Databases. From the 8-K SEC filing from Sun, "The Statement of Objections sets out the Commission's preliminary assessment regarding, and is limited to, the combination of Sun's open source MySQL database product with Oracle's enterprise database products and its potential negative effects on competition in the market for database products." EU and EU Commissions are generating a bit of a history of disagreeing with US counterparts."
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+-   Is it the end of the road for NetBeans?-> on Monday November 09, @12:46PM Anonymous Coward

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 09, @12:46PM
java
An anonymous reader writes "Oracle has released an FAQ that describes its plans for the future of popular Sun technologies like GlassFish, NetBeans, MySQL and more. In some cases Oracle’s announcement is unclear and raises concerns about product viability. Especially in the case of NetBeans there are many that believe it describes a future that NetBeans is either 100% maintained by the open source community or has become obsolete, since Oracle's #1 investment is JDeveloper."
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+-   NoSQL Ecosystem-> on Monday November 09, @11:45AM abartels

Submitted by abartels on Monday November 09, @11:45AM
abartels writes "Unprecedented data volumes are driving businesses to look at alternatives to the traditional relational database technology that has served us well for over thirty years. Collectively, these alternatives have become known as NoSQL databases. The fundamental problem is that relational databases cannot handle many modern workloads. There are three specific problem areas: scaling out to data sets like Diggs (3 TB for green badges) or Facebooks (50 TB for inbox search) or eBays (2 PB overall), per-server performance, and rigid schema design."
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+-   X11 Chrome outperforms Windows and Mac?-> on Monday November 02, @07:11AM Anonymous Coward

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 02, @07:11AM
google
An anonymous reader writes "In a curious contrast to conventional wisdom, there are reports of X11 Chromium being faster than Windows or Mac versions. In the thread titled "Why is Linux Chrome so fast", a developer speculates that it is due to the use of X11 capabilities: "On X-windows [sic], the renderer backingstores are managed by the X server, and the transport DIBs are also managed by the X server. So, we avoid a lot of memcpy costs incurred on Windows due to keeping the backingstores in main memory there."

Has the design of X11 withstood the test of time better than people tend to give it credit for?"
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+-   Facebook ditches App Verification Program-> on Thursday October 29, @08:13PM angry tapir

Submitted by angry tapir on Thursday October 29, @08:13PM
angry tapir writes "Facebook has abruptly decided to pull the plug on its Application Verification program, which let external developers pay to have their applications certified as exceeding certain requirements. "We're retiring the formerly optional Application Verification brand, submission process, fees and badge; the program's higher standards will be required and applications will be subject to review at any time," wrote Facebook official Ethan Beard in a blog post."
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+-   Oracle sheds new light on future of Sun-> on Thursday October 29, @06:28PM angry tapir

Submitted by angry tapir on Thursday October 29, @06:28PM
oracle
angry tapir writes "Oracle has provided new details about its plans for certain key Sun Microsystems technologies, including the GlassFish application server and the NetBeans application development toolkit. According to an FAQ released by Oracle (PDF) on the acquisition, the company plans to "continue evolving" GlassFish."
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+-   Service Oriented Architecture with Java on Wednesday October 28, @01:44PM Martijn de Boer

Submitted by Martijn de Boer on Wednesday October 28, @01:44PM
books
Martijn de Boer writes "The book has been written to provide the reader with a short introduction to the concepts of Service Oriented Architecture with Java. The book covers the theory and analysis from the start and is progressing to a more intermediate level slowly throughout the different chapters. This book has been written for software architects and programmers of the Java language who have an interest in building software using SOA concepts in their applications. The cover hints to a series called “From Technologies to Solutions”, and that is exactly what this book tries to do, it tries to explain the SOA technology with different case studies and a path for solutions for your applications.

When I ordered the copy of the book, I was under the impression that I was required some familiarity with terms used in the world of SOA but I was rather fond of the easy explanation of terms in the first chapter. The first chapter starts off with a small introduction to the role of software architecture when thinking about a software project. The chapter covers alternatives to SOA and tries to get the reader onto the right path for the rest of the book.

Later on in the book different subjects pass, the first few chapters start off with the basics of using XML as a communication layer. The third chapter introduces the audience to different implementations of web services in the Java world including the most familiar names as Apache Axis, Spring and XFire. The reader will be shown and guided to the install process of these web services and is being shown around the process of working with the software. The pros and cons of every piece of software are shown when following the steps throughout the chapters.

The book ends with chapters providing case studies of real world examples of SOA and alternatives. I have found this to be the most informative section of the book when looking to make decisions on how to architect a software project as it provides several examples on when to use which aspect of SOA. The different case studies allow you to put some weight and foundations into your decisions. The last chapter of the book is basically a conclusion of what we have learned throughout the book and provides a clear summary of goals of using service oriented architecture.

The reader is expected to have understanding of Java to follow the examples throughout the book. Examples are demonstrated on Windows machines, but could be followed on any other platform as well without having the hassle of setting up a different environment. That is one of the advantages of Service Oriented Architecture with Java, because it basically can be ran everywhere.
When you work your way throughout the book, you will discover different clearly illustrated diagrams and other informational graphics. There are more than enough images to make the image not a boring theory book, as the images often provide a better understanding of different explanations of architecture and setups throughout the book.

The book covers a small setup with Apache Axis 1.3 and mentions to use this opposed to the more recent 2.0 version because more software is being implemented on top of the 1.x series of said web service. However because the reader is starting to learn about SOA, it would have been great to see some of the differences and read why 2.0 hasn't been adopted much yet. I would have liked to see a bigger comparison between those two versions, but as the authors point out, there is a great community for both versions which provides a lot more background information if you want to look further into the more technical information that isn't provided in the book yet.
This book is a good way to get your feet wet in using web services to build and architect powerful Java applications for your business. I am no big Java developer yet, and I needed this book to navigate me through the different pieces of software available, it succeeded very well at that point. I was fond of the clear writing style, which has always been the case by books from Packt Publishing. The book also has been written in a logical order, putting case studies at the end of the book so they are better to follow. Most technical books I own are written in a way that allows you to jump from chapter to chapter in an order that you need them, but I found this book to be a solid line of information of which the difficulty grade builds up from beginning to end. As a developer and software architect I am really appreciating how well this book has been written for this audience, it's almost as if it was written especially for me and the knowledge I had of service oriented architecture before starting with this book.

http://www.packtpub.com/service-oriented-architecture-for-java-applications/book
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Service-Oriented-Architecture-With-Java/Malhar-Barai/e/9781847193216/?itm=2&USRI=Java%2CService+Oriented+Architecture"
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+-   Applications for Large UML Diagrams on Monday October 26, @01:45PM OSDever

Submitted by OSDever on Monday October 26, @01:45PM
programming
OSDever writes "I'm currently formulating an idea for a project that is likely to require several hundred or even thousand separate classes, and, in order to keep everything organized, I would like to make use of the Unified Modeling Language. For some of my previous personal work I've used the open source application BOUML for UML diagramming; however, I'm well aware of its faults and would hesitate using it as my primary modeling application, especially if involving others (specifically since the documentation is desperately in need of an English editor to remove the French grammatical syntax, and the program has a bit of a learning curve for beginners unless they immerse themselves in the rather cryptic documentation.) As a result, I'm currently looking for a stable, well-tested modelling application capable of handling a large number of UML entities (but not necessarily displaying them all on one screen,) that allows easy integration into a versioning system, and preferably doesn't break the bank for a small startup project. What has /. used in its larger pet projects?"
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+-   Are Software Developers Naturally Weird? on Sunday October 18, @10:25AM jammag

Submitted by jammag on Sunday October 18, @10:25AM
jammag writes "Well, c'mon, yes — let's admit it. As a veteran coder discusses as he looks at his career, software development is swelled with the offbeat, the quirky and the downright odd. As he remembers, there was the 'Software Lyrics' guy and the 'Inappropriate Phone Call' programmer, among others. Are unique types drawn to the profession or, are we 'transformed over time by our darkened working environments and exposure to computer screen radiation.'?"
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+-   The Sad State of the Mobile Web-> on Thursday October 15, @02:29PM snydeq

Submitted by snydeq on Thursday October 15, @02:29PM
snydeq writes "Despite being the much better development platform for today's smartphones, open Web standards still face an uphill battle on mobile devices, Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister writes, nothing that here, as on the desktop, the main hurdle is scalability. But whereas successful Web development for the desktop is a matter of scaling up, mobile Web development calls for applications that can effectively scale down as well — an imperative that is fast making the state of the mobile Web 'even sadder,' McAllister writes. 'The more that modern Web applications take advantage of the new client-side technologies available in desktop browsers, the more the divide between the desktop Web and the mobile Web widens.' As a result, developers are forced to fall back on basic Web technologies — a tactic that too often translates simply into writing separate UIs for mobile users. 'The result? Mobile Web applications are in pretty much the same boat as they were when the first WAP-enabled handsets appeared: two separate development tracks, one for the desktop and one for mobile. Call that an opportunity if you want. I call it a waste of potential.'"
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+-   Doubts raised about legal soundness of GPL2-> on Thursday October 15, @10:30AM svonkie

Submitted by svonkie on Thursday October 15, @10:30AM
programming
svonkie writes "Two prominent IP lawyers have warned that the all-pervasive General Public License version 2 (GPLv2) is legally unsound. They claim GPLv3 and AGPLv3 are much better suited for the realities of modern open source software. "If you go back in time to when GPLv2 was written, I don't think people were aware of just how ubiquitous this license would become and how closely scrutinized it would be," said Mark Radcliffe, partner at the firm DLA Piper and general counsel for the Open Source Initiative (OSI). "At that time, open source was not something as broadly used as it is now." Radcliffe was joined by Karen Copenhaver, partner at Choate Hall & Stewart and counsel for the Linux Foundation, for a GPL web conference hosted by the license-sniffing firm Black Duck software"
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Comments: 1 +-   Mickos urges EU to approve Oracle's MySQL takeover-> on Thursday October 08, @04:26PM mjasay

Submitted by mjasay on Thursday October 08, @04:26PM
business
mjasay writes "Former MySQL CEO Marten Mickos has written to EU Commissioner of Competition Neelie Kroes to urge speedy approval of Oracle's proposed purchase of Sun, including the open-source MySQL database. The EU is has been worried that Oracle's acquisition of Sun could end up hurting competition by dampening or killing MySQL's momentum. But in his letter, Mickos separates MySQL, the community, from MySQL, the company, arguing that Oracle's takeover cannot hurt the MySQL community: "Those two meanings of the term 'MySQL' stand in a close mutually beneficial interaction with each other. But, most importantly, this interaction is voluntary and cannot be directly controlled by the vendor." In a follow-up interview with CNET, Mickos indicated that he has no financial interest in the matter, but instead argues he "couldn't live with the fact that [he's] not taking action," and is "motivated now by trying to help the employees still at MySQL and Sun, and by an urge to bring rational discussion to the matter.""
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Comments: 4 +-   Do we need to know basic math as programmers?-> on Tuesday October 06, @03:25PM Anonymous Coward

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 06, @03:25PM
programming
An anonymous reader writes "How much math does a programmer need to know to do his job? These days with all the frameworks that exists you don't need to know how to do a square root, a power function or a quick sort these will likely already be built in...but do you need to know basic math?"
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+-   Interview with Bell Labs' legend, Brian Kernighan-> on Tuesday October 06, @05:30AM Tri

Submitted by Tri on Tuesday October 06, @05:30AM
programming
Tri writes "Computerworld interviews Brian Kernighan, the K in K&R, the K in AWK and co-author of the Practice of Programming."
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+-   Interview with Brian Kernighan of AWK/AMPL fame-> on Monday October 05, @10:59PM oranghutan

Submitted by oranghutan on Monday October 05, @10:59PM
programming
oranghutan writes "In this interview, Brian Kernighan — who helped popularise C with his book (co-written with the creator Dennis Ritchie) The C Programming Language and contributed to the development of AWK and AMPL — talks about his tips for up and coming programmers, who he thinks are the icons of the programming world, and what his thoughts on Ruby, Perl and Java are.

He also discusses whether the classic book The Practice of Programming, co-written with Rob Pike needs an update. Plus he highlights Bill and Melinda Gates as two people doing great things through computer sciences for the world and says "a typical programmer today spends a lot of time just trying to figure out what methods to call from some giant package and probably needs some kind of IDE like Eclipse or XCode to fill in the gaps. There are more languages in regular use and programs are often distributed combinations of multiple languages. All of these facts complicate life, though it's possible to build quite amazing systems quickly when everything goes right."

Another good quote for programmers is: "Every language teaches you something, so learning a language is never wasted, especially if it's different in more than just syntactic trivia."

http://www.computerworld.com.au/article/321082/an_inteview_brian_kernighan_co-developer_awk_ampl?cache=4"
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