No Macs? Holy crap did WotC do the math wrong!

[Nifft]

Ignoring the fact that I think it is difficult to write good software, my answer to this is that corporate culture discourages good software from being written when mediocre code will suffice and is generally accepted by users.

Please keep in mind I was answering someone else -- "why don't most developers do cross-platform coding if it's so easy?"

It is indeed not easy to write good software. But many of the things that you do in order go get good software are also things that enable you to relatively easily make your code cross-platform.

And once your test suite is running cross-platform, you'll find bugs faster.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Nifft]

Your favorite OS sucks.

Well duh. It's made of software.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Zurai]

The GC is here to stay and isn't going away. It's the revolution. Memory management being abstracted away makes writing code much more productive and less buggy. That's why .NET uses GC.

Yes... and .NET has tools for interfacing with the garbage collector. Java does not. That was my point.

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

Java is a LOUSY solution. It has horrible memory management tools, it's slow as molasses in January, and it has problems with certain browsers.

A very uninformed opinion. I find that those who make comments like this are not software developers, or if they are, are junior and have zero experience with the language. Where does this sort of misinformation come from? The first edition of Java (1996) suffered from these problems. Java is currently in its sixth version (with the seventh on its way). If you're not an authority on something, please don't speak as if you are.

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

Yes... and .NET has tools for interfacing with the garbage collector. Java does not. That was my point.

You mean like this?

Runtime r = Runtime.getRuntime();

r.gc();

Java does allow you to access the garbage collector, but with modern garbage collection algorithms, it's virtually unnecessary to do so.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

Well duh. It's made of software.

Cheers, -- N

My computer runs on a hardware-OS. I built it myself.

 

[blargney the second]

It'd be cool to see the DDI game table go open source. It seems appropriate.
-blarg

 

[wedgeski]

Did you even understand my economics argument? Or are you content with your ad hominem?

Yes, I understood it. If I thought you'd believe me, I'd tell you about my academic background to prove it. But what has become clear, in the intervening years of being a full-time software engineer, is that the lessons I internalized during my studies have zero -- if not less than zero -- impact on the day-to-day exigencies of actually *running* a software department.

The point I want to make, and I apologize for resorting to the rhetoric I did in my previous post, is that markets are unique. Corporations are unique. Pressures are unique. Micro-economic theory simply collapses under the weight of factors introduced by human decision-making, and it's a very unconvincing way to make your case.

At least to me. And IME, anyone I have ever had to answer to.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

That's weird. We use C++ and QT specifically because it does cross platform so well. Are you sure it's the QT bit making it hard to do the cross platform?

No, no, not at all. Sorry if I made the impression. I think one of the major reasons is that some of the Controls used for file browsing is based on ActiveX controls. (Don't ask me why they are using ActiveX, I am not developing that application. I guess there were good reasons to do it when they began, and they simply don't have the time to build their own file system viewers...)

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

So, no counter argument to any of my other points, based on sound economic theory and 10 years experience writing cross-platform apps, then? Just nitpicking one word? I hate that kind of message board discussion tactic.

Sorry. You might not have deserved it. But the post was the x-th post that used a unfounded attack like this, and I couldn't take it any longer and needed a small vent... But I tried to keep my outbreak out of the main discussion because the topic itself is valid.

And no, no further counters except the ones I gave shortly after that post...
More might come...