 |
Early Adopter Curl
by Robert Howard, in Book Reviews - Sat, Jul 20th 2002 00:00 UTC
Curl is an attempt to replace HTML, JavaScript, Java, and Flash with a
single easy-to-learn language platform. Since I am a computer language
junkie, it didn't take much convincing to get me to try Curl. To dive
into new technology, I like to quickly devour a book on the subject,
and, fortunately, there was one available. It proved to be sufficient
for the task, despite some shortcomings.
Copyright notice: All reader-contributed material on freshmeat.net
is the property and responsibility of its author; for reprint rights, please contact the author
directly.
This book was released at roughly the same time as the 1.0 release of
Curl, which is impressive, given that Curl already has a huge code
library. To accomplish this feat, the publishers enlisted six
different authors to write various chapters covering different aspects
of the language and libraries. The risk with this approach is that the
book might mimic the fable of the six blind men and the elephant, and
present radically differing views of Curl. Fortunately, this pitfall was
avoided by Mr. Maharry and Mr. Ullman, who provided the bulk of the
introductory material, thus providing a firm foundation for the book's
presentation.
The book starts with three separate introductions. The first gives an
overview of Curl and its intended use, creating and delivering
interactive client-side Web content. The second is a brief tour of
Surge Lab, the free Curl programming environment. The third is a
comparison of Curl with HTML and CSS for simple content.
Next, the book presents a chapter on syntax and another on Curl's
support for object oriented programming. These chapters are laden with
simple examples covering most of the basic concepts and capabilities
of Curl. The authors did not, however, recommend a particular
programming style, and this can leave readers without a firm anchor
for creating their own Curl programs.
The remainder of the book covers the Curl libraries. Scripting
objects, layout, interaction, and 2D/3D graphics get the bulk of the
attention. These sections are excellent, although there are notable
coverage gaps due to space considerations. Sections on audio, input,
XML, and SOAP are particularly skimpy.
This book is a superior introductory text. There are plenty of useful
examples, although nothing complete enough to impart a real sense of
what a fully-realized interactive content site (or even page) might be
like. Similarly, there is no fully-realized example of a reusable Curl
widget. Fortunately, these deficiencies are not serious, given the
availability of the CurlExamples.com Web site,
which has hundreds of free examples to download and study. Also, the
extensive documentation that is included with Surge Lab is remarkable
for a 1.0 product release.
A large part of the pleasure of this book comes from the superior
design of the Curl language and libraries. I found it easy to get up
to speed and create a variety of increasingly interesting projects. My
most serious challenge was that a few programming habits from C and
Java programming had to be unlearned before Curl (which is influenced
by Lisp) felt entirely comfortable to me. I also have the impression
that the community of Curl programmers are still feeling their way
towards a preferred programming style, so the shortcomings of Early
Adopter Curl in this area are understandable.
The book includes a few misspelled class names and the like, so check
the
errata on the Wrox Web site. Also, there is one extremely serious
shortcoming: The book has no index! This vexed me so much that I
created a Curl program to allow me to create and present book indexes
on the Web, so now there is an index at http://www.rockhoward.com/curl/.
(To see it, you will need the Curl plugin, which, as of this date, is
only available for Windows.)
I like Curl a lot and recommend it for highly interactive Web content
projects. It is also an interesting choice for a Web services
client. The available examples are pretty amazing, given the youth of
the technology and the relatively small band of Curl practitioners who
are currently on the loose.
Of course, this is a difficult economic climate for launching new
technology, and the Curl company has been forced to play with their
licensing models as they work to put their business on a firmer
foundation. This matter is in flux as I write this, so you should
check the Web site for the latest
licensing information. I am confident that developers will not have to
"pay to play", but the licensing model for deployments is likely to
change from the original model (which essentially allowed smaller
companies to deploy Curl technology for free).
A second book on Curl called The Curl Programming Bible hit the
stands last month. I am currently going through this massive tome to
see what it offers the forward-thinking Curl technologist.
Author's bio:
Robert "Rock" Howard can be found at http://www.rockhoward.com/.
T-Shirts and Fame!
We're eager to find people interested in writing articles on
software-related topics. We're flexible on length, style, and
topic, so long as you know what you're talking about and back up
your opinions with facts. Anyone who writes an article gets a
t-shirt from ThinkGeek
in addition to 15 minutes of fame. If you think you'd like to try
your hand at it, let jeff.covey@freshmeat.net
know what you'd like to write about.
[Comments are disabled]
Comments
[»]
Curl, a view of the language
by Arthur - Aug 5th 2003 23:44:58
Anyone interested in finding out more about Curl should check out the
articles from their pressroom:
http://www.curl.com/html/about/news.jsp
Martin Heller from Byte gives a good overview of the language from a
programmers perspective:
http://www.curl.com/html/demos/subtleframe.jsp?title=News+Article:Curl&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.curl.com%2Fhtml%2Fabout%2Fbytearticle.pdf
and yeah, they do have a Linux version in the works:
http://www.curl.com/html/demos/subtleframe.jsp?title=News+Article:Curl+preps+Linux+version+of+app+dev+tool&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.infoworld.com%2Farticle%2F03%2F04%2F09%2FHNcurl_1.html
[reply]
[top]
[»]
This seems out of place
by jimfaulkner - Jul 20th 2002 14:30:42
Just don't rewrite freshmeat in Curl!!!! We'll all have to start using
windows!!!!
[reply]
[top]
[»]
looked at it, and...
by Guido Draheim - Jul 20th 2002 08:39:55
... saw it looks modern, but there are fine alternatives, that do about
the same - specifically, if you look for a tool in the same region as
"curl", have a look at mp4h:
http://freshmeat.net/projects/mp4h
which was later adopted by RSE and folded with WML
http://www.thewml.org/about/
These are mature tools and fine programmers, support them, add your tricks
and ideas, and benefit from what's there already.
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: looked at it, and...
by PhiLho - Jul 23rd 2002 04:04:08
>
> ... saw it looks modern, but there are
> fine alternatives, that do about the
> same - specifically, if you look for a
> tool in the same region as "curl", have
> a look at mp4h:
>
I am not sure about it, because I only had a quick overview of both, but
it seems that mp4h is to generate static pages, while Curl is to interpret
code on the client.
I would rather compare it to Yindo <http://www.yindo.com/> which is
based on the fine language Lua, allowing it to be light and fast.
Unfortunately, development, seemingly on free time of developers, is quite
slow...
As somebody else pointed out, it is too bad the Curl name clashes between
this language and another fine network tool, cURL
<http://curl.haxx.se>. See http://curl.haxx.se/legal/thename.html for
some explaination on the subject. It seems they coexist peacefully.
Regards.
--
--
Philippe Lhoste (Paris -- France)
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by lagasek - Jul 20th 2002 07:13:09
So, let's get this straight:
- "next generation" "next generation". Someone in this
economy is still hiring clueless non-technical MBA's to sell more
sophisticated consumers widgets when they don't even know what a widget is?
Apparently.
- ignoring the fact these people don't understand enough to have a working
application or even an index to their hurried book on their product (we all
know now, after Java, that selling books is the most profitable and
formerly respectable revenue stream for a new language) in the current
generation, well, what is the "next generation" and how do they
intend to replace Flash, HTML and Javascript? You won't find the technical
answers - this hype is just chum for the chums.
- This very new, near vaporware rudely ignores the fact that there is a
very popular open-source application by the same name already.
- The site, book and all appearances are consistent in look and feel; the
similarities between affiliated sites that are offered up as some show of
community support are all backed by the company. Like the demo site.
- The license issues are avoided because this is clearly anti-thetical to
the open source movement: clearly some money charged and no source
available to what we'd all be interested in: the guts. Adding insult to
injury to the fine Swedish+world programming of the real deal.
- And for the icing on the cake, if you, dear freshmeat reader, would like
to download yet another VM (oh, I mean plugin, because were dumb!), you
will have to get rid of linux. Or MacOS, or Solaris, or HP-UX, or AIX, or
IRIX, or any BSD, or... well anything but Windows. Perhaps there was an
endian mishap causing the marketing dept. to roll with a release that is 9
increments behind alpha?
It is sad to see this here on freshmeat. I have to wonder what this
portends about freshmeat's respectability and commitment to remaining part
of the community that makes it so important. However, it may even be a
sadder thing to think that the real curl folks may get sued after this
company is done riding on the good name of a good open-source program, and
have to change it. No vaseline, no reacharound...
If you want to find out information about the _real_ curl, go check out
the freshmeat.net project pages. Maturity level 6; and you won't see
anything about the fake curl mentioned outside of their many self-sponsored
sites. Not in the freshmeat projects anyway, because it isn't open-source
or proprietary, or any other license - just bogus.
As a long time reader of freshmeat, I've never been prompted to write
about the stupidity of the one-off unfinished perl, python and PHP scripts.
It's all good because it all shares an honest spirit. This, this load of
shit here, was so bad that I couldn't believe freshmeat gave it top-rank
status for a few days and gave this bloke a t-shirt to boot. I had to
finally register an account just for this rant, which I'm sure will
represent what [m]any other regular trooper will be feeling after a quick
investigation here.
Ugh. <spit, fume, froth>. Ack!
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by Richard - Jul 20th 2002 07:27:04
Not much to say to this except Hear Hear! You're absolutely right - this
'article' is disgusting. Oh well, I guess this is a sign of Freshmeat's
move towards being a standard OSDN site - hypocritical and more interested
in money than in the community
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by lagasek - Jul 20th 2002 07:53:04
I didn't want to mention it, but that is what I thought too. Check OSDN's
page where they claim that they are the #1 and #2 tech news sites. Scary.
And sad. Their job board has sucked for a long time but someone must have
had some clue to pick up themes.org and freshmeat. Freshmeat has been so
refreshing and I'm happy about that... one never knows, maybe OSDN will
realize that the only thing they need to do is pay the old freshmeat team
(esp. scoop) some big $$ to just keep up what wasn't broke. Or that like k5
has proven to slashdot, they can be easily never visited overnight by their
target market. This was the first article I really felt the wool going past
my eyes and constructing airflow.
A smart market is problematic for dumb vendors. The silence in particular.
The only other letter I wrote like this was to CmdrTaco some time ago now,
and I've never been back there. I don't know anyone who still goes there
(other than the occasional irresistable link from freshmeat), but then I
don't know anyone still in highschool.
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by jeff covey - Jul 20th 2002 09:00:55
> Check OSDN's page where they claim that they are the #1 and #2 tech
> news sites. Scary. And sad.
Ummmm... This is bad how, exactly? Why is the OSDN marketing group
supposed to be silent about the sites' @plan rankings? If you were
selling advertising for a TV network that had the top Nielsen ratings,
would you neglect to mention that to potential advertisers?
> Their job board has sucked for a long time but someone must have
had
> some clue to pick up themes.org and freshmeat. Freshmeat has been
so
> refreshing and I'm happy about that...
Are you talking about jobs.osdn.com? Yes, that sucked, and it's gone
now. I don't know when it died, but it started in June of 2001.
freshmeat was acquired by Andover in August of 1999. themes.org was
acquired by VA sometime that same year. If you're saying that it's
refreshing that freshmeat was added to the network after the jobs
site, I don't think you have any idea what you're talking about.
> maybe OSDN will realize that the only thing they need to do is pay
> the old freshmeat team (esp. scoop) some big $$ to just keep up
> what wasn't broke.
scoop is the only member of the pre-acquisition team who was still
working at freshmeat after the sale, so it makes no sense to talk
about "the old freshmeat team". The rest of us were working for or
came to work for Andover/OSDN. Based on your comments, I don't think
you've had any experience of freshmeat as run by the "old team". As
far as I can see, OSDN has made minimal interference in freshmeat in
the last three years, especially compared to other companies that have
bought sites and destroyed them overnight.
> This was the first article I really felt the wool going past my
eyes
> and constructing airflow.
I'm surprised the earlier discussions about running VB and C# apps on
Linux systems didn't give you seizures. Your comments above may mean
that you don't know anything about earlier discussions because you're
new here, and are the sort of person for whom we have to write this FAQ.
> The only other letter I wrote like this was to CmdrTaco some time
> ago now, and I've never been back there.
He told me he lays awake at night crying over that. You could at
least send him a card sometimes. :(
> I don't know anyone who still goes there
2.6 million people hit it every month. You may need to get out more.
--
vs lbh pna ernq guvf, lbh'er n trrx.
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by lagasek - Jul 20th 2002 10:46:50
>
> % Check OSDN's page where they claim
> that they are the #1 and #2 tech
> % news sites. Scary. And sad.
>
>
>
>
> Ummmm... This is bad how, exactly? Why
> is the OSDN marketing group
> supposed to be silent about the sites'
> @plan rankings? If you were
> selling advertising for a TV network
> that had the top Nielsen ratings,
> would you neglect to mention that to
> potential advertisers?
>
>
<br><br>
[ apologies in advance for not quoting, I didn't want to muck with
breaking up the '%' tags. you'll just have to nod your head
;-)]<br><br>
Ok... since what was clearly a gut reaction to what seems to me to be a
clear incident of advertisement passing for the kind of information that
most people (including myself) have come to respect FM for has been met
with a rational and defensive "analysis", I'll respond in
kind.
<br><br>
But the real reason I will bite is because I think you misrepresented the
spirit of my intentions. I thought the title was pretty clear in indicating
a casual annoyance with Curl in particular - because the review as an
egregious commercial troll for it, approved by freshmeat(OSDN) to catch as
many eyeballs as possible. This time go read the review yourself and then
ask yourself how this is bad. I'm assuming you didn't the first time
because you never addressed Curl at all.
<br><br>
If OSDN has no responsibility for the review than fine - I thought they
were the owner/publisher of FM, but maybe I'm mistaken. If they were
responsible as such it is bad because: who has ever heard of @plan? There
is no link and of course their name contains a token that makes most
searches cumbersome. Is this an "independent" analyst paid by
OSDN? Perhaps they do accounting as well. I'll bet they'd recommend a
strong buy. Cynical maybe, but I am going by smell here. Please, do show me
it ain't so.
<br><br>
>
>
>
>
> % Their job board has sucked for a long
> time but someone must have had
> % some clue to pick up themes.org and
> freshmeat. Freshmeat has been so
> % refreshing and I'm happy about
> that...
>
>
>
>
> Are you talking about jobs.osdn.com?
> Yes, that sucked, and it's gone
> now. I don't know when it died, but it
> started in June of 2001.
> freshmeat was acquired by Andover in
> August of 1999. themes.org was
> acquired by VA sometime that same year.
> If you're saying that it's
> refreshing that freshmeat was added to
> the network after the jobs
> site, I don't think you have any idea
> what you're talking about.
>
I guess I was talking about jobs.osdn.com. Seems like it wasn't as long
ago as that. Oh well. Depends on one's idea of "some" and
"not at all". Some, to me, is remembering it sucked and it was
OSDN.
<br><br>
>
>
>
>
>
> % maybe OSDN will realize that the only
> thing they need to do is pay
> % the old freshmeat team (esp. scoop)
> some big $$ to just keep up
> % what wasn't broke.
>
>
>
>
> scoop is the only member of the
> pre-acquisition team who was still
> working at freshmeat after the sale, so
> it makes no sense to talk
> about "the old freshmeat team". The
> rest of us were working for or
> came to work for Andover/OSDN. Based on
> your comments, I don't think
> you've had any experience of freshmeat
> as run by the "old team". As
> far as I can see, OSDN has made minimal
> interference in freshmeat in
> the last three years, especially
> compared to other companies that have
> bought sites and destroyed them
> overnight.
>
>
>
All I was saying about freshmeat, and not just about scoop, was that the
site itself was refreshing. I don't know if I can express my enthusiasm
correctly but it is there, and I don't mean any offence to the current
staff.
Nearly none of the readership work there or could possibly "have any
idea about" things there compared to someone who does. We can only
comment on what we see from the outside, and I have been watching for quite
some time. You seem to be saying I'm just stupid, if I may say so at the
risk of sounding negative about your dismissal of my outsider
perspective.
<br><br>
My experience is only as a frequent reader. Strike that, I have probably
read all of the reviews and articles but my normal checks (1-2 times per
day avg. since '99?) are just to see what new software is up. I agree that
FM seems to have much more liberty than many sites, judging by the high
level of sanity. Whether that has anything to do with the level of
involvement I don't know.
<br><br>
I don't know how OSDN is as a company, unless some of the things that have
smelled funny (like that review) can comment on that. I judged from their
own web-page with that @plan bunk. Let's see the ranking study. I'd be
willing to believe that they beat out The Reg., but I doubt it. In fact I'd
put several others ahead of them and I think most people in our industry
would - mostly because they don't know about OSDN. Or maybe I do need to
get out more... get off the computer and go to parties at Wired and talk
about how they rank lower in their segment. Or how I really need a
replacement for HTML and Flash for Curl - really.
<br><br>
>
>
>
> % This was the first article I really
> felt the wool going past my eyes
> % and constructing airflow.
>
>
>
>
> I'm surprised the earlier discussions
> about running VB and C# apps on
> Linux systems didn't give you seizures.
> Your comments above may mean
> that you don't know anything about
> earlier discussions because you're
> new here, and are the sort of person for
> whom we have to write
> href="http://freshmeat.net/faq/view/39/">this
> FAQ.
>
>
>
Those discussions were plausable technical discussions. I had some trouble
with the idea that D'Icaza was so friendly towards the technology, like
alot of people probably; but then the followups from him and RMS cleared it
up for me. Again, I don't think I'm alone in that pattern. Seeing any later
discussions here or anywhere else were no big deal. Now that is really how
it was for me. I'm not new here or to what's going on.
<br><br>
>
>
>
> % The only other letter I wrote like
> this was to CmdrTaco some time
> % ago now, and I've never been back
> there.
>
>
>
>
> He told me he lays awake at night crying
> over that. You could at
> least send him a card sometimes. :(
>
>
>
>
Heh. It is quite clear that Malda does not give a rat's tail what anyone
thinks. But you talk to him, so you probably know that. Or at least can
easily sympathize with someoe in his lophty position. Hey, I'm nobody
right? So obviously my comment was not made in order to chastise a big
fancy dictator, it was made to prove the point that there is a precedent
set where a site that starts out cool, because the person is cool, can
become so cool that it isn't anymore yet demands to be recognized as such.
Hence all the sycophant losers at slashdot.
<br><br>
>
>
> % I don't know anyone who still goes
> there
>
>
>
>
> 2.6 million people hit it every month.
> You may need to get out more.
>
Yes, I'll bet Dr. Dobbs gets far fewer visitors than slashdot. And here
too. Any good porn place would get all those readers and more. But you can
only sell so many "Got root" shirts. Maybe not. I wonder where
@plan ranks them. I'd take a tenth of their readership's attention if I was
an advertiser.
<br><br>
Gee, as a matter of fact, as an advertiser I might get downright bent out
of shape when someone deliberately blows their attractiveness out of petty
short-term greed and then are too blind and/or mighty to own up to it. But
I'd be afraid to say anything, because then I obviously woudn't know
anything.
<br><br>
People like real people. Real reviews for real technology. I like computer
programming languages - for real. I don't appreciate someone sneaking in
some b.s. and then pretending it isn't b.s., it's just me because it has to
be me. It's a dis-service to the other language projects listed here and
out of character for what I thought was FM. In light of a few other factors
I felt it needed to be said, but this brings me suddenly from lurking to
being at odds with a staffer. My opinion of FM and its people is high, so
shoot me.
<br><br>
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by jeff covey - Jul 20th 2002 11:46:23
> the review as an egregious commercial troll
Umm, how exactly? It's a book review. We've also had book reviews on
Zope, Ruby, and Linux. Why is it that those are fine because you like
the projects in question, and anything that talks about a project you
don't like is a "commercial troll"?
Publishers publish books. They send me a list of what's new. I pick
whatever looks interesting and look around for someone to review it.
curl.com does not enter the procedure at any point.
> If OSDN has no responsibility for the review than fine - I thought
> they were the owner/publisher of FM, but maybe I'm mistaken.
If you don't have even the most basic, most obvious facts at the
disposal of your arguments, why do you continue to make them?
> who has ever heard of @plan?
Anyone who has ever had anything to do with Internet marketing. Your
ignorance does not become truth just because it belongs to you.
> There is no link
Because the person osdn.com is for doesn't need to be told about http://www.webplan.net/, just as
you didn't have to link to k5 for me to know what you mean.
> Depends on one's idea of "some" and "not at all".
What?
> Some, to me, is remembering it sucked and it was OSDN.
You've now thrown your troll ship into hyperdrive and come out in
another galaxy. What does jobs.osdn.com sucking have to do with
anything related to this discussion?
> You seem to be saying I'm just stupid,
I'm sorry if I gave that impression; I don't mean to say that. I mean
to say that you're acting as though you understand things that you
have no idea about.
> if I may say so at the risk of sounding negative about your
> dismissal of my outsider perspective.
If I were dismissing your perspective, I'd be ignoring your comments
instead of spending my Saturday morning replying to them.
> Those discussions were plausable technical discussions. I had some
> trouble with the idea that D'Icaza was so friendly towards the
> technology, like alot of people probably; but then the followups
> from him and RMS cleared it up for me. Again, I don't think I'm
> alone in that pattern. Seeing any later discussions here or
anywhere
> else were no big deal. Now that is really how it was for me. I'm
not
> new here or to what's going on.
Then I don't know why this article in particular churns your stomach.
It's a much simpler one. It just says "There's a new Web programming
language. If you're interested in it, there's a book about it.
Here's what I think about the book." This is a news site about things
that are interesting to Unix programmers. Said programmers may need
to write in or support Curl some day, or discourage their bosses from
adopting it, or at least know what it is. There's no harm in this.
--
vs lbh pna ernq guvf, lbh'er n trrx.
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by lagasek - Jul 20th 2002 20:18:54
>
> Then I don't know why this article in
> particular churns your stomach.
> It's a much simpler one. It just says
> "There's a new Web programming
> language. If you're interested in it,
> there's a book about it.
> Here's what I think about the book."
> This is a news site about things
> that are interesting to Unix
> programmers. Said programmers may need
> to write in or support Curl some day, or
> discourage their bosses from
> adopting it, or at least know what it
> is. There's no harm in this.
>
I have decided to not respond to the character assasination other than to
say that based on all the public information I can see about you that I do
indeed know alot more about programming than you do. Obviously less than
you do about OSDN and its relationship with FM.
What is quoted above is the only part of your replies that addresses the
real issue. What churns my stomach is the impression I had of FM as a more
impartial and Unix community site. This is supported by the general
behavior over the years I've been coming here and documents like this:
- FAQ: Why Doesn't FM List Windows Software
http://freshmeat.net/faq/view/34/
Allow me to quote a relevant bit:
"Part of the reason why freshmeat has reached its current level of
success is because we have remained conscious of our target audience.
freshmeat has always aimed itself at the Unix crowd, and if we were to try
to shift our focus and be "all things to all people", then we
would end up spreading ourselves too thinly. "
When I saw a book review for Windows only software of a book that doesn't
even ship with an index, is "playing" with their license model,
etc. etc it seemed to me someone at FM had lost consciousness of its target
audience. Most of all because there already IS a great piece of Unix
software named after the same thing, it isn't vapor, and the only apparent
reason for this breach of trust with FM's seemed to be commercial. Most of
us are not expecting an advertisement to be put forth as a (bogus) book
review. That is what churned my stomach.
So let me ask you what I'd like to know right from a source whose word we
can take as the official FM position:
- will FM accept book reviews (from OSDN or whomever) as a
promotional item and submit them to their audience? Without regard to the
"rules" that the rest of us think we are playing with here when
we contribute (for free)?
- did OSDN pay webplan to conduct a ranking? where is the data?
- as a technical publishing professional do you really believe
that OSDN is the #1 site people go to for technological news on the
Internet?
- what do you think of curl and the fact that outside of their own
site's and Howard's that it practically doesn't exist and only right now
for Windows?
- do you think Curl warrants mention and the company of mature
projects like Zope and haxx's curl?
- do you really think that people here are as aware of webplan as
K5?
Let's hear your answers to those questions. No one wants to hear about me.
This is about Curl and whether or not FM/OpenSourceDN will be selling
promotions to commercial Windows interests and then passing them off as
legitimate community contributions here on FM.
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by jeff covey - Jul 21st 2002 09:12:35
> I have decided to not respond to the character assasination
Do you even hear yourself? You accuse me of taking a bribe from a
company to put a review online. I point out that you don't know what
you're talking about. Your only justifications are a) you think I'm a
tool, and b) you're pathologically paranoid. My justifications are
facts, dates, and links, and I'm the one who is engaging
in "character assasination"?
I'm sorry, but your poorly-crafted trolls are getting too tedious to
bother with. No, we're not perfect, but no, we don't take bribes to
have articles appear on the site, but no, you're not going to take off
your tinfoil hat long enough to believe it, so there's nowhere useful
this discussion can go. Bye.
--
vs lbh pna ernq guvf, lbh'er n trrx.
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by runa - Jul 22nd 2002 10:36:23
Im sorry, Jeff but I think that you have to answer that acussation. It's a
very hard one and he has good arguments (the FAQ stuff).
And btw, it's not called 'bribe' they use the word 'publicity' :)
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by jeff covey - Jul 22nd 2002 15:00:13
> Im sorry, Jeff but I think that you have to answer that acussation.
The comment you're replying to says "no, we don't take bribes to
have articles appear on the site". How much clearer do you need
that to be?
--
vs lbh pna ernq guvf, lbh'er n trrx.
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by runa - Jul 22nd 2002 16:34:17
Im sorry, but please try to understand that it's a little suspicious to
find, in a site where you don't post news about windows software, a review
of a book about a commercial, closed source, windows based technology.
Im not acussing you of accepting a bribe, we just feel a little bit
confused about the review.
And, I know that you are (or at least slashdot) 'us centric' but many of
us don't speak english as our mother languaje, so think about that when you
say "How much clearer do you need that to be?"
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by jeff covey - Jul 24th 2002 08:26:23
> Im sorry, but please try to understand that it's a little
suspicious
> to find, in a site where you don't post news about windows
software,
> a review of a book about a commercial, closed source, windows based
> technology.
I do understand. I just wish I could be given enough benefit of the
doubt that if people are going to jump to a conclusion, it's that I
didn't do enough research when picking a book off the publisher's list
(the truth) rather than that I've sold out the site.
Also, I can make the same request I always make: If you don't like
the articles on the site, write a better one for me, or at least
suggest a topic and someone who could do it justice.
> many of us don't speak english as our mother languaje, so think
> about that when you say "How much clearer do you need that to be?"
Ok, I will, especially since scoop had to look up "bribe" to find out
what we were talking about. :)
--
vs lbh pna ernq guvf, lbh'er n trrx.
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by jeff covey - Jul 20th 2002 08:07:27
> I guess this is a sign of Freshmeat's move towards being a standard
> OSDN site - hypocritical and more interested in money than in the
> community
Yes, everything's a conspiracy.
Or:
It's just possible that closing your eyes to everything in the world
that's not GPLed is not the wisest policy. We're talking about a
Lisp-based Web programming language. Even in the abstract, it is, by
default, something interesting to programmers. From the technical
perspective, it offers a host of questions, including:
Does it fill a niche not currently being served by anything we have at
our disposal? What do it and its libraries offer? Does it have any
new ideas we could appropriate for our own work?
Is it just Flash eye candy all over again, or will it be put to use in
real applications? If it does catch on, do we need to be concerned
about getting Curl applications to run on *nix platforms, just as we
wrote our own Java VMs? Do we need a debate over this like the one
we've had over C# and Mono?
Or is the answer political? If Curl is something worthwhile, should
we be lobbying the company behind it about Open Sourcing it, or key
parts of it?
Or is Curl just a dead end than can be ignored?
I think there are more opportunities for meaningful discussion here
beyond "Why is freshmeat talking about something written by The Man?".
Five years ago, would you have said freshmeat had sold out because we
reviewed a book about Java?
--
vs lbh pna ernq guvf, lbh'er n trrx.
[reply]
[top]
[»]
Re: Articles please, not shameful advertising for Alpha Quadrant Vapor
by MacroCreative - Jul 20th 2002 09:46:11
It's just possible that closing your
eyes to everything in the world
that's not GPLed is not the wisest
policy. We're talking about a
Lisp-based Web programming language.
Even in the abstract, it is, by
default, something interesting to
programmers. From the technical
perspective, it offers a host of
questions, including:
I completely agree. It is interesting and I for one like to know about
emerging technologies. I do, however, take issue with the way the article
was presented. It was certainly not an objective overview/introduction of a
new technology.
Is it just Flash eye candy all over
again, or will it be put to use in
real applications? If it does catch on,
do we need to be concerned
about getting Curl applications to run
on *nix platforms, just as we
wrote our own Java VMs? Do we need a
debate over this like the one
we've had over C# and Mono?
Relating this to C# is ridiculous. C# is a new language put out the worlds
largest software maker, not some startup. The chances of it being adopted
for general use are very high compared to the chance of Curl ever going
anywhere.
Or is the answer political? If Curl is
something worthwhile, should
we be lobbying the company behind it
about Open Sourcing it, or key
parts of it?
Good question, though I didn't really even want to look into the merits of
Curl after being rather put off by the article.
[reply]
[top]
|
|
