Sep 14, 2004 | Software Development
In a recent blog item, Robert Scoble suggests that Joe Stegman’s video on Windows Forms answers Joel Spolsky’s article “How Microsoft Lost the API War.”
Sorry Robert – but it doesn’t.
Make no mistake, Windows Forms is great stuff. Ok, perhaps you hype it a bit too much – that great looking Outlook application that is created with 100 lines of code largely looks like Outlook because it uses an Outlook control. But nevertheless – it’s great.
And yes, Windows Forms will “play” with Avalon. Microsoft’s “Developer’s Guide to Migration and Interoperability in “LongHorn” on MSDN chapter 5 addresses this.
But “play together” in this sense is an interoperability issue. Avalon and Windows Forms represent two different programming models or API’s.
Let me stress the word “interoperability” here. Sure, Avalon can host Windows Forms and vice versa. Just as Windows Forms today can host COM ActiveX controls. But do you know many people writing COM ActiveX controls for use with .NET? No.
Why not?
- Because people are reluctant to trust an interoperability layer, both from reasons of compatibility and reasons of performance.
- Because once Microsoft adopts and promotes a new technology (.NET), they tend to stop development and gradually support on the old one (COM).
- Because psychologically, developers want to play with the latest technology, and managers feel pressure to adopt the latest technology.
Having two technologies that have different API’s have all the costs Joel discusses such as the cost to learn a new technology and the cost to port applications (even when there is no feature, performance or economic benefit in doing so).
With Avalon and Longhorn we are faced with the same process. Sure Windows Forms is being invested in big time. Sure Windows Forms controls will be hosted in Avalon through an interop layer (and vice versa). It doesn’t matter. The same pressures will apply in just a few years to migrate to Avalon. There will be inevitable problems in the hosting, concern about long term support, and pressure in the media and development community to use the latest and greatest thing.
Sure, if you’re writing software with a lifespan of a few years, Windows Forms is a great way to go. But we all know that software, enterprise software especially, lives a long time. Can Microsoft categorically promise to maintain a full commitment to development, maintenance and support of Windows Forms for the next 15 years? (A more typical lifespan for enterprise software). Will they maintain that commitment during at time where their marketing department and media are pushing Avalon and Longhorn?
Do you really want to invest full bore in Windows Forms today given the uncertainty of which technology will become dominant, run on the most platforms, and have the best long term support?
For smaller applications, absolutely. But if you’re going to invest in a large project, this is a very difficult decision, and waiting for Avalon might be the better strategy. It’s too soon to know.
RSS feeds for sites referred to in this item:
Joel on Software
Scobleizer
Sep 13, 2004 | Software Development, Technology
Let’s start with the obvious. Almost nobody reads software licenses. You know why – they’re incomprehensible, too long, and in cases where you have to use the software anyway, you’re stuck with the license regardless. The only exceptions are the large corporations who have the lawyers, time and money to deal with them. Normal people don’t bother.
Unfortunately, this has some pretty serious side-effects. Aside from the obvious fact that millions of people are in effect agreeing to contracts they’ve never read, one of the common ways that spyware and adware are spread are by having users agree to them without realizing they are doing so.
I think it is time to completely revolutionize the way we deal with software licenses. To do so, I offer the following modest proposals.
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A law should be passed that restricts the length of software licenses for consumer software to no more than 500 words. For comparison: the BSD Open Source license is 225 words, The Claria (formerly Gator) adware license agreement is over 6600 words (15 pages single spaced).
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Software licenses must be written in plain language that can be clearly understood by the average 13 year old.
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Security updates to software may not include any license terms that were not present in the original software.
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No license for released (not beta) software may include any terms that restrict speech, review or benchmarking of the software. For a software publisher to restrict free speech and commentary on their products is shameful and unethical. I do think, however, it’s fair to require that any benchmarks include the source code of the benchmark so people can independently review the results.
My Challenge to Microsoft
As the software industry leader, I call on Microsoft to take the lead in coming up with creative and user friendly solutions to this problem. To start with, try taking the software licensing process out of the hands of your lawyers, and hand it to your user interface people. They’re good, and if they can’t figure out a way to revolutionize software licenses so they work, then we should all go to open source, because the situation will truly be hopeless.
My Challenge to the Government
Yes, I know – asking Congress (which is made up primarily of lawyers) to create laws that simplify license agreements seems like a long shot. But I can dream, right?
How else do you think software licenses need to be changed? Comments welcome.
Sep 5, 2004 | Society & Politics
Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me… well, so says the quote. But honestly, with so many conflicting claims and lies, I’ve become increasingly frustrated by my own inability to figure out what’s actually true. Whether it’s lying through omission, lying through misdirection, or outright lies, it’s awfully hard to extract nuggets of truth from the noise.
So, being a civic minded individual, I did some extensive research, and am pleased to offer this guide to detecting who is lying during this joyful campaign season:
- Anyone who explicitly claims to be telling the truth – is lying. Groups with “truth” in their name, lie. “Swift Boats for Truth” – dead giveaway. If they weren’t lying, they wouldn’t need to convince you otherwise.
- Every political advertisement lies (by omission- obviously).
- All issues ads lie (you know, the kind that aren’t sponsored by the candidate, but rather by their best friend, leading contributor, ex college roommate, etc.)
- All news broadcasts lie. The one exception: Jon Stewart’s Daily Show, which claims to lie, has a higher degree of truth than any news broadcast. This is not surprising because all comedy is ultimately based on truth.
- Anyone claiming the other side is lying, is lying (Michael Moore, Rush Limbaugh, you know the type).
- All the candidates and their spokespersons lie. You see, if they actually said anything truthful the media would squeeze it of any ounce of subtlety and portray it as a mistake or gaff. So the campaigns must stick with carefully polished and scripted sound bites – lies.
- Anyone who mentions 9/11 in a political context more than once in a speech or conversation is lying (it’s the ultimate misdirection). Oh, except for Rudolph Giuliani, who’s the only guy who’s earned the right to say it twice in a speech before it’s a lie.
- Anyone who talks extensively about how great America is, is lying. Real patriots know America is great – we don’t need politicians going on about it. We’d rather hear them explain HOW they’re going to keep America great. And how we’ll pay for it. Specifics please?
- There are probably more – comments are welcome.
Finding the truth is clearly a greater challenge than I ever imagined. And it poses some fundamental challenges when it comes to voting this November. But since it is clear that lies far outnumber the truth, the following axiom, stripped of spin and manipulation, must be fundamentally true:
Since all politicians and media are lying (either through omission, misdirection, or outright), you cannot predict their future actions based on what they say. This implies that you can only anticipate their future actions based on past actions of themselves and their supporters.
Ok, we’re making progress. Having written off the media, the candidates, the ads, the campaigns, and statistics (which are also subject to manipulation and later correction), it becomes remarkably easy to choose a candidate. Let’s consider the major topics:
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Iraq & Terrorism:
Both sides now agree that the arguments for going into Iraq were either outright lies, or the results of gross incompetence. Frankly, I supported going into Iraq because I could not imagine our government either lying about WMD, or being so grossly incompetent as to go to war without an incredibly high degree of certainty on the issue. Spin aside, the buck stops there: It was either a lie or gross incompetence.
If you believe the current administration has learned from their mistakes, and has become highly competent at intelligence and foreign policy, you should stick with Bush. If you’re one of those people who, if you had an employee who lied or was grossly incompetent, would fire them, you should choose Kerry.
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Taxes:
This one is simple. You either choose a Tax and Spend Democrat. Or a Borrow and Spend Republican. Sorry, you can’t have a true responsible economic conservative (control spending and balance the budget) – that was Clinton and he can’t run again.
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Economy:
If you’re making more money, have better job security, and your friends and family are happily employed, the economy is good. If your economic status is uncertain, and you know people who are out of work, the economy is bad. Since the media and statistics lie, all you can base it on is what you see around you.
- Social Issues:
If aborting fetuses and gays getting married is more important to you than security, taxes or the economy, you know who to choose.
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Health Insurance:
If you don’t have health insurance or can’t afford it, and want it, choose Kerry. It’s virtually certain the Democrats will do more than the Republicans on that score.
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Civil Liberties:
If you’re willing to give up more privacy and civil rights in the hope of gaining more security, stick with Bush. If you’re willing to accept more risk in order to keep privacy and civil rights, choose Kerry.
Those are the big ones. There are lots of other issues, but it’s much harder to distill the truth out of lies on those, or to figure out which “experts” might be closer to the truth. But I’ll keep working on it.
Sep 3, 2004 | Security, Software Development
This week I was quoted in an SD Times story about 64 bit Windows. In it I say:
“Migration to 64 bits is likely to be slow, as is migration to any new technology. What’s more, delays of major products from Microsoft are common, so it’s hard to get excited about them.”
Now, for the record, I was not misquoted. Nor was this taken out of context. However, also for the record, I’d like to include the remainder of the quote that was not included in the article:”
Not only are delays on major products common, but as an industry we would much rather Microsoft take the time needed to “do it right”, and make sure the technology is secure and reliable, than to rush something out the door.
Kudos to Microsoft for having the discipline to wait until it’s truly ready to ship.
Now, on another note. I saw the most remarkable phishing email scam today. The misdirected link was subtle and hard to spot in the message source code, even when I knew what I was looking for. I wrote up a description of this IE specific attack at alwaysuseprotection.com. Visit the page using IE – it’s a trip.
Sep 1, 2004 | Society & Politics
The ongoing flap about Kerry’s service in Vietnam is an all too typical example of the media (and others) focusing on triviality and completely missing the bigger picture. Were there bullets flying? Did Kerry bleed on his Purple Heart?
Who cares?
The bottom line is that Kerry did serve in Vietnam. And if he didn’t get shot at in this particular instance, there’s no doubt he was shot at other times. Those boats sailed dangerous waters. Even if he exaggerated the danger on some report 35 years ago, the idea that this should influence today’s election is ludicrous.
But unfortunately our political system is all too often based on the big lie and distraction – shout a lie long and loud enough and people start to care and to believe it.
Or how about flip-flops?
“Flip-flop” is a common insult in this political season. I think it’s overtaken “liberal” as a dirty word (in part because more Democrats are willing to stand up and proudly claim the term, a common schoolyard technique for shutting up a bully). Could the same approach work for “flip-flop?” Absolutely. Why, I myself flip-flopped recently. Just a few months ago I explained why I had no interest in blogging. And here I am, blogging furiously. Flip-flop is a childish way of saying “changing your mind.” If someone learns something new, and has the courage to acknowledge that their previous opinion was wrong and to adopt a stance based on their new knowledge – that’s something to be admired, not condemned.
Is there hope?
They say that California leads the nation, and a recent flap with our Governor gives hope. You remember him, governor Schwarznegger. Just yesterday we were the laughing stock of the world with an open ended recall election that had 135 people running for the office. They laughed harder when we chose an ex-body builder movie star with a thick accent. But guess what – most Californians are absolutely thrilled with the job he’s been doing. But there’s one recent incident that gives true hope for the future.
The legislature was in the midst of their usual annual deadlock on passing a budget. In frustration, Governor Schwarznegger called those who refused to act “girlie men.” The media went into a frenzy: he was sexist, he was homophobic, he was….
Meanwhile, the reaction of most of the population seemed to be “yeah, he was funny. Now pass the d#*# budget!”
In other words, by and large the electorate did not buy into the media distraction, and stayed focused, maybe even appreciated the humor of the Governor using a phrase that was originally used on Saturday Night Live to parody him. And we got our budget.
Weapons of Mass Distraction is also the title of a wonderfully wicked movie. Though a bit hard to find, I highly recommend it. Might be available from Barnes & Noble