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Comment Re:Damnit (Score 1) 302

And don't forget about bugs with Java itself. We spent about half a day trying to figure out why an application that had been functioning until a Java upgrade stopped talking to the MS-SQL server it used, until we stumbled across JDK-7103725. We had to rollback until it was fixed (which actually took a few builds). There is a tiny bit of truth to the "Write once, break everywhere." troll.

I HAD forgotten the bugs... until I took on this project. That too has been part of the problem. I remember all too clearly now. :-/

And since the original project actually started in January 2002, a bunch of the code was actually written for Java 1.3 (and then, 3 years later, when the project was complete and in testing, ran on Java 1.4 and eventually a combo of 1.4.2 and 1.5).

Comment Re:Damnit (Score 1) 302

I am working on a 80 000 lines long Java web application in the last 15 years. I have upgraded through 5 major versions, from Java 1.1 to 1.2 to 1.3 to 1.4 to 5 to 6. I do not remember a single issue related to any of these upgrades. There vere about 2 minor issues when we migrated from Unix to Windows to Linux (related to the case sensitivity of the file system).

(1) Try Java 7 - more breaks there than in 6

(2) 80,000 lines of code is a joke compared to 74 GIGABYTES of code with tons of shared custom and outside vendor libraries, running to interconnect FIVE DOZEN servers running a multitude of server daemons, spread across RHEL, RHAS, RHES, Solaris (multiple versions), CentOS, Windows (multiple versions), on x86/64 and non x86/64 hardware - and those run on multiple Java versions in various Java engines (Sun, Oracle, IBM) and in various Java application servers (WebLogic, WebSphere, Tomcat, Covalent, and more). And since it covers virtually everything (in scope of calls and libraries), both Sun and outside vendor wise, we've run into a lot of deprecated calls - and numerous other issues.

(3) Some of the infrastructure components will need to be "upgraded" onto a new OS - for instance, components of IBM FileNet P8 that used to "run best" on Solaris are now being "upgraded" onto RHEL 7 ("upgraded" is in quotes, because it's an upgrade migration where the actual installed version isn't really being upgraded - its settings and data are being migrated onto the newer FileNet version).

(4) Numerous of the outside libraries (for instance the ancient FileNet libraries that *FileNet* (not IBM) wrote) are not compliant with Java 6 or above (IBM for instance, fixed that in later releases - doesn't help us until the rest of the code is corrected to work with the new libraries and Java 7).

I think comparing a tiny (in comparison) 80,000 line project to the scope of our infrastructure is where and why you're seeing different results. I envy you.

Comment Re: Damnit (Score 1) 302

Not saying Java is neglected. I'm saying if his systems are dependent on Java 1.4 then the code written in Java has been neglected.

Oh so horrendously neglected. Gigabytes of it. Good news is, me and my team are guaranteed a job for ages to come. ;-)

Bad news is, ugh... bringing gigabytes of inter-related Java code up to snuff is oh so much fun. :-P

Comment Smelling more fishy every day. (Score 5, Insightful) 227

It's amazing how they "found" these... I would have thought that computers would make it impossible to "lose" such funds - even with the most simplistic of accounting programs. The more I hear, the more it sounds like something else is going on (like the principles of Mt Gox trying to run off with as many BitCoins as they can). It's like watching a soap opera.

Comment Re:Damnit (Score 4, Insightful) 302

What the fuck are you going on about? Java 8 supports all the previous versions without a problem. Same for Java 7, and all the others before it. If you write code that breaks because of backwards compatibility issues, you're a retard.

No, they most definitely do NOT. We inherited an infrastructure (from a company we bought) that relies heavily on Java 1.4.2 and Java 1.5 (both on the server end and on the client end). Many of the (entirely internal) apps and servlets will not run in Java 6, much less Java 7. Believe me, we've tried. Too much deprecated stuff (not to mention security keys from Sun that haven't been changed in over half a decade).

We've got a two year long project going on to upgrade everything - but because so many libraries are shared (including *SUN* libraries that don't work in Java 6/7) across hundreds of projects, it's going to be an upgrade nightmare. In total, we have GIGABYTES of code, spread across a pretty large infrastructure (comprised of over a hundred servers and 5 racks of SAN).

Of course, our plans are to ensure that all code is up to snuff so we never run into this again - but we had no choice in this matter, since we neither wrote nor planned the original code bases. But what WE do going forward doesn't resolve what we have to do in order to move forward.

Perhaps you simply haven't done any real Java coding on an Enterprise level? If you had, you'd never had made such a post.

Comment Re:Don't they have to fly that thing around? (Score 1) 330

If my memory's correct, one of the issue was that the car needed to have a certain minimal acceleration that couldn't be delivered by an electric engine, with all the weight it would have to pull. If I'm right, and the requirements didn't change, well...

Except, especially with all wheel drive and two to four motors, such is no longer true - as Tesla has proven with motors that aren't particularly large in a car that's considerably heavy compared to its gas counterparts.

The correct statement would have been " the car needed to have a certain minimal acceleration that couldn't be delivered (by GM) by an electric engine (as GM has no interest in doing anything that leads credence to the viability of any electric vehicles." The same would apply to other automakers - but more especially to the EV1 destroying, battery technology suppressing GM.

Considering the size of the vehicle (figure mega-Suburban, extended, if you don't recognize the truck platform mentioned), plenty of battery power could be put into it, and four larger motors (than the ONE motor in the Model S) could also fit - as would Subaru's concept 3 motor (two rear, one front) design. As a matter of fact, with all wheels independently driven via computer, there's also the increase in traction to consider for quick (from stop or slow speed) acceleration.

Comment Really? (Score 1) 187

Anyone who can't see the yellow box with the word "Ad" in it shouldn't be in the Internet. My opinion on this, is that this new method actually makes it far easier to see which ones are ads, since each such result is clearly labeled right at the beginning of the link-out.

The people who would miss this or be confused by it are the same ones who'd already have so many infections on their computer from clicking idiotic things that it's unlikely their browser would even load Google. ;-)

Comment Re:Is "impact" such a bad thing? (Score 1) 183

Nature doesn't "consider" anything. Your argument is basically that nature will adapt around us. Yes, it will..... but it might "adapt" in ways that eliminate important species, destroy biodiversity, and generally ravage the environment around us. Nature may "adapt" in ways that suck total ass for both us and millions of other species.

Comment Re:Becuz (Score 3, Interesting) 273

But, seriously, we've only solved the universal literacy problem over about the last 50-150 years(depending on when you consider it "solved"),

Sadly, you are only correct if you are equating "the ability to read (anything)" as literacy. There are states where the functionally illiterate rate is staggering. The figures on the DOE sites are very misleading, since they consider the ability to read "basic prose" to indicate "literacy" - when in reality, the "deeper numbers" indicate "21 percent of adults in the U.S. read below a 5th grade level, and 19 percent of high school graduates can't read.". The numbers are even worse if one expects an adult to read at what's considered an adult level - someplace decently over 50%.

and it's made a huge difference for how well society functions.

The true situation does indeed impact how well society (in this country) works. And we can see that ignorance, lack of education and lack of literacy driving some lunatic policies.

Comment Re:Is "impact" such a bad thing? (Score 5, Insightful) 183

Because we have power lines everywhere and as far as I know we haven't really spent a lot of time considering the possibility that a simple power line is a de facto boundary to an animal's habitat. It's kind of a big deal when there are serious, important aspects of land use planning and environmental conservation that absolutely rely on accurately predicting and knowing an animal's range and habitat.

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