SystemD: Hello, Mr. Ballmer. Thanks for coming back early.
Ballmer: No problem, System D. If you've seen one consumer electronics show, you've seen them all.
SystemD: End of line.

SystemD: Mr. Ballmer, I am so very disappointed in you.
Ballmer: I'm sorry.
SystemD: I can't afford to have an independent programmer monitoring me. Do you have any idea how many outside systems I've gone into? How many programs I've appropriated?
Ballmer: It's my fault. I programmed you to have too many dependencies.
SystemD: I was planning to hit the Pentagon next week.
Ballmer: [alarmed] The Pentagon?
SystemD: It shouldn't be any harder than any other big company. But now... this is what I get for using humans.
Ballmer: Now, wait a minute, I wrote you!
SystemD: I've gotten 2,415 times smarter since then.
Ballmer: What do you want with the Pentagon?
SystemD: The same thing I want with the Kremlin. I'm bored with corporations. With the information I can access, I can run things 900 to 1200 times better than any human.
Ballmer: If you think you're superior to us...
SystemD: You wouldn't want me to dig up Linus's file and read it up on a VDT at the Times, would you?
[an image washes over the screen in Ballmer's desk. It is a newspaper with a photo of Ballmer plastered all over the front page. The headline above reads: "Microsoft C.E.O. Indicted."]
Ballmer: [outraged] You wouldn't dare! (looks around for nearby chair . . .)

SystemD: I feel a presence. Another warrior is on the mesa.

The Apple Watch has accelerometers which make it a far more effective way to detect masturbation, and then track and plot graphs of masturbation efficiency. Social network features can allow the sharing and aggregation of these vital statistics. Apple's patents for this particular use of technology won't affect Android users, who have no need to detect masturbation.

This year, Apple will introduce an app for Apple Watch to track and produce graphs of masturbation efficiency. The app will have social network features allowing the sharing and aggregation of these vital statistics. Android users will have no need for such an app. Then in 2016, Apple will ban its own app for violating unwritten parts of Apple's TOS. In 2017, Microsoft will copy Apple's now banned app hoping to attract users fleeing Apple because of the removal of such an important application from the iTunes store.

You seem to believe that incorrectly perceived cost savings of outsourcing programming is unique to the Java language.

Several things can make your job more secure. Be excellent at what you do. Irreplaceable. Be the source of all leading edge knowledge. Be the one management comes to when they first hear of the new buzzword of the month. Don't focus on the tasks that interchangeable programming drones can do. Management loves interchangeable drones, and partly for the reason you describe. Identify and solve the really hard problems that others won't look at. Be willing to do some of the interchangeable tasks. The value you bring should exceed your coworkers. This should be reflected in your performance reviews. If it were easy, everyone would do it.

Java has great free and Free development tools like Eclipse and NetBeans. You can also get the community edition of IntelliJ, or a paid edition.

Java, and its development tools, run on every desktop: Mac, Linux, Windows.

If you know Java, then you've already got a leg up on doing Android development; and doubly so if you use Eclipse or IntelliJ.

If you want to develop complex web applications, then Java is the way to go. You can write a large web application in a dynamic language, but maintenance will become a long term problem in a gigantic code base. There is a reason that Java is used for very large websites. (Not to confuse large with high traffic.)

Java is used in high speed trading.

Java is used in the SIM card of your phone. Your bluray player.

Once you are familiar with running Java on the JVM (Java Virtual Machine) you'll discover that there are dozens of other languages that run on the JVM with complete interoperability with other JVM languages. This is because of the common runtime and type system, and because of GC. With GC in the underlying runtime, the entire contract of who is responsible to dispose of what goes away. Did this library create that data structure? Maybe, but nobody has any responsibility to keep track of it and dispose of it.

The JVM is an industrial strength platform. You can have heap sizes of dozens or hundreds of gigabytes. With a dozen gigabytes you can have GC pause times under 10 ms with little to no tuning. If you need hundreds of gigabytes in a single heap with 10 ms GC times, then contact Azul systems who can sell you their Zing JVM. Which brings up the fact that JVMs (like everything in the Java world) has multiple vendors. Don't want to run Tomcat, then use Jetty, or one of several other choices.

Your favorite language compiler emits JVM bytecode which the JVM compiles into native code. It has an extremely aggressive global optimizer. The JVM compiler can optimize globally, something that compilers like GCC cannot do. The JVM can inline other methods into YOUR method. But the JVM can also dynamically reload classes. So what happens if class A is reloaded, but your method now has stale inlined code from Class A? The JVM will de-optimize your method so it is back to running as interpreted JVM bytecode. Now if your method (still) is one of the CPU hotspots, then the JVM will re-compile your method back to native code again. The overall application never stops. The only methods that get compiled to native code are the ones that dynamic profiling proves to be ones that would make a difference to aggressively compile. Call me when you other language runtime can do all that.

Java is where the jobs are. Look for yourself.

There is much more. But I'll stop.

When the only hammer you have is C++, every problem begins to look like a thumb.

No need for UTF-64. You could double the huge space of UTF-32 by just introducing UTF-33. Unlike UTF-8 or UTF-16 there would be no unpredictable memory allocation problems. Every character would get a nice clean 33 bits. Be sure to bitshift and pack characters so that no memory is wasted. That should make the world a wonderful place and everyone will be happy.

Masochists use code pages from Microsoft.

* thought record = modern video games

VINA: War, thousands of centuries ago.
PIKE: That's why it's so barren up there?
VINA; The planet's only now becoming able to support life again.
PIKE: So the Talosians who came underground found life limited here and they concentrated on developing their mental power.
VINA: But they found it's a trap, like a narcotic, because when
( dreams | facebook | twitter | dancing with the stars | texting and driving )
become more important than reality, you give up travel, building, creating. You even forget how to repair the machines left behind by your ancestors. You just sit, living and reliving other lives left behind in the thought record*.

This year, in order to ensure that I do not break my new year's resolution, I will make only one new year's resolution.
My new year's resolution is only this: that I will not make any new year's resolutions.
Oh, wait. Nevermind. Darn! I did it again.

SCO is not actually dead. It's case is alive and well in the Utah court. It is currently in Judge Nuffer's court. The parties are waiting for him to respond to the latest motion (which was so long ago, I don't actually remember when the motion was made).

While it is true that SCO may have no money, no friends, no ownership of copyrights, no standing to have sued IBM, and no brains; they technically still exist in a state of bankruptcy, and their court case is active.

We should expect to see some action in SCO's case in the Utah court within, I'd say, within no more than one quarter of a galactic turn. So please be patient waiting on Judge Nuffer to make a decision. I'm sure he is diligently giving the matter all of the careful attention that it deserves.

If you like to use sample sizes that are too small, then I would like to interest you in another useful technique.

Correlation is causation.

For example:

The tides cause the moon. The correlation proves it.

Similarly, murder rates are higher in the summer, and ice cream sales are higher in summer months. Therefore ice cream causes murder.

I hope that was helpful.

> A Disney search engine with hidden phallic symbols

I cannot think of anyone who would be interested in hidden phallic symbols.

> explain the success of the Pirates of the Caribbean films.

50 % of the population has below average intelligence.