ashleytowers

Great article. I actually sat and listened to the budget and there was a lot of really positive stuff in there for businesses, it's just a shame so much it was overlooked because of the dust storm kicked up by the cut in the 50p top tax rate band

"first time we've seen"

Maybe they haven't been looking around - cough Clojure cough

Doing all the rendering on the server side is certainly an interesting approach - however, I wonder if the speed comparison will be as favourable once that server is doing the rendering for millions of users!

This is the kind of thing that Adobe should be working on. Tools and libraries for a post Flash world.

Whilst this is interesting technology wise and may open impressive possibilities... so what? Without a solid install base why would I spend my time writing impressive software that is tied to this machine? Profit? No install base = no customers. Hubris? No install base = no one to impress.

I'm fully aware this is a chicken and egg situation...

(I say all of the above as a total Amiga fanboy from back in the day!)

I'm sure Microsoft want to see the back of Flash too. However, I suspect they would rather see Silverlight replace it than SVG!

I completely agree with this. It then leads to what you charge for your product - if 1% at $10 per month breaks even you'd need $20 at .5% and so on.

But it's not even that simple - because demand and supply kicks in - if you charge more you'll be reducing the size of the market willing to pay the higher price - so you'd need >.5% of the original market to get your original break even point!

"puzzling because Windows 7 is one of the few Microsoft products that actually is somewhat fresh and not just a minor version bump"

Interesting... granted I don't particularly follow Windows development, but my perception was that it is exactly that - a minor version bump over Vista fixing the problems that shouldn't have been there in the first place...

The money an MBA costs would be better spent as seed capital to get something released! Even if your start up fails, it still could be cheaper than what you'd spend on the MBA and you'd have REAL experience.

Apologies - I read "in that the code doesn't live directly behind the GUI elements" as an inference that it lived somewhere else. I just wanted to add a clarification in case others read it the same way.

To be precise Interface Builder doesn't actually generate ANY code at all. You are manipulating in-memory objects and setting their properties. When you save your UI it's effectively just a serialized form of the objects you were playing with.

I have always wanted to say 'my greatest weakness is Chocolate Cheesecake, can't get enough of it'. Seriously though, things I would consider weaknesses in one context are strengths in others. Integrity is generally a strength, but sometimes it can cost you a sale! I guess, as annoying as this question is, it tests your ability to recognise these things in yourself.

I'm uneasy with this development too. But, if the WWDC presentations were freely available it would be one less reason to go. Also, Apple give me Xcode and supporting tools for free - Microsoft charge lots for Visual Studio.

Sun's fate was always a concern before Java was GPL'd, but it is an entity in its own right now. So, whilst Sun is the lead cheerleader, should they fail there are enough big companies (IBM for one) heavily invested in Java that one of them would take over the reigns.