It’s interesting how the tone and culture of corporate email hasn’t changed in (almost) 30 years. Change Java for some other technology and I feel like I could have gotten that email in my inbox today.
Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)
191–200 of 239 posts
Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)
#192Earlier quoted context omitted.
> They reverse engineered the language and named it differently because they had no rights over JavaScript at the time The story I heard was that it was the Java trademark that was a bigger problem for Microsft naming it JavaScript. But that's somewhat irrelevant as you're right about the more important point about how JScript was reverse engineered from JavaScript. > Even MS is not evil all the time There was a lot…
> yet MS still pushed ahead with IE-specific language features Yeah, they all did though. I was doing frontend dev back then, if we can call it that, it was web development with some JS actually or DHTML for those who remember. Scripting elements was very limited at the beginning, you couldn't access the entire DOM, only forms and images, if I remember correctly, and maybe the decoration of links, that's how the hove…
Yeah MS was hot on COM back then. Even JScript was a COM object IIRC.
Agreed Netscape also introduced their own incompatibilities too, but Netscape didn’t have a desktop monopoly. Though I do agree that IE4 was actually a really good product. If I recall correctly even IE3 loaded pages quicker than Netscape Navigator 3.
I really wanted to like Netscape Communicator but it was hard to overlook just how sluggish it was compared to IE.
As for front end development, I mostly an sysadmin back then but I did have a few websites live (my first being publish in 1994). I even won in the JavaScript category of Planet Source Code (remember that place?) one month for a recreation of the Windows desktop using JS. But I much preferred writing desktop software to web pages (and I still don’t really enjoy frontend dev all that much even now)
Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)
#193Nathan Myhrvold answer is extremely impressive. There is a lot of extremely accurate forecasting in this email from the cheapening of the value of the OS to his extremely interesting idea about storing files on the internet with the File API which is more or less Dropbox before Dropbox.
Reading that you realise how wrong a choice it was to put Ballmer in charge and how much it cost Microsoft.
Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)
#194Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes. I’m 100% sure about that :) Is there a chance you’re thinking about Opera? That didn’t kill Internet Explorer either but it was around before FireFox gained traction.
No, I remember netscape navigator was my main browser up until 2005 or so. I switched in maybe 2003. Maybe I was just a hipster.
The last release of Navigator was in the 90s. There were still Netscape branded browsers after that but it wasn’t called Navigator. However the market share Netscape had at that point was virtually nothing compared to Microsoft/IE and nearly all sites were written to support IE. For all intents and purposes Microsoft had won the browser wars.
Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)
#195Earlier quoted context omitted.
Internet Explorer dominated for years. Microsoft killed Netscape not the other way around. Mozilla helped with the downfall of IE but it was really Google that put the final nail in the coffin. As for backend, Microsoft had some systems running IIS and Apache can run on Windows Server too, but UNIX and Linux was always the dominant platform for web hosting. Java didn’t change anything there. Javas impact on Windows c…
I believe, Javas impact on Windows can be felt most with Android. Android's development began in 2003 first as OS for digital cameras but they pivoted in 2004 to smart phones. At the same time, in 2003, Windows Mobile launched, which goes back to 2000 (Windows Pocket PC) and 1996 (Windows CE). Windows Smartphones were actually a thing used in practice before Android and iOS. Personally, I had a T-Mobile MDA II, for e…
I think it’s a bit of a stretch to say Android has had a bigger impact on Windows then .NET, but each to their own.
It is also worth noting that Android is Google’s own implementation of Java and has nothing to do with Microsoft’s code (J++) nor Sun/Oracles either. So regardless of opinions about “impact”, I’m not really convinced Android is even in the scope of this conversation.
Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)
#196This was super interesting, and it would seem Bill Gates absolutely predicted the effect that not Java, but ultimately interactive web apps in a broad sense would come to have by making it less important to have one operating system or another. Interesting that the reply mostly implied that there wasn't much reason to worry, and that the future and dominance of web apps was still uncertain. But we are reading this em…
The reply was on point and serious . Mainframe still exists and generates billions in revenue. Windows/ Microsoft lost their foothold in a new market. However Microsoft is also transforming into a cloud first company.
Well the cloud is the new mainframe, hence why "Azure OS" is the new Windows.
Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)
#197Earlier quoted context omitted.
> yet MS still pushed ahead with IE-specific language features Yeah, they all did though. I was doing frontend dev back then, if we can call it that, it was web development with some JS actually or DHTML for those who remember. Scripting elements was very limited at the beginning, you couldn't access the entire DOM, only forms and images, if I remember correctly, and maybe the decoration of links, that's how the hove…
Yeah MS was hot on COM back then. Even JScript was a COM object IIRC. Agreed Netscape also introduced their own incompatibilities too, but Netscape didn’t have a desktop monopoly. Though I do agree that IE4 was actually a really good product. If I recall correctly even IE3 loaded pages quicker than Netscape Navigator 3. I really wanted to like Netscape Communicator but it was hard to overlook just how sluggish it was…
For those that have been living outside Windows, MS has been hot on COM since OLE 2.0 days.
Not only are many .NET bindings for Win32, largely based on top of COM, WinDev has doubled down on COM since they rebooted Longhorn ideas into Windows Vista, and WinRT is nothing more than COM with another set of additional interfaces (TL;DR version, it is a bit more actually).
Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)
#198Earlier quoted context omitted.
> which Java engine you wanted your browser to use and Microsoft Java (or whatever it was called) It was called JScript. It was released after JavaScript. I am a peaceful man; never been in a fight with anybody, and oppose the death penalty. The exception is that I think all the people responsible for this clusterfuck of names should be shot.
JScript was their version of JavaScript You could also use VBScript in the browser if you wanted to, it's been an option up to IE 11 IE had pluggable scripting engines, which wasn't a bad idea per se and anyone could write one, it was a simple COM component
ActiveState provided Tcl, Perl and Python versions actually.
Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
I believe, Javas impact on Windows can be felt most with Android. Android's development began in 2003 first as OS for digital cameras but they pivoted in 2004 to smart phones. At the same time, in 2003, Windows Mobile launched, which goes back to 2000 (Windows Pocket PC) and 1996 (Windows CE). Windows Smartphones were actually a thing used in practice before Android and iOS. Personally, I had a T-Mobile MDA II, for e…
I think it’s a bit of a stretch to say Android has had a bigger impact on Windows then .NET, but each to their own. It is also worth noting that Android is Google’s own implementation of Java and has nothing to do with Microsoft’s code (J++) nor Sun/Oracles either. So regardless of opinions about “impact”, I’m not really convinced Android is even in the scope of this conversation.
In a way, Android is Google's J++, with the difference that they got away with it.
Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)
#200Earlier quoted context omitted.
Funny how all my "nerdy" friends love Gates now. I guess 100B$+ is enough to afford PR team that can convince public you are no longer "more evil than satan himself".
Well, Gates is absolutely terrible at PR and doesn't tick any of the boxes of being chic, unless it's some kind of so uncool that he's cool kind of thing. Despite this and more importantly despite his reputation in business and the often laughable products MS produced, his tremendous philanthropy really changed my perspective on him. In a world where there are mega-billionaires, he's my least unfavourite. He's doing…
Eh, I would say he puts a lot of effort intro creating image of benevolent nerd philantropist. Point in case: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hnZJIRd6Qw There must have been a team of people dedicated to carefully crafting this video, creating props, there's even a dozen or so actors there (each in the background for just a few seconds). It looks like someone put a lot of effort into this and it surely consumed thousands of dollars (my uneducated guess is somewhere in 10-100k$ range). To what end other than working on his personal brand?
Speaking of malaria, after googling for 3 minutes it seems he spent around 2B$ on it. Does it really matter? Yes and no. Maybe it had impact on people's lives, but given Gates' net value is 100B$+, giving away a billion or two does not matter. It will not affect his quality of life in any significant way. He could give away a few dozen billions more and still will spend rest of his life living in luxury that I could only dream off. Sure, better to fight malaria than buy another yacht, but still, it's easy decision to make when you have that much money.