TOO MANY COOKS

<geekpost>I read with interest the latest in a spate of flame wars and “informed opinions” regarding the Java IDE brouhaha between the folks who like to code using the Eclipse IDE and those who think that NetBeans is the bee’s knees. (FULL DISCLOSURE: I’m both an Eclipse and a NetBeans user, although I’ve been using NetBeans pretty exclusively as of late.)  In Too Many Cooks Spoils the IDE, Robert Thornton posits that Eclipse’s successful nature is causing it to be a less capable IDE than NetBeans. While there’s some truth to the argument that the confusion of all the Eclipse plugins and such hampers usability, that’s pretty much admitting that Eclipse is a victim of its own success. I don’t hear anyone complaining that Linux’s myriad packages makes it a less appropriate operating system than, say Windows, although the exact same argument can be made. When (says I) the confusion of Eclipse packages and “personalities” (an Eclipse-ism) becomes an overwhelming issue (and I suspect it will, soon) subprojects will form to steer specific personalities into convenient distributions to alleviate the pain of the problem. It’s childish to complain that the phenomenal rate of Eclipse adoption amongst third party tools vendors gives it a distinct disadvantage, although clearly NetBeans’ simplicity and pretty much single-vendor involvement does give it more of a “designed under a single roof” feel. My take on the whole Eclipse vs. NetBeans war? In a nutshell, there’s room for two competing IDE’s but Sun needs to figure out what its value proposition is for its entire app dev and deployment stack is. Giving it all away doesn’t add to the bottom line and whatever strategy they are pursuing isn’t either.</geekpost>

2 QUIET

Two of my frequent reads seem to have gone silent as of yesterday. Benador Associates, a conservative think-tank and enplaned, a blog about the aviation industry both seem to have shut their doors at some point over the weekend. I hope it's only temporary in both cases, but I fear the worst. Sigh.

FALCON DOWN

SpaceX’s revolutionary inexpensive rocket, the Falcon 1, was lost 25 seconds into its inaugural flight. I got to watch the video feed of the launch and saw the rocket camera roll before losing the feed. Since it was just before the Sabbath, EST, that the launch took place, I had to turn off the computer and couldn’t find out conclusively what happened. Que Sera, although it’s worth noting that all the major rocketry attempts suffered from poor track records at their inception. At 6.7 million a copy, the Falcon is certainly cheap enough to plug on and keep trying. Keep the faith, SpaceX, you'll get there!

SCOOPED

Was watching Domestic Disturbance the other day (fell asleep & never got through it) with wifey and noticed yet another role in which Steve Buscemi gets bumped off. It’s become his M.O. Been meaning to blog about it. Sure enough, this morning the New York Times beats me to the punch. Read: They Keep Killing Steve Buscemi, but He’s Not Complaining (NYTimes, free registration req’d, will time out after a few days.)

ALL YOUR DOG ARE BELONG TO US*

This Popular Science article about “BigDog,” a U.S. Army sponsored, Sherpa-style robot built to accompany soldiers on patrol carrying several hundred pounds of gear is neat. The accompanying video, through, is outrageously cool. You’d think you’re watching some crazy Blue Man Group sketch or something. The legs on this beastie are uncannily human.

*Play on the All Your Base Are Belong To Us internet phenomenon, circa 2001-2002

QUICK NOTE

Baby Bayla Golda (after my wife’s great-grandmother) was born Sunday night, March 19 (20 Adar, 5766) Mother, daughter and big sister Basya are all doing great! Ecstasy tinged with chaos reigns for now.

FORTUNATE CIRCUMSTANCE

I wonder if anyone has caught on to the happy circumstance that many of our reservists fighting in Iraq have extensive law enforcement experience. It seems that this type of experience should be quite valuable fighting the “asymmetric” war we seem to be caught up in. Also, David Ingatius comments on our military’s increased competence in executing the war.

WHAT OUR PARENTS KNEW

My father, OB”M, when he would sing to us as children, changed the ending to the song “There was an old lady who swallowed a fly.” Instead of “perhaps she’ll die,” he sang “Perhaps she’ll get sick!” which seemed perfectly natural to me and my siblings when we were little and perfectly hilarious when we got older. As it turns out, my wife’s mother did something similar with “It’s raining, it’s pouring.” Instead of “he went to bed and bumped his head and couldn’t get up in the morning” she sang “he got up late in the morning.” Which I just used as further proof that Lorraine and I were truly meant for each other…