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| GeoCommunity Mailing List |
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| Mailing List Archives |
| Subject: | RE: GISList: Automatic data recording |
| Date: |
07/02/2003 12:35:00 AM |
| From: |
Dimitri Rotow |
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I don't mean to jump into a hornet's nest (ah... well, why not...) but it is
very important to debate the assumptions people have behind holy cows, be
they received wisdom regarding php or asp. The main issue, to me, is not
whether you or I would like to use php or asp for our personal programming
but rather which is the best match to the business situation surrounding any
given customer requirement. I don't know about you, but after over 30
years of programming I don't really care which language or environment I use
anymore so much as what I do with it. They all have plusses and minuses. But
unfortunately for our personal sense of taste, the unrelenting particularity
of profit and loss does not give many organizations or individuals the
ability to ignore the cold economics of a given situation, and the cold
economics tend to strongly favor Microsoft for most commercial or
organizational users. That is why an old UNIX guy like me finds the very
rich ecological niche of Microsoft so compelling.
> Take a look at
> http://www.perlmonth.com/perlmonth/issue4/benchmarks.html
> If you don't like those benchmarks, maybe you can show us yours.
>
More accurately, Microsoft's. Google the Microsoft site and you'll find
plenty of information on .asp performance.
> This is a non-sequitor. The number of different reported flaws has
> nothing to do with the number of instances running.
>
??? I don't understand why you would write that. It has a lot to do with
the number of instances running and with the number of people (hundreds of
millions, if not over a billion) using it. Quite obviously, no one notices
defects in things that go unused, and no one bothers to attack things that
are not used. Those things that are widely used, it seems to me, would get
much more attention.
> Go to www.netcraft.com - type in the website of your choice. I picked
> these. I think I've mentioned before that you guys use Apache on Unix
> for your front page. Now I notice that you also use PHP. Good stuff, eh?
Well, that would be a good argument if the Manifold pages were not so
utterly trivial and simplistic (in their webstuff structure if not their
content). You don't need an elaborate, dynamically-served page to deliver
worthwhile content, no more than authors for thousands of years have needed
more than pen and ink and paper to write immortal text.
The main Manifold pages are all painfully banal http and use neither PHP nor
ASP, nor do they involve commerce or any security issues. They're just
plain, old web pages with text and images in them. On the other hand, take
a look at any of our Internet Map Server sites and you'll note they are all
.asp. Why? Because it is a cost effective way to proceed without having to
think much about programming except to consider pretty much the same
Microsoft-isms that permeate our commercial work. Obviously, the people who
created Manifold know a lot about programming but that doesn't mean that
they wish to create something that requires a lot of programming from
customers who would rather not be writing code.
>
> www.manifold.net - Apache Unix PHP 4.3.0
> www.ibm.com - Apache Unix.
> www.whitehouse.gov - Apache Linux
> www.fidelity.com - Netscape-Enterprise Solaris
> www.citibank.com - Solaris
> www.direct.com - Apache Unix (my credit union)
>
I trust you are not making a case based on statistics (since no doubt you
know perfectly well a self-selected sample of six web pages proves nothing
about an Internet universe of millions of sites). Survey the web at large,
say, a few million sites and compare those on which real commerce is done.
Microsoft has some good papers on these, which you can find by Googling the
Microsoft site.
> > their shoes pre-made. Note also that most people don't hire a
> consultant to
> > make their shoes for them when they can easily buy them off the shelf.
>
> Tsk, tsk. I hope you get that message through to the management at
> Manifold.
>
I think they find my opinions amusing at times, but as regards the above
case they already know it, lucky for everyone involved. That's why our
products work in Windows and the company heavily exploits Microsoft's
technologies. If you want to make money and have a world-wide impact it is
madness to ignore the choices made by 94% of computing humanity.
>
> I guess you don't worry about ticking off the PHP programmers in your
> company who keep your website running. I'm glad I don't work for you!
>
As far as I know every programmer who works here wants to create cool
software that lots of people can use, that lots of people can afford, that
blows away legacy junk at one twentieth of the price, and that makes lots of
money for all concerned. These are honorable and highly motivating factors
and, to me, make a
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