CNet has an interview with Irving Wladawsky-Berger from IBM about Linux. I only point to this interview to make fun of Sun’s whiner-in-chief Scott McNeally. The interview mentions that McNeally criticized IBM for jumping into Linux the same way they jumped into Windows NT in the early nineties. I don’t know if Scott paid attention, but Windows NT is ridiculously successful, and I’m certain IBM made boatloads of cash by betting on Windows NT. If Linux is similarly successful, Sun can hang it up.

Microsoft has posted a C# overview on their developer site. There are a few thinly veiled jabs at Java included in the language description, which only further exposes Microsoft’s denial that C# is a Java competitor as an obvious lie. One cool feature they mention in the overview is explicit method overriding, which Java lacks. I’d download the detailed documents that they link to, but they’re executable files. Why do they need to package documents in executables? We have HTML, PDF, RTF, and even Word DOC format for this sort of thing, don’t we?

Sun has posted a sample chapter from a promising new book, Joshua Bloch’s Effective Java Programming. The sample chapter is on substitutes for C constructs that are missing in Java.

How do I hate Network Solutions? Let me count the ways … Their latest shenanigans involve auctioning off lapsed domain names rather than just returning them to the pool of unregistered names. This allows them to do two things; collect more than the standard registration fee for domain names that have already been registered, and more importantly, prevent people from registering those names with another registrar. Sometimes I wonder if it wouldn’t be worth it to throw out the domain name system and start over with something that doesn’t involve Network Solutions at all.

ArsDigita Systems Journal: Redefining Professionalism for Software Engineers.

As part of its raft of new offerings, Microsoft has also created a new programming language called C sharp (C#). The language is based on C and C++, except that it’s supposed to be easier to use, but Microsoft says it’s not a Java competitor. General advice for Microsoft: don’t piss down my back and tell me it’s raining. With any luck, this will force Sun to open up Java further as a response.

Dennis Miller will be one of the new analysts on Monday Night Football. I haven’t watched MNF in years, but I’ll definitely watch the season opener next year, so I guess ABC’s ploy to get attention is working. It will be interesting to see how much Miller knows about football, and whether his snarky and condescending style will make its way into the broadcasts. I don’t think he’ll last long if he mocks the players or the game, whether they deserve it or not.

Here’s Salon’s write up of the .Net press event at Microsoft yesterday.

XML.com is running Simon St. Laurent’s article XML: A Disruptive Technology, which covers the changes and considerations XML is forcing on the existing Web protocols and standards that it uses. The article discusses URIs, HTTP, and MIME-types. Very interesting stuff.

Random thoughts and observations on the latest Microsoft initiative, Microsoft .NET:

• The Microsoft .NET web site is not actually found at www.microsoft.net. The name is really stupid as well, but at least it’s not another contrived acronym. (DNA, anyone?)
• Some vision of the future this is. People have been talking about everything Microsoft has announced for years. Pervasive network connectivity to all devices? Accessing all of your applications through one window? Building applications out of dynamic, downloadable components? These are all other people’s ideas.
• Vaporware? Of course. Microsoft says they’re at least two years away from delivering on any of this. They’re just telling you about it so that you don’t use anyone else’s products if they release them first.
• Microsoft is trying to cut off the air supply for the burgeoning gang of ASPs by announcing their own ASP called bCentral.net.
• Optimists see this as a sign of a new openness from Microsft, an acknowledgement that they don’t rule the Internet. I don’t think I’m buying that. I mean, how do people even know that given that any software based on this initiative is two years out?
• Microsoft’s utter humiliation of its former competitors continues apace. First, Steve Jobs kissed the ring before the crowd at a MacWorld conference a few years ago. Now we see Marc Andreessen swearing fealty to Gates at this announcement. I wonder if we’ll ever see Scott McNeally or Larry Ellison kneeling before the Microsoft throne?