Microsoft: A reality check

Opinion, Tech News No Comments

MS_logo I’ve been using Microsoft Windows since I realized that my 8-bit Kaypro wasn’t the wave of the future. Not on phones, mind you – I could never see downgrading from Palm to one of Microsoft’s many mobile versions and I doubt I’ll see a compelling reason to downgrade from Android to the Windows Mobile 7 either. A downgrade to iPhone + AT&T is equally unlikely.

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When mobile newsletters go bad

Opinion No Comments

Note: My thanks to the Droid Bugs blog for detailed instructions on capturing Droid screenshots on a PC via USB cable.

bad_mobile_1 While reading my email (Gmail) on my Motorola Droid this morning, I found several industry newsletters waiting for me. That last one caught my eye, so I opened it to find …

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PhpStorm/WebStorm released

Tech No Comments

PhpStorm 1.0 and WebStorm 1.0 have been released by JetBrains. Pricing is about where I had hoped it would be – and even better until September 1, 2010.

For PhpStorm

  • Commercial license until September 1, $149, $199 after
  • Personal license until September 1, $49, $99 after
  • Freebies are available for classroom and open source project use

For WebStorm

  • Commercial license until September 1, $99, $149 after
  • Personal license until September 1, $39, $69 after
  • Freebies are available for classroom and open source project use

Both IDEs are available for Windows, Mac OS, and Linux and both have 45-day trial downloads available.

Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with JetBrains in any way and have no financial interest in the company or its products. I have been using the PhpStorm beta for several months.

Dinosaur sightings

Tech No Comments

Kaypro II I’ve been trying to decide how to replace/ refurbish my aging self-built home workstation (XP, 4 GB RAM, 2.13Ghz Core 2 Duo processor). I have all the software I need for a software and web development powerhouse, so I need a platform to really take advantage of the toolkit.

With those thoughts in the back of my mind, I came across an article on Tech Republic entitled “Dust off that dinosaur computer”. Naturally, that got me thinking about – not my next, but my first computer (ca. 1983).

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Write a compiler the easy way

Tech No Comments

no_lex_yaccGot an idea for a new programming language? Thinking about implementing one on a new platform? It may be easier than you think. Early in my teaching career, I got interested in the problems that confront – and sometimes discourage – novice programmers. One of the problems that beginners had (and probably continue to have) is that they focus more on syntax than on semantics. That is, they get so hung up on how to express something in, say, C or Java (syntax) that they neglect to ensure that what they are trying to express actually makes sense (semantics).

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