On Fri, Apr 30, 2010 at 11:23 AM, Mayo, Bill <bem...@pittcountync.gov> wrote: > I will refrain from saying what I would like to say about your last > comment. I will not stoop to your typical level of verbal abuse.
If you really found the "Reality Distortion Field" remark hurtful, I apologize, and withdraw it. However, I stand by the rest of my statements. > They are requiring that you use their development tools, based on > the past experience that cross-platform development aimed at the > Mac nearly destroyed the company. If you have followed the history, > then you would know that this is not fiction. I would call it fiction. The Mac fell behind was because they didn't do any significant software development for nearly a decade. While even freaking *Microsoft* was discovering security, preemptive multi-tasking, and memory protection, Apple was still trying to sell people their toy OS for a premium price. So the rest of the world was introduced to things like reliable multimedia and video games, while apps on the Mac struggled to keep up. That also meant app developers found it harder and harder to support the Mac, so fewer and fewer apps were available. Even *Linux* was making better inroads against Microsoft than Apple, and this was back when people still sometimes had to write X11 mode lines by hand. Apple turned around with the release of an OS that could keep up with modern usage, and started producing software that people actually wanted to use. It's not like third-party development tools aren't available for Mac OS X. It's a BSD Unix underneath the pretty GUI; you can install and run whatever you want. Heck, might it even ship with GCC? If third-party development tools are the cause of Apple's downfall, why are they succeeding like never before, now that it's actually *easier* to build *ugly old Unix apps* for the Mac platform? > I am not sure why it is hard to understand that there is a competitive > advantage in having more advanced features than the competition. Allowing third-party development tools (cross-platform *or not*) does not make those features go away. I find the idea that the use of third-party development tools would cause the iPhone's features to become unavailable absolutely ludicrous. If you think that means I'm calling you a moron, so be it. -- Ben ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~
