The compatible application

[Leif K-Brooks]

Java is not OS dependent. It is a browser plugin.

I'm sorry, but I honestly can't resist nitpicking a bit here. Feel free
to ignore this post entirely.

Depending on how you look at it, *everything* is either OS-independent
or OS-Dependant. There's nothing about Win32 -- or Carbon, Cocoa, GTK,
Qt, Java, and the other hundreds of other frameworks available -- that
ties them to one operating system. Win32 has been implemented for fewer
operating systems than Java (just Windows and Unix), but that's
irrelevant: it *could* be implemented on any modern operating system if
someone wanted to enough.

Even processor differences don't decide what's platform Dependant and
what isn't. Java has its own byte code, which is fairly similar to a
machine language; there's nothing stopping someone from building a Java
Physical Machine (as opposed to the Java Virtual Machine used to run
Java byte code on other processors), it's just not done much. Why is x86
machine code any less portable than Java byte code, besides having fewer
emulators available?

 

[Jeffrey Silverman]

A Java app *may* work, client side Java support is not great, it may be
present on the client system but not enabled in the UA. I for one refuse
to allow Java on my system.

Why? No, really. Why?

 

[Spartanicus]

Why? No, really. Why?

1) I don't like slow bloatware (Sun Java), and I don't trust MS so I
removed their "Java".
2) I've never missed out on anything because of not having Java.

 

[Joel Shepherd]

I'm only considering a Windows based app.[/QUOTE]

Well, then there's the answer to your originally inquiry.



The Java app will take to long to

develop and most of the users are Windows based.

Thanks,
Brett

--
Joel.

http://www.cv6.org/
"May she also say with just pride:
I have done the State some service."

 

[Joel Shepherd]

(Argh - accidentally shot off a response before complete...)

I'm only considering a Windows based app.[/QUOTE]

Well, there's the answer to your original inquiry.

A Windows-only app does not -- by definition -- have to run on various
platforms, and the range of browsers it runs on may also be quite
limited.

Web content is supposed to be accessible to browsers across a wide range
of capabilities, running on any platform that can support a browser.
Some browsers don't support the 'G' in GUI, some do, but the basic
content is supposed to be accessible to all. So it's no wonder that the
functionality offered by forms (really the only vaguely interactive
content that straight HTML can deliver) is fairly basic.

It's not clear to me what issues firewalls and antivirus utilities can
cause, assuming you're not using unusual ports or attempting to access
things on the client end which you shouldn't.

--
Joel.

http://www.cv6.org/
"May she also say with just pride:
I have done the State some service."

 

[Brett]

(Argh - accidentally shot off a response before complete...)

I'm only considering a Windows based app.

Well, there's the answer to your original inquiry.

A Windows-only app does not -- by definition -- have to run on various
platforms, and the range of browsers it runs on may also be quite
limited.

Web content is supposed to be accessible to browsers across a wide range
of capabilities, running on any platform that can support a browser.
Some browsers don't support the 'G' in GUI, some do, but the basic
content is supposed to be accessible to all. So it's no wonder that the
functionality offered by forms (really the only vaguely interactive
content that straight HTML can deliver) is fairly basic.

It's not clear to me what issues firewalls and antivirus utilities can
cause, assuming you're not using unusual ports or attempting to access
things on the client end which you shouldn't.[/QUOTE]

Here's an example: This one person was having problems using an ActiveEdit
item on one of my webpages. ActiveEdit provides a WSYWIG type of area
people can edit web pages in. It uses JavaScript and I think ActiveX. For
this one person, the AE area was blank. It was just a plain looking webpage
there. We went through all of his IE settings, had him clear cookies/cache,
close all browsers, disable the firewall, reboot. Still nothing. Finally,
after disabling the firewall and antivirus software, it worked. This was a
very time consuming process.

Had the program been written in Visual Basic for example as an EXE, none of
this would have happened. Either the EXE runs completely or not at all.
Just install it and allow port 80, which the EXE will use to update the web
database.

Brett

 

[Jeffrey Silverman]

1) I don't like slow bloatware (Sun Java), and I don't trust MS so I
removed their "Java".

Allright, I guess that's reasonable. So you run FreeBSD with no GUI (Or
maybe Fluxbox) on a 486 then, right?

2) I've never missed out on anything because of not having Java.

Well, that may be true. But there are many apps written in Java that work
well and feel like an app written for the native platform. examples
include

http://www.arachnoid.com/arachnophilia/
http://www.javazoom.net/jlgui/jlgui.html
http://jalbum.net/index.jsp
http://www.limewire.com

and many others...

 

[Jeffrey Silverman]

Had the program been written in Visual Basic for example as an EXE, none of
this would have happened. Either the EXE runs completely or not at all.
Just install it and allow port 80, which the EXE will use to update the web
database.

Like Joel said, "there's the answer..."

What was the original query again?

 

[mbstevens]

Allright, I guess that's reasonable. So you run FreeBSD with no GUI (Or
maybe Fluxbox) on a 486 then, right?

Fluxbox is sweet, no matter what powers your machine has.
(I usually run it as an extra X session along with KDE.)

Well, that may be true. But there are many apps written in Java that work
well and feel like an app written for the native platform. examples
include

http://www.arachnoid.com/arachnophilia/
http://www.javazoom.net/jlgui/jlgui.html
http://jalbum.net/index.jsp
http://www.limewire.com

and many others...

I agree about applications, and the server is fine.
Applets, on the other hand, are about as useful as a bicycle
to a fish.

Newest Now they've got out the 3D Looking Glass desktop project.
It looks like it is no more usable than a 2d system,
but I'd like to play with it. Since java isn't open source,
I doubt it will gain a developer base in the Linux community.

 

[Toby Inkster]

A Windows-only app does not -- by definition -- have to run on various
platforms

It doesn't *have* to, but it probably should.

If you're doing anything complex, you will probably get into a bit of a
bother with making it work on:

- 16-bit DOS-based Windows (up to Windows 3.11)
- 32-bit DOS-based Windows (95, 95-osr2, 98, 98SE, ME)
- 32-bit NT-based Windows (NT4, 2000, XP, 2003)

And of course NT-based versions of Windows are available for various
different processor flavours -- x86, Alpha, x86-64, ...