July 10, 2011
"Is Silverlight dead?” I replied: “No, but it has seen better days."

—

From Silverlight is Dead, Long Live XAML.

I’m surprised, because I never had the perception of Silverling taking off; although that it has seen better days it’s quite relative.

I’ve never used Silverlight, and I have a quite decent online life (that’s harder to say without Flash, for example), but the big news behind this is that Microsoft wants HTML5 and Javascript to be the main application platform in Windows 8. That sounds like screw you .NET developers!

I couldn’t care less about the next Windows version, but it’s true that Microsoft embracing a standard it’s been dangerous in the past. You know that embrace and extend motto.

I hope it doesn’t mean that we’re going to see standard HTML5/Javascript applications that work in Microsoft systems only.

by jjm on 11:23am  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZPorZy6y7SRt
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(Notes: 7)
  
Filed under: HTML5 Javascript Silverlight Microsoft Windows 8 Standard 
April 30, 2010
"The distinction between the availability of source code and the ownership of the intellectual property in that available source code is critical. Today, intellectual property rights for H.264 are broadly available through a well-defined program managed by MPEG LA. The rights to other codecs are often less clear, as has been described in the press."

—

From IEBlog about HTML5 video an IE9.

Oh, come on: as has been described in the press. Nice argument. I would have expected something more ellaborated than as seen on tv.

Seems that IE9 will playback only H.264. Not a big surprise. We already know Apple will bet for H.264 too, so the question now is if Mozilla are going to change their minds.

by jjm on 8:06am  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZPorZyXPeEV
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Filed under: IE Microsoft Video HTML5 H.264 standard 
April 23, 2010
"This is two companies arguing about which level of hell they represent. (It’s still hell, guys!)"

—

From Open vs. Standard, by Christopher Blizzard.

Seems that I have a snarky part too. Another worth quoting part is: It’s open if I don’t have to ask anyone for permission to use it. Or ship it. Or improve on it.

by jjm on 10:56pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZPorZyWR42Y
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Filed under: Apple Adobe Open Standard Blizzard Flash H.264 wars 
December 29, 2009
Why I Avoid Using Closed Source Software

Lemme add: while possible.

--------------------- Kernel Begin ------------------------ 

 
 WARNING:  Segmentation Faults in these executables
    npviewer.bin :  1 Time(s)
 
 WARNING:  General Protection Faults in these executables
    npviewer.bin :  9 Time(s)
 
 ---------------------- Kernel End -------------------------

This is an extract of the logwatch report that it’s generated every day in my Fedora system (do you read it, don’t you?)

Yes, it’s the flash-plugin 10.0.42.34-release (non-free, from Adobe repos), and yesterday crashed 10 times and I don’t remember I browsed any page with intensive flash stuff on it (that’s very vague, because almost any page in the Internet has Flash on it).

Anyway, it crashes, it sometimes eats all my CPU (and/or the sound it’s choppy), and it piss me off that I can’t see Vimeo stuff on HD (may be it’s my 3 years old laptop), but there’s no replacement right now that doesn’t exclude you from being a normal web citizen.

I think it’s too late for Flash, but we must learn from this story and try doing something so it doesn’t happen again. I bet you’ve seen links to Spotify, haven’t you? What happens when you click on it? Disappointment.

I don’t know what’s the formula to stop this kind of viral closed source adoption that leads to de facto standards that finally avoids you to be free to choose, but I know that Gtalk and XMPP advocacy helped with the Microsoft Messenger issue.

We may need both: a free implementation of the idea, and a cool company to promote it.

by jjm on 10:10am  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZPorZyIFHkg
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Filed under: Fedora Flash crash Spotify Bad Standards standard free software closed source