On Mon, 2007-06-18 at 22:18 -0700, Darren New wrote:
> Andrew Lentvorski wrote:
> > .Net and the CLR kinda broke the *entire freakin' Windows API*. 
> 
> I said "in many things." Obviously the CLR isn't a match for the 
> existing Windows API. On the other hand, you can invoke the existing 
> Windows stuff from C# quite easily.
> 
> > Microsoft is a *lousy* example of backward compatibility on almost every 
> > front.
> 
> Um, sure. Show me a 10-year-old Linux program or Mac program that runs 
> without recompiling?

How old is Quake II (seriously, when did it come out for Linux?). It
will still run. This is a complex game (for its time) and will still run
on Linux. My two ports of it will still run on Linux.

In fact, Linux games are good examples of how much better a Linux based
game is than a Windows based game in many respects. the use of OpenGL
instead of Direct 3D increases their longevity a bunch (theoretically,
forever) because part of the OpenGL standard is to stay backward
compatible. It is common for new DirectX versions to break anything
written with an older version. It's the M$ way of doing business - force
upgrades to "standards" to foster new purchases.

Linux system calls are also based upon a standard. System calls within
the game work on new systems as they did on old. Shared object files can
either be back-revved or statically linked, or even by making a symlink
that gives the new .so the old name.

> 
> I'll grant you that Java stuff is probably the most portable compiled 
> code out there, yes. And Sun too has worked hard to maintain backwards 
> compatibility in the JVM at the expense of improving the language.
> 

And when a method does vanish from the language, there is a warning for
at least one version that it's been deprecated before it's removed
completely.

PGA
-- 
Paul G. Allen BSIT/SE
Owner/Sr. Engineer
Random Logic Consulting
www.randomlogic.com

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