Is it ok to love Google?

[OwlHoot]

... (I don't want to give you the impression that I'm stalking you Nick... )

I'd be quite happy to stalk Nick, or anyone, in Google Wave if only I knew how.

Cliphead kindly sent me an invitation, but all I see is an empty screen, which looks something like a web email app with no emails.

[FiveTimes]

No invite here

WHS

[pzz76077]

Anyone here using Google Go currently??

Will watch the Youtube video introduction at the w/e.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwoWei-GAPo

PZZ

[dang65]

Never heard of Sketchup but it looked good. Then I read the conditions:

By installing the Software, you agree to automatically request and receive Updates

Sod that. Fed up with Google sticking auto updates in here there and everywhere.

Aha, a detractor at last. Though I think that auto updates are pretty commonplace nowadays. You still get prompted to actually go ahead with any installation, it just automatically requests and receives them.

[xoggoth]

Google doesn't. The only way you know it is updating is by keeping a check on the services that are running. You will probably have 4 or 5 copies of their updater in program files and C:\Users\yourname\AppData\Roaming, local etc.

[d000hg]

Anyone here using Google Go currently??

Will watch the Youtube video introduction at the w/e.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwoWei-GAPo

PZZ

You mean there attempt at a system-programming language? There can't be many contracts here working on OS-development, I shouldn't think?

[pzz76077]

You mean there attempt at a system-programming language? There can't be many contracts here working on OS-development, I shouldn't think?

No, true. ~But I am curious how much publicity Google got from their 20 quid Youtube ad and a stooge on /. in comparison with the 100's of millions Ms etc spend on advertising annually.

Not the same thing I know but interesting anyway.

PZZ

[NickFitz]

Anyone here using Google Go currently??

Will watch the Youtube video introduction at the w/e.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwoWei-GAPo

PZZ

I haven't bothered watching any videos (WTF can you learn about any programming language from watching a video other than that "This bloke on the video knows how to do stuff with it"?) but I've been reading through various bits of documentation such as the core language basics. I'm drawn by its movement away from old-school procedural styles in favour of more functional and even declarative approaches: they make it much easier to write code that's intended to scale across many machines, which is a basic requirement for any web application that expects more than a couple of thousand users a day.

In that respect you can see the inspiration of Python, but of course Python is still a general-purpose language and has its roots in the concept of a monolithic application running on a computer; Go is clearly intended for the purpose of many application components scaling seamlesly across many machines to meet fluctuating demand: not only demand for the overarching application, but fluctuations of demands made upon individual components within the application. Scalability is so much easier if the runtime environment is designed for it, and I think that's one of the key things about Go.

It's also got a remarkably extensive library of supporting APIs, or libraries, or whatever you want to call them. I'm thinking of setting up a server specially to have an intensive play with it after Christmas. EC2 makes it easy to play with this stuff, and scale up and down even if it's just for fun

[voodooflux]

It'll be interesting to see how Google respond to this:

When you’re a huge web company, and you choose a name for something as important as a new programming language, you should take great care to investigate whether the name is already taken.

Apparently, Google didn’t do that. Frank McCabe, a developer working at San Jose, Calif.-based Starview Technologies, has created a programming language and named it Go years ago. In fact, he published a research paper about it in 2004, and devoted an entire book to it, named “Lets Go” in 2007.

In an e-mail to Information Week, McCabe said he doesn’t own a trademark on the language, but he’s not happy about Google choosing the name Go nevertheless. “It takes a lot of effort to produce a reasonably well-designed language. I am concerned that the ‘big guy’ will end up steam-rollering over me. I do not have resources to invest in legal action; but do not intend to let Google keep the name without them being explicit that they are steam-rollering over us,” he says.

If the folks at Google who named the language didn’t know about the other “Go”, they were careless. If they knew about it and decided to name their language “Go” anyway, it sounds like a big company not caring much about the little guy. After all, how many names are taken when it comes to programming languages? Perhaps a couple hundred? Surely Google could have chosen another name.

Google hasn’t given a definitive answer to this problem yet. So far, their spokesman merely said they “recently became aware of the Go! issue and are now looking into the matter further.” But ignoring the issue definitely won’t go well with Google’s oft quoted mantra – “Don’t be evil”.

Via http://mashable.com/2009/11/13/google-go/