OT: non-standard language features (was Re: OT: case statements in sh)

[ryan at bulldogsoftware.com]

On Wed, Jan 25, 2006 at 01:59:21PM -0500, Kenneth Brody said:

> A more recent example would be Microsoft's "Java" compiler, which was
> really not Java, but an MS language that was "mostly Java, but with a
> whole lot of Windows-specific extensions, which were conveniently not
> marked as 'Windows only', so that people writing 'Java' programs would
> really be locking themselves into the Microsoft Windows platform only
> and not know it until it was too late".
> 
> Not that MS would put it that way, mind you.  :-)

But they did put it that way secretly. Well it was secretly. 

According to a leaked memo obtained by the Department of Justice,
Microsoft's Thomas Reardon to his colleagues in November 1996:

"We should just quietly grow J++ share and assume that people will
take more advantage of our classes without ever realizing they are
building win32-only java apps."

-- 
Ryan Powers
Bulldog Software, Inc.
http://www.bulldogsoftware.com
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