Uniform Resource Locators

By Jim Straus, URLs@mactech.com

Spare your fingers and find the full list online at:

http://www.mactech.com/URLs.html

Welcome to the latest update on Internet information. Java is the hot topic of the moment; everyone is jumping on the bandwagon. A lot of people sure are getting excited about this dynamic object-oriented language with a class library. Java’s popularity has focused our attentions away from similar environments, like SmallTalk, Dylan, or NewtonScript, but if the Web is what it takes to move people toward the future of programming, that is great. Now on to the sites.

Latest Updates

Internet Related

How Do I http://www.digitalfocus.com/digitalfocus/faq/howdoi.html

Java SDK http://java.sun.com/new.html

MacJava http://www.seas.upenn.edu/~mcrae/projects/macjava/

OpenDoc Java http://summary.net/~breck/java-opendoc.html

New Technologies

ATT Bell Labs http://www.research.att.com/

DayStar MP Developers http://www.daystar.com/developer/dev-pageone.html

MacLinux http://www.mklinux.apple.com

OpenDoc/Bento/SOM http://www.cilabs.org/

Other Programmer Resources

Pascal Central http://www.webcom.com/icog/polymorphic/pascal.html

Vendors, Products and Miscellaneous

Always Apple http://always.apple.com

BareBones SW (BBEdit) http://www.barebones.com/

Fog City Software http://www.fogcity.com/

guideWorks http://www.guideworks.com

NeoLogic http://www.neologic.com/

Nisus http://www.nisus-soft.com/

PowerTap http://members.aol.com/powertap

PPC Fragments http://www.triplesoft.com/fragment/

Internet

Finally, there are some Java development tools appearing for Macintosh. JavaSoft (Sun’s newly created division that is supporting Java) has released the first beta version of the Macintosh Java SDK. By the time you read this, it should be much farther along. Natural Intelligence is releasing updates to their Roaster development environment, and Metrowerks and Symantec should have their development environments out. Also, people are thinking about Java and OpenDoc and just general Java info. Java is one of those products that you should keep track of, as it could have a significant impact on the industry. Just as an example of its perceived importance, Bell Labs has pulled some of the biggest names (such as Dennis Ritchie) off of Plan 9, their next-generation OS, and put them onto their own answer to Java (no name as of yet).

Java SDK http://java.sun.com/new.html
Metrowerks http://www.metrowerks.com/
Symantec http://www.symantec.com/
How Do I http://www.digitalfocus.com/digitalfocus/faq/howdoi.html
MacJava http://www.seas.upenn.edu/~mcrae/projects/macjava/
OpenDoc Java http://summary.net/~breck/java-opendoc.html
ATT Bell Labs http://www.research.att.com/

Sometime during the shakeup at Apple this winter, Apple decided to officially support the Open Software Foundation’s porting Linux to the PowerPC. They are pushing hard to make the PowerPC Macintosh into an Internet server, in every possible way that people may want. This Unix variant joins the ranks of Tenon’s MachTen, IBM’s AIX, and Apple’s own AU/X.

MacLinux http://www.mklinux.apple.com
Tenon - MachTen http://www.tenon.com/

Macintosh

Now that Gil Amelio is at Apple, he’s announced that one of his goals is to provide more visibility into what is going on inside Apple. We will have to see if this works, but in the meantime, there is a new Web site where he has posted some information on what’s been done to date. Hopefully, developers and the public will see some of what goes on inside Apple, and will gain confidence that Apple will be a great place in the future. We could all use the good news.

Always Apple http://always.apple.com

I am always interested in how fast a machine can go. There’s a limit to how fast a single processor can go (even a PowerPC), and multi-processing is how we will break through that barrier. DayStar has a page with technical information on their multi-processor system. If you are looking for computing power, four 604s will certainly go fast. Now to find a compiler that will use them all!

DayStar MP Developers
http://www.daystar.com/developer/dev-pageone.html

If you need more than the computing power of one machine, how about ganging them up across a net? PowerTap has a library and utilities to allow your programs to use the CPUs on other Macs on a network. It will even use the multiple CPUs in an MP machine. Just think of how much computing your program could get done at night in a typical office. Think of how much spare computing power there is, at night, inside Apple!

PowerTap http://members.aol.com/powertap

Neat Non-Macintosh Site of the Month

On the Web, you can find neat maps of just about anything. Xerox PARC put out one of the first maps available to the public on the Internet. You can zoom in on any place in the world. MapQuest also allows you to zoom around, or you can enter an address and see just where it is located. Finally, the Census Bureau has a mapping program that has all sorts of interesting overlays (from all the data they’ve collected) that can be added to their geographic maps.

MapQuest http://www.mapquest.com/
Map Viewer http://pubweb.parc.xerox.com/map/
Tiger Mapping Service http://tiger.census.gov/

Well, that is it for this month. As always, if you find something interesting, or have updates, send them to URLs@MacTech.com.

Thanks this month to Gil Amelio, Liam Breck, Bill Catambay, Guy Kawasaki, Steve Kortze, Bruce Lawton, Will Mayall, Matt Neuburg, John Powers, Rich Siegel, Joe Zobkiw, and many others for their contributions for their suggestions and pointers to new and old sites.