The future of QB64

[STxAxTIC]

Looks like anon1 never heard of Xampp. Give that a search and get back to me. You have all the system resources you want if your browser thinks you're the server. Obviously not as much hardware access as GL had, but thats a welcome cancer removal as far as I care. Browsers running qb65 (the next version, whatever it is) are more than capable at being faster and vaster than qb64 is now. Better look into it before you shit on it, just sayin.

[STxAxTIC]

K, juss makin' sure. Didn't mean to assume.

Tell me you've seen this vid - its been passed around quite a bit.

https://www.destroyallsoftware.com/talks/the-birth-and-death-of-javascript

[codeguy]

My contribution to the future of QB64 will be small, yet significant. I am working on a stable Polyphase Merge, aka External Merge, used heavily in Big Data applications. It will involve of course, MergeInsert(), TreeSort() allowing multiple same-key entries, a file parser (cr, crlf or other character(s) delimited) and of course the output will be STABLY sorted, exactly like the Big Boys of Big Data do, in a user-definable maximum memory partition. I have tested it to M = 8 KBytes, enough for 682 LongInt values and the 341 necessary for the n/2 version of merge in my sorting library. Yes, this creates THOUSANDS of files, but they are cleared as the Polyphase Merge progresses. Yes, it is dramatically slower than standard MergeSort, but able to handle as much data as the medium can hold. Grab your coffee, this process, while O(NLogN) is limited by the input/output medium, whichever is slower and the efficiency of TreeSort(), used as a B-tree. Those are the dominant factors. I am roughly to the actual merge process, a bit different with the priming reads necessary for classic disk-based merge. Remember, this algorithm is designed for very low high-speed memory constraints, exactly as the widely used version employed nearly everywhere Big Data is a regular issue. First, make it work correctly, then make it fast. The attached picture illustrates the merge path for odd and even numbers of files to be merged. If the file count ends in anl even number, there are an odd number of files and this leftover is merged.with the most recent file created by a binary (two file) merge. This procedure is repeated until one file containing all the data is created. Using a different approach will make this FAR slower and unusable garbage for a extremely large datasets.

[SMcNeill]

How is it used? A Polyphase Merge... I feel like a child with all those words I don't understand.

Basically, think of taking a file that's too big to load into memory and trying to sort it.

For example, let's say I want to sort all the sentences in the books in the library to see which ones are the most repeated.  First, we gather a crapload of text from a crapload of books (start here if you want: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_digital_library_projects ), and amass a HUGE dataset.  (And it doesn't even have to be that huge if you're on a 32-bit computer with a 2GB memory limit per program.)

Now, can you imagine that datafile?  How do you sort something that massive??

You break it down into smaller units and then sort those, then merge them back together.

In this case, you might break it down to 26 files to start with...  You'd open the huge master data file, and read one sentence at a time.  According to what letter the sentence started with, you'd write a copy of that sentence into the corresponding file.  "A ... " sentences would go in file #1.  "B..." sentences would go into file #2.  And so on, down to "Z..." sentences.

Then you sort those files if they're small enough to fit in memory now -- OR, you repeat the process and divide another 26 times, separated by the second letter -- repeating the process until you divide the contents and sort each individual part; and then you basically reassemble them all back together again.

Poly -- Many
Phase -- Step
Merge -- to put together

It's basically just breaking an over large sorting task into smaller parts, using Many Steps To Put it back Together in a sorted order. 

Not hard to understand at all.  :D

[SMcNeill]

Tell me you've seen this vid - its been passed around quite a bit.
https://www.destroyallsoftware.com/talks/the-birth-and-death-of-javascript

Very good recommendation - that has opened my mind quite a bit...

I agree with the guy in the video on one thing: Nobody codes in JavaScript.  In the last few years, the most I've used JavaScript was for this:

Code: QB64: [Select]

1. javascript:var%20p=document.getElementsByTagName('*');for(i=0;i%3Cp.length;i++)%7Bif(p%5Bi%5D.style.fontSize)%7Bvar%20s=parseInt(p%5Bi%5D.style.fontSize.replace(%22px%22,%22%22));%7Delse%7Bvar%20s=12;%7Ds+=2;p%5Bi%5D.style.fontSize=s+%22px%22%7D

And what's that for??

Save a bookmark on your tablet or phone, however you do it in your browser.  Then, edit the link and replace it with that script...

Now, whenever you click that link, you can enlarge the fonts on your screen so you can read without straining your eyes.  Click it as many times as needed, and when you want to return to normal, just refresh the page.

And that's all I've actually used JS for in the last few years.  How about you guys?  :P

[STxAxTIC]

Lol. I will let someone else bulldog this one. Educate Steve for me.

[Pete]

I don't use JavaScript enough to remember it well, so I always have o go reference it, but I have used it extensively over quite a few years for website development.

Pete

[SMcNeill]

Mentioning ReactOS a few times, this is timely:
https://www.reactos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=17936
ReactOS 0.4.10 released (Alpha).

and you can see the state of testing with real world apps that you and I might use.

https://reactos.org/wiki/Tests_for_0.4.10

ReactOs is a pipe dream, in my opinion.  V0.2 was released back in 2004.  In the past 14 years, they've improved to V0.4.  At this rate, it'll be the year 2060 before they release version 1.0.

By the time they implement 32-bit Windows functionality, Windows will be using 128-bit systems...  :P

[Pete]

Reactos looks like all the time was spent getting applications that won't run on it to successfully install. I mean as much as I hate Microsoft as a company, as a company they have hired and put to work hundreds of programmers on every release. Just glancing at the wiki for Reactos demonstrates how many apps need this type of attention to work. Couple that with keeping up with new apps and changes in apps and the project looks like one that could have only been successful back in the days of Windows 95, when there were a lot less complicated apps.

I wonder if the definition of "progress" needs to be updated? Maybe it should be written as: pro'gress, meaning problematic regression.

Pete

[Pete]

9-million lines of code... and still growing. I wonder how many of those lines contain GOTO statements? I wonder how many contributors they have, and what time each has donated to the project. It seems to me that they have many apps that work with windows they have managed to get installed, but most don't appear to work. That's a lot of debugging, and if they keep bringing in new people, it is a lot of redundancy getting newbies up to speed. In terms of getting things accomplished, this is where paid software beats the crap out of Open Source projects.

Pete

[SMcNeill]

Reactos looks like all the time was spent getting applications that won't run on it to successfully install.

Not really, that list changes all the time and that's due to structural changes being implemented, those regressions can often be simple, ReactOS was missing SO much initially but recently it has been receiving a lot of the fundamental fixes and the list of working apps is growing and growing as those are put in place.

For me, ReactOS will be usable when I can run Photoshop on it, my default editor RJTextEd and a javascript engine or two. It isn't far off that. I feel a test run coming on tonight in a VM.

As I said in my previous posts, from monitoring ReactOS' recent progress, the outlook looks very positive and in five years time (which is the timescales for any changes that MS might implement causing problems for apps like QB64)  then ReactOS looks a good escape plan for a variety of outcomes.

Honestly, isn't it just easier to get a copy of Win 7 and use it then?  WinXP went out of service 10 years, or so, ago, and people still use it. 

Even if Win 10 pushes some update saying, "Only run apps bought from the windows store", I imagine that what will happen is that folks will basically turn off Windows Update for good at that point and never upgrade again, which is as simple as:

1) Type Services in Start menu or taskbar search box and then press Enter key. Alternatively, you can type Services.msc in Run command box and then press Enter key to open Services.

2) Here, look for the service named Windows Updates. Right-click on it and click Properties to open Windows Update Properties dialog.

3) Here, change the Startup type to Disabled. Click Apply button and then reboot your computer. That’s it!

**************************

By default, I keep windows update disabled on my machine (as well as search, index, and cortana, as well as a few other stupid pieces of windows junk).  The day when Win 10 decides "the apps you create yourself won't work on your own machine" is the day I simply stop upgrading to newer versions of windows...

[Pete]

I have been abandoned too often. The loss of my VB6 work and knowledge is my biggest frustration and I won't be bitten again.

I've been on that bus, and it ain't a nice ride. My software worked perfectly in QBasic, but that was abandoned. The programs with SHELL didn't work in DOSBox, because DOSBox doesn't do DOS worth a SOD. My best paint program was PhotoMagix, which only worked up through Win XP. Coral bought the guy out, and the product went FUBAR. Paint.net is decent, but no where near as intuitive and easy for creating great results as PhotoMagix was. Windows Movie maker was decent for simple edits, but now it's not in WIn 10, and Outlook Express was my favorite in XP, but I learned to like Live Mail in WIn 7... and then they scrapped that in Win 10. Now I just suffer through Blunderturd, another stupid web-based app.

They say in time, computers get smarter. That's a good thing, because the people who design the software systems just keep getting dumber and dumber.

Pete

[SMcNeill]

I have been abandoned too often. The loss of my VB6 work and knowledge is my biggest frustration and I won't be bitten again.

I've been on that bus, and it ain't a nice ride. My software worked perfectly in QBasic, but that was abandoned. The programs with SHELL didn't work in DOSBox, because DOSBox doesn't do DOS worth a SOD. My best paint program was PhotoMagix, which only worked up through Win XP. Coral bought the guy out, and the product went FUBAR. Paint.net is decent, but no where near as intuitive and easy for creating great results as PhotoMagix was. Windows Movie maker was decent for simple edits, but now it's not in WIn 10, and Outlook Express was my favorite in XP, but I learned to like Live Mail in WIn 7... and then they scrapped that in Win 10. Now I just suffer through Blunderturd, another stupid web-based app.

They say in time, computers get smarter. That's a good thing, because the people who design the software systems just keep getting dumber and dumber.

Pete

You do know that you can still use Live Mail, if you want?  It's just MS Deltasync which no longer works.

Microsoft's Windows Live Mail 2011 and 2012 continue to work with Hotmail e-mail accounts by using IMAP (or, less effectively, POP) in place of DeltaSync. Gmail and other service providers still support DeltaSync, so users can still use Windows Live Mail with non-Microsoft email accounts.

For that much, Mail is a decent upgrade to Live Mail, and it's free:  https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/mail-and-calendar/9wzdncrfhvqm?activetab=pivot:overviewtab

PhotoMagiX simply went on to change names over time, as Corel developed it, and it's now Photoshop Pro.  You just have to spend $$$ to get the new version.

And Windows Movie Magic still works fine as well.  Grab a copy and install:  https://archive.org/details/wlsetup-all_201802

[Pete]

Photoshop Pro is nothing like Photomagix. Companies often buy other brands out to eliminate competition. PhotoMagix was the easiest most straight forward way to work with photos and web art I've ever experienced. Think of it as needing a #2 pencil, and some pinhead dumps 600 different kinds of pencils on your desk. Good luck going straight in and finding the #2, and when you do, it requires sharpening and the eraser is half eaten off but that's OK, it comes in a rainbow design with luminescent lettering on the sides. No thanks.

As for Windows Live Mail working, well, there are posts about it needing .Net 3 framework, the installation timing out, etc. I liken this crap to spinning on broken glass. Step one, acquire stool. Step 2, break a beer bottle on the stool (It helps if you drink the contents first) Step 3, sit on broken glass and spin. I would want Live Mail to work on my internet provider account , like it did on 7 but if you ever find something from seven that can be installed to 10 without the 7-day ASCII %^&*$#@, let me know.

https://windowsreport.com/windows-live-mail-windows-10/

Pete

[_vince]

The loss of my VB6 work and knowledge is my biggest frustration

sounds like a blessing