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Real Men Use Android: Special Forces Favor Google Phone
- abello 16y agoThey also use Windows...
- face 16y agoSo does everyone. Now they'll use less of it.
- bhiggins 16y agoI still have a problem with using a VM on a phone and having GC on a phone. (I also have a problem with Objective C's function call overhead.)
- mahmud 16y agoMacho. But a phone is exactly where you want a VM. In fact, I would love to be able to push vm images for my phone from my desktop machine. Wake up, plug phone, push image. Security upgrades, new GPS data, my downloaded podcasts, news, emails, etc. I want to be able to come home with a new handset, plug it, and have my "phone" back.
- jlazarow 16y agoPretty sure he meant Dalvik.
- mahmud 16y agoDalvik is not the only VM on a phone, and Android is not the only phone with a GC, nor is it coded primarily in Objective-C natively. Pretty sure he was speaking 'in general'.
- regularfry 16y agoTotally different use of the term "virtual machine". You're talking about a virtualised execution environment, or hardware virtual machine (as executed by virtualbox, xen or whatever); he's talking about a runtime virtual machine (like the CLR, JVM, or Dalvik).
- mahmud 16y agoThe distinction is negligible on the mobile phone where the the 'runtime VM' takes care of memory allocation for even "native" C code.
- tomjen3 16y agoThis isn't hard realtime systems. Nobody is going to die because it takes a few seconds extra for them to download updates (the human brain takes a lot longer to process it anyway). And JIT compiled java can be faster than native code, even in situations where you would not expect it (such as signal handling code).
- vetinari 16y agoSignal handling code on android phones is not only native, it runs on separate core too. But your points are true anyway.
- glhaynes 16y agoWhy, if the resulting products are performant and capable?
- bhiggins 16y agodrains battery too fast
- duskwuff 16y agoHave you ever looked at Apple's objc_msgSend implementation? It's pretty fast, really.
- spot 16y agoOne problem with releasing your code as open source is it can get used in ways that you don't approve of, eg weapon systems by the military or crapware by the carriers.
- Tycho 16y ago"Trying to deploy a T9000 XF Ground-Based Cluster Missile? There's an app for that."
- forensic 16y agoThis is why the GPL is better than Apache. The military would have to release their code.
- DannoHung 16y agoWhy? They don't distribute it outside of their organization.
- glhaynes 16y agoWhat if they shared it with a contractor?
- astine 16y agoThen they would have to share it with the contractor under the terms of the GPL. The contractor could then release it further. More likely though, the contractor would be brought in to work on the project and the military would argue that it wasn't distributing the code.
- anamax 16y ago> The contractor could then release it further. Unless the contract said that they couldn't. And even if a specific contract didn't stop a given contractor from redistributing some GPL technology, how many contractors are going to risk being banned from future contracts because they redistributed?
- ary 16y agoApparently "real men" can't be pacifists. Good to know.
- hasenj 16y agoI like one of the comments over there: >Wrong on so many levels. Primarily the assumption that real men shoot third world peasants in the face for pay.
- confuzatron 16y ago...so third world girls have the chance to go to school.
- sliverstorm 16y agoI do not understand. I do not see where the article suggests that all "real men" are in the armed forces.
- glhaynes 16y agoApparently "real men" can't be iPhone users. Good to know. :)
- jasonjei 16y agoBack in AF, pilots in training would be obsessed with their iPhones playing X-Plane. It actually is a fantastic simulator considering that many of these pilots could very possibly be flying your commercial jet someday :) My buddy who went the cargo AF pilot route is a heavy iPhone user, but I guess the rest of the military doesn't consider the AF a real branch and call it the "Air Farce." The AF is going towards the UAV route, so pilots in the service are less and less.
- access_denied 16y ago> The AF is going towards the UAV route Can you explain what this means?
- erikpukinskis 16y agoToday all of my SMS messages disappeared off my HTC Incredible. Google is just full of wonderful surprises.
- spoiledtechie 16y agoPretty good article. For one that works directly with the troops as well as building tools for the R&D department for my company. We are building and showing off tools just like what is explained in this article to try and win contracts just like this. We are always looking for more things and ways to help the troops out. This article does a good job of actually telling the public what the private sector builds for the troops.
- jasonjei 16y agoFor all the flack vets/servicemen get, it's not their war. Policymakers such as Bush determined what servicemen would do. Servicemembers can save lives in Katrina, and they may be ordered to carry out bombing missions--a lot of people were commissioned/enlisted during 9/11 after being moved by the collapse of the twin towers: it is a case of bait and switch, when we were sold the falsehoods of the "War on Terror." What the military does is not a binary answer. The public chooses the commander in chief and the policy (Congress). It's a system that has endured for the last three centuries. You have the power to change it, and if you don't like it and don't speak up, remember V for Vendetta: "If you're looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror." I sometimes remember the story of my girlfriend's grandpa: He was a Japanese soldier drafted in the Second World War. Around the same time, my maternal grandmother was serving as a provincial administrator of the Republic of China version of the IRS as one of the first college educated female accountants. She had to dress up as a man, cut her hair short to avoid being summarily raped and shot in Nanjing, then-capital of China. So now you know I'm of Chinese ethnicity dating a Japanese girl. My girlfriend's grandpa on a China mission was ordered by his commander to shoot one of the prisoners. If he refused, he would most likely be shot (most militaries allow this; the UCMJ allows this in combat). It was a choice between his life or somebody else's. If you watched Dark Knight, you know it's never a black or white answer. It's always a cruel decision to make. Just ask any Vietnam vet who saw combat. If my girlfriend's grandpa didn't shoot the man, my girlfriend might not exist. If he did, he would be a conscientious objector at the expense of his life, and I would not meet my girlfriend. All the while it's awful 40 million Chinese people lost their lives to the Japanese. There are your obvious offenders, the ones that do enjoy raping and killing people, but they are not normal and are present even in civilian society. A lot of them are likely decent people, and would secretly free Chinese prisoners if they had the opportunity. I wish we could all be pacifists, but should we eliminate the military? I'm sure that's a resounding no, and I realize my sentiment may not be the most popular on HN, but we would be looking at anarchy without the men manning the silos too. War is awful and thankfully the Internet seems to be eliminating 99.9% of armed conflicts. There is no point in senseless loss of life. But we still need a good defense--maybe not as much power as we have now, bur nonetheless something to protect the border.