Engadget is running an interesting article about Obama and his Blackberry or smartphone and what might be going on.  The gist of the story is this: Obama loves his Blackberry but the security folks in the Secret Service and at the NSA say it is not secure.  Now we learn that Obama’s Blackberry might be getting some special software for encryption, or he might be getting an NSA approved device.

During my short stint working on a project at White Sands, some individuals had phone that had been “modified” to allow them to be used for sensitive discussions.  I always wondered if this was a) a lie to give the new guy (me) some grief, b) an actual chip or, c) a software upgrade.  It will be interesting to see if there is a simple software upgrade that can be performed to a phone to make it NSA approved.

The C# team at Microsoft keeps churning out new versions. They recently released a Community Technology Preview of C# 4.0 with .Net 4.0 and Visual Studio 2010. The bits are here if you want to download this preview in the form of a Microsoft Virtual Machine. The download, or I should 8 downloads, are huge; 7 X 700 MB + 1 x 286 MB.

I got the VM up and running and I immediately jumped into VS 2010. I don’t have much of an opinion on that subject. For the most part it looks and feels like a spiffy version of VS 2008.  It is pretty obvious it is written in WPF.

The release of C# 4.0 introduces 4 groups of changes to the languages (get it, 4).

1. Compile-time and run-time dynamic type handling,
2. Named arguments and default argument values,
3. Variance, meaning covariance and contra-variance,
4. Better COM support.

Along with these buckets of C# features, .Net 4.0 is expected to support the functionality in the Parrallel FX Library and perhaps ASP.Net MVC.  Here are some quick opinions/rants on the new features.

• Dynamic types: When I first heard about this feature I thought it was stupid.  After seeing how it is implimented and watching the videos (One, Two) I am excited.  I can see where this type would have made my life much easier in the past in a few ways.  First, this type will work well with the new Office integration.  I vividly remember programming against version X of some Word interop, and having that code *not* work on version Y.  The dynamic type should handle those situations, assuming the portions of the API being used look the same.  Second, this will allow two .Net types that have some of their function singnatures the same but do not share a common ancestor or impliment a common interface to be treated polymorphically at run-time.  Third, interop with scripting will be easier.  And, this type will perform better than reflection.  See Dynamic Language Runtime aka DLR for more info on some of the plumbing the type will be using.
• Named arguments and default values:  Whatever.  I have gotten by without these for years.  I have used them in other lanuages, and did not miss them when I moved to C#.  I don’t need them now.
• Variance:  It would be great if they actually implemented really covariance and contra-variance for types like List<T>, but they aren’t.  The implementation in the current beta sucks.  It is cumbersome.  I would go so far as to call it stupid.  Come on guys!   You have done such a great job until now; don’t crap on C# now with this junk.  Does it sound like I am being melodramatic?  Well, its because it is fucking stupid the way this is implimented in the CTP.  That might be the first time I have ever cursed on my blog, and it was for a good reason.
• Better COM Interop: As much as we would all like COM to go away, it isn’t going anywhere soon.  Better interop with COM is a good thing.
• Parrallel FX: Very cool threading library.  Me likey.
• ASP.Net MVC: Whether this gets released before hand or with .Net 4.0, who knows.  But having played around with it in the various CTP/beta releases, I do like it.

So there you go.  Hopefully MS will fix the pathetically moronic impimentation of variance they are proposing and release the best version of C# yet!  I am really looking forward to the future betas.  .Net has been a great platform to program on, and it just keeps getting better.

An AP News Story released Dec 26 highlights Amazon’s success in a bad economy.  They were able to increase sales over 2007 (from the metrics they are making public), bucking a nationwide retailer trend.  They appear to have also done better during this holiday shopping season as opposed to last year.  While other retailers have seen a substantial drop in sales this XMas, Amazon continues to do great business.

Why is this?  I think it is because they offer what is often the best price on any given product, and what is always the best service you can get, period.  That is my opinion; Forrester Research think Amazon.com ranks #3 overall for customer experience in 2008.

I began shopping on Amazon.com in 1998, which makes it 10 great years of shopping for me.  I first started with Amazon.com to order books.  I lived in a rural area that did not have a decent book store.  For a few years Amazon.com and BookPool.com were my only real sources of good tech books.  As the years went on and I moved to more urban areas, I still prefered Amazon.com to many brick-and-morter stores.  I found, over and over, that Amazon often had products that the local store did not.  And when a local store did have the product I was looking for, Amazon would beat their price by a significan margin.

This XMas I did almost all of my shopping on Amazon.  I have an Amazon prime acount.  For $80/year, I get free 2-day shipping, and $1.99 overnight shipping on most items that Amazon sells.  It is worth it for me.  I by enough tech books alone to make up for the price.  At XMas and Birthday time I take advantage of the free shipping.  I was able to buy a number of presents on Amazon, and they were all shipped for free to the recepients.  For one other present I purchased locally I paid about $5 for shipping.  I had to find a box, pack the item, wait in line at the post office, and pay to have it shipped.

Anytime Amazon has ever made a mistake they have provided wonderful customer service to resolve the issue.  I wait a very short amount of time to speak with customer service, and my issue has always be resolved promptly.  Is this the experience I have had a local brick-and-mortar stores?  Nope.

It is no wonder that Amazon is doing well, and that they have so many loyal customers like myself.