The System namespace holds classes for simple common tasks, and a large number of sub-namespaces for slightly less common (but still important) tasks, including string manipulation, IO, and threading. Learn how .NET handles namespaces — and how they can make your life easier.
The .NET System Namespace
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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Does this also apply to Mono ?
@Davamundo – This article focuses on c++, but yes, this applies to Mono as well. Mono is trying to complete all of the .NET namespaces except for Microsoft specific ones. Not all namespaces will be done for Mono 1.0.
I’m so glad that .NET/Mono/Pnet… doesn’t force you to create a physical directory hierarchy like java does for its packages. That is very annoying.
We are commited to Java. Java is stable and scalable and portable.
Who is we? What a bizarre comment.
I use Java all day at work. Sure it’s good overall, but not good enough to make me truly happy. And unfortunately Java is not evolving fast enough to even make people want to upgrade. Sure J2EE 1.4 is a big deal, but I still don’t get the vibe like from .NET that big things are on the horizon.
Java is going to be around for a long time. .NET is going to be around for a long time. It will be interesting to see what features, maturity, and respect they will have in 5 years. At this point, I would not be surprised to see Java programs in a “maintainence only” situation. Who knows about .NET. If Mono takes off and runs with .NET the future is wide open in my opinion, just as long as Microsoft lets it.
I agree there is not much push to upgrade Java versions, unless you want to use some new class provided. In fact, it seems (for some applications) that Java is even slowing down, contrary to what you would expect in the newer versions.
http://www.volano.com/report/index.html
Java is good stuff and it sure beats the hell out of doing a lot of the stuff that would be programmed in c++ and tools like Eclipse and IDEA help out with some of its shortcomings, but I feel that Sun dumbed down c++ too much. E.g. why did they leave out enums and unsigneds, no variable length arguments, etc…
Yeah, java is going to be around for a long time on the server, but it’s pretty much dead on the desktop, expect for various corporate, proprietary apps. I believe the biggest mistake Sun made was the whole AWT/Swing debacle. What kind of brain damage was going on when they thought that every java app should look the same no matter what platform it was on. Oh, I guess this was back in the days when they were still under the illusion that the underlying OS didn’t matter.
It looks like .NET is finally forcing Sun into adding some needed features, e.g. a foreach construct, vm sharing, enums. There’s a book I was reading a while back(the title escapes me at the moment), which discusses various software luminaries and their contributions. In one chapter it talks about heated arguments that Bill Joy and Gosling had about features that should be in java. Joy wanted some useful additions to the language but Gosling wanted ultra-simplicity. Gosling obviously won the arguments.
Also, what’s up with the apparent regressions in java versions? Seems like not everybody is happy with slowdowns between 1.3 and 1.4.
It’s cool that java is around, but it’s also good that .NET is around for the competition.
I contract for a development company that develops mission critical applications for the bond market, where the unit of display are millions, just to give an idea of the money involved in this market. I can shurely tell you that Java is the only middleware programming language that is considered viable in this market, .net doesn’t even com close.
Myths such as that java is not fast at all, is loosing steam, is not good enough on the client etc are all just that, myths.
The only time I hear .net come up in discussions on and off work are when either someone is talking about mono, or someone tells a sad story about how they now have to do an evaluation about doing the next project in .net because some highflying hotshot high up in the company had a golf session with a microsoft salesman.
Dont believe the early commenters about .net catching on. They just dont have a clue.
>> Dont believe the early commenters about .net catching on. They just dont have a clue. <<
You know that is totally not true. Most of the Fortune 500 companies are starting to use .Net. I can even name a couple contractors that are doing signal processing with .Net. Not only that it has been popping up all over the place, because a .Net server is easy to setup and deploy unlike the J2EE counter part. There is probably a 10/1 ratio of .Net Servers to J2EE servers at least for small and mid sized businesses that are offered from hosting companies.
Your comment is just not true. Java has it’s purposes, but as for client apps, Java has really taken a back seat to .Net. For server apps .Net hasn’t cought up with Java yet, but I think it will after it has been tested and proven for a couple years.
Here is a question. How many years did it take companies to start adopting Java as a viable alternative to C++ and CGI’s? I can garontee that it was a lot longer than it has taken C# to be looked at as a viable alternative to Java and J2EE. Six years ago if you mentioned Java in a high level development meeting as an alternative to the tried and true C++ you were laughed out of the room.
You just need to realize there are no definites in any industry especially software. And with the state that Sun is in. I am putting my money on Microsoft winning.
I tried not to include any numbers, because they should allways be backed by their source, and I didn’t have the time for it.
>> Most of the Fortune 500 companies are starting to use .Net.
Please back up such statements with a source. I also hear most Fortune 500 companies are starting to use Linux, but the end of Microsofts dominance is not close just yet.
>> There is probably a 10/1 ratio of .Net Servers to J2EE servers at least for small and mid sized businesses that are offered from hosting companies.
Do you have a netstat statistic to back this up?
>> Java has it’s purposes, but as for client apps, Java has really taken a back seat to .Net.
Hmm, yes I agree there will be a lot of .net apps when it becomes the only viable way to create native windows client apps with the introduction of Longhorn. For now I don’t know about that many .net apps. Do you?
I do know about http://java.sun.com/products/jfc/tsc/sightings/S19.html however.
>> Six years ago if you mentioned Java in a high level development meeting as an alternative to the tried and true C++ you were laughed out of the room.
Actually, we were doing enterprice java development six years ago. This was before the J2EE specifications and EJBs.
Anyway, it allways takes much more time for windows zealots to discover non-windows technologies.
>>The only time I hear .net come up in discussions on and off work are when either someone is talking about mono, or someone tells a sad story about how they now have to do an evaluation about doing the next project in .net because some highflying hotshot high up in the company had a golf session with a microsoft salesman.
>>Dont believe the early commenters about .net catching on. They just dont have a clue.
Why are you peddling misinformation like this? As you yourself point out, your only contact with .NET is casual conversation, not development of a real project. So, how can what you say even be relevant? I have written a ton of code for projects involving .NET and Java (both client and server). The fact is, they both perform well and produce stable, fast systems. An unstable, slow project is less a result of the language than it is a result of the competence (or incompetence) of the developer(s) using the language!
From my own personal experience, I give the edge to .NET Framework in ease and speed of development (because of a nice IDE and richer runtime library), and especially in configuration and deployment of .NET server apps. I still enjoy developing Java applications (which I am doing right now), but given a choice on a new project, I would pick .NET.
>> Please back up such statements with a source.
NDA prohibits me from providing detailed information, but I can honestly tell you that we’re currently building a mission-critical application for a securities firm in Syd Australia, based entirely on .NET 1.1 runtime utilising encypted TCP/IP over Windows Service app and thin clients deployed to futures brokers.
>> >>Dont believe the early commenters about .net catching on. They just dont have a clue.
>> Why are you peddling misinformation like this? As you yourself point out, your only contact with .NET is casual conversation, not development of a real project. So, how can what you say even be relevant?
Ok, I probably shouldn’t have trolled with that “They just dont have a clue” sentence. I didn’t back it up with anything.
Seriously, most of the posters here claimed .net is superiour to Java, and that .net is gaining ground on Java.
The first claim is very subjective, but at least there are a large number of developers that claim otherwise, http://manand.typepad.com/DotnetTruth/ , http://www.manageability.org/manageabilityWiki/WhyJavaIsBetterThanD….
The second claim is hard to accept unless any numbers or references to back the claim is provided.
So as long as noone provide any support for their claims, I’d say they don’t have a clue.
> http://www.manageability.org/manageabilityWiki/WhyJavaIsBetterThanD…
I don’t care much about the Java vs. .NET wars, not being fond of either, but I wonder how good an argument a webpage is when the first two points are completely false.
The core Java APIs are definitly not in the Public Domain, as I’m sure Sun’s lawyers will be happy to explain. You cannot see the Java VM source code without signing a NDA; you can see the code of both class libraries, under a look-but-don’t-touch license. The source code of neither one is Free, and neither has a complete implementation under a free software license, but for both, there are incomplete implementations under such licenses available.
The only other thing from that page I’d like to comment on is the “more languages for the JVM” thing. This may well be, and is no surprise given how much longer the JVM is around, but .NET support for various languages is certainly growing. However, I think that both platforms are completely unsuited to efficiently support any language that isn’t closely enough related to Java/C# respectively, and that this isn’t a big deal anyway – it should be clear that different languages require different runtimes, class libraries etc., unless you believe in the skinnable-language ideology where the only difference between programming languages is syntax.
Dude Motta,
You really know how to distort what you just read.
Any Java public API are indeed part of the public domain. The J2SDK license is crystal clear about this. If you implementation of API, then that’s a different matter.
Who said anything about JVM source code, I am talking about the Java core libraries which have nothing to do with how the JVM is implemented. Get a clue dude.
So before you begin debunking the entire list, try to get a clue of what the first two entries actually mean.
>> The core Java APIs are definitly not in the Public Domain, as I’m sure Sun’s lawyers will be happy to explain.
The wording of the title of the first reason was not too good, but the content of it is still true. Since microsoft has sought patent protection for their api, the validity of an open source implementation of it is thus at best questionable.
My arguments still stand; Those who post that .net is superiour to Java, and that .net is gaining ground on Java, have still not backed up their claims with any references of any kind. I still think they don’t have a clue.