ext

A company at the heart of the Web-app revolution hopes a major update to its programming tools will further the new style of development.

Sencha plans to release Ext JS 4.0 today, bringing new features and some maturity to the software. Ext JS is a software foundation that lets programmers create Web sites that house active applications, not just static pages, that work not just on modern browsers but also on Microsoft's ancient, despised, but still widely used IE6.

Web programming these days is getting steadily more advanced, and indeed Web browsers are becoming more like operating systems … Read more

General Motors today announced its recalling 1.5 million 2007-2009 model cars, trucks, and crossovers to disable a heated washer fluid system module that could pose a fire risk. Because the feature will be disabled, GM will make a voluntary payment of $100 to the owner or lessee of each vehicle.

There are no known injuries or crashes related to the condition, according to a GM news release.

"While our analysis shows the number of incidents is very small compared with the number of vehicles on the road, we want our customers to have complete peace of mind," … Read more

When I texted Sam Ramji to let him know about Sandcastle, and he quickly texted back that he would look into it, I figured that a) it hadn't yet hit anyone's radar at Microsoft and b) that he'd fix it.

Fix it, he did. As Mary Jo Foley notes, it was "doubtful [that] Microsoft was willing to risk the wrath of the OSI over a documentation compiler." I'd go one step further. Once alerted to Sandcastle's violation and to the importance thereof, it was doubtful that Microsoft's Sam Ramji and Co. would be interested in the code, however important/non-important it might be.

Sam gets open source. He's not always supported in this understanding by the larger Microsoft entity, but Sam gets it. His apology to the OSI is direct, concise, and appropriate:

This is unacceptable and represents a violation of Microsoft's Open Source policy. I take it extremely seriously.

I have directed the project to be unpublished from Codeplex immediately, including removal of the project's use of the Ms-PL. If the team chooses to publish the source code and follow Microsoft policy, then the project may be re-published in the future. If not, we will remove all references to Sandcastle from Codeplex.… Read more

ExtJS is a cool JavaScript framework for writing web applications. It is, quite possibly, the best of its kind. My own engineers were salivating at the chance to use it.

Unfortunately, ExtJS is of many minds when it comes to licensing its product. It pretended that the software was LGPL, but only insofar as that meant many people using it...and many people paying to use it. (Hint to the ExtJS business team: LGPL and Apache licenses are impotent to compel payment.)

The company took the hint, re-releasing the code under GPLv3, causing consternation in some quarters. Why the concern? Well, because it meant that freeriders would now clearly have to pay, or distribute their own software under the GPL. Many don't like having to pay for value, particularly if it's GPL'd.

All of which has caused some to fork the ExtJS project. Given the dubious open-source provenance of ExtJS, this is not as easy (or advisable) as it might appear. If ExtJS were never truly LGPL, as the messed-up licensing would seem to suggest, then forking a proprietary product is called...copyright infringement.

It didn't have to be this way.… Read more

I was really excited to hear about ExtJS the other day. It was billed as an open-source JavaScript framework for building web applications. Great! I went to the company's website and learned that it's actually dual-licensed. Even better! Maximum licensing flexibility.

But then I went to the company's licensing page and things got murky really fast. It turns out that the ExtJS won't allow you to use Ext under its LGPL (3.0) license "[i]f you plan to distribute Ext in a product that will be packaged or sold as a software development library, toolkit or plug-in-based framework."

It's a bit like saying, "You can use this as open source so long as you use the software how we'd like you to use it. If you have any money, forget open source: pay us instead."… Read more

It's difficult to imagine what customer segment the designers at GM had in mind when they came up with the idea of the Cadillac Escalade EXT. The 2007 model that just arrived into the CNET Car Tech garage boasts a dazzling array of tech features: heated and cooled front seats, a factory-installed DVD player, DVD-based touch-screen navigation, as-standard XM Satellite radio playing through an eight-speaker Bose surround-sound audio system and...an 8-foot cargo bed.

With all-wheel drive and a monstrous 6.2-liter engine, the EXT could theoretically be used to haul around stacks of 50-gallon drums or to tow … Read more