JBoss' Achilles' heel
I note with much bemusement today that the JBoss clan now has a collective blog. This consists of 3 kinds of posts so far. Bill Burke posting useful technical stuff (for anyone foolish enough to use JBoss). Nathalie Mason-Fleury posting a rational piece about JBoss and people’s attitudes to it, and Andy Oliver…well….making a prat of himself.
It’s then that I realised what the problem with JBoss is (well, one of). Surprisingly, the reason is not technical at all. JBoss might have terrible performance, but that’s not a crime. It can certainly be argued that you get what you pay for, but in this case you get more. You get a reasonably functional J2EE stack for nothing, which is not to be sneezed at.
The problem in fact lies in some of the personalities at the forefront of JBoss. On one side you have people like Nathalie; erudite, charming, witty, and all that good stuff. On the other side you have….Andy. Migrating rapidly from the Andy school of thought are Marc Fleury and Bill Burke. Now, we might all laugh and giggle at Marc’s potty mouth and inability to speak without frothing wildly. It’s important to remember that he’s been suitably leashed lately, and seems remarkably restrained, on-topic, and coherent these last few months (and considerably less vocal). Bill also seems to have been transformed into a likeable chap. He avoids all the gossipmongering and bullshit and tries to stick the job at hand. It’s not nearly as easy to point at laugh at someone like that.
Sadly though, Andy seems to have taken over this role. Witness his dislike of poor Joseph Ottinger, for example. Now, Joe certainly has a certain abruptness to him that can be quite irritating. However, I know for a fact that he as a person does not get to pick and choose what gets published in JDJ based on personal whimsy. Poor little Andy wrote some tedious crap that got rejected, and so now he decides that he hates JDJ. JDJ certainly didn’t help by rubbing salt into his wounds and publishing my silly little article.
I feel bad for Andy, I must say. He’s one of those people where you sort of feel vaguely embarrassed for whenever they speak around you. Everyone sort of shuffles about uncomfortably, laughs nervously, and generally wishes they had someone more socially competent to talk to. It’s really not hard to see how this wormy Andy grew (haha) out of a fat little shit at school who was regularly bullied and harassed, and now that he’s had some moderate success is out to ‘get’ all those who wronged him in some way and/or continue to do so. He’s out to prove once and for all that the timid little wedgie infected twerp is gone for good.
I’m sure he’ll point out the hypocrisy in my mockery of him. All sorts of wild accusations involving pots and kettles will spring up. It’s irrelevant though, one has to but read his childish musings to realise that deep down inside, he’s just a bullied little child begging for a little love.
Sadly though, this is not beneficial to JBoss. They end up being represented (yet again) by some immature unprofessional illbred twat. One has to wonder if they’ll be surprised yet again when their bad karma goes up.
December 8th, 2003 at 3:35 pm
I’m generally amused, and occasionally even informed, by the Bile Blog, but this entry left me cold. Despite the fact that I identify very, very strongly with my code (as a lot of heavy code-fu types do), ruthlessly criticizing code is generally OK (… well, we’ll see how I fare when Tapestry gets in the Bile Blog crosshairs).
On the other hand, raking Andy over the coals this way is not fair game, even on the Bile Blog. Andy is a hard working likeable guy (I met up with him at ApacheCon). He thinks through many difficult issues and is very outspoken about those thoughts … and that’s a good thing. I don’t know where he gets the energy, or how he keeps up with the influx of mail.
Having spoken with Andy *at length* I can tell you that (while I didn’t agree with him on many subjects) I never felt embarrased of him or on his behalf … nor does he have an axe to grind.
Anyway, it should be interesting to see the Two Foul Mouthed Titans of Unrestrained Blogging go at it. Cheers!
December 8th, 2003 at 3:36 pm
Just an Achille’s heel? It’s a good thing we’re ugly. Alas, there aren’t many like Fair Helen. Although, I’d hate to see the destruction brought about by a “face that could sink a thousand ships.”
What can I say. I hang out with the skater boyz. You prom committee people are just too cool for us.
No worries, I don’t expect we’ll be growing or improving any time soon. We’d hate to deprive the Amen Corner of that little shiver of nauseated voluptuousness, as they catalogue our numerous failings. Or miss the fun of seeing our critics descend from the vertiginous heights of Mt. Olympus in full regalia to judge us.
Not a chance.
December 8th, 2003 at 3:40 pm
Say what?
December 8th, 2003 at 4:05 pm
While I do agree with some points on your post about JBoss and agree that you can criticize whatever you like about the product JBoss, you stepped way over the line when you started criticizing another professional. Now I understand that you are entitled to your opinions, as is everyone, but posting something this hateful, disgracing, and downright rude is just not right. I’m apalled that you would disgrace another person in such a way.
December 8th, 2003 at 4:46 pm
Nathalie Mason-Fleury you turn me on!
December 8th, 2003 at 5:18 pm
Squire Matt Wiczlurkanobibble: Hast thou never partooketh of the bile of the blog before?
December 8th, 2003 at 5:34 pm
Matt, you assume Andy is a professional?
December 8th, 2003 at 5:38 pm
” Nathalie Mason-Fleury you turn me on!” -Sir Edward Sykes-Picot
Me TOO! I use this picture all the time.
December 8th, 2003 at 5:38 pm
I think Andy was let off easy. To write like Hani you would have had to have taken it up the arse in the communal showers.
December 8th, 2003 at 8:38 pm
Now now chaps, settle down and stop harassing your Tutor, Nathalie. Back to Introductory Classics for the lot of you! Gentlemen, I expect to see you all in Remedial Latin at 6pm Friday.
December 8th, 2003 at 9:28 pm
What’s all this about clowns? If I laugh too hard from reading this, do I have to punch clowns? If I die laughing, am I re-incarnated as a clown?
December 9th, 2003 at 1:56 am
Nathalie: SUCK MY DICK!
December 9th, 2003 at 3:25 am
Matt Kurjanowicz: the point, as always, is that Hani clearly shows the way out of the stupid behavioural patterns by pointing out just how stupid those behaviours are. If you are trying to look competent and professional and nice you do NOT have a handwaving, foaming at the mouth-person that you openly say is a part of your organization. This is why it’s a Good Thing for JBoss that Herr Fleury has supposedly been “reeled in” as it were.
The bile is the Sanity Check that is so sorely missing from so many projects. You need to stop taking it so damn personal and start fixing the problems.
December 9th, 2003 at 5:11 am
So whats the URL for JBoss’s blog Hani ?
December 9th, 2003 at 5:29 am
http://linuxintegrators.com/blog/jbossBlog/
December 9th, 2003 at 10:42 am
Hani, can you please delete the “suck my dick” comment above? It’s not in good form, particularly since it’s anonymous. (At least Marc signs his name.)
December 9th, 2003 at 10:51 am
It’s rather funny to me that people are eviscerating the Bile Blog for attacking a “professional”. Where the “professional’s” blog is mostly unfocused ranting, hateful attempts at attacking people, and lots of vague handwaving. Oh, and the “professional” more often than not admits right in his blog that he hasn’t a clue about what he’s talking about, hasn’t researched his opinion at all, and is just shooting at the hip. Say what ya want about Fate, but at least it’s focused and well-researched.
December 9th, 2003 at 11:23 am
Agreed, the BileBlog is far better reading than the Spleen Blog any day.
December 9th, 2003 at 11:30 am
For once the comments are waaaaaaaaaaay funnier than the article. I can’t stop laughing.
December 9th, 2003 at 11:40 am
Cameron: “…do I have to punch clowns?”
Only if yer not getting any.
December 9th, 2003 at 11:42 am
….oh, and it’s best to only punch your own clown. Unless your into..you, know…that kind of thing.
December 9th, 2003 at 12:22 pm
To the more frisky commentators,
And here I was ignoring yet another creative way JBoss leverages the Internet to provide free services for the community.
There are far more accomodating and accessible writing and pictures than mine out there. I’m sure you’d be taking care of those needs regardless. If, in the process, you had to open the dictionary or look up a literary reference–there it is. You might even develop an opinion on whether Dr. Faustus paid too high a price for his vision of Fair Helen.
December 9th, 2003 at 1:03 pm
Nathalie you jboss slut, wanna to suck my dick ?
December 9th, 2003 at 1:27 pm
“Mr. Anonymous,” dear chap,
It’s remedial grammar for you. Might help in your future propositons to the ladies.
December 9th, 2003 at 1:30 pm
I’m not a fan of some the antics of the JBoss people (although I like the product) but this is getting out of hand.
December 9th, 2003 at 4:09 pm
Not an uncommon behavior for adolescent (and sometimes older) men who take solice in computers to escape their pimple-faced/greasy-haired/obesity-burdened personas, too afraid to leave their own homes and see the world outside, let alone talk to women — a feat they’re capable of accomplishing only in their wet dreams.
Making anonymous outbursts like the above, thinking anyone cares more than with a feeling of pity towards them.
December 9th, 2003 at 4:17 pm
Mikki,
I posted the comment above yours, after struggling to come up with something like what you said. You said much better than I could have
December 9th, 2003 at 4:37 pm
I am sooo disappointed in this “rant”. After a deserved hateful couple of rants against JBoss and the Fleury sect, Hani now calls Nathalie (the whore) “charming”, Bill Burke “posts useful stuff”, Marc is now “coherent and on-topic”, and worst of all, JBoss is now referred to as a “reasonably functional J2EE stack”. WTF?!?!?!
Hani, what has happened here? Did the JBoss Group kidnap and brainwash you?
Or did you lose you pilot’s license and, as a result of being fired from the Jordanian Airlines, went mad?
December 9th, 2003 at 8:18 pm
I have it on good authority that Andy is a total geek wanker. That dork freaking spends all of his time writing open source, and wanking on the internet. Probably sneaks in some pron now and then.
December 9th, 2003 at 10:09 pm
I have researched the myth about Marc Fleury being the biggest Schwanzelutscher of all times and found there is not much beef to it:
http://freeroller.net/page/fx/20030514#the_truth_about_jdj_jboss
There are always bigger fish in the sea to fry!
December 10th, 2003 at 6:54 am
Hani, while I still enjoy your blog, the outrageous comments here only go to show that your audience is made up of a bunch of sad, “anonymous” losers.
Whether you like JBoss or not, the insults hurled at Mrs Fleury here are just way - and I mean *way* - over the line.
December 10th, 2003 at 8:50 am
Andy is my friend. From whence came all this cheeky monkey talk of punching clowns? Let me put it another way. If three clowns stood on their heads, while chewing parsley, and without losing their balance (of course, a good clown can do this in their sleep), then I would be pretty annoyed with myself for not noticing the Great Big Monkey appearing through the aforementioned means.
December 10th, 2003 at 8:55 am
Hello!
December 11th, 2003 at 10:49 am
In answer to Nathalie’s comment about forming an opinion as to whether Faust regretted his decision, well here is his final speech.
O Faustus,
Now hast thou but one bare hour to live,
And then thou must be damn’d perpetually!
Stand still, you ever moving spheres of heaven,
That time may cease, and midnight never come;
Fair Nature’s eye, rise, rise again, and make
Perpetual day; or let this hour be but
A year, a month, a week, a natural day,
That Faustus may repent and save his soul!
O lente, lente currite, noctis equi!
The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike,
The devil will come, and Faustus must be damn’d.
O, I’ll leap up to heaven! Who pulls me down?
See, where Christ’s blood streams in the firmament!
One drop of blood will save me: O my Christ!
Rend not my heart for naming of my Christ;
Yet will I call on him: O, spare me, Lucifer!
Where is it now? ’tis gone:
And, see, a threatening arm, an angry brow!
Mountains and hills, come, come, and fall on me,
And hide me from the heavy wrath of heaven!
No!
Then will I headlong run into the earth:
Gape, earth! O, no, it will not harbour me!
You stars that reign’d at my nativity,
Whose influence hath allotted death and hell,
Now draw up Faustus, like a foggy mist,
Into the entrails of yon labouring cloud,
That, when you vomit forth into the air,
My limbs may issue from your smoky mouths;
But let my soul mount and ascend to heaven!
[The clock strikes the half-hour.]
O, half the hour is past! ’twill all be past anon.
O, if my soul must suffer for my sin,
Impose some end to my incessant pain;
Let Faustus live in hell a thousand years,
A hundred thousand, and at last be sav’d!
No end is limited to damned souls.
Why wert thou not a creature wanting soul?
Or why is this immortal that thou hast?
O, Pythagoras’ metempsychosis, were that true,
This soul should fly from me, and I be chang’d
Into some brutish beast! all beasts are happy,
For, when they die,
Their souls are soon dissolv’d in elements;
But mine must live still to be plagu’d in hell.
Curs’d be the parents that engender’d me!
No, Faustus, curse thyself, curse Lucifer
That hath depriv’d thee of the joys of heaven.
[The clock strikes twelve.]
It strikes, it strikes! Now, body, turn to air,
Or Lucifer will bear thee quick to hell!
O soul, be chang’d into small water-drops,
And fall into the ocean, ne’er be found!
[Thunder. Enter DEVIL.]
O, mercy, heaven! look not so fierce on me!
Adders and serpents, let me breathe a while!
Ugly hell, gape not! come not, Lucifer!
I’ll burn my books! O Mephistophilis!
[Exit DEVIL with FAUSTUS.]
December 11th, 2003 at 12:02 pm
Maybe she’s saying, no good will come of paying attention to the PR girls!
Was this the face that launchd a thousand ships, / And burnt the topless towers of Ilium? / Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss! / Her lips suck forth my soul: see, where it flies!
Faustus.
December 11th, 2003 at 12:26 pm
you forgot the last two lines, in latin, which read “the hour ends the day, the author ends his work” .. IIRC - “terminat hora diem, terminat author opus”.
December 11th, 2003 at 12:43 pm
Well, this does entertain me more than the Beavis and Butthead in Javaland dialogue.
“That man that hath a tongue, I say, is no man,
If with his tongue he cannot win a woman.”
Shakespeare “The Two Gentleman of Verona”
December 11th, 2003 at 1:36 pm
Camerson, sorry cut and paste error, glad you spotted it.
Nathalie, I’ve not read or seen The Two Gentleman of Verona so I must now do so as that is great line. But my favourite is still the end of Henry V speech before the battle;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.
You can almost here Hani speaking with the French being represented by the JBoss fanatics ;-)
December 11th, 2003 at 1:37 pm
Mind you, I think the language would be distinctly anglo saxon :-))
December 11th, 2003 at 2:44 pm
Well the French consider fanaticism and self-promotion to be distinctly ungallic virtues…they refer to Marc as “That American!”
I always did love the Henry V St. Crispin’s Day speech. “Once more unto the breach dear friends once more…,” or at least something in that vein, don’t have time to look it up. If you go back to the Henry 1Vs as well as Henry V, the Prince Hal evolution is a useful metamorphasis and then there’s one of my all-time favorite Shakespeare characters–Sir John Falstaff, the fat knight.
December 11th, 2003 at 3:36 pm
I looked up the whole of the “That man that hath a tongue” piece and it gave me such hope. Thanks for pointing me to it.
December 19th, 2003 at 11:01 am
man, this must be an all-time high with about 95% of trash comments. Must be something like an orgasm for a lot of people to crank out shit like this. Hani, cant you provide some “register for comments” function, where you manually check if the registration data is correct? THis way you could assure that registered people have some IQ above 10.
December 21st, 2003 at 10:18 am
Unbelievable… I can’t understand why our industry attracts so many perverted sex-crazed losers.
January 4th, 2004 at 4:26 pm
Nathalie said:
I always did love the Henry V St. Crispin’s Day speech. “Once more unto the breach dear friends once more…,”
The St Crispin’s day speech is the “we happy few” one (you know, the less people here to share the glory) which at the battle of Agincourt.
“Once more unto the breach my friends … or let us fill the hole with our English dead” is before that battle, at a castle seige.
The Scottish Play is still the best one though (followed by Othello).
January 29th, 2004 at 8:05 pm
Thanks Bard,
Didn’t have time to look up the Henry V speech. My all time favorite would be The Tempest. After that, it’s a tie between King Lear and Macbeth.
February 20th, 2004 at 5:56 pm
Do you make a gagging, choking sort of noise? Or is it more of a fapfapfapfap sorta thing?
April 12th, 2004 at 6:19 pm
Does anybody here actually write code? I’ve used JBoss for a couple of years. It’s not too bad for the price (free). I found problems with it and so I fixed them. You just decompile and think. Something I’m afraid isn’t done very often by this group (the thinking part, anyway).
April 13th, 2004 at 10:13 am
Does anybody here actually write code? I’ve used JBoss for a couple of years. It’s not too bad for the price (free). I found problems with it and so I fixed them. You just decompile and think. Something I’m afraid isn’t done very often by this group (the thinking part, anyway).
April 13th, 2004 at 10:13 am
Does anybody here actually write code? I’ve used JBoss for a couple of years. It’s not too bad for the price (free). I found problems with it and so I fixed them. You just decompile and think. Something I’m afraid isn’t done very often by this group (the thinking part, anyway).
April 14th, 2004 at 10:12 am
Does anybody here actually write code? I’ve used JBoss for a couple of years. It’s not too bad for the price (free). I found problems with it and so I fixed them. You just decompile and think. Something I’m afraid isn’t done very often by this group (the thinking part, anyway).