Walt Mossberg wrote this in the Wall Street Journal. So, here's the email I sent him:

Hi Walt,

As a responsible journalist whose column informs, educates and inflences many non-techies about technology, I think you do a great disservice to your readers through columns like the 7/14 one on cookies. I would not have minded the column so much if you had given even play to cookies used for storing preferences versus tracking cookies. Instead you allocate a couple of sentences to the latter while going on and on about how bad tracking cookies are. This is just irresponsible, plain and simple because it causes the average, non-technical user to do things like disable cookies altogether in their browser. Well, guess what, Walt, that messes up a LOT of web applications. And increase the support burden on websites. And impacts businesses and their ability to provide online services to their customers. And results in frustrated customers, who blame the business, when they really should be blaming Mr. Mossberg.

What would be helpful is if you were more objective in your characterization. For instance, "Cookies are small text files that Web-site operators -- and third-party companies that insert ads into Web sites -- place on a user's computer." could easily have been written as "Cookies are a browser feature that websites can use to store a small piece of information on your computer that is retrievable only by that website."

I don't have a problem with people in positions of influence stating their opinions. But they do have a responsibility to their audience. How can you make a statement like this:

"Until that happens, here is my advice: If you don't like the idea of tracking cookies, run an antispyware program that detects and removes them, along with all the other indefensible computer code some companies think they have the right to install. After all, it is your computer."

Do you seriously believe that your average user is capable of making an informed decision when their antispyware program prompts them "Remove XYZ cookie. Yes/No? How do you reckon the user can distinguish between what's a tracking cookie and what's an authentication cookie?

Get a clue, Walt, and please stop feeding the paranoia.

Regards,

Nik Kalyani

P.S.: You should consider getting the WSJ site to not use cookies. People in glass houses and all that...

Edit: Walt, obviously disagrees. Here's his emailed response:

<quote>
Wow. I can't even begin to say how wrong you are. First, I am an opinion columnist, paid to be subjective. Second, the column wasn't about cookies as a whole, but one type of cookie that is a form of spyware. Third, despite your claims, I was very careful to say that many other cookies are beneficial, and to give examples. Finally, if you ever used antispyware software, you'd know that it never even detects most cookies, and never asks the user about them. It only detects tracking cookies. I have never seen an antispyware program remove a cookie that stores login prefs, for instance.

So I am going along implementing RFC 2518 and was Googling for clarification on an item. One of the search results caught my eye because it referenced "WebDAV Batch Methods." I was a bit puzzled by this, because I have read RFC 2518 at least a dozen times now, and have never seen a reference to this phrase.

Did a bit of digging and discovered this on MSDN. I don't understand how Microsoft can have this documentation without once mentioning that these batch methods are entirely a Microsoft concoction. I will not be implementing BCOPY, BDELETE, BMOVE, BPROPFIND and BPROPPATCH.

My daughter just hit the seven-month mark and it's time to activate her tech genes. So I am building her a complete learning system. Ideally, I would buy all this stuff, but seeing that I make a living selling DotNetNuke modules, this is currently not an option. Besides, the geek in me could never handle plug-and-play electronics. If it doesn't require taking the top off a dozen times and Googling for hours to find a driver, it probably has a low coolness factor and has limited appeal.

Anyway, the intended use of the system is to allow my kid to experience two kinds of multimedia content:

1) All the stuff from our UpToTen premium membership (which by the way, is amazing!!!)

2) Custom content I will create to give her a firm grasp of English, Spanish, Hindi, Gujarati and Kannada languages, plus world culture with emphasis on U.S. and Indian cultures.

Since I have settled on the UpToTen content, I went ahead and acquired the Berchet Baby Keyboard overlay.

I also purchased a Logitech Cordless Keyboard, but discovered post-purchase that it has a non-standard navigation key layout. So it now goes into the back of a closet, and I have to acquire another wireless keyboard for attaching the Berchet keyboard overlay.

I already have a 250Gb USB2 external drive with around 50Gb of music and another 100Gb or so of my favorite DVD's, so that will suffice for the BES. If I can make the BES sufficiently flexible, it can do double-duty as an AES (Adult Entertainment System) also. In which case it makes sense to consolidate all the media onto one drive.

I have struggled with whether to get a Mac-mini or build a Media Center PC, and I am currently leaning toward the Media Center PC, mostly because I can leverage hardware I already have (Hauppauge WinTV USB tuner+fm+dvr for example).

So, I need to acquire:

a) All the pieces I don't already have to build a Media Center PC (small form-factor case, motherboard w/ audio, CPU, memory, video card, small HD for OS, MC remote control, wi-fi card). This is easy and I think I can get it done for less than $300. I have found a few options and just need to make a decision.

b) Either a decent projector or a plasma TV. This is a dilemma. I'm going to have to figure out where I can get something that's affordable. I did some preliminary Googling, but haven't found anything that looks appealing yet (i.e. it's way outside my meager budget). Most products are geared towards businesses or home theater enthusiasts so the prices are fairly outlandish. I need something without a lot of bells and whistles, but which is functional for basic multimedia content. If anyone has ideas/suggestions, I am all ears. (Will trade software development/marketing consulting for plasma TV...hehe)

My vision is to sit on the couch with baby on lap (or baby in high-chair) with wireless Berchet-overlaid keyboard to view content so she can watch/listen/learn comfortably. I will release any content I produce to the public for free so other interested parents can benefit.

I will leave you with my two favorite multimedia characters -- Boowa and Kwala

This has been a bad week. My grandmother passed away earlier in the week. Since then, in addition to not being very productive and not feeling very creative, I have also been generally quite irritable. Today, I also did one thing that is a rarity for me...I got into a pointless argument about a pointless subject on the DNN forums. OK, make that two things. Here I am blogging about something that no one is interested in. I'll stop.

Now that I have made significant progress in my WebDAV server API implementation, I can post some details.

My goal is to create an API that faithfully implements RFC2518. This RFC outlines the Http/1.1 Extensions that constitute the WebDAV protocol. There are two levels: Level 1, general WebDAV support, and Level 2, locking support. I plan on supporting both levels, but for the 0.xx release will release with Level 1 support only.

I have designed the API so any developer who knows how to code with a .Net language can use the API. Zero knowledge of WebDAV is required. To use the API, a developer would need to:

1) Reference the API assembly from her/his class project.

2) Provide an implementation of abstract classes WebDAVCollection and WebDAVItem. Basically, you have to map your data store collections and items so that when the API requests a collection or an item, it gets one.

3) Provide an implementation of abstract WebDAVAuthentication class.

To put it in use, you have to:

1) Configure IIS to support file extension .davx and have it respond to all verbs (the extension is irrelevant; if you want, you can have it be .foobar, as long as it responds to all verbs).

2) Add a line similar to the following in your web.config:
<add verb="*" path="MyFiles.davx" type="MyCompany.WebDAV, MyCompany.WebDAV" />

3) Create a file with the name used in #2 (i.e. MyFiles.davx). This file can be empty.

With this in place, Windows or Mac clients can natively map a drive letter using http://yourserver/MyFiles.davx as the path. Alternately, they can directly open a resource as a file from applications such as Word, Excel, HomeSite etc.

I have designed the API so each unique data store type on the server, would have an end-point ({something}.davx) and a line in the web.config.

For example, a handler such as DotNetNukeHTML.davx could be placed in the root of a DotNetNuke portal. A user on a Windows or Mac platform could then map a drive letter using http://yourserver/DotNetNukeHTML.davx/NNN where NNN is the DotNetNuke Portal ID. The user would then see a folder structure where each folder corresponds to a DotNetNuke tab. Within each folder are files corresponding to DotNetNuke module instances. Initially I plan on supporting only the HTML and NukeHTML modules so you would only see files for each instance of these modules. You could then open any of the files using Word, HomeSite or any other HTML Editor and edit the file and save it back. Of course, you can also create a new file which will result in a new module instance being added to the page.

This will basically eliminate the need to use a browser-based editor to create/modify portal content. Just use any rich Windows or Mac editors at your disposal.

This is one example. Using the API, you could also allow full file management on the web server, view a mailbox as a collection of EML files, open up a database table in Excel, there is really no limit to the possibilities. As long as you can figure out a way to present your data (any format) as a data stream that represents the file content expected by a WebDAV-enabled desktop app, you can enable native WebDAV access to your app.

Here's an illustration that gives an overview of how things will work:

Today was my first Independence Day as an American citizen, as it was for my daughter who was born last December. We joined more than half a million other people to catch the amazing fireworks display on the National Mall. Quite spectacular.

Happy Birthday America!