Wow, Slashdotters, ask a simple question, get a hundred flames in response. Yes, I know he should have seen it coming, but hopefully he'll be able to locate some decent information in the midst of most of your garbage. Go flame about something actually controversial for Pete's sake.
Data Modeling and Database Design (amazon.com) by Umanath and Scamell - Excellent resource that covers several levels of data modelling, including conceptual schemas and logical schemas as well as normalization, relational algebra and quality/efficient SQL design.
Your argument backfires here.
You just claimed that medium doesn't determine art. Put another way, (as others here have said) the medium itself is not art (to the other writer above, the pencil and the watermelon are not art, it is their combination that is the art). Similarly, video games themselves are not art. Not because they have objectives, but because what makes a video game a video game is not art.
Put another way, books are not art (they are blocks of paper stained with ink), but literature is.
Once again, as you said above, art is defined by the aesthetic experience. It is not only the medium, but what you experience through the medium that defines art. This is not to say that art is completely internal. It is to say that art is the combination of the paint on the canvas or the shape of the statue, combined with your experience of it.
And a "good" video game can be deemed as such only by the quality of experience (aesthetic only being one of them) you get out of it.
All that being said, that is all just philosophical precision stuff. As for Ebert - he's just bitter. From my definition, film isn't art either (but individual movies/ photographs combined with your aesthetic experiences of them can be).
Of course, some people say "don't reinvent the wheel", but then there are applications where size and performance really do matter. Or maybe limited memory and limited CPU systems are considered too old school for some.
Heh,
Seems to me like a lot of the people on here are coming from highly disparate development environments. Limited Memory and CPU's are old school to people who have jobs at new firms writing Java or.Net web applications. There are people, on the other hand who are still writing for transaction processing systems that are 20 years old. You bet your ass they need to optimize and know sorting algorithms backward and forwards. And of course, everything in between.
Flame flame flame. It's like the people here can't conceive of different circumstances where the other programming paradigm works/exists.
I will say that the new programmers don't know enough, but the new programs and ide's do handle a lot for them very efficiently. Great when it works. Stupid when it doesn't
Important to note that the only part of the video that looks completely normal is the behavior of the head, the arms, the breathing of the torso-essentially everything done by the actual human. I'd be surprised if you felt absolutely no (at least confusion if not revulsion) watching the video. The face was interesting to me, but I was blown away by how realistic the hair looked, how realistic the arm movements--until I realized that that was all still a regular human being. Then, when I focused in on the face alone, it simply looked animated, and if not disgusting, at least completely out of place.
I think the general feeling, even if it isn't an all-out feeling of disgust, is one that things are...not...right. Ultimately, I think this is a pretty bad example, though, since Emily is touted as being "not real" but in fact the majority of the body language--the stuff we are tuned into almost subconsciously--is still human. I think if this video skips by any general feeling of revulsion, disgust, or out of place-ness, it is specifically because there are still physical human elements in it.
I think some of our slashdotters think that the kids in Africa are just sitting there waiting for some old parts to fall into their laps which they can hack together to make a working computer...which they will run without electricity.
Where are the computers going? Relief organizations? Come on. They have no use for them.
You can argue all day long about the effects of relief organizations. It's never that black and white - some are good, some are bad. Some are having positive effects, some are having negative effects. What's your goal? To raise the standard of living for "all African citizens?" That's a chimera that people will be chasing long after we're gone. Most of the relief organizations are only effective because they're effective in one place, with one population. That may lower the standard of living somewhere else, or it may just raise the standard of living. What about you? Do you have a right to say anything when you're (anybody reading slashdot probably--and if you're not I'm sorry) has a full belly and a roof over your head. That makes us rich. Are you willing to give up even some of that luxury in order that one (or twenty) African citizens can have more? I'm not really concerned with your answer to that question. I'm just saying - can any of us really untangle the moral mess that comes out of it?
But that shouldn't stop us from trying, even in stumbling ways, to make a difference.
I'm part of an organization that is pulling together newer computers (P4's and Dual Cores) to send to a lower income school in South Africa for training purposes. There are jobs, even in third world countries, using computers, and these students with those skills could have the chance to change their lives for the better with a job. Oh, and I love linux, but the employers only take people with experience with M$ software. The free/open solutions don't give them anything except luxuries they can't afford to maintain. Stop sending our trash there, but apply some of our resources to actually make a difference, and use solutions that make sense.
If you're somebody who doesn't think you should share your resources with the less fortunate, then we don't have anything to talk about on this subject. You're just taking advantage of your position.
Slashdot Mirror
Wow, Slashdotters, ask a simple question, get a hundred flames in response. Yes, I know he should have seen it coming, but hopefully he'll be able to locate some decent information in the midst of most of your garbage. Go flame about something actually controversial for Pete's sake.
Data Modeling and Database Design (amazon.com) by Umanath and Scamell - Excellent resource that covers several levels of data modelling, including conceptual schemas and logical schemas as well as normalization, relational algebra and quality/efficient SQL design.
Your argument backfires here. You just claimed that medium doesn't determine art. Put another way, (as others here have said) the medium itself is not art (to the other writer above, the pencil and the watermelon are not art, it is their combination that is the art). Similarly, video games themselves are not art. Not because they have objectives, but because what makes a video game a video game is not art. Put another way, books are not art (they are blocks of paper stained with ink), but literature is. Once again, as you said above, art is defined by the aesthetic experience. It is not only the medium, but what you experience through the medium that defines art. This is not to say that art is completely internal. It is to say that art is the combination of the paint on the canvas or the shape of the statue, combined with your experience of it. And a "good" video game can be deemed as such only by the quality of experience (aesthetic only being one of them) you get out of it. All that being said, that is all just philosophical precision stuff. As for Ebert - he's just bitter. From my definition, film isn't art either (but individual movies/ photographs combined with your aesthetic experiences of them can be).
Of course, some people say "don't reinvent the wheel", but then there are applications where size and performance really do matter. Or maybe limited memory and limited CPU systems are considered too old school for some.
Heh, Seems to me like a lot of the people on here are coming from highly disparate development environments. Limited Memory and CPU's are old school to people who have jobs at new firms writing Java or .Net web applications. There are people, on the other hand who are still writing for transaction processing systems that are 20 years old. You bet your ass they need to optimize and know sorting algorithms backward and forwards. And of course, everything in between.
Flame flame flame. It's like the people here can't conceive of different circumstances where the other programming paradigm works/exists.
I will say that the new programmers don't know enough, but the new programs and ide's do handle a lot for them very efficiently. Great when it works. Stupid when it doesn't
Important to note that the only part of the video that looks completely normal is the behavior of the head, the arms, the breathing of the torso-essentially everything done by the actual human. I'd be surprised if you felt absolutely no (at least confusion if not revulsion) watching the video. The face was interesting to me, but I was blown away by how realistic the hair looked, how realistic the arm movements--until I realized that that was all still a regular human being. Then, when I focused in on the face alone, it simply looked animated, and if not disgusting, at least completely out of place.
I think the general feeling, even if it isn't an all-out feeling of disgust, is one that things are...not...right. Ultimately, I think this is a pretty bad example, though, since Emily is touted as being "not real" but in fact the majority of the body language--the stuff we are tuned into almost subconsciously--is still human. I think if this video skips by any general feeling of revulsion, disgust, or out of place-ness, it is specifically because there are still physical human elements in it.
I think some of our slashdotters think that the kids in Africa are just sitting there waiting for some old parts to fall into their laps which they can hack together to make a working computer...which they will run without electricity. Where are the computers going? Relief organizations? Come on. They have no use for them. You can argue all day long about the effects of relief organizations. It's never that black and white - some are good, some are bad. Some are having positive effects, some are having negative effects. What's your goal? To raise the standard of living for "all African citizens?" That's a chimera that people will be chasing long after we're gone. Most of the relief organizations are only effective because they're effective in one place, with one population. That may lower the standard of living somewhere else, or it may just raise the standard of living. What about you? Do you have a right to say anything when you're (anybody reading slashdot probably--and if you're not I'm sorry) has a full belly and a roof over your head. That makes us rich. Are you willing to give up even some of that luxury in order that one (or twenty) African citizens can have more? I'm not really concerned with your answer to that question. I'm just saying - can any of us really untangle the moral mess that comes out of it? But that shouldn't stop us from trying, even in stumbling ways, to make a difference. I'm part of an organization that is pulling together newer computers (P4's and Dual Cores) to send to a lower income school in South Africa for training purposes. There are jobs, even in third world countries, using computers, and these students with those skills could have the chance to change their lives for the better with a job. Oh, and I love linux, but the employers only take people with experience with M$ software. The free/open solutions don't give them anything except luxuries they can't afford to maintain. Stop sending our trash there, but apply some of our resources to actually make a difference, and use solutions that make sense. If you're somebody who doesn't think you should share your resources with the less fortunate, then we don't have anything to talk about on this subject. You're just taking advantage of your position.