That depends on the individual. I've known people in their 20s who were already set in their ways, and people in their 70s who were still open to new ideas. It's got nothing to do with age as such - it's entirely a state of mind. If you keep using your brain to learn new things, there's no reason you shouldn't be as capable of it at 80 as you were at 18 really.
I'm 55 and i'm studying science at university. I'm having less difficulty than some of my 20-something uni mates. I taught myself PHP, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, a few years ago, so i could work as a web developer for a while. I taught myself Java in the uni break last year so i could play with developing Android apps.
The fact that 'for' stands for an english word doesn't mean a non-programmer can look at the source code and see what 'for' does or the implications it has.
A Dutch speaker shouldn't have too much trouble with the word "for" - it's spelled a little differently, but pronounced almost exactly the same as its Dutch equivalent "voor".
I doubt age is a factor as such - although familiarity and comfortableness with technology might play a part in it. (I'm 54 and i've been working with computers on and off for over 30 years, so i'm not sure where that puts me!) But i think it helps to have something to distract your conscious mind while your unconscious churns away creatively.
I think procrastination is an essential part of the sort of creativity that has a deadline, for instance - so long as it doesn't get out of hand! In particular, i'm talking about writing things, but being distracted by Slashdot or Facebook. While you're apparently procrastinating, your brain is in fact processing the task that needs to be accomplished. For some people, at least, a reasonable amount of time spent procrastinating probably produces better results than just diving in and doing the job. A study on that would be interesting!
[......] I am on slashdot now because I have to let the welds cool down so that I can move the work and then weld another section. If I don't wait for the weld to cool down, I will burn my finger off. [......]
That sounds like a feeble excuse! Have you ever thought of using tongs?
This is clearly nonsense. If it wasn't then the most successful authors would be the ones that never read books - and i'm certain that's not true.
I spent the last two and a half years driving insanely big trucks in a mine, which is mindlessly boring almost all the time. It certainly didn't make me any more creative, in fact it numbed my brain to the point where there was no more creativity left in me. Now i'm at university full time, my creativity's starting to recover. Stimulation, not boredom, is what fuels creativity.
Of the "studies" claimed by the article, one was carried out by a university and seems to have been fairly dubious - although there are no citations either in the article or in the article it refers to - and another was carried out by a mobile phone company and is nothing to do with boredom.That's it. The article linked to from the original article mentions "studies", but doesn't give any clues about what they are. So, as far as i can tell, the "studies" are a fantasy.
[......] are you seriously suggesting that the OP a) find or create an IMAP server,
Ridiculously simple. They're already running Linux, they just have to install dovecot and they've got a fully functional IMAP server (no configuration required) - which has access to all their local mail boxes.
b) force feed that server all his archived emails (presuming that there is some way to bulk import email into the IMAP server)
Ridiculously simple. Fire up Thunderbird, configure it to access your local IMAP server, select all, drag and drop.
c) change his current email setup so that, from now on, his email is sent to the mail server on which the IMAP server runs?
Why would they need to do that? Thunderbird (or other mail reader of choice) can access multiple accounts.
Neanderthals didn't disappear. As a distinct culture they "disappeared" from the archaeological record, but that certainly doesn't mean Neanderthals disappeared from existence. A big chunk of the world's population have a significant proportion of Neanderthal genes. You can't say a population went extinct if their descendants are still alive!
It sounds like my Galaxy S3 has a better camera than your iPhone. However, it still only takes good photos in a limited range of circumstances. Or, perhaps more accurately, it takes surprisingly good photos for a limited range of compositions. My Nikon DSLR can take a lot of photos that the phone can't take. It can zoom, for a start. And, because the lens i use has vibration reduction, i can take handheld photos in very low light.
However, the wide angle lens of the phone can get photos that the Nikon can't get (but only because i haven't got a wide angle lens for it). And the phone can take panoramic shots, which the DSLR can't. In the end though, a good photographer can take good photos with a bad camera, but a bad photographer can't take good photos with a good camera. Have you ever tried taking duckface selfies with a DSLR?
Most importantly, the phone is always with me - and the best shot is the one you took, not the one you could have taken if you'd had a camera with you.
In addition to the clutter aspect, it may be worth considering the potential adverse health effects of having piles of old electronic equipment kicking around. Depending on their age, they may be leaking polychorinated biphenyls and/or banned flame retardants, etc.
[......] what about Meego, Tizen, even Ubuntu ? Why not just fork Android ?
Android's crap! (It's been my exclusive phone/tablet OS for about 3 years). It's not worth forking. Meego didn't do much for Nokia. Ubuntu's interesting - but it might be a bit brown for mass consumption. Firefox has made a big mark with their browser, i guess people think that might translate into a usable phone. So long as it starts up quicker than the Firefox web browser does, they could be onto something...
Slashdot Mirror
That depends on the individual. I've known people in their 20s who were already set in their ways, and people in their 70s who were still open to new ideas. It's got nothing to do with age as such - it's entirely a state of mind. If you keep using your brain to learn new things, there's no reason you shouldn't be as capable of it at 80 as you were at 18 really.
I'm 55 and i'm studying science at university. I'm having less difficulty than some of my 20-something uni mates. I taught myself PHP, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, a few years ago, so i could work as a web developer for a while. I taught myself Java in the uni break last year so i could play with developing Android apps.
If you use it, you don't lose it!
"When you call your business Penguin Computer & Telephone Solutions, it's obvious that......" you've got no imagination.
The fact that 'for' stands for an english word doesn't mean a non-programmer can look at the source code and see what 'for' does or the implications it has.
A Dutch speaker shouldn't have too much trouble with the word "for" - it's spelled a little differently, but pronounced almost exactly the same as its Dutch equivalent "voor".
[......] LibreOffice [......] is the best of the free alternatives but sadly lacks in many areas [......]
What areas are those? (I'm not being funny, i'm genuinely interested.)
Printing boarding passes? How quaintly retro! The last few times i've flown, the boarding pass has been sent to my phone as a text message.
I wrote my first cheque ever sometime in the mid 1970s, aged in my teens. I haven't written a cheque for nearly 30 years.
I doubt age is a factor as such - although familiarity and comfortableness with technology might play a part in it. (I'm 54 and i've been working with computers on and off for over 30 years, so i'm not sure where that puts me!) But i think it helps to have something to distract your conscious mind while your unconscious churns away creatively.
I think procrastination is an essential part of the sort of creativity that has a deadline, for instance - so long as it doesn't get out of hand! In particular, i'm talking about writing things, but being distracted by Slashdot or Facebook. While you're apparently procrastinating, your brain is in fact processing the task that needs to be accomplished. For some people, at least, a reasonable amount of time spent procrastinating probably produces better results than just diving in and doing the job. A study on that would be interesting!
Folks:
[......] I am on slashdot now because I have to let the welds cool down so that I can move the work and then weld another section. If I don't wait for the weld to cool down, I will burn my finger off. [......]
That sounds like a feeble excuse! Have you ever thought of using tongs?
This is clearly nonsense. If it wasn't then the most successful authors would be the ones that never read books - and i'm certain that's not true.
I spent the last two and a half years driving insanely big trucks in a mine, which is mindlessly boring almost all the time. It certainly didn't make me any more creative, in fact it numbed my brain to the point where there was no more creativity left in me. Now i'm at university full time, my creativity's starting to recover. Stimulation, not boredom, is what fuels creativity.
Of the "studies" claimed by the article, one was carried out by a university and seems to have been fairly dubious - although there are no citations either in the article or in the article it refers to - and another was carried out by a mobile phone company and is nothing to do with boredom.That's it. The article linked to from the original article mentions "studies", but doesn't give any clues about what they are. So, as far as i can tell, the "studies" are a fantasy.
I never will understand why some people feel the need to post on topics they don't have the slightest clue about.
Because it's a long standing Slashdot tradition!
[......] are you seriously suggesting that the OP
a) find or create an IMAP server,
Ridiculously simple. They're already running Linux, they just have to install dovecot and they've got a fully functional IMAP server (no configuration required) - which has access to all their local mail boxes.
b) force feed that server all his archived emails (presuming that there is some way to bulk import email into the IMAP server)
Ridiculously simple. Fire up Thunderbird, configure it to access your local IMAP server, select all, drag and drop.
c) change his current email setup so that, from now on, his email is sent to the mail server on which the IMAP server runs?
Why would they need to do that? Thunderbird (or other mail reader of choice) can access multiple accounts.
That looks like quartz veins on the horizontal lying rock about north east by east. I wonder if it is.
What you call artifacting, I call dusty air.
Air? On Mars?
Especially since the controls are backwards.
No they're not. Just pretend you're controlling the camera.
Ozone in lower atmosphere==bad. Smog, lung damage, etc.
Methane doesn't produce ozone in the lower atmosphere either.
Ozone from the lower atmosphere doesn't make it to the upper atmosphere [......]
No, but methane does - which is what we're discussing.
The leaking gas [......] enhances ozone production
No such luck! The problem is that methane destroys ozone, it doesn't produce it.
[......]who won the Six Nations at the weekend?
Neanderthals?
pasta? really? from where?
They were our ancestors!
Neanderthals didn't disappear. As a distinct culture they "disappeared" from the archaeological record, but that certainly doesn't mean Neanderthals disappeared from existence. A big chunk of the world's population have a significant proportion of Neanderthal genes. You can't say a population went extinct if their descendants are still alive!
It sounds like my Galaxy S3 has a better camera than your iPhone. However, it still only takes good photos in a limited range of circumstances. Or, perhaps more accurately, it takes surprisingly good photos for a limited range of compositions. My Nikon DSLR can take a lot of photos that the phone can't take. It can zoom, for a start. And, because the lens i use has vibration reduction, i can take handheld photos in very low light.
However, the wide angle lens of the phone can get photos that the Nikon can't get (but only because i haven't got a wide angle lens for it). And the phone can take panoramic shots, which the DSLR can't. In the end though, a good photographer can take good photos with a bad camera, but a bad photographer can't take good photos with a good camera. Have you ever tried taking duckface selfies with a DSLR?
Most importantly, the phone is always with me - and the best shot is the one you took, not the one you could have taken if you'd had a camera with you.
Windows 3.11 on a 286 with a Hercules graphic card.
And a 2400 bps modem. Hopefully you can still find a copy of Trumpet Winsock around somewhere!
In addition to the clutter aspect, it may be worth considering the potential adverse health effects of having piles of old electronic equipment kicking around. Depending on their age, they may be leaking polychorinated biphenyls and/or banned flame retardants, etc.
I also don't think HTML5/JS is up to the task of writing apps as rich as what can be found now in the app stores [......]
I think it could be - given the right infrastructure and a good API.
[......] what about Meego, Tizen, even Ubuntu ? Why not just fork Android ?
Android's crap! (It's been my exclusive phone/tablet OS for about 3 years). It's not worth forking. Meego didn't do much for Nokia. Ubuntu's interesting - but it might be a bit brown for mass consumption. Firefox has made a big mark with their browser, i guess people think that might translate into a usable phone. So long as it starts up quicker than the Firefox web browser does, they could be onto something...