There is still one readily "hackable" car: the Honda Civic. It was a no-brainer installing an upgraded MP3 stereo in my '98 Civic CX. There's so much space inside the console that I was even able to tuck a decent-sized amp in there.
There's a thriving market for Civic mods. Of course kids with far too much money and time on their hands tend to go overboard with their mods, producing some very
hilariousresults.
...or would there be no speed restriction if one were to "accidentally" block the GPS antenna?
Ah well. We need to have it implemented in one place, just to prove how silly it is, and then convince the rest of the world to never try something like that. Funny that it takes a big screwup before people realize that something is truly wrong.
They're M$FT geeks but they can produce a product.
As in they work for MICROS~1? If so then, they're with the only company in the world that actually gets decent tech support for MICROS~1 development environments. The rest of us have to search through the horrid "Knowledge Base" on the web and attempt in vain to contact techies via email. Try doing that some time. No wait; don't ever try that! Go to the comp.lang.* newsgroups. You'll get flamed by a bunch of elitist programmers who believe that all answers are contained in the FAQ, but it's much less frustrating than the MICROS~1 web page!
Non-Coders should talk place in the process, testing the product, working with it, helping to get it out, but they should stick to
"easy" coding tasks: defining user interfaces and such things.
True and False.
Non-coders are really good at bashing an application till it breaks. Not having any idea whatsoever about how it works inside makes them try clicking and typing things that most geeks would overlook.
It takes a special cross-breed of geek and artist to design a good user interface. One has to know what the underlying code does, while also making the interface "feel right". Hardcore geeks typically make very functional but very unintuitive UIs. "If you don't find it user-friendly enough, then you're not a real user", or so they say. Just look at any UNIX-type shell for a fine example.;^)
Most people in software development these days are clueless. Having a university degree, college diploma and/or MCSE does not make one any better at coding, from what I've seen. Programming is something that requires both inate talent and experience.
Second, making development environments supposedly more accessible and "fun", while stripping away useful language constructs because they are "too complicated for the average programmer", only makes for sub-par software. Try making a 30-screen database app in Visual Basic. Actually no; don't ever try that. Just beleive me when I say that it's damn near impossible to produce a good product that way!
Finally, most new programmers are thrown into difficult tasks without much background knowledge at all, and very little if any mentorship. Still they're expected to produce exemplary results. Sure it's fun to be "challenged", but that's not the way to have a good end result.
What's important is allowing people to gradually gain experience in programming, to guide them along the way, to show them how to improve their skills, and to give them the proper tools to get the job done. This is how it's done in every industry, except for that of software.
Slashdot Mirror
There's a thriving market for Civic mods. Of course kids with far too much money and time on their hands tend to go overboard with their mods, producing some very hilarious results.
Ah well. We need to have it implemented in one place, just to prove how silly it is, and then convince the rest of the world to never try something like that. Funny that it takes a big screwup before people realize that something is truly wrong.
Glad that I live in Canada!
As in they work for MICROS~1? If so then, they're with the only company in the world that actually gets decent tech support for MICROS~1 development environments. The rest of us have to search through the horrid "Knowledge Base" on the web and attempt in vain to contact techies via email. Try doing that some time. No wait; don't ever try that! Go to the comp.lang.* newsgroups. You'll get flamed by a bunch of elitist programmers who believe that all answers are contained in the FAQ, but it's much less frustrating than the MICROS~1 web page!
True and False.
Non-coders are really good at bashing an application till it breaks. Not having any idea whatsoever about how it works inside makes them try clicking and typing things that most geeks would overlook.
It takes a special cross-breed of geek and artist to design a good user interface. One has to know what the underlying code does, while also making the interface "feel right". Hardcore geeks typically make very functional but very unintuitive UIs. "If you don't find it user-friendly enough, then you're not a real user", or so they say. Just look at any UNIX-type shell for a fine example. ;^)
...software will continue to suck.
Most people in software development these days are clueless. Having a university degree, college diploma and/or MCSE does not make one any better at coding, from what I've seen. Programming is something that requires both inate talent and experience.
Second, making development environments supposedly more accessible and "fun", while stripping away useful language constructs because they are "too complicated for the average programmer", only makes for sub-par software. Try making a 30-screen database app in Visual Basic. Actually no; don't ever try that. Just beleive me when I say that it's damn near impossible to produce a good product that way!
Finally, most new programmers are thrown into difficult tasks without much background knowledge at all, and very little if any mentorship. Still they're expected to produce exemplary results. Sure it's fun to be "challenged", but that's not the way to have a good end result.
What's important is allowing people to gradually gain experience in programming, to guide them along the way, to show them how to improve their skills, and to give them the proper tools to get the job done. This is how it's done in every industry, except for that of software.