But why should upper-middle class pay a greater percentage of their earnings toward roads than the lower-middle class?
Marginal income. A lower-middle-class family might have to spend, say, 85% of their post-tax income on basic necessities, whereas an upper-middle-class family might be able to meet those same needs on 60% of their income. Wealthier people have more cash left over after their basic needs are met. That's why we have progressive marginal tax rates.
Do rich people wear out roads faster?
Yes, they do. They take public transit less, and they drive more and bigger cars.
Do the cops spend more or less of their budget year dealing with rich or poor people?
Rich people have a greater expectation of service from the cops than poor people do.
Obama, et al, really do think your money belongs to them first. To be doled out as they see fit.
The only difference between Obama and Bush is that Obama thinks the rich should pay taxes.
And don't miss it in the slightest. Okay, I do watch the occasional show on Netflix or streamed online. The internet is my TV, newspaper, and magazines.
Or maybe the hardware you install it on will be. If you don't have to shell out $Millions for the firmware OS, you can pass some savings on to your customer and still make a buck.
"Cut your teeth" is a term from the pre-industrial era, when only master craftsmen could design and build mechanical equipment. The masters worked with entire gear trains, apprentices were put to work polishing the metal plates from which gears were made, and journeymen made the gears. In order to graduate from apprentice to journeyman, you had to design and fabricate your own tooth-cutting bit and make a gear. If it meshed with the gears the established journeymen were making, you qualified.
Excellent response. Using break statements would have the same effect that my GOTO statements have, with non-GOTO syntax.
Using multiple return points in my experience is more trouble than not. It is just another magic "get me the fuck out of here", plus you have to duplicate your cleanup code.
When I'm chasing a bug, tracing the a program is easier when I know a function only exits in one place.
Boolean combinations doesn't really address my need. Most of my functions follow a pattern something like this:
Set the return code to fail.
Check the parameters. If there's anything wrong, just bail and return.
Perform step 1. If it fails, don't bother going any further, just bail, perform necessary cleanup, and return.
If step 1 doesn't fail, then use the results of step 1 to perform step 2. And so on through step N.
Set the return code to success.
Clean up and return.
Without the use of GOTO, the indentation level gets deep in a hurry. With GOTO, you know that at any given point in a function, all the dependencies are successfully met in order to get that far.
You may call it bad coding style; when I was a TA for freshman programming, I know I would have. But in practice, I find it to be a very elegant solution that dramatically improves code readability and debuggability in some cases.
I use GOTO quite often. It is useful for keeping code from getting deeply nested, which in fact can impair code clarity.
Where you might say: if( OK ) { ... function body...
}
return;
I would say: if( NOT_OK ) goto DONE; ... function body...
DONE:
return;
Now imagine the above example, with 8 or 10 different places where the value has to be tested before proceeding. Without GOTO, your code is indented at various depths across the screen. With it, your code lines up neatly and is easy to scan.
"I'm trying to long into my system at work and it doesn't seem to respond." "No sweat, Chief, your desktop is just a VNC session on our server. Just fire up VNC Viewer on your home machine and point it to this host..."
I like my clicky keys as much as the next guy (more than the next guy, actually, since he has to listen to me type). But the reason I shelled out big $ for a Model M is because my hands don't hurt after I use it for 8 hours.
That's a really easy opinion to hold until you try riding public transit four hours each day to and from your menial minimum-wage job. And I'm not making this up, I know someone with a college degree who is in this position.
The schools I attended from the late 80s through mid 90s had 5 to 10 Macs for every PC. In spite of this, there was usually a wait for Macs but never for PCs.
After we graduated, we found that the business world was 99% PCs, as it had been from day one, never having given Apple any serious consideration at all.
Most then went on to get the same kind of computer at home that they used at work because, as much of a pain as it is to use Windows, it's more of a pain to have to use both.
Then school boards started making noises, with some merit, that kids should learn in school what they'll be using in the real world. This caused many schools to switch to PCs.
This has nothing to do with technical merit and everything to do with first-mover advantage in the right market (personal computers for business).
Also, running virtual desktops over the network is not necessarily slow and clunky. Have you tried it? I've been doing it for years.
Suppose you choose to release the source code of your product.
The BSD license allows your competitors to take your work and add to it in secret ways to gain a competitive advantage over you.
The GPL guarantees that if they use the fruit of your labor, you also get theirs. Maintains a level playing field for anyone who wants to open their source.
The GPL is the license for anyone who wants to share without being handicapped. The BSD license is best for for parasites.
Bruce's article discusses license proliferation from the perspective of how-do-I; I'd like to confront those who use it to say why-should-I.
I used to work for a company whose lawyers argued that we must avoid Free Software because there were too many licenses to understand. Really.
Okay, so hundreds or thousands of Free Software products tend to use one of a few dozen licenses. We get that.
When you use proprietary software, every software product is governed by its own unique license. This is an improvement?
License proliferation is a totally bogus reason not to use Free Software.
Epilogue: My former employer has since seen the light. The legal team (whole executive team, actually) was sacked, and the company now uses and writes software under the GPL.
I have owned quite a few computers that could boot in about a second. One of them is even a PC-grade machine with a GUI and a hard drive. What they all have in common is the OS burned into fast ROM.
I agree with you that people of ordinary skills can choose to apply themselves and succeed in most endeavors. And if they enjoy doing it, they will probably be fulfilled. My point was simply that being good at something doesn't mean you will be happy doing it. As your post illustrates.
I wouldn't agree with your statement about aptitude, though. I hope you would agree that possessing adequacy is quite different from virtuosity. You can achieve mastery either way, but the former is more work.
Hear, hear. I was going to say something like that, leaving out the being female part of course. If you don't love what you do, then no amount of aptitude will be truly satisfying. That's why my SO went into software development after getting a science PhD.
My original comment was meant in jest, but I want to respond to this. Macs have been networkable since 1984; no OS networks more easily. My house had 6 networked Macs with shared printers in 1995.
TCP/IP networking is harder than Mac-only (i.e., AppleTalk or Rendezvous/Bonjour), but I don't think it's a big deal. Maybe I've developed a blind spot to it.
I'm not saying network administration is worthless by any means, but a smaller organization, ~50 users, can definitely get by without full-time IT as long as there's one good power user.
"Your suggestion would definitely get rid of the problem of employees wasting their time away web surfing or posting on slashdot instead of working..."
Zing! Thank you for that. I'll meet you at the unemployment office and buy you a beer.;-)
Slashdot Mirror
But why should upper-middle class pay a greater percentage of their earnings toward roads than the lower-middle class?
Marginal income. A lower-middle-class family might have to spend, say, 85% of their post-tax income on basic necessities, whereas an upper-middle-class family might be able to meet those same needs on 60% of their income. Wealthier people have more cash left over after their basic needs are met. That's why we have progressive marginal tax rates.
Do rich people wear out roads faster?
Yes, they do. They take public transit less, and they drive more and bigger cars.
Do the cops spend more or less of their budget year dealing with rich or poor people?
Rich people have a greater expectation of service from the cops than poor people do.
Obama, et al, really do think your money belongs to them first. To be doled out as they see fit.
The only difference between Obama and Bush is that Obama thinks the rich should pay taxes.
And don't miss it in the slightest. Okay, I do watch the occasional show on Netflix or streamed online. The internet is my TV, newspaper, and magazines.
Or maybe the hardware you install it on will be. If you don't have to shell out $Millions for the firmware OS, you can pass some savings on to your customer and still make a buck.
It's not the executable size of most games that takes so much space on your disk, it's all the pictures and sounds.
"Cut your teeth" is a term from the pre-industrial era, when only master craftsmen could design and build mechanical equipment. The masters worked with entire gear trains, apprentices were put to work polishing the metal plates from which gears were made, and journeymen made the gears. In order to graduate from apprentice to journeyman, you had to design and fabricate your own tooth-cutting bit and make a gear. If it meshed with the gears the established journeymen were making, you qualified.
Excellent response. Using break statements would have the same effect that my GOTO statements have, with non-GOTO syntax.
Using multiple return points in my experience is more trouble than not. It is just another magic "get me the fuck out of here", plus you have to duplicate your cleanup code.
When I'm chasing a bug, tracing the a program is easier when I know a function only exits in one place.
Boolean combinations doesn't really address my need. Most of my functions follow a pattern something like this:
Set the return code to fail.
Check the parameters. If there's anything wrong, just bail and return.
Perform step 1. If it fails, don't bother going any further, just bail, perform necessary cleanup, and return.
If step 1 doesn't fail, then use the results of step 1 to perform step 2. And so on through step N.
Set the return code to success.
Clean up and return.
Without the use of GOTO, the indentation level gets deep in a hurry. With GOTO, you know that at any given point in a function, all the dependencies are successfully met in order to get that far.
You may call it bad coding style; when I was a TA for freshman programming, I know I would have. But in practice, I find it to be a very elegant solution that dramatically improves code readability and debuggability in some cases.
I use GOTO quite often. It is useful for keeping code from getting deeply nested, which in fact can impair code clarity.
Where you might say:
... function body ...
if( OK ) {
}
return;
... function body ...
I would say:
if( NOT_OK ) goto DONE;
DONE:
return;
Now imagine the above example, with 8 or 10 different places where the value has to be tested before proceeding. Without GOTO, your code is indented at various depths across the screen. With it, your code lines up neatly and is easy to scan.
"I'm trying to long into my system at work and it doesn't seem to respond."
"No sweat, Chief, your desktop is just a VNC session on our server. Just fire up VNC Viewer on your home machine and point it to this host..."
You tell it, Ilgaz. For years I've had a high-quality mattress to rest my weary bones, even when I didn't have a bed to put it on.
You should not be asking, "am I too old for this".
You should be asking, "do I love doing this".
How much would you pay for carpal tunnel surgery?
I like my clicky keys as much as the next guy (more than the next guy, actually, since he has to listen to me type). But the reason I shelled out big $ for a Model M is because my hands don't hurt after I use it for 8 hours.
Midwesterners are as entitled to their dialect as anyone. Dude.
"self-driving cars on defined tracks"
We have these. They are called "trains". And they are very efficient, too.
That's a really easy opinion to hold until you try riding public transit four hours each day to and from your menial minimum-wage job. And I'm not making this up, I know someone with a college degree who is in this position.
The schools I attended from the late 80s through mid 90s had 5 to 10 Macs for every PC. In spite of this, there was usually a wait for Macs but never for PCs.
After we graduated, we found that the business world was 99% PCs, as it had been from day one, never having given Apple any serious consideration at all.
Most then went on to get the same kind of computer at home that they used at work because, as much of a pain as it is to use Windows, it's more of a pain to have to use both.
Then school boards started making noises, with some merit, that kids should learn in school what they'll be using in the real world. This caused many schools to switch to PCs.
This has nothing to do with technical merit and everything to do with first-mover advantage in the right market (personal computers for business).
Also, running virtual desktops over the network is not necessarily slow and clunky. Have you tried it? I've been doing it for years.
Suppose you choose to release the source code of your product.
The BSD license allows your competitors to take your work and add to it in secret ways to gain a competitive advantage over you.
The GPL guarantees that if they use the fruit of your labor, you also get theirs. Maintains a level playing field for anyone who wants to open their source.
The GPL is the license for anyone who wants to share without being handicapped. The BSD license is best for for parasites.
Bruce's article discusses license proliferation from the perspective of how-do-I; I'd like to confront those who use it to say why-should-I.
I used to work for a company whose lawyers argued that we must avoid Free Software because there were too many licenses to understand. Really.
Okay, so hundreds or thousands of Free Software products tend to use one of a few dozen licenses. We get that.
When you use proprietary software, every software product is governed by its own unique license. This is an improvement?
License proliferation is a totally bogus reason not to use Free Software.
Epilogue: My former employer has since seen the light. The legal team (whole executive team, actually) was sacked, and the company now uses and writes software under the GPL.
I have owned quite a few computers that could boot in about a second. One of them is even a PC-grade machine with a GUI and a hard drive. What they all have in common is the OS burned into fast ROM.
I agree with you that people of ordinary skills can choose to apply themselves and succeed in most endeavors. And if they enjoy doing it, they will probably be fulfilled. My point was simply that being good at something doesn't mean you will be happy doing it. As your post illustrates.
I wouldn't agree with your statement about aptitude, though. I hope you would agree that possessing adequacy is quite different from virtuosity. You can achieve mastery either way, but the former is more work.
Hear, hear. I was going to say something like that, leaving out the being female part of course. If you don't love what you do, then no amount of aptitude will be truly satisfying. That's why my SO went into software development after getting a science PhD.
"no IT, no network for your macs"
My original comment was meant in jest, but I want to respond to this. Macs have been networkable since 1984; no OS networks more easily. My house had 6 networked Macs with shared printers in 1995.
TCP/IP networking is harder than Mac-only (i.e., AppleTalk or Rendezvous/Bonjour), but I don't think it's a big deal. Maybe I've developed a blind spot to it.
I'm not saying network administration is worthless by any means, but a smaller organization, ~50 users, can definitely get by without full-time IT as long as there's one good power user.
"Your suggestion would definitely get rid of the problem of employees wasting their time away web surfing or posting on slashdot instead of working..."
Zing! Thank you for that. I'll meet you at the unemployment office and buy you a beer. ;-)
Your CEO should buy a Mac for everyone in the company and fire the whole IT department.
Perhaps this is why we tend to elect governors as president, not senators.
Thanks for that vote of confidence. Shall I have my agent call you? ;-)