It also means that while developer positions are harder to come by, more jobs in other sectors will be created to satisfy the increased revenue IBM has available.
Let's see and those jobs would be for: Lawyers, Marketeers, Sales droids, and more Wall Mart clerks. Yipee! What a wonderful future we'll have.
Do we have to have a 'Made by U.S. Programmers' label for software packages?
Honestly, did you 'look for the union label' before buying your clothing? Why do you think anyone else is going to care if their software was made in the USA? Ultimately, they just want the lowest price.
The situation sucks, but I'm not sure what we can do about it. Maybe tax breaks for companies that hire American workers in America, but even that would probalby not helpt too much.
Couldn't you do "very little work" in 8 hours instead of 10? That would give you a couple of hours to exercise.
Come to think of it, you could probably do "very little work" in four hours instead of 10....Where does this guy work? Apparently he can sit around and drink beer while doing very little work all day.
There is a direct relationship between wages and home prices in Silicon Valley - they each influenced the other into an upward spiral. Since you have to make so much more there just to pay rent that requires larger salaries to attract people to move there.
From what I hear home prices/Apartment rents in the Valley have not really gone down yet. Housing prices seem to be rather 'sticky' when it comes to declining.... Similar with wages, though many have accepted pay cuts in the last 2-3 years - yet their rents/mortgages have remained high.
But rents and land values must decline if the Valley is to remain competitive with Bangalore, India, for example. Of course there are other areas within the US which aren't as expensive...
In the long run, if Thomas and Hunt are correct (and I tend to agree with their thesis) Silicon Valley is in for a long decline which will eventually lead to lower (much lower) land values which may in turn sow the seeds for it's revival - but that is probably decades away.
The plus side is that certain IT skills are difficult or impossible to move overseas. For instance, the ability to build a network, hardware and sofware, is something that must physically be done in the office...The best thing one can do, then, is keep learning and move up to one of those non-outsourcable positions.
Going from programming to routing wires around an office is a move up?
I myself have given a lot of thought to taking university courses in database administration -- this story was just about the last piece of motivation I needed.
And why can't a database admin postion be outsourced? Actually seems like a good candidate for outsourcing.
OK, it is a bit of an ethical dilemma, I must admit. But I'm leaning toward taking the free lunch tomorrow.
Why? Well for one thing, if we do as you suggest and boycott, then Microsoft will just have the lunches distributed to the homeless up and down the street near the Hotel and so they'll get credit for feeding the homeless and it'll be on the local news tomorrow night: "Microsoft comes to Portland to feed the homeless! Isn't Bill Gates wonderful? Film at 11."
Also, I think I can take the free lunch and remain objective. It's not like after I finish eating it, I'll feel obliged to go out and buy a copy of WinXP - not likely to happen; Gentoo is safe on my laptop. I suppose the more paranoid among us might be afraid that they'll insert some sort of mind control drugs into the sandwiches, but I don't think that's too likely. Might also be a good idea for us to wear tinfoil hats too but mostly because of all the WiFi around here not because of Microsoft spin.
Now, if they make us listen to some sort of Microsoft sales pitch in order to get the lunch, then I'll most likely skip... But to be honest, I haven't seen much of any Microsoft presence here in the last couple of days. Maybe they're just using this as an opportunity to observe us;-)
I think both high level languages like ruby and python and very low level languages like C are wrong for OSS development.
Well, it really depends on what you're developing, doesn't it?
What is needed is a typesafe language that is compiled, has garbage collection, and kind of straightjackets the programmers so that they don't make foolish mistakes that end up as security holes.
No, in many cases we need to take off the 'straightjacket' of static typing (not for everything, of course) and breathe the sweet smell of freedom. Keep in mind that dynamically typed language can still be strongly typed - if an object in Ruby or SmallTalk doesn't respond to a particular message (method) then an exception will be thrown (of course you can always use 'method_missing' to redirect these errant messages).
take the best aspects of java, objective-c, eiffel and maybe some smalltalk like elements and roll them up into one language.
Not sure that's possible. Both SmallTalk and Objective-C have dynamic typing (of course it's optional in Obj C) and that's one of their best features. Java is statically typed and that leads to all manner of typecasts which defeat the purpose of static typing - the idea that static typing was supposed to save you from all kinds of mistakes.
The Linux kernel is coded in C(or is it C++?), maybe someone should tell Linus that C isn't a good language for an OS project.
I don't think too many people will dispute that C is probably the best implementation language for an OS kernel that must be fast. However, C/C++ are not appropriate for all projects. And in fact the subset of projects where C/C++ are the best fit is probably fairly small (a lot smaller than current use anyway).
I recall meeting an older sw engineer who used assembly language for everything - in fact some of his colleagues were telling me that he did some kind of web programming project in assembly (ran very fast, but took a long time to develop and debug. Now I tend to look at the "C/C++ are the best languages for every project" folks as falling into a similar catagory as this assembly- language-everywhere guy.
The dynamic languages like Ruby, Lisp/Scheme, SmallTalk deserve more of a look when starting a project. They tend to accelerate development (especially when compared to C/C++ or even Java) so much that they deserve a closer look.
And, in Ruby for example, it's quite easy to do mixed-language development where you develop the parts that need to run fast (typically no more than 20% of your code) in C/C++ and develop the rest in Ruby. Because in Ruby classes and modules are always open, you can extend (add methods to) your C++ classes in Ruby (you could even do this at runtime if you so desire) quite easily. I've done this on some very speed critical projects with very good results (with positive results in both schedule and runtime).
I very much agree with him: C/C++ are no longer viable for rapid development.
Personally, I prefer Ruby, but Python is almost as good of a choice. (;-)
It's also quite easy to do mixed-language development with Ruby were you write the bits that need to be fast in C/C++ and you write the rest in Ruby (Swig can also help out here). This way you get the best of both worlds. The nice thing about doing this with Ruby is that classes and modules are always open, so a class originally defined in C++ can be extended (you can add methods to it) on the Ruby-side - in fact you could even do this at runtime if you so desire.
That's *not* GWB. It's a paraphrase of Ben Franklin. A man who would be *appalled* by the restrictions on personal liberties that have been put in place by the Presidential Shrub's junta.
Read it again...
Franklin said (paraphrase): Those who would be willing to trade freedom for security deserve neither.
At least with the GPL the author will be acknowledged (in the code) and the source code will be distributed.
With BSD-style licenses, commercial companies can use your code without having to distribute the source. Your hard work can then be used by a company to profit without any acknowledgement of the true author of the code.
So many people have posted here admitting to being ADHD/ADD that it really makes you wonder...
1) Are those who are inclined to post to/. more likely to have ADHD/ADD? (because they can't stay focused on their work, maybe?)
2) Is it being waaayyyy over diagnosed?
3) Is it really a disorder at all or is it just that different people are 'put together' in different ways and those who don't conform to our social norms must have a disorder?
It just seems like another way for the drug companies to profit. For those with ADHD or ADD: How did you get the diagnosis? Did you tell your doctor that you thought that you might have ADHD or did the doctor notice something about you and then dig further?
I recall seeing a PBS documentary on the life of Ansel Adams a few months back. As a child he couldn't learn in the classroom environment - today he would have been labeled ADHD. His father, however felt that little Ansel was bright so he took him out of school and taught him at home. As the World's Fair was being held in San Francisco around this time, Ansel's father bought him a season ticket to the World's Fair and Ansel spent most days there - his father figured he was learning more at the fair than he would have in school, which is probably true. Ansel then took an interest in the piano and his father arranged for lessons - he eventually became a very accomplished pianist. Later on he got into photography and the rest is history. Nowadays, the young Ansel Adams would have been medicated and probably would not have accomplished the things he did.
My post has meandered all over the place, gee, now I wonder if I've got ADD?
Wolf Blitzed: "This is Wolf Blitzed reporting from a Motel 6 on the outskirts of Lindon, Utah. We've been awaiting IBM's 'shock & awe' campaign against SCO for several days and now it appears to have begun. We've witnessed several cruising lawyers land near the SCO headquarters. Thousands of para-lawyers are now filling the air and landing near and surrounding SCO headquarters. The sound of paper shuffling is now almost deafening in this small Utah town. The insane dictator, Darl McBride has not been seen in the last few days and rumor has it that he is hiding in the vast bunkers under SCO headquarters. Even so, he has continuted to issue bizarre press releases claiming to not only own the rights to Unix now, but also Mac OSX, PacMan, Donkey Kong and all dirivitives of those works. BZZT...SSSHH..." CON News Anchor: "Wolf! Are you still there?..." silence "Blitzed! Are you all right?... Well ladies and gentlemen, we appear to have lost contact with our correspondent in Lindon, Wolf Blitzed." Wolf Blitzed: "I'm OK. Repeat, I am OK. The IBM lawers are now so thick in this area that they're blocking our transmissions. One of them just came through my room and threatened to sue me until I managed to convince him that I was a member of the press - he thought I was a hiding SCO officer. I am going to have to sign off now so I can get to a more secure area... This is Wolf Blitzed CON News, Lindon, Utah...." CON News Anchor"Ok, Wolf. Keep your head down, and whatever happens, don't sign any NDAs."
Been getting these containers for a few weeks
on
Corn-Based Plastic
·
· Score: 1
Since I live in the Portland, OR metro area, I've had a chance to try out these corntainers... looks just like plastic. It looks like the only drawback is that you can't microwave'em - they've got a little sticker on them reminding you not to (I suspect they'll just melt, but I haven't tried it yet as the container is still holding salsa).
I do have to wonder, though, is corn really all that environmentally friendly? I mean it takes a good amount of fuel to run those tractors and to transport the stuff. Also lots of pesticides and herbacides are used. Then there's the GMO issue - lots of corn grown in the US is genetically modified. And of course, corn is pretty hard on the soil - I generally don't grow it in my garden because it takes a lot nutrients out of the soil and you don't get that much out of it (2 or 3 ears of corn on a stalk). Are there better alternatives?
Yes it is illegal in Oregon for the average consumer to pump their own gas, because they might spill a little as opposed to the highly trained pumping engineer that you meet at your gas station every fillup (who loves spilling gas down the side of my car)
There you've hit upon the biggest part of the problem: It's against the law to pump your own gas in Oregon, so the gas prices are higher because the station needs to pay the attendents to pump the gas for you. So since we're already paying more for gas here because of this, we're not as likely to vote for an increase in the gas tax. What we need is for self-serve to be made legal in Oregon, but for some reason it always gets voted down... Isn't it a pro-choice issue: if I choose to pump my own gas, I should be allowed to, after all I can choose to commit suicide in Oregon.
Oregon: You can kill yourself here, but you can't pump your own gas! Go figure!
Slashdot Mirror
...named Dilbert.
It also means that while developer positions are harder to come by, more jobs in other sectors will be created to satisfy the increased revenue IBM has available.
Let's see and those jobs would be for:
Lawyers, Marketeers, Sales droids, and more Wall Mart clerks. Yipee! What a wonderful future we'll have.
Stop Cribbing, Guys! Get your skills upto date....there is no dearth of jobs for quality workers.
That's like saying "Learn to swim better guys, you can out swim this tsunami!" as the tidal wave breaks over your head.
You think they don't have quality workers in India? You think the USA is the only place which has quality workers?
Now the game is all about price anyway, and we're way overpriced compared to quality workers in India. Time to learn how to fix cars or teeth.
Do we have to have a 'Made by U.S. Programmers' label for software packages?
Honestly, did you 'look for the union label' before buying your clothing? Why do you think anyone else is going to care if their software was made in the USA? Ultimately, they just want the lowest price.
The situation sucks, but I'm not sure what we can do about it. Maybe tax breaks for companies that hire American workers in America, but even that would probalby not helpt too much.
And it would seem that perhaps it's time for the company to trim a bit of weight.
Couldn't you do "very little work" in 8 hours instead of 10? That would give you a couple of hours to exercise.
...Where does this guy work? Apparently he can sit around and drink beer while doing very little work all day.
Come to think of it, you could probably do "very little work" in four hours instead of 10.
Linux has Tux, the cute/cool little mascot. What does SCO have?
SCO has that cute Mickey Mouse ear logo... Hey, wait, does Disney know about that? Maybe someone ought to tell them.
Silicon Valley (SV) died today after a multi-year decline.
SV's death was apparently due to it's addiction to astronomical land prices which in turn led to astronomical salaries.
Silicon Valley is survived by it's adopted stepchild, Bangalore, India.
"I modeled myself after SV, but I just hope I can learn from and avoid it's mistakes." Bangalore said in an interview today.
There is a direct relationship between wages and home prices in Silicon Valley - they each influenced the other into an upward spiral. Since you have to make so much more there just to pay rent that requires larger salaries to attract people to move there.
From what I hear home prices/Apartment rents in the Valley have not really gone down yet. Housing prices seem to be rather 'sticky' when it comes to declining.... Similar with wages, though many have accepted pay cuts in the last 2-3 years - yet their rents/mortgages have remained high.
But rents and land values must decline if the Valley is to remain competitive with Bangalore, India, for example. Of course there are other areas within the US which aren't as expensive...
In the long run, if Thomas and Hunt are correct (and I tend to agree with their thesis) Silicon Valley is in for a long decline which will eventually lead to lower (much lower) land values which may in turn sow the seeds for it's revival - but that is probably decades away.
The plus side is that certain IT skills are difficult or impossible to move overseas. For instance, the ability to build a network, hardware and sofware, is something that must physically be done in the office...The best thing one can do, then, is keep learning and move up to one of those non-outsourcable positions.
Going from programming to routing wires around an office is a move up?
I myself have given a lot of thought to taking university courses in database administration -- this story was just about the last piece of motivation I needed.
And why can't a database admin postion be outsourced? Actually seems like a good candidate for outsourcing.
OK, it is a bit of an ethical dilemma, I must admit. But I'm leaning toward taking the free lunch tomorrow.
;-)
Why? Well for one thing, if we do as you suggest and boycott, then Microsoft will just have the lunches distributed to the homeless up and down the street near the Hotel and so they'll get credit for feeding the homeless and it'll be on the local news tomorrow night: "Microsoft comes to Portland to feed the homeless! Isn't Bill Gates wonderful? Film at 11."
Also, I think I can take the free lunch and remain objective. It's not like after I finish eating it, I'll feel obliged to go out and buy a copy of WinXP - not likely to happen; Gentoo is safe on my laptop. I suppose the more paranoid among us might be afraid that they'll insert some sort of mind control drugs into the sandwiches, but I don't think that's too likely. Might also be a good idea for us to wear tinfoil hats too but mostly because of all the WiFi around here not because of Microsoft spin.
Now, if they make us listen to some sort of Microsoft sales pitch in order to get the lunch, then I'll most likely skip... But to be honest, I haven't seen much of any Microsoft presence here in the last couple of days. Maybe they're just using this as an opportunity to observe us
I think both high level languages like ruby and python and very low level languages like C are wrong for OSS development.
Well, it really depends on what you're developing, doesn't it?
What is needed is a typesafe language that is compiled, has garbage collection, and kind of straightjackets the programmers so that they don't make foolish mistakes that end up as security holes.
No, in many cases we need to take off the 'straightjacket' of static typing (not for everything, of course) and breathe the sweet smell of freedom. Keep in mind that dynamically typed language can still be strongly typed - if an object in Ruby or SmallTalk doesn't respond to a particular message (method) then an exception will be thrown (of course you can always use 'method_missing' to redirect these errant messages).
take the best aspects of java, objective-c, eiffel and maybe some smalltalk like elements and roll them up into one language.
Not sure that's possible. Both SmallTalk and Objective-C have dynamic typing (of course it's optional in Obj C) and that's one of their best features. Java is statically typed and that leads to all manner of typecasts which defeat the purpose of static typing - the idea that static typing was supposed to save you from all kinds of mistakes.
The Linux kernel is coded in C(or is it C++?), maybe someone should tell Linus that C isn't a good language for an OS project.
I don't think too many people will dispute that C is probably the best implementation language for an OS kernel that must be fast. However, C/C++ are not appropriate for all projects. And in fact the subset of projects where C/C++ are the best fit is probably fairly small (a lot smaller than current use anyway).
I recall meeting an older sw engineer who used assembly language for everything - in fact some of his colleagues were telling me that he did some kind of web programming project in assembly (ran very fast, but took a long time to develop and debug. Now I tend to look at the "C/C++ are the best languages for every project" folks as falling into a similar catagory as this assembly- language-everywhere guy.
The dynamic languages like Ruby, Lisp/Scheme, SmallTalk deserve more of a look when starting a project. They tend to accelerate development (especially when compared to C/C++ or even Java) so much that they deserve a closer look.
And, in Ruby for example, it's quite easy to do mixed-language development where you develop the parts that need to run fast (typically no more than 20% of your code) in C/C++ and develop the rest in Ruby. Because in Ruby classes and modules are always open, you can extend (add methods to) your C++ classes in Ruby (you could even do this at runtime if you so desire) quite easily. I've done this on some very speed critical projects with very good results (with positive results in both schedule and runtime).
I very much agree with him: C/C++ are no longer viable for rapid development.
;-)
Personally, I prefer Ruby, but Python is almost as good of a choice. (
It's also quite easy to do mixed-language development with Ruby were you write the bits that need to be fast in C/C++ and you write the rest in Ruby (Swig can also help out here). This way you get the best of both worlds. The nice thing about doing this with Ruby is that classes and modules are always open, so a class originally defined in C++ can be extended (you can add methods to it) on the Ruby-side - in fact you could even do this at runtime if you so desire.
That's *not* GWB. It's a paraphrase of Ben Franklin. A man who would be *appalled* by the restrictions on personal liberties that have been put in place by the Presidential Shrub's junta.
Read it again...
Franklin said (paraphrase): Those who would be willing to trade freedom for security deserve neither.
Not only that, but shoes are mostly made of plastic, rubber, etc. that would look just the same as plastic explosives.
Those who are willing to trade security for freedom deserve neither --GWB
The LRP guy did seem to be investing his energy into some things that wouldn't offer much return for his efforts:
* A new shell (no bash, no ash, no sh at all!)
* A new shell scripting language
Do you really need a new shell and scripting language for this sort of thing? It probably would have been better to put that effort into other areas.
At least with the GPL the author will be acknowledged (in the code) and the source code will be distributed.
With BSD-style licenses, commercial companies can use your code without having to distribute the source. Your hard work can then be used by a company to profit without any acknowledgement of the true author of the code.
So many people have posted here admitting to being ADHD/ADD that it really makes you wonder...
/. more likely to have ADHD/ADD? (because they can't stay focused on their work, maybe?)
1) Are those who are inclined to post to
2) Is it being waaayyyy over diagnosed?
3) Is it really a disorder at all or is it just that different people are 'put together' in different ways and those who don't conform to our social norms must have a disorder?
It just seems like another way for the drug companies to profit. For those with ADHD or ADD: How did you get the diagnosis? Did you tell your doctor that you thought that you might have ADHD or did the doctor notice something about you and then dig further?
I recall seeing a PBS documentary on the life of Ansel Adams a few months back. As a child he couldn't learn in the classroom environment - today he would have been labeled ADHD. His father, however felt that little Ansel was bright so he took him out of school and taught him at home. As the World's Fair was being held in San Francisco around this time, Ansel's father bought him a season ticket to the World's Fair and Ansel spent most days there - his father figured he was learning more at the fair than he would have in school, which is probably true. Ansel then took an interest in the piano and his father arranged for lessons - he eventually became a very accomplished pianist. Later on he got into photography and the rest is history. Nowadays, the young Ansel Adams would have been medicated and probably would not have accomplished the things he did.
My post has meandered all over the place, gee, now I wonder if I've got ADD?
Wolf Blitzed: "This is Wolf Blitzed reporting from a Motel 6 on the outskirts of Lindon, Utah. We've been awaiting IBM's 'shock & awe' campaign against SCO for several days and now it appears to have begun. We've witnessed several cruising lawyers land near the SCO headquarters. Thousands of para-lawyers are now filling the air and landing near and surrounding SCO headquarters. The sound of paper shuffling is now almost deafening in this small Utah town. The insane dictator, Darl McBride has not been seen in the last few days and rumor has it that he is hiding in the vast bunkers under SCO headquarters. Even so, he has continuted to issue bizarre press releases claiming to not only own the rights to Unix now, but also Mac OSX, PacMan, Donkey Kong and all dirivitives of those works. BZZT...SSSHH..."
CON News Anchor: "Wolf! Are you still there?..." silence "Blitzed! Are you all right?... Well ladies and gentlemen, we appear to have lost contact with our correspondent in Lindon, Wolf Blitzed."
Wolf Blitzed: "I'm OK. Repeat, I am OK. The IBM lawers are now so thick in this area that they're blocking our transmissions. One of them just came through my room and threatened to sue me until I managed to convince him that I was a member of the press - he thought I was a hiding SCO officer. I am going to have to sign off now so I can get to a more secure area... This is Wolf Blitzed CON News, Lindon, Utah...."
CON News Anchor"Ok, Wolf. Keep your head down, and whatever happens, don't sign any NDAs."
Since I live in the Portland, OR metro area, I've had a chance to try out these corntainers... looks just like plastic. It looks like the only drawback is that you can't microwave'em - they've got a little sticker on them reminding you not to (I suspect they'll just melt, but I haven't tried it yet as the container is still holding salsa).
I do have to wonder, though, is corn really all that environmentally friendly? I mean it takes a good amount of fuel to run those tractors and to transport the stuff. Also lots of pesticides and herbacides are used. Then there's the GMO issue - lots of corn grown in the US is genetically modified. And of course, corn is pretty hard on the soil - I generally don't grow it in my garden because it takes a lot nutrients out of the soil and you don't get that much out of it (2 or 3 ears of corn on a stalk). Are there better alternatives?
The International Association of Mouse and Keyboard Manufacturers.
Oh.. and the glasses so you could figure out who was a visitor and who wasnt.
I think that was from the movie 'They Live', not 'V'. 'They Live' (a John Carpenter film) was a much better alien invasion movie IMHO.
Seems like just yesterday... man, I'm getting old.
And that 'next generation' thing is real original...
Yes it is illegal in Oregon for the average consumer to pump their own gas, because they might spill a little as opposed to the highly trained pumping engineer that you meet at your gas station every fillup (who loves spilling gas down the side of my car)
There you've hit upon the biggest part of the problem: It's against the law to pump your own gas in Oregon, so the gas prices are higher because the station needs to pay the attendents to pump the gas for you. So since we're already paying more for gas here because of this, we're not as likely to vote for an increase in the gas tax. What we need is for self-serve to be made legal in Oregon, but for some reason it always gets voted down... Isn't it a pro-choice issue: if I choose to pump my own gas, I should be allowed to, after all I can choose to commit suicide in Oregon.
Oregon: You can kill yourself here, but you can't pump your own gas! Go figure!