Programming will mature as a discipline when programmers see themselves as not that different from any other skilled, educated professional.
This will occur when prostration before academic authority figures for a prolonged and expensive period, rather than talent & ability, becomes the requirement for admission into the profession.
I find that often hiring managers tolerate jerks in our profession because a lot of hotshot programmers develop a large ego early in their careers, aided by management teams that enable this disfunction.
One problem that management must contend with, is that not all arrogant programmers (or whatever profession, really) are also jerks. Some of these "hotshots" may make eccentric demands -- "I will show up to work at noon wearing bib overalls, or not at all" or "I don't care if we are a Red Hat shop, I'm running Slackware!" -- but manage to get along well with their team and be (often very highly) productive workers. It is prudent for a company that wishes to have good technology to tolerate this sort of egotism.
However, the same attitudes or policies set up to accommodate harmless hotshots like this, can enable other talented programmers to be jerks. A jerk is one who belittles his juniors and fights with his superiors over trivial things; who can't be bothered to comment his code; who balks at simple things, like updating tickets & showing up for meetings, that keep the group synchronized; and generally, whose unusual behaviors and demands impose an actual burden on his colleagues and impede the work of the team.
The effect on a firm of tolerating harmless eccentrics is thus quite different from the effect of tolerating eccentric assholes. Yet from the perspective of company policy, it can be difficult to distinguish between the two sets of behavior. Neither one of the two types is likely to be in full compliance with "official" policy. But a good organization, and one that wishes to avoid legal complications, must apply it's policies with equal harshness or leniency to all employees. In a small organization where the ultimate decision makers still have close knowledge of day to day operations, this may not be such a big issue. But in a larger company, where decision makers must execute their plans through policy & delegation, this can be a much thornier problem.
I find the best programmers are the ones with the maturity to complete a task when they said they would. Who can perform an exhaustive session of testing without complaining (even though it's boring, but necessary work). Who will produce the required documentation to a high standard and will play nice with the other members of the team they are in.
That is one kind of 'best'. But in my experience, the folks who grind through exhaustive & tedious tasks with nary a peep of discontent, rarely have good creative skills.
Just because you can afford to pay a certain fee, to access information that already belongs to you as a citizen, doesn't mean all your fellow citizens can afford the same. If we want to uphold the basic American ideal of equal access to the law, then essential public records like this need to be free.
Yes, if that means more taxes, count me in. Whatever increase in my (already high) taxes this would require, is miniscule in comparison to that part which is now squandered on the police state at home and wars of aggression abroad.
A juror is to make his decision based on the evidence presented in court. He should not be basing his judgments on the opinions, rumors, and other information that may not true or relevant to the case at hand. The
Exactly! Jurors should only be exposed to opinions, rumors, and other information that may not true or relevant to the case, that has been carefully selected for him by the legal priesthood.
a lot of farmers went the chemical route because they were told there was nothing wrong with pesticides.
Exactly.. I am a bit dismayed at fellow slashdotters' insistence that obviously there is no risk at all that a strong nearby source of microwave radiation could affect crops. The long term impact of radiation on plant DNA, and that of consuming irradiated foods on human health, is yet but dimly understood even by scientists in the field.
I, for one, give this farmer credit for his conservative instincts. He wants to practice traditional farming, and avoid exposing his crops (and therefore his customers) to the often unknown side effects of modern industrial techniques and pollution. In this case, we can think of the radiation given off by the antenna as a sort of pollution -- a man-made addition to the natural atmosphere surrounding the antenna. While there appears to be no conclusive proof that this sort of pollution is harmful, I don't slight the guy for wanting on principle to keep all pollution away from his fields.
Or maybe Americans involved in developing software should start looking for the exit. There are doubtless many countries out there with less insane & draconian intellectual monopoly regimes, that would be happy to have an influx of talented programmers.
Then there are cases where the code is not that hard, and you can copy the idea by just looking at the end product. Therefore having patents is necessary.
Actually, I have been using Linux (and *BSD) exclusively for 10 years -- and I like Ubuntu. Personally, I enjoy the fact that it's dead-easy to use. I don't get any joy out of needlessly wrangling with my workstation -- I'd rather be writing code (or reading Slashdot).
File sharing is not inherently bad. Using it to infringe upon copyrights is.
Some folks would argue that government grants of intellectual monopoly (such as copyright) have the net effect of stifling culture and retarding innovation. In that way of thinking, resistance to the monopoly is a positive moral good.
Raiding the neighbor's apple orchard to bake a pie for the church social isn't sharing. It's theft.
In this case, the orchard's no longer has access to the stolen apples, and thus has suffered a material loss. Do the RIAA no longer have copies of music that has been shared? If so, they should just download a copy!
Under current US law both distribution and reproduction are exclusive rights of the copyright holder
One should not forget that 'reproduction' of a record today means something very different than it did back in the day, when most of the copyright regime was written into law. Consider the steps listed below, for making a million unauthorized copies of a record in each technological era.
Olde-times: 1. Build or rent record-stamping factory 2. Physically steal master-quality recording from owner (else your analog copies will sound like shit) 3. Hire workers and run your record factory for a few weeks
Nowadays:
for n in $(seq 1 1000000); do
cp orig/shitty-riaa-record.tbz copies/shitty-riaa-record-copy-$n.tbz done
Man I don't get how people are so polarized about this.
I suppose a lot of Americans have an idea -- which many lawyers would no doubt argue is incorrect -- that our courts ought to be held to a standard of justice that transcends statute.
The geek is cheap and he feeds on the thrill - and that is what lands him in court.
Now wait -- is the sharer poor (I think that's what you meant by "cheap"), or is he sharing for the "thrill" of doing so? Sure, sharing a copy of a song is more convenient, affordable, and morally commendable than paying money to Recording Industry cabal for that same copy. But does anyone out there actually find it "thrilling"?
Slashdot Mirror
Developers have always struck me as people who have absolutely no desire to think.
Wow, your company (or industry?) must suck really hard...
Programming will mature as a discipline when programmers see themselves as not that different from any other skilled, educated professional.
This will occur when prostration before academic authority figures for a prolonged and expensive period, rather than talent & ability, becomes the requirement for admission into the profession.
I find that often hiring managers tolerate jerks in our profession because a lot of hotshot programmers develop a large ego early in their careers, aided by management teams that enable this disfunction.
One problem that management must contend with, is that not all arrogant programmers (or whatever profession, really) are also jerks. Some of these "hotshots" may make eccentric demands -- "I will show up to work at noon wearing bib overalls, or not at all" or "I don't care if we are a Red Hat shop, I'm running Slackware!" -- but manage to get along well with their team and be (often very highly) productive workers. It is prudent for a company that wishes to have good technology to tolerate this sort of egotism.
However, the same attitudes or policies set up to accommodate harmless hotshots like this, can enable other talented programmers to be jerks. A jerk is one who belittles his juniors and fights with his superiors over trivial things; who can't be bothered to comment his code; who balks at simple things, like updating tickets & showing up for meetings, that keep the group synchronized; and generally, whose unusual behaviors and demands impose an actual burden on his colleagues and impede the work of the team.
The effect on a firm of tolerating harmless eccentrics is thus quite different from the effect of tolerating eccentric assholes. Yet from the perspective of company policy, it can be difficult to distinguish between the two sets of behavior. Neither one of the two types is likely to be in full compliance with "official" policy. But a good organization, and one that wishes to avoid legal complications, must apply it's policies with equal harshness or leniency to all employees. In a small organization where the ultimate decision makers still have close knowledge of day to day operations, this may not be such a big issue. But in a larger company, where decision makers must execute their plans through policy & delegation, this can be a much thornier problem.
I find the best programmers are the ones with the maturity to complete a task when they said they would. Who can perform an exhaustive session of testing without complaining (even though it's boring, but necessary work). Who will produce the required documentation to a high standard and will play nice with the other members of the team they are in.
That is one kind of 'best'. But in my experience, the folks who grind through exhaustive & tedious tasks with nary a peep of discontent, rarely have good creative skills.
Just because you can afford to pay a certain fee, to access information that already belongs to you as a citizen, doesn't mean all your fellow citizens can afford the same. If we want to uphold the basic American ideal of equal access to the law, then essential public records like this need to be free.
Yes, if that means more taxes, count me in. Whatever increase in my (already high) taxes this would require, is miniscule in comparison to that part which is now squandered on the police state at home and wars of aggression abroad.
It's always struck me as strange how the conservatives who push the strongest for small government also push the hardest for drug criminalization.
Psssssst.... don't tell anyone, those "conservatives" aren't actually interested in conserving anything, our constitutional rights least of all.
A juror is to make his decision based on the evidence presented in court. He should not be basing his judgments on the opinions, rumors, and other information that may not true or relevant to the case at hand. The
Exactly! Jurors should only be exposed to opinions, rumors, and other information that may not true or relevant to the case, that has been carefully selected for him by the legal priesthood.
Judges have way too much power to determine what arguments you're allowed to make.
But how will the jury arrive at the 'appropriate' decision, if they are exposed to 'inappropriate' arguments?
I'll take twelve less-intelligent peers than one intellectual elected official any day.
But how do you define your "peers"?
a lot of farmers went the chemical route because they were told there was nothing wrong with pesticides.
Exactly.. I am a bit dismayed at fellow slashdotters' insistence that obviously there is no risk at all that a strong nearby source of microwave radiation could affect crops. The long term impact of radiation on plant DNA, and that of consuming irradiated foods on human health, is yet but dimly understood even by scientists in the field.
I, for one, give this farmer credit for his conservative instincts. He wants to practice traditional farming, and avoid exposing his crops (and therefore his customers) to the often unknown side effects of modern industrial techniques and pollution. In this case, we can think of the radiation given off by the antenna as a sort of pollution -- a man-made addition to the natural atmosphere surrounding the antenna. While there appears to be no conclusive proof that this sort of pollution is harmful, I don't slight the guy for wanting on principle to keep all pollution away from his fields.
The state of law in the US is quite disturbing and definitely anti-competitive.
Fixed that for you...
Or maybe Americans involved in developing software should start looking for the exit. There are doubtless many countries out there with less insane & draconian intellectual monopoly regimes, that would be happy to have an influx of talented programmers.
Otoh, I haven't yet followed my own advice....
Citation please!
Wrong, inventions within in a successful software product will be copied within a few days without this protection.
Must be quite a simple, blindingly obvious "innovation" if it only takes a few days to copy it.
Patents have a good side: they keep large established companies from just stealing from the little guys.
What planet are you living on? Can you site even one court case where patents, especially software patents, protected "the little guy"?
Then there are cases where the code is not that hard, and you can copy the idea by just looking at the end product. Therefore having patents is necessary.
Lazy, blood-sucking, uninventive tard.
Time to buy some RusHydro stock?
Actually, I have been using Linux (and *BSD) exclusively for 10 years -- and I like Ubuntu. Personally, I enjoy the fact that it's dead-easy to use. I don't get any joy out of needlessly wrangling with my workstation -- I'd rather be writing code (or reading Slashdot).
Please listen to this song once in a while, and start to think for yourself: Dan Le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip - Thou Shalt Always Kill
That's the best song I've heard all month. Thanks!
File sharing is not inherently bad. Using it to infringe upon copyrights is.
Some folks would argue that government grants of intellectual monopoly (such as copyright) have the net effect of stifling culture and retarding innovation. In that way of thinking, resistance to the monopoly is a positive moral good.
Raiding the neighbor's apple orchard to bake a pie for the church social isn't sharing. It's theft.
In this case, the orchard's no longer has access to the stolen apples, and thus has suffered a material loss. Do the RIAA no longer have copies of music that has been shared? If so, they should just download a copy!
Under current US law both distribution and reproduction are exclusive rights of the copyright holder
One should not forget that 'reproduction' of a record today means something very different than it did back in the day, when most of the copyright regime was written into law. Consider the steps listed below, for making a million unauthorized copies of a record in each technological era.
Olde-times:
1. Build or rent record-stamping factory
2. Physically steal master-quality recording from owner (else your analog copies will sound like shit)
3. Hire workers and run your record factory for a few weeks
Nowadays:
Man I don't get how people are so polarized about this.
I suppose a lot of Americans have an idea -- which many lawyers would no doubt argue is incorrect -- that our courts ought to be held to a standard of justice that transcends statute.
The geek is cheap and he feeds on the thrill - and that is what lands him in court.
Now wait -- is the sharer poor (I think that's what you meant by "cheap"), or is he sharing for the "thrill" of doing so? Sure, sharing a copy of a song is more convenient, affordable, and morally commendable than paying money to Recording Industry cabal for that same copy. But does anyone out there actually find it "thrilling"?
I wasn't expecting to find the correct answer to a legal question here on Slashdot, but, there it is.
Wow, the copyright parasites must really be scraping bottom, if database field names count as "creative" work.