Here's a hint: the professional associations for lawyers, doctors and so on are actually unions.
Brilliant... it's not a Union, it is a Professional Association. If doctors and lawyers can do it, why can't IT?
(and no, I am not being sarcastic)
We cannot yet, because we lack the primary requisite for making it happening: licensing. Doctors, lawyers, architects, engineers and nurses, vets and plumbers need state-sanctioned licenses (where licenses are legal instruments.)
It is this requirement of a legal instrument that allows the creation of a professional association.
This would actually nuke the shit out of H1B visas. Not necessarily a good thing (because, when done right, H1B programs have their place). However, a software/IT professional association or guild would completely obliterate the practice of replacing US professionals with temporary foreign ones.
Another way to destroy this practice would be to require H1B workers to be paid 10% above the median average for that position per metropolitan area, and/or give a H1B worker the freedom to change sponsors after 1 year.
The average H1B worker is bound to a sponsor in very brutal ways. And that pretty much makes them indenture servants, and that is not fucking right now matter how we cut it.
Don't needlessly replace US workers with H1B visas, and don't treat H1B workers as indenture servants. One would think our political classes would get behind that concept.
"prove you have done a qualified job search" just how do you think this will work?
You've seen the ads "Seeking experienced Scala developer with 15 years experience, Must know CICS, JCL, DOS/360, C, Java, Python, Perl, FORTRAN, PL/I, SNOBOL, LISP. PhD preferred. Starting pay depending on qualifications, 50-60k/annually"
Funny thing, nobody responds, and they file the certification "Unable to locate qualified person".
And you can't go "person actually hired must match requisition", because that really doesn't happen for anyone, imported or not. Realistically, employers publish an ad that is a "wish list", not a "must have", and then they look for the maximal fit between "wish list" and "resume" to call for an interview, where they refine the "what I really need" vs "what you have to offer".
And that is the problem that needs fixing. Whoever they get via H1B must match those qualifications (and this should/must be verifiable by law). That is, H1B hires must match very specific openings, down to the T (and that is what is not being verified nowadays.)
I do not agree that TFA makes a good point of the discrepancy being racial in nature. it is not race as the primary factor, not even discrimination (as in willful discrimination). It's economics. Economic classes in this country are, not always,but in general, proxies to race, but the underlying factor is just that, economics.
I can afford my wife to stay home and help my kids with their homework, then KUMON and extra curricular activities. And on summer, I can afford to send them to Japan to study there (my wife is from Japan). And most of my buddies at the same middle/upper-midddle income bracket can do the same (wife at home, or hire a tutor, throw money at summer activities, etc.)
My kids are at a significant advantage over that kid whose parents are working multiple part-time jobs just to meet ends, who are trying their best, but with a system rigged against those at the lower end of the economic spectrum.
It would be the same disadvantage for a poor black kid in Oakland, or a poor hispanic kid in Austin, or a poor white kid in West Virginia or a poor Hmong kid in St. Paul. As I said, it just happens that economic classes tend to map to race in many regions.
And this points to the fundamental problem of public education in the US - there isn't. There is a policy of sending kids to a specific place, not to a school where means of education are guaranteed, as in Germany, Japan or Argentina, but a just a place with walls typically funded by real state taxes.
With a system such as this, more in common with a 3rd world country than with a 1st world country, there should not be any surprise in the educational discrepancies (in terms of fundamental subjects) that we see across economic groups.
I'm Asian and my parents neither pushed nor helped me in schooling. In fact, they were downright unhelpful. By the complaints of people saying that programs are racist, I should have been an underperformer in school. I was not. Without even trying, I was put into the gifted programs and such.
Why can't people just acknowledge that intelligence is very heavily influenced by heredity (hence the preponderance of Ashkenazy Jews in most fields) instead of playing the tiresome racist card?
At least with blacks, I can see how they could have a legitimate claim of generational racism. But Hispanics? Are Asians somehow "whiter" than Hispanics despite the fact that Hispanics (meaning from the Ibernian peninsula) have European blood in them? Why didn't the racist policies of this country put Asians at the bottom of the economic and academic ladder?
As a college educated Hispanic (a term whole fabricated in the US to fit into their statistics pigeonholes), I could tell you the number of things I've saw and experienced that were extremely racist and detrimental. Even from some college professors, the mocking, the sneers, the unbelievable open suggestions again certain groups of people (black and hispanics) from pursuing graduate studies, etc, etc.
And then even when you complete and try to savor the fruits of your achievements, you get typecasted - how could he graduate? Are his skills legit? Affirmative action? Hand-out? My tests were the same as everyone else, my work the same, but that never matters? There is always the inference, the nefarious inference (think of it as a generalized birther movement.) Intelligence and effort is forever questioned. That is just how it is.
I've worked at times counseling kids, and it has been, not once, but several times that I've run into kids who have been told not to go to college by their HS professors for being Puerto Rican or whatever. You tell a kid that shit since elementary, that kid will believe it regardless of potential.
Or imagine living in a world when even when you are dressed with an impeccable business suit and expensive briefcase, that old lady still holds her purse a bit tighter, just in case I mug her. Or imagine, as in my case, that many cases I have to dress business casual when shopping for a home or condo in an affluent residential area (while any Asia or White person can just show up with flip-flops) because that is the only way to avoid someone telling me there are no more units to show (even though they are.)
Do you even get to grasp what that constant stream of shit does to a community's sense of self? To kids' sense of worth and capabilities?
I applaud you for being able to progress on your own. Welcome to the club, you are neither the only one, nor your personal anecdotes, however praiseworthy they might be) deny the reality of race in this country. Obviously, African-American and Hispanic communities have their own social problems when it comes to family dynamics and education, but that does not even start to take into account the subtle and yet rampant
Take it for what it is, believe it or dismiss it. It takes someone to walk on someone's shoes I guess.
When you opt for the Windows experience, you gonna get whatever experience they want you to get.
But any way I know of of blocking any updates blocks all of them. like pulling the cable or disabling wifi.
Sometimes you do not opt, but you get a mandate from above (say, current company merges with another one that has a bunch of windows systems to support). At this point we can try be professionals and do the best effort possible, or simply throw a tantrum and leave Windooze doesn't wanna play nice with you.
Right, just like I said - and your company better hope that the enterprise edition of Wondows 10 doesn't phone home with sensitive documents.
Well, like everything. You presume a risk, and you try to mitigate it. Shit happens, you fix it. It is not the technical challenges or the fact that you have to work with shitty software that makes a job shitty, but the work culture, schedules, etc. You take the good with the bad, and the bad with the good. You weight your options while always acting professionally.
Again, it is not what *you* opt, but what your tasks entail.
When you opt for the Windows experience, you gonna get whatever experience they want you to get.
But any way I know of of blocking any updates blocks all of them. like pulling the cable or disabling wifi.
Sometimes you do not opt, but you get a mandate from above (say, current company merges with another one that has a bunch of windows systems to support). At this point we can try be professionals and do the best effort possible, or simply throw a tantrum and leave Windooze doesn't wanna play nice with you.
He has a connecting to all the features he put into C++ and any coding guidelines should include thing that should not be used. First among those are exceptions, unfortunately Bjarne has never wanted to admit C++ exceptions were a mistake.
That's a hard call. Exceptions have their place. The thing I cannot stomach is the catch(...) construct. I understand the technical reasons for having it. I still think that was a bad design decision that outweighs the pros. It is almost always impossible to quickly pinpoint the origin of the error (specially if you do not have a core dumb to at least analyze.)
The hard part here comes from "get it in writing".
Not really. What I've done in very "interesting" situations (names will be withheld), is that I send an e-mail that would have the following structure (I'm putting the important part in bold):
As per our discussion/instructions today, we will implement X,Y,Z and that this has been cleared/authorized/whatever-adjective-you-see-fit, and that these steps are appropriate. (If there are any lingering concerns, I list them here.)
Please let me know if you have any questions or corrections. Otherwise, I will proceed with your approval.
Once I send that e-mail, I reply to it, to me, indicating the time and date the discussion/instruction took place.
The critical part is in bold. No reply to the contrary implies tacit approval. Not bullet proof, and I'm no lawyer, but I've gotten people to backtrack "strange" orders as soon as they get such an e-mail.
Even when they tell me their reversal verbally, I then send another e-mail just like that, acknowledging the reversal.
No shit happens unless I get it in writing, or force them to put it in writing. If it ever comes to a case when things become contentious at work after sending one such e-mail, that is a red flag to me that some weird shit is going on and that it is time for me to leave with my hands clean.
If we aren't killing people, what the hell is the point of war?
Destruction of enemy's infrastructure? Disruption of another country's economy for political (or economic/mercenary reasons)? This could still be achieved with fully automated combatants on both sides since the cost of doing so (an arms race) also has an economic impact (remember the cost of Reagan's Star Wars on the Soviet Union.)
Be cheaper to run simulations and the best one wins.
I think I saw/read a Sci-Fi story just like that (the name is on the tip of the tongue, but I cannot remember).
It was a fucking clock. His engineering teacher could have verified it. Second, if they were really concerned why the fuck was the bomb squad and fire dept not called? They kept that kid for two class periods interrogating him without a lawyer and his parents. The principal trying to force him to write some kind of written confession. Again, without his parents. Do you think that was reasonable? Jeezus.
Also speculating what the kid was up to? Really? Why not just give him the benefit of the doubt?
Cuz in 'Murika we do not given the benefit of the doubt to kids with Muslim-sounding names (whatever that means) and/or suffer from Dermal Hypermelaninetis (a condition clearly documented in the "Take Our Country Back" medical manual.)
"Most of the cuts will occur in HPâ(TM)s long-troubled Enterprise Services unit and may be offset by new hires in that unit."
E.S. is basically what they are selling off. Most of the jobs will be bought by an outsourcing company. It was on this site not too long ago, and in the summary so you could avoid the article.
I know at least 500 people from HPES, and there are overpaid and underpaid people. Guess who gets the axe? That's right, the overpaid people. Not the "expensive and worth it" but overpaid.
I'm guessing lots of middle management cuts, where people built a team to look important but do little.
Job cuts aren't always bad, sometimes the job should never have existed.
How else can you do the opposite of a merger and save money? Hiring cheap replacements is a very tiny part of the answer. Take your knee jerk cynicism elsewhere, and meanwhile learn before posting. All if it was posted right here, in dorkslush, so you didn't have to exert much energy at all.
Here, from the article itself. Think of it as a middle finger to your post, or think about it as unfounded knee jerking, whichever suits you best.
Most of the cuts will occur in HP’s long-troubled Enterprise Services unit and may be offset by new hires in that unit. The head of the group, Mike Nefkens, outlined a plan under which it is cutting jobs in what he called “high-cost countries” and moving them to low-cost countries.
From reading the OP it is clear there were already plans for a computer learning lab, which exists to some degree.
Oh, really?
Key constraints: The kids don't know much English and speak a local language called Odiya. There aren't any technical publications/resources in Odiya. Poor internet connectivity. No computer experts on the school staff. Any other advice/help would also be appreciated.
This doesn't sound like they have any infrastructure, expertise, technology, or a plan... just "hey, let's show these kids computers".
At which point, I seriously question if this serves any purpose or will improve these kids lives any.
As someone who actually grew in a very poor country, I agree with this post.
I'm willing to bet a testicle that those kids have serious needs of a different kind: vaccination, nutrition (just because you are not starving that does not mean you are growing up well nourished, from experience, I know what I'm talking about here.), availability of vocational training that they can employ in ther socio-economic context, etc, etc.
Kids in those situations need to get good nutrition, good meals in school, basic hygiene and vaccination, a focus on a mainstream language (English or Hindi), math and literacy, and vocational programs that can help them in their society.
There are realities that need to be dealt with before one even begins to contemplate the idea of bringing computers to the masses. Stupid first world mentality I tell you.
While you are correct that not all employees get healthcare benefits (what is usually referred to as "benefits"), all employees get some benefits, which contractors do not. For example: social security contributions (which raise your rate in retirement), workers-comp insurance, and unemployment insurance.
Err no, unless we are talking as corp-to-corp contractors, contractors typically get those benefits through their contracting agencies. The majority of contractors in numbers similar to Uber's do not work corp-to-corp.
All of these things cost employers money, but the law assumes contractors will pay for themselves.
This is what Uber has been fighting so hard to avoid paying.
Correct. Uber's accounting/labor farce is over me thinks.
What's the difference between an employee and a contractor? The contractor doesn't receive any benefits.
Oh wow, that was stupid. Using that line of argument a part-time employee is a contractor because he/she does not get benefits usually given under the law to full-time employees.
UK researchers are working on disease-resistant chickens, adding a gene to eggs before they hatch that renders the bird less susceptible to avian influenza.
Good. I remember growing up in Honduras where most people in the cities, out of necessity raise their own poultry, my family included. On the country side it is obvious, but not so in the cities, in the poor neighborhoods unless you live in them.
And every awful year, around August, an avian flu would just move across the region, and bro, poultry would die by the thousands. Industrial-level farms would survive it given that their animals were isolated. Poor people in isolated villages would also fare well with their poultry animals.
But subsistence urban farmers like us, that pestilence would just kill our animals, our only source of affordable meat and eggs. We tried everything - immunization, injection of vitamins prior to the expected pestilence, covering the pens, the floors and walls with ash and limestone (very powerful antiseptic.) Nothing,nothing will work.
Animals would die by the thousands, thousands and thousands, and we had nothing left to do but to burning the carcasses in pits.
After many years, we had an epiphany and we started raising Muscovy ducks which are resilient to this pestilence. We had to make adjustments in our little backyard for the animals, but it worked well. When the next round of influenza came, our house was the only one with standing, aliven-n-kicking poultry.
After that, everyone who could spare the extra space needed for ducks caught on the the idea and made the switch.
So, although we were able to adapt, many cannot for a variety of reasons. Avian flu has a cost, and a very hard one for poor people in developing countries.
People in the 1st world sometimes ignore these nuisances and forget that experiments like this can make the difference between children eating an egg a day or just eating boiled millet.
I can understand the preoccupation with altering the environment, but me, knowing what it is like to grow poor and what it is like to spend days without eating any type of protein, I say to these scientists, go for it.
As someone who gets earaches fairly often, once upon a time, I would get a course of antibiotics, and occasionally needed a second course.
Then a very smart lady told me about hydrogen peroxide. A bit of that in your ear for a day or so would knock those little buggers on their ass.
It was very interesting the first time you put some in your ear - tickles a little and is loud as it releases the oxygen it kills the germs with.
21st century US litigation disclaimer:
This is not medical advice. Do not ever do this. Always consult a trained medical professional with the proper certifications for any and all medical treatments including antiseptics and band-aids. Do not use any other treatments than prescribed medicine. Always visit a trained professional for every physical ailment.
To the readers, the disclaimer above also applies to my post.
With the cover-your-ass part done, I'll add that I've done something similar. I've used a mix of alcohol (or water peroxide) mixed with tea tree oil and iodine. Hurts as hell, but that has knocked out ear infections that would make me go see a doc to get prescription antibiotics.
First time I tried and showed my PCP she was actually quite surprised. She even told me "man you did nuke those suckers" (not that she was approving of it.)
Same with my sinuses. I spent thousands of dollars in medicine (even going under the knife). Then someone told me to try neti pots. Then someone else suggested alkalol in the neti pot solution. Then another person suggested I use borax in the saline solution. That last part, the borax, within a week, that shit completely cured me of the sinus infection that have been plaguing me for 25 years.
Again, medical disclaimer - don't try it. I'm not a doctor. For all I know I could be developing a tumor for doing this stuff. And if you do, you are on your own.
If you think that people are more valuable when they show less commitment to staying at a place for any length of time, then as an extension of your logic, you are probably the least valuable employee to your company. After all, you've been there for nine years.
The reason you don't see people with 10 years in is because our industry doubles every three years, so 100% will have under a year of experience, 50% will have about 3 years of experience, 25% will have about six years of experience, and 12% will have about 9 years of experience.
If you are in that 12% odds are you have already jumped in and out of the less desirable jobs and have found a place where you are generally happy. For example, I worked for Cisco systems for 8 years and was rather happy there. My "move" from Cisco had a lot to do with layoffs and nothing to do with motivation to find a new team.
I am one of the really rare ones, I have over 15 years of experience. I assure you that I'm not unemployable. In fact, there is a high demand for people who really know their field, and in computers, it is still a field where you can command a high salary if you have the skill set to back it up.
Exactly. Layoffs. That it happened to you only on a rare occasion that allowed you to stay at Cisco for 8 years only means that you are an statistical outlier in this industry.
Nobody is motivated to jump ship just for shits and giggles, but because we know the vibe of things and known when a round of head chopping is around the block.
And you get laid off very often in this industry without having anything to do with performance. In my 20 years of experience, I've been laid off three times because funding cuts. The first two experiences showcase how abnormal shit can be, specially when the economy is going belly up.
First time I got laid off, because money ran out. Took me 2 months to find another gig just for the company to run out of money again. I had to work for 8 weeks without a salary just to make sure we could deliver to our last client to get our last paycheck. 13 years later I got another lay-off, also because the accountants up there decided to cancel a shitload of projects to make their 1st quarter reports look pretty.
And in between, another firm (big firm, no names) that also did the same - cut funding. So I had to bail ship after just 6 months. At another company there was no prospect of a raise (not just for me, but for everyone), so after 2 years, guess what? Bail ship.
Very recently I was working for a DoD contractor, going to my fifth year. Great job. Then comes the sequester. Guess what? Bail ship again.
That is life. From the highly technical to the incompetent. That's what the American software person goes through. Shit even in SV you see that regularly (for each successful startup, there is a trail of carcasses of failed startups - what do you think those folk do when shit runs to an end.)?
Good for you that you have not had to experience the churn. Either you are one lucky bastard, or you are one of the talented few who will never run out of solid opportunities, or you are like a horseshoe crab - plowing through the endless sands for ages, blissfully unaware of the changing world around him.
No he isn't "spot on". No one wants to train new employees. It costs money to hire and retrain. Companies want to keep you at the cheapest amount possible. No one is going to hire anyone who jumps around every year.
Except for the very few who have internship programs, no one trains new employees anymore. Welcome to yesterday's news.
So when you hop, it is because you know your shit (or know how to figure things out) and land on your feet running. If you lack that skill, you are dead weight, plain simple.
Also, the OP never said jumping every year, but keep looking and keep moving. That can be 2-3 years intervals at least to no more than 5. 2-3 years is the norm. 4 is pushing it, and 5, either you lack the drive or you are one of the very few who has landed a gig worth keeping past 5.
That is how it has been for the last 20 years. Not by our choices mind you, but as a reaction of the way the industry has been changing.
No one wants to keep jumping ship every 2-3 years. Of course not!
But no one gives permanent jobs anymore. They are all contracting jobs. No benefits. No yearly raises. And every 3-4 years there is this churn when all of the sudden the whole dev/it group is let go with their jobs going offshore. And since most people are contractors, there are no legal obligations to give advanced warning or severance packages.
That is reality. Not of our choosing, but one that has been imposed on us (and the country at large - just look at all those people who are still dreaming for their manufacturing jobs to come back from China.).
I mean, seriously, under what type of rock have you been hiding for the last 15-20 years?
Wow. That is possibly the dumbest thing I have read on here. Keep moving, or you will get fired? Who is going to hire someone who keeps switching jobs constantly? I'm sure you will be modded to +5 Insightful though.
Where have you been in the last 15-20 years? The IT/software industry moved towards a contractor-base system years ago, where layoffs are a common occurrence every 2-5 years, with up/down cycles lasting 5 to 10. Outside of SV, it is rare to find a perm opening, let alone a place where you can spend 10 years on the job uninterrupted.
Nowadays, it is just contracting jobs. Even the health and DoD sectors (sectors I've worked with in addition to others) have been moving towards that modus operandi.
That you act surprised like this tells me that you are either new to this shit or you are in a very special niche. Nothing wrong with the later if your niche is a highly technical one (otherwise you are just playing a "Dodo on an island" role completely unaware of changes around you - not a good place to be.)
people being afraid to touch the code to avoid breaking a rare and poorly-tested code path
In short, no unit tests were ever written.
Yes, welcome to the real world of software development where deadlines trump other things.
Your concept of the "real world" is pretty damned narrow... and false.
I would reply like this: No. Welcome to the real world where shitty programmers or shitty organizations pretend their shitty practices are the general case.
I've worked in large commercial firms, small start-ups and defense-related companies, each with teams of various sizes and different projects. C/C++, Java, C#, Python and what not. Some where horrid, some were great. Most were ok. Unit testing has always been the norm for the ok and great. Horrid experiences were with the few projects I've been where there was no concept of automated testing.
I mean, shit, good programmers have been implementing their own automated tests in one way or another even before the term "unit test" was introduced in the agile lingo. And normal companies that do not have their heads up their buttholes have plans that take into account some form of testing.
Deadlines always exist, and many times things have to be shipped out without full tests. This is typically the norm for, say, delivering an emergency patch.
But these are the exceptions rather than the norm. And in all cases, you simply put the missing tests on a backlog and re-calibrate your plans for the next sprints to take these into account.
If you are working in a company where code quality always suffer due to dealines, then get a different job somewhere else.
And if *you* happen to be the cause of such mishaps, please get out of the industry. It takes one crappy programmer to deliver poorly tested, badly written code that ends up requiring an army of engineers to deal with it.
Slashdot Mirror
Incorrect the largest waves were made by humans when the detonated an H-Bomb.
Your measly wave pool is tiny compared to real power.
The goal is to produce tsunamis without the nuclear fallout.
You can with enough TNT.
all of your ebooks will be stored in amazon's cloud. why would they be on the SD card?
You don't travel overseas much, do you?
Here's a hint: the professional associations for lawyers, doctors and so on are actually unions.
Brilliant... it's not a Union, it is a Professional Association. If doctors and lawyers can do it, why can't IT?
(and no, I am not being sarcastic)
We cannot yet, because we lack the primary requisite for making it happening: licensing. Doctors, lawyers, architects, engineers and nurses, vets and plumbers need state-sanctioned licenses (where licenses are legal instruments.)
It is this requirement of a legal instrument that allows the creation of a professional association.
This would actually nuke the shit out of H1B visas. Not necessarily a good thing (because, when done right, H1B programs have their place). However, a software/IT professional association or guild would completely obliterate the practice of replacing US professionals with temporary foreign ones.
Another way to destroy this practice would be to require H1B workers to be paid 10% above the median average for that position per metropolitan area, and/or give a H1B worker the freedom to change sponsors after 1 year.
The average H1B worker is bound to a sponsor in very brutal ways. And that pretty much makes them indenture servants, and that is not fucking right now matter how we cut it.
Don't needlessly replace US workers with H1B visas, and don't treat H1B workers as indenture servants. One would think our political classes would get behind that concept.
"prove you have done a qualified job search" just how do you think this will work? You've seen the ads "Seeking experienced Scala developer with 15 years experience, Must know CICS, JCL, DOS/360, C, Java, Python, Perl, FORTRAN, PL/I, SNOBOL, LISP. PhD preferred. Starting pay depending on qualifications, 50-60k/annually"
Funny thing, nobody responds, and they file the certification "Unable to locate qualified person".
And you can't go "person actually hired must match requisition", because that really doesn't happen for anyone, imported or not. Realistically, employers publish an ad that is a "wish list", not a "must have", and then they look for the maximal fit between "wish list" and "resume" to call for an interview, where they refine the "what I really need" vs "what you have to offer".
And that is the problem that needs fixing. Whoever they get via H1B must match those qualifications (and this should/must be verifiable by law). That is, H1B hires must match very specific openings, down to the T (and that is what is not being verified nowadays.)
replying to myself...
WITH THAT SAID:
I do not agree that TFA makes a good point of the discrepancy being racial in nature. it is not race as the primary factor, not even discrimination (as in willful discrimination). It's economics. Economic classes in this country are, not always ,but in general, proxies to race, but the underlying factor is just that, economics.
I can afford my wife to stay home and help my kids with their homework, then KUMON and extra curricular activities. And on summer, I can afford to send them to Japan to study there (my wife is from Japan). And most of my buddies at the same middle/upper-midddle income bracket can do the same (wife at home, or hire a tutor, throw money at summer activities, etc.)
My kids are at a significant advantage over that kid whose parents are working multiple part-time jobs just to meet ends, who are trying their best, but with a system rigged against those at the lower end of the economic spectrum.
It would be the same disadvantage for a poor black kid in Oakland, or a poor hispanic kid in Austin, or a poor white kid in West Virginia or a poor Hmong kid in St. Paul. As I said, it just happens that economic classes tend to map to race in many regions.
And this points to the fundamental problem of public education in the US - there isn't. There is a policy of sending kids to a specific place, not to a school where means of education are guaranteed, as in Germany, Japan or Argentina, but a just a place with walls typically funded by real state taxes.
With a system such as this, more in common with a 3rd world country than with a 1st world country, there should not be any surprise in the educational discrepancies (in terms of fundamental subjects) that we see across economic groups.
I'm Asian and my parents neither pushed nor helped me in schooling. In fact, they were downright unhelpful. By the complaints of people saying that programs are racist, I should have been an underperformer in school. I was not. Without even trying, I was put into the gifted programs and such.
Why can't people just acknowledge that intelligence is very heavily influenced by heredity (hence the preponderance of Ashkenazy Jews in most fields) instead of playing the tiresome racist card?
At least with blacks, I can see how they could have a legitimate claim of generational racism. But Hispanics? Are Asians somehow "whiter" than Hispanics despite the fact that Hispanics (meaning from the Ibernian peninsula) have European blood in them? Why didn't the racist policies of this country put Asians at the bottom of the economic and academic ladder?
As a college educated Hispanic (a term whole fabricated in the US to fit into their statistics pigeonholes), I could tell you the number of things I've saw and experienced that were extremely racist and detrimental. Even from some college professors, the mocking, the sneers, the unbelievable open suggestions again certain groups of people (black and hispanics) from pursuing graduate studies, etc, etc.
And then even when you complete and try to savor the fruits of your achievements, you get typecasted - how could he graduate? Are his skills legit? Affirmative action? Hand-out? My tests were the same as everyone else, my work the same, but that never matters? There is always the inference, the nefarious inference (think of it as a generalized birther movement.) Intelligence and effort is forever questioned. That is just how it is.
I've worked at times counseling kids, and it has been, not once, but several times that I've run into kids who have been told not to go to college by their HS professors for being Puerto Rican or whatever. You tell a kid that shit since elementary, that kid will believe it regardless of potential.
Or imagine living in a world when even when you are dressed with an impeccable business suit and expensive briefcase, that old lady still holds her purse a bit tighter, just in case I mug her. Or imagine, as in my case, that many cases I have to dress business casual when shopping for a home or condo in an affluent residential area (while any Asia or White person can just show up with flip-flops) because that is the only way to avoid someone telling me there are no more units to show (even though they are.)
Do you even get to grasp what that constant stream of shit does to a community's sense of self? To kids' sense of worth and capabilities?
I applaud you for being able to progress on your own. Welcome to the club, you are neither the only one, nor your personal anecdotes, however praiseworthy they might be) deny the reality of race in this country. Obviously, African-American and Hispanic communities have their own social problems when it comes to family dynamics and education, but that does not even start to take into account the subtle and yet rampant
Take it for what it is, believe it or dismiss it. It takes someone to walk on someone's shoes I guess.
When you opt for the Windows experience, you gonna get whatever experience they want you to get.
But any way I know of of blocking any updates blocks all of them. like pulling the cable or disabling wifi.
Sometimes you do not opt, but you get a mandate from above (say, current company merges with another one that has a bunch of windows systems to support). At this point we can try be professionals and do the best effort possible, or simply throw a tantrum and leave Windooze doesn't wanna play nice with you.
Right, just like I said - and your company better hope that the enterprise edition of Wondows 10 doesn't phone home with sensitive documents.
Well, like everything. You presume a risk, and you try to mitigate it. Shit happens, you fix it. It is not the technical challenges or the fact that you have to work with shitty software that makes a job shitty, but the work culture, schedules, etc. You take the good with the bad, and the bad with the good. You weight your options while always acting professionally.
Again, it is not what *you* opt, but what your tasks entail.
When you opt for the Windows experience, you gonna get whatever experience they want you to get.
But any way I know of of blocking any updates blocks all of them. like pulling the cable or disabling wifi.
Sometimes you do not opt, but you get a mandate from above (say, current company merges with another one that has a bunch of windows systems to support). At this point we can try be professionals and do the best effort possible, or simply throw a tantrum and leave Windooze doesn't wanna play nice with you.
The path of least resistance is to change jobs while still employed.
If I could mod+ you a million, I would.
He has a connecting to all the features he put into C++ and any coding guidelines should include thing that should not be used. First among those are exceptions, unfortunately Bjarne has never wanted to admit C++ exceptions were a mistake.
That's a hard call. Exceptions have their place. The thing I cannot stomach is the catch(...) construct. I understand the technical reasons for having it. I still think that was a bad design decision that outweighs the pros. It is almost always impossible to quickly pinpoint the origin of the error (specially if you do not have a core dumb to at least analyze.)
std::auto_ptr is deprecated. You should be using std::unique_ptr, or std::shared_ptr which address the issue of pointer ownership.
I think he meant it with a flair of irony. I dunno, just guessing.
The hard part here comes from "get it in writing".
Not really. What I've done in very "interesting" situations (names will be withheld), is that I send an e-mail that would have the following structure (I'm putting the important part in bold):
As per our discussion/instructions today, we will implement X,Y,Z and that this has been cleared/authorized/whatever-adjective-you-see-fit, and that these steps are appropriate. (If there are any lingering concerns, I list them here.)
Please let me know if you have any questions or corrections. Otherwise, I will proceed with your approval.
Once I send that e-mail, I reply to it, to me, indicating the time and date the discussion/instruction took place.
The critical part is in bold. No reply to the contrary implies tacit approval. Not bullet proof, and I'm no lawyer, but I've gotten people to backtrack "strange" orders as soon as they get such an e-mail.
Even when they tell me their reversal verbally, I then send another e-mail just like that, acknowledging the reversal.
No shit happens unless I get it in writing, or force them to put it in writing. If it ever comes to a case when things become contentious at work after sending one such e-mail, that is a red flag to me that some weird shit is going on and that it is time for me to leave with my hands clean.
If we aren't killing people, what the hell is the point of war?
Destruction of enemy's infrastructure? Disruption of another country's economy for political (or economic/mercenary reasons)? This could still be achieved with fully automated combatants on both sides since the cost of doing so (an arms race) also has an economic impact (remember the cost of Reagan's Star Wars on the Soviet Union.)
Be cheaper to run simulations and the best one wins.
I think I saw/read a Sci-Fi story just like that (the name is on the tip of the tongue, but I cannot remember).
It was a fucking clock. His engineering teacher could have verified it. Second, if they were really concerned why the fuck was the bomb squad and fire dept not called? They kept that kid for two class periods interrogating him without a lawyer and his parents. The principal trying to force him to write some kind of written confession. Again, without his parents. Do you think that was reasonable? Jeezus.
Also speculating what the kid was up to? Really? Why not just give him the benefit of the doubt?
Cuz in 'Murika we do not given the benefit of the doubt to kids with Muslim-sounding names (whatever that means) and/or suffer from Dermal Hypermelaninetis (a condition clearly documented in the "Take Our Country Back" medical manual.)
"Most of the cuts will occur in HPâ(TM)s long-troubled Enterprise Services unit and may be offset by new hires in that unit."
E.S. is basically what they are selling off. Most of the jobs will be bought by an outsourcing company. It was on this site not too long ago, and in the summary so you could avoid the article.
I know at least 500 people from HPES, and there are overpaid and underpaid people. Guess who gets the axe? That's right, the overpaid people. Not the "expensive and worth it" but overpaid.
I'm guessing lots of middle management cuts, where people built a team to look important but do little.
Job cuts aren't always bad, sometimes the job should never have existed.
How else can you do the opposite of a merger and save money? Hiring cheap replacements is a very tiny part of the answer. Take your knee jerk cynicism elsewhere, and meanwhile learn before posting. All if it was posted right here, in dorkslush, so you didn't have to exert much energy at all.
Here, from the article itself. Think of it as a middle finger to your post, or think about it as unfounded knee jerking, whichever suits you best.
Most of the cuts will occur in HP’s long-troubled Enterprise Services unit and may be offset by new hires in that unit. The head of the group, Mike Nefkens, outlined a plan under which it is cutting jobs in what he called “high-cost countries” and moving them to low-cost countries.
Oh, really?
This doesn't sound like they have any infrastructure, expertise, technology, or a plan ... just "hey, let's show these kids computers".
At which point, I seriously question if this serves any purpose or will improve these kids lives any.
As someone who actually grew in a very poor country, I agree with this post.
I'm willing to bet a testicle that those kids have serious needs of a different kind: vaccination, nutrition (just because you are not starving that does not mean you are growing up well nourished, from experience, I know what I'm talking about here.), availability of vocational training that they can employ in ther socio-economic context, etc, etc.
Kids in those situations need to get good nutrition, good meals in school, basic hygiene and vaccination, a focus on a mainstream language (English or Hindi), math and literacy, and vocational programs that can help them in their society.
There are realities that need to be dealt with before one even begins to contemplate the idea of bringing computers to the masses. Stupid first world mentality I tell you.
While you are correct that not all employees get healthcare benefits (what is usually referred to as "benefits"), all employees get some benefits, which contractors do not. For example: social security contributions (which raise your rate in retirement), workers-comp insurance, and unemployment insurance.
Err no, unless we are talking as corp-to-corp contractors, contractors typically get those benefits through their contracting agencies. The majority of contractors in numbers similar to Uber's do not work corp-to-corp.
All of these things cost employers money, but the law assumes contractors will pay for themselves.
This is what Uber has been fighting so hard to avoid paying.
Correct. Uber's accounting/labor farce is over me thinks.
What's the difference between an employee and a contractor? The contractor doesn't receive any benefits.
Oh wow, that was stupid. Using that line of argument a part-time employee is a contractor because he/she does not get benefits usually given under the law to full-time employees.
UK researchers are working on disease-resistant chickens, adding a gene to eggs before they hatch that renders the bird less susceptible to avian influenza.
Good. I remember growing up in Honduras where most people in the cities, out of necessity raise their own poultry, my family included. On the country side it is obvious, but not so in the cities, in the poor neighborhoods unless you live in them.
And every awful year, around August, an avian flu would just move across the region, and bro, poultry would die by the thousands. Industrial-level farms would survive it given that their animals were isolated. Poor people in isolated villages would also fare well with their poultry animals.
But subsistence urban farmers like us, that pestilence would just kill our animals, our only source of affordable meat and eggs. We tried everything - immunization, injection of vitamins prior to the expected pestilence, covering the pens, the floors and walls with ash and limestone (very powerful antiseptic.) Nothing,nothing will work.
Animals would die by the thousands, thousands and thousands, and we had nothing left to do but to burning the carcasses in pits.
After many years, we had an epiphany and we started raising Muscovy ducks which are resilient to this pestilence. We had to make adjustments in our little backyard for the animals, but it worked well. When the next round of influenza came, our house was the only one with standing, aliven-n-kicking poultry.
After that, everyone who could spare the extra space needed for ducks caught on the the idea and made the switch.
So, although we were able to adapt, many cannot for a variety of reasons. Avian flu has a cost, and a very hard one for poor people in developing countries.
People in the 1st world sometimes ignore these nuisances and forget that experiments like this can make the difference between children eating an egg a day or just eating boiled millet.
I can understand the preoccupation with altering the environment, but me, knowing what it is like to grow poor and what it is like to spend days without eating any type of protein, I say to these scientists, go for it.
I wonder why we don't have a gene that protects us from Anthrax or the HSV-* class of viruses.
As someone who gets earaches fairly often, once upon a time, I would get a course of antibiotics, and occasionally needed a second course.
Then a very smart lady told me about hydrogen peroxide. A bit of that in your ear for a day or so would knock those little buggers on their ass.
It was very interesting the first time you put some in your ear - tickles a little and is loud as it releases the oxygen it kills the germs with.
21st century US litigation disclaimer:
This is not medical advice. Do not ever do this. Always consult a trained medical professional with the proper certifications for any and all medical treatments including antiseptics and band-aids. Do not use any other treatments than prescribed medicine. Always visit a trained professional for every physical ailment.
To the readers, the disclaimer above also applies to my post.
With the cover-your-ass part done, I'll add that I've done something similar. I've used a mix of alcohol (or water peroxide) mixed with tea tree oil and iodine. Hurts as hell, but that has knocked out ear infections that would make me go see a doc to get prescription antibiotics.
First time I tried and showed my PCP she was actually quite surprised. She even told me "man you did nuke those suckers" (not that she was approving of it.)
Same with my sinuses. I spent thousands of dollars in medicine (even going under the knife). Then someone told me to try neti pots. Then someone else suggested alkalol in the neti pot solution. Then another person suggested I use borax in the saline solution. That last part, the borax, within a week, that shit completely cured me of the sinus infection that have been plaguing me for 25 years.
Again, medical disclaimer - don't try it. I'm not a doctor. For all I know I could be developing a tumor for doing this stuff. And if you do, you are on your own.
You are stupid.
If you think that people are more valuable when they show less commitment to staying at a place for any length of time, then as an extension of your logic, you are probably the least valuable employee to your company. After all, you've been there for nine years.
The reason you don't see people with 10 years in is because our industry doubles every three years, so 100% will have under a year of experience, 50% will have about 3 years of experience, 25% will have about six years of experience, and 12% will have about 9 years of experience.
If you are in that 12% odds are you have already jumped in and out of the less desirable jobs and have found a place where you are generally happy. For example, I worked for Cisco systems for 8 years and was rather happy there. My "move" from Cisco had a lot to do with layoffs and nothing to do with motivation to find a new team.
I am one of the really rare ones, I have over 15 years of experience. I assure you that I'm not unemployable. In fact, there is a high demand for people who really know their field, and in computers, it is still a field where you can command a high salary if you have the skill set to back it up.
Exactly. Layoffs. That it happened to you only on a rare occasion that allowed you to stay at Cisco for 8 years only means that you are an statistical outlier in this industry.
Nobody is motivated to jump ship just for shits and giggles, but because we know the vibe of things and known when a round of head chopping is around the block.
And you get laid off very often in this industry without having anything to do with performance. In my 20 years of experience, I've been laid off three times because funding cuts. The first two experiences showcase how abnormal shit can be, specially when the economy is going belly up.
First time I got laid off, because money ran out. Took me 2 months to find another gig just for the company to run out of money again. I had to work for 8 weeks without a salary just to make sure we could deliver to our last client to get our last paycheck. 13 years later I got another lay-off, also because the accountants up there decided to cancel a shitload of projects to make their 1st quarter reports look pretty.
And in between, another firm (big firm, no names) that also did the same - cut funding. So I had to bail ship after just 6 months. At another company there was no prospect of a raise (not just for me, but for everyone), so after 2 years, guess what? Bail ship.
Very recently I was working for a DoD contractor, going to my fifth year. Great job. Then comes the sequester. Guess what? Bail ship again.
That is life. From the highly technical to the incompetent. That's what the American software person goes through. Shit even in SV you see that regularly (for each successful startup, there is a trail of carcasses of failed startups - what do you think those folk do when shit runs to an end.)?
Good for you that you have not had to experience the churn. Either you are one lucky bastard, or you are one of the talented few who will never run out of solid opportunities, or you are like a horseshoe crab - plowing through the endless sands for ages, blissfully unaware of the changing world around him.
No he isn't "spot on". No one wants to train new employees. It costs money to hire and retrain. Companies want to keep you at the cheapest amount possible. No one is going to hire anyone who jumps around every year.
Except for the very few who have internship programs, no one trains new employees anymore. Welcome to yesterday's news.
So when you hop, it is because you know your shit (or know how to figure things out) and land on your feet running. If you lack that skill, you are dead weight, plain simple.
Also, the OP never said jumping every year, but keep looking and keep moving. That can be 2-3 years intervals at least to no more than 5. 2-3 years is the norm. 4 is pushing it, and 5, either you lack the drive or you are one of the very few who has landed a gig worth keeping past 5.
That is how it has been for the last 20 years. Not by our choices mind you, but as a reaction of the way the industry has been changing.
No one wants to keep jumping ship every 2-3 years. Of course not!
But no one gives permanent jobs anymore. They are all contracting jobs. No benefits. No yearly raises. And every 3-4 years there is this churn when all of the sudden the whole dev/it group is let go with their jobs going offshore. And since most people are contractors, there are no legal obligations to give advanced warning or severance packages.
That is reality. Not of our choosing, but one that has been imposed on us (and the country at large - just look at all those people who are still dreaming for their manufacturing jobs to come back from China.).
I mean, seriously, under what type of rock have you been hiding for the last 15-20 years?
Wow. That is possibly the dumbest thing I have read on here. Keep moving, or you will get fired? Who is going to hire someone who keeps switching jobs constantly? I'm sure you will be modded to +5 Insightful though.
Where have you been in the last 15-20 years? The IT/software industry moved towards a contractor-base system years ago, where layoffs are a common occurrence every 2-5 years, with up/down cycles lasting 5 to 10. Outside of SV, it is rare to find a perm opening, let alone a place where you can spend 10 years on the job uninterrupted.
Nowadays, it is just contracting jobs. Even the health and DoD sectors (sectors I've worked with in addition to others) have been moving towards that modus operandi.
That you act surprised like this tells me that you are either new to this shit or you are in a very special niche. Nothing wrong with the later if your niche is a highly technical one (otherwise you are just playing a "Dodo on an island" role completely unaware of changes around you - not a good place to be.)
people being afraid to touch the code to avoid breaking a rare and poorly-tested code path
In short, no unit tests were ever written.
Yes, welcome to the real world of software development where deadlines trump other things.
Your concept of the "real world" is pretty damned narrow... and false.
I would reply like this: No. Welcome to the real world where shitty programmers or shitty organizations pretend their shitty practices are the general case.
I've worked in large commercial firms, small start-ups and defense-related companies, each with teams of various sizes and different projects. C/C++, Java, C#, Python and what not. Some where horrid, some were great. Most were ok. Unit testing has always been the norm for the ok and great. Horrid experiences were with the few projects I've been where there was no concept of automated testing.
I mean, shit, good programmers have been implementing their own automated tests in one way or another even before the term "unit test" was introduced in the agile lingo. And normal companies that do not have their heads up their buttholes have plans that take into account some form of testing.
Deadlines always exist, and many times things have to be shipped out without full tests. This is typically the norm for, say, delivering an emergency patch.
But these are the exceptions rather than the norm. And in all cases, you simply put the missing tests on a backlog and re-calibrate your plans for the next sprints to take these into account.
If you are working in a company where code quality always suffer due to dealines, then get a different job somewhere else.
And if *you* happen to be the cause of such mishaps, please get out of the industry. It takes one crappy programmer to deliver poorly tested, badly written code that ends up requiring an army of engineers to deal with it.