You're already in Washington state, so you definitely want to look at Electronic Media and Culture at Washington State U. in Vancouver. I have a friend who worked for several years a project manager on projects to move, upgrade, or migrate office computers. He's about to graduate from the program and he's been very happy with it. Don't hesitate to get in touch with me if you want to know more.
As far as computer studies without coding, as a software developer I will say that if you want to write software for a living, and it sounds like that's not really your goal, there is no shortcut to learning -- writing lots of code is an absolute necessity, in exactly the same way that writing lots of words is necessary to become a good writer.
Yes, work out the expected answer, and then write code to test for it. Not only will it prevent you from making a dumb mistake in doing the manual comparison, you then commit the test code and you've created a regression test in case that bug ever pops up again.
but how do you know it's fixed?
on
Debugging
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
Nothing about writing code for a test case that exercises the bug, then rerunning it every time you make a change you think will fix the bug? Seems like a big oversight. Any program of reasonable size is going to require wasting a significant amount of time restarting and re-running to the point of failure, and with every manual check of the result, there's an increasing probability that fallible human will make a mistake.
There's so many things wrong with these proposals I won't even bother going into specifics.* What I will say is, there is a Better Way, and I have seen its genesis. The Master of Fine Arts in Software, and the University of Illinois just recently gave the idea a trial run, which I was thrilled to have been able to participate in.
* OK, I couldn't help myself, I had to mention one specific: Why is writing HTML and CSS in the programming curriculum?
Nevertheless, the fundamentals of the field would not exist without the work the practioners have done. I may be easy for a layman but do it once shown how to do it, but that does not invalidate the field. Arguably, the discovery of principles and techniques easy enough for the non-specialist to use is the mark of a robust and dynamic field. Example: they teach calculus in high school now. Does the fact that any kid can learn it mean that the work Newton and Leibniz did has no merit?
The author shows terrific mastery and use of the rhetorical literary deconstruction techniques he derides. In other words, he couldn't have written the article without the very skills and work he criticizes.
My usual response is "I used work on computers for a living, but I put away my screwdriver years ago. Now I only know how to program high-end servers." However, over the Christmas holidays my sister asked me about getting her wireless access point working. I was intrigued, and I knew from previous experience that she's pretty good about keeping her computer clean and free of junkware. I am sure it's because she works from home and the computer is all business to her.
I'm glad I did it now. I got to play with a Linksys wireless router and I learned something new, got a chance to talk with my sister while I was working, and had fun. I got a nice feeling of accomplishment when I got the connection to come up the first time.
But routine maintenance, virus scanning, adware removal, etc, I still wouldn't do.
Effective dead connection detection and failover is a Hard Problem in general. Asking for a general-purpose RPC mechanism that solves this problem is asking quite a lot. Perhaps it would be worth re-examining the requirements for the system that lead to asking for failover, and considering what other solutions to those requirement there might be other than robust failover.
Excellent idea. Check the lock regularly, by the way. Here's what happened to me. I had my identity stolen because the outgoing mail slot at my apartment complex had a busted lock. In my case the thief got an insurance form with my SSN and checking account number. The mail slot door was cleverly wedged shut so that it wasn't obvious that the lock was busted, but after I and several other residents reported thefts the problem was discovered by accident when one of the on-site managers was just checking to see if the mail could be reached by putting a finger in the slot. Now I take all mail to directly to the post office. It's a little bit extra effort, but far less work than the endless forms and phone calls it took to clear up the theft.
I suppose there's always the argument that you need lots of fresh meat at the sharp end before the grinder (mainstream press) starts to notice any difference. If it's simply that it's a slow process, then by all means chaps, carry on:-)
I was once told by a co-worker that at my employer, you had to say the same thing 7 different ways to 7 different groups before you would begin to be heard -- and this company was only 2000 people. Getting the message to the entire business community is orders of a magnitude more difficult. At the same time certain software companies are continually countering the facts about open source (and getting the attention of the mainstream press more easily), and inventing new distortions. Keep up the good work, Tom Adelstein, and all like-minded authors.
The question on my mind is -- how many of those companies that complained about the quality of the customer service themselves have offshored their tech support or other operations? Will they see the irony themselves, or will that little bit of cognitive dissonance be swept under the rug?
Basically: work virtually, put all your knowledge on the company intranet for others to have, and why would the company need you any more?
That's a simplistic assumption, because the value of an employee is primarily in what cannot be communicated or written down easily (otherwise rules engines would be able to replace us all), but executives might just assume that once you've been "milked" of what you know, you are expendable. In your place they hire some cheap incompentent, and tell them to read your digital history.
Did they actually fix the SunRay and network thing that caused them to be virtually unusable at JavaOne 2000? I had my JavaCard but plugging in was pretty much as useful as putting a quarter in a slot machine. What a nightmare.
Rules engines can't handle exceptions that are not programmed in. Rules engines apply their rules ceteris paribus, assuming that everything not accounted for in the rules is constant, when if fact the unaccounted-for variables may in fact be the important ones. Expert human collaboration and judgment is required to correct and update rules engine errors.
The ongoing maintenance of rules is a significant effort and drain on resources. In a rapidly changing business, the value of the rules degrades rapidly without maintenance.
Deskilling of workers is a significant risk in heavy reliance on rules engines. As more business expertise becomes embodied in the rules engine, the ability of the workers to understand the domain becomes less.
Recommended readings include:
Dreyfus, H and Stuart E. Dreyfus, Mind over Machine
Ditto for bicycles. I try to be a good citizen and obey the traffic rules, like bikes should, but if the light won't change, it sucks.
But now, I think the only thing for municipalities to do is jack up the fines for using one illegally, and use the money collected to replace the system with something harder for the ordinary citizen to take advantage of.
Slashdot Mirror
You're already in Washington state, so you definitely want to look at
Electronic Media and Culture at Washington State U. in Vancouver. I have a friend who worked for several years a project manager on projects to move, upgrade, or migrate office computers. He's about to graduate from the program and he's been very happy with it. Don't hesitate to get in touch with me if you want to know more.
As far as computer studies without coding, as a software developer I will say that if you want to write software for a living, and it sounds like that's not really your goal, there is no shortcut to learning -- writing lots of code is an absolute necessity, in exactly the same way that writing lots of words is necessary to become a good writer.
Yes, work out the expected answer, and then write code to test for it. Not only will it prevent you from making a dumb mistake in doing the manual comparison, you then commit the test code and you've created a regression test in case that bug ever pops up again.
Nothing about writing code for a test case that exercises the bug, then rerunning it every time you make a change you think will fix the bug? Seems like a big oversight. Any program of reasonable size is going to require wasting a significant amount of time restarting and re-running to the point of failure, and with every manual check of the result, there's an increasing probability that fallible human will make a mistake.
More programmers need to get Test Infected.
How nice of Microsoft to deign to abide by the law. So innovative of them.
There's so many things wrong with these proposals I won't even bother going into specifics.* What I will say is, there is a Better Way, and I have seen its genesis. The Master of Fine Arts in Software, and the University of Illinois just recently gave the idea a trial run, which I was thrilled to have been able to participate in.
* OK, I couldn't help myself, I had to mention one specific: Why is writing HTML and CSS in the programming curriculum?
> This is not a Kennedy-type announcement.
THIS is a Kennedy-type announcement.
'nuff said.
Please tell me that that IP stack on this thing is not called SkyNET.
Nevertheless, the fundamentals of the field would not exist without the work the practioners have done. I may be easy for a layman but do it once shown how to do it, but that does not invalidate the field. Arguably, the discovery of principles and techniques easy enough for the non-specialist to use is the mark of a robust and dynamic field. Example: they teach calculus in high school now. Does the fact that any kid can learn it mean that the work Newton and Leibniz did has no merit?
The author shows terrific mastery and use of the rhetorical literary deconstruction techniques he derides. In other words, he couldn't have written the article without the very skills and work he criticizes.
My usual response is "I used work on computers for a living, but I put away my screwdriver years ago. Now I only know how to program high-end servers." However, over the Christmas holidays my sister asked me about getting her wireless access point working. I was intrigued, and I knew from previous experience that she's pretty good about keeping her computer clean and free of junkware. I am sure it's because she works from home and the computer is all business to her.
I'm glad I did it now. I got to play with a Linksys wireless router and I learned something new, got a chance to talk with my sister while I was working, and had fun. I got a nice feeling of accomplishment when I got the connection to come up the first time.
But routine maintenance, virus scanning, adware removal, etc, I still wouldn't do.
Effective dead connection detection and failover is a Hard Problem in general. Asking for a general-purpose RPC mechanism that solves this problem is asking quite a lot. Perhaps it would be worth re-examining the requirements for the system that lead to asking for failover, and considering what other solutions to those requirement there might be other than robust failover.
I'm surprised that this hasn't come up -- but how do we know it isn't already happening?
Think about it.
Excellent idea. Check the lock regularly, by the way. Here's what happened to me. I had my identity stolen because the outgoing mail slot at my apartment complex had a busted lock. In my case the thief got an insurance form with my SSN and checking account number. The mail slot door was cleverly wedged shut so that it wasn't obvious that the lock was busted, but after I and several other residents reported thefts the problem was discovered by accident when one of the on-site managers was just checking to see if the mail could be reached by putting a finger in the slot. Now I take all mail to directly to the post office. It's a little bit extra effort, but far less work than the endless forms and phone calls it took to clear up the theft.
Indeed. I don't believe the name "Eclipse" and its implications for (the) Sun was an accident.
In direct contradiction to Brooks' law, managers still believe that adding more programmers to a late project will ensure that it meets its deadline.
I was once told by a co-worker that at my employer, you had to say the same thing 7 different ways to 7 different groups before you would begin to be heard -- and this company was only 2000 people. Getting the message to the entire business community is orders of a magnitude more difficult. At the same time certain software companies are continually countering the facts about open source (and getting the attention of the mainstream press more easily), and inventing new distortions. Keep up the good work, Tom Adelstein, and all like-minded authors.
The question on my mind is -- how many of those companies that complained about the quality of the customer service themselves have offshored their tech support or other operations? Will they see the irony themselves, or will that little bit of cognitive dissonance be swept under the rug?
This article from Stanford Business School talks about research showing workers reactions -- they fear virtual teams may make them obsolete.
Basically: work virtually, put all your knowledge on the company intranet for others to have, and why would the company need you any more?
That's a simplistic assumption, because the value of an employee is primarily in what cannot be communicated or written down easily (otherwise rules engines would be able to replace us all), but executives might just assume that once you've been "milked" of what you know, you are expendable. In your place they hire some cheap incompentent, and tell them to read your digital history.
Did they actually fix the SunRay and network thing that caused them to be virtually unusable at JavaOne 2000? I had my JavaCard but plugging in was pretty much as useful as putting a quarter in a slot machine. What a nightmare.
What a pathetic story! Congratulations to the Wired writer for an evocative description -- the litte red wagon was a perfect detail.
And for a reality check, the Bionic Office!
Eek, you're right -- major brain fart, or someone snuck me decaf. Bread does have one other "luminous" track: "Baby I'm A-Want You"
Keep up, man!
Rules engines at best are competent beginners in a limited, structured domain. Discovering and programming the rules is a process requiring a very significant investment of time and effort, including both technical and business experts. "more difficult and important is the twofold task of knowledge acquisition: finding articulate, self-analytical experts who know why they do things, and developing efficient techniques for extracting what they know and distilling it into rule bases. The essential prerequisite for building an expert system is to have an expert." In most cases, experts don't in fact use the rules that might be discovered by interview and reflection. Rules are always context free and cannot take into account the relevance of facts.
Rules engines can't handle exceptions that are not programmed in. Rules engines apply their rules ceteris paribus, assuming that everything not accounted for in the rules is constant, when if fact the unaccounted-for variables may in fact be the important ones. Expert human collaboration and judgment is required to correct and update rules engine errors.
The ongoing maintenance of rules is a significant effort and drain on resources. In a rapidly changing business, the value of the rules degrades rapidly without maintenance.
Deskilling of workers is a significant risk in heavy reliance on rules engines. As more business expertise becomes embodied in the rules engine, the ability of the workers to understand the domain becomes less.
Recommended readings include:
Interesting timing on this question. Just recently I attended the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference and heard a talk by Bret Pettichord on just this very subject. His presentation, Home Brew Test Automation covered this subject with some terrific lessions.
Ditto for bicycles. I try to be a good citizen and obey the traffic rules, like bikes should, but if the light won't change, it sucks.
But now, I think the only thing for municipalities to do is jack up the fines for using one illegally, and use the money collected to replace the system with something harder for the ordinary citizen to take advantage of.