Again, from TFA: "Imagine having an accountant as a client who insisted on maintaining his general ledgers using a word processor."
My ex-wife is an accountant who does a variation of this: she insists on doing all of her word processing in Excel. She writes letters, takes notes, and even designs brochures, all in Excel. She hates Word. She loves Excel. There is no arguing with her.
From TFA: "If you are feeling particularly malicious, make up your own unit of measure; name it after yourself or some obscure person and never define it. If somebody challenges you, tell them you did so that you could use integer rather than floating point arithmetic."
I've seen this! I actually worked on code (I won't say what or where to protect the guilty) where the author defined all sorts of angular measurements and corresponding functions in units named after himself. The unit turned out to be something like 1/4096 of a radian, just so that it could use integer rather than floating point arithmetic.
The sad part: after working on that code long enough, I could actually think in those units:-(.
I've been holding off on getting TiVo - never really saw the need, since my TV viewing time is limited as it is and between, SciFi, Cartoon Network, Comedy Central, HBO and ESPN there's almost always something I *want* to watch on when I do have time.
But I just got an iPod video, and now the thought of TiVo-ing Adult Swim to my iPod video for watching while I commute to/from work is just *too* tempting:-).
How about Google Vision. Free glasses with targeted ads shot directly into your retinas based on gps tracking and their new image decifering software that can see what you're seeing and automatically sense the best ads to post based on statistical inferances about your environment.
I didn't RTFA, but I suspect that this is to address issues like: "We won't hire people who have a genetic predisposition to cancer in an attempt to get lower insurance rates."
You're assuming that the amount of indexable information stays constant over time. It does not. As others have argued, the index itself is indexable.
Assume your equation is roughly correct however. We should be able to compute how much information would need to be indexed for it to take 300 years. 1TB * (e ** (300 yrs / 1.168 yrs)) = 3.533 * 10 ** 111 TB.
It would run for weeks or so and then just bang, it would stop....
the first thing that popped into my mind is "they've got a hardware issue." I've seen Windows boxes do the exact same thing; it always has turned out to be hardware.
Other things I found suspicious in the article:
"We asked the customer to do a diagnostic test and the customer never responded, so it was impossible for us to address the issue," Mr McLaren [General Manager of Red Hat Australia] says.
and
Software updates had to be manually installed to ensure SAP certification.
[]
Red Hat Australia's Mr McLaren says there is no risk of losing vendor certification if an organisation enables auto-patching on Red Hat Enterprise Linux. "Every patch goes through our engineering and quality testing, which involves certification by the vendor. It absolutely doesn't invalidate the support from the software vendor," he says.
Mr Horton disagrees: "It might be fine for things like security patches, which don't impact SAP certification rules but with some patches you still actually have to check the release levels and then check against the SAP site. Otherwise SAP might ask you to roll back to the previous version before they will support it."
I've been in similar situations. Applications should *never* be able to crash the system; if they do, then either there is a kernel bug or a hardware problem. Unless SAP requires the installation of kernel-level drivers, this sounds a lot like a hardware problem to me.
I have a weblog. I don't use it to look for fame; I use it to communicate experiences with friends and family, with the added feature that others who want information about what it's like to have these experiences may read my weblog to do so.
I find it a lot more effective than getting on the phone with various family members and friends in different time zones and repeating the same stories over and over again. It allows those who are interested to find out what's going on when they want to, and allows me to communicate any updates when I want to.
And I agree, the word "blog" is annoying, and, as far as I can tell, purely a media construct. Back in the day, when I was doing game development, I used to post a monthly development log on progress on the game. (Unforutnately, it's been lost to the mists of time - even the Wayback Machine can't get to it:-(.) We called it "a development log." Why do new words have to be invented for something, especially when they are just the lazy contraction of existing words that work perfectly well?
Question about the industry
on
Ask Sid Meier
·
· Score: 1
Do you think it is possible for a so-called "indie" game to be successful in today's market?
Though it's been over seven years since I was in the game development industry, my experience agrees with yours almost exactly.
That said, there's something to be said for creating a game and seeing it on store shelves, then watching people play it and thinking "I helped create that."
Even then, it didn't hit the shelves until November 1995, just barely making it!
Windows95 was released on August 24, 1995. I remember it well; I was working at Papyrus Design Group at the time (since acquired by Sierra, since acquired by Vivendi) and we were working on a Windows95-based version of IndyCar Racing II.
Every single one of the server companies is out of that business with the exception of Sun, which is trading at the same price it was back in 1996.
Be careful and don't confuse hardware with software. Most of the "server" companies now offer x86-based alternatives, although HP still offers PA-RISC-based systems (yes, I know they are encouraging their customers to move to Itanium-2), and IBM still offers POWER-based systems. These systems tend to run the vendor's proprietary flavor of *nix.
And the x86-based alternatives are often used to run Linux. Even the "traditional" x86-based server vendors (i.e., Dell) offer Linux as an installation option.
So I think I tend to agree with the GP: it's way too early to declare Microsoft the winner of the server market.
I am interested in building applications that run in multiple environments. If money were no object to me, I'd have the following:
0) A state-of-the-art generic 1U server running Fedora Core to act as file server, SCM server (either CVS or SVN - haven't decided yet), DNS server, mail server and whatever other server, connected to terrabytes of disks, some in RAID-1 and some in RAID-5. 1) A state-of-the-art Xserve running MacOS X Server (multiple versions in separate bootable partitions) 2) A state-of-the-art generic 1U Xeon-based server running Linux/*BSD (multiple distros in separate bootable partitions) 3) A state-of-the-art generic 1U Xeon-based server running Windows Server (multiple versions in separate bootable partitions) 4) A state-of-the-art generic 1U AMD64-based server running Linux/*BSD/Windows Server (separate bootable partitions) 5) A top-of-the-line PowerMac G5 6) A decked out 17" PowerBook G4 7) A top-of-the-line Pentium 4-based box, running Windows XP Pro SP 2. 8) A top-of-the-line Pentium 4-based box, running Linux/*BSD(multiple distros) 9) A Pentium II with about 128MB of RAM, running Windows 95/98/ME (multiple boot drives) 10) A Pentium with about 32MB of RAM, running Windows 95/98/ME (multiple boot drives) 11) A 486 with about 8MB of RAM, running Windows 3.1/95/98 (multiple boot drives) 12) An iMac G4 with about 256MB of RAM running MacOS X 13) An original iMac with about 128MB of RAM running MacOS 9/MacOS X 14) Some flavor of 4-digit PowerMac running MacOS 8/9 15) Some flavor of 3-digit Macintosh running MacOS 7
Why systems 9 through 15? Because I'm also interested in scalable applications, applications that run equally well (though perhaps with degraded functionality) on low-end systems as well as high-end systems.
Slashdot Mirror
You obviously don't administer Windows servers...
...if they think that Siberia is south of North America.
Now, if the North Pole was heading toward, say, Ecuador, that would be news!
...until you've read them in the original Klingon.
By subtle, I mean a myth that at first doesn't seem like it should be a myth.
Again, from TFA: "Imagine having an accountant as a client who insisted on maintaining his general ledgers using a word processor."
My ex-wife is an accountant who does a variation of this: she insists on doing all of her word processing in Excel. She writes letters, takes notes, and even designs brochures, all in Excel. She hates Word. She loves Excel. There is no arguing with her.
From TFA: "If you are feeling particularly malicious, make up your own unit of measure; name it after yourself or some obscure person and never define it. If somebody challenges you, tell them you did so that you could use integer rather than floating point arithmetic."
:-(.
I've seen this! I actually worked on code (I won't say what or where to protect the guilty) where the author defined all sorts of angular measurements and corresponding functions in units named after himself. The unit turned out to be something like 1/4096 of a radian, just so that it could use integer rather than floating point arithmetic.
The sad part: after working on that code long enough, I could actually think in those units
And how can you not love a language that has a data type for Pounds Sterling?
I've been holding off on getting TiVo - never really saw the need, since my TV viewing time is limited as it is and between, SciFi, Cartoon Network, Comedy Central, HBO and ESPN there's almost always something I *want* to watch on when I do have time.
:-).
But I just got an iPod video, and now the thought of TiVo-ing Adult Swim to my iPod video for watching while I commute to/from work is just *too* tempting
I agree. I was confused by the "blow" comment myself; they should be commended for upholding their principles and firing the guy.
On the other hand, I'm not sure I would qualify this as acting "swiftly", as the misconduct was discovered in August of 2004....
As seen here...
I didn't RTFA, but I suspect that this is to address issues like: "We won't hire people who have a genetic predisposition to cancer in an attempt to get lower insurance rates."
With the exception of power, this already exists.
You're assuming that the amount of indexable information stays constant over time. It does not. As others have argued, the index itself is indexable.
;-).
Assume your equation is roughly correct however. We should be able to compute how much information would need to be indexed for it to take 300 years. 1TB * (e ** (300 yrs / 1.168 yrs)) = 3.533 * 10 ** 111 TB.
I gotta go buy stock in DVD-R companies
the first thing that popped into my mind is "they've got a hardware issue." I've seen Windows boxes do the exact same thing; it always has turned out to be hardware.
Other things I found suspicious in the article:
and
I've been in similar situations. Applications should *never* be able to crash the system; if they do, then either there is a kernel bug or a hardware problem. Unless SAP requires the installation of kernel-level drivers, this sounds a lot like a hardware problem to me.
Do you use neural nets?
Do you do any game recording/playback?
Do you have the game play itself?
What kind of "tuning knobs" do you have?
Inquiring minds want to know!
I have a weblog. I don't use it to look for fame; I use it to communicate experiences with friends and family, with the added feature that others who want information about what it's like to have these experiences may read my weblog to do so.
:-(.) We called it "a development log." Why do new words have to be invented for something, especially when they are just the lazy contraction of existing words that work perfectly well?
I find it a lot more effective than getting on the phone with various family members and friends in different time zones and repeating the same stories over and over again. It allows those who are interested to find out what's going on when they want to, and allows me to communicate any updates when I want to.
And I agree, the word "blog" is annoying, and, as far as I can tell, purely a media construct. Back in the day, when I was doing game development, I used to post a monthly development log on progress on the game. (Unforutnately, it's been lost to the mists of time - even the Wayback Machine can't get to it
Do you think it is possible for a so-called "indie" game to be successful in today's market?
I don't.
Except for Lexa Doig.
Mmmmmm.....Lexa Doig.......
Though it's been over seven years since I was in the game development industry, my experience agrees with yours almost exactly.
That said, there's something to be said for creating a game and seeing it on store shelves, then watching people play it and thinking "I helped create that."
Windows95 was released on August 24, 1995. I remember it well; I was working at Papyrus Design Group at the time (since acquired by Sierra, since acquired by Vivendi) and we were working on a Windows95-based version of IndyCar Racing II.
Anyone else remember WinG?
Be careful and don't confuse hardware with software. Most of the "server" companies now offer x86-based alternatives, although HP still offers PA-RISC-based systems (yes, I know they are encouraging their customers to move to Itanium-2), and IBM still offers POWER-based systems. These systems tend to run the vendor's proprietary flavor of *nix.
And the x86-based alternatives are often used to run Linux. Even the "traditional" x86-based server vendors (i.e., Dell) offer Linux as an installation option.
So I think I tend to agree with the GP: it's way too early to declare Microsoft the winner of the server market.
I am interested in building applications that run in multiple environments. If money were no object to me, I'd have the following:
:-).
0) A state-of-the-art generic 1U server running Fedora Core to act as file server, SCM server (either CVS or SVN - haven't decided yet), DNS server, mail server and whatever other server, connected to terrabytes of disks, some in RAID-1 and some in RAID-5.
1) A state-of-the-art Xserve running MacOS X Server (multiple versions in separate bootable partitions)
2) A state-of-the-art generic 1U Xeon-based server running Linux/*BSD (multiple distros in separate bootable partitions)
3) A state-of-the-art generic 1U Xeon-based server running Windows Server (multiple versions in separate bootable partitions)
4) A state-of-the-art generic 1U AMD64-based server running Linux/*BSD/Windows Server (separate bootable partitions)
5) A top-of-the-line PowerMac G5
6) A decked out 17" PowerBook G4
7) A top-of-the-line Pentium 4-based box, running Windows XP Pro SP 2.
8) A top-of-the-line Pentium 4-based box, running Linux/*BSD(multiple distros)
9) A Pentium II with about 128MB of RAM, running Windows 95/98/ME (multiple boot drives)
10) A Pentium with about 32MB of RAM, running Windows 95/98/ME (multiple boot drives)
11) A 486 with about 8MB of RAM, running Windows 3.1/95/98 (multiple boot drives)
12) An iMac G4 with about 256MB of RAM running MacOS X
13) An original iMac with about 128MB of RAM running MacOS 9/MacOS X
14) Some flavor of 4-digit PowerMac running MacOS 8/9
15) Some flavor of 3-digit Macintosh running MacOS 7
Why systems 9 through 15? Because I'm also interested in scalable applications, applications that run equally well (though perhaps with degraded functionality) on low-end systems as well as high-end systems.
You did say money was no object
It's nanomarketing!
<ducks/>
I.e., this is Slashdot
<ducks/>