As someone who has done probably 90% of his work in maintenance programming, let me give you my tips:
Snapshot what you get - don't change it, don't even look at it. As soon as you get it, check it in, binaries and all, to a change tracking system (eg, CVS, SVN, etc).
Now that you know what they gave you, and you can get back to it at any time, your options are seemingly limitless, but for the quickest way to get up to speed, I would recommend writing unit tests for the software. This will be long and tedious, but by writing unit tests you will a) learn what to expect out of the software, b) be able to tell when you break something and c) truly learn the software.
Automate, automate, automate! It's a close call as to whether you should start right away on your first unit test, or get the build system automated, but let me just say that it will save you a ton of time to have a "one button push" way to build, run and test the software. From there, you should be having your machine build and run the unit tests automatically, preferably nightly, from a clean checkout of the repository, just in case you forget to run a test after you change something or you forget to check something in.
Run the software (including unit tests) through the gauntlet - valgrind's memcheck, electric fence, fuzz, bfbtester, rats, gcc's -fstack-protector-all flag, libc's MALLOC_CHECK_=3, gcc's _FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 define, gcc's -fmudflap flag, gcc's -Wall -Wextra and -pedantic flags; any way you can think to flush out bugs, do it, and start fixing them; you will learn much, not just about the code, but about the thought process of the original coder(s) this way. Change tools as appropriate for your programming language and environment (including compiler/interpreter, libs, OS, etc). As you can tell, I do a lot of C and C++ programming.
BTW, the fact that you have a hard time understanding this code may be more a reflection on the original authors' coding skills than on your abilities; any idiot can write code that "just works"; it takes a lot of thought, time and effort to write code that is maintainable, and more often than not, the original coders were short on at least one of those (if not all three). Here's hoping you have the time to follow my above tips; they take a lot of time, but can be worth it if you really need to maintain the code. It's funny to note that apart from the first one, most of those tips apply equally well to developing software from scratch. If the code already has a change tracking system, unit tests, a build/run/test system, *and* automated testing, consider yourself lucky and just start picking apart the unit tests.
People keep talking as if Apple really missed the boat with iPad, but the truth is they only missed the boat for hard-core, tinker-happy nerds...and they've made a very specific point of missing that boat for at least the last decade. They're marketing to fanboys who want it to be trendy and 'just work', not to nerds.
The above posts are from the same guy who wrote Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain this to you, a brilliant little piece that really explains the philosophy behind Free software (oblig. quote: "Free software doesn't have "end users". That's kind of the point.")
So, after the war, they put #2 in there to make sure that people always had the right to form their own militia and fight back against their government if they deemed it tyranical or for any other reason. That's the only way #2 would make sense in the context of how and where it was written. And the fact that it was put as the 2nd amendment (right under the freedom of speech) shows how important they felt it was.
Okay, here's a serious question: how are you supposed to form a militia if you don't already have weapons? If the government won't "allow" you to have weapons as an individual, what do you think they're going to say when you come asking for them in a mob?
I'm no gun nut; I don't even own any; in all honesty, I do have a number of friends who might be considered borderline gun nuts, but I don't take their opinions at face value. My problem has always been that banning items, rather than actions, just seems wrong. For instance, banning encryption. A quote I once saw on slashdot put it thus: banning instruments rather than acts indicates a belief that man is not worthy of his own free will. Or as a pro-choice quote put it: if you can't trust me with a choice, how can you trust me with a child? Why even allow me to vote if you don't trust me enough to own certain items? Granted, some people shouldn't be allowed to handle guns (such as those who murder with them), but to claim no one should have them? Even if it is a nice idea, until you come up with a perfect, incorruptible government, weapons will be necessary. Some would argue that an armed populace is a perfect government, because who needs government thugs to protect you when you can protect yourself? Guns are a wondrous equalizer; they can allow old ladies to defend themselves against even the biggest of brutes.
So while I agree that maybe the militia line in the 2nd specifies extenuating circumstances, in principle I believe that free people should be allowed to bear any tool they please, as long as they don't use it to inflict harm or force their will on another.
Take a look at the comments for this article, keeping in mind that the article points out that its definition of "Spirituality" is neurologically different from "Religious" and let me know what the atheist club looks like.
slashdot is one site out of what, millions? Take a look at how many other websites that will insta-ban you for life for even *hinting* you are an atheist. slashdot is tame and/extremely/ tolerant of superstition by comparison. Granted, it would be nice if there were *no* bigotry on slashdot, but slashdot is leagues ahead of most religious sites, and it is one of the few places you can express a dissenting opinion (whether for or against atheism) and not get kicked, threatened or severely mocked.
Or how about the real world, where an *elected* US president actually said that he didn't think that atheists should be considered American citizens. slashdot is one of *very* few havens that atheists and other freethinkers have where we vent a bit against what we can only perceive as a neurological disorder, brainwashing or failure of logic and/or the imagination.
You almost sound like one of those white people who says "what racism? I don't see any racism, therefore it must not be a problem! All you people complaining about being discriminated against are the real racists!"
BTW, there is no "atheist club"; most atheists are independent thinkers by definition, otherwise they'd probably be Unitarians (joking, joking). One of the few things that most atheists can agree upon is that there is nothing wrong individual spirituality or religion, as long as it isn't forced on anyone. It's when organized religion tries to force its opinions on everyone that people take issue. Sort of like when the RIAA forces through legislation we don't agree with then uses their clout as a large organization to legally bully you into submission.
That doesn't sound anything like "damning with faint praise" now, does it?
Even "damning with faint praise" is pretty high approbation, coming from a geek like Linus. Most software geeks are this way; cf. mutt's "All mail clients suck. This one just sucks less." motto, or "X is the second worst windowing system in the world - all the rest are tied for first." re: XWindows. That's not to say that geeks/engineers are more pessimistic than most people - just more honest.
No, you parsed that wrong: it's supposed to read "Superb Owl". What this has to do with kicking the inflated skin of a pig through something that symbolizes an erect bifurcated penis, I cannot fathom.
I've downloaded quite a few of them. However, relatively recently I learned about gog.com, and over the 1.5 years since I signed up, I bought 3 of the games (all DRM-free) available there.
I stumbled upon gog.com awhile back and thought they were pretty nifty too. I especially like that not only do they not have DRM, but it's one of their advertised features! Usually, I hate ads and don't ever see them online, but somehow I caught one for gog.com, and had to smile when I saw in nice big lettering that they were DRM free. It's kind of like how Oroweat advertises on some of their bread products that they have no high fructose corn syrup. It's especially cogent in the face of what the companies peddling DRM and HFCS say: "oh, it's not bad for you", yet here are companies spending advertising money to distinguish themselves as NOT having these "ingredients" in their products. It's not like some car company has advertising that brags that their cars don't have seatbelts or airbags; people know that DRM and HFCS are shit, and they don't want them, and smart businesses can capitalize on this fact.
Actually, I don't even remember a time when we didn't have a law that requires you to report crimes you see or learn about. Not reporting them makes you immediately an accomplice and you could be tried as such. Oddly, nobody complains about it despite the can of worms it opens,
So, let's say there is this guy I know who violates copyright law. Should I report him? Or taking it a (hypothetical) step further, if it was illegal to be Jewish, should I report any Jews I see? Sometimes complying with the law is wrong.
And that's the crux of the matter. The fact that someone SHOULD do something does not mean that anyone (not even the government) has the right to FORCE them to do something.
Too true. Sure, we all want to live in a society where people are kind enough to help each other, but it just seems wrong to force people to help each other. You can argue about the good or bad of social security, universal health care, etc, but it's different if you see someone dying.
This is why religion scares me: many religionists claim that without religion, the world would become a murdering, raping, stealing hellhole. As an atheist, it scares me to think that the only thing that keeps 90% of the population around me (I live in the US) from shivving me is their mythology. It's a testament to human nature that despite all the insane things in religion, I haven't been stoned to death (ie, people don't always practice what they preach (thankfully)).
I may state that at the center of a black hole is cake. Just to make all the Portal players happy.
THE CAKE IS A . . . naw, too easy. Besides, I really should get back to work. I mean, here I am still talking when there's science to do. It may be frustrating at times, but there's no sense crying over every mistake.
I might pay $30 for a ticket to a concert for a set of songs I'll only hear ONCE... but I might think no cd is worth $15, even though the experience could be replicated hundreds of times.
No home stereo will ever be able to reproduce that kind of experience (for better or for worse). Even if you were to get the whole same sound system set up again then pop in the CD, you wouldn't get the spontaneous riffing that you would get from a live band (if a live band doesn't *ever* change their songs, why are you going to see them perform?). Others can argue the merits or demerits of being in a very large crowd of people who also like the band. Which brings up another point . . .
Movies at the theater have the advantage that the screen is bigger and the sound (hopefully) better, yet most people I know would rather stay at home and watch a rented movie, and I don't think it's the cost. When you have audiences talking on their cellphones or yelling things (and I don't just mean whole audience cheers or boos) at performers who can't react, it really detracts from the experience. Ironically, theaters' biggest customers are causing the loss of a large majority of their other customers. There doesn't seem to be an easy solution to this for the theaters. Luckily, you can still rent a movie for dirt cheap and see it in the comfort of your own home, with or without people who will yell at the screen.
Billions lost on failed UK IT projects by the 'adults' with developers receiving very fat paycheques shows it guarantees neither success of the project nor accountability within it.
Yeah, don't even get me started on such "adult" software as VxWorks, where $30k will get you "oops, we released a version of our compiler and stdc library that didn't close a C namespace in a header, thereby breaking any C++ code you include it in." Stuff *beginners* would be chided for. Stuff that would have *easily* been caught by unit or regression tests, which scares me further still because it means they probably don't have them.
Here's a hint to all the FOSS haters: most FOSS is not developed by inexperienced "gee, let's see what I can do with a computer!" types, even the unpaid stuff. The large majority of FOSS (especially the large successful projects) is developed by people who develop software for a living. The only difference between them and other paid programmers is that instead of having a hobby like golf or fantasy football, they go home and work on software that scratches a personal itch (assuming they aren't getting paid to work on it already). Now, let's just think about this: which software would you trust more: something written by someone who is just there to punch the clock and spends his breaks thinking about Paris Hilton, or someone who loves making software so much they can't keep their hands off a keyboard for more than a few hours? You can scream "boring nerd with no life" all you want, but the simple fact that most FOSS developers are professional coders, added to the fact that they work on software more than other devs, plus the fact that they decided to share the fruits of (some) of their labors with the world puts their software head and shoulders above most "paycheck only" software.
BTW, many FOSS coders I know of have other hobbies (and families); it just seems like they are able to pack so much more into a day than most people, it amazes me. Maybe they code faster; they are, by definition good coders, otherwise I probably wouldn't have heard of them. Or maybe they just don't waste so much time on things like TV. But just jump on Planet Debian and you will find scuba divers, cyclists, hikers, runners, community activists, etc, etc . . .
Also, I'm not slagging _all_ non-FOSS coders (technically, I am currently one . . . ). It just seems that where the source isn't available, and people aren't scratching their own itches that software generally sucks more.
It's a sign Linux is maturing since now there are businesses willing to hire developers to add and maintain the features the care about.
I would argue the inverse: Linux has been mature for a very long time; businesses are finally maturing and grudgingly admitting what any five year old could tell you: you get better quality when someone does something for love rather than a paycheck. Of course, these programmers have bills, too, and if they have to take a different job and reduce their time writing the software the businesses want, that would impact the businesses. Might as well hire them so they can work on what they love full time and not have to worry about where next month's rent is coming from.
Cost-per-line is a patently bad way to compute the worth of code or value of a coder. Knowing what to code is more important then just writing the code. Features implemented or bugs fixed is probably a better measure.
Or even apart from that, *reducing* code size or increasing it's execution speed is worth something. Anyone who thinks otherwise has never had to compute how much hardware to buy to solve a given problem.
I can honestly say, I have _never_ had actual *Linux* stability problems (not apps, but actual kernel and other low-level "OS" util programs), except in one of three situations:
When using closed-source only binary drivers.
When developing kernel drivers of my own.
Flaky hardware.
Notice how *none* of these is the fault of Linux developers.
I have been using Linux almost exclusively for well over a decade, hacking on it, playing with it, using it to play games, balance accounts, etc, etc. The fact that I hardly ever use Windows but have had many more problems with it than Linux should tell you something. Anyone who claims "Linux is just as buggy as Windows" loses all credibility in my eyes.
If I had seen someone unicycling on my campus, I wouldn't even blink. If I saw someone unicycling in a clown suit on my campus, I might think it was his day off - or he was on his way to a second job as a clown for a kids party. Or I might think that someone was doing an experiment. The only thing out of those three situations that would give me pause would be the thought of "what does unicycling in a clown outfit have to do with real science? is this some weird way to prove the Casimir effect?" (we didn't have many soft "sciences" at my university).
I'll give you "Terminator", but "Alien" was better than "Aliens" (that was what I was referring to by "Vietnam in Space"). "Aliens" may be quintessential in the oeuvre of action movies, but it's still just an action flick.
I'm sure Avatar is horrible because it's similar to stories you've heard before (minus Sigourney Weaver) but obviously he knows how to take good source material and make a bad-ass movie from it.
Don't get me wrong: Avatar is very pretty, there's just not a whole lot of substance to it, and what little it has has already been covered in other movies and covered better. Sure, people still haven't learned the lesson, but if they haven't picked up on it by now, another enviro-preachy movie isn't going to do it.
Sigourney Weaver is one of my favorite actresses, but *the* most important factor to a movie's quality is the director. The second most important factor is the writers. Alita has an fairly typical post-apocalypse/love story, but what makes it great is the way it's done. It's subtle and understated, yet shocking in places (eg, the scene with the dog; the boy's death scene). I just don't think Cameron has the style, chops, subtlety or whatever you want to call it to pull it off well. I mean, how can you care about the death of space marine when you've already seen five or six die? If it wasn't for his unusual name, no one would remember Wiersbowski.
I'm not trying to be elitist and say what I like is better than what anyone else likes.
Well then, I'll go ahead and say it: what I've seen you say you like on slashdot is generally better than what other people like. Yes, I happen to like those movies too, why do you ask?;P
The thing is, I'm not just talking out my ass here: these movies are either well written/directed, have deeper meanings and are contemplative and thought provoking or don't have plot holes big enough to drive a mac truck through. Generally all three. That would generally qualify them as "better". So what if some shmuck doesn't like Kubrick? I think people would generally agree that Kubrick's movies stand on their own and are "art" and "better" than most other movies.
Don't get me wrong, I have my guilty pleasures (usually in the form of "Buckaroo Bonzai" or "Johnny Mnemonic"). But I still hold that "Memento" was better than either of the most recent Batmans, even though they were made by the same director (all props to Heath Ledger, though; he's the only guy who seems to have out-Jokered Nicholson). Of course, I have to kind of laugh at people who take Batman "seriously" (or like it "darker" or "grittier" or whatever else you want to call it to try and make it more "grown-up"). They're comic books about a guy dressed up as a bat fighting bad guys in bad Mexcian wrestling masks for pete's sake! Also, nobody likes brooding moralists.
Not exactly on-topic, but this kinda reminds me of how excited I am that James Cameron is directing the Battle Angel Alita movie. It's a world where cyborgs are common, and normal humans are exactly as squishy as they should be when manhandled by a cyborg. Like getting partially decapitated when a cyborg knocks off the top half of someone's skull. I really hope he keeps that aspect, it would necessarily mean an R rating, but if anyone can include that kind of realistic violence without making it seem over the top (as I think some of the comic panels do), it would be him.
I loved the anime version of "Battle Angel Alita"; the scene before she fights the guy she beat before and he shreds the dog is just heart-rending for me. It's gory and violent, yes, but it gets the point across that humans (and animals) are squishy and the world of Alita is harsh.
That aside, they got James Cameron? The same guy who directed "Vietnam in Space"? The same guy that directed Pocahontas" (er, I mean "Ferngully")? And "Titanic"? Ick. I think I'll skip the live action version of Alita.
Because it's not a developers job to worry about day-to-day administration of their systems
Maybe if they were running a halfway decent OS/distro, they wouldn't *have* to worry about day-to-day administration. One of the reasons I love Debian is that it is literally install and forget. I install what I need, tweak a few things (including a security lockdown) and I never have to touch admin stuff again. Of course, I am also a reasonably competent admin, but the fact that I have literally all the tools I need at my fingertips in the form of Debian packaged and signed software means the most sysadmin thing I have to do is "insert Debian DVD binary-1" to install something I forgot (or didn't know I needed until then).
And unfortunately, most developers have little regard for the difference between USER and ROOT (or equivalent). Until we bash them over the heads about it.
As a (past) sysadmin and a current developer, I have to say this really depends. For the most part, developers know what the hell they are doing; if they don't, they probably shouldn't be developers. If they're unwilling to learn how to properly use root/admin, they shouldn't be in the computing industry.
Concern for code is appropriate, but irrelevant. Too much requires root or equivalent access in todays day and age.
Granted, but again, this is a problem of what platform you choose. Under Debian, I intentionally limit myself on the commands I run through sudo, even though I am the only user and admin. I've found I can get by with about 6-7 commands (and one of those is visudo, to temporarily add something I might need).
I see the opposite, and that's what I am cautioning against.
We can agree to disagree, but I can think of (at least) two examples off the top of my head of politicians having mud slung at them for being "smart". I see it everyday, and I (arguably) work around some very intelligent people!
It is the elitist attitude that only people of a certain social or educational status are actually people.
I can't speak for others, but this is exactly what I am against; social and educational status have nothing to do with it; it has everything to do with a willingness to learn. I'm sure that most of this "elitist attitude" you see is really just a disgust with people who refuse to make any attempt to educate themselves. Not because they aren't considered people; but because they wallow in their ignorance the same way a pig does in filth. And BTW, speaking of labels, throwing out "elitist" is a sure way to alienate your audience.
The actual fact of the matter is that while you may make a habit of making better choices, you are quite likely not that much more intelligent than your average 'asshole'.
That I am not smarter than the average person is not in dispute; that I make mistakes like any other human being is also not in dispute; that I think that people have a responsibility to learn how to do a dangerous activity properly before they do it is what I am trying to convey. Those that are unwilling to learn how to drive safely or demonstrate they are willing to ignore the rules of safe driving for insufficient reason should not be allowed to drive.
Likewise, shedding this label may mean that we have to use persuasion instead of superiority to gain compliance, and few elitists are willing to 'sink' to that level.
I am all for pleasant persuasion and making every opportunity available for people to better themselves and to that end we should welcome with open arms anyone who is eager or even willing to learn. However, just as I will not deny the fact that there are some true elitists that don't want to "sink" to that level, I hope you will not deny the fact that there are some people who are willfully ignorant and snub their noses at the very possibility of learning. And I contend that the willfully ignorant far outnumber the elitists. To them, no amount of persuasion will suffice, so we might as well ignore them, and if it proves necessary (through repeated dangerous actions), restrain them from causing harm.
If there's no reasonable expectation that stopping is genuinely necessary, the what exactly is the 'intelligent' behavior?
This is what separates us from the animals: being able to perceive risk, not just be conditioned to it. All it takes is once: one time that someone blows through a red light and someone going the other direction doesn't have time to stop or get out of their way. Just once, and they have ruined probably one life, perhaps more. And what did it gain them? Perhaps they arrived a few seconds earlier at their destination. Seconds they could have easily reclaimed in some other, much safer way (perhaps by cutting the amount of TV they watch).
Not really. It's generally accepted that putting yourself or others at risk is stupid. Unless you're doing it on purpose; then it's called "being an asshole". While some would claim that many sports qualify for this label, if you are merely trying to live your life (including traveling) and you do something that has a high probability of maiming you or others (such as running red lights), that's definitely stupid.
2) Classifying large groups of people as 'stupid' is divisive and elitist
Ah, someone pulls out the "elitist" card. What next, are you going to call us "ivory tower academics" for pointing out that many people are only allowed to drive because they don't have adequate access to public transportation? Or how about "socialists" for even mentioning public transportation (which is safer and more efficient). Here's a tip: when someone singles out the idiots by their actions it is only "elitist" and "divisive" in a good way: they are dividing up people based on their actions, and they are saying that people that don't do stupid things are better than people who do.
3) Labeling this behavior as 'stupid' implies both an acceptance of the inability to change it AND an implicit protection from the consequences of their behaviors
Okay, let's call it "ignorant". After all, ignorance can be cured, but stupid is forever. The only problem lies in that people have to want to learn, otherwise they won't.
If you really do think a portion of the 'US of A' is 'stupid', please do us all a favor and stop saying so.
So your solution to the problem is to silence the people pointing it out. Right.
You're only perpetuating the problem when the truth is the vast majority of adults are 'smart' enough to operate an intersection correctly.
Okay, then we'll only pick on the willfully ignorant, which we have already established are the ones who think that running a red light will get them to the black friday sales at Wal-Mart before everyone else.
The sad truth is that there has been a very vocal anti-intellectual attitude in America for (at least) the past 30 years. While shunning those who are incapable of learning is pointless and harmful, I think that anyone who is willfully ignorant (that is, they refuse to learn) should be ridiculed and barred from any possibility of causing harm to others, until they learn to mend their ways. There is absolutely no reason someone with no regard for their own (or others') safety should be allowed to pilot a half-ton or more of metal in populated areas. But since driving is a "god-given right" in America, the best we can do is to keep calling people who do endanger others either "assholes" or "ignorant" and shun them.
Landry Walker (alternative comics creator of X-Ray Studios) has a brief opinion piece at Elder Geek asserting that all he wants for Christmas is more realistic game violence.
I want people to stop being pretentious and start being more realistic in nomenclature by not calling their comic books "graphic novels". Sounds like we both will be disappointed this year.
Slashdot Mirror
As someone who has done probably 90% of his work in maintenance programming, let me give you my tips:
BTW, the fact that you have a hard time understanding this code may be more a reflection on the original authors' coding skills than on your abilities; any idiot can write code that "just works"; it takes a lot of thought, time and effort to write code that is maintainable, and more often than not, the original coders were short on at least one of those (if not all three). Here's hoping you have the time to follow my above tips; they take a lot of time, but can be worth it if you really need to maintain the code. It's funny to note that apart from the first one, most of those tips apply equally well to developing software from scratch. If the code already has a change tracking system, unit tests, a build/run/test system, *and* automated testing, consider yourself lucky and just start picking apart the unit tests.
Too true. Obligatory links:
If wishes were iPhones
Tinkerer's Sunset
The above posts are from the same guy who wrote Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain this to you, a brilliant little piece that really explains the philosophy behind Free software (oblig. quote: "Free software doesn't have "end users". That's kind of the point.")
Okay, here's a serious question: how are you supposed to form a militia if you don't already have weapons? If the government won't "allow" you to have weapons as an individual, what do you think they're going to say when you come asking for them in a mob?
I'm no gun nut; I don't even own any; in all honesty, I do have a number of friends who might be considered borderline gun nuts, but I don't take their opinions at face value. My problem has always been that banning items, rather than actions, just seems wrong. For instance, banning encryption. A quote I once saw on slashdot put it thus: banning instruments rather than acts indicates a belief that man is not worthy of his own free will. Or as a pro-choice quote put it: if you can't trust me with a choice, how can you trust me with a child? Why even allow me to vote if you don't trust me enough to own certain items? Granted, some people shouldn't be allowed to handle guns (such as those who murder with them), but to claim no one should have them? Even if it is a nice idea, until you come up with a perfect, incorruptible government, weapons will be necessary. Some would argue that an armed populace is a perfect government, because who needs government thugs to protect you when you can protect yourself? Guns are a wondrous equalizer; they can allow old ladies to defend themselves against even the biggest of brutes.
So while I agree that maybe the militia line in the 2nd specifies extenuating circumstances, in principle I believe that free people should be allowed to bear any tool they please, as long as they don't use it to inflict harm or force their will on another.
slashdot is one site out of what, millions? Take a look at how many other websites that will insta-ban you for life for even *hinting* you are an atheist. slashdot is tame and /extremely/ tolerant of superstition by comparison. Granted, it would be nice if there were *no* bigotry on slashdot, but slashdot is leagues ahead of most religious sites, and it is one of the few places you can express a dissenting opinion (whether for or against atheism) and not get kicked, threatened or severely mocked.
Or how about the real world, where an *elected* US president actually said that he didn't think that atheists should be considered American citizens. slashdot is one of *very* few havens that atheists and other freethinkers have where we vent a bit against what we can only perceive as a neurological disorder, brainwashing or failure of logic and/or the imagination.
You almost sound like one of those white people who says "what racism? I don't see any racism, therefore it must not be a problem! All you people complaining about being discriminated against are the real racists!"
BTW, there is no "atheist club"; most atheists are independent thinkers by definition, otherwise they'd probably be Unitarians (joking, joking). One of the few things that most atheists can agree upon is that there is nothing wrong individual spirituality or religion, as long as it isn't forced on anyone. It's when organized religion tries to force its opinions on everyone that people take issue. Sort of like when the RIAA forces through legislation we don't agree with then uses their clout as a large organization to legally bully you into submission.
Even "damning with faint praise" is pretty high approbation, coming from a geek like Linus. Most software geeks are this way; cf. mutt's "All mail clients suck. This one just sucks less." motto, or "X is the second worst windowing system in the world - all the rest are tied for first." re: XWindows. That's not to say that geeks/engineers are more pessimistic than most people - just more honest.
No, you parsed that wrong: it's supposed to read "Superb Owl". What this has to do with kicking the inflated skin of a pig through something that symbolizes an erect bifurcated penis, I cannot fathom.
I stumbled upon gog.com awhile back and thought they were pretty nifty too. I especially like that not only do they not have DRM, but it's one of their advertised features! Usually, I hate ads and don't ever see them online, but somehow I caught one for gog.com, and had to smile when I saw in nice big lettering that they were DRM free. It's kind of like how Oroweat advertises on some of their bread products that they have no high fructose corn syrup. It's especially cogent in the face of what the companies peddling DRM and HFCS say: "oh, it's not bad for you", yet here are companies spending advertising money to distinguish themselves as NOT having these "ingredients" in their products. It's not like some car company has advertising that brags that their cars don't have seatbelts or airbags; people know that DRM and HFCS are shit, and they don't want them, and smart businesses can capitalize on this fact.
So, let's say there is this guy I know who violates copyright law. Should I report him? Or taking it a (hypothetical) step further, if it was illegal to be Jewish, should I report any Jews I see? Sometimes complying with the law is wrong.
Too true. Sure, we all want to live in a society where people are kind enough to help each other, but it just seems wrong to force people to help each other. You can argue about the good or bad of social security, universal health care, etc, but it's different if you see someone dying.
This is why religion scares me: many religionists claim that without religion, the world would become a murdering, raping, stealing hellhole. As an atheist, it scares me to think that the only thing that keeps 90% of the population around me (I live in the US) from shivving me is their mythology. It's a testament to human nature that despite all the insane things in religion, I haven't been stoned to death (ie, people don't always practice what they preach (thankfully)).
THE CAKE IS A . . . naw, too easy. Besides, I really should get back to work. I mean, here I am still talking when there's science to do. It may be frustrating at times, but there's no sense crying over every mistake.
No home stereo will ever be able to reproduce that kind of experience (for better or for worse). Even if you were to get the whole same sound system set up again then pop in the CD, you wouldn't get the spontaneous riffing that you would get from a live band (if a live band doesn't *ever* change their songs, why are you going to see them perform?). Others can argue the merits or demerits of being in a very large crowd of people who also like the band. Which brings up another point . . .
Movies at the theater have the advantage that the screen is bigger and the sound (hopefully) better, yet most people I know would rather stay at home and watch a rented movie, and I don't think it's the cost. When you have audiences talking on their cellphones or yelling things (and I don't just mean whole audience cheers or boos) at performers who can't react, it really detracts from the experience. Ironically, theaters' biggest customers are causing the loss of a large majority of their other customers. There doesn't seem to be an easy solution to this for the theaters. Luckily, you can still rent a movie for dirt cheap and see it in the comfort of your own home, with or without people who will yell at the screen.
Yeah, don't even get me started on such "adult" software as VxWorks, where $30k will get you "oops, we released a version of our compiler and stdc library that didn't close a C namespace in a header, thereby breaking any C++ code you include it in." Stuff *beginners* would be chided for. Stuff that would have *easily* been caught by unit or regression tests, which scares me further still because it means they probably don't have them.
Here's a hint to all the FOSS haters: most FOSS is not developed by inexperienced "gee, let's see what I can do with a computer!" types, even the unpaid stuff. The large majority of FOSS (especially the large successful projects) is developed by people who develop software for a living. The only difference between them and other paid programmers is that instead of having a hobby like golf or fantasy football, they go home and work on software that scratches a personal itch (assuming they aren't getting paid to work on it already). Now, let's just think about this: which software would you trust more: something written by someone who is just there to punch the clock and spends his breaks thinking about Paris Hilton, or someone who loves making software so much they can't keep their hands off a keyboard for more than a few hours? You can scream "boring nerd with no life" all you want, but the simple fact that most FOSS developers are professional coders, added to the fact that they work on software more than other devs, plus the fact that they decided to share the fruits of (some) of their labors with the world puts their software head and shoulders above most "paycheck only" software.
BTW, many FOSS coders I know of have other hobbies (and families); it just seems like they are able to pack so much more into a day than most people, it amazes me. Maybe they code faster; they are, by definition good coders, otherwise I probably wouldn't have heard of them. Or maybe they just don't waste so much time on things like TV. But just jump on Planet Debian and you will find scuba divers, cyclists, hikers, runners, community activists, etc, etc . . .
Also, I'm not slagging _all_ non-FOSS coders (technically, I am currently one . . . ). It just seems that where the source isn't available, and people aren't scratching their own itches that software generally sucks more.
I would argue the inverse: Linux has been mature for a very long time; businesses are finally maturing and grudgingly admitting what any five year old could tell you: you get better quality when someone does something for love rather than a paycheck. Of course, these programmers have bills, too, and if they have to take a different job and reduce their time writing the software the businesses want, that would impact the businesses. Might as well hire them so they can work on what they love full time and not have to worry about where next month's rent is coming from.
Or even apart from that, *reducing* code size or increasing it's execution speed is worth something. Anyone who thinks otherwise has never had to compute how much hardware to buy to solve a given problem.
I can honestly say, I have _never_ had actual *Linux* stability problems (not apps, but actual kernel and other low-level "OS" util programs), except in one of three situations:
Notice how *none* of these is the fault of Linux developers.
I have been using Linux almost exclusively for well over a decade, hacking on it, playing with it, using it to play games, balance accounts, etc, etc. The fact that I hardly ever use Windows but have had many more problems with it than Linux should tell you something. Anyone who claims "Linux is just as buggy as Windows" loses all credibility in my eyes.
The Linux community is very open and egalitarian! *Anyone* can get called an idiot for saying something stupid or posting a retarded patch!
If I had seen someone unicycling on my campus, I wouldn't even blink. If I saw someone unicycling in a clown suit on my campus, I might think it was his day off - or he was on his way to a second job as a clown for a kids party. Or I might think that someone was doing an experiment. The only thing out of those three situations that would give me pause would be the thought of "what does unicycling in a clown outfit have to do with real science? is this some weird way to prove the Casimir effect?" (we didn't have many soft "sciences" at my university).
I'll give you "Terminator", but "Alien" was better than "Aliens" (that was what I was referring to by "Vietnam in Space"). "Aliens" may be quintessential in the oeuvre of action movies, but it's still just an action flick.
Don't get me wrong: Avatar is very pretty, there's just not a whole lot of substance to it, and what little it has has already been covered in other movies and covered better. Sure, people still haven't learned the lesson, but if they haven't picked up on it by now, another enviro-preachy movie isn't going to do it.
Sigourney Weaver is one of my favorite actresses, but *the* most important factor to a movie's quality is the director. The second most important factor is the writers. Alita has an fairly typical post-apocalypse/love story, but what makes it great is the way it's done. It's subtle and understated, yet shocking in places (eg, the scene with the dog; the boy's death scene). I just don't think Cameron has the style, chops, subtlety or whatever you want to call it to pull it off well. I mean, how can you care about the death of space marine when you've already seen five or six die? If it wasn't for his unusual name, no one would remember Wiersbowski.
Aye, you can tell the difference and you don't go around spouting the rhetoric that "there are no good or bad movies, it's all just taste."
Well then, I'll go ahead and say it: what I've seen you say you like on slashdot is generally better than what other people like. Yes, I happen to like those movies too, why do you ask? ;P
The thing is, I'm not just talking out my ass here: these movies are either well written/directed, have deeper meanings and are contemplative and thought provoking or don't have plot holes big enough to drive a mac truck through. Generally all three. That would generally qualify them as "better". So what if some shmuck doesn't like Kubrick? I think people would generally agree that Kubrick's movies stand on their own and are "art" and "better" than most other movies.
Don't get me wrong, I have my guilty pleasures (usually in the form of "Buckaroo Bonzai" or "Johnny Mnemonic"). But I still hold that "Memento" was better than either of the most recent Batmans, even though they were made by the same director (all props to Heath Ledger, though; he's the only guy who seems to have out-Jokered Nicholson). Of course, I have to kind of laugh at people who take Batman "seriously" (or like it "darker" or "grittier" or whatever else you want to call it to try and make it more "grown-up"). They're comic books about a guy dressed up as a bat fighting bad guys in bad Mexcian wrestling masks for pete's sake! Also, nobody likes brooding moralists.
I loved the anime version of "Battle Angel Alita"; the scene before she fights the guy she beat before and he shreds the dog is just heart-rending for me. It's gory and violent, yes, but it gets the point across that humans (and animals) are squishy and the world of Alita is harsh.
That aside, they got James Cameron? The same guy who directed "Vietnam in Space"? The same guy that directed Pocahontas" (er, I mean "Ferngully")? And "Titanic"? Ick. I think I'll skip the live action version of Alita.
Maybe if they were running a halfway decent OS/distro, they wouldn't *have* to worry about day-to-day administration. One of the reasons I love Debian is that it is literally install and forget. I install what I need, tweak a few things (including a security lockdown) and I never have to touch admin stuff again. Of course, I am also a reasonably competent admin, but the fact that I have literally all the tools I need at my fingertips in the form of Debian packaged and signed software means the most sysadmin thing I have to do is "insert Debian DVD binary-1" to install something I forgot (or didn't know I needed until then).
As a (past) sysadmin and a current developer, I have to say this really depends. For the most part, developers know what the hell they are doing; if they don't, they probably shouldn't be developers. If they're unwilling to learn how to properly use root/admin, they shouldn't be in the computing industry.
Granted, but again, this is a problem of what platform you choose. Under Debian, I intentionally limit myself on the commands I run through sudo, even though I am the only user and admin. I've found I can get by with about 6-7 commands (and one of those is visudo, to temporarily add something I might need).
We can agree to disagree, but I can think of (at least) two examples off the top of my head of politicians having mud slung at them for being "smart". I see it everyday, and I (arguably) work around some very intelligent people!
I can't speak for others, but this is exactly what I am against; social and educational status have nothing to do with it; it has everything to do with a willingness to learn. I'm sure that most of this "elitist attitude" you see is really just a disgust with people who refuse to make any attempt to educate themselves. Not because they aren't considered people; but because they wallow in their ignorance the same way a pig does in filth. And BTW, speaking of labels, throwing out "elitist" is a sure way to alienate your audience.
That I am not smarter than the average person is not in dispute; that I make mistakes like any other human being is also not in dispute; that I think that people have a responsibility to learn how to do a dangerous activity properly before they do it is what I am trying to convey. Those that are unwilling to learn how to drive safely or demonstrate they are willing to ignore the rules of safe driving for insufficient reason should not be allowed to drive.
I am all for pleasant persuasion and making every opportunity available for people to better themselves and to that end we should welcome with open arms anyone who is eager or even willing to learn. However, just as I will not deny the fact that there are some true elitists that don't want to "sink" to that level, I hope you will not deny the fact that there are some people who are willfully ignorant and snub their noses at the very possibility of learning. And I contend that the willfully ignorant far outnumber the elitists. To them, no amount of persuasion will suffice, so we might as well ignore them, and if it proves necessary (through repeated dangerous actions), restrain them from causing harm.
This is what separates us from the animals: being able to perceive risk, not just be conditioned to it. All it takes is once: one time that someone blows through a red light and someone going the other direction doesn't have time to stop or get out of their way. Just once, and they have ruined probably one life, perhaps more. And what did it gain them? Perhaps they arrived a few seconds earlier at their destination. Seconds they could have easily reclaimed in some other, much safer way (perhaps by cutting the amount of TV they watch).
Not really. It's generally accepted that putting yourself or others at risk is stupid. Unless you're doing it on purpose; then it's called "being an asshole". While some would claim that many sports qualify for this label, if you are merely trying to live your life (including traveling) and you do something that has a high probability of maiming you or others (such as running red lights), that's definitely stupid.
Ah, someone pulls out the "elitist" card. What next, are you going to call us "ivory tower academics" for pointing out that many people are only allowed to drive because they don't have adequate access to public transportation? Or how about "socialists" for even mentioning public transportation (which is safer and more efficient). Here's a tip: when someone singles out the idiots by their actions it is only "elitist" and "divisive" in a good way: they are dividing up people based on their actions, and they are saying that people that don't do stupid things are better than people who do.
Okay, let's call it "ignorant". After all, ignorance can be cured, but stupid is forever. The only problem lies in that people have to want to learn, otherwise they won't.
So your solution to the problem is to silence the people pointing it out. Right.
Okay, then we'll only pick on the willfully ignorant, which we have already established are the ones who think that running a red light will get them to the black friday sales at Wal-Mart before everyone else.
The sad truth is that there has been a very vocal anti-intellectual attitude in America for (at least) the past 30 years. While shunning those who are incapable of learning is pointless and harmful, I think that anyone who is willfully ignorant (that is, they refuse to learn) should be ridiculed and barred from any possibility of causing harm to others, until they learn to mend their ways. There is absolutely no reason someone with no regard for their own (or others') safety should be allowed to pilot a half-ton or more of metal in populated areas. But since driving is a "god-given right" in America, the best we can do is to keep calling people who do endanger others either "assholes" or "ignorant" and shun them.
I want people to stop being pretentious and start being more realistic in nomenclature by not calling their comic books "graphic novels". Sounds like we both will be disappointed this year.