It's absolutely asinine to *require* proper indentation when it's so *easy* (at least with curly-bracket delimited blocks) to have a program handle indentation for you.
Well put! And that's why every programmer's editor supports Python's indentation so that you never have to think about it.
I haven't bought a CF that wasn't almost full brightness instantly.
they can't be dimmed,
The dimmable ones can be. Besides, for all the times I hear this argument, how many dimmers do people actually have? I installed dimmers in the kids' rooms when they were babies so we could change diapers in low light, but those are the only ones in my house. Where do you people live that have dimmers on the majority of fixtures?
the color of light they put off is obnoxious (unless you pay even more money),
I'll grant that they're different from the ugly, yellow light of incandescents.
they can't be used in a wide variety of applications (ie: limited sizes available),
The market will adjust.
they perform poorly in cold temperatures,
The ones in my garage don't.
they are not suitable in motion sensor lights,
So use something different.
they flicker and/or buzz (unless you pay even more money),
You're just making that up. I've never heard a CF, even though I've been annoyed by plenty of long tubes in the past.
their lifetime is bound by the number of times you turn them on and off (instead of the number of hours you have them on),
Why is "number of power cycles" so much worse than "length of time turned on"? Your complaint seems to be that they're different.
you can't just throw a dead one in the trash,
You can, although it's probably not a good idea. Just keep doing what you've done with the long tube fluorescents for decades.
and so on.
How 'bout this:
You can put over-rated bulbs in tiny enclosures. That dim wall sconce that can only hold a 60W bulb for heat reasons? Stick a 60W CF in it and get 4 times the light.
Get giant CF bulbs for your garage and work in daylight. I bought some 105W (420W equivalent) monsters that you need welding goggles to look at. They're incredibly nice for working outside.
Some games may be inappropriate for minors and some aren't.
And some movies may be inappropriate for minors and some aren't. That doesn't mean that it should be illegal to sell or rent or let kids into them. Games are just being targetted because they're easy; most soccer moms don't understand them so there's not much political fallout from raising a stink about them.
The eighties put out some of the best vapid, brainless music that the world will ever see.
...and then you go on to list a bunch of the good songs from the 80s, but even those are probably awful and dated to today's listeners. They sound good to you and me because we liked them when they first came out. I have "Safety Dance" on my Sansa but I don't think it's going to be winning any awards this year.
In 20 years, today's kids will be talking about how much the 2020's music sucks and how much better it was in the 2000's. If you don't believe that, you've never talked to old people.
Even at the lowest estimate, 100,000 write cycles to failure
Hey, I never get this question answered: the bad block map has to be stored somewhere, so is it also limited to 100,000 writes? You can't remap the map, can you? If not, then, are you limited to 100,000 total errors?
Samsung says the drive can withstand an operating shock of 1,500Gs at.5 miliseconds (versus 300Gs at 2 miliseconds for a traditional hard drive).
I was just thinking the other day that 300G just wasn't cutting it anymore. I can't count how many times I've thrown my laptop out of the space shuttle and the drive was barely readable after it landed in a concrete parking lot.
The example was perfectly normal idiomatic ruby, not obfuscated in any way other than the fact that it doesn't actually do anything (as you'd expect from examples using metasyntax like "foo", "bar", "blah" etc).
I totally disagree. How hard would it have been to write that like:
inputlist {|value,object| object.method!(value) }
or similar where an experienced programmer can at least figure out which parts of speech are involved? Metasyntactic variables are fine, but not to the point that you can't tell which are objects, methods, and parameters - especially when the syntax involved doesn't closely mirror other popular languages.
That's not to say new music sucks, but new POPULAR music does sucketh greatly.
Pop music has always suckethed. I'm a child of the 80s too, and while there was some truly great music then (as there is now and always has been), there were plenty of stinkers. You remember Appetite, but I'm remembering Stacy Q's "Two Of Hearts". You've mercifully forgotten most of the awful but I can't leave it alone.
And there is good new music coming out. I don't know that I'll be listening to My Chemical Romance 20 years from now, but I'm pretty certain I won't be embarrassed about having liked them today.
I still have The Ramone's "Ramones" and Zep 4 in my car, though, so we can be friends.:-D
OK, time for the original poster to interject a pet peeve. Please do not optimize your examples for inscrutability! As a non-Ruby programmer, I have no idea whatsoever where to begin deciphering the above. Maybe, |a,b| is a list and you're calling b.frob! with a as an argument, then passing the results to bla? Or assigning them to bla? I have no idea.
It has nothing directly to do with Ruby (as far as I know), but its proponents seem to pick the most obtuse examples imaginable, at least for people who are completely unfamiliar with its syntax. It's like, "hey, look how much I can do with one line!", except the people seeing it for the first time have no idea how that would even parse.
Alright, I know this is going to be flame fodder, but do you program for a paycheck, or do you program to get great at writing programs? If the former, don't bother with Ruby, because your company has already picked Python and you probably won't get fired for not knowing Ruby.
Actually, my company picked Python because I kept insisting that it was better suited for us than FoxPro or VB.NET.
It's been said that programmers should learn a new language every year.
I learned enough Lisp to write my son's birth announcement in it a few months ago. Previous announcements were in Python, Perl, and C - pretty much following my career path. We're not having another kid, but if we did I promise you the announcement wouldn't be called "baby.4th". Dang, actually that might've been cool for the fourth kid. Rats.
You don't write Ruby programs. You write Ruby programs that write Ruby programs.
I have a Python class that contains a list of functions that must all eval to True before certain actions can take place. If a test failed, I wanted to return an explanation to the user, and decided to store that in the function's docstring. In Python that's an unlinked string at the very beginning of a function definition:
>>> def foo(): ... "This doesn't do anything useful" ... >>> print foo.__doc__ This doesn't do anything useful
By the way, Python's self-documenting system uses these docstrings to dynamically build it's man page equivalents. But I digress. Anyway, the problem is that I wanted functions to only have one argument: the single value that was being validated. So, I wrote a function that created a function, complete with docstring, and returned it:
.def shippingweightlessthan(threshold): . """Return a function that returns an error if the given value is not less than the threshold""" . testfunc = lambda x: x < threshold . testfunc.__doc__ = """%%s must be less than %d""" % threshold . return testfunc
Finally, the list of requirements inside this validation class looks like inthepresent, destinationexists, hasphonenumber, shippingweightlessthan(5000).
This isn't something you do all the time in Python, but it's definitely possible. The function creation syntax certainly isn't as simple as Lisp's, but it's still easy enough that you don't ever want to avoid it or have to look up how to do it.
BTW, Slashdot: your <ecode> tags are the only place where Python's whitespace is a pain in the butt. Please get them to honor the snake. Please?
I really like how quite often the single-line if/then statements in Ruby could be read aloud directly and they would make sense
I don't like Perl so much anymore, but it had a really cool feature where instead of writing "object.method(args)", you could write "method object args". Instead of a construct like
if not value: output.log("value isn't set")
you could write
log output "value isn't test" unless value
It was kind of a pain in the ass for maintenance because if you want to change the test for value from false to true, you'd have to re-write that as "unless not value" and mentally parse the double-negative each time, or replace "unless" with "if". Still, I always that that was a pretty construct.
That definitely falls under "WTF where they thinking?!?" where a single, invisible, space can bork up your code.
OK, does anyone really write significant amounts of code in Notepad? That's the only editor I'm aware of that doesn't have any form of Python syntax highlighting available. Emacs or Vim or Kate or Eclipse will cheerfully steer you around that single, invisible space so this only seems to be a problem in the minds of people who want to invent reasons to dislike it.
Alright, I know this is going to be flame fodder, but I'm genuinely curious: does Ruby have anything to offer for someone who's already very proficient in Python (and Django, so Rails is already covered)? Basically, I've been using Python for quite a while and work with a largish codebase at the office. Is there any reason why I should give Ruby a try other than the standard - and very valid - "because it's there"? From what I've heard it seems that the two languages occupy roughly the same niche and are approximately as expressive.
Again, I know that sounds flamebait-like but I'm asking sincerely. My available time is pretty limited these days and don't have the luxury of branching out nearly so much as I used to.
At the end of the day though, if this business is to survive at all something will need to be done.
That's an interesting idea: that a business (or even entire industry) has the right to survive. The only people who ever seem to find that reasonable are the people who work in dying industries.
I can see where you're coming from, but I don't think I'd go as far as considering my friends stupid or idiots.
I know that was harsh, but I didn't say that because they were uncomfortable around mercury. I said that because they're spreading misinformation and panicking people about something they simply don't need to worry about.
Hg is bad stuff, it dosen't get expelled from the body and tends to collect, and is not safe at any level in a gaseous (vapor) state.
True, but again, there's less of it in a CFL than there is in a traditional long tube. No one was worried about those, but now people are freaking out about something a tenth the size. There's just no need to buy into the hysteria, let alone spread it - and especially from a position of authority as your friend seems to be.
How about the smashed bulb clean-up procedure. Sounds a little HazMat to me:
I wouldn't wanna smoke the stuff, but I just can't get too worked up over the idea of a broken bulb. Have you ever read the cleanup directions for paint or deck sealant or epoxy or drain cleaner? All of those should be treated with respect, sure, but the labels make it sound like you'll die if you're in the room with them. Use caution but don't get carried away.
Slashdot Mirror
That's a highly appealing feature for the subset of the population who can afford a high-end computer and only has analog cable.
Which doesn't exactly address the libertarians mentioned in your parent post.
Yeah, but Apple fixed their problem with a service pack ten days later.
Depending on needs, Apple makes a nice little fileserver.
Well put! And that's why every programmer's editor supports Python's indentation so that you never have to think about it.
$0.18 to $0.12 in 45 minutes. Impressive!
Demonstrably false.
they don't turn on instantly,I haven't bought a CF that wasn't almost full brightness instantly.
they can't be dimmed,The dimmable ones can be. Besides, for all the times I hear this argument, how many dimmers do people actually have? I installed dimmers in the kids' rooms when they were babies so we could change diapers in low light, but those are the only ones in my house. Where do you people live that have dimmers on the majority of fixtures?
the color of light they put off is obnoxious (unless you pay even more money),I'll grant that they're different from the ugly, yellow light of incandescents.
they can't be used in a wide variety of applications (ie: limited sizes available),The market will adjust.
they perform poorly in cold temperatures,The ones in my garage don't.
they are not suitable in motion sensor lights,So use something different.
they flicker and/or buzz (unless you pay even more money),You're just making that up. I've never heard a CF, even though I've been annoyed by plenty of long tubes in the past.
their lifetime is bound by the number of times you turn them on and off (instead of the number of hours you have them on),Why is "number of power cycles" so much worse than "length of time turned on"? Your complaint seems to be that they're different.
you can't just throw a dead one in the trash,You can, although it's probably not a good idea. Just keep doing what you've done with the long tube fluorescents for decades.
and so on.How 'bout this:
You can put over-rated bulbs in tiny enclosures. That dim wall sconce that can only hold a 60W bulb for heat reasons? Stick a 60W CF in it and get 4 times the light.
Get giant CF bulbs for your garage and work in daylight. I bought some 105W (420W equivalent) monsters that you need welding goggles to look at. They're incredibly nice for working outside.
And some movies may be inappropriate for minors and some aren't. That doesn't mean that it should be illegal to sell or rent or let kids into them. Games are just being targetted because they're easy; most soccer moms don't understand them so there's not much political fallout from raising a stink about them.
...and then you go on to list a bunch of the good songs from the 80s, but even those are probably awful and dated to today's listeners. They sound good to you and me because we liked them when they first came out. I have "Safety Dance" on my Sansa but I don't think it's going to be winning any awards this year.
In 20 years, today's kids will be talking about how much the 2020's music sucks and how much better it was in the 2000's. If you don't believe that, you've never talked to old people.
Hey, I never get this question answered: the bad block map has to be stored somewhere, so is it also limited to 100,000 writes? You can't remap the map, can you? If not, then, are you limited to 100,000 total errors?
I was just thinking the other day that 300G just wasn't cutting it anymore. I can't count how many times I've thrown my laptop out of the space shuttle and the drive was barely readable after it landed in a concrete parking lot.
I totally disagree. How hard would it have been to write that like:
or similar where an experienced programmer can at least figure out which parts of speech are involved? Metasyntactic variables are fine, but not to the point that you can't tell which are objects, methods, and parameters - especially when the syntax involved doesn't closely mirror other popular languages.
Probably true. I'd picked up "Practical Common Lisp" about two weeks earlier and hadn't had a chance to really field-test it yet.
Pop music has always suckethed. I'm a child of the 80s too, and while there was some truly great music then (as there is now and always has been), there were plenty of stinkers. You remember Appetite, but I'm remembering Stacy Q's "Two Of Hearts". You've mercifully forgotten most of the awful but I can't leave it alone.
And there is good new music coming out. I don't know that I'll be listening to My Chemical Romance 20 years from now, but I'm pretty certain I won't be embarrassed about having liked them today.
I still have The Ramone's "Ramones" and Zep 4 in my car, though, so we can be friends. :-D
OK, time for the original poster to interject a pet peeve. Please do not optimize your examples for inscrutability! As a non-Ruby programmer, I have no idea whatsoever where to begin deciphering the above. Maybe, |a,b| is a list and you're calling b.frob! with a as an argument, then passing the results to bla? Or assigning them to bla? I have no idea.
It has nothing directly to do with Ruby (as far as I know), but its proponents seem to pick the most obtuse examples imaginable, at least for people who are completely unfamiliar with its syntax. It's like, "hey, look how much I can do with one line!", except the people seeing it for the first time have no idea how that would even parse.
Bleached Perl?
Actually, my company picked Python because I kept insisting that it was better suited for us than FoxPro or VB.NET.
It's been said that programmers should learn a new language every year.I learned enough Lisp to write my son's birth announcement in it a few months ago. Previous announcements were in Python, Perl, and C - pretty much following my career path. We're not having another kid, but if we did I promise you the announcement wouldn't be called "baby.4th". Dang, actually that might've been cool for the fourth kid. Rats.
I have a Python class that contains a list of functions that must all eval to True before certain actions can take place. If a test failed, I wanted to return an explanation to the user, and decided to store that in the function's docstring. In Python that's an unlinked string at the very beginning of a function definition:
By the way, Python's self-documenting system uses these docstrings to dynamically build it's man page equivalents. But I digress. Anyway, the problem is that I wanted functions to only have one argument: the single value that was being validated. So, I wrote a function that created a function, complete with docstring, and returned it:
Finally, the list of requirements inside this validation class looks like inthepresent, destinationexists, hasphonenumber, shippingweightlessthan(5000).
This isn't something you do all the time in Python, but it's definitely possible. The function creation syntax certainly isn't as simple as Lisp's, but it's still easy enough that you don't ever want to avoid it or have to look up how to do it.
BTW, Slashdot: your <ecode> tags are the only place where Python's whitespace is a pain in the butt. Please get them to honor the snake. Please?
Ouch. Try this one:
It scales easily (add "+ c.items()" to mix in another dict) and doesn't have any restriction's on the keys' datatypes.
I don't like Perl so much anymore, but it had a really cool feature where instead of writing "object.method(args)", you could write "method object args". Instead of a construct like
you could write
It was kind of a pain in the ass for maintenance because if you want to change the test for value from false to true, you'd have to re-write that as "unless not value" and mentally parse the double-negative each time, or replace "unless" with "if". Still, I always that that was a pretty construct.
OK, does anyone really write significant amounts of code in Notepad? That's the only editor I'm aware of that doesn't have any form of Python syntax highlighting available. Emacs or Vim or Kate or Eclipse will cheerfully steer you around that single, invisible space so this only seems to be a problem in the minds of people who want to invent reasons to dislike it.
Alright, I know this is going to be flame fodder, but I'm genuinely curious: does Ruby have anything to offer for someone who's already very proficient in Python (and Django, so Rails is already covered)? Basically, I've been using Python for quite a while and work with a largish codebase at the office. Is there any reason why I should give Ruby a try other than the standard - and very valid - "because it's there"? From what I've heard it seems that the two languages occupy roughly the same niche and are approximately as expressive.
Again, I know that sounds flamebait-like but I'm asking sincerely. My available time is pretty limited these days and don't have the luxury of branching out nearly so much as I used to.
That's an interesting idea: that a business (or even entire industry) has the right to survive. The only people who ever seem to find that reasonable are the people who work in dying industries.
I know that was harsh, but I didn't say that because they were uncomfortable around mercury. I said that because they're spreading misinformation and panicking people about something they simply don't need to worry about.
Hg is bad stuff, it dosen't get expelled from the body and tends to collect, and is not safe at any level in a gaseous (vapor) state.True, but again, there's less of it in a CFL than there is in a traditional long tube. No one was worried about those, but now people are freaking out about something a tenth the size. There's just no need to buy into the hysteria, let alone spread it - and especially from a position of authority as your friend seems to be.
I wouldn't wanna smoke the stuff, but I just can't get too worked up over the idea of a broken bulb. Have you ever read the cleanup directions for paint or deck sealant or epoxy or drain cleaner? All of those should be treated with respect, sure, but the labels make it sound like you'll die if you're in the room with them. Use caution but don't get carried away.