Let me add an analogy : music writing by hand vs. software
When you are dealing with very special customized type of music, it is really complicated to translate it from your mind to a graphical program. You can do it well with a pencil on paper, but later you must try to realize what to do to move your ideas to the software capacities (that always will be limited compared with your own expressive writing).
So, in my case, the best solution has been to use Lilypond and to write by hand on Lilypond language, not trying to use those extremely limited graphical toys. And, this carry me to a keyboard, that I can use very efficiently because I began with formal typing studies on a mechanical typewriter a lot of years ago, and complemented with my piano studies in University.
I can use my "finger memory" that it is separated from my thinking, something that permits me to do both at the same time. And I don't need to look at the keyboard to find the letters. And QWERTY it is just perfect, no matter if I am using a Spanish or an English keyboard.
Also, I have two daughters, 8 and 9 years old. They are learning to use the keyboard with some software, and they are very good right now with just some weeks of practice. This means, that QWERTY it is not artificial even for little children, it is fast, it is reliable. Then, what it is the urgency to replace it.?
A different story is with your mobile or tablet. Well, maybe you can't carry a physical keyboard, so you must paint one in the screen... it is a practical solution, but on a limited device. But if you can attach a physical keyboard things improve several times...always.
The main difference with old and new times is the stealing "method". At the end, we agree on giving something to acquire something, but the one with more power will be the one have more benefits.
You see, in Costa Rica we don't have military forces. They are not needed. But this doesn't mean that we don't have problems... we have a lot of them, we have corruption, bad management, or lack of it. And at the end, even when we work the same as any person in a developed country, we don't have that country advantages. Why must be like this?
There is a balance everywhere, and this balance never is fair for everybody. About the central management... can we change that? It is right to change an evil for another one?... I think that humans are not so fool, but we need to stop thinking that what it is around us it is right and works well.
It is natural for human society. At the end, the "free" in freedom (and this includes the "right" to use) means that somebody it is providing it for some "control" reason.
TCP/IP was created with a military mindset and the Internet inherited that capacity, not only in the technical but also in the political and control part. To think that we can do whatever we like in the virtual space it is an illusion, as false as to say that we can do whatever we like in the physical world. But, what to do?
The important it is to realize that the Internet has a control body somewhere and to learn what can be done and what can't be done there. These are new times, and we need to evolve accordingly.
I think, if you ever used a Chromebook, that you are not playing with LInux native applications in Developer Mode.
Taking into consideration that it is Beta software and that some features (as sound) are not ready, they work very well. I have a Samsung Chromebook Plus machine and I see no difference between a full Linux machine and this Chromebook running the software. But some people will complain, that these programs are just Linux and not ChromeOS native applications as the Windows ones.
The main difference now is that the Web browser, in particular Chrome, grew to be an extremely powerful Graphical User Interface by itself, even capable of running games. What a Web Browser lacks, because never was the intention to have it, is heavy processing layers of functionality... the Web Browser depend on servers to do the heavy things... but, just a minute.
Linux it is wonderful running background functionality. Through all the Internet and in many of our appliances we have Linux based server software without a GUI doing very good work. And... why not to mix them in the same machine? The heavy things running in the new LInux compartments and the Graphical stuff in the Browser?... then, the Chromebook it is not a toy, it is really a better machine concept than a standard notebook where everything it is mixed producing all sort of troubles. It is a type of machine designed for the current state of affairs in computing and, in particular, security.
Whatever happens with ChromeOS and Windows, I think that the 1980s model to do things arrived to an end. It is not just practical. And when you see Microsoft investing so much in Azure, including Linux, you realize that they also noticed that.
I side note: They already run Android stuff in the Chromebook... why to add the Linux part?
The problem is that Android it is very limited compared with the full Linux functionality. Also, they are working the Fussia OS core.. what could they be thinking for the future?... I don't think that Android be the answer for all the questions.
Well... when people pay more, builders are forced to improve their phones capacity in each new iteration.
This produces better sub $300 phones that are comparable to two years before $1000 ones and, as a side effect, new types of gadgets using the phones SoCs as multimedia boxes and Single Board Computers. Even, this makes the PC foundation to be weaker because more IoT oriented machines are eating the previously only PC kingdom.
I am not one of those purchasing $1000 phones, but for those making the investment, my sincere gratitude. You are financing all the other marvels that are not simple phones.
The problem here is not to make programming easier but to classify the type of tasks you are trying to accomplish.
Some tasks are easy and can be accomplished by anybody without training, so the people without knowledge or sophisticated skills can work them easily. But other tasks are very critical and complex and well trained specialists need to work on them.
Don't try to put everyone in the same basket because you will obtain super complex and heavy things (when you need to do special programs with very easy and powerless tools), or super dangerous solutions (when you are trying to use those easy to use tools in critical environments).
Another issue is about the computers. Before everything was "Basic" because the machines were very simple, slow, with less resources, so only Basic or machine language was possible. But today the user machines are ultra powerful computing devices with many layers or complexity to deal with. An option is to go the Raspberry Pi path and to define small simple things on machines that only do one thing and can do it without a lot of complexity, and not to try to resolve all humanity problems with the current bloated operating environments that are excessive in everything they "try" to do. This is not a programming problem, this is a conceptualization one.
Amazon stores are not consolidated. Depending on what you purchase, you could receive several packages even when you choose consolidation because the origin of the goods it is different no matter what "Amazon" tag they have.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
But it was... just thinking how few old traditional buildings made with soft materials survived strong central american (where I live) continuous earthquakes. This is why seismic codes are becoming more and more strict, because of the bad experiences and fallen buildings
The real difference is that humans have several thousands of years making buildings and just some decades working with software. And Tesla took a very risky path working many new things that could carry them where they are today. I expect this learning process will help them very much in the future.
There are so many attack vectors and options, and so much research from a lot of fronts. Soon or later another serious problem will arise because the modern CPUs are just too complex to be 100% safe for everything.
However, the solution seems to be simple. Don't put all the eggs in the same basket.
Use several independent computers. The ones could be exposed to environments where those exploits could be possible, must lack hyperthreading, branch prediction all these fancy speed things. But the ones are behind in really secured areas with enough control and a small quantity of well behaved and controlled software, could use those resources.
The issue here is to design for security and forget the sellers fairy tales about how good are their products.
There is an important detail. Even if the electricity it is being produced with coal or petroleum, an electricity power plant can be optimized and the method to produce the energy can be closely monitored. However, it is impossible to guarantee that half million diesel buses are working correctly and the individual method to use the energy in each independent combustion engine it is extremely ineficient.
Then, it is an improvement. Also, it is easier, as other reader described, to replace the coal plants than to run around looking for all these thousands of diesel machines.
Why not to design the satellite as some sort of long cilindre and to use a militar converted jet to carry it "near" the atmosphere limit and just to send it the remaining distance as a missile? You can take a lot of decisions, even to return home if the conditions are not optimal, and the sending device is 100% reusable without almost no effort.
Talking about conspiracy theories... could be necessary to replace our machines (although they continue doing their work apparently well) because some obscure mistake was performed?
It is not realistic to think that Intel will replace all CPUs with the problems. Not only because there are many, but also because sometimes they are soldered, inside production systems that can't be so easily serviced or, because the machines users have no idea how to open and replace the CPU. This is a sensitive operation that must be performed by somebody knowing what he/she is doing. So... in the sake of security, new machines need to be made, and this will boom the PC markets for a while.
OR
This is the Katana that will pass through the hearth of the PC and a lot of people that really don't need it, will stop using it. Mobiles and Chromebooks or similar devices will acquire a little more functionality and PC sales will drop even more.
For the people that really need a stationary, secure and powerful machine, for development or gaming, a new brew of PCs will arise. And in the office environment, other options, different from PCs (let's call them OC for Office Computer), could accomplish the task. The days when the PC was all almighty for everything and everybody really are over.
Computers have sense because they are general usage (i.e. universal) machines.
Then, it is possible to do many things with them, even more than the original designers visualized. This is why we have Windows, Linux, MacOS, Virtualization and many embedded applications using exactly the same chips, making the effort to create complex solutions extremely cheap and in timely fasion.
But this means that the undecidable nature of what can be done with the computer brain, the CPU, tends to create some undesired circumstances. In fact where a person will see a problem, another one will devise an opportunity to create some interesting type of functionality.
The real problem is that we have been building a very complex infrastructure thinking that the behavior for some CPU characteristic was A when it was really B, and now that the difference has been discovered that infrastructure and its capacity becomes dangerous to use as it is. And... we need to evolve. Of course people is angry, but this is not the first time and neither will be the last one something like this will happen, particularly with clever people trying to expand the computer capacities.
What to do? Understand, Change (if you call that change a "fix" or an "improvement" it is OK) and Continue. And never to put all the eggs in the same basket, because we are not clear when this type of things will happen again.
I agree that you must use more than one authentication factor.
In fact, it is terribly dangerous to use biometrics, because when somebody stole your data you are doomed for the rest of your life. And to use in consumer products it is very irresponsible because those products, no matter the brand neither the price, won't be so well designed as security oriented machines.
Also... light interferes, children younger than 13 years interfere, photocopies interfere... this technology is useless on real life scenarios. Maybe the 3rd or 4th editions will be of some use.
I have decades of studies in music. Right now I am helping my children to enter this wonderful world on their violin studies.
But I also have a bachelor in Computing Science and a Master Degree in Security from high profile universities.
I know that music and informatics are very related professions; they share "the way of thinking". However, they don't share the engineering provision knowledge that requires a lot of studies and experience to develop. Simply stated, it is not the same to understand the situation than to control it.
Security has a very complex profile in the currently evolving world and, sadly, a big quantity of security managers are not prepared enough to decide how to move safely on our modern dangerous data seas.
I can't talk in particular about this person because I don't know her. However, I think that a real security manager must be some sort of magician and, in general, they are only managers without enough knowledge to take the right decisions on time.
FullHD it is not enough to display music pdf files. The problem is that music has thin horizontal lines located in analogous defined positions, and sometimes, they just are not in the screen. 1080 it is not enough.
So, it is important to go up, although it is also very difficult to find a good monitor that be able to "replace" printed music, with the right size, weight and resolution. Just think about having two letter size pieces on paper in front of you, with 4K resolution.
But here we are talking about 70 inches monitors. These are behemoths that must be attached to a wall, and that, with that resolution can work perfectly in a group-work room or a table. Not for people to see from the distance, but paired with some type of touch screen technology, to put and move high resolution elements around the screen.
This can work for:
Medical imagining, in particular real-time remote surgeries
Engineering analysis (can you imagine to check Fukushima pictures at that detail?)
Painters creating very detailed high resolution digital art
Software engineers describing highly complex 3D software models
A different type of music expression
High quality advertising on huuuuge displays on public places
Very detailed map and picture analysis
And maybe, if they make cylindrical screens where you can be inside, a totally different type of immersive experience.
I see many usages... but just a TV... this is like to drive a 12 cilindres car to carry children to school.
Then, if you work hard to make something successful, and because of that wonderful work your name becomes a synonym of the main task that work it is related, then you need to give up on your name?
Then it is wrong to have Hoover vacuum machines right?
I made a mental effort to acquire a Samsung J7-2016 model. For around $300. Yes, the last one to have a replaceable battery.
This has enough power for doing everything the society is forcing me to reluctantly do... you know, WhatsApp, Facebook. A nice thing about the phone that I really use very much (and my wife with the kids) is the camera. Sometimes it permits me to read the news or to see a movie in a nice enough screen. And I have a Chromebook Plus costing a little more than $400 with a gorgeous screen and 8+ hours of battery usage that I connect to a Raspberry Pi Zero and I can make marvels with both machines and mi Mac Mini 2012 model at home (this is a i7 four core $800 machine with $100 16GB memory upgrade... a very nice machine).
$1200 for a phone?... $1200... ?????
I really think that what we see in the Oatmeal would be true. This is like a disease. I work with computers and I had had many of them during my life, but this need to have so expensive and comparatively useless thing at hand just because of having it, deserves to receive a particular name. Is this the Apple Syndrome or something like that?
Good luck to the future glamorous owners of the inimaginable power and convenience they never will know how to use appropriately, just because it is Apple and, maybe, because will be pretty.... and what will be done for iPhone 9?
It depends on what is the "current" definition for "wrong".
Some day the governments establish some generic framework because of a valid reason, but then they change the parameters and that framework can be used legally for something different. If the framework has an opportunity to provide excessive power to the authorities, always will exist a high possibility that it be used against its original purpose. And this is not a naive idea, our human history is full of cruel examples.
It is an ominous action what was performed when parents were waiting to pickup their children after a concert.
After declaring something that it is true, let's talk about technology and the justification to violate the privacy human right in the name of security.
If there is any justification to break all rights trying to catch terrorists, then we must stop using paper because somebody "could" have been designing a terrorist act in a piece of paper. Let's also stop talking, because when we talk could be possible that we let others to receive messages describing how to perform terrorist acts.
Let's give the authorities the right to use "advanced" interrogation methods, because we could be thinking on performing terrorist acts and, in general, let's become guilty by default in a world were it is enforced to demonstrate that we are not guilty on any possible action that could hurt others.
The main problem is that the human being it is very capable to bypass the obvious communication methods and the bad people will continue performing bad actions in one or another way, and in the middle all the really innocent people will become guilty by default and the freedom that humanity has been working to acquire during thousands of years and millions of lives will be lost in just some years. And if this happen, the terrorists will win the war.
Elizabeth Lions, the main reference in the article, has a lot of experience with recruiting companies, although she is a psychologist, not a computer science professional neither a "coder".
So, what she has in front of her is a lot of companies that depend on recruiting companies asking for resources for their Java and.Net based information systems. That's all. Really, to call people "coders" have all the smell of "maquila software" (high volume and cheap outsourcing, where you replace constantly the "coders" because of quality issues).
The computing landscape is like a rainbow, full of different colors and flavors. In fact, when you need a C/C++ specialist for some type of secure/embedded/efficient/fast/specific piece of software, you don't ask them because they don't know how to deliver this type of specialized professionals, making the statistics useless.
To declare that whatever language is dead because they don't recommend that language "coders" to their customers is like to say that neurologists are sentenced to disappear because nobody ask them for this type of professionals. Then, the usual are general medicine doctors, so people must give-up on studying the brain because it has no market share.
You are right this has two questions inside. And there are hundreds of answers.
In my case, my first language was GW-Basic on a Tandy 1000 SX my parents purchased to my brother that was studying Electronic Engineering in the University. As many others, nobody taught me... this was just test and error. Later, when I came to study Informatics in the University (was not my first career), the used a Spanish Logo-Writer version. And it was very interesting, because of the type of language... you needed to figure how to make loops with recursion, an interesting way to approach the problem in a first programming course. Later we went with Turbo Pascal, a marvelous language for learning, and then C.
I think that two good languages to start learning are C and C++. Why?
Many languages follow their programming style.
They force you to be careful, to make a good design and to apply it (is not this the sense of learning anything?)
You can make your machine to sing and dance with them.
There are thousands of libraries that can help you to arrive to any corner in the knowledge landscape.
There are 100% free versions you can use to learn on extremely cheap machines.
Strong typing. Be ordered, do things well.
.
What I don't think is a good idea?
Garbage Collector based languages. Remember, this is about "learning", and these languages hide many things are important to take into consideration when you are in your formation days.
Heavy framework based languages. What are you learning, programming or to use a particular framework? These are different things. There are frameworks in C++ but they are even optional to use and you can design your own hierarchy of classes. Be creative.
Particular machine's behavior. This is similar to the framework stuff. Better go with open standards that permit you to approach many different platforms. Learn about the "computer", not about "that computer".
And could be better if what you are using give you the capacity to create concurrent systems. It is very important in 2017 to learn about that when even the smaller machine has several cores or works with concurrent operating systems. This can be done with language constructions or with libraries.
Slashdot Mirror
Let me add an analogy : music writing by hand vs. software
When you are dealing with very special customized type of music, it is really complicated to translate it from your mind to a graphical program. You can do it well with a pencil on paper, but later you must try to realize what to do to move your ideas to the software capacities (that always will be limited compared with your own expressive writing).
So, in my case, the best solution has been to use Lilypond and to write by hand on Lilypond language, not trying to use those extremely limited graphical toys. And, this carry me to a keyboard, that I can use very efficiently because I began with formal typing studies on a mechanical typewriter a lot of years ago, and complemented with my piano studies in University.
I can use my "finger memory" that it is separated from my thinking, something that permits me to do both at the same time. And I don't need to look at the keyboard to find the letters. And QWERTY it is just perfect, no matter if I am using a Spanish or an English keyboard.
Also, I have two daughters, 8 and 9 years old. They are learning to use the keyboard with some software, and they are very good right now with just some weeks of practice. This means, that QWERTY it is not artificial even for little children, it is fast, it is reliable. Then, what it is the urgency to replace it.?
A different story is with your mobile or tablet. Well, maybe you can't carry a physical keyboard, so you must paint one in the screen ... it is a practical solution, but on a limited device. But if you can attach a physical keyboard things improve several times .. .always.
I like to agree with you ... however.
What country it is not stealing from another one?
The main difference with old and new times is the stealing "method". At the end, we agree on giving something to acquire something, but the one with more power will be the one have more benefits.
You see, in Costa Rica we don't have military forces. They are not needed. But this doesn't mean that we don't have problems ... we have a lot of them, we have corruption, bad management, or lack of it. And at the end, even when we work the same as any person in a developed country, we don't have that country advantages. Why must be like this?
There is a balance everywhere, and this balance never is fair for everybody. About the central management ... can we change that? It is right to change an evil for another one? ... I think that humans are not so fool, but we need to stop thinking that what it is around us it is right and works well.
It is natural for human society. At the end, the "free" in freedom (and this includes the "right" to use) means that somebody it is providing it for some "control" reason.
TCP/IP was created with a military mindset and the Internet inherited that capacity, not only in the technical but also in the political and control part. To think that we can do whatever we like in the virtual space it is an illusion, as false as to say that we can do whatever we like in the physical world. But, what to do?
The important it is to realize that the Internet has a control body somewhere and to learn what can be done and what can't be done there. These are new times, and we need to evolve accordingly.
I think, if you ever used a Chromebook, that you are not playing with LInux native applications in Developer Mode.
Taking into consideration that it is Beta software and that some features (as sound) are not ready, they work very well. I have a Samsung Chromebook Plus machine and I see no difference between a full Linux machine and this Chromebook running the software. But some people will complain, that these programs are just Linux and not ChromeOS native applications as the Windows ones.
The main difference now is that the Web browser, in particular Chrome, grew to be an extremely powerful Graphical User Interface by itself, even capable of running games. What a Web Browser lacks, because never was the intention to have it, is heavy processing layers of functionality ... the Web Browser depend on servers to do the heavy things ... but, just a minute.
Linux it is wonderful running background functionality. Through all the Internet and in many of our appliances we have Linux based server software without a GUI doing very good work. And ... why not to mix them in the same machine? The heavy things running in the new LInux compartments and the Graphical stuff in the Browser? ... then, the Chromebook it is not a toy, it is really a better machine concept than a standard notebook where everything it is mixed producing all sort of troubles. It is a type of machine designed for the current state of affairs in computing and, in particular, security.
Whatever happens with ChromeOS and Windows, I think that the 1980s model to do things arrived to an end. It is not just practical. And when you see Microsoft investing so much in Azure, including Linux, you realize that they also noticed that.
I side note: They already run Android stuff in the Chromebook ... why to add the Linux part?
The problem is that Android it is very limited compared with the full Linux functionality. Also, they are working the Fussia OS core .. what could they be thinking for the future? ... I don't think that Android be the answer for all the questions.
Well ... when people pay more, builders are forced to improve their phones capacity in each new iteration.
This produces better sub $300 phones that are comparable to two years before $1000 ones and, as a side effect, new types of gadgets using the phones SoCs as multimedia boxes and Single Board Computers. Even, this makes the PC foundation to be weaker because more IoT oriented machines are eating the previously only PC kingdom.
I am not one of those purchasing $1000 phones, but for those making the investment, my sincere gratitude. You are financing all the other marvels that are not simple phones.
The problem here is not to make programming easier but to classify the type of tasks you are trying to accomplish.
Some tasks are easy and can be accomplished by anybody without training, so the people without knowledge or sophisticated skills can work them easily. But other tasks are very critical and complex and well trained specialists need to work on them.
Don't try to put everyone in the same basket because you will obtain super complex and heavy things (when you need to do special programs with very easy and powerless tools), or super dangerous solutions (when you are trying to use those easy to use tools in critical environments).
Another issue is about the computers. Before everything was "Basic" because the machines were very simple, slow, with less resources, so only Basic or machine language was possible. But today the user machines are ultra powerful computing devices with many layers or complexity to deal with. An option is to go the Raspberry Pi path and to define small simple things on machines that only do one thing and can do it without a lot of complexity, and not to try to resolve all humanity problems with the current bloated operating environments that are excessive in everything they "try" to do. This is not a programming problem, this is a conceptualization one.
Amazon stores are not consolidated. Depending on what you purchase, you could receive several packages even when you choose consolidation because the origin of the goods it is different no matter what "Amazon" tag they have.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
But it was ... just thinking how few old traditional buildings made with soft materials survived strong central american (where I live) continuous earthquakes. This is why seismic codes are becoming more and more strict, because of the bad experiences and fallen buildings
The real difference is that humans have several thousands of years making buildings and just some decades working with software. And Tesla took a very risky path working many new things that could carry them where they are today. I expect this learning process will help them very much in the future.
Owning an iPhone it is a good sign that you "pretend" to be rich.
That material ... could have some practical usage?
There are so many attack vectors and options, and so much research from a lot of fronts. Soon or later another serious problem will arise because the modern CPUs are just too complex to be 100% safe for everything.
However, the solution seems to be simple. Don't put all the eggs in the same basket.
Use several independent computers. The ones could be exposed to environments where those exploits could be possible, must lack hyperthreading, branch prediction all these fancy speed things. But the ones are behind in really secured areas with enough control and a small quantity of well behaved and controlled software, could use those resources.
The issue here is to design for security and forget the sellers fairy tales about how good are their products.
To stop a hard disk ... yes ... but you can make a long term "attack" damaging the disks slowly with not so strong noise.
Everything depends on what it is your goal.
There is an important detail. Even if the electricity it is being produced with coal or petroleum, an electricity power plant can be optimized and the method to produce the energy can be closely monitored. However, it is impossible to guarantee that half million diesel buses are working correctly and the individual method to use the energy in each independent combustion engine it is extremely ineficient. Then, it is an improvement. Also, it is easier, as other reader described, to replace the coal plants than to run around looking for all these thousands of diesel machines.
Why not to design the satellite as some sort of long cilindre and to use a militar converted jet to carry it "near" the atmosphere limit and just to send it the remaining distance as a missile? You can take a lot of decisions, even to return home if the conditions are not optimal, and the sending device is 100% reusable without almost no effort.
Talking about conspiracy theories ... could be necessary to replace our machines (although they continue doing their work apparently well) because some obscure mistake was performed?
It is not realistic to think that Intel will replace all CPUs with the problems. Not only because there are many, but also because sometimes they are soldered, inside production systems that can't be so easily serviced or, because the machines users have no idea how to open and replace the CPU. This is a sensitive operation that must be performed by somebody knowing what he/she is doing. So ... in the sake of security, new machines need to be made, and this will boom the PC markets for a while.
OR
This is the Katana that will pass through the hearth of the PC and a lot of people that really don't need it, will stop using it. Mobiles and Chromebooks or similar devices will acquire a little more functionality and PC sales will drop even more.
For the people that really need a stationary, secure and powerful machine, for development or gaming, a new brew of PCs will arise. And in the office environment, other options, different from PCs (let's call them OC for Office Computer), could accomplish the task. The days when the PC was all almighty for everything and everybody really are over.
Computers have sense because they are general usage (i.e. universal) machines.
Then, it is possible to do many things with them, even more than the original designers visualized. This is why we have Windows, Linux, MacOS, Virtualization and many embedded applications using exactly the same chips, making the effort to create complex solutions extremely cheap and in timely fasion.
But this means that the undecidable nature of what can be done with the computer brain, the CPU, tends to create some undesired circumstances. In fact where a person will see a problem, another one will devise an opportunity to create some interesting type of functionality.
The real problem is that we have been building a very complex infrastructure thinking that the behavior for some CPU characteristic was A when it was really B, and now that the difference has been discovered that infrastructure and its capacity becomes dangerous to use as it is. And ... we need to evolve. Of course people is angry, but this is not the first time and neither will be the last one something like this will happen, particularly with clever people trying to expand the computer capacities.
What to do? Understand, Change (if you call that change a "fix" or an "improvement" it is OK) and Continue. And never to put all the eggs in the same basket, because we are not clear when this type of things will happen again.
I agree that you must use more than one authentication factor.
In fact, it is terribly dangerous to use biometrics, because when somebody stole your data you are doomed for the rest of your life. And to use in consumer products it is very irresponsible because those products, no matter the brand neither the price, won't be so well designed as security oriented machines.
Also ... light interferes, children younger than 13 years interfere, photocopies interfere ... this technology is useless on real life scenarios. Maybe the 3rd or 4th editions will be of some use.
I have decades of studies in music. Right now I am helping my children to enter this wonderful world on their violin studies. But I also have a bachelor in Computing Science and a Master Degree in Security from high profile universities.
I know that music and informatics are very related professions; they share "the way of thinking". However, they don't share the engineering provision knowledge that requires a lot of studies and experience to develop. Simply stated, it is not the same to understand the situation than to control it.
Security has a very complex profile in the currently evolving world and, sadly, a big quantity of security managers are not prepared enough to decide how to move safely on our modern dangerous data seas.
I can't talk in particular about this person because I don't know her. However, I think that a real security manager must be some sort of magician and, in general, they are only managers without enough knowledge to take the right decisions on time.
FullHD it is not enough to display music pdf files. The problem is that music has thin horizontal lines located in analogous defined positions, and sometimes, they just are not in the screen. 1080 it is not enough.
So, it is important to go up, although it is also very difficult to find a good monitor that be able to "replace" printed music, with the right size, weight and resolution. Just think about having two letter size pieces on paper in front of you, with 4K resolution.
But here we are talking about 70 inches monitors. These are behemoths that must be attached to a wall, and that, with that resolution can work perfectly in a group-work room or a table. Not for people to see from the distance, but paired with some type of touch screen technology, to put and move high resolution elements around the screen.
This can work for:
And maybe, if they make cylindrical screens where you can be inside, a totally different type of immersive experience.
I see many usages ... but just a TV ... this is like to drive a 12 cilindres car to carry children to school.
Let me understand.
Then, if you work hard to make something successful, and because of that wonderful work your name becomes a synonym of the main task that work it is related, then you need to give up on your name?
Then it is wrong to have Hoover vacuum machines right?
I made a mental effort to acquire a Samsung J7-2016 model. For around $300. Yes, the last one to have a replaceable battery.
This has enough power for doing everything the society is forcing me to reluctantly do ... you know, WhatsApp, Facebook. A nice thing about the phone that I really use very much (and my wife with the kids) is the camera. Sometimes it permits me to read the news or to see a movie in a nice enough screen. And I have a Chromebook Plus costing a little more than $400 with a gorgeous screen and 8+ hours of battery usage that I connect to a Raspberry Pi Zero and I can make marvels with both machines and mi Mac Mini 2012 model at home (this is a i7 four core $800 machine with $100 16GB memory upgrade ... a very nice machine).
$1200 for a phone? ... $1200 ... ?????
I really think that what we see in the Oatmeal would be true. This is like a disease. I work with computers and I had had many of them during my life, but this need to have so expensive and comparatively useless thing at hand just because of having it, deserves to receive a particular name. Is this the Apple Syndrome or something like that?
Good luck to the future glamorous owners of the inimaginable power and convenience they never will know how to use appropriately, just because it is Apple and, maybe, because will be pretty. ... and what will be done for iPhone 9?
It depends on what is the "current" definition for "wrong".
Some day the governments establish some generic framework because of a valid reason, but then they change the parameters and that framework can be used legally for something different. If the framework has an opportunity to provide excessive power to the authorities, always will exist a high possibility that it be used against its original purpose. And this is not a naive idea, our human history is full of cruel examples.
It is an ominous action what was performed when parents were waiting to pickup their children after a concert.
After declaring something that it is true, let's talk about technology and the justification to violate the privacy human right in the name of security.
If there is any justification to break all rights trying to catch terrorists, then we must stop using paper because somebody "could" have been designing a terrorist act in a piece of paper. Let's also stop talking, because when we talk could be possible that we let others to receive messages describing how to perform terrorist acts.
Let's give the authorities the right to use "advanced" interrogation methods, because we could be thinking on performing terrorist acts and, in general, let's become guilty by default in a world were it is enforced to demonstrate that we are not guilty on any possible action that could hurt others.
The main problem is that the human being it is very capable to bypass the obvious communication methods and the bad people will continue performing bad actions in one or another way, and in the middle all the really innocent people will become guilty by default and the freedom that humanity has been working to acquire during thousands of years and millions of lives will be lost in just some years. And if this happen, the terrorists will win the war.
Elizabeth Lions, the main reference in the article, has a lot of experience with recruiting companies, although she is a psychologist, not a computer science professional neither a "coder".
So, what she has in front of her is a lot of companies that depend on recruiting companies asking for resources for their Java and .Net based information systems. That's all. Really, to call people "coders" have all the smell of "maquila software" (high volume and cheap outsourcing, where you replace constantly the "coders" because of quality issues).
The computing landscape is like a rainbow, full of different colors and flavors. In fact, when you need a C/C++ specialist for some type of secure/embedded/efficient/fast/specific piece of software, you don't ask them because they don't know how to deliver this type of specialized professionals, making the statistics useless.
To declare that whatever language is dead because they don't recommend that language "coders" to their customers is like to say that neurologists are sentenced to disappear because nobody ask them for this type of professionals. Then, the usual are general medicine doctors, so people must give-up on studying the brain because it has no market share.
You are right this has two questions inside. And there are hundreds of answers.
In my case, my first language was GW-Basic on a Tandy 1000 SX my parents purchased to my brother that was studying Electronic Engineering in the University. As many others, nobody taught me ... this was just test and error. Later, when I came to study Informatics in the University (was not my first career), the used a Spanish Logo-Writer version. And it was very interesting, because of the type of language ... you needed to figure how to make loops with recursion, an interesting way to approach the problem in a first programming course. Later we went with Turbo Pascal, a marvelous language for learning, and then C.
I think that two good languages to start learning are C and C++. Why?
.
What I don't think is a good idea?
Garbage Collector based languages. Remember, this is about "learning", and these languages hide many things are important to take into consideration when you are in your formation days.
Heavy framework based languages. What are you learning, programming or to use a particular framework? These are different things. There are frameworks in C++ but they are even optional to use and you can design your own hierarchy of classes. Be creative.
Particular machine's behavior. This is similar to the framework stuff. Better go with open standards that permit you to approach many different platforms. Learn about the "computer", not about "that computer".
And could be better if what you are using give you the capacity to create concurrent systems. It is very important in 2017 to learn about that when even the smaller machine has several cores or works with concurrent operating systems. This can be done with language constructions or with libraries.