According to the article, the House voted to put this language in a bill. That doesn't mean the Senate will approve it, and it doesn't mean the President will sign it. The House, by itself, can't "direct" or "order" the Defense Department to do this.
I write a lot of comments because it feels natural to me. For me, the *most* important obstacle to working with another's code (or my code that I haven't seen for a long time) is understanding the meaning behind it. With that priority, I sometimes write three times more lines of comments than lines of code.
It surprised me when I ran into someone who thought this was "too many comments." I came to understand that, for this person, the priority was to see as much code on the screen as possible. For him, my comments were "diluting" the code and making it harder to understand. I think I saw this reflected in the summary description when it mentioned "the clarity of comment-free code."
This was an important moment for me, in that I realized neither he nor I were "wrong," we just had different things that were important to us because we had different ways of understanding code.
There is far more need for real talent than there is talent to fill it. I think the problem is intrinsically hard (you don't need me to tell you that), and I think it always will be.
Which is to say, I don't think there's any way to improve the situation. I think you will have to continue to be clubbed over the head with a poor S/N ratio, like a soul in hell that can't ever escape the burning.
This looks very much like a product created by Rocksteady called W-IPN (Wireless Individual Private Networking).
The user downloads an executable and runs it. The executable retrieves a randomly generated user name and password over a secure SSL (TLS) link from the server. Then, it logs into the server with the given name/password and set up a VPN. From the user's point of view, it's painless VPN (as long as you trust whoever provided the executable to you).
Others may have also done this, but W-IPN is the only similar thing I know of.
Manufacturing jobs have been "outsourced" overseas for a very long time. One could say that outsourcing has simply been moving steadily along a continuum from less-skilled to more-skilled jobs (i.e., less-well-paid to more-well-paid). Perhaps this latest wave of concern is not the result of a fundamental change in outsourcing, but is instead just a symptom of its arrival at a particular skill/pay/pain threshold.
If we're simply experiencing a natural extrapolation of the outsourcing trend, should we react to it any differently than we reacted to the loss of our manufacturing jobs (as painful as that was)? Is there truly a need for any more action/legislation here than we thought we needed when we were losing our steel industry?
RFID is a red herring. It's needed now simply because our computer technology can't understand what's going on around it without a little help. As soon as computers can understand what they're seeing through a video camera, they'll just *look* at you and your basket and gather the same information. Are we going to ban video cameras in order to protect our privacy?
Instead of arguing about whatever particular technologies happen to be available now, let's jump forward to the final argument. Unless you're inside your house, or some other friendly enclosure, you will be observable - and how can we really complain about anyone just *noticing* what they see and recording information about it, regardless of what their purposes are? I'm not really sure where this question will eventually lead but, in the end, it's the truly relevant question.
www.rocksteady.com Our software does most of what you've described here. We dynamically authenticate users and construct/destroy firewall rules as they enter/exit the system. </shameless> I could go on, but I dislike spamming people with information they haven't asked for. If you'd like to know more, you're very welcome to visit the site.
Slashdot Mirror
See subject.
I find that the best way to read and understand someone else's code is to comment it.
According to the article, the House voted to put this language in a bill. That doesn't mean the Senate will approve it, and it doesn't mean the President will sign it. The House, by itself, can't "direct" or "order" the Defense Department to do this.
I've made a number of happy purchases at http://www.lcdarms.com./ They are expensive, but really good.
... I'll probably make FireFox my default browser. This is more awesome than sharks with frickin' laser beams. God bless Mozilla.
I think you've hit on something and, for what it's worth, I encourage you to continue looking at this.
I write a lot of comments because it feels natural to me. For me, the *most* important obstacle to working with another's code (or my code that I haven't seen for a long time) is understanding the meaning behind it. With that priority, I sometimes write three times more lines of comments than lines of code.
It surprised me when I ran into someone who thought this was "too many comments." I came to understand that, for this person, the priority was to see as much code on the screen as possible. For him, my comments were "diluting" the code and making it harder to understand. I think I saw this reflected in the summary description when it mentioned "the clarity of comment-free code."
This was an important moment for me, in that I realized neither he nor I were "wrong," we just had different things that were important to us because we had different ways of understanding code.
The Schrodinger wave equation?
HERE it is...
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2010/06/gawande-stanford-speech.html#ixzz0rEyC8iDU
Oh - dang it - that's NOT the right address.
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2009/06/atul-gawande-university-of-chicago-medical-school-commencement-address.html
/agree
I thought the text you offered just then was pretty good.
It's interesting how much legitimate detail there was here, and how many lessons to learn. Thank you for the careful research.
Me too. That was one of too few cool moments.
Do you have any interest in management? You could manage software engineers rather than be one.
Of course, to do that, you might have to spend some time being one first. Would that be OK?
There is far more need for real talent than there is talent to fill it. I think the problem is intrinsically hard (you don't need me to tell you that), and I think it always will be.
Which is to say, I don't think there's any way to improve the situation. I think you will have to continue to be clubbed over the head with a poor S/N ratio, like a soul in hell that can't ever escape the burning.
wiki
I'm probably not the first person to respond by mentioning this book. I just need to make sure :)
I subscribe to this newsweekly as well and it's a great way to keep up with the most interesting, recent scientific news.
This looks very much like a product created by Rocksteady called W-IPN (Wireless Individual Private Networking).
The user downloads an executable and runs it. The executable retrieves a randomly generated user name and password over a secure SSL (TLS) link from the server. Then, it logs into the server with the given name/password and set up a VPN. From the user's point of view, it's painless VPN (as long as you trust whoever provided the executable to you).
Others may have also done this, but W-IPN is the only similar thing I know of.
Manufacturing jobs have been "outsourced" overseas for a very long time. One could say that outsourcing has simply been moving steadily along a continuum from less-skilled to more-skilled jobs (i.e., less-well-paid to more-well-paid). Perhaps this latest wave of concern is not the result of a fundamental change in outsourcing, but is instead just a symptom of its arrival at a particular skill/pay/pain threshold.
If we're simply experiencing a natural extrapolation of the outsourcing trend, should we react to it any differently than we reacted to the loss of our manufacturing jobs (as painful as that was)? Is there truly a need for any more action/legislation here than we thought we needed when we were losing our steel industry?
RFID is a red herring. It's needed now simply because our computer technology can't understand what's going on around it without a little help. As soon as computers can understand what they're seeing through a video camera, they'll just *look* at you and your basket and gather the same information. Are we going to ban video cameras in order to protect our privacy?
Instead of arguing about whatever particular technologies happen to be available now, let's jump forward to the final argument. Unless you're inside your house, or some other friendly enclosure, you will be observable - and how can we really complain about anyone just *noticing* what they see and recording information about it, regardless of what their purposes are? I'm not really sure where this question will eventually lead but, in the end, it's the truly relevant question.
www.rocksteady.com
Our software does most of what you've described here. We dynamically authenticate users and construct/destroy firewall rules as they enter/exit the system.
</shameless>
I could go on, but I dislike spamming people with information they haven't asked for. If you'd like to know more, you're very welcome to visit the site.
EOM