Not quite as bad as the Tabaco industry from the PC point-of-view.
But McDonalds is kind of a down market, low functionality kind of restaruant. Not exactly a great image for a high-tech customer reference. For that Tabaco would have been better.
This is perhaps what many with exclusively Open Source or hobby exerience think, but anyone who has worked in big and/or little commerical software firms knows that this is total garbage.
Commericial programmers are often rejected and ejected by their peers or superiors for poor performance.
And Open Source software quality is at least as variable its commerical counterparts.
The only "insightful" comment here is that popular Open Source code profits from a massive peer review that commericial software cannot provide. But this observation has been often made by many (for example by Microsoft in the original Halloween document, if my memory servers me right).
I think a comment that superficial is not deserving of so many points.
1) Be good at identifying new market opportunities and moving in quickly (enough).
2) Defend its own turf (cash cows)
I think these require completely different mindsets, and the management can only really host one at at time. Microsoft has played both games well up to now, which is wierd, and maybe just luck, but can it do it forever?
I don't think so. Hitler made some bad decisions, more than the pros would have made, but he wasn't as stupid militarily as people would like to think.
If you read about Soviet production statistics, it is hard to imagine them losing against Germany, short of Germany going nuclear.
The only reason the Soviets did so badly in the begining was because Stalin was stupid enough to kill all his decent officers. Once he stopped doing that, and let the surviving good ones emerge, then the odds were all on Russias side.
Even if D-Day hadn't happened the Soviets wouldd have overrun Germany eventually. D-Day's essential effect was to keep West-Germany (and Western Europe) away from the Soviets.
After all, the Soviets were 3-4 times bigger than Germany, and were only fighting on one front (and Germany had 3-4 other fronts to worry about).
This was actually done a lot, as most academics thought that the ALGOL syntax was clearly superior to the C syntax.
For example Steve Bourne wrote the Bourne shell (from which BASH ultimately derives) in such a C macro dialect, and it remained in common use for decades afterward. Seems silly today.
This is related in Peter Van der Linden's Expert C Programming, Deep C Secrets along with lots of other cool programming legends. So if the above fact is false, blame him not me:)
That was Munich. Be interesting to see how that turns out. My guess is that IBM will be too eager to make a profit, and the Munich users won't be happy. I've heard some wierd things abouot how they are approaching things (lots of emulators and stuff).
German bureaucrats are not known for their flexiblity and eagerness to learn new things.
It was admittedly an off-hand comment, and (as you correctly recognised), is partly motivated by observing the amount of unproductive resources in the Universities (spelled it right this time:).
Nontheless, I think there are few people who would say that the Universities are producing important innovation at the rate that they did in the past. And their business model seems to have more to do with producing connected people than it does with producing knowledge.
And I also think that "private" research (i.e. non-commercial work done in people's free-time) is playing a bigger role than it has in the relatively recent past.
And if this is true, leads to other interesting questions (like is this sustainable)?
It worked wonders for me. Girls like fit guys and it is a nice balence to mental work.
I make my kids swim 500-1000 meters a week (they do freestyle now, takes them about 10-15 minutes, and they can play in the pool for about an hour beforehand)). They also do Jijitsu (I am clueless abou that).
We are sending our kids to acting classes, and they like it, even though my son is really quite the geek.
But you have to MAKE them do it. They will usually like it in the end, but most kids (people) have a huge amount of lethargy to overcome.
Hmmm. He did say elegant. Okay, I guess it probably is and I was completely out-of-line. Maybe I looked at too many obscure Algebra books in my math days.
Still I wonder about the liberalization of the patent and copyright laws too. Every heard of the "Tragedy of the Commons"?
Of course the other side is that maybe programming talent (and the basics for living) are no longer scarce resources, and we simply don't have to ration them. (Pretty and intellegent females (or males for that matter)are scace though). Maybe OSS software is just the price going to the variable cost of production (i.e. $0.00) in an ideally competitivte market, with totally free information flow.
I'll be curious to see. But it took 80 years for the best minds in the world to figure out if communism was a blessing or a curse. Maybe OSS will take as long.
I never looked at Wiles work, but I wonder if he himself would call that particular work "beautiful and elegant". 60 pages of obsccure algebra is elegant? Would Gauss or Newton have called it elegant? Brilliant however I would go along with.
In fact I think it is not clear what the best way to promote science and art is. Patronage begs the question as to who is going to get the patronage. And it is questionable if the masses (who are paying for it all don't forget) really want to pay for Science and Art for its own sake.
OTOH, enslaving the best ideas and minds of humankind to economic utility with patents and copyrights or just plain secrecy obviously has huge drawbacks.
I think the balence we have today seems not too far off the mark, but in the long run who knows?
And I personally feel that the Internet Bubble wouldn't have burst so soon if Hollywood could safely distribute content without fear losing it. A lot more fibre would have been lit.
Just some odd ramblings. But I do feel that the world of Mathematics is a shadow of its former glorious self.
And we all know how the market in Mathematicians is booming these days...
Maybe if there was a business model for Mathematics it would be in better shape. As it is they have to beg all their money from the government.
Re:That's only partly true
on
Debugging
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Lots of point there to answer...
Tests of the 10000 test case sort should be automated, then boredom is not an issue.
I've written and maintained quite a few largeish (>10000 line) programs in my life, and those with extensive automated test suites (all right, there were only two of those:), were much nicer.
By the time a program gets large (and sucessful ones usually do (it is amazing how many unsucessful ones do too)), the way the "pieces work together", and "optimal architectures" are no longer an issue. I like Fowlers statement "Architecture is about decisions that are hard to change later".
Brand new shiny programs based on brand new shiny ideas are always more interesting than the old ones, just like everything else in life. But by the time they have a "complete feature set", they are old and wrinkly.
Admittedly Regression Testing is often not an option. There usually seem to be tests that are hard to automate, and they just don't get automated. And bugs occur there (maybe mostly there). I haven't seen much in the way of Automated Regression Testing, except in the NUnit project.
He forgot regression tests
on
Debugging
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
Regression test suites (if possible) should be maintained so that when bugs get fixed, they stay fixed.
Astronauts are supposed to risk their lives. That's their job. Just like soldiers or policemen. Anyway, how is sending someone to Mars going to be safer than a quick jaunt to the Hubble to fix some things.
O'Keefe is simply not being candid about his real goals, which is to garner votes for his boss anyway he can.
Your average Joe/Jane can't remember what the Hubble was, but might just recall that Bush wanted to do something cool like send heros to Mars.
I live in a big city in Europe, and I used to use them to look at my work e-mail sometimes, but now I am afraid of keyloggers. There is no policy in my firm about not using these (we have OWA), but maybe there should be, we are all moving to SmartPhones and the like anyway now.
I like to surf in them sometimes though. While in airports waiting for example. And I find looking at the bulliten (sp) boards is a good way to find out what is happening locally.
A cool project in and of itself. I am waiting for a 17" Flatscreen with built in speakers, a USB hub, and USB speakers. That way I can just run one USB wire to the PC for all that (still need power though).
I like having the mouse and keyboard attached, keeps the kids (and me) from running off with them (like they do with the remotes).
Work is about doing something for others so you can consume the things they produce. If they don't want the stuff you produce, there is no reason for them to give you their stuff.
Some people are lucky enough to get paid for what they love. Most aren't though.
Look and see who is hiring what kind of people in the place you want to live. If you see something there you want to do, THEN get certified and/or qualified and do that.
Geeks get hung up on what they *want* to do. Jobs are about doing things for other people. Find out what the people want, where you want to be and do that. Anything else is insane.
Networking is down because the market is saturated, supply exceeds demand. The same is true of Mathematical Programming (what I love to do). So I do Enterprise Programming. Much less interesting, but people want/need it, so I can make a living doing it (even that used to be easier though).
If Enterprise Programming goes down the tubes (read off-shore competition), then I will find something else. That's life.
Slashdot Mirror
Not quite as bad as the Tabaco industry from the PC point-of-view.
But McDonalds is kind of a down market, low functionality kind of restaruant. Not exactly a great image for a high-tech customer reference. For that Tabaco would have been better.
This is perhaps what many with exclusively Open Source or hobby exerience think, but anyone who has worked in big and/or little commerical software firms knows that this is total garbage.
Commericial programmers are often rejected and ejected by their peers or superiors for poor performance.
And Open Source software quality is at least as variable its commerical counterparts.
The only "insightful" comment here is that popular Open Source code profits from a massive peer review that commericial software cannot provide. But this observation has been often made by many (for example by Microsoft in the original Halloween document, if my memory servers me right).
I think a comment that superficial is not deserving of so many points.
Microsoft has been good at it historically.
However it is not clear how the same culture can:
1) Be good at identifying new market opportunities and moving in quickly (enough).
2) Defend its own turf (cash cows)
I think these require completely different mindsets, and the management can only really host one at at time. Microsoft has played both games well up to now, which is wierd, and maybe just luck, but can it do it forever?
We will see.
I don't think so. Hitler made some bad decisions, more than the pros would have made, but he wasn't as stupid militarily as people would like to think.
If you read about Soviet production statistics, it is hard to imagine them losing against Germany, short of Germany going nuclear.
The only reason the Soviets did so badly in the begining was because Stalin was stupid enough to kill all his decent officers. Once he stopped doing that, and let the surviving good ones emerge, then the odds were all on Russias side.
Even if D-Day hadn't happened the Soviets wouldd have overrun Germany eventually. D-Day's essential effect was to keep West-Germany (and Western Europe) away from the Soviets.
After all, the Soviets were 3-4 times bigger than Germany, and were only fighting on one front (and Germany had 3-4 other fronts to worry about).
Your joking right? That's like not swatting a mousquito because he has already been sucking for a minute or two and it wouldn't be fair.
Conservation of energy?
:)
Or does the air just get hotter? (thereby making the fan rather pointless)
Seems like some physical law is getting violated somewhere
This was actually done a lot, as most academics thought that the ALGOL syntax was clearly superior to the C syntax.
:)
For example Steve Bourne wrote the Bourne shell (from which BASH ultimately derives) in such a C macro dialect, and it remained in common use for decades afterward. Seems silly today.
This is related in Peter Van der Linden's Expert C Programming, Deep C Secrets along with lots of other cool programming legends. So if the above fact is false, blame him not me
That was Munich. Be interesting to see how that turns out. My guess is that IBM will be too eager to make a profit, and the Munich users won't be happy. I've heard some wierd things abouot how they are approaching things (lots of emulators and stuff).
:)
German bureaucrats are not known for their flexiblity and eagerness to learn new things.
But maybe I will be surprised
Really? What's her name?
300 lbs is pretty light for a gorilla I think...
Kilos maybe?
It was admittedly an off-hand comment, and (as you correctly recognised), is partly motivated by observing the amount of unproductive resources in the Universities (spelled it right this time :).
Nontheless, I think there are few people who would say that the Universities are producing important innovation at the rate that they did in the past. And their business model seems to have more to do with producing connected people than it does with producing knowledge.
And I also think that "private" research (i.e. non-commercial work done in people's free-time) is playing a bigger role than it has in the relatively recent past.
And if this is true, leads to other interesting questions (like is this sustainable)?
They laid off two-thirds of the company. It would be odd if Research wasn't similarly decimated (triated?).
I wonder if the "Open Source" is picking up the slack in basic research these days. I don't think Universitys have been too productive in my lifetime.
It worked wonders for me. Girls like fit guys and it is a nice balence to mental work.
I make my kids swim 500-1000 meters a week (they do freestyle now, takes them about 10-15 minutes, and they can play in the pool for about an hour beforehand)). They also do Jijitsu (I am clueless abou that).
We are sending our kids to acting classes, and they like it, even though my son is really quite the geek.
But you have to MAKE them do it. They will usually like it in the end, but most kids (people) have a huge amount of lethargy to overcome.
Hmmm. He did say elegant. Okay, I guess it probably is and I was completely out-of-line. Maybe I looked at too many obscure Algebra books in my math days.
Still I wonder about the liberalization of the patent and copyright laws too. Every heard of the "Tragedy of the Commons"?
Of course the other side is that maybe programming talent (and the basics for living) are no longer scarce resources, and we simply don't have to ration them. (Pretty and intellegent females (or males for that matter)are scace though). Maybe OSS software is just the price going to the variable cost of production (i.e. $0.00) in an ideally competitivte market, with totally free information flow.
I'll be curious to see. But it took 80 years for the best minds in the world to figure out if communism was a blessing or a curse. Maybe OSS will take as long.
I never looked at Wiles work, but I wonder if he himself would call that particular work "beautiful and elegant". 60 pages of obsccure algebra is elegant? Would Gauss or Newton have called it elegant? Brilliant however I would go along with.
In fact I think it is not clear what the best way to promote science and art is. Patronage begs the question as to who is going to get the patronage. And it is questionable if the masses (who are paying for it all don't forget) really want to pay for Science and Art for its own sake.
OTOH, enslaving the best ideas and minds of humankind to economic utility with patents and copyrights or just plain secrecy obviously has huge drawbacks.
I think the balence we have today seems not too far off the mark, but in the long run who knows?
And I personally feel that the Internet Bubble wouldn't have burst so soon if Hollywood could safely distribute content without fear losing it. A lot more fibre would have been lit.
Just some odd ramblings. But I do feel that the world of Mathematics is a shadow of its former glorious self.
And we all know how the market in Mathematicians is booming these days...
Maybe if there was a business model for Mathematics it would be in better shape. As it is they have to beg all their money from the government.
Lots of point there to answer...
:), were much nicer.
Tests of the 10000 test case sort should be automated, then boredom is not an issue.
I've written and maintained quite a few largeish (>10000 line) programs in my life, and those with extensive automated test suites (all right, there were only two of those
By the time a program gets large (and sucessful ones usually do (it is amazing how many unsucessful ones do too)), the way the "pieces work together", and "optimal architectures" are no longer an issue. I like Fowlers statement "Architecture is about decisions that are hard to change later".
Brand new shiny programs based on brand new shiny ideas are always more interesting than the old ones, just like everything else in life. But by the time they have a "complete feature set", they are old and wrinkly.
Admittedly Regression Testing is often not an option. There usually seem to be tests that are hard to automate, and they just don't get automated. And bugs occur there (maybe mostly there). I haven't seen much in the way of Automated Regression Testing, except in the NUnit project.
Regression test suites (if possible) should be maintained so that when bugs get fixed, they stay fixed.
Just my 2 cents.
Me too.
:)
Too often inactivity is labeled wise, when in reality it has another cause (indecision, distraction, procrastionation, or even worse).
I would rather do the wrong thing, then waste my life in inactivity. I used to think otherwise. But I have gotten older and time is getting shorter
Astronauts are supposed to risk their lives. That's their job. Just like soldiers or policemen. Anyway, how is sending someone to Mars going to be safer than a quick jaunt to the Hubble to fix some things.
O'Keefe is simply not being candid about his real goals, which is to garner votes for his boss anyway he can.
Your average Joe/Jane can't remember what the Hubble was, but might just recall that Bush wanted to do something cool like send heros to Mars.
It already is a big story. Face it, Linux on the Desktop for non-techies is "bleeding edge".
:)
IBM and SuSe are both involved though, so I am sure everything will go okay in the end
I live in a big city in Europe, and I used to use them to look at my work e-mail sometimes, but now I am afraid of keyloggers. There is no policy in my firm about not using these (we have OWA), but maybe there should be, we are all moving to SmartPhones and the like anyway now.
I like to surf in them sometimes though. While in airports waiting for example. And I find looking at the bulliten (sp) boards is a good way to find out what is happening locally.
Wireless stuff, USB hub, etc...
A cool project in and of itself. I am waiting for a 17" Flatscreen with built in speakers, a USB hub, and USB speakers. That way I can just run one USB wire to the PC for all that (still need power though).
I like having the mouse and keyboard attached, keeps the kids (and me) from running off with them (like they do with the remotes).
Work is about doing something for others so you can consume the things they produce. If they don't want the stuff you produce, there is no reason for them to give you their stuff.
Some people are lucky enough to get paid for what they love. Most aren't though.
Look and see who is hiring what kind of people in the place you want to live. If you see something there you want to do, THEN get certified and/or qualified and do that.
Geeks get hung up on what they *want* to do. Jobs are about doing things for other people. Find out what the people want, where you want to be and do that. Anything else is insane.
Networking is down because the market is saturated, supply exceeds demand. The same is true of Mathematical Programming (what I love to do). So I do Enterprise Programming. Much less interesting, but people want/need it, so I can make a living doing it (even that used to be easier though).
If Enterprise Programming goes down the tubes (read off-shore competition), then I will find something else. That's life.