Actually, Computer Science teaching seems to be different in Spain (where I currently live) too. For instance, in the UK Computer Science is predominantly a male thing, in Spain it is much more mixed.
So I guess in different countries it is different. Perhaps it is only in the UK where CS students tend to be lacking in other skills.
we even got to watch a video series "The Dream Machine" - the highlight of the first year:-)
I think this highlights the low intellectual standards of most CS courses, at least in the UK -the fact that they sat you down in front of a video series as part of the course.
As a biology undergraduate, a lecturer would have given you a list of books and papers to read in your own time. You would then be expected to have sufficient knowledge and analytical power to stand in front of the class to debate an issue, such as "Has the development of computers had a positive or negative impact on peoples lives?" or whatever.
I can imagine a bunch of CS students sat in front of a video thinking "this is great, at least they're not making us do proper work".
I also graduated from a university in England, although it was ten years ago now.
I studied a combined degree of biology and computer science, and so I used to take courses from both the biology and the CS schools.
What struck me then was what a bunch of dunderheads the computer scientists where. Sure, they new the finer points of Unix better than I ever will, but if you asked them to write an essay on the importance of computers to society, for instance, they could hardly string two words together - an average biology student could have done a far better job of it. Frankly most of their essays were embarrassing in their childish views, ignorance, poor grammar and spelling.
And my point is? Well, at least in my experience, I think that many people who are hardcore computer enthusiasts generally have a far more myopic view of the world than people from other subject areas. They are socially inept and interested in very little else but computers, and even then in very narrow fields of computers rather than the bigger picture. I don't know if it has changed, but when I graduated many big employeers complained that computer graduates often lacked the most basic skills. Is it like this in the USA too?
I think it is hilarious that this post has been moderated as insightful and informative. In the UK most people would recognise that this post is 'taking the piss'. It's meant to be funny and is mocking the stupidity of some slashdotters.
Obviously my English humour is too subtle for some people.
You use that word a lot.. I do not think it means what you think it means.
The definition of irony I gave was taken from a dictionary. Sarcasm is defined as a cutting, often ironic remark intended to wound.
You may be confused by that song by Alanis Morissette, in which she uses a slightly different meaning of ironic - something that happens that's the opposite of what you expect.
Irony is the use of words to express something different from and often opposite to their literal meaning. Satire is a literary work (such as a Slashdot posting;-) in which human vice or folly is attacked through irony, derision, or wit.
Satire can sometimes be difficult to spot, especially for those of low intelligence. However, people who use irony often leave clues that they are not being serious.
If you read a posting on Slashdot that appears to contain extreme views, and statements that are obviously untrue, it could just be a troll. However, be careful! It might be satire! Then you'll look stupid if you respond to it seriously. If you're not sure or are confused, then it's better not to respond.
I am outraged by all these people attacking the recording industry. If it wasn't for them then how would any band succeed? I think the internet is going to do incredible damage to musicians and their ability to earn an honest living.
I have my own pop band and one day we're hoping to be really big. We've sent tapes to some of the big record companies, but so far we've been rejected. Apparently we're not commercial enough, but we'll keep trying.
But guess what - people have been copying and distributing our music on the internet! Some of our so called 'fans' came to one of our concerts and made a recording of some of the songs, then they emailed them to their friends and suddenly we found that thousands of people were distributing our music without our permission! Some 'fans' set up web sites without our permission, with photographs and with virtually all the songs we played at the concert downloadable. We have sent them emails to tell the to take them down, and if they don't then we'll be contacting our lawyers.
Some of these 'fans' had the cheek to email us and ask us when we were next going to play a concert. We've decided that from now on we are not going to publicise our concerts to prevent these types of parasites coming.
I think we're going to really big and popular one day, but of course that can only happen with the help of the big record companies, so lay off them!
Responding to recent events on Earth, Bill Gates, the creator of the omniscient Windows, used by billions of computer users worldwide, angrily clarified His license agreement today.
"Look, I don't know, maybe I haven't made myself completely clear, so for the record, here it is again" said Bill, visibly angry.
"Somehow, people keep getting the idea that I don't mind them giving away or reselling copies of Windows. Well, I do mind. And to be honest, I'm really getting sick and tired of it. Get it straight. Not only can you not copy or give away Windows, but you can't resell a copy bought from an OEM. I don't care if you're a school, a charity, or a damn orphanage, the rules apply to you."
"I don't care how poor you are, or how much you need a copy of Windows. If someone tells you I don't mind you making a copy, they're wrong. Got it? I own it all, ok? It's all there in the license agreement. It all belongs to me. You mean nothing to me. You bunch of fucking loosers."
We should all be thankful to Microsoft for tracking down these criminals. People like this are a menace to modern society. Microsoft employees have seen their stock options slide significantly in recent months, a cause of considerable stress for them. People who freely give away computers or sell for peanuts on auction sites - often without the proper licenses and documentation - these people are no better than thieves. Schools, charities for homeless people and orphanages are all implicated in this evil trade, which is causing some Microsoft employees to turn gray with worry. Well done Microsoft, you are a role model for us all.
I think this is a great idea. People who copy music and distribute it on the internet are robbing artists of their rightful earnings. After all, the RIAA is really just a kind of charity that collects money for poor musicians.
I think they should go further. They should allow the RIAA to break into people's houses to check that they don't have any music copies on cassette. If they do, the RIAA should be allowed to smash up their music system. And crap on their carpet.
Spanish-speaking people can also speak English [1]
[1] excludes New York, Texas, California, Florida
Ha. That's funny. What you mean to say is that most latin americans living in some parts of the USA can speak English. The world is a big place you know. The vast majority of the people of this world cannot speak English.
Why don't you take a trip to China or Columbia and see how you get on only speaking English?
Actually I used XML for 3 months. WHy is it when anyone disagrees with someone on here they're immediately labelled as ignorant? Insecurity perhaps?
I complained about your posting being modded as 'insightful' because the posting contained dumb comments:
XML is just the current flavour of the month
This is a dumb comment. XML is built on top the experience of SGML, which has been around for a long time. If you understand the issues involved in software integration across multiple systems then you should understand why XML is a very important standard.
Unicode is 2 bytes per char, ascii is 1. A simple converstion program is trivial to write, you simply have to find the mappings.
Saying this is dumb in the context of the orginal question and also demonstrates a lack of understanding of what's involved in enterprise level software development.
Actually I used XML for 3 months.
So? I am fluent in Spanish. That doesn't mean that I am qualified to make comments about South American politics.
Seriously, there's a huge difference between someone with trivial experience and someone who has worked on major projects at an enterprise level. So I stick by my original comment - you don't know what you are talking about in this context.
spanish: (a) everyone would be spitting all over eachother. That's just the way the language is.
I live in Spain and speak spanish. I've never found people spitting on each other a problem, perhaps you're thinking of a particular country in South America.
(b) It has bizarre gender constructions.
Bizarre?? Lots of languagues, perhaps the majority, have this.
English has many idiosyncracies, one of the worst for people that are learning it are that it isn't pronounced as it is written. In this respect, Spanish is much more sensible and easier to learn. Also, phrasal verbs are a nightmare for anyone trying to learn English. In this respect Spanish is also easier.
(c) It has annoying verb tense constructions. In english, one can easily construct new tenses to deal with problems encountered when talking about time travel/relativity in physics. "He would have been going to do that last week". That's a pain in the ass in spanish.
This is relatively obscure. All working languages have their idiosyncracies, including English.
Hence, native spanish speakers have a much shakier grasp of the concept of time.
If your client is Excel (don't ask) that complicates matters.
Do you mean Microsoft Excel? Do you mind expanding on this a bit, because I am doing a project at the moment that involves a translation agency giving us translated files in Excel in lots of different languages.
I'm finding it depressing seeing how things get modded here. This has been modded as funny??
The guy is absolutely right - using UTF-8 solves lots of problems when having to use legacy software with Unicode. I did one project working with twelve languages, including arabic, japanese, hindi and welsh, and we just used SED to search and replace marker tags in hundreds of UTF-8 files. Worked a treat.
It should be fairly obvious to anyone who is knowledgeable about technology (I hope that includes most Slashdot moderators) that this guy doesn't know what he is talking about.
At the end of the day, if can happily do everything I need to do with one company, why not stick with them?
There's a simple answer to that - because you then give the company the power to screw you. The question is not sticking to one company, but choosing a partner that uses open standards which do not lock you in.
Microsoft is beinging to turn the screws by increasing their licencing fees, which at least in the UK is upsetting an awful lot of big organisations. They are only able to do this because of their 'vendor lock-in'.
Re:Which european country should I migrate to?
on
EU May Fine Microsoft
·
· Score: 2
Really depends what you want - they're all different!
I've moved around a bit and I'm quite happy in Spain. Good climate, great food, friendly people. The legal system is screwed up but the politics isn't as corrupt as I expected it to be and it's improving all the time.
Your education may be free, but it's not accessible like it is in the US.
Hmm... Surely it's just a different kind of accessibility. In the US a good education is available to those who have the money to pay for it. In Europe those who want to study in the best universities need the brains and motivation to get in, not the money.
It is different with schools and colleges, and I think the experience you describe wouldn't be considered unusual in Europe - there's free education available to virtually anyone who is motivated enough to seek it.
Slashdot Mirror
That's a typo. We all make mistakes.
Good looking too, but smoking is the in thing there,
;-)
This I can agree with.
only the French beat them as far as not bathing.
This I would really disagree with. Most Spanish are fairly obsessive about physical hygene, especially the females.
No, the worst thing about Spanish girls with that it takes such a long time to get into their pants
Taking of which: Your own grammer is not so hot is it. Even this illiterate CS grad has spotted eleven mistakes in your post.
You've spotted eleven mistakes in my "grammer"? For someone who can't even spell it that's quite an achievement.
Having re-read my original post I will admit to a couple of basic mistakes and typos. But eleven? Please do enlighten me.
Actually, Computer Science teaching seems to be different in Spain (where I currently live) too. For instance, in the UK Computer Science is predominantly a male thing, in Spain it is much more mixed.
So I guess in different countries it is different. Perhaps it is only in the UK where CS students tend to be lacking in other skills.
we even got to watch a video series "The Dream Machine" - the highlight of the first year :-)
I think this highlights the low intellectual standards of most CS courses, at least in the UK -the fact that they sat you down in front of a video series as part of the course.
As a biology undergraduate, a lecturer would have given you a list of books and papers to read in your own time. You would then be expected to have sufficient knowledge and analytical power to stand in front of the class to debate an issue, such as "Has the development of computers had a positive or negative impact on peoples lives?" or whatever.
I can imagine a bunch of CS students sat in front of a video thinking "this is great, at least they're not making us do proper work".
I also graduated from a university in England, although it was ten years ago now.
I studied a combined degree of biology and computer science, and so I used to take courses from both the biology and the CS schools.
What struck me then was what a bunch of dunderheads the computer scientists where. Sure, they new the finer points of Unix better than I ever will, but if you asked them to write an essay on the importance of computers to society, for instance, they could hardly string two words together - an average biology student could have done a far better job of it. Frankly most of their essays were embarrassing in their childish views, ignorance, poor grammar and spelling.
And my point is? Well, at least in my experience, I think that many people who are hardcore computer enthusiasts generally have a far more myopic view of the world than people from other subject areas. They are socially inept and interested in very little else but computers, and even then in very narrow fields of computers rather than the bigger picture. I don't know if it has changed, but when I graduated many big employeers complained that computer graduates often lacked the most basic skills. Is it like this in the USA too?
I think it is hilarious that this post has been moderated as insightful and informative. In the UK most people would recognise that this post is 'taking the piss'. It's meant to be funny and is mocking the stupidity of some slashdotters.
Obviously my English humour is too subtle for some people.
You use that word a lot.. I do not think it means what you think it means.
The definition of irony I gave was taken from a dictionary. Sarcasm is defined as a cutting, often ironic remark intended to wound.
You may be confused by that song by Alanis Morissette, in which she uses a slightly different meaning of ironic - something that happens that's the opposite of what you expect.
Look them up in a dictionary.
Irony is the use of words to express something different from and often opposite to their literal meaning. Satire is a literary work (such as a Slashdot posting;-) in which human vice or folly is attacked through irony, derision, or wit.
Satire can sometimes be difficult to spot, especially for those of low intelligence. However, people who use irony often leave clues that they are not being serious.
If you read a posting on Slashdot that appears to contain extreme views, and statements that are obviously untrue, it could just be a troll. However, be careful! It might be satire! Then you'll look stupid if you respond to it seriously. If you're not sure or are confused, then it's better not to respond.
I am outraged by all these people attacking the recording industry. If it wasn't for them then how would any band succeed? I think the internet is going to do incredible damage to musicians and their ability to earn an honest living.
I have my own pop band and one day we're hoping to be really big. We've sent tapes to some of the big record companies, but so far we've been rejected. Apparently we're not commercial enough, but we'll keep trying.
But guess what - people have been copying and distributing our music on the internet! Some of our so called 'fans' came to one of our concerts and made a recording of some of the songs, then they emailed them to their friends and suddenly we found that thousands of people were distributing our music without our permission! Some 'fans' set up web sites without our permission, with photographs and with virtually all the songs we played at the concert downloadable. We have sent them emails to tell the to take them down, and if they don't then we'll be contacting our lawyers.
Some of these 'fans' had the cheek to email us and ask us when we were next going to play a concert. We've decided that from now on we are not going to publicise our concerts to prevent these types of parasites coming.
I think we're going to really big and popular one day, but of course that can only happen with the help of the big record companies, so lay off them!
Responding to recent events on Earth, Bill Gates, the creator of the omniscient Windows, used by billions of computer users worldwide, angrily clarified His license agreement today.
"Look, I don't know, maybe I haven't made myself completely clear, so for the record, here it is again" said Bill, visibly angry.
"Somehow, people keep getting the idea that I don't mind them giving away or reselling copies of Windows. Well, I do mind. And to be honest, I'm really getting sick and tired of it. Get it straight. Not only can you not copy or give away Windows, but you can't resell a copy bought from an OEM. I don't care if you're a school, a charity, or a damn orphanage, the rules apply to you."
"I don't care how poor you are, or how much you need a copy of Windows. If someone tells you I don't mind you making a copy, they're wrong. Got it? I own it all, ok? It's all there in the license agreement. It all belongs to me. You mean nothing to me. You bunch of fucking loosers."
And he sniggered.
We should all be thankful to Microsoft for tracking down these criminals. People like this are a menace to modern society. Microsoft employees have seen their stock options slide significantly in recent months, a cause of considerable stress for them. People who freely give away computers or sell for peanuts on auction sites - often without the proper licenses and documentation - these people are no better than thieves. Schools, charities for homeless people and orphanages are all implicated in this evil trade, which is causing some Microsoft employees to turn gray with worry. Well done Microsoft, you are a role model for us all.
I think this is a great idea. People who copy music and distribute it on the internet are robbing artists of their rightful earnings. After all, the RIAA is really just a kind of charity that collects money for poor musicians.
I think they should go further. They should allow the RIAA to break into people's houses to check that they don't have any music copies on cassette. If they do, the RIAA should be allowed to smash up their music system. And crap on their carpet.
the US is still more "free" than Iraq or Afghanistan
Errm. Yes. You're right. It's not got quite that bad yet.
Perhaps it would be better to make your comparisons against, for instance, Australia and Europe? Just a suggestion.
DMCA
SSSCA
USA Act
Now I think you Americans have also given up the right to call your country 'Land of the free'.
Someone will probably mod this as funny but really it's sad.
Spanish-speaking people can also speak English [1]
[1] excludes New York, Texas, California, Florida
Ha. That's funny. What you mean to say is that most latin americans living in some parts of the USA can speak English. The world is a big place you know. The vast majority of the people of this world cannot speak English.
Why don't you take a trip to China or Columbia and see how you get on only speaking English?
Thanks for spending the time to reply to my query.
Actually I used XML for 3 months. WHy is it when anyone disagrees with someone on here they're immediately labelled as ignorant? Insecurity perhaps?
I complained about your posting being modded as 'insightful' because the posting contained dumb comments:
XML is just the current flavour of the month
This is a dumb comment. XML is built on top the experience of SGML, which has been around for a long time. If you understand the issues involved in software integration across multiple systems then you should understand why XML is a very important standard.
Unicode is 2 bytes per char, ascii is 1. A simple converstion program is trivial to write, you simply have to find the mappings.
Saying this is dumb in the context of the orginal question and also demonstrates a lack of understanding of what's involved in enterprise level software development.
Actually I used XML for 3 months.
So? I am fluent in Spanish. That doesn't mean that I am qualified to make comments about South American politics.
Seriously, there's a huge difference between someone with trivial experience and someone who has worked on major projects at an enterprise level. So I stick by my original comment - you don't know what you are talking about in this context.
spanish: (a) everyone would be spitting all over eachother. That's just the way the language is.
I live in Spain and speak spanish. I've never found people spitting on each other a problem, perhaps you're thinking of a particular country in South America.
(b) It has bizarre gender constructions.
Bizarre?? Lots of languagues, perhaps the majority, have this.
English has many idiosyncracies, one of the worst for people that are learning it are that it isn't pronounced as it is written. In this respect, Spanish is much more sensible and easier to learn. Also, phrasal verbs are a nightmare for anyone trying to learn English. In this respect Spanish is also easier.
(c) It has annoying verb tense constructions. In english, one can easily construct new tenses to deal with problems encountered when talking about time travel/relativity in physics. "He would have been going to do that last week". That's a pain in the ass in spanish.
This is relatively obscure. All working languages have their idiosyncracies, including English.
Hence, native spanish speakers have a much shakier grasp of the concept of time.
Is this a joke?
If your client is Excel (don't ask) that complicates matters.
Do you mean Microsoft Excel? Do you mind expanding on this a bit, because I am doing a project at the moment that involves a translation agency giving us translated files in Excel in lots of different languages.
I'm finding it depressing seeing how things get modded here. This has been modded as funny??
The guy is absolutely right - using UTF-8 solves lots of problems when having to use legacy software with Unicode. I did one project working with twelve languages, including arabic, japanese, hindi and welsh, and we just used SED to search and replace marker tags in hundreds of UTF-8 files. Worked a treat.
Why has this been modded as insightful?
It should be fairly obvious to anyone who is knowledgeable about technology (I hope that includes most Slashdot moderators) that this guy doesn't know what he is talking about.
At the end of the day, if can happily do everything I need to do with one company, why not stick with them?
There's a simple answer to that - because you then give the company the power to screw you. The question is not sticking to one company, but choosing a partner that uses open standards which do not lock you in.
Microsoft is beinging to turn the screws by increasing their licencing fees, which at least in the UK is upsetting an awful lot of big organisations. They are only able to do this because of their 'vendor lock-in'.
Really depends what you want - they're all different!
I've moved around a bit and I'm quite happy in Spain. Good climate, great food, friendly people. The legal system is screwed up but the politics isn't as corrupt as I expected it to be and it's improving all the time.
Your education may be free, but it's not accessible like it is in the US.
Hmm... Surely it's just a different kind of accessibility. In the US a good education is available to those who have the money to pay for it. In Europe those who want to study in the best universities need the brains and motivation to get in, not the money.
It is different with schools and colleges, and I think the experience you describe wouldn't be considered unusual in Europe - there's free education available to virtually anyone who is motivated enough to seek it.