When we did, we looked for C++ developers and stopped the pain, and increased the quality of our code overall. Hmm. I hope this doesn't become a problem for those of us still using C rather than C++ - we may find ourselves pushed out of our current jobs as the job spec changes to requrire C++ skills our employers aren't willing to support our retraining on.... --
Odd, one of the problems I've seen is that lecturers concentrate on the C++ aspects of C++ too much and give the C aspects short-shrift. The biggest problem I see in day to day coding maintaining stuff written by people who are poor C++ coders is overuse and misuse of the advanced parts of C++. If I had a nickle every time multiple inheritance was used unneccesarily... I've obviously been away from Academia too long <grin> - When I learnt C, C++ was still in it's new, shiny wrapper, and most of the lecturers were obscessed with Pascal anyhow:+) --
I can just imagine Bjarne's eyes rolling back, and then him taking a deep breath when he read this question. I can see how the style it was written in (confrontational and almost a direct attack) could be a little daunting, but there *is* a important question in there, and I think he made a game attempt to answer it - what it comes down to is "How tied is C++ to the OO methodologies, can it evolve to whatever is or could replace it in the near future, and if it can, in what directions would you expect it to evolve?" --
Elegantly said. C++ is a little tougher and takes a little effort to learn. The key word being effort. As a PHB I've found that developers who write marginal code in C did write poor code in C++, however I think this comes down to both a person who uses tools and resources targeted to meet a specific purpose and people who stay whith what is comfortable to them reguardless of the fact they may be using the wrong tool for the job. Guilty as charged <grin>. I have largely ended up writing C code thinly disguised as C++ for years - not really due to comfort or singlemindedness though, but due to the fact I can write decent C, and if I had to suffer through my C++ puppyhood in a production environment, my job would be on the line. It took me four or five years to learn to write decent procedural-language paycode - and how many employers are willing to have an employee currently producing usable code effectively not there for that length of time? --
I'm amazed that no question regarding his opinion on Java didn't make it through moderation. I'm sure it scored highly - but when you are limited to ten, it's difficult to select such a small subset to give from such a wide pool of possible queries. One point I did find interesting was the statement that he "peeked" at the raw questions on/. - and wondered if it would be possible to have a more interactive layout for this - maybe even convice some of our potential questionees to take part in the initial trawling and guide some of the comments with short replies. Does he feel Java is a competitor? or just another implementation to solve a different set of problems (e.g. web-programming)? I am slowing learning this too <grin> but also see it as aimed at a different set of problems - one where compatibility and visual effect is more important than power and scope. I could be wrong of course:+)
Or maybe this is in the FAQ? Not that I have ever seen. --
Bjarne mentions the poor education of C++ programmers frequently in this interview. I can't help but think, is this poor education a direct result of the complexity of the language? More likely the fact that C++ tends to be taught by lecturers more familiar with C. I suspect better training for lecturers would result in better training for students:+)
I think that it's a much shorter learning curve to learn the C language fairly well than C++. I think this has helped in the Gnome project, although I'm sure there are people who feel differently. I suspect a lot depends on what you have learned before it - I found C easy to learn having already studied Basic, Cobol and Pascal - all procedural languages. Had I went from a base of OO language to C++, I would probably have regarded the C subset as a primitive reminant suitable only for things not worth wasting the full glory of objects on.....
That said, many of the historical reasons for disliking C++ are becoming obsolete. In particular, the language seems to be settling down standards-wise, and there are now decent implementations to be had, both free and non. I've only used C++ sparingly in my own work so far, but I look forward to expanding my use of the language. I am being dragged kicking and screaming into C++:+) well, I might not be THAT badly off, but the Microsoft Visual C++ compilers seem to go out of their way to make using classic C awkward, so I am having to adopt C++ in self defence. --
Wow! Can he do no wrong? I guess there's just nothing wrong with C++ at all. There's nothing that could have been better implemented. I think this is far from a problem - what he is saying is that anything he saw as being wrong he has fixed or is fixing - If someone builds a tool, and it is perfectly suited to his hands and his reach, then you also use that tool, and find it less well suited, it just means you are different to him - not that either of you are "wrong" in some abstract sense..... --
I guess it's patent based around process and discovery of process. Much in the same way you can have the madness of naturally occuring genetic material being patented by companies... Justified through process of use and extraction... I don't dispute that (well, I do, but that is another matter <grin>) what I *do* dispute is that their discovery required enough effort to justify a patent - this is stuff a high-school project could have done..... --
Re:This is getting a lot of attention.
on
Victory in Holland
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· Score: 2
I hear they have books there that ACTUALLY TALK about sexual health! Burn them! burn them all! --
3. The problem with the patent system is that they are granting completely bogus patents on things in textbooks. When someone invents something new, they deserve a patent. Invents new, not discovers old. Everything in computer science was done in the 70, get over it already. It seems to be the New Wave for patents - first, we have a whole heap of commonly accepted business methods patented as being "applied to the web"; the next wave now seems to be "applied to Linux". will we have a whole heap of patents "applied to radio transmissions" now that WAP providers are coming in? --
I have a feeling this should have a "patent gone mad" icon rather than a genius one - that they have noticed that standard alge, deprived of sulphur, produce Hydrogen is of course a useful product of research, but seems to rank below discovering that rubber dropped on a hot stove vulcanises - and they rejected that one fast enough..... --
Hmm. I had a quick look, but it DOES seem that the engine keeps a cached copy of each image (as a thumbnail?) on the server media.ditto.com. I can see both plusses and minuses for this approach; the big plusses are obviously:
Servers don't get/.tted every time they appear on a search result for something totally different (for example, a search for tigers looking for big stripy animals, turning up a tiger woods fansite)
You don't end up with a pageful of "broken link" images
Websites can't pull a bait-and-switch - swapping out a pre-indexed image for something different (like porn or advertising)
to be honest though, as long as the search engines *are* just search engines, he should be glad of the free publicity and stop trying to make an extra buck on top.... --
I don't really think this is a major issue - it appears to be a pretty standard RedHat distro, with the correct hardware setup already made; OEM copies of Windows (in particular, the HP varient that doesn't even HAVE a real install disk, just a flashable image) have been doing this for years in the Microsoft world, without people saying it is going to splinter Windows and end the Windows dream..... --
I think a lot depends here on the market they will be aiming at - if they go for the executive large-screen laptop market (ultrathin laptops don't have much battery space, so tend to need frequent recharges) then the price can be astronomical and it will still sell. if they want to compete with traditional desktop monitors, though, they will need to compete on price AND have a low failure rate for individual pixels I WOULD like to see a nice, flat 21" monitor capable of 1600x though:+) --
This frightens me - not because of the potential of encrypted computer displays, but of Digital video players piping directly to a digital display suddenly requiring a card to access the signal from hardware you have bought, running a film you have already paid for - with reverse engineering of it prohibited by the same rules the DVD organisation is using against DeCSS. Market forces have already seen off the last attempt to produce pay-per-view videos - this could be an attempt to sneek them back in by the back door. --
1) People should get a rating based on the TIME they have been a Slashdot, not just this "karma". New members posts start at -1, no exceptions. After three months, they start at 0. After three more months, they start at 1. This means that if a troll wants to troll, he'll have to put in his dues for six months. If he then wants to blow it all on a single, grand, troll parade...fine. He can start all over.
I disagree - if a time-based limit is what you are after, you should consider making it on a per-article basis, as follows:
*NO* AC posts at all for the first ten minutes
*NO* AC replies directly to the article (root posts) for the first twenty minutes
New users are subject to AC rule for the first week of their account (and must make five posts not moderated down before they lose their Newbie status)
...VERY good... but is it ready? The last version out the door was very flaky, hideously slow, and not particularly complete,IMHO. This -summer-, maybe. But SPRING? AOL must be really into IE to do something =that= fatal to Mozilla. Not to sure if that will really matter. What netscape/AOL have the advantage on is that they can merge in their existing Communicator source, replacing anything Mozilla does better with the Mozilla versions, but leaving the original Communicator code for stuff Mozilla is currently shaky at intact. --
X = Bandwidth now Y = Bandwidth once they block dialpad where X and Y both vary wildly and unprecictably
X - Y = Bandwidth due to dialpad go for it - If I get to pick the points on the graph where you measure x and y, I can prove Dialpad uses negative bandwidth:+) --
Hmm...you basically just described the process for making a conventional CD master, except on the master stamp all the pits are inverted. the life of the disc) well, partially (the process is close) but the idea is to get a single, playable CD with as durable a construction as possible. metal and glass rather than foil and plastic, and so forth --
You're right. I assume (hope) Mr. Katz knows the difference as well. But... The DVD CCA sued claiming that that is what DeCSS was for. They claimed that DeCSS was solely to illegally copy DVDs. Yes, this is wrong, and that is part of the problem with their case. No DeCSS is needed to duplicate DVDs. DeCSS is just needed to view them. I think what Munky was referring to was that the DVD CCA used selected, out of context posts from slashdot to boost their own case. Given that they seem to assume every/. poster (especially the anonymous ones) are defacto spokespersons for the internet users as a whole, having a misspeak like that in the main story header is just playing into their hands. --
How about this: Make a standard backup of your vital data. Take it to a special "data preservation agent" who will probably do it as a sideline for normal Disaster Recovery stuff Agent makes an optical mask of a CDR image onto a blank, metal disk optical mask is acid-etched to give a metallic CD (using two metals with noticably different optical properties, or burning right though if the disk is thin enough) in a suitable atmosphere, mold glass around the metal disk to give you a metal-and-glass CD. place in padded, light-opaque, metal case, and state you only guarantee the data readable if it is kept in that case full-time.
Obviously, the DRA would need to keep some hardware capable of reading these, but as he will probably be offering vaulting services for these disks anyhow, he will be wanting to access them on demand in any case. Any comments? --
I think the case would be better stated as follows:
You have bought a shiny new $ITEM from your local department store, and it comes with a nice, uniformed man who will set it up in your front room for you, and also install another nice, uniformed man whose only function is to unlock the front of $ITEM whenever you want to use it. However, you don't want to be in your front room; you tend to sit in the kitchen where it is warmer, and there is more access to food and other essentials. unfortunately, the nice uniformed man in the front room refuses to work in the kitchen - you need a kitchen man for that, it's against his union rules. so, you contact the supplier, and ask them to send you a kitchen-man. unfortunately, they don't think kitchens are important enough places for $ITEM that they are willing to train kitchen man; they say that yes, you have bought $ITEM, but if you don't choose to use it in the front room, then you can't use it. Enter your local Norwegian kid (what? you don't have one? then get one! they come in handy for all sorts of things) who looks at the key in the front-room guy's hand and makes you a new one. you are now happy - if you use $ITEM in the front room, you can let the uniformed guy do his thing; if you use it in the kitchen, you can use the Norwegian kid's key. The fact you can now use the key in the front room as well doesn't matter, as it's your choice anyhow, yes? NO. the manufacturers you contacted initially rush to court, and make your key illegal. they scream that the guy in the front room shouldn't have had the key where the norwegian kid could see it - it should have been safely in his pocket when not in use - and therefore you shouldn't be allowed to use the copied key. Moreover, they also say you shouldn't even be able to tell people where they can get a key, and to make sure the norwegian kid doesn't make any more, have him arrested and his key-making kit confiscated - and arrest his father too, just to be on the safe side.
This sounds a _lot_ like the tactics shown by some well-known software manufacturers, at least one springs directly into mind:) Maybe the MPAA had better be careful - Microsoft may ALREADY have done the "patent this business method as applied to the web" thing (henceforth to be called "doing an Amazon") and they may find themselves retroactively in breach of a MS patent - and they are more overlawyered than the MPAA - difficult though that is to visualise.
This is completely unconstitutional. Everyone should have a freedom of choice. Entering a dormitory is not the same as entering a prison. Just because university is loosing a contract (which is basically a legalized monopoly) does not mean that it can ban other choices? I doubt it - if the university chooses to provide one service (web access) but not another (free long-distance phones) you can't really scream that you are being denied a basic right - particularly as free long-distance phones are uncommon in the normal setup. --
Slashdot Mirror
When we did, we looked for C++ developers and stopped the pain, and increased the quality of our code overall.
Hmm. I hope this doesn't become a problem for those of us still using C rather than C++ - we may find ourselves pushed out of our current jobs as the job spec changes to requrire C++ skills our employers aren't willing to support our retraining on....
--
Odd, one of the problems I've seen is that lecturers concentrate on the C++ aspects of C++ too much and give the C aspects short-shrift. The biggest problem I see in day to day coding maintaining stuff written by people who are poor C++ coders is overuse and misuse of the advanced parts of C++. If I had a nickle every time multiple inheritance was used unneccesarily... :+)
I've obviously been away from Academia too long <grin> - When I learnt C, C++ was still in it's new, shiny wrapper, and most of the lecturers were obscessed with Pascal anyhow
--
I can just imagine Bjarne's eyes rolling back, and then him taking a deep breath when he read this question.
I can see how the style it was written in (confrontational and almost a direct attack) could be a little daunting, but there *is* a important question in there, and I think he made a game attempt to answer it - what it comes down to is "How tied is C++ to the OO methodologies, can it evolve to whatever is or could replace it in the near future, and if it can, in what directions would you expect it to evolve?"
--
Elegantly said. C++ is a little tougher and takes a little effort to learn. The key word being effort. As a PHB I've found that developers who write marginal code in C did write poor code in C++, however I think this comes down to both a person who uses tools and resources targeted to meet a specific purpose and people who stay whith what is comfortable to them reguardless of the fact they may be using the wrong tool for the job.
Guilty as charged <grin>. I have largely ended up writing C code thinly disguised as C++ for years - not really due to comfort or singlemindedness though, but due to the fact I can write decent C, and if I had to suffer through my C++ puppyhood in a production environment, my job would be on the line. It took me four or five years to learn to write decent procedural-language paycode - and how many employers are willing to have an employee currently producing usable code effectively not there for that length of time?
--
I'm sure it scored highly - but when you are limited to ten, it's difficult to select such a small subset to give from such a wide pool of possible queries.
One point I did find interesting was the statement that he "peeked" at the raw questions on
I am slowing learning this too <grin> but also see it as aimed at a different set of problems - one where compatibility and visual effect is more important than power and scope. I could be wrong of course
Or maybe this is in the FAQ?
Not that I have ever seen.
--
More likely the fact that C++ tends to be taught by lecturers more familiar with C. I suspect better training for lecturers would result in better training for students
I think that it's a much shorter learning curve to learn the C language fairly well than C++. I think this has helped in the Gnome project, although I'm sure there are people who feel differently.
I suspect a lot depends on what you have learned before it - I found C easy to learn having already studied Basic, Cobol and Pascal - all procedural languages. Had I went from a base of OO language to C++, I would probably have regarded the C subset as a primitive reminant suitable only for things not worth wasting the full glory of objects on.....
That said, many of the historical reasons for disliking C++ are becoming obsolete. In particular, the language seems to be settling down standards-wise, and there are now decent implementations to be had, both free and non. I've only used C++ sparingly in my own work so far, but I look forward to expanding my use of the language. :+)
I am being dragged kicking and screaming into C++
well, I might not be THAT badly off, but the Microsoft Visual C++ compilers seem to go out of their way to make using classic C awkward, so I am having to adopt C++ in self defence.
--
Wow! Can he do no wrong? I guess there's just nothing wrong with C++ at all. There's nothing that could have been better implemented.
I think this is far from a problem - what he is saying is that anything he saw as being wrong he has fixed or is fixing - If someone builds a tool, and it is perfectly suited to his hands and his reach, then you also use that tool, and find it less well suited, it just means you are different to him - not that either of you are "wrong" in some abstract sense.....
--
I guess it's patent based around process and discovery of process. Much in the same way you can have the madness of naturally occuring genetic material being patented by companies... Justified through process of use and extraction...
I don't dispute that (well, I do, but that is another matter <grin>) what I *do* dispute is that their discovery required enough effort to justify a patent - this is stuff a high-school project could have done.....
--
I hear they have books there that ACTUALLY TALK about sexual health! Burn them! burn them all!
--
3. The problem with the patent system is that they are granting completely bogus patents on things in textbooks. When someone invents something new, they deserve a patent. Invents new, not discovers old. Everything in computer science was done in the 70, get over it already.
It seems to be the New Wave for patents - first, we have a whole heap of commonly accepted business methods patented as being "applied to the web"; the next wave now seems to be "applied to Linux". will we have a whole heap of patents "applied to radio transmissions" now that WAP providers are coming in?
--
I have a feeling this should have a "patent gone mad" icon rather than a genius one - that they have noticed that standard alge, deprived of sulphur, produce Hydrogen is of course a useful product of research, but seems to rank below discovering that rubber dropped on a hot stove vulcanises - and they rejected that one fast enough.....
--
erm - correct me if I am wrong of course, but doesn't it use the hydrogen to make simple sugars and starches, and release the oxygen?
--
I can see both plusses and minuses for this approach; the big plusses are obviously:
to be honest though, as long as the search engines *are* just search engines, he should be glad of the free publicity and stop trying to make an extra buck on top....
--
I don't really think this is a major issue - it appears to be a pretty standard RedHat distro, with the correct hardware setup already made; OEM copies of Windows (in particular, the HP varient that doesn't even HAVE a real install disk, just a flashable image) have been doing this for years in the Microsoft world, without people saying it is going to splinter Windows and end the Windows dream.....
--
I think a lot depends here on the market they will be aiming at - if they go for the executive large-screen laptop market (ultrathin laptops don't have much battery space, so tend to need frequent recharges) then the price can be astronomical and it will still sell. if they want to compete with traditional desktop monitors, though, they will need to compete on price AND have a low failure rate for individual pixels :+)
I WOULD like to see a nice, flat 21" monitor capable of 1600x though
--
This frightens me - not because of the potential of encrypted computer displays, but of Digital video players piping directly to a digital display suddenly requiring a card to access the signal from hardware you have bought, running a film you have already paid for - with reverse engineering of it prohibited by the same rules the DVD organisation is using against DeCSS.
Market forces have already seen off the last attempt to produce pay-per-view videos - this could be an attempt to sneek them back in by the back door.
--
--
...VERY good... but is it ready? The last version out the door was very flaky, hideously slow, and not particularly complete,IMHO.
This -summer-, maybe. But SPRING? AOL must be really into IE to do something =that= fatal to Mozilla.
Not to sure if that will really matter. What netscape/AOL have the advantage on is that they can merge in their existing Communicator source, replacing anything Mozilla does better with the Mozilla versions, but leaving the original Communicator code for stuff Mozilla is currently shaky at intact.
--
Y = Bandwidth once they block dialpad
where X and Y both vary wildly and unprecictably
X - Y = Bandwidth due to dialpad :+)
go for it - If I get to pick the points on the graph where you measure x and y, I can prove Dialpad uses negative bandwidth
--
Hmm...you basically just described the process for making a conventional CD master, except on the master stamp all the pits are inverted. the life of the disc)
well, partially (the process is close) but the idea is to get a single, playable CD with as durable a construction as possible. metal and glass rather than foil and plastic, and so forth
--
You're right. I assume (hope) Mr. Katz knows the difference as well. But... The DVD CCA sued claiming that that is what DeCSS was for. They claimed that DeCSS was solely to illegally copy DVDs. /. poster (especially the anonymous ones) are defacto spokespersons for the internet users as a whole, having a misspeak like that in the main story header is just playing into their hands.
Yes, this is wrong, and that is part of the problem with their case. No DeCSS is needed to duplicate DVDs. DeCSS is just needed to view them.
I think what Munky was referring to was that the DVD CCA used selected, out of context posts from slashdot to boost their own case. Given that they seem to assume every
--
Make a standard backup of your vital data.
Take it to a special "data preservation agent" who will probably do it as a sideline for normal Disaster Recovery stuff
Agent makes an optical mask of a CDR image onto a blank, metal disk
optical mask is acid-etched to give a metallic CD (using two metals with noticably different optical properties, or burning right though if the disk is thin enough)
in a suitable atmosphere, mold glass around the metal disk to give you a metal-and-glass CD.
place in padded, light-opaque, metal case, and state you only guarantee the data readable if it is kept in that case full-time.
Obviously, the DRA would need to keep some hardware capable of reading these, but as he will probably be offering vaulting services for these disks anyhow, he will be wanting to access them on demand in any case. Any comments?
--
You have bought a shiny new $ITEM from your local department store, and it comes with a nice, uniformed man who will set it up in your front room for you, and also install another nice, uniformed man whose only function is to unlock the front of $ITEM whenever you want to use it.
However, you don't want to be in your front room; you tend to sit in the kitchen where it is warmer, and there is more access to food and other essentials. unfortunately, the nice uniformed man in the front room refuses to work in the kitchen - you need a kitchen man for that, it's against his union rules.
so, you contact the supplier, and ask them to send you a kitchen-man. unfortunately, they don't think kitchens are important enough places for $ITEM that they are willing to train kitchen man; they say that yes, you have bought $ITEM, but if you don't choose to use it in the front room, then you can't use it.
Enter your local Norwegian kid (what? you don't have one? then get one! they come in handy for all sorts of things) who looks at the key in the front-room guy's hand and makes you a new one. you are now happy - if you use $ITEM in the front room, you can let the uniformed guy do his thing; if you use it in the kitchen, you can use the Norwegian kid's key. The fact you can now use the key in the front room as well doesn't matter, as it's your choice anyhow, yes?
NO. the manufacturers you contacted initially rush to court, and make your key illegal. they scream that the guy in the front room shouldn't have had the key where the norwegian kid could see it - it should have been safely in his pocket when not in use - and therefore you shouldn't be allowed to use the copied key. Moreover, they also say you shouldn't even be able to tell people where they can get a key, and to make sure the norwegian kid doesn't make any more, have him arrested and his key-making kit confiscated - and arrest his father too, just to be on the safe side.
Comments?
--
Maybe the MPAA had better be careful - Microsoft may ALREADY have done the "patent this business method as applied to the web" thing (henceforth to be called "doing an Amazon") and they may find themselves retroactively in breach of a MS patent - and they are more overlawyered than the MPAA - difficult though that is to visualise.
unless of course, Sun beat them to it :+)
--
This is completely unconstitutional. Everyone should have a freedom of choice. Entering a dormitory is not the same as entering a prison. Just because university is loosing a contract (which is basically a legalized monopoly) does not mean that it can ban other choices?
I doubt it - if the university chooses to provide one service (web access) but not another (free long-distance phones) you can't really scream that you are being denied a basic right - particularly as free long-distance phones are uncommon in the normal setup.
--