Doesn't the performance of the compiled code speak for itself?
Here's a history lesson:
Once upon a time, every CPU second on a computer was precious (and charged out accordingly). Consequently, a lot of programmers' jobs involved hunting through source code and optimising it by hand. The quick and dirty fixes that folks like Microsoft can now get away with were not permissible then. You (OK, we) didn't have the resources to run code through just to see if it ran faster or not. The idea was to get it right the first time.
FORTRAN, especially in its older incarnations e.g. FORTRAN-77, reall is that bad. Having learned C as a teenager...
You said it yourself. If you learned C as a teenager, you would not have been forced to spend the time with Fortran that it takes to get proficient enough with it to appreciate its elegance, power and simplicity.
I'm not going to get on the tired old hobbyhorse of "Real Programmers Don't Use Pascal" (if you're not following me, google for the title), but if you cut your teeth on mainframe assembly code, FTN is a fabulous language.
Trouble is, FTN was designed for people who were assembly programmers first and knew how it all worked, and that doesn't sit well with a generation that can't/won't take the trouble.
As for the "worst one prevailing", I have to ask "worst at what?". If you're doing heavy-duty maths, Fortran is much quicker to code, and the resulting objects are nearly always extremely efficient. (Boeing math library, anyone?) Having said that, I remember coding financial packages in FTN back in 1978...
If turning up one minute late on a handful of occasions is so heinous, I sure hope you give recognition to the employee who stays late to get stuff done.
Though I guess if you are an employer, you might not run into that situation with your attitude...
Your employers set up the rules, as a good employee you should respect an abide by those rules.
Sure, if you're a Nazi or like working at a boot camp. In the real world, the majority of well-run places I've worked at are flexible enough so long as you get your work done and don't take things to extremes like 3-hour lunches... The responsibility is also there that nobody should feel like you're dumping your workload onto your colleagues.
A boss who's into kicking heads will not get as much value from his staff as one who rides with a looser rein.
It doesn't help that the word isn't English. Though I agree that to take another poster to task for spelling and then commit a major solecism of one's own within half a sentence is more than usually cretinous...
I don't usually see them in my line of work either, but...
On the occasions that I do my shopping from the desktop I find it is very common for sites to be built without a non-flash option. And, from a recent experience sharing the same room with my wife when she was shopping online for clothes, it appears that women's clothes manufacturers virtually never do so.
Sure it is. Can't disagree with that; trouble is, the sites which go in for groovy flash displays are all too often the ones that leave out important information like addresses, phone numbers, pricelists etc.
I get very tired of the moronic site builders who believe form is more important than function. Having to wade through Mbs of animation at 128K can be a frustrating enough experience, it's even worse for the many who are stuck with dialup for the forseeable future.
The Clangers, lead by the evil dictator The Soup Dragon, have developed weapons of mass destruction, fashioned from illegally imported felt and cardboard.
LOL, welcome to my "friends" list; everyone else to whom I've mentioned the Clangers over the last few years has looked at me blankly and said "Who?"...
I wonder if perhaps special measures should be set up to protect the resources of the Universe, such as the planets around us and our Sun.
Sorry to be cynical, but having seen several major governments default on even ratifying the Kyoto Protocol, what makes you think those measures would be honoured?
the more advanced operating systems of last decade of the 10th century
Hell, I thought I was getting a bit long in the tooth, but I hadn't noticed missing over a thousand birthdays since the really modern OSs of the 1970s, but I guess living in a reverse time-warp can do that to you.
... the structure of silly putty is well enough known to be publicised in several introductory-level organic chemistry texts I have seen, and it is not too hard to reproduce.
interesting article, but it's hard to prove a negitave[sic]
Indeed, I don't disagree. That's why I qualified the reference with "it is claimed that"... The most we can actually do about the whole thing is play it safe, within reasonable limits, i.e.:
Don't tarzan-grip your mobile phone to your ear... Try not to live too close to the transmitters... Don't use wireless comms at home when wired will do... Etc, etc...
You might want to read this
New Scientist article where (it is claimed that) "Mays Swicord spent 26 years searching for a health effect of radio-frequency radiation. He tried and tried to falsify the notion that this radiation - the kind emitted by mobile phones - has no effect. He failed."
Let's not. You're interfering with people's livelihoods here.
Bullshit. Nobody has a right to a parasitical livelihood that runs by at best annoying the hell out of someone or at worst by preying on their insecurities or other frailties.
Don't you have some sort of telecommunications ombudsman in you country/state/whatever? If this outfit is in breach of legislation, that would be the logical place to start.
You must buy very cheap CD-Rs then. I have many re-writables that mave been re-used many times over more than 3 years without a single glitch. Might also depend on how fast your burner is, too.
Slashdot Mirror
You mean Fortran 4, of course... :-)
Here's a history lesson:
Once upon a time, every CPU second on a computer was precious (and charged out accordingly). Consequently, a lot of programmers' jobs involved hunting through source code and optimising it by hand. The quick and dirty fixes that folks like Microsoft can now get away with were not permissible then. You (OK, we) didn't have the resources to run code through just to see if it ran faster or not. The idea was to get it right the first time.
You said it yourself. If you learned C as a teenager, you would not have been forced to spend the time with Fortran that it takes to get proficient enough with it to appreciate its elegance, power and simplicity.
I'm not going to get on the tired old hobbyhorse of "Real Programmers Don't Use Pascal" (if you're not following me, google for the title), but if you cut your teeth on mainframe assembly code, FTN is a fabulous language.
Trouble is, FTN was designed for people who were assembly programmers first and knew how it all worked, and that doesn't sit well with a generation that can't/won't take the trouble.
As for the "worst one prevailing", I have to ask "worst at what?". If you're doing heavy-duty maths, Fortran is much quicker to code, and the resulting objects are nearly always extremely efficient. (Boeing math library, anyone?) Having said that, I remember coding financial packages in FTN back in 1978...
That sounds like a galvanising combination :-)
All right, I'll shut up...
Though I guess if you are an employer, you might not run into that situation with your attitude...
Sure, if you're a Nazi or like working at a boot camp. In the real world, the majority of well-run places I've worked at are flexible enough so long as you get your work done and don't take things to extremes like 3-hour lunches... The responsibility is also there that nobody should feel like you're dumping your workload onto your colleagues.
A boss who's into kicking heads will not get as much value from his staff as one who rides with a looser rein.
It doesn't help that the word isn't English. Though I agree that to take another poster to task for spelling and then commit a major solecism of one's own within half a sentence is more than usually cretinous...
If there's any justice in this world, with any luck Mr Gates might just write the car and himself off on the first corner...
On the occasions that I do my shopping from the desktop I find it is very common for sites to be built without a non-flash option. And, from a recent experience sharing the same room with my wife when she was shopping online for clothes, it appears that women's clothes manufacturers virtually never do so.
Sure it is. Can't disagree with that; trouble is, the sites which go in for groovy flash displays are all too often the ones that leave out important information like addresses, phone numbers, pricelists etc.
I get very tired of the moronic site builders who believe form is more important than function. Having to wade through Mbs of animation at 128K can be a frustrating enough experience, it's even worse for the many who are stuck with dialup for the forseeable future.
Put a copyright notice on your website (in case these guys try to rip you off) and tell them to get fucked.
If you want to be a bit more professional than that, tell them to get professionally fucked. :-)
If you reason thus, then you cannot reason at all.
LOL, welcome to my "friends" list; everyone else to whom I've mentioned the Clangers over the last few years has looked at me blankly and said "Who?"...
I'm not sure that's possible.
[ducks and runs :-)]
And pretty nearly everything else, too... :-)
Sorry to be cynical, but having seen several major governments default on even ratifying the Kyoto Protocol, what makes you think those measures would be honoured?
Or better still, MCP :-)
Hell, I thought I was getting a bit long in the tooth, but I hadn't noticed missing over a thousand birthdays since the really modern OSs of the 1970s, but I guess living in a reverse time-warp can do that to you.
Pity it left me old and wrinkly, though... :-)
... the structure of silly putty is well enough known to be publicised in several introductory-level organic chemistry texts I have seen, and it is not too hard to reproduce.
Indeed, I don't disagree. That's why I qualified the reference with "it is claimed that"... The most we can actually do about the whole thing is play it safe, within reasonable limits, i.e.:
Don't tarzan-grip your mobile phone to your ear...
Try not to live too close to the transmitters...
Don't use wireless comms at home when wired will do...
Etc, etc...
... according to the level of our paranoia.
You might want to read this New Scientist article where (it is claimed that) "Mays Swicord spent 26 years searching for a health effect of radio-frequency radiation. He tried and tried to falsify the notion that this radiation - the kind emitted by mobile phones - has no effect. He failed."
Easy enough to do if you still have an old dialup modem hanging around, though, and the time to write a little script...
Bullshit. Nobody has a right to a parasitical livelihood that runs by at best annoying the hell out of someone or at worst by preying on their insecurities or other frailties.
Don't you have some sort of telecommunications ombudsman in you country/state/whatever? If this outfit is in breach of legislation, that would be the logical place to start.
You must buy very cheap CD-Rs then. I have many re-writables that mave been re-used many times over more than 3 years without a single glitch. Might also depend on how fast your burner is, too.