People who have learned assembler are the ones who understand why [snip] will usually run faster than [snip]
No, it's fairly obvious that one will run faster than the other. For a non-square pixel area, one will no-op for a range of pixels, or quite possibly crash before running to completion. But I'm guessing that you mistyped your example.
I'm sure it's possible to learn that stuff without hitting the metal a few times, but I've never, not one single time, ever met someone who's done so.
I'm not saying that someone shouldn't learn assembly, but generally speaking beginners aren't going to care about the kind of optimization that learning assembly will teach. Not only that, but the scope of doing anything more than absolutely trivial tasks in assembly is going to be completely overwhelming to a beginner.
A child who learns to walk only with crutches will not be able to stand on their own feet when those crutches are not available.
Have you ever watched a child learn to walk? A child does not just suddenly stand up and amble over to the couch. A child crawls, then learns to stand up by holding on to something, then takes a few steps with the help of a parent or by leaning on a nearby object. Only then, once it's surefooted, will it walk. All children learn to walk with "crutches". It's ambition that makes them give up crutches.
Learning to program without all of the fancy IDE tools forces you to actually know what you're doing, and think about it.
Or it will cause extreme boredom and frusteration. Not necessarily, but quite possibly.
...and if you ever get put into a job where you must write without the IDE, having started your learning with it will only hurt you.
Alternately, you will figure out how to manually add the boilerplate code (since you're already familiar with the language structure), then get on with doing what you already know-- the meat of the programming.
At that point, most serious programmers realized that they were taking longer to hack VB to do what they wanted rather than just coding it from scratch in another language.
Absolutely true for VB6. But that has nothing to do with VB.Net, which is what the submitter was talking about? VB.Net is useful for far more RAD.
More important is to just find something that provides quick feedback so that they can work on something, then turn around and quickly see the results. Something that encourages exploration.
I'd mod you up if I had any mod points, and hadn't already posted the same idea earlier. I completely agree. My first programming language was BASICA, but I don't put line numbers at the beginning of every line. My second programming language was LISP, and I'm not completely obsessed with parathesis.:)
If you know how to implement proper instantiations [in VB5], and pass objects as instances, please share. I'd love to know, because Microsoft sure as heck never documented it properly.
Um, if I understand what you're saying, try using VB6? Just as there was a huge difference between VB6 and VB.Net, there's a huge difference between VB5 and VB6.
Why are you trying to compare apples to oranges? The fact that VB is now translated to CIL does not change the structure of the language significantly.
In this case, GP is comparing gala apples to fuji apples. I've never written a line of VB.Net code, but I understand it, because I've programmed extensively in C#. VB.Net really is pretty far from VB6 (which I've also used), and quite close to C#.
On the other hand, I would not recommend a beginner to use Visual Studio or any of the IDE where you drag-and-drop to program.
Yeah, because programming boilerplate includes, class, main, and event handling code (which does nothing on its own) is really going to get someone hooked. Screw that. Give that code to a new programmer for free and let them add in something that does something fun, obvious, and interesting right away. That's how you'll get 'em hooked.
Look at it this way... no-one got hooked on pot because they liked making bongs.
Clicking on a wizard isn't the same thing as programming.
I agree that clicking on a wizard is not programming, but for someone who's just starting, built-in IDE tools (like wizards) can really help. As an expirienced user, I have no problem manually typing private void Button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e) { } ... but someone who has never hacked before is bound to get confused some step along the way, flipping back and forth between web pages, books, and the editor. I think that a lot of the "ease" of modern programming comes down to IDE tools and integration. Wizards and great built-in documentation (tooltips, auto-completion, etc.) can make a huge difference.
I go so far as to say that it's a better idea to learn assembler first...
Why not get a multi-function box and plug the iPod into an AUX port?
Not disagreeing that the iBoombox is a little... odd, but the integration with an iPod makes sense. You're not running your iPod's batteries down, and there are no extra wires hanging around. And it looks like the iBoombox does have an aux-in (minijack or SPDIF), so it would work with your digital radio receiver, CD player, 8-track, etc.
You can get a 100mm x 160mm, 4 layer version of Eagle for $125, as long as you aren't making a profit using it.
Er, I'm not sure you're right about that. The $125 version of Eagle is a non-profit version, which means that you can't attempt to make money off it. It's not like you can use the non-profit license to sell stuff as long as you don't actually go into the black.
From the non-profit license: With this declaration I assure that the non-profit license of EAGLE I bought under my name will be used exclusively for non-commercial purposes.
What advantage other than higher resolution does the new HD have over regular DVD?
I fully agree that the new HD format (whatever it turns out to be) will have little practical advantage over DVDs. I certainly don't have any use for it-- my entertainment system is DVD and digital cable routed through a crappy VCR (which, believe me, degrades the picture quality) over crappy RCA cables, into a slowly fading analog TV w/ small built-in stereo speakers. (And I like it.)
However, I'm not personally convinced that current customer satisfaction is sufficient to ward off technological "advancement". After all, the computer industry keeps growing, and grandma and grandpa are using cheap 2GHz P4 machines to surf the web and email baby pictures, when they could get along just spiffy with a 800MHz PIII. But you can't buy a new cheap 800MHz PIII anymore.
I think the entertainment industry works the same. We don't need HD, but come hell or high water, Sony (et. al.) will sell it to us, if only because they won't sell us anything less. Maybe not today, but not long from now. And here's the real kicker-- when HD has come of age, it will be no more expensive than what we have today. So folks will still get their $200 TV from Walmart... it will just happen to be a $200 27" LCD w/ built-in DRM. Amd why not get that when it's only $10 more than the last year's discounted-to-$190 27" CRT TV (which you can't even mount on the wall)?
That's progress.
And yes, local storage will continue to grow and grow. So maybe we won't go out to Best Buy and purchase a Blu-Ray copy of "Terminator 6: First Judgement: Revenge Of The Hoomans: Unobtanium Edition", but rather it will be downloaded onto your Sony MegaStor 15TB EntertainmentCenter (tm), which you purchased for $249.99 from Amazon.com. That doesn't stop the download from being DRM'ed.
Nor does any of this stop copyright infringement. It just moves the game around.
...so I don't even care what protection they employ against ripping & copying, because I probably won't bother to buy them in the first place.
Right now. You don't care right now. But all it takes is a decade to kill off a medium. Can you still get cassettes of new audio recordings? VHS tapes are all but gone. How long do you think it will be until DVDs are dead?
So you may not care right now, because for the immediate future, you have a viable option. But in the predictable future, you can kiss you hard-drive-video-archive solution goodbye.
Agreed. I especially liked the bit where he ruminates that there is no reason an executive software layer couldn't be fitted onto Windows to keep the Mac look and feel. John Dvorak obviously hasn't done any Windows programming in a long time. An "executive" software layer? So, what, he just expects that Apple's going to write some layer that spys on every application's message loop and redirects anything GUI related? Or does he think that the GUI bits of Win32 can be superceded, leaving the rest alone? And nevermind that pesky ol' GDI / GDI+ stuff, Windows Forms, or whatever's going on in Vista. Nice little bit of hand-waving there.
Furthermore, it would be completely pointless. Why would Apple chuck it's own OS, full of nice features that current Windows OS's don't even have yet, just to do a crapload of work to bolt on their own look'n'feel, then wait several years for the underlying OS to catch up? Not to mention a huge penalty in the security department, and the loss of customer faith. As I understand it, Apple customers are Apple customers not just because the hardware's good, but because the software's good.
In conclusion, I'll paraphrase the article...
The idea that Apple would ditch its own OS for Microsoft Windows came to me from John Dvorak, who in turn got it from Yakov Epstein, a professor of psychology at Rutgers University. I was amused, but after mulling over various coincidences, I'm convinced he may be a complete idiot.
The problem for the company is that if they start asking around people will find out before the fact and that could cause some bigger problems.
Such as? When I was working at Avaya, I survived several rounds of layoffs before finally being let go. And yes, my managers were being very critical of who was being let go at what point. I saw that axe coming... I just started a project that had a lot of more expirienced engineers already onboard, so I wasn't critical. If they had randomly let me stay and some other people go, that project wouldn't have been as well off.
I heard yesterday that they laid off over 20 people from just one floor at my friend's building.
Confirmed. A friend of mine was one of the layed off. His severence included WARN, which means that in an office of 75+ people, when 50+ are laid off, they are given 60 days pay. (Or, that's the brief explanation I got.)
Luckily, another friend there did make it through.
Not just "to layoff", as in to happen in the future, either. Just yesterday, Oracle layed off a slew of people from their Pleasanton office. I don't have any numbers, just word from a friend who was among the "let go".
The DIY crowd will just record off the analog out,...
What makes you think there will be an analog out? They're going to digitally encode the signal going from the converter into the television, or whatever other device, to prevent exactly that. Are you sure you read the article? Let's quote said article:
So far, so good, right? Now we have a clear MPEG-2 stream ready for viewing--which is why the CableCARD re-encrypts the signal using the keys that it has already exchanged with the host device. This is to prevent hackers from using the CableCARD to decrypt the signal and then outputting it in a clear and easy-to-capture format. The newly-encrypted signal is passed to the host, which (if it's a TV) decrypts the signal using the shared key it has generated with the CableCARD and displays the stream for your viewing pleasure.
"But what about a DVR?" you ask, and with good reason. The cable company did not build all this encryption into the product only to see it thwarted by a digital video recorder that outputs an unencrypted HDTV signal to the television. Therefore, if the host device is not a display device, it is required to encrypt the video stream yet again for transmission to another device.
Better still, if you can manage it, is to arrange your cubicle/office so that your face is towards the entrance...
That worked amazingly well for me when I could do it. In my current situation, though, in addition to my cube not being set up to do so, I'd loose the ability to glance up and gaze out over the Alameda / Oakland estuary, which can be very relaxing.
A hammer can cause deafness, too, but any reasonable person knows not to press their ear tightly against the board they want to drive a nail into. And I don't think I've ever seen a hammer with a "may cause permanant hearing damage" sticker on it.
I'm going to sue you for attempting to make me spit my coffee all over my screen.
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People who have learned assembler are the ones who understand why [snip] will usually run faster than [snip]
No, it's fairly obvious that one will run faster than the other. For a non-square pixel area, one will no-op for a range of pixels, or quite possibly crash before running to completion. But I'm guessing that you mistyped your example.
I'm sure it's possible to learn that stuff without hitting the metal a few times, but I've never, not one single time, ever met someone who's done so.
I'm not saying that someone shouldn't learn assembly, but generally speaking beginners aren't going to care about the kind of optimization that learning assembly will teach. Not only that, but the scope of doing anything more than absolutely trivial tasks in assembly is going to be completely overwhelming to a beginner.
I think this makes the case for the IDE for the beginner.
:)
Ah, if only I could have compiled my comment before running it, I would have seen my error. Oops. I never could spell that word consistantly.
Have you ever watched a child learn to walk? A child does not just suddenly stand up and amble over to the couch. A child crawls, then learns to stand up by holding on to something, then takes a few steps with the help of a parent or by leaning on a nearby object. Only then, once it's surefooted, will it walk. All children learn to walk with "crutches". It's ambition that makes them give up crutches.
Learning to program without all of the fancy IDE tools forces you to actually know what you're doing, and think about it.
Or it will cause extreme boredom and frusteration. Not necessarily, but quite possibly.
Alternately, you will figure out how to manually add the boilerplate code (since you're already familiar with the language structure), then get on with doing what you already know-- the meat of the programming.
At that point, most serious programmers realized that they were taking longer to hack VB to do what they wanted rather than just coding it from scratch in another language.
Absolutely true for VB6. But that has nothing to do with VB.Net, which is what the submitter was talking about? VB.Net is useful for far more RAD.
More important is to just find something that provides quick feedback so that they can work on something, then turn around and quickly see the results. Something that encourages exploration.
:)
I'd mod you up if I had any mod points, and hadn't already posted the same idea earlier. I completely agree. My first programming language was BASICA, but I don't put line numbers at the beginning of every line. My second programming language was LISP, and I'm not completely obsessed with parathesis.
If you know how to implement proper instantiations [in VB5], and pass objects as instances, please share. I'd love to know, because Microsoft sure as heck never documented it properly.
Um, if I understand what you're saying, try using VB6? Just as there was a huge difference between VB6 and VB.Net, there's a huge difference between VB5 and VB6.
Why are you trying to compare apples to oranges? The fact that VB is now translated to CIL does not change the structure of the language significantly.
In this case, GP is comparing gala apples to fuji apples. I've never written a line of VB.Net code, but I understand it, because I've programmed extensively in C#. VB.Net really is pretty far from VB6 (which I've also used), and quite close to C#.
On the other hand, I would not recommend a beginner to use Visual Studio or any of the IDE where you drag-and-drop to program.
Yeah, because programming boilerplate includes, class, main, and event handling code (which does nothing on its own) is really going to get someone hooked. Screw that. Give that code to a new programmer for free and let them add in something that does something fun, obvious, and interesting right away. That's how you'll get 'em hooked.
Look at it this way... no-one got hooked on pot because they liked making bongs.
The #Region " Windows Form Designer generated code " seems to be a bit of a giveaway, no?
Not really. That's just boilerplate code, and is no big deal. Why would a "real programmer" care?
Clicking on a wizard isn't the same thing as programming.
... but someone who has never hacked before is bound to get confused some step along the way, flipping back and forth between web pages, books, and the editor. I think that a lot of the "ease" of modern programming comes down to IDE tools and integration. Wizards and great built-in documentation (tooltips, auto-completion, etc.) can make a huge difference.
I agree that clicking on a wizard is not programming, but for someone who's just starting, built-in IDE tools (like wizards) can really help. As an expirienced user, I have no problem manually typing
private void Button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
}
I go so far as to say that it's a better idea to learn assembler first...
OK, that's just mean.
Why not get a multi-function box and plug the iPod into an AUX port?
Not disagreeing that the iBoombox is a little... odd, but the integration with an iPod makes sense. You're not running your iPod's batteries down, and there are no extra wires hanging around. And it looks like the iBoombox does have an aux-in (minijack or SPDIF), so it would work with your digital radio receiver, CD player, 8-track, etc.
You can get a 100mm x 160mm, 4 layer version of Eagle for $125, as long as you aren't making a profit using it.
Er, I'm not sure you're right about that. The $125 version of Eagle is a non-profit version, which means that you can't attempt to make money off it. It's not like you can use the non-profit license to sell stuff as long as you don't actually go into the black.
From the non-profit license:
With this declaration I assure that the non-profit license of EAGLE I bought under my name will be used exclusively for non-commercial purposes.
We have always been at war with Eastasia
No, brother, we have always been at war with Eurasia. Eastasia are our allies.
What advantage other than higher resolution does the new HD have over regular DVD?
I fully agree that the new HD format (whatever it turns out to be) will have little practical advantage over DVDs. I certainly don't have any use for it-- my entertainment system is DVD and digital cable routed through a crappy VCR (which, believe me, degrades the picture quality) over crappy RCA cables, into a slowly fading analog TV w/ small built-in stereo speakers. (And I like it.)
However, I'm not personally convinced that current customer satisfaction is sufficient to ward off technological "advancement". After all, the computer industry keeps growing, and grandma and grandpa are using cheap 2GHz P4 machines to surf the web and email baby pictures, when they could get along just spiffy with a 800MHz PIII. But you can't buy a new cheap 800MHz PIII anymore.
I think the entertainment industry works the same. We don't need HD, but come hell or high water, Sony (et. al.) will sell it to us, if only because they won't sell us anything less. Maybe not today, but not long from now. And here's the real kicker-- when HD has come of age, it will be no more expensive than what we have today. So folks will still get their $200 TV from Walmart... it will just happen to be a $200 27" LCD w/ built-in DRM. Amd why not get that when it's only $10 more than the last year's discounted-to-$190 27" CRT TV (which you can't even mount on the wall)?
That's progress.
And yes, local storage will continue to grow and grow. So maybe we won't go out to Best Buy and purchase a Blu-Ray copy of "Terminator 6: First Judgement: Revenge Of The Hoomans: Unobtanium Edition", but rather it will be downloaded onto your Sony MegaStor 15TB EntertainmentCenter (tm), which you purchased for $249.99 from Amazon.com. That doesn't stop the download from being DRM'ed.
Nor does any of this stop copyright infringement. It just moves the game around.
That's progress.
I'm waiting for GDDR8 memory.
Screw that, it's all about GODDAMNDR13.
...so I don't even care what protection they employ against ripping & copying, because I probably won't bother to buy them in the first place.
Right now. You don't care right now. But all it takes is a decade to kill off a medium. Can you still get cassettes of new audio recordings? VHS tapes are all but gone. How long do you think it will be until DVDs are dead?
So you may not care right now, because for the immediate future, you have a viable option. But in the predictable future, you can kiss you hard-drive-video-archive solution goodbye.
As usual, Dvorak is talking out his ass.
Agreed. I especially liked the bit where he ruminates that there is no reason an executive software layer couldn't be fitted onto Windows to keep the Mac look and feel. John Dvorak obviously hasn't done any Windows programming in a long time. An "executive" software layer? So, what, he just expects that Apple's going to write some layer that spys on every application's message loop and redirects anything GUI related? Or does he think that the GUI bits of Win32 can be superceded, leaving the rest alone? And nevermind that pesky ol' GDI / GDI+ stuff, Windows Forms, or whatever's going on in Vista. Nice little bit of hand-waving there.
Furthermore, it would be completely pointless. Why would Apple chuck it's own OS, full of nice features that current Windows OS's don't even have yet, just to do a crapload of work to bolt on their own look'n'feel, then wait several years for the underlying OS to catch up? Not to mention a huge penalty in the security department, and the loss of customer faith. As I understand it, Apple customers are Apple customers not just because the hardware's good, but because the software's good.
In conclusion, I'll paraphrase the article...
The idea that Apple would ditch its own OS for Microsoft Windows came to me from John Dvorak, who in turn got it from Yakov Epstein, a professor of psychology at Rutgers University. I was amused, but after mulling over various coincidences, I'm convinced he may be a complete idiot.
The problem for the company is that if they start asking around people will find out before the fact and that could cause some bigger problems.
Such as? When I was working at Avaya, I survived several rounds of layoffs before finally being let go. And yes, my managers were being very critical of who was being let go at what point. I saw that axe coming... I just started a project that had a lot of more expirienced engineers already onboard, so I wasn't critical. If they had randomly let me stay and some other people go, that project wouldn't have been as well off.
Just being randomly let go is stupid.
I heard yesterday that they laid off over 20 people from just one floor at my friend's building.
Confirmed. A friend of mine was one of the layed off. His severence included WARN, which means that in an office of 75+ people, when 50+ are laid off, they are given 60 days pay. (Or, that's the brief explanation I got.)
Luckily, another friend there did make it through.
It should read, "Oracle to layoff 2000 people"
Not just "to layoff", as in to happen in the future, either. Just yesterday, Oracle layed off a slew of people from their Pleasanton office. I don't have any numbers, just word from a friend who was among the "let go".
The DIY crowd will just record off the analog out,...
What makes you think there will be an analog out? They're going to digitally encode the signal going from the converter into the television, or whatever other device, to prevent exactly that. Are you sure you read the article? Let's quote said article:
So far, so good, right? Now we have a clear MPEG-2 stream ready for viewing--which is why the CableCARD re-encrypts the signal using the keys that it has already exchanged with the host device. This is to prevent hackers from using the CableCARD to decrypt the signal and then outputting it in a clear and easy-to-capture format. The newly-encrypted signal is passed to the host, which (if it's a TV) decrypts the signal using the shared key it has generated with the CableCARD and displays the stream for your viewing pleasure.
"But what about a DVR?" you ask, and with good reason. The cable company did not build all this encryption into the product only to see it thwarted by a digital video recorder that outputs an unencrypted HDTV signal to the television. Therefore, if the host device is not a display device, it is required to encrypt the video stream yet again for transmission to another device.
Better still, if you can manage it, is to arrange your cubicle/office so that your face is towards the entrance...
That worked amazingly well for me when I could do it. In my current situation, though, in addition to my cube not being set up to do so, I'd loose the ability to glance up and gaze out over the Alameda / Oakland estuary, which can be very relaxing.
Otherwise, I could see someone at Apple snapping it up for the next iMac.
iDrink?
I hope the judge tells them to POUND SAND.
Pound sand? I've never heard that expression before... what does it mean?
A hammer can cause deafness, too, but any reasonable person knows not to press their ear tightly against the board they want to drive a nail into. And I don't think I've ever seen a hammer with a "may cause permanant hearing damage" sticker on it.
I'm going to sue you for attempting to make me spit my coffee all over my screen.