I was talking about the parent post, not you in my academic comment. Also, I don't think you understand the 'billing' table I am talking about. The billing is a snap shot of what was billed, current data is viewable elsewhere. In my earlier comment I was stating that IDs are saved so links can be made if necessary to current data.
I am not saying hundreds of fields, but around 30 or 40. In my reply I considered this close enough to the hundred(s) that the original message referred too. Enough so that the table is largely used simply for a snapshot of how things were at the time of the billing, other tables are used for current information. I was replying to the question from the viewpoint of a programmer from the 'real' world as opposed to 'academia'.
"Who in their right mind needs a table with 100 columns"
I will tell you one case. In BILLING! As a business rule we have to have a record of exactly what was billed and this can be handled in one of two ways or both. The first way is to write a record that has everything you could possibly need to bill (LOTS OF FIELDS). Lots of redundent data, yes, but the data is easy to get to when needed. The other way is some sort of auditing. We do both. Auditing may seem like a cleaner way to implement this business rule in the database but if you really need to know beyond a shodow of a doubt what a specific piece of billing information was at the time of billing it is easier to go to the exact record used to bill with. Of course IDs are stored in this record to link to lets say the current customers record that allow access to current data if needed.
my experience with SQL is purely academical
To this I would first like to say, I loved being in school and I love book learning. BUT, I would like to add that things are not always what they seem in school. First of all Third Normal form is not the end all, sometimes you need to denormalize and that is ok. An instance where 3rd normal form is could possible not be the best solution is with speed, joining a 'large' number of tables in school may be cool, but it may just take too much time when you have 100s or 1000s of users pounding away at a database with tables of 100s of thousands or even millions of records.
It was hard to write, It should be hard to read!
I suspect you and many other/.ers need to read Steve McConnell's book, Code Complete. It is worth the time!
This is in response to the parent post, it is quite long so please refer back to it.
I think it is funny that you think that I lack 'basic' knowledge of SQL. Also, I find it amusing that you think my success is due to blind luck. If your example is the best you can come up with in refuting my assertion that using different DB back ends can be transparent to the user then I would have to say you failed miserably. The specific example you gave me had to do with Oracle not enforcing a unique constraint. We do not depend on the DB for uniques on the system I work on although all of them support uniqueness in one way or another. Also, all the fields that absolutely need to be unique, absolutely need data in them. This is the way databases are made at the company I work for. Maybe your company needs some different IT 'expertese'.
Again, people who say it can't be done are usually interrupted by the people doing it.
I must say that I work in IT and *do* care a lot what database is used, especially for mission critical applications. Learning a new database is not that much of an issue, but when it comes to backup and nice features like the ability a point in time recovery or a flashback databases do differ and the time for restoring from a failure can differ a lot.
The time for IT to voice concerns about a particular DB is when the decision is being made. It is ITs responsibility to get the right information to the people who make decisions. If your boss picks DB A because it is cheaper than DB B, but DB B has nicer recovery features, then when the DB goes done everyone knows that they are going to have a longer wait. Since in my experiance management tends to forget these things have some kind of documentation on the strengths and weaknesses of each DB and why you choose the DB you are using.
I haven't come accross your "IS NULL" problem with oracle so I can't comment on that. As to this comment, And there are a LOT of applications that absolutely, positively, cannot live without triggers., I would have to say that there is a threshold to where a company will choose to use triggers as opposed to being DB independent. Programming can overcome the lack of triggers, whether that is the way a company wants to go is again a question of the benifits of having them and living without them. Absolutes in the negative are usually not a good thing. People who say it can't be done are usually interrupted by the people doing it.
Yes, DBs have differences. I think the difference for the company I work for is that the windows app and server apps that access the database was designed from the ground up with the expectation that the database was variable. This means everything has to be kept to the lowest common denominator. Saying this, we also have built in optimizations based on particular databases for several different reasons. These optimizations and database specific stuff is kept to a minimum. It can be done. Is there trade offs. You bet there is. Could we build a application significantly faster if we focused on one DB. You bet we could. But in reality, the benifits don't justify it. For instance, if a client wants Database A and we developed only for Database B. We can't bid on the contract. Unacceptable. We can't use triggers and that makes things more difficult at times. We also had to implement our own locking mechanism because one of the databases we support is very very old. But again, the benifit of being able to point to several DBs and it being transparent to the user is immense.
Also, your comment seems to me like you are taken a position of a technology zeolot. This technology is better, or this technology we got to have. Technology is there to solve problems not create them.
OK, MOST 'good' IT departments won't care much if they have to learn a new DB. I realize that some IT departments could be resistant to change, but every now and then I run into IT guys who assimilate new stuff at a greater efficiency rate than the Borg. I don't really count the lazy or incompotant in my views or assessments as those people shouldn't be in IT. Saying that, a lot of IT departments are stretched to the limit on things they have to do. In this case, learning a new DB may be reason to gripe.
Unlike all the articles about linux and it's rise as an OS, Open Source databases do not have the same major difficulty. With an OS, every user that uses the computer has to know how to use the system. Conversely, with a database, most, if not all users will not care what database they are using. For example, for my job, I write and maintain a windows application that supports 3 different database back ends. Our clients can care less what database they are using. Only IT and whoever is in charge of the cash will probably care what database is running. In my experiance, IT will not really care what they use because DB issues don't usually take up the bulk of their time. As for whoever is shelling out the money, well that is a toss up, but the trend that I see is that more companies are opting for less expensive DB options.
Again, open source DBs have a chance because not every user works with them directly. Also, the interface, SQL, is a much more standardized interface than with an OS. As a programmmer, writing queries to DB A is pretty darnd exactly like writing queries for DB B. So, I think that their will be much better competition in the database world as in the OS world.
last I knew, I don't think/. had readership on the scale necessary to effect change.
What do you mean/. doesn't have the readership on the scale necessary for change. The number of people reading slashdot is HUGE. If you look at ID# alone,/. ID#s are at least 8 digits, meaning that people who have signed are in the millions!!! Also, another less accurate measurement of the number of readers of/. is the slashdot effect. Ever heard of that?
The problem is, is that/.ers don't organize to make their voice heard. We would be a mighty force if we were like old people and their collective voting to do such things as protect their social security.
You must not be a true/.er because you know that if you were you would read up on every bit of documentation about anything that we do....Like how we alway RTFA...errr....wait, scratch that
"but I'd be pissed if I had bought the rights to see a story early.... only to find out it was a dupe."
Oh man,/. is worthy for a some kind of subscription fee regardless if you get to see a story early regardless if it is a dupe. Besides, you make it sound like one has to mortgage his/her house to get a subscription. IT IS 5 DOLLARS FOR 1000 PAGES. Morning coffee for half the people in the office is more than that!
Obviously the music industry is not very interested in changing their music pricing system. Look at there handling of the music distribution system! The music industry is fighting to keep their revenues at the same rate as their golden years. For apple this means they have to bow down to the music industry. The music industry will not back down. Given that Ipods and selling music is a big thing for apple they will bend over and take it from the music industry. Right or wrong, that is the way it will probably go. Apple needs to create a new innovative product anyways. That is their strength. The should ride out the ride of the Ipod and Itunes as long as possible, but have the next cash cow ready by the time the party is over for Ipod/itunes.
Have I been living under rock? I have never heard of this game. Was this a huge game or something?
I guess I may be behind the times a bit, because I still play Half Life/CS, Rise of Nations, etc.
I would just like to say, I live in Oregon and everyone flips out that there is no sales tax here like it is a tax eutopia. There IS an income tax, which is around 10% of my gross. I used to live in WA and I would much rather pay 8% sales tax on non food items than 10% of everything I make. So, again, fwiw, Oregon is not a tax haven.
I think it is kind of sad that I and I assume most U.S. citizens disregard our neighbor to our south as an irrelevant dog at the table of the U.S. waiting for our table scraps.
Good for Mexico! I hope that this is part of a much larger trend for Mexico where they start to take the technological lead from the U.S.. I think it would not only be good for Mexico but for North America in general. I think the North American countries would have much more effect on the world if the countries other than the U.S. were much more economically and intellectually powerful.
I had to reply to the parent post because I couldn't believe what I was reading. What rubbish!!!
Colleges are too full of people who think someone is going to hand you something. The most important thing you can do in college is to learn to THINK FOR YOURSELF. If you have passion for the subject matter you will either have talent in the subject material and naturally, without much effort, excel in that area. If you don't have much natural talent your passion will carry you through. If all the proffessors spoke broken english and all the TAs where all horrible SO WHAT! Learn it on your own! I don't mean to be an ASS or rude, but I went to college with too many whiners. Too many people who didn't know what a nights homework was. I was in the honors portion of my Computer Science program and I was also one of the ones who spent the most time every day studying. I didn't like most of the profs and didn't show up to the classes when attendence didn't effect the grade. When it did, I showed up and studied for another class while in the front row. Your proffessors are not always going to be there to hold your hand, why expect them to be at all. Learning is done on your own. One goes to college for the piece of paper that saids you have achieved something officially. Again, learning doesn't happen at a university, it happens in your mind!
Also, I, as well as the rest of honors portion of the computer science department had plenty of time to 'party'. I think we able to do it, because we never waited to the last minute, we never accepted the minimum, and we helped each other(not because we needed help, but becuase like people, naturally come together). We had study groups where all were welcome, but only the smart ones really benefited. We benefited because we worked on all the problems before the study session. The slackers came, not even knowing the problem set.
Furthermore, the smart ones got keys to the computer science building and came during off hours. These where the times when all the slackers have gone home. We would not only do homework, but we would work on extra things. Like exploring a branch of a text book that is not officially covered in the book or doing something that wasn't in ones area of computer science. For instance building computers. Several of us bought computers and ran our own demonstrations on building computers. IT WAS THE STUFF WE LIKED TO DO!
Man, I can go on and on
Also, who cares about grades. I and anyone with passion for what they were doing naturally did better than our peers. So what if the highest grade of the class was 50%, I took physics classes where the highest grade on a test wasn't over 30%. SO WHAT! I didn't have to worry about it because a test only measures what the prof decides to test on and it is all subjective. In the end the whiners would whine enough, the prof will realize that he can't flunk everyone and the top people will get really good grades. Regardless of the grades, the ones with passion will learn what they need too. If you can't get the grades or your ego gets bruised, then my thought is that you have lived in a society where whining gets you somewhere, where last minute is good enough, where finding things out for yourself is foriegn. If that is you, then it is good that you changed majors. My thought is I hope you have that passion for whatever major you choose, because life is too short to spend that kind of money and time on something you don't have passion for. If you wouldn't do it naturally for free then don't major in it! Certainly don't whine and say it is the system that screwed you.
ok, that is my two cents, crap, that is more like 100 cents...LOL
Again, don't mean to offend anyone in particular, just speaking the truth plainly
Programming is not like other proffessions. Programming is not where you can see a select statement and know what it is. Or being able to follow the logic of a program. Programming is much more than that. Programming at it's core is about thinking, conceptually building. People who are good active thinkers make good programmers. Sure, people who learn syntax and what a class is can work as programmers, but if they are not at their core thinkers, then all you have is a regurgetory lump sitting in a chair. I have worked with these kind of people, I mean it pains me to work with these kind of people. I am insulted when they are called a programmer just like me.
To me, having a game that teaches the 'basics' of programming insinuates that programming is easy. That anyone can do it. That is the last impressions I want to see. I went to school with too many people who just shouldn't have been programmers. I also work with many people who shouldn't be programmers. So I think that professional programmers should be offended by such a game insinuating that our profession is easy. We should have the same respect as engineers, doctors and other professionals for what we do.
It is already possible, and not terribly difficult, for a person to go to the library and scan every page in the book. I can't see why Google should be obligated to make their excerpt-only system any harder to break than this existing "weakest link." Reasonable protection is, IMHO, all that is warranted. It needn't be impossible to game the system.
I think this situation is different than the real life library situation you described. At a library you would be probably be paying 10 cents a page or equivalent if you aren't from the US. And even if you are lucky enough to live around a library with free copying or otherwise have access to free copying. Eventually you will be pissing someone off by wasting their resources. Also, depending on the length of work, it would get very tiresome to manually copy every page of a book. Conversaly, if you did it by hacking googles search then it would be a perfect digital copy. Also, depending on how easy google search would be to circumvent (lets say one computer could do it) then it could be done fairly cheaply. Using your home computer and the broadband bandwith while you are asleep or otherwise idle. I see a BIG difference in what google has brought forward with searchable text of copyrighted books.
In order to have an opinion on this whole copyright thing between google and authors/publishers I would like to know the following. How is google going to keep people/organizations from creating or otherwise attaining large server farms or some method to fool googles methods of detecting unique visitors. I mean if such a server farm or something like it can be created/obtained, couldn't one theroretically compile whole texts. In essense getting digital copies of whole libraries? If so, publishers and authors should be very concerned and either should be working with google to solve this issue or sueing them. If not, and this very well may be the case because google as a company is just smart then these publishers/authors are just greedy jerks and should be publically flogged. Does anyone know how google combats the problem of people/organisations compiling whole works?
However, simply railing against the record industry for overcharging isn't fixing a leaky pipe, it's pissing in the wind
As much as you think that I am "pissing in the wind" because I think the problem lies with the overcharging of music, I think that you are "pissing in the wind" thinking that P2P is really going anywhere whether courts say it is legal or not. P2P in one sense or another will always exist.
Intellectual property laws won't be overthrown on the basis that, the IP owners, while having legitimate grounds to ask for compensation, are asking more that I think is worth the product they offer.
I am not too concerned about property laws. I am hoping that piracy in music becomes more and more of problem until the industry fixes itself. Also, I am hoping that people continue with the lack of music sales. The RIAA will change once they realize they can make more money by other means than trying to strangle hold the industry with law suits. In the end given the voice of the masses, property laws will naturally follow suit.
It'll do no good to call the doody-heads (or fat cats).
I did not use the term FAT CAT to simply name call, I used it because I didn't bother to take a few more moments to think about a more formal name, nor did I think that it was needed.
"Do the rights of one of these bodies trump the value of the others?" Within all the legalese, this is one of the big questions that will be asked. Yes, it has to do with whether one of these groups is "more legitimate", of greater value to the common good, etc. This will all be decided in court one of these days.
Again, I think this will be settled in the marketplace before it will be settled in court.
Unfortunately, the idea that record companies need to "realize the error of their ways" is highly naive
That is not naive at all. But since you did not fill in the obvious blanks from what I was saying, let me spell it out. They will "realize the error of their ways" when they lose so much money that they, the record industry, will figure out that it will better for them to take a different route.
However, in no case will this be solved by record companies "realizing the error of their ways"
NOW THIS IS A NAIVE STATEMENT! Companies, Organizations, or any entity, if they do not realize their mistakes then they die or cease to exist. So I guess the RIAA can cease to exist fighting to the bitter end in courts. But even if they do cease to exist, things will be solved!
You should have read your own parent post. I will show a snippet of it to you
Really, when a specific implimentation of a technology is being used overwelmingly for illegal activity, we, as a society, have a responsibility to look into the causes, and try to resolve the issue.
I was taking 'responsibility' and 'looking into' possible causes and even throwing out a possible way to 'resolve' the issue. 'Responsibility' in that I proposed a possible cause for all this illegal downloading. In short greed and the the lack of a proper correlation between value and selling price. 'Looking' into it in that I have read up on the issue for a while now giving me the background knowledge to have that opinion. And giving a possible way to solve the situation by suggesting that the record comings realizing the error of their ways and match the value of their products to their price.
To me concentrating on the legitamacy of these programs is like fixing a leaky pipe when flood waters are heading your way. Get the sandbags out fill them, protect your house from the flood waters before you even think about the leaky pipe.
Slashdot Mirror
I was talking about the parent post, not you in my academic comment. Also, I don't think you understand the 'billing' table I am talking about. The billing is a snap shot of what was billed, current data is viewable elsewhere. In my earlier comment I was stating that IDs are saved so links can be made if necessary to current data.
I am not saying hundreds of fields, but around 30 or 40. In my reply I considered this close enough to the hundred(s) that the original message referred too. Enough so that the table is largely used simply for a snapshot of how things were at the time of the billing, other tables are used for current information. I was replying to the question from the viewpoint of a programmer from the 'real' world as opposed to 'academia'.
"Who in their right mind needs a table with 100 columns"
I will tell you one case. In BILLING! As a business rule we have to have a record of exactly what was billed and this can be handled in one of two ways or both. The first way is to write a record that has everything you could possibly need to bill (LOTS OF FIELDS). Lots of redundent data, yes, but the data is easy to get to when needed. The other way is some sort of auditing. We do both. Auditing may seem like a cleaner way to implement this business rule in the database but if you really need to know beyond a shodow of a doubt what a specific piece of billing information was at the time of billing it is easier to go to the exact record used to bill with. Of course IDs are stored in this record to link to lets say the current customers record that allow access to current data if needed.
my experience with SQL is purely academical
To this I would first like to say, I loved being in school and I love book learning. BUT, I would like to add that things are not always what they seem in school. First of all Third Normal form is not the end all, sometimes you need to denormalize and that is ok. An instance where 3rd normal form is could possible not be the best solution is with speed, joining a 'large' number of tables in school may be cool, but it may just take too much time when you have 100s or 1000s of users pounding away at a database with tables of 100s of thousands or even millions of records.
It was hard to write, It should be hard to read! I suspect you and many other /.ers need to read Steve McConnell's book, Code Complete. It is worth the time!
This is in response to the parent post, it is quite long so please refer back to it. I think it is funny that you think that I lack 'basic' knowledge of SQL. Also, I find it amusing that you think my success is due to blind luck. If your example is the best you can come up with in refuting my assertion that using different DB back ends can be transparent to the user then I would have to say you failed miserably. The specific example you gave me had to do with Oracle not enforcing a unique constraint. We do not depend on the DB for uniques on the system I work on although all of them support uniqueness in one way or another. Also, all the fields that absolutely need to be unique, absolutely need data in them. This is the way databases are made at the company I work for. Maybe your company needs some different IT 'expertese'.
Again, people who say it can't be done are usually interrupted by the people doing it.
I must say that I work in IT and *do* care a lot what database is used, especially for mission critical applications. Learning a new database is not that much of an issue, but when it comes to backup and nice features like the ability a point in time recovery or a flashback databases do differ and the time for restoring from a failure can differ a lot.
The time for IT to voice concerns about a particular DB is when the decision is being made. It is ITs responsibility to get the right information to the people who make decisions. If your boss picks DB A because it is cheaper than DB B, but DB B has nicer recovery features, then when the DB goes done everyone knows that they are going to have a longer wait. Since in my experiance management tends to forget these things have some kind of documentation on the strengths and weaknesses of each DB and why you choose the DB you are using.
I haven't come accross your "IS NULL" problem with oracle so I can't comment on that. As to this comment, And there are a LOT of applications that absolutely, positively, cannot live without triggers., I would have to say that there is a threshold to where a company will choose to use triggers as opposed to being DB independent. Programming can overcome the lack of triggers, whether that is the way a company wants to go is again a question of the benifits of having them and living without them. Absolutes in the negative are usually not a good thing. People who say it can't be done are usually interrupted by the people doing it.
Yes, DBs have differences. I think the difference for the company I work for is that the windows app and server apps that access the database was designed from the ground up with the expectation that the database was variable. This means everything has to be kept to the lowest common denominator. Saying this, we also have built in optimizations based on particular databases for several different reasons. These optimizations and database specific stuff is kept to a minimum. It can be done. Is there trade offs. You bet there is. Could we build a application significantly faster if we focused on one DB. You bet we could. But in reality, the benifits don't justify it. For instance, if a client wants Database A and we developed only for Database B. We can't bid on the contract. Unacceptable. We can't use triggers and that makes things more difficult at times. We also had to implement our own locking mechanism because one of the databases we support is very very old. But again, the benifit of being able to point to several DBs and it being transparent to the user is immense.
Also, your comment seems to me like you are taken a position of a technology zeolot. This technology is better, or this technology we got to have. Technology is there to solve problems not create them.
OK, MOST 'good' IT departments won't care much if they have to learn a new DB. I realize that some IT departments could be resistant to change, but every now and then I run into IT guys who assimilate new stuff at a greater efficiency rate than the Borg. I don't really count the lazy or incompotant in my views or assessments as those people shouldn't be in IT. Saying that, a lot of IT departments are stretched to the limit on things they have to do. In this case, learning a new DB may be reason to gripe.
Unlike all the articles about linux and it's rise as an OS, Open Source databases do not have the same major difficulty. With an OS, every user that uses the computer has to know how to use the system. Conversely, with a database, most, if not all users will not care what database they are using. For example, for my job, I write and maintain a windows application that supports 3 different database back ends. Our clients can care less what database they are using. Only IT and whoever is in charge of the cash will probably care what database is running. In my experiance, IT will not really care what they use because DB issues don't usually take up the bulk of their time. As for whoever is shelling out the money, well that is a toss up, but the trend that I see is that more companies are opting for less expensive DB options.
Again, open source DBs have a chance because not every user works with them directly. Also, the interface, SQL, is a much more standardized interface than with an OS. As a programmmer, writing queries to DB A is pretty darnd exactly like writing queries for DB B. So, I think that their will be much better competition in the database world as in the OS world.
last I knew, I don't think /. had readership on the scale necessary to effect change.
/. doesn't have the readership on the scale necessary for change. The number of people reading slashdot is HUGE. If you look at ID# alone, /. ID#s are at least 8 digits, meaning that people who have signed are in the millions!!! Also, another less accurate measurement of the number of readers of /. is the slashdot effect. Ever heard of that?
/.ers don't organize to make their voice heard. We would be a mighty force if we were like old people and their collective voting to do such things as protect their social security.
What do you mean
The problem is, is that
You're an oldie, a SIX DIGIT!, don't you have that perk?
You must not be a true /.er because you know that if you were you would read up on every bit of documentation about anything that we do....Like how we alway RTFA...errr....wait, scratch that
"but I'd be pissed if I had bought the rights to see a story early.... only to find out it was a dupe."
/. is worthy for a some kind of subscription fee regardless if you get to see a story early regardless if it is a dupe. Besides, you make it sound like one has to mortgage his/her house to get a subscription. IT IS 5 DOLLARS FOR 1000 PAGES. Morning coffee for half the people in the office is more than that!
Oh man,
Obviously the music industry is not very interested in changing their music pricing system. Look at there handling of the music distribution system! The music industry is fighting to keep their revenues at the same rate as their golden years. For apple this means they have to bow down to the music industry. The music industry will not back down. Given that Ipods and selling music is a big thing for apple they will bend over and take it from the music industry. Right or wrong, that is the way it will probably go. Apple needs to create a new innovative product anyways. That is their strength. The should ride out the ride of the Ipod and Itunes as long as possible, but have the next cash cow ready by the time the party is over for Ipod/itunes.
Great, I will go buy it right now! Can't wait to get it! Thanks for the heads up!
Have I been living under rock? I have never heard of this game. Was this a huge game or something? I guess I may be behind the times a bit, because I still play Half Life/CS, Rise of Nations, etc.
I would just like to say, I live in Oregon and everyone flips out that there is no sales tax here like it is a tax eutopia. There IS an income tax, which is around 10% of my gross. I used to live in WA and I would much rather pay 8% sales tax on non food items than 10% of everything I make. So, again, fwiw, Oregon is not a tax haven.
I think it is kind of sad that I and I assume most U.S. citizens disregard our neighbor to our south as an irrelevant dog at the table of the U.S. waiting for our table scraps.
Good for Mexico! I hope that this is part of a much larger trend for Mexico where they start to take the technological lead from the U.S.. I think it would not only be good for Mexico but for North America in general. I think the North American countries would have much more effect on the world if the countries other than the U.S. were much more economically and intellectually powerful.
I had to reply to the parent post because I couldn't believe what I was reading. What rubbish!!!
Colleges are too full of people who think someone is going to hand you something. The most important thing you can do in college is to learn to THINK FOR YOURSELF. If you have passion for the subject matter you will either have talent in the subject material and naturally, without much effort, excel in that area. If you don't have much natural talent your passion will carry you through. If all the proffessors spoke broken english and all the TAs where all horrible SO WHAT! Learn it on your own! I don't mean to be an ASS or rude, but I went to college with too many whiners. Too many people who didn't know what a nights homework was. I was in the honors portion of my Computer Science program and I was also one of the ones who spent the most time every day studying. I didn't like most of the profs and didn't show up to the classes when attendence didn't effect the grade. When it did, I showed up and studied for another class while in the front row. Your proffessors are not always going to be there to hold your hand, why expect them to be at all. Learning is done on your own. One goes to college for the piece of paper that saids you have achieved something officially. Again, learning doesn't happen at a university, it happens in your mind!
Also, I, as well as the rest of honors portion of the computer science department had plenty of time to 'party'. I think we able to do it, because we never waited to the last minute, we never accepted the minimum, and we helped each other(not because we needed help, but becuase like people, naturally come together). We had study groups where all were welcome, but only the smart ones really benefited. We benefited because we worked on all the problems before the study session. The slackers came, not even knowing the problem set.
Furthermore, the smart ones got keys to the computer science building and came during off hours. These where the times when all the slackers have gone home. We would not only do homework, but we would work on extra things. Like exploring a branch of a text book that is not officially covered in the book or doing something that wasn't in ones area of computer science. For instance building computers. Several of us bought computers and ran our own demonstrations on building computers. IT WAS THE STUFF WE LIKED TO DO!
Man, I can go on and on
Also, who cares about grades. I and anyone with passion for what they were doing naturally did better than our peers. So what if the highest grade of the class was 50%, I took physics classes where the highest grade on a test wasn't over 30%. SO WHAT! I didn't have to worry about it because a test only measures what the prof decides to test on and it is all subjective. In the end the whiners would whine enough, the prof will realize that he can't flunk everyone and the top people will get really good grades. Regardless of the grades, the ones with passion will learn what they need too. If you can't get the grades or your ego gets bruised, then my thought is that you have lived in a society where whining gets you somewhere, where last minute is good enough, where finding things out for yourself is foriegn. If that is you, then it is good that you changed majors. My thought is I hope you have that passion for whatever major you choose, because life is too short to spend that kind of money and time on something you don't have passion for. If you wouldn't do it naturally for free then don't major in it! Certainly don't whine and say it is the system that screwed you.
ok, that is my two cents, crap, that is more like 100 cents...LOL
Again, don't mean to offend anyone in particular, just speaking the truth plainly
Programming is not like other proffessions. Programming is not where you can see a select statement and know what it is. Or being able to follow the logic of a program. Programming is much more than that. Programming at it's core is about thinking, conceptually building. People who are good active thinkers make good programmers. Sure, people who learn syntax and what a class is can work as programmers, but if they are not at their core thinkers, then all you have is a regurgetory lump sitting in a chair. I have worked with these kind of people, I mean it pains me to work with these kind of people. I am insulted when they are called a programmer just like me.
To me, having a game that teaches the 'basics' of programming insinuates that programming is easy. That anyone can do it. That is the last impressions I want to see. I went to school with too many people who just shouldn't have been programmers. I also work with many people who shouldn't be programmers. So I think that professional programmers should be offended by such a game insinuating that our profession is easy. We should have the same respect as engineers, doctors and other professionals for what we do.
It is already possible, and not terribly difficult, for a person to go to the library and scan every page in the book. I can't see why Google should be obligated to make their excerpt-only system any harder to break than this existing "weakest link." Reasonable protection is, IMHO, all that is warranted. It needn't be impossible to game the system.
I think this situation is different than the real life library situation you described. At a library you would be probably be paying 10 cents a page or equivalent if you aren't from the US. And even if you are lucky enough to live around a library with free copying or otherwise have access to free copying. Eventually you will be pissing someone off by wasting their resources. Also, depending on the length of work, it would get very tiresome to manually copy every page of a book. Conversaly, if you did it by hacking googles search then it would be a perfect digital copy. Also, depending on how easy google search would be to circumvent (lets say one computer could do it) then it could be done fairly cheaply. Using your home computer and the broadband bandwith while you are asleep or otherwise idle. I see a BIG difference in what google has brought forward with searchable text of copyrighted books.
In order to have an opinion on this whole copyright thing between google and authors/publishers I would like to know the following. How is google going to keep people/organizations from creating or otherwise attaining large server farms or some method to fool googles methods of detecting unique visitors. I mean if such a server farm or something like it can be created/obtained, couldn't one theroretically compile whole texts. In essense getting digital copies of whole libraries? If so, publishers and authors should be very concerned and either should be working with google to solve this issue or sueing them. If not, and this very well may be the case because google as a company is just smart then these publishers/authors are just greedy jerks and should be publically flogged. Does anyone know how google combats the problem of people/organisations compiling whole works?
However, simply railing against the record industry for overcharging isn't fixing a leaky pipe, it's pissing in the wind
As much as you think that I am "pissing in the wind" because I think the problem lies with the overcharging of music, I think that you are "pissing in the wind" thinking that P2P is really going anywhere whether courts say it is legal or not. P2P in one sense or another will always exist.
Intellectual property laws won't be overthrown on the basis that, the IP owners, while having legitimate grounds to ask for compensation, are asking more that I think is worth the product they offer.
I am not too concerned about property laws. I am hoping that piracy in music becomes more and more of problem until the industry fixes itself. Also, I am hoping that people continue with the lack of music sales. The RIAA will change once they realize they can make more money by other means than trying to strangle hold the industry with law suits. In the end given the voice of the masses, property laws will naturally follow suit.
It'll do no good to call the doody-heads (or fat cats).
I did not use the term FAT CAT to simply name call, I used it because I didn't bother to take a few more moments to think about a more formal name, nor did I think that it was needed.
"Do the rights of one of these bodies trump the value of the others?" Within all the legalese, this is one of the big questions that will be asked. Yes, it has to do with whether one of these groups is "more legitimate", of greater value to the common good, etc. This will all be decided in court one of these days.
Again, I think this will be settled in the marketplace before it will be settled in court.
Unfortunately, the idea that record companies need to "realize the error of their ways" is highly naive
That is not naive at all. But since you did not fill in the obvious blanks from what I was saying, let me spell it out. They will "realize the error of their ways" when they lose so much money that they, the record industry, will figure out that it will better for them to take a different route.
However, in no case will this be solved by record companies "realizing the error of their ways"
NOW THIS IS A NAIVE STATEMENT! Companies, Organizations, or any entity, if they do not realize their mistakes then they die or cease to exist. So I guess the RIAA can cease to exist fighting to the bitter end in courts. But even if they do cease to exist, things will be solved!
You should have read your own parent post. I will show a snippet of it to you
Really, when a specific implimentation of a technology is being used overwelmingly for illegal activity, we, as a society, have a responsibility to look into the causes, and try to resolve the issue.
I was taking 'responsibility' and 'looking into' possible causes and even throwing out a possible way to 'resolve' the issue. 'Responsibility' in that I proposed a possible cause for all this illegal downloading. In short greed and the the lack of a proper correlation between value and selling price. 'Looking' into it in that I have read up on the issue for a while now giving me the background knowledge to have that opinion. And giving a possible way to solve the situation by suggesting that the record comings realizing the error of their ways and match the value of their products to their price.
To me concentrating on the legitamacy of these programs is like fixing a leaky pipe when flood waters are heading your way. Get the sandbags out fill them, protect your house from the flood waters before you even think about the leaky pipe.