I spent a lot of time lurking on the kde usability list (for about six months last year) because I was (and still am) interested in understanding the design and decision-making process for open source projects, particularly as it relates to the UI. The one thing that sticks in my mind about that period of lurking is the volume of people doing folk-HCI about users they imagine in your head (such as ESR's "Aunt Tillie") and vehemently arguing their perspective. I posted a couple messages and was torn up by the people who responded. My conclusion of that experience was the the UI team has smart people, but a few (or many, depending on the day) loud and largely unknowledgable people arguing their points. My guess is the people who really do HCI don't participate in the noisemaking. I wonder how much of a contribution the HCI people really have, given the immaturity levels of the list that I saw.
It's weird to see this on Slashdot, because I was researching "bio-CAD" about a month ago. The BC guys are not the only ones working on this sort of thing. For example: researchers at Buffalo are working on a similar problem.
Bio-CAD is an interesting field. You can use modeling or reconstruction of what you think an organism was like, and you can sometimes come to a conclusion that doesn't support the currently accepted theory of how something worked. The dromaeosaurs (velociraptor and friends) were among the smartest dinosaurs (as determined by the brain cavity's size). So if they were also capable of taking down larger dinosaurs by means of disembowelment (ant waiting for them to die), this means they have less reason to hunt in packs. But if they can't take down a big game as individuals, they may have had reason to work together. Now, I'm not a paleontologist, so I may have the story wrong here. But the basic idea is that you can use modeling and replication as a way to support or contradict other theories (which we can't directly measure).
For those of you who do not know, or did not read the article, the clock is a project of The Long Now Foundation. A friend of mine hipped me to this earlier this year. I listened to a recording of Brian Eno giving his talk on why he is involved in the project, and how he came to give it it's name. This seriously is one of the things that stand out to me in the past ten years as changing how I look at things. I highly, highly recommend listening to it--you can read it in PDF or Word format, but I really recommend listening to it. Just chill out for an hour or so and let it sink in. You'll thank yourself for doing it.
I followed his link and for some reason my eye fell on the right side where they list their "Favorites"... one of which was lewrockwell.com... which made my idiot-alarm go off and I closed that tab. Thanks for telling me what nonsense I missed!
Creative solutions to problems are about the ONLY way you can even pass the classes I'm taking. That's why I don't know where this "Culture of the quantifiable" comes from.
That's actually pretty interesting. Where did you do your undergrad?
As for the culture of the quantifiable: I'm talking about the situation where everything that can be easily measured is turned into a grade, and everything that isn't easily measured (aesthetics, creativity of approach, etc) is totally ignored. Say your assignment was to build a chair, and you have all these quantifiable requirements: it must be certain dimensions, it must support so much weight, it must use fewer than so many screws, etc. The people who do not engage a single brain cell but meet the requirements to a T will get an A, even if it sqeaks when you sit in it (there was no anti-squeaking requirement). Those people who make a chair that is undeniably awesome, is comfortable, and something you'd likely see in a DWR catalog, but it's not wide enough or it's too tall, or in some way doesn't meet the other requirements, those people will get a C.
Sure, the assignment was to meet the requirements. And most undergrads (not you, apparently) throughout their four years are given problems and requirements at every step of the way, are not rewarded for creative design and punished for deviating from the rules. I see the results every day when undergrads aren't able to formulate their own set of requirements or do anything vaguely creative--they want somebody else to do that part so they can then work a problem according to somebody else's requirements.
I'm sure it is evening out, and it's a great thing for the rest of the world. I've said before that the fury over offshoring is really just an uninformed case of racism--if somebody's job ships off to country X, some people write their congressmen that this must be stopped. If the job shipped off to, say, Kentucky, they'd probably bitch about it to friends for a while, but nobody would wish for an interveining an act of congress. Residents of country X can do the brainwork within some tolerance of acceptability, and they cost one tenth the amount of money. In the process, the wealth of country X will increase and maybe they're more willing to buy different sorts of things from us (assuming we still know how to build stuff and not just consume it).
Some of the comments I have read are summarized like this: "This kid couldn't hack it with engineering, so he complains to the web that it's the system's fault. Lame!"
I do not think that Kern said things in the right way, but I generally agree with him. Look guys, engineering is not about pain and suffering. An engineering curriculum should help you learn about a limited set of facts and theoretical basics that will enable you to solve complex design tasks that real-world situations will throw at you. It is increasingly obvious that the ability to design creative solutions to real-world problems is at a premium (and this is not something that a typical curriculum teaches). Pain and suffering are not part of that equation. Kern is pointing out that there is an unnecessary amount of pointless heartache, wasted hours in lectures given by inept teachers, and horribly crafted textbooks. To those of you who get on people's cases when they complain about the inefficiency of the engineering-education situation: Aren't you just bragging? Or lying? Or just beating your chest because you were able to manage the pain?
I think the most important part of his article came at the end:
the United States will grow ever more reliant upon foreign brainpower to design its scientific and manufacturing endeavors.
I'm not sure if Kern meant this in the way that I take it, but to me he hit it right on the head. It's about design. The ability to solve certain known sets of problems computationally is essentially solved--it can be delegated out to machinery or people in other countries, even if they don't speak your language. The most interesting problems facing people these days are those that are not well-defined, or "wicked" problems as some would call them, and the only way to solve them--to engineer a solution--is by a human being, well-versed in the subject area, to creatively apply their knowledge to the area.
Good design can't be automated, but this automation is exactly what the American engineering environment is producing, because of this machoistic culture that has taken root. Engineering students are rewarded when they are able to play to a system that assesses everything that is quantifiable. Those things that are not quantifiable (such as the ability to effectively solve problems with teams or design new solutions to problems) are not graded and therefore students can't afford to spend time honing those skills. I think Kern is right; we have an engineering education system that is inefficient, and I think that system is producing exactly the wrong kind of engineers for the American engineering environment to be sustainable in the future.
Anybody who is interested in the topic of the business of news, spin, and journalsim, should check out Bad News by Tom Fenton. Fenton knows what he is talking about.
If we really wanted to have enough qualified people to teach math and science (or anything else, for that matter), we wouldn't pay them like chumps. I am by no means saying that they *are* chumps, but we sure do pay them that way.
And what's more is that before Hilf was put into his current position, MS higherups needed to become convinced that such a position was useful enough to justify spending so much money on it. True, Microsoft has deep pockets, but there must have been a lot of discussion involving a lot of people on the topic of "we need to learn from Open Source". I suspect there are a lot of people--even important people capable of creating new boxes in the org chart--trying to "affect change from within".
I don't think the government of PRC feels like they need justification. As long as the west does not put pressure on them, they have no need to change.
(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.
(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
I'm one of the people that Derkec was in touch with (in Denver). I asked him about a month ago if he knew of any GOOD people who were looking for a coding gig. Now, my company is an in-the-black non-VC-backed startup, and we are kicking some ass. We have got to where we are by making sure that everybody that we hire is really talented. Experience is good to have because it makes you seasoned. But experience can also take your edge off and cause a person to think only in terms of what they are used to.
We made a big effort to get resumes from talented people, and we cast the net pretty far and wide. We ended up with a stack of about 100 resumes. Of that 100 we called maybe 10. Nine of those calls were "like pulling teeth"--people are just not passionate about technology, they seem to think that "knowing computers" is enough to get by. We don't want people who want to get by, we want people who want to do awesome things. (The one person that made a good impression in the phone call ended up being a dufus once we met him.)
This is a pretty big problem. The position we were hiring was entry level -- so all you college kids just getting done with school, all you Jedi Masters of codery, where are you? We are willing to hire people out of school because in our experience this has been the best way.
This ruling applies to custom development (hardware/software) only. So DHS can buy all the cell phones they want from Taiwan. If they want buy something that does not exist in the commercial market, then "Buy American" applies.
If that is the case, what prevents a non-domestic company from producing exactly what the DHS needs and puts it on the open market? This seems like an obvious loophole--has that been addressed?
It's interesting that this topic of paying for comments should come up. My cubemates and I were talking yesterday about the progression of Slashdot over the years, and how the quality of posts has seemed to have been drained.
There are quite a few ways of tweaking the conversation system (moderation, friend-or-foe, payment, karma bonuses) but you'd have Slashdotters screaming bloody murder if the default was changed. Personally I would like to see comments pushed out over an Atom feed (or the like) and 3rd party filters applied to them in whatever fancy way they see fit. I don't know, maybe they're already out there.
Here's a filter that I would like to see: people could subscribe to groups (which could be free or for pay, it's up to the group maintainer), and those posts written by members of that group would be flagged or given point boosts. This way I could see comments from people who identify with a certain group whose opinion I respect.
Apple - College dropout from Reed College and not sure where Woz went.
I did a brief web search and couldn't find anything out there to support this. So I may just be spreading dirty rumors. But I believe this is true.
Woz was a student at the university of Colorado. At some point early in his stay there, he started playing, hacking, doing other things that you would expect. But the powers that be didn't like him doing whatever it was that he was doing, and was kicked out of school for it. It is funny to me (and many other CU alums) that there is a 'Woz Lab' at Colorado that lets students do the exact sort of hacking and tinkering for which he was kicked out. (google for ("woz lab" colorado) to see it mentioned)
It's interesting that whenever I see people talking about why Google is so popular, one of the things is always their interface. Google understands user-centered design (which is, by the way, much deeper than the interface). And since they have the whole "Don't be evil" thing, it means that gaudy advertising and design-by-ego will not ever, ever be part of their offering.
Frog: I'm guessing that iWork (which includes Pages and Keynote) is a predecessor to a larger professional suite we'll see in the future.
I think you're completely right about this. Apple has this relationship with Microsoft that as long as Apple doesn't encroach on MS's territory (Office), MS will continue to make Office on the Mac. I recently bought a PowerBook and did a pretty wide search for word processing software that ran on OSX. I have yet to find anything that even approaches usable. Frustratingly, AppleWorks does not have the level of usability that you would expect from Apple.
Why would they create a new word processor, rather than continue to build on AppleWorks? Especially because they can't encroach on MS's world, they really have no reason to put lots of effort into building a new word processor. But there they are, releasing a new word processor.
Apple's strategy seems clear to me: get Windows users to become interested in well designed producs like iPod, iPod mini, or the new iPod shuffler. Then, release an affordable Mac that those Windows users can plug their already-owned keyboards, displays, and mice into. Then, down the road, start delivering productivity software that is fully functional, and as well-designed as iLife software like iTunes.
Apple is positioning themselves for war with Microsoft. This can be nothing but good for everybody.
Laptop: "I'm being stolen! Security guys, help!" [Security guy shows up, gun drawn] Security guy: "You there! Hands up" Innocent guy: "But, I'm just bringing Bob's laptop over to him in building 4!"
I do like the idea, however, even though it may have issues. You could also use a wireless signal that pervades your company that is used as a key to decrypt.
It's a good thing we have states like California with the nutsack (and economy) to stand up to The Man and fund research into "controversial" areas such as stem cell. Hopefully what they've done in Korea can be expounded upon by the Californian initiative and show the Bushies that they are dumb (at least as far as science goes).
Slashdot Mirror
I spent a lot of time lurking on the kde usability list (for about six months last year) because I was (and still am) interested in understanding the design and decision-making process for open source projects, particularly as it relates to the UI. The one thing that sticks in my mind about that period of lurking is the volume of people doing folk-HCI about users they imagine in your head (such as ESR's "Aunt Tillie") and vehemently arguing their perspective. I posted a couple messages and was torn up by the people who responded. My conclusion of that experience was the the UI team has smart people, but a few (or many, depending on the day) loud and largely unknowledgable people arguing their points. My guess is the people who really do HCI don't participate in the noisemaking. I wonder how much of a contribution the HCI people really have, given the immaturity levels of the list that I saw.
Bio-CAD is an interesting field. You can use modeling or reconstruction of what you think an organism was like, and you can sometimes come to a conclusion that doesn't support the currently accepted theory of how something worked. The dromaeosaurs (velociraptor and friends) were among the smartest dinosaurs (as determined by the brain cavity's size). So if they were also capable of taking down larger dinosaurs by means of disembowelment (ant waiting for them to die), this means they have less reason to hunt in packs. But if they can't take down a big game as individuals, they may have had reason to work together. Now, I'm not a paleontologist, so I may have the story wrong here. But the basic idea is that you can use modeling and replication as a way to support or contradict other theories (which we can't directly measure).
http://seminars.longnow.org/
I followed his link and for some reason my eye fell on the right side where they list their "Favorites"... one of which was lewrockwell.com ... which made my idiot-alarm go off and I closed that tab. Thanks for telling me what nonsense I missed!
That's actually pretty interesting. Where did you do your undergrad?
As for the culture of the quantifiable: I'm talking about the situation where everything that can be easily measured is turned into a grade, and everything that isn't easily measured (aesthetics, creativity of approach, etc) is totally ignored. Say your assignment was to build a chair, and you have all these quantifiable requirements: it must be certain dimensions, it must support so much weight, it must use fewer than so many screws, etc. The people who do not engage a single brain cell but meet the requirements to a T will get an A, even if it sqeaks when you sit in it (there was no anti-squeaking requirement). Those people who make a chair that is undeniably awesome, is comfortable, and something you'd likely see in a DWR catalog, but it's not wide enough or it's too tall, or in some way doesn't meet the other requirements, those people will get a C.
Sure, the assignment was to meet the requirements. And most undergrads (not you, apparently) throughout their four years are given problems and requirements at every step of the way, are not rewarded for creative design and punished for deviating from the rules. I see the results every day when undergrads aren't able to formulate their own set of requirements or do anything vaguely creative--they want somebody else to do that part so they can then work a problem according to somebody else's requirements.
I'm sure it is evening out, and it's a great thing for the rest of the world. I've said before that the fury over offshoring is really just an uninformed case of racism--if somebody's job ships off to country X, some people write their congressmen that this must be stopped. If the job shipped off to, say, Kentucky, they'd probably bitch about it to friends for a while, but nobody would wish for an interveining an act of congress. Residents of country X can do the brainwork within some tolerance of acceptability, and they cost one tenth the amount of money. In the process, the wealth of country X will increase and maybe they're more willing to buy different sorts of things from us (assuming we still know how to build stuff and not just consume it).
I do not think that Kern said things in the right way, but I generally agree with him. Look guys, engineering is not about pain and suffering. An engineering curriculum should help you learn about a limited set of facts and theoretical basics that will enable you to solve complex design tasks that real-world situations will throw at you. It is increasingly obvious that the ability to design creative solutions to real-world problems is at a premium (and this is not something that a typical curriculum teaches). Pain and suffering are not part of that equation. Kern is pointing out that there is an unnecessary amount of pointless heartache, wasted hours in lectures given by inept teachers, and horribly crafted textbooks. To those of you who get on people's cases when they complain about the inefficiency of the engineering-education situation: Aren't you just bragging? Or lying? Or just beating your chest because you were able to manage the pain?
I think the most important part of his article came at the end:
I'm not sure if Kern meant this in the way that I take it, but to me he hit it right on the head. It's about design. The ability to solve certain known sets of problems computationally is essentially solved--it can be delegated out to machinery or people in other countries, even if they don't speak your language. The most interesting problems facing people these days are those that are not well-defined, or "wicked" problems as some would call them, and the only way to solve them--to engineer a solution--is by a human being, well-versed in the subject area, to creatively apply their knowledge to the area.
Good design can't be automated, but this automation is exactly what the American engineering environment is producing, because of this machoistic culture that has taken root. Engineering students are rewarded when they are able to play to a system that assesses everything that is quantifiable. Those things that are not quantifiable (such as the ability to effectively solve problems with teams or design new solutions to problems) are not graded and therefore students can't afford to spend time honing those skills. I think Kern is right; we have an engineering education system that is inefficient, and I think that system is producing exactly the wrong kind of engineers for the American engineering environment to be sustainable in the future.
Anybody who is interested in the topic of the business of news, spin, and journalsim, should check out Bad News by Tom Fenton. Fenton knows what he is talking about.
gabe
If we really wanted to have enough qualified people to teach math and science (or anything else, for that matter), we wouldn't pay them like chumps. I am by no means saying that they *are* chumps, but we sure do pay them that way.
And what's more is that before Hilf was put into his current position, MS higherups needed to become convinced that such a position was useful enough to justify spending so much money on it. True, Microsoft has deep pockets, but there must have been a lot of discussion involving a lot of people on the topic of "we need to learn from Open Source". I suspect there are a lot of people--even important people capable of creating new boxes in the org chart--trying to "affect change from within".
I don't think the government of PRC feels like they need justification. As long as the west does not put pressure on them, they have no need to change.
Article 29.
(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.
(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
It's something Americans don't understand about America, either.
I'm one of the people that Derkec was in touch with (in Denver). I asked him about a month ago if he knew of any GOOD people who were looking for a coding gig. Now, my company is an in-the-black non-VC-backed startup, and we are kicking some ass. We have got to where we are by making sure that everybody that we hire is really talented. Experience is good to have because it makes you seasoned. But experience can also take your edge off and cause a person to think only in terms of what they are used to.
We made a big effort to get resumes from talented people, and we cast the net pretty far and wide. We ended up with a stack of about 100 resumes. Of that 100 we called maybe 10. Nine of those calls were "like pulling teeth"--people are just not passionate about technology, they seem to think that "knowing computers" is enough to get by. We don't want people who want to get by, we want people who want to do awesome things. (The one person that made a good impression in the phone call ended up being a dufus once we met him.)
This is a pretty big problem. The position we were hiring was entry level -- so all you college kids just getting done with school, all you Jedi Masters of codery, where are you? We are willing to hire people out of school because in our experience this has been the best way.
It's interesting that this topic of paying for comments should come up. My cubemates and I were talking yesterday about the progression of Slashdot over the years, and how the quality of posts has seemed to have been drained.
There are quite a few ways of tweaking the conversation system (moderation, friend-or-foe, payment, karma bonuses) but you'd have Slashdotters screaming bloody murder if the default was changed. Personally I would like to see comments pushed out over an Atom feed (or the like) and 3rd party filters applied to them in whatever fancy way they see fit. I don't know, maybe they're already out there.
Here's a filter that I would like to see: people could subscribe to groups (which could be free or for pay, it's up to the group maintainer), and those posts written by members of that group would be flagged or given point boosts. This way I could see comments from people who identify with a certain group whose opinion I respect.
Oh, I dunno. James Madison actually invaded Canada, which seems a bit more alienating. Point taken though.
I did a brief web search and couldn't find anything out there to support this. So I may just be spreading dirty rumors. But I believe this is true.
Woz was a student at the university of Colorado. At some point early in his stay there, he started playing, hacking, doing other things that you would expect. But the powers that be didn't like him doing whatever it was that he was doing, and was kicked out of school for it. It is funny to me (and many other CU alums) that there is a 'Woz Lab' at Colorado that lets students do the exact sort of hacking and tinkering for which he was kicked out. (google for ("woz lab" colorado) to see it mentioned)
It must be a slow news day.
It's interesting that whenever I see people talking about why Google is so popular, one of the things is always their interface. Google understands user-centered design (which is, by the way, much deeper than the interface). And since they have the whole "Don't be evil" thing, it means that gaudy advertising and design-by-ego will not ever, ever be part of their offering.
I think you're completely right about this. Apple has this relationship with Microsoft that as long as Apple doesn't encroach on MS's territory (Office), MS will continue to make Office on the Mac. I recently bought a PowerBook and did a pretty wide search for word processing software that ran on OSX. I have yet to find anything that even approaches usable. Frustratingly, AppleWorks does not have the level of usability that you would expect from Apple.
Why would they create a new word processor, rather than continue to build on AppleWorks? Especially because they can't encroach on MS's world, they really have no reason to put lots of effort into building a new word processor. But there they are, releasing a new word processor.
Apple's strategy seems clear to me: get Windows users to become interested in well designed producs like iPod, iPod mini, or the new iPod shuffler. Then, release an affordable Mac that those Windows users can plug their already-owned keyboards, displays, and mice into. Then, down the road, start delivering productivity software that is fully functional, and as well-designed as iLife software like iTunes.
Apple is positioning themselves for war with Microsoft. This can be nothing but good for everybody.
Laptop: "I'm being stolen! Security guys, help!"
[Security guy shows up, gun drawn]
Security guy: "You there! Hands up"
Innocent guy: "But, I'm just bringing Bob's laptop over to him in building 4!"
I do like the idea, however, even though it may have issues. You could also use a wireless signal that pervades your company that is used as a key to decrypt.
It's a good thing we have states like California with the nutsack (and economy) to stand up to The Man and fund research into "controversial" areas such as stem cell. Hopefully what they've done in Korea can be expounded upon by the Californian initiative and show the Bushies that they are dumb (at least as far as science goes).
Sorry, 50 years ago was Ike. I think I may still be in shock--my higher functions aren't working...
50 years ago, we had FDR. I'm just curious which president you had in mind as being worse than Bush.