You're missing the point. The point is that even simple functions (someone commented "where the fluck is UNDO?") are unnecessarily difficult to locate. That has nothing to do with the complexity of 3D modeling or the software used for it. That has to do with bad UI design, plain and simple.
The fact is that many other programs accomplish the same difficult tasks that Blender does, without making the simple ones needlessly painful.
The instrument example doesn't hold up extremely well, no. But I was mainly attempting to reply to it - wasn't my choice for an example. But to take another stab at it, many 3D modeling programs have a consistancy in basic UI features that makes things easier. Likewise, your instruments are consistant in many ways. You don't tend to pick up a clarinet and discover that the different fingerings are broken up into quarter-tones.
A consistany, reasonably familiar UI is always desirable. It is how we instantly use many programs that we've never used before, as well as ease the learning of using complex programs. How many word processors have the nice little File menu, Edit menu, etc? Consistancy is a good thing. Programs that don't force me to play detective are good, as are instruments that don't force you to search for a D (somehow lodged right next to A, physical properties of sound be damned).
We're badly oversimplifying the discussion here, but that's OK.
One could say that a violin has a confusing UI. Does that mean it's broken? No. But it does mean that you need to know what you are doing.
"The violin sucks. It's too confusing."
"Do you read sheet music?"
"Uh, no. Would that help?"
This is a nonsense example.
A more realistic one would be if someone created a violin that operated very differently from all the other violins on the market, and also had "different" sheet music that required lots of re-learning.
That's what a piece of software that ignores industry standards in things like UI is equal to.
Mogwai is supposed to be notoriously painfully loud.
I'm surprised to hear Autechre's live show is so loud. As you point out, that's absolutely not the appeal of the music.
I went to a TOOL show that was ideal with earplugs. I've gone to some concerts that were fine without any plugs (though they were usually the "art-rock band in a small theater" type, instead of the "commercially huge rock band in an arena" type).
He invented Awk, a spiritual godfather to Perl He co-authored The C Programming Language He co-authored The UNIX Programming Environment He co-authored Software Tools, an early manifesto of the "Unix Way" of using small, interoperable tools.
Nearly all the interview questions are either (a) things widely available in the literature (as in FAQs, not digging research - did the interviewer really not know what AWK stood for? If so, shame on him), or (b) idiotic questions that I might ask if I was interviewing a 6th grader.
I do a lot more work in C++ than I do in C. That said, there's no programming book that I hold in a higher regard than Kernighan & Ritchie's C language book.
It maintains the impossible balance of being both brief and complete. The book is that way because every individual description of something is also both brief and complete.
I wish Stroustrup's C++ book was equally well-written.
E-mail them and complain. I did just that.
Make as much noise to any Windows/IE-only web services that you can. Be calm and reasonable in tone, but get your point across.
It is necessary for everyone using software like Mozilla or Safari to do this, if we want anything to change.
All of these features seem like they will damage the three most important parts of a handheld console - price, size, and battery life.
An expensive, oversized handheld will NOT be desirable even if it plays like a dream.
I remember how great the Sega Nomad was, but it was big and sucked battery juice like an intern. Never caught on. I owned one and I didn't use it as much as I would have liked, because of these reasons (and it was still the best playing handheld until the GBA came out).
No matter how nice it looks, large amounts of people won't pay top dollars for a gigantic "handheld" that can't stay charged.
I am an avid video gamer, and every winter, I spend lots of time with my videogame hockey.
A couple of years ago, NHL 2001 was my constant entertainment. The thing was, the game had a penchant for random crashes. Not constant, but you could expect 1 every 3 period of play (for the non-hockey fans, 3 periods = 1 full hockey game, minus any overtime). To be able to progress through a season, at the end of each period of play, I would save and quit the program entirely. Then, I'd fire it up again and continue. Or, if I was feeling adventurous, I would just save and continue without exiting the program (however, to do this, I still had to exit the gameplay portion of the program, and continuing involved going through the whole loading process again).
Around the same time, I found that Calculus homework and Physics studies simply weren't getting done - not because of time spent on games, but because I didn't spend any of my other time on it, either.
To solve the two problems, at the end of each period of play, I would stop and spend 15 minutes studying (which, incidentally, is the length of the intermissions between periods in the NHL). Then, I would resume play. This steady toggling between gameplay and studies made the whole studying thing a lot easier to deal with. The key is the fact that the nature of the gameplay had very structured and definite stoppages of play (unlike, say, a Final Fantasy game, where you could spend 100 hours straight without stopping actual gameplay, if you so chose to). The crash bug that I was avoiding actually helped, as it made stopping between periods pretty much mandatory, and it was actually more effective than if the stops were between entire games (I was always ready to go for the next period, and studying seemed more like a "break" from the action, instead of a roadblock keeping me from starting the next game).
I have to find a way to implement something like this again, except without the crash bug.
I don't keep that sort of thing saved and tucked away, no. There was a topic here on Slashdot about the pitfalls of outsourcing, and many people there had some real horror stories. Search for it and you should find it easily. Some Google searches will direct you to other discussions on the topic as well (there are plenty out there). Everyone has stories, but the one thing agreed upon all around is that the quality varies *widely*.
Even some stories that weren't "horror stories" still ended up being somewhat negative. One that sticks out in my mind is where the time difference between the company and the outsourcing firm was exactly 12 hours - the office hours between the two simply did not intersect at *all*. The employers were pleased with the quality of the firm's work, but the extreme difficulty of continued communication forced them to cut the firm loose. Even in the best of conditions, outsourcing comes with some real hurdles to deal with - and when the outsourcer ISN'T top notch, you get a real disaster on your hands.
Also, I recall someone pointing out the factor of maintenance. Are you going to rely on that firm for the maintenance of the code, or are you going to take a stab at maintaining someone else's code? Each situation can be sticky. It's one thing if you need to wait a day and leave a message to clarify something in the initial development of the product. It's quite another thing if you've got an emergency that needs to be repaired, and talking to them directly entails either a plane flight or waiting until 4AM to make a phone call.
You should also consider theres nothing to stop the still very young Indian tech economy from raising its game even if that were true.
That's true. At the same time, keep in mind that the Indian tech talent pool loses top talent to places like the US, where they know they can be hired as the highly-paid guy instead of the overseas undercutter. Heck, many come here to college and just stay and start a career (though some come for school and then do return to their home country).
Software development isn't like manufacturing Nike shoes. The ability to communicate regularly and clearly, adapt on the fly, monitor code quality, etc., are all compromised to varying degrees when outsourcing. The price is attractive, but there's certainly some "gotchas" to keep in mind.
Many accounts of people that have utilized outsourcing from India have been negative, even from some of the top outsourcers.
There are many tales of bad code that had to eventually be reworked and largely replaced. Also a lot of tales of getting code that doesn't correctly meet the needs of the project (communication failures, etc).
After enough companies have had bad experiences, I think you'll see the flood level off a bit. Granted, some companies will accept the flawed code wholeheartedly for the cheap price, but things will stop well short of the doomsday scenarios.
I think the game's intent on one-upping itself ruined the story as well. It started great - first the ship sequence, then the President is being held hostage on a huge oil rig.
Now we're going to go into left field and fight Metal Gears on an astral plane or some crap.
Now you're talking to an AI.
Now all of politics is a lie.
Now we're fighting in some other location that we got to with no apparent rhyme or reason.
It just got LAMER and LAMER. You know what could've been gripping? Rescuing the President before a nuclear launch could've started. You DON'T HAVE TO go into comic book land to make a good gane storyline!
Flaw with #1: DVDs technically cost much less to produce. The cost of making the movie is paid for by the THEATRICAL RELEASE. After that, you just copy it over to a DVD and score some practically free money.
Flaw with #2: Not really flawed, except if this is common for you, you are listening to the wrong music. Quality music tends not to have "one or two good songs" on a CD. Quality music also tends not to be pimped by the RIAA.
Flaw with #3: What device can I not play my music on if I own the CD and have the software to "rip" it to various formats?
Flaw with #4: Actually pretty accurate, except it underestimates the "it's there, so I'm going to take it" attitude of some downloaders. Many downloads aren't filling unmet need, but are done because it's completely free.
1) Maybe you didn't pay attention. I also said "congressmen", which extends the sample size to a much larger number.
2) The media in the 1970s is not close to being the same as the media in 2003. Going back that far would not help create a better picture of today's press.
None of those even come close to being as intrusive as the bugs that plague many games.
Sorry, but I don't think your comparison holds. A winshield remaining intact is in no way even close to being comparable as, say, a scene of the movie entirely missing, or one part of the movie that causes the reel to fall off the machine.
Slashdot Mirror
The fact is that many other programs accomplish the same difficult tasks that Blender does, without making the simple ones needlessly painful.
The instrument example doesn't hold up extremely well, no. But I was mainly attempting to reply to it - wasn't my choice for an example. But to take another stab at it, many 3D modeling programs have a consistancy in basic UI features that makes things easier. Likewise, your instruments are consistant in many ways. You don't tend to pick up a clarinet and discover that the different fingerings are broken up into quarter-tones.
A consistany, reasonably familiar UI is always desirable. It is how we instantly use many programs that we've never used before, as well as ease the learning of using complex programs. How many word processors have the nice little File menu, Edit menu, etc? Consistancy is a good thing. Programs that don't force me to play detective are good, as are instruments that don't force you to search for a D (somehow lodged right next to A, physical properties of sound be damned).
We're badly oversimplifying the discussion here, but that's OK.
This is a nonsense example.
A more realistic one would be if someone created a violin that operated very differently from all the other violins on the market, and also had "different" sheet music that required lots of re-learning.
That's what a piece of software that ignores industry standards in things like UI is equal to.
Well, glad you asked. It runs like shit and has a limited color palette!
I'm surprised to hear Autechre's live show is so loud. As you point out, that's absolutely not the appeal of the music.
I went to a TOOL show that was ideal with earplugs. I've gone to some concerts that were fine without any plugs (though they were usually the "art-rock band in a small theater" type, instead of the "commercially huge rock band in an arena" type).
A vast number of questions asked both online and offline can be answered with what I call "5SOG": "5 Seconds On Google".
I wrote a paint program in OpenGL.
Where's my interview?
All he left out was "who do you like?"
I do a lot more work in C++ than I do in C. That said, there's no programming book that I hold in a higher regard than Kernighan & Ritchie's C language book.
It maintains the impossible balance of being both brief and complete. The book is that way because every individual description of something is also both brief and complete.
I wish Stroustrup's C++ book was equally well-written.
E-mail them and complain. I did just that. Make as much noise to any Windows/IE-only web services that you can. Be calm and reasonable in tone, but get your point across. It is necessary for everyone using software like Mozilla or Safari to do this, if we want anything to change.
An expensive, oversized handheld will NOT be desirable even if it plays like a dream.
I remember how great the Sega Nomad was, but it was big and sucked battery juice like an intern. Never caught on. I owned one and I didn't use it as much as I would have liked, because of these reasons (and it was still the best playing handheld until the GBA came out).
No matter how nice it looks, large amounts of people won't pay top dollars for a gigantic "handheld" that can't stay charged.
A couple of years ago, NHL 2001 was my constant entertainment. The thing was, the game had a penchant for random crashes. Not constant, but you could expect 1 every 3 period of play (for the non-hockey fans, 3 periods = 1 full hockey game, minus any overtime). To be able to progress through a season, at the end of each period of play, I would save and quit the program entirely. Then, I'd fire it up again and continue. Or, if I was feeling adventurous, I would just save and continue without exiting the program (however, to do this, I still had to exit the gameplay portion of the program, and continuing involved going through the whole loading process again).
Around the same time, I found that Calculus homework and Physics studies simply weren't getting done - not because of time spent on games, but because I didn't spend any of my other time on it, either.
To solve the two problems, at the end of each period of play, I would stop and spend 15 minutes studying (which, incidentally, is the length of the intermissions between periods in the NHL). Then, I would resume play. This steady toggling between gameplay and studies made the whole studying thing a lot easier to deal with. The key is the fact that the nature of the gameplay had very structured and definite stoppages of play (unlike, say, a Final Fantasy game, where you could spend 100 hours straight without stopping actual gameplay, if you so chose to). The crash bug that I was avoiding actually helped, as it made stopping between periods pretty much mandatory, and it was actually more effective than if the stops were between entire games (I was always ready to go for the next period, and studying seemed more like a "break" from the action, instead of a roadblock keeping me from starting the next game).
I have to find a way to implement something like this again, except without the crash bug.
"Mike broke the Hubble! Mike broke the Hubble!"
I don't keep that sort of thing saved and tucked away, no. There was a topic here on Slashdot about the pitfalls of outsourcing, and many people there had some real horror stories. Search for it and you should find it easily. Some Google searches will direct you to other discussions on the topic as well (there are plenty out there). Everyone has stories, but the one thing agreed upon all around is that the quality varies *widely*.
Even some stories that weren't "horror stories" still ended up being somewhat negative. One that sticks out in my mind is where the time difference between the company and the outsourcing firm was exactly 12 hours - the office hours between the two simply did not intersect at *all*. The employers were pleased with the quality of the firm's work, but the extreme difficulty of continued communication forced them to cut the firm loose. Even in the best of conditions, outsourcing comes with some real hurdles to deal with - and when the outsourcer ISN'T top notch, you get a real disaster on your hands.
Also, I recall someone pointing out the factor of maintenance. Are you going to rely on that firm for the maintenance of the code, or are you going to take a stab at maintaining someone else's code? Each situation can be sticky. It's one thing if you need to wait a day and leave a message to clarify something in the initial development of the product. It's quite another thing if you've got an emergency that needs to be repaired, and talking to them directly entails either a plane flight or waiting until 4AM to make a phone call.
That's true. At the same time, keep in mind that the Indian tech talent pool loses top talent to places like the US, where they know they can be hired as the highly-paid guy instead of the overseas undercutter. Heck, many come here to college and just stay and start a career (though some come for school and then do return to their home country).
Software development isn't like manufacturing Nike shoes. The ability to communicate regularly and clearly, adapt on the fly, monitor code quality, etc., are all compromised to varying degrees when outsourcing. The price is attractive, but there's certainly some "gotchas" to keep in mind.
There are many tales of bad code that had to eventually be reworked and largely replaced. Also a lot of tales of getting code that doesn't correctly meet the needs of the project (communication failures, etc).
After enough companies have had bad experiences, I think you'll see the flood level off a bit. Granted, some companies will accept the flawed code wholeheartedly for the cheap price, but things will stop well short of the doomsday scenarios.
Case study: Windows.
Now we're going to go into left field and fight Metal Gears on an astral plane or some crap.
Now you're talking to an AI.
Now all of politics is a lie.
Now we're fighting in some other location that we got to with no apparent rhyme or reason.
It just got LAMER and LAMER. You know what could've been gripping? Rescuing the President before a nuclear launch could've started. You DON'T HAVE TO go into comic book land to make a good gane storyline!
Thank god for Splinter Cell.
And as someone pointed out, not everyone uses the crash reporting. Most people have become very familiar with the "Don't Send" button.
For me, crashing isn't the big problem... it's the system's penchant for becoming very sluggish after it has been running for over a few hours...
Flaw with #2: Not really flawed, except if this is common for you, you are listening to the wrong music. Quality music tends not to have "one or two good songs" on a CD. Quality music also tends not to be pimped by the RIAA.
Flaw with #3: What device can I not play my music on if I own the CD and have the software to "rip" it to various formats?
Flaw with #4: Actually pretty accurate, except it underestimates the "it's there, so I'm going to take it" attitude of some downloaders. Many downloads aren't filling unmet need, but are done because it's completely free.
2) The media in the 1970s is not close to being the same as the media in 2003. Going back that far would not help create a better picture of today's press.
Sorry, but I don't think your comparison holds. A winshield remaining intact is in no way even close to being comparable as, say, a scene of the movie entirely missing, or one part of the movie that causes the reel to fall off the machine.
Or the Hooters waitress, for that matter.
Especially in 50 years, when I'm old, I want cute young women bringing me my food.
"The great thing about high-school girls is that I keep getting older, but they stay the same age..."