The jobs that are disappearing are the ones that can be automated or the ones that easily be done cheaper by someone else half way around the world for pennies on the dollar. The jobs that are harder to automate or outsource are the ones that will be available. Jobs requiring lots of social skills are hard to automate and hard to offshore.
Still, I don't know that scientists or engineers as a group are any less valued than any other worker but there has been a change in the last few decades over by how we measure the success of companies. It used to be that layoffs of any sort were a last resort of a failing company. Now healthy and growing companies layoff people all the time. We are all disposable.
Whether it's actually written down or not, pretty much every community has some sort of CoC. If not they will often invent one on the fly when somebody starts causing more trouble than they're worth. Even worse is when these people are allowed to continue to behave in a way that causes quality people to leave. Or the community spends more time bickering than accomplishing anything.
Linus gets away with it because it's his show and there's no shortage of people who want to contribute to the kernel. But for an up and coming language, framework, or whatever, an active developer community is something that needs to be built and maintained. That gets harder over time as you have to figure out how to move forward without breaking the stuff that depends on earlier work.
Plus, I have seen no evidence that being an effective developer requires you to be an asshole.
Clearly the guy who sold it to the junk yard didn't know what it was. I was born in 64, and was very interested in the space program. I even built model rockets including a Saturn V. I would not have recognized that at all. However, it's certainly unusual and looks like a one-off kind of thing.
Since the space program had a major presence there I can see a savvy junk dealer coming to the conclusion that it at least might be something that came from NASA and contacting them.
Before the first light rail line I had a 35 to 40 minute express but ride from about 42nd street and 23rd to downtown. Yes, it is longer than it takes to drive, and only 10 to 15 minutes shorter than when I lived out in the burbs. But I can use the time on the bus to actually do stuff. I can't do anything but listen to the radio while I'm driving.
Once the Hiawatha (blue) line was finished, I took that instead. The closest station is a mile from my house but it's a quick bike ride. Combining the bike and the train, it takes about 30 minutes, roughly the same as it does to drive during rush hour. Eventually I figured out that biking the entire 6 miles to work is the fastest way there since I can go door to door. And yes, I ride during the winter too. Granted cycling is not for everyone, but e-bikes with pedal assist will make it more practical for a larger segment of the population.
Whether downtown or in a suburban business district, an insane amount of space is devoted just to parking. And it doesn't end there, the most prominent feature of many suburban homes is the garage. The cost of maintaining the infrastructure we've dedicated to the automobile is quickly becoming unsustainable. By the year 2030, 60% of bridges in Minnesota alone will be past their useful life and will require major structural work. And we have relatively young bridges compared to the rest of the country. The automobile isn't going away, but we need to invest in other methods for people to get from A to B that are going to be more sustainable over time.
As far as SW LRT is concerned, your criticisms are very much like the ones leveled at the blue line, yet ridership has far exceeded expectations. The riders will come from the lakes area and SW suburbs. The unwillingness to tunnel has everything to do with cost. Even with the relatively cheap route on an old railroad bed that they've chosen, it is an extremely expensive project and they've had to eliminate stops and take other cost cutting measures just to make it happen. As great as it would be, there is no way the taxpayers are going to pay for a subway.
It seems to be an article of faith among urban planners that the way to deal with cars is just to get rid of them, as if you can wave your hands and simply undo 60-odd years of growth and sprawl enabled by cars.
For sure cars have drawbacks, but so many of the planning decisions which seem to be anti-car seem to be somewhat ideologically driven rather than recognizing that arbitrarily making cars more difficult (less parking, narrower roads built with "traffic calming" features, etc) really is a kind of net negative when the larger geography and established infrastructure can't possibly be adapted on a timescale to accommodate it.
We had hundreds of miles of streetcar in 1950, but rebuilding it with light rail has taken over a decade and there's only two lines built. It's cost somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.7 billion dollars to build those two lines. I think the projected cost of the Southwest line is something on the order of 1.5 billion dollars and has a crazy route that will maul some of the city's parks and somehow manages not to serve the Hennepin Avenue corridor, despite it being one the most ideal places to build rail service to support existing high density residence.
The bus system is a joke, only practical for suburban commuters -- any kind of urban trip you could make in 20 minutes in a car is an hour odyssey not including time spent waiting for the bus.
I live in the city (Minneapolis) that I presume you're talking about. I drive, take public transportation, and ride my bike. I see it differently. The bus system isn't great, but works well for a lot of people within the city, and not just those coming in from the suburbs. It's still a relatively easy place to drive, but there has been a definite change and that there is a movement away from "automobile first" transportation design. There have been a few examples where lanes previously devoted to car use has been turned into bike lanes or devoted to light rail tracks.
Overall however, the space dedicated to the automobile hasn't changed much. Next time you're downtown, take a hard look at how much space is devoted to cars, -between parking ramps, street parking, underground parking, etc. It's kind of crazy. It is slowly changing with the emphasis on the word "slowly".
To me it's kind of ironic to complain about the SW LRT line's cost and at the same time suggest that it should be rerouted down Hennepin Ave. To delay the line in order to study if that reroute were even feasible would likely only add to the costs, and probably kill the project altogether. Any route through developed property is controversial. The main people objecting to the current route down the Kenilworth trail (not really a park) are the wealthy people that live nearby. I'm a cyclist that uses that trail pretty frequently. Having LRT be part of the mix will definitely alter the woodsy feel of that stretch, but it's worth it in the long run.
There are lots of options if you need to transport something more than you can carry or put into panniers on a bike. BTW, I have a family of 4 and I don't think we've ever had 15-20 bags worth of groceries.
I'll just go ahead and point out that I'll not be bothered to listen to this "no, exercise is free, there's no environmental impact to walking or biking" tripe. There's a reason that Tour de France competitors burn 7000 calories a day. Exercise burns calories - that's what powers your muscles. That's the reason you get hungry after exercising a lot. And even if you lose weight, it's almost impossible to lose enough that your baseline metabolism lowers more than the exercise you spent achieving that weight loss. Or anywhere close. Bikes take very little energy to be propelled forward, but they get that energy in a horribly inefficient manner using an energy source with massive environmental impacts.
If you're going to exercise, good for you if you put the energy expended toward a productive manner. But there's many, many productive ways to exercise. I, as mentioned, like to exercise on my land, doing projects like planting trees to help with reforestation and erosion control, among others. Some people exercise by playing with their kids, nurturing them and getting peace of mind. Some people exercise by building things. Some people exercise by gardening. And on and on. There's tons of ways to put exercise to productive uses. Not simply your preferred way, cyclists. And don't in any circumstance try to force others to exercise because "it's good for them". Should I get to dictate what's "good for you" to you, what you may and may not do in your life?
I don't want to take part in your damned hobby. Stop trying to force me to take part in your damned hobby. And everyone else like me who has no interest in your damned hobby. Which is why most people don't take part in your hobby as it is.
Evanston is a city in the US, a country where by and large the population consumes far more calories than they need. For the most part, cycling, walking, or whatever instead of driving isn't going to require them to eat any more calories than they already do. They'll just be healthier or find it less necessary to get their exercise in other ways. Which is worse, spending an hour a day cycling to and from work, or driving to work and then driving to a gym to spend an hour on a stationary bike?
Just for some perspective, I started riding to work regularly about 10 years ago. It's not exactly the Tour de France. During the summer I burn somewhere from 250 to 400 calories riding. On a cold winter day, where there's some snow to push through, it could be close to 1000, but those days are less common and since I tend to get less exercise during the winter anyway, not a bad thing. I also ride relatively hard. I want the workout. I could burn less calories by taking it easy if I wanted to.
No one is forcing you to live any particular way. There are lots of small towns and traditional suburbs, but relatively few places like Evanston in the US. Shouldn't people who'd appreciate the sort of lifestyle that Evanston provides have options too? Seems like many millennials prefer cities and places like that.
You can list whatever facts you like but at the end of the day the one fact that nobody can deny is that the guy landed his position inside CIA was not based on his ability
Then what was it based on? Brennan worked for the CIA for 25 years. He left around 2005. Prior to being appointed Director of the CIA, Brennan became CEO of The Analysis Corporation, a security consulting business.
I don't doubt that many factors contributed his being selected for the position, but on the surface at least, he would seem to have been qualified.
Some of these posts make it sound like these jobs go to the President's good buddies and favorite fundraisers. There are lots of people on both sides of the political spectrum. When it comes to jobs like this, you can find people who are both qualified and pass whatever political smell test you might want to apply. Remember too, that these folks need to be approved by the Senate.
Because maybe when a white dude who had a 25 year career with the CIA gets hacked too, it's not all that relevant.
you appoint someone like Jeh Johnson, who was a former Democrat fundraiser, for his political connections rather than his ability.
Uh yes it is relevant. "ability" includes technical abilities which is directly related to hackability. So get over yourself and stick with the facts.
Fact: The assertion was that the Jeh Johnson was hacked because he was not qualified and was appointed to his position because of his political connections. Yet, a 25 year veteran of the CIA who wasn't appointed, was also hacked. So the assertion doesn't hold.
Fact: Another post went on to suggest that Jeh Johnson was selected because of his race and that somehow contributed to the problem. Yet John Brennan was also hacked and he is white. Again, a failure of logic.
Fact: Describing Jeh Johnson as a fundraiser who got the position due to his political connections rather than ability is highly misleading. He has a law degree from Columbia University. He was general council of the Air Force where he received the Decoration for Exceptional Civilian service. He went on to be the General Counsel for the Department of Defense before becoming the Secretary for Homeland Security. Clearly the man is no idiot who was highly placed in organizations charged with our defense prior to his most recent appointment. Not only did he hold those positions but he received an accommodation for his work.
Is he a techie? Probably not, but his job was to run the organization, not be a network administrator. Technical skills likely aren't a big factor in what qualifies one for the job. Should he have known better? Yes, but lots of people who get hacked, have their identity stolen, or whatever should have known better. The problem goes deeper than how department secretaries typically get appointed and whether they are black or not.
Though we may not realize it at first there are quite a few examples of modern, democratic, and respected governments turning on their own citizens. It occurs when the government feels sufficiently threatened. The problem is that it typically happens with the support (or indifference) of the bulk of the rest of citizens. One example is the internment of US citizens of Japanese descent in WWII. The right to own firearms didn't help them. When the government feels sufficiently threatened, rights are taken away from those they feel threatened by and perhaps others. You could argue that sometimes it's justifiable, but there definitely have been times when it was not.
Even groups that are well armed and willing to use their weapons don't fair well when the government decides to take them down, - Waco Texas and the Branch Davidians for example. In my opinion some of these people (and especially their leader) were borderline nuts but my point is that once you find yourself outside the law, - for legitimate reasons or not, all bets are off if things escalate far enough. It doesn't matter what your rights were when you were a citizen in good standing.
Personal firearms aren't going to bring down a tyrant or end tyrannical practices. In reality, personal firearms are actually used mostly for target shooting or hunting. Once in a while they are used to successfully defend oneself or someone else. But far too often, they are intentionally or accidentally used to kill people with no justification. Handled incorrectly they are extremely dangerous and should be regulated just like any other thing that has a huge potential to kill or injure people (such as motor vehicles).
For better or worse, we've structured our society in such a way that depending on where you live, driving is practically a requirement for holding down a job or doing many of things required to live our lives being buying food and clothing or getting to a doctor's appointment.
Though we may not give much thought to it when we climb behind the wheel, lots of people are killed in car accidents including kids. That is one reason why motor vehicle use is so highly regulated. You must be licensed and to get a license you must past both written and behind the wheel tests. In many if not all states you must carry insurance. Vehicles have titles and you are required to license them and pay annual taxes on them.
Negligent use of a motor vehicle that results in someone's death may very well result in manslaughter charges and jail time. To me not properly guarding against the use of your firearm by a toddler definitely falls into the category of negligence. While I wouldn't advocate a life sentence for either the driver or the gun owner unless there was malice or a pattern of repeated negligence, I can definitely see revoking driving rights as well as rights to gun ownership.
I'm glad you brought this up. Though people may disagree with me, I see gun ownership as far more optional for most people than the right to operate a vehicle. If you live in a city with great public transportation, that may not be true. But for most of us it is. To me that deserves more protection that the right to own a gun. We highly regulate motor vehicle use yet have comparatively little regulation when it comes to guns. That makes no sense.
That's basically what it is. Computers didn't come into their own as a "Thinkerer" field until the early 80s. By that time, most degrees had gone to women, and you were still seeing that population into the early 90s.
The shift in degrees occurred early/mid-80s with the release of the PC platform and Home computers, these things don't happen in the span of a few days. It takes years to change a trend like that in emerging fields. In the 90s, when I did my Comp Sci classes, we had like 80% of our teachers being women, while 90% of the class were guys.
Why is it so hard to accept that maybe women in general don't prefer the field, just like men in general don't prefer nursing ?
Huh? Women didn't get most of the degrees in the 80's. It was still very much a male dominated field, just not nearly so much so as it is today. In the 80's I had one female CompSci professor. The rest were all men.
The PC platform brought computing to the masses but it didn't fundamentally change what it meant to be a programmer or the skills that were required. It may have helped promote the start-up mentality of ridiculously long hours that are good for neither men or women.
Men tend not to go into nursing because there is a stigma associated with being a male nurse, - though that is changing and there are more men going into nursing than have in the past. And since there is a shortage of nurses (my wife is a nurse), men are getting actively recruited to enter the field.
I suspect a stigma is also why some women stay away from computer careers, - there's a nerdy image associated with it. It's not because they can't do the work or wouldn't enjoy it. History has shown that not to be the case.
Back in the '70s and '80s, computers and programming were seen more as secretarial work than actual technical work. The field had more women participation because of stereotypes of the time being that "Secretarial" work meant work for women. As the industry progressed and created and identity for itself as a tinkerer field, guys managed to overcome the sexist stereotype that "Computers are for secretaries and secretaries are women".
That's what changed.
No, that's not it. Maybe through 60's and partly into the 70's that was true but I suspect it wasn't even then.
Anyone expecting computer programming to be anything like secretarial work and not technical wouldn't have made it through their first CompSci course. But plenty of women were getting degrees. It was not at all unusual for me to work with women programmers in the 80's and into the 90's. But as time went on there were fewer and fewer.
Just to add some historical perspective, I got my CompSci degree in the mid 80's. Although still a minority there were a significant number of women in my classes. And in the first decade of my career I worked with a number of women programmers but over time there have been fewer and fewer.
Also over the course of my career, I've taken on more management responsibility. The first person I hired to work for me as a programmer back in the mid 90's was a woman. Today I manage a small group of software developers. We don't have openings often but again over the course of time, I've seen a drop in the number of female applicants when have been looking for help. The last time I hired a developer (about a year ago), there was not a single female applicant.
It's not as though coding were something that women aren't as a group interested or never have been. Something has changed.
Linus is describing a false dichotomy. Deciding not to curse every other sentence is not the same as lying and manipulating. The intent of cursing and swearing IS to bring emotion into the conversation. If you want an unemotional and logical response (fix what is broken), then don't introduce emotion into an exchange that doesn't warrant it.
I realize that coarse language in many situations is just part of the culture of the group and is often devoid of any real meaning or it could even be part of what is meant to be a warm exchange. But in a technical exchange it is wasted bandwidth at best unless the situation really warrants it.
I have a young teen and part of our deal with him is that he can have a smartphone with the understanding that we as his parents can check what he is doing on it any time. Teenagers don't always use the best judgement. Anyway, the texts exchanged with his friends are full of swearing. But even teens are smart enough to recognize that would not be an effective way to communicate outside of certain situations.
I'm a director of IT with both men and women in the department. A good boss/leader knows how to motivate and recognizes that there isn't a one size fits all approach. I am by no means perfect but it is not at all hard to be clear and to the point without swearing, yelling, insulting people, or being abusive.
I rarely yell or swear but my employees know when I'm not happy and when they need to do better.
My honest belief is that a lot of people in IT simply do not know how to interact effectively with people who aren't like them. Even worse is that they see the problem as being with those that they're interacting with rather than as a set of skills they need to work on.
Let me be direct. If you find women as a group difficult to work with (as opposed to just certain individuals), then the problem is with your approach, not theirs.
Sounds like an AWESOME time to buy a VW tdi for much less than they normaly are:)
I know, but it kind of depends on what happens and what's important to you. If VW is forced to recall these cars for some firmware modification that decreases their performance, and the owners are somehow compelled to have the modifications made, you might be stuck with something you don't want and can't get rid of.
If on the other hand, if current owners aren't obligated to get the likely firmware update, and you don't care about the emissions, you could get a great deal.
Heard a couple of TDI owner's interviewed on the radio. They were pissed. One guy's previous car was a Prius. He bought into VW's marketing that their diesels burned clean. I would also been tempted by a TDI, but only if they met emission standards.
Even if an owner doesn't give a crap, what do you suppose the resale value on these cars is right now?
Sometimes the companies most in need of the services they provide are themselves.
I frequently walk by this handyman's house where he has a sign advertising his various services including painting. I shake my head every time I see it because his house needs a good paint job more than any other house on the block.
For me personally, XCode doesn't make a whole lot of sense on a touch screen device with limited screen real-estate. I'd prefer to use a Macbook.
I'll grant you the touchscreen part (though they are offering an overpriced keyboard lid), but not the "limited screen real-estate". They are offering a 12.9" screen. Macbooks have long been offered in a 13.3" size. The iPad will be in a 2732×2048 resolution. I've considered the 11.6" / 12" range to be the minimum for a laptop that could be usable as a real computer (as compared to 10" netbooks). Those 12" laptops would frequently have 1366x768 resolutions. 13"-14" computers are easily usable full time. The iPad Pro's screen is obviously not a limitation. The oversized cellphone apps on it may get in the way, but not the screen.
For working with textual information like you are in Xcode, the native resolution on retina displays is almost meaningless. For example, the native resolution on my MBP 15 with retina display is 2880 X 1800, but the default effective resolution is 1440 X 900 which is the same as the non-retina displays of previous versions. Same with the iPads. The newest iPad Air has the same effective resolution as the original, - 1024 X 768. That's because Apple pixel-doubles the text so it's large enough to read.
You could have a native resolution of 2880 X 1800 on an iPhone but that doesn't mean the screen would be optimal for doing Xcode work.
That being said, the screen size of an iPad Pro is approaching that of an MBP 13 which I used for many years for software development. Before that I briefly had a Macbook Air. Obviously portability is an important feature to me and I could hook them up to external displays in the office. However, when away from the office I found the 13" display to be a liability unless I was just working in the terminal, web browsing, checking email, etc. The latest MBP 15 that I have now is almost as light as the earlier generation MBP 13 and is probably thinner. The larger screen is well worth the added footprint when I'm away from the office.
So I guess I don't see the fact that Xcode doesn't work on the iPad Pro as much of a downside since I don't think it's a great form factor for that kind of work anyway.
Depends on what your qualifications for being a professional tool are. The stylus support and Apple Pencil are potentially very big things for people in the graphics world. Keyboards and cases have been available for iPads for a long time, so that in and of itself doesn't seem to be much of an advance.
Other than for taking notes or referencing documents when I don't feel like caring around a laptop, it doesn't seem like a professional tool for me personally. On the other hand, it's approaching the size of a small laptop anyway.
I think what RT showed is that it's hard to survive as a platform without applications and without clear reasons for choosing it over a confusingly similar product from the same vender.
For me personally, XCode doesn't make a whole lot of sense on a touch screen device with limited screen real-estate. I'd prefer to use a Macbook. As for Photoshop, there might be a ton of photo applications that do make sense on a touch screen device with stylus support. Whether that needs to be a full desktop version of Photoshop or something targeted specifically at that kind of device is an open question.
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You can be "fascinated by numbers" and still score low on the test. It's measuring a whole bunch of traits.
I have many qualities that you'd associate with people in STEM fields (and I am a CS grad and software developer) but I only scored a 9.
The jobs that are disappearing are the ones that can be automated or the ones that easily be done cheaper by someone else half way around the world for pennies on the dollar. The jobs that are harder to automate or outsource are the ones that will be available. Jobs requiring lots of social skills are hard to automate and hard to offshore.
Still, I don't know that scientists or engineers as a group are any less valued than any other worker but there has been a change in the last few decades over by how we measure the success of companies. It used to be that layoffs of any sort were a last resort of a failing company. Now healthy and growing companies layoff people all the time. We are all disposable.
Whether it's actually written down or not, pretty much every community has some sort of CoC. If not they will often invent one on the fly when somebody starts causing more trouble than they're worth. Even worse is when these people are allowed to continue to behave in a way that causes quality people to leave. Or the community spends more time bickering than accomplishing anything.
Linus gets away with it because it's his show and there's no shortage of people who want to contribute to the kernel. But for an up and coming language, framework, or whatever, an active developer community is something that needs to be built and maintained. That gets harder over time as you have to figure out how to move forward without breaking the stuff that depends on earlier work.
Plus, I have seen no evidence that being an effective developer requires you to be an asshole.
Clearly the guy who sold it to the junk yard didn't know what it was. I was born in 64, and was very interested in the space program. I even built model rockets including a Saturn V. I would not have recognized that at all. However, it's certainly unusual and looks like a one-off kind of thing.
Since the space program had a major presence there I can see a savvy junk dealer coming to the conclusion that it at least might be something that came from NASA and contacting them.
Before the first light rail line I had a 35 to 40 minute express but ride from about 42nd street and 23rd to downtown. Yes, it is longer than it takes to drive, and only 10 to 15 minutes shorter than when I lived out in the burbs. But I can use the time on the bus to actually do stuff. I can't do anything but listen to the radio while I'm driving.
Once the Hiawatha (blue) line was finished, I took that instead. The closest station is a mile from my house but it's a quick bike ride. Combining the bike and the train, it takes about 30 minutes, roughly the same as it does to drive during rush hour. Eventually I figured out that biking the entire 6 miles to work is the fastest way there since I can go door to door. And yes, I ride during the winter too. Granted cycling is not for everyone, but e-bikes with pedal assist will make it more practical for a larger segment of the population.
Whether downtown or in a suburban business district, an insane amount of space is devoted just to parking. And it doesn't end there, the most prominent feature of many suburban homes is the garage. The cost of maintaining the infrastructure we've dedicated to the automobile is quickly becoming unsustainable. By the year 2030, 60% of bridges in Minnesota alone will be past their useful life and will require major structural work. And we have relatively young bridges compared to the rest of the country. The automobile isn't going away, but we need to invest in other methods for people to get from A to B that are going to be more sustainable over time.
As far as SW LRT is concerned, your criticisms are very much like the ones leveled at the blue line, yet ridership has far exceeded expectations. The riders will come from the lakes area and SW suburbs. The unwillingness to tunnel has everything to do with cost. Even with the relatively cheap route on an old railroad bed that they've chosen, it is an extremely expensive project and they've had to eliminate stops and take other cost cutting measures just to make it happen. As great as it would be, there is no way the taxpayers are going to pay for a subway.
It seems to be an article of faith among urban planners that the way to deal with cars is just to get rid of them, as if you can wave your hands and simply undo 60-odd years of growth and sprawl enabled by cars.
For sure cars have drawbacks, but so many of the planning decisions which seem to be anti-car seem to be somewhat ideologically driven rather than recognizing that arbitrarily making cars more difficult (less parking, narrower roads built with "traffic calming" features, etc) really is a kind of net negative when the larger geography and established infrastructure can't possibly be adapted on a timescale to accommodate it.
We had hundreds of miles of streetcar in 1950, but rebuilding it with light rail has taken over a decade and there's only two lines built. It's cost somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.7 billion dollars to build those two lines. I think the projected cost of the Southwest line is something on the order of 1.5 billion dollars and has a crazy route that will maul some of the city's parks and somehow manages not to serve the Hennepin Avenue corridor, despite it being one the most ideal places to build rail service to support existing high density residence.
The bus system is a joke, only practical for suburban commuters -- any kind of urban trip you could make in 20 minutes in a car is an hour odyssey not including time spent waiting for the bus.
I live in the city (Minneapolis) that I presume you're talking about. I drive, take public transportation, and ride my bike. I see it differently. The bus system isn't great, but works well for a lot of people within the city, and not just those coming in from the suburbs. It's still a relatively easy place to drive, but there has been a definite change and that there is a movement away from "automobile first" transportation design. There have been a few examples where lanes previously devoted to car use has been turned into bike lanes or devoted to light rail tracks.
Overall however, the space dedicated to the automobile hasn't changed much. Next time you're downtown, take a hard look at how much space is devoted to cars, -between parking ramps, street parking, underground parking, etc. It's kind of crazy. It is slowly changing with the emphasis on the word "slowly".
To me it's kind of ironic to complain about the SW LRT line's cost and at the same time suggest that it should be rerouted down Hennepin Ave. To delay the line in order to study if that reroute were even feasible would likely only add to the costs, and probably kill the project altogether. Any route through developed property is controversial. The main people objecting to the current route down the Kenilworth trail (not really a park) are the wealthy people that live nearby. I'm a cyclist that uses that trail pretty frequently. Having LRT be part of the mix will definitely alter the woodsy feel of that stretch, but it's worth it in the long run.
taxi
uber
Car2Go
HourCar
ZipCar
delivery service
There are lots of options if you need to transport something more than you can carry or put into panniers on a bike. BTW, I have a family of 4 and I don't think we've ever had 15-20 bags worth of groceries.
I'll just go ahead and point out that I'll not be bothered to listen to this "no, exercise is free, there's no environmental impact to walking or biking" tripe. There's a reason that Tour de France competitors burn 7000 calories a day. Exercise burns calories - that's what powers your muscles. That's the reason you get hungry after exercising a lot. And even if you lose weight, it's almost impossible to lose enough that your baseline metabolism lowers more than the exercise you spent achieving that weight loss. Or anywhere close. Bikes take very little energy to be propelled forward, but they get that energy in a horribly inefficient manner using an energy source with massive environmental impacts.
If you're going to exercise, good for you if you put the energy expended toward a productive manner. But there's many, many productive ways to exercise. I, as mentioned, like to exercise on my land, doing projects like planting trees to help with reforestation and erosion control, among others. Some people exercise by playing with their kids, nurturing them and getting peace of mind. Some people exercise by building things. Some people exercise by gardening. And on and on. There's tons of ways to put exercise to productive uses. Not simply your preferred way, cyclists. And don't in any circumstance try to force others to exercise because "it's good for them". Should I get to dictate what's "good for you" to you, what you may and may not do in your life?
I don't want to take part in your damned hobby. Stop trying to force me to take part in your damned hobby. And everyone else like me who has no interest in your damned hobby. Which is why most people don't take part in your hobby as it is.
Evanston is a city in the US, a country where by and large the population consumes far more calories than they need. For the most part, cycling, walking, or whatever instead of driving isn't going to require them to eat any more calories than they already do. They'll just be healthier or find it less necessary to get their exercise in other ways. Which is worse, spending an hour a day cycling to and from work, or driving to work and then driving to a gym to spend an hour on a stationary bike?
Just for some perspective, I started riding to work regularly about 10 years ago. It's not exactly the Tour de France. During the summer I burn somewhere from 250 to 400 calories riding. On a cold winter day, where there's some snow to push through, it could be close to 1000, but those days are less common and since I tend to get less exercise during the winter anyway, not a bad thing. I also ride relatively hard. I want the workout. I could burn less calories by taking it easy if I wanted to.
No one is forcing you to live any particular way. There are lots of small towns and traditional suburbs, but relatively few places like Evanston in the US. Shouldn't people who'd appreciate the sort of lifestyle that Evanston provides have options too? Seems like many millennials prefer cities and places like that.
You can list whatever facts you like but at the end of the day the one fact that nobody can deny is that the guy landed his position inside CIA was not based on his ability
Then what was it based on? Brennan worked for the CIA for 25 years. He left around 2005. Prior to being appointed Director of the CIA, Brennan became CEO of The Analysis Corporation, a security consulting business.
I don't doubt that many factors contributed his being selected for the position, but on the surface at least, he would seem to have been qualified.
Some of these posts make it sound like these jobs go to the President's good buddies and favorite fundraisers. There are lots of people on both sides of the political spectrum. When it comes to jobs like this, you can find people who are both qualified and pass whatever political smell test you might want to apply. Remember too, that these folks need to be approved by the Senate.
Because maybe when a white dude who had a 25 year career with the CIA gets hacked too, it's not all that relevant.
you appoint someone like Jeh Johnson, who was a former Democrat fundraiser, for his political connections rather than his ability.
Uh yes it is relevant. "ability" includes technical abilities which is directly related to hackability. So get over yourself and stick with the facts.
Fact: The assertion was that the Jeh Johnson was hacked because he was not qualified and was appointed to his position because of his political connections. Yet, a 25 year veteran of the CIA who wasn't appointed, was also hacked. So the assertion doesn't hold.
Fact: Another post went on to suggest that Jeh Johnson was selected because of his race and that somehow contributed to the problem. Yet John Brennan was also hacked and he is white. Again, a failure of logic.
Fact: Describing Jeh Johnson as a fundraiser who got the position due to his political connections rather than ability is highly misleading. He has a law degree from Columbia University. He was general council of the Air Force where he received the Decoration for Exceptional Civilian service. He went on to be the General Counsel for the Department of Defense before becoming the Secretary for Homeland Security. Clearly the man is no idiot who was highly placed in organizations charged with our defense prior to his most recent appointment. Not only did he hold those positions but he received an accommodation for his work.
Is he a techie? Probably not, but his job was to run the organization, not be a network administrator. Technical skills likely aren't a big factor in what qualifies one for the job. Should he have known better? Yes, but lots of people who get hacked, have their identity stolen, or whatever should have known better. The problem goes deeper than how department secretaries typically get appointed and whether they are black or not.
Because maybe when a white dude who had a 25 year career with the CIA gets hacked too, it's not all that relevant.
Though we may not realize it at first there are quite a few examples of modern, democratic, and respected governments turning on their own citizens. It occurs when the government feels sufficiently threatened. The problem is that it typically happens with the support (or indifference) of the bulk of the rest of citizens. One example is the internment of US citizens of Japanese descent in WWII. The right to own firearms didn't help them. When the government feels sufficiently threatened, rights are taken away from those they feel threatened by and perhaps others. You could argue that sometimes it's justifiable, but there definitely have been times when it was not.
Even groups that are well armed and willing to use their weapons don't fair well when the government decides to take them down, - Waco Texas and the Branch Davidians for example. In my opinion some of these people (and especially their leader) were borderline nuts but my point is that once you find yourself outside the law, - for legitimate reasons or not, all bets are off if things escalate far enough. It doesn't matter what your rights were when you were a citizen in good standing.
Personal firearms aren't going to bring down a tyrant or end tyrannical practices. In reality, personal firearms are actually used mostly for target shooting or hunting. Once in a while they are used to successfully defend oneself or someone else. But far too often, they are intentionally or accidentally used to kill people with no justification. Handled incorrectly they are extremely dangerous and should be regulated just like any other thing that has a huge potential to kill or injure people (such as motor vehicles).
For better or worse, we've structured our society in such a way that depending on where you live, driving is practically a requirement for holding down a job or doing many of things required to live our lives being buying food and clothing or getting to a doctor's appointment.
Though we may not give much thought to it when we climb behind the wheel, lots of people are killed in car accidents including kids. That is one reason why motor vehicle use is so highly regulated. You must be licensed and to get a license you must past both written and behind the wheel tests. In many if not all states you must carry insurance. Vehicles have titles and you are required to license them and pay annual taxes on them.
Negligent use of a motor vehicle that results in someone's death may very well result in manslaughter charges and jail time. To me not properly guarding against the use of your firearm by a toddler definitely falls into the category of negligence. While I wouldn't advocate a life sentence for either the driver or the gun owner unless there was malice or a pattern of repeated negligence, I can definitely see revoking driving rights as well as rights to gun ownership.
I'm glad you brought this up. Though people may disagree with me, I see gun ownership as far more optional for most people than the right to operate a vehicle. If you live in a city with great public transportation, that may not be true. But for most of us it is. To me that deserves more protection that the right to own a gun. We highly regulate motor vehicle use yet have comparatively little regulation when it comes to guns. That makes no sense.
That's basically what it is. Computers didn't come into their own as a "Thinkerer" field until the early 80s. By that time, most degrees had gone to women, and you were still seeing that population into the early 90s.
The shift in degrees occurred early/mid-80s with the release of the PC platform and Home computers, these things don't happen in the span of a few days. It takes years to change a trend like that in emerging fields. In the 90s, when I did my Comp Sci classes, we had like 80% of our teachers being women, while 90% of the class were guys.
Why is it so hard to accept that maybe women in general don't prefer the field, just like men in general don't prefer nursing ?
Huh? Women didn't get most of the degrees in the 80's. It was still very much a male dominated field, just not nearly so much so as it is today. In the 80's I had one female CompSci professor. The rest were all men.
The PC platform brought computing to the masses but it didn't fundamentally change what it meant to be a programmer or the skills that were required. It may have helped promote the start-up mentality of ridiculously long hours that are good for neither men or women.
Men tend not to go into nursing because there is a stigma associated with being a male nurse, - though that is changing and there are more men going into nursing than have in the past. And since there is a shortage of nurses (my wife is a nurse), men are getting actively recruited to enter the field.
I suspect a stigma is also why some women stay away from computer careers, - there's a nerdy image associated with it. It's not because they can't do the work or wouldn't enjoy it. History has shown that not to be the case.
Something has changed.
Back in the '70s and '80s, computers and programming were seen more as secretarial work than actual technical work. The field had more women participation because of stereotypes of the time being that "Secretarial" work meant work for women. As the industry progressed and created and identity for itself as a tinkerer field, guys managed to overcome the sexist stereotype that "Computers are for secretaries and secretaries are women".
That's what changed.
No, that's not it. Maybe through 60's and partly into the 70's that was true but I suspect it wasn't even then.
Anyone expecting computer programming to be anything like secretarial work and not technical wouldn't have made it through their first CompSci course. But plenty of women were getting degrees. It was not at all unusual for me to work with women programmers in the 80's and into the 90's. But as time went on there were fewer and fewer.
Just to add some historical perspective, I got my CompSci degree in the mid 80's. Although still a minority there were a significant number of women in my classes. And in the first decade of my career I worked with a number of women programmers but over time there have been fewer and fewer.
Also over the course of my career, I've taken on more management responsibility. The first person I hired to work for me as a programmer back in the mid 90's was a woman. Today I manage a small group of software developers. We don't have openings often but again over the course of time, I've seen a drop in the number of female applicants when have been looking for help. The last time I hired a developer (about a year ago), there was not a single female applicant.
It's not as though coding were something that women aren't as a group interested or never have been. Something has changed.
Linus is describing a false dichotomy. Deciding not to curse every other sentence is not the same as lying and manipulating. The intent of cursing and swearing IS to bring emotion into the conversation. If you want an unemotional and logical response (fix what is broken), then don't introduce emotion into an exchange that doesn't warrant it.
I realize that coarse language in many situations is just part of the culture of the group and is often devoid of any real meaning or it could even be part of what is meant to be a warm exchange. But in a technical exchange it is wasted bandwidth at best unless the situation really warrants it.
I have a young teen and part of our deal with him is that he can have a smartphone with the understanding that we as his parents can check what he is doing on it any time. Teenagers don't always use the best judgement. Anyway, the texts exchanged with his friends are full of swearing. But even teens are smart enough to recognize that would not be an effective way to communicate outside of certain situations.
I'm a director of IT with both men and women in the department. A good boss/leader knows how to motivate and recognizes that there isn't a one size fits all approach. I am by no means perfect but it is not at all hard to be clear and to the point without swearing, yelling, insulting people, or being abusive.
I rarely yell or swear but my employees know when I'm not happy and when they need to do better.
My honest belief is that a lot of people in IT simply do not know how to interact effectively with people who aren't like them. Even worse is that they see the problem as being with those that they're interacting with rather than as a set of skills they need to work on.
Let me be direct. If you find women as a group difficult to work with (as opposed to just certain individuals), then the problem is with your approach, not theirs.
Sounds like an AWESOME time to buy a VW tdi for much less than they normaly are :)
I know, but it kind of depends on what happens and what's important to you. If VW is forced to recall these cars for some firmware modification that decreases their performance, and the owners are somehow compelled to have the modifications made, you might be stuck with something you don't want and can't get rid of.
If on the other hand, if current owners aren't obligated to get the likely firmware update, and you don't care about the emissions, you could get a great deal.
Heard a couple of TDI owner's interviewed on the radio. They were pissed. One guy's previous car was a Prius. He bought into VW's marketing that their diesels burned clean. I would also been tempted by a TDI, but only if they met emission standards.
Even if an owner doesn't give a crap, what do you suppose the resale value on these cars is right now?
Sometimes the companies most in need of the services they provide are themselves.
I frequently walk by this handyman's house where he has a sign advertising his various services including painting. I shake my head every time I see it because his house needs a good paint job more than any other house on the block.
For me personally, XCode doesn't make a whole lot of sense on a touch screen device with limited screen real-estate. I'd prefer to use a Macbook.
I'll grant you the touchscreen part (though they are offering an overpriced keyboard lid), but not the "limited screen real-estate". They are offering a 12.9" screen. Macbooks have long been offered in a 13.3" size. The iPad will be in a 2732×2048 resolution. I've considered the 11.6" / 12" range to be the minimum for a laptop that could be usable as a real computer (as compared to 10" netbooks). Those 12" laptops would frequently have 1366x768 resolutions. 13"-14" computers are easily usable full time. The iPad Pro's screen is obviously not a limitation. The oversized cellphone apps on it may get in the way, but not the screen.
For working with textual information like you are in Xcode, the native resolution on retina displays is almost meaningless. For example, the native resolution on my MBP 15 with retina display is 2880 X 1800, but the default effective resolution is 1440 X 900 which is the same as the non-retina displays of previous versions. Same with the iPads. The newest iPad Air has the same effective resolution as the original, - 1024 X 768. That's because Apple pixel-doubles the text so it's large enough to read.
You could have a native resolution of 2880 X 1800 on an iPhone but that doesn't mean the screen would be optimal for doing Xcode work.
That being said, the screen size of an iPad Pro is approaching that of an MBP 13 which I used for many years for software development. Before that I briefly had a Macbook Air. Obviously portability is an important feature to me and I could hook them up to external displays in the office. However, when away from the office I found the 13" display to be a liability unless I was just working in the terminal, web browsing, checking email, etc. The latest MBP 15 that I have now is almost as light as the earlier generation MBP 13 and is probably thinner. The larger screen is well worth the added footprint when I'm away from the office.
So I guess I don't see the fact that Xcode doesn't work on the iPad Pro as much of a downside since I don't think it's a great form factor for that kind of work anyway.
Depends on what your qualifications for being a professional tool are. The stylus support and Apple Pencil are potentially very big things for people in the graphics world. Keyboards and cases have been available for iPads for a long time, so that in and of itself doesn't seem to be much of an advance.
Other than for taking notes or referencing documents when I don't feel like caring around a laptop, it doesn't seem like a professional tool for me personally. On the other hand, it's approaching the size of a small laptop anyway.
I think what RT showed is that it's hard to survive as a platform without applications and without clear reasons for choosing it over a confusingly similar product from the same vender.
For me personally, XCode doesn't make a whole lot of sense on a touch screen device with limited screen real-estate. I'd prefer to use a Macbook. As for Photoshop, there might be a ton of photo applications that do make sense on a touch screen device with stylus support. Whether that needs to be a full desktop version of Photoshop or something targeted specifically at that kind of device is an open question.
Why? We need a real man...
Says the guy posting as an AC