Well let's see... That would apply an acceleration of 1.11x10^-12 m/s^2 to the 'roid...
On the other hand, the same gravitational force would be acting on the spacecraft, and F=ma gives us 5509 m/s^2 there...
Am I calculating this wrong? Because it seems it would take a hell of a lot of fuel to keep that spacecraft from just crashing into the asteroid... And they plan to keep this spacecraft sitting next to the roid for years?
When asked the same question, without a tablecloth available, he responded... "Well, imagine Microsoft is this glass, and this fork is a trans-ductional mode in the matter curve--"
Is it more profitable to stick with the same client for an extended period, or to use the (hopefully) good references/referrals to move on to other clients?
And "don't gouge them" is a good point. Our department had the same consultant for over a decade, since the place started up. I had been there about a year and a half when it was found he was inflating timesheets and overbilling, among other things. Needless to say, we stopped using him, and we were his only significant client.
Perhaps it's just a matter of preference then. I admit I have little experience in this respect, being a full-time employee instead of a contractor, but why not just set it up like this?
* The client gets ownership of the final product in the delivered form * The client gets a copy of the source code, and permission to use and modify it for internal use only (i.e. They couldn't go and resell it to another company).
That would allow the contractor to resell the code, in whole or in part, but still let the company modify it as necessary. The only issue is whether you want to rely on an NDA to keep your code from going public.
(I realize this differs slightly from my previous point, but I hadn't considered the reselling angle before)
Yeah, last year, when they were setting up their little Central Brainwashing Office in Times Square (New York City), there were little scientologists in white suits with bright red-clothed tables giving "Free Stress Tests"...
The dead giveaway, of course, was the big stack of Dianetics books on every table. They would walk up to people on the street and try to drag them over to the table for the test, which, inevitably, would be something like "Wow, you're suffering from a lot of stress. Boy, do I have the cure for you!"
You have no idea how hard it was to resist the temptation to follow them to their little tables and give a little tribute to Elvira Kurt...
"You know what I find really stressful? Being sucked into a creepy, scary, religious cult!"
Those bastards can practice any religion they want, but the instant they try to recruit me, they become the enemy, and I would then feel no compunction in recruiting them as the world's newest Atheists.
And what if they decide to change it themselves? They bought the software, so shouldn't that be their option? Granted, it might void any support contract you make with them, but they should still be allowed to modify a program they paid to have custom-made.
That's a good point... I forgot about the whole ownership vs. license distinction. In the case of the article, the company had to prove that this software fell into the "ownership" category, while normally we just buy "licenses" for software.
This link, posted in another comment, explains it better than the link in the/. submission...
it's legal for people to make changes to software, provided that they own a physical copy of the program, the changes constitute "an essential step in the utilization" of the program, and the software is used "in no other manner."
Circumventing copy protection just so you can play it (i.e. not to distribute it) seems like it fits there...
Maybe it was more of a consultant gig, where he sold them a black-box custom solution. They'd own the program, but he'd keep the code. They'd get it a little cheaper, but they'd have to hire him again whenever changes were needed...
I've seen this tactic before... I wouldn't work that way.
"What's the use of us staying up all night arguing about whether there is or isn't a Linux 2.7 kernel, when you walk right up and tell us it doesn't exist!? We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty! I demand that I may, OR may NOT be Darl McBride!"
As I said, MOST VB programmers come over from macro languages. Those of us who choose it for its strengths instead of out of necessity are a minority. I'm working in the financial industry, and everywhere I look, there are decade-old programs that started as excel macros and turned into VB6 apps that give new meaning to the term "spaghetti code". Perhaps my quoted statement was molded by my personal experience, but I stand by it.
And when I say I'm eager to drop VB6 completely, that's to move to VB.NET, which I think is in every way superior to its predecessor.
Alright, as someone who does a good amount of programming in VB, I have to step in here...
VB was never intended to be for shrink-wrapped commercial development (Or if it was, someone was REALLY stoned). It was meant for small, in-house solutions.
Department X needs a utility that will accomplish simple task Y which is currently being done manually by a dozen people. A few hours later, a VB developer delivers a program that accomplishes this in a few seconds. Could this have been done in C? Yes. Damn near anything can be done in C. Could it be done as quickly, and be nearly 100% free of memory leaks, buffer overflows, and the like? Assuming equally-skilled programmers, probably not.
That said... VB6 is in every other respect, greatly inferior to C. I fully admit that. It lacks proper OOP, despite being advertised as an object-oriented language. It hides the windows API, yet still requires it for many tasks. It runs much slower than a C executable, for obvious reasons.
On the other hand, I actually prefer the VB syntax in many cases. Yes, well-written C code has a distinct beauty to it, but badly-written C-code can be nearly impossible to read. Well-written VB code (Rare, nowadays - See my next point) is nothing much to look at, but even the worst VB code can still be read with relative ease. Brag all you want about how organized your code is, but there's always that one idiot on your team who just won't follow the guidelines, and if I'm cleaning up his mess, I'd rather it was in VB.
The major problem with VB is that most VB programmers are NOT hackers, in the original sense. Most VB programmers are people who hopped over from Office when the old macro language or VBA wasn't quite good enough. Most VB programmers know how to code, NOT how to truly program. Most VB programmers don't know how to elevate software design to an art form, and most VB programmers don't care. The problem isn't that VB creates bad programmers. The problem is that bad programmers gravitate towards VB, because it's the simplest tool they can find.
Now, VB.NET is a whole different story. VB.NET blends the old VB syntax (Which, as I've said, I actually prefer), with the power of a real language. It's still closer to Java than C in terms of raw power, but it's a step in the right direction.
Anyway, I've ranted enough... I'll close with these simple points.
1) VB may have a lot of flaws, but it does a good job of filling its niche (Extremely-rapid tool development).
2) Not all VB programmers are bad. It just attracts most of the bad ones.
3) Show some respect, because if it wasn't for VB, all of those horrible programmers would be out of the sandbox and doing even more damage in C.
(DISCLAIMER: I prefer VB.NET, but am also well-versed in C/C++/C#, Java, and Perl, among others. If my office wasn't so backwards, I'd have dropped VB6 long ago.)
Careful observation even shows that there are even leaders of major western countries who owe everything to family connections rather than intelligence or education.
If you start doing that, you have to mention the rest of them, too. Here, let me give you a hand.
"One day, lad, all this will be yours!" "To maintain airspeed velocity, a swallow..." "We are the knights who say..." "The castle aaaaaaaggghhhh" "Your mother was a hamster, and your father..." "Logically, if she weighs the same as a duck..." "You're using coconuts!" "Bad, naughty Zoot!"
All hail the Pythons! *hums the chant and smacks himself in the face with his keyboard*
Slashdot Mirror
+5 Amusing Description of Randomization
Hahaha... So true... I read your post, then suddenly realized I'd been quietly humming it to myself as soon as I clicked the Zelda 1 map picture!
Well let's see... That would apply an acceleration of 1.11x10^-12 m/s^2 to the 'roid...
On the other hand, the same gravitational force would be acting on the spacecraft, and F=ma gives us 5509 m/s^2 there...
Am I calculating this wrong? Because it seems it would take a hell of a lot of fuel to keep that spacecraft from just crashing into the asteroid... And they plan to keep this spacecraft sitting next to the roid for years?
Nuke it.
Well that's one way to build up a good reputation. Probably got quite a few referrals because of that.
When asked the same question, without a tablecloth available, he responded... "Well, imagine Microsoft is this glass, and this fork is a trans-ductional mode in the matter curve--"
"Hey, could you get your hands off my fork?"
"Ok, THIS fork--"
"That's the fork I was eating with."
"Ok, this knife then..."
Is it more profitable to stick with the same client for an extended period, or to use the (hopefully) good references/referrals to move on to other clients?
And "don't gouge them" is a good point. Our department had the same consultant for over a decade, since the place started up. I had been there about a year and a half when it was found he was inflating timesheets and overbilling, among other things. Needless to say, we stopped using him, and we were his only significant client.
Hmm, good point.
Perhaps it's just a matter of preference then. I admit I have little experience in this respect, being a full-time employee instead of a contractor, but why not just set it up like this?
* The client gets ownership of the final product in the delivered form
* The client gets a copy of the source code, and permission to use and modify it for internal use only (i.e. They couldn't go and resell it to another company).
That would allow the contractor to resell the code, in whole or in part, but still let the company modify it as necessary. The only issue is whether you want to rely on an NDA to keep your code from going public.
(I realize this differs slightly from my previous point, but I hadn't considered the reselling angle before)
Yeah, last year, when they were setting up their little Central Brainwashing Office in Times Square (New York City), there were little scientologists in white suits with bright red-clothed tables giving "Free Stress Tests"...
The dead giveaway, of course, was the big stack of Dianetics books on every table. They would walk up to people on the street and try to drag them over to the table for the test, which, inevitably, would be something like "Wow, you're suffering from a lot of stress. Boy, do I have the cure for you!"
You have no idea how hard it was to resist the temptation to follow them to their little tables and give a little tribute to Elvira Kurt...
"You know what I find really stressful? Being sucked into a creepy, scary, religious cult!"
Those bastards can practice any religion they want, but the instant they try to recruit me, they become the enemy, and I would then feel no compunction in recruiting them as the world's newest Atheists.
Funny, I thought it was because of the decline in the number of pirates since the 1800's.
And what if they decide to change it themselves? They bought the software, so shouldn't that be their option? Granted, it might void any support contract you make with them, but they should still be allowed to modify a program they paid to have custom-made.
+5 Informative... That link should be in the submission, not the news.com one.
That's a good point... I forgot about the whole ownership vs. license distinction. In the case of the article, the company had to prove that this software fell into the "ownership" category, while normally we just buy "licenses" for software.
/. submission...
This link, posted in another comment, explains it better than the link in the
http://wistechnology.com/article.php?id=2194
I stand corrected.
Hey, if I write a piece of software for hire, they get the code too. They buy it, they own it.
Obviously this wouldn't apply to a shrink-wrapped commercial product, but then, that's not what this is about.
it's legal for people to make changes to software, provided that they own a physical copy of the program, the changes constitute "an essential step in the utilization" of the program, and the software is used "in no other manner."
Circumventing copy protection just so you can play it (i.e. not to distribute it) seems like it fits there...
But then, I'm a programmer, not a lawyer.
Maybe it was more of a consultant gig, where he sold them a black-box custom solution. They'd own the program, but he'd keep the code. They'd get it a little cheaper, but they'd have to hire him again whenever changes were needed...
I've seen this tactic before... I wouldn't work that way.
"What's the use of us staying up all night arguing about whether there is or isn't a Linux 2.7 kernel, when you walk right up and tell us it doesn't exist!? We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty! I demand that I may, OR may NOT be Darl McBride!"
Or you could just be an extremist and abandon graphics entirely. If you want a game with a plot, that's where to look.
I agree with you 100%.
As I said, MOST VB programmers come over from macro languages. Those of us who choose it for its strengths instead of out of necessity are a minority. I'm working in the financial industry, and everywhere I look, there are decade-old programs that started as excel macros and turned into VB6 apps that give new meaning to the term "spaghetti code". Perhaps my quoted statement was molded by my personal experience, but I stand by it.
And when I say I'm eager to drop VB6 completely, that's to move to VB.NET, which I think is in every way superior to its predecessor.
Alright, as someone who does a good amount of programming in VB, I have to step in here...
VB was never intended to be for shrink-wrapped commercial development (Or if it was, someone was REALLY stoned). It was meant for small, in-house solutions.
Department X needs a utility that will accomplish simple task Y which is currently being done manually by a dozen people. A few hours later, a VB developer delivers a program that accomplishes this in a few seconds. Could this have been done in C? Yes. Damn near anything can be done in C. Could it be done as quickly, and be nearly 100% free of memory leaks, buffer overflows, and the like? Assuming equally-skilled programmers, probably not.
That said... VB6 is in every other respect, greatly inferior to C. I fully admit that. It lacks proper OOP, despite being advertised as an object-oriented language. It hides the windows API, yet still requires it for many tasks. It runs much slower than a C executable, for obvious reasons.
On the other hand, I actually prefer the VB syntax in many cases. Yes, well-written C code has a distinct beauty to it, but badly-written C-code can be nearly impossible to read. Well-written VB code (Rare, nowadays - See my next point) is nothing much to look at, but even the worst VB code can still be read with relative ease. Brag all you want about how organized your code is, but there's always that one idiot on your team who just won't follow the guidelines, and if I'm cleaning up his mess, I'd rather it was in VB.
The major problem with VB is that most VB programmers are NOT hackers, in the original sense. Most VB programmers are people who hopped over from Office when the old macro language or VBA wasn't quite good enough. Most VB programmers know how to code, NOT how to truly program. Most VB programmers don't know how to elevate software design to an art form, and most VB programmers don't care. The problem isn't that VB creates bad programmers. The problem is that bad programmers gravitate towards VB, because it's the simplest tool they can find.
Now, VB.NET is a whole different story. VB.NET blends the old VB syntax (Which, as I've said, I actually prefer), with the power of a real language. It's still closer to Java than C in terms of raw power, but it's a step in the right direction.
Anyway, I've ranted enough... I'll close with these simple points.
1) VB may have a lot of flaws, but it does a good job of filling its niche (Extremely-rapid tool development).
2) Not all VB programmers are bad. It just attracts most of the bad ones.
3) Show some respect, because if it wasn't for VB, all of those horrible programmers would be out of the sandbox and doing even more damage in C.
(DISCLAIMER: I prefer VB.NET, but am also well-versed in C/C++/C#, Java, and Perl, among others. If my office wasn't so backwards, I'd have dropped VB6 long ago.)
So, flame away.
When it expired
We just changed our pass three times
Kept it just the same
"5-7-5, the magic thing that is... Haiku!" --Hooptie-Goo
A valid point, but on the other hand, what are the statistics on children born to 16-year-old mothers?
I couldn't have said it better myself...
And a big slingshot at the top, to send them horizontally into orbit!
Wow... An intelligent analysis... You must be new here.
If you start doing that, you have to mention the rest of them, too. Here, let me give you a hand.
"One day, lad, all this will be yours!"
"To maintain airspeed velocity, a swallow..."
"We are the knights who say..."
"The castle aaaaaaaggghhhh"
"Your mother was a hamster, and your father..."
"Logically, if she weighs the same as a duck..."
"You're using coconuts!"
"Bad, naughty Zoot!"
All hail the Pythons! *hums the chant and smacks himself in the face with his keyboard*