I had to do a bunch of web crap that had to be Netscape compatible a few years back; as far as basic HTML, you're fine, but forget javascript and don't rely on fancy CSS either. Even the very newest version of Netscape was idiosyncratic there.
I still deal with a lot of similar crap. Geographically I'm not exactly in early-adopter central, and I've basically ended up moving to the point where I either do a modern page with modern javascript, and post a nasty message to anyone who doesn't have a modern browser that they need to upgrade...Or I just do simple HTML with all the dynamic code server side.
I think a lot of the problem is that big, professional shops will still keep a guy on staff to program in compatibility for every browser that has any kind of market share. As long as they keep doing that, guys like the article guy can get away without ever having to upgrade.
The humor thing works well...I can remember exactly what it felt like, and how outraged I was that my anger wasn't taken seriously. I remember being sent to my room (while screaming) and every time I hit a particularly epic scream, I'd hear a burst of laughter from the rest of the house. It really drove home the point that that sort of behaviour is never taken seriously, and I stopped repeating it.
My kid likes the hardware store as well...I get screaming, but it's oh-my-god-this-place-is-unbearably-awesome-must-see-everything screaming, and that's cool. I started driving home the "not yours" concept really early, so there is no expectation that they can rip everything off shelves, or grab stuff for themselves.
Fact of life. Most people persecute most thoroughly the vices they hate themselves for having. I don't really see anything wrong with the sex trade; like a lot of things I think it's a hell of a lot worse when it's illegal and unregulated. So him being anti-sex trade doesn't endear him to me.
At the same time, his patronizing hookers doesn't really interest me (because I don't care about the sex trade) though his hypocrisy is somewhat amusing. I'd be happy if he just apologized to everyone, sought psychiatric help for his latent sex issues, and loosened up a little bit.
What will happen though, is he'll be railroaded out of office. Not because he's a hypocrite, mind you, but because he screwed some pricey hookers.
Oh, I'm right there with you. I yanked my kid out of daycare on the spot when I walked in and found a room full of goddamn year old toddlers watching Spongebob with commercials. Jesus. And I've inherited the family gene that makes me think tantrums are funny (as a child that drove me absolutely insane; the madder I got, the more hilarious my parents found it) so I don't cave to that sort of kid pressure.
It's more just a general observation. Most people don't deal well with screaming kids in the grocery store. That's the whole point of the wall-to-wall candy at every checkout line, the cartoon characters on every cereal box, the random kid crap on little face-out hangers that adorns rows full of otherwise kid-unfriendly merchandise.
Have to say, one of the things that irritates me most about/. is people's tendency to take exception to a statement about the general state of the world, and insist that everyone should be an exception to it, and that you, for acknowledging it, are that sort of person in the worst possible way.
Just because a guy occasionally thinks with his dick doesn't make him bad at his job. We're all human; expecting someone to have no human flaws is idiotic and unrealistic.
It's not buying them that's the problem, its having to navigate through a grocery store where all the things you don't want your kid to eat are marketing themselves aggressively right from the shelves...The kid will want them, the marketers will make sure of that, and you'll either have to buy 'em or deal with the crazed screaming/whining/sulking that will ensue.
Sure, you can fight that fight, but you have to fight it often enough already for crap that actually matters more than a box of cereal. Lot of people will give in just to avoid the inevitable scene.
If you work that way, you deserve what you get. Most businesses don't need a whole set of new computers every three years, unless it's a tech business, and that's the cost of being one. Likewise servers...A 5 year old server attached to a decent drive array is plenty of file storage for most medium sized companies. What are you using your servers for that they're gone after three years?
An intelligent system is to cascade things...Replace a percentage when you have to, and move the machines you replace down along the line to less critical functions. When the power users need new desktops (which isn't that often unless you're doing graphics or something), buy them new machines, and pass their machines down to people whose older machines are wearing out. Etc.
If you're buying huge software upgrades all the time, you're being foolish. Either your primary software is under a support contract, in which case upgrades are free, or you're just buying tons of over the counter consumer grade crap. The former is a necessary evil, and the latter is an extremely poor business practice. And new software shouldn't be a continuing expense; software should be purchased based on a demonstrated need, and an intelligent evaluation process.
Almost all of the things you say scream mismanagement to me. A three year cycle doesn't even fit the release cycles of most major upgrades, and no IT department worth its salt will move onto a platform right after release (which is the real reason no one is moving to Vista). Three year hardware cycles are too slow to be bleeding edge, but too methodical to take into account the best times to buy new hardware.
You definitely have a management point of view. I suggest if your IT department is out of control with its expenses, you fire half the staff and slash their budget. If your quality of service remains roughly the same, you'll be a hero...If it doesn't at least you won't have to work at that company any more.
Sadly, you don't have to explain what a burster is to me, though thankfully we use ours as a spot to store the coffee machine these days.
And yea, I agree completely. We have a heavily telephone and internet dependent business (and they skimp on IT. Hah. But I digress...) and our phone system is antiquated crap, and our network infrastructure is hilariously mis-wired...Parts of the building are depending on cat5 pulls that are almost twice the "maximum" length. There is no rhyme or reason to the madness. And my suggestions to do away with about half the cable by adding a mere 5 internal fibre lines, lines, I may add, that I'm willing to run myself, since all the actual cable guys are scared to death of fibre...Denied. The phone system upgrade which will pay for itself, just in phone line savings (not counting the productivity gains which are literally incalculable), in 3 years...Denied.
People are just stupid. They want a quick buck today, and they don't care about tomorrow.
Nah. You wouldn't want to be here if I was. Too many problems, not enough money, no training budget, etc, etc, etc. Seems like it's the same everywhere.
In my particular situation, the legacy system is part of the finance system, so the word "upgrade" causes the CFO to have the vapors.
On top of that, they have no real motivation to upgrade. It's not really supported anymore, which would make a normal person worry, but since I've been able to fix it every time it's crapped itself, they think it's going to keep working forever.
Eventually it will catastrophically fail, and we'll get a new one. That's how crap works around here...They let it limp along until it dies, and then they replace it immediately. It has the advantage of surprise, and the disadvantage that its massively costly and has obscene pass-along costs to the business.
Probably because VAX is strictly legacy these days, having been discontinued...Last time I did anything on one of those was in 1994, though they were still making 'em up until a few years ago.
Not to bitch and moan (I'm supporting an old MPE/iX system myself, so I've got no room to talk), but asking anyone young to devote their life to supporting a deadend system is silly. You want a senior VAX admin, you're going to have to pry one out of retirement, or you're going to have to accept someone who is willing to develop the skills, and you're going to have to make it worth their while to develop skills that are pre-obsolete.
I'd rule anyone out who only has paper credentials, be they degrees, certifications, whatever. A crappy candidate could get all of those things, and still be crappy. Experience and raw aptitude will separate the good candidates from the bad ones.
Eh. It's hard. The interview process is like a collision of paradigms...On the one side, you have management, and on the other side you have techs. Most management doesn't do a great job of spotting tech talent. Everything is measured in "years" like programming experience works that way...I have about 10 years of Java experience, but I'm not primarily a Java guy, and I'm certainly not a Java ubergeek...But I do tend to churn out a minor Java app or two a month. So what do I put on the resume? 10 years is disingenuous; I've been working with it since forever, but it's not what I do, and someone looking for someone with "10 years of Java experience" is going to be disappointed. But 10 years (almost 11) is what I've got.
A better approach would be to look for people who have completed certain types of projects, but there you don't often get a good sense of what kind of contribution the individual has made. Did he just do the gui? Did he do esoteric network socket stuff that doesn't apply to your needs? So we get these weird "Knowledge tests" which vary between ridiculous and absurd. You get asked specifics about some weird method or interface, the sort of thing a quality programmer would rarely waste brain space with, when you can look it up in seconds. Or its a logic puzzle, like I need to be able to move foxes, grain, and chickens as part of my daily grind.
It's even worse if you're not a specialist. My "specialty" is applications support and extension. That guy you hired, who programmed that critical thing that no one can support, and then got hit by a truck? If you want to replace him, I'm not your guy. If you want someone to transition his applications into something clean and supportable, that's me...To use the Microsoft metaphor: I'm great at embracing and extending, but not so hot at innovation...My original stuff is clean and functional, but nothing special. Right now I'm transitioning ~50 years of legacy Cobol, Speedware, and RPG (all programmed with zero comments) to Java and Perl. It's not the kind of thing people usually know to look for. I have a freaking TON of language experience, but I'm not a specialist with any language, and I'm miserable when people start badgering me with specific syntax questions...If you work with enough different crap, it's easy to get mixed up.
So how do you present when your primary skillset isn't the sort of crap that ends up posted on job sites? Emphasize "problem solving" not "learning new skills"; means the same thing, but problem solving is proactive. Don't claim to be a hard worker; that can be interpreted as a slight on your skills, oddly enough, because if you were more skilled, you wouldn't have to work hard, right? Taking initiative is something you don't want to over-emphasize unless they're asking for it specifically...Managers don't want someone who is too aggressive; either you're after their job, or you're going to be making headaches for them with other departments...Better to say your a "Team player."
In the end its all a crap shoot. Gotta interview interview interview, and hope that you'll eventually find a not-stupid job at a worthwhile salary.
I think a lot of people would rather gouge out their eyes with a spork than work helpdesk. The problem is, you're going to get people who want to work with people. I'm a reasonably social geek (how can you spot an extroverted geek? He looks at your shoes when he's talking to you) and people in the department live in fear of those rare times I have to interact with users. So the hardcore tech people are going to avoid the job; even if they're just benchtech types, there are a lot of better gigs.
Helpdesk is the worst too; users with stupid problems, who then blame you when you fix 'em. The temptation to put in snarky responses to tickets is overwhelming.
Meh. IT is still a "non-revenue generating department" for the vast majority of businesses. That means their budgets suck hind teat; but worse, the bulk of the budget goes to things like hardware and software, so you're left with the dregs to supply salary money for your workers.
If they don't take it seriously, they can't expect to attract top talent.
Shrug. We've all been fresh out of school at some point...A lot of the time I'd rather have a recent grad who's willing to learn than a guy with 10 years experience who thinks he doesn't have to learn anymore.
I seriously get tired of people who expect high-end experts to explode out of the ground whenever they want one. Lot of the time you're going to have to settle for some people who are bright, young, and inexperienced. Mix them up with some more experienced workers, and they'll do okay.
Lot of people say, "I don't want to train someone, knowing that he's going to leave as soon as he gets a better offer." The English translation of that is: "I did this guy a favor by hiring him, and piling crap work on him, and I can't figure out why he'd be so disloyal." Make your company a good place to work, and you won't have such high turnover.
Yea, but the reason the Nazi's got so nasty in the first place is because no one was willing to stand up to them.
Leave them their hysteria, leave them their irrationality, but don't allow their brainless assertions to go unanswered. I think this sort of thing is precisely the way to deal with them; humor, fact, and dispassion. Scientific fact stands on it's own, and has no need of faith or belief...If they want to continue to try and pretend that the evidence that sits right before their eyes is false, let them. But don't fail to point out their shortcomings where it is appropriate.
Creationist science is like a cargo cult...They buy guys who have letters after their names, they use all the terminology, and put on lab coats...and still don't understand why no one takes their "science" seriously.
And it's the same old argument from ignorance: "No one has proven with 100% certainty how this happened, therefore it must have been God." Of course you can insert anything in where "God" is and the argument will be equally fallacious. I'd be nice if they'd throw out a valid argument every now and again.
It's rarely that simple. The cost of moving forward is seldom in the "lump sum" format, whereas switching platforms often is, so you're trying to cost justify switching to a platform that will pay for itself in 5 or 6 years, but you have to have people who are willing to overlook the fact that a platform switch is going to cost them dramatically more in the short term.
A lot of the time they'll vote to stay with the crap platform on the premise that something better (cheaper) will show up in a few years. That sort of reasoning can delay a migration indefinitely.
These days I develop primarily in Java and Php, and I can say with assurance that if you think you can do anything in php that you can do in Java, you're out of your mind.
Php has its place, and it's easy to develop in, but if you can do everything you ever need to do in php, you have pretty simple needs.
Yea, I was imprecise. Mars has an atmosphere, and even some pretty wild storms occasionally which we've gotten pictures of from the rovers.
What it really lacks is a dense atmosphere...It's only about 1/100th as dense as ours. It would be interesting if it were a little denser, because the atmosphere is almost completely CO2. In composition, it is much heavier than our primarily nitrogen atmosphere, and it does lend weight to the idea that the bulk of the "light" elements in the atmosphere have been stripped away, though it's equally likely, especially in the case of things like H2, that they just "escaped"...It doesn't take much to accelerate hydrogen to escape velocity when the gravity is that low. Even on earth we lose a measurable amount.
Nah, polarity flips have been happening for a long time; if we lost our atmosphere every time, this planet would LOOK like mars...Anyway, Mars has no atmosphere because it's too small, not because it doesn't have a liquid core with the attendant magnetic field. Losing the magnetic field (which may or may not happen during a flip...Geologic data isn't precise enough to tell) could cause some problems with regards to the solar wind, but complete loss of atmosphere is extremely unlikely.
The average period between pole flips is about 250,000 years, so that will give you a pretty good idea of how often it happens, and how unlikely it is that atmospheric loss follows. For the curious, it's been about 800,000 years since the last flip, so we're due one.
I'd rather they worked with Rabies...We know the flu is a killer.
And yea, 3 years, Jesus. My mother lasted 3 weeks; when they removed the tumor (which was horrifying big...I talked to the Doc before the operation, and he showed me the MRI, and you get that progression of slices of the brain, and it was like, "Ugh...UGH...damn...Damn...DAMN!" It was literally the size of my fist, and it spread out everywhere.) the brain didn't redistribute the fluid correctly, and then she had a pretty serious stroke...
We could have kept her alive, on the principle that she'd recover somewhat, but recover to what? There was no way she'd have been well enough for treatment, and no treatment means what, 6 weeks? If we'd known going in, we wouldn't even have operated.
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Then don't expect to be able to use a site with javascript on it. I use noscript all the time, but I don't whine when it breaks a website.
Well the stats at W3Schools delisted Netscape in 2007, but they're still showing a percent and a half for Netscape.
So it's a good bet.
I had to do a bunch of web crap that had to be Netscape compatible a few years back; as far as basic HTML, you're fine, but forget javascript and don't rely on fancy CSS either. Even the very newest version of Netscape was idiosyncratic there.
I still deal with a lot of similar crap. Geographically I'm not exactly in early-adopter central, and I've basically ended up moving to the point where I either do a modern page with modern javascript, and post a nasty message to anyone who doesn't have a modern browser that they need to upgrade...Or I just do simple HTML with all the dynamic code server side.
I think a lot of the problem is that big, professional shops will still keep a guy on staff to program in compatibility for every browser that has any kind of market share. As long as they keep doing that, guys like the article guy can get away without ever having to upgrade.
The humor thing works well...I can remember exactly what it felt like, and how outraged I was that my anger wasn't taken seriously. I remember being sent to my room (while screaming) and every time I hit a particularly epic scream, I'd hear a burst of laughter from the rest of the house. It really drove home the point that that sort of behaviour is never taken seriously, and I stopped repeating it.
My kid likes the hardware store as well...I get screaming, but it's oh-my-god-this-place-is-unbearably-awesome-must-see-everything screaming, and that's cool. I started driving home the "not yours" concept really early, so there is no expectation that they can rip everything off shelves, or grab stuff for themselves.
Fact of life. Most people persecute most thoroughly the vices they hate themselves for having. I don't really see anything wrong with the sex trade; like a lot of things I think it's a hell of a lot worse when it's illegal and unregulated. So him being anti-sex trade doesn't endear him to me.
At the same time, his patronizing hookers doesn't really interest me (because I don't care about the sex trade) though his hypocrisy is somewhat amusing. I'd be happy if he just apologized to everyone, sought psychiatric help for his latent sex issues, and loosened up a little bit.
What will happen though, is he'll be railroaded out of office. Not because he's a hypocrite, mind you, but because he screwed some pricey hookers.
Oh, I'm right there with you. I yanked my kid out of daycare on the spot when I walked in and found a room full of goddamn year old toddlers watching Spongebob with commercials. Jesus. And I've inherited the family gene that makes me think tantrums are funny (as a child that drove me absolutely insane; the madder I got, the more hilarious my parents found it) so I don't cave to that sort of kid pressure.
/. is people's tendency to take exception to a statement about the general state of the world, and insist that everyone should be an exception to it, and that you, for acknowledging it, are that sort of person in the worst possible way.
It's more just a general observation. Most people don't deal well with screaming kids in the grocery store. That's the whole point of the wall-to-wall candy at every checkout line, the cartoon characters on every cereal box, the random kid crap on little face-out hangers that adorns rows full of otherwise kid-unfriendly merchandise.
Have to say, one of the things that irritates me most about
Just because a guy occasionally thinks with his dick doesn't make him bad at his job. We're all human; expecting someone to have no human flaws is idiotic and unrealistic.
Speaks the guy with no kids.
It's not buying them that's the problem, its having to navigate through a grocery store where all the things you don't want your kid to eat are marketing themselves aggressively right from the shelves...The kid will want them, the marketers will make sure of that, and you'll either have to buy 'em or deal with the crazed screaming/whining/sulking that will ensue.
Sure, you can fight that fight, but you have to fight it often enough already for crap that actually matters more than a box of cereal. Lot of people will give in just to avoid the inevitable scene.
If you work that way, you deserve what you get. Most businesses don't need a whole set of new computers every three years, unless it's a tech business, and that's the cost of being one. Likewise servers...A 5 year old server attached to a decent drive array is plenty of file storage for most medium sized companies. What are you using your servers for that they're gone after three years?
An intelligent system is to cascade things...Replace a percentage when you have to, and move the machines you replace down along the line to less critical functions. When the power users need new desktops (which isn't that often unless you're doing graphics or something), buy them new machines, and pass their machines down to people whose older machines are wearing out. Etc.
If you're buying huge software upgrades all the time, you're being foolish. Either your primary software is under a support contract, in which case upgrades are free, or you're just buying tons of over the counter consumer grade crap. The former is a necessary evil, and the latter is an extremely poor business practice. And new software shouldn't be a continuing expense; software should be purchased based on a demonstrated need, and an intelligent evaluation process.
Almost all of the things you say scream mismanagement to me. A three year cycle doesn't even fit the release cycles of most major upgrades, and no IT department worth its salt will move onto a platform right after release (which is the real reason no one is moving to Vista). Three year hardware cycles are too slow to be bleeding edge, but too methodical to take into account the best times to buy new hardware.
You definitely have a management point of view. I suggest if your IT department is out of control with its expenses, you fire half the staff and slash their budget. If your quality of service remains roughly the same, you'll be a hero...If it doesn't at least you won't have to work at that company any more.
Sadly, you don't have to explain what a burster is to me, though thankfully we use ours as a spot to store the coffee machine these days.
And yea, I agree completely. We have a heavily telephone and internet dependent business (and they skimp on IT. Hah. But I digress...) and our phone system is antiquated crap, and our network infrastructure is hilariously mis-wired...Parts of the building are depending on cat5 pulls that are almost twice the "maximum" length. There is no rhyme or reason to the madness. And my suggestions to do away with about half the cable by adding a mere 5 internal fibre lines, lines, I may add, that I'm willing to run myself, since all the actual cable guys are scared to death of fibre...Denied. The phone system upgrade which will pay for itself, just in phone line savings (not counting the productivity gains which are literally incalculable), in 3 years...Denied.
People are just stupid. They want a quick buck today, and they don't care about tomorrow.
By the way...you hiring?
Nah. You wouldn't want to be here if I was. Too many problems, not enough money, no training budget, etc, etc, etc. Seems like it's the same everywhere.
In my particular situation, the legacy system is part of the finance system, so the word "upgrade" causes the CFO to have the vapors.
On top of that, they have no real motivation to upgrade. It's not really supported anymore, which would make a normal person worry, but since I've been able to fix it every time it's crapped itself, they think it's going to keep working forever.
Eventually it will catastrophically fail, and we'll get a new one. That's how crap works around here...They let it limp along until it dies, and then they replace it immediately. It has the advantage of surprise, and the disadvantage that its massively costly and has obscene pass-along costs to the business.
Probably because VAX is strictly legacy these days, having been discontinued...Last time I did anything on one of those was in 1994, though they were still making 'em up until a few years ago.
Not to bitch and moan (I'm supporting an old MPE/iX system myself, so I've got no room to talk), but asking anyone young to devote their life to supporting a deadend system is silly. You want a senior VAX admin, you're going to have to pry one out of retirement, or you're going to have to accept someone who is willing to develop the skills, and you're going to have to make it worth their while to develop skills that are pre-obsolete.
I'd rule anyone out who only has paper credentials, be they degrees, certifications, whatever. A crappy candidate could get all of those things, and still be crappy. Experience and raw aptitude will separate the good candidates from the bad ones.
Eh. It's hard. The interview process is like a collision of paradigms...On the one side, you have management, and on the other side you have techs. Most management doesn't do a great job of spotting tech talent. Everything is measured in "years" like programming experience works that way...I have about 10 years of Java experience, but I'm not primarily a Java guy, and I'm certainly not a Java ubergeek...But I do tend to churn out a minor Java app or two a month. So what do I put on the resume? 10 years is disingenuous; I've been working with it since forever, but it's not what I do, and someone looking for someone with "10 years of Java experience" is going to be disappointed. But 10 years (almost 11) is what I've got.
A better approach would be to look for people who have completed certain types of projects, but there you don't often get a good sense of what kind of contribution the individual has made. Did he just do the gui? Did he do esoteric network socket stuff that doesn't apply to your needs? So we get these weird "Knowledge tests" which vary between ridiculous and absurd. You get asked specifics about some weird method or interface, the sort of thing a quality programmer would rarely waste brain space with, when you can look it up in seconds. Or its a logic puzzle, like I need to be able to move foxes, grain, and chickens as part of my daily grind.
It's even worse if you're not a specialist. My "specialty" is applications support and extension. That guy you hired, who programmed that critical thing that no one can support, and then got hit by a truck? If you want to replace him, I'm not your guy. If you want someone to transition his applications into something clean and supportable, that's me...To use the Microsoft metaphor: I'm great at embracing and extending, but not so hot at innovation...My original stuff is clean and functional, but nothing special. Right now I'm transitioning ~50 years of legacy Cobol, Speedware, and RPG (all programmed with zero comments) to Java and Perl. It's not the kind of thing people usually know to look for. I have a freaking TON of language experience, but I'm not a specialist with any language, and I'm miserable when people start badgering me with specific syntax questions...If you work with enough different crap, it's easy to get mixed up.
So how do you present when your primary skillset isn't the sort of crap that ends up posted on job sites? Emphasize "problem solving" not "learning new skills"; means the same thing, but problem solving is proactive. Don't claim to be a hard worker; that can be interpreted as a slight on your skills, oddly enough, because if you were more skilled, you wouldn't have to work hard, right? Taking initiative is something you don't want to over-emphasize unless they're asking for it specifically...Managers don't want someone who is too aggressive; either you're after their job, or you're going to be making headaches for them with other departments...Better to say your a "Team player."
In the end its all a crap shoot. Gotta interview interview interview, and hope that you'll eventually find a not-stupid job at a worthwhile salary.
I think a lot of people would rather gouge out their eyes with a spork than work helpdesk. The problem is, you're going to get people who want to work with people. I'm a reasonably social geek (how can you spot an extroverted geek? He looks at your shoes when he's talking to you) and people in the department live in fear of those rare times I have to interact with users. So the hardcore tech people are going to avoid the job; even if they're just benchtech types, there are a lot of better gigs.
Helpdesk is the worst too; users with stupid problems, who then blame you when you fix 'em. The temptation to put in snarky responses to tickets is overwhelming.
Meh. IT is still a "non-revenue generating department" for the vast majority of businesses. That means their budgets suck hind teat; but worse, the bulk of the budget goes to things like hardware and software, so you're left with the dregs to supply salary money for your workers.
If they don't take it seriously, they can't expect to attract top talent.
Shrug. We've all been fresh out of school at some point...A lot of the time I'd rather have a recent grad who's willing to learn than a guy with 10 years experience who thinks he doesn't have to learn anymore.
I seriously get tired of people who expect high-end experts to explode out of the ground whenever they want one. Lot of the time you're going to have to settle for some people who are bright, young, and inexperienced. Mix them up with some more experienced workers, and they'll do okay.
Lot of people say, "I don't want to train someone, knowing that he's going to leave as soon as he gets a better offer." The English translation of that is: "I did this guy a favor by hiring him, and piling crap work on him, and I can't figure out why he'd be so disloyal." Make your company a good place to work, and you won't have such high turnover.
Yea, but the reason the Nazi's got so nasty in the first place is because no one was willing to stand up to them.
Leave them their hysteria, leave them their irrationality, but don't allow their brainless assertions to go unanswered. I think this sort of thing is precisely the way to deal with them; humor, fact, and dispassion. Scientific fact stands on it's own, and has no need of faith or belief...If they want to continue to try and pretend that the evidence that sits right before their eyes is false, let them. But don't fail to point out their shortcomings where it is appropriate.
Creationist science is like a cargo cult...They buy guys who have letters after their names, they use all the terminology, and put on lab coats...and still don't understand why no one takes their "science" seriously.
And it's the same old argument from ignorance: "No one has proven with 100% certainty how this happened, therefore it must have been God." Of course you can insert anything in where "God" is and the argument will be equally fallacious. I'd be nice if they'd throw out a valid argument every now and again.
It's rarely that simple. The cost of moving forward is seldom in the "lump sum" format, whereas switching platforms often is, so you're trying to cost justify switching to a platform that will pay for itself in 5 or 6 years, but you have to have people who are willing to overlook the fact that a platform switch is going to cost them dramatically more in the short term.
A lot of the time they'll vote to stay with the crap platform on the premise that something better (cheaper) will show up in a few years. That sort of reasoning can delay a migration indefinitely.
These days I develop primarily in Java and Php, and I can say with assurance that if you think you can do anything in php that you can do in Java, you're out of your mind.
Php has its place, and it's easy to develop in, but if you can do everything you ever need to do in php, you have pretty simple needs.
Yea, I was imprecise. Mars has an atmosphere, and even some pretty wild storms occasionally which we've gotten pictures of from the rovers.
What it really lacks is a dense atmosphere...It's only about 1/100th as dense as ours. It would be interesting if it were a little denser, because the atmosphere is almost completely CO2. In composition, it is much heavier than our primarily nitrogen atmosphere, and it does lend weight to the idea that the bulk of the "light" elements in the atmosphere have been stripped away, though it's equally likely, especially in the case of things like H2, that they just "escaped"...It doesn't take much to accelerate hydrogen to escape velocity when the gravity is that low. Even on earth we lose a measurable amount.
Nah, polarity flips have been happening for a long time; if we lost our atmosphere every time, this planet would LOOK like mars...Anyway, Mars has no atmosphere because it's too small, not because it doesn't have a liquid core with the attendant magnetic field. Losing the magnetic field (which may or may not happen during a flip...Geologic data isn't precise enough to tell) could cause some problems with regards to the solar wind, but complete loss of atmosphere is extremely unlikely.
The average period between pole flips is about 250,000 years, so that will give you a pretty good idea of how often it happens, and how unlikely it is that atmospheric loss follows. For the curious, it's been about 800,000 years since the last flip, so we're due one.
I'd rather they worked with Rabies...We know the flu is a killer.
And yea, 3 years, Jesus. My mother lasted 3 weeks; when they removed the tumor (which was horrifying big...I talked to the Doc before the operation, and he showed me the MRI, and you get that progression of slices of the brain, and it was like, "Ugh...UGH...damn...Damn...DAMN!" It was literally the size of my fist, and it spread out everywhere.) the brain didn't redistribute the fluid correctly, and then she had a pretty serious stroke...
We could have kept her alive, on the principle that she'd recover somewhat, but recover to what? There was no way she'd have been well enough for treatment, and no treatment means what, 6 weeks? If we'd known going in, we wouldn't even have operated.