My job should be fucking protected because I fucking VOTE. That's doesn't make any sense! Voting doesn't entitle you to anything. It simply means you get an input into how the country is run.
Fuck the rest of the world,saved their asses from starvation I'd love to see how you figure that the United States, which spends less of its budget on foreign aid than pretty much every other developed country, has saved the world from starvation.
saved their asses from communism And now you're the communist.
Congratulations. You're basically going to be guaranteeing that your children will be living in an America that the rest of the world has left behind. You've got two options:
- Put up with some pain for a few years, then reap the benefits that free trade brings; - Fuck up the economy in the long term
Its not about not having compassion (I'm a devout democrat, by the way). Its about not trying to fuck everyone else over to support you. If we try to protect your job, it comes out of everyone else's pockets. Not just that, but some guy in India misses out on a good job, that'll help them a lot more than it'll help you. In the end, you'll benefit from it too, as both economies are improved.
Yeah, we're in a few years of a slump. After a fucking decade long boom! Economies naturally have cycles. If you want the booms, you have to take the busts along with it. This was the smallest recession in our history. Quit bitching about it.
political rights and high expectations I don't know about the high-expectations, but Indians and Russians have political rights too.
who can't unionize You do realize that most of US white coller workers cannot unionize?
and don't get health insurance or retirement benefits Says who?
God damn-it. At least get your fucking facts right! Its phenomenal how ignorant people on Slashdot are about this. Guess it goes to show you that technical knowledge doesn't mean you necessarily have a clue in any other area.
Do you have the slightest idea what you're talking about? The game industry does not make huge profits. Things are very lean for almost everyone in the industry. That's because its a highly competitive industry, and in any competitive industry, profits will go down to a level just high enough to keep people from going into another industry. If costs fall, prices will quickly fall because of the competition.
Whatever. Be cynical. Don't let the facts get in the way.
But on the other hand, you shouldn't just ignore the pain that change can cause on the grounds that it's 'progress'. You don't have to ignore the pain, you can do things to ease it, but you shouldn't stop progress because of it.
Everyone? Don't think so. There's still large amounts of poverty in the north of England (as there is elsewhere in the world). On the whole, people are better-off overall than they were before.
I think you'll find that was military Imperialism. Europe was rich long before military imperialism.
Oh yes. The 'all progress is good' arguement, where one tries to claim that by fighting against the latest Capitalist trend Its hardly the latest capitalist trend. Its been an integral part of capitalism for centuries.
So how about supporting some real progress in the world and trying to move away from a system that supports the powerful few to one that helps everyone. Capitalism does help everyone. Please read up on the fricking theory, okay? Capitalism creates more real value. What a government chooses to do with that value is up to them. I'm not unopposed to more socialistic systems (national healthcare, etc) to spread the wealth a bit, but its just plain stupid to oppose something like free trade, which helps everyone in the end.
Indian schools can produce well trained lab technicians just as easily as they produce well trained IT workers. If they cannot afford the expensive equipment required to train these technicians, how can they?
Don't believe that you've found a well paying magic industry that is outsource-proof. There is no such thing. However, experience has shown that there are always capital-intensive industries that rich countries excel at over poor ones. For now, nano-tech/bio-tech are examples of such industries.
A true world market is emerging. That means a global minimum wage is developing, and it's a lot closer to the wages paid in the Third World than those paid in the First. That's completely unsubstantiated blather. What proof (or even theoretical justification) do you have for making that statement? Such transitions have happened several times before in history. Remember, there was a time when different regions within Europe were even more isolated from each other than seperate countries are today. Shipping from one part of France to another was much more of an ordeal than shipping from the US to China is today. There were large-scale differences between the economies of various regions of European countries. Yet, the tearing down of trade barriers, first within countries then between countries has proven to be immensely successful. The same thing is happening again, only in a larger physical scale, aided by communications and transportation technology. Again, those who embrace the change (countries like China) will prosper, and those who fight it will fall behind, just like Eastern Europe did in the past.
The rich wanted the barriers down in europe so they could get cheap supplies and were double sided by wanting to prevent cheap imports. America was classic for doing this. You're oversimplifying the issue. From mabout 1700 onwards, there was a strong overall trend in Europe of breaking down trade barriers in both directions.
For example the Dutch paid more for products like sugar and the british paid less. So Americans would buy sugar cane from the spanish Indies because the price was the lowest and then resold 9 out of 10 barrels of processed sugar or Mollasis to the Dutch. I don't see how this has anything to do with trade barriers. Maybe try explaining it more clearly?
This is why America's standard of living was higher. That's a vast oversimplification of the issue. In general, Americas standard of living has always been very high. The main thing is that we have tons of resources, and not a lot of people to support.
Demand for labor does not go down if an employer really needs the job filled. Things don't work on a case-by-case basis like that. In general, employers *don't* need the job filled, especially not in the markets where we're talking about minimum wage workers. If hiring X more workers would cost them too much money, they'll simply produce less, thus lowering the demand for workers.
If the poor have more money they buy more products which trickle back down into the economy. Studies show that the minimum wage actually increases poverty.
Yes some businesses can not hire as fast but if people do not have money to buy your products they wont want to hire anyway. Right? Owners can just raise prices instead. If owners raise prices, then people will have less money to spend on other goods.
The problem you seem to be having is that you don't seem to understand that the labor market, as well as the products market, is a self-balancing equilibrium. It'll reach an equillibrium no matter what you do to it. The problem is that some things you do to it, like restrictions in free trade, as well as minimum wage laws, create inefficiencies in the system that sap potential productivity.
The free siders theory of the rich is ignorant since most store their money in reserves and banks and do not buy more products. Where the hell do you think that money goes? Nobody keeps their money under the mattress. If they don't spend it, they invest it. That money thus goes back into the economy, to finance new business ventures, housing purchases, capital investment, etc.
Productivity is garbage. They are not more productive working for cheaper. It only means you get more work per less buck. Efficiency is a more accurate term. I never said foreign workers were more productive. I said that under a minimum wage, overall productivity drops, because labor black markets redirect resources from productive uses (working), to unproductive uses (dodging the law).
Clinton raised taxes on businesses and the wealthy but they earned more money from the booming economy. Raising taxes on businesses is generally considered harmful. Businesses don't sit on their money, they invest it. Taxing them discourages investment in the future. While I'm generally in favor of higher taxes on the wealthy, I do acknowledge they cost the economy. However, unlike free trade restrictions and minimum wage laws, which harm everyone in the long term, taxes serve to redistribute wealth, which economists generally agree is an acceptable trade-off.
Tarrifs work. They do not. The vast majority of economists say they do not. History shows that they do not.
We have hundreds of years of history to back that up. No we don't. We are party to many of the largest free-trade agreements in the world, ones that have been beneficial to everyone involved. Examples, please?
Or maybe it's based on seeing what happens to areas when their main industries are destroyed by cheaper foreign competition, such as much of the north of England during the '80s. Transition is tough, there is no doubt about it. But we cannot ignore progress because it is uncomfortable. The coming of industrialization left millions of European artisans out of work. Yet, it ultimately turned out better for everyone. It must be noted that North England was one of the areas that chiefly benefited from the industrial transition earlier this century. If they have not been able to handle this wave of transition, then though nuggets. It is just plain hipocracy to support capitalism only when its convenient for you.
Whether you believe competition is a basic fact of life or not, that doesn't particularly comfort the millions (yes millions) of people out of work as a result. Its not a matter of believing that competition is a basic fact of life. Its a matter of believing that free competition is what has gotten us this far. Free trade has done wonders for countries around the world. It has been instrumental in making Europe the economic power that it is. It has greatly benefited countries like China, Argentina, Mexico, Hong Kong, Singapore, etc, that have embraced it. Hong Kong, for example, went from having a per-capita GDP 1/3 that of the US a few decades ago, to having a per-capita GDP 80% that of the US. Post-facto studies on NAFTA have shown that it has been benificial to both the United States and Mexico, and just as the economists had predicted, did not have a significant effect on the US labor market.
I do feel for those out of work, and support measures to make it easier for them to handle the transition (better welfare programs, better retraining programs, cheaper eduction), but I think its utterly stupid to halt progress because people cannot handle change. If we had taken that attitude, we'd all still be hunters and gatherers, living in the jungle!
All free trade does is lower the standard of living. Tarrifs provided the high standard of living the first world has enjoyed. that is true economics. According to who? Economic theory shows that tarrifs only hurt everyone involved. So does history, for example. Take France, for example. France was an economic backwater for a very long time, because of trade barriers within the country. Napoleon came in, tore down all those barriers, and gave a huge boost to the French economy.
Otherwise we would all be living like the Chinesse in huts and sleep on dirt floors. Its those who do not put up with this garbage that started tarrifs and created a high standard of living. How can you be so supremely ignorant of history? A central feature of European economic history has been the tearing down to trade-barriers, to the mutual benefit of everyone involved!
To you the fact that we even have such regulations is sickening right? Lets really go all capitalists and let McDonalds pay whatever they want. Actually, minimum wage laws are considered harmful. There are two parts to it:
1) They don't have an effect. Raising the price of labor decreases the demand of labor. So instead of more people being employed, we have fewer people being employed. Also, the laws great black-markets for those willing to work less than minimum wage. What do you think all those illegal Mexican immigrants are working for? Sure, you could stop illegal immigration, but all that'd happen is another black market would spring up. The general theory of this phenomenon is very well illustrated by the housing black-markets in the rent-controlled areas of New York city.
2) As a result of #1, productivity is wasted. Instead of doing productive work, people spend time trying to get around the minimum wage. The net result is that your economy wastes resources that could be otherwise used productively.
India has good technical schools, And little money. That's why IT is so great for them --- IT training is cheap.
and with telecommunications costs so low, it will be fairly easy to outsource experiments to $1 a day techs over there. Where are $1 a day techs going to get the skills necessary to run that expensive equipment? You forget the main reason sending IT work over to India is so convenient. Its easy for India to train thousands upon thousands of IT workers, because IT training is cheap. In no way do they have the resources to do the same for something expensive like nanotec/biotech.
It's just empty talk like "no new taxes". Distancing yourself from the means you use to take advantage of others is clever
Bullshit! Companies don't owe you jobs. Its their job, and their right, to hire whomever they damn-well please. If they can get the same job done for cheaper somewhere else, they'd be stupid *not* to do that. Nobody is taking advantage of anybody here.
I am by no means supporting outsourcing or anything
Geez. You know the f*cking populists have won when you have to distance yourself from an economically sound and mutually benifical practice. The fear of outsourcing is a direct result of people being ignorant of economics. Slashdotters are never hesitant to lambast the general public on their ignorance of other topics, but have no problem in not only accepting, but buying into this brand of ignorance.
Since when was IT one of the last places to make a middle class income? There'll be a big boom in the demand for lab technicians and whatnot, as US companies migrate to doing capital-expensive things like nano-tech and bio-tech.
The thing most Slashdot chicken-littles ("the middle class is falling!") fail to understand is that IT is actually specially-suited to outsourcing. Its easy for India to afford the infrastructure it takes to churn out IT people by the thousands, because computers are relatively cheap. Meanwhile, bio/nanotech (among other fields) equipment is fricking expensive, which gives us a comparative advantage in those markets.
Nader is a populist who believes its the government's business to protect people from themselves. In all truth, he might just be a *worse* candidate than bush.
And if Kerry's on the right in terms of free trade, than good for him. I'm a devout democrat, but the ignorance of economics among our base really sickens me. Although I find Kerry to be a bit of a politician, I think it is justified in this case --- making people think they're getting what they want, while actually giving them what's best for them.
And who the fuck cares if our flags are made in Taiwan? If they can make it cheaper than we can, they should do so.
At the time, every other GUI programming method used messages. From Xlib through to Win32, all GUI programming methods use messages. Agh! Xlib and Win32 are horrible GUI APIs! At least Xlib isn't largely at fault --- its not meant to be a full GUI API. Win32, however, has no excuse! Are you honestly telling me you think that Win32 (with its 200 line GUI hello world), is more sensical than Qt???
It is considerably easier to thread a program that does not have a GUI wrapped up inside of a object than one that does not. Not really. Multi-threading fits pretty naturally with OOP. Look at the BeOS API (which has a lot of parallels with Qt) sometime. Could you give more detail on why you think this is the case?
Object orientation brings bloat: often students would go way overboard in designing a solution, using 30 classes where 5 would suffice. That's because students, by and large, are stupid. That's why they are in school, to learn. You should have taught them to only use classes when they naturally fall out of the design of the program.
Compilers are not good at OO: compared to C, C++ compilers are immature and buggy. That was true for the STL and templates, but Qt doesn't use the STL. Qt was very well supported on the compilers of the time. Again, specific examples?
Thankfully, the GTK+ toolkit is winning the battle of the GUI toolkits. Really now? Seems pretty even to me.
Students these days feel much more grounded in reality when they see their favourite applications such as mozilla, gaim, xchat, and xmms using the same toolkit they do. Bah! My favorite apps (Konqueror, Kopete, Ksirc, and Amarok) use my favorite toolkit (Qt).
I think you're misunderstanding how the TT license works. Since Qt is GPL'ed, you're right, they can distribute it however they want. However, if you want to write a proprietory app using the library, you'll have to use a GPL-compatible license for your work. If you don't want to do that, you can pay Trolltech to license it to you under the terms of a non-GPL license.
The PyQt bindings are dreamlike. However, C++ with Qt is pretty decent. Qt + moc makes the language a lot more dynamic and easy to use than normal, and the library does a good job of managing its own memory.
I greatly prefer Qt to Swing, though. Swing tries to be way to "pure" and as a result can be somewhat contorted.
I've come up with a pretty good counter-argument for the car analogy:
Computers are different from cars. Understanding computers gives you a huge boost in productivity. For example, someone who doesn't know about popup-blockers and virus scanners are wasting a lot of time dealing with popups and viruses. Understanding how to adjust the timing belt on your car doesn't decrease the amount of time it takes to get from point A to point B. Thus, even if you just "want to get work done" it makes sense to learn about and understand your computer.
Slashdot Mirror
My job should be fucking protected because I fucking VOTE.
That's doesn't make any sense! Voting doesn't entitle you to anything. It simply means you get an input into how the country is run.
Fuck the rest of the world,saved their asses from starvation
I'd love to see how you figure that the United States, which spends less of its budget on foreign aid than pretty much every other developed country, has saved the world from starvation.
saved their asses from communism
And now you're the communist.
Congratulations. You're basically going to be guaranteeing that your children will be living in an America that the rest of the world has left behind. You've got two options:
- Put up with some pain for a few years, then reap the benefits that free trade brings;
- Fuck up the economy in the long term
Pick one.
Its not about not having compassion (I'm a devout democrat, by the way). Its about not trying to fuck everyone else over to support you. If we try to protect your job, it comes out of everyone else's pockets. Not just that, but some guy in India misses out on a good job, that'll help them a lot more than it'll help you. In the end, you'll benefit from it too, as both economies are improved.
Here is that sense of entitlement. Somebody else is willing to do your job for less. Why the fuck should your boss be forced to keep you around?
Yeah, we're in a few years of a slump. After a fucking decade long boom! Economies naturally have cycles. If you want the booms, you have to take the busts along with it. This was the smallest recession in our history. Quit bitching about it.
political rights and high expectations
I don't know about the high-expectations, but Indians and Russians have political rights too.
who can't unionize
You do realize that most of US white coller workers cannot unionize?
and don't get health insurance or retirement benefits
Says who?
God damn-it. At least get your fucking facts right! Its phenomenal how ignorant people on Slashdot are about this. Guess it goes to show you that technical knowledge doesn't mean you necessarily have a clue in any other area.
Do you have the slightest idea what you're talking about? The game industry does not make huge profits. Things are very lean for almost everyone in the industry. That's because its a highly competitive industry, and in any competitive industry, profits will go down to a level just high enough to keep people from going into another industry. If costs fall, prices will quickly fall because of the competition.
Whatever. Be cynical. Don't let the facts get in the way.
But on the other hand, you shouldn't just ignore the pain that change can cause on the grounds that it's 'progress'.
You don't have to ignore the pain, you can do things to ease it, but you shouldn't stop progress because of it.
Everyone? Don't think so. There's still large amounts of poverty in the north of England (as there is elsewhere in the world).
On the whole, people are better-off overall than they were before.
I think you'll find that was military Imperialism.
Europe was rich long before military imperialism.
Oh yes. The 'all progress is good' arguement, where one tries to claim that by fighting against the latest Capitalist trend
Its hardly the latest capitalist trend. Its been an integral part of capitalism for centuries.
So how about supporting some real progress in the world and trying to move away from a system that supports the powerful few to one that helps everyone.
Capitalism does help everyone. Please read up on the fricking theory, okay? Capitalism creates more real value. What a government chooses to do with that value is up to them. I'm not unopposed to more socialistic systems (national healthcare, etc) to spread the wealth a bit, but its just plain stupid to oppose something like free trade, which helps everyone in the end.
Indian schools can produce well trained lab technicians just as easily as they produce well trained IT workers.
If they cannot afford the expensive equipment required to train these technicians, how can they?
Don't believe that you've found a well paying magic industry that is outsource-proof.
There is no such thing. However, experience has shown that there are always capital-intensive industries that rich countries excel at over poor ones. For now, nano-tech/bio-tech are examples of such industries.
A true world market is emerging. That means a global minimum wage is developing, and it's a lot closer to the wages paid in the Third World than those paid in the First.
That's completely unsubstantiated blather. What proof (or even theoretical justification) do you have for making that statement? Such transitions have happened several times before in history. Remember, there was a time when different regions within Europe were even more isolated from each other than seperate countries are today. Shipping from one part of France to another was much more of an ordeal than shipping from the US to China is today. There were large-scale differences between the economies of various regions of European countries. Yet, the tearing down of trade barriers, first within countries then between countries has proven to be immensely successful. The same thing is happening again, only in a larger physical scale, aided by communications and transportation technology. Again, those who embrace the change (countries like China) will prosper, and those who fight it will fall behind, just like Eastern Europe did in the past.
Ad hominem. You can't just attack the argument by insinuating that they have alterior motives.
But, economists are generally in agreement about these laws, and the underlying theory supports that conclusion.
Like in this interview.
The rich wanted the barriers down in europe so they could get cheap supplies and were double sided by wanting to prevent cheap imports. America was classic for doing this.
You're oversimplifying the issue. From mabout 1700 onwards, there was a strong overall trend in Europe of breaking down trade barriers in both directions.
For example the Dutch paid more for products like sugar and the british paid less. So Americans would buy sugar cane from the spanish Indies because the price was the lowest and then resold 9 out of 10 barrels of processed sugar or Mollasis to the Dutch.
I don't see how this has anything to do with trade barriers. Maybe try explaining it more clearly?
This is why America's standard of living was higher.
That's a vast oversimplification of the issue. In general, Americas standard of living has always been very high. The main thing is that we have tons of resources, and not a lot of people to support.
Demand for labor does not go down if an employer really needs the job filled.
Things don't work on a case-by-case basis like that. In general, employers *don't* need the job filled, especially not in the markets where we're talking about minimum wage workers. If hiring X more workers would cost them too much money, they'll simply produce less, thus lowering the demand for workers.
If the poor have more money they buy more products which trickle back down into the economy.
Studies show that the minimum wage actually increases poverty.
Yes some businesses can not hire as fast but if people do not have money to buy your products they wont want to hire anyway. Right? Owners can just raise prices instead.
If owners raise prices, then people will have less money to spend on other goods.
The problem you seem to be having is that you don't seem to understand that the labor market, as well as the products market, is a self-balancing equilibrium. It'll reach an equillibrium no matter what you do to it. The problem is that some things you do to it, like restrictions in free trade, as well as minimum wage laws, create inefficiencies in the system that sap potential productivity.
The free siders theory of the rich is ignorant since most store their money in reserves and banks and do not buy more products.
Where the hell do you think that money goes? Nobody keeps their money under the mattress. If they don't spend it, they invest it. That money thus goes back into the economy, to finance new business ventures, housing purchases, capital investment, etc.
Productivity is garbage. They are not more productive working for cheaper. It only means you get more work per less buck. Efficiency is a more accurate term.
I never said foreign workers were more productive. I said that under a minimum wage, overall productivity drops, because labor black markets redirect resources from productive uses (working), to unproductive uses (dodging the law).
Clinton raised taxes on businesses and the wealthy but they earned more money from the booming economy.
Raising taxes on businesses is generally considered harmful. Businesses don't sit on their money, they invest it. Taxing them discourages investment in the future. While I'm generally in favor of higher taxes on the wealthy, I do acknowledge they cost the economy. However, unlike free trade restrictions and minimum wage laws, which harm everyone in the long term, taxes serve to redistribute wealth, which economists generally agree is an acceptable trade-off.
Tarrifs work.
They do not. The vast majority of economists say they do not. History shows that they do not.
We have hundreds of years of history to back that up.
No we don't. We are party to many of the largest free-trade agreements in the world, ones that have been beneficial to everyone involved. Examples, please?
All of europe had tarrifs
340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,45 6 is the correct number. My calculator is Python :)
Or maybe it's based on seeing what happens to areas when their main industries are destroyed by cheaper foreign competition, such as much of the north of England during the '80s.
Transition is tough, there is no doubt about it. But we cannot ignore progress because it is uncomfortable. The coming of industrialization left millions of European artisans out of work. Yet, it ultimately turned out better for everyone. It must be noted that North England was one of the areas that chiefly benefited from the industrial transition earlier this century. If they have not been able to handle this wave of transition, then though nuggets. It is just plain hipocracy to support capitalism only when its convenient for you.
Whether you believe competition is a basic fact of life or not, that doesn't particularly comfort the millions (yes millions) of people out of work as a result.
Its not a matter of believing that competition is a basic fact of life. Its a matter of believing that free competition is what has gotten us this far. Free trade has done wonders for countries around the world. It has been instrumental in making Europe the economic power that it is. It has greatly benefited countries like China, Argentina, Mexico, Hong Kong, Singapore, etc, that have embraced it. Hong Kong, for example, went from having a per-capita GDP 1/3 that of the US a few decades ago, to having a per-capita GDP 80% that of the US. Post-facto studies on NAFTA have shown that it has been benificial to both the United States and Mexico, and just as the economists had predicted, did not have a significant effect on the US labor market.
I do feel for those out of work, and support measures to make it easier for them to handle the transition (better welfare programs, better retraining programs, cheaper eduction), but I think its utterly stupid to halt progress because people cannot handle change. If we had taken that attitude, we'd all still be hunters and gatherers, living in the jungle!
All free trade does is lower the standard of living. Tarrifs provided the high standard of living the first world has enjoyed. that is true economics.
According to who? Economic theory shows that tarrifs only hurt everyone involved. So does history, for example. Take France, for example. France was an economic backwater for a very long time, because of trade barriers within the country. Napoleon came in, tore down all those barriers, and gave a huge boost to the French economy.
Otherwise we would all be living like the Chinesse in huts and sleep on dirt floors. Its those who do not put up with this garbage that started tarrifs and created a high standard of living.
How can you be so supremely ignorant of history? A central feature of European economic history has been the tearing down to trade-barriers, to the mutual benefit of everyone involved!
To you the fact that we even have such regulations is sickening right? Lets really go all capitalists and let McDonalds pay whatever they want.
Actually, minimum wage laws are considered harmful. There are two parts to it:
1) They don't have an effect. Raising the price of labor decreases the demand of labor. So instead of more people being employed, we have fewer people being employed. Also, the laws great black-markets for those willing to work less than minimum wage. What do you think all those illegal Mexican immigrants are working for? Sure, you could stop illegal immigration, but all that'd happen is another black market would spring up. The general theory of this phenomenon is very well illustrated by the housing black-markets in the rent-controlled areas of New York city.
2) As a result of #1, productivity is wasted. Instead of doing productive work, people spend time trying to get around the minimum wage. The net result is that your economy wastes resources that could be otherwise used productively.
India has good technical schools,
And little money. That's why IT is so great for them --- IT training is cheap.
and with telecommunications costs so low, it will be fairly easy to outsource experiments to $1 a day techs over there.
Where are $1 a day techs going to get the skills necessary to run that expensive equipment? You forget the main reason sending IT work over to India is so convenient. Its easy for India to train thousands upon thousands of IT workers, because IT training is cheap. In no way do they have the resources to do the same for something expensive like nanotec/biotech.
It's just empty talk like "no new taxes". Distancing yourself from the means you use to take advantage of others is clever
Bullshit! Companies don't owe you jobs. Its their job, and their right, to hire whomever they damn-well please. If they can get the same job done for cheaper somewhere else, they'd be stupid *not* to do that. Nobody is taking advantage of anybody here.
I am by no means supporting outsourcing or anything
Geez. You know the f*cking populists have won when you have to distance yourself from an economically sound and mutually benifical practice. The fear of outsourcing is a direct result of people being ignorant of economics. Slashdotters are never hesitant to lambast the general public on their ignorance of other topics, but have no problem in not only accepting, but buying into this brand of ignorance.
Since when was IT one of the last places to make a middle class income? There'll be a big boom in the demand for lab technicians and whatnot, as US companies migrate to doing capital-expensive things like nano-tech and bio-tech.
The thing most Slashdot chicken-littles ("the middle class is falling!") fail to understand is that IT is actually specially-suited to outsourcing. Its easy for India to afford the infrastructure it takes to churn out IT people by the thousands, because computers are relatively cheap. Meanwhile, bio/nanotech (among other fields) equipment is fricking expensive, which gives us a comparative advantage in those markets.
Nader is a populist who believes its the government's business to protect people from themselves. In all truth, he might just be a *worse* candidate than bush.
And if Kerry's on the right in terms of free trade, than good for him. I'm a devout democrat, but the ignorance of economics among our base really sickens me. Although I find Kerry to be a bit of a politician, I think it is justified in this case --- making people think they're getting what they want, while actually giving them what's best for them.
And who the fuck cares if our flags are made in Taiwan? If they can make it cheaper than we can, they should do so.
gnome and kde are metapackages.
libgnome2 vs kdelibs4 (to see who uses GNOME apps vs KDE apps) or kicker vs gnome-panel (to see who uses the desktop itself) would be more accurate.
At the time, every other GUI programming method used messages. From Xlib through to Win32, all GUI programming methods use messages.
Agh! Xlib and Win32 are horrible GUI APIs! At least Xlib isn't largely at fault --- its not meant to be a full GUI API. Win32, however, has no excuse! Are you honestly telling me you think that Win32 (with its 200 line GUI hello world), is more sensical than Qt???
It is considerably easier to thread a program that does not have a GUI wrapped up inside of a object than one that does not.
Not really. Multi-threading fits pretty naturally with OOP. Look at the BeOS API (which has a lot of parallels with Qt) sometime. Could you give more detail on why you think this is the case?
Object orientation brings bloat: often students would go way overboard in designing a solution, using 30 classes where 5 would suffice.
That's because students, by and large, are stupid. That's why they are in school, to learn. You should have taught them to only use classes when they naturally fall out of the design of the program.
Compilers are not good at OO: compared to C, C++ compilers are immature and buggy.
That was true for the STL and templates, but Qt doesn't use the STL. Qt was very well supported on the compilers of the time. Again, specific examples?
Thankfully, the GTK+ toolkit is winning the battle of the GUI toolkits.
Really now? Seems pretty even to me.
Students these days feel much more grounded in reality when they see their favourite applications such as mozilla, gaim, xchat, and xmms using the same toolkit they do.
Bah! My favorite apps (Konqueror, Kopete, Ksirc, and Amarok) use my favorite toolkit (Qt).
I think you're misunderstanding how the TT license works. Since Qt is GPL'ed, you're right, they can distribute it however they want. However, if you want to write a proprietory app using the library, you'll have to use a GPL-compatible license for your work. If you don't want to do that, you can pay Trolltech to license it to you under the terms of a non-GPL license.
(with-french-accent (say "Accuracy and precision!"))
The PyQt bindings are dreamlike. However, C++ with Qt is pretty decent. Qt + moc makes the language a lot more dynamic and easy to use than normal, and the library does a good job of managing its own memory.
I greatly prefer Qt to Swing, though. Swing tries to be way to "pure" and as a result can be somewhat contorted.
I've come up with a pretty good counter-argument for the car analogy:
Computers are different from cars. Understanding computers gives you a huge boost in productivity. For example, someone who doesn't know about popup-blockers and virus scanners are wasting a lot of time dealing with popups and viruses. Understanding how to adjust the timing belt on your car doesn't decrease the amount of time it takes to get from point A to point B. Thus, even if you just "want to get work done" it makes sense to learn about and understand your computer.