By the way, while it is in the GoF book, I'd argue that Singleton is actually an anti-pattern.
It's an anti-pattern in Java and Smalltalk, and probably C# (never used it in anger, so can't say). It's not in lower-level languages (e.g. C++) where the semantics of shared libraries are not specified and you don't have enough meta-object protocol to do dependency injection. In that scenario, singleton is critical to enforce initialisation order.
[...] and in addition the field of compiler optimization was more or less revolutionized by the invention of "SSA" form after the first edition was published.
Also not covered in the first edition are bottom-up code generation and graph colouring register allocation. These three techniques are the back-end of a typical compiler these days, if you don't count highly machine-specific stuff like static pipeline scheduling and D-cache optimisation.
It would be more correct to say that it's "classically" misunderstood. GoF is fundamentally a dictionary, but too many people understand it to be a recipe book.
That would be true if programming languages defined in the Scott-Strachey way, which pretty much nobody does these days. The ones that do formalise their semantics tend to do so either based on an abstract machine (see Pierce's Types and Programming Languages as mentioned in the summary), or categorically.
Everyone should work their way through TAoCP, but I'm not sure that everyone needs a copy. The same goes for Concrete Mathematics by Knuth, Graham and Patashnik.
This distinguishes it from Half-Life, where even though you're carrying enough ordnance to blow up a small suburb, you can't break that door or window.
Not in countries that don't let you own pump-action shotguns.
Incidentally, if you're curious why that make and model of shotgun mattered, it's in the paper. They had to factor in that shotguns don't cover a target with an even distribution of shot. In the zombie apocalypse, I think it's going to be simpler to measure the diameter of the motor of my chainsaw. It won't require any importance sampling for a start.
Actually, there's one key word in the headline (and the story) which I don't see being teased out: "America".
This is an extremely important qualification which can't be under-emphasised. The United States has a quirky form of evangelical fundamentalist protestantism which (until the US started exporting it) basically didn't exist anywhere else in any significant numbers. In the late 70s to early 80s, it became a political tool of the neo-conservatives, which means that it's a bizarre mix of fringe religion and fringe politics. Well, "fringe" by the standards of the rest of the world.
The most similar phenomenon is political Islamism. (According to Adam Curtis, you can even think of them as two sides of the one coin.)
One upshot is that the Internet actually attacks it on two fronts, both the religious front and the political front.
The other factor which is important is that the largest (and fastest-growing) religious group in the English-speaking world is people who self-identify as some kind of Christian but who don't regularly attend a place of worship. This group is even growing faster than atheism. So the Internet may be making people "not religious", but most of those prefix that with "spiritual but". It also explains the rise of "post-evangelicals", especially among young people, in the Internet era.
The Dragon Book of graphics is Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice by Foley and van Dam (and later Feiner and Hughes too). Like CG:PP, the other two books that you mention are books for scientists and engineers. The Black Book is for hackers of the early 1990s.
It's a book which describes a world that no longer exists. We don't have non-pipelined 80386 CPUs, non-existent or slow floating point, VGA data latches, or pretty much anything that the book describes in depth. I remember that world, and I remember it well.
The first edition of the Dragon Book has dated, and doesn't cover a lot of modern compiler practice, but over half of it is still relevant. The Gang of Four book also shows its age, but it still serves its purpose as a dictionary, and as a tool for helping you to think in higher-level structures. Very little in the Black Book is useful today as anything other than history.
Has any new company ever succeeded with Java Enterprise?
If you're old enough, you might remember a company called "eBay". It's apparently still around as a cheap Chinese crap vendor.
But seriously, plenty of new companies have succeeded with Java EE, but most new companies don't make external-facing social media websites. You probably haven't heard of the company that wrote the online banking system used by your financial institution, but chances are good that it's written in either.NET or J2EE.
Slashdot Mirror
It is overrated, but only by people who didn't understand it.
You know it's true.
It's an anti-pattern in Java and Smalltalk, and probably C# (never used it in anger, so can't say). It's not in lower-level languages (e.g. C++) where the semantics of shared libraries are not specified and you don't have enough meta-object protocol to do dependency injection. In that scenario, singleton is critical to enforce initialisation order.
Also not covered in the first edition are bottom-up code generation and graph colouring register allocation. These three techniques are the back-end of a typical compiler these days, if you don't count highly machine-specific stuff like static pipeline scheduling and D-cache optimisation.
Nah, go with Foley and van Dam. Most modern hardware gives you at least 256 shades of grey.
It would be more correct to say that it's "classically" misunderstood. GoF is fundamentally a dictionary, but too many people understand it to be a recipe book.
That would be true if programming languages defined in the Scott-Strachey way, which pretty much nobody does these days. The ones that do formalise their semantics tend to do so either based on an abstract machine (see Pierce's Types and Programming Languages as mentioned in the summary), or categorically.
Everyone should work their way through TAoCP, but I'm not sure that everyone needs a copy. The same goes for Concrete Mathematics by Knuth, Graham and Patashnik.
He didn't kill them, it was old age.
This distinguishes it from Half-Life, where even though you're carrying enough ordnance to blow up a small suburb, you can't break that door or window.
Gabriel's horn does not fit into a finite space. A better example is the Koch curve.
Not in countries that don't let you own pump-action shotguns.
Incidentally, if you're curious why that make and model of shotgun mattered, it's in the paper. They had to factor in that shotguns don't cover a target with an even distribution of shot. In the zombie apocalypse, I think it's going to be simpler to measure the diameter of the motor of my chainsaw. It won't require any importance sampling for a start.
I first assumed that it was Ingress backstory.
1. ^ Mike Davis, Buda's Wagon: A Brief History of the Car Bomb (Verso: New York, 2007).
Little-known fact: The car bomb was invented by atheists. They were also nihilist anarchists, of course, but atheists nonetheless.
If people just adopted my opinions on everything, everyone would be better off. Why can't you all compromise and do what I say?
Actually, there's one key word in the headline (and the story) which I don't see being teased out: "America".
This is an extremely important qualification which can't be under-emphasised. The United States has a quirky form of evangelical fundamentalist protestantism which (until the US started exporting it) basically didn't exist anywhere else in any significant numbers. In the late 70s to early 80s, it became a political tool of the neo-conservatives, which means that it's a bizarre mix of fringe religion and fringe politics. Well, "fringe" by the standards of the rest of the world.
The most similar phenomenon is political Islamism. (According to Adam Curtis, you can even think of them as two sides of the one coin.)
One upshot is that the Internet actually attacks it on two fronts, both the religious front and the political front.
The other factor which is important is that the largest (and fastest-growing) religious group in the English-speaking world is people who self-identify as some kind of Christian but who don't regularly attend a place of worship. This group is even growing faster than atheism. So the Internet may be making people "not religious", but most of those prefix that with "spiritual but". It also explains the rise of "post-evangelicals", especially among young people, in the Internet era.
In the United States, "communism" means any public policy that Rupert Murdoch doesn't like.
The hell it is.
The Dragon Book of graphics is Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice by Foley and van Dam (and later Feiner and Hughes too). Like CG:PP, the other two books that you mention are books for scientists and engineers. The Black Book is for hackers of the early 1990s.
It's a book which describes a world that no longer exists. We don't have non-pipelined 80386 CPUs, non-existent or slow floating point, VGA data latches, or pretty much anything that the book describes in depth. I remember that world, and I remember it well.
The first edition of the Dragon Book has dated, and doesn't cover a lot of modern compiler practice, but over half of it is still relevant. The Gang of Four book also shows its age, but it still serves its purpose as a dictionary, and as a tool for helping you to think in higher-level structures. Very little in the Black Book is useful today as anything other than history.
Neo-Godwin's Law!
To be fair, it didn't work. So it's only attempted oppression.
Sorry, they're not kosher.
If you're old enough, you might remember a company called "eBay". It's apparently still around as a cheap Chinese crap vendor.
But seriously, plenty of new companies have succeeded with Java EE, but most new companies don't make external-facing social media websites. You probably haven't heard of the company that wrote the online banking system used by your financial institution, but chances are good that it's written in either .NET or J2EE.
Would you use (F)CGI today? If the answer is "no", you have your answer.
If you don't know why Facebook would be reluctant to fund a compete rewrite of their core money-making software, then you've never worked in industry.