Or how about that ATT/Verizon don't give you a discount for not having a loan with your wireless contract. It only makes financial sense with T-Mobile to buy the unlocked phone. And there is no locked phone for Verizon/ATT so it doesn't make sense at all. T-Mobile is not in the same tier of network quality as ATT/Verizon. Admittedly the various ads say ATT/Verizon suck...but T-Mobile's network is much smaller. It may be better where it is, but there are a lot of places where T-Mobile has no service and ATT/Verizon do. Also 3G service is an even smaller map. Sprint is a bit better because they have roaming deals with Verizon, but still the plan where you don't pay roaming is more expensive, so it is cheaper just go to with Verizon.
Also, there is no service on Verizon because it is CDMA. And on ATT there was no 3G for the longest time because ATT and T-Mobile have different 3G frequencies. So you would have to pay the $500 without 3G. Then they got the 3G but there was no subsidy with ATT and no discount for signing with your own phone. You might as well just wait for the Samsung Galaxy, at least that comes at a subsidized price.... On Verizon there is no Nexus One, just the Droid Incredible.
Anyway I went with a Droid X on Verizon. Still if the Nexus one was subsidized somehow, I would have gotten the Nexus one. Or if Verizon offered a lower price out of contract and the math worked out (or was close) I would have bought a Nexus one. Prior to the Droid X I was at ATT and if there was a lower price out of contract, I would have gone with the 3G version of the Nexus One once it came out on ATT. With ATT I would have been even more likely because ATT lagged behind with android phones, and the first few to come out (Backflip and Aero) were nowhere near the Nexus One, so basically everyone looking for an android phone would have flocked to the Nexus. However the price makes no sense on ATT.
Also I read about the Nexus One reception problems. Google tried a few things and then was like tough shit. I was not left with much confidence in the Nexus One brand or Google customer service ability as a company. Still there is a good chance I would have bought it anyway if the price was right and if I had reception problems I would have returned it
Anyway I'm somewhat happy with the Droid X except for the battery life when the screen is in use. I suspect if the reception was okay and there was a subsidy/discount off contract I would have been happy with the Nexus One on ATT. T-Mobile is not an option because of their small network. Otherwise I probably would have switched.
Kindle's other format Topaz is different. Mobi and Epub are based off HTML sort of but Topaz is like a scanned image with embedded fonts (at least according to current hackers). So it seems like there is now way to directly convert it to epub/mobi like format.
Seriously? On mine unless you set the font to small it is a disaster. And with the font that small you can't read it. Larger fonts totally mess up the PDF, especially if they have multiple columns, it is like the columns are appended together instead of reading up and down.
I went web searching for a zoom but couldn't find anything about zooming in/out on a PDF. So basically it is useless for many articles since they often use 2 or 3 columns of text. Also on ones with diagrams it is better to keep the original layout and zoom in/out.
Not entirely true, many have their own DRM scheme. Adobe DRM is the standard but there are other DRMs on epub (ie Barnes and Noble). Really Barnes and Noble and Amazon seem the biggest players. So even if they were both ePub, if they have their own DRM scheme then it is the same as now. If they both had Adobe DRM then no problem, everyone can read Adobe DRM and so there is lots of choice.
Anyway while Barnes and Noble is opening its book store to other readers (probably because it wants to sell books more than anything else). I'm sure they'd love to find ways to lock people into their store only.
There is a format war, especially Amazon. From what I can tell it appears Barnes and Noble is willing to open up its store to other readers (see Plastic Logic). Amazon seems to want to lock users into the Kindle and their format so people have no alternatives.
ePub is becoming a standard and it does have a standard Adobe DRM (which the nook can read). But everyone seems to be inventing their own DRM. Nook can read the standard DRM and Barnes and Noble's DRM. I don't know why it felt compelled to invent its own DRM.
Anyway Amazon's DRM has been cracked, and there are utilities to convert from Mobi Pocket to ePub and the other way. Most of the formats are basically similar to HTML. However Topaz is different, it is a scanned image. The books are lower quality, but basically you just scan it and are done. For ePub/Mobi you actually have to publish your book in that format which is more work for the publisher. For publishers who don't want to bother at all with eBooks, they can just scan it into Topaz and sell a few extra ebooks. For the ones who are serious about eBooks, they often put it in the format and then publish both Mobi (Amazon's format) and ePub(most of the rest) with each store locking it into the various DRM. Sometimes I see the same book on Amazon, Fictionwise, Barnes and Noble.
But still it would be good if they all agreed on one format. But it seems like with the seamless utilities, if a publisher goes to ePub or Mobi they can convert to the other format and then each store just throws its own DRM. For a consumer it sucks because you are locked in. At least with Nook you can read adobe DRM so you have some choice. But in reality most of the DRM schemes have been cracked so even Kindle users can crack the DRM and convert to Mobi.
I have a nook and my problem is that a lot of the technical books either don't have e-books, or they only have the amazon topaz format. So really I have no choice but to buy the hard copy...... Hopefully this will change. From what I understand Topaz format means the publisher pays amazon a small amount to scan the book into a format which can be re-flowed but isn't very good. And a full fledged mobi pocket/ebook requires more effort from publishers to make that format.
This is even true of "Coders at Work" which while not a technical book, would be fun to read. But I don't want to have it sitting on my shelf if I'm just going to read it once and probably not go back. Your choices are PDF or TOPAZ, none of which work that well on Nook. And even Kindle users complain about Topaz books not reflowing well. Of course if I had an iPad the PDF would probably be fine. So maybe for technical books iPad is the way forward... Still for reading fiction the Nook/Kindle/other eInk readers are pretty nice...
Back when I was 22 and just out of school (in the 2002 recession) was sending resumes everywhere. this one company sent out a programming challenge via e-mail. I don't remember all the details now, but it was in a language called "J" see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J_(programming_language). I think it was taking a bunch of numbers from a file and doing some quick transformations, then printing the output. The program was trivial, however it was in J. Anyway it served to filter out people who didn't want to learn anything new. Even if you hire a PHP/MySQL expert, they still have to learn the firm's business requirements. Also things always change, if you go from PHP to Perl or ASP.NET will you need to fire them and hire new people, or can they keep working for you?
Anyway the company had hundreds of applicants but the challenge narrowed it down to 10 or so which they invited to an interview. They also said they liked my solution more than all the others because I bothered to change the decimal precision to get the exact output they put on their sheet, instead of just the answer in the default output....Sadly I got lost and never made it for the interview...Oh well. But I'm sure whoever they got was competent. I definitely could have done the job.
Anyway after working with graduate freeloaders on group projects and 3 companies professionally for 7 years I can say that what you need to do is push people out of their comfort zone. Find out if they are willing to learn something new. You should invent your own programming language, and give that to candidates to solve a (trivial or nearly trivial problem). If they cannot take the time to learn your simple language to solve a trivial problem, do you think they will take the time to learn the business requirements for a piece of software? Also say you hire a PHP expert, what happens if you like Django/Python more.....do you need to fire them and rehire them? Also I'm not sure what level candidates you are hiring. But a typical university education does not teach you PhP, OOP (nothing more than an object holds procedures/data), etc.. Also normalization depends. But it is really simple to learn if you don't know it. I always confuse the ones after the first 3. So I refer to a book/web page but the concepts are easy enough. Still does a typical web jockey need to no normalization (especially if you employ a DBA already), probably not.... Even for a normal corporate database you probably don't need more than 3rd normal form. Still the more advanced ones (at least Boyce Codd and 4th) are easy enough with a book. I wouldn't hire or not hire someone for that. I'd much rather an open mind and willing to learn.
Why don't they have to have relief wells partially drilled before drilling the main well? It seems like if you could cut the work down from months to a week or so it would be a lot better (although a week of this thing gushing in the ocean would still a disaster...).
Anyway maybe people should bet on how long the cap will last before it starts leaking lower in the well, or something else happens... Call my bookie!!!!
This is not flame bait. A site that doesn't work with Internet Explorer is ignoring a huge chunk of the market. Most businesses cannot afford to ignore the IE users...
Another great example is admob. Steve has decreed that he does not like people getting sales numbers on his iPhone, so only advertisers who collect data he has approved will be permitted to exist. Then he invented his own platform. This is dangerous because previously people were using admob and he suddenly decided nope, I am changing the rules, you have to work my way. Then he invented a competitor which is not subject to the same rules. It gives him an unfair advantage. This is no big deal right now, because you are free to chose android. But if apple becomes the only game in town, then it is a problem.
If you are a company and your only products are apps in Steve's store, then you have to ensure you don't piss him off. But still you'd have to disclose to your investors the huge risks of Steve changing his mind, deciding to invent a competitor to you not subject to the same restrictions. Or all out, you spend a year making an app, Steve decides to build it into the iPhone and ban any apps doing the same thing because it is duplicating the functionality....
As a business that is very risky. It's just like the problem with investing in some foreign countries. When governments keep changing the laws/rules often less people will invest there. It is important to find places that offer consistent laws/processes. It's no different then Venezuela where Chavez suddenly decides to nationalize your business. Then he keeps jacking up the prices....
The problem is that it is tempting to still buy it:) Hence why I said debating:) The iPad is very polished, and Mac OSX is also very tempting. The walled garden approach of the iphone/iPad sets a bad precedent. But anyway they are still nice devices. If they don't become the absolute future, then it is no big deal, but if everyone gets an iPad/iPhone and the alternatives go away, then we have a problem...
I never heard about that. Maybe because I was a Rutgers student at the time and only took a few CS electives there.
The one professor who assumes everyone is guilty unless proven innocent claims one exam almost everyone failed out because a TA distributed the wrong answer to anyone having trouble. I find that hard to believe. But anyway usually you have to prove someone guilty in the justice system, innocent until proven guilty.
And in the app store how to you distribute your source code with the app? If you build a game with a scripting engine to add new levels, how do you distribute that app? If you write a new programming language to try out writing your own compiler, how do you distribute that?
I realize it seems bad. But the walled garden approach has good and bad. And I am aware the average customer who knows nothing about computers just cares about the experience, so the walled garden is good for them.
Until they want an App that apple has decided to give themselves a monopoly on. Without competition the prices tend to be higher. Look at what happened to Internet Explorer when Microsoft didn't have that much competition, it stagnated. Few would argue that today Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Opera, etc. are not better than IE 6.0 was. Basically Steve can take a monopoly on whatever he wants by disapproving all the other applications from other developers. When consumers realize that it is more expensive, that's when the average consumer will care more about the walled garden approach.
But you are right it's not all bad. It does enable them to control the user experience a bit which does lead to a more polished product. In the older days on Unix one of the thing that would drive me crazy was that different apps had different ways of doing cut/paste and the shortcut keys would be different between apps.
But also it seems like the rules are arbitrary. As a developer I would not spend 6 months making something with the possibility my 6 months of works could be for nothing. He even changes his mind after he approves things based on public opinion or his latest spat of the moment....
I didn't say he was against free software, I just said he is a thread. If everyone in the world gets an iPad then Steve Jobs will have right of approval on everything. Only software that he approves will be permitted. If he decides he doesn't want software xxx in his app store, whether that be web browser, mathematica clone, alternative video editing packages, he will deny them all. He could change his mind after he approved it (and frequently does according to experiences).
If the iPad was the only computing environment, I'm sure it would be very hard to make free software projects except for those running Objective C, not interpreting any code. If there is a new programming language, like say Google Go picks up and he doesn't like it, then he will decree any app not in Objective C will not be approved. Then he is free to introduce whatever limits he wants into his flavor of Objective C....
The funny thing was as an undergrad people would cheat, but it wasn't so widespread. Professors would mention it on the first day, and occasionally one or two people would get thrown out of class. But no one outright asked me for the answer or expected me to cheat.... Or in a group project suggested out sourcing it.....
The professor's name was Hung. He might be easier now, I did undergrad 1998-2002 and at the time he had broken English. By now I'm sure it improved. Other people tell me his exams are still hard. But I'm so put off by him that I never ever wish to take another class with him again.
But as people go, I dislike him. He is a threat to free software. Also he seems like a major jerk. He banned code generation just because flash made him cry like a baby. Someone as petty as that with too much power over your computing experience is dangerous.... He wants to make a walled garden where you will only run Steve Job approved software. When someone leaks an apple secret or jail breaks their device and posts steps on how to do it, he wants to call in the sharks with frikken lasers (lawyers). Even Bill Gates/Steve Balmer are not that bad.
I will admit he is great at making a total user experience. Compare the iphone to the phones before it. Look at the iPod. Even the Mac now has a better experience. And in the old days before the mag stagnated he was pushing the envelope which led to windows getting his ideas. He seems to know how to hire people with a good sense of a product vision as well. If he was a little more open, I would not be debating an iPad, I would have bought one already. Allowing him to form the future of computing would be dangerous, but one day things like the iPad or even a cell phone will be the future of computing....
In my grad school I noticed that too. The indian guys have a huge network with old graded assignments/programs/etc. I was asked for help on what should have been an easy assignment and I quickly realized that the person had no clue what was going on at all, so much so that it was impossible he wrote it. Some more questioning and sure enough it wasn't his. Still not all Indians join the network or rely on it for cheating. One Indian guy in my 7 person group was the only other guy who did work. But it is there. Chinese have one as well but not as extensive (probably because there are way more Indian students).
Anyway I know they have old exams because I asked someone if they were crazy for taking a certain Professor's class....as an undergrad I had him for a semester and I would never voluntarily take him again. It turns out if you have his old exams then the class is much easier. Anyway that's a gray area. If the professor uses the same exam every year then it is cheating. If not, then it is more a gray area.... But they do turn in homework assignments/programs and just modify the words/variables and that is definitely cheating. Anyway I went with the other guy, I would never voluntarily take that professor again.... If based on the book/lectures you can't do well in a class then something is wrong with the class/teacher. Even if the teacher made the exams available, I'd be wary. But this guy also speaks broken english so forget it...Accent I deal with, broken english forget it... (or at least he used to 8 years ago...).
There are professors who treat you like a criminal, never give an exam back, say even discussing an exam is plagiarism (I told a professor he was full of it since no one is taking his work and saying it is theirs and he should be ashamed for trying to throw around one of the worst academic offenses for fearmongering). I think Professors should give exams back for two reasons: 1. So that students can learn from their mistakes, they can see what they got wrong and see why. 2. For auditing purposes...i often find professors who mark a problem wrong and it is right, special lecturers are guilty of this much more than full professors. In fact just yesterday I pointed out a mistake in the answer key that my professor posted on the page. They are people as well and they make mistakes.. We've seen how well no auditing/oversight worked for the Bush administration.
NJIT has an honor code as well, but when professors make their own exams and don't use the university blue composition book you often don't have to sign it. Anyway people still cheat like hell there. The Indian students are particularly bad, they have like a whole cheating network to save old exams/homework assignments. One professor even assumes that you cheat unless you do something beyond the assignment. That kind of stuff pisses me off because innocent until proven guilty....I think universities should not be wasting our time with whining about cheating.
Really it's quite easy. If you think someone cheated, ask them to explain their answer, if they can't then they cheated... (admittedly this won't work on multiple choice tests where you can Christmas tree).
In the past everyone used to copy Microsoft Software. I actually built an app using VB 3.0 while I was in high school. Basically you had a friend with the disks and he would copy them for you (often his copy was a copy). There was a lot of pirated software. Employers at big companies often let all the employees copy it at home too (they shouldn't have, but it was no big deal at the time and they didn't care). Also there were articles stating that Microsoft actually encouraged the copying of things like windows 3.1. In general Windows, Office, and Visual Studio were copied all the time. I'm not saying it was right. But there wasn't really as much awareness back then as now. It's not a lost sale because in high school I couldn't afford VB. Basically the widespread piracy had the side effect of spreading the Microsoft environment. There were illegal copies, available all over IRC/USENET/Websites/etc... Also it was not uncommon to by one copy of windows/office and put it on all your computers....
Skip ahead to now. The BSA enforces piracy much more (as they probably should). If you are a company and you get caught with pirating software you can have huge fees/legal fees. There's no way you can afford to not be properly licensed now. Also Microsoft software is much harder to pirate. Windows activation, the constant updates. Also even stuff like office has a limit to the number of PC's you can install it to. I have 4 main computers but office home only allows 3 installations on different computers and enforces this via activation. So my last computer gets open office. In the past I would have installed it on all 4 computers (even though old offices I think were meant for one PC). Visual Studio as well...if I ever bought it, I would have expected to install it on all my computers. Now I'm not sure whether you can or cannot with the latest editions, but I wouldn't be surprised if that gets activation at some point (if it doesn't have it already). But a side effect is that in the past where people would pirate it without thinking, the software would spread more. Now I have to think about the cost. In college there is nothing to think about, the cost is too high Microsoft loses. Even academic pricing used to be expensive. I think I could get office for $100, visual studio for $100, etc. back in college, but all those $100's added up. Now my grad school has a Microsoft site license. But it is such a pain to use because you go to their slow website to download the software, then you have to activate it with a key. They key is limited to 1 installation for most things (the program I wanted to use was visio). So I install it on my desktop at home. But then I want to work at school on my laptop for a group project. The key is locked out.... Recently I got a new laptop at home. Rather than using Visio, I just stick to Dia and Powerpoint for my drawing needs.
Now I am more aware of software piracy. And rather than pony up the money, I am more likely to go with the cheaper alternative. I prefer C# to Java. I don't want to start a holy war here, but it is obvious that Microsoft learned a lot from Java and made some improvements. If both were free, I would go with C# all the time. Visual Studio is a great development environment, it does sometimes crash, but overall I think it is one of Microsoft's best products. For me Visual Studio beats any other IDE. Even having said that, when I take price into account, I will pick Java 10 out of 10 times. I like C# more. Also I think the apps done in C# end up better on windows. But Java is free, I will pick that. In the future as Mono continues to evolve, who knows... But still I will not use SQL Server, I will use PostgreSQL. And I will not use Visual Studio, I will use MonoDevelop (or whever the environment is now called) or just good old notepad++. Microsoft does have an impressive dev environment but it is expensive. With MSDN you can use any dev tool you want on as many computers as you want for development purposes (with the
I worked for a start-up. They had to license MSDN but then when they went live they had to buy licenses for their production servers. Maybe that changed since 2003-2006 now, or the guy in charge of software licensing was a dummy.... But either way if I was going to do a start-up, I'd install Linux for free, and then write the software in Java/Python and PostgreSQL. Then I'd be ahead probably a good 10,000 on licensing costs.... Depending upon the burn rate, that I could be a whole month for a one/two person startup....
I don't doubt Google has problems and idiots working there as well as good people. Microsoft is also more interesting because you are developing windows/office/xbox stuff, etc... But I'm sure they have a normal boring accounting department as well.
Most software companies have the normal programming that everyone has to run/automate a company in addition to their main product. Although some main products require more skills than others...
I thought they used Python/Java/C++ and their own custom stuff (map reduce, etc..). But just an example that there you generally have to think more than simple business GUI front ends to databases/calc engines for databases...
although there are probably boring GUI front ends to databases there too... I'm sure someone maintains custom accounting financial reports/calculation items for the accounting department...Even with an off the shelf solution like Oracle Financials you still need custom code for most accounting departments....
But a lot of their products are more interesting (android, search, maps, etc..) and require more than high school algebra and basic programming skills.
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Or how about that ATT/Verizon don't give you a discount for not having a loan with your wireless contract. It only makes financial sense with T-Mobile to buy the unlocked phone. And there is no locked phone for Verizon/ATT so it doesn't make sense at all. T-Mobile is not in the same tier of network quality as ATT/Verizon. Admittedly the various ads say ATT/Verizon suck...but T-Mobile's network is much smaller. It may be better where it is, but there are a lot of places where T-Mobile has no service and ATT/Verizon do. Also 3G service is an even smaller map. Sprint is a bit better because they have roaming deals with Verizon, but still the plan where you don't pay roaming is more expensive, so it is cheaper just go to with Verizon.
Also, there is no service on Verizon because it is CDMA. And on ATT there was no 3G for the longest time because ATT and T-Mobile have different 3G frequencies. So you would have to pay the $500 without 3G. Then they got the 3G but there was no subsidy with ATT and no discount for signing with your own phone. You might as well just wait for the Samsung Galaxy, at least that comes at a subsidized price.... On Verizon there is no Nexus One, just the Droid Incredible.
Anyway I went with a Droid X on Verizon. Still if the Nexus one was subsidized somehow, I would have gotten the Nexus one. Or if Verizon offered a lower price out of contract and the math worked out (or was close) I would have bought a Nexus one. Prior to the Droid X I was at ATT and if there was a lower price out of contract, I would have gone with the 3G version of the Nexus One once it came out on ATT. With ATT I would have been even more likely because ATT lagged behind with android phones, and the first few to come out (Backflip and Aero) were nowhere near the Nexus One, so basically everyone looking for an android phone would have flocked to the Nexus. However the price makes no sense on ATT.
Also I read about the Nexus One reception problems. Google tried a few things and then was like tough shit. I was not left with much confidence in the Nexus One brand or Google customer service ability as a company. Still there is a good chance I would have bought it anyway if the price was right and if I had reception problems I would have returned it
Anyway I'm somewhat happy with the Droid X except for the battery life when the screen is in use. I suspect if the reception was okay and there was a subsidy/discount off contract I would have been happy with the Nexus One on ATT. T-Mobile is not an option because of their small network. Otherwise I probably would have switched.
Kindle's other format Topaz is different. Mobi and Epub are based off HTML sort of but Topaz is like a scanned image with embedded fonts (at least according to current hackers). So it seems like there is now way to directly convert it to epub/mobi like format.
Seriously? On mine unless you set the font to small it is a disaster. And with the font that small you can't read it. Larger fonts totally mess up the PDF, especially if they have multiple columns, it is like the columns are appended together instead of reading up and down.
I went web searching for a zoom but couldn't find anything about zooming in/out on a PDF. So basically it is useless for many articles since they often use 2 or 3 columns of text. Also on ones with diagrams it is better to keep the original layout and zoom in/out.
Not entirely true, many have their own DRM scheme. Adobe DRM is the standard but there are other DRMs on epub (ie Barnes and Noble). Really Barnes and Noble and Amazon seem the biggest players. So even if they were both ePub, if they have their own DRM scheme then it is the same as now. If they both had Adobe DRM then no problem, everyone can read Adobe DRM and so there is lots of choice.
Anyway while Barnes and Noble is opening its book store to other readers (probably because it wants to sell books more than anything else). I'm sure they'd love to find ways to lock people into their store only.
There is a format war, especially Amazon. From what I can tell it appears Barnes and Noble is willing to open up its store to other readers (see Plastic Logic). Amazon seems to want to lock users into the Kindle and their format so people have no alternatives.
ePub is becoming a standard and it does have a standard Adobe DRM (which the nook can read). But everyone seems to be inventing their own DRM. Nook can read the standard DRM and Barnes and Noble's DRM. I don't know why it felt compelled to invent its own DRM.
Anyway Amazon's DRM has been cracked, and there are utilities to convert from Mobi Pocket to ePub and the other way. Most of the formats are basically similar to HTML. However Topaz is different, it is a scanned image. The books are lower quality, but basically you just scan it and are done. For ePub/Mobi you actually have to publish your book in that format which is more work for the publisher. For publishers who don't want to bother at all with eBooks, they can just scan it into Topaz and sell a few extra ebooks. For the ones who are serious about eBooks, they often put it in the format and then publish both Mobi (Amazon's format) and ePub(most of the rest) with each store locking it into the various DRM. Sometimes I see the same book on Amazon, Fictionwise, Barnes and Noble.
But still it would be good if they all agreed on one format. But it seems like with the seamless utilities, if a publisher goes to ePub or Mobi they can convert to the other format and then each store just throws its own DRM. For a consumer it sucks because you are locked in. At least with Nook you can read adobe DRM so you have some choice. But in reality most of the DRM schemes have been cracked so even Kindle users can crack the DRM and convert to Mobi.
I have a nook and my problem is that a lot of the technical books either don't have e-books, or they only have the amazon topaz format. So really I have no choice but to buy the hard copy...... Hopefully this will change. From what I understand Topaz format means the publisher pays amazon a small amount to scan the book into a format which can be re-flowed but isn't very good. And a full fledged mobi pocket/ebook requires more effort from publishers to make that format.
This is even true of "Coders at Work" which while not a technical book, would be fun to read. But I don't want to have it sitting on my shelf if I'm just going to read it once and probably not go back. Your choices are PDF or TOPAZ, none of which work that well on Nook. And even Kindle users complain about Topaz books not reflowing well. Of course if I had an iPad the PDF would probably be fine. So maybe for technical books iPad is the way forward... Still for reading fiction the Nook/Kindle/other eInk readers are pretty nice...
Back when I was 22 and just out of school (in the 2002 recession) was sending resumes everywhere. this one company sent out a programming challenge via e-mail. I don't remember all the details now, but it was in a language called "J" see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J_(programming_language). I think it was taking a bunch of numbers from a file and doing some quick transformations, then printing the output. The program was trivial, however it was in J. Anyway it served to filter out people who didn't want to learn anything new. Even if you hire a PHP/MySQL expert, they still have to learn the firm's business requirements. Also things always change, if you go from PHP to Perl or ASP.NET will you need to fire them and hire new people, or can they keep working for you?
Anyway the company had hundreds of applicants but the challenge narrowed it down to 10 or so which they invited to an interview. They also said they liked my solution more than all the others because I bothered to change the decimal precision to get the exact output they put on their sheet, instead of just the answer in the default output....Sadly I got lost and never made it for the interview...Oh well. But I'm sure whoever they got was competent. I definitely could have done the job.
Anyway after working with graduate freeloaders on group projects and 3 companies professionally for 7 years I can say that what you need to do is push people out of their comfort zone. Find out if they are willing to learn something new. You should invent your own programming language, and give that to candidates to solve a (trivial or nearly trivial problem). If they cannot take the time to learn your simple language to solve a trivial problem, do you think they will take the time to learn the business requirements for a piece of software? Also say you hire a PHP expert, what happens if you like Django/Python more.....do you need to fire them and rehire them? Also I'm not sure what level candidates you are hiring. But a typical university education does not teach you PhP, OOP (nothing more than an object holds procedures/data), etc.. Also normalization depends. But it is really simple to learn if you don't know it. I always confuse the ones after the first 3. So I refer to a book/web page but the concepts are easy enough. Still does a typical web jockey need to no normalization (especially if you employ a DBA already), probably not.... Even for a normal corporate database you probably don't need more than 3rd normal form. Still the more advanced ones (at least Boyce Codd and 4th) are easy enough with a book. I wouldn't hire or not hire someone for that. I'd much rather an open mind and willing to learn.
Why don't they have to have relief wells partially drilled before drilling the main well? It seems like if you could cut the work down from months to a week or so it would be a lot better (although a week of this thing gushing in the ocean would still a disaster...).
Anyway maybe people should bet on how long the cap will last before it starts leaking lower in the well, or something else happens... Call my bookie!!!!
This is not flame bait. A site that doesn't work with Internet Explorer is ignoring a huge chunk of the market. Most businesses cannot afford to ignore the IE users...
Another great example is admob. Steve has decreed that he does not like people getting sales numbers on his iPhone, so only advertisers who collect data he has approved will be permitted to exist. Then he invented his own platform. This is dangerous because previously people were using admob and he suddenly decided nope, I am changing the rules, you have to work my way. Then he invented a competitor which is not subject to the same rules. It gives him an unfair advantage. This is no big deal right now, because you are free to chose android. But if apple becomes the only game in town, then it is a problem.
If you are a company and your only products are apps in Steve's store, then you have to ensure you don't piss him off. But still you'd have to disclose to your investors the huge risks of Steve changing his mind, deciding to invent a competitor to you not subject to the same restrictions. Or all out, you spend a year making an app, Steve decides to build it into the iPhone and ban any apps doing the same thing because it is duplicating the functionality....
As a business that is very risky. It's just like the problem with investing in some foreign countries. When governments keep changing the laws/rules often less people will invest there. It is important to find places that offer consistent laws/processes. It's no different then Venezuela where Chavez suddenly decides to nationalize your business. Then he keeps jacking up the prices....
The problem is that it is tempting to still buy it :) Hence why I said debating :) The iPad is very polished, and Mac OSX is also very tempting. The walled garden approach of the iphone/iPad sets a bad precedent. But anyway they are still nice devices. If they don't become the absolute future, then it is no big deal, but if everyone gets an iPad/iPhone and the alternatives go away, then we have a problem...
I never heard about that. Maybe because I was a Rutgers student at the time and only took a few CS electives there.
The one professor who assumes everyone is guilty unless proven innocent claims one exam almost everyone failed out because a TA distributed the wrong answer to anyone having trouble. I find that hard to believe. But anyway usually you have to prove someone guilty in the justice system, innocent until proven guilty.
And in the app store how to you distribute your source code with the app? If you build a game with a scripting engine to add new levels, how do you distribute that app? If you write a new programming language to try out writing your own compiler, how do you distribute that?
I realize it seems bad. But the walled garden approach has good and bad. And I am aware the average customer who knows nothing about computers just cares about the experience, so the walled garden is good for them.
Until they want an App that apple has decided to give themselves a monopoly on. Without competition the prices tend to be higher. Look at what happened to Internet Explorer when Microsoft didn't have that much competition, it stagnated. Few would argue that today Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Opera, etc. are not better than IE 6.0 was. Basically Steve can take a monopoly on whatever he wants by disapproving all the other applications from other developers. When consumers realize that it is more expensive, that's when the average consumer will care more about the walled garden approach.
But you are right it's not all bad. It does enable them to control the user experience a bit which does lead to a more polished product. In the older days on Unix one of the thing that would drive me crazy was that different apps had different ways of doing cut/paste and the shortcut keys would be different between apps.
But also it seems like the rules are arbitrary. As a developer I would not spend 6 months making something with the possibility my 6 months of works could be for nothing. He even changes his mind after he approves things based on public opinion or his latest spat of the moment....
I didn't say he was against free software, I just said he is a thread. If everyone in the world gets an iPad then Steve Jobs will have right of approval on everything. Only software that he approves will be permitted. If he decides he doesn't want software xxx in his app store, whether that be web browser, mathematica clone, alternative video editing packages, he will deny them all. He could change his mind after he approved it (and frequently does according to experiences).
If the iPad was the only computing environment, I'm sure it would be very hard to make free software projects except for those running Objective C, not interpreting any code. If there is a new programming language, like say Google Go picks up and he doesn't like it, then he will decree any app not in Objective C will not be approved. Then he is free to introduce whatever limits he wants into his flavor of Objective C....
The funny thing was as an undergrad people would cheat, but it wasn't so widespread. Professors would mention it on the first day, and occasionally one or two people would get thrown out of class. But no one outright asked me for the answer or expected me to cheat.... Or in a group project suggested out sourcing it.....
The professor's name was Hung. He might be easier now, I did undergrad 1998-2002 and at the time he had broken English. By now I'm sure it improved. Other people tell me his exams are still hard. But I'm so put off by him that I never ever wish to take another class with him again.
But as people go, I dislike him. He is a threat to free software. Also he seems like a major jerk. He banned code generation just because flash made him cry like a baby. Someone as petty as that with too much power over your computing experience is dangerous.... He wants to make a walled garden where you will only run Steve Job approved software. When someone leaks an apple secret or jail breaks their device and posts steps on how to do it, he wants to call in the sharks with frikken lasers (lawyers). Even Bill Gates/Steve Balmer are not that bad.
I will admit he is great at making a total user experience. Compare the iphone to the phones before it. Look at the iPod. Even the Mac now has a better experience. And in the old days before the mag stagnated he was pushing the envelope which led to windows getting his ideas. He seems to know how to hire people with a good sense of a product vision as well. If he was a little more open, I would not be debating an iPad, I would have bought one already. Allowing him to form the future of computing would be dangerous, but one day things like the iPad or even a cell phone will be the future of computing....
In my grad school I noticed that too. The indian guys have a huge network with old graded assignments/programs/etc. I was asked for help on what should have been an easy assignment and I quickly realized that the person had no clue what was going on at all, so much so that it was impossible he wrote it. Some more questioning and sure enough it wasn't his. Still not all Indians join the network or rely on it for cheating. One Indian guy in my 7 person group was the only other guy who did work. But it is there. Chinese have one as well but not as extensive (probably because there are way more Indian students).
Anyway I know they have old exams because I asked someone if they were crazy for taking a certain Professor's class....as an undergrad I had him for a semester and I would never voluntarily take him again. It turns out if you have his old exams then the class is much easier. Anyway that's a gray area. If the professor uses the same exam every year then it is cheating. If not, then it is more a gray area.... But they do turn in homework assignments/programs and just modify the words/variables and that is definitely cheating. Anyway I went with the other guy, I would never voluntarily take that professor again.... If based on the book/lectures you can't do well in a class then something is wrong with the class/teacher. Even if the teacher made the exams available, I'd be wary. But this guy also speaks broken english so forget it...Accent I deal with, broken english forget it... (or at least he used to 8 years ago...).
There are professors who treat you like a criminal, never give an exam back, say even discussing an exam is plagiarism (I told a professor he was full of it since no one is taking his work and saying it is theirs and he should be ashamed for trying to throw around one of the worst academic offenses for fearmongering). I think Professors should give exams back for two reasons: 1. So that students can learn from their mistakes, they can see what they got wrong and see why. 2. For auditing purposes...i often find professors who mark a problem wrong and it is right, special lecturers are guilty of this much more than full professors. In fact just yesterday I pointed out a mistake in the answer key that my professor posted on the page. They are people as well and they make mistakes.. We've seen how well no auditing/oversight worked for the Bush administration.
NJIT has an honor code as well, but when professors make their own exams and don't use the university blue composition book you often don't have to sign it. Anyway people still cheat like hell there. The Indian students are particularly bad, they have like a whole cheating network to save old exams/homework assignments. One professor even assumes that you cheat unless you do something beyond the assignment. That kind of stuff pisses me off because innocent until proven guilty....I think universities should not be wasting our time with whining about cheating.
Really it's quite easy. If you think someone cheated, ask them to explain their answer, if they can't then they cheated... (admittedly this won't work on multiple choice tests where you can Christmas tree).
In the past everyone used to copy Microsoft Software. I actually built an app using VB 3.0 while I was in high school. Basically you had a friend with the disks and he would copy them for you (often his copy was a copy). There was a lot of pirated software. Employers at big companies often let all the employees copy it at home too (they shouldn't have, but it was no big deal at the time and they didn't care). Also there were articles stating that Microsoft actually encouraged the copying of things like windows 3.1. In general Windows, Office, and Visual Studio were copied all the time. I'm not saying it was right. But there wasn't really as much awareness back then as now. It's not a lost sale because in high school I couldn't afford VB. Basically the widespread piracy had the side effect of spreading the Microsoft environment. There were illegal copies, available all over IRC/USENET/Websites/etc... Also it was not uncommon to by one copy of windows/office and put it on all your computers....
Skip ahead to now. The BSA enforces piracy much more (as they probably should). If you are a company and you get caught with pirating software you can have huge fees/legal fees. There's no way you can afford to not be properly licensed now. Also Microsoft software is much harder to pirate. Windows activation, the constant updates. Also even stuff like office has a limit to the number of PC's you can install it to. I have 4 main computers but office home only allows 3 installations on different computers and enforces this via activation. So my last computer gets open office. In the past I would have installed it on all 4 computers (even though old offices I think were meant for one PC). Visual Studio as well...if I ever bought it, I would have expected to install it on all my computers. Now I'm not sure whether you can or cannot with the latest editions, but I wouldn't be surprised if that gets activation at some point (if it doesn't have it already). But a side effect is that in the past where people would pirate it without thinking, the software would spread more. Now I have to think about the cost. In college there is nothing to think about, the cost is too high Microsoft loses. Even academic pricing used to be expensive. I think I could get office for $100, visual studio for $100, etc. back in college, but all those $100's added up. Now my grad school has a Microsoft site license. But it is such a pain to use because you go to their slow website to download the software, then you have to activate it with a key. They key is limited to 1 installation for most things (the program I wanted to use was visio). So I install it on my desktop at home. But then I want to work at school on my laptop for a group project. The key is locked out.... Recently I got a new laptop at home. Rather than using Visio, I just stick to Dia and Powerpoint for my drawing needs.
Now I am more aware of software piracy. And rather than pony up the money, I am more likely to go with the cheaper alternative. I prefer C# to Java. I don't want to start a holy war here, but it is obvious that Microsoft learned a lot from Java and made some improvements. If both were free, I would go with C# all the time. Visual Studio is a great development environment, it does sometimes crash, but overall I think it is one of Microsoft's best products. For me Visual Studio beats any other IDE. Even having said that, when I take price into account, I will pick Java 10 out of 10 times. I like C# more. Also I think the apps done in C# end up better on windows. But Java is free, I will pick that. In the future as Mono continues to evolve, who knows... But still I will not use SQL Server, I will use PostgreSQL. And I will not use Visual Studio, I will use MonoDevelop (or whever the environment is now called) or just good old notepad++. Microsoft does have an impressive dev environment but it is expensive. With MSDN you can use any dev tool you want on as many computers as you want for development purposes (with the
I worked for a start-up. They had to license MSDN but then when they went live they had to buy licenses for their production servers. Maybe that changed since 2003-2006 now, or the guy in charge of software licensing was a dummy.... But either way if I was going to do a start-up, I'd install Linux for free, and then write the software in Java/Python and PostgreSQL. Then I'd be ahead probably a good 10,000 on licensing costs.... Depending upon the burn rate, that I could be a whole month for a one/two person startup....
Too bad all states don't follow your example...
I don't doubt Google has problems and idiots working there as well as good people. Microsoft is also more interesting because you are developing windows/office/xbox stuff, etc... But I'm sure they have a normal boring accounting department as well.
Most software companies have the normal programming that everyone has to run/automate a company in addition to their main product. Although some main products require more skills than others...
I thought they used Python/Java/C++ and their own custom stuff (map reduce, etc..). But just an example that there you generally have to think more than simple business GUI front ends to databases/calc engines for databases...
although there are probably boring GUI front ends to databases there too... I'm sure someone maintains custom accounting financial reports/calculation items for the accounting department...Even with an off the shelf solution like Oracle Financials you still need custom code for most accounting departments....
But a lot of their products are more interesting (android, search, maps, etc..) and require more than high school algebra and basic programming skills.