It depends on what needs to be created
on
Ageism in IT?
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· Score: 1
I have been a guitarist for over 40 years. My experience teaching music to all ages of people is that younger people do seem to attack things with a higher level of energy. I have also been a programmer for 20 years, and I now manage developers. The similarities between music and programming are astounding. They are both very abstract vehicles used to accomplish something that only resembles the task at hand in physical ways. In music, the initial task is to create sound with an instrument. As the years go by, and if there is an artist involved in the process, the sound begins to take on a meaning that transcends the physical action of playing. That musical meaning is what causes one to "study" a piece of music for an entire lifetime. I have been playing some pieces for 30 years. It usually takes about a week to memorize about a page of music. Depending on the composition, the rest of the time is to understand not only the intention of the composer - ranging itself from zero to infinite meaning - but to find the relationship of the music to what an individual wants to express.
Software is pretty much the same thing. When I first started programming, I didn't understand the architecture of complex systems. I was able to attack small jobs with a tenacity that always resulted in a working solution. I shudder to think of the the poor bast...s that must now be supporting that code. However, that doesn't invalidate the work I did. I pulled companies out of big deadline troubles back in those days, and that kept the money flowing in. If I had known then what I know now, I would have insisted in designing a robust, supportable system. It would not have been completed in time to meet the demands of the customer, and I would have been fired.
If you want quick work with some innovation that might not have had the test of time, young people can often provide that much faster than those who are experienced, and can't work like a bull in a pasture filled with cows in heat. Although, to extend that analogy somewhat, I still dream about having that opportunity:-)
I thought there were rules about attorneys taking cases where there were former cases that could generate conflicts of interest? MS is now a big owner of SCO, and therefore has a serious vested interest. Wouldn't that interest affect Mr. Boies' involvement in the case?
I am not a lawyer, but I thought there were some kind of "fair use" statues that allow small parts of copyrighted material to be used by others. I know this applies to music, since, for example, certain chord progressions, are so common as to be outside the right of any one person to copyright. It would seem to me that 80 lines of code, out of how many tens of thousands of lines?, would fall into that category. That argument should apply regardless of the success or failure of the argument the SCO might actually be using Linux, or other 3rd party code.
It would be very useful to determine the exact nature of the code in question. It is hard to imagine that such a small fraction of what may be Unix code, could be the keystone of the SCO's entire business.
If you are working with a large organization, you are most likely working with quite a few "home grown" applications. The *only* support available for those applications will come from you and others on your team. Make sure your team is sustainable, and that your management can rely on them to handle any crisis. Remind your management that closed source software, no matter how well supported by the vendor, by its nature *must* force you to rely on an outside organization for critical support. You shouldn't need to go to MS or Sun or anyone else for information about how to run commercial software. That type of knowledge is what *you* are paid to provide, and you had better provide that or get out of the businesss. Real problems with commercial software are usually handled by patches that execute "workarounds", not fixes. If you are very, very, lucky, your problem will be fixed in a future release, but usually, you will have to figure out to reapply the same patch (modified properly for the new configuration and version of commercial software), or wait until the latest bug surfaces at the most inopportune time possible.
Open Source software gives you and your team the ability to fix the bugs that bother your organization. They could be insignificant to any other company, undetectable by most otheres, but killer bugs to your company - bugs that have to be fixed NOW!
There are many 3rd parties who offer Linux and other open source consulting services. Use those services to educate your own staff, and put a few of the people on long term retainer for gnarly problems.
I have been using World Party Music (http://www.wpmusic.com) for several years and it is much more convenient. They charge a flat fee of $1.00 for handling, they do all the inventory handling, shipping, and just send me a check for the amount of my sales minus $1.00 for each sale. They charge the customer the shipping charges and they are responsible for any taxes on the sale.
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I have been a guitarist for over 40 years. My experience teaching music to all ages of people is that younger people do seem to attack things with a higher level of energy. I have also been a programmer for 20 years, and I now manage developers. The similarities between music and programming are astounding. They are both very abstract vehicles used to accomplish something that only resembles the task at hand in physical ways. In music, the initial task is to create sound with an instrument. As the years go by, and if there is an artist involved in the process, the sound begins to take on a meaning that transcends the physical action of playing. That musical meaning is what causes one to "study" a piece of music for an entire lifetime. I have been playing some pieces for 30 years. It usually takes about a week to memorize about a page of music. Depending on the composition, the rest of the time is to understand not only the intention of the composer - ranging itself from zero to infinite meaning - but to find the relationship of the music to what an individual wants to express. Software is pretty much the same thing. When I first started programming, I didn't understand the architecture of complex systems. I was able to attack small jobs with a tenacity that always resulted in a working solution. I shudder to think of the the poor bast...s that must now be supporting that code. However, that doesn't invalidate the work I did. I pulled companies out of big deadline troubles back in those days, and that kept the money flowing in. If I had known then what I know now, I would have insisted in designing a robust, supportable system. It would not have been completed in time to meet the demands of the customer, and I would have been fired. If you want quick work with some innovation that might not have had the test of time, young people can often provide that much faster than those who are experienced, and can't work like a bull in a pasture filled with cows in heat. Although, to extend that analogy somewhat, I still dream about having that opportunity :-)
I thought there were rules about attorneys taking cases where there were former cases that could generate conflicts of interest? MS is now a big owner of SCO, and therefore has a serious vested interest. Wouldn't that interest affect Mr. Boies' involvement in the case?
I am not a lawyer, but I thought there were some kind of "fair use" statues that allow small parts of copyrighted material to be used by others. I know this applies to music, since, for example, certain chord progressions, are so common as to be outside the right of any one person to copyright. It would seem to me that 80 lines of code, out of how many tens of thousands of lines?, would fall into that category. That argument should apply regardless of the success or failure of the argument the SCO might actually be using Linux, or other 3rd party code. It would be very useful to determine the exact nature of the code in question. It is hard to imagine that such a small fraction of what may be Unix code, could be the keystone of the SCO's entire business.
If you are working with a large organization, you are most likely working with quite a few "home grown" applications. The *only* support available for those applications will come from you and others on your team. Make sure your team is sustainable, and that your management can rely on them to handle any crisis. Remind your management that closed source software, no matter how well supported by the vendor, by its nature *must* force you to rely on an outside organization for critical support. You shouldn't need to go to MS or Sun or anyone else for information about how to run commercial software. That type of knowledge is what *you* are paid to provide, and you had better provide that or get out of the businesss. Real problems with commercial software are usually handled by patches that execute "workarounds", not fixes. If you are very, very, lucky, your problem will be fixed in a future release, but usually, you will have to figure out to reapply the same patch (modified properly for the new configuration and version of commercial software), or wait until the latest bug surfaces at the most inopportune time possible. Open Source software gives you and your team the ability to fix the bugs that bother your organization. They could be insignificant to any other company, undetectable by most otheres, but killer bugs to your company - bugs that have to be fixed NOW! There are many 3rd parties who offer Linux and other open source consulting services. Use those services to educate your own staff, and put a few of the people on long term retainer for gnarly problems.
I have been using World Party Music (http://www.wpmusic.com) for several years and it is much more convenient. They charge a flat fee of $1.00 for handling, they do all the inventory handling, shipping, and just send me a check for the amount of my sales minus $1.00 for each sale. They charge the customer the shipping charges and they are responsible for any taxes on the sale.