Prostitutes of the Information Age
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Ageism in IT?
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· Score: 1
The real sad thing is that there are still 35+ year old programmers (although I have all the respect for older COBOL programmers. I know of no young people who still use it). Shouldnt they be product-manager-types now? Mentoring/telling us young people what to do??
Are we sure that the old people hottly debating this topic arent just the old-hacks who couldnt cut it??
I hope to god I am not programming when I am 30 even. Programmers, are the prostitutes of the information age. Its pure grunt work -- leave that for the new grads who actually think programming is cool
To clear things up, kind-of; I was just as suprised last year to hear that CPSC at UofC was phasing out C/C++ in introductory classes. But after hearing the reason (Pascal and Java offer a better learning environment for students new to computer science), it makes sense. C/C++ however is not phased out of the university. You are still expected to learn it on your own, and be able to write C programs when you start doing the hardware, networking, OS, etc courses. It is, as it is with many languages, expected that you learn the language on your own. The computer science does not teach you programming, it does not teach you programming languages. It teaches you the science of computer science, the language and the programming are just the tools you use.
If you are looking to learn/refresh C/C++ skills, university is not the place; however, the UofC offers continuing education courses which are probably more of what you are looking for.
Virus writing is very easy now, but it is because nobody is really writing a virus anymore. Instead, they are using virus creating programs to write them, or taking a current virus, and modifying it.
To write a virus from scratch takes a bit more effort, and you need to be adept at asm, which nowadays, very few young people bother learning. I dont think people reallize that virii are not written in C, its all asm.
If someone actually wants to take a look at what a real virus looks like, take a look at the following site. Im sure we all remember the SQLWorm Virus of late January. Well, here is a website that has the virus code posted:
I actually just recently completed lectures with Dr. Aycock this past fall on Operating Systems. This guy definately know's his stuff. Through the course of the semester, he would bring in the CERT advisements, and actually go through (in a high-level manner) and tell how operating systems could be compromised. After learning about how they could be compromised, we took special measures to make sure our assignments were secure against for example, buffer-overflow. He, and our TA's purposely took measures to break our OS assignments, and our grades were assigned accordingly.
It all contributes to better code, and I dont think the introduction of Virus' to the university would be any different.
The University of Calgary has been very diligent at offering new cutting-edge (cutting edge in that they havent been officially offered before) courses such as this and Games Programming (UofC was the first university to offer a concentration in games programming).
What the hell is up with the Maclean's ratings?? =)
Thanks bub.
I wish your self-taught education would have told you the real difference between CS and programming. CS is NOT programming; CS encompasses all things that is computers. Now, I do agree that some CS people are dumb as bricks, but this is true of all disciplines. The real problem now, is what I call the 'Business Syndrome'. It used to be. if you could not decide on what to major in, you just majored in business. Nowadays however, 'business' now means computer science. I graduated with a gpa of 2.9 and I knew a helluva lot more than most grads with the 3.7-4.0 gpa's. There is a huge difference between book-smart, and real-world-smart. I wish that technology firms would realize that. So, yes, I do agree with you on that point.
The real problem is your assumption that CS is computer programming. Computer Programming is only maybe 40% of CS. Computer Scientists are supposed to have programmers (like you) working under us; we are to be telling you what to do. We didnt work our asses through 4 years of school to do the grunt work (it should have been hell, or else your school, and thus your degree is a joke). To put it bluntly, its beneath us.
Think you are cut out for computer science? or you think you are better?? I invite you to optimize a cache validation schema for a mobile database system that works faster than 2-Phase-Cache-Validation. I did it, can you?? I created one that runs in O(lg n) rather than O(n) which is the current standard. I invite you to create a more efficient algorithm than Strassens O(n^lg7) for matrix multiplication. Its not a computer programmer who is doing this; its an actual scientist, infact....its a computer scientist. How about you try your hands at some complexity theory?? Try your hands at trying to prove or disprove N=NP.
There is a lot more to CS than programming, and I find it insulting that you are under this assumption. How about for your next 'self-teaching' venture, you actually find out what things are before you bash them. Ignoramous!
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The real sad thing is that there are still 35+ year old programmers (although I have all the respect for older COBOL programmers. I know of no young people who still use it). Shouldnt they be product-manager-types now? Mentoring/telling us young people what to do?? Are we sure that the old people hottly debating this topic arent just the old-hacks who couldnt cut it?? I hope to god I am not programming when I am 30 even. Programmers, are the prostitutes of the information age. Its pure grunt work -- leave that for the new grads who actually think programming is cool
If you are looking to learn/refresh C/C++ skills, university is not the place; however, the UofC offers continuing education courses which are probably more of what you are looking for.
To write a virus from scratch takes a bit more effort, and you need to be adept at asm, which nowadays, very few young people bother learning. I dont think people reallize that virii are not written in C, its all asm.
If someone actually wants to take a look at what a real virus looks like, take a look at the following site. Im sure we all remember the SQLWorm Virus of late January. Well, here is a website that has the virus code posted:
http://www.eeye.com/html/Research/Flash/sapphire.t xt
What the hell is up with the Maclean's ratings?? =)
I started learning how my car works cause I had no money, and broke stuff needed to be fixed.
Finally! Someone see's the light!
Thanks bub. I wish your self-taught education would have told you the real difference between CS and programming. CS is NOT programming; CS encompasses all things that is computers. Now, I do agree that some CS people are dumb as bricks, but this is true of all disciplines. The real problem now, is what I call the 'Business Syndrome'. It used to be. if you could not decide on what to major in, you just majored in business. Nowadays however, 'business' now means computer science. I graduated with a gpa of 2.9 and I knew a helluva lot more than most grads with the 3.7-4.0 gpa's. There is a huge difference between book-smart, and real-world-smart. I wish that technology firms would realize that. So, yes, I do agree with you on that point. The real problem is your assumption that CS is computer programming. Computer Programming is only maybe 40% of CS. Computer Scientists are supposed to have programmers (like you) working under us; we are to be telling you what to do. We didnt work our asses through 4 years of school to do the grunt work (it should have been hell, or else your school, and thus your degree is a joke). To put it bluntly, its beneath us. Think you are cut out for computer science? or you think you are better?? I invite you to optimize a cache validation schema for a mobile database system that works faster than 2-Phase-Cache-Validation. I did it, can you?? I created one that runs in O(lg n) rather than O(n) which is the current standard. I invite you to create a more efficient algorithm than Strassens O(n^lg7) for matrix multiplication. Its not a computer programmer who is doing this; its an actual scientist, infact....its a computer scientist. How about you try your hands at some complexity theory?? Try your hands at trying to prove or disprove N=NP. There is a lot more to CS than programming, and I find it insulting that you are under this assumption. How about for your next 'self-teaching' venture, you actually find out what things are before you bash them. Ignoramous!