How many people in the work force have homework? Not a lot. Outside of teachers, business owners, and (presumably) well paid white collar workers, very few.
It sounds kind of like you are describing successful people.
I find myself doing "homework" on a regular basis, as does my wife. Many salaried professionals find that to stay up with their field, to get all of the work that needs to be done finished, and to come to a real sense of accomplishment and satisfaction that they have to work outside of the office.
While I agree that too much homework, for students or professionals, can be distracting, I think it is stretching for either students to assume they can learn all they are taught without any outside effort or for professionals to think that they can succeed in their field if they treat work as a nine to five burden.
It's not just a tried and true story, it is the classic story.
The hero myth, retold in many forms, be it Hercules, Frodo, Paul Atreides, Arthur, or a white hatted Tom Berenger fighting evil cattle barons is meant to be told again and again. A youth sets out on a quest aided by an elder mentor who dies or leaves early in the quest. The youth, imbued with mystical powers, totems, and/or animal or spirit guides, stares into the maw of evil coming back victorious but scarred to be misunderstood by those around him.
The impact of all of these stories on me as a young person was not to impress me with either special effects or dialogue (though I would argue both were great..."who is more foolish, the fool or the fool who follows him?", "I don't care what you smell, just get in there!", "You came in that? You're braver than I thought!") but to inspire me with examples of people who in the face of danger and evil made their morality the focal point of their life.
6) Does anyone really use meta-keywords other than spammers
No, and it is unfortunate. I work with a web cataloguing effort in computational science education (The Computational Science Education Reference Desk) and I spend a lot of time trying to define standard metadata for pages on the web.
The job of building digital libraries will be much easier and will better reflect the intention of people who create web content when web content creators put, at a minimum, title, description, and keyword metadata into their pages (and preferably much much more.
The more that meta-spam is used to beat search engines, the less that people will put metadata into their pages, and as a result, the less time that people will spend actually thinking about and creating good metadata.
I have no idea what impact this law will have, if any, but I would like to see more search engines that use metatags, but include some sort of "meta-spam" filter, perhaps a penalty on excessive use of keywords.
Well, computer science is not what most students are being taught with computers. Many teachers, like most people in our society, do not entirely realize that computer programs are mathematical functions, nor that they are something that ordinary human beings can learn to write. ... Much of the use of computers in schools has nothing to do with programming. Some of it involves playing "educational" computer games. Some of it involves vocational training in the use of word processors and spreadsheets -- which in my opinion is improperly generalized to too much of the student population. (See below.) Some of it involves online research, which has become connected these days to library science. None of these have anything in particular to do with computer science.
One of the things I would like to see more of is having students use computers to compute. We run a series of summer camp programs for middle and high school students, as well as design educational software centered around computational science and engineering education (available for free on the internet) and train faculty in undergraduate science and teacher training progams in how to use computing effectively in middle, high school, and undergraduate science, technology, and math education (www.shodor.org).
Working with middle school students what we have found is that computing, when placed in the context of doing science (and by doing science I mean answering the question "how do we know if it is right", not just memorizing facts) can help students learn the science. Science and Math are done differently today by many of its practitioners than 40 years ago. The "using a theory to make a prediction" part of the scientific method is a much larger piece of the puzzle. In addition, solving a single simple problem over and over again really quickly can turn the process of graphing into exploring fucntions (see Function Flyer). And while there is a extra hurdle in finding, analyzing, and verifying the information that can be found on the web, there is a lot more data out there to mine and sort through.
In addition, we have seen a different demographic by incorporating computational science in education as early as 6th grade. We are seeing students in traditionally underrepresented groups being exposed to computing, while learning something they were already curious about. What we get as a result is a lot of minorities and women interested in computing at a young age, without ever limiting programs to a single group. (www.shodor.org/succeed)
Technology can be used extremely poorly, but it can also be used well. "Change is inevitable, improvement is by design."
Then go out after waking up. Going out is important. It doesn't matter if you go to buy bread, but go always out.
I agree with this wholeheatedly. When I am going a little stir crazy, I make a point of going out in the morning before work to get a bagel and coffee. It helps that this was a standard part of my routine when I was working in the office -- I typically stopped for a bagel and coffee on the way in to work.
Oh, and by the way, if you HAVE been going to SC conferences, then you know exactly when I'm talking about when I say it's all "hype", made up demos to "prove" something. Last year they had some goofy badge thing with flowers on a screen, and they were trying to get people to put the badges on...what the hell does that have to do with Supercomputing? Nothing. What does it have to do with "hype"? Everything.
I don't recall the "goofy badge" at Baltimore. I remember those GIS units everyone wore and the person who walked the most got a prize. The point of that one, I thought, was a fun way of demonstrating just how far GIS techonology had advanced. At least I thought that was the point.
I remember assorted displays of exhibition floor traffic at Baltimore, the point of which I thought was to say something about how high end computing could be used to visualize real time data. At least I thought that was the point.
I remember loads of booths for governmental labs showing what they were studying with high perfomance computing. At least I thought that was the point.
I remember loads of academic groups showing how different sort of middleware could tie together supercomputers across the country into a computational grid, enabling even greater computer power. At least I thought that was the point.
I remember a lot of exhibitors "hyping" their own products, trying to stand out against a crowd of virtually identical competitors (no pun intended). At least I thought that was the point.
I remember talks given by people trying to spread what they are doing to advance their careers. At least I thought that was the point.
I remember great tutorials and an excellent education program for faculty new to HPC, where people learned new skills to take back and apply to their careers. At least I thought that was the point.
And I remember people running around the exhibit floor getting all the swag they could. And while that isn't the point, its still real fun.
Have you ever BEEN to an SC conference? They stage all that stuff off site, just like any other conference. There's no "magic" here. This conference is more about hype than anything else, and there's no magic about putting together a top 100 level machine at a show like this. I'd be damn disappointed if they COULDN'T do that.
As I said in my previous post, any conference where they can put that sort of machine together and it isn't the coolest thing in the show has got to be a good conference.
I have to be honest, I don't remember this exhibit. My brain was prety full, I heard about it afterwards. This was the Intel booth, right?
Still, 17 hours is pretty boss. I've done a lot of cluster installation tutorials where getting 4 machines set up in 1.5 hours takes a little work and a lot of rehearsal. They put together and installed 192 nodes in 17 hours with a variant of ROCKS. Now that's what I call pulling out all the stops to put on a good show.
No magic? I'll grant you it was rehearsed. I'll also grant you that noone went to the conference just to see a cluster put together in 17 hours. No conference, technical or scientific, is just about the exhibits. It is about meeting people face to face (and there are a lot of people to meet at SC), attending (or sometimes giving) a useful tutorial or two, and as I said before...
Protein folding...the human genome project...the early evolution of the universe...weather prediction...the next generation of stealth technology...cracking documents encrypted by terrorists...
For an annual breakdown of the national direction in supercomputing and current "Grand Challenge" applications, look at the National Coordination Office for Information Technology Research and Development's supplements to the President's budget (a.k.a. the blue books)
And if you're not impressed by a conference where someone put together a top 100 level machine in under a day and it wasn't even the coolest thing in the show, then yes, you should turn in your geek card.
iTunes is what got me listening to music again. I don't care for their full CD prices, but a buck a song is not bad when you can get just the songs you like. For most artists, there are only about 4 or 5 songs I actually want to listen to from their entire career, so I can make my own best of for 4 or 5 dollars, without ever driving to the record store.
If they are running using any of the standard OSs available for PPC, and the software currently available on those OSs, they're stuck with MPICH or LAM or something else that doesn't optimize collective communications.
Other than MPICH or LAM, what would you recommend?
Slashdot Mirror
How many people in the work force have homework? Not a lot. Outside of teachers, business owners, and (presumably) well paid white collar workers, very few.
It sounds kind of like you are describing successful people.
I find myself doing "homework" on a regular basis, as does my wife. Many salaried professionals find that to stay up with their field, to get all of the work that needs to be done finished, and to come to a real sense of accomplishment and satisfaction that they have to work outside of the office.
While I agree that too much homework, for students or professionals, can be distracting, I think it is stretching for either students to assume they can learn all they are taught without any outside effort or for professionals to think that they can succeed in their field if they treat work as a nine to five burden.
It's not just a tried and true story, it is the classic story.
The hero myth, retold in many forms, be it Hercules, Frodo, Paul Atreides, Arthur, or a white hatted Tom Berenger fighting evil cattle barons is meant to be told again and again. A youth sets out on a quest aided by an elder mentor who dies or leaves early in the quest. The youth, imbued with mystical powers, totems, and/or animal or spirit guides, stares into the maw of evil coming back victorious but scarred to be misunderstood by those around him.
The impact of all of these stories on me as a young person was not to impress me with either special effects or dialogue (though I would argue both were great..."who is more foolish, the fool or the fool who follows him?", "I don't care what you smell, just get in there!", "You came in that? You're braver than I thought!") but to inspire me with examples of people who in the face of danger and evil made their morality the focal point of their life.
WWLSD?
That grass did cost $18 mil. I'd rather see 250,000 people choking the sidewalks and subways of NYC, anyway.
In terms of lawn maintenance, this is different from 250,000 people going to see a Simon and Garfunkel concert how?
No, and it is unfortunate. I work with a web cataloguing effort in computational science education (The Computational Science Education Reference Desk) and I spend a lot of time trying to define standard metadata for pages on the web.
The job of building digital libraries will be much easier and will better reflect the intention of people who create web content when web content creators put, at a minimum, title, description, and keyword metadata into their pages (and preferably much much more.
The more that meta-spam is used to beat search engines, the less that people will put metadata into their pages, and as a result, the less time that people will spend actually thinking about and creating good metadata.
I have no idea what impact this law will have, if any, but I would like to see more search engines that use metatags, but include some sort of "meta-spam" filter, perhaps a penalty on excessive use of keywords.
The RPNs worth buying are:,,,
Dont forget the 28S, I'm still using mine from 15 years ago, when I can find batteries that is.
Do they even make that any more? I never felt the need to upgrade, so I haven't bought a calculator since.
...
Much of the use of computers in schools has nothing to do with programming. Some of it involves playing "educational" computer games. Some of it involves vocational training in the use of word processors and spreadsheets -- which in my opinion is improperly generalized to too much of the student population. (See below.) Some of it involves online research, which has become connected these days to library science. None of these have anything in particular to do with computer science.
One of the things I would like to see more of is having students use computers to compute. We run a series of summer camp programs for middle and high school students, as well as design educational software centered around computational science and engineering education (available for free on the internet) and train faculty in undergraduate science and teacher training progams in how to use computing effectively in middle, high school, and undergraduate science, technology, and math education (www.shodor.org).
Working with middle school students what we have found is that computing, when placed in the context of doing science (and by doing science I mean answering the question "how do we know if it is right", not just memorizing facts) can help students learn the science. Science and Math are done differently today by many of its practitioners than 40 years ago. The "using a theory to make a prediction" part of the scientific method is a much larger piece of the puzzle. In addition, solving a single simple problem over and over again really quickly can turn the process of graphing into exploring fucntions (see Function Flyer). And while there is a extra hurdle in finding, analyzing, and verifying the information that can be found on the web, there is a lot more data out there to mine and sort through.
In addition, we have seen a different demographic by incorporating computational science in education as early as 6th grade. We are seeing students in traditionally underrepresented groups being exposed to computing, while learning something they were already curious about. What we get as a result is a lot of minorities and women interested in computing at a young age, without ever limiting programs to a single group. (www.shodor.org/succeed)
Technology can be used extremely poorly, but it can also be used well. "Change is inevitable, improvement is by design."
you go to buy bread, but go always out.
I agree with this wholeheatedly. When I am going a little stir crazy, I make a point of going out in the morning before work to get a bagel and coffee. It helps that this was a standard part of my routine when I was working in the office -- I typically stopped for a bagel and coffee on the way in to work.
I don't recall the "goofy badge" at Baltimore. I remember those GIS units everyone wore and the person who walked the most got a prize. The point of that one, I thought, was a fun way of demonstrating just how far GIS techonology had advanced. At least I thought that was the point.
I remember assorted displays of exhibition floor traffic at Baltimore, the point of which I thought was to say something about how high end computing could be used to visualize real time data. At least I thought that was the point.
I remember loads of booths for governmental labs showing what they were studying with high perfomance computing. At least I thought that was the point.
I remember loads of academic groups showing how different sort of middleware could tie together supercomputers across the country into a computational grid, enabling even greater computer power. At least I thought that was the point.
I remember a lot of exhibitors "hyping" their own products, trying to stand out against a crowd of virtually identical competitors (no pun intended). At least I thought that was the point.
I remember talks given by people trying to spread what they are doing to advance their careers. At least I thought that was the point.
I remember great tutorials and an excellent education program for faculty new to HPC, where people learned new skills to take back and apply to their careers. At least I thought that was the point.
And I remember people running around the exhibit floor getting all the swag they could. And while that isn't the point, its still real fun.
As I said in my previous post, any conference where they can put that sort of machine together and it isn't the coolest thing in the show has got to be a good conference.
I have to be honest, I don't remember this exhibit. My brain was prety full, I heard about it afterwards. This was the Intel booth, right?
Still, 17 hours is pretty boss. I've done a lot of cluster installation tutorials where getting 4 machines set up in 1.5 hours takes a little work and a lot of rehearsal. They put together and installed 192 nodes in 17 hours with a variant of ROCKS. Now that's what I call pulling out all the stops to put on a good show.
No magic? I'll grant you it was rehearsed. I'll also grant you that noone went to the conference just to see a cluster put together in 17 hours. No conference, technical or scientific, is just about the exhibits. It is about meeting people face to face (and there are a lot of people to meet at SC), attending (or sometimes giving) a useful tutorial or two, and as I said before...
It's all about the swag, baby. SC has the best.
Protein folding...the human genome project...the early evolution of the universe...weather prediction...the next generation of stealth technology...cracking documents encrypted by terrorists...
For an annual breakdown of the national direction in supercomputing and current "Grand Challenge" applications, look at the National Coordination Office for Information Technology Research and Development's supplements to the President's budget (a.k.a. the blue books)
http://www.itrd.gov/pubs/bb.html
Because it's all about the swag, baby!
And if you're not impressed by a conference where someone put together a top 100 level machine in under a day and it wasn't even the coolest thing in the show, then yes, you should turn in your geek card.
iTunes is what got me listening to music again. I don't care for their full CD prices, but a buck a song is not bad when you can get just the songs you like. For most artists, there are only about 4 or 5 songs I actually want to listen to from their entire career, so I can make my own best of for 4 or 5 dollars, without ever driving to the record store.
What do you have against MPICH?
If they are running using any of the standard OSs available for PPC, and the software currently available on those OSs, they're stuck with MPICH or LAM or something else that doesn't optimize collective communications.
Other than MPICH or LAM, what would you recommend?