Modern software engineering *everywhere* has redefined "beta"... which is why "software engineering" exists only at NASA and a few other such places.
The rest of software "engineers" throw half-ready rubbish over the wall to meet idiotic management's "vision" and "development schedule" and pray that someone else's job will go to India when the self-serving suits at the top decide to go for big bonuses by slashing the payroll.
On the other hand, evolution itself is constant beta, with losers and winners, periodically re-set by catastrophic terrestrial events that wipe out all lawyers.
Nobody said it's functional English that we're talking about. This is marketing, after all.
Hell for me would be listening to lawyers and advertising people talk. However, marketing is the art of calculated manipulation. If people understand what the marketer wants understood, it is highly functional, regardless of how many "rules" it breaks.
On education. I have finally gotten off my ass to finish up my degree
And you say my ranting is a waste of time! (o:
Learning techniques differ, as is to be expected of 6 billion existential accidents. Memorization can be effective. Some people have more analytical intelligence; that's an aberration rather than a practical expectation of humanity. Creative problem solving is the ideal, but evolution did not require much intelligence of our kind... as our kind demonstrates every day.
The protocols of communication/cooperation are what have brought us through to this point. I suggest that what has brought us through Ice Ages will bring us through the Toxic Age.
I'd even be amused if someone's religion proved to be true. But an asteroid strike has significantly higher probability, with all due respect to the card tricks and lofty-sounding gibberish that people believe.
I have tried to figure out the education problem and I just can't pin it down.... It seems we need to go back to what we were doing right then rather than reinvent the wheel. It seems to be a horrible lack in the ability to teach critical thinking skills and I have no idea where that breakdown is really happening.
I think you have it, there. Since you are indulging me, I'll offer the opinion that it is the lack of bracing, critical discourse, anywhere. Throwing resources at nincompoops is a gamble that just creates an expensive, complacent bureaucracy and produces accredited nincompoops. Great ideas can happen anywhere if people think with one another. People offering mush to one another just makes more mush.
The US used to attract or recruit great minds from all over the world instead of invading to grab oil and repelling potential citizens who may already live in a fascist state.
I enjoy a good rant, don't get me wrong, it is just terribly pointless. Louis Black, George Carlin, and Robin Williams are some of my heroes when it comes to ranting.
I regret that I cannot attain those standards, nor even scream half as well as Sam Kinison. But I do bite my thumb at the plutocrats. And as you say, when we exit, exit laughing.
So your best bet is to really just stay clear of the madmen and eat, drink, and be merry for tommorow the world may end.
Yes, it will end. There is surely little that I or you can do about it, given that a) it'll probably be by asteroid strike, and b) we're 6 billion chattering monkeys. I can only envy your greater equanimity in the face of lies and nonsense. I need a good rant once in a while, don't you?
You wouldn't want to be associated with literary works written by the likes of the treasonous felons and revolutionaries Benjamin Franklin or Thomas Jefferson.
*Those* unlawful combattants! Why I swear, Mr FBI agent, I don't even handle money with their pictures on it!
In fact, it is almost getting to the point where it is best not to be associated with the ability to read and research.
You mean, best not to be associated with it, unless you are doing it for Monsanto. (o;
The joy of our modern system is that it does not really rely on slave labor style oppression. It relies on the drone worker/consumer.
And, let us not omit, the mis-education of said creature so that "hoodwinking" may be transformed into "marketing" and "elections".
No one believes politicians. Why should anyone believe them? From the city councillor to the President of the Benighted States, there is no punishment for incompetence or lying. If you bribe the right people, there's no punishment for crime, either. A pretty good game to play if you have cash and connections. Make billions for your circle, even if you kill millions of people in a far-away land where they don't even play baseball.
Political parties are organisms that thrive on cajolery and deception. They pick "leaders" but these leaders are really just pushed to the fore to take the spotlight away from the cunning monkeys behind the curtains writing the speeches and glad-handing the lobbyists. These leaders aren't really meant to change anything profound.
Civil servants also do their best to survive. Sometimes politicians and civil servants cooperate. Most of the time, it's a null hypothesis. Sometimes, you get a highly-motivated evil cretin in power and other evil cretins join in the convulsions. Then you have efficiency at the expense of freedom, justice, and maybe even life itself.
Listen to people everywhere speaking today. This is the age of Peter Pan. Everyone's a child, wanting other people to do the work and make the sacrifices and unwilling to grow up. Give me my ear-pod and home theatre with a screen full of high-definition retardation and don't ask me to learn about the world. Then I can spend all my time talking with my idiotic friends about about which plastic Hollywood dolls we would fuck if we had the opportunity... when we win the lottery.
And when we tire of that desperate chain of infantile hope and outright stupidity, we post on Slashdot. (o:
Slashdot Mirror
Modern software engineering *everywhere* has redefined "beta"... which is why "software engineering" exists only at NASA and a few other such places.
The rest of software "engineers" throw half-ready rubbish over the wall to meet idiotic management's "vision" and "development schedule" and pray that someone else's job will go to India when the self-serving suits at the top decide to go for big bonuses by slashing the payroll.
On the other hand, evolution itself is constant beta, with losers and winners, periodically re-set by catastrophic terrestrial events that wipe out all lawyers.
It's now or never,
our bid is right.
Yahoo, you're sinking
'neath Google's might.
We're desperate and it's geeeeeetting late.
Icahn's our puppet and this chaaaaaaaaair won't wait.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVMy0PFr8no
The "Political Candidate Will Embarrass and Impoverish The Nation" detector
The "Spook Who Gets Advanced Killing Gear Is Insane And Should Be Fired" detector
The "Chick Will Sleep With Men Who Have The Detector" detector
How are the salaries of senior management doing?
Yes, I thought so.
Although I usually decry any MS Windows-only feature proposal for not supporting Linux, I feel it is appropriate in this case.
Hell for me would be listening to lawyers and advertising people talk. However, marketing is the art of calculated manipulation. If people understand what the marketer wants understood, it is highly functional, regardless of how many "rules" it breaks.
facepalm
If you are still watching Stupevision, you have your answer.
On education. I have finally gotten off my ass to finish up my degree
And you say my ranting is a waste of time! (o:
Learning techniques differ, as is to be expected of 6 billion existential accidents. Memorization can be effective. Some people have more analytical intelligence; that's an aberration rather than a practical expectation of humanity. Creative problem solving is the ideal, but evolution did not require much intelligence of our kind... as our kind demonstrates every day.
The protocols of communication/cooperation are what have brought us through to this point. I suggest that what has brought us through Ice Ages will bring us through the Toxic Age.
And THEN the asteroid will hit. (o:
A guy burns a master CD while smoking a joint in Taiwan... Somewhere in Redmond, a large office chair is hurtled through a pane of glass.
Bah, asteroids are so cliche.
I'd even be amused if someone's religion proved to be true. But an asteroid strike has significantly higher probability, with all due respect to the card tricks and lofty-sounding gibberish that people believe.
I have tried to figure out the education problem and I just can't pin it down.... It seems we need to go back to what we were doing right then rather than reinvent the wheel. It seems to be a horrible lack in the ability to teach critical thinking skills and I have no idea where that breakdown is really happening.
I think you have it, there. Since you are indulging me, I'll offer the opinion that it is the lack of bracing, critical discourse, anywhere. Throwing resources at nincompoops is a gamble that just creates an expensive, complacent bureaucracy and produces accredited nincompoops. Great ideas can happen anywhere if people think with one another. People offering mush to one another just makes more mush.
The US used to attract or recruit great minds from all over the world instead of invading to grab oil and repelling potential citizens who may already live in a fascist state.
I enjoy a good rant, don't get me wrong, it is just terribly pointless. Louis Black, George Carlin, and Robin Williams are some of my heroes when it comes to ranting.
I regret that I cannot attain those standards, nor even scream half as well as Sam Kinison. But I do bite my thumb at the plutocrats. And as you say, when we exit, exit laughing.
BBEdit is a well-crafted and powerful tool. It's the best code editor for OS X.
I do not think that all the changes to its UI have been for the better, though.
In general, OS X is a good-looking *and* powerful platform for coding. Especially once you install Fink http://www.finkproject.org/.
jEdit is written in Java. That may be a recommendation or a condemnation, depending on your politics, CPU, and RAM.
I like Active State and I like what Komodo Edit is trying to do but I find it and Komodo IDE too slow.
Gedit, Gvim and Scite are quick. If I need to run a complicated RegEx, I will open the file in Komodo Edit, do the deed, and quit.
a popularity contest, not a truth gauge
The distinction is, I regret, becoming increasingly subtle.
If you're going to rant about the intentions of other, run for office yourself. You obviously are not just different, you're better than them.
I know you're just an AC bravely critiquing my critique, but you know... Ron Paul tried.
So your best bet is to really just stay clear of the madmen and eat, drink, and be merry for tommorow the world may end.
Yes, it will end. There is surely little that I or you can do about it, given that a) it'll probably be by asteroid strike, and b) we're 6 billion chattering monkeys. I can only envy your greater equanimity in the face of lies and nonsense. I need a good rant once in a while, don't you?
You wouldn't want to be associated with literary works written by the likes of the treasonous felons and revolutionaries Benjamin Franklin or Thomas Jefferson.
*Those* unlawful combattants! Why I swear, Mr FBI agent, I don't even handle money with their pictures on it!
In fact, it is almost getting to the point where it is best not to be associated with the ability to read and research.
You mean, best not to be associated with it, unless you are doing it for Monsanto. (o;
The joy of our modern system is that it does not really rely on slave labor style oppression. It relies on the drone worker/consumer.
And, let us not omit, the mis-education of said creature so that "hoodwinking" may be transformed into "marketing" and "elections".
Let's not start the Classicists-Modernists literary debate, Sir. I study and honour the ancients but I live to rant in my time, as they did in theirs.
And I happily recommend that people go to the local library rather than waste another minute here. (o:
No one believes politicians. Why should anyone believe them? From the city councillor to the President of the Benighted States, there is no punishment for incompetence or lying. If you bribe the right people, there's no punishment for crime, either. A pretty good game to play if you have cash and connections. Make billions for your circle, even if you kill millions of people in a far-away land where they don't even play baseball.
Political parties are organisms that thrive on cajolery and deception. They pick "leaders" but these leaders are really just pushed to the fore to take the spotlight away from the cunning monkeys behind the curtains writing the speeches and glad-handing the lobbyists. These leaders aren't really meant to change anything profound.
Civil servants also do their best to survive. Sometimes politicians and civil servants cooperate. Most of the time, it's a null hypothesis. Sometimes, you get a highly-motivated evil cretin in power and other evil cretins join in the convulsions. Then you have efficiency at the expense of freedom, justice, and maybe even life itself.
Listen to people everywhere speaking today. This is the age of Peter Pan. Everyone's a child, wanting other people to do the work and make the sacrifices and unwilling to grow up. Give me my ear-pod and home theatre with a screen full of high-definition retardation and don't ask me to learn about the world. Then I can spend all my time talking with my idiotic friends about about which plastic Hollywood dolls we would fuck if we had the opportunity... when we win the lottery.
And when we tire of that desperate chain of infantile hope and outright stupidity, we post on Slashdot. (o:
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer announces a multi-billion dollar investment in a fleet of submarines.
If I were the yuhangyuan on the tether, I'd be yelling "You Hang You On!" like crazy!
Joy luck, gentlemen.
You have now given another generation of Students For Life a thesis topic for their PhDs.
Anyone who thinks that stealing such things once laid off is a bright idea just does not have a criminal mind.
You appear to be suggesting that a bright criminal mind would show itself wiser by doing something else that *is* bright.
And I agree. Drugs, weapons, strippers, and foreign invasions have made me the billionaire that I am today.
Ok, I admit that I bought a little MSFT in the 80s, too.
I specifically choose ATI cards for my Linux boxen and ignore any on-board Nvidia graphics chip.
Saying its like Google Labs is like saying Saks Fifth Avenue is like Madison Avenue because they both have the word Avenue.
I live in another city and cannot grok your simile in fullness, you insensitive clod!