DirecTV has added something like 40 new HD channels over the past month, and they are all MPEG-4. It doesn't look like they've been recompressing them either; the image quality is fantastic.
But because she's an idiot, she's very angry and confused when she finds out that RAM just. doesn't. work. like. that.
She's not an idiot. She's just not technical. There is a big difference between the two.
Your advantage is that you've got the technical background
For now. You have a technical background for now. I used to be an engineer, and a pretty good one at that. I was certainly one of the top technical people at the company when it came to understanding and solving customer problems. I've been a manager for two years now...and my technical skills are shot. I know enough to keep up with conversations, but ask me to do any real down and dirty troubleshooting and I'm back to being a babe in the woods.
It's not that I dislike the manager role; it presents some interesting challenges. But don't rely on your technical skills to save you when you're flailing as a manager, because within a month or two your former co-workers and now underlings will be passing you by.
I'm actually in the process of writing my senators and congressman a hand written, registered letter to tell them how ashamed I am of DHS and TSA. Yesterday, flying home from Orlando, I witnessed:
*The security line ID checker occasionally checking people's IDs, then turning around to talk to his co-worker and letting people pass, then randomly checking IDs. *A second TSA staff member knocking on the glass trying to get the attention of a friend of hers, then making faces like you'd see kids do in high school *A sporadic "take out all of your electronics" followed by "only laptops" followed by "only electronics bigger than your hand need to be removed from your bag."
Anyone who travels on a regular basis (I fly about 100,000 miles a year) knows that behavior like this is unsurprising, but I'm just getting to the point where I've had enough. If we're going to enforce security, how about actual enforcing effective security protocols rather than making sure that my shaving creams fits in a ziploc bag?
Product managers I have seen (and I have seen many) often don't know zilch about technology, but even worse they usually also don't know much about their market, target audience/users, User Interfaces, project management, etc.
As a product manager, I think you're right to an extent. If a product manager doesn't know who the product is being built for and what that customer needs, then the product is doomed to fail. If they know those needs, but can't communicate them to their development team, then the product is again doomed to fail.
I will argue, however, that it is not up to the product manager to know user interfaces. I can tell my team what the customer wants to do, and I can provide examples of how other applications have done it, but frankly it's not my job to do UI work. I have (talented) engineers whose job it is to design user interfaces. I'm going to trust that they know what they're doing, provided that I've communicated to them what the customer wants to do. If I was a UI engineer, I wouldn't want my PM telling me what to do, just like as a PM I wouldn't want one of my software developers telling me how to conduct a user survey or interview with the press.
Regardless, there is no chance of success without communication. That goes from me to my engineers in communicating requirements up front (and not adding new requirements as the project goes on), and with them telling me what's feasible, what's not, and most importantly, when things change.
Have you ever worked on a commercial software product? Have you ever released a product that has no bugs?
At the company I work for, we always plan on releasing a patch 3-6 months after a major release. It is simply unrealistic to assume that the product is going to work perfectly with no flaws.
"Just imagine an incapacited captain in a 747, with this co-pilot only trained in a sim having to do a no visibility, one engine out go around in a bad african airport."
I think you'd have a really tough time going around in a 747 with just one engine. 3 yes. Perhaps even 2 (if you hadn't extended the flaps all the way). But 1? No chance.
At any rate, there's nothing wrong with training in the sims. It's not an exact replica of the real thing, but you can go through situations that you wouldn't do in real life (engine out with a heavy crosswind, etc). Also, I hope that all airlines don't go the way of some carriers that choose for their pilots to be autopilot jockeys rather than aviators.
I flew into Sea-Tac Thursday night during the wrath of God storm we had that night (winds 220 at 30 knots, gusting to 47 knots with moderate turbulence ground-3000 ft when we landed), and let me tell you: the captain had two big brass ones. I was very thankful that the people in the pointy end of the airplane knew how to fly the plane, not just manage it.
I'd mod you up if I had the points. You're talking about my single best grip with TP: control inconsistency. I can't remember how many times I've pressed A instead of B on the menu screen simply due to different screens using different options to "accept" changes.
I think the graphics look fine, even on a 57" TV. They're not as good as 360, of course, but stylistically they are amazing. In-game controls are great. I've loved using the Wiimote. But the menus are awful.
Of course you'll never get SSSS on a boarding pass you printed at home. If your try to check in on-line and the computer determines you've been "selected" for screening, you'll be given a message similar to "On-line checkin failed. Please see an agent at the airport." You'll get your SSSS card there instead.
The outline of the story of nine movies was written before any of them were shot
Does anyone actually believe this anymore? It became patently obvious by Return of the Jedi that Lucas was making up the story as he went along. What other reason would there be to reuse the plot of the first film? Blow up the Death Star? Where have I seen that before?
Or perhaps he actually meant, all along, for Luke and Leia to be sisters and for Anakin to have built C-3PO. That thing about Leia remembering her mother? All planned, even though Padme died at childbirth.
None of it was planned. It was all marketing hype, just like how the original trilogy would never be released on DVD.
AAC, the default ripping format for iTunes, is on its own not a DRM format. AAC with FairPlay, which is what you purchase from the iTunes Music Store, is DRM'd.
Cheap(ish)?
The other day I was looking for a flight from London to Amsterdam. BA's price? $1 USD.
Of course, with all of the requisite taxes it came to $130 USD, but that is dirt cheap for a round trip flight.
Absolutely. Most commercials are very poor, but I absolutely love the "Jose +10" commercials that adidas is running during World Cup, particularly when Beckenbauer and Platini get picked.
While the games are played entirely in the US (and occasionally Canada), the "World" in "World Series" is becoming a more apt descriptor. There are +many+ non US players in Major League Baseball, particularly from Central American and the Carribbean. Asians players are also becoming a bigger factor; Ichiro will probably lead the AL in hits again this year.
Oh, and I'm a huge football (American) and football (real) fan as well...I'm taking Monday morning of to watch US/Czech.
Ah, I hadn't considered the McDonnell Douglas aircraft that Boeing now owns.
The 777, however, has no mechanism for overriding the pilot aside from the fact that it's a fly-by-wire plane. It doesn't have the same law structure that the Airbus aircraft have.
Care to provide a more specific example? As far as I know, this is patently false. All modern and semi-modern Boeing A/C (737-300+, 747-400, 757-200/300, 767-200/300/400, and 777-200/300), will display a WINDSHEAR warning on the PFD, along with a vocal callout from the GPWS. At that point, it is still up to the pilot to either advance the thrust levers/press the TOGA button and rotate to the correct attitude. This +can+ all be done with the autopilot, but at no point is the pilot overriden.
I disagree with this. Unless you are working on an application that is only going to be used rarely, you user will not be a novice forever. They may never become an expert with your application, but they will in relatively short order become an experienced user. It seems like you should make it accessible for both extremes, but focus on the middle ground.
As other posters have mentioned, the key to releasing a successful product is all about balance. As a product manager, I would love to be able to wait until the product has 100% of the specified features and zero bugs before we ship it.
That's just not feasible in the real world, though. While first to market does not necessarily provide an advantage, being las to market is a tough hole to climb out of. Additionally, there are always pressures to meet revenue expectations, especially in a public company. This is why I try, as much as possible, to define requirements early, to work with our engineering team early to get initial (and continually refined) estimates, and to know which features I can sacrifice when we get to crunch time and the product has to ship.
Having worked on both the software development side and the product management side, my impression is that most programmers and software engineers are not aware of the pressure to meet revenue targets. It is the reason (in a lot of cases) why the company exists. Waiting "until it's done," in many instances is just not feasible...at least if I want the company to stay in business.
Let's see how my METAR translation skills are holding up...
PWK (Pawtucket? Paulwaukee?) airport weather information for 03/20/2006, 2253 UTC. Winds 040 at 15 knots, 10 miles visibility, clear skies. Temperature 1 degree centigrade, dewpoint -6 degrees centrigade, altimeter 30.18 inches of hg.
When an employer asks you about your current salary, don't lie. Then again, you don't have to reveal it, either. Simply saying "I would require $X to accept this position" is fine. If they keep pressing you, I think it's completely valid to state that you are not comfortable talking about your current employment situation. I find this is particularly true when you are interviewing at a company that is in the same industry your current company is.
However, there is a big difference between stating something in an interview and writing it down on a job application. Saying the amount you require is different than being less than honest on an application. If a prospective employer finds that any information on an application is false, you can kiss the offer goodbye. This goes for employment history as well. On a resume, it's okay to leave off jobs you were only at for a year, or to stress jobs that link up well with the job you are trying to get. But an application is essentially an affidavit of your personal history.
All of that being said, one of the best pieces of advice I ever received was that you will never get a substantial raise at your current job. The only way to significantly increase your salary is to switch jobs. So, when you do, don't be afraid to state what you want.
Have you tried the latest version, Allied Force? I'm curious how much better it is. I do know that a lot of work has gone into it to bringing it up to date, but I haven't had the time to dive into such a complex sim.
I remember back when Falcon 3.0 came out, Spectrum Holobyte made a big deal about how much more impressive the flight dynamics were with a 486 rather than at 386 because of the onboard math coprocessor. I never did find out if it actually made a big difference, but that's the first game I can recall that really taxed my system, and actively marketed itself towards higher end systems. As I recall, the specs on the side of the box listed the 80486 processor as "Sh*t Hot."
Au contraire. You didn't *have* to use a joystick, but it did make it a lot better. That being said, my college roommate and I in 1994 played X-Wing using the keyboard and mouse. It's a good thing I had a strong right arm (ahem) because the "scroll, lift, replace, scroll" action gets tiring after a while.
My first computer was a Commodore 64, though I remember a friend of mine have having a Ti-99 that I used to love to play with. Started with old Dataset drive, but later on I got one of the 1541 disk drives. Best of all, my friend's Commodore 64 died, and they gave me their old drive, so I had two! When I was in elementary school, I remember that I took an after school class at the middle school on the TRS-80. Like most folks here, I also would find copies of Compute! and other rags at the library and try their programs at home.
I actually kept the C=64 using GEOS until about 1990, when we bought a 286/12, and decided to upgrade to 2MB of RAM (instead of 1) and to add the 3.5" floppy drive in addition to the 5 1/4".
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Bathymetric LiDAR does work underwater, but only in limited conditions.
DirecTV has added something like 40 new HD channels over the past month, and they are all MPEG-4. It doesn't look like they've been recompressing them either; the image quality is fantastic.
But because she's an idiot, she's very angry and confused when she finds out that RAM just. doesn't. work. like. that.
She's not an idiot. She's just not technical. There is a big difference between the two.
Your advantage is that you've got the technical background
For now. You have a technical background for now. I used to be an engineer, and a pretty good one at that. I was certainly one of the top technical people at the company when it came to understanding and solving customer problems. I've been a manager for two years now...and my technical skills are shot. I know enough to keep up with conversations, but ask me to do any real down and dirty troubleshooting and I'm back to being a babe in the woods.
It's not that I dislike the manager role; it presents some interesting challenges. But don't rely on your technical skills to save you when you're flailing as a manager, because within a month or two your former co-workers and now underlings will be passing you by.
I'm actually in the process of writing my senators and congressman a hand written, registered letter to tell them how ashamed I am of DHS and TSA. Yesterday, flying home from Orlando, I witnessed:
*The security line ID checker occasionally checking people's IDs, then turning around to talk to his co-worker and letting people pass, then randomly checking IDs.
*A second TSA staff member knocking on the glass trying to get the attention of a friend of hers, then making faces like you'd see kids do in high school
*A sporadic "take out all of your electronics" followed by "only laptops" followed by "only electronics bigger than your hand need to be removed from your bag."
Anyone who travels on a regular basis (I fly about 100,000 miles a year) knows that behavior like this is unsurprising, but I'm just getting to the point where I've had enough. If we're going to enforce security, how about actual enforcing effective security protocols rather than making sure that my shaving creams fits in a ziploc bag?
Product managers I have seen (and I have seen many) often don't know zilch about technology, but even worse they usually also don't know much about their market, target audience/users, User Interfaces, project management, etc.
As a product manager, I think you're right to an extent. If a product manager doesn't know who the product is being built for and what that customer needs, then the product is doomed to fail. If they know those needs, but can't communicate them to their development team, then the product is again doomed to fail.
I will argue, however, that it is not up to the product manager to know user interfaces. I can tell my team what the customer wants to do, and I can provide examples of how other applications have done it, but frankly it's not my job to do UI work. I have (talented) engineers whose job it is to design user interfaces. I'm going to trust that they know what they're doing, provided that I've communicated to them what the customer wants to do. If I was a UI engineer, I wouldn't want my PM telling me what to do, just like as a PM I wouldn't want one of my software developers telling me how to conduct a user survey or interview with the press.
Regardless, there is no chance of success without communication. That goes from me to my engineers in communicating requirements up front (and not adding new requirements as the project goes on), and with them telling me what's feasible, what's not, and most importantly, when things change.
Have you ever worked on a commercial software product? Have you ever released a product that has no bugs?
At the company I work for, we always plan on releasing a patch 3-6 months after a major release. It is simply unrealistic to assume that the product is going to work perfectly with no flaws.
"Just imagine an incapacited captain in a 747, with this co-pilot only trained in a sim having to do a no visibility, one engine out go around in a bad african airport."
I think you'd have a really tough time going around in a 747 with just one engine. 3 yes. Perhaps even 2 (if you hadn't extended the flaps all the way). But 1? No chance.
At any rate, there's nothing wrong with training in the sims. It's not an exact replica of the real thing, but you can go through situations that you wouldn't do in real life (engine out with a heavy crosswind, etc). Also, I hope that all airlines don't go the way of some carriers that choose for their pilots to be autopilot jockeys rather than aviators.
I flew into Sea-Tac Thursday night during the wrath of God storm we had that night (winds 220 at 30 knots, gusting to 47 knots with moderate turbulence ground-3000 ft when we landed), and let me tell you: the captain had two big brass ones. I was very thankful that the people in the pointy end of the airplane knew how to fly the plane, not just manage it.
I'd mod you up if I had the points. You're talking about my single best grip with TP: control inconsistency. I can't remember how many times I've pressed A instead of B on the menu screen simply due to different screens using different options to "accept" changes. I think the graphics look fine, even on a 57" TV. They're not as good as 360, of course, but stylistically they are amazing. In-game controls are great. I've loved using the Wiimote. But the menus are awful.
Of course you'll never get SSSS on a boarding pass you printed at home. If your try to check in on-line and the computer determines you've been "selected" for screening, you'll be given a message similar to "On-line checkin failed. Please see an agent at the airport." You'll get your SSSS card there instead.
The outline of the story of nine movies was written before any of them were shot
Does anyone actually believe this anymore? It became patently obvious by Return of the Jedi that Lucas was making up the story as he went along. What other reason would there be to reuse the plot of the first film? Blow up the Death Star? Where have I seen that before?
Or perhaps he actually meant, all along, for Luke and Leia to be sisters and for Anakin to have built C-3PO. That thing about Leia remembering her mother? All planned, even though Padme died at childbirth.
None of it was planned. It was all marketing hype, just like how the original trilogy would never be released on DVD.
AAC, the default ripping format for iTunes, is on its own not a DRM format. AAC with FairPlay, which is what you purchase from the iTunes Music Store, is DRM'd.
Cheap(ish)? The other day I was looking for a flight from London to Amsterdam. BA's price? $1 USD. Of course, with all of the requisite taxes it came to $130 USD, but that is dirt cheap for a round trip flight.
Absolutely. Most commercials are very poor, but I absolutely love the "Jose +10" commercials that adidas is running during World Cup, particularly when Beckenbauer and Platini get picked.
While the games are played entirely in the US (and occasionally Canada), the "World" in "World Series" is becoming a more apt descriptor. There are +many+ non US players in Major League Baseball, particularly from Central American and the Carribbean. Asians players are also becoming a bigger factor; Ichiro will probably lead the AL in hits again this year.
Oh, and I'm a huge football (American) and football (real) fan as well...I'm taking Monday morning of to watch US/Czech.
Ah, I hadn't considered the McDonnell Douglas aircraft that Boeing now owns. The 777, however, has no mechanism for overriding the pilot aside from the fact that it's a fly-by-wire plane. It doesn't have the same law structure that the Airbus aircraft have.
Care to provide a more specific example? As far as I know, this is patently false. All modern and semi-modern Boeing A/C (737-300+, 747-400, 757-200/300, 767-200/300/400, and 777-200/300), will display a WINDSHEAR warning on the PFD, along with a vocal callout from the GPWS. At that point, it is still up to the pilot to either advance the thrust levers/press the TOGA button and rotate to the correct attitude. This +can+ all be done with the autopilot, but at no point is the pilot overriden.
Don't assume user expertise
I disagree with this. Unless you are working on an application that is only going to be used rarely, you user will not be a novice forever. They may never become an expert with your application, but they will in relatively short order become an experienced user. It seems like you should make it accessible for both extremes, but focus on the middle ground.
Um...is it a triforce?
As other posters have mentioned, the key to releasing a successful product is all about balance. As a product manager, I would love to be able to wait until the product has 100% of the specified features and zero bugs before we ship it.
That's just not feasible in the real world, though. While first to market does not necessarily provide an advantage, being las to market is a tough hole to climb out of. Additionally, there are always pressures to meet revenue expectations, especially in a public company. This is why I try, as much as possible, to define requirements early, to work with our engineering team early to get initial (and continually refined) estimates, and to know which features I can sacrifice when we get to crunch time and the product has to ship.
Having worked on both the software development side and the product management side, my impression is that most programmers and software engineers are not aware of the pressure to meet revenue targets. It is the reason (in a lot of cases) why the company exists. Waiting "until it's done," in many instances is just not feasible...at least if I want the company to stay in business.
Let's see how my METAR translation skills are holding up...
PWK (Pawtucket? Paulwaukee?) airport weather information for 03/20/2006, 2253 UTC. Winds 040 at 15 knots, 10 miles visibility, clear skies. Temperature 1 degree centigrade, dewpoint -6 degrees centrigade, altimeter 30.18 inches of hg.
When an employer asks you about your current salary, don't lie. Then again, you don't have to reveal it, either. Simply saying "I would require $X to accept this position" is fine. If they keep pressing you, I think it's completely valid to state that you are not comfortable talking about your current employment situation. I find this is particularly true when you are interviewing at a company that is in the same industry your current company is.
However, there is a big difference between stating something in an interview and writing it down on a job application. Saying the amount you require is different than being less than honest on an application. If a prospective employer finds that any information on an application is false, you can kiss the offer goodbye. This goes for employment history as well. On a resume, it's okay to leave off jobs you were only at for a year, or to stress jobs that link up well with the job you are trying to get. But an application is essentially an affidavit of your personal history.
All of that being said, one of the best pieces of advice I ever received was that you will never get a substantial raise at your current job. The only way to significantly increase your salary is to switch jobs. So, when you do, don't be afraid to state what you want.
Have you tried the latest version, Allied Force? I'm curious how much better it is. I do know that a lot of work has gone into it to bringing it up to date, but I haven't had the time to dive into such a complex sim.
I remember back when Falcon 3.0 came out, Spectrum Holobyte made a big deal about how much more impressive the flight dynamics were with a 486 rather than at 386 because of the onboard math coprocessor. I never did find out if it actually made a big difference, but that's the first game I can recall that really taxed my system, and actively marketed itself towards higher end systems. As I recall, the specs on the side of the box listed the 80486 processor as "Sh*t Hot."
For X-Wing, you just *HAD* to have a joystick.
Au contraire. You didn't *have* to use a joystick, but it did make it a lot better. That being said, my college roommate and I in 1994 played X-Wing using the keyboard and mouse. It's a good thing I had a strong right arm (ahem) because the "scroll, lift, replace, scroll" action gets tiring after a while.
My first computer was a Commodore 64, though I remember a friend of mine have having a Ti-99 that I used to love to play with. Started with old Dataset drive, but later on I got one of the 1541 disk drives. Best of all, my friend's Commodore 64 died, and they gave me their old drive, so I had two! When I was in elementary school, I remember that I took an after school class at the middle school on the TRS-80. Like most folks here, I also would find copies of Compute! and other rags at the library and try their programs at home.
I actually kept the C=64 using GEOS until about 1990, when we bought a 286/12, and decided to upgrade to 2MB of RAM (instead of 1) and to add the 3.5" floppy drive in addition to the 5 1/4".