You're spot on - hence the corollory
Everyone knows that debugging is twice as hard as writing code. Hence, if your're as clever as you can be when you write the code you need to be twice as clever as you can be when you debug it The quote (the sentiment is right even if I can't remember the exact words) is from Elements Of Programming Style by Kerningham (yes, that Kerningham) and Plauger. The book is so old that the examples are in Fortran and PL1 but the lessons are as relevant as ever.
The difference is that the rate of change is increasing beyond exponentially. It may be nice to be 'defining the theoretical basis for laws that will be enacted in twenty or fifty years' time. but the PC is barely 25 years old, mass internet usage is less than 10 years old and the ability to bulk copy and distribute media less than that. I'm not sure we have the time to wait 20 - 50 years to sort it out.
I've already been through this - Star Trek, the TV series, was written in part by award winning Sci-Fi writers with an established track record. Tron was written by Disney studio hacks who have nothing of any merit to their name, especially in Sci-Fi.
Ok, so opinions vary over the quality of the writing but, objectively at least, Star Trek has the better pedigree.
My original contention was that Tron's weakness was that it was written by Disney studio hacks at a time when Sci-Fi fans were used to things like Star Trek which were written by established Sci-Fi writers, and, in my opinion, it shows. And, no, I'm not a fan boy, but I am someone who cares to check IMDb. Compare the credits for the Tron writers.
I don't normally reply to ACs and I have a sneaking suspicion that you're trolling but I'll rise to the bait. If you look at the list of Star Trek writers you'll see some well respected names from the Sci-Fi field, so yes, quality writing.
From TFA
Yet despite the film's brilliance, it was a box office flop. Why was that?
I'm sure it's not because of the technology involved. I don't know -- maybe the story didn't grab people, or they felt like it was too juvenile. I'm not sure, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't technique-related. It was because, underneath the brilliant technology, it was pretty standard Disney fare. The Disney audience didn't appreciate the technology and those that did wanted better writing. After all, we were used to sci-fi of the Star Trek standard where the quality of the writing overcame the poor effects.
and how could it be since a random number generator must be based on a non-random number seed It all depends on what you mean by random. True random is very hard to achieve - and I speak as someone involved with ERNIE
As far as providing a 'random' suffle for a music player some time based seed would be sufficiently random to be indistinguishable from the real thing
Boy am I glad to see Sturgeon at the top of your list. I was introduced to his work many, many years ago by my father and would put him frist in my list as well. How sad it is that most of his stuff is out of print. Sure, you can get 'More than Human', but try finding 'Some Of Your Blood' or 'The Dreaming Jewels'
With modern information technology we live in a world where, in order that we may keep up with the input, it has to be reduced to soundbites and oversimplifications. It doesn't matter if it's science, or politics, or medicine, the information has to fit in a two minute portion of the evening news and it has to shout pretty loud to be heard in the first place.
Because of this oversimplification complex truths become simple lies, and, as the simple lies fail to come true the complex truths behind them are seen as untrue. The end result is a breakdown in trust such that nobody trusts anybody any more. Whereas the teacher, the banker, the politician, the policeman were all seen as pillars of society, nowadays they're all suffering from mistrust and lack of respect. It is in this climate that such beliefs as Intelegent Design can grow.
If this is the case, it is a great advantage that it is now possible to study the plasmons on surfaces, where they is much easier to probe them than inside the material. I'm sure it are.
One moron is chance
Two morons is coincidence
Three morons is enemy attack, Mr Bond I am certainly not missing the part of the/. group think that is anti EU.
Consider the difference between the amount of excretia generated by even the largest shoal of fish (or even Moby Dick) and the amount generated by a human population centre of any size, lets say a city of 100,000+, of which there are many around the coasts of the world. Add to that the fact that the shoal of fish, and especially Moby Dick, will be mobile and deposit the excretia over a significant area whereas sewage outlet pipes aren't particularly known for their mobility.
It's the sheer concentration involved with urban human population which makes simply dumping the stuff at sea bad for the environment because it seriously disturbs the balance.
Otherwise, by a similar argument, we might as well be dumping our sewage in the street as they used to; after all, all other animals shit where they stand.
But they would get into trouble with (some) environmentalists, maybe they need to just "accidentally" knock a few more crates overboard? Only the completely stupid ones. As far as I'm concerned you can pour as many chemically inert (well, Ok - relatively inert) plastic ducks as are needed into where ever they are required. It's the untreated sewage/industrial waste that I object to (and plastic bags because they look like jellyfish to whales and leatherback turtles).
Because the index is stored locally on the computer, What, outside of an inbuilt level of paranoia, leads you to think that Google will know what's on your hard drive?
Anyway, all my pr0n is stored on M$'s filestore from now on.
Well, maybe 'clueless' was a trifle strong but we/.ers would probably make up our minds on technical issues - especially as we tend to download rather than rent - but the technically clueless will use availability as a major deciding factor.
As I remember it, it was the rental market that killed off Betamax. Whatever you might think of them (and few have a lower opinion than I do) the rental market, and Blockbusters in particular, has a massive influence. You can just see the average clueless consumer saying 'Why get HD DVD when Blockies only stocks Blu Ray'
One way to build a solid team is to get complete involvement from the bottom to the top. If, at the end of the day, all the personnel who worked on the project get to put their names on the paper it shows how their work is valued and how much they are 'part of the team'.
And as for team size being limited - I'll bet that during the better days at NASA, say during the Apollo missions, everyone right down to the janitor felt that they were part of the team - and, if you don't think that janitors are important just wait until the next time the toilet blocks.
Slashdot Mirror
At 2am after a night on the town I have trouble remebering how to spell my own name. Yes, I meant the 'K' of K&R.
The difference is that the rate of change is increasing beyond exponentially. It may be nice to be 'defining the theoretical basis for laws that will be enacted in twenty or fifty years' time. but the PC is barely 25 years old, mass internet usage is less than 10 years old and the ability to bulk copy and distribute media less than that. I'm not sure we have the time to wait 20 - 50 years to sort it out.
I've already been through this - Star Trek, the TV series, was written in part by award winning Sci-Fi writers with an established track record. Tron was written by Disney studio hacks who have nothing of any merit to their name, especially in Sci-Fi.
Ok, so opinions vary over the quality of the writing but, objectively at least, Star Trek has the better pedigree.
You miss the point
My original contention was that Tron's weakness was that it was written by Disney studio hacks at a time when Sci-Fi fans were used to things like Star Trek which were written by established Sci-Fi writers, and, in my opinion, it shows. And, no, I'm not a fan boy, but I am someone who cares to check IMDb. Compare the credits for the Tron writers.
- Theodore Sturgeon
- Jerry Sohl
- Robert Bloch
Maybe you don't know your 50s/60s Sci-Fi writers that well but there's three award winning authors for you.I don't normally reply to ACs and I have a sneaking suspicion that you're trolling but I'll rise to the bait. If you look at the list of Star Trek writers you'll see some well respected names from the Sci-Fi field, so yes, quality writing.
I'm sure it's not because of the technology involved. I don't know -- maybe the story didn't grab people, or they felt like it was too juvenile. I'm not sure, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't technique-related. It was because, underneath the brilliant technology, it was pretty standard Disney fare. The Disney audience didn't appreciate the technology and those that did wanted better writing. After all, we were used to sci-fi of the Star Trek standard where the quality of the writing overcame the poor effects.
As far as providing a 'random' suffle for a music player some time based seed would be sufficiently random to be indistinguishable from the real thing
Boy am I glad to see Sturgeon at the top of your list. I was introduced to his work many, many years ago by my father and would put him frist in my list as well. How sad it is that most of his stuff is out of print. Sure, you can get 'More than Human', but try finding 'Some Of Your Blood' or 'The Dreaming Jewels'
That's right the mascara snake Ah, Trout Mask Replica, that was a great album.
make that 9, professional 40 years old-is (well, 54 is 40ish, honest!)
(Slashdot Standard Rely #42)
This doesn't affect me because I run
[] OSX
[] Linux
[] Multix
[] CP/M
I feel that the problem lies deeper than that.
With modern information technology we live in a world where, in order that we may keep up with the input, it has to be reduced to soundbites and oversimplifications. It doesn't matter if it's science, or politics, or medicine, the information has to fit in a two minute portion of the evening news and it has to shout pretty loud to be heard in the first place.
Because of this oversimplification complex truths become simple lies, and, as the simple lies fail to come true the complex truths behind them are seen as untrue. The end result is a breakdown in trust such that nobody trusts anybody any more. Whereas the teacher, the banker, the politician, the policeman were all seen as pillars of society, nowadays they're all suffering from mistrust and lack of respect. It is in this climate that such beliefs as Intelegent Design can grow.
Now, if only I knew what to do about it...
Come on, this is /.
You don't call your girlfriend, you download her videos from Pirate Bay.
Two morons is coincidence
Three morons is enemy attack, Mr Bond
I am certainly not missing the part of the
So, in /. terms
US vs M$ Anti Trust - good thing
EU vs Hollywood Anti Trust - bad thing
Or am I missing something here?
I'm not sure how this got modded 'insightful'
Consider the difference between the amount of excretia generated by even the largest shoal of fish (or even Moby Dick) and the amount generated by a human population centre of any size, lets say a city of 100,000+, of which there are many around the coasts of the world.
Add to that the fact that the shoal of fish, and especially Moby Dick, will be mobile and deposit the excretia over a significant area whereas sewage outlet pipes aren't particularly known for their mobility.
It's the sheer concentration involved with urban human population which makes simply dumping the stuff at sea bad for the environment because it seriously disturbs the balance.
Otherwise, by a similar argument, we might as well be dumping our sewage in the street as they used to; after all, all other animals shit where they stand.
Anyway, all my pr0n is stored on M$'s filestore from now on.
Well, maybe 'clueless' was a trifle strong but we /.ers would probably make up our minds on technical issues - especially as we tend to download rather than rent - but the technically clueless will use availability as a major deciding factor.
As I remember it, it was the rental market that killed off Betamax. Whatever you might think of them (and few have a lower opinion than I do) the rental market, and Blockbusters in particular, has a massive influence. You can just see the average clueless consumer saying 'Why get HD DVD when Blockies only stocks Blu Ray'
One way to build a solid team is to get complete involvement from the bottom to the top. If, at the end of the day, all the personnel who worked on the project get to put their names on the paper it shows how their work is valued and how much they are 'part of the team'.
And as for team size being limited - I'll bet that during the better days at NASA, say during the Apollo missions, everyone right down to the janitor felt that they were part of the team - and, if you don't think that janitors are important just wait until the next time the toilet blocks.