You think that, but that's the illusion that so many complaining customers fall into. As an individual, your opinion of the store is next to worthless. Statistically, the amount of money you spend at a store is insignificant. And if 1 customer is that insignificant, what difference will 10 or 50 make? The effectiveness of your storytelling will decline 100 fold each time someone passes it on -- how many people do you think you'll sway? You'd be lucky if telling a -direct- acquaintance even had an effect.
The reality is that stores will increase their profitability by ridding themselves of the chronic complainers. In the end, the complainers are seen as immature reactionaries anyway, and the public's memory for things like this is much less than the 6 months you get out of, say, a major political event.
As an individual, you don't matter to the store. Retail workers and even management -pray- that you never show up again, and they're happy when you don't, because then they can get back to being productive.
Like most things having to do with money, it's the long-term that matters. Complainers consistently think in a short-term time frame, and convince themselves that this 100x cost you talk about is effectual. And yet I'm willing to bet that any store you've complained to didn't go out of business, or much less suffer an even notable decline in profits, because of your statement.
Now, you're probably thinking that the time you spend complaining is costing the company money, and therefore they should acquiesce to your complaints. But that's not true, either. Assume the typical complaint lasts 30 minutes. How is company money spent any differently in terms of salaries, overhead, etc., servicing you, the complaining customer, than it would be making a sale? Not nearly as much as you'd think. For crying out loud, companys spend tens of thousands of dollars on videos and literature that train employees on how to deal with customers like you. I've never seen one that said capitulating to a complaining customer saved the company money. They probably exist, but I'd question the competence of any manager that stood behind such rhetoric.
And finally, for the sake of all the people standing behind you, watching you complain, who spend their delay rolling their eyes and concocting daydreams about how good your head would look on the end of a pike, be considerate and look at it from a philosophical standpoint. Shit happens. Deal with it.
Running 3D games at the lowest resolution possible. 640x480 is getting harder to do, but 800x600 satisfies -- it has a "feel" to it. And it plays faster.:)
How about... every game out there right now is just what VR was going to be? A big, interactive 3D world? You don't think GTA3 qualifies as VR?
The VR concept didn't really die, the VR buzzword died. The VR concept instead mutated into the crap we see today. What do you think a first-person shooter is?
What you hint at, and what most people forget, is that VR revolved around the concept of total sensory immersion. The Battletech pods are a good example. But seriously... except for coverage of peripheral vision, what are the FPS et al. games out there lacking, from an immersion standpoint?
1) A facility for examining variables used as bitflags. MSVC++ will let me see a variable in every way except binary. I'm not geeky enough to know what bits are set by looking at a hex or octal value. Not yet, anyway.
2) The ability to backtrack the flow of execution. Not just see a call stack, but actually move backwards and repeat certain steps to see over and over again how they affect state.
3) Better GUI debugging all around. The mechanism by which windows or dialogs update is designed to be fast, sure, but it often prevents the developer from seeing how the GUI changes or responds over time. GUI developers need a GUI debugger. "Magic Lenses" are a good step in this direction.
4) Better fault/bug prediction. If people can diagnose future problems by examining the code, the computer should be able to, too.
5) Statistical analysis detailing which bugs a developer (a student, in particular) cause/encounter most often.
6) More debuggers that suggest solutions to problems.
7) More general breakpoint descriptions. I'd like to be able to tell the debugger to break whenever any variable in the system equals a certain value.
Words & phrases managers should never utter:
-"Appropriate"
-"Entity"
-"Mission Statement"
-never refer to what your company creates as "product"
-"Synergy"
-"Action Item"
-"Team Player"
-"Content"
-"Value-added"
-"Customer"
-"Positive/negative attitude"
Euphamisms & other false statements you should avoid:
-"Improvement Opportunity" when you mean "Fault" or "Weakness"
-"I'm not directing this to anyone in particular," when in fact you are
-"Everyone says _______," when in fact only one or two people say _______
-"Our customers sign your paycheck," when in fact the company signs your paycheck.
I'm majoring in CS at Georgia Tech, and believe me, the tedium has driven me to the edge. Came a point where I avoided all coding jobs in favor of design work.
Then I picked up 3D Studio's MAXScript, and overnight I got back in the habit; I got really carried away with small scripts that turned into major plugins.
Then my interest in video games started bleeding over to the coding arena. Wasn't long before I had the urge to write all kinds of video game code.
So it happens to the best of us. I suppose my advice would be: step back from your college classwork, and try to identify something you really enjoy that's codeable, be it short graphic demos, OS utilities, whatever floats your boat. The problem I had with classwork, which I imagine you're having too, is that it's just -boring-, and not very gratifying at all. Find some kind of code that you find gratifying and your spark might be rekindled.
Also, do consider your being depressed, and take it seriously. I made myself go see a counselor here at Tech, and it's the best decision I ever made. Made me feel better about where I'd been and where I was going; I'd recommend it to anyone, depressed or not! If nothing else, it gives you someone to talk to when friends are in short supply, due to time shortages or what have you.
Try to identify why you wanted to become a coder in the first place and go back to it. Rekindle a hobby-level interest in it again, refresh your memory, and work your way up.
I'm gonna love watching this cocky asshole get slapped with the trout of reality. He sounds like a 16-yr-old kid who's taken a government class in HS and thinks he has it all figured out. OOOOOooh I'm gonna keep tabs on this little development.:)
You people make it sound like you have bouts of depression every time you discover that a project is closed source. There is nothing WRONG with closed source. In addition, you people need to learn that it would be IMPOSSIBLE to secure the Quake client if all code involved were open source. So don't go blabbing about how "unfortunate" a closed source solution is. It's the ONLY solution, and you know it. There isn't an alternative, so DON'T COMPLAIN!
...a bitter and senile old man. He's just trying to find anyone he can to rally behind him in his "crusade of the week." Do your homework before you pick a hero to follow; RMS is getting crazier every day, and it shows. PLEASE people, don't give him a lot of your attention. It just encourages him.
Um, no? All the education in the world won't help someone with a terminal disease. All the education in the world won't change the chances of a hostage in a bank holdup getting shot.
Yeah, 'cause the US sense of humor is tired and simple. Go Python! I always hate to see fellow Americans that can't appreciate British humor. It's really sad.
Slashdot Mirror
You think that, but that's the illusion that so many complaining customers fall into. As an individual, your opinion of the store is next to worthless. Statistically, the amount of money you spend at a store is insignificant. And if 1 customer is that insignificant, what difference will 10 or 50 make? The effectiveness of your storytelling will decline 100 fold each time someone passes it on -- how many people do you think you'll sway? You'd be lucky if telling a -direct- acquaintance even had an effect.
The reality is that stores will increase their profitability by ridding themselves of the chronic complainers. In the end, the complainers are seen as immature reactionaries anyway, and the public's memory for things like this is much less than the 6 months you get out of, say, a major political event.
As an individual, you don't matter to the store. Retail workers and even management -pray- that you never show up again, and they're happy when you don't, because then they can get back to being productive.
Like most things having to do with money, it's the long-term that matters. Complainers consistently think in a short-term time frame, and convince themselves that this 100x cost you talk about is effectual. And yet I'm willing to bet that any store you've complained to didn't go out of business, or much less suffer an even notable decline in profits, because of your statement.
Now, you're probably thinking that the time you spend complaining is costing the company money, and therefore they should acquiesce to your complaints. But that's not true, either. Assume the typical complaint lasts 30 minutes. How is company money spent any differently in terms of salaries, overhead, etc., servicing you, the complaining customer, than it would be making a sale? Not nearly as much as you'd think. For crying out loud, companys spend tens of thousands of dollars on videos and literature that train employees on how to deal with customers like you. I've never seen one that said capitulating to a complaining customer saved the company money. They probably exist, but I'd question the competence of any manager that stood behind such rhetoric.
And finally, for the sake of all the people standing behind you, watching you complain, who spend their delay rolling their eyes and concocting daydreams about how good your head would look on the end of a pike, be considerate and look at it from a philosophical standpoint. Shit happens. Deal with it.
--
Jeff S.
3D Studio's later DOS versions had an Optimize feature that accomplished what seems to be exactly the same thing.
--
Jeff S.
Metroid? Super Metroid? Metroid Prime? Metroid: Zero Mission?
Not -one- of these made it in there?
Running 3D games at the lowest resolution possible. 640x480 is getting harder to do, but 800x600 satisfies -- it has a "feel" to it. And it plays faster. :)
How about... every game out there right now is just what VR was going to be? A big, interactive 3D world? You don't think GTA3 qualifies as VR?
The VR concept didn't really die, the VR buzzword died. The VR concept instead mutated into the crap we see today. What do you think a first-person shooter is?
What you hint at, and what most people forget, is that VR revolved around the concept of total sensory immersion. The Battletech pods are a good example. But seriously... except for coverage of peripheral vision, what are the FPS et al. games out there lacking, from an immersion standpoint?
1) A facility for examining variables used as bitflags. MSVC++ will let me see a variable in every way except binary. I'm not geeky enough to know what bits are set by looking at a hex or octal value. Not yet, anyway.
2) The ability to backtrack the flow of execution. Not just see a call stack, but actually move backwards and repeat certain steps to see over and over again how they affect state.
3) Better GUI debugging all around. The mechanism by which windows or dialogs update is designed to be fast, sure, but it often prevents the developer from seeing how the GUI changes or responds over time. GUI developers need a GUI debugger. "Magic Lenses" are a good step in this direction.
4) Better fault/bug prediction. If people can diagnose future problems by examining the code, the computer should be able to, too.
5) Statistical analysis detailing which bugs a developer (a student, in particular) cause/encounter most often.
6) More debuggers that suggest solutions to problems.
7) More general breakpoint descriptions. I'd like to be able to tell the debugger to break whenever any variable in the system equals a certain value.
Words & phrases managers should never utter:
-"Appropriate"
-"Entity"
-"Mission Statement"
-never refer to what your company creates as "product"
-"Synergy"
-"Action Item"
-"Team Player"
-"Content"
-"Value-added"
-"Customer"
-"Positive/negative attitude"
Euphamisms & other false statements you should avoid:
-"Improvement Opportunity" when you mean "Fault" or "Weakness"
-"I'm not directing this to anyone in particular," when in fact you are
-"Everyone says _______," when in fact only one or two people say _______
-"Our customers sign your paycheck," when in fact the company signs your paycheck.
I'm majoring in CS at Georgia Tech, and believe me, the tedium has driven me to the edge. Came a point where I avoided all coding jobs in favor of design work.
Then I picked up 3D Studio's MAXScript, and overnight I got back in the habit; I got really carried away with small scripts that turned into major plugins.
Then my interest in video games started bleeding over to the coding arena. Wasn't long before I had the urge to write all kinds of video game code.
So it happens to the best of us. I suppose my advice would be: step back from your college classwork, and try to identify something you really enjoy that's codeable, be it short graphic demos, OS utilities, whatever floats your boat. The problem I had with classwork, which I imagine you're having too, is that it's just -boring-, and not very gratifying at all. Find some kind of code that you find gratifying and your spark might be rekindled.
Also, do consider your being depressed, and take it seriously. I made myself go see a counselor here at Tech, and it's the best decision I ever made. Made me feel better about where I'd been and where I was going; I'd recommend it to anyone, depressed or not! If nothing else, it gives you someone to talk to when friends are in short supply, due to time shortages or what have you.
Try to identify why you wanted to become a coder in the first place and go back to it. Rekindle a hobby-level interest in it again, refresh your memory, and work your way up.
I'm gonna love watching this cocky asshole get slapped with the trout of reality. He sounds like a 16-yr-old kid who's taken a government class in HS and thinks he has it all figured out. OOOOOooh I'm gonna keep tabs on this little development. :)
You people make it sound like you have bouts of depression every time you discover that a project is closed source. There is nothing WRONG with closed source. In addition, you people need to learn that it would be IMPOSSIBLE to secure the Quake client if all code involved were open source. So don't go blabbing about how "unfortunate" a closed source solution is. It's the ONLY solution, and you know it. There isn't an alternative, so DON'T COMPLAIN!
...a bitter and senile old man. He's just trying to find anyone he can to rally behind him in his "crusade of the week." Do your homework before you pick a hero to follow; RMS is getting crazier every day, and it shows. PLEASE people, don't give him a lot of your attention. It just encourages him.
Um, no? All the education in the world won't help someone with a terminal disease. All the education in the world won't change the chances of a hostage in a bank holdup getting shot.
Please. Don't be naive.
Maybe it's just another joke. :)
Yeah, 'cause the US sense of humor is tired and simple. Go Python! I always hate to see fellow Americans that can't appreciate British humor. It's really sad.