The connection between LP and digital computers
on
George Dantzig, 1914-2005
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· Score: 5, Informative
Linear programming was among the first "real" applications of digital computers. I saw Dantzig give a talk about it at an INFORMS conference back in the 1980s.
It seems that in a visit to Von Neumann in 1947 he described LP and the simplex method a bit. (See http://www.pupress.princeton.edu/chapters/i7802.ht ml.) It seems that Von Neumann understood everything pretty much immediately, and even derived the dual solution to LP in the first sitting.
I suppose we all know what Von Neumann did next...
As an information systems professor, I sometimes get asked by people what kind of graduate business degree (MBA, MS IS, MSA,...) goes best with a technical undergraduate degree (mine is systems engineering).
Carnegie Mellon and a few other schools have so-called "Techno-MBA" programs geared to managing technology and technical people. The programs leverage and extend your technical knowledge into the business domain. A plain vanilla MBA won't give you any of that. Why start over when you can use what you can build on what you already know?
Most of J2EE is over-engineered for everyday usage, intended to be used only occasionally and almost never if you're not working on very large-scale apps.
As long as you're comfortable with databases you can learn most of the useful stuff from developing a few small database-backed web apps. The idea is to see the various tiers and how they fit together, not to build a professional-quality web app. Do that later after you've read a bit and looked at a few real, working J2EE apps.
A good place to start reading is with Rod Johnson's book on J2EE without EJB, where he makes several practical recommendations of open source tools, libraries, and frameworks that should cut through most of the complexity for you. Unfortunately, since he does spend a lot of his time comparing other technologies to EJB, you may find yourself skipping around a bit. Don't worry about it: that part is for those who have already anchored on EJB and does not (necessarily) apply to you.
After getting an overview from Johnson's book, you might want to read up on some of the things he covers in his book: Hibernate or JDO for persistence, Spring or PicoContainer for a lightweight container/services framework, Struts or SpringMVC or WebWork for the web tier. There are plenty of books on these things, including some very good ones from Manning.
Good luck. J2EE is like a huge casino. There's lots of stuff in there to do, but you will likely only spend your time at a few tables. Pick well and you can have a good time without losing your shirt.
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Linear programming was among the first "real" applications of digital computers. I saw Dantzig give a talk about it at an INFORMS conference back in the 1980s.
t ml.) It seems that Von Neumann understood everything pretty much immediately, and even derived the dual solution to LP in the first sitting.
...
It seems that in a visit to Von Neumann in 1947 he described LP and the simplex method a bit. (See http://www.pupress.princeton.edu/chapters/i7802.h
I suppose we all know what Von Neumann did next
As an information systems professor, I sometimes get asked by people what kind of graduate business degree (MBA, MS IS, MSA, ...) goes best with a technical undergraduate degree (mine is systems engineering).
Carnegie Mellon and a few other schools have so-called "Techno-MBA" programs geared to managing technology and technical people. The programs leverage and extend your technical knowledge into the business domain. A plain vanilla MBA won't give you any of that. Why start over when you can use what you can build on what you already know?
Most of J2EE is over-engineered for everyday usage, intended to be used only occasionally and almost never if you're not working on very large-scale apps. As long as you're comfortable with databases you can learn most of the useful stuff from developing a few small database-backed web apps. The idea is to see the various tiers and how they fit together, not to build a professional-quality web app. Do that later after you've read a bit and looked at a few real, working J2EE apps. A good place to start reading is with Rod Johnson's book on J2EE without EJB, where he makes several practical recommendations of open source tools, libraries, and frameworks that should cut through most of the complexity for you. Unfortunately, since he does spend a lot of his time comparing other technologies to EJB, you may find yourself skipping around a bit. Don't worry about it: that part is for those who have already anchored on EJB and does not (necessarily) apply to you. After getting an overview from Johnson's book, you might want to read up on some of the things he covers in his book: Hibernate or JDO for persistence, Spring or PicoContainer for a lightweight container/services framework, Struts or SpringMVC or WebWork for the web tier. There are plenty of books on these things, including some very good ones from Manning. Good luck. J2EE is like a huge casino. There's lots of stuff in there to do, but you will likely only spend your time at a few tables. Pick well and you can have a good time without losing your shirt.