Re:Tau instead of Pi... Wait a few months
on
Happy Pi Day
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· Score: 1
I read that a while ago and I thought i made a lot of sense. And the really good part is: It's backwards compatible. just write, at the top of each calculation def: tau = 2*pi
So of course I then started doing my math with tau instead of pi. Turns out we actually tend to have pi without a factor of two quite a lot. In my case it was the fact that -1 = e^(i*pi) that made everything messy.
Suddenly I got a lot of fractions where I beforehand had none. And really, fractions are way more messy than multiplications. I prefer having a lot of 2*pi than even a few extra tau/2.
If anything, it might be a good idea to have the constant be for a quarter of a circle rather than a half. That would probably simplify complex calculations a lot. Since 1, i, -1, -i could all be described in polar notation without any fractions.
TL;DR: Tau is better in theory. Pi is simpler in practice. A constant for Pi/2 might be a good idea.
Well, isn't that reason enough to not sign the thing? It seems kinda weird to me that you would need to consult an expensive lawyer for even interviewing at a company. Maybe they should consider making the agreement more readable by regular people. If the American legal system can't handle regular English it's really flawed.
Cool, modded flamebait just for questioning something. Well, guess I have enough Karma to take that. At least it feels nice it was quite undeserved. On the good side though, now it won't show up in Google searches for my name, could give potential future employers the impression that I would do that.:)
At least I now see why some people seem to have a problem with the Slashdot Groupthink Moderation System.;)
I can see why it would be bad to look at porn, rather than doing work, and in places where you might have customers walking by. But why would watching porn under a break be worse than reading Slashdot?
Being able to afford is a relative term. If you got 50% more pay, what would you spend it on, keeping the same standard as you have now, only with ethically better food. Or would you spend it on increasing you standard of living some more? I'm quite sure you aren't on the border of survival now. Only few western people really are.
Instead I'd go for the democratic approach. If some product is produced in bad ways. For example mistreating animals. It should be illegal. If it's produced in worse, but still acceptable ways, like creating pollution. It should get an extra tax to compensate for that.
Of course that's hard to do in such an undemocratic democracy as USA, which due to it's size can't ever work properly as a democracy. People can't feel any connection to the decisions if they're one of 200 million. It's hard enough when they're on of 10 million.
You're missing the point of competitions of this kind. They are not a way for companies to get rich by getting lot of ideas to choose from. Ideas aren't really valuable, and surely any large company have enough of ideas amongst the employees.
The point of this kind of competitions is usually to create awareness. Basically they could spend x million dollars on a TV advertising campaign, or they could spend the same money on a competition like this. And it will spread by word of mouth. I'd bet getting front page on Slashdot is quite valuable.
If they went on and created whatever product that wins this competition, having come up with the idea on their own, skipping the competition step. Do you think they would have sold as many copies as they will now?
Really, it isn't very likely that our generation will show up as big black hole i human history. Even though we percentually use computers and volatile media alot more than previusly. In actual numbers we create a lot of more media than before. It's more likely that historians some generations forward will have big problems going trough all the data than having problems finding any.
Somehow I suspect that even hundreds and thousands of years from now much of our data will be avaible in some form.
I can't say I agree. Doing stupid mistakes on your own can be quite funny, if nothing else, with some distance to the accident. When someone is really hurt, I think most people stops to find it funny. The difference in movies is that you know that no one was hurt.
I fell when skiing in a steep slope the other day. I found it more entertaining than my friends seeing the accident. They were more concerned with my health. Personally I knew quite soon that I'd be ok. Obviously it isn't a definitive rule that it's funnier when other people get hurt.
It's not like fashion trends, in the way that they aren't cyclic like them. You probably won't see people hyping Java as the next cool language in five years. It's also not random, as Paul Graham noted, they'r all more or less going towards Lisp in functionality. We are walking away from languages based on how the computer work and towards languages more focused on how humans work.
To me the evolution of languages to be more pleasant to work with is a reason to go into IT, just imagine how it would be if the only languages avaible were Fortran, Basic and Assembler. Discovering Python made me interested in programming again.
Re: Good code is self documenting...
on
How to Write Comments
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· Score: 2, Interesting
Some people say that when you see the need of a comment, see if you can fix the code first. In your example that would mean putting the tricy calculations in a separate function, that also has the benefit that if you find a better way to write it, you only have to make the change at one place even if the function is used in many places. Maybe you'd still want to add comment in the function to clarify it though considering the coplexity of the code. But in many cases just the name and the docstring of a function is clear enough that you won't have to add extra comments.
ACtually, you could have a meaningful picture, showing the screen in some sourounding, provided that the photo aren't editet it should show now natural like and bright the picture can get. A setup could be a plant in good lighting with the screen showing the same picture below. If you've ever tried photographing a screen you know that it's a major difference.
In Sweden, both grades and the closest equivalent of SSN is public. Just call the school that gave out the grade and they'll tell you, just contact the right place and they'll tell you the personal number. I'd have assumed that is the case everywhere else too?
I don't see the problem with that, really. It's not like that will give you any useful information, at best you can check if a person lied about his grade. Is the problem that it's avaible on the internet?
""" Truth is, no professional actually uses Blender. """ That's just simply false. Blender was initially made as a in-house software wich has been freed for use by anyone. It's still used professionally. Not so much for movies though, but then you probably have larger budgets anyway.
There's always next year...
on
Google Moon Debuts
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· Score: 3, Informative
It has been known for quite some long time that you get Vitamin D from sun bathing. It's also known that it is important. If you want to keep the cake and eat it you can buy vitamins and eat them instead of sun batching though. Why risk cancer when you can solve the problem without it?
Well, I think the line usually goes where you start modifying the body. Having a display project the image on the retina is not an implant. Using electrodes to bypass the retina and connect directly to the brain is.
I think it's a pretty Black and White situation, modify your body, or don't modify it. Maybe grey areas would be stuff like nanobot medicination.
Well, I guess Slashdot already have a quite complete coverage of Google stuff, but if you wan't to beat the rush for some hours I recommend the Google Blog (with RSS)
Though, if you would have read the article you'd know that he explicitly mentions that he "99%" of the time is writing, and he aknowledges that what he says of course doesn't apply to other situations.
But mentioning that in the summary wouldn't have been as interesting now would it?
Slashdot Mirror
Interesting cas. Do you have a source to share?
I read that a while ago and I thought i made a lot of sense. And the really good part is: It's backwards compatible. just write, at the top of each calculation def: tau = 2*pi
So of course I then started doing my math with tau instead of pi. Turns out we actually tend to have pi without a factor of two quite a lot. In my case it was the fact that -1 = e^(i*pi) that made everything messy.
Suddenly I got a lot of fractions where I beforehand had none. And really, fractions are way more messy than multiplications. I prefer having a lot of 2*pi than even a few extra tau/2.
If anything, it might be a good idea to have the constant be for a quarter of a circle rather than a half. That would probably simplify complex calculations a lot. Since 1, i, -1, -i could all be described in polar notation without any fractions.
TL;DR: Tau is better in theory. Pi is simpler in practice. A constant for Pi/2 might be a good idea.
Well, isn't that reason enough to not sign the thing? It seems kinda weird to me that you would need to consult an expensive lawyer for even interviewing at a company. Maybe they should consider making the agreement more readable by regular people. If the American legal system can't handle regular English it's really flawed.
How about we give them computers, so they can learn how to make their own wells?
Cool, modded flamebait just for questioning something. Well, guess I have enough Karma to take that. At least it feels nice it was quite undeserved. On the good side though, now it won't show up in Google searches for my name, could give potential future employers the impression that I would do that. :)
;)
At least I now see why some people seem to have a problem with the Slashdot Groupthink Moderation System.
I can see why it would be bad to look at porn, rather than doing work, and in places where you might have customers walking by. But why would watching porn under a break be worse than reading Slashdot?
Being able to afford is a relative term. If you got 50% more pay, what would you spend it on, keeping the same standard as you have now, only with ethically better food. Or would you spend it on increasing you standard of living some more? I'm quite sure you aren't on the border of survival now. Only few western people really are.
Instead I'd go for the democratic approach. If some product is produced in bad ways. For example mistreating animals. It should be illegal. If it's produced in worse, but still acceptable ways, like creating pollution. It should get an extra tax to compensate for that.
Of course that's hard to do in such an undemocratic democracy as USA, which due to it's size can't ever work properly as a democracy. People can't feel any connection to the decisions if they're one of 200 million. It's hard enough when they're on of 10 million.
You're missing the point of competitions of this kind. They are not a way for companies to get rich by getting lot of ideas to choose from. Ideas aren't really valuable, and surely any large company have enough of ideas amongst the employees.
The point of this kind of competitions is usually to create awareness. Basically they could spend x million dollars on a TV advertising campaign, or they could spend the same money on a competition like this. And it will spread by word of mouth. I'd bet getting front page on Slashdot is quite valuable.
If they went on and created whatever product that wins this competition, having come up with the idea on their own, skipping the competition step. Do you think they would have sold as many copies as they will now?
Accidently modded redundant(aimed for insightful) :)
So posting to remove my moderation.
High end cameras use CMOS too. So there's no limit in the technology itself. I guess it's just that it 's also easier to make cheaply.
good quality CMOS sensors = expensive
low quality CMOS = cheap
Medium quality CCD = middleground
Really, it isn't very likely that our generation will show up as big black hole i human history. Even though we percentually use computers and volatile media alot more than previusly. In actual numbers we create a lot of more media than before. It's more likely that historians some generations forward will have big problems going trough all the data than having problems finding any.
Somehow I suspect that even hundreds and thousands of years from now much of our data will be avaible in some form.
I can't say I agree. Doing stupid mistakes on your own can be quite funny, if nothing else, with some distance to the accident. When someone is really hurt, I think most people stops to find it funny. The difference in movies is that you know that no one was hurt.
I fell when skiing in a steep slope the other day. I found it more entertaining than my friends seeing the accident. They were more concerned with my health. Personally I knew quite soon that I'd be ok. Obviously it isn't a definitive rule that it's funnier when other people get hurt.
It's not like fashion trends, in the way that they aren't cyclic like them. You probably won't see people hyping Java as the next cool language in five years. It's also not random, as Paul Graham noted, they'r all more or less going towards Lisp in functionality. We are walking away from languages based on how the computer work and towards languages more focused on how humans work.
To me the evolution of languages to be more pleasant to work with is a reason to go into IT, just imagine how it would be if the only languages avaible were Fortran, Basic and Assembler. Discovering Python made me interested in programming again.
Some people say that when you see the need of a comment, see if you can fix the code first. In your example that would mean putting the tricy calculations in a separate function, that also has the benefit that if you find a better way to write it, you only have to make the change at one place even if the function is used in many places. Maybe you'd still want to add comment in the function to clarify it though considering the coplexity of the code. But in many cases just the name and the docstring of a function is clear enough that you won't have to add extra comments.
ACtually, you could have a meaningful picture, showing the screen in some sourounding, provided that the photo aren't editet it should show now natural like and bright the picture can get. A setup could be a plant in good lighting with the screen showing the same picture below. If you've ever tried photographing a screen you know that it's a major difference.
In Sweden, both grades and the closest equivalent of SSN is public. Just call the school that gave out the grade and they'll tell you, just contact the right place and they'll tell you the personal number. I'd have assumed that is the case everywhere else too?
I don't see the problem with that, really. It's not like that will give you any useful information, at best you can check if a person lied about his grade. Is the problem that it's avaible on the internet?
"""
Truth is, no professional actually uses Blender.
"""
That's just simply false. Blender was initially made as a in-house software wich has been freed for use by anyone. It's still used professionally. Not so much for movies though, but then you probably have larger budgets anyway.
They actually mention that in their blog.
At least Carbon Silicon doesn't put lound flash movies on their web page like garageband.com do. My poor ears. :(
It has been known for quite some long time that you get Vitamin D from sun bathing. It's also known that it is important. If you want to keep the cake and eat it you can buy vitamins and eat them instead of sun batching though. Why risk cancer when you can solve the problem without it?
Well, I think the line usually goes where you start modifying the body. Having a display project the image on the retina is not an implant. Using electrodes to bypass the retina and connect directly to the brain is.
I think it's a pretty Black and White situation, modify your body, or don't modify it. Maybe grey areas would be stuff like nanobot medicination.
Google sues people for click inflating, for the sake of their customers.
Google's customer sues Google for not doing enough.
Well, I guess Slashdot already have a quite complete coverage of Google stuff, but if you wan't to beat the rush for some hours I recommend the Google Blog (with RSS)
Ban Open Source! ;)
Though, if you would have read the article you'd know that he explicitly mentions that he "99%" of the time is writing, and he aknowledges that what he says of course doesn't apply to other situations.
But mentioning that in the summary wouldn't have been as interesting now would it?