I never took these exams, so I don't know for sure. But I imagine it's not an issue of having to show every step in routine computations. More like justifying (with words or symbols) what you're doing. Mathematics teachers in U.S. universities expect pretty much the same thing.
You'll notice I said "cross-browser", not "cross-platform".
I'm not a "fancy web developer" -- just a student with a temporary job doing some web development work. I use Linux every day in my free time. I know the limitations of Silverlight on Linux, but it sounds like the OP is in a locked-down environment where he gets to dictate even the browser version, so saying "hey, you can use whatever browser you want, but you still have to stick with Windows" seems like an improvement on his current situation.
I think the issue isn't some sort of inherent problem with Indian programmers, but rather the fact that it's hard to hold them accountable and it's much harder for them to see how their bad code affects them personally. E.g. they don't have to sit in the office with the rest of the team every day and be friends with the people whose lives they are making more difficult by taking shortcuts.
Also, a lot of the very good Indian programmers are working in the U.S. or Europe, so there's probably a bit of brain-drain when you go to India to find some.
And as a response, I'll leave you with this quote, that I ripped off from the sig of a fellow Slashdotter: "If I'd asked my customers what they wanted, they'd have said a faster horse." ~ Henry Ford
The bit about top schools not caring about the SAT is totally false. I got very mediocre grades (B average) in high school and got into some schools that should have been way out of my league (Carnegie Mellon, McGill, UIUC, huge scholarship from U. of Georgia, and others). The only remarkable thing about my record was a 2370 SAT score (not trying to brag -- it was pure luck if you ask me).
In the only one of those countries I'm familiar with (France), there is a standardized high school graduation exam (really shouldn't be called "high school graduation" as that makes what is a legitimate achievement sound like the mockery of education we have here in the U.S., but alas, there is no better English language term for the baccalauréat), so you are technically correct.
However, it is nothing like the "standardized testing" we are familiar with here in the States. It's graded completely by human, not computer, and multiple-choice questions are very rare. The exams in the humanities and social sciences consist of being given four hours to write an essay on a given subject, and the exams in technical subject consist of being given four hours to solve multiple long, challenging problems. Full work needs to be shown, of course.
These stats could be wrong, but off the top of my head, I think about 30-40% get this kind of diploma (baccalauréat général) and almost all of them go to university, whereas the other 60-70% get diplomas from technological or trade high schools (baccalauréat technologique, baccalauréat professionnel, or others, which exist in everything from computer networking to how to bake bread).
Thanks for the suggestion. I'll look into it if we start a new project, but I have a feeling my boss will want us to stick with what we know, which is Silverlight.
What about the people producing child pornography? I absolutely agree that simple possession of an image should carry no legal penalty, but I also think there should be a punishment for causing a person to engage in something potentially psychologically damaging before that person has reached the age to make an informed decision about whether to do so. However, I do think that the age of consent to appear in porn should be lowered to 15 or so.
Also, "this wasn't illegal for a long time, and society did fine!" is a bad argument. Hundreds of years ago, most people lived in abject poverty without what we would consider today to be the most basic standard of food, housing, education, or health care. It's only because in rich countries we've mostly solved those problems that we can turn our energies to comparatively minor issues like child pornography.
That's nice, but why are you commenting on a thread in which a guy is asking what he should use in his real-life job? Since you clearly admit here that your opinion is totally irrelevant to that situation.
Yes, everyone hates IE. Some of us live in the real world with real jobs with bosses who tell us what to do. What the fuck is your point? It's not like we develop for IE because we like to or because we are trying to make some sort of point.
You are basically describing Silverlight. (Or maybe, you are describing what Silverlight will look like in a few years, and what it almost is like today). Shame it's currently a buggy piece of shit.
I would say about 75% of my time at work is spent working around inconsistencies and bugs in Silverlight. To be fair, I've only tried 3, not 4, but they really should have called it "Silverlight Beta 3", not "Silverlight 3". It works flawlessly cross-browser (with a few odd, rare exceptions), and it seems like a big leap forward from HTML/JS for this sort of thing, but I have to say it's not quite ready to compete with desktop solutions.
However, if you absolutely must have it run in a browser and don't want to use hokey Java applets, Silverlight is something you should really look into.
I'm not from Quebec, but I think I know Quebec politics well enough to say that the PQ is a single-issue party. Why would you vote for them if you disagree (enough to get militant) with them on that one issue?
Yes they take positions on other issues, but their focus is only on one. Or two, if you consider language policy and separatism to be separate issues.
This isn't perfect, but it's hopefully better than the machine translation linked to in the summary.
(Quebec) The Régie des rentes du Québec (RRQ) acted illegally in February 2008 when it acquired Microsoft software without a bidding process, Superior Court's Judge Denis Jacques concluded.
In a lengthy ruling of about forty pages, the magistrate sided completely with the company Savoir-Faire Linux (SFL), who brought this action against the RRQ and the Centre de services partagés du Québec (Quebec shared services center, CSPQ).
"The real winner in this judgment is the government of Québec, which has been freed from the grip of multinational conglomerates", said Cyrille Béraud, president of the SFL, on Thursday. "All I won was the right to be considered alongside the others in a free and competitive market."
SFL began this action after the RRQ denied its request to submit a Linux-based bid for the RRQ's planned acquisition of operating systems and office suites for 500 workstations.
Simple upgrade?
The Centre de services partagés du Québec argued before the court that the Régie was only "upgrading" its workstations, in order to justify its decision to consider only Microsoft products, notably the operating system Vista and the Office 2007 suite.
The judge disagreed due to the fact that the RRQ intended to replace the Windows XP OS and the Office 2000 suite. "This is a migration, a renowal of their technological infrastructure. [...] If such a major change constituted an upgrade, then everything would be an upgrade, nullifying the bidding rules."
The judge also cited e-mail among RRQ employees, which he said showed evidence of improvisation and bias towards Microsoft products.
"Give me reasons to justify each product, anything you come up with..." writes an employee, a comment that the judge conluded clearly indicates a lack of serious and documented research.
"I hope a free software expert from CGI comments on the answer we gave [to Cyrille Béraud]. Are the arguments sound? [...] I hope this conversation remains CONFIDENTIAL", asked the same employee later.
A process that surprises even the people of CGI. "I thought the objective was to compare the two solutions", writes the specialist approached by the RRQ. "In reality, they were asking for confirmation that Linux - OpenOffice was unsuitable. It wouldn't make sense for us to make such a conclusion since we promote just the opposite..."
This exchange, wrote the judge, "shows the spirit in which the RRQ operates in order to sidestep the requirement that it proceed via a bidding process...".
He also notes the RRQ's decision to publish the notice of its intentions in the middle of the Christmas season, on December 21st, 2007, demanding that interested parties submit comments before January 11th, 2008.
"Unfortunately for the RRQ's 'strategy', Mr. Béraud responded on December 25th, 2007", notes Judge Jacques.
The judge finds it unreasonable to retroactively cancel the transaction concluded in 2008, but finds all the same that it is "fair and necessary" to declare that the RRQ acted illegally in making this acquisition without serious and documented research. He conludes that the RRQ did not have the right to award this contract without a bidding process.
The RRQ's spokesperson, Herman Huot, indicated Thursday that the organization would take some days to study the decision.
As for the president of SFL, he explained that the trial "wasn't meant to harm RRQ or anyone else. We wanted to show that we were falling behind technologically. I hope that, since this judgment is nothing more than a declaration, the government won't appeal."
"We couldn't have hoped for more", he added. "I'd like to take this opportunity to solemnly call for all political parties and the Charest administration to consider the question of free software. Free software is technological independence, local jobs, less costly and more efficient systems."
I don't have the energy to respond to your whole post right now, but I'll point out that university education costs a couple thousand pounds per year in the United Kingdom, as far as I know. Very cheap, but not quite free.
And Windows is rock solid reliable compared to the software made abroad (I won't name specific countries) that I have to deal with at work. I suspect many people feel the same way.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't think the filename and MIME types are enough information to tell you that the files are "quite different".
Google has a lot more time and money than 99.9% of companies in the world. Saying "Google does it -- why can't we" is ludicrous.
I never took these exams, so I don't know for sure. But I imagine it's not an issue of having to show every step in routine computations. More like justifying (with words or symbols) what you're doing. Mathematics teachers in U.S. universities expect pretty much the same thing.
You'll notice I said "cross-browser", not "cross-platform".
I'm not a "fancy web developer" -- just a student with a temporary job doing some web development work. I use Linux every day in my free time. I know the limitations of Silverlight on Linux, but it sounds like the OP is in a locked-down environment where he gets to dictate even the browser version, so saying "hey, you can use whatever browser you want, but you still have to stick with Windows" seems like an improvement on his current situation.
I think the issue isn't some sort of inherent problem with Indian programmers, but rather the fact that it's hard to hold them accountable and it's much harder for them to see how their bad code affects them personally. E.g. they don't have to sit in the office with the rest of the team every day and be friends with the people whose lives they are making more difficult by taking shortcuts.
Also, a lot of the very good Indian programmers are working in the U.S. or Europe, so there's probably a bit of brain-drain when you go to India to find some.
No need to get angry!
And as a response, I'll leave you with this quote, that I ripped off from the sig of a fellow Slashdotter:
"If I'd asked my customers what they wanted, they'd have said a faster horse." ~ Henry Ford
The bit about top schools not caring about the SAT is totally false. I got very mediocre grades (B average) in high school and got into some schools that should have been way out of my league (Carnegie Mellon, McGill, UIUC, huge scholarship from U. of Georgia, and others). The only remarkable thing about my record was a 2370 SAT score (not trying to brag -- it was pure luck if you ask me).
In the only one of those countries I'm familiar with (France), there is a standardized high school graduation exam (really shouldn't be called "high school graduation" as that makes what is a legitimate achievement sound like the mockery of education we have here in the U.S., but alas, there is no better English language term for the baccalauréat), so you are technically correct.
However, it is nothing like the "standardized testing" we are familiar with here in the States. It's graded completely by human, not computer, and multiple-choice questions are very rare. The exams in the humanities and social sciences consist of being given four hours to write an essay on a given subject, and the exams in technical subject consist of being given four hours to solve multiple long, challenging problems. Full work needs to be shown, of course.
These stats could be wrong, but off the top of my head, I think about 30-40% get this kind of diploma (baccalauréat général) and almost all of them go to university, whereas the other 60-70% get diplomas from technological or trade high schools (baccalauréat technologique, baccalauréat professionnel, or others, which exist in everything from computer networking to how to bake bread).
Thanks for the suggestion. I'll look into it if we start a new project, but I have a feeling my boss will want us to stick with what we know, which is Silverlight.
What about the people producing child pornography? I absolutely agree that simple possession of an image should carry no legal penalty, but I also think there should be a punishment for causing a person to engage in something potentially psychologically damaging before that person has reached the age to make an informed decision about whether to do so. However, I do think that the age of consent to appear in porn should be lowered to 15 or so.
Also, "this wasn't illegal for a long time, and society did fine!" is a bad argument. Hundreds of years ago, most people lived in abject poverty without what we would consider today to be the most basic standard of food, housing, education, or health care. It's only because in rich countries we've mostly solved those problems that we can turn our energies to comparatively minor issues like child pornography.
Anonymous Coward
I think you might have missed something.
If it works in IE then it will work in everything else.
Trolling?
That's nice, but why are you commenting on a thread in which a guy is asking what he should use in his real-life job? Since you clearly admit here that your opinion is totally irrelevant to that situation.
Yes, everyone hates IE. Some of us live in the real world with real jobs with bosses who tell us what to do. What the fuck is your point? It's not like we develop for IE because we like to or because we are trying to make some sort of point.
You are basically describing Silverlight. (Or maybe, you are describing what Silverlight will look like in a few years, and what it almost is like today). Shame it's currently a buggy piece of shit.
I would say about 75% of my time at work is spent working around inconsistencies and bugs in Silverlight. To be fair, I've only tried 3, not 4, but they really should have called it "Silverlight Beta 3", not "Silverlight 3". It works flawlessly cross-browser (with a few odd, rare exceptions), and it seems like a big leap forward from HTML/JS for this sort of thing, but I have to say it's not quite ready to compete with desktop solutions.
However, if you absolutely must have it run in a browser and don't want to use hokey Java applets, Silverlight is something you should really look into.
This troll was not posted anonymously in order to comply with regulations in Italy.
I'm not from Quebec, but I think I know Quebec politics well enough to say that the PQ is a single-issue party. Why would you vote for them if you disagree (enough to get militant) with them on that one issue?
Yes they take positions on other issues, but their focus is only on one. Or two, if you consider language policy and separatism to be separate issues.
This isn't perfect, but it's hopefully better than the machine translation linked to in the summary.
(Quebec) The Régie des rentes du Québec (RRQ) acted illegally in February 2008 when it acquired Microsoft software without a bidding process, Superior Court's Judge Denis Jacques concluded.
In a lengthy ruling of about forty pages, the magistrate sided completely with the company Savoir-Faire Linux (SFL), who brought this action against the RRQ and the Centre de services partagés du Québec (Quebec shared services center, CSPQ).
"The real winner in this judgment is the government of Québec, which has been freed from the grip of multinational conglomerates", said Cyrille Béraud, president of the SFL, on Thursday. "All I won was the right to be considered alongside the others in a free and competitive market."
SFL began this action after the RRQ denied its request to submit a Linux-based bid for the RRQ's planned acquisition of operating systems and office suites for 500 workstations.
Simple upgrade?
The Centre de services partagés du Québec argued before the court that the Régie was only "upgrading" its workstations, in order to justify its decision to consider only Microsoft products, notably the operating system Vista and the Office 2007 suite.
The judge disagreed due to the fact that the RRQ intended to replace the Windows XP OS and the Office 2000 suite. "This is a migration, a renowal of their technological infrastructure. [...] If such a major change constituted an upgrade, then everything would be an upgrade, nullifying the bidding rules."
The judge also cited e-mail among RRQ employees, which he said showed evidence of improvisation and bias towards Microsoft products.
"Give me reasons to justify each product, anything you come up with..." writes an employee, a comment that the judge conluded clearly indicates a lack of serious and documented research.
"I hope a free software expert from CGI comments on the answer we gave [to Cyrille Béraud]. Are the arguments sound? [...] I hope this conversation remains CONFIDENTIAL", asked the same employee later.
A process that surprises even the people of CGI. "I thought the objective was to compare the two solutions", writes the specialist approached by the RRQ. "In reality, they were asking for confirmation that Linux - OpenOffice was unsuitable. It wouldn't make sense for us to make such a conclusion since we promote just the opposite..."
This exchange, wrote the judge, "shows the spirit in which the RRQ operates in order to sidestep the requirement that it proceed via a bidding process...".
He also notes the RRQ's decision to publish the notice of its intentions in the middle of the Christmas season, on December 21st, 2007, demanding that interested parties submit comments before January 11th, 2008.
"Unfortunately for the RRQ's 'strategy', Mr. Béraud responded on December 25th, 2007", notes Judge Jacques.
The judge finds it unreasonable to retroactively cancel the transaction concluded in 2008, but finds all the same that it is "fair and necessary" to declare that the RRQ acted illegally in making this acquisition without serious and documented research. He conludes that the RRQ did not have the right to award this contract without a bidding process.
The RRQ's spokesperson, Herman Huot, indicated Thursday that the organization would take some days to study the decision.
As for the president of SFL, he explained that the trial "wasn't meant to harm RRQ or anyone else. We wanted to show that we were falling behind technologically. I hope that, since this judgment is nothing more than a declaration, the government won't appeal."
"We couldn't have hoped for more", he added. "I'd like to take this opportunity to solemnly call for all political parties and the Charest administration to consider the question of free software. Free software is technological independence, local jobs, less costly and more efficient systems."
Feel free to visit the web site of any U.K. university and look up tuition rates.
I don't have the energy to respond to your whole post right now, but I'll point out that university education costs a couple thousand pounds per year in the United Kingdom, as far as I know. Very cheap, but not quite free.
You should just change your sig to "Americans: please stop using French words if you don't know French". "à la" is such a minor part of the problem :)
Seems like a happy medium would be for the government to pay for healthcare, but for private hospitals and doctors to provide it?
That was exactly his point.
And Windows is rock solid reliable compared to the software made abroad (I won't name specific countries) that I have to deal with at work. I suspect many people feel the same way.