What I find to be truly amazing is that there are people who don't believe in 'black magic' like this.
Where I work, we needed a revision in how data was stored for our applications. What we came up with was rather similar to what Google does, though on a little smaller scale.
What happened to the project? It was torpedoed, sabotaged, generally screwed in the... functionality, because a couple old goats didn't understand it. Seriously.
Yes, it works when there are 10 lines. Throw a 60 page document at it, with 10 major sections and a dozen subsections each, THEN try to get it to behave. Indeed, I wasn't very clear about that.
If there is an OO developer who wants a concrete example, I may be able to provide a document that reproduces the issue (would have to clean proprietary stuff out etc.)/fd!
It's great in a lot of respects... not so great in others. At my organization (80 developers) where we tried to use it for design documents, we gave up in mass frustration because it cannot be forced to auto-number documentation sections accurately.
It was like that 'bop the duck' game where heads keep popping out of little holes in a box - you hit one little head, another one pops out of a different hole. The 'holes' are section numbers - they simply cannot be maded to behave.
Example: I want to have a document that looks like:
1.0 Section
1.1 Subsection
2.0 Section 2
2.1 Subsection
2.1.1 Subsection
2.1.2 Subsection
etc. OK, type that into OO, and it'll do it. Now come back and insert something 1.2.
Q. What'll happen?
A. If you know the answer a priori, you have an excellent chance a making a bundle as an OO consultant.
No, we're not stupid noobies. Sure seems like it though...
By itself it's nearly impossible; add in real MS Office compatibilty requirements, and it's hopeless (so far)
Yes, we read ALL the documentation. And the source code. Should that be necessary to get a document editor to work?
We wound up removing ALL FORMATTING and manually adding it in at the end. Sad.
IF there's a clue stick to be had, please feel free to beat me with it. Please?
Oh crap, are all those thousands of people whose lives depend on those toy databases in our application gonna die now?
Of course, I always thought *SQL Server* was the toy database, but what do I know? - but at least I'll admit to what I don't know.
Imagine writing all that otherwise apparently useful and informative commentary then blowing your credibility right out the door. Ouch.
Realistically, our perceptions are often colored by our current environment, which is very easy to forget. Seems to be the case here...
Speaking of incompetent (me)... > The secret is to find competent subordinates and listen to what they say....
Where I'm desperately fleeing, along with a significant percentage of my associates, is where management is listening to one particularly key INCOMPETENT subordinate. The story of FUD and misdirection could fill a book.
>The secret is to find competent subordinates and listen to what they say.
Where I'm desperately fleeing, along with a significant percentage of my associates, is where management is listening to one particularly key INCOMPETENT subordinate. The story of FUD and misdirection could fill a book. Hmmmm....
I started going to Purdue U. to take CS classes while a freshman in high school (1971). Learned Fortran and went on from there. Used good old punchcards, using a keypunch. Want them sorted? Put them into the sorting machine (assuming you'd used columns 72-80 for sequences). Need a listing? Put the stack of cards in the lister.
Became a physicist and elec. engineer, now mostly physics application coding, perl & c++.
Taught my kids programming on a CP/M machine (Pascal & Basic) then later they taught themselves HTML and Java. "Taught them" by discussing things a little, and told them "here's a good book, try it out a little a step at a time".
Old Goat
Slashdot Mirror
What I find to be truly amazing is that there are people who don't believe in 'black magic' like this. ... functionality, because a couple old goats didn't understand it. Seriously.
Where I work, we needed a revision in how data was stored for our applications. What we came up with was rather similar to what Google does, though on a little smaller scale.
What happened to the project? It was torpedoed, sabotaged, generally screwed in the
Sometimes this IS what I want. For instance, maybe I don't know what I'm looking for, thus finding similar concepts can be very handy.
Perhaps Google Search Exact and Google Search General buttons in addition to the Do you feel lucky, Punk? button?
Yes, it works when there are 10 lines. Throw a 60 page document at it, with 10 major sections and a dozen subsections each, THEN try to get it to behave. Indeed, I wasn't very clear about that. /fd!
If there is an OO developer who wants a concrete example, I may be able to provide a document that reproduces the issue (would have to clean proprietary stuff out etc.)
It's great in a lot of respects... not so great in others. At my organization (80 developers) where we tried to use it for design documents, we gave up in mass frustration because it cannot be forced to auto-number documentation sections accurately.
It was like that 'bop the duck' game where heads keep popping out of little holes in a box - you hit one little head, another one pops out of a different hole. The 'holes' are section numbers - they simply cannot be maded to behave.
Example:
I want to have a document that looks like:
1.0 Section
1.1 Subsection
2.0 Section 2
2.1 Subsection
2.1.1 Subsection
2.1.2 Subsection
etc.
OK, type that into OO, and it'll do it. Now come back and insert something 1.2.
Q. What'll happen?
A. If you know the answer a priori, you have an excellent chance a making a bundle as an OO consultant.
No, we're not stupid noobies. Sure seems like it though...
By itself it's nearly impossible; add in real MS Office compatibilty requirements, and it's hopeless (so far)
Yes, we read ALL the documentation. And the source code. Should that be necessary to get a document editor to work?
We wound up removing ALL FORMATTING and manually adding it in at the end. Sad.
IF there's a clue stick to be had, please feel free to beat me with it. Please?
Toy databases?
Oh crap, are all those thousands of people whose lives depend on those toy databases in our application gonna die now?
Of course, I always thought *SQL Server* was the toy database, but what do I know? - but at least I'll admit to what I don't know.
Imagine writing all that otherwise apparently useful and informative commentary then blowing your credibility right out the door. Ouch.
Realistically, our perceptions are often colored by our current environment, which is very easy to forget. Seems to be the case here...
Speaking of incompetent (me)...
> The secret is to find competent subordinates and listen to what they say....
Where I'm desperately fleeing, along with a significant percentage of my associates, is where management is listening to one particularly key INCOMPETENT subordinate. The story of FUD and misdirection could fill a book.
>The secret is to find competent subordinates and listen to what they say. Where I'm desperately fleeing, along with a significant percentage of my associates, is where management is listening to one particularly key INCOMPETENT subordinate. The story of FUD and misdirection could fill a book. Hmmmm....
2 barrels of #8 shot. Repeat as necessary.
For you Law Enforcement types out there, you must realize that my tongue is (mostly) in cheek, but:
/F
Remember all those old retired CIA 'specialists' from Cold War days? Maybe we can find, um, new assignments for them...
Actually, I know someone who responds to spam ads. Believe it or not, she was one of the best PC/Linux tech supports I ever met. Go figure.
:( I'd have strangled her already.
/F
If she didn't have MS now
I started going to Purdue U. to take CS classes while a freshman in high school (1971). Learned Fortran and went on from there. Used good old punchcards, using a keypunch. Want them sorted? Put them into the sorting machine (assuming you'd used columns 72-80 for sequences). Need a listing? Put the stack of cards in the lister. Became a physicist and elec. engineer, now mostly physics application coding, perl & c++. Taught my kids programming on a CP/M machine (Pascal & Basic) then later they taught themselves HTML and Java. "Taught them" by discussing things a little, and told them "here's a good book, try it out a little a step at a time". Old Goat