I've worked for the past two years as a software engineer at athenahealth. The experiences that you described are well known throughout the R&D people that I work with. I actually *have* been to clinics and followed doctors, PAs, and other staff around as they went about their day. I've seen them working with other EHR software that looks like it was built in the early 1980s. I've listened to them describe their ideal software solutions and what their biggest pain points are. AFAIK, my company is the only EHR out there that does these "site visits" regularly and encourages people to sign up and go.
It's difficult to design EHR software that meets everyone's needs when every clinic likes to do things their own way. Your comments about the over saturation of documentation requirements is spot on, and there are teams at my work that focus on reducing the time spent doing documentation. Especially the "after hours" documentation that you mentioned is something we are trying to kill completely. Whether or not we've been doing a good job making that better, I don't know since I work on something completely different. But I think at least our hearts and our minds are in the right place.
Healthcare is a very complex and difficult thing to manage. I wish it was an easy thing to fix, but it is an absolute juggernaut of a problem. I know my company certainly isn't perfect, and some things were designed in a downright idiotic fashion. But I think at least our hearts and our focus is in the right place, and I've seen a ton of improvements in the past two years since I started there.
I just wanted to share my perspective as one of those EHR programmers. We're trying to make things better, not worse. But it is a business, and most EHR businesses are focused only on making more money, not making better products. Sometimes, that means they make decisions that harm the industry (like refusing to share patient data outside their systems) because they are afraid it will hurt their checkbooks. Sad, but true.
I also got a copy of the book for free about a year or two ago from winning a contest on GameDev.net. I'm not much of a fiction reader but I gave it a shot. My review is overwhelmingly positive. I can count with one hand how many books I've read that I truly, truly enjoyed and this is one of them. It really did hook me in a way that few books ever have. I gave this book to my mother (who can barely use a computer) and she loved it just as much as I did. I highly recommend this book to anyone, geek or non-geek alike.
I'm an Obama supporter living in Texas and I think this is actually a great thing to have both McCain and Obama's names removed from the ballot. Texas is a very conservative state, which makes my vote here virtually worthless. But if neither is on the ballot, then the chances of Obama winning the state because of write-ins or Barr (or another 3rd party candidate) winning because their name is on the ballot increases. Basically if John McCain doesn't win Texas, its a very deep blow for him and this lawsuit is pretty much the only shot we have at it.
When will we abolish this stupid electoral college?
Having a greater number of transistors on a chip does not make a processor "smarter" or capable of doing something a less populated processor can. It only gives it the potential to be much faster (and consume more power). The real story here is that a person or group of programmers have designed a better algorithm for playing the game. This is a human achievement, not a machine one.
I have resisted all "Wii bundle" deals that stores try to offer because I just don't like the idea of being forced to buy other things when all I want is a console. But now that the Wii has been out for an entire year and I have still yet to lay my eyes on an Wii unit in retail stores, I have surrendered myself to the thought. Fortunately my mother works at Costco so next shipment of Wiis they get, she will be buying one of the bundles for me (which I believe isn't too bad: wii unit, 2 controllers, 2 games of my choice, $340). Its nice to have someone close working in retail for times like these.:)
Mind sharing WHERE it is readily available? I go to game/electronics stores every so often, always with the premise that "if I see a Wii console in this store, I will buy it". In almost a year, I can sadly report that I have not been able to lay eyes on a Wii box:(
I'm not 100% sure, but I do believe that I read a clause about this when I studied copyright law one year ago. Making copyrighted content available to others (online or otherwise) without owning the rights to the work is against the law. Like I said, I'm just going by memory here but I'm fairly certain that I read an older case dealing with this same issue in a non-online context.
Regardless, the article submitting shouldn't be so quick to dismiss a judge's ruling as foobar just because he doesn't like the outcome. I actually agree with the judge's decision, despite my strong disdain for the RIAA/MPAA and its friends.
Intellectual Property is a blanket term that covers laws of copyright, patents, trademarks/trade dress, and trade secrets. The use of the term here is not necessarily incorrect, it is just overly broad. But you are right, the summary should have used copyright.
How about this as an alternative: bool continue_loop = true; for (loop1 && continue_loop) {
for (loop2) {
if (termination condition == true) {
continue_loop = false;
break;
}
do_inner_loop_work();
} }
Someone takes a picture of your face using their cell phone, or takes an existing picture off of myspace, etc. I think it would be pretty damn hard for a camera to do facial recognition unless it truly is a 3D camera -- otherwise you can just stick a picture of the owner's face in front of the lens and you're in business.
Well, speaking from my own experience...
on
Linus on GIT and SCM
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
I've used CVS, SVN, and GIT in serious projects and I can say I far prefer SVN to GIT, and GIT to CVS. GIT was incredibly confusing to use, and it may just have been the way the repository was administered was poor, but I never knew if I was synched with everyone else's checkouts and the command names made no sense. Its been over a year so I don't remember the details of GIT, but I remember having to do a lot of things "twice". Need to do a checkout? Two commands. Need to commit? Two commands. It was a bitch to use and I am glad I'm done with it. SVN, on the other hand, I felt very comfortable with from the start and most important of all, I trusted SVN to do what I wanted it to and to keep me from screwing up. In a year of using it, it has failed to lose my trust.
I'm not trying to say SVN is better than GIT. The best repository depends on the type of project and type of development. But defaming SVN in favor of GIT is not, I believe, a valid statement. Especially when (I'm pretty certain) many, many more projects use SVN rather than choosing to use GIT.
You protest declining literacy by BURNING books? Isn't that a little umm.....ironically incorrect? Why don't they burn radios or TVs instead? I'm certain the presence of those devices cause declining literacy more than books do... >_>
I would argue that such a comparison is invalid. We are all well aware that the gaming industry was much smaller in size and audience in the PS1-release era than it is right now. I don't have any hard data so lets just assume that the gaming market is 4 times larger today than it was back then. Then your outselling the PS1 by 2-3x becomes (2-3x)/4, or 0.5-0.75x. Also IIRC, the PS2 had supply problems and couldn't meet demand very well, so PS2s were rather difficult to find. On the other hand, I see several PS3s collecting dust on store shelves all the time. Again, no hard facts or data in my argument and I'm not trying to invalidate yours, but I just wanted to provide an additional perspective.
In my humble opinion, the best console RPGs were developed during the SNES and PSX eras. I actually think that with all this technological advancement since then, the typical game designer is focusing less and less on story and gameplay, and more on making their game a glorified multimedia presentation. It was with that thought in mind that I began developing my own RPG, reminiscent of "the old days" that I miss so dearly. I quickly learned that developing a game (especially in your spare time) is an incredibly arduous process, but its still (slowly) coming along.
But, I would love to see more great single-player RPGs come into existence. One thing that I've learned is that when you are actually making the game instead of only playing it, some of the fun factor is kind of dissolved as a result.:(
Not to mention that the side-bar is full of links to negative press about Vista or Microsoft in general. I doubt Microsoft will respond to a site that is obviously a lot of flame-bait towards MS.
Why are there these people that feel like every other living soul in the world HAS to accept what they believe, otherwise they should be killed/crucified/outcasted/suffer for eternity in the afterlife? Aren't these the people that killed thousands during the Crusades? Aren't these the people that are killing thousands now in the name of Allah? Are all the religions and dieties that man-kind have believed in one way or another so damn righteous as to demand that their followers mame all others in their name?
I just don't understand why people can't accept that others can believe different things than they do. If the whole world was just more accepting of others and respected others' beliefs even if they disagreed, the world would be a much, much better place. Not to mention that millions of innocent people wouldn't have had to die in ages past.
It's obvious why they are going to deny this. If they announce it, that means their already lack-luster PSP sales will go down, since consumers are now aware of the eminent price drop that has been confirmed. They would be insane for announcing a planned price drop that won't occur for months, even if they really are planning it.
Then again, this is Sony we're talking about, so sanity doesn't really play much of a factor in my argument.:(
- doesn't mention that OO.org can (usually) read/write.doc,.xls,.ppt documents
- doesn't mention that it can run Linux and other O/S (I know Windows and Mac users are the target audience here, but the wide platform availability is one reason why I switched personally...)
- "Free Software for Free People" => doesn't quite work. It is not explicitly said that OO.org can be downloaded and installed for zero financial cost, but instead alludes that OO.org is "free" in the same sense that people are "free". A person can not cost anything (unless you are a slave), so... the ad draft doesn't communicate the important point of "free to download, free to install, free to use"
- don't even get me started on the bright yellow background. I know its a rough draft, but at least make it a *good* rough draft! If I saw something that cheezy/annoying/distracting/unprofessional in my newspaper, I would turn to the next page before I finished reading the title
Good intentions are there, but I need more faith in an ad that works if I'm going to shell out cash for this cause. I don't want to waste my donation money on an ad that doesn't advertise very well:/
One is dated July 14th 2005, while the second version is dated December 8th 2005. Get off your ass and call up your senator and tell them that you feel this bill should be passed into law to protect you as either a former victim, or possible future victim. Cite some recent examples of identity theft from the news. Tell them that this is more important to you as a citizen that they are supposed to represent, compared to whatever other "important agenda" they are talking about right now in the Senate (gay marriage, starting MORE wars with countries in the name of "freedom", etc). Don't just whine and complain because no one is going to want to listen to you. Instead, push and shove so that they will be forced to do something about it!
Damn, just after I posted this I realized I forgot to mention another part (which parts 5 and 6 are also dependent on in the same way they are dependent on parts 1-4)
7. In the case of theft, any and all persons that may have had their information stolen in the theft must be informed within a 48 hour period upon discovery of the theft. No party may with hold or keep secret the theft any longer, or they are subject to further financial obligation to the victims.
Of course "48 hours" is something I pulled out on a whim right now, and "all persons that may be effected" can be intentionally misinterpreted by a party. In reality, if one person's information was stolen, there is a non-zero chance that everyone else had the possibility of having that information stolen.
Slashdot Mirror
I've worked for the past two years as a software engineer at athenahealth. The experiences that you described are well known throughout the R&D people that I work with. I actually *have* been to clinics and followed doctors, PAs, and other staff around as they went about their day. I've seen them working with other EHR software that looks like it was built in the early 1980s. I've listened to them describe their ideal software solutions and what their biggest pain points are. AFAIK, my company is the only EHR out there that does these "site visits" regularly and encourages people to sign up and go. It's difficult to design EHR software that meets everyone's needs when every clinic likes to do things their own way. Your comments about the over saturation of documentation requirements is spot on, and there are teams at my work that focus on reducing the time spent doing documentation. Especially the "after hours" documentation that you mentioned is something we are trying to kill completely. Whether or not we've been doing a good job making that better, I don't know since I work on something completely different. But I think at least our hearts and our minds are in the right place. Healthcare is a very complex and difficult thing to manage. I wish it was an easy thing to fix, but it is an absolute juggernaut of a problem. I know my company certainly isn't perfect, and some things were designed in a downright idiotic fashion. But I think at least our hearts and our focus is in the right place, and I've seen a ton of improvements in the past two years since I started there. I just wanted to share my perspective as one of those EHR programmers. We're trying to make things better, not worse. But it is a business, and most EHR businesses are focused only on making more money, not making better products. Sometimes, that means they make decisions that harm the industry (like refusing to share patient data outside their systems) because they are afraid it will hurt their checkbooks. Sad, but true.
I also got a copy of the book for free about a year or two ago from winning a contest on GameDev.net. I'm not much of a fiction reader but I gave it a shot. My review is overwhelmingly positive. I can count with one hand how many books I've read that I truly, truly enjoyed and this is one of them. It really did hook me in a way that few books ever have. I gave this book to my mother (who can barely use a computer) and she loved it just as much as I did. I highly recommend this book to anyone, geek or non-geek alike.
I'm an Obama supporter living in Texas and I think this is actually a great thing to have both McCain and Obama's names removed from the ballot. Texas is a very conservative state, which makes my vote here virtually worthless. But if neither is on the ballot, then the chances of Obama winning the state because of write-ins or Barr (or another 3rd party candidate) winning because their name is on the ballot increases. Basically if John McCain doesn't win Texas, its a very deep blow for him and this lawsuit is pretty much the only shot we have at it.
When will we abolish this stupid electoral college?
Having a greater number of transistors on a chip does not make a processor "smarter" or capable of doing something a less populated processor can. It only gives it the potential to be much faster (and consume more power). The real story here is that a person or group of programmers have designed a better algorithm for playing the game. This is a human achievement, not a machine one.
I have resisted all "Wii bundle" deals that stores try to offer because I just don't like the idea of being forced to buy other things when all I want is a console. But now that the Wii has been out for an entire year and I have still yet to lay my eyes on an Wii unit in retail stores, I have surrendered myself to the thought. Fortunately my mother works at Costco so next shipment of Wiis they get, she will be buying one of the bundles for me (which I believe isn't too bad: wii unit, 2 controllers, 2 games of my choice, $340). Its nice to have someone close working in retail for times like these. :)
Mind sharing WHERE it is readily available? I go to game/electronics stores every so often, always with the premise that "if I see a Wii console in this store, I will buy it". In almost a year, I can sadly report that I have not been able to lay eyes on a Wii box :(
I'm not 100% sure, but I do believe that I read a clause about this when I studied copyright law one year ago. Making copyrighted content available to others (online or otherwise) without owning the rights to the work is against the law. Like I said, I'm just going by memory here but I'm fairly certain that I read an older case dealing with this same issue in a non-online context.
Regardless, the article submitting shouldn't be so quick to dismiss a judge's ruling as foobar just because he doesn't like the outcome. I actually agree with the judge's decision, despite my strong disdain for the RIAA/MPAA and its friends.
Intellectual Property is a blanket term that covers laws of copyright, patents, trademarks/trade dress, and trade secrets. The use of the term here is not necessarily incorrect, it is just overly broad. But you are right, the summary should have used copyright.
How about this as an alternative:
bool continue_loop = true;
for (loop1 && continue_loop) {
for (loop2) {
if (termination condition == true) {
continue_loop = false;
break;
}
do_inner_loop_work();
}
}
Someone takes a picture of your face using their cell phone, or takes an existing picture off of myspace, etc. I think it would be pretty damn hard for a camera to do facial recognition unless it truly is a 3D camera -- otherwise you can just stick a picture of the owner's face in front of the lens and you're in business.
I've used CVS, SVN, and GIT in serious projects and I can say I far prefer SVN to GIT, and GIT to CVS. GIT was incredibly confusing to use, and it may just have been the way the repository was administered was poor, but I never knew if I was synched with everyone else's checkouts and the command names made no sense. Its been over a year so I don't remember the details of GIT, but I remember having to do a lot of things "twice". Need to do a checkout? Two commands. Need to commit? Two commands. It was a bitch to use and I am glad I'm done with it. SVN, on the other hand, I felt very comfortable with from the start and most important of all, I trusted SVN to do what I wanted it to and to keep me from screwing up. In a year of using it, it has failed to lose my trust.
I'm not trying to say SVN is better than GIT. The best repository depends on the type of project and type of development. But defaming SVN in favor of GIT is not, I believe, a valid statement. Especially when (I'm pretty certain) many, many more projects use SVN rather than choosing to use GIT.
You protest declining literacy by BURNING books? Isn't that a little umm.....ironically incorrect? Why don't they burn radios or TVs instead? I'm certain the presence of those devices cause declining literacy more than books do... >_>
I would argue that such a comparison is invalid. We are all well aware that the gaming industry was much smaller in size and audience in the PS1-release era than it is right now. I don't have any hard data so lets just assume that the gaming market is 4 times larger today than it was back then. Then your outselling the PS1 by 2-3x becomes (2-3x)/4, or 0.5-0.75x. Also IIRC, the PS2 had supply problems and couldn't meet demand very well, so PS2s were rather difficult to find. On the other hand, I see several PS3s collecting dust on store shelves all the time. Again, no hard facts or data in my argument and I'm not trying to invalidate yours, but I just wanted to provide an additional perspective.
In my humble opinion, the best console RPGs were developed during the SNES and PSX eras. I actually think that with all this technological advancement since then, the typical game designer is focusing less and less on story and gameplay, and more on making their game a glorified multimedia presentation. It was with that thought in mind that I began developing my own RPG, reminiscent of "the old days" that I miss so dearly. I quickly learned that developing a game (especially in your spare time) is an incredibly arduous process, but its still (slowly) coming along.
:(
But, I would love to see more great single-player RPGs come into existence. One thing that I've learned is that when you are actually making the game instead of only playing it, some of the fun factor is kind of dissolved as a result.
Not to mention that the side-bar is full of links to negative press about Vista or Microsoft in general. I doubt Microsoft will respond to a site that is obviously a lot of flame-bait towards MS.
Why are there these people that feel like every other living soul in the world HAS to accept what they believe, otherwise they should be killed/crucified/outcasted/suffer for eternity in the afterlife? Aren't these the people that killed thousands during the Crusades? Aren't these the people that are killing thousands now in the name of Allah? Are all the religions and dieties that man-kind have believed in one way or another so damn righteous as to demand that their followers mame all others in their name?
I just don't understand why people can't accept that others can believe different things than they do. If the whole world was just more accepting of others and respected others' beliefs even if they disagreed, the world would be a much, much better place. Not to mention that millions of innocent people wouldn't have had to die in ages past.
Great! Now thanks to you we also have a duped comment for this duped article :p
I predict that by 2020, Richard Stallman will be successful in changing our country's name to the United States of GNUmerica. You heard it here first!
It's obvious why they are going to deny this. If they announce it, that means their already lack-luster PSP sales will go down, since consumers are now aware of the eminent price drop that has been confirmed. They would be insane for announcing a planned price drop that won't occur for months, even if they really are planning it.
:(
Then again, this is Sony we're talking about, so sanity doesn't really play much of a factor in my argument.
...would this technology have on a game like, say, Dead or Alive: Xtreme Volleyball?
>_>
Lets not forget all of the "useful" features that they have cut out of it along the way. If Vista fails, it won't be just because of delays.
- doesn't mention that OO.org can (usually) read/write .doc, .xls, .ppt documents
:/
- doesn't mention that it can run Linux and other O/S (I know Windows and Mac users are the target audience here, but the wide platform availability is one reason why I switched personally...)
- "Free Software for Free People" => doesn't quite work. It is not explicitly said that OO.org can be downloaded and installed for zero financial cost, but instead alludes that OO.org is "free" in the same sense that people are "free". A person can not cost anything (unless you are a slave), so... the ad draft doesn't communicate the important point of "free to download, free to install, free to use"
- don't even get me started on the bright yellow background. I know its a rough draft, but at least make it a *good* rough draft! If I saw something that cheezy/annoying/distracting/unprofessional in my newspaper, I would turn to the next page before I finished reading the title
Good intentions are there, but I need more faith in an ad that works if I'm going to shell out cash for this cause. I don't want to waste my donation money on an ad that doesn't advertise very well
Kudos to you sir. That's one of the best jokes I've heard in quite a while.
Here is a link to two proposed bills on identity protection.
One is dated July 14th 2005, while the second version is dated December 8th 2005. Get off your ass and call up your senator and tell them that you feel this bill should be passed into law to protect you as either a former victim, or possible future victim. Cite some recent examples of identity theft from the news. Tell them that this is more important to you as a citizen that they are supposed to represent, compared to whatever other "important agenda" they are talking about right now in the Senate (gay marriage, starting MORE wars with countries in the name of "freedom", etc). Don't just whine and complain because no one is going to want to listen to you. Instead, push and shove so that they will be forced to do something about it!
(Cue Braveheart moment) - FFFFFRRRRREEEEEEEDDDDDDOOOOOOMMMMMM!!!!!
Oh yeah, and don't forget to buy LOTS of stock in identity theft protect companies! Citizens will win, and irresponsible parties will lose!
Damn, just after I posted this I realized I forgot to mention another part (which parts 5 and 6 are also dependent on in the same way they are dependent on parts 1-4)
7. In the case of theft, any and all persons that may have had their information stolen in the theft must be informed within a 48 hour period upon discovery of the theft. No party may with hold or keep secret the theft any longer, or they are subject to further financial obligation to the victims.
Of course "48 hours" is something I pulled out on a whim right now, and "all persons that may be effected" can be intentionally misinterpreted by a party. In reality, if one person's information was stolen, there is a non-zero chance that everyone else had the possibility of having that information stolen.