I loved Seinfeld as much as anyone else, but after seeing Bee Movie, its obvious exactly how 1990s he is. Watching repeats of Seinfeld are great, but he isn't exactly current (granted, he would do a better job than I would).
I see this more as a throwback to when Windows was at its most popular... 10 years ago.
I agree with you about software patents (not to the same degree as you seem to, but thats a conversation for another day). While software patents are a bad idea, you have to realize that that is the system you are playing in.
You can stand on your moral grounds, but your boss won't really care about that, especially if the first he has heard of it is an aggressive stance by one of his employees. What your boss will care about is that if he isn't allowed to patent it, but his competitors are, he is at a disadvantage.
I would suggest that you talk to your boss, explain your stance, file the patents anyway and suggest to your boss that you look into alternative methods for protecting future income for the future sake. Patent reform is needed, but (unless you are really wealthy and don't need the job) I wouldn't risk your job to take a stand. Take your stand by joining an appropriate organization.
This article isn't about that, its about how they think. The information it does have, while brief, is exactly the type of information that I was expecting when I clicked the link.
I think the problem is not 'too many distros', rather that not everything that runs on distroX runs on distroY. If a standard base could be setup that still allows for distros to be unique, but also allows for them to work together a lot better, then we will see an increase in applications made for linux, both open and closed source.
As it stands, if you want to make something non-trivial that runs on a linux distro, you either need to pick your distro (at least decide between RHEL, Debian or another base), and just hope that it runs on the others.
I disagree that the market is that small. Its not large, but 1% of 1% would be too small. The reason that LaTeX doesn't have the market is because its a programmer's way of typesetting, and Word is 'easier', even if the results are poorer, take more memory and storage and are harder to make changes.
Doing my thesis in LaTeX made the process much easier, but doing things like APA formatting of the bibliography using the classes was more trouble than it should be.
If a replacement does come out, I imagine it will come from the open source side, as, like you said, the market isn't big. Its also the highly technical people both that would be able to write it and would need it, so the encouragement is there.
Also, I agree on the Knuth comment, his contribution was huge and has helped many fields. However TeX, and LaTeX, are stuck in a decade very different to ours when it comes to typesetting.
You need to consider what information is in these emails and what needs to be done with that information. Example, from my last job in a Helpdesk/IT Officer for a small business:
Email Type -> Where it goes
Request for help from IT -> Send to our helpdesk system
Serial number from supplier for appliction -> Save to our IT Auditing software, print out and file
Information on fixing a program -> Print out if needed soon, and copy information to our procedure manual folder on the network.
Look at your email more as an inbox and less of a filing system. If your upper management have taken this step, they may just decide one day (after something happens) to accidentally 'wipe' all email. If you work based on the assumption that will happen, you should be able to live with this rule.
I never had a problem with spam on GMail from when I signed up, which was in 2006, fairly soon after it opened. Only lately have I been getting spam through, but while its blocking about 1000 a month, only 2 actually got through in the last couple of months and once I reported it as spam, I haven't got any spam through since.
I was initially really careful with giving out this email address (its my actual name, so I can use it on resumes, etc), but since then, haven't been so careful, using it to signup for many sites.
The quote was poorly worded, but the idea isn't. These guys do know what they are talking about, they just oversimplified the concept for a quotable quote.
Poker strategies aren't transitive, i.e. if Player A beats Player B, then Player B beats Player C, that does not necessarily mean that Player A will beat Player C.
That said, given a distribution of players, you can still rank them in order from better players to worse players, given that distribution.
I think the point the parent was trying to make was that Poker has variance, where Chess does not. Play poker for long enough and its purely a skill game (i.e. that bad beat you got early on will be evened out by a bad beat for your opponent later). However, in practice, few people have the many years to devote to poker to get to this point.
So any single game is a matter of luck, with lots of variance. Given a sufficient amount of time, the better player will win.
This is a very ignorant view of what optimal play means. The standard example is Rock-Paper-Scissors (RoShamBo). If I play perfectly randomly, and I tell you that I am going to play perfectly randomly, there is exactly nothing you can do to beat me in the long run.
This concept can be extended to poker (and all two player zero-sum games). For a computer to play truely optimal means that it can give you its exact strategy before the match and you still won't be able to beat it. A mathematically optimal play is still the same regardless of what the opponent has. Truely optimal play hides the true nature of the hidden cards from being able to be predicted by the opponent.
If, by "mathematically optimum poker", you mean immediate pot odds, then you are right. Its easily beatable, however that is certainly not what mathematically optimal poker is. I suggest reading "The Mathematics of Poker" (http://www.amazon.com/Mathematics-Poker-Bill-Chen/dp/1886070253), it will absolutely change your mind into how mathematics can be used.
So every OS should run tasks at root level without some form of verifacation first?
I'm not saying the Linux does this (I have no idea), but in general, its a bad idea for this to happen.
Its a well known fact that Microsoft will not fix many security holes it finds until they have been made public. I'd much rather have them forced into releasing the patch soon, as opposed to a few black hat researchers knowing and exploiting this for many years until someone else publically posts the information.
The problem with IT as opposed to the other jobs you listed is that IT is often a thankless job with no clear gratifacation for a job well done. Those other jobs, you can see the result of your work, but often in IT (especially if you are responsible for things such as "uptime" and QA) there isn't a clear indication and can often result is a severe lack of any closure after a day of work. Build this up over a long time and you have a recipe for poor mental health (stress, anger, resentment).
I haven't even been working for 12 years, so I can't say I know how the poster feels, but I have been working non-stop with a part time job and full time uni (trying to get first class honours to get into a doctorate, so no slacking) and I have been told that it is critical that you spend leisure time away from your work, otherwise you will be worse for wear because of it. So my recommendation is to take some time off, take a holiday somewhere you would actually enjoy (don't go to the beach if you hate the sun, don't go skiing if you hate the cold) and if you come back and still find that you can't take it, ask your manager if there is a different role you can take on for a while to get a change of work experience. If they can't you may need to change jobs and move to a different area, but don't leave your current job without a new one.
At work, we run a Lotus Notes 6.5 shop and are due for upgrade soon. Unless we get higher end computers, Lotus Notes 8 will be slow to run even for everyday things. There is an update 8.1 that is either due out soon or out now, that is supposed to make it more friendly for lower end computers, but if it fails to do that, we will end up going with Outlook as we can't afford to buy high end computers for every seat just because of the requirements of one of our core programs. We have tested it in our environment and anything under 2gb just doesn't cut it. That is too much for a program that (at the time of testing) was just doing email.
So I wouldn't look at new newer aggressive pricing as a sign to look further into it, more as an act of desperation to make a bloated program seem more accessible.
While I am on the subject, most enterprise software these days has become overly bloated with features added without considering the disadvantages, usually in speed and memory usage. Until businesses start considering these aspects though, it isn't a trend that is likely to stop anytime soon.
Any interesting non-trivial problem suffers from a lack of data. I agree though that a lot of the teams are suffering from a movement of copying the top teams and hoping to get lucky by adding incremental improvements.
The winner of Netflix will probably be someone that took the problem from a completely new angle. Eventually the increments will reach there, as new algorithms are tweaked and edited to reach the milestone, but I'm guessing that someone will come along and take the prize another way before that happens.
Slashdot Mirror
I loved Seinfeld as much as anyone else, but after seeing Bee Movie, its obvious exactly how 1990s he is. Watching repeats of Seinfeld are great, but he isn't exactly current (granted, he would do a better job than I would).
I see this more as a throwback to when Windows was at its most popular... 10 years ago.
I agree with you about software patents (not to the same degree as you seem to, but thats a conversation for another day). While software patents are a bad idea, you have to realize that that is the system you are playing in.
You can stand on your moral grounds, but your boss won't really care about that, especially if the first he has heard of it is an aggressive stance by one of his employees. What your boss will care about is that if he isn't allowed to patent it, but his competitors are, he is at a disadvantage.
I would suggest that you talk to your boss, explain your stance, file the patents anyway and suggest to your boss that you look into alternative methods for protecting future income for the future sake. Patent reform is needed, but (unless you are really wealthy and don't need the job) I wouldn't risk your job to take a stand. Take your stand by joining an appropriate organization.
Ubuntu can easily handle a FAT16, but has trouble handling a FAT32. It needs more practice I suppose.
This article isn't about that, its about how they think. The information it does have, while brief, is exactly the type of information that I was expecting when I clicked the link.
I think the problem is not 'too many distros', rather that not everything that runs on distroX runs on distroY. If a standard base could be setup that still allows for distros to be unique, but also allows for them to work together a lot better, then we will see an increase in applications made for linux, both open and closed source.
As it stands, if you want to make something non-trivial that runs on a linux distro, you either need to pick your distro (at least decide between RHEL, Debian or another base), and just hope that it runs on the others.
If they wouldn't let him sign up, he would of gone elsewhere. With a monopoly, this isn't an option.
I disagree that the market is that small. Its not large, but 1% of 1% would be too small.
The reason that LaTeX doesn't have the market is because its a programmer's way of typesetting, and Word is 'easier', even if the results are poorer, take more memory and storage and are harder to make changes.
Doing my thesis in LaTeX made the process much easier, but doing things like APA formatting of the bibliography using the classes was more trouble than it should be.
If a replacement does come out, I imagine it will come from the open source side, as, like you said, the market isn't big. Its also the highly technical people both that would be able to write it and would need it, so the encouragement is there.
Also, I agree on the Knuth comment, his contribution was huge and has helped many fields. However TeX, and LaTeX, are stuck in a decade very different to ours when it comes to typesetting.
Given the huge number of WW2 games that appeared a couple of years ago, "pre-war gamer" sounds right.
You need to consider what information is in these emails and what needs to be done with that information. Example, from my last job in a Helpdesk/IT Officer for a small business:
Email Type -> Where it goes
Request for help from IT -> Send to our helpdesk system
Serial number from supplier for appliction -> Save to our IT Auditing software, print out and file
Information on fixing a program -> Print out if needed soon, and copy information to our procedure manual folder on the network.
Look at your email more as an inbox and less of a filing system. If your upper management have taken this step, they may just decide one day (after something happens) to accidentally 'wipe' all email. If you work based on the assumption that will happen, you should be able to live with this rule.
See kids, this is why you shouldn't say "first post", even if you think you are...
I believe the problem with this is outlined in this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosecutor's_fallacy
Have a read. It shows that you can't trust statistics when you only have half of the picture, and why it can be so dangerous to do so.
I never had a problem with spam on GMail from when I signed up, which was in 2006, fairly soon after it opened. Only lately have I been getting spam through, but while its blocking about 1000 a month, only 2 actually got through in the last couple of months and once I reported it as spam, I haven't got any spam through since.
I was initially really careful with giving out this email address (its my actual name, so I can use it on resumes, etc), but since then, haven't been so careful, using it to signup for many sites.
The quote was poorly worded, but the idea isn't. These guys do know what they are talking about, they just oversimplified the concept for a quotable quote.
Skill is vastly UNDERestimated in poker.
Poker strategies aren't transitive, i.e. if Player A beats Player B, then Player B beats Player C, that does not necessarily mean that Player A will beat Player C.
That said, given a distribution of players, you can still rank them in order from better players to worse players, given that distribution.
I think the point the parent was trying to make was that Poker has variance, where Chess does not. Play poker for long enough and its purely a skill game (i.e. that bad beat you got early on will be evened out by a bad beat for your opponent later). However, in practice, few people have the many years to devote to poker to get to this point.
So any single game is a matter of luck, with lots of variance. Given a sufficient amount of time, the better player will win.
This is a very ignorant view of what optimal play means. The standard example is Rock-Paper-Scissors (RoShamBo). If I play perfectly randomly, and I tell you that I am going to play perfectly randomly, there is exactly nothing you can do to beat me in the long run. This concept can be extended to poker (and all two player zero-sum games). For a computer to play truely optimal means that it can give you its exact strategy before the match and you still won't be able to beat it. A mathematically optimal play is still the same regardless of what the opponent has. Truely optimal play hides the true nature of the hidden cards from being able to be predicted by the opponent. If, by "mathematically optimum poker", you mean immediate pot odds, then you are right. Its easily beatable, however that is certainly not what mathematically optimal poker is. I suggest reading "The Mathematics of Poker" (http://www.amazon.com/Mathematics-Poker-Bill-Chen/dp/1886070253), it will absolutely change your mind into how mathematics can be used.
So every OS should run tasks at root level without some form of verifacation first? I'm not saying the Linux does this (I have no idea), but in general, its a bad idea for this to happen.
Its a well known fact that Microsoft will not fix many security holes it finds until they have been made public. I'd much rather have them forced into releasing the patch soon, as opposed to a few black hat researchers knowing and exploiting this for many years until someone else publically posts the information.
Phoenix Mars Lander Touched Down 2 Hours ago
Please, nobody uses emacs anymore...
The problem with IT as opposed to the other jobs you listed is that IT is often a thankless job with no clear gratifacation for a job well done. Those other jobs, you can see the result of your work, but often in IT (especially if you are responsible for things such as "uptime" and QA) there isn't a clear indication and can often result is a severe lack of any closure after a day of work. Build this up over a long time and you have a recipe for poor mental health (stress, anger, resentment).
I haven't even been working for 12 years, so I can't say I know how the poster feels, but I have been working non-stop with a part time job and full time uni (trying to get first class honours to get into a doctorate, so no slacking) and I have been told that it is critical that you spend leisure time away from your work, otherwise you will be worse for wear because of it. So my recommendation is to take some time off, take a holiday somewhere you would actually enjoy (don't go to the beach if you hate the sun, don't go skiing if you hate the cold) and if you come back and still find that you can't take it, ask your manager if there is a different role you can take on for a while to get a change of work experience. If they can't you may need to change jobs and move to a different area, but don't leave your current job without a new one.
I have never used 7, and my manager didn't like it. Therefore, we won't move to it.
I have read many reports saying that it isn't worth the effort, but I could be wrong.
At work, we run a Lotus Notes 6.5 shop and are due for upgrade soon. Unless we get higher end computers, Lotus Notes 8 will be slow to run even for everyday things. There is an update 8.1 that is either due out soon or out now, that is supposed to make it more friendly for lower end computers, but if it fails to do that, we will end up going with Outlook as we can't afford to buy high end computers for every seat just because of the requirements of one of our core programs. We have tested it in our environment and anything under 2gb just doesn't cut it. That is too much for a program that (at the time of testing) was just doing email.
So I wouldn't look at new newer aggressive pricing as a sign to look further into it, more as an act of desperation to make a bloated program seem more accessible.
While I am on the subject, most enterprise software these days has become overly bloated with features added without considering the disadvantages, usually in speed and memory usage. Until businesses start considering these aspects though, it isn't a trend that is likely to stop anytime soon.
Absolutely not! We wouldn't want to make kidnapping and murder seem more serious then they really are!
Any interesting non-trivial problem suffers from a lack of data. I agree though that a lot of the teams are suffering from a movement of copying the top teams and hoping to get lucky by adding incremental improvements.
The winner of Netflix will probably be someone that took the problem from a completely new angle. Eventually the increments will reach there, as new algorithms are tweaked and edited to reach the milestone, but I'm guessing that someone will come along and take the prize another way before that happens.