FORTRAN was the only programming language I used for the first 20 or so years of my career, starting in 1964, first as an applied math student, and then as a scientist. I see that it is common today to ridicule it, and it is not much taught, nor are there many jobs for FORTRAN programmers today. It is true that FORTRAN progamming in the early days was difficult; and this has given FORTRAN a somewhat poor reputation. However, FORTRAN is not today a bad language, and it probably should be used more for purposes (math-science-engineering) that suit it.
There were, IMO, three main reasons why writing and debugging programs was more difficult and time-consuming in those days:
First, the techniques and procedures of programming were not well understood, and were therefore not well taught, in the 1960s. One had to learn, year by year, partly by trial and error and partly by reading about new thinking in the field, to program better. One had to learn about consistent, well-organized, readable style, systematic testing and bug-finding, avoidance of methods that caused buggy programs, and so on. As the skill and science of computing matured, techniques improved, and programmers were able to be more productive.
Second, FORTRAN itself had to mature (as other posters have noted). When it was first created in the 1950s, as the first real programming language, the techniques of writing a good programming language were not understood. Therefore the first versions of FORTRAN lacked important features (such as IF-THEN-ELSE constructions), and programming with these versions was troublesome. However, later versions of FORTRAN are much better; FORTRAN 77 is usable, and current FORTRAN is reasonably good. I might add that I think it might be easier to write reliable code in modern FORTRAN than in C; C has bug-inducing pitfalls such as "pointers" and IMO is less readable than FORTRAN.
Third, the technical resources available in "the bad old days" were by today's standards poor. Programs had to be punched onto cards. Since one's workplace did not generally have its own computer, one had to hand carry the deck of cards to an available computer (in my experience sometimes a half-hour trip each way). One generally had to wait several hours for the output, so there would be only 1-2 turnarounds possible a day. Output was on the old-fashioned large-format computer paper. One's only record of past work on a project was a bulky and cumbersome stack of this paper output.
FORTRAN tended in time to become a scapegoat for the difficulties caused by poor programming practices and now-antiquated resources. Those problems that were in fact caused by the old-type FORTRAN have been mostly eliminated in later versions.
A study cited in the original post estimates that crop production would decrease in case of global warming. I think that this is still uncertain. In general, given increased temperature and the same wetness to dryness balance, crop production should increase with warmth because the growing season becomes longer. If the climate becomes dryer, it is true, crop production could decrease. However, if the weather becomes warmer, evaporation becomes greater, which probably leads to greater rainfall amount. Also, farmers would adjust their practices to the new conditions. Therefore I think the trend in future crop production is still in doubt.
The Bible has two creation stories - and they contradict each other.
The more well known story - I will call it Creation A - is described in Genesis 1 to 2:3. The other story - I will call it Creation B - is described in the rest of Genesis 2. Consider some of the differences:
Creation A
- Man created the sixth day
- Man created after the plants
- Mankind created in God's image
- Many humans created, of both sexes ("male and female He created them"), but not woman from man
Creation B
- Man created the first day ("in the day the Lord God made the Earth and the Heavens... the Lord God formed man")
- Man created "when no plant of the field was yet in the Earth"
- Man created from dust (no mention of "God's image")
- One man created first (Adam), then one woman from the man's rib (Eve)
Easy to find near Earth asteroids - those of at least a few hundred meters diameter and with a favorable orbit - seem to be already mostly discovered. NASA statistics (on their Near Earth Object (NEO) website) suggest that the rate of new discoveries of easy to find objects is slowing, suggesting that there are not many of these left. Therefore the future strategy has to concentrate increasingly on finding and tracking the more difficult objects. This would be done partly with new earth and space based telescopes as suggested in the original post and partly by effective use of existing equipment.
It should be emphasized that finding the asteroid is less than half the job. After finding the asteroid it is necessary to track it long enough and well enough to get an accurate orbit calculation. If this is not done, the asteroid sighting becomes almost useless because the orbit is poorly predicted. The asteroid will thus probably never be found again if it is small. In addition, the list of potential impact hazards is cluttered by an increasing number of poorly resolved asteroid orbits with very small impact probabilities.
A few strategies that can be employed are:
- More use of observatories in the Southern Hemisphere, to track objects in the southern sky, and also to improve asteroid finding in the northern summer (southern winter)
- Observing the sky closer to the sun's position (lower elongation), to study objects that remain entirely within the Earth's orbit and objects that cross near the Earth's orbit
- Observing every day of the month, even near full moon, to track objects whose apparent brightness is decreasing rapidly (there are a few such objects on NASA's NEO hazard list right now, just after full moon)
As a Canadian, I remember we went through this sort of thing the last time the Olympic Winter Games were held in Canada, in Calgary, in the year 1988.
There was a whack-a-mole attack on anything "infringing". God forbid you should use the word "Olympic". If an eatery in Toronto's Greek immigrant district was called "Olympic Restaurant", demands would be made to change the name.
This campaign reached its peak (IIRC) when demands were made that Olympic Airways, the national airline of Greece, stop flying to Canada under that name. The issue got some embarrassing press coverage. As a result, "Olympic Airways" was allowed to continue, on condition that it provide some free trips to the organization running the games.
It seems to me that the Olympic Games, like other businesses, is entitled to reasonable copyright and trademark protection. However, I am uneasy about special laws and draconian enforcement for the purpose.
I agree with a lot of the comments here. The GUI design of Safari is good; however, the low level functioning needs an overhaul.
I also find the persistent "memory leak" problem referred to by others. In addition, when an page is slow to load - and the "beachball" is going - I often cannot cancel the page load by clicking the "X" button; the application will not respond.
In fact there are scenarios in which a hazardous asteroid, not previously discovered, could strike by surprise. This is possible even with an asteroid larger than Apophis, and with best surveillance efforts.
It is difficult to see an asteroid that is close in angular direction to the sun, and that direction is usually not the target of systematic surveillance. Hence an asteroid coming from inside the Earth's orbit towards the Earth might not be seen.
Another problem is that for about ten days a lunar month, telescopes are partly "blinded" by the light of the full moon. That is enough time for an asteroid to approach from a considerable distance.
I don't mean to be alarmist; the risk per year of a serious strike is very small. However, we cannot at present see all risks in advance. Decades from now, our knowledge may be better.
Slashdot Mirror
... but JESUS is not!
FORTRAN was the only programming language I used for the first 20 or so years of my career, starting in 1964, first as an applied math student, and then as a scientist. I see that it is common today to ridicule it, and it is not much taught, nor are there many jobs for FORTRAN programmers today. It is true that FORTRAN progamming in the early days was difficult; and this has given FORTRAN a somewhat poor reputation. However, FORTRAN is not today a bad language, and it probably should be used more for purposes (math-science-engineering) that suit it.
There were, IMO, three main reasons why writing and debugging programs was more difficult and time-consuming in those days:
First, the techniques and procedures of programming were not well understood, and were therefore not well taught, in the 1960s. One had to learn, year by year, partly by trial and error and partly by reading about new thinking in the field, to program better. One had to learn about consistent, well-organized, readable style, systematic testing and bug-finding, avoidance of methods that caused buggy programs, and so on. As the skill and science of computing matured, techniques improved, and programmers were able to be more productive.
Second, FORTRAN itself had to mature (as other posters have noted). When it was first created in the 1950s, as the first real programming language, the techniques of writing a good programming language were not understood. Therefore the first versions of FORTRAN lacked important features (such as IF-THEN-ELSE constructions), and programming with these versions was troublesome. However, later versions of FORTRAN are much better; FORTRAN 77 is usable, and current FORTRAN is reasonably good. I might add that I think it might be easier to write reliable code in modern FORTRAN than in C; C has bug-inducing pitfalls such as "pointers" and IMO is less readable than FORTRAN.
Third, the technical resources available in "the bad old days" were by today's standards poor. Programs had to be punched onto cards. Since one's workplace did not generally have its own computer, one had to hand carry the deck of cards to an available computer (in my experience sometimes a half-hour trip each way). One generally had to wait several hours for the output, so there would be only 1-2 turnarounds possible a day. Output was on the old-fashioned large-format computer paper. One's only record of past work on a project was a bulky and cumbersome stack of this paper output.
FORTRAN tended in time to become a scapegoat for the difficulties caused by poor programming practices and now-antiquated resources. Those problems that were in fact caused by the old-type FORTRAN have been mostly eliminated in later versions.
A study cited in the original post estimates that crop production would decrease in case of global warming. I think that this is still uncertain. In general, given increased temperature and the same wetness to dryness balance, crop production should increase with warmth because the growing season becomes longer. If the climate becomes dryer, it is true, crop production could decrease. However, if the weather becomes warmer, evaporation becomes greater, which probably leads to greater rainfall amount. Also, farmers would adjust their practices to the new conditions. Therefore I think the trend in future crop production is still in doubt.
The Bible has two creation stories - and they contradict each other.
... the Lord God formed man")
The more well known story - I will call it Creation A - is described in Genesis 1 to 2:3. The other story - I will call it Creation B - is described in the rest of Genesis 2. Consider some of the differences:
Creation A
- Man created the sixth day
- Man created after the plants
- Mankind created in God's image
- Many humans created, of both sexes ("male and female He created them"), but not woman from man
Creation B
- Man created the first day ("in the day the Lord God made the Earth and the Heavens
- Man created "when no plant of the field was yet in the Earth"
- Man created from dust (no mention of "God's image")
- One man created first (Adam), then one woman from the man's rib (Eve)
Easy to find near Earth asteroids - those of at least a few hundred meters diameter and with a favorable orbit - seem to be already mostly discovered. NASA statistics (on their Near Earth Object (NEO) website) suggest that the rate of new discoveries of easy to find objects is slowing, suggesting that there are not many of these left. Therefore the future strategy has to concentrate increasingly on finding and tracking the more difficult objects. This would be done partly with new earth and space based telescopes as suggested in the original post and partly by effective use of existing equipment.
It should be emphasized that finding the asteroid is less than half the job. After finding the asteroid it is necessary to track it long enough and well enough to get an accurate orbit calculation. If this is not done, the asteroid sighting becomes almost useless because the orbit is poorly predicted. The asteroid will thus probably never be found again if it is small. In addition, the list of potential impact hazards is cluttered by an increasing number of poorly resolved asteroid orbits with very small impact probabilities.
A few strategies that can be employed are:
- More use of observatories in the Southern Hemisphere, to track objects in the southern sky, and also to improve asteroid finding in the northern summer (southern winter)
- Observing the sky closer to the sun's position (lower elongation), to study objects that remain entirely within the Earth's orbit and objects that cross near the Earth's orbit
- Observing every day of the month, even near full moon, to track objects whose apparent brightness is decreasing rapidly (there are a few such objects on NASA's NEO hazard list right now, just after full moon)
As a Canadian, I remember we went through this sort of thing the last time the Olympic Winter Games were held in Canada, in Calgary, in the year 1988.
There was a whack-a-mole attack on anything "infringing". God forbid you should use the word "Olympic". If an eatery in Toronto's Greek immigrant district was called "Olympic Restaurant", demands would be made to change the name.
This campaign reached its peak (IIRC) when demands were made that Olympic Airways, the national airline of Greece, stop flying to Canada under that name. The issue got some embarrassing press coverage. As a result, "Olympic Airways" was allowed to continue, on condition that it provide some free trips to the organization running the games.
It seems to me that the Olympic Games, like other businesses, is entitled to reasonable copyright and trademark protection. However, I am uneasy about special laws and draconian enforcement for the purpose.
I agree with a lot of the comments here. The GUI design of Safari is good; however, the low level functioning needs an overhaul.
I also find the persistent "memory leak" problem referred to by others. In addition, when an page is slow to load - and the "beachball" is going - I often cannot cancel the page load by clicking the "X" button; the application will not respond.
In fact there are scenarios in which a hazardous asteroid, not previously discovered, could strike by surprise. This is possible even with an asteroid larger than Apophis, and with best surveillance efforts. It is difficult to see an asteroid that is close in angular direction to the sun, and that direction is usually not the target of systematic surveillance. Hence an asteroid coming from inside the Earth's orbit towards the Earth might not be seen. Another problem is that for about ten days a lunar month, telescopes are partly "blinded" by the light of the full moon. That is enough time for an asteroid to approach from a considerable distance. I don't mean to be alarmist; the risk per year of a serious strike is very small. However, we cannot at present see all risks in advance. Decades from now, our knowledge may be better.
Another quote from Bush:
"I want it to be said that the Bush administration was a results-oriented administration"
- and now, of course, we see the results.