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User: wcrowe

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  1. Re:I'm with you to some extent on Ask Slashdot: What's the Harm In a Default Setting For Div By Zero? · · Score: 1

    I know, but you can't account for every person's actions and every variable.

  2. "opt-in" = sodomy on SourceForge Suspends Independent Project Mirroring · · Score: 2

    " With that in mind, SourceForge pledges to present third-party offers only with the projects that explicitly opted-in to that program."

    These days, whenever I see a company or organization use the phrase "opt-in", I immediately tune out anything else that is said, and decide I want nothing more to do with that company or organization.

  3. Re:I'm with you to some extent on Ask Slashdot: What's the Harm In a Default Setting For Div By Zero? · · Score: 1

    Here's an example. Your company has contracts to sell diesel fuel to a couple of thousand trucking company customers, who need to know what your quoted price is going to be every day, so that they can dispatch their trucks. So there is a program that runs at 3:00am that calculates and sends out the quoted prices to these customers. Meanwhile, Susie Mushferbrains, a college intern, forgot to enter some minor data which is needed for a job that happens to run at 2:55am in the same job queue as the diesel fuel quotes program. So, at 2:55:13am there is a divide by zero error which holds up everything in the job queue, and nobody notices this until 8am the next morning. Because the diesel fuel quotes didn't go out, the various trucking company dispachers are routing their vehicles to your competitor's stores and you lose several million dollars that day in revenue.

    It would be better if the system would just plug in 0 and send out a warning rather than crash a program because, OMG! bad math!

  4. Re:I'm with you to some extent on Ask Slashdot: What's the Harm In a Default Setting For Div By Zero? · · Score: 1

    That's not what I'm saying. When you have a number of critical jobs that have to be run, you don't want all of them held up because some idiot somewhere forgot to put in, for instance, the number of students, and now there is a divide by zero error that brings everything to a standstill. In this case, it is far better to take the chance of paying out $10,000 accidentally (something that will probably be caught by someone before it becomes a problem), than the chance of losing $10 million because some other critical job did not get executed at the right time.

  5. I'm with you to some extent on Ask Slashdot: What's the Harm In a Default Setting For Div By Zero? · · Score: 1

    I know that in a business setting, making x/0 = 0 would be okay. At least it has always been okay in my 30+ years of experience. But I think the problem lies at a very low level, that is, the CPU cannot divide something by zero. I am pretty sure this is why it is, universally, an error.

  6. They just need to hire more sociopaths on USAF Cuts Drone Flights As Stress Drives Off Operators · · Score: 1, Insightful

    This should be no problem. They just need to hire more sociopaths and psychopaths. Corporate America is filled with such people, most of whom are middle managers. Other areas to mine are collection agencies, repo agencies, and Audi drivers. A lot of those people would be perfectly content to spend all day killing humans remotely, then going home to the wife and kids. The military just needs to lower their physical standards a bit.

  7. Re:Legal but not moral? on Writer: "Why I Defaulted On My Student Loans" · · Score: 1

    I hate responding to my own post, but I mis-wrote that I got my first student loan 40 years after he did. I meant to say that I got the loan 10 years after the author. I hope my post makes more sense now.

  8. Legal but not moral? on Writer: "Why I Defaulted On My Student Loans" · · Score: 2

    The writer describes the student loan process as being "legal but not moral". Considering when he got his student loan, and how he got it, I don't understand his perception of the loan as being "not moral". I took out my first student loan about 40 years after he did, in 1984. That was a different time. College was not nearly as expensive, and paying back loans was not as difficult. All of my student loans together added up to about 40% of the annual income from my first job. These days, comparable loans would probably come to about 120% of the annual income of a first job. The first obligation is something that could be satisfied in a few years. The latter, modern obligation might well never be satisfied. One might argue that the modern system, with towering loans to complete useless degree programs is immoral, but that was not the situation 40 years ago, or even 30 years ago.

    What is immoral is not paying back what you borrowed. A couple of his suggestions for handling the situation are totally outrageous, most notably, that one should marry someone who has a good credit rating. Really? His life philosophy is to burden someone else with the consequences of his bad decisions?

  9. Something about the steam catapult on Watch the US Navy Test Its Electromagnetic Jet Fighter Catapult · · Score: 1

    I was in the Navy from 1980 to 1991 and served in two different squadrons aboard USS America (CV-66) and USS Eisenhower (CV-69). For much of that time I worked on the flight deck. I'm glad the EM catapults are more reliable and require less maintenance. I am sure sailors and aviators alike will not miss cold cat shots and fires in the cat tracks. Nevertheless, the rising vapor from the steam catapults added a kind of surrealism to the job. I'll miss the "theatrics".

     

  10. Re:They still sell those? on Opening Fixed-Code Garage Doors With a Toy In 10 Seconds · · Score: 1

    It's one of those appliances that lasts a long time and a lot of people don't think about it. I replaced my old style door about a year and a half ago, and the only reason I replaced it was because I installed it in 1995 and it suddenly occurred to me that it was easy to break into. Mechanically, the old opener worked perfectly. I am glad the new door installer wanted the old unit (he builds automatic flag-raising systems with them). At least the old unit didn't go to waste.

  11. Re:Anti-robo call service on PayPal Will Be Able To Robo-Text/Call Users With No Opt-out Starting July 1 · · Score: 1

    It appears that they intend to make their money from commercial customers. The service does not work with most cell providers, but it's new, so we'll see.

  12. I closed my account on PayPal Will Be Able To Robo-Text/Call Users With No Opt-out Starting July 1 · · Score: 1

    I just closed my Paypal account. I hardly ever used it anyway, so I am sure I can live without it. Surprisingly, they made it pretty easy to close the account.

  13. Re:$ type 2 ? on The Artificial Pancreas For Diabetics Is Nearly Here · · Score: 1

    I was quoting the percentage off the top of my head. The number is actually lower. Here is an article on the CDC study that the numbers come from:

    http://www.livescience.com/256...

    I've been living with diabetes for over 12 years now. At one point I had lost 110 pounds through diet and exercise. At first my situation improved, but over time it got worse. I now live life as a type 1 diabetic.

    You can certainly live better with diabetes through lifestyle changes, I'm not going to argue that. But for most type 2s, treatment will eventually still include medications and even insulin injections.

  14. Re:$ type 2 ? on The Artificial Pancreas For Diabetics Is Nearly Here · · Score: 1

    Cute. Yes, lifestyle changes make a difference for about 20% of type 2 diabetics, but for the rest, treating the disease is elusive. There are a lot of type 2 diabetics who are not overweight and follow healthy eating habits. There are a lot of obese people who never develop type 2 diabetes.
     

  15. Not enough people with the required capacity on Clinton Foundation: Kids' Lack of CS Savvy Threatens the US Economy · · Score: 1

    You know, in the past, they used to equate the amount of skill and experience it took to be a good coder to being similar with a skilled surgeon. There is some truth in that. In fact, being a surgeon is easier because you don't have to worry about basic human anatomy changing every few years. In IT, however, platforms and languages evolve and your skillset has to cope with these changes all the time.

    Now they would have us believe that you can take regular people, and teach them to be "skilled surgeons" in a short period of time.

    The reason there is a shortage of good coders is because it takes a lot more intelligence, skill and discipline than most people realize. There are simply not enough people with the capacity it takes to meet the demand.

  16. Because stupid managers on Survey: 2/3 of Public Sector Workers Wouldn't Report a Security Breach · · Score: 1

    A few years ago, at the company I work for, we got a spec to build an interface that would send passwords, in the open, to a vendor. Several of us warned upper management of the foolishness of this idea, but despite multiple attempts to push back on this request, management insisted that the process be written this way, so that is what was done. Perhaps 64% of employees would stay quiet about a security breach because so many managers are universally, fucking stupid, and it is always dangerous to tell the emperor that he has no clothes.

  17. Miracles, yo on New Device Could Greatly Improve Speech and Image Recognition · · Score: 3, Funny

    After reading that summary I feel like a juggalo. "...F*cking magnonics, how do they work?.."

  18. Reminds me of an old joke on 17-Year-Old Radio Astronomy Mystery Traced Back To Kitchen Microwave · · Score: 1

    Patient: "Doctor, I get a sharp pain in my eye when I drink my tea."

    Doctor: "Take the spoon out of the cup."

    This is basically the same thing.

  19. It's a hoax! on Opportunity Rover Reaches Martian Day 4,000 of Its 90-Day Mission · · Score: 5, Funny

    Of course it's lasted more than 90 days. That's because Opportunity never landed on Mars. All the images are created in a secret NASA location in Nevada.

    Now if you'll excuse me I have to go monitor the Jade Helm Texas takeover.

  20. WTF? on Long Uptime Makes Boeing 787 Lose Electrical Power · · Score: 1

    What I'm hearing here is not a story about a potential software bug. I'm hearing about a serious design problem. An airplane should not be so reliant on software that it shut down if the software is not working.

    I was in Naval aviation. The 1960's - era A-7's I worked on for most of my career had redundant systems. There was even an air-stream-driven generator that could be deployed in the event of engine failure that would not only supply electrical power, but provide a minimum amount of hydraulic power to critical systems so that the plane had a chance of safely landing.

    I can't believe we're designing aircraft that can carry hundreds of people that lacks redundant systems and can literally fall out of the sky due to a simple software glitch. Have I read this wrong? Are they exaggerating the danger in this article?

  21. Enjoy it while it lasts on Internet Customers Surpass Cable Subscribers At Comcast · · Score: 1

    Currently the internet is taking over television. Unfortunately this is a temporary situation. Once the telcoms, ISPs, etc get enough lobbying money funneled into congress, net neutrality will disappear and cable TV will be back in business bigger than ever. With their monopolies on internet access, ISPs will be able to control what you see, and when you see it; will be able to insert advertising wherever and whenever they want; and will be able to charge you an arm and a leg for it. The future of the internet is cable TV version 2.0.

  22. Save the GOP; Save the Elephants on House Panel Holds Hearing On "Politically Driven Science" - Without Scientists · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm still registered as a Republican and I agree with this. Many years ago, when my daughter was little, I remember her picking up a discarded coke can and placing it in a trash bin at the park. A young man standing nearby said, in the kind of patronizing voice that some people use with children, "Yes, people should learn to recycle." I responded, "I would settle for them just throwning away their trash properly." My point being, that teaching recycling while people are just tossing trash around is putting the cart before the horse. Twenty years down the road, and the situation is worse than ever. I have actually witnessed people just open their car window and toss out the McDonald's bag without even slowing down. How can you expect people to understand something as complex as global warming when you can't even get them to put their garbage in the trash can?

    Maybe a good start is to show Republicans that their vaunted mascot for their party, the elephant, is going extinct. They might deny global warming, but it's pretty hard for them to deny the fact that elephants are disappearing from the planet, mainly due to people. Maybe we could get them to see the disappearance of the elephants as a harbinger of their own loss of popularity. Perhaps if we could get the GOP to save their pachyderms, they could learn something important in the process.

  23. Re:God bless and keep you, Yeoman Rand on Actress Grace Lee Whitney, Star Trek's Yeoman Janice Rand, Has Died · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Indeed. I recall what St. Nikolai Velimirovic said about death:

    "Think of yourself as though you were dead, I say to myself, and you will not feel the coming of death. Blunt the barb of death during life, and when it comes it will not have the means to sting. Think of yourself every morning as a newborn miracle, and you will not feel old age. Do not wait for death to come, because death has indeed already come and has not left you. Its teeth are continually in your flesh. Whatever was living before your birth and whatever will survive your death--that even now is alive within you."

  24. Re:30% on ESPN Sues Verizon To Stop New Sports-Free TV Bundles · · Score: 1

    I don't think the super bowl statistic is meaningful. The only reason I watched the superbowl this year is because I was invited to a party in which the event was featured. I went to the party to socialize and have fun -- an endeavor in which I was successful. I didn't give a crap about either team and, in fact, do not even remember who was playing.

  25. Re:Instead... on 'Mobilegeddon': Google To Punish Mobile-Hostile Sites Starting Today · · Score: 1

    That's exactly what I was thinking. Wikipedia does have mobile-friendly pages. I don't understand what tfs is talking about.