Print out all your code (a2ps -2r is helpful here)
find a conference room with a big table
spread out all the code after hours
start top-to-bottom and cross out dead code
annotate functions with comments as you go along
repeat top-to-bottom passes until you don't understand anything more
type the comments in when you get back to your desk
repeat tomorrow
I'd be curious to see how quickly it takes you to totally understand it (I've done this before and it really helped). I think your thought processes engage differently when you can visually see the whole program at once to get your mind around its entire scope, at which point you can then zoom in on the specifics. Compare this with looking at the program in a sliding window (your terminal or IDE) piece by piece and you'll see what I mean.
Do you really think a prof (probably at stage 2-4) is afraid that they'll be made redundent by google, or is more like they're annoyed by idiots at stage 1 who think they've got everything worked out already.
Getting annoyed by contact with people at level 1 is like getting angry at the law of gravity (or more poignantly, evolution). If a professor is surprised, annoyed, and frustrated everytime s/he meets one of the large group of people at that level, then the prof still has some learning and adjustment to do -- and is still at a sort of level 1 of his/her own.
However, the moment you get to Windows XP and recent versions of Office, you hit the dreaded Product Activation bugaboo.
Then this request comes right in time -- the problem is currently an inconvenience solvable by virtualization, and comes with its own handy cautionary tale. If they immediately stop using Office products that require activation or run on platforms that do, it's obvious that they're saving themselves from something worse than a simple inconvenience down the line.
Frankly, I think Linspire got some things right. While other
people are saying, "Linux is secure, and we don't really have
consumer-level antivirus software for it", their number one request from
their new consumer-os-acclimated customers (I can't remember the article,
but I believe it was an interview) was for antivirus software -- so they
provided an antivirus offering.
From a business perspective, this looks like a one-banana
problem and solution. Maybe I haven't looked, but I haven't seen that kind
of attitude from other distributions or the rest of the community.
Slashdot had a book review on micro ISV's, and I personally like Joel Spolsky's take on things. I'm a wage slave, but it seems like these would be good places to start when looking at this stuff, open-source or no.
You may also want to consider this story, and consider that you might not have to completely open-source your software to satisfy your paying customers.
I think that the kids are pretty stupid to post photos of themselves doing illegal things on the Internet,
And while it's not the administrators' job to be scouring facebook, hopefully the kids will be 'learning' a 'lesson', making them less 'stupid'. Shouldn't a school, whether it happens through a rigid, boring civics class curriculum or through other means, educate its attendees? Or actually care enough to play parent when the parents aren't?
Of course it's likely that the admins are just trying to protect themselves, play righteous, or feel like they have to 'do something' when this sort of thing is 'brought to their attention'. I can't say I'm surprised when someone posts photos of themselves breaking the law, that they get in trouble, and that this isn't a reasonable lesson to learn about where the law and privacy intersect in the US.
Worst of all, the strcpy() function seemed to imply "buffer overflow is no great concern, we're not even going to give you a single argument on this very dangerous function to help you avert it". It was a false parsimony to save that extra argument in the default case.
Aren't you being a bit harsh? When programmers used two digits instead of four to represent the current year, they saved a not-insignificant amount of memory for that time without any serious repercussions.
Now if you'll excuse me, this new show called 'Enterprise' is on. The special effects are cool, but what I like most is the original concept, about Earth's first foray into deep space. I like the fresh face who plays the captain; I hope he goes on to do another TV show.
Didn't some major clothing designer (Tommy Hilfiger or Abercrombie and Fitch) actually tell their employees to allow shoplifting but to note which clothes were being shoplifted, to spot clothing trends in lower-class urban youth? I think I read this something like ten years ago. Isn't this similar (and can someone provide corroboration for this)?
Re:Perl 6: The Language of the Future (... Forever
on
State of the Onion 11
·
· Score: 1
A language with a clean design means that you can collaborate with others.
On the other hand, not having a release date can make your project into a massive vaporware joke... for example, Duke Nukem Forever.
I don't think you have to have a release date -- couldn't a list of milestones with expected and actual completion dates be enough to get a sense of progress? Consider Debian's dependency toplist, as an example of something that doesn't project out release dates, albeit with Ubuntu's twice-yearly releases as the counterexample.
In fact, it's simplified in a rather smart way, with some neat utilities cleverly docked on the left and right sidebars. But the thing that has always drawn me to KDE is Konqueror. About 90% of KDE users will echo that.
Unless more users are drawn to KDE in part because a simpler file manager is available, in which case that 90% number would go down, wouldn't it?
I found a box of $30 Casio G-Shock 'atomic' (WWVB-receiving) watches
in blister packs next to the eye-exam room at Costco. I simply had to
check, and yes, they were all showing the same time. Also, at that
price they're easily an inexpensive consumer item.
I like the idea of a leap second. It serves a real purpose, ties in
conceptually to well-understood concepts such as leap years, and
investigating why we need it leads to a variety of ideas relating to
what science has to do to accommodate nature. I suppose if you
believe in intelligent design, it's also a reminder of how you
can never get out the last bug:-)
Slashdot Mirror
Just a matter of time before online crime became a threat to the good old-fashioned kind.
I'd be curious to see how quickly it takes you to totally understand it (I've done this before and it really helped). I think your thought processes engage differently when you can visually see the whole program at once to get your mind around its entire scope, at which point you can then zoom in on the specifics. Compare this with looking at the program in a sliding window (your terminal or IDE) piece by piece and you'll see what I mean.
Getting annoyed by contact with people at level 1 is like getting angry at the law of gravity (or more poignantly, evolution). If a professor is surprised, annoyed, and frustrated everytime s/he meets one of the large group of people at that level, then the prof still has some learning and adjustment to do -- and is still at a sort of level 1 of his/her own.
Hey, this guy hasn't been a CD since before his first birthday!
Then this request comes right in time -- the problem is currently an inconvenience solvable by virtualization, and comes with its own handy cautionary tale. If they immediately stop using Office products that require activation or run on platforms that do, it's obvious that they're saving themselves from something worse than a simple inconvenience down the line.
From a business perspective, this looks like a one-banana problem and solution. Maybe I haven't looked, but I haven't seen that kind of attitude from other distributions or the rest of the community.
-- all 18000 of them, because they're sorted by use, not difficulty (e.g., newbie->'luser'->user->etc.) Back to square 1a :-|
You may also want to consider this story, and consider that you might not have to completely open-source your software to satisfy your paying customers.
Thanks to rebindings, it's in a spot where it can be much more useful:
So why we don't have three keys in that spot?
And while it's not the administrators' job to be scouring facebook, hopefully the kids will be 'learning' a 'lesson', making them less 'stupid'. Shouldn't a school, whether it happens through a rigid, boring civics class curriculum or through other means, educate its attendees? Or actually care enough to play parent when the parents aren't?
Of course it's likely that the admins are just trying to protect themselves, play righteous, or feel like they have to 'do something' when this sort of thing is 'brought to their attention'. I can't say I'm surprised when someone posts photos of themselves breaking the law, that they get in trouble, and that this isn't a reasonable lesson to learn about where the law and privacy intersect in the US.
Aren't you being a bit harsh? When programmers used two digits instead of four to represent the current year, they saved a not-insignificant amount of memory for that time without any serious repercussions.
Now if you'll excuse me, this new show called 'Enterprise' is on. The special effects are cool, but what I like most is the original concept, about Earth's first foray into deep space. I like the fresh face who plays the captain; I hope he goes on to do another TV show.
-- (drum roll) to whom?
Because you'd have to localize it in 50 different languages, and it's faster to post it once in a blog?
But in all fairness, to be anal-retentive, it's anal-retentive.
When you'd rather do it in Acme::Eyedrops by hand, then I'll be impressed.
I've been wanting to know what's possible for some time as well. Please repost this as an 'Ask Slashdot' question.
kio-slaves. If the mac had these, I'd use my mac a lot more.
A better idea:
Didn't some major clothing designer (Tommy Hilfiger or Abercrombie and Fitch) actually tell their employees to allow shoplifting but to note which clothes were being shoplifted, to spot clothing trends in lower-class urban youth? I think I read this something like ten years ago. Isn't this similar (and can someone provide corroboration for this)?
Like English?
At least this device from an IBM training film was particularly robust for its time (pre-1970). But it also caught fire, after a sort.
I don't think you have to have a release date -- couldn't a list of milestones with expected and actual completion dates be enough to get a sense of progress? Consider Debian's dependency toplist, as an example of something that doesn't project out release dates, albeit with Ubuntu's twice-yearly releases as the counterexample.
Unless more users are drawn to KDE in part because a simpler file manager is available, in which case that 90% number would go down, wouldn't it?
I like the idea of a leap second. It serves a real purpose, ties in conceptually to well-understood concepts such as leap years, and investigating why we need it leads to a variety of ideas relating to what science has to do to accommodate nature. I suppose if you believe in intelligent design, it's also a reminder of how you can never get out the last bug :-)
Like water in bottles?