The Whiteboard - 2013-11-19 (page 1 of 3)

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12:04 AM

@JimmyHoffa Based on your hourly salary do you think your company can shell out the $18 as a productivity enhancement (without making you spend 6 hours of your time proving the $18 is justified)?

4 hours later…

user55340

4:20 AM

"I kind of like flagging obsolete comments." You need a hobby. ;} — Yannis 3 hours ago

5:23 AM

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15

Q: How many undeletes does one have?

DoubleAA (a mod for over a year) seems to have to vote extra times to undelete a post. http://judaism.stackexchange.com/posts/8920/revisions Shouldn't it just say his name once? Week has passed and five more have been added... this is getting out of control!

bug revisions-list undelete

2 hours later…

7:38 AM

2 days ago, by Stack Exchange

Ars Technica » Stack Exchange: Is it a good idea to write tests for legacy code?

posted on November 16, 2013 by Stack Exchange

The code works perfectly, so why mess it up?

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-1

Q: What are the core points to be mentioned in the concise software development proposal?

Help me out recognizing the core points to be focused while creating software project proposal.

-1

Q: How do you avoid looping mistakes? Mistakes that are not detected by systems

I had this crazy initialisation -- documentList = new ArrayList<Map<String,Integer>>(); which I intended to store a new map everytime in a loop but unfortunately put itself inside the loop. And you know the havoc. How do you detect such mistakes? I might be looking for suggestions on 'recommen...

java debugging loops mistakes error-detection

-1

Q: Best language/setup for searchable, filterable database?

What is going to be the best way to create and implement a searchable, filterable database? Populate a database with information and be able to search and filter the results.

database search

-1

Q: Where i can get some templates for code Revewing as QA offcer

Current we were building a big web application as 4 coders. now my role have been changed to QA officer to do code review , fill the gap between business requirements and coded software. and also look at some testing. Now i have no idea what QA is what i am supposed to do in coming weeks. Althou...

programming-languages programming-practices code-quality software-design

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my favorite pattern is from MetaFilter, which is: When we start seeing effects of scale, we shut off the new user page. "Someone mentions us in the press and how great we are? Bye!" That's a way of raising the bar, that's creating a threshold of participation. And anyone who bookmarks that page and says "You know, I really want to be in there; maybe I'll go back later," that's the kind of user MeFi wants to have... (Clay Shirky, A Group Is Its Own Worst Enemy) — gnat Oct 24 at 15:11

6 hours later…

1:57 PM

Hello, I'd like to ask for a review of the different question (about programming) that I ask when I interview people. Is programmers.stackexchange the right place for it?

2:54 PM

@Pol0nium is your question really specific to programming?

3:10 PM

@Pol0nium Plausibly not, what's your question?

user55340

@Pol0nium As a question on the Q&A part of P.SE - probably not. As a question here in chat? Sure!

Thanks for your answers :) well, i'm interviewing some programmers those days and I have a list of basic programming-culture questions. I'm looking for more generic questions and for a review of the questions I already have

3:25 PM

@Pol0nium that's definitely going to be better in chat than on the site

@Pol0nium Go ahead and ask them in here

programming-culture questions... what's the purpose of these questions? I mean, what do you hope to learn from an applicant by asking them?

Well, that's just a way for me to filter the applicants. I don't have much time for that so I phone them at first, then I ask a set of questions. If they have many good answers (or if they have a good reflexion), I call them for a real on site interview.

This is my actual set of questions :

What is a design pattern

What is 'MVC', why is it used and how does it work?
Please cite some DBMS (database management systems)
Please cite some versionning tools
How are they different?
What is the 'map' function that can be found in many languages
What is a lambda function
What is the difference between deep copy and shallow copy
In regex, what is '+' and what is '*'
What is the difference between a class variable and an instance variable
What is an access modifier
What are unit tests? Why are they used? How do they work?

@Pol0nium I wouldn't ask map because there's two notions of maps across languages, there's "map" as hashtable/hashmap, and then "map" in the functional sense of a function that maps things from inside a context to other things inside that context

Context : i'm working in a bank as a front office dev. The technologies are ruby/rails (mostly) and different databases (oracle, pgsql, microsoft sql ...)

or at least accept both answers as correct because depending on their language familiarity, they are both correct definitions of "what do I mean when I say 'map'"

3:32 PM

@JimmyHoffa Of course, my goal is to see if they have a programming culture. If one answer is relevant. I accept it

@Pol0nium class variable and instance variable are kind of strange terms, they might be common vernacular in ruby so if you only want rubyists that's ok I guess, but I'm not familiar with either term myself, I would guess you mean what I more commonly hear called "local variable" vs. "member variable or class field"

Other than those two, all of your questions seem perfectly good quick filter questions

@JimmyHoffa I'm sorry but this question is very common :p google.co.uk/…

oh "class" variable means static variable?

I've never heard it called that

yEP ;)

I've always heard it called static

3:35 PM

@Pol0nium since you mention versioning tools (VCS?), questions about bug / issue tracking and code review tools seems to be worth asking as well

@Pol0nium Yeah, that's just terminology trivia then, really not the best question heh

The others are all pretty good

@gnat Unfortunately, we have no bug/issue tracking soft and we don't do code reviews (I know this is a shame...). So this kind of question is irrelevant for the position.

Anyway, thanks for the reviews! Do you have any suggestions on more generic questions?

By more generic, I 'm thinking about things like "What is inheritance?"

@Pol0nium I would make your questions a bit more focusing on "why" so it's not just trivia based

@enderland Could you give me an example?

> Please cite some DBMS (database management systems)

3:40 PM

@Pol0nium it's relevant to assess culture anyway. And to find out about candidate chances to blend into your team. Say, if you are already working on getting these, you'd rather reject candidates who know nothing. If OTOH you expect to be without these tools mid/long term, you better be careful / forthright with candidates experienced in these, to avoid culture shock

Perhaps make this "what are some applications for DBMS tools?

@gnat good point

@enderland in fact, when the interviewee gives me answers, I try to get deeper by being more specific like in your example

@Pol0nium some people also have a hard time coming up with trivia types of answers on the spot but may know the tools better than those who can spit back answers easily, too

@Pol0nium if you want to briefly slide over the "pillars" of OOP, just ask a single question to cover abstraction, encapsulation, polymorphism and inheritance. I don't remember the wording, but when I was interviewing a lot, I dealt with a question that covered these in a broad sweep

@enderland good point! I'll ask it in a different manner if the interviewee struggles with the straightforward question.

3:44 PM

this would be even more true in cases of people without formal classes in development, terminology can be a big sticking point

I tried to ask this question : "How would you implement a naive garbage collector?" but never got smart answers :(

also, when you ask about "Heap and Stack", is this in context of memory or data structures? anyway you as the interviewer either set it straight or be prepared for candidate to answer either one or another, or even asking you about what kind you want to hear about

@gnat both answers accepted in this case :) but yes, I'll be more specific about the expected answer

@Pol0nium You might think about trimming some of your trivia questions out and have them replaced by more design style questions or some code implementation. Asking people to write some tiny bit of code can filter out a lot of people that may have memorized lots of the trivia stuff like you mention, but can't actually think through a solution

user55340

@Pol0nium Thats one of the classics...

user55340

3:49 PM

> One day a student came to Moon and said: “I understand how to make a better garbage collector. We must keep a reference count of the pointers to each cons.”

Moon patiently told the student the following story:

“One day a student came to Moon and said: ‘I understand how to make a better garbage collector...

@MichaelT Exactly! I would love to talk about circular references with the interviewee

@JimmyHoffa I find it very difficult to ask pure coding questions by phone

@Pol0nium My boss used to make people use a shared desktop service with him, I think it was webex or gotopc or something

user55340

Does candidate have net access? You could have a gist out there you could ask them to do a quick review of.

@Pol0nium "Walk me through your thought process if I told you to implement XXXX" is a good way to do this

@MichaelT I work in a bank : I'm not allowed to install anything :/

3:52 PM

@enderland These get funky in my experience... I've heard tons of "I gather reqs and bla bla bla" going on about process stuff that tells me nothing about their actual ability to solve problems

@JimmyHoffa that acutally does tell you some about their ability to solve problems ;)

user55340

@Pol0nium gist.github.com

@Pol0nium Another approach I've seen used is I had someone give me a problem and say "You have 20 minutes to email me the solution, I'll call you back then."

user55340

For example (one that I have sitting around - pretend its some code)

Nothing complex

user55340

3:53 PM

gist.github.com/shagie/7029143

user55340

(back to not one boxing apparently)

@MichaelT that a very good idea

@enderland To an extent... I think it's more about people's inability to understand questions in interviews. It seems even good people misinterpret questions in interviews pretty constantly

user55340

But the idea being "here's some code, look at it, and lets talk about it"

@MichaelT Yep, I get it

3:54 PM

@JimmyHoffa imo asking a clarification question is one of the most important things

@enderland Sure, people still seem to mess shit up a lot. Maybe it's just that the majority of applicants in this industry stink is the real problem.

;)

sometimes showing you understand what you need to know is just as valuable as actually showing you know stuff

@Pol0nium I've written small bits of code with a variety obvious bugs before and asked people to point out the issues in the code, this might be something to try in a gist for example. Try not to make them bugs specific to the language/library it's written in so much as logic bugs etc so they're more universally recognizable

What I need is people who think fast. Front office developpers are called "Commandos" for a reason

Don't get rid of all your trivia, some of them are decent questions, things like stack vs. heap are good because basically everyone should have some sense of how memory is used

user55340

3:57 PM

@JimmyHoffa A reverse fizzbuzz!

I definitely like your idea about a code review/a little code challenge to send by mail in XX minutes

@MichaelT I'm thinking more like: for(int i = 0; j < len(arr); i++)

lol. please tell me you don't actually think people would have a hard time noticing that?

things like that should be picked up by somebody no matter what language they're reading, you don't need to know the language or libraries to realize the variable being checked in a loop must be the same one being incremented

@enderland It's a filter, that's all. Put in some stuff like that, and some harder to find ones in the course of 25 lines of code, it's a conversation.

user55340

my interview at Netapp included a bit of "there's a bug in this regex..."

4:00 PM

besides, if they do miss that, well there ya go problem solved.

@MichaelT i...hate...regexp...

grrr I hate it too

user55340

@JimmyHoffa I love 'em... when in the proper spot.

user55340

The biggest problem of regex is using them in places where the language isn't regular.

EXTRA EXTRA: PERL DEV LOVES REGEXP READ ALL ABOUT IT

Frontpage fuckin news right there :P

I like regex for the most part as well

user55340

4:03 PM

@JimmyHoffa hmm... best keep my current project away from you (specialized NDFA generator to match subsequences)... in essence, my own limited regex engine.

Well, guys, thanks a lot for this discussion. I have to get back to work ;)

Have a nice day.

@MichaelT I'm all for NDFA etc, it's just regexp as a symbolic parse engine that's totally non-standard across languages and has arbitrary symbolic characters I have to memorize but have for lack of usage never managed to that makes me nuts

@JimmyHoffa don't forget the syntax sometimes changes in different languages ;)

user55340

@JimmyHoffa Ahh, the implementation issues. Ok... see, there's the theoretical regex which has groups, the Kleene star, and the Kleene plus. (Stephen Kleene formalized the description of it - this is what is used in ed, grep and such).

parser combinator librarys are symbolic as well but the symbols aren't arbitrary so it makes them easier to remember for instance: in fparsec if you want to get the bits on the left side of something you use .>> the right side is >>. if you want to return the parsed values from both sides you use .>>. and in parsec it's similarly *> >* *>* and attoparsec is something similar

user55340

4:12 PM

Then you've got Posix regex which was a base, and then you got the Posix extended... and then you got the Perl Compatible RegEx (often termed as PCRE) - and the variants based on that.

I never have trouble remembering parser combinator symbols but for the life of me I can't get the damned meanings of regexp symbols to ever stick in my head

PCRE = Regexp++ULTRAx11#

I did have to deal with those at one job

were it not for the o'reilly book I would have been screwed

like 50% of PCRE doesn't exist in any other regexp implementation

user55340

Frankly, advanced PCRE can give me a headache too when people try to do "too much" in it.

user55340

> 'Regular expressions' [...] are only marginally related to real regular expressions. Nevertheless, the term has grown with the capabilities of our pattern matching engines, so I'm not going to try to fight linguistic necessity here. I will, however, generally call them "regexes" (or "regexen", when I'm in an Anglo-Saxon mood).

user55340

(Incidentally, that's a Larry Wall quote)

user41796

4:32 PM

@JimmyHoffa - have a look at Google Hangouts, it's the "replacement" for Talk (whatever that's worth). The description for hangouts indicates it can receive SMS & MMS so it might be the solution you need to get your facebook dev account in place.

@GlenH7 hangouts are actually an easy way to screen share, too, so @Pol0nium might want to try those if he wants a simple screen share thing :)

user55340

102

Q: Do zombie threads exist in .NET?

I was having a discussion with a teammate about locking in .NET. He's a really bright guy with an extensive background in both lower-level and higher-level programming, but his experience with lower level programming far exceeds mine. Anyway, He argued that .NET locking should be avoided on cri...

c# .net multithreading load zombie-process

user55340

I first read that as "Do zombie threats exist in .NET?"

@GlenH7 shit where were you when I decided to screw it and plug my normal phone number into it. jerk!

@MichaelT MS just raised the zombie threat level to chartreuse this morning. It's usually back down to cobalt by noon though...

user55340

@JimmyHoffa Btw, ever try chartreuse - the liquor?

user55340

4:37 PM

Chartreuse (liqueur)

Chartreuse () is a French liqueur made by the Carthusian Monks since 1737 according to the instructions set out in the secret manuscript given to them by François Annibal d'Estrées in 1605. It is composed of distilled alcohol aged with 130 herbs, plants and flowers. The liqueur is named after the Monks' Grande Chartreuse monastery, located in the Chartreuse Mountains in the general region of Grenoble in France. The liqueur is produced in their distillery in the nearby town of Voiron (Isère). Chartreuse gives its name to the color chartreuse. It is one of the handful of liquors that co...

@MichaelT Nope, I once tried hypnotiq though, all I can say is ewwwwwww

user55340

@JimmyHoffa That stuff is meh... designed to be a "just drink it straight for the crowd that wants something that looks colorful"

user55340

Chartreuse itself is an old liqueur that is quite distinctive... and nothing like hypnotic.

user55340

user41796

@JimmyHoffa Sorry, had a parent-teacher conference yesterday afternoon. Kind of a higher priority.

4:39 PM

@GlenH7 Nonsense.

user55340

Hmm... it doesn't like the high ascii characters in the url apparently

user41796

@JimmyHoffa I know. I let you down. I'm sorry. I'll try not to do it again. <sigh>

user55340

Lets just say its a 1600's version of a wheat grass shot from a smoothie place... with alcohol.

user55340

> Green Chartreuse (110 proof or 55%) is a naturally green liqueur made from 130 herbs and plants macerated in alcohol and steeped for about 8 hours. A last maceration of plants gives its color to the liqueur.

Hopefully it went better than the last parent-teacher conference I was at where my kid got canned from a pre-school for not being still enough

@MichaelT Damnit I am way too curious now. I'm gong to have to give the stuff a crack next time I stop into the liquor store...maybe...I've had a hankering for whiskey lately though...

Haven't had snow so can't really break out the glogg

@MichaelT have you had it? What's it like?

user55340

4:42 PM

It has a distinct specific gravity, combined with its color makes for some layered drink options.

user41796

The meeting itself went really well. The communication helped identify some items, but I don't think it's the core of our current challenges.

user55340

@JimmyHoffa A hard wheat grass shot.

user55340

>
Chartreuse has a very strong characteristic taste. It is very sweet, but becomes both spicy and pungent. It is comparable to other herbal liqueurs such as Galliano, Liquore Strega or Kräuterlikör, though it is distinctively more vegetal. Like other liqueurs, its flavor is sensitive to serving temperature. If straight it can be served very cold but is often served at room temperature. It also features in some cocktails. Some mixed drink recipes call for only a few drops of Chartreuse due to the assertive flavor. It is popular in French ski resorts where it is mixed with hot chocolate and c…

@MichaelT Never had a wheat grass shot...maybe I should start there...

user55340

Galliano is likely the best comparison to it... though without the anise flavor.

4:43 PM

@GlenH7 Current challenges: Glen Jr. won't stop drawing cryptic equations on the chalkboard and trying to correct the teacher

user55340

(I'm mostly joking about the wheat grass comparison)

@MichaelT So chartreuse doesn't have anise? Because I can't stand the whole licorice flavor like ouzo/jaeger etc

user55340

@JimmyHoffa Current challenges: Glen Jr. keeps using air quotes when he says he wants to grow up to be an "engineer"

user41796

@JimmyHoffa erm, actually that's part of the challenge. He hasn't started the "I'm bored" behavior fortunately. But it's hard for the teacher to balance the lesson across all the skill levels in the class.

user55340

@JimmyHoffa I didn't say any - but if its in there, its just one of 130 and gets lost in it.

4:45 PM

@GlenH7 Yeah, that stinks. Could be worse though; at least he's not struggling with the challenge.

user41796

@MichaelT he knows it's all smoke and mirrors. Fortunately, he kind of likes theatrical aspects of things so it may still make sense.

@MichaelT True story: Whenever I say engineer at home my kid repeats it as "ninjaneer"

user41796

@JimmyHoffa yes, and there are some in the class where that is the case.

user41796

@JimmyHoffa Have you seen those t-shirts?

user55340

That said, apparently... green chartreuse has become something else in today's culture - details.com/blogs/daily-details/2012/04/…

user55340

4:46 PM

(why do they have to keep messing it up?!)

user41796

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@GlenH7 Yeah; my kids pretty developmentally delayed from lots of medical issues, I'm hoping once he gets into real school and such he's not really struggling a ton, or at least that my wife and I being on the higher spectrum can bring his skills forward at home

user41796

@MichaelT this explains your added animosity towards hipsters as of late

@GlenH7 Hah! Never saw that, that's awesome!

@MichaelT o, well perhaps I won't be trying this then..

user55340

@GlenH7 its more I read about something and find a link to "Oh, hipsters are trying to be counter culture by drinking / doing this..."

user41796

4:49 PM

@JimmyHoffa I wouldn't underestimate how quickly things can turn around if given the chance. I coach soccer, and the rate of change even at grade school level can be quite dramatic from one kid to the next. Can be frustrating getting to that point, but such is life

user41796

@MichaelT at least they picked something decent instead of that wretched PBR

user55340

Just don't go for a shot of it in a chartreuse / PBR bomb drink...

@GlenH7 Yeah, I'm fairly hopeful all and all, wife's got a biology degree from Purdue so between the two of us it's not like he'll ever feel like intelligence isn't something to strive for/something unreachable

user41796

my stomach is churning at the thought of that combination

which one? programmer/bioogy? or chartreuse/PBR :P

user55340

4:51 PM

But this is something you can do without being hipster...

user55340

user image

user41796

@JimmyHoffa we try to focus on setting up good study habits. Even though he's breezing through stuff now we want him prepared for later when it does get more difficult.

user55340

> 1/3 Crème de Cassis. (1/2 oz Brizard Cassis)
1/3 Maraschino. (1/2 oz Luxardo Maraschino)
1/3 Green Chartreuse. (1/2 oz Green Chartreuse)

@GlenH7 enderland of years ago wishes you were my parents for this regard

user41796

@enderland it's the same problem both my wife and I had. Breezed through grade & high school. Didn't know what was what once we really got into college level studies.

user55340

4:52 PM

The reason you find it in layered drinks - cocktails.about.com/od/mixology/qt/spirit_gravity.htm

@GlenH7 I am an awesome test taker. dooms me in college for the "learn to study?" problem too :(

user41796

@enderland that skill will pay off if / when you take your FE & PE exams.

user55340

low specific gravity - floats; high - sinks.

I don't want to take either of those @GlenH7. I don't have a lot of interest in doing that sort of work :) though I could probably take the FE and pass it right now, I'd think

@GlenH7 Yeah, if nothing else we definitely have taught the kid routine and consistency in his schedule, that should translate well moving forward. Right now my biggest concern is that continued medical stuff will just accumulate causing more delays, hate reading studies about what repeated anesthetizations show statistically as far as all that goes :/

user55340

4:55 PM

Green Chartreuse has one of the lowest gravities, and with its disticintive color makes for a good choice in layered drinks.

user55340

everything2.com/title/Table+of+liquor+specific+weights

user41796

@enderland I took them because it adds a measure of "certification" to your claims and expertise. I'll never use my seal on anything, but I happily lay claim to the title.

@GlenH7 see I'm worried if I get those, people will start making me do that sort of "work" - I don't really want to do work which the FE/PE are ever relevant for ;)

user41796

@JimmyHoffa if he's not already, regular aerobic activity is important then. Helps clear everything out of his system and reduces the impact of the anesthesia.

@enderland I remember I scored in the 86th% of one of those national tests in high school and my teacher came to me all pissed that I clearly didn't try (ok, I was high for the test and got bored halfway through and started just filling out random bubbles) because he wanted me to bring the school's average up

4:57 PM

was it the PSAT? I had no idea that was important, turns out it was

user41796

@enderland I know lots of PEs who never use their seals. It's a matter of demonstrating you were able to get the qualifications. And in some places you need to have a PE to hit the upper level career advancements. Again, that's regardless of whether you stamp anything or not.

stop trying to convince me! I was so happy in my blissful world! :)

@GlenH7 That's actually a really good tip... though the kid's from my genes; spaz should have been his middle name so he's everywhere all the time but he's got another MRI coming up this december, I'll make sure and get him out running around somewhere the next day

user41796

@enderland alright, last one. Whenever I get an engineer's resume, I always check to see if they have at least passed the FE. Just shows a commitment to the field. And I know quite a few engineers who feel the same way.

(I'm being somewhat sarcastic in that, I'm just not sure if I ever want to go up the chain to management or if I'll be happy being the bus-factor guy)

user41796

4:59 PM

@JimmyHoffa the consistent aerobic activity is key. Just bouncing around every now and then isn't enough to effect the aerobic changes you're looking to get.

user41796

@enderland For the FE, just get the NCEES & PPI books in the section you're going to test for. Work all of the questions in there and you'll be fine. For the PE, you'll need to assemble a broader library. Ping me when you get to that state and I'll give you my thoughts.

@GlenH7 Aye, he works up a solid sweat anytime he's let lose at any play area, I figure that's as much of a sign as I'll get

user41796

@JimmyHoffa that's the key, yes.

user41796

if he's getting that 3 - 5x / week then you're seeing all the benefits you can expect for countering the anesthesia effects.

@GlenH7 I rpboably should do that now if I am going to take it. I did my undergrad in Mech E which is basically the FE exam as I understand

user41796

5:03 PM

@enderland yes. I took the FE 10+ years after I had graduated. Studying and remembering all that stuff sucked.

Yeah... plus if you end up with kids at that point, not high on a list of "sounds like fun!" things

@enderland I worked with one guy who got his undergrad in Mech E and then got an MS in CS... he freely admitted it was a joke and he didn't know how to code at all, in any language. So, at least you're not that guy heh

heh yeah. MS CS classes are a lot of theory and not a lot of coding ime

@enderland Yeah that's what he said, he said he didn't write a single line of code through his entire school

I took a few classes in coding but more or less just had to code for several years (you learn realllly fast when you start coding on a multiyear project with a 10+ year devleoper who knows his stuff)

5:08 PM

Just had to describe processes and such in english, and with his Mech E I'm guessing the math was trivial

well you learn some things. not the nitty gritty things

@enderland Yeah, collaboration with skilled programmer(s) is really the hands down best way to learn coding in my experience.

you learn development that way, not necessarily coding

user41796

@enderland it was a .... challenge.

that's one of the things I miss right now. I don't work with developers at all (or even "hackers")

user55340

5:22 PM

> Hubot is your company's robot. Install him in your company to dramatically improve and reduce employee efficiency.

user55340

"improve and reduce employee efficiency"? hubot.github.com

user41796

> A Customizable,
Kegerator-Powered
Life Embetterment Robot

user41796

erm, yeah.

user41796

I salute the thought. Not so sure about the current implementation.

@GlenH7 A kegerator on wheels, gives a whole new meaning to the term drunk driving

user41796

5:34 PM

Just need to pace yourself, that's all. It's like reviewing & working your way through crappy code. It's doable, you just have to deal with it one WTF at a time.

5:55 PM

@GlenH7 Or reviewing 2 cases of beer, you take a 2 hour break for every time you start trying to convince people you live in a van down by the river

blatant, shameless not an answer - how did it manage to get an upvote?

1

A: How to get a job with no experience?

I need the community's advice. Here is my situation. I am wondering what a hiring manager would say if: a candidate had an employment gap of several years after working in the field for several years; that candidate would be taking certification courses in his primary programming language and o...

@gnat I gave it a +1 for effort!

Don't worry, my feelings aren't hurt. I actually put a DV on it ;)

user41796

@JimmyHoffa for the code I'm walking through, the WTF/min rate is way higher than I'd like.

@GlenH7 Do you have to resolve it, or is it on someone else? (Will you end up maintaining it anyway?)

user41796

@enderland I figured you would take it as a joke. I also try to be mindful of what would someone else think later on if they didn't have all of the context.

user41796

6:03 PM

@JimmyHoffa It's on me. I'm the lead for this significant segment of code and we've got a number of updates already scheduled for it. So I can't just let it rot.

@GlenH7 Time to get out the duct tape and salad strainer

user41796

indeed they do.

;)

user41796

What's the phrase? "Never assign to malice that which can be explained by stupidity?" I'm having one of those days I think.

@GlenH7 You said you're the team lead on this? Put the screws to people doing sloppy work. An old job my boss a couple times made people who were causing problems come sit in our office with their laptops working on things to ensure we could pester and audit what they were doing while they were doing it. More than anything to get the point across: Seriously, when we ask you to do things correctly we don't mean just go fuck off and do what you want

Like putting them in the penalty box for a day

Petty bullshit you shouldn't have to do with professionals, but well...

9 mins ago, by GlenH7

@gnat idiots abound.

user41796

6:11 PM

@JimmyHoffa - "lead" in the sense I own a particular area. But I don't have HR type responsibilities. So I need to work with the actual team lead to explain the problems I'm running into.

woah you can link to a deleted post?

49 secs ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

27 secs ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

18 secs ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

arr

hah. well. kids these days

:12251052 Nope, not the image, look closer.

I'll just go back to taking my drugs and not worrying about things. seems easier that way

user41796

6:14 PM

Interesting. I would say that ought to be a bug since I had removed the post but you could still bring it back from the comment history

user41796

but I have bigger issues to grapple with today.

@GlenH7 I would think so until enderland pointed out yesterday that edit history's are actually public, you don't need privileges to see them.

chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/message/12250807#12250807

@GlenH7 Yeah, go make your case and build a cantilever to prove that you're an engineer so you will not be ignored.

user55340

Hmm! Intresting!

6:15 PM

23 secs ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT good point

user55340

@gnat You need all the parts - chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/0?m=12251052#12251052

user55340

Replace the number with the message id (thats the deleted one, would be interesting to see if a non-room owner can revive a deleted post)

@MichaelT Interesting thing is I can pull from a deleted post, but if you try to pull a historical version of an undeleted post it just gets the latest version

ah historical versions all have the same link

@MichaelT Don't think so

@MichaelT what I really need now is votes to close and down :)

too much garbage in

Garbage in, garbage out

Garbage in, garbage out (GIGO) in the field of computer science or information and communications technology refers to the fact that computers will unquestioningly process unintended, even nonsensical, input data ("garbage in") and produce undesired, often nonsensical, output ("garbage out"). History It was most popular in the early days of computing, but applies even more today, when powerful computers can produce large amounts of erroneous information in a short time. The first use of the term has been dated to a 1 April 1963 syndicated newspaper article about the first stages of compute...

6:32 PM

simulations have the same problem (but try convinving people of this, they assume you can can put garbage data in and get meaningful results to solve their problems)

@MichaelT Did this on Sunday cookingforengineers.com/recipe/45/… -- Awesome. Thanks for reminding me of that site..

user55340

6:48 PM

@JimmyHoffa I really like the visual way it presents it - the "each step looks like this" and then that final table of how things mix together.

I feel a little prophetic programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/218893/…

-4

Q: Can we just have a place for programmers to ask questions?

i understand in stackoverflow, questions are closed as "off topic" "not constructive" that is why we come here!! /* programmers */ should be alot more liberal as to the type of questions allowed. example: Comparison of IDEs for C++ and C development on Linux: KDevelop, Eclipse, NetBeans, Code...

discussion moderation

user55340

@jozefg There was comment on there that was flagged...

user55340

You can, but if you don't ask question that fit the FAQ's description of "On Topic Questions" they'll get closed. This isn't really all that surprising. And likely you'll get downvoted in Meta, since well, this question get's posted once a week — jozefg 1 hour ago

user55340

17:23 (your comment), 16:30 (the meta post)... so its more deja-vu than prophecy.

@MichaelT Flagged? Can you see flags at 10k?

6:55 PM

@MichaelT My comment was flagged? I think it was overly harsh (whoops)

user55340

@JimmyHoffa I flagged it.

user55340

@jozefg I flagged the comment that was there before yours that was quite rantish (IMHO) and mentioning meta.

It may seem to be "not too popular" to you, but the popularity of this site has grown significantly over the course of the last year or so as we maintain carefully manicured content of high quality. The proof is in the pudding. — Jimmy Hoffa 2 mins ago

@MichaelT Oh alright. We seem to have a silent majority of "happy with content" and a very vocal minority of "my question just got closed and our mods are crazy"

user55340

@jozefg The second part of your vocal majority statement is... not likely to be controversial.

user55340

6:59 PM

But yes, there is a fairly consistent pool of either old timers who never accepted change of scope and an influx of "this isn't SO, everything should be askable" without looking at what the site is about.

Yeah.. one day they'll figure it out.

Posting on Meta should require that badge you get from reading the FAQ

user55340

@jozefg retired badge...

user55340

Btw, @jozefg ...

user55340

7

Q: Change of the complexity class through compiler optimization?

I am looking for an example where an algorithm is apparently changing its complexity class due to compiler and/or processor optimization strategies.

c++ algorithms optimization big-o

@MichaelT Yeah, but by this notion than TCO optimization also qualifies (linear space to constant)

user55340

7:06 PM

@jozefg (thats answer #2 in the page... higher voted than mine too)

@jozefg I don't think I agree.. the operation count is still O(n) with TCO

@JimmyHoffa You allocate space (stack frames) linearly without TCO but with it you can reuse the same space resulting in constant space. Time complexity is still who knows what

ah yeah ok space requirements that's fair

I was thinking time complexity

Super compilation is interesting in this regard, but it's still research-y even by my standards

read "doesn't work usually and makes runs slow when it does"

I suppose fusion also might qualify, reducing operation by constant factors though, not complexity

user55340

Hmm...

user55340

7:10 PM

0

Q: Automatic optimization of algorithms

I was wondering if and artificially based algorithm could be developed that in itself optimizes an existing algorithm ? For eg. to sort a list of numbers the slowest is the bubble sort. Insertion was an improvement, but then there was the quicksort, which was O(nlogn) ( I think ). The lateral t...

user55340

1

Q: Deriving an algorithm from it's neural network representation

I am not sure if this question is silly or not, or even nonsensical, but can a neural network be converted to a traditional algorithmic representation ? For eg. the NN for a pattern recognition program. Is there any mathematical basis for this ? Thanks Cheers

user55340

0

Q: Reverse engineering a program from it's graphical output

I was wondering if it's possible to reverse engineer a graphical application based on it's changing output. For eg. take a simulation where 2D boxes are being thrown around and bouncing off eachother, the program must be able to recognize shapes ( using image analysis ), and then classify those ...

reverse-engineering

user55340

Three "I was wondering" questions.

They're not inherently "bad" questions, just a bit broad and the writing is wishy-washy

user55340

-4

Q: Automated generation of neural networks and genetic algorithms

From everything that I have seen about neural networks and genetic algorithms, I have noticed a few things : NN's are very good at converging to a solution after a certain number of iterations. GA's are good at finding a solution to a problem after a certain number of generations. However there ...

ai.artificial-intel

user55340

7:13 PM

0

Q: Automated generation of genetic algorithms and neural networks

From everything that I have seen about neural networks and genetic algorithms, I have noticed a few things : NN's are very good at converging to a solution after a certain number of iterations. GA's are good at finding a solution to a problem after a certain number of generations. However th...

neural-networks

Cross posting?

user55340

Cross posted those two... looks like he got smacked down with close votes and came here.

<sigh> Shame because his experience here is going to be lousy if he keeps posting stuff this vague

user55340

"I was wondering..." type questions tend not to fare well on P.SE. From the help center, "You should only ask practical, answerable questions based on actual problems that you face." and "Your questions should be reasonably scoped. If you can imagine an entire book that answers your question, you’re asking too much." — MichaelT 1 min ago

user55340

Part of the thing is that P.SE tends to be of the pragmatic / practical approach rather than dealing with all those high flouting CS things. Neural nets, GA and such... There isn't a "practical" use for them 99% of the time in the code that 99% of the programmers in the world write.

7:23 PM

Well I've attempted to give this a reasonable answer

He's in trouble since computing time complexity is undecidable

user55340

0

Q: Classification of questions

I was wondering if a program can be made that can classify the questions used on this site in order to place them on the proper stack exchange site. For eg. if someone places a question in the Computer Science section but it actually belongs in the Mathematics or Programming section then it must ...

user55340

(btw, if we can get some migrate to meta close votes on that one...)

Did I mention that this isn't multiple inheritance? — Robert Harvey 48 secs ago

user41796

@MichaelT needs 1 more

For the love of God.

user41796

7:31 PM

@RobertHarvey Holy comment chain, Batman!

2

user55340

@RobertHarvey Nice comment stream there...

Do you get the feeling that they don't know what extension methods are?

@MichaelT That's not a meta question. It's not even a question, really, just some hand waving.

user55340

@RobertHarvey All his questions are hand waving. The if on meta I can answer properly with how the site scopes are overlappping and such is undecideable.

user55340

And I'll mention the croissants.

7:34 PM

Ah, yes. The croissants.

user55340

On meta at least the question of "what site does something go on" can get addressed... because yea, the other part is just... wavy and misguided.

@RobertHarvey I'm not reading all of that..just...no.

tldr; Him: "It's Multiple Inheritance, and it's evil." Me: "It's not even Inheritance."

It's easy to see more into Extension Methods than is actually there.

@RobertHarvey Ah yeah, that's common.

user41796

@RobertHarvey I'm kind of surprised. I never would have figured you an advocate of multiple inheritance. </intentional misconstruing>

7:40 PM

@RobertHarvey The only reasonable response: "I'll multiple inheritance you!!"

He isn't just arguing with a straw man, he's throwing it around like a rag doll.

"OK, I'll concede that it isn't really multiple inheritance. But it's evil, because it's multiple inheritance." You can't reason with somebody like that. They forget their name five minutes later.

@jozefg fusion qualifies simply because fusion is fucking amazing.

Unfortunately, I realize far too late, and we wind up with these chat conversations in comments that go nowhere.

@JimmyHoffa It is, though oddly enough we can do these safely but not CSE

(In a lazy language)

Oh, now it's partial multiple inheritance. Like that's a thing.

That's like being partially pregnant. — Robert Harvey 43 secs ago

2

7:44 PM

You just have to use their reasoning against them: You're right, it's multiple inheritance because the property accessors are in the partial JAR; but it's ok because the strategy pattern it implements ensures safe construction of the deriving abstraction! It even ensures atomicity in the macro expansion if you pay close attention to how the IL is written:
IL_0000: ldarg.0
IL_0001: stloc.0
IL_0002: ldarg.1
IL_0003: stloc.2
IL_0004: ldloc.0
IL_0005: ldftn instance class [Pine.Core]Pine.Core.IScope class [Pine.Core]Pine.Core.Function::get_Scope()

Throw in more category theory, it makes everything better

@JimmyHoffa

@RobertHarvey A common problem among siamese twins

user41796

@RobertHarvey Again, I'm surprised. Being such an advocate of MI, I'm really surprised you haven't heard of partial-MI and how it's all the rage right now.

[sigh] :)

@jozefg Yeah now that I think about it I think static extension methods are endofunctors with an isomorphism between monoids and multiple inheritance

7:46 PM

If you squint than they form a monoid based adjoint where the tensor is upcasting

@RobertHarvey If it makes you feel any better, I'm pretty sure that guy's an idiot. Do you feel better?

user41796

@RobertHarvey Sorry, I shouldn't troll. But I just put a vote-to-close on the question. The OP is more interested in debating than he is in getting an answer.

(that was a weird accidental use of words)

Added my close vote.

user41796

And I've flagged for a temporary lock - the OP and the question need to cool off. Where's a mod when you need one? :-P

7:49 PM

...just made my first abuse of the custom close reason, because, today kind of sucks.

> This question appears to be off-topic because it is an unruly quandry of flabberghastery.

Actually I'm going to edit the question and retract my vote (maybe)

I'll just tear out the "You're all wrong! Everyone is wrong!" parts because fuck, that doesn't belong in a question.

user41796

@JimmyHoffa I would recommend just leaving it alone. Otherwise you'll end up in a rollback war. The OP isn't interested in constructive Q&A.

user55340

0

A: Classification of questions

Between CS.SE, P.SE, and SO the scope of each overlaps and depends significantly on what type of answer the person asking wants get. First off as a starter, read: Which computer science / programming Stack Exchange do I post in? When do these questions belong on Programmers instead of Stack Ov...

user55340

(Argh! out of close votes)

2

user55340

0

Q: do employers look down on netbeans?

I have learned a bit of swing from head first. I also browsed the official docs and found it kind of intimidating. I am messing around lately and finding things not working out how I want. I just downloaded netbeans and it looks easy. If I were to apply for a job that requires swing, say an entry...

user55340

We're a netbeans shop... so no.

7:54 PM

0

Q: Are Extension methods (C#) and categories (Objective-C) the same as traits?

According to: Something similar to Objective-C categories in other languages? Static extension methods in C# are basically the same thing as Objective-C categories, so I'm going to lump these two features together in asking: Are these techniques the same as traits? Also, are they the same as M...

c# objective-c scala extension-method

@GlenH7 I don't do rollback wars. I make one edit, if rollback occurs I close vote (I'm not even retracting my close vote actually)

Revision reason:

> Removing unnecessary and irellevant details which are basically a subjective argument and antithetical to the purpose of this site.

user55340

user image

user41796

@RobertHarvey - I would just walk away from that one. He's never going to give up on the MI argument. If he were a lower rep user, I'd accuse him of blatantly trolling.

I already have.

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