The Whiteboard

10:00 PM

6pm. Day's been over for 3 hours (yay for working late and not wanting to work 45 to get OT).

user55340

Former employer has "hop to it" that just started. If you can go 6 weeks of no late arrivals and 48+h/week, you get a $500 merchandise credit check (before tax) bonus (that can be used to buy stuff in the stores).

dylanribb

@MichaelT Did you work at Yahoo?

Aborted

Hello guys!

user55340

@dylanribb Nope.

user55340

@Aborted ello.

dylanribb

10:05 PM

@Aborted Howdy.

user55340

0

Q: What is it like to be employed as a programmer?

I'm 19 years old and I might call myself a programmer. I know PHP in quite a high level with its "sidekicks" (HTML, CSS, Sass, LESS, Javascript etc.). So I'm basically a Web Developer more than a software developer. Having this said, I'm also more than familiar with Ruby (including RoR), Java and...

Aborted

This was unexpected, but thanks @MichaelT!

Thomas Owens

Oh, wow. Someone actually read the comment and came to chat. That's...rare.

2

dylanribb

@ThomasOwens That's how I ended up here. =P

user55340

@ThomasOwens We get it from time to time anyways... remember that "engineering" discussion?

Thomas Owens

10:06 PM

Oh, yeah.

dylanribb

I'd link to the question I had originally asked but it's closed now.

user55340

On "engineering" and teaching pointers.

Feb 19 at 20:17, 1 hour 5 minutes total – 219 messages, 10 users, 7 stars

Bookmarked Feb 20 at 15:25 by MichaelT

user55340

That was two people who read comments and came into chat.

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT That's the single most ridiculous fucking thing I've ever heard. "If you work 48 extra hours, we'll pay you a whole $500 for that more than a weeks worth of work you gave us!"

user55340

@Aborted Just adding the appropriate context to your arrival.

user55340

10:07 PM

@JimmyHoffa You still get all that 8h * 1.5 overtime too... but yea.

Aborted

Thanks @Mic

@MichaelT

dylanribb

@JimmyHoffa Better than some places that have "mandatory overtime" during certain periods and give you the chance to ENTER INTO A CONTEST for a bonus if you attend.

user55340

@dylanribb everyone gets that extra $500 bonus...

user55340

Though this year, it seems like morale of the people still left is so low, no one on my old team is doing it.

dylanribb

@MichaelT Yeah, that's what I mean. At least you're certain to get it if you work 48+ hours.

Aborted

10:09 PM

So is any of you guys employed as a programmer?

user55340

I am... and I've been at several places.

Thomas Owens

@MichaelT I'd make over three times that if I worked 8 extra hours a week for 6 weeks. Of course, it would be taxed. But it would count toward 401k matching.

dylanribb

@Aborted My official title is "Systems Analyst", but, yes, a large portion of my job involves programming.

Aborted

What languages @dylanribb

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT is the only real employed dev here. The rest of us just fool around with code, you know how it is, fool around a lot but never want to commit.

Thomas Owens

10:10 PM

@Aborted I sometimes write code. I do everything - requirements analysis, architecture and design, configuration management, QA, development, process engineering.

user55340

I was a "web programmer" at Network Appliance for 11 years (company size 400 to 20k), at a large retail company (internal web and point of sales devices), and now at a small SASS shop (web stuff again).

dylanribb

@Aborted JavaScript (including CoffeeScript), Python, Objective-C.

Aborted

So can you tell me what it's like to work with a group of people?

user55340

Though I've also been a sysadmin (small startup), QA (cisco), and tech support (SGI).

dylanribb

@Aborted Depends. I work with many groups. Are you talking a group of programmers specifically or just people in general?

Thomas Owens

10:11 PM

@Aborted You've never had a group project in school?

user55340

Really depends on the company and its culture... every place has been so different. There's also a big difference between the east coast, mid-america and west coast shops.

Aborted

@dylanribb Group of programmers. @Thomas No, not really.

dylanribb

@ThomasOwens Would be strange if he hadn't. It was pretty much mandatory when I was in school.

Shahar

what's the best mysql search engine library

user55340

NYC tech jobs are different than MSP, Chicago to Austin which are different than SF / Portland / Seattle.

user55340

10:12 PM

SF is more similar to Seattle than it is to Austin or Chicago.

dylanribb

@Aborted I work with two ex-employees who are now contractors, as well as the front end team for our website and web store. I get along with them most of the time.

Jimmy Hoffa

@Aborted last time I checked, @MichaelT just tries to be away from his cube with others show up, working in a programmers group is like coordinated musical chairs where each person tries to get work done without ever being at his cube at the same time as anyone nearby

Thomas Owens

Industry also matters. Aerospace draws a different crowd than a startup building a web app or mobile app as their software.

dylanribb

But I also straddle the line between extrovert and introvert, so...

We have a code review process that I just implemented and manage. We use Git for version control.

Just depends on what aspect you're interested in.

user55340

Currently, I work with 3 GIS specialists, 4 Java, 2 node and 2 interns. One of the java guys is more focused on Android than Java EE though.

user55340

10:14 PM

(thats the entire dev team)

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT You get interns? Do you ever ask them to hold your coffee for you, and then just leave them there holding it?

ratchet freak

I'm the dev team in my team

then again focus is traffic

dylanribb

@MichaelT My entire dev team is me + two ex-employees turned part-time consultants.

@JimmyHoffa He asks them for coffee and then bats it out of their hands when they come in and forces them to clean it up, just to show who is in charge.

Jimmy Hoffa

I'm pretty sure I should never be allowed around an intern. Though you can't fault me for wanting free oil changes.

user55340

Former employer... (before everyone started leaving), the POS department was 8 back, 8 front, 6 Java... SLS (store labor scheduling - timeclocks and payroll) was another 12, Internet (WWW site) is another 10, intranet was 8, destkop apps was 4, store apps was 12...

Aborted

10:16 PM

Do I have to interact a lot with other developers? Considering there's a team of around 4-5 people. Actually, what the average size of a developers team?

dylanribb

@Aborted Depends on the team, project, size of company.

user55340

@Aborted beyond 4-5 it gets messy for a development group.

user55340

You'll likely have to interact with others in that group to work on the project though.

Jimmy Hoffa

@Aborted it varies a lot. I've been in teams of 2 and teams of 20

dylanribb

@MichaelT And outside of the group, depending on the project.

Thomas Owens

10:17 PM

It also varies. There are like 80 software engineers, but they support like 5 different systems and come and go as their expertise is needed.

dylanribb

I talk to the marketing department, project manager, and sales support staff on a daily basis during requirements gathering.

Jimmy Hoffa

4-5 tends to be the typical ideal size well-functioning orgs tend to aim for, but the majority of the companies in this industry are not well-functioning.

user55340

@dylanribb Yep... but the thing is that beyond 4-5 people working on an area of the application, you get problems with too many cooks.

Aborted

I think I get the idea

Thomas Owens

But then you have project managers, quality assurance, other engineering disciplines (if you're writing software for physical things that you make). The largest project team I've seen was like 6 or 7, working on two distinct pieces.

Jimmy Hoffa

10:18 PM

@MichaelT I will say, well-managed branching and lots of feature-siloing (which is actually bad for productivity) can handle a lot of devs on the same codebase.

dylanribb

@Aborted Most of the companies where I've worked have required a mix of technical and interpersonal skills. People like working with someone they feel comfortable talking to and when they feel like their concerns and ideas are being heard and valued.

Jimmy Hoffa

feature-siloing is shite though, it gets you a ton of concurrency at very low speed having 1 dev per feature... but it does all merge back together well when the devs do ok and are silo'd to work on their feature on their branch and no others and you have a few people who are good about meticulously merging branches

user55340

(found out today old team lead from old team at former employer who got booted back to developer because she couldn't handle the organization of keeping all the tickets/issues moving in a smooth way transferred to project management... o_O)

dylanribb

@JimmyHoffa We just rebase everything all the time. Who needs history?

Aborted

Thanks a lot for your answers guys

Jimmy Hoffa

10:21 PM

@dylanribb you're talking about a different strategy altogether using a DVCS

Aborted

I find this chat to be very helpful. Actually, I'll give this chat more frequent visits.

user55340

At Netapp, the group I worked with was typicaly a group of 4 (lead, ui, sr, dev).

Thomas Owens

We're usually here during the workday.

It sounds weird. But it's true. I may vent about things sometimes. Like crappy Java code written by embedded developers.

user55340

The UI guy also doubled as project manager when needed.

Jimmy Hoffa

@Aborted sure, just remember only to listen to half of the things I say.

user55340

10:22 PM

@ThomasOwens convertDoubleToShort()

Thomas Owens

@MichaelT And that.

Aborted

@JimmyHoffa Haha, alright

dylanribb

And if @JimmyHoffa goes off about monads just rest assured that he's not having a seizure. That's just part of the day.

Aborted

Have a nice night guys

user55340

@Aborted you might actually find the Mythical Man Month : Surgical team a good read.

Aborted

10:24 PM

@MichaelT I might give it a shot. Thanks.

user55340

Its an ideal, but... well... its an ideal (from the old days of punched cards). It still has good ideas in it though.

Jimmy Hoffa

sounds like somebody wants the cont monad. Usually I might say that as a trolling joke, but in your case it's actually dead-true. — Jimmy Hoffa 7 secs ago

dylanribb

"The first thing to realize about the continuation monad is that, fundamentally, it's not really doing anything at all." - I love it.

Jimmy Hoffa

@dylanribb 'tis true. Continuations are just computations, they don't do anything, just represent things that do stuff which can be run. They give the ability to pause/resume though because of what I just said; they represent things that do stuff which can be run. At any point just pause one and have leftover the rest of the representation to run at a later point.

Ok, that is ridiculous though. I should write a true and proper answer to the guy; he should learn about signalling which is awesome.

dylanribb

@JimmyHoffa Yeah, I don't really understand it. I just thought the way the answer started was hilarious.

Thomas Owens

10:28 PM

I'm debating adding a work certification to my LinkedIn profile/SO Careers profile. I've met a certain level of competence (training, participation) in things like value stream mapping, kaizen, root cause analysis, lean, and stuff like that. I'm afraid of what those words will do for recruiters that contact me.

Jimmy Hoffa

@dylanribb all seriousness; a well regarded article on the topic you might reach for at some point in the future if you keep poking around at Haskell: blog.sigfpe.com/2008/12/mother-of-all-monads.html

@ThomasOwens work certification?

dylanribb

@JimmyHoffa Cool, I'll check it out. I have been playing with Haskell a bit more lately.

Though I did decide to not write my REST API in it like a crazy person.

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa Yeah. My company has this big thing on continuous improvement. We've actually been studied by MIT and a few other places. I've reached a milestone in that.

dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/17898

dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/81998

dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/82002

Jimmy Hoffa

oh, REST? You don't want yesod or snap for that. Just install WARP (it's what Yesod and likely Snap too run on). It's just an HTTP server, you define routes and map them to functions and tell it "route X goes to function Y and the result of function Y should be serialized as JSON or REST or MudHut format"

REST in Haskell is ultra simple. You just import the warp lib, you don't need to use yesod-init or any of the overarching web frameworks, those are all for websites not just REST services

dylanribb

Yeah, see that's where I got stuck.

It was the feeling that Yesod/Snap/Happstack were way too big for what I was trying to do.

I just want someone to be able to send GET /users/<user id> and get a JSON object back.

Jimmy Hoffa

10:34 PM

@dylanribb yes, they are. They're big scaffolded frameworks, frankly I hate the whole drive to scaffolded websites the industry has decided to follow because of Rails success. Just because Rails was succesful doesn't make huge conventions based scaffolding any less of a fucking terrible idea. But that's my opinion...

@dylanribb yeah, that's like 3 or 4 lines of Haskell... one second..

That was one of the first things I did in Haskell as well

10

Q: Artifact collision in plane module

Here's something I tried putting together as I'm learning. Critiques on anything are welcome. There's also a logic bug in the Plane module I can't identify. The long and the short are that it takes the URI "some float/some float/some float/some float", and makes the first 2 (x,y) coord where s...

best-practice beginner haskell computational-geometry collision

There's a bit of code I wrote ages ago fiddling around

main :: IO ()
main = do
    let port = 3000
    putStrLn $ "Listening on port " ++ show port
    run port app

app :: Request -> ResourceT IO Response
app req = do
    return $ moveArtifactResponse path
    where path = pathInfo req

^-- that's all it takes to start a warp server

+ the imports in my Main.hs listed there.

god that code is terrible...

heh

dylanribb

Pretty short, though.

Reminds me of writing for Flask.

Jimmy Hoffa

Here's a better example:

1

A: Minimal warp webserver example

Here's a minimal Hello World application using warp. Run it, then navigate to http://localhost:3000. This example will show Hello world. In order to keep this example minimal, URL paths are not handled at all (the same content is delivered for any path). For a slightly longer example incorporati...

@ThomasOwens what is a "work certification" ?

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa It's a certification from my company.

Like, I've done training and completed things in a program that's well known across all of the business units and with suppliers and customers.

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens Oh, your company integrates with LinkedIn?

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa No. I'd add it to my profile on LinkedIn and SO Careers.

You go and click the icon and type things in boxes.

Jimmy Hoffa

10:45 PM

@ThomasOwens Oh, you mean you can just add anything to LinkedIn as a "Work Certification" ?

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa Yeah. You can add anything to LinkedIn.

Jimmy Hoffa

I was thinking it was like an authorized Certification fo some sort

s/fo/of/g

I don't touch linkedin so I don't know

Thomas Owens

It is. It was submitted to corporate to say that I've completed my training and required things.

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens Yeah but there's no authorization on LinkedIn for it. I could add the same work certification if I wanted to mine

Thomas Owens

Oh, yeah.

There's no way to prove it on LinkedIn. But then again, I could add President of the United States as a job.

Jimmy Hoffa

10:46 PM

@ThomasOwens I encourage this behaviour.

> Author: Hutton, Thomas C., 1965-

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa What about it

Jimmy Hoffa

At first glance I saw the year, thought "wow kinda old research" then caught "Hunter S Thompson" as the author and was suddenly confused what he was doing studying software quality approaches in the 60s...

Thomas Owens

The reports were written in the...90s?

No, 2000s.

Jimmy Hoffa

Either way, I just scanned that line wrong and was very interested in reading the report

@ThomasOwens I presume the 1965- is that fellows life? 1965-present? Iduno what that 1965 is...

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa I think it's his date of birth.

dylanribb

10:50 PM

"We can't stop here. This is asynchronous processing country."

Thomas Owens

From a bio, "Mr. Hutton earned degrees in Manufacturing Engineering from Greater New Haven State Technical College in 1985"

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens yeah that's what I was figuring, 1965-present

Thomas Owens

That would make him...19 when he graduated with a BS? That's young, isn't it?

dylanribb

@ThomasOwens Yeah, fairly young.

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens He went to MIT, of course he graduated everywhere young. Just another fucking genius like jozefg and all those jerks who go to MIT

Thomas Owens

10:52 PM

@JimmyHoffa MIT doesn't even have a software engineering degree program.

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens Did I misunderstand; that was not a research paper from an MIT student/alum/whatever ?

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa No, it was. I think the Sloan School published them. They are business and management.

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens yeah, so he went to MIT like I said

user55340

►

6

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa Yeah. MBA from MIT.

user55340

10:55 PM

Try not to laugh (or cry) when watching that.

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT that's absolutely fucking hilarious.

dylanribb

@MichaelT Hilarious and painfully accurate. I'm going to go simultaneously chuckle and weep, now.

user55340

> So what is stopping us from doing this?
Geometry.
Just ignore it...

Thomas Owens

The ending.

Robert Harvey

@MichaelT This is every pointy-haired boss I've ever worked for.

What part of "you can't do that" don't you understand?

MetaFight

11:04 PM

only 40 days to go for a gold badge. I'd a had one by now if it wasn't for vacationing with the family! Darn family.

dylanribb

"That's the problem, your lines are blue! Draw them with red ink!"

Thomas Owens

This video is better than Bill Murray wearing checkered PBR pants and a Caddyshack t shirt.

user55340

I'll go drop that on it on workplace chat too.

Robert Harvey

-3

Q: How can I make an 3D object(like a cat)to run away

How can I make an 3D object(like a cat)to run away from mouse cursor on may website?I guess that the object(for example a cat) I will make in Unity or Blender?Please help me!

java javascript html5 css3

Coincidence?

user55340

@RobertHarvey I was wondering that too. But its a cat, not a kitten.

Robert Harvey

11:13 PM

I should ask if he wants to do it in red or blue ink.

2

dylanribb

@RobertHarvey Don't forget transparent.

user55340

Its easy to do the cat on the screen in all transparent ink.

dylanribb

@MichaelT But it needs to be a 3D cat in transparent ink.

user55340

I can do that. I'm an expert. I'll inflate the balloon to look like a cat too.

dylanribb

But seriously: Is this guy building websites in 1995?

user55340

11:16 PM

@dylanribb No... Duh... its a 3D cat. Thats like 2002.

dylanribb

Think I should just show them this: nyanit.com ?

user55340

List of food days

This is a list of food days. Global {| class="wikitable" |- ! Date ! event ! Origin ! notes |- |47 Days Before Easter(Shrove Tuesday) | International Pancake Day | International House of Pancakes | |- |- | March 22 | World Water Day | 1993, United Nations General Assembly | |- | August 2 | International Beer Day | | |- | September(Saturday before Labor Day) | International Bacon Day | | |- | September 29 | International Coffee Day | | |- | October 1 | World Vegetarian Day | 1977, North American Vegetarian Society | |- | October 2 | World Farm Animals Day | | |- | October 14 | World Eg...

user55340

Apparently, March 31 is national "Clams on the half shell day"

user55340

And July 6th is take your webmaster to lunch day?!

user55340

National Vodka Day

National Vodka Day is a marketing creation that has been "celebrated" in the United States on October 4 since at least 2009. It has its own website, has been mentioned by Wine Enthusiast Magazine, and has been noted on news websites such as CBS. National Vodka Day falls the marketing trend of having a food or drink to celebrate in the fashion of a holiday for each day of the calendar year. Many are documented at the website for American Food and Drink Days. Indeed, National Vodka Day is also National Taco Day, though it is unclear if mixing the two is advisable. Additionally, an event...

dylanribb

11:24 PM

@MichaelT The day AFTER my birthday, of course.

user55340

October 5th is the most common birthday in the US.

user55340

(and when you think of why... you will go 'ewww')

dylanribb

No, I know why.

Cold January weather.

Gotta warm up somehow.

user55340

Actually, a specific day in January... the 1st.

dylanribb

Oh.

OHHHH.

That's more... depressing than disgusting.

user55340

11:26 PM

abcnews.go.com/blogs/technology/2011/10/…

dylanribb

Yep.

Guess we're in the same boaty.

boat^

user55340

The one that made my sister go "eww" was the correlation to the first day of school for my brother.

dylanribb

Ha!

Thomas Owens

Why is Thing on a Stick day not on that Wikipedia article? brb editing

dylanribb

Google knows what's up: google.com/search?q=something+on+a+stick+day

(I don't know how to expand links here, yet).

Thomas Owens

11:32 PM

You need to post only the link in a message, and it's only for some sites.

dylanribb

Ah, okay. Good to know.

Thomas Owens

Why are there two National Tequila Days?

user55340

Wikipedia, Youtube, Stack Exchange things, Twitter, images that end in .jpg, .gif or .png...

user55340

@ThomasOwens Forgot about the first one?

Thomas Owens

And they are 2 weeks apart.

I can definitely get behind July 27th, though.

And two national vodka days.

ratchet freak

11:33 PM

@ThomasOwens the hangover blackout struck after the first one

Thomas Owens

Bah. I don't get hangovers.

dylanribb

Tequila is the only thing that makes me feel like total crap while drinking.

ratchet freak

one for the designated drivers of the first one :)

Thomas Owens

@ratchetfreak Ah! Makes sense. Role reversal time. Same for the vodka day, I'm presuming.

dylanribb

Is there a national bourbon day?

I mean for me that's every day.

But just want to make sure others can participate.

Thomas Owens

11:35 PM

Nope. No day for whiskey, either.

user55340

Where is @YannisRizos when you need him? We need expert information on Tequila.

dylanribb

There are quite a few national <alcohol_type> days in July.

user55340

November 8th National Harvy Wallbanger Day?

dylanribb

Tequila day and Drive-Thru day are on the same day.

Because what better after a few margaritas than a drive down to the old Taco Bell?

"World Vegetarian Day" - Is that the day we eat vegetarians or?

user55340

@dylanribb you just gnaw on them a bit.

dylanribb

11:44 PM

Alright, I'm finally out of here. Have a great weekend, all.

user55340

Hmm... Navicat has a 25% off sale that ends soon... I'm of the "I'm going to get the best tools even if the company doesn't have them" (pgadmin works for 90% of what I'm doing, but sometimes I just get irked with it)

user55340

Its a question of "do I just get the postgress version" or do I really splurge and get the all databases version... because I do touch those other ones on home projects.

user55340

in Workplace 2014 Election, 35 secs ago, by MichaelT

Ok, question for moderator candidates: Can you draw seven perpendicular red lines, some with red ink, some with green ink and some with transparent ink? And maybe... can you make one of the lines look like a kitten?

ratchet freak

@MichaelT you troll

On "engineering" and teaching pointers.

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