The Whiteboard

12:07 AM

Now this was a weird one

1

A: Java Integer.valueOf produces NumberFormatException for valid number within range

After attempting to debug this at some length, and, given your updates, and your stack trace (the fact that you are on a worker thread), I am convinced that you are somehow confusing your attempts to debug with a multithreading issue. Change your code to this: private final AtomicInteger attemp...

evinda

Hello :) Do you have an idea if there is a tighter upper bound for the following modified DFS algorithm?

0

Q: Time Complexity of modified dfs algorithm

I want to write an algorithm that finds an optimal vertex cover of a tree in linear time O(n), where n is the number of the vertices of the tree. A vertex cover of a graph G=(V,E) is a subset W of V such that for every edge (a,b) in E, a is in W or b is in W. In a vertex cover we need to have ...

rolfl

12:26 AM

@durron597 For the record... that's not what I would have done.

I would have put a try-catch around the Integer.valueOf, and then printed the failed value.

durron597

@rolfl There had been a lot of comments for him to try stuff

Multithreading is the only thing I thought it could be

rolfl

(of course, using a method-local variable to store the value in from the get through to the catch.

I saw that... I am impressed with the diagnosis, and I am not really challenging it.

just saing I would have taken a different approach

Likely gotten to the same answer.

A weakness in the Java native libraries are that they seldom print the input data that caused the fault.

so, when I encounter it, I simply make better exceptions

Oh, but here I am, talking crap, the value is in this message.

never mind.

evinda

@rolfl Did you see my question?

rolfl

Only this one...:

Can you try adding System.out.println(chunkSizeAsString.length()) as a sanity check? — durron597 1 hour ago

Sorry, wrong person.

durron597

@rolfl I also spent some time in eclipse AND going on grepcode reading Integer.parseInt source

Before I went the multithreading route

rolfl

12:32 AM

@evinda Uhm, I see it now... and?

evinda

@rolfl Do you have an idea if the time complexity of the algorithm is linear, so if there is a tighter upper bound?

rolfl

@evinda I was about to be flippant and say no, but then I thought I would look, and I will say yes.

I have an idea, and no, it is not linear, and yes, it likely has an upper boudn, about n^2

@durron597 I am not sure I understand your result, now.... you think a second string was passed in with bad characters after the first was reported?

evinda

@rolfl So the algorithm doesn't find an optimal vertex cover of a tree in linear time O(n), right? Do you have an idea what else I could do in order to achieve linear time?

rolfl

Nope

Well, yes, scanning each node only once (or a fixed number of times) would make it linear.

How you do that, I don't know.

durron597

@rolfl Yes

Ok going to dinner

He's processing many packets, clearly

it doesn't seem unreasonable that multiple packets would have the same chunksize

rolfl

12:38 AM

Hmm, then the valueOf exception was throwing the broken error somehow...

> java.lang.NumberFormatException: For input string: "8d"

so the actual exception was not from code with radix 16, which is .... odd... I can live with odd, enjoy dinner ;-)

Off too.

evinda

12:55 AM

@rolfl A ok.. No problem..

Thanks for your answer!!!

Does anyone else have an idea how we could do this?

user55340

1:14 AM

Oh, the things you find when you go digging on old posts on... less than ideal tags.

user55340

1

Q: Book on Access and SQL

My little brother is a CPA but in his new job he is required to use access to pull his own data. He has grown frustrated with the limitations of the canned reports that he has access to. However he does have read access to the data cubes and can write his own queries. I am looking for a book th...

books sql non-programmers access

user55340

1:27 AM

Note: going with the ginger sauce and the ginger vegetable set from Safeway produces very ginger flavers.

user15026

@MichaelT Duly noted. :)

user15026

Although we don't have safeway here I don't think

user55340

1:47 AM

correction: target, not safeway

user15026

Well, we are short on those now too ;)

user15026

(Dunno if you know, but they closed all the Canadian ones recently)

user55340

Yep... saw that news a bit ago.

user15026

I never really liked the closest Target to me, it didn't have a lot that worked for me compared to stored that were much closer

user55340

So Target has this deal where you get all the parts of a stir fry and part of is free. Not a bad deal. Chicken, vegetables (note the ginger), sauce, and 'starch' (rice, noodles, fajhetias (for other options))...

user20683

1:54 AM

@MichaelT Fajitas

user55340

@WorldEngineer yep. Those things.

user55340

A little bit of an excessive sandwich found on imgur.

user15026

@MichaelT That's fancier than the shooter I made a few months back

user15026

although I found that there is a limit to how much meat you want in one

user15026

or it just becomes too hard to eat

rolfl

1:59 AM

Excessive -> i.stack.imgur.com/KwvjT.jpg

user15026

Yeah, that's....what why

user15026

did they get it from a Brontosaurus?

user20683

@rolfl that's a hunk of cow, not a sandwich

user15026

Like that is some Flintstones level shit right there

user15026

For reference, this is the shooter I made :

user15026

2:00 AM

seriouseats.com/2014/03/…

rolfl

That's just a serendipitous one ..... saw that one yesterday in a funnies column, so I dug it up

user55340

Canadian Lasagna - Epic Meal Time

►

rolfl

2:19 AM

That looks ... tasty

user55340

Mega Oreo - Epic Meal Time

►

rolfl

Yeah... I am lost in their channel ;-0

user55340

Not that I condone trolling... but think of how amusing it would be to ask about epic meal time recipes on cooking.se.

user55340

2:35 AM

user15026

@MichaelT That is exactly what I thought of!

user15026

So, I keep looking at American job ads for various reasons....what's Secret Clearance mean?

rolfl

I could tell you, but then.....

durron597

3:14 AM

wait, swing JTextComponent has a convenience print() method that prints to the PRINTER?

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagghhhh

Ummm

I just got the Java tag badge

but I don't even have 800 upvotes

user15026

@durron597 You only need 1000 total score, so that's just 100 upvotes on answers, no?

durron597

@AshleyNunn If that were the case I would have gotten it a long time ago

user15026

@durron597 well, and the 200 non wiki answers

durron597

@AshleyNunn I have over 400 non wiki answers

user15026

@durron597 I am just going by what the badge text says

durron597

3:27 AM

@AshleyNunn dunno. I'm posting on meta

user15026

that works :)

durron597

3:39 AM

0

Q: Did I get my gold tag badge incorrectly?

On StackOverflow, I have 428 java questions answered with a total score of 775 as of the writing of this post. However, I was just awarded the Java tag badge. Am I counting the score wrong? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to have it, I just want to make sure everything is as it's supposed to be.

bug badges tag-badges tag-score

durron597

3:59 AM

Still here @AshleyNunn?

user15026

@durron597 Yep :)

durron597

-1

A: Cannot link an iPod to an iPad

I'm having the same problem plzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz help

user15026

@durron597 preps the hug gun

durron597

@AshleyNunn :-D

user15026

Dead like dinner :D

durron597

4:01 AM

@AshleyNunn ooo my first arqade helpful flag

user15026

@durron597 Yay! Welcome to the fold!

durron597

@AshleyNunn I cheated though

user15026

@durron597 Oh that explains the unusual flaggers

durron597

I struggle with arqade because it's hard to be an expert in many many games

there are way more video games than programming languages

also there are so many good alternatives to arqade, like game wikias, gamefaqs, etc.

user15026

4:17 AM

For me, I just play a wide enough variety that few others play so I ask a lot of stuff

durron597

in Tavern on the Meta on Meta Stack Exchange Chat, 1 min ago, by animuson

From a look-around at the people receiving these badges, it looks like the bug is that the badge awarderer is simply not looking at the tag score and is awarding them to whomever has reached the minimum answer count for the badge.

user15026

Huh, makes sense.

durron597

4:34 AM

@AshleyNunn Off to bed. Good night!

user15026

Good night :)

Robert Harvey

8:23 AM

10

Q: What does “Your hair is so white now, it can talk back to police” mean?

Vanity Fair magazine (April 27) introduced a barrel of jokes about political figures she delivered at Best White House Correspondents’ Dinner held on April 25th in Washington under the headline, “Cecily Strong’s best White House Correspondents’ Dinner jokes.” The following is one of them: “M...

meaning-in-context

Hoo, boy.

Duga

8:55 AM

@MohammedNoureldin Try Programmers. — enb081 59 secs ago

Robert Harvey

9:06 AM

microsoftvirtualacademy.com ... Is it worth it?

ratchet freak

@RobertHarvey my knee jerk reaction is no

Robert Harvey

Well, I don't have the money to go to MIT.

TZHX

Is it actually a Microsoft thing?

Robert Harvey

I assume it is, otherwise Microsoft would be all over them to get their name out of the domain name.

TZHX

I did an online training for SQL Server some time (years) ago that was quite detailed and well laid out, with good exercises -- from something with a similar name.

I believe it was integrated with MSDN. But the quality of any individual course will surely depend on that specific course.

Robert Harvey

9:11 AM

They actually have a MEAN course, which I thought was interesting... Has nothing to do with Microsoft.

ratchet freak

microsoft owns the domain

TZHX

I think Angular and Node have traction pretty much everywhere now.

Robert Harvey

Hmm... 396 jobs for “ASP.NET MVC”, 238 jobs for “node.js” on Careers.

How long has Node.JS been around?

ratchet freak

invented in 2009

Node.js

Node.js is an open source, cross-platform runtime environment for server-side and networking applications. Node.js applications are written in JavaScript, and can be run within the Node.js runtime on OS X, Microsoft Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, NonStop and IBM i. Node.js provides an event-driven architecture and a non-blocking I/O API that optimizes an application's throughput and scalability. These technologies are commonly used for real-time web applications. Node.js uses the Google V8 JavaScript engine to execute code, and a large percentage of the basic modules are written in JavaScript. Node.js...

Robert Harvey

What is the database typically used with Node? Mongo?

I guess it would be Mongo with the MEAN stack.

TZHX

9:27 AM

I think a lot of people are probably using mysql or sqlite as well -- for the more relational approach (which is still what everyone seems to be taught in schools).

Duga

10:43 AM

The question better fits to Programmers.stackexchange, please consider asking it there. — CsBalazsHungary 44 secs ago

deostroll

11:52 AM

When would you opt for a linked list based array resizing? (as opposed to asymptotic array resizing...?

ratchet freak

12:15 PM

@deostroll when your free space is very fragmented and it's simpler to allocate just a page for extensions and sacrifice a pointer per page

or you have a very good pool implementation

also consider that you get random access of O(n) with linked-segments list

unless you have an overarching structure (index table) of course

deostroll

I have data in a stream...and I need to cache it somewhere...so is a linked-list approach to resizing good here?

I don't know the size before hand...

ratchet freak

12:34 PM

it's great if you want to avoid needing a massive sequential buffer

Stack Exchange

12:45 PM

The Codeless Code: Case 189: The Dense Forest

posted on April 26, 2015

Suku and her apprentices had come to a secluded temple in the heart of a immense old forest. Here the trees grew so thick and tall that a raindrop falling on the canopy would take a full day to reach the ground as it dripped from leaf to leaf. (As a consequence, the monks in that place could walk outside during a thunderstorm and remain as dry as toast, but the next day they would have to…

user55340

12:59 PM

> "Canadians lead the charge in their use of money, violence, sports-related, raunchy, and even the poop emoji," he says.

user55340

npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2015/04/27/402003080/…

user114359

As an American, I approve of pizza: "Pizza was one of the most frequently used [emojis] in the U.S."

user55340

🍕🍔🍗!

ratchet freak

@Snowman you'd wonder how they got that data and then you realize NSA intern

user55340

Btw, after last nights questions, I'm already out of close votes.

user114359

1:03 PM

@ratchetfreak I just assume the NSA read every single text message looking for emojis.

ratchet freak

@Snowman regex dude, so much faster

user55340

📞🔑😕

user114359

@ratchetfreak I don't mean literally read, clearly they wrote a Perl script to do it

durron597

So on the bright side, the tag badge fiasco got me a Good Question badge ;)

Duga

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it probably belongs on either programmers or computer science — Kristoffer Sall-Storgaard 45 secs ago

user114359

1:32 PM

Looks like a poor-quality SO question asked here:

user114359

0

Q: how to update one record only by filtering 1 Projectname?

Dim con As New OleDbConnection con.ConnectionString = "Provider=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0;Data Source=C:\Users\Neo Spectrum\Desktop\Log\LogSheet\LogSheet\sheetlog.mdb;Jet OLEDB:Database Password = 'password';" Dim myCommand As OleDbCommand Try con.Open() myCommand =...

update

Telastyn

1:47 PM

emojis are a scourge upon humanity.

enderland

@Telastyn :)

Duga

Same question on Programmers.SE. — Carsten 31 secs ago

user55340

Ohh! @Telastyn that's what we need: Cards Against Humanity - Emoji Edition.

Duga

2:19 PM

For anyone wanting to vote to close this question with mod capabilities: would it be possible to move this question to programmers.stackexchange.com? I believe the question is still valid, but that community might be a better place for it. — David 33 secs ago

@David Sorry tool requests are also off topic on programmers.SE, this question would get closed there quickly as well. — ratchet freak 54 secs ago

user55340

... Assuming we had close votes.

user41796

2:34 PM

@RobertHarvey I would say go for it - looks like all it will cost is your time. Good way to get exposure to current MS technologies that they are pushing. If nothing else, that gives you more tools to consider when you're thrown those "design a system in 10 minutes" type things.

user41796

those sorts of conferences are great for getting just enough knowledge to throw a high level design in place

user41796

Personally, I'd want to take a look at some of the Azure courses. Azure is infrastructure in the cloud and has a tremendous number of services behind it. Great place to use for tools to fill out the layers for a system.

Jimmy Hoffa

3:33 PM

@MichaelT ewww :/ those would be the most horrible emojis ever

user55340

@JimmyHoffa nah. I'm thinking of standard CAH questions where the answers are standard emojis. You use 1-3 of the emojis together for the answer you want to give.

user55340

Q: what is Batman's guilty pleasure? A: 🌃👙👠

Duga

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it belongs on programmers.stackexchange.com instead of SO. — rmaddy 53 secs ago

psr

4:04 PM

@MichaelT we should update the on-topic Venn diagram to reflect this.

durron597

I attempted to rescue this question. Should it remain open as modified, or should we close it anyway?

2

Q: What are the major differences between OpenGL ES 2.0 and 1.x?

I have to learn OpenGL and get a basic OpenGL app built, and I have a few questions: What are specific things programmers need to know to program in these frameworks? How does the shader language in 2.0 affect using these libraries? Are there any compelling reasons to start with 1.x before 2.0?

opengl

The answers are pretty good and useful

user114359

It is upvoted so even if closed it won't get deleted

user114359

I think closing off-topic questions that are constructive with good answers is the right thing to do. We keep the information around, while putting a message on it saying "don't ask questions like this in the future"

durron597

@Snowman If I thought it were clearly off topic I would have just VTCed and moved on

user114359

although in this case it is perhaps "too broad"

durron597

4:10 PM

I'm asking here because I'm not certain it's off topic

It's definitely not too broad. A clear sign (after the fact, obviously) that a question is not too broad if people can answer it well in a few short paragraphs.

user114359

I guess I got tripped up by the wording

durron597

@Snowman I'm not saying it's clearly not off topic, either. If I felt confident I would have upvoted it and moved on. I genuinely don't know.

user114359

2

Q: Why is one of these questions too broad and not the other?

Question 1: What is an object pool? Quoted because of impending edits: What is an object pool? What are some examples of Object Pools? Could you consider stack memory to be an example of an Object Pool? Question 2: What is a thread pool? Question 1 attracted downvotes and close ...

discussion

Duga

@David see above ^^. Recommended reading: What goes on Programmers.SE? A guide for Stack Overflow — gnat 55 secs ago

user114359

I think this is one of the tougher calls to make, and that alone tells me it is probably not off-topic or too broad.

Duga

4:16 PM

@CsBalazsHungary this question is a poor fit for Programmers - it would be quickly voted down and closed over there, see meta.programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/6483/… Recommended reading: What goes on Programmers.SE? A guide for Stack Overflow — gnat 41 secs ago

Duga

4:30 PM

SO is intended for much more specific and low-level questions than this. It might be a better fit for Programmers.SE, where high-level design questions are on-topic. A question is a good fit for SO if you can imagine yourself asking it while looking at an open IDE or terminal; a question is a good fit for Programmers if you can imagine yourself asking it while looking at a diagram drawn on a board (like yours). — Leushenko 14 secs ago

Ahh, was not aware of the Programmers.SE site. Thank you Leushenko; I'll try asking there, instead. — DGolberg 5 secs ago

@DGolberg This question would also be too broad at Programmers.SE. It would also need to lose the resource request (tutorial). Also see Where to start? — Snowman 14 secs ago

Duga

4:50 PM

@Leushenko see above ^^^. Recommended reading: What goes on Programmers.SE? A guide for Stack Overflow — gnat 6 secs ago

user114359

This could be a good question for Programmers. We don't have much on OSGI here, which is surprising given that Eclipse RCP is moderately popular and OSGI brings its own framework and design concerns.

user114359

-1

Q: How to create a modular, standalone, GUI program with OSGI?

Ok, I've hit a point in my Java programming career (if you can call it that) where I need to start thinking about future expandability. I've been doing some research on OSGI and I think it's along the lines of what I need to move forward, but I'm still struggling to get a grasp on how it works a...

java eclipse osgi modularity bndtools

user114359

It would take some editing and maybe it would be multiple questions, of course.

Robert Harvey

@Snowman The only difference between the two questions in the accepted answer is that, in the latter example, the OP claims to have done some research.

durron597

5:12 PM

@RobertHarvey So this seems to be right up your anti "what have you tried" alley

Robert Harvey

5:26 PM

@durron597 Bradley's answer seems to have captured my sentiment pretty well.

enderland

must.not.say.anything.

Robert Harvey

Why?

Exhibit A:

43

Q: SPA best practices for authentication and session management

When building SPA style applications using frameworks like Angular, Ember, React, etc. what do people believe to be some best practices for authentication and session management? I can think of a couple of ways of considering approaching the problem. Treat it no differently than authentication ...

security angularjs authentication ember.js single-page-application

Exhibit B:

0

Q: Best way to pass access token to another application for authentication

I have the login app at http://login.companyname.com and the core application at http://app1.companyname.com in different sub domains. After I login I generate the access token and I need to pass to app1 to launch the application using the token. What would be the best way to send the token other...

c# javascript http http-headers access-token

The first question got lots of love from the community. The second question got ignored completely.

enderland

I think SE should have a "try harder" close reason

user114359

@RobertHarvey I have to agree with this: code is not 100% required on SO but it helps. Granted I mostly lurk there but questions like "Exhibit B" don't help me as someone coming from a Google or SO search.

user114359

If I see code in the question I can easily answer the question "does this person have the same problem I do" which saves a ton of time: it also results in better answers.

Robert Harvey

5:31 PM

@Snowman True, but it never results in a "how to" type of answer.

Only a "how to fix" answer.

enderland

I also want to be a Professional Help Vampire Exterminator (™)

user114359

@enderland The only close reason I would like to see added (to Programmers at least) is "legal help"

user114359

I think "try harder" was probably wrapped up in the "not constructive" reason that went away

enderland

@Snowman RIP. ;)

durron597

@Snowman Try harder is still wrapped up in "too broad"

user114359

5:34 PM

@durron597 Mostly, but I suppose it is possible to have a properly-scoped question that lacks sufficient details to provide an answer. But then it would probably be "unclear" instead.

Robert Harvey

The "try harder" reason was the one that said "this question is being closed because you seem to lack sufficient knowledge about the subject matter to understand any answers we might give you." It was widely misinterpreted as "what have you tried," which has never been a requirement for asking a question on Stack Overflow.

(despite the community's protestations to the contrary)

durron597

@RobertHarvey Ooh Indian Microsoft just called me

Robert Harvey

Awesome. Rickroll him.

durron597

@RobertHarvey Nah, already hung up on him

Robert Harvey

Here's another example, very similar to Exhibit B, above.

0

Q: Best way to Pass Authentication Token To External Website

I have an azure API that will issue an authorization token. I want to then call an external website and pass this authorization token in the header. In the external website, I will be checking for the authorization token, and then checking if the token is still valid on every page load. Is ther...

.net security authentication azure asp.net-web-api

Thing is, this is a very useful question, with broad applicability. It could benefit from a good, well-written, comprehensive answer.

But nobody's going to answer it, because the OP is hand-waving.

And he hasn't shown enough effort, probably. Even though he says he already does it through the headers.

enderland

5:41 PM

@durron597 not really, you can have questions lacking effort which is completely clear and not too broad

durron597

@enderland "Write my code for me" has too many possible answers.

enderland

@durron597 It depends on what type of code the asker needs

see - the latest SO question I saw

durron597

50

A: How should "do my homework" questions be closed? (Missing "demonstrate minimal understanding")

Too Broad. Because the asker is a student, and has asked for the solution in total, a good answer would require a step-by-step description of each line of the code sample you post, which would be too long for the Q&A format. In general, any question which the OP has not demonstrated that they...

I think the person who wrote that is a mod on SO, not sure.

enderland

@durron597 oh I know. this debate goes back and forth, though. I fall very much into the "askers should demonstrate minimal understand and put forth some effort" camp but this is not the direction of SE ;)

Thomas Owens

Who says an asker doesn't have to demonstrate minimal understanding?

> Sharing your research helps everyone. Tell us what you found and why it didn’t meet your needs. This demonstrates that you’ve taken the time to try to help yourself, it saves us from reiterating obvious answers, and above all, it helps you get a more specific and relevant answer!

Because the Help Center says they do.

SO's how-to-ask is different. But it has similar things.

> In the body of your question, start by expanding on the summary you put in the title. Explain how you encountered the problem you're trying to solve, and any difficulties that have prevented you from solving it yourself.

SO also links to Jon Skeet's blog post that also says you should research and explain your research. That also strongly implies a minimal understanding and previous effort.

durron597

5:53 PM

Upon further reflection, "demonstrate minimal understanding" is different that "do my homework for me"

"do my homework for me" could be "i'm lazy and I don't want to take the time" not "i don't get it", for example.

Robert Harvey

@durron597 That custom copy/paste homework reason I wrote there is actually in Stack Overflow's Help Center (though it's not an official close reason). Mods are given the ability to edit some of the pages, and I was able to get that one to stick.

In fact, all of the close reasons are in the "What kinds of questions can I ask here" page, word for word. It stops arguments about "This is the first time I've seen this wording."

Thomas Owens

@RobertHarvey Closing is for questions that need to be improved to be good. There are guidelines for sharing research and explaining it on the how-to-ask page that doesn't appear to be on the what kinds of questions page.

Robert Harvey

@ThomasOwens Because the guidelines are already on the How to Ask] page. I had to pick my battles.

Thomas Owens

@RobertHarvey So are these quality guidelines on how to ask not valid for closure?

Robert Harvey

If you can shoehorn them into one of the general close reasons, sure. Or get five people to agree on your custom close reason.

Thomas Owens

6:02 PM

Because it seems like a question that doesn't explain how the problem was encountered and why the asker couldn't solve it on his own seems like a reason for closure.

@RobertHarvey But does the content on the how to ask page make it a valid reason for closure?

If it is, then the direction of SE is that askers need to put forth effort and anyone who says otherwise is wrong.

Robert Harvey

Stack Overflow was originally meant to be a repository for useful programming knowledge. "What have you tried" turned it into a troubleshooting tool. Not saying that's a good or bad thing, it just is what it is.

Thomas Owens

Since it's on the help center pages of every site.

Robert Harvey

Because the reality is that most troubleshooting questions will never benefit anyone else but the OP.

Thomas Owens

I'm not convinced by that.

If 1000 people use a tool and 1 person has a problem, the odds are good that someone else has experienced that same problem. Maybe the solved it on their own. Maybe they haven't experienced it yet.

Robert Harvey

Because you see each question as a symptom/solution key/value pair. In that regard, it can be very useful if the right person looks at it and can provide an answer.

Unfortunately a lot of questions that are asked on Stack Overflow are being asked by people who don't know How to Debug Small Programs.

durron597

6:06 PM

I really think it's a problem of a saturated knowledge base. It's hard to come up with questions that aren't troubleshooting but also aren't duplicates anymore

Robert Harvey

In general, any question that asks for tutelage is best answered by a tutor or teacher, not by Stack Overflow. Paradoxically, those kinds of questions can be the most useful to others, if the answer is well-written.

And there's plenty of canvas left to paint there, if people simply took the time.

user114359

@RobertHarvey I think blogs and other articles can fill that niche. Sometimes you need to write a big long article, link to example code, etc. which is technically possible here, but doesn't work well.

Robert Harvey

People reserve the good stuff for their blog.

And in general find things that they already know uninteresting.

Jimmy Hoffa

@Snowman it works perfectly well here

102

A: When is it a good idea to force garbage collection?

You really can't make blanket statements about appropriate way to use all GC implementations. They vary wildly. So I'll speak to the .NET one which you originally referred to. You must know the behaviour of the GC pretty intimately to do this with any logic or reason. The only advice on collect...

user114359

@JimmyHoffa I have worked through tutorials that were many pages long, with entire projects of code to download and work along. Sure, it is technically feasible to put that in an answer, but it is better off in a different format.

Jimmy Hoffa

6:14 PM

30

A: How to create better OO code in a relational database driven application where the database is poorly designed

Object orientation is valuable specifically because these types of scenarios arise, and it gives you tools to reasonably design abstractions that allow you to encapsulate complexity. The real question here is, where do you encapsulate that complexity? So let me step back a moment and speak to w...

Robert Harvey

@JimmyHoffa The first sentence in your answer constrains the question.

Do you have a blog?

user114359

@JimmyHoffa that is a good answer: long, detailed, covers a lot of ground and is readable. I am talking bigger than that though. Think about questions that say "I don't know how to get started with technology X, and I really want to learn." Closed in a heartbeat here, but really good material for a blog or tutorial.

Robert Harvey

Those kinds of questions don't pass muster anywhere on the SE network, for good reason. They're magnets for Google Searches on forums that allow those kinds of questions, but they produce very little in terms of useful information.

user114359

@RobertHarvey That is my experience: I run into some issue I have not seen before so I google it. I get links to forums where nobody has an answer, someone hijacks the thread so I have to figure out what people are discussing... then I search at SO and either get the answer or I don't real quick.

durron597

6:32 PM

@Snowman googling with site:stackoverflow.com works really well too

user114359

@durron597 yeah using the "site:" syntax on a google search can be really useful if a site has no built-in search or it does but it sucks.

user114359

How could anyone think bringing your dog in to work in an office environment is acceptable?

user114359

13

Q: How to avoid distractions from boisterous dog?

The engineering manager in my office of ~10 people brings his dog to the office, and has for years. The dog will bark and cry if the manager leaves the room for more than ten seconds, say to go to the bathroom or to a meeting. It also picks things up out of trash cans and constantly badgers peopl...

work-environment company-culture

enderland

@Snowman lots of startup "hip" companies

user114359

Maybe if you worked at a vet office

Robert Harvey

6:41 PM

'Boisterous dog' sounds like a cartoon character.

user114359

I would have a fun time filing an OSHA complaint. I am sure "dog allergy" falls under the "H" in "OSHA"

durron597

s/dog/Bloomberg News/ <-- my office

enderland

@Snowman what a great top answer there! ;)

durron597

including the whining and crying part

user114359

@enderland that comment is similar to liking your own post on facebook ;-)

enderland

6:47 PM

@Snowman hey you brought the question up!

and that's starring your own post ;)

user114359

It is bad enough I have to deal with my neighbor's little furry rat barking all the time, especially when I have the grill out and he can see me through the fence. If I had to work like that? No way.

enderland

a good example of when you should just quit

user114359

Yep, there are some battles you just cannot win and the only positive outcome is to retreat.

Thomas Owens

@Snowman Sun Tzu said that, I think.

enderland

wtf our time reporting is in Sharepoint

Thomas Owens

6:55 PM

@enderland o_o

enderland

there are only a MILLION companies doing this and what, we're using SHAREPOINT ugggggggggggggggggggggggggggh

user114359

@enderland just be glad it is something other people have heard of. I don't know why, but it seems every company has to be a special snowflake with their own time reporting system. Because "logging time" is different at company X!

enderland

@Snowman maybe? it's in SHAREPOINT

Sharepoint is the "hey we can have a business app without doing any development!" tool

user114359

@enderland I agree that Sharepoint is crap, but at least it is something I have heard of.

user114359

There is a chance that your Sharepoint app is third-party and tested rather than "some random crap that our secretary whipped up." Actually, it is Sharepoint, so it could be either.

enderland

7:02 PM

@Snowman a 0% chance, probably

And it's sharepoint so it's super slow

Robert Harvey

Can you use a JSON Web Token over an HTTPS connection?

user114359

I don't see why not, but my knowledge on the topic is pretty basic. I have never tried it.

Robert Harvey

Hmm, the OWASP recommends TLS (essentially SSL) for all REST web services. owasp.org/index.php/REST_Security_Cheat_Sheet#Data_in_transit

In addition to the JSON Web Token.

@enderland Better not need any development, because writing Sharepoint apps is a bit of a nightmare.

Telastyn

time reporting is worthless.

Robert Harvey

7:21 PM

Duplicate: programmers.stackexchange.com/q/280312/1204

user114359

@Telastyn I agree, but the beancounters love it and they sign our paychecks.

Jimmy Hoffa

@Snowman tons of people do... it's really easy to can that shit though: Just claim dog allergies. Done. If that doesn't do it, your co is shitty

@Snowman which is why working for bean counters sucks... Never working in the financial section of the software industry again

user114359

@JimmyHoffa which is why I brought up OSHA. Once you get a regulatory body involved... wow. Just stand back and watch the fireworks.

enderland

@Snowman and get the OP fired

Jimmy Hoffa

@enderland yeah, isn't this stuff such a bloody shit show?

durron597

7:30 PM

@Snowman nationalreview.com/article/348756/…

Jimmy Hoffa

@enderland this is one of those rare times where the "anonymous" tip lines companies have would actually be the perfect out - barring the (likely) fact that his boss would immediately know precisely who had made the call. This is the shitty thing about all "anonymous" things in companies, you don't have to sign something for people to know where comments came from when they work with these people 40 hours a week for years

I never put anything but the company line in all "anonymous" surveys and shit companies come up with

user114359

I would be hard-pressed to think of any office job I worked where an "anonymous" complaint could not be tracked back to the complainer. Maybe in a factory or shift work it could be easier, and certainly if you never make comments about something sucking.

Jimmy Hoffa

exactly. As soon as you make comments or requests in a normal fashion about something that doesn't get resolved, all future comments or requests on that topic will be presumed to have come from you.

enderland

@JimmyHoffa in this case maybe, seems likely someone else has complained too

user114359

inc.com/chas-rampenthal/dogs-in-the-office-is-it-legal.html

user114359

7:47 PM

My pet peeve: when a library does not have the version in the filename, and the SVN commit comment also lacks the version number.

enderland

@Snowman i wish all libraries included version number in their source comments / copyright text...

rolfl

That is remarkably hard to do

I would discourage it as well....

durron597

So when something doesn't work in deserializing google gson, it just returns null

user114359

I am happy if a jar file has the library version in the manifest, or a DLL has it in its metadata. Thankfully this time it did

user114359

But it is too easy not to care and omit it

durron597

7:52 PM

It's frustrating when I help someone fix one problem but it rapidly becomes clear they've made other mistakes that still cause Gson to return null

Ixrec

release version number seems like something the automated build system should figure out when you hit the big red release button

user114359

@Ixrec Should be, but someone has to set it up to begin with.

rolfl

Good, I checked, JDOM jars have a well-populated manifest, an additional info file, and the version is in the jar name too.

enderland

yeah not so much C++ headers...

user114359

I think it makes sense to have the version number in a single source file, updated by the build script prior to compilation. That way you can truly have the version updated in one location. But that does not help with binary distributions.

user114359

7:57 PM

Meaning, you update one file and the build process propagates the value everywhere it needs to go.

Ixrec

hmm, out of curiosity...
we have a system where including a certain macro in every header file guarantees certain data will be in the final binary, so we can run something like $identify thingy.exe and get the build timestamp and settings and svn revisions of each file and other crazy stuff
how many of you work at a place that has something like this?

André

I have something like maven build version and the frontend checks if backend and itself have the same version. It's rich internet application, so we just deploy to the webserver, we don't distribute binaries around

Duga

This is not really a question for Stack Overflow, as I'm sure you know. Why not try programmers.stackexchange.com, which is better suited for broad based subjective questions like this. — Nick Bailey 35 secs ago

@NickBailey Programmers.SE is not well-suited for broad, subjective questions like this: it would be closed as either "too broad" or "primarily opinion based" if migrated. — Snowman 56 secs ago

user114359

@Duga you are sleeping on the job, not picking up my edit to that comment!

user41796

8:17 PM

@Ixrec Have seen that in previous lives; but not presently. IMO, it depends upon the target audience of the application as well as the quantity and type of support work that's expected.

Duga

8:48 PM

Stack Overflow doesn't seem to be a good fit for your question. Maybe Programmers is more appropriate. — honk 1 min ago

Robert Harvey

“On two occasions I have been asked, ‘Pray,
Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong
figures, will the right answers come out?’ . . . I am
not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion
of ideas that could provoke such a question.”
— Charles Babbage,
Passages from the Life of a Philosopher (1864)

durron597

@RobertHarvey Charles Babbage for SO mod

Ixrec

I just noticed Duga has non-zero rep

did a human donate their account to be botified?

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