The Whiteboard - 2013-09-30

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user55340

1:55 AM

Some thoughts on that suggested edits and minor edits...

user55340

0

A: Can we give the community evangelist something more noteable to make suggested edits go more smootly?

I'm going to go out on a limb here and make this answer more about minor edits than about Sam. Unless the edit is wrong, approve it. Reviews should be 'stateless'. You look at the original, you look at the suggested and if the suggested is better, approve it. Thats it. Every improvement is a...

user55340

@gnat one thing I realized while writing that, doing 5 edits to 4 answers and the question in one question is just as disruptive to the front page as an edit to the question alone.

user55340

I'm also came to the opinion that /review should be stateless. It doesn't matter if its one person doing 10 edits or 1 edit. Where the patterns of editing (or voting) come into scrutiny is with a flag (unless some mod wants to chime in and say otherwise).

user20683

@MichaelT Two typos in the question title

user20683

irony ensues

user55340

1:59 AM

Feel free to fix... ;-)

user55340

2:36 AM

Free spam flags...

user55340

-3

Q: Several Mysteries about the Mining Industry

Without the mining industry, your Smartphone would not be so smart. In fact, the majority of all electronic devices make use of more than 35 minerals. Some of these important minerals include silver and gold. Without mining, baking soda would not be available for cooking and cleaning. In addition...

machine-learning

user20683

@MichaelT aims and fires

user55340

Burry it! Deep in a mine somewhere...

user20683

@MichaelT bury? I atomize.

7:37 AM

@MichaelT yeah I once mistakenly rejected suggestion of a guy who was doing a major cleanup in a question and all answers (there was a handful suggestions in the "pack" besides this one). After that made a habit of opening the post in a separate browser tab to check copyedits in context

@MichaelT I guess I cleaned up most of xkcd through your link-only answer script. Your not an answer flags you mentioned recently, also likely had an effect. XKCD with len=300 returned me just two links, one is historical lock and another probably should be HL:

141

Q: How do you maintain focus when a particular aspect of programming takes 10+ seconds to complete?

I have a very difficult time focusing on what I'm doing (programming-wise) when something (compilation, startup time, etc.) takes more than just a few seconds. Anecdotally it seems that threshold is about 10 seconds (and I recall reading about study that said the same thing, though I can't find ...

productivity focus

3 hours later…

11:12 AM

spelling correction as a way to abort CV review... programmers.stackexchange.com/review/close/40730 Given the context (close review), one would rather think that purpose of the"Edit" button is for salvaging edits but oh well

3 hours later…

user55340

2:03 PM

Sometimes you just have to sigh when you've used up all your cv's 3h after vote reset. 20 in the queue and a few others floating around.

2:24 PM

@MichaelT lol. you guys so often use up all your CVs

user55340

@enderland Once you get to 3k rep and help clean the queue...

@MichaelT going to be a long time at this rate :P

user55340

@enderland Just a few more times of playing in the collider...

@MichaelT I also need to be able to write as good of answers as all you guys :)

user55340

2:43 PM

@enderland Just study up on git some. Those answers seem to have a long tail.

user55340

I was expecting this to be +5 to +10 score answer...

@MichaelT oh git.

@MichaelT this is my favorite FAQ entry ever:

git.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/…

user55340

25

A: What are the advantages and disadvantages of cryptographically signing commits and tags in Git?

(This is largely based on A Git Horror Story: Repository Integrity With Signed Commits - a very good read and more information than I could put into an answer) There are a number of ways in which a git repository can be compromised (this isn't a security flaw, just a fact of life - one should no...

user55340

> Currently the design of the Git index (staging area) only permits files to be listed, and nobody competent enough to make the change to allow empty directories has cared enough about this situation to remedy it.

:)

user55340

2:45 PM

Seriously... git... people ask a question, I research it and write an answer based on the research.

user55340

4

A: How to make a "git push" update files on your web host?

This is summarized from Using Git to manage a web site The key to the process is the server side hook 'post-receive' (more on git hooks at Customizing Git - Git Hooks and the githooks man page). This hook runs after the server has received all of the data. Once the server receives the data, it...

git is incredibly cryptic initially

user55340

3

A: which directory to initialize git repo

Putting your source control files in the deployed directory runs the risk of exposing those files and their complete history. This is potentially a bad thing (do you have passwords in these files? Are the files themselves important to not let leak?) One could try to staunch this by putting a .h...

user55340

(in that last one, note the 'related' set of links where I went to write the answer)

argI hate when I forget to save code before running and my app crashes so I lose it. SO STUPID

3:06 PM

-2

Q: How do the "JavaScript problem" Haskell libraries compare?

On this page from the official Haskell wiki, there are several proposed solutions to what they call "the JavaScript problem". It is not obvious from the text which, if any, of those are ready for production. How do those library compare, and how does one find out whether any of them is mature fo...

javascript compilers haskell

This is not an ideal way to come back from a suspension...

user55340

@YannisRizos I was thinking about this morning when I saw your comments in there.

user55340

Just say "Haskell is some dream of some academics... and crazy people who mumble 'monad' and 'catisomorphism' under their breath while pushing a shopping card down the sidewalk. It will never be production ready."

Asking for us to compare and analyze a suite of technologies is not really an appropriate question here, it's overly broad; and will basically turn into Gorilla vs. Shark. Remember, if your question could entail an entire book to answer it really won't work here. Be more specific; choose one or two and ask very specific questions about them if you want to know; asking "How mature and usable are they?" is basically asking for a full detail of the technical state of each of these extremely complex technologies. — Jimmy Hoffa 1 min ago

@MichaelT Hallmark or Topps?

user55340

@YannisRizos (what did I tell you about crazy people mumblining monad?)

3:42 PM

its only monday morning and I'm already frustrated with our help desk. lol.

user55340

@enderland The paradox of the help desk - the person on the other line of the phone is always an idiot.

user55340

(See, I used to work help desk / tech support...)

I want to know who is the internal owner for a software tool and apparnetly they need my computer name (????) to escalate the ticket :(

makes me pretty sure they've misunderstood my request...

@enderland Do you have internal help desk or an outside service?

user55340

@enderland its a required field in the helpdesk ticketing system.

user55340

3:46 PM

@JimmyHoffa do you think that the guy asking about GCD got the answer he wanted?

@MichaelT no it's not, because this is the first time they've required it. the guy on IM simply filed my ticket incorrectly

@MichaelT Hope so, don't care much though; A good question got a good answer, and that's good for the site. Can only hope it helps him.

@ThomasOwens kinda both, it's outsourced but I think still internal

@enderland Do you know who it's outsourced to? I'm just curious.

not sure. it's in the Philippines or something

user55340

3:48 PM

@JimmyHoffa I think it answered your question... but not sure about if it answered his original one. One could write a function such that once you know the GCD(x,y), you could write a function that returns the number of steps from this.

user55340

There's a project euler question that has similar basis about calculating the number of steps in fractran.

user55340

FRACTRAN is a Turing-complete esoteric programming language invented by the mathematician John Conway. A FRACTRAN program is an ordered list of positive fractions together with an initial positive integer input n. The program is run by updating the integer n as follows: #for the first fraction f in the list for which nf is an integer, replace n by nf #repeat this rule until no fraction in the list produces an integer when multiplied by n, then halt. Conway gave an interesting formula for primes in FRACTRAN: : \left( \frac{17}{91}, \frac{78}{85}, \frac{19}{51}, \frac{23}{38}, \frac{29}{33...

user55340

$user image$

user55340

There's a program to calculate prime numbers.

@MichaelT Dunno, you can gladly make your answer even more comprehensive if it makes you feel better.

user55340

3:50 PM

@JimmyHoffa Nah, I like answering the real question rather than the homework question.

aye. Even at that, I'm not certain he wasn't asking exactly what I said. Either makes sense as something they would put in homework; Euclid's algorithm for teaching Big-O analysis is perfectly valid

@MichaelT can you be tech support for my company please. help me michaelt, you're my only hope

user55340

@enderland Sure... I'll take 1M/year (and outsource it after taking my cut... see how this works?)

user55340

@JimmyHoffa Finding that old analysis was quite neat.

@MichaelT Isn't business fun! It's like, wait no not like, it is free money!

Long live MBAs, and the work ethic of a thief!

user55340

3:56 PM

2

Q: Help understanding the proof of Lame's Theorem.

I think Lamé's Theorem is beautiful and really want to understand the proof. I am new to proofs, but after reading over the proof of Lamé's Theorem (and failing to understand it), I feel that I am capable of understanding it because it contained terms such as Fibonacci numbers, logarithms (base ...

elementary-number-theory proof-writing

4:09 PM

it's so hard to decide if I should be annoyed with fail helpdesk service

user55340

Just remember how much they're getting paid.

user55340

Oh, that fractran thing... its crazy. Look at how a program runs.

user55340

user image

user55340

This computes 3*2. It starts out with 72 because -- 72 = 2^3 * 3^2. The powers is where the variables / state is stored.

user55340

The result is stored in the powers of 5 - the answer is 5^6 = 15625

4:14 PM

@MichaelT right. that's why it's hard to feel bad

user55340

I wonder if I'd be labeled a troll asking about debugging fractran on SO.

4:35 PM

@MichaelT oh, it's a part of a larger loop ;)

actually it's about 3 for loops deep

and yet we can't figure out why it's unresponsive...

user55340

4:52 PM

yea, done pretending to be an oracle dba again for awhile.

5:10 PM

@MichaelT you mean you aren't an oracle trained consultant?

user55340

@Ampt Nope, I only make 5 figures... not 7.

I need to work for oracle....

boss actually just came up and told me that he was talking to the engineering manager and they were in the process of creating a full time offer for me after I graduate

@MichaelT Hahahhahaahhaahhahahahahahahahhaha. I worked for a company right after they went to oracle. Brings back... painful memories lol

that was my pre- software dev days

@Ampt nice!

user55340

@Ampt Its not work for oracle, its work with oracle.

@MichaelT It's not "with", it's "in the glorious empire of".

user55340

5:15 PM

The people who really understand normal forms, how to make huge databases do what they need to, model the data correctly, know all the configurations, set up clustering, etc...

user55340

When I do database admin stuff I feel like I'm a kid with a stick poking a big bear with a stick. The thing I do know is I want to document my tracks as I do it and have a really long stick (and poke lightly).

user55340

(fun related reading - simple-talk.com/opinion/opinion-pieces/bad-carma )

@Ampt you should poke around workplace.stackexchange.com a bit too

also read this

user55340

@enderland Shh. You're just trying to get him there and sneak in enough rep for him to get cvs there.

@MichaelT nah we don't get the volume of quesitons you guys do

so it's not as bad :)

user55340

5:23 PM

@Ampt be warned, you get cv's at workplace at 500 rep.

.... yet

well I didn't give him a yes or no right there, I want to see what options are out there. The big career fair for my school is in ~4 weeks so that's when it really gets going

I <3 snow plows and all but I'm not sure that this is where I want to be for the next 10 years

user55340

I hear there are some job openings at my former employer....

@enderland I'll definitely give that a read and I already poke around workplace ;)

@MichaelT good joke

user55340

@Ampt Not joking about the openings... the only way they can fill them is with ~~gullible~~ enthusiastic college students.

5:26 PM

@MichaelT I'm not as gullible as I once was thanks to the summer doing what I do at work and the knowledge I've gained in no small part thanks to you guys on the whiteboard

the main TL;DR is that people who are competent in the tech world - whether engineering/software dev - are worth a lot

5:43 PM

I'm pretty sure 99% of SQL code constructing dynamic queries is vulnerable to SQL injection

user55340

@enderland Prepared statements get around much of that.

?

@MichaelT Which is key to increasing code quality; staffing only enthusiastic college students. My last employer did that for 2 decades, holy smokes the things in that code base would make cthulhu cry.

user55340

I like ORMs in theory - the database agnosticism that they provide and the reduction in errors from raw sql.

user55340

@JimmyHoffa The "senior" devs in my old team are now 2 years out of college... (the actual long timers are there because of the dead sea effect)

5:50 PM

That's all they could hire because they had their office in a tiny dead rustbelt town in the woods of PA hours from any economy.

user55340

@enderland Instead of stmt = conn.statement("select foo from bar where qux = '"+bletch+"'"); stmt.execute(); ... you do ... stmt = conn.prepareStatement("select foo from bar where qux = ?"); stmt.bindString(1,bletch); stmt.execute();

user55340

(sorry about all those tweaks to the message).

hmmm I wonder if you can do this with VBA. I'm gonna cry if not

user55340

Note the constant string. This makes the database happier.

user55340

@enderland technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa905910(v=sql.80).aspx

5:55 PM

wtfgooglehax

what terms did you use, lol

So long as you escape certain characters like ; and others, you're really fine. Unfortunately it's not that easy because there's a bunch of details about the parsing of characters and everything that's particular to your data provider's protocol, which is why you use command objects, they are knowledgeable on your providers command protocol which allows special communication approaches for many servers, and when the server's protocol doesn't have special command facilities the command knows

user55340

foo, bar, qux, bletch.

the appropriate escaping for all relevant parts of the protocol

user55340

Typically, one tosses 'baz' in there, but I keep forgetting that one and go to bletch.

user55340

Metasyntactic variable

A metasyntactic variable is a placeholder name used in computer science, a word without meaning intended to be substituted by some objects pertaining to the context where it is used. The word foo as used in IETF Requests for Comments is a good example. By mathematical analogy, a metasyntactic variable is a word that is a variable for other words, just as in algebra letters are used as variables for numbers. Any symbol or word which does not violate the syntactic rules of the language can be used as a metasyntactic variable. For specifications written in natural language, nonsense words a...

5:56 PM

bletch is more fitting for the variable that shouldn't be tossed in there anyway

no I mean to get that technet article

user input is after all disgusting

user55340

catb.org/jargon/html/M/metasyntactic-variable.html

user55340

@enderland prepared statement vba

user55340

its a matter of knowing what the proper name of the resource is.

5:58 PM

@MichaelT I hate you, lol. I guess I didn't realize to search "prepared statement" yeah

the more you know...

user55340

Glance at how the database does it - dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/…

user55340

The big advantage for this comes from things were you use the same statement many times.

user55340

insert = conn.prepareStatement("INSERT INTO data (txt, ts, active) VALUES (?, ?, ?)");

...
	private void addData(String txt, Timestamp ts, boolean active) throws Exception {
		insert.setString(1, txt);
		insert.setTimestamp(2, ts);
		insert.setBoolean(3, active);
		insert.execute();
	}
...

addData("active_foo", new Timestamp(then1h), true);        // active but old
addData("inactive_bar", new Timestamp(then1h), false);    // inactive and old
addData("active_quz", new Timestamp(then2m), true);        // active and new

user55340

And you can just invoke it again and again and again - the same statement.

user55340

This makes it easier for the database too - because it doesn't have to recompile the sql.

6:02 PM

yeah. I've got several queries referencing the same field names but I'm decently consistently adding them

user55340

Its just bind 3 parameters and execute - much less network traffic too.

thanks, this should make my life a million times easier - otherwise I have to update EVERY SQL query and data model every time something changes (not that those requesting this will ever want to change things... oh)

user55340

and the prepared statements live on the database too - so that if two different sessions prepare the same statement, the database just pulls it out of its cache.

hopefully this works in Access too

guess I'll find out :)

user55340

5

Q: msaccess prepared statements

Is it possible to execute a prepared statement in msaccess on a local table in vba like this: UPDATE part SET part_description=? WHERE part_id=? If so how is it done?

6:04 PM

yup haha

user55340

6

A: msaccess prepared statements

Public Sub UpdateWithParameters() Dim db As DAO.Database Dim qdf As DAO.QueryDef Dim strSql As String Set db = CurrentDb strSql = "UPDATE Month_Totals Set item_date = [which_date]" & _ " WHERE id = [which_id];" Debug.Print strSql Set qdf = db.CreateQueryDef("",...

now that I know what terms to search this is much easier :D

user55340

So... my consulting fee... I mentioned 7 figures earlier...

$0.00000001 ?

That's 9, your precision is way off

6:06 PM

I figured I'd be generous and include an additional 2 more figures

Besides you can't actually pay in amounts that fractional, instead I would suggest 7 easy payments of $0

Sweet

alternatively you could pay him with... 7 figures

Figure may refer to: *A shape, drawing, or depiction *Figure (wood), wood appearance *Figure (music), distinguished from musical motif *Noise figure, in telecommunication *Dance figure, an elementary dance pattern *A person's figure, human physical appearance Arts *Figurine, a miniature statuette representation of a creature *Action figure, a poseable character figurine *Figure painting, realistic representation, especially of the human form *Figure drawing *Model figure, a scale model of a creature Writing *figure, in writing, a type of floating block (text, table, or graphic separ...

@enderland you are so generous with those 2 extra figures

user55340

Side bit... here's a fun format. docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/lang/…

user55340

6:08 PM

0x1.0p-2 == 0.25

user55340

scientific notation in hex.

user55340

(though the power is in powers of 2)

user55340

Need to Get Creative? Turn Out the Lights

@MichaelT can you imagine the obfuscation you could cause with that?

@Ampt :)

user55340

@enderland Oh indeed. Its accepted as a valid format for valueOf()

user55340

6:22 PM

> What Steidle and Werth found was that those in the dimly lit room not only solved more problems than those in the brightly lit room, they solved more correctly. The dim room people also reported feeling freer than those in the bright room. "These results indicate that dim illumination heightens perceived freedom from constraints, which in turn improves creative performance,"

@MichaelT thanks for the SQL help btw. I feel like I just learned a ton of incredibly valuable things about how to write good SQL code

user55340

@enderland No problem at all... I mean, after all, that is what we're here for.

now I just have to get my query working correctly :D

or rather, put the right unique entry for my test to match the one I deleted. lolwoops! :)

@MichaelT I wish I had been more active on SO when I was in grad school

I think my coding abilities and knowledge would have skyrocketed

user55340

Was talking with one of the PM's about pockets this morning. She was bemoaning the lack of pockets in womens clothing. Sent here a link to scottevest.com - she's VERY happy now.

user55340

6:38 PM

Granted, its a guy's link for this one... but scottevest.com/v3_store/SeV-Sportcoat.shtml - a sports coat with 23 pockets, one of which is big enough to fit an ipad in.

I love pockets. I need to check this out.

I sometimes wear a jacket (or at work, my lab-approved ESD jacket) just so I have an extra two or three pockets.

Even if I don't have anything in them, I need pockets.

user55340

@ThomasOwens scottevest.com/v3_store/Explorer-Shirt.shtml

user55340

user image

I need to get out of here ASAP or I'm going to want one

user55340

My PM was "They even have a dress that has 3 pockets!" (she finds that rather difficult to find anything moderately formal)... and a cardigan that has a interior zipperd pocket...

user55340

6:51 PM

user image

@MichaelT I don't understand why I don't see those pictures or whatever is in this reply

user55340

@enderland question likely headed your way...

user55340

0

Q: Leaving or staying when company is heading downward

I am working as a solo developer in a small company which is going down thanks to bosses and salespeople. There are many things I still need to learn. Learning rate is higher than earning rate. I am unsure whether to stay or leave. Should I stay till the time I am getting due salary or look for o...

solo-development

user55340

@enderland Dunno... maybe blocked at your site. That last image was of a pair of boxers that had 2 pockets.

user55340

@enderland the answer, of course, is just quit... right?

6:55 PM

16

Q: Is 'Quit your job' an acceptable answer?

A lot of the questions on Workplace are getting an answer along the lines of 'You should quit'. There are some cases where i can see this as a viable answer but the majority of the time I think it shouldn't be used. The main reason why i disagree with it being an answer is that people come to W...

discussion answers

user55340

I was getting there... had to find the right pinned comment first...

user55340

That said, have you ever read "Death March"?

user55340

amazon.com/Death-March-Edition-Edward-Yourdon/dp/013143635X

user55340

Discussion of book c2.com/cgi/wiki?DeathMarch

user55340

> I remember two key points from DeathMarch. The first was, as Betsy mentions, you can always quit (and I recently did exactly that). The second is that one way get a a death march project back under control is to resort to triage - cutting functionality drastically in order to return the project to tractability.

6:57 PM

I have not, no

I know the concept though

user55340

> Yourdon repeatedly reminds the reader that one alternative is to quit, and that in many cases the consequences of quitting, even without another job, are no worse than the consequences of staying.

yeah, there are definitely situations when "quit" is best

user55340

On that question, just left a comment...

user55340

It is never a wrong time to explore other opportunities. — MichaelT 15 secs ago

but people only see one negative and throw out "just quit" and those answers get lots of UVs without any real explanation, when many times people ask about really minor issues

user55340

7:00 PM

Some people quit over very minor things. Sometimes its the minor things that are the straw that broke the camels back.

user55340

(for me, it was how they handled having to punch out to use a vending machine that made me go "WTF")

absolutely

user55340

7:20 PM

0

A: Can we give the community evangelist something more notable to make suggested edits go more smoothy?

Good to be noticed! Indeed, I make these minor (occasionally significant) edits once a week in preparation for the week's Ask Stack column at Ars Technica. As you know, it's easy to get hung up on a minor speling or, punctuation error. And it's important to me that the awesome questions and ans...

8:37 PM

-2

Q: Where would the right place to DISCUSS devloping good progamming work habits?

I know (and respect) that stack exchange would prefer questions that can be answered not discussed ... but i am looking for a good place to discuss and learn about programming work habits ... I've been in the business for about three years but have always worked alone, so I have never seen what...

let the DVs flow forth

8:59 PM

alrighty @MichaelT I have a dumb dumb dumb SQL question but I cannot figure it out :)

9:09 PM

I cannot figure out why the second command here will not work, given this post

INSERT INTO EngineeringTypes (EngineeringType) VALUES ('test');
--INSERT INTO EngineeringTypes (EngineeringType) VALUES ('test'), ('test2');

hmmm maybe this is a limitation with SQL server 2005...

user55340

9:48 PM

I personally don't see anything wrong with it.

user55340

0

Q: If I send an IPA over TestFlight, can it be used to deploy to the app store?

I am currently working for a small startup. I was previously under contract, now I am working for equity (no pay). The thing is, there is not yet a signed agreement in place as the details are being worked out. I may finish development before the contract is ready. I'm not currently under any co...

ios legal appstore

user55340

India Pale Ale?

@MichaelT it's a limitation in 2005 vs 2008 :(

user55340

10:09 PM

> Also note that generating optimal, or even sort-of-optimized, code for the x86 architecture is a lot like breeding elephants: it takes lots of time, lots of noise, lots of effort, lots of bellowing, and there is a real risk of getting crushed underfoot.

user55340

From:

user55340

2

A: Optimizing code generation for expressions in a compiler

Understand that Jack Crenshaw's tutorial is about the basics of compiler design. It is not intended to take you all the way to production quality in one swell foop. There are other basic texts available: the various dragon books are well-known. I personally like Wirth's text: it is almost as a...

thanks again @MichaelT for the help earlier on parameter strings. Pretty dang nifty!

11:05 PM

I wrote a bunch of code today. Winner!

Pretty handy little structure, just finished slapping together a message processing service that can be hosted in a windows service, web service, console app, what have you, and parses a config file to reflection invoke up any list of receivers with each with a child list of processors and registers the processors to it's parent receiver so when messages come in on that given IReceiver, it's message is passed to all of it's IProcessors. Each receiver and processor config section has

an arbitrary settings bag

woo. now to write a couple basic receivers for things we need here and then a couple known processors that I need

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