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Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
3:07 AM
should interop and interoperability be synonymmed? I wager they intend the same meanings nine times out of ten, but there is a such thing as an "interop" as a term to refer to an assembly that does the interoperability...
 
 
1 hour later…
Wronski
Wronski
4:14 AM
hello?
 
 
3 hours later…
gnat
gnat
7:13 AM
there we go...
> Please stop counting proven low score answers in hotness formula. Please roll the dice fairly, let user voting and time decay contribute to hotness score as intended. Please promote to collider audience less brain-damaging content to learn from.
0
Q: In hotness formula, discard answers when voting evidence indicates that these are not good data points

gnatIn current version of “hot” questions formula (Qanswers * Qscore)*, all answers are assumed to equally contribute to question "hotness score", including even those downvoted into oblivion. Suggest to discard answers when there is a strong evidence that these do not provide good data points for a...

feature-request stackexchange-button hot-questions answer-quality
 
gnat
gnat
7:35 AM
@YannisRizos as an experienced "publicist", do you find above redditable? Post starts at fairly boring, "specification analysis" note, but I tried to at least make a bottomline "hit"
 
 
3 hours later…
Yannis Rizos
Yannis Rizos
10:28 AM
@gnat The above? The Meta q?
 
gnat
gnat
@YannisRizos yes the above. I really doubt that meta Q's are "redditable" but since I've no idea on how "publicists" do their magic, I decided it's better to ask :)
just doing my best to ensure that it won't be somehow swept under the carpet by usual gang of brainless MSO downvoters...
funny to see "downvote gang" squirm at this straight support question. Guys, what are you going to achieve with downvotes? If this is supposed to somehow "harm", note I just spent 200 on a bounty, so these funny -2s make me rather smile — gnat yesterday
 
Yannis Rizos
Yannis Rizos
10:52 AM
I don't think anyone outside SE would care for a Meta q.
 
gnat
gnat
11:15 AM
@YannisRizos okay then, no problem
Posted 5 (five!) years ago, this answer presents ideas that read surprisingly relevant now: "I certainly don't think it should be based on just the number of views or answers posted (both could obviously be gamed easily). However, I believe it should be mainly based on score... (upvotes - downvotes)." — gnat 7 mins ago
answer posted on Aug 23'08 oh my. They were warned, but nobody gave a shit
There were distinct complaints since at least July 2010 but, again, nobody gave a shit
74
Q: Don't let questions stick to the top of the hot questions list forever

Mad ScientistI've noticed that some very highly upvoted questions stay in the list of hot questions (also displayed in the Stack Exchange menu on the top left) for a very long time, often for several days. One example would be this question on Programmers which is still in the hot questions list (though prett...

feature-request stackexchange-button hot-questions
-1 - 10 examples collected by OP in between Jul '11 and Jan '13 mean this happens every month or two. To me, this hardly qualifies as "very, very rare event" — gnat Jan 29 at 8:20
 
 
3 hours later…
user55340
1:54 PM
Ahh, the debate that shall not be named has been named...
 
user55340
0
Q: Change site name from 'Programmers' to 'Programming'

ProfessionalAmateurIt would make 1000% more sense given the type of discussions people want to see here.

feature-request status-declined
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@gnat Bravo, your formula correction is great
@YannisRizos Is there an SE reddit site?
 
Undo
Undo
@Jimmy No, in the same way there isn't a Quara SE site.
 
user55340
I'm still waiting for discourse.programmers.stackexchange.com
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@MichaelT I haven't heard a peep about discourse in quite a while, I think everybody kind of looked at it for a bit and decided "Yeah... Jeff messed up, cest la vie..."
I like it as far as forums go, I just don't much like forums.
 
user55340
2:05 PM
It was mentioned in the latest podcast...
 
Undo
Undo
@Jimmy It was in the most recent podcast.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
I've never listened to a single one of those
are they interesting outside of my SE addiction?
 
user55340
Blog - Stack Exchange: Podcast #51 – The Return of Coding Horror
Alex Miller on August 05, 2013

Welcome to Stack Exchange Podcast #51, with special guest Jeff Atwood and the usual suspects Joel Spolsky, David Fullerton, and Jay Hanlon. Today’s show was brought to you by Pan-American World Airways!

We kick off the discussion with a topic not on the agenda… which is reminiscing about who used to prepare the agenda on the old Joel & Jeff podcasts.

Site Milestones! Spaaaace is now in public beta, so you should check it out. We also closed the India proposal, after much discussion about the possibilities for location-based sites. …

 
Undo
Undo
I've only listened to about 5 minutes of the last one.
 
user55340
> Jeff is looking for three major partners. He’s got two already. Listen in to hear the Stack Exchange exclusive on the third Discourse partner! (DISCLAIMER: there is no actual announcement.)
 
Undo
Undo
2:07 PM
I also detest forums - but maybe it's because I'm spoiled with SE :)
 
user55340
I dislike forums, but I do recognize there is a place for them that SE doesn't fill. In the goal of "keep eyeballs here", having a discourse place may help keep people on Stack Exchange rather than wandering to other sites.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
0
Q: How to develop an execution framework?

user1125516I have a GEF based graphical editor that saves the model drawn as xml, what is saved is the graphical model, with postions, size, etc. The model is a graphical representation of componenents that conforme to an API. What i want to achieve is the aibility graphically execute what is drawn and he...

java architecture interpreters
s/an execution framework/my entire architecture/f
You probably have a lot of interesting sub-problems here which would make for good questions, as it stands this really is a bit of a "Help design my entire architecture" question which doesn't work very well because there's no single correct answer which the Q&A format requires. Please feel free to break this down and ask a few questions with specific problems you're facing though! Remember, if you're question asks for advice rather than an answer it probably doesn't fit here. — Jimmy Hoffa 41 secs ago
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
I'm looking for a software language to muck around with over Summer. I often like to muck around with software languages as full time I work as a web developer. I have mucked around with Java before, as well as .NET, but I haven't touched c++. I've done some reading on it and it seems very powerful and quite a challenge. I understand the concepts of object-oriented programming and I'm sure would quickly pick up the new syntax.

What I'm really asking is.. over the new few weeks I'd love to produce a really basic little 2D game, just something to practice on. Is c++ a good language to do thi…
 
user20683
@JoelKidd C++ is a monster
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
@WorldEngineer So not recommended for indie game development?
 
user55340
2:20 PM
@WorldEngineer I think we mentioned this earlier... it hides under one's bed?
 
user20683
@JoelKidd Overkill for 2D
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
@WorldEngineer What about Java?
 
user55340
17 hours ago, by Wronski
Bjarne Stroutrup Book is destined to be kept under the bed
 
user20683
@JoelKidd Java can work, if you're on Windows, I'd recommend C#
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Ahhhhhhh I love you
C#
Niceeeee
Is it like a tone-downed version of c++?
 
user20683
2:22 PM
@JoelKidd Not really
 
user55340
C++ is really an all or nothing prospect. There's no C++ lite.
 
user20683
It's more like a tuned up Java
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
@WorldEngineer Would you mind telling me the reasons why C# would be a better option?
Also
 
user20683
@JoelKidd it's actually designed
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Can you publish Java games on the Steam store?
(just out of interest)
 
user55340
2:23 PM
 
user20683
@JoelKidd There are no language restriction on the Steam Store that I'm aware of. Talk to them.
 
user55340
> Yo can, but Steamworks API is C/C++ only, so if you want Steam Cloud, Steam Achievements or others of the Steamwork's services you have to make your own C/C++ to Java/whatever wrapper, in case they let you.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Ahh I see
 
user55340
> Altitude is also written in Java and works with Steamworks ok.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Is C# a popular language to use for game development?
 
user55340
2:24 PM
So... probably.
 
user20683
@JoelKidd very
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Now that's nice to here
I want something that's going to be of use in the future should I go down the road of game development
I'm very much interested in it, although always tied up as a web developer
 
user55340
C# gives you closer linkages to Microsoft Windows... rather than going through the C++ abstractions.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
I see.
I know this sounds silly
 
user55340
That is its advantage and problem. You'll have difficulty taking it to other platforms.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
2:25 PM
But is there "less" to learn than C++?
 
user20683
@JoelKidd You know we've got a Game Development site?
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
No I didn't lol
That's awesome :)
 
user20683
@JoelKidd sorta
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@WorldEngineer at first glance I read mobster, and I feel this might be a more appropriate description. Monsters go away and hide and do various predictable things, C++ is more akin to whitey bolger; for some reason people think it's on the good guys side, but it keeps doing horrible things
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
C# sounds pretty good then, I think that'll be my choice
When you say difficult to take it onto other platforms
Can I not just outsource should that be necessary?
I want to focus on a single software language.. not have to work about learning other languages to get it onto other platforms
worry** not work
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
2:28 PM
@JoelKidd C# also interoperates with C/C++ quite well so you can link with steam from C# quite easily
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
@JimmyHoffa Are a large percentage of Windows games on Steam produced in C#?
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@JoelKidd You know HTML, CSS, PHP, and JavaScript? The next logical stepping stone is Haskell.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
I've never hard of that before
heard*
 
user20683
@JoelKidd hard is a good word for it
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Well is learning Haskell going to be any use, what's wrong with jumping straight into C#?
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
2:29 PM
@JoelKidd I don't know if that's the case, but there definitely are some and large portions of indie games are done in C#, have a read here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_XNA
 
user20683
@JoelKidd Haskell will make you a better programmer in the long term but it's of minimal use right now.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@JoelKidd I was joking; you don't want to learn Haskell, it's not a stepping stone, it's more like a floating island in the sky
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Lol I see
lmao
 
user20683
@JoelKidd Mono is how you do C# for Mac/Linux
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Righty I see
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
2:30 PM
@WorldEngineer Not sure what support mono has for XNA though..
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
If I asked you
I know you can't just pluck a random figure but
If you have any idea
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@JoelKidd XNA game studio I just linked you to is what can be used to do game development in C#, it's all done by microsoft very high quality tools and libraries
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
What percentage of Steam games would you say are produced with C#?
Yes I've heard of XNA before
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@JoelKidd I literally couldn't even guess
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
What I'm trying to get at
Is, is it going to be worth learning C# in the long run?
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
2:31 PM
Absolutely
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
I don't want to learn a language that's going to be poop in a years time
As long as it's a long term achievement
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
C# is a great language that will be around for a long time, and you can get work using C# in lots of different industries
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
That's what I wanted to hear
Great stuff, now I feel like I should learn it anyway :D
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
I've been a C# developer for over 8 years
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Wowsa
Do you think it'll take me a long time to get to grips with it?
Syntax relatively similar to .NET?
Please tell me lines end with ;
 
user20683
2:33 PM
@JoelKidd C# is part of .NET
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
.NET is a framework, C# is a language which uses that framework
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Oh snap
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
C# is very similar to java
you'd have no problems if you know java
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Oh fantastic
Yeah I studied Java for a few months
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
2:34 PM
@JimmyHoffa If I asked you now to develop a 2D game after 8 years of experience doing whatever, would you find it difficult?
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
Yay me, I love it when a nice comment results in a voluntary deletion to create better quality
@JoelKidd Probably, I've never done any game development at all
or graphics work or anything of the nature.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
@JimmyHoffa Out of interest, what do you use C# for?
@JimmyHoffa It's the only thing I've used software languages for, making games
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
I've used C# for various extremely high traffic, large dataset websites, and lots of other things. distributed data processing across thousands of servers at one job
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Would C++ not be a better language for dealing with high traffic (because of the direct access to memory etc)?
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
C#, Java, C++, these are all what are known as "General Purpose Languages", this means you can use them for basically anything and people do. They each have their strengths, but they can each be used interchangably more or less.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
2:37 PM
Ahh I see
 
user20683
@JoelKidd C# can have direct access if it needs it.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
@WorldEngineer :D
 
user20683
with "unsafe"
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Didn't know that
 
user20683
@JoelKidd It's not a good idea
 
user20683
2:38 PM
use only when absolutely necessary
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
@WorldEngineer I don't think I'll ever need it anyway, was just out of interest
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@JoelKidd Nah, there's a lot more to think about than performance, C# does allow direct memory access as well, but it doesn't require it. More importantly than performance is that you can write quality code in a timely fashion that has a low bug count and maintain that code for years adding features and keeping it up to date without introducing new bugs
 
Dynamic
Dynamic
@WorldEngineer Preferably not at all
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
in the case of C++, it takes a rather significant amount of code to do web development over what C# or Java require, the added amount of code gives more places for bugs to crop up so C++ is not so good for web development in comparison. That said if you're a C++ expert, there's no reason you can't do web development with it, and people do web development with C++
 
user20683
@JoelKidd Also Learn Mercurial while your at it. Lost source code sucks
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
2:39 PM
Hold on
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@JoelKidd mercurial is a tool not a language
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
So I'm a web designer, you're talking about web development with C++?
that confuses me
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
You're the one who suggested it
 
user55340
Its doable. My first web program was in C.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
I didn't suggest web development with C++
I don't know how you'd do that
 
user20683
2:40 PM
@JoelKidd with difficulty
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
> Would C++ not be a better language for dealing with high traffic (because of the direct access to memory etc)?
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
I thought PHP, rubby etc were web development languages?
 
user55340
The old school way is with a CGI. Newer approaches are writing plugins for web servers.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Ahh sorry, I meant in more general terms, server stuff
 
Dynamic
Dynamic
@MichaelT Doable, but compared to Python/Ruby/Perl/PHP it's no fun.
 
user20683
2:41 PM
@JoelKidd ASP.Net
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
They are, so is C#, Java, C++ at a stretch has some frameworks but it's really not C++'s focus
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
I must learn to hear the word 'web development' more broadly :P
Well C# it is then :)
Thanks for your help chaps
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
This website runs on C# with ASP.Net
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
ok
 
gnat
gnat
@JimmyHoffa this formula isn't exactly mine; in the hindsight, my first attempt was rather lame. If memory serves, discussions with Ben Brocka, Mysticial and especially with @GlenH7 made it the way it is now
2
A: Trial run of modified "hotness formula" for Programmers questions

GlenH7As a suggestion to your proposed change in the algorithm: ((Qanswers * Qscore)/5) this section should ignore counting any answers that have a total negative value. (ie. -1 or less) However, sum(Ascores) should still accrue the negative votes. The net effect is that poor quality answers (aka ...

 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
2:42 PM
You mean the server?
 
user55340
@Dynamic When I did it in C, Perl was just about as painful, php and ruby didn't exist and python was horribly immature.
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
The website runs on a server created by C# using ASP.NET framework?
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@JoelKidd The whole website.
yes
 
Joel Kidd
Joel Kidd
Right that makes sense
ok thanks guys, Joel signin' out
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@gnat Damned engineers and their "equations"
 
gnat
gnat
2:50 PM
@MichaelT I for one disagree with both "Programmers" and "Programming". First revision of the question had a fantastic typo that would make an awesome title for our site: Pro-gamers. Now that's the name I could be 200% happy with
 
user55340
@gnat Except that we'd be inundated by DOTA and starcraft players.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@MichaelT We're pretty good at showing people the door, I think we could handle it...
 
user55340
Instead of FGITW, we'd have people complaing about Zerging.
 
gnat
gnat
3:12 PM
@MichaelT somehow, this perspective stops scaring me after reading some of the questions we get...
-1
Q: I am newbie in web development having one year's experience. Need guidance for my future endeavors

user2111027I have one year of experience in Web development .Net technology. currently i am working on ERP projects. And now i have time to learn new things which will be use-full for become more knowledgeable person && have good salary package.

c# web-development asp.net enterprise-development erp
hey, and I could freely post Klingon pictures without a need to hide them behind programming related stuff!
6
A: How do I approach a coworker about his or her code quality?

gnat ...the code simply wasn't indented, there were hundreds of lines commented out for no apparent reason, documentation was basically non-existent, coding standards weren't applied consistently (e.g. mixing camelCase and under_scored_variables), variable names were unintelligible, datatype choice...

 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@MichaelT I see you're on codingconfessional.com
> I love Perl.
 
user55340
@JimmyHoffa heh... no, thats not me.
 
gnat
gnat
simple math: there are "300 freaking easy golden badges that could drain 40,000 items from the queue in less than a month, and... 10,000 eligible users..." It looks like currently, SE team has good reasons to keep poor usability of this queue and no good reasons to improve it — gnat 26 mins ago
 
user55340
3:42 PM
Hmmm... can you get a tag badge for status-declined on MSO?
 
gnat
gnat
3:58 PM
how could this question attract so many crappy answers?
7
Q: If this is camelCase what-is-this?

Lea HayesThe naming convention for a term like doSomething is camel case. What would the naming convention of do-something be called?

naming
 
user55340
For all the haters out there...Lisp is older than the alphabet. Lower case had not been invented yet. As such case did not matter and therefore all your fancy naming conventions were useless, as everything got squashed to all caps. The dashes (which a Lisp interpreter would never confuse with application of minus) were the best way to make functions, etc. readable. — Keith Layne Aug 29 '11 at 18:05
 
gnat
gnat
oh I figured at least why one of the answers is accepted and has good score. Relatively rare case of link-only answer pointing to stuff that makes a good answer indeed
11
A: If this is camelCase what-is-this?

JeffODelimiter-Separated which could also use the underscore (Delimiter_Separated). ...A common recommendation is "Use meaningful identifiers." A single word may not be as meaningful, or specific, as multiple words. Consequently, some naming conventions specify rules for the treatment of "compound...

but hey, that...
21
A: If this is camelCase what-is-this?

Keith LayneI call it lisp-case for lack of a better term, and for a lack of seeing it used much (if ever) in other language families.

...or that...
I made it up just now. I don't think I've ever seen it used anywhere. — boshvark Sep 4 '11 at 18:39
feels like pure crap
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
4:25 PM
I really want to change the title to If thisIs camel case what-is-this because currently it's inaccurately claiming "this is" to be camel case
but lisp case, I can work with that. it is the common in lisp
 
psr
psr
@gnat Would it help if 20 or 30 of us contributed meh answers to your question? (Is there such a thing as meta-hotness)?
 
gnat
gnat
4:44 PM
@psr ROTFL! don't know if this would help, but that would certainly be very meta, self-demonstrating issue report. "Everything counts in large amounts..."
and that would be fun... and we'd have to invite @JimmyHoffa to share that fun. He loves to hunt where hotness lemmings swim
 
user55340
@gnat That may cool off after he hits 10k... he's wishing for those review tools to see more of the inside bits of SE.
 
gnat
gnat
@MichaelT I hope that this will cool off a bit differently, by fixing that bug in hotness formula. Though, I wouldn't be surprised to see this freakin' bug still there, even after he reaches 15, 20, 30K... SE is veeeeery sloooow sometimes
yesterday, by Jimmy Hoffa
also I should write an answer because agile questions are total lemming bait
 
user55340
Yep... he's after the 10k rep and was impressed with the paypal answer rep.
 
user55340
32
Q: Where does paypal's 92233720368547800 number come from?

shamp00There has been a story in the news about a man whose Paypal account was accidentally credited with $92,233,720,368,547,800. Where does this number come from? What sort of programming bug is likely to give rise to this number?

errors numbers payment
 
user55340
And then... there was this epic...
 
user55340
4:52 PM
12
A: How to create better OO code in a relational database driven application where the database is poorly designed

Jimmy HoffaObject 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...

 
user55340
> That's right, let's start talking about a monad...
 
gnat
gnat
5:09 PM
@MichaelT thanks for reminding! put a bounty on it
> This answer is exemplary and worthy of an additional bounty. "That's right, let's start talking about a monad..."
 
user55340
I'm snickering about that and getting funny looks from co-workers.
 
gnat
gnat
I was thinking of doing bounty from the moment I saw rev 3, and totally decided in it at rev 4 but somehow managed to forget about it. Now it's there at last
fuck-the-fake-hotness request is at +17 now. So far so good (keeping fingers crossed)
17
Q: In hotness formula, discard answers when voting evidence indicates that these are not good data points

gnatIn current version of “hot” questions formula (Qanswers * Qscore)*, all answers are assumed to equally contribute to question "hotness score", including even those downvoted into oblivion. Suggest to discard answers when there is a strong evidence that these do not provide good data points for a...

feature-request voting stackexchange-button hot-questions answer-quality
 
user41796
5:47 PM
0
A: In hotness formula, discard answers when voting evidence indicates that these are not good data points

GlenH7I think you have a solid suggestion in reining in the issues with the hotness formula, but I don't think your approach goes far enough. Instead of just ignoring negatively scored answers, they should drag the hotness value down. Any answer with a negative score should have an equal, but opposite...

 
user41796
And Jimmy can make all the comments he wants about engineers, but if you want to talk about control systems then you better talk to an engineer. :-)
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
6:09 PM
@gnat Thanks!
@gnat If it's a lisp-case post, of course it's going to do well
 
gnat
gnat
@JimmyHoffa do you suggest to change the post title to that "f-t-f-h" identifier? Regarding lisp I know of a program that could inspire such an edit: Terminal emulator for GNU Emacs by Richard Mlynarik... 
;;;; what a complete loss

(defun te-quote-arg-for-sh (fuckme)
  (cond ((string-match "\\`[a-zA-Z0-9-+=_.@/:]+\\'"
               fuckme)
     fuckme)
    ((not (string-match "[$]" fuckme))
     ;; "[\"\\]" are special to sh and the lisp reader in the same way
     (prin1-to-string fuckme))
    (t
     (let ((harder "")
           (cretin 0)
           (stupid 0))
       (while (cond ((>= cretin (length fuckme))
             nil)
            ;; this is the set of chars magic with "..." in `sh'
            ((setq stupid (string-match "[\"\\$]"
poetry of programming
 
user55340
should put that up on code review... and its elegant.
 
user55340
I've often said that getting into the head of the coder is key to making modifications to the code. This would need some gin and some good angry punk music.
 
gnat
gnat
@GlenH7 that's right, without negative feedback I would likely post the first / lame version of formula which would be in turn trashed and downvoted for all the issues it had
 
user20683
6:29 PM
@MichaelT how's this?
 
user20683
 
thorsten müller
thorsten müller
Could be nice if sound quality wouldn't be so abominable.
 
user55340
Btw, City Square Off is a hit with my co-workers for quick games to play.
 
user55340
 
user55340
It says 15 minutes on the box, but if neither person goes for analysis paralysis, its 5.
 
user20683
6:34 PM
@thorstenmüller that's actually built into the song, it was recorded in the hallway of the record studio to make it more "authentically" punk.
 
thorsten müller
thorsten müller
sounds like a hipsters idea about punk :)
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@gnat ...wow
 
thorsten müller
thorsten müller
 
user20683
@thorstenmüller it was 1986...there were no Hipsters
 
thorsten müller
thorsten müller
There were tons of hipsters 1986, just nobody had invented that name for them yet
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
6:38 PM
@gnat Richard Gabriel's Rise of Worse is Better is one of my favorite blogs for how it details so eloquently an abstract concept that can be seen generalized to the micro and macro levels of software architecture
 
psr
psr
@WorldEngineer Yet if you observed closely, a few infants drank their vintage Mickey Mouse bottles ironically.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
His 'The Right Way' I've taken to calling 'Micro-Architecture' from MicroKernel, because realistically all software can match that same set of concepts: Small, modular, segregated componentry vs. monolithic being your N-Tier top-to-bottom stack architectures which happen at fractal depths of software design (Monolithic kernel to monolithic desktop or web apps etc)
 
Yannis Rizos
Yannis Rizos
@MichaelT I tried converting that answer to a comment on Jeff's answer, but it ended up as a comment on the question instead. I guess that's good enough, it could have ended up on Cooking Stack Exchange...
 
user55340
@YannisRizos That would be an amusing migration to see.
 
gnat
gnat
6:54 PM
@thorstenmüller that's... hypnotizing. Thanks!
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
If you wish to talk about changing the site scope or title or any of those other things to fit the perspective you appear to have, I humbly suggest you read the annals of meta.p.se first, there has been much debate through here about the topic in the past; it was finally put to bed around the end of last year after a great deal of tumult on the topic, the reasons for such tumult will become clear if you start reading through. — Jimmy Hoffa 11 secs ago
Where's a good starting Q or list of Q's on M.P.SE for someone to read and acquaint themselves with the history of this site's scope and the fights about it; such that they may realize we've already hashed and rehashed all of that and they need not bring it up any more?
 
user20683
@JimmyHoffa "debate" and "tumult" are such polite words to use for it.
 
user20683
not sure, I can go digging
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
If you could just find the earliest one or two would be fine
just so that they can follow it chronologically if they feel inclined
 
user55340
I was waiting for Robert to comment "AGAIN?!?!?!?!?!"
 
gnat
gnat
7:05 PM
wow. Spammer registered (to post their stuff as a question)?
-1
Q: Exeter vs QPR Live Stream 06/08/2013

user2657849Watch Exeter vs QPR Live Streaming Online. We are streaming this match along with all other matches of English Capital One Cup. Date: 6th August 2013 English Capital One Cup Watch Exeter vs QPR Live Stream Here Harry Redknapp’s QPR squad, as currently registered, share 381 senior internationa...

php
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
(or stop halfway through to lose their lunch and decide they are on the wrong train)
 
user20683
@gnat already scheduled them for a date with a blowtorch
 
user55340
I didn't even get my spam flag in.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@MichaelT Got mine! Woot!
 
user20683
@MichaelT gnat FGITW except that I knew before I got any flags
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
7:06 PM
Had to do it quick but yay for free flag points
 
user55340
@WorldEngineer Hey baby... you look like some hot stuff.
 
user20683
because I am the FMITE
 
gnat
gnat
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
0
Q: When should we clean up old, no longer used GIT branches?

Pheonixblade9We have several bugfix branches that are starting to pile up. They have been merged into master, and deployed to production. Is there a good benchmark for when these branches should be cleaned up? Should they ever be cleaned up, or is it good to have the historical data?

git naming github branching
git and somewhat opinion based, collider or not? I'm thinking collider.
 
gnat
gnat
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
7:10 PM
@JimmyHoffa - Honestly I'm removing my account from SE.Programmers. This exchange site is one that values form more than function. As a result it is not a useful resource to me or enjoyable to participate in. I may be the only one that feels this way, but by reading what gets closed and the discussions in meta.programmers on the topic Im clearly not alone on this. — ProfessionalAmateur 31 secs ago
 
gnat
gnat
@JimmyHoffa I think dupe (listening to that suicide, feels great)
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@gnat Agree; I voted
and I hesitate to vote for dupes
but they are the same question
 
gnat
gnat
@JimmyHoffa that's the good general instinct to hesitate. Dupes take much effort and care, compared to other close reasons
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
7:26 PM
0
Q: Rampant abstraction is driving me to distraction and I feel like putting Little Lord Fauntleroy in traction

Clay ShannonHere's an example of why I'm dubious about all this "elegant" (fancy-pants) abstraction (my first rant diesbzg is here: http://codereview.stackexchange.com/questions/28990/fancy-pants-vs-cowboy-coding). I'm working on an asp.net app that uses the MVC pattern. One of the model members is/was a Li...

asp.net-mvc abstraction modeling binding
That's a hall-of-fame title (that's right, not just hall of fame, but lisp-cased which makes everything better)
 
gnat
gnat
fair meh answer that reads like spam, why am I not surprised to see it in this question?
0
A: Shouldn't recruitment be the other way round?

Jace Browninghttp://workforpie.com/companies/ We'll introduce you to job seeking candidates based on how well their skills align with your needs. That's the baseline. We take it a step further and match you to developers based on common cultural preferences. Our goal is to help you find a team that you'll...

...just because...
"Does anybody know of some recruitment platform like this?" -- Questions asking us to recommend a tool, library or favorite off-site resource are off-topic for Programmers as they tend to attract opinionated answers and spam. Instead, describe the problem and what has been done so far to solve it. — gnat 1 min ago
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
How many close reasons can we comment on this question?
-4
Q: What do programmers hate most about recruiters?

user98889I'm working on an article which details what engineers, software developers, designers, or really people of any technical background think about recruiters. Because people with these skill sets are so valuable and in such high demand, I'm sure many of you have encountered headhunters or unprompte...

programming-practices recruiting
 
user20683
@JimmyHoffa I might be able to list all of them
 
user20683
I'm sure it's a dupe fro the early days, it's too broad because I know some of you are long winded about these things. It's primarily opinion based because I don't hate recruiters (yet).
 
user20683
it's off-topic because it's not expressly about software development and it's unclear what he's asking because it doesn't appear really truly answerable.
 
user20683
7:36 PM
there, I think that does it.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@WorldEngineer Start off on the right foot; hate recruiters pre-emptively. You'll be better off for it.
 
user55340
In the glory days of the dot.com boom, one could make a bit of money selling the complete company directory (former company one would suppose) to a head hunter so they could cold call your (former) engineering department with offers.
 
gnat
gnat
@JimmyHoffa I am trying very hard to avoid snarky answer-in-comments "when recruiters post questions like that at programming sites". That's a strong indication of a question ion a need of harvey-ing
 
user20683
@JimmyHoffa here's a flag
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@WorldEngineer thanks, I'm working on a flaghawk
@gnat I hope you mean harvey-ing as in crude sarcastic disheveling comments in response to unnecessarily garbagey questions or answers, because that's the Robert Harvey I know...
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
7:52 PM
great answer from a new user:
3
A: How much does the data model affect scalability and performance in so called "NoSQL" database?

haragethDoes using a NoSQL database give a boost to scalability even if you aren't sharding data? Well lets define scalability. If you are referring to scalability as database/backend systems are concerned, in that you have vertical and horizontal scaling where horizontal scaling IS sharding data then th...

 
user55340
I saw that too... upvoted.
 
user55340
And Workplace took the management book question.
 
user55340
-1
Q: Is giving a management book to your boss inappropriate?

EricFromSouthParkI've read Rework (by David Heinemeier Hansson and Jason Fried) and found that it has some really good points about ASAP, meetings, etc. I've found that this book addresses many mistakes that are regularly practiced at my daily job. My boss is hosting an annual BBQ party soon. Is it wrong if I gi...

management
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
This question appears to be off-topic because you didn't ask a question. It appears to be more of a rant than anything else. Pick up some good books on ASP.NET MVC and learn some "proper" ways of doing things. Experiment; find out which technologies best suit your needs. — Robert Harvey 39 mins ago
As far as piloting 747's is concerned, that's exactly what you would do if you wanted to get a couple hundred passengers to a destination quickly and safely. My impression is that you haven't really studied ASP.NET MVC enough to evaluate it on its own merit, or tried to build a non-trivial web application without some framework support to hold it up. — Robert Harvey 37 mins ago
Finally, if your question really is about binding a CSV value to an array of checkboxes, strip away all of the rant, and re-ask the question on Stack Overflow. Include your attempts to solve the problem in your question. — Robert Harvey 35 mins ago
"STFU in Three Parts, a poem by @RobertHarvey."
 
user20683
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
8:15 PM
Interesting fact, using two vertical monitors chrome has ever rendered as such when I stretch it across the border of the two; I think so few people use two vertical monitors practically no one knows (lots of apps, visual studio included, behave strangely with my monitor setup) the split you see in the google image is where the two monitor borders touch
the further I stretch it the more of the left side of the page it shows instead of the right side like it's supposed to
 
user55340
(Further proof that monads damage your brain... the desire to use vertically stacked monitors.)
 
user55340
Though more seriously, if I was to ever get 'office' style progressive lenses, vertical stacked monitors would be even more difficult.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@MichaelT The causal relation goes the other way, it takes brain damage to interest in monads; I've used vertical monitors far longer than having known monads
 
user55340
It also goes to the ergonomics bit that you 'shouldn't' be tilting your head up and down to read.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
and they're not stacked vertically, they're rotated vertically; sitting side by side
Used this way I never have to tilt my head up/down or right/left
 
user20683
8:18 PM
@JimmyHoffa Dr. King uses a vertical monitor
 
user55340
Ahh... I knew one guy who uses two monitors, in mixed orientation.
 
user55340
Left was vertical, right was horizontal.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@MichaelT That's common among UI folks (because they're different)
our whole UI team works like that
I'm guessing it's so they can test various screen sizes
 
user55340
He was a strong 80 col proponent, so he could see more code on his screen at once.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
two wide screens side by side is just too much looking left-right for me, plus I get way more start-bar real estate this way
 
user55340
8:20 PM
And I do value vertical space, but I like having two vertical halfs to my screen than horizontal.
 
user55340
If I have one monitor, I prefer a wide screen. If I have two at 19", I'd rather have them be normal aspect ratio for more screen real estate. if they are huge, I go back to wide scren because its more of a "one monitor and stuff to the side" setup.
 
user20683
I have a 13 inch monitor
 
user20683
that's what I've used for a good long while
 
user20683
never had more than 17
 
user55340
Previous employer... first I had a 17" regular, then I swaped it for a 17" wide. I later got 2x 19" and I got regular ones.
 
user55340
8:25 PM
Here, I've got 2x 17" regular and a laptop monitor. At home I have a 27" and a 24" wide (apple).
 
user55340
One guy here has 4x monitors. One 24" (center main), 2x 17" (left and right "stuff" monitoring) and the laptop display (center low).
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
I've had 2 24" monitors at every job since '08, except six months at my last place it was 2 19" monitors
If I was ever given anything smaller than 19" I don't have a clue what I'd do. Strangle someone and leap out of a window? Craziness. @MichaelT I'm guessing you were supplied far more appropriately in silly valley?
 
user55340
I had a linux box with a single 19" regular monitor for which I ran a window manager that did virtual desktops nicely.
 
user55340
I had 4x virtual desktops, each virtual desktop was a 2x the width of my monitor - so hitting the side of the screen would start the entire screen scrolling.
 
user55340
IT dev was the unwanted child of the company (to an extent)... we weren't revenue generating so we got hand me downs for equipment.... and thats also why we were laid off.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
8:32 PM
@MichaelT yeah back in the small monitor days X really was awesome. You can still do a lot of that in windows as well with for instance fluxbox for windows
 
user55340
What a lot of companies don't realize is that IT dev is not revenue generating... but it is cost savings across the company to implement the things needed to make them work smoothly together.
 
user20683
@MichaelT If there is one thing I've learn from working receiving in retail, it's that infrastructure is king.
 
user20683
IT Department = Road Engineers.
 
user20683
@MichaelT @JimmyHoffa Could this be improved? programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/207436/…
 
user55340
@WorldEngineer Previous employer saw IT as "expense" rather than "cost savings" and "efficiency enabler"
 
user20683
8:36 PM
@MichaelT much as much of America sees its roads and bridges.
 
user55340
@WorldEngineer Upgrades. Bug fixes. You don't write bug free code, nor do the frameworks. But you can upgrade the framework and get the bug fixes faster than you can fix your own.
 
user20683
@MichaelT oh, that's a good point
 
user55340
Writing just the minimal for the project means that if the client wants more (they always do), you have to write more. If you are not writing a framework, that is even more time that you need to spend on updates.
 
user55340
More time is spent maintaining code than writing code. To a person familiar with the framework (say, Spring), you can sit down on another Spring app and immediately be familiar with 75% of the code. If someone sits down with an unfamiliar custom app, everything is unfamiliar.
 
user55340
The familiarity means that you can get into maintaining the code that much faster with a framework than custom code.
 
user55340
8:40 PM
The standard web framework has a rather centralized or straight forward way of indicating where everything is for each action. Compare to the unframework way where you need to read three different sections of web.xml in order to figure out where a given request goes.
 
user20683
@MichaelT I'd argue I covered that with "complexity"
 
user20683
and "time"
 
user55340
development time and maintenance time really need to be considered differently... especially if someone else is doing the maintenance.
 
user55340
if anything. the maintenance aspect means it is even more important for new programmers to learn frameworks because it gets them up to speed faster.
 
user20683
@MichaelT aye
 
user55340
8:42 PM
Knowing spring from the start (former employer was a spring shop), means that you don't need to have them spend 3 weeks learning it shortly after new hire.
 
user20683
I swear if I ever do my own programming language, I'll allow commas for large numbers
 
user20683
int var = 40,000,000 will be totally legal
 
user55340
In perl, the underscore in a number is ignored. '4_000_000 == 4000000 == 4_0000_00'
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
You should use frameworks anytime a decent one that's purpose-built for your use is available. Using a framework will only ease your general use of the language itself (this is dependant on quality, but the time to use a bad framework is never), as such starting with a framework is most ideal; the systemic details past the framework can come as you ease into the application you're working on with the framework(s) to get you started.
 
user20683
@Leatherwing welcome to Programmers. Something we can help you with?
 
user20683
8:46 PM
@JimmyHoffa hence my recommendation of diving in immediately and then filling gaps as you go
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
I think there's value in pointing out the beginning of what I just said though; you should always use frameworks when they're available, purpose-built to your needs, and of quality
 
user55340
(we're just trying to get you to do 10 edits and CW the answer...)
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
There are simply no cons, so long as they meet basic usage guidelines, there's no reason to write the code yourself when someone else already did
in other words, I disagree on this point:
> You should start using frameworks when it becomes impractical not to for either reasons of complexity, time, or correctness. I will address each case separately:
 
user20683
@MichaelT I can de-wiki answers
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
You need to reverse your guard condition:
You should *stop* using frameworks when it becomes *impractical to*
 
user55340
8:56 PM
Another caveat... "even though you are using frameworks, you should still know what is going on under the covers of the framework. This will make you appreciate it more, and also avoid some bugs that the framework won't be able to solve for you."
 
user20683
@MichaelT like Rails
 
user55340
 
user55340
> TL;DR Ruby libraries need to stop being too powerful. Programmers need to understand the libraries they are using.
 
user55340
@WorldEngineer Like rails.
 
Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
@MichaelT Like I said, before using a framework you should make sure it's meets basic usage guidelines; such as: Not being written in Ruby by someone who doesn't know the slightest thing of appropriate design approach.
 
user55340
8:59 PM
> Will says that “The aim is to be so declarative, so high-level as to no longer see nor understand what is happening beneath and before." What really happens is that most people that work with ruby are simply not educated enough to understand what is happening “beneath and before."
 
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