The Whiteboard

Ampt

18:02

@GlenH7 is homebrew on topic?

user41796

@Ampt I don't think so since they have a separate site dedicated to homebrew

user55340

@Ampt what nature of it?

user55340

Ampt

@MichaelT making it I would suppose

It seems weird to have a site for making and a site for drinking

user55340

@Ampt That's what the HB.SE site is for.

user55340

18:04

0

Q: My "Cider" has the consistency of puree - what to do?

3 weeks ago, I set up a batch of apple to make hard cider. I chopped the apples in a kitchen machine and added yeast. The yeast I put into a smaller batch of the mashed apples before, after ading some sugar there was vissible fermentation (bubbles). For most of the three weeks, I guess the fermen...

user55340

6

Q: How do I carbonate without yeast or a keg?

I am brewing a batch of Hard Lemonade. The gravity started at 1.090 in mid September 2011. I pitched Lalvin EC-1118 as the yeast. It is now down to 1.029 and tastes good and is sweet. If I bottle and carbonate the traditional way, I will have bottle bombs. I don't own a keg or have the money to b...

carbonation lemonade force-carbonation

user55340

So, that's the homebrew site.

Ampt

area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/48905/beer/48907#48907

totally a brewing question

area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/48905/beer/48978#48978

user41796

@Ampt ale vs lager?

Ampt

area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/48905/beer/49045#49045

@GlenH7 Its what kind of yeast you ferment with

top fermenting vs bottom

also, the top fermenting typically need different temperatures

user41796

18:10

sure, but I would argue that's in the "general knowledge" realm. So there will be some overlap with homebrew

Ampt

area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/48905/beer/50206#50206

user41796

I fear no one will get that reference. N'ermind

user55340

I wonder if they'll be able to get a beta-beta migration between the two sites sooner than later.

Ampt

all of those questions have to do with the creating of beer, not the consumption

Thomas Owens

@GlenH7 You mean one of the worst songs of 2013, according to Todd in the Shadows?

user41796

18:13

@ThomasOwens Wasn't making any commentary regarding quality. Just making a horrible pop culture reference.

Thomas Owens

@GlenH7 Well, yeah. Todd is losing credibility with his commentary on quality after calling Roar the worst song of 2013 and giving Stay the Night an honorable mention. But I get the reference.

user41796

Roar seems to be a love it or hate it type song

Ampt

I don't think you can separate the brewing from the drinking

user55340

Trying to find the MSO caching image meme... found this:

user55340

user41796

18:16

@ThomasOwens now I must go watch because someone is wrong on the internet

Thomas Owens

@Ampt I don't brew, but I drink.

Just like I don't distill, but I drink.

Although home distilling may be illegal?

Ampt

It is in wisconsin

but how can you say what the difference between a porter and a stout is?

user55340

@ThomasOwens how does one define distill?

user41796

@ThomasOwens depends upon what state you're in

Thomas Owens

@MichaelT I don't know. I mean making your own vodka and whiskey.

Ampt

18:18

@MichaelT usually concentrating an alcoholic liquid to increase its proof

user55340

Ice wine is naturally distilled... cold filtered beer is a distilling process too.

Ampt

most often through evaporation

Thomas Owens

@GlenH7 It's about 30 minutes long. Most of his picks for worst songs are spot on. I may be biased against some of his picks, since I'm a huge dance pop and EDM fan, though, and he really isn't a fan of those genres.

user41796

@ThomasOwens I'll try not to hate him then. :-) My tastes align with yours, so I suspect I'll be equally nonplussed at his review.

user41796

I wonder how much the videos affect his decisions

Thomas Owens

18:23

@GlenH7 When he's reviewing individual songs, he does comment on the videos.

I think for the worst songs of the year, he focuses on the songs themselves.

user41796

The lesson I'm picking up from Todd's review is that I need to be watching more videos...

Thomas Owens

@GlenH7 Some videos are downright weird. I love Like Satellites, but the video...

user41796

He's trashing Lil Wayne at the moment

Ampt

@ThomasOwens The video for timber almost gave me a seizure

they change the video with every beat of the song (130 BPM) and it's just terrible

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 here's something that may be up your alley that's fun. Never saw the music video before, it adds to the strangeness for sure...

►

Thomas Owens

18:34

@JimmyHoffa What song is it?

No YT at work. :(

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens RJD2 - The Horror

Thomas Owens

Also, any music video from the 80s is usually gold.

user41796

@JimmyHoffa I'll have a look in a bit - he just hit #3 in his commentary

user55340

►

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 "He" ?

user41796

18:35

@JimmyHoffa Todd in the shadows - worst of 2013

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa He's watching the Todd in the Shadows worst of 2013.

user41796

thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/teamt/tis/tpsr/…

user41796

"When the EDM well runs dry, you'll just move on to ruin some other genre"

user41796

@ThomasOwens - what's his beef with will.i.am?

Thomas Owens

@GlenH7 My friends don't get how big EDM is. They think of hardcore, drum and bass, and dubstep with the heavy wub wubs, ignoring trance, house, and electronica like Blackmill and Glitch Mob.

@GlenH7 It started with the Britney song, I think.

user41796

18:39

@ThomasOwens fair enough. I saw that as will rebooting himself back onto the scene.

user41796

And dubstep is an incredibly young niche within the EDM scene

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 Wow, I can't listen to that. Terrible, terrible music. No thanks.

Thomas Owens

But too many people associate EDM with the heavy wub wubs. It's disappointing. I usually work to a trance or ambient pandora station. Really helps pass the day.

@JimmyHoffa What did you expect from the worst of 2013? Good music?

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens Something I could listen to, that I cannot.

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa I enjoy his supposed "worst song of 2013", and totally love one of his honorable mentions.

user41796

18:43

@ThomasOwens some of his commentary just seems more angry than witty or even cynical.

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 That also doesn't help, smells like a "Hey guys I'm going to shout slander and people will like it, because everybody enjoys angry holier-than-thouness" but still, the music playing throughout just makes it unlistenable

Ampt

@JimmyHoffa Remember, it's only slander if it's not true!

jozefg

@Ampt ... said every US political ad from 1990 forward.

user41796

@JimmyHoffa I'm watching another video just for a second sampling. And ... it's definitely more angry than funny at the moment

Ampt

@jozefg no, technically slander has to be false to be slander

Jimmy Hoffa

18:51

@Ampt No, I think you're confusing slander and libel, I don't think slander is necessarily untrue

Ampt

Slander is the verbal form of libel

both are torts

legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Libel+and+Slander

jozefg

"Slander n. - the action or crime of making a false spoken statement damaging to a person's reputation."

Jimmy Hoffa

"Libel - a published false statement that is damaging to a person's reputation; a written defamation."

Ampt

Slander is a punishable civil offence in the form of a tort

Jimmy Hoffa

How about that

TIL Slander is lying

Ampt

18:53

and is also illegal

Jimmy Hoffa

I knew that part, but there's a ton of "is illegal" things which never get prosecuted

cough I think I just choked on some slander.

user41796

for slander to be punishable, there must be harm

Ampt

it gets tricky with that because you have to be able to prove it

@GlenH7 for any civil offence to be punishable there has to be harm.

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 it's less about what must be there, surely there is harm in many cases of things people with large public audiences do, it's a matter of what lawyers can twist

Ampt

Civil offences are used to make people "whole" so if you commit slander or libel or whatever else without harm, you can't be taken to court

@JimmyHoffa It's really what you can prove/what it will cost to prove it

user41796

18:56

@JimmyHoffa I think your (rightful) cynicism is blurring the discussion regarding what constitutes punishable slander

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 Call it pragmatism: I prefer viewing the law in reality rather than ideality.

user55340

The annoying bit about posting answers on MSO is that you see this green "+10" and go "ohh, where did I get the rep?"... "oh, MSO... thats unicorn poo"

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT That's what happened to me this morning with TW..

Ampt

@JimmyHoffa The further we get from ideality into reality with our interpretations, the further we get from the spirit of the law. You have to draw a line somewhere

Jimmy Hoffa

15

A: Is it sufficient to use acceptance and integration tests instead of unit test?

It's comparing oranges and apples. Integration tests, acceptance tests, unit tests, behaviour tests - they are all tests and they will all help you improve your code but they are also quite different. I'm going to go over each of the different tests in my opinion and hopefully explain why you n...

Somebody go approve that edit.

Ampt

19:01

@JimmyHoffa Looked good to me. Approved.

Jimmy Hoffa

@Ampt Nope, the spirit of the law is totally irrelevant. No reason to give it any mind other than with "oo" and "ahh" and thoughts of "That'd sure be nice"

Ampt

@JimmyHoffa Laws are there as solid guide lines. They are meant to allow us to provide a clear basis for what is right and wrong. Changing those laws is allowed and even intended, but there is a process for doing that. Allowing laws to float about in ephemeral form where it will slowly creep from one idea to the next isn't a great process.

user41796

0

A: How to architect this simple problem in high level

My name's Dan Walmsley and I'm the CTO of NationBuilder. This sample is, word for word, our "Developer Challenge" for new hires. I co-authored this problem back in 2012 and it's the same test we use today. I appreciate the thoughtful answers from contributors here. If this seems like a problem y...

user41796

How do you flag something like that? On the one hand, he's calling for a copyright violation (kind of). OTOH, he's blatantly trolling for job applicants...

Jimmy Hoffa

@Ampt whoa whoa whoa let's step away from the knife with statements about how laws are meant to provide a basis for right and wrong, that is one hell of a righteous way to have a truly terribly set of morals heh

Ampt

19:08

@JimmyHoffa They are aren't they? If they aren't what the people feel they should be then they should be changed. I never said they were perfect, or even good, but they are the best we have aren't they?

user55340

@GlenH7 not an answer?

Ampt

@GlenH7 Yeah that's a weird one

user55340

(at least, that's how I'm gonna send it down the diamond path)

Thomas Owens

I'm going to nuke everything.

user41796

@ThomasOwens Thanks!

user55340

19:09

@ThomasOwens That fixes it completely!

Ampt

@JimmyHoffa I'm not saying you have to agree and abide by the laws 100% all the time, forever and always. I'm saying that if you don't like or agree with a law, pretending it doesn't exist doesn't solve the problem.

user55340

Quick! Flag everything so they're all helpful!

user41796

It's just a big ball of bleh at this point

Jimmy Hoffa

@Ampt yeah but don't ever mistake that laws make any dictate regarding "right" or "wrong", segregation used to be law, ones sense of right and wrong should come from a completely different place than the law

user41796

I wish he had been more clear in expressing his concerns through his "answer"

user41796

19:12

OTOH, what did he expect would happen if they are handing out their interview question as a screening tool?

Ampt

@JimmyHoffa I never said that you should gather your morals from the law, I said that the law should reflect your morals.

Jimmy Hoffa

> They are meant to allow us to provide a clear basis for what is right and wrong

user55340

A tangent to the interview question problem?

Jimmy Hoffa

Then that is said backward :p

you meant

> Right and wrong are meant to provide a clear basis for what should be law

Ampt

lets say that we are moral citizens making laws

we then make laws using this moral judgement

Jimmy Hoffa

19:14

@Ampt Are not!

@Ampt Do not!

user55340

Btw, migration votes on that git question would be nice.

Ampt

@JimmyHoffa shush and listen.

so we've made these laws with our moral decisions and now someone from canadia comes to visit and wants to know what is right and wrong

he can use our laws to deduce what we believe is right and wrong

user55340

@Ampt you need to take an ethics philos class... there are many things in there that are much deeper.

Ampt

@MichaelT too late. Not happening in my last quarter haha

user55340

@Ampt I don't recall what semester I took it... I was only ~3-4 classes away from a BS degree in philos if I wanted it.

user55340

19:16

Utilitarianism

Utilitarianism is a theory in normative ethics holding that the proper course of action is the one that maximizes utility, usually defined as maximizing happiness and reducing suffering. Classic utilitarianism's two most influential contributors are Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. John Stuart Mill in his book Utilitarianism, stated, "In the golden rule of Jesus of Nazareth, we read the complete spirit of the ethics of utility. To do as one would be done by, and to love one's neighbour as oneself, constitute the ideal perfection of utilitarian morality." According to Bentham and Mil...

user41796

This is almost as good as their argument over how to cook brats....

user55340

@GlenH7 Beer. Brown mustard. Go take a field trip up to Middleton, WI. The museum is open 9-5 I think.

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 It's very simple, you put the Brat in the microwave wrapped in a paper towel for about 6 minutes. :)

user55340

Hedonism

Hedonism is a school of thought that argues that pleasure is the only intrinsic good. In very simple terms, a hedonist strives to maximize net pleasure (pleasure minus pain). Ethical hedonism is the idea that all people have the right to do everything in their power to achieve the greatest amount of pleasure possible to them. It is also the idea that every person's pleasure should far surpass their amount of pain. Ethical hedonism is said to have been started by a student of Socrates, Aristippus of Cyrene. He held the idea that pleasure is the highest good. Etymology The name derives ...

Ampt

I'd love a brat thanks

user55340

19:18

(The professor was a "prosper" rather than "pleasure" hedonist)

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT At this point we should have @WorldEngineer in the conversation...

user55340

Personally, I still most enjoy ancient philosophy - Plato, Aristotle, Pythagoras and the Stoics... modern (Descartes, Leibowitz, Spinoza) are interesting but... they get hard to read.

Robert Harvey

Utilitiarian Hedonism

user55340

> Through the upturned glass I see
a modified reality--
which proves pure reason "kant" critique
that beer reveals das ding an sich--

Oh solipsism's painless,
it helps to calm the brain since
we must defer our drinking to go teach.

user55340

►

user55340

19:22

> Oh read me some Hume
in a skeptic-packed room,
where the beer and the arguments play--
where often is heard
a reduction absurd--
and the statements are mostly de re!

user55340

►

user55340

(so many jokes in there...)

Ampt

@RobertHarvey sounds like my kinda party

user41796

> Bleh. I'd say leave this for Robert Harvey, but he's not a mod here.

user41796

I got a "helpful" flag on a mod flag starting with that. May the meme live on.

Thomas Owens

19:26

@GlenH7 If a mod takes an action without dismissing first, it's helpful.

I deleted, so it got auto-helpfuled.

user55340

> Bleh. Just... yea, just make it go away. – MichaelT Dec 12 '13 at 2:56 helpful

user41796

@ThomasOwens I'm going to take a helpful any way I can get it... :-)

Thomas Owens

19:36

bang bang

user41796

@ThomasOwens Surely you didn't have higher expectations of this crowd, right?

Thomas Owens

@GlenH7 I was referring to the two questions I just closed.

user41796

@ThomasOwens even better. You need to work a little harder at things so we can accuse you of mod abuse too. You wouldn't want to be left out, would you?

Thomas Owens

Once, I saw 4 flags in the queue. By the time I clicked it, there were 0. I would do more if I saw things.

user41796

I'll go find some comments to flag then...

Thomas Owens

19:40

I need to go to the manufacturing floor soon, though.

So I'll probably miss them.

user41796

I try to lend a helping hand ...

Ampt

@ThomasOwens You know the question doesn't have to be bad for you to delete it ;)

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens was that math question I mentioned above migrated?

user55340

nope, not this one. Ignore me.

user55340

(not yet)

user41796

19:42

@Ampt mods generally don't delete the question immediately so the OP can come back and see it was closed. Otherwise the OP thinks a glitch happened and they just re-ask their question

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens should this be migrated actually to MathOverflow or Mathematics.SE (I don't know the difference)?

3

Q: Draw graph of a function whose characteristics are unknown

Suppose I have a function. I have code that, given an x value, produces a y value. I can assume that the function is somewhat mathematically sane, not something crazy like an everywhere-discontinuous function or the like, but beyond that, I don't know anything about it. I want to draw a graph ...

algorithms language-agnostic math

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa I don't know the difference either. There's also apparently a dupe on scicomp?

Ampt

ls

err..

wrong window

user55340

11

Q: Algorithms for (adaptive?) function plotting

I am looking for algorithms to draw standard 2d-graphs for functions that may or may not have singularities. The purpose is to write a "Mini-CAS", so I have no a priori knowledge of the types of functions, the users want to graph. This problem is very old, so I imagine there must be some standa...

numerics algorithms visualization

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens I saw that but still, scicomp appears to be algorithmic stuff, the guy appears to be asking more about fundamentally how to approach the problem, which looks like a standard math problem

user41796

19:44

@Ampt I'm not sure what running a list against this room would get you.

Thomas Owens

Yeah. If no one else does, I'll try to follow up with the mods of other sites later on.

I honestly don't know where it should go, if anywhere.

Jimmy Hoffa

@Ampt . .. .booze Awesome Errors Broken die.py kill.hs probably-from-dev-random.pl

Ampt

@JimmyHoffa ... how'd you know?

Thomas Owens

rm -rf /home/JimmyHoffa

user55340

-rwurwxr-- 1 SE users ThomasOwens
-rwxrwur-- 1 SE users GlenH7
-rwxrwxr-- 1 SE users Ampt
lrwxr-xr-x 1 SE users Sparticus@ -> Ampt

Ampt

19:46

@ThomasOwens if only..

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens stupid sudoers... you guys don't know what it's like

Thomas Owens

OK. I'm out.

user41796

@JimmyHoffa That's an interesting challenge. How many different unix OSs have you worked on?

user41796

and no, they're not unix, but I'll count iSeries and zSeries in this case

user41796

and I don't know if all the different flavors of linux should count or not...

user55340

19:49

ultrix, linux (don't count flavors), hp-ux (too bad Mr. Packard didn't want his name first), SunOS, Solaris, Mac OS, Irix, Aix (and pains), AUX, Free|Net|OpenBSD(386)?, SCO (yes)

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 wait, what's the challenge? deleting me from every OS?

user41796

aix, solaris, linux (redhat, ubuntu, suse), iseries, zseries, hpux, osx

user41796

so far @MichaelT is winning

Ampt

    DROP TABLE Jimmy_hoffa

user41796

@JimmyHoffa simple - how many different unix like os's have you worked on?

user55340

19:51

The linux thing wouldn't be fair either... I worked on Wangix once.... and Caldera... two that don't exist anymore.

user55340

(Wangix - we found a old wang semi-compatable pc sitting around, we ported linux to it. It was semi-comptabile because it only had 512k base ram rather than 640k. So we hed to tell Linux "there's a buffer there, no you can't use it, no don't write anything to it, and please don't read it either... but its there... trust us")

user41796

@MichaelT i can haz bufferz?

user55340

Had full length memory cards in it to get it to 2MB of ram. An MFM hard drive (voice coil rather than stepping motor, we had a directory called /beep where we isolated all the inodes that had bad data behind them that forced the disk to recalibrate... it beeped when it did... the disk was so slow, it was faster to put swap space on nfs than local drive)

user41796

@MichaelT yeah, that's pretty frigging slow... Wow.

user55340

One of the memory boards had piggybacked chips on it. When the machine finally failed, we unsoldered the pins to see what was under it. One was a positive enable the other was negative enable... or something like that. The EEs in the room were going "eww!"

user55340

19:56

user41796

@MichaelT I love the bent pin on the top one to prevent the connection.

user55340

(read about one approach to it at seattlerobotics.org/encoder/200011/moreram.html )

Ampt

@MichaelT wow.... that is janky

user41796

> and despite your space preserving attempts you just need more memory.

user41796

made me lol when I read that. "Yep! Been there, done that!"

user55340

19:59

@Ampt Should have seen the Vax CPU (size of a milk crate) that had hand wired patches on it.

user41796

@WorldEngineer - you need to school @JimmyHoffa & @Ampt on the relativism between morals, ethics, and law.

user20683

@GlenH7 Morality is absolute. Ethics are somewhat absolute, Law is not absolute. QED.

user20683

With regards to the UNIX question: Irix and Solaris

Jimmy Hoffa

Oh the challenge was how many *nix' have you worked on?

user20683

Linux: Ubuntu, Lubuntu, Xubuntu, Knoppix

user41796

20:04

@JimmyHoffa yes

Jimmy Hoffa

Yeah nix, nah I don't touch that stuff. None of it works I never worked with any of that garbage

That stuffs terrible, never touched it.

user41796

@WorldEngineer I'm still wrapping around morals being absolute

user20683

@GlenH7 These are my answers to your question :P

Ampt

@WorldEngineer QED?

user41796

ah, fair enough then. I'll flush that cache and move on. :-)

user20683

20:08

@Ampt Qua Ergo Demonstrandum or there abouts

user20683

That which has been demonstrated in Latin

Ampt

@WorldEngineer oh I thought you meant something else. Doesn't QED imply proof?

Jimmy Hoffa

@Ampt he is proof.

user20683

@Ampt It does. He asked me to explain it to you. So I did. :P

Ampt

@JimmyHoffa oh, of course. I must have missed that step :P

user20683

20:09

Given that all I had was what he pinged me with and I'm feeling too lazy to roll through the transcript

Jimmy Hoffa

@WorldEngineer You should, it'll raise your hackles and you'll want to punch someone. It'll entertain us anyway.

Ok that's highly unlikely but it would be fun anyway if it did happen

user41796

@JimmyHoffa he'll just suspend you instead

gnat

user41796

apropos of nothing - it's interesting seeing how I have different playing styles on words with friends depending upon whom I'm playing

user41796

when I play my brother, I have to use every trick I can think of just to keep up with the point score. When I play with another friend the pace is a lot more relaxed.

user55340

20:24

@gnat amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0813522609/sciencecartoonsp

user55340

(and the cartoonist: sciencecartoonsplus.com/index.php )

user41796

RE: C# question. I want my dang fireworks already.

Karl Bielefeldt

I'm not a C# guy, so I don't know. Is C# even relevant in mobile development today?

user55340

@KarlBielefeldt As relevant as windows phones and tablets...

user55340

20:39

(that said, I'm not sure how relevant they are)

user41796

WPF is written in C#

user55340

And there are ways to use C# to compile to other mobil targets:

user55340

36

Q: Develop Android app using C#

I am pretty new to phone app development. Not even wrote single line of code for phone app. I wanted to know is it possible to write an android app using C#? Is there an API or something? Is it free for personal and commercial development? What do I need to install to have android project templ...

c# android c#-4.0 mobile mono

user41796

More or less, that's what you would use for phones or tablets at the moment with the MS stack. You could use WinRT, but I would discourage that. IMO, WinRT was DOA, but I have heard many who like their ARM backed windows 8 tablets.

user41796

But for overall market share, the MS stack is a non-starter in the mobile environment currently.

user55340

20:44

It basically means you want to target those devices, and they're such a small fraction of the market share that is so far behind the curve. Will be of interest to see if MS can use Nokia well... or if they just run it into the ground.

Ampt

Windows Tablets/ultrabooks/transformers are pretty BA though

guy in my class has a transformer with a 15 inch screen that less than a finger width thick. dual core i7 with 8 gigs of ram. absolutely blazing fast, and gets like 8 hours of battery life in a form that can be used as a tablet or a laptop

user41796

@MichaelT I think the key will be a killer biz app that they push on the M$ stack only, or push there heavily first

user41796

@Ampt lenovo?

user55340

@GlenH7 Yep... strong linkage between the two... but those business units are batteling.

Jimmy Hoffa

Go learn Haskell if you want to become acquainted with the language thinking 15 years from now, I'd gladly call C# DOA right now if I could but while most C# devs will tell you it'll be strong 15 years from now, I am a C# dev who disagrees with my colleagues on this point. I think 5 years from now it'll be maintenance mode only and 10 years from now it'll be the next COBOL. — Jimmy Hoffa 33 secs ago

Ampt

20:46

@GlenH7 may have been, yes

user41796

@Ampt lenovo has got some gorgeous laptops / ultas / whatevers right now

Ampt

@GlenH7 the Yoga 2 looks like it may be it

Jimmy Hoffa

best lenovo...

user41796

@JimmyHoffa That discredits the value of maintenance programming and that it can be a very secure gig

user41796

You could argue that COBOL is dead, but there's quite a few programming jobs available for it still

user41796

20:50

quick search on monster shows 157 cobol gigs and 13 haskell gigs

Ampt

@GlenH7 although for that price I would probably go with a rMBP

user55340

news.cnet.com/8301-10805_3-20128013-75/…

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 You discredit it with that statement, I'm just saying it goes maintenance soon but I didn't say that was bad

The guy was asking about that

Ampt

@MichaelT ugh. Don't even bring it up. seriously. SO disappointed in that

user41796

@JimmyHoffa I disagree; I don't think it will go maintenance in even the next 5 years

user55340

20:53

The thing is, there wont be a synergizing killer device / pc business app because those business unit are fighting.

user41796

@MichaelT 'prolly not.

user55340

And the big money ones that could be good on a device - exchange client, word, excel, powerpoint... they don't want to cannablize the one thing that does bring in money.

user55340

(flip side, Apple doesn't mind canniablizing its own products... "ipad eats into air sales? Too bad... its still a sale for us rather than someone buying a chromebook")

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 I know, lots do, I think we're in a large chaos mode right now and I don't see nearly the same amount of new C# development happening 5 years from now as is happening now. Heck right now I suspect there's significantly less new C# development occuring than was occuring 5 years pryor.

but that's my opinion and why his question is closed

@MichaelT the CEO change may break this mold though, with luck

user55340

One thing that makes me uncomfortable with hitching anything to MS is that they may drop it for the next thing at the drop of a hat or indigestion of a CEO.

user55340

20:57

@JimmyHoffa Possibly... but there is a lot of corporate inertia there.

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT <MS CEO> burp yeah fuck C# you guys are out

user41796

@MichaelT yeah, I'm reading the courier article thinking "whoops, there went their game changer"

user55340

@GlenH7 They've had the opportunity many times.

Ampt

@GlenH7 That was a long time ago

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT Which would be a bigger problem in other corps, one thing that has been consistent about MS is the Supremely Powerful Leader

user55340

20:58

They could have had that announced at the same time as the iPad... and it would have come close to matching apple (or vice versa depending on prefs).

Jimmy Hoffa

No one ever questioned how much control or change Balmer could exert if he wished or Gates before him

user55340

They could have done that with surface back in the days of old too... that's just a marketing toy now.

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT that thing was sooo niche...

user55340

Back when they announced the original surface... I was drooling over the prospect of buying a $?k coffee table that I could play board games on.

Jimmy Hoffa

it was a research project but really nothing they could hang their coat on

@MichaelT until you filled in the ?

user55340

21:00

I was living in Silly Valley... single digits wouldn't have bothered me.

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT It wasn't single digits.

user55340

No, it wasn't because they didn't make it for consumers... they made it for corporations. They could have though.

Jimmy Hoffa

trying to find now, but to my recollection it was in the range of $30-50k

@MichaelT That's the thing, they couldn't have, it was just a research project for them to learn about touch interactive technologies and interactions, they put zero effort into the market feasability of it as a product

user55340

I remember when high end Macs were in the $10k range for the computer... this would fit in the same area... very expensive toy.

Jimmy Hoffa

MS is littered with those unfortunately, F# is a prime example

user55340

21:02

@JimmyHoffa But if they did... if they did decide to make it a consumer product... I'll be willing to bet they could have sold them at a profit for $5k + software

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT totally not market feasible (you never hear people say this because they want to sound smart with FP stuff) but honestly some of the holes in the tooling are just dumb, like you could have an intern fix them dumb.

user41796

@MichaelT read an article the other day laying out costs for the new mac pro server. Cheaper to buy it through apple than it is to try and assemble your own

user41796

They note that specialty parts are used, which drives up the consumer price

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 Just like so much of apple; they gouge their vendors and bulk-commodotize everything to get a way smaller price than any of us could

user41796

@JimmyHoffa All the good interns went to google. :-)

Jimmy Hoffa

21:04

@GlenH7 ;P not true, there was one ultra-smart intern at MS when I was working there. He went to google after the internship.

user55340

Prediction: this will get hot and maybe interesting

user55340

0

Q: Why do we still use floats?

I understand why floats served a purpose in the past and why they're useful in some very extreme simulation examples today, but I've never understood why floats are still so much more prevalent in simple simulations rather than very high precision integers. For example: with modern 64-bit proces...

math data-types numeric-precision floating-point byte

Jimmy Hoffa

he made a program that would find and correct lens-flares in bulks of images and gave a presentation on all the math he used to do it, was pretty awesome for someone still in College...

user20683

@MichaelT It's at -1 as we speak

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT "because math is hard and you're a jerk!"

user55340

21:06

@WorldEngineer Not mine.

Ampt

@MichaelT wooo jumping on that bandwagon

user55340

@Ampt because pi isn't 3.

user41796

Let's see if that salvages the question

enderland

-1

Q: How did you became a successful programmer?

I don't mean in terms of getting a good job, i mean in terms of knowledge. Did you read a lot of books? Youtube tutorials? Internet tutorials? Trying on your own? I just graduated from college and i feel like i know nothing compared to everyone else, causing me to be insecure when going to an i...

professionalism productivity work-experience knowledge-transfer

you guys want this amirite

user20683

How did I become a successful programmer? By checking for syntax errors, understanding the algorithms I was using, and then hitting "Compile".

user55340

21:14

@enderland We are not TW's toilet.

user41796

@MichaelT yeah, he's got that passthru backwards

Ampt

No voters out on that question

user41796

@Ampt nah, you don't get away that easily. enjoy the imaginary points

Ampt

@WorldEngineer Just tried commenting "Lots of riddilin" but I'm not a member on the site. Probably for the best.

@GlenH7 Boooo

user41796

@Ampt We'll get you to 3k yet. Just so we can laugh when you get an indefinite suspension. :-)

Ampt

21:23

@GlenH7 what a relief that would be

user55340

@Ampt "I played fizz-buzz with my friends as a drinking game until I could code it with a BAC higher than the legal limit"?

3

Ampt

ritalin. Not Riddilin. Apparently I'm really bad at spelling

user55340

(For other bad ideas - I was recently introduced to 'stump' as a drinking game - questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=2619 )

user41796

@MichaelT Brilliant!

user41796

and did you notice he was wearing safety glasses?

Ampt

21:28

@MichaelT I used to stay on top of QC until google reader was shut down. We have a different name for that game here, but I forget what it's called. It's bloody fun though

user41796

@Ampt damn you kids, one-upping your elders with drinking games...

Ampt

@GlenH7 As far as I'm aware of that one has been around for a while! A close second favorite is the one where you bang your hands on a pattern on the table until you have to do your "move". after a few drinks you start banging louder and louder until someone wakes up with a broken arm hahaha

user41796

@Ampt we just played 3-man and keg-stands

user55340

@Ampt Added my $0.02 ... dang! that's a floating point number.

user20683

we played drunk D&D

Ampt

21:36

@MichaelT Ugh. there goes all that potential rep

thanks obama

user55340

@Ampt Actually, it means its more likely to collide.

user41796

@Ampt nah, you're still leading that particular race.

user41796

And I just up voted the question to push it on to the collider. Would be nice going into the race with more up votes, but we'll see how it plays

user41796

@WorldEngineer unfortunately not a lot of RPG people when I was at Uni. Had fallen out of vogue for a while.

enderland

@MichaelT we're accepting applications, there's sitll time!

user20683

21:38

@GlenH7 late 90s were dark times

user20683

so were the times after WoW

user41796

@WorldEngineer regrettably so. I still have all my SJGames stuff with car wars though. I loved that game

enderland

TIE Fighter was the best game. ever

user41796

float question should have a collider score of ~10 at this point. Needs a few more up votes to push it up there. Answer and Question up votes count equally at the moment.

enderland

@GlenH7 to help or not to help, that is the question

user20683

21:40

god my C is rusty

user41796

@enderland jump in and ride the train

user41796

@WorldEngineer it's only bad when you try to do nested unions... :-)

user55340

17

Q: One Line Aquarium

My parents-in-law have a fishpond in their yard, filled with koi. It didn't really cross my mind until I noticed the following extract from my code. ',') & '_' ... I had fish-faces looking back at me from my screen... Which has given me a great idea... My quest for you, my dear golfers is to ...

code-golf ascii-art printable-ascii animation

user41796

And it's on the collider with an arbitrary 18.229 hotness points

Jimmy Hoffa

Questions that require a prediction of the future are specifically off topic. Microsoft is investing heavily in C#. Read into that what you will. — Eric Lippert 37 mins ago

haha Eric Lippert read my comment on C#... he probably just shook his head like I'm an idiot.

which is ok, with Eric Lippert on the chart I do score somewhere vaguely between idiot and nincompoop

enderland

21:50

@GlenH7 oh fine though I'm not convinced my answer is very good

user41796

@JimmyHoffa "like an idiot"? Wrong comparative there... :-)

user41796

@enderland Now we just need someone to sully themselves by dropping that out on Reddit.

user41796

And it will probably get tweeted since the question & 2 answers have at least 3 votes

user55340

There are 3x cv's on it... I don't think the tweeter does those. Or something.

user20683

@GlenH7 Yannis

user41796

21:53

@WorldEngineer True. He has no shame and will drop into reddit any time...

user55340

yesterday, by enderland

oh gosh someone kill me I just admitted I use reddit :(

user41796

(was waiting for that one)

Jimmy Hoffa

@EricLippert your comment begs for a resource request to see what upcoming particulars you think are going to keep C# relevant 5 - 10 - 15 years from now. As it stands the only thing really reaching for the future that I'm aware of, which is admittedly a small subset especially compared to you, is the async/await stuff giving C# the ability to do somethings more akin to computations, but that's not even new anymore. If roslyn genuinely brings us Macros that would be cool but lacking homoiconicity it wouldn't have the same heft of the Macros we all want.. Guess I'll go look up MS' plans — Jimmy Hoffa 29 secs ago

user20683

I almost registered on reddit...then I washed my eyes out with vinegar and stuff my mouth full of cayenne

Jimmy Hoffa

eesh, semi-baiting Eric Lippert, have I no respect for anything??

user41796

21:55

@WorldEngineer I hear lye is useful in that case

user20683

@JimmyHoffa No.

user20683

well Whiskey and Steak

user41796

@WorldEngineer whiskey will help you forget

user41796

@JimmyHoffa invite him to chat; don't carry on a thread in comments....

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