The Whiteboard

12:04 AM

@RobertHarvey I said they get insane, I didn't say they get good

user20683

@RobertHarvey I will say that knowing SQL has improved my ability to use Base (OO Access)

For some reason in many devs the word "report" suddenly turns them into an abstracting machine, they abstract abstractions over abstractions; I think it's all a ruse to avoid actually dealing with the data.

user20683

report = here is a view of a database

user20683

that's what I've figured out from my retail job

Jimmy Hoffa

@WorldEngineer That's a great approach. As soon as you make it "Here's an API that let's you create recursive aggregational prepromorphic Pivot-tabled elbow-charts" it turns into "How can I make something unmaintainable and completely business critical??"

user20683

12:09 AM

@JimmyHoffa As far as I can tell, that's all MVC is

Jimmy Hoffa

I've used SQL Server Reporting Services a good bit for generating reports. Nothing beats a good bit of SQL to get your data, and some simple report engine that somebody else wrote to create a presentation for said query's results.

user20683

user tells controller "I want this", controller requests from the database "get this", relevant views are updated and displayed. The end.

Jimmy Hoffa

@WorldEngineer Yeah, that's good MVC, and why I like SPA's where the controller is simply a rest service. People blur the boundaries way too much when their views are generated on the server and they realize they can make their controller have some of the views logic, or better yet put some of the view logic in the database how convenient! ugh

They never do it intentionally, they just can't help themselves I've found

user20683

@JimmyHoffa Far as I can tell: HTML form w/associated JS = controller, model = server DB, view = resulting HTML page

Jimmy Hoffa

Scenarios arise where it's just so much easier, keep your view entirely client side and you ensure it will never be so much easier to put view logic in your controller.

user20683

12:12 AM

rinse and repeat for video or whatever

Robert Harvey

@WorldEngineer No. MVC is a display paradigm. It's a way to isolate the GUI from the rest of the system, and it gives you a bit of system structure and some routing for free. It looks like 3-tier, but it's really just a convenient way to organize a web application.

@JimmyHoffa What significance is the Halting problem to a business?

user20683

@RobertHarvey I'm wondering that too. I think it depends on the business.

user20683

If you're writing compilers, I suspect it becomes important

user20683

@RobertHarvey Hence the endless variations: MVP, MVVM, etc.

Robert Harvey

@WorldEngineer Quite right.

user20683

12:21 AM

@RobertHarvey I've not read all of GoF but they indicated that nothing of that sort is hard and fast.

user20683

which is nice. I like options.

Robert Harvey

MVC is very flexible that way.

user20683

@RobertHarvey Hence why Django and Rails work completely differently

Robert Harvey

Yes. It's why you have all those front-end libraries and frameworks, despite the howling of the purists.

user20683

@RobertHarvey Angular is all I see these days :P

Robert Harvey

12:23 AM

Angular has some really good things going for it.

One of these days I'll learn it. :)

Jimmy Hoffa

2:01 AM

@RobertHarvey I didn't say anything about that, now you're just putting words in my mouth :P

however undecidability is a business problem

Most frequently undecidability occurs in businesses due to lacking data; not having enough or accurate data to guarantee your aggregates, so you make guesses and call it good enough

people just don't associate that with undecidability because they think about all the sciencey theoretical "undecidability" things like type system "undecidability"

but undecidability almost always comes down to that one simple thing and the halting problem is a useful type of undecidability: If you force programmers to give your compiler the piece of data it requires to guarantee halting, it usually requires the programmers to not be able to do lots of really interesting things for them to come up with that piece of data so that your compiler can make the guarantee.

and in that way compilers say "Eh I guess it'll halt, I don't have the necessary data to say for certain but I'll make my best guess and call it good."

user20683

2:29 AM

@JimmyHoffa "If it doesn't halt, tech support can tell the customer to reset their machine"

Jimmy Hoffa

Exactly. Undecidability is as mundane as trying to accurately present time series data when the code that recorded it forgot to record the timezone.

user20683

@JimmyHoffa or a shared data bug with a temperature sensor

user20683

causes one of the ovens to run a little hot so the bread is a tad scorched but no biggie

user20683

4:00 AM

@MichaelT

user20683

user55340

3:16 PM

That question on TW that was reposted and stuck to the top of the collider caused some consternation.

user55340

5

A: Reorder questions picked for hot list based on adjusted hotness score (discard some answers by voting evidence)

Yes, yes, and absolutely yes Because of this question which got more views in 24 hours than we the entire site gets page views many days (question A), we have a lot of new users. That leads to people upvoting questions like this (question B) which are off-topic, has 4 close votes, but is still o...

user55340

3:45 PM

@WorldEngineer can you do your invite magic for this room?

user55340

@MichaelT Yes, and when they ask you to decide... I ask the Internet and get flamed :( Not enough rep (certainly not after this question) to join chat but thanks for the offer. — Brock Hensley - FKA dirt 2 mins ago

Brock Hensley - FKA dirt

@MichaelT Hello, I guess I do have enough rep

(it said I didnt originally)

user55340

Ahh... (@WorldEngineer don't worry about it)

user55340

@BrockHensley-FKAdirt I blame caching.

user55340

Anyways...

user55340

3:46 PM

(I worked on a Point of Sale system for 3 years at a large company... the last project before I left was replacing the returns system)

user55340

Relevant question for context:

user55340

-1

Q: How to handle returns when incorporating coupons or discounts in Point of Sale?

What is the proper way to handle determining the amount to return to a customer when dealing with coupons and discounts applied to receipts? [Scenario A] A receipt contains items each with their own price. A returned item would give back the amount spent for that item. ItemA $25 ItemB $75 ====...

design

user55340

@BrockHensley-FKAdirt at the core of the returns really boils down to the rule "give them back what they paid (through the way they themselves paid)"

gnat

Okay, at this point, perhaps it isn't a bad idea to talk with the folks in Programmers chat about questions they intend to migrate this way. Whenever I migrate questions from one site to another, I generally edit it on the source site first before moving it over, since if it gets closed on the source site we can still easily reopen it. As an aside, I can try unlocking this one if you think it can be edited. Let me know. — jmort253 14 hours ago

user55340

When you have a discount or coupon, that is applied evenly across all the items that it is applied to.

gnat

3:49 PM

2

A: Isn't this a request for a "Poll" type answer?

I always tread lightly on migrated questions. Questions that get migrated here will be locked and unable to be edited if they are voted to close, and I thought that post was sorely in need of an edit at the very least: (it is in sore need of an edit at the very least, and will likely get clos...

Brock Hensley - FKA dirt

Yeah, it just gets complicated when applying global discounts and determining what amount each item gets back if they are returned,

user55340

So if you have a BOGO (buy one get one) coupon, for an item that is $10, and they get 2 (so its $10 for one and $0 for another), its actually at the back end, 2 items for $5.

Brock Hensley - FKA dirt

If a $10 off per $100 coupon is applied, and they return items that bring the total below $100, do you remove the original coupon?

user55340

Thats a particularly problematic one... (working on it)

user55340

Lets say they had two items: $50 and $60. They have a total of $110, which kicks in the coupon and brings the total to $100. Now, they return the $60 one - the coupon is applied to $10... $60 is 54.5% of the total purchase and thus the price of the $60 after discount is really $60 - $5.45.

user55340

3:55 PM

So the return on it would be $54.55

user55340

Trying to undo coupons is very difficult and could result in things where the customer doesn't get back any money for returning something... which scores you very low on customer satisfaction.

user55340

The other thing to consider with all this is to try to make sure that the rules are as simple as possible - both so the business understands them but also the returns desk... they are the ones describing why the customer isn't getting back some amount on the return.

user55340

And sometimes, you're just gonna need to eat the cost of the discount / return.

jozefg

Hi all

user55340

The BOGO one for example... had a coupon once that was "Buy one get three". Well, if I only wanted two, I could buy 2 and ignore the other 2 (that was fun implementing the thresholds)...

user20683

4:00 PM

Yeah, our retail POS gets weird...sometimes

user55340

But you could also buy 4, and then go to the return desk and return 2 of them right away. It has to work that way otherwise returning one when there is a regular return makes things unhappy.

user55340

(BOG3 -> $10 each item, buy 4 (one at $10, 3 at $0 = 4x @$2.50), return 2 -> get back $5)

user55340

If you really want to have fun (no, you don't) the return to same tender as you got it. So if they pay with a credit card, you return the funds to the credit card rather than instore credit.

enderland

@MichaelT what if it's a gift VISA card?

user55340

But lets say if they have instore credit from a previous return. And they use $10 of ISC and $30 from credit card to buy 4x $10 items. And now they return all of the $10 items - where does it get returned to? You shouldn't put $40 on the credit card.

user55340

4:04 PM

But, that $10 of ISC came from a previous return that used a credit card... so you could track back that ISC to that credit card and return $30 to the current one and $10 to the past one...

enderland

simple solution is to just have fair prices and not use coupons ever eh? :)

Brock Hensley - FKA dirt

I suggest we simply don't allow returns ;)

user55340

But what if the ISC came from a previous return that was payed with ISC, which came from a previous return payed with ISC, which was paid for with two credit cards, one for $20 and another for $50...

user55340

@enderland Manufacturer coupons.

enderland

@MichaelT just be a hater :D

user55340

4:05 PM

But even without coupons, you've still got instore discounts, employee discounts, clearance items...

user55340

(incidentally, we had code to handle that ISC chain)

user55340

@enderland visa gift cards are very problematic because they should never have more than the original amount that was put on them on them. That ISC chain was to handle this problem.

enderland

my guess is they are an edge case which causes all sorts of problems too

user55340

@BrockHensley-FKAdirt btw, I would strongly suggest looking into a rules engine such as Drools for doing this. Writing raw code to handle it just is not fun.

user55340

Drools

Drools is a business rule management system (BRMS) with a forward chaining inference based rules engine, more correctly known as a production rule system, using an enhanced implementation of the Rete algorithm. Drools supports the JSR-94 standard for its business rule engine and enterprise framework for the construction, maintenance, and enforcement of business policies in an organization, application, or service. JBoss Enterprise BRMS JBoss Enterprise BRMS is a business rule management system and reasoning engine for business policy and rules development, access, and change managem...

user55340

4:09 PM

$10 global coupon for every $100 spent

ItemA $25
ItemB $75
ItemC $120
ItemD $15
=====
Subtotal: $220
Coupons: $20
Total: $200

Return ItemA: $?
Return ItemB: $?
Return ItemC: $?
Return ItemB, ItemC, ItemD: $?

Brock Hensley - FKA dirt

Yeah and kicker is including Tax and trying to integrate with QuickBooks... sigh

user55340

One thing you need to consider in this case is how the coupon works. Is it a $20 off on ItemC? or is it $20 off on more than $100 purchase?

user55340

Because if its $20 on C, then only item C is affected and returns on ABD aren't affected.

Brock Hensley - FKA dirt

Would need to account for global coupons, item coupons, markdowns,

The one you pasted would be a global coupon, affects the receipt total

user55340

So, that was the "distribute the coupon and eat it if the return dips below the threshold"

user55340

4:12 PM

> Multiple returns per receipt (e.g. Monday return ItemA, Tuesday return ItemB)

user55340

Do you have a returns system or is the receipt itself the return "token"?

user55340

My former employer had a system where you could look up and reprint a receipt for returns (or accounting - some accountants used it for that). So there could be multiple copies of a single receipt.

user55340

And all the transactions were stored in a returns system - you match the receipt ID with the system and it knows what was returned or not and all of the tender information and such.

user55340

Either way, multiple returns per receipt becomes less of an issue when you distribute the discounts across the items.

user55340

Though that system then has 'fun' with the "multiple receipts as a single return" - you've got receipts {A, B, C} and {B, D, E} and {C, E} and they return an {A, C, E} -- how do you select which ones to do the returns against?

Brock Hensley - FKA dirt

4:16 PM

Thanks for trying to help, unfortunately most of these business decisions are being changed every other day as they try to figure it out for themselves, back to the drawing board I guess...

user55340

(former employer always did the return that would give back the customer the most money first, and if there was a tie, the oldest one in the return window for the credit card charge back)

user55340

@BrockHensley-FKAdirt Like nailing jelly to a tree?

Brock Hensley - FKA dirt

And then trying to return the jelly.

user55340

> Used to describe a task thought to be impossible, esp. one in which the difficulty arises from poor specification or inherent slipperiness in the problem domain. “Trying to display the ‘prettiest’ arrangement of nodes and arcs that diagrams a given graph is like nailing jelly to a tree, because nobody's sure what ‘prettiest’ means algorithmically.”

user55340

But thats the key thing - you've got the ideas, the edge cases, the problems... look at trying to make sure the requirement owner knows what they're deciding and sets down the rules.

user55340

4:18 PM

Having a rules engine will really free up your mind from the code (and also let them see it in more plain terms)

user55340

Test. Test. Test. Give them 30 receipts with edge cases and have them write down what the return amount on each receipt should be. Create tests from those receipts.

Brock Hensley - FKA dirt

There's more organization in your last paragraph than I've seen all week here ;)

user55340

Then run your rules engine through the tests and see where it breaks. When you've got some rule that's firing in a way that isn't giving the right answer, sit down with the business owner and say "this rule is causing this receipt to give this much, what rule am I missing?"

user55340

Every time they come up with a new case, put that down as a new test. You will be thankful for it later. Especially when they come up with a new rule.

user55340

But while you're fighting requirements, do some research into Drools and see how you can use it.

user55340

4:22 PM

user55340

(@BrockHensley-FKAdirt just some screen shots of various components of the Drools engine - visualization is key to helping non-technical people understand it and see it... and maybe even run it themselves)

Brock Hensley - FKA dirt

had never heard of Drools, will have to check it out

user55340

docs.jboss.org/drools/release/5.2.0.Final/drools-expert-docs/…

user55340

rule "Free Fish Food Sample"
    agenda-group "evaluate"
    dialect "mvel"
when
    $order : Order()
    not ( $p : Product( name == "Fish Food") && Purchase( product == $p ) )
    not ( $p : Product( name == "Fish Food Sample") && Purchase( product == $p ) )
    exists ( $p : Product( name == "Gold Fish") && Purchase( product == $p ) )
    $fishFoodSample : Product( name == "Fish Food Sample" );
then
    System.out.println( "Adding free Fish Food Sample to cart" );
    purchase = new Purchase($order, $fishFoodSample);

Jimmy Hoffa

4:30 PM

@MichaelT I've heard much good of Drools, what's your take? I'm a little skeptical because it sounds like a huge framework that people plausibly use for small problems, was it flexible and nice whenever you had rules systems needed even in the small scale?

user55340

You've got an order. If the purchase does not contain fish food, or fish food sample, and contains a goldfish, add the fish food sample to the order.

user55340

@JimmyHoffa I'm working on a 'small' demo of it as a proof of concept and getting my feet really into it.

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT Alternatively, If you've got a goldfish in the order, there is fish food in the order.

user55340

@JimmyHoffa Its a framework for the modern world that fits the same problem domain as prolog.

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT My colleagues said in a previous project before I was here that got canned they used it for their Authorization to give it granularity-> User meets rule X, can access sproc Y etc

user55340

4:33 PM

@JimmyHoffa It would work nicely for that too.

Jimmy Hoffa

they spoke highly of it, I've heard similar from others before but never having seen any of it I've always pictured a java library wherein you're just coding java to an API to declare rules which sounds terrible

or worse you declare them in XML

user55340

Its not always a java library / api. Think of it as a service... be you call it with code or a web service or whatever.

user55340

The problem that such systems have is that while coding the simple business rules in code is... simple, code isn't well designed to implement business rules. They're awkward and cumbersome.

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT It's a problem that begs for a declarative language, I had hoped that drools had such a DSL

user55340

From Conway's Life drools:

user55340

4:37 PM

rule "Calculate Live"
    ruleflow-group "calculate"
    lock-on-active
when
    theCell: Cell( cellState == CellState.LIVE )
    Neighbor( cell == theCell, $neighbor : neighbor )
then
    modify( $neighbor ){
        setLiveNeighbors( $neighbor.getLiveNeighbors() + 1 ),
        setPhase( Phase.EVALUATE );
    }
end

Jimmy Hoffa

ah so it does

user55340

That looks like a declarative DSL to me.

user55340

I'd really check out the examples for it docs.jboss.org/drools/release/5.2.0.Final/drools-expert-docs/…

user41796

Is it cruel to play obfuscation code-golf with the C question?

Jeroen Vannevel

I've got a library written in C# up on github. Should I also add the solution generated stuff (nuget, .sln, .csproj) or leave it at just the folders with their source files?

user41796

4:46 PM

@JeroenVannevel I would put it in. Makes it easier for future users to consume your project since they don't have to re-create the project + solution.

Jeroen Vannevel

Yeah, that was my consideration as well. I just had to recreate it myself and it was a pain to do

user41796

@JeroenVannevel So you could either document the steps, or just provide the solution + project files. Some of the customization stuff isn't necessary to check in, but I wouldn't worry about isolating those if you don't know which files do what.

Jeroen Vannevel

Adding the project files seems a lot easier

I was about to commit when I realized I added my appconfig (with private info) to the commit as well. I just closed the terminal window, will the commit still go through if I blacklist that file now and create a new commit?

user55340

@GlenH7 Post it to code golf?

user41796

@JeroenVannevel no clue; sorry

user41796

4:56 PM

@MichaelT I'm obviously feeling a bit ornery today since I wanted to code that up with as many pre-processor directives as I could...

user55340

@JeroenVannevel You shouldn't put generated code in the source code. It just makes things unhappy. Just the source files.

user55340

51

Q: Should I store generated code in source control

This is a debate I'm taking a part in. I would like to get more opinions and points of view. We have some classes that are generated in build time to handle DB operations (in This specific case, with SubSonic, but I don't think it is very important for the question). The generation is set as a p...

version-control code-generation

user41796

@MichaelT Visual Studio solution files are kind of an exception to that rule. Having them makes it a lot easier to open up the solution and saves you the effort of having to build it yourself.

user55340

4

Q: Should I commit my generated parser to source control?

I'm using a parser generator to build a compiler. Should I commit the source files produced by the parser generator? I want to commit them to avoid a dependency on the parser generator during the build process and tests. However, if I commit them, it is tempting never to update the parser gene...

version-control compiler parser

user41796

For posterity since I think the Q will be deleted:

user41796

4:58 PM

-1

A: Translate the expression in c language

This is one approach... You might want something more elegant than relying upon #ifdef directives though. I would recommend looking at using an if statement. #include<stdio.h> //#define X_GREATER_THAN_FOUR true #define P 1 #define Q 1 #define MAGIC 3 int main(void) { int X = 0; #ifdef X_...

user55340

@GlenH7 In the java world, if you use maven you set up the project configuration in Maven and then do mvn eclipse to get the excel project files and mvn netbeans to get the netbeans project files...

user41796

yet another example of why I like eclipse more so than VStudio. But if you're writing in C#, you really don't have a choice

user55340

This way the project configuration itself becomes a generated file from the build tool.

Jeroen Vannevel

Yeah, I think I'll add the project files. All together it's only 3-4 files per project so it's still doable

user55340

@GlenH7 Its not eclipse thats doing that, its maven.

user55340

5:01 PM

Sometimes having such project files means that the other machine needs the same paths to other resources as you have.

user55340

So you've got a library at /foo/bar/lib.dll and now the other guy needs the library at the same path. But they have it at /foo/baz/lib.dll so they change that and commit it... and when you clone yours is messed up...

user41796

@MichaelT ok, I sit corrected. VStudio tooling can still leave a lot to be desired. To my knowledge, I can't easily point it at a code tree and say "go make yourself a VS solution even if I tell you what type of a solution is should be."

user55340

or they modify it and don't check it in... and you add another library at /foo/qux/blah.dll to the project, and commit it... which they don't get because that would be a merge conflict... and you know that hand edditing merge conflicts on such files would be fun.

user55340

(we've got that here with build.impl - a generated file for netbeans that is checked in and says where the libraries are at... and if we add a library everyone has to go through, and merge it in to their enviroment... at least its text xml, still not fun)

user41796

I am a bit disappointed that my snark answer hasn't pulled an up vote yet...

user55340

5:10 PM

@GlenH7 maven.apache.org/plugins/maven-eclipse-plugin/eclipse-mojo.html

gnat

I forgot that a 'programmers chat' was attached to this - thanks @gnat - what's the best way to 'preview' a question with a lot of detail on chat - put it up on a gist and then include the link in the chat message? — marfarma 17 mins ago

user55340

@GlenH7 1.4k rep until 20k here... speedy delete votes.

user41796

@MichaelT ~650 now. Fortunately that quest hasn't been set back too far by people disagreeing with my snark. But the down vote came in before I posted my actual answer - it was during the placeholder I had put out there.

user55340

@GlenH7 @gnat gonna do any delete vote therapy for a friday?

user41796

I'm in...

gnat

5:18 PM

"me too"

enderland

@MichaelT I was literally just wishing there was a way to tell what questions you've voted to delete when looking at questions, by vote count

user55340

(who, I see a queue of 32 close... someone's been a stuffing the queue)

user55340

@enderland Look at my favorites.

user55340

(though some actually are favorites)

user41796

or gnat's favorites. He does the same thing with earmarking delete-worthy Q's

user41796

5:22 PM

yay, I got my 2 points back - someone removed their down vote on my snark

user41796

It's not funny enough to even contemplate a reversal badge though

user41796

Thoughts everyone? Could use a pile-on as well to clear out. programmers.stackexchange.com/q/131180/53019

user41796

It's a big bag of meh, IMO

user41796

Currently needs 4 more delete votes due to its score of 52

user41796

woo hoo. Didn't think we could kill that one off today

user41796

5:32 PM

@gnat, @MichaelT - I have 4 delete votes left. I'll save them for a bit for any amazing candidates you run across.

Ampt

@MichaelT only therapy I need on friday comes in a can that lets me know when it's cold

user55340

@Ampt If you stick your arse in the snow, you will know this very quickly. That said, I'm not sure that such therapy is useful... but hey... whatever worse for you.

user41796

@Ampt It's beer-thirty somewhere

Ampt

@GlenH7 I just checked my clock! Beer thirty is definitely here!

user41796

<<cues loud steam whistle blowing>>

user55340

5:35 PM

►

Ampt

(right after this class it will be anyway)

user41796

@Ampt I feel like I should scold you for hanging out in chat instead of focusing on your class. Senioritis has kicked in?

Ampt

@GlenH7 It's contemporary European Society. Interesting, but not exactly super important

user41796

@Ampt European influences upon beer? :-)

Ampt

@GlenH7 More like Greek Influence on the EU ;)

Thomas Owens

5:39 PM

Who here was for the discussion about dance and EDM the other day? A friend who "doesn't like EDM" just added Armin van Buuren to one of his Pandora stations.

gnat

@GlenH7 "...these questions aren’t educational in any way, because there’s no way to learn about the process of discovery. A particular community member, by virtue of their experience in the field, just happens to be able to take the limited information you remembered and fill in enough of the blanks to guess the correct answer... guessing game questions do not meet our goal of making the Internet better." (blog.stackoverflow.com/2012/02/lets-play-the-guessing-game)

a-a-and... it's gone

user41796

@Ampt That would be @MichaelT's cup of tea

Ampt

@GlenH7 I thought that was Yannis?

user41796

@ThomasOwens epic. Cause Armin's not EDM. Not at all...

user41796

@Ampt He does modern catastrophes. Michael does historical catastrophes

Thomas Owens

5:40 PM

@GlenH7 Trance is a subgenre of EDM.

@Ampt Yannis doesn't drink tea. Only tequila.

Ampt

@GlenH7 this sounds gross. please delete.

Thomas Owens

:13251575 Not sure if gross or awesome.

user41796

My understanding is that EDM grew out of trance

Ampt

Armin isn't EDM, its new-wave-synth-popadelic

user41796

But I haven't really studied the island / trance scene that spawned a lot of that material

Ampt

5:42 PM

duh. You guys are so main stream.

user41796

@Ampt clearly not engaged in your class if you're going to blatantly bait like that

user55340

@GlenH7 I actually had a tea-infused martini cocktail once.

Thomas Owens

@GlenH7 It's weird. The way I understand it, EDM came later as an umbrella for the house and trance scenes that started in the 80s.

user41796

@ThomasOwens yes, exactly

Thomas Owens

There were lots of genres that started independently, but had common themes and even influences. A lot traces their roots to disco.

user41796

5:43 PM

Trying to remember if Chicago house grew up on its own or if it took cues from other scenes

user55340

google.com/search?q=tea+infused+cocktail

Ampt

TIL Electronic music is as complex as Italy's governmental system.

user41796

@Ampt certainly weaves together in many many weird ways. And you can't ignore the contributions of hip-hop either

Thomas Owens

@Ampt Yep. Because you have the odd folks. Like Blackmill.

I don't know wtf Blackmill is. Except awesome.

Ampt

@GlenH7 are we talking about Electronic music or Italy?

user41796

5:45 PM

electronic. :-)

user41796

Dunno what hip hop has done to italia. Probably not much

Thomas Owens

@Ampt Italy. Hip-hop made Marco Polo leave for China.

user41796

but it's hilarious seeing what hip hop has done to asia

Ampt

Anyone see anything about googles new contact lens?

user41796

@Ampt it's not april 1st yet, is it?

Thomas Owens

5:47 PM

I want to go to Ibeza again. That needs to be a summer vacation one year.

user41796

@ThomasOwens I have long wanted to go but have never been

Ampt

@GlenH7 my thoughts too.. seems cool though

Thomas Owens

I need to plan it like 6 months in advance, though. Need to file the paperwork and get approvals. Not that they'd say no, since it's not like I'm going to North Korea or something.

user41796

@ThomasOwens and then you need to reserve a place to stay; figure out which shows to catch; starting saving up to bankroll the whole thing...

Thomas Owens

@GlenH7 Yeah. It would literally be days of partying. Eat, sleep, rave, repeat.

user55340

5:53 PM

(see, for me... this is all gibberish... its like you're talking about Haskell or something... I'm a singer/songwriter preference with a heavy dash of classic and folk rock... but a very large dabbling of everything else)

user55340

last.fm/user/turnmichael/tracks

Thomas Owens

@MichaelT Check out folktronica.

It's a legit genre.

user55340

@ThomasOwens I'll spin up a itunes radio for it and check it out.

Thomas Owens

Off to a meeting, then out for the day. Later, all.

user41796

@ThomasOwens enjoy!

Jimmy Hoffa

6:39 PM

Nice rant, yeah it annoys the pedant in many of us to call it AJAX, but there's really no question here that I see, sorry. Also a "Suggest other names?" question that you could put in here would just be a polling question which won't get any authoritative response. Have a look at the faq, best of luck fighting technical misnomers my friend. — Jimmy Hoffa 21 secs ago

Jimmy Hoffa

6:52 PM

I'm guessing you're all out of CVs already considering that's not closed yet.

user41796

@JimmyHoffa Rolling through the queue now. But I've earmarked that one to CV if it doesn't show up in the queue

user41796

Odd how some bikeshed questions (ie floating point) explode but others implode.

user41796

@JimmyHoffa our resident evil mod killed it

user41796

does that qualify as a mercy killing since it was at +0 / -7?

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 Yeah, I mean it's pretty bad when you see -7 with only 3 cvs because that means even <3k users are like "This is crap"

2

user41796

6:58 PM

some people get too wound up about otherwise inconsequential names

Jimmy Hoffa

I admit it's annoying sometimes saying AJAX because people who are still a bit behind in tech hear it and presume you're talking about calling some SOAP service or otherwise and then they start thinking about it in terms that are totally wrong, but that's more a problem of those folks who haven't kept up than the term itself

user41796

@JimmyHoffa I had that cognitive dissonance a while ago, so it's still somewhat fresh. But it's also not that hard to shut up and listen a bit longer so you can catch up to the conversation.

Jimmy Hoffa

That guy's just another "You're not SO, so you're an SOiletBowl amiright?"

user41796

we have picked up a number of rants lately

Jimmy Hoffa

Here's another good one: What is your best programmer's joke?. — crush 3 mins ago

What he thinks is a good question says it all right there.

gnat

7:08 PM

@JimmyHoffa well I for one am outta CVs for about 3 hours now. Bad days yesterday and today, I don't frequently hit CV-limit

user41796

@gnat I need another 700 rep so I can get another delete vote. :-)

user41796

reading over /privileges gave me a new goal to work towards - at 35k rep I max out on the number of delete votes I can have. (total of 30)

Jimmy Hoffa

> I don't frequently hit CV-limit

Gotta say... not really believing that. :)

user41796

@JimmyHoffa I'm the one who's always whinging about being out of CVs for a day

user41796

and delete votes

user41796

7:14 PM

MichaelT whines a little bit too, but I think he's just got a few more sock puppets than I do.

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 Wait, @MichaelT isn't the sock puppet? O_O

user41796

@JimmyHoffa He might be @Ampt's sock puppet. I forget and get confused. Or maybe Ampt is my puppet. I dunno. I've got too many of them to keep track of, much less actively maintain.

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 I'm fairly convinced you're all just sock puppets. It's Identity the chat room, maybe I'm a sock puppet too O_O

user41796

7:32 PM

@JimmyHoffa no comment?

psr

lint

user41796

@MichaelT, @Ampt, @KarlBielefeldt - interesting read in light of our recent conversation about Courier and the future of C# in mobile development. theregister.co.uk/2014/01/16/…

user55340

You know we're all just AI's that Skeet wrote in C# to generate traffic on his site.

gnat

@JimmyHoffa you better believe. Understanding the need for load balancing comes with experience. Hit that limit too soon and then you'll be sorry to the rest of the day watching bad (but not bad enough for flagging) stuff flowing in freely. Same to down/up votes

gitroids attack (2 answers in 8 minutes)

0

Q: Multiple git repositories with same base directory

I have two codebases, called a and b. Project a provides a common infrastructure that project b relies upon. However, all of the code for for project b is underneath the directory structure for project a. Here's an example: a File0.cs a Assets/Core/File1.cs b Assets/Extension/File2.cs So proje...

git

recommended reading: Where does my git question go? — gnat 1 min ago

Jimmy Hoffa

7:52 PM

> To hell!

user20683

gnat

@JimmyHoffa that goes without saying

user20683

bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25780908

tylerl

@WorldEngineer Thank the Christians that you get Sunday off and the Jews for Saturday. The work week used to be a full 7 days out of 7.

user20683

@tylerl Some Christians take Saturday as Sabbath as well.

user20683

7:59 PM

7th Day Adventists too I believe

user55340

Its a question of when the Sabbath begins... and the answer is "sundown".

enderland

not very many Christians actually use Sunday as a Sabbath, however

tylerl

@WorldEngineer it was speicifically to please the Jewish community that Labor negitiated saturdays off.

user55340

So the Saturday night mass for Catholics is on the Sabbath.

tylerl

adventists just weren't a big enough lobby

user20683

8:00 PM

fair enough

user20683

my religious history is solid but I'm weak with labor movements

tylerl

By the way; I'm starting a new religion for which mondays is holy and work is prohibited. I don't have a name yet, but I'm lobbying for religious protection.

user41796

@tylerl let us know how that goes ...

user55340

I'm waiting for the Last Thursdayism types to lobby for Thursdays off.

tylerl

@MichaelT unfortunately, they only get Last Thursday off. Not so useful in the future.

user20683

8:03 PM

@GlenH7 Re: MS question just now. "Nope".

user41796

@WorldEngineer First! (to VTC)

thorsten müller

If I remember right, then Thursday is taken by Discordianism

user41796

@WorldEngineer Here's another chuckle (10k only link). programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/224551/…

user41796

maple_shaft spoiled my snark with that one.

user20683

@GlenH7 It's a trick question. It's in a low level language.

user41796

8:12 PM

I suspect that even your C isn't that rusty, despite your lamentations yesterday.

user41796

ew. I used a C++ style comment in a straight C program. Oooops. I'll just pretend I had the compiler flag on to allow that.

user20683

@GlenH7 // ? That's allowed in C99

user41796

When I was last actively working in C, C99 compliant compilers weren't super common. MS hadn't given it any attention for example. Oh wait, that may still be the case...

user41796

even gcc hadn't done anything with it and clang didn't exist.

user20683

@GlenH7 I learned C99. Remember, I don't like K&R :)

user20683

8:17 PM

It's an excellent example of technical writing. Other than that, I'd use something more current.

user55340

ANSI C for(;;) {}

user41796

@WorldEngineer for someone who likes history, I'm a bit surprised. K&R was quite notable for its period in time.

user20683

@GlenH7 Note my qualification statement. I also think the original FORTRAN manual is a good example of tech writing but I'd never use it as a learning resource.

user41796

I think many profess a love of K&R simply because of who the authors are. Similar to Stroustrup and C++

user20683

@GlenH7 Yeah. I appreciate what they did for the field. Doesn't mean I have to use their book.

user41796

8:19 PM

But I haven't read Bjarne's books on C++ either

Jimmy Hoffa

I believe the pastafarians take off Wednesdays in celebration of meatballs.

user41796

I feel so dumb. 10k users can do stealth edits on tags

user41796

so they don't hit the front page at all (afaik)

user41796

@MichaelT why didn't you tell me about stealth tag editing?!

user55340

Umm... I did but it was too stealthy? That privileges page is quite stealthy.

user41796

8:34 PM

huh. Apparently I shouldn't click on the edit history though because that does make it pop up

user41796

or maybe the front page was caching. <sigh> So much for stealth edits.

user41796

At least I have an easy scapegoat in blaming caching

user20683

@GlenH7 I was about to say. Even mods can't stealth edit.

user41796

I was playing with the in-line tag edit that can be done without going into full editing of the question. I made the change; new tag showed up but didn't show me as editing; then checked front page and no changes there

user41796

Should have recreated twice before assuming

user41796

8:39 PM

and sorry for bumping two questions at the same time. I had promised to bump them more slowly than that.

user55340

That is weird... I blame caching, just because. — Robert Harvey Sep 18 '13 at 3:55

Jimmy Hoffa

Am I the only one who wishes you could read maps with the part below the equator upside down so up is always directionally distancing itself from the equator. I want a map where the lower half of the world is upside down and laid out nextside of the upper half.

user55340

@Robert I tried to blame caching for why the trash did not appear to be out on the curb yet. My wife didn't buy it, and she knows what caching is. — Andrew Barber Sep 18 '13 at 3:58

user20683

@JimmyHoffa That's just the Haskell. You want a world that's referentially transparent.

user55340

@JimmyHoffa message.snopes.com/showthread.php?t=23256 (#2)

user55340

8:43 PM

(I heard that story as a missile guidance (which wouldn't care about upside down) being repurposed in a jet fighter)

user20683

Free Operating System Textbook

user55340

@WorldEngineer (whee! cs.wisc.edu!)

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT Not helpful, crashing planes does not give me a more climatalogically consistent geography representation

user20683

@MichaelT That's your Alma Mater isn't it.

user55340

@WorldEngineer Yep.

user55340

8:48 PM

@JimmyHoffa No, you misunderstand... you just need to read the map while in the plane... because its now upside down with you, the map will be right.

user41796

@MichaelT But sometimes strange things do happen. dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=6225

user55340

@GlenH7 o_O

user41796

oh? You hadn't heard of that one? I remember laughing out loud when I first read it.

user20683

Apparently C++ has the same kind of date-time issues that Java does.

user55340

Rather, C++ and Java are both based on C's date-time issues.

Jimmy Hoffa

8:52 PM

@MichaelT I think the issue is with date-time. We need a more chronologically consistent time and relative distance in space representation.

user55340

(Out of close votes sigh)

user55340

@JimmyHoffa Father time can't get a date?

user41796

C'mon upvotes before migrating to SO: programmers.stackexchange.com/a/224593/53019

user41796

Pathetic what I do to get SO rep...

user41796

@MichaelT not all inheritance is good. :-)

user55340

8:54 PM

@GlenH7 That will exit after 1 loop.

Jimmy Hoffa

tech.slashdot.org/story/14/01/17/162237/…

user20683

@JimmyHoffa Tardis Time: There's More Time on the Inside!

user55340

Joda Time? Bah! We've got Tardis Time!

user41796

@MichaelT No it won't. :-)

user55340

They're missing a fair bit of the functionality at 0th glance.

user41796

8:58 PM

@MichaelT Likely. I knew there's a lot of effort that has gone into just the web side of their product. And that's where a lot of the customer experience / value comes from.

user55340

The learning part for example?

user41796

@MichaelT I don't recall where that portion occurs. I should since I've talked with one of their developers, but he knows just a sliver of the broader environment.

user41796

And he was limited in what exactly he could share with me ...

user55340

There's rules in how to handle itself when its in the sun or not, determining how long it takes to get to a temp, learning your schedule and preferences. Gas vs heat pump heating...

user55340

I see it very much like the attempt to clone siri when that came out and saying "look, we can open source it"

user41796

9:02 PM

@MichaelT And I think they had a number of challenges supporting the disparate HVAC systems that are out there. Oil heating remains a buggaboo for everyone in the industry afaik.

user55340

The open source community, as a whole, does not realize the importance of polish for consumers and non-hackers.

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 You mean for everyone.

user41796

@JimmyHoffa yeah, price of oil doesn't help either

user55340

I really read that OpenSource thing as "look guys, we cobbled together something that was a v 0.0.1 prototype like what Nest had before they got any funding. $3.2B pshaw!

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT I just read it as "Look, you can get stuff to do some of these things on your own, what a cool project that would be!" anybody claiming their joy of slapping consumer componentry together as proof of any industrial value is missing something between their hearing oculi

user55340

9:11 PM

Ok... I'll give it that... I did think of trying to write something on my own back when I first got my house... but then Nest came out and I was "Hmm... is the time it would take me to cobble a custom home automation thermostat worth $200? or more?"

user55340

And honestly, custom home automation decreases the value of the house because you'd need a consultant or former owner to come back to maintain it when its sold.

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT yeah well home projects for our sort don't tend to think too much about the value, more "Look what I can do! Cool, my roof now has an opener! :O"

user55340

Its fun to tinker with... and sure, if you've got an apartment where you can pop the thermostat off and put a custom one on (and flip it back when you leave)... great. But otherwise, you're tinkering with a thing that is $60k - $1M (and beyond)... and you'd really not lose 10% of that value because you've put too much customization into it.

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT I'm just saying I want an automatically raisable roof. That's all.

maybe some low-rider effects too, so I can raise different parts and make it bounce up and down for like cinco de mayo

I encourage this form of engineering.

gnat

who said recently that we need to promote chat room to those unsure about how to ask question at Programmers? There we go...

1

A: Where to ask for general advice for young programmers?

As you have sufficient privileges, safe places for "drafting" questions like that are Programmers and Workplace chat rooms (Whiteboard and Water Cooler, respectively). Being free from topical / subjectivity limitations of Q&A sites, chat rooms allow one to discuss problems that might be not good...

user41796

9:23 PM

Sam is about to Ars us

thorsten müller

Problem is that many of those new questions come from people with <20 rep. So they simply can't go into chat. For some reasons people very rarely follow that advice anyway. And for large parts of the day at least in Whiteboard there simply is nobody online.

user41796

Q is already protected

Jimmy Hoffa

@thorstenmüller so then maybe we need to teach them to lurk.

user55340

@thorstenmüller We're certainly less active in the "kids at home weekend" time when one would presume they have questions.

gnat

@thorstenmüller agree, that's a problem. Still I decided to use a chance to educate at least those who already have privileges. Frankly, amount of troublesome questions that comes from guys who can chat, 101-rep users - mostly SO guys with association bonus - is about the same as one that comes from 1-to-20

user55340

9:32 PM

@thorstenmüller That said, the MSO question appeared to be about where that user could ask such questions, not where arbitrary user could ask. And the OP has 12k MSO rep...

psr

The supercollider has really been helpful this week in pinning down the specs for the one ring.

Jimmy Hoffa

@psr I haven't been able to find it since the toolbar shift

(haven't looked closely either)

user55340

@JimmyHoffa Right Hand Side.

user55340

gnat

@GlenH7 with 3 of 10 answers scored less than -4, sure Haylem figured it's about time to protect :)

user55340

9:35 PM

The One Ring is fairly stuck in the top 10.

user41796

@gnat too bad we don't have enough 20k voters to kill off answers yet

Jimmy Hoffa

@MichaelT Oh crap it totally trolled me! I clicked one of those the other day because it's over there.. it didn't used to was over there was it?

gnat

agree. Looks like same guys who teach me what to do about low quality answers, happily ignore crap...

What do you do with any low quality answers? Downvote/edit/flag — Karl Bielefeldt Dec 17 '13 at 8:05

user55340

@JimmyHoffa Nope. Used to be in the old navar. Now they made it more prominent.

gnat

@MichaelT even better place is full list. @JimmyHoffa go to stackexchange.com/questions (two pages, 100 questions!), pick SO questions, lemming-upvote them then have fun watching them bumped at collider. Smaller sites strike back

gnat

9:51 PM

@GlenH7 there is a typo in code comments in your recent answer, I think it should read This is your mission statement

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