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Programmers come out of college in one of two modes: either they are full of fire and initiative, ready to change the world with their “mad h@x0r skillz” and energy, or they are timid and tentative, completely afraid to take any chance or risk that might possibly lead them to getting fired from their job. The first are the ones that scare me. "Try not. Do. Or do not. There is no try."
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Random number generation is one of the most fascinating subjects in cryptography -- mostly because of how terrible things get when people screw it up. And oh boy, do people screw it up. When this happens, people get nervous. They start to wonder: am I at risk? And if so, what can I do to protect myself? Answering this question is easy. Answering it in detail is hard. What's a bad RNG? And what do I do if I 40713455...
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The Free Universal Construction Kit - a 3-D-printable collection of 80 parts that function as a a Rosetta Stone for young builders - connects lego to lincoln logs to tinkertoys, with the aim of making those systems spark truly unlimited creativity. Lego, K’Nex, Tinkertoys... Oh my!
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The IE team published an in-depth post over the weekend, raising a few concerns about StatCounter’s methodology (or lack thereof) for reporting browser market share. Their points were interesting to consider, but what’s the use in splitting hairs about this? Cooking the books is hard and doesn't help anyone.
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Cooking books is easy. All you need is a microwave.
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Seattle. Cost of gas, energy, and real estate (not to mention natural beauty) are just some of the reasons why the Emerald city is not only one of the best places in the country to live, but also one of the most attractive places for startups to bootstrap or for bigger companies to make the hires necessary to scale their operations. Three months of sun is all anyone really needs.
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Linus Torvalds has reached middle age, and so has Linux. Nowadays, it’s easy to take both of them for granted. But both are still going strong — very strong. Linus still runs the Linux kernel with his unique brand of no-nonsense attitude. But he's also a regular guy. Sudo put the kids to bed.
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In days of yore, when memory was measured in kilobytes, games used to come with manuals. Made out of paper. Sometimes quite a lot of paper. That was then, this is now. Today most games don't even come in a box, and we gladly pay extra for "deluxe editions" and pre-order swag. Have the games become better as a result? This subhead left intentionally blank.
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The company I work for has seen a big 'cultural change' over the last couple of years instigated mainly by the HR department. One of the things that is now valued almost more than anything else is positiveness. EVERYTHING here is awesome now. The synergies are invigorating.
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If you are game to learn a new language then I highly recommend looking at Python. You will find it both fun and productive. Basic tenets of the language can be summarized in what is called “The Zen of Python”. Where did I get this from? Well, from Python itself.
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I know people that are great at starting projects, they are always on to something new and great. But it's not the same 'new and great' thing they were doing last week, they already lost interest because the 'hard' parts are finished and so they've moved on to the next challenge. Never mind that nothing ever gets finished that way! Every software project that is remotely successful needs all four of these.
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There's a bunch of new stuff in Visual Studio 11 Express for Web that I suspect not everyone noticed. Remember that Express is our free version of Visual Studio. Sometimes I hear folks complain that Express isn't advanced enough, even though its free. 10 things you probably complained about before even installing.
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Math and programming have a somewhat misunderstood relationship. Many people think that you have to be good at math or made good grades in math class before you can even begin to learn programming. But how much math does a person need to know in order to program? Not That Much, Actually.
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Absolutely Correct.
Programming requires more of logic and lesser of math.
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except if you're doing 3d graphic programming. That needs buckloads of maths
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Speaking from experience, while knowing more about Math is incredibly helpful, no, it isn't required.
What you do need to know are how to decipher the annoying as hell language they write it in. If you want an example, look at the Taylor Series on Wikipedia for the Triginometry functions.
It's actually pretty simple to implement in code, but you wouldn't know it just by looking at those equations.
And I agree, logic is more important that Math in programming. Being able to think a process through in your head is more important than Math.
Again, Math is needed, but you don't need a Ph'D in order program nowadays.
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In a statically typed language, the compiler knows the data-type of a variable and how to represent that. In a dynamically-typed language, it has to keep flag describing the actual type of the value of the variable, and the program has to perform a data-dependent branch on that value each time it manipulates a variable. It also has to look up all methods and operators on it. That’s why the dynamic language JIT benchmarks emphasise near-C speed on small inner loops but steer clear of large data-structures and data manipulation problems. Looking for Python performance in all the wrong places.
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It doesn’t look good for Firefox: Almost every month for the last three years, Firefox has lost ground to Internet Explorer, Chrome, and Safari. You can look at this two ways. First, the total number of people on the internet is growing, so while Firefox’s share has decreased, the total number of people using Firefox is increasing. The other point of view is that Firefox, whether you like it or not, is declining in popularity. The rumours of my death have been 404 Not Found.
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It’s trendy right now to produce office space that looks like an Apple store. Bright, airy, cheerful, lots of open space, big ceilings, blonde wood, attractive and friendly employees. So why is it that companies - small and large, startup and established player - continually take high-pay, high-skilled, super-smart programmers and cram them into giant rooms full of noise and distraction? Hear that? It's the deafening sound of thousands of dollars of productivity being sucked out of the room.
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Ugh man, I wish I could send this article to every place I've ever worked. Well there was one job that didn't have an open office, my desk was in a hallway.
"I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours. "
— Hunter S. Thompson
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Computers have been getting steadily “better” — faster, smaller, cheaper — for sixty years. But they get “smarter” — more capable and more broadly useful — in discrete leaps, the biggest of which don’t happen very often. We’re overdue for our next big leap. What will the Next Big Thing be? The next next thing is the perfect thing for startups to work on.
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Netflix is a developer oriented culture, from the top down. NoOps is the way developers work at Netflix. However, there are teams at Netflix that do traditional Operations, and teams that do DevOps as well. To try and clarify things I need to explain the history and current practices at Netflix. This is how Netflix goes from code to cloud, without a huge IT staff.
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There’s no denying that devices like the iPad, Kindle and Nook have dramatically changed the way that many people consume media. Last year, online retailer Amazon announced that electronic book sales had surpassed print book sales for the first time in history. But the future of the book has quite a few failed predictions in its wake. The April, 1935 issue of Everyday Science and Mechanics included this nifty invention which was to be the next logical step in the world of publishing. One more thing...
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http://finance.yahoo.com/news/amazon-com-buy-kiva-systems-205003362.html[^]
Amazon.com Inc said on Monday it agreed to buy Kiva Systems Inc for $775 million in cash, a deal that will bring more robotic technology to the e-commerce company's giant network of warehouses.
The acquisition, which has been approved by Kiva's stockholders, is expected to close in the second quarter of 2012, Amazon added in a statement.
Kiva develops robots that zip around warehouses, grabbing and moving shelves and crates full of products. The technology helps retailers fulfill online orders quickly and with fewer workers. Companies including Gap Inc, Staples Inc and Crate & Barrel, have used the technology.
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I liked the link on CNN's homepage better: "Amazon buys army of robots"
Sounds much more diabolical.
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