 |
|
The biggest change in programming over the last twenty-five years is that today you manipulate a set of useful, flexible data types, and twenty-five years ago you spent a disproportionately high amount of time building those data types yourself. Thinking about how to arrange ready-made building blocks into something new is a more radical change than it may first appear.
|
|
|
|
|
In our San Francisco chapter of GirlDevelopIt, we have an increasing number of members that are attending our web development classes because they actually want to get a job in our industry. They come from all sorts of backgrounds... but the important thing to note is that many of them do not come from a computer science background. They are learning web development skills and computer science concepts by attending classes like ours, going through online tutorials like Treehouse or Codecademy, taking online courses like Coursera's CS 101, and generally taking the DIY approach to learning. So, they can do all that to learn the skills that they need for the job, but the question remains, can they actually get a job? What's the best way to show skills and get a job without the degree?
|
|
|
|
|
I am entirely self taught, worked in the industry for 24 years, won industry prizes for software I have designed, written and implemented.
|
|
|
|
|
most days you don't need what they teach in school, problem with education is, it's taught (and curriculum as well) by *Academics* with no industry/real world experience
I don't think this is true for everyone but for *many* school is quite irrelevant.
This said, quant finance, CAD/graphics engineering software, gaming ... all uses a lot of linear algebra/matrix mathematics
dev
|
|
|
|
|
Terrence Dorsey wrote: What's the best way to show skills and get a job without the degree?
Write a program that people want to use.
m.bergman
For Bruce Schneier, quanta only have one state : afraid.
To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered. -- Voltaire
In most cases the only difference between disappointment and depression is your level of commitment. -- Marc Maron
I am not a chatbot
|
|
|
|
|
We’ve become great at curating our lives for the sake of our audiences on various social media services. We post what benefits our reputations, leaving out the parts that reflect poorly on us. Instagram is filled less with interesting photography and more with pictures that makes the photographer look like they lead an interesting life. Foursquare check-ins seem less weighted towards grocery store visits and gas stations and more towards coffee shops, music venues, and other coolhunting hotspots. Facebook is filled with posts that exhibit the wit and witticism of the poster. Pics or it didn't happen.
|
|
|
|
|
Did you know... If you listen to CLOUDS.MID backwards, you will go to sleep and have an amazing dream. In it, one by one, you meet the Microsoft Windows 95 Product Team. Finally, you get to Mr. Gates. you reach out to shake his hand, but instead, he puts something in your palm. He smiles. You wake up... Welcome to Windows 95. Here are some features you may not have seen before.
|
|
|
|
|
In real life (off the internet), pretty much everyone I meet seems to be using the Raspberry Pi or other Linux embedded system. The use of an actual microcontroller seems quite rare with people I’ve met. Even Arduino seems less popular in my city than embedded Linux. In a way this makes sense — why would someone buy an Arduino when they can get a Raspberry Pi that does so much more at the same price or less? Linux offers a large amount of software out of the box and allows people to program in simpler scripting languages. What is a microcontroller actually good for in comparison to a system on a chip?
|
|
|
|
|
Power consumption is a major factor. Many microcontrollers can run on a few µA. Keep in mind that the microcontroller is just the chip, not the board with all the accessories. When designing a purpose-built system you're designing around 100mm² of space, as opposed to 4000mm² or more for all the gadgets.
|
|
|
|
|
Thank you Yvan, that's a very educated response for those/many of us who don't come from background in Electrical Engineering!
dev
|
|
|
|
|
I've heard many say that Sinofsky is responsible for the death of Silverlight and that it's absence on Windows 8 is a shame. I hear a lot of Silverlight enthusiasts (or apologists) that Silverlight, while being a great technology, was killed because DevDiv and Windows couldn't get along. At last year's build, it was big news that Sinofsky actually said the word Silverlight made news. While the idea that Silverlight ran on a Mac certainly caused waves in the Windows team, it's not the reason for it getting pushed to the pile of technologies that are now in 'sustaining engineering' mode. If any executive is responsible for the current state of Silverlight it's... Steve Jobs.
|
|
|
|
|
Windows Phone 8 has been official for two weeks now. Handsets hit the stores just days ago, and we’ve been busying our fingers learning all the ins and outs of Microsoft’s newest mobile OS. There’s a lot to love about Windows Phone 8—slick user experience, bright live tiles, and unique hardware—but it takes some time to get to know new software. And since we’re already elbow-deep in it, we thought we’d bring you a quick cheat sheet on some of the more common questions about Windows Phone 8. Bonus tip: it's a phone, too!
|
|
|
|
|
Apple (AAPL) launched the iPhone 5 about seven weeks ago and the sleek smartphone still isn’t easy to find on store shelves. It's big, whether we like it or not.
|
|
|
|
|
Bit of an old story, but still mostly true. One thing that has changed is the ship time (now 2-3 weeks rather than 3-4 weeks).
I'm still waiting to buy a factory unlocked iPhone 5. I'm hoping it comes out soon, as I need one for my car's remote starter to work to its full extent. 
|
|
|
|
|
AspDotNetDev wrote: Bit of an old story, but still mostly true.
Well, you're right. It's a week old now. I must not have been paying attention when I looked at it. 
|
|
|
|
|
LAPTOP Editor-in-Chief Mark Spoonauer on the bandwidth capabilities of the U.S. networks. All I can say is "WOW" 
|
|
|
|
|
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) shot down talk on Tuesday that the struggling chip maker is exploring a potential sale of the company What? I was just getting ready to party :(
modified 14 Nov '12 - 8:20.
|
|
|
|
|
Countered 2-Vote.
I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We've created life in our own image.
Stephen Hawking
|
|
|
|
|
|
Shouldn’t years of Web development and advocacy about performance by Yahoo and Google and many others have born fruit and made us aware of how much each HTTP request costs? If you look at the final products, it doesn’t seem that way.... There are a few reasons why our Web is on the chubby side, and most of them actually are possible for us as developers to change. Death by a thousand plugins (and libraries, and HTTP requests, and...).
|
|
|
|
|
Minimalism has become the latest trend in many web designs, particularly in the area of online business and service professional websites. However, unlike many fads, this trend has more than a few practical benefits that make it ideal not just for the short term but also for long range website decoration and appearance. If you’re wondering about how to best keep a minimalist framework in mind for your site or just want to find out a bit about the pros and cons; see how they compare, then read ahead. Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
|
|
|
|
|
How many times have you wanted to send a project to a friend or upload it to a web site like MSDN Code Gallery only to find that your zip file has lots of stuff that you don't need to send in it making the file larger than it needs to be. Clean Project is a utility that cleans Visual Studio project directories so you can quickly upload or email a zip file with your solution. All the code that's fit to share.
|
|
|
|
|
In Windows 8, we reimagined the browser with IE10. We designed and built IE10 to be the best way to experience the Web on Windows. With the IE10 Release Preview for Windows 7 consumers can now enjoy a fast and fluid Web with the updated IE10 engine on their Windows 7 devices. The release preview of IE10 on Windows 7 is available for download today. Modern browsers everywhere!
|
|
|
|
|
Not sure if I'm ready for IE10 with that unknown bug on the loose.
|
|
|
|
|
For me there was a time that can only be described as adolescence in the field of programming and more specifically JavaScript. This period was characterised by a certain laziness and hubris. I thought I was right. I thought others were wrong. I could see no path but the very strict one that I had boxed myself into through a process in which I longed for certainty and the expulsion of realistic doubt. Today I present a short list of JavaScript practices that once seemed right but I now deem foolish.
|
|
|
|
|
The next game console from Nintendo is a strange beast indeed. The controller, called GamePad, has a built-in touch screen. And the system can wirelessly stream its visuals to both the GamePad and the television at the same time. So you can play games in which the player has to alternate between the two screens. Or multiplayer games in which some players look at the TV while others look at the controller. Or you can just play games on the controller and forget about the TV entirely — which we were surprised to find might be the most compelling way to play on Wii U. Will it revolutionize gaming like the original Wii did?
|
|
|
|
|
Why and how did humankind become “unusually successful”? And what, to an evolutionary biologist, does “success” mean, if self-destruction is part of the definition? Does that self-destruction include the rest of the biosphere? What are human beings in the grand scheme of things anyway, and where are we headed? What is human nature, if there is such a thing, and how did we acquire it? What does that nature portend for our interactions with the environment? With 7 billion of us crowding the planet, it’s hard to imagine more vital questions. Science is cool.
|
|
|
|
|
With large numbers of Tablets and Smartphones running virtually identical software, the display becomes the single most important way for manufacturers to differentiate their products – that’s been true for Android and the same will apply for Windows devices. A top notch display makes everything that runs on a Tablet or Smartphone look great or as good as possible – including all of the Apps, web content, photos, and videos – looking a lot better than on devices with inferior displays. The ultimate smackdown: Microsoft Surface RT vs. Apple iPad 3 vs. Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1.
|
|
|
|
|
While Sinofsky was seen as a brilliant figure at Microsoft, his downfall was that he didn't get along with others within the company. He was notorious for picking fights with other executives, including current CEO Steve Ballmer, and even pushed former executives like chief software architect Ray Ozzie to quit. It's not you, it's... well, actually it is you. Seeya.
|
|
|
|
|
I didn't know that Sinofsky read this page. Now I do. Vote countered.
|
|
|
|
|
I agree with Pete.
Why cannot a person post a news story without some uni-voter being an arse?
Uni-nitwit vote countered with my +5
|
|
|
|
|
|
You're fooling yourself. We're living in a dictatorship. A self-perpetuating autocracy in which the working classes...
Wait, wrong movie. So there's this Maunder fellow...
Director of Content Development, The Code Project
|
|
|
|
|
Terence me ol' mucker; he's half way round the world, half blind from staring at the sun, brain addled from the unaccustomed heat. You can say what you like about him (or even better, what you don't like about him). We won't tell. Honest. And there'll be no trace anywhere to read.
|
|
|
|
|
For the first time in its 30-plus year history, the person leading Microsoft’s Windows unit won’t be a man. With the departure of Steven Sinofsky on Monday, Microsoft is handing over leadership of its flagship operating system to Julie Larson-Green and Tami Reller, both of whom served as top deputies to Sinofsky.... They will have their hands full. For years, the highest-ranking female employee has been HR head Lisa Brummel.
|
|
|
|
|
But the real question is, will they wash my windows? 
|
|
|
|
|
All too often I see programmers trying to solve their problems on the internet by blindly "flipping switches." Change something, hit refresh in the browser. "Why is that cached? What's going on?" Change something else, hit refresh in the browser. "What's the deal?" When coding on the web, remember that effectively NOTHING is hidden from you.
|
|
|
|
|
I thought I'd share my favorite regex of all time: [ -~] Any ideas what this regexp matches?
|
|
|
|
|
Hmmmm. What a pretty darned useless regex. The I18n train passed it by without stopping.
|
|
|
|
|
I like Pythonista and I was impressed with the previous update. Pythonista is a well designed implementation of Python on iOS that goes far beyond just being a dumb shell. The developer, Ole Zorn, has a new release out today that raises the bar considerably. This post will serve as an introduction to some of my favorite new features of Pythonista but also as a practical guide to how I use it. A Python interpreter for iOS... for taking your scripts on the road.
|
|
|
|
|
Programming is frustrating because the tools, documentation & processes that we use every day are so bad. It’s not because programmer’s don’t understand logic or how to make algorithms, it’s because they’re still working on getting “hello world” to compile without errors. Or get a simple Facebook function to work for PHP CodeIgniter when you realize that the PHP CodeIgniter Github project has 2 lines of documentation... I’m glad I know what I’m doing because otherwise, I would have quit.
|
|
|
|
|
Robbie wrote: Programming is frustrating because the tools, documentation & processes that we use every day are so bad
You can switch to become a project manager or Business ANALyst then you don't need to debug sh*t code you inherit from your peers.
dev
|
|
|
|
|
In my years of programming in Python and roaming around GitHub's Explore section, I've come across a few libraries that stood out to me as being particularly enjoyable to use. This blog post is an effort to further spread that knowledge. I specifically excluded awesome libs like requests, SQLAlchemy, Flask, fabric etc. because I think they're already pretty "main-stream". If you know what you're trying to do, it's almost guaranteed that you'll stumble over the aforementioned. This is a list of libraries that in my opinion should be better known, but aren't. "Fuzzywuzzy" wins my vote for best-named library.
|
|
|
|
|
When David Schnurman heard Hurricane Sandy was coming to Downtown Manhattan, he says he knew he had to act, and fast. His business had to do more than evacuate— he had to find a way to stay up and running for what was slated to be its busiest three days of the year Know where your servers are.
|
|
|
|
|
Quote:
To complicate matters, the company’s servers were hosted by Amazon’s AWS platform, located in Virginia, another Sandy target. Kicking into emergency mode, Schnurman decided to transport everything to the cloud, a fast-growing option for small-businesses, in a matter of days. The company also relied on voice over IP service, so that team members could work from home.
So isn't Amazon's AWS platform located in Virginia part of the cloud then? The author seems slightly confussed.
|
|
|
|
|
Jan Steyn wrote: So isn't Amazon's AWS platform located in Virginia part of the cloud then?
Yeah, that's correct. I think the point is that he was getting the data to different servers, but, yep, Amazon's AWS is technically part of the cloud.
|
|
|
|
|
Microsoft's emphasis on the mobile nature of Windows 8 and its bold touch-friendly user interface may lead some to fear the software giant has taken its foot off the pedal in terms of security. Hackers, start your engines!
|
|
|
|
|
Since 2000, Intel has done just about everything right in its core business, maintaining its dominance of the market for PC microprocessors and putting substantial distance between itself and competitors in the market for server chips. And yet the company finds itself in a very tough position: computers are going mobile, and Intel’s share of the microprocessor market is falling off a cliff. Still doing great in servers and PCs... which are an increasingly small part of the market for CPUs.
|
|
|
|
|
I'm curious what is and isn't being counted as part of the mobile total. Unless they're excluding lower end phones the >96:1 ratio between PC and mobile isn't plausible; and I can only conclude they're rejecting older non-pc markets for CPUs to make Intel's situation look worse.
Did you ever see history portrayed as an old man with a wise brow and pulseless heart, waging all things in the balance of reason?
Is not rather the genius of history like an eternal, imploring maiden, full of fire, with a burning heart and flaming soul, humanly warm and humanly beautiful?
--Zachris Topelius
Training a telescope on one’s own belly button will only reveal lint. You like that? You go right on staring at it. I prefer looking at galaxies.
-- Sarah Hoyt
|
|
|
|
|
Dan Neely wrote: to make Intel's situation look worse
Exactly. It's purely a load of marketing tactics/scare mongering.
=====
\ | /
\|/
|
|-----|
| |
|_ |
_) | /
_) __/_
_) ____
| /|
| / |
| |
|-----|
|
=====
===
=
|
|
|
|
|
General 
News 
Suggestion 
Question 
Bug 
Answer 
Joke 
Rant 
Admin 
Submit an article or tip
Post your Blog
