ChucklesNorris

Unfortunately, it's susceptible to a big bad wolf attack.

Unfortunately, it's susceptible to the big bad wolf.

And apps. I hate flashing ads, I always pay the extra to be left alone. But I wonder, how many have fake, extra annoying ads? It's almost like extortion.

But as technology progresses, I can see a future where AI and facial recognition and this targeted sound will torment every person, everywhere they go. The more recent Time Machine movie showed a bit of this.

Age discrimination is rampant and yet illegal. Corporations ought to be fined for having a workforce younger than the average age of the country's citizens. That would help people like the man in this article.

But I wonder, at 64, hasn't he applied for Social Security? It wasn't mentioned. It's not much, but it's better than nothing.

Then I would say The Elements Of Programming Style, and possibly this one (I haven't read it, but from the description it seems to be what you're looking for): https://www.amazon.com/Elegant-SciPy-Art-Scientific-Python/d...

I remember looking at used books in my college bookstore, and found one which had nearly every sentence highlighted in yellow. The book might as well have been dipped in yellow ink! Overuse of the highlighter amounted to not using it at all.

I agree, comment judiciously.

Are you looking for a book geared toward a particular language, or one aimed more at better general programming methodology, regardless of language?

Practice without learning, and learning without practice are both dead ends. The two go hand in hand.

About the comments, by no means do I mean that comments can be a crutch and should allow for sloppier coding, but sometimes the problem that you're trying to solve requires a lot of brainstorming, and when you hit your "aha" moment, you'd better write down what your thinking is, in English. The code itself might be pretty hairy to go over and decipher if that's all you've left yourself.

But I get what you mean, and you make a valid point.

Excellent input!

These replies were not what I expected. Practice, practice, practice is not necessarily good advice if you don't know what you're doing. Before I took college programming classes I was self taught and wrote what I later learned was called "spaghetti code." I had no idea (before the classes) who was giving me good advice and who was giving me bad advice. My code was unorganized and a total mess.

In my class, our textbook was "The Elements Of Programming Style" by Kernighan and Plaugher. As far as I'm concerned, it is THE book for beginning programmers. It's rare and expensive now, but worth it.

In a nutshell, it taught:

- program in a direct way, do NOT try to be clever and code in weird, complex ways. Your code (not just the comments) needs to be readable to others, what it does should be evident. (The book gave examples of both, and after looking at a number of these examples, you get the idea of what K&P mean by ELEGANT programming.)

- Subroutines must have one entry point and one exit point, and accomplish one task.

- Add lots of comments in your code to help others or even yourself in case you forget what your thinking was.

These are just a few examples of good programming practice. I later became a professional programmer, using assembly language and C++. But that first college book was the one that outshone all the later ones that I read. Get it if you can find it!

I would also highly recommend Dennis Ritchie's books.

One more thing - object oriented programming is good, but I'm not sure it's paradigm will win out in the end. As an assembly language programmer, I began to realize the power of data driven programming, and I began to write my programs in that way. Which is why I think this new language, Julia, holds a lot of promise. I say this as one who has only read ABOUT Julia, not as one who has studied the language itself.

The difference is pay at the pump or pay via what your car's embedded GPS is reporting. GPS also allows them to know when and where you were speeding, and since Sweden went cashless, they can simply deduct the fines from your bank account. Compliance is irrelevant.

If having a GPS device on your person becomes law, then avoiding the tax by riding a bicycle, walking, riding a horse etc is defeated.

I think back to the old Cat Stevens song "I Want To Live In A Wigwam", except now I think maybe one day I'd like to live in a Faraday cage.

Computers, like guns, drugs, and any other invention of man are not inherently evil. All these things can be used for good or evil. Unfortunately, the fly in the ointment is human nature. With the convergence of cheaper but increased computing power and the monetization of personal information, I fear what the future holds. I hope I'm wrong, but it looks to me that humanity is doomed to forever live in a state total surveillance and control. We're seeing it happening already. Just the other day I saw an article that said that Sweden is going to tax people on the miles they drive. The very next day I saw another article saying Los Angeles is planning to do the same thing.

Sigh... I'm glad I'm old.

"Bug"? What came to my mind was "bugged."

Zuckerberg needs to answer more questions before Congress, this time under oath.

I believe I've got the gist of it: Keep your options open, and don't put all your eggs in one basket, because s* happens.