potbelly83

I miss the days where people actually cared if you knew about threading, how the unix file system worked, the finer points of the language you choose to work in. Yeah I get it, most of it is book knowledge, but it still somehow selected for the people that actually built the foundations of the tech companies we see today. The current crop of hires aren't really contributing anything fundamental, just jumping from one high paying gig to the next (and I say this as someone who works at one of those fancy places he get an offer from).

In all fairness, Gates does fly around the world in his private jet, live in huge energy consuming mansions, all the while expecting us commoners to live an ascetic life. If these people where serious in instrumenting change, maybe they could start setting an example by the life they lead?

Out of curiosity how do they plan too monetize these workflows? I'm sure the really big players in the industry (i.e. Merck/Eli Lilly/etc..) all have their own bespoke workflows. Maybe, the founder actually put in a few years at one of these companies and knew some of the gaps in their workflow but looking at his resume that doesn't seem the case.

No reason they can’t stick a designated call spot at the end of the plane where people can make their calls. Why does everything have to be a negative?

It looks like a lot of the EU crowd have jumped in here with the usual US sucks, everything about the US is crazy. Just to give some perspective, I live in the suburbs of Philadelphia and the kids in my neighborhood are always outside, no parents in sight, riding their bikes around, going down to the creek etc... Same was true when I lived in upstate NY. The US is a huge country and comparing Texas to other parts is somewhat like comparing France to Poland.

I'm always curious what is it about old people that make some behave in this way? Is it the way people used to be raised, cognitive decline, or simple nothing better to do? I also notice it in the comment's section where older people tend to be far less forgiving of discretions than younger people.

How about first tackling the low hanging fruit like a) private jet flights b) cruise ships c) methane production by agriculture rather than again putting all the responsibility on the working/middle classes?

MS research is an interesting case. From my memory they did support some theoretical research in non-linear stat mech a few years back (i.e. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oded_Schramm worked there and he was certainly doing pure research), they also let https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Freedman spend time doing his topology research even though it probably aint going to lead to a quantum computer :) Google however seems mainly to support research in ML/DL with applications the end result, yes it's research, but I wouldn't call it greenfield research like what occurred at Bell Labs (i.e. discovery of microwave background radiation).

The system (at least with regards to the sciences) worked well during the cold war because we had some higher goal to focus on, now with that gone, it's just a bunch of hacks looking to line their pockets. Speaking as someone with a PhD the whole system needs to be razed to the ground and reconstructed in another way. Its disappointing also private industry doesn't step in and fund more greenfield work (i.e. where is the 21st century's bell labs?)

Agreed. For inspiration though as to what programming could be it can't be beat.

Understand this has probably been posted numerous times, but just wanted to point out that written over 20 years ago, Abrash really was prescient. Here's a quote

"Again, I am not saying that this is bad. It does, however, have major implications for the future nature of PC graphics programming, in ways that will directly affect the means by which many of you earn your livings. Not so very long from now, graphics programming—all programming, for that matter—will become mostly a matter of assembling in various ways components written by other people, and will cease to be the all-inclusively creative, mindbendingly complex pursuit it is today. (Using legally certified black boxes is, by the way, one direction in which the patent lawyers are leading us; legal considerations may be the final nail in the coffin of homegrown code.) For now, though, it’s still within your power, as a PC programmer, to understand and even control every single thing that happens on a computer if you so desire, to realize any vision you may have. Take advantage of this unique window of opportunity to create some magic!"

Masking might not be effective on a population level, true, but on an individual level it may make a difference (wear N95, proper fit, etc etc ....) Still I agree, this does supply evidence against mandates.

Off topic but reminds me reading about how on a population level humans congregating in towns/cities was great, but terrible at an individual level (more diseases etc...)

And they wonder why they don’t get the best candidates.

Ha no worries, to be fair most of my working life has been spent at C++ shops. I guess Windows does something similar via dlls.

Interesting question arises here. Given most shops are now using interpreted languages, is it possible to make a change to say a .py file and ONLY deploy that .py file to production? i.e. do incremental releases

Well at some point you may want to actually calculate the eigenvalues. Unless you just dive in and try and compute the characteristic polynomial directly.

Because aprior it's not really clear what does increase our collective wealth. For example, the whole quantum age (and hence the silicon age), came about from people trying to understand the spectrum of radiation emitted from a heated box. If you spoke to someone at the end of the 19th century they'd probably think this was a waste of time, and tell you that people should be trying to make steam engines more efficient.

what are you smoking? we've consistently taken away gun laws.

I’d like to shed some pessimism on a lot of the optimistic comments. Unless you did your phd in quite an applied area you may find it tough to get a job without extensive study. I graduated with a phd in pure math and had a very hard time even getting applied positions as I didn’t have the domain knowledge. I ended up in software and still have the nagging feel the grass was probably greener on the other side.

How do you differentiate a string? Enum?

Maybe they can also follow Cromwell into coming to the realization that in the end only God can rule over men.

As a math PhD I have to say the only way you're going to learn mathematics is if you actually have a pressing need to do so. i.e. You have a project at work that needs some math, you have a hobby that needs some math. In this case you just learn what you need. Just learning math for its own sake outside of a University STEM track is just too hard (I wouldn't be able to do it and I've tried).

Off topic, but curious why Ada went?

I mean you'd think people would just look at how long the mormons live for to figure out that most of these studies showing abstainers=>higher chance of death are biased.

When you made the switch how did you go about getting embedded employees to take your applications seriously?

Nice book. As a C++ programmer how much of its discussion related to C's storage/memory model would carry over to C++?

Well technically a PDE is an operator between various function spaces.

This is bad advice. When it comes to school finish what you start otherwise you look like a quitter. Jumping ship every 1 year? I wouldn't hire that person. At most places it takes min 6 months to get up to speed.

Why? What's this obsession with ML? There are tons of interesting problems in the embedded/distributed systems/security spaces.

Depends where. In Westchester/Nassau counties (bordering NYC) teachers get a pretty sweet deal.