pungentcomment

I read somewhere that it's a huge money loser for Amazon. Alexa being such a big part of Amazon's identity, could they shut it down without losing face though?

I wish I could upvote you more than once. I'm not a bus driver but a truck driver though lol.

It's all garbage collector.

I took classes, not the fancy 6 months full time course, but a part time 6 or 8 (can't remember) weeks course that showed me the basics. I like to drive so this was not a hardship for me. Did not buy my own rig. I just got out of self employment and did not want to go back to that.

Finding a job as a newbie was not easy at the time (because of the insurance they were saying) so I went the agency route and they found me work right away. Worked there for 2 years then found a job closer to home. Been doing that for about 15 years already.

I did this 15-20 years ago. I had a small internet/consulting business that I ran out of my house, with a full T1 mind you lol. Got tired of staring at the walls and tired of the f'king servers that chained me down.

An error message from a server while in the car going on a small vacation triggered the change. I had enough. So on the spot I thought of my options and decided on becoming a trucker.

My first aim was to do long haul but I never went that way. I got hired to do local LTL deliveries/pick ups and I loved it. For me it's hard to beat driving a truck when it's nice outside. Winter can be a bitch but you learn manage.

Constantly going in and out of the truck got me and keeps me in shape. I lost 100lbs and feel much better than the fat slob I used to be, tied to the keyboard. It also help that I bike to work (not in winter though).

Took a real pay cut but I would never go back. I don't think I can anyway. I started programming again a couple of years ago on personal projects and I love it. I realize that my skills are greatly diminished but it's still fun to find solutions to problems, fix the damn bugs lol, and be proud of the final product.

Chances are that the site will be hosted outside the US and the DMCA is a US only copyright law afaik. I don't think it's applicable outside the US.

You get that kind of response anytime the subject matter is vi or vim. Still more if it mentions nvim, nano or, god forbid, emacs(!)

Saying it' maths is simplifying it a bit. They use simulations. They can simulate how an object orbits and eventually fall down to earth. They can test those simulations everyday by predicting where a know object in orbit will be in the future. Multiply that by a billion and you can predict that earth's rings would have fall down eventually.

CS came first. At the end I had a small internet business at home that chained me to the computers. An alarm about a defective RAID just as I was starting a short vacation triggered the career change. I couldn't see myself go back into a cubicle and I always liked to drive so I decided on the spot to become a trucker. So I sold the business, took a course, pass the license and here I am 15 years later, 100 pounds lighter because I'm no longer behind a desk getting fat. I'm doing local and regional deliveries with a 53ft and have a 20km bike commute. I probably make 1/3 of what a computer job would pay but to me money is not everything. To tell the whole truth, I was simply burned out. I just came back to programming on personal projects just a couple of years ago and I love it.

As for comparing industries, I don't know, how can you compare when one has really small margins, has no technology besides tracking and logistics, is really change averse and has basically an un-educated cheap labor force and the other has hopefully good margins, a well paid skilled labor force and creates technology.

One thing for sure, a good or a bad boss is the same in both industries lol.

Trucker with a CS degree here. I'm very skeptical of the feasibility of autonomous highway trucks that can drive outside very tightly defined parameters or ideal situations. That being said, it just occurred to me, how will these trucks react to or let alone detect tire blowouts or break failures/fires on the trailers?

Edit: I know from experience that getting a project to what we think is 95% there is relatively easy compared to the last 5% that make the product/project 100% viable. The real life testing will kill you if the edge cases don't. (I don't mean that literally, although...)