Eji1700's recent activity
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Comment on Should C be mandatory learning for career developers? in ~comp
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Comment on Should C be mandatory learning for career developers? in ~comp
Eji1700 Link ParentI mean I’ve been arguing that most 4 year degrees are a huge waste of time for most of my life. I think a 1-2 year boot camp into real job experience is almost always more valuable than 4 years...Otherwise, why ono simply go to a 1-2 year coding camp?
I mean I’ve been arguing that most 4 year degrees are a huge waste of time for most of my life. I think a 1-2 year boot camp into real job experience is almost always more valuable than 4 years racking up debt, learning outdated techniques that don’t hold up to reality
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Comment on Should C be mandatory learning for career developers? in ~comp
Eji1700 Link ParentYes and absolutely yes? The corner store employee giving you your booster shot doesn't know how the vaccine is made in the slightest. And construction is the example I'm already using? 90% of...Like medicine? Or construction?
Yes and absolutely yes? The corner store employee giving you your booster shot doesn't know how the vaccine is made in the slightest. And construction is the example I'm already using? 90% of construction work is labor intensive and SUPER narrow skill specification. The guy doing the drywall doesn't know shit about the electrical, and that guy doesn't know jack about the plumbing, and none of them know much about the physics that hold the whole thing up.
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Comment on America tips into fascism in ~society
Eji1700 Link ParentOr even trumps political allies. Given that this entire topic is about fascism, the important metric is the loyalty of the military.Or even trumps political allies. Given that this entire topic is about fascism, the important metric is the loyalty of the military.
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Comment on Which directors have a flawless filmography? in ~movies
Eji1700 Link ParentIt's very possible i'm mixing my characters (although so very very few are memorable). Obviously I didn't have a great impression of the film and I saw it so long ago. If i have a reason to watch...It's very possible i'm mixing my characters (although so very very few are memorable). Obviously I didn't have a great impression of the film and I saw it so long ago. If i have a reason to watch it again I could do a breakdown, but yeah clearly not something I'd want to do at this point
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Comment on Should C be mandatory learning for career developers? in ~comp
Eji1700 Link ParentAnd yet there's more code in production around the world than ever before. This, in my eyes, has absolutely nothing to do with the languages being used, and a lot more to do with the fact that the...And that's been a problem. Our code just gets more bloated, and more people become less able to fix it.
And yet there's more code in production around the world than ever before. This, in my eyes, has absolutely nothing to do with the languages being used, and a lot more to do with the fact that the market just doesn't care if your code is perfect. I think AI allowing for VERY quick output of REALLY awful code could jacknife things finally into the discussion of "ok we need some fucking standards and metrics that matter", much like a bridge collapse in olden days eventually led to "who ACTUALLY knows math here?", but that doesn't mean you build bridges without modern tools because the older ones meant you had to understand the math better. Like many industries the separation of skills is something that's going to occur, and having a bunch of "Good enough" coders with a few "knows the ins and outs" coders is mostly fine.
Taking this example down the slippery slope, we'd eventually stop being able to write compilers. A language like C is close enough to the metal to help computer scientists / software engineers get a good feel for how their code affects the machines they make do things. For me, the assembly course was great in helping me appreciate how much heavy lifting even a language like C is doing for me. And yes, I gained a better understanding of the low level stuff, which in turn helps things like Big-Oh have more context.
And for the coder handling their 50th frontend ticket today that matters not one iota. The vast majority of coding work boils down to "here's this isolated piece that does X and should do Y, figure out why and fix it". There's a larger discussion of how to handle the immense problem of these insanely large projects, but "make sure everyone knows C" isn't going to change most people's understanding because they aren't coding with anywhere near that level of freedom to begin with.
And I don't know that the fact you've seen devs choose wrong tools justifies the case you're making. To me it simply says their education wasn't good enough because they are unwilling to learn the proper tools. Likely because their education wasn't principles-based (multi-purpose tools), but more rote (single purpose/use tools). I can't stand PowerShell, but I'm not forcing my whole company to use git-bash/MSYS2/etc., either. Instead, I apply the principles I know and google the syntax.
Would that everyone would be perfect, but the teaching methods need to match the people who show up, not the people we always want. Lowering the barrier of entry to coding is the end goal just like every other discipline. You don't look for the finest crafstman anymore for construction because its no longer required. You simplify the process. Most people taking a hammer to the build site don't know anything about what the architect went through to make the structure sound, and coding is very much already well down that path.
I can't tell if you're advocating more for the bootcamp approach, which is great at churning out entry-level coders (who now have to increasingly rely on vibes, making learning even more difficult) who will become competent mid-level coders. But if we're going to keep advancing, people need to know it all, including the lower-level stuff, too. I do have moments where I think the terms Computer Scientist and Software Engineer should have never been chosen. We need a "do grunt coding" title, and that seems to fit the people you're describing. Much like the difference between a drafter and a design engineer.
Eh i think our entire approach across the industry is going to change pretty drastically in the next 10 or so years (even before AI was a thing, which is going to be its own problem). Coding has become massively more accessible and we're now hitting the point that you don't need craftsman. I don't think bootcamps are all that useful either, but yes I do think it moves towards a more mass produced approach. That said I also think that just like in my housing metaphor you don't let standard construction works do the architecture. Much like the early days of electricity vs today, I do think coding will eventually settle much more into reasonable standards. It's just still in its infancy and of course mutates faster than just about every other discipline.
Having cake and eating it too, teach Zig.
See i'd probably be more in favor of that as well. Everyone likes to throw around C, but why not Rust or Zig? C is still an absurdly dangerous language to code in with a ton of "well of course you know that you can't..." exceptions that are just NOT obvious. We've got much better tooling at the language level these days and if you are going to expose people to the joys of memory management they might as well "wear a helmet" to keep on this tortured metaphor.
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Comment on America tips into fascism in ~society
Eji1700 Link ParentNo where did I advocate for this in the slightest. There's ways to say "this is dangerous and leading to dangerous outcomes" without hyperbole and faulty comparisons.“Bad but disrespectful” - no, it’s disrespectful to those who built the protections against fascism to ignore that those are getting dismantled to allow for more and more overreach.
No where did I advocate for this in the slightest. There's ways to say "this is dangerous and leading to dangerous outcomes" without hyperbole and faulty comparisons.
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Comment on America tips into fascism in ~society
Eji1700 Link ParentNo worries I very much get it, and it is something interesting to discuss. Corrupt democratic republic likely. Corruption is like entropy for governments. It will, over time, naturally seep in....- Exemplary
God, I wish we could discuss this in an actual conversation because there's so many things to say and it's not really possible to do that in an internet comment without writing way too much or sounding incoherent. Hopefully this doesn't come across as yelling.
No worries I very much get it, and it is something interesting to discuss.
I guess what I want to ask is what would you call our current situation? Would you consider this to be something like quasi-fascism or fascism lite? What is your "red line" that turns whatever this is to full-blown fascism? While we're at it, when does a fetus become a baby?
Corrupt democratic republic likely. Corruption is like entropy for governments. It will, over time, naturally seep in. While it can be a catalyst for changing that government to something else, it doesn't have to to still drastically change the way things work. Even the US 100 years ago and today has gone through dramatic changes. And that's before you get into "democratic republic with slavery" for a large portion of its history.
From what I gather, it seems like tight-fisted autocratic control and violent crackdowns on dissidents is a real sticking point.
The reason I choose the midterms as a likely tipping point is because it's hard to say "This is a fully fascist/autocratic/whatever" government if a single election can change that. That's, traditionally, not really a thing in what most people would think of fascism. The entire theory behind governments with enforced turnover and a separation of powers is that the worst and most objectively evil person in the world could take power, but things could be corrected, at latest, by the next election. We literally saw Trump voted out in the first election, and he likely would not have won had the dems done anything remotely strategic to prevent it in the second. Obviously this term is different for about a thousand reasons, and yet people were absolutely calling the first term fascist too.
But one thing I've been thinking about a lot lately is does that stuff matter? Or I guess to be a little more clear, is it necessary? Not just definitionally, but for Trump. Yeah, the national guard isn't doing shit right now, but no one is really trying to stop them from being there. When Trump sent the Marines to LA during the ICE protests, they didn't do anything because the protests were non-violent and they fizzled out after a week. People went back to their lives and the ICE arrests carried on. Why spill so much blood when you don't have to?
I think it does, yeah. Simply put the majority of the country has not seen nor felt major effects of any sort of governmental shift. Yes, there is probably a path forward where we lose elections basically non violently. If the average person on the street keeps their current level of living, they're not going to risk their lives to oppose something that many see as performative anyways.
That said, Trump's incompetence/intentional probing makes it a little tricky to identify. At the end of the day if you want to change the government you NEED the military because they're the ones with the weapons and the ability to enforce your will when someone says "you and what army". The national guard deploying and rolling their eyes because blood in the streets isn't worth a corrupt senile politicians stupid orders when just standard compliance is "stand here and look pretty". If trump orders the guard to start firing on civilians that escalates things FAST. And yes, he's toying with that, and yes, the members of the military and the guard are aware of it like any other person and have all sorts of views about it, but I don't think it's wrong to say that from the pov of the military right now this is still a civil problem. Smashing the glass on the "activate the military to defend/destroy democracy" button is very very likely to lead to millions dead, and very few people want that. So for the most part right now its "Follow your orders so long as their legal" with a large helping of creative interpretation, and, because trump is trump, some level "well this would be way more dangerous if this moron knew what he was doing but fuck it i guess we'll just tromp around a bit and go back home".
And while Trump has teased the end of mail-in voting, joked about freezing elections, and laid the groundwork to deny any election loss moving forward, he and the Republicans might not have to do any of that in order to get their way. As you rightly put it, the likelihood of Democrats reversing course in the near future is incredibly slim. Why dissolve your opposition if they're just going to lose or be ineffective? I guess we might know for sure if the Republicans lose in the next few years, but what if they just do what they did last time and wait it out for a term then pick up where they left off? A softer touch and a little more flexibility, while still getting most of the desired outcome. Or, if push comes to shove, everything is in place to do it the hard way.
A big problem with dictatorships, or things approaching them, is the passing of power. For whatever reason, right now, trump holds the keys. Basically anyone who wants what he wants knows that they can't easily stand against trump, and they can't easily do what he's doing. The idea of the republicans picking up where they left off is a very very valid one, but the question of if that's even going to work is also valid. All the "pretenders" to trumps succession, should he willingly leave office, have so far been unable to replicate even an ounce of his success. A common ploy might just be "Ok republicans are running Vance next but he swears trump will fill a new cabinet position giving him unlimited power", and that is concerning, but ultimately Trump's age is a big guardrail to this whole situation. The man is clearly ancient, and only getting older. If he were in his 40's, or if somehow all of his designs and decisions passed to Vance successfully, yeah it'd be bad. I don't know if that's likely.
Further people seem to, incorrectly, think that every republican who voted for Regan or a Bush is still onboard and always has been. That's just not true. If Arnold and Romney suddenly said "you know what fuck this" and started a new party focusing on more traditional republican platforms (namely spending) it wouldn't likely win, but it'd likely split the vote enough. That's waaaaaaaaaay more complicated of course than that little blurb conveys, but again, it's a possibility (or something akin to it.).
It's important to remember that the largest voter block in the united states is the NON VOTER. Assuming they are happy, or say, willing to watch the country burn is a dangerous assumption.
I think every single one of us has thought, "Well, it's not that bad because ____ hasn't happened yet." But we tend to minimize the other warning signs when we do it. I think it comes from the same inherent hope that tells us we still have time to do something about climate change. We can hold on to the fact that we haven't hit the scary threshold yet, but every sign shows us cruising to that destination with no indication of us stopping or slowing down. At some point you gotta say we're most of the way there. That's what I appreciate about this article. It's a reminder to the “well it’s not affecting me yet” crowd that many of the bad things are already happening and it doesn't look like we're changing direction any time soon.
I have quite the opposite take on articles like this. It's crying wolf and hyperbolic and wasting time and attention that will be important should things hit critical thresholds. I 100% agree we need to do things, and that includes raising awareness, but to the average headline reader this comes off as "fuck it, it's too late, game over, we're in hell now, anyways good night see you all in the morning just like yesterday", and it's just such a terrible decision.
The most powerful force in Trump's success in my eyes is the utter incompetence in those who claim to be resisting him (and honestly are more likely just trying to benefit in a different way). I am one of the first to ignore conspiracies but dear god Trump could not wish for a more perfect opponent than one that started screaming about impeachment the moment the results were out in 2016 while trying to juggle the multitude of issues the democratic party refuses to address in any meaningful manner.
They have been sounding the alarm so much for so long most people don't even notice or care when he DOES cross a meaningful threshold. When you can easily point to "well no, what happened there wasn't what they said.." over and over and over and over you lose all credibility. To be clear we're discussing this man in the same breath as Hitler, and your solution was "uhh guess we'll run biden again because there's too much infighting to do otherwise" all while pretending that wasn't a terrible idea and directly against what he implied and what people wanted? At what point is your incompetence just as dangerous as your enemy?
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Comment on Should C be mandatory learning for career developers? in ~comp
Eji1700 Link ParentOne of the biggest things is more raw power and memory. That’s not to say that a webpage should have 8 gigs of JS framework under it, but you’re insane if you spend weeks optimizing for an extra...I suppose I'm not sure how computers have really changed since the 1970s
One of the biggest things is more raw power and memory. That’s not to say that a webpage should have 8 gigs of JS framework under it, but you’re insane if you spend weeks optimizing for an extra 1K.
Styles like functional programming are becoming popular again because “fuck it it’s all immutable, clone it if you need to “ isn’t a death sentence of an overhead but a rounding error in performance instead.
Further styles like that let the compiler do the heavy lifting. If I stay in proper F# code practice, 90% of the time if my code compiles IT RUNS. I cannot tell you how happy I am to almost never deal with runtime bugs anymore because through proper typing and testing a single change in my code will instantly highlight every other area I need to adjust to fix it.
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Comment on Should C be mandatory learning for career developers? in ~comp
Eji1700 Link ParentMy issue with the end of this line of logic is that it strikes me as humorous that the line always ends at C. Why not assembly? Why is C the abstraction we decide is the reasonable line between...My issue with the end of this line of logic is that it strikes me as humorous that the line always ends at C.
Why not assembly?
Why is C the abstraction we decide is the reasonable line between understanding and “too tedious”.
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Comment on America tips into fascism in ~society
Eji1700 LinkAnd again I’m stuck with “just because I think this has all illegal and awful doesn’t mean I think we’re in fascism yet” but it gets old getting yelled at for trying to find nuance. Off the cliff...And again I’m stuck with “just because I think this has all illegal and awful doesn’t mean I think we’re in fascism yet” but it gets old getting yelled at for trying to find nuance.
Off the cliff will, in my eyes, likely be determined around the midterms. If somehow the democrats just magically won every race and used those victories to enact sweeping change, it would be hard for me to say that the US fell into any meaningful definition of fascism for just 2 years before an election corrected.
That is, to be clear, not a remotely likely outcome, but also one that’s just not on the table in a fascist government. There’s lots of in between outcomes that course correct still.
There’s also outcomes where trump has the military murder anyone who doesn’t kiss the ring tomorrow and we fall faster.
There’s outcomes where the whole country rips itself apart in violent civil war and neither point matters.
There’s outcomes where trump has a heart attack and we fall even harder OR the entire house of cards he’s built falls apart due to in fighting.
And there’s what I see as the most likely outcome which is that between the “well it’s not affecting me yet” attitudes, the gerrymandering, possible legit election rigging, and the ever reliant incompetence of the Democrat machine the mid terms happen, things don’t get better but don’t get drastically worse, and we stay in this state of decay until the next election.
There’s also lots of outcomes where we wind up in corporate oligarchy or some other not great but not really meaningfully fascist government.
So in short, Trump playing at dictator while the republicans allow it and the dems send thoughts and prayers sure as shit is bad, and very real people are being wronged, harmed, and killed by it, but when your point in favor of a fascist takeover includes deployments of the local national guard mostly derping around and wasting taxpayer money and doing precious little else…it feels kinda disrespectful to the people who have or are living in the kind of fascism where posting this article would have led to the imprisonment or death of themselves and their families.
Further, frankly, it makes me question what people actually plan to do to fight what they perceive as the literal worst case scenario occurring. I’ve heard a lot of talk and read a lot of articles but seems like a lot of people are sleeping good enough at the end of the night after decrying the downfall of democracy.
It would be denying reality to say we aren’t sprinting there, but god I find these semantic arguments with lists of infringements so damn tiring. The people I know with family that lived through the kind of things you’re comparing to watched people die in droves, lived in constant fear due to the threat of imminent death, and knew people who died fighting to prevent it.
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Comment on Should C be mandatory learning for career developers? in ~comp
Eji1700 Link ParentI think it's mattered a lot less in the last decade or so, and is almost detrimental for some. I've seen a lot of dev's go all in on either: A. I want to manage every bit of memory for what should...I think it's mattered a lot less in the last decade or so, and is almost detrimental for some. I've seen a lot of dev's go all in on either:
A. I want to manage every bit of memory for what should be a 5 second CRUD application
or
B. I want to build an enterprise monolith solely in base javascript.From my point of view, in magical fairy land, we wouldn't need to ever manage memory. It would always work itself out, never expose us to vulnerabilities, and be as performant as physically possible.
We don't actually live in that world, but if you're doing small projects/apps, you kinda can by just using any of the very good and shockingly performant GC languages out there. I live in F# and have yet to run into a performance issue that wasn't something that couldn't just be fixed in F# by writing better code, not even working around the memory guardrails.
A friend of mine worked in the kind of environment that NEEDED to care about shaving milliseconds, and so yeah it was relevant to him, but honestly I've found more people misapply knowledge of memory management more than they've found it useful. Spending time diving into unsafe code because they don't understand that the issue isn't "this stupid language" but their own code did something poor (list instead of an array or something like that).
In all honestly to me the way we teach coding (at uni/college) these days seems massively behind the times and an artifact of back when you NEEDED to understand this stuff because there weren't other options. The future is a lot closer to Scratch than it is to Assembly for 99% of the world.
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Comment on Should C be mandatory learning for career developers? in ~comp
Eji1700 Link ParentIt's absurdly easy when actually put in practical terms instead of abstracted ones that are often used to teach it. I was looking for lambda calculus (and by extension functional programming/being...It's absurdly easy when actually put in practical terms instead of abstracted ones that are often used to teach it. I was looking for lambda calculus (and by extension functional programming/being able to pass functions) without knowing it for the start of my career.
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Comment on Which directors have a flawless filmography? in ~movies
Eji1700 Link ParentI'm not going to bother to watch the movie again, but I can recall being annoyed at multiple scenes where it felt like she was telling the experts what to do, and was, of course, the one who was...I'm not going to bother to watch the movie again, but I can recall being annoyed at multiple scenes where it felt like she was telling the experts what to do, and was, of course, the one who was right.
The main one that jumps out in my mind is her taking off her helmet, as is standard trope in just about every alien movie, but there were so many others.
So in short I don't care about the language thing, but Whittaker is played off as borderline psychopathic and incompetent, and he's hardly the only one.
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Comment on SpaceX's Starship completes successful test flight after a year of mishaps in ~space
Eji1700 Link ParentThat's fine, but physics says it's not happening.That's fine, but physics says it's not happening.
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Comment on A mysterious rose survived weeks under water after Hurricane Katrina. Its origins are still unknown but fans are planting it across the US. in ~enviro
Eji1700 LinkMy gut reaction is "ok that's nice but is it a good idea?". The plants that can live no matter what often out compete the local ones and then you wind up with situations like bamboo or tumble...My gut reaction is "ok that's nice but is it a good idea?".
The plants that can live no matter what often out compete the local ones and then you wind up with situations like bamboo or tumble weeds.
Given this is some kind of rose i doubt it'll be anywhere near as bad, and I'm assuming the kind of people who care about this stuff have already looked into it, but hopefully it's not damaging.
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Comment on Letting younger children access Fortnite - Looking for opinions in ~games
Eji1700 LinkI do not have kids, have played basically 0 fortnight, and as such have tried writing this a few times. I think the summary of my thoughts is that 8 seems extremely young to be playing fortnight...I do not have kids, have played basically 0 fortnight, and as such have tried writing this a few times.
I think the summary of my thoughts is that 8 seems extremely young to be playing fortnight and that’s as someone who credits Dota in high school as being a portion of my success in life in what it taught me. It’s an awfully commercialized game with a lot of ugly community aspects in and around it.
It’s hard to compare though because its not like such games even existed when I was 8.
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Comment on Which directors have a flawless filmography? in ~movies
Eji1700 Link ParentI’ll be the contrarian and say that arrival is heavily overrated and merely ok. It’s got some great ideas wrapped around a painful “everyone but the protagonist is dumb and bad” trope. I think...I’ll be the contrarian and say that arrival is heavily overrated and merely ok. It’s got some great ideas wrapped around a painful “everyone but the protagonist is dumb and bad” trope.
I think it’s one of his worst (but still better than many films)
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Comment on Adventures in state space in ~comp
Eji1700 LinkI don’t have much to add other than I love this persons work. The discussion is approachable and the visualizations so satisfying. I always love content like thisI don’t have much to add other than I love this persons work. The discussion is approachable and the visualizations so satisfying. I always love content like this
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Comment on McDonald’s is cutting prices of its combo meals to convince customers it’s affordable again in ~food
Eji1700 Link ParentExcept it is? And often more importantly when doing these low income studies, it's what's actually in the neighborhood? Many of the poor communities don't actually have a wide variety of places to...Income doesn't matter. Its not like McDonalds is cheaper than other places.
Except it is? And often more importantly when doing these low income studies, it's what's actually in the neighborhood? Many of the poor communities don't actually have a wide variety of places to choose from. And as I already talked about in my other comment, cooking at home can be a privileged as well when you're juggling multiple jobs and children/school.
McDonalds should absolutely be making healthier burgers; and there's no reason they can't.
I mean....some of it is because it will cost more? If healthy food were just 1 to 1 cheaper, they'd do it, not even a question. The issue is it's often not (for all sorts of skewed reasons), but also that yes, unhealthy food is what your clients will choose 9/10 times. So raising prices for something that's going to be bought less (and often drive some % of your customers to competition that isn't trying, although that depends ) isn't really helping.
These are very complex problems that almost always harm the ones people claim they're trying to help when first thought approaches are applied.
I don't totally disagree but also find it a little funny you mention PostgreSQL instead of Oracle when that can be considered the database version of teaching C# instead of C (arguably, although looked at another way its a question of capabilities not level of management)