https://medium.com/@amandoabreu/you-dont-understand-your-software-engineers-53442ca0805a
The TLDR of this is that open office formats make distractions and coders really need to concentrate. I can't really disagree, but different people can focus in different ways. I mean, I don't think this article is talking about something universal.
Saturday, March 30, 2019
Wednesday, March 27, 2019
Journalism: History of Tower Defense Games
https://pcdreams.com.sg/history-of-tower-defense-games/
The author mentioned Balloons Tower Defense 6. I hadn't heard of that. I played 5 quite a bit. Also, this was the first I'd heard of gemcraft. I think Rampart is considered the first tower defense game, but I have never heard anything that might dispute that. So, I wonder.
The author mentioned Balloons Tower Defense 6. I hadn't heard of that. I played 5 quite a bit. Also, this was the first I'd heard of gemcraft. I think Rampart is considered the first tower defense game, but I have never heard anything that might dispute that. So, I wonder.
Journalism: Paul Ford: What is Code
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-paul-ford-what-is-code/
This was something I had started to read when it was first published, but couldn't find the time to sit and read 38,000 words on my phone.
The author makes a good show of coding and how it works. I'm a bit less convinced than he is that coding is running everything. These breaths are still human.
Anyway, the best example is about how 60 frames a second for movies works. It is a bunch of still pictures but we think it is moving. Lots of computation, done with or through code, works in a similar way. Lots of computation makes things look fluid.
Anyway, here are some good quotes:
Look at the new reality we’ve defined, the way that difficult things are now easy and drab things can be colorful.I hope they define my reality with plenty of colors
“Ecosystem” is another debased word, especially given what we keep doing to the real, physical one around us. But if a few hundred thousand people are raising their kids and making things for 100 million people, that’s what they call it.Things are based on elitism.
Bugs aren’t the original sin of programming. They’re just part of life, like unwanted body hair or political campaigns.I am a human bug. I am also hairy. Think of that what you may.
What the coders aren’t seeing, you have come to believe, is that the staid enterprise world that they fear isn’t the consequence of dead-eyed apathy but rather détente.I hope coders have seen the power.
Tuesday, March 26, 2019
JOURNALISM: The best $5,929.10 I ever spent: moving back to the Midwest
https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/3/26/18255131/moving-midwest-cedar-rapids
Seattle sucks so the author moved to Cedar Rapids. The general mills plant smells good on a good day, but every time i've smelt it it was a steamy rotten bowl of dogfood. Its been a long time. Things may have changed.
I just wonder how the racial diversity of Seattle compares to Cedar Rapids. I wonder if the author has been in CR when it floods.
If I was moving somewhere for 15 years I would buy my own appliances.
Will this still work, the whole move to a small city with a freelancers income, when AI does all the writing?
Where are the downsides? Is this a marketing ploy for a city that I remember having no sidewalks? Who named it the Creative Belt? What a boring name for a supposedly creative place.
I dunno, I bet this author is cool, I'd drink coffee with them or even in the same cafe but not with them. But I wonder.
Seattle sucks so the author moved to Cedar Rapids. The general mills plant smells good on a good day, but every time i've smelt it it was a steamy rotten bowl of dogfood. Its been a long time. Things may have changed.
I just wonder how the racial diversity of Seattle compares to Cedar Rapids. I wonder if the author has been in CR when it floods.
If I was moving somewhere for 15 years I would buy my own appliances.
Will this still work, the whole move to a small city with a freelancers income, when AI does all the writing?
Where are the downsides? Is this a marketing ploy for a city that I remember having no sidewalks? Who named it the Creative Belt? What a boring name for a supposedly creative place.
I dunno, I bet this author is cool, I'd drink coffee with them or even in the same cafe but not with them. But I wonder.
BOOK: The Code Book by Simon Singh
This book explains ciphers, crypt-analysis, and the developments of them throughout history. He does a good job of personifying the various stages of development of codes and codebreaking.
I learned things. The concept of the computer was created by a gay man. One German cryptographer was harrassed for almost 30 years, from 1943 when he left Nazi Germany until well after WW2. Advanced computers probably already exist, but they aren't being used to advance medical research. The explanation of quantum computing was very clear, and I have a much greater understanding of quantum physics now.
The narrative was well done. I just can't imagine things being as tidy as the author makes them out to be. There isn't a lot of hedging, like, what if what we understand the actions of certain historical figures to be, what if it is wrong. There's no mention of patriarchy, white supremacy, racism, or some other potent totems in society. Maybe they just weren't in the scope of the book. But I find that hard to believe. The author seems talented enough to tie in almost any topic. Clearly he cares about privacy and government oppression, which he covers extensively near the end of the book. But, it seems to be a narrow concern, perhaps even a bit bourgeois.
All in all a solid read, interesting stories, clear explanation, unique information, and not too much of a shit head. I also read this quite quickly, and it was rather digestible.
Thanks Mr. Singh.
I learned things. The concept of the computer was created by a gay man. One German cryptographer was harrassed for almost 30 years, from 1943 when he left Nazi Germany until well after WW2. Advanced computers probably already exist, but they aren't being used to advance medical research. The explanation of quantum computing was very clear, and I have a much greater understanding of quantum physics now.
The narrative was well done. I just can't imagine things being as tidy as the author makes them out to be. There isn't a lot of hedging, like, what if what we understand the actions of certain historical figures to be, what if it is wrong. There's no mention of patriarchy, white supremacy, racism, or some other potent totems in society. Maybe they just weren't in the scope of the book. But I find that hard to believe. The author seems talented enough to tie in almost any topic. Clearly he cares about privacy and government oppression, which he covers extensively near the end of the book. But, it seems to be a narrow concern, perhaps even a bit bourgeois.
All in all a solid read, interesting stories, clear explanation, unique information, and not too much of a shit head. I also read this quite quickly, and it was rather digestible.
Thanks Mr. Singh.
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