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d3vvnull | 15 years ago | on: Is The Times making you stupid?

I've actually been reading more books since I started using the Web. There is no doubt in my mind that reading web content engages different kinds of reading skills and requires different kinds of reading discipline. Because so much information is hyper-linked in the web it is easy to get off the main thread of a subject and find yourself reading about a topic that had very little to do with the topic of origin. And that's where the special discipline comes into play, keeping the mind on track and knowing how deep you need to pursue links that will help you more completely grasp the original topic. In some printed non-fiction texts, footnotes allow you a similar ability to do this, though these are more often citations than clarifications. We don't need as much discipline to keep ourselves to the book, because the book itself doesn't offer the same convenient ability to hyperlink to the text referenced in the footnote that a web page does. In the world of books, we are forced to enrich our understanding of our text by following up with other books.

This does mean that it can be much easier to do research on the web, because of the immediacy of hyperlinks. However unless you are a careful reader, you may not actually do research. Casual reading of web content without the discipline amounts to just surfing. But surfing is not always bad, you might surf for a while and then find yourself doing research when you encounter a topic compelling enough to read more carefully.

d3vvnull | 16 years ago | on: Study: Coffee unrelated to alertness, Stimulating effects may be illusion

It may also be that it's not just the coffee for some of us. I have a whole ritual early in the morning around making my coffee. I grind the beans, put on the water to boil. And I brew the coffee in my French press. After I've had a couple of cups of coffee at the beginning of the day, I feel really good and ready to start my day. The expectation and enjoyment of that cup of coffee should be factored in.

d3vvnull | 16 years ago | on: We need a new word for "Open"

Like any other word or phrase, 'open' or 'open API' is going to have a meaning based on the context in which it is used. Open has a certain marketing cachet that generally says anyone can use it and they can use it just about everywhere (usually for free or at nominal cost). To give it meaning, you must further qualify it by what it does. That gives it context. Without context it's just hype.

d3vvnull | 16 years ago | on: Daniel Lyons: Obama right, devices like the iPad are rotting our brains

Or it could be that he just does not see how these new devices, which are today geared only to entertainment, could some day be used to further empower us. Perhaps, in the future we might see the iPad or other devices like it, be used in schools for delivering instructional, interactive content. They might serve as rich clipboards for carrying and streaming medical information in a hospital or other medical centers. As for Facebook and Twitter, while they are still mostly used for entertainment, they have also been useful for pushing up-to-minute status of things going on in places of political unrest or from the hospital rooms. When I was at the hospital with my daughter after her surgery, I used Facebook to provide continual updates to my friends and family about her condition.

So maybe Obama's comments simply lack imagination of how these devices could be more useful in the future. And I believe it's also true that some of the most significant technological innovations start out as toys.

d3vvnull | 16 years ago | on: Obama bemoans 'diversions' of IPod, Xbox era

A blackberry isn't a toy. I have at least three of the items mentioned on the list (which are toys), and I use none of them for actual productive work. Though I do have a telnet terminal app on the iPod. Still all of the devices he mentions were not designed for productive enterprises, but for diversions. And diversions have a way of being big time wasters if you're not balanced. Not today Halo 3!

d3vvnull | 16 years ago | on: What Makes Us Happy?

I think this study is skewed simply by the fact that these people knew they were being observed and that what happened in their lives mattered to enough to be studied. How much does that weigh into one's happiness?

d3vvnull | 16 years ago | on: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

And how hard would it be for those code translators to remove these footprints or even offer the user the option of leaving them out? Doesn't this edict invite code translators to work harder at leaving no trace that the code was generated or translated? The bigger question too is, isn't this just another stupid rule that developers can find a workaround for anyway?

d3vvnull | 16 years ago | on: Top Things That Annoy Programmers

In the company I work for they use "direct report" to identify someone who reports directly to a manager or supervisor. But like it or not, "subordinate" is not so much a slam as it is a way to describe one's position in a hierarchical command structure.

d3vvnull | 16 years ago | on: Achievement Porn

Any achievement has scope and context. What one achieves in any activity may or may not transcend that activity. The meaningfulness of the activity itself may not carry beyond the individual or beyond a select group. So I think, ultimately that the achiever has to make the final judgement as whether achieving the goal really matters to the achiever and whether it matters that the achievement is important to others.

Also, treadmills are not entirely useless, even in the metaphorical sense. I may not visibly being going anywhere, but my mind may be active and going through a process of re-wiring and preparation for other challenges.

d3vvnull | 16 years ago | on: Is there any age limit to being a programmer ?

I started to be serious about learning to program at 26. Then, I was in an entry-level position where I learned how to write spreadsheet macros on my own, with just the spreadsheet documentation as my guide. I also had a problem I needed to solve so my self-training was directed by what I needed to accomplish. That's often the best way to learn how to program: take a problem you want to solve and develop a solution with whatever tools you have available. When you have completed your first programming task, you will find that you have built foundation for you to tackle your next task, which may be even more complex than the first one you solved. Today there is an overwhelming amount of tools and information available for learning how to program on the Web.

Now I am 46 and have been building applications for almost 20 years and the learning doesn't stop. Even experienced programmers continually learn how to program as they pick up on new techniques, new programming languages, and new best practices. Good luck with your efforts.

d3vvnull | 17 years ago | on: "Programmers seem to get off on complexity and detail..."

The English language is in a period of never-ending flux, so neologisms and compression are acts of making the language more efficient and accessible for any group. It's all about who the target audience is, what you want to communicate, and what will be the most adequate way to communicate with that audience.
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