Blue Screen of Death Lives On!

Think typing on your phone is hard?

I dont know about you but the thought of communicating via a text message makes me cringe. For me to eek out a short "Will you pick up some milk?" takes what seems like an eternity. Robert Bernocco, Italian IT Professional, type an entire 384 page novel. Which by the way would take me an eternity to type on my laptop let alone a cell phone.

Read the full story here.

King of Kong

Coming out August 17th King of Kong documents the struggle of Steve Wiebe the middle school science teacher as he tries to become the world's greatest Donkey Kong player. The only thing that stands in his path is Billy Mitchell the current record holder and Video Game Player of the Century. Check out the preview:



I will be waiting in line to catch this epic David vs Goliath donkey showdown!

Thanks to Matt for this find!

What be yer pirate name ... Arrrr

My pirate name is:

Bloody Sam Flint

Every pirate lives for something different. For some, it's the open sea. For others (the masochists), it's the food. For you, it's definitely the fighting. Like the rock flint, you're hard and sharp. But, also like flint, you're easily chipped, and sparky. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

Plane lands on highway ... it happens all the time

Eat muffins everyday ... or else

The Wii as Exercise equipment?

Skynet bad

After watching the documnetaries Terminator, Terminator 2 and Terminator 3 I though we had learned from our mistakes and not involved AI in warfare. The good news is that instead of calling it Skynet they call it Deep Green. So besides thinking that maybe we shouldnt do this I wonder what is Deep Green's position on tic tac toe?

iPhone is blended

The iPhone its everything

Sorry Earth

A fully operational death star

When you dont have the funds or storm troopers to build the real thing go for the Lego scale model. Well then again that assumes you have lots of free time .... I still want one!

Math Important for CS Majors?

Karl Fant, CEO of Theseus Research, has written a book that seeks to show that knowledge of math is not important to understanding computer science. Yikes! Many colleges have already started offering a water downed version of Computer Science (CS) called Computer Information Science (CIS) that takes it easy on the math and science and favors learning the syntax of today's popular languages. The idea is that for a wide range of business applications you dont really need an in depth knowledge of math, algorithms, compiler design, etc. That for the most part you need to know just enough VB to fake it. Is there some truth to that? Yes.

Many useful applications require little understanding of how the computer works. I was contracted to write an application that would calculate the insurance premium for a house. It was very simple. The user would enter some characteristics about the house, the program would run a calculation (the calculation was provided by the insurance company) and then it would spit out an answer. The application required no understanding of math or computer science. Or did it?

The application used a small amount of RAM, was it by accident? Knowledge of math helps to understand how much RAM each variable will take up and what the overall program foot print will be. Is that not important? Knowing a little math is crucial to efficiency. In part of the application I need to sort a list of data, the list contains about a 100000 data points. This list will grow over time as the company does more and more business. Can a sort be written without a good understanding of math, sure. Here is perhaps the simplest example of a sort

procedure bubbleSort( A : list of sortable items ) defined as:
for each i in 1 to length(A) do:
   for each j in length(A) downto i + 1 do:
     if A[ j ] <>then
       swap( A[ j ],  A[ j - 1 ] )
     end if
   end for
end for
end procedure

The worst case time for this to execute is O(n^2), meaning worst case this could take n^2 iterations. Thats bad. On the other hand one of the fastest sort algorithms executes in O(n * log n) worst case. This is incredible faster. To illustrate the difference lets say that is takes the computer 1/100 of a second to perform on cycle. In the case of the bubble sort then we would first calculate the number of cycles: 100,000^2 = 10,000,000,000. Divide that by 100 to get seconds: 100,000,000. Then lets divide that by 3600 (the number of seconds in a hour): 27,778. So the bubble sort would take 27, 778 hours, yikes! What does this look like for the faster routine of O( n * log n). Well lets do the log firs: log 100,000 = 5 (its going to be a long day for the bubble sort). So multiply it by n and the divide by 100 for seconds: (100,000 * 5 ) / 100 = 5,000. So to get the answer in hours divide by 3600: 5,000/3,600 = 1.39 hours.

Do you thinks it more reasonable for a user to wait 1.39 hours or 27,778 hours (which is over three years)? So what is my point? You can get away without understanding the math, but there is a price to pay. Industry does seem to be leaning in the direction of CIS majors who can code but lack real analytical skills, they are banking on the ever increase in computing power. The theory is that with a powerful enough computer it doesn't matter how inefficient the code is. Remember that the next time your using an application that seems to frequently crash. The next time you surf a web page that takes minutes to display.

There is in IDE for C++ called Code Warrior, certainly appeals to us geeky coder types. I think the metaphor has taking on a new meaning. We seem to view coding staff as grunts in an army. Most IT firms try to get as many grunts on the battlefield as possible, thats how you win a war right? Gather up some warm bodies and had them a rifle ... er ... key board. Interestingly enough there is a real parallel hear. When a well trained army meets an untrained army of greater numbers the well trained army is favored.

My feeling on education for Programmers, and I give this advice to everyone who asks, is that should take as little programming as possible. Take Philosophy (esp logic), Math, Literature, Physics, Chemistry, Military History. Spend your time becoming a good analyst, some one who can take a problem a part. Learning a programming language is by far the easiest part of a good education in Computer Science. You will find that writing code is the easiest part of being a programmer. The hard part is understanding and solving the right problem. The questions is do you want to be a Code Warrior or a Code Ninja?

Did someone say Calamari

Apparently Calamari sales are up since the ad ran

It's been a busy time for CEO Keith Cox and his crew at Pacific Catch. For thelast few weeks, the restaurant has been featured in ads for Apple's new iPhone as a place to go if you're jonesing for for calamari.Turns out, Cox says, that calamari was only an occasional special at the Corte Madera branch (133 Town Center). When the calls -- up to 100 a day -- started coming in, executive chef Aaron Noveshen quickly put it on the menu.

Good way to keep in shape?

MyKind of Storm Trooper