I get annoyed by tools like those featured here putting the language they are written in front and center like it's a defining feature about the application. The only thing that should matter (specifically with a compiled binary distributed program) is what it does and how well it does it.
Readit Newsnpmaile commented on Terminal Trove – A collection of CLIs, TUIs and all things in the terminal terminaltrove.com/... · Posted by u/diazc
npmaile commented on Mercedes beats Tesla to autonomous driving in California theregister.com/2023/06/0... · Posted by u/belter
What do we want from self driving cars?
Naturally I wand a car I can summon from the pub that will drive me the 20km, over country roads, to my house while I mix cocktails or have a nap.
That may never happen, current technology does not seem up to it.
Then what? Modern cruise control, that keeps my car a constant distance form the car in front (unless it roars off at a speed higher that what I am comfortable with) is great. Helpful, especially in city driving.
I would appreciate "automated rumble strips" that warns me gently if I veer out of my lane.
Stopping at a parking spot, push a button, and park my car for me, less useful but still worth it.
But unless I have L5, and can turn my back on the road as I drink my vodka drink, (would that be L6? The impossible dream....) I am not interested in anything that lets me take my hands off the when whilst driving on any road. It seems too dangerous.
As a computer programmer I make my living building complex machines, and I have a very deep distrust of machines built by my comrades, at Tesla or Mercedes.
My 2019 bmw has the automated ruble strips thing, which is pretty nice for long drives.
npmaile commented on Speak English to me: The secret world of programmers github.com/npmaile/blog/b... · Posted by u/npmaile
> "First off," I reply, "No. And second off,
This is a super condescending thing to say. Let's say you're a lawyer telling a client why you can't do something. The language you're using is pretty harsh.
> Maybe I just need to have a little more empathy (or is it sympathy?) for normal people.
You are also a "normal person" I don't understand why developers sometimes think they are gods or something.
> Can you help with my printer. No
No explanation on this one at all? That, again, is a rude response.
I've been saying this for a while, but the pay we provide to developers was a mistake. It has created a class of people that think they are gods. Come down from your soap box, learn real empathy, decide you are a Normal Person yourself and get rid of your condescending attitude.
This was literally my whole point.
If you think my attitude is condescending in the scenarios presented, then you properly understood what I was trying to express in the last section.
I didn't want to write it in a way that's specifically attacking the (likely technical) reader, so I put the focus on "me"
npmaile commented on Speak English to me: The secret world of programmers github.com/npmaile/blog/b... · Posted by u/npmaile
I want to point out two additional observations.
1. There are a decent amount of software engineers or programmers whom literally aged at the perfect time to organically learn these tools that later became fundamental. If you even touched a computer from the 60s to the late nineties in a engineering aspect at all, you were bound to have worked in a terminal, worked on computers with a single core, worked on computers with very little memory, had to either get comfortable with some lower level tooling or build your own, at some point had to mess with networking or at least understand how packets were being sent and received, seen and gone through iterations of version control and saving your work, automated task using shell scripts.
2. While there is a plethora of knowledge, videos, tutorials and flavors of ways to learn these things; the sheer volume and breadth that presents to newcomers is daunting. Yes you can learn Git, but there are so many ways to do it that it can cause analysis to paralysis. Building on point (1) if you learned it early there were only a few ways it was being done or even shared in smaller communities. Too many choices or paths can lead to just using the way someone showed you without digging 1 layer deeper just because you might not know better.
All of those things you ‘caught’ by being at the right place at the right time are a privilege. Please don’t look down on people trying to aspire to learn or want to enter into this field that haven’t got there yet.
Coming from a family of immigrants and being the first person in my family to graduate college + enter SWE. I cannot count how many times other engineers were rude, made condescending remarks or discouraged me by shoving these expectations in my face as failures instead of taking the opportunity to teach (I was always open to learning).
The point I expressed in the conclusion was meant to turn the apparent condescension from the earlier part around on the reader. I'm saying that we should be more mindful of those who don't know what we know.
Ahh, the pro-fractional reserve banking system libertarians. A group that is well known as much as it is not contradictory.
I made this guide to save myself time when I’m helping new people get into software. Feel free to submit a pull request and discuss using the github system if you find something highly objectionable. I do understand that the first one is very divisive, but I’m not sure how else to get people into problem-solving and not being afraid of the terminal.
I mean of course. How much cargo could you get into a small airship?