kogus

I worked with Delphi for several years, and it was the first IDE I used professionally. It was truly brilliant for developing Win32 and WinForms applications. I can honestly say that Delphi 5 was a better tool for building Windows apps than the latest versions Visual Studio, at least in terms of usability, responsiveness, and debugging.

But man are you ever right about the compatibility issues! Upgrading from Delphi 5 to the (then current) Delphi 2005 was a total nightmare. Our codebase was about 600k lines, and I will never forget the trauma of trying to get it to just build in the newer version.

The comparison with .NET codebases that "just work" from version to version is night and day, and sadly it's worth putting up with a laggy beast of an IDE to have that security around your projects.

I just checked and sure enough, the clickable Goooooooooogle is still there at the bottom of search results, with ten clickable "o"s.

When I see articles like this, I have this bet between Jeff Atwood and John Carmack in the back of my mind:

https://blog.codinghorror.com/the-2030-self-driving-car-bet/

Any time I come across Fodor guides, I think of the old Carmen Sandiego games. They used to include a Fodor guide, and the copy protection would be questions like "what is the third word on page 96". They were always enjoyable to read in the same way Guiness World Record books were, to me.

Sounds like he feels UA is not going far enough. The UAT list of "forbidden courses" is pretty tame:

https://web.archive.org/web/20221224074124/https://www.uaust...

I also found this opinion piece to be interesting, if a bit fawning:

https://web.archive.org/web/20221223134933/https://www.washi...

I mean, exponents can be fractions. Maybe it's x^1.2 faster? I think it is funny when advertisements claim that something is "a fraction of the price". You could literally raise prices and run such an ad, and be technically correct. 3/2 is a fraction, after all.

Reminds me of the classic "how to write unmaintainable code": https://cs.fit.edu/~kgallagher/Schtick/How%20To%20Write%20Un...

Especially this bit:

    Bedazzling Names
    Choose variable names with irrelevant emotional connotation. e.g.:

    marypoppins = (superman + starship) / god; 

    This confuses the reader because they have difficulty disassociating the
    emotional connotations of the words from the logic they're trying to think about.

This reminds me of my own wacky idea for a line of fitness products: ordinary everyday items that are normal in every way except that they are intentionally designed to be physically challenging to use.

For example, doors that require a lot of force to open, keyboards with 1lb resistance springs, remote controls that weigh several kilograms, etc. Since many people have trouble going to the gym, it would be a way to introduce weight training in a way that was both unobtrusive and unavoidable.

Just one of those things that has been bouncing around in my head for years now. I think riding this bike would definitely qualify as weight training :)

I think it's important to distinguish between government censorship and corporate self-censorship. Almost nothing should be censored by the government. Almost anything can be censored by private parties (however cowardly such censorship may often be).

My first experience programming was with a LOGO turtle in third grade. I remember the lab full of Apple IIs, and the joy of PEN DOWN, UP 10, PEN UP style commands.

Absolute idleness is both harder and more rewarding than it seems.

This is timely- I happen to be reading Tai-Pan by James Clavell at the moment, which is a wonderful bit of historical fiction set at this time.

If you are serious about writing code for non-profits, you might be interested in places like Zuri Group (https://zurigroup.com/) or BrightVine (https://www.brightvinesolutions.com/). I am in that space as an independent consultant, and it can be really rewarding.

TL;DR: We have no idea if they were real, and if they were what caused them, and it's ok to be unsure and inconclusive sometimes.

I have a lot of problems with this article.

Point 1: The industry is consolidating and might be price fixing.

The author makes a leap from "ships got bigger" to "the industry consolidated" without establishing a real link. Are large ships the reason for consolidation? I think a more likely reason is one that the author herself mentions; the economic downturn of 2008 diminished demand and the survivors consolidated. Maybe that gave them extra power, and maybe that power needs to be reined in - but I'm not convinced that ship size was the reason there.

Point 2: Port congestion How many times in the last 100 years has port infrastructure needed an upgrade to accomodate larger and better ships? Surely we can expect a permanent cycle of Advancement is made>>Port cant handle it>>Port upgrades>>Advancement is made. Is that really a problem?

Point 3: Too much capacity

  By continually flooding the market with capacity, ocean carriers drove down
  their own shipping rates.

How is this not a direct contradiction of point 1? Are dominant cartels abusing their power to gouge consumers? Or are desperate cartels selling space cheap just to avoid half-empty ships?

The article also does not mention the advantages of larger ships, which are substantial. Fewer, larger ships represent less total ocean noise pollution, less total fuel consumed, and straightforward efficiencies of scale.

Currently on the iPhone, if your FaceID or TouchID fail repeatedly, you have the option to type in the passcode, which grants the same access. I'm not sure if the same is true on Android.

I think the more general point is that "able to unlock the phone" is not / should not be the same as "I have verified that this is you" for sensitive applications and information.

In addition to the reasons you have listed, it would probably be a big headache to jump through accreditation hurdles, hire staff, find a physical location, and any number of other problems that would distract from the goals he has in mind.

Cleopatra was closer to the moon landings them to the building of the pyramids!

I think we have the first problem now anyway. And I have no problem with a tax code that gives a little friction to profligate consumerism. In any case, I don't think you need to worry about my idea becoming policy any time soon :)

No, I do not. In fact, when it comes to income taxes, I object to the social gamesmanship + privacy invasion more than the actual amount. A solution I prefer would be a federal sales tax, combined with a Universal Basic Income.

The UBI would be equal to the amount of the tax on up to some minimum income level (say, 50k / year). In other words, everyone gets a monthly check that is essentially a rebate on their sales tax up to the income threshold.

That's simple, loophole-free, and avoids the privacy invasion that accurate income tax collections require.

This is the real story, in my opinion. The income tax code in the United States boils down to:

Here is a simple, large amount you owe.

You can reduce it by:

1) changing your behavior in ways we like

and

2) telling us everything about your personal and financial life

It's a disgusting invasion of privacy on a far far larger scale than, say, the PATRIOT act. H&R Block and Intuit are just leeches on the back of the tumor that income tax represents.

I just searched for it, and it appears to be quite active. Walk down memory lane.

If this is interesting to you, then you'll enjoy Raymond Chen's Old New Thing blog.

https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/

Better watch out for Lord Helmet and Spaceball One... (sorry, I couldn't help myself)

I think that's a great question. I have always preferred a good cloth seat to leather. I suppose leather is easier to clean, but I can't think of any other meaningful advantages.

One answer would be a federal sales tax, combined with a Universal Basic Income.

The UBI would be equal to the amount of the tax on up to some minimum income level (say, 50k / year). In other words, everyone gets a monthly check that is essentially a rebate on their sales tax up to the income threshold.

That's simple, loophole-free, and avoids the privacy invasion that accurate income tax collections require.

This is a great trick. It says something about RegEx syntax that matching a simple rule with a relatively clear expression is a major accomplishment.

For those interested in the actual reasons behind the myriad eccentricities of English vocabulary, grammar, and spelling, there is an excellent podcast on that subject called simply "The History of English Podcast" [1].

The short short version is that English began as a Germanic language, which bumped into Greek-influenced Latin at regular intervals. Then the Norman French conquered England in 1066, and ruled it for a few hundred years, which brought in a huge French (and, because French is a Romance language, Latin) influence. Then the UK conquered much of the earth, and absorbed thousands of words from many world cultures. As a result, English today is like a German christmas tree decorated with so many ornaments that you can hardly make sense of it when you see it. That's my summary, the podcast is better :)

https://historyofenglishpodcast.com/

Passed through Washington, NC many times on my way to another dupe, Plymouth, NC. The locals call it “Little Washington”.

  When was the last time you were able to lobby congress to write laws to your liking, or create trade agreements, or author a bill to advantage your financial interests?

That's exactly my point. Corporations have all kinds of power and leverage when negotiating with politicians regarding their tax burden. That's what leads to corruption. Corporations don't even exist as anything other than a legal framework. When you tax a corporation, you are by definition taxing the investors in it. The corporate framework gives those individual investors cover to avoid paying their taxes.

I'm suggesting that you bypass the problem by eliminating corporate taxes, and replacing them with taxes on investors, who individually would not have the leverage to avoid them. As an added bonus, you'd deprive politicians of a powerful tool that they are demonstrably incapable of wielding fairly and effectively.