Moores Law is being wasted...
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Marc Clifton wrote: Instead of teaching kids real, useful, knowledge, they teach kids what they need to learn so they can pass the test. And then when they don't pass, they either make the tests easier so they can pass, or they say "the kids aren't learning enough, so that means we need to make the tests harder.", but they never see the real reason why they aren't passing to begin with. Marc Clifton wrote: I forgot his name now, but I could dig it up if I have to. No need - I already read about that a while back.
**"To know what is right and not do it is the worst cowardice." -- Confucius
jdunlap wrote: No need - I already read about that a while back. I'm impressed. Do you realize that when I gave a presentation to a group of parents on the roots of our educational system, none of them had any idea how it all came about? It's wierd to me, that people have kids but they don't spend any time understanding what that really means--to bring a child into the world and raise them. Here we are talking about innovation and technology and our parental skills hark back to the stone ages (with a few exceptions here and there). And that's another thing I don't understand. Why do people sit in front of the TV watching some stupid sitcom instead of learning about something or doing something creative? I mean, sure, once in a while we all need to veg, but to make watching the next Seinfeld episode (yes, I know the series is no more) the climax of the week is just beyond the absurd to me. What a world we live in. Marc Latest AAL Article My blog Join my forum!
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Yeah, I read that article too and had exactly the same thought. It blows my mind that I have to "interact" with my computer using an archaic keyboard from the 19th century and a pointing device that hasn't changed since it was invented in the 60's. But before I start ranting myself, let me just say this--I've thought long and hard about the same issue. The conclusion that I came to, is that if I want to work on something cool, something that really speaks to me and comes from the heart, then I pretty much have to create it myself. So, that solved the "what do I want to do" question. As to the other points you bring up, I've found, sadly, that true innovation is not something that happens very often. It's accomplished by one person, or a very small group of people. These people usually are very intelligent and break all sorts of accepted rules. Looking at the history of software development and ignoring the breakthroughs regarding hardware development, I don't think anything innovative has been done for at least the last 20 years. Real innovation is way overdue in the software industry. Unfortunately, the setting that creates innovation is being severely hampered by "The Microsoft Way", a glut of useless information that people seem to find necessary to manage rather than shitcan, and a growing myopic "solve the problem for the short-term, biggest bang for the buck" attitude, and our educational system is completely incapable of figuring out how to engendre creativity in our children and the ability to transform them into independent thinkers as adults. All of this means that, from my perspective, all those wonderful things that you wish for won't happen for a very long time. Hmmm. Did I say something about not ranting? Marc Latest AAL Article My blog Join my forum!
Good post Marc. Innovation is truely becoming rare. Regardz Colin J Davies
*** WARNING *
This could be addictive
**The minion's version of "Catch :bob: "It's a real shame that people as stupid as you can work out how to use a computer. said by Christian Graus in the Soapbox
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jdunlap wrote: No need - I already read about that a while back. I'm impressed. Do you realize that when I gave a presentation to a group of parents on the roots of our educational system, none of them had any idea how it all came about? It's wierd to me, that people have kids but they don't spend any time understanding what that really means--to bring a child into the world and raise them. Here we are talking about innovation and technology and our parental skills hark back to the stone ages (with a few exceptions here and there). And that's another thing I don't understand. Why do people sit in front of the TV watching some stupid sitcom instead of learning about something or doing something creative? I mean, sure, once in a while we all need to veg, but to make watching the next Seinfeld episode (yes, I know the series is no more) the climax of the week is just beyond the absurd to me. What a world we live in. Marc Latest AAL Article My blog Join my forum!
Marc Clifton wrote: Do you realize that when I gave a presentation to a group of parents on the roots of our educational system, none of them had any idea how it all came about? 'Tis a sad shame. :( Marc Clifton wrote: It's wierd to me, that people have kids but they don't spend any time understanding what that really means--to bring a child into the world and raise them. I don't think the majority of people today take their children or their responsibility to their children seriously enough. They don't spend the time and effort that's necessary to do a good job. Marc Clifton wrote: And that's another thing I don't understand. Why do people sit in front of the TV watching some stupid sitcom instead of learning about something or doing something creative? It's a whole "consumer" mentality - the same thing that's behind the "biggest-bang-for-the-buck" mentality.
**"It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible." -- George Washington
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It looks like Moores Lay of computer speed is going to hold for at least a few more years. (NOTE: I just read Intel's press release at http://www.intel.com/pressroom/archive/releases/20031105tech.htm[^].) Maybe I'm crazy, but at least from my point of view it looks like we're wasting all of the performance gains from computer advancement. The current "breakthroughs" (.NET, JAVA, XML, etc) (and I use that term loosely) in the software development world are not about using new performance to create new capabilities, tools, etc, but is largely being used to "enhance" developer productivity. I realize that there is a benefit to this, but where are the "breakthrough" applications for users. Where are the novel new uses for the performance (ie. voice recognition, etc)? Since Windows 2000 (doesn't seem that long ago does it?), what real advancement has been made in the OS to take advantage of the added performance? I suspect that due to the underlying code in Windows, it isn't really possible to leverage much of the performance in a safe/reliable way...Besides, what can a keyboard driver do with a 10GHZ processor it can't do with a 120mhz processor? <rant> .NET and the advancements in JAVA have made the development of certain types of software somewhat easier, but in my opinion have not really made the end-product more powerful. Sure, ASP.NET is better than ASP, but is a let down from ISAPI and C++. I guess from a business perspective, hardware is cheap and developers are expensive, so in that sense, the power is not wasted. But give me a break, I want voice recognition, touch screens, biometrics, truly context-sensitive (me being the context) help and search, true wireless (I love my laptop, but want to get rid of the power cord.) I want it all, and at least from a performance perspective it seems within our grasps. But all I ever hear about any more is how much more productive I can be. I DON'T WANT SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT TO BE MORE PRODUCTIVE! DAMN IT! I want to work with some cool technology (I will kill the first person who refers to .NET as cool). I want to search for "The Matrix" on the internet and have the search engine display a page with movie information, times in my area, reviews, buy tickets, reserve seats, etc. I do not want a list of more web pages. I want some math-head to enter the
The breakthrough development tools are necessary to accomplish what you are envisioning. Would you rather have programmers spend time tracing memory leaks or create the next big thing. We could all still be programming assembly, which would lead to faster programs, but I doubt that we would even have half of the features of the software we use currently, if that were the case. I am working on a cool software, which will take advantage of Moore's law, but it's only possible because the development effort is less onerous with the new development tools. Satisfy the developer before the user. Managed code is an enabler because it makes code easier to write, and cuts out all the low-level management of detail that hinders creativity and progress. ---------------------------- Wesner Moise http://wesnerm.blogs.com
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The breakthrough development tools are necessary to accomplish what you are envisioning. Would you rather have programmers spend time tracing memory leaks or create the next big thing. We could all still be programming assembly, which would lead to faster programs, but I doubt that we would even have half of the features of the software we use currently, if that were the case. I am working on a cool software, which will take advantage of Moore's law, but it's only possible because the development effort is less onerous with the new development tools. Satisfy the developer before the user. Managed code is an enabler because it makes code easier to write, and cuts out all the low-level management of detail that hinders creativity and progress. ---------------------------- Wesner Moise http://wesnerm.blogs.com
Well said! :-D
**"Worry not that no one knows of you; seek to be worth knowing." -- Confucius
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Yeah, I read that article too and had exactly the same thought. It blows my mind that I have to "interact" with my computer using an archaic keyboard from the 19th century and a pointing device that hasn't changed since it was invented in the 60's. But before I start ranting myself, let me just say this--I've thought long and hard about the same issue. The conclusion that I came to, is that if I want to work on something cool, something that really speaks to me and comes from the heart, then I pretty much have to create it myself. So, that solved the "what do I want to do" question. As to the other points you bring up, I've found, sadly, that true innovation is not something that happens very often. It's accomplished by one person, or a very small group of people. These people usually are very intelligent and break all sorts of accepted rules. Looking at the history of software development and ignoring the breakthroughs regarding hardware development, I don't think anything innovative has been done for at least the last 20 years. Real innovation is way overdue in the software industry. Unfortunately, the setting that creates innovation is being severely hampered by "The Microsoft Way", a glut of useless information that people seem to find necessary to manage rather than shitcan, and a growing myopic "solve the problem for the short-term, biggest bang for the buck" attitude, and our educational system is completely incapable of figuring out how to engendre creativity in our children and the ability to transform them into independent thinkers as adults. All of this means that, from my perspective, all those wonderful things that you wish for won't happen for a very long time. Hmmm. Did I say something about not ranting? Marc Latest AAL Article My blog Join my forum!
Marc Clifton wrote: Yeah, I read that article too and had exactly the same thought. It blows my mind that I have to "interact" with my computer using an archaic keyboard from the 19th century and a pointing device that hasn't changed since it was invented in the 60's. This statement reminded me of the scene in Star Trek IV where Scotty sits at a "modern day" computer, picks up the mouse and says "Computer?" Then one of the guys hands him a keyboard to use and he says, "A keyboard, how quaint."
"We have done so much in the last 2 years, and it doesn't happen by standing around with your finger in your ear, hoping everyone thinks that that's nice." - Donald Rumsfeld
Jason Henderson
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It looks like Moores Lay of computer speed is going to hold for at least a few more years. (NOTE: I just read Intel's press release at http://www.intel.com/pressroom/archive/releases/20031105tech.htm[^].) Maybe I'm crazy, but at least from my point of view it looks like we're wasting all of the performance gains from computer advancement. The current "breakthroughs" (.NET, JAVA, XML, etc) (and I use that term loosely) in the software development world are not about using new performance to create new capabilities, tools, etc, but is largely being used to "enhance" developer productivity. I realize that there is a benefit to this, but where are the "breakthrough" applications for users. Where are the novel new uses for the performance (ie. voice recognition, etc)? Since Windows 2000 (doesn't seem that long ago does it?), what real advancement has been made in the OS to take advantage of the added performance? I suspect that due to the underlying code in Windows, it isn't really possible to leverage much of the performance in a safe/reliable way...Besides, what can a keyboard driver do with a 10GHZ processor it can't do with a 120mhz processor? <rant> .NET and the advancements in JAVA have made the development of certain types of software somewhat easier, but in my opinion have not really made the end-product more powerful. Sure, ASP.NET is better than ASP, but is a let down from ISAPI and C++. I guess from a business perspective, hardware is cheap and developers are expensive, so in that sense, the power is not wasted. But give me a break, I want voice recognition, touch screens, biometrics, truly context-sensitive (me being the context) help and search, true wireless (I love my laptop, but want to get rid of the power cord.) I want it all, and at least from a performance perspective it seems within our grasps. But all I ever hear about any more is how much more productive I can be. I DON'T WANT SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT TO BE MORE PRODUCTIVE! DAMN IT! I want to work with some cool technology (I will kill the first person who refers to .NET as cool). I want to search for "The Matrix" on the internet and have the search engine display a page with movie information, times in my area, reviews, buy tickets, reserve seats, etc. I do not want a list of more web pages. I want some math-head to enter the
Advancements in power mean that programmers no longer need to program as close to the metal as before. .NET / Java etc do provide higher productivity, but most importantly they also provide enhanced stability and security. Rest assured - Microsoft have bought back pointers in C++ .NET for Whidbey, and have also bought back the destructor. C++ is once again King. cheers, Chris Maunder
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The breakthrough development tools are necessary to accomplish what you are envisioning. Would you rather have programmers spend time tracing memory leaks or create the next big thing. We could all still be programming assembly, which would lead to faster programs, but I doubt that we would even have half of the features of the software we use currently, if that were the case. I am working on a cool software, which will take advantage of Moore's law, but it's only possible because the development effort is less onerous with the new development tools. Satisfy the developer before the user. Managed code is an enabler because it makes code easier to write, and cuts out all the low-level management of detail that hinders creativity and progress. ---------------------------- Wesner Moise http://wesnerm.blogs.com
The breakthrough development tools are necessary to accomplish what you are envisioning. "Breakthrough"?? Where? I'm sorry, I must have missed them. NextStep's Interface Buidler and Project Builder were break through when they came out - in friggin 1989-1990! (or earlier) The Lisp Machines fully interactive development IDE's were breakthroughs when they came out, again around 20 years ago. VB was quasi break through (would've been truly breakthrough if the language wasn't so incredibly braindead, and could extend the IDE directly). Other than that I don't see squat that's a breakthrough. I see a whole bunch of refinements. I see over a decade of missed opportunities with C++, part of the blame I lay squarely on Microsoft's doorstep. How is that one person (me) can create a framework based on standard C++ that feature wise (RTTI, controls, graphics, components, etc) can mostly hold up to .Net over the course of a couple years in his spare time, and ALL of Microsoft couldn't have implemented the same damn thing YEARS ago! They have over 8 billion in R&D - where the hell does it all go? Why have we not had most of these "features" pushed into C++? Why have the frameworks from them not been improved instead of sputtering arounf with MFC? Satisfy the developer before the user. Right. Yeah, I'll believe that when I see it. Too little too late. All of this could have been done a long time ago. They simply had no interest in it. And the fact that it is happening now, is simply mind numbingly boring, because at this point it's just run of the mill. Is it nice to see the tools finally emerge? Sure, but once again, C++ get's slowly left behind. Managed code is an enabler because it makes code easier to write, and cuts out all the low-level management of detail that hinders creativity and progress. memory leaks don't hinder creativity. Stupid programmers hinder creativity. People who lack discipline hinder creativity. Programming is a discipline and a craft, one that takes time, and a willingness to pay attention to details. People who fail to do this, or are unwilling to do this, shouldn't program. Managed code is NOT a panacea, and I'm really sick of hearing how it's going to fix all our problems. Buffer overflows, and their ilk, frequently come from sloppy poorly written code. Having the array bounds checked may help eliminate that singular problem, but all it means is that problem of sloppy, poorly written code is migrated to some other area. Solid, tight code
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You make some good points, But just because every 2 yrs the number of flip flops doubles, doesn't mean that other stuff can handle it. Memory and Bus speeds are now begin to really lag and high processor output is being throttled by this. I don't want any of that breakthrough stuff yet. Idiot proof languages mean more people can attempt to program and this is one of the reasons program developers have lost their status. Regardz Colin J Davies
*** WARNING *
This could be addictive
**The minion's version of "Catch :bob: "It's a real shame that people as stupid as you can work out how to use a computer. said by Christian Graus in the Soapbox
ColinDavies wrote: Idiot proof languages mean more people can attempt to program Yeah, look at the microcomputer boom in the early 80s, the .com bubble in the late 90s. The more you let idiots program, the more idiotic the industry becomes. At any given instant there are considerably more assholes than mouths in the universe.
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It looks like Moores Lay of computer speed is going to hold for at least a few more years. (NOTE: I just read Intel's press release at http://www.intel.com/pressroom/archive/releases/20031105tech.htm[^].) Maybe I'm crazy, but at least from my point of view it looks like we're wasting all of the performance gains from computer advancement. The current "breakthroughs" (.NET, JAVA, XML, etc) (and I use that term loosely) in the software development world are not about using new performance to create new capabilities, tools, etc, but is largely being used to "enhance" developer productivity. I realize that there is a benefit to this, but where are the "breakthrough" applications for users. Where are the novel new uses for the performance (ie. voice recognition, etc)? Since Windows 2000 (doesn't seem that long ago does it?), what real advancement has been made in the OS to take advantage of the added performance? I suspect that due to the underlying code in Windows, it isn't really possible to leverage much of the performance in a safe/reliable way...Besides, what can a keyboard driver do with a 10GHZ processor it can't do with a 120mhz processor? <rant> .NET and the advancements in JAVA have made the development of certain types of software somewhat easier, but in my opinion have not really made the end-product more powerful. Sure, ASP.NET is better than ASP, but is a let down from ISAPI and C++. I guess from a business perspective, hardware is cheap and developers are expensive, so in that sense, the power is not wasted. But give me a break, I want voice recognition, touch screens, biometrics, truly context-sensitive (me being the context) help and search, true wireless (I love my laptop, but want to get rid of the power cord.) I want it all, and at least from a performance perspective it seems within our grasps. But all I ever hear about any more is how much more productive I can be. I DON'T WANT SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT TO BE MORE PRODUCTIVE! DAMN IT! I want to work with some cool technology (I will kill the first person who refers to .NET as cool). I want to search for "The Matrix" on the internet and have the search engine display a page with movie information, times in my area, reviews, buy tickets, reserve seats, etc. I do not want a list of more web pages. I want some math-head to enter the
Matt Gullett wrote: where are the "breakthrough" applications for users. Where are the novel new uses for the performance (ie. voice recognition, etc)? Bioinformatics wants more computer power. Chemical modeling, systems biology is thriving right now, and just because even the cheapes computer you can buy now has 10x the power of the computers that were in use when bioinformatics started (on PDP-11) and such things. I came in when my institute had a shiny new SGI Iris Indigo. I think my old celeron with voodoo-graphics is about that fast.
Who is 'General Failure'? And why is he reading my harddisk?!?