Adobedobedoo - might be ever so slightly trademark infringey... Docmutator - zero hits on DuckDuckGo, one on Google :omg:

In .Net, string is a class, and has a length variable, so can contain NULL in the middle. Just like the std::string class in C++. FWIW, I thought the Pascal style of having the length in the first char was quite neat (though that limited it to strings of < 255 characters).

IIRC, I used to have a boot time less than 5 seconds on my 64... kB Commodore 64.

Avon? ;-)

No, I've got a job I'm quite happy with, salary-, perk-, and commute-wise. I've worked on the outskirts of Cambridge (Fulbourn business park) before, and that was usually quite okay. This looks like it's closer to the town centre, though.

That might be because that's an alias, to avoid putting by name next to theirs. :-) There can't be that many big online book sellers named after big rivers, can there?

The other day I got contacted by a manager at the Big River, the online book-and-everything seller, who said my C++/STL/Boost background made me an ideal candidate to work in their office in Cambridge, UK. Which is flattering and all, but I recall hearing they're a horrible place to work. A cursory search brings up a fair few articles to that effect, but also ones arguing they're not worse than other behemoths like Microsoft, Facebook or Google (mind you, the friends I have at Google are all very happy with them, so they might be an exception). So I'm curious to hear if any of you have any opinions?

Yup. Saxon, Viking, and Norman.

1. Automatic[1] 2. Large enough to fit a couple of 7'6" spears Everything else is negotiable. [1] Because the wife can't shift manually lefthanded. We used to have manual cars, but since we moved to England, we've had automatics.

These days, for GUI applications I would definitely recommend C# over Delphi. The languages are quite similar at their core (they were designed by the same person) but it is orders of magnitude harder to find developers skilled in Delphi. For recruitment, and for maintainability, C# is a much better option. If you find you need to fix something three years after deployment, finding a Delphi developer to do it will be very expensive. I mainly use C# and C++, but worked with Delphi in the mid-90s and mid-noughties, so do occasionally get calls from recruiters desperate to find someone with Delphi experience. And they are desperate. Sounds like the consultant is either not as knowledgeable about the field as you should be able to expect, or is angling for a long-term contract with no competition. The only reason to start a new Delphi project these days is if you have a large amount of tried and tested existing Delphi code you want to re-use. Even so, in that case I'd package that into DLLs and call from a C# application.

Patents cover implementations, not ideas, for just this reason.

Yup. Also, not a website coder.

Someone clever said "Ideas are cheap - it's implementation that creates value" which is fair enough, and I can't really argue with that. However, I do wish there was an idea marketplace, where I could dump all the ideas and half-designed games and apps and web businesses I get assaulted by but won't ever implement. Give me money for a good coffee or beer and I'll gladly give up all rights to them. I actually came up with a business model and elevator pitch for that, years ago, which I won't make a business out of either. Because I'm to lazy and old to be an entrepreneur.

Don't do it! That way lies madness!

The "Any" key? See here[^].

I'd ask you to write a CP article about the solution you coded, and download the included source code from that article. ;-)

Not enlightenment. ;P

Heh. I'm not much for sigs outside usenet, but he was incredibly generous to his fans. He started out as a fan himself, and never stopped being one. He used to hang out on his fan group - alt.fan.pratchett - and participate like anyone else. We once had a long discussion on a.f.p. about what art is, and in the end he said, IIRC, "I can live with your definition", which would be another siggable quote. Terry even got me my only video game credit, by introducing me to his daughter, who knew someone who needed someone who could help with Vikings, Old Norse and modern Scandinavian languages. If not for his fandom, which he did actively shape to be friendly, inclusive, honest, and inquisitive, I wouldn't have moved to the UK, and wouldn't have met almost all of my current friends. And here I sit, lumpy-throated, in the office. I'll raise a glass to him tonight. He was a good human being.

den2k88 wrote:

Orjan Westin wrote:

for our sword'n'sorcery spoof novel.

:OMG: Please elaborate...

See Westala and Villtin (Wikipedia)[^] and The Tale of Westala and Villtin (TV Tropes)[^]. Terry was aware of us writing it, and when I was about to do a small print run (illustrated[^] by a RPG/fantasy/kids book illustrator), I talked to him in the bar at a convention, and by bribing him with salt liquorice, he agreed to give me a quote to put on the cover. Not having read any of it, but having talked to both of us on Usenet for years, he said:

"These guys might be sane, for certain values of sane."

Sir Terry Pratchett, renowned fantasy author, dies aged 66[^] He was, indirectly, the cause of me moving to the UK, lo these many years ago. And he was generous enough to give me and a friend a front-cover quote for our sword'n'sorcery spoof novel.