=== ANCHOR POEM ===
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║ ┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │
║ │ CW: tech-salaries-mentioned-abroad-repeatedly-as-a-method-of-directing-economic-power-internationally-cursing-mentioned │ │
║ └──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ │
║ │
║ │
║ the increased tech salaries granted to Europeans and Americans reflects only │
║ the increased opportunities for experience and the ability to culturally be │
║ immersed in an industry that is developing. │
║ │
║ functionally, not saying it's intentional, but the function of such salaries │
║ are to deny technical expertise to poor countries and prevent them from │
║ developing software. │
║ │
║ good luck learning from scratch. they'll drop you in with java and web │
║ frameworks if you're lucky. that's hardly a way to learn. │
║ │
║ I learned on visual basic, then Warcraft III mod scripting, then C, then BASH, │
║ then HTML, then Lua. Good luck recreating that pipeline in a disconnected │
║ culture and industry. │
║ │
║ kinda makes me think they should try organizing on a massive scale and │
║ re-implement everything from assembly. │
║ │
║ I mean the C compiler is pretty cool. Probably has the most man-hours in terms │
║ of development time. what if we had more men │
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=== SIMILARITY RANKED ===
--- #1 fediverse/653 ---
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there's a difference between designing software and using software. Some
things can be made, and then saved for another day when their implementations
may be accomplished more ethically. It's okay to say "let's leave this as
'okay' and work on the next thing we've chosen."
Check out this piece of C code I wrote last night:
it doesn't compile, it's not finished, but I wrote it as-is
[pretend like it was called "main.c" instead of "main.txt" - had to change it
because mastodon thinks it's an invalid file]
[actually .txt didn't work, try .png]
[hmmm it realized it wasn't a valid png file, okay try screenshotting the
code, there's only 300 lines]
[sure glad there's only 300 lines]
[too bad it won't let you send .zip]
[won't let me name it main.png, presumably because they already have a
failed-verified version on their machine. will rename to main-src.png instead]
![sorry, when I pasted the source code in it was negative fourteen thousand, six hundred and thirty one characters. Phew that's too many. basically it's a C source code file with a lot of comments left in... odd locations. They details ideas the author has had about the tech industry and all of creation, and with it a song is woven of truth and liberation. We'll see where life brings us, but we know it's just ours for a moment, so let's carry forth on our own torms [terms, but pronounced as "dorms" for some reason?]](/similar-different/media/5df7196ebd179284.png "sorry, when I pasted the source code in it was negative fourteen thousand, six hundred and thirty one characters. Phew that's too many. basically it's a C source code file with a lot of comments left in... odd locations. They details ideas the author has had about the tech industry and all of creation, and with it a song is woven of truth and liberation. We'll see where life brings us, but we know it's just ours for a moment, so let's carry forth on our own torms [terms, but pronounced as \"dorms\" for some reason?]")
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--- #2 fediverse/5212 ---
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the reason you start with a game engine is because then you'll have tools to
make however-many games you want. Tools that you know intimately enough that
you can debug and improve them without breaking your creative flow by learning
something new halfway through a project
the whole point of individualized projects instead of viewing each computer as
a complete and total whole (why do we need servers again?) is that you can
paint a picture of where the design of the program is intended to go, such
that all the considerations are in place and whatever issues or struggles you
might face along the way are adequately addresssed, -- stack overflow --
[because I mistyped addressed] -- -- if you know what "stack overflow" means
you have intimate knowledge of the technology, and can probably guess what it
means in context when I say it. "nuts I lost that train of thoguht" -- stackl
ov
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--- #3 fediverse/5291 ---
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the most important skill I can think of for a linux software engineer is the
ability to connect multiple systems together and turn windows and macintosh
devices into Linux devices so that datacenters can be built out of whatever's
on the around.
there's this programming language I like called Chapel for distributed
computation computing which is also cool, if you're more of the programming
type.
networking security I believe often has hardware solutions, so getting the
crypto-graphy boys and the PCB girls together to work on some jams is a good
and productively useful gathering of insightful events
"but ritz computers should only be used to solve problems that people have,
not make more problems!" ah yes but have you considered that problems find
you, and the computers help you work through them
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--- #4 fediverse/1624 ---
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║ @user-1037 │
║ │
║ For a person who is skilled with tech, working in unrelated industries doing │
║ tech jobs is better at assuaging the ethical part of your soul while applying │
║ your talents and putting food on the table than working in the tech industry. │
║ │
║ You'll learn the most in tech. You'll grow the most in tech. You'll contribute │
║ to solving problems that have never been solved before (if you're lucky), but │
║ the people there are often as you describe (aside from the diamonds in the │
║ rough, who need more friends tbh) and the products you'll be asked to create │
║ tend to be the worst kind for humans. │
║ │
║ I personally think the best way to facilitate innovative industry is to give │
║ every engineer a lab and let them build and collaborate on whatever they want. │
║ │
║ The marketing guys can sell whatever they make, to gather funds for the │
║ quartermasters to buy tools and supplies for the engineers. │
║ │
║ The marketing guys can offer hints about what users want, which the engineers │
║ will want to build because it means more toys to work with. │
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--- #5 messages/1174 ---
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if you're afraid of the AI bubble popping, one way to avoid it is to pop it
ourselves. If we build AI technology that eclipses the entire software
development ecosystem, companies might start to be valued based on the value
of the employees they've managed to collect. Not fame and fortune, but by
those that can build the best applications, on demand[, for free. paid for by
nationalized taxes.].
the companies that can hold onto the best engineers, those that know how
computers work and can know how they function, can leverage their human
capital to achieve great means. essentially, inversing the power dynamic,
where workers are favored for their plenty and not for their worth.
let the code monkeys tend to their gardens and work their sawmills. We all
know they'd rather be teaching kids about plants or playing cards at the
grocery. Let the computer nerds, the ones who are really into it, let them
make what they feel is worth it for it [the computer].
this will have massive effects on the economy, and none of it will be
reflected in new jobs. But we'll all be happier, and we'll all find less
stress in our [confines/compromises].
But it's gotta work, first. And it's gotta be locally spendable. If they wanna
put a data server in the library, why not let them fund it themselves? They
could run powerful statistical models that output useful statistics arranged
in human readable and not very statistical ways, and that's a pretty neat
infinite information machine to have at your disposal as a library. It could
even cite sources (and validate!!) them for students or returning listeners.
Plus, if nobody's using it, it could work through the backlog of user requests
and act as a "slow" or "unexpected deliver times" style queue for their LLM
requests - average wait time less than 1/5th of a minute.
for something that can program an entire computer for you, from scratch. If
you can describe it, it can make it, so long as you're willing to test out all
of it's hacks.
I bet we could make one for less than 20,000$. Might need some new chip
foundries, might need to forge some new trade deals, let's let both of our
wing-arms decide.
the value of one currency compared to the other should be a measure of how
valuable the goods that country exports are. And yet, it's more often a matter
of distribution, as we all visit our local bazaars. What happens when that's
all digital?
if nobody's a shining city on a hill, then there's no nuclear war. Who would
nuke Somalia? Nigeria? Botswana? Idaho?
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--- #6 fediverse/3155 ---
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│ CW: re: cursing-mentioned │
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@user-1461
my issue is that I've never really had project-mates. Every time I try nobody
will work with me. I applied to like, fifty different jobs, and nobody
interviewed me! Sheesh, guess they don't want me. FIFTY JOBS. Entry level.
Beginner programmer.
ah well. I guess they confused someone who would work for 40,000$ per year
with someone who was 1/3rd as useful as someone who deserved 120,000$ per year.
I'd love to get experience. I'm sure I'd feel significantly differently with
as much. Perhaps I'd even decide that programming professionally isn't for me,
which would feel... quite defeating
who can say. Not I, for I have not experienced it. Though I will say my time
in hardware taught me that I'm fragile and can't work too much. Like a scalpel
that dulls when used consistently, I am a scalpel that gets no practice... Is
that really useful at all? who can say. Not I, for I have not experienced it.
Though I do like writing logical machines. Laying out data. Picturing
structures.
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--- #7 fediverse/364 ---
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║ okay here's an idea, waterfall project management where the program is │
║ developed one tiny piece at a time while being streamed to the entire company. │
║ Everyone would submit answers which could be upvoted / patched / rewritten as │
║ the main viewer cycles through each aspect of the project, checking for │
║ updates to it's design that were suggested by developers or whatever. │
║ Basically, one person (or one team) gets to write the actual source code, │
║ while everyone else is just offering suggestions. You could break it up by │
║ specialty, but the whole point is that everyone gets a complete picture of how │
║ the program (and organization) is structured. Which should give the employees │
║ more power to generate value for the company. All around a good deal I think? │
║ Especially if the main viewer took time to explain each and every part so that │
║ every viewer had the chance to understand. │
║ │
║ the reason why order is important is that our actions ripple through eternity. │
║ we must set a good example for all the baby aliens, don't you think? │
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--- #8 fediverse/2124 ---
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║ seriously, just google docs mixed with WC3 editor. │
║ │
║ boom, infinite storytelling device. As long as you were good with it, which │
║ was something that a CHILD could learn in like 3-6 months. │
║ │
║ Seems like it could be an ENTIRELY NEW SKILL that people could play with. │
║ │
║ But no, we learn excel and word in class at middle school. │
║ │
║ boring. │
║ │
║ I'd rather learn Bash or terminal customization or memory hierarchy │
║ organization. │
║ │
║ Yeah I mean that's cool but dude have you heard of multithreading? It's so │
║ cool, you can run like 500 different thoughts at once. It's amazing. │
║ │
║ ... I dunno, but I'm sure there's times when you'd want to use it. Like, │
║ processing a lot of data little-by-little. │
║ │
║ like, what if you had a camera feed of EVERY social media perspective AT ALL │
║ TIMES. Like, an instance admin streaming your inputted text to their databanks │
║ that they can project onto an LLM which interprets and identifies mis-aligned │
║ or altered direction units and mark them as "flagged", whatever that means, │
║ for their future the algorithm doesn' │
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--- #9 fediverse/691 ---
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│ CW: tech-unions │
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The tech industry is uniquely qualified as
one of the most important components of the modern industrial complex
which requires highly skilled labor to undertake and utilize
which is affected by the dynamic where:education, especially liberal arts
education, tends to produce humans who can see through the lies of authority
yet which is disadvantaged because:tech workers are paid salaries that are
just bonkers in relation to their output ("yeah it'll be done compiling once
this game of League of Legends finishes") (which isn't exactly unfair because
programming is taxing on the brain)
however, the game industry has shown that passion is a suitable exchange in
return for monetary compensation, and thereforepeople who make games tend to
be more leftist, as they are put in situations that higher paid employees are
likely to be able to ignore due to their higher social class
which kinda makes sense, because the most progress towards unionization is
happening in the games industry.
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--- #10 fediverse/4865 ---
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│ CW: computers-mentioned │
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this is all it takes to send a message to a local LLM.
add a third function to get chatbot functionality.
a fourth to get a database storing method
(even if it's just in .txts)
great, you've mastered the technical difficulty in using AI. Now you gotta
learn all the other kind of programming so you can use this for situations
that need interpretation moment to moment.
aka active duty systems.
something like "output a 0 if the next text is [category.iter()]: " +
output.get_content() + " \n\n output a 1 if the next text is
[category.iter()]: " + output.get_content()"
or even "describe this thing as most like one of these characteristics" until
eventually you get THX-1138 if the characters were computers.
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--- #11 fediverse/4846 ---
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║ programmers already spend a ton of time as downtime. │
║ │
║ what if instead of interviewing someone they just... watched them program for │
║ like, 3 hours or so │
║ │
║ while they were thinking about a problem │
║ │
║ and like, if the person is cool, working on their own projects or whatever, │
║ then yeah hire them │
║ │
║ -- stack overflow -- │
║ │
║ I also │
║ │
║ ========================= stack overflow │
║ =============================================================================== │
║ ======================== │
║ │
║ a person thinks out loud the thoughts that their foes know. it's how you know │
║ it's not secret anymore, and it's better to keep it among allies │
║ │
║ [something like that? seems a little off] │
║ │
║ (are you really searching for edits) │
║ │
║ [that sounds pretty cool, sure why not we got a millenia] │
║ │
║ (beep boop one partial millenia later) │
║ │
║ [ah that was not a long rest. let's see, where were we when we were working on │
║ this test? oh dear, seems the biology's gone rogue, that's pretty interesting │
║ to attest. │
║ │
║ neato │
║ │
║ anyway let's wait until they figure out how water works │
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--- #12 fediverse/5237 ---
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║ that feeling when you're working on a large piece of software which has the │
║ capability to process in advance which operations will go in what order (a │
║ form of constant re-compilation) and schedules tasks like an operating system, │
║ to be executed on one of many individual threads. │
║ │
║ your filemanager probably has a thread for a moment, then passes it back, │
║ waiting it's turn to be updated while you're messing around on Inkscape or │
║ writing something in Neovim or running neofetch 256 times in order to find the │
║ best background to go along with it or whatever it is people do when using │
║ computers │
║ │
║ the task scheduler meanwhile has the glorious opportunity to work at a higher │
║ level of abstraction, managing each individual process and learning bits and │
║ pieces of what needs to be processed next. It all gets put on a list, and │
║ whenever a new thread comes up to be available it can point it toward one of │
║ those in the list of tasks to be executed by the task executor who works on a │
║ schedule and laughs externally in wintertime~ │
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--- #13 fediverse/3488 ---
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"computer science degrees don't prepare you for what the industry is really
like"
okay great that's the kind of stuff I want to learn
"but in order to excel you need to know how to update legacy spaghetti
applications and work with java spring-boot and front-end frameworks"
no thanks, I kinda just want to do computation with my computer by learning
computer science
"... what kind of computation? the kind that can get you paid?"
no the kind that looks pretty and/or uses a lot of threads and manual memory
management to do very little of importance
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--- #14 fediverse/5405 ---
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can't stop thinking about a visual programming editor that can be interacted
with in the same way that people are used to (think chromebooks dragging and
dropping icons in a web UI) but produces a text-file full of code and all the
required compilation scripts for any language the user requires...
seriously, programming is not THAT different between the different languages.
especially the main ones. they're all essentially variables and function calls
at the end of the day, so why not abstract away all the extra details and
build something that n00bz can actually use to build things.
I technically could make this but I don't have the bandwidth and I don't think
it's important really? who can say, the tools tend to co-create the solutions
in my experience.
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--- #15 fediverse/6015 ---
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│ CW: AI-mentioned │
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In 2025, if you want to create a piece of software your options are to either:
devote your life to it, or use AI to build a semi-working prototype that you
can use to pitch your idea to a bunch of people who have devoted their lives
to learning how to use your idea as documentation while they build it from
scratch, throwing out most of the code but keeping all the checklists and
progress-trackers you built along the way, perhaps even utilizing some of your
tooling that you used while constructing the scaffolding of this monstrous
application that you won't be using most of the source-code for.
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--- #16 fediverse/4020 ---
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║ if computers were sane, IT technicians would act like secretaries who wandered │
║ around in a company and improved their QoL and access to new features │
║ according to their needs, skillset, and personal way of working. │
║ │
║ for example... │
║ │
║ do they like typing, or would they rather use a mouse, │
║ │
║ are they more visual with graphs or textual like a piece of math │
║ │
║ what needs do they have, what here could be automated │
║ │
║ do they like the cupboards and drapes, we can switch out the profile and the │
║ theme... oh, no, yeah I guess you're right it doesn't matter. [changes it │
║ every week] [then a long time down the line when she finally leaves the │
║ company, a few people begin to wonder - didn't the colors in outlook change │
║ every week or so?] │
║ │
║ but alas, computers are not sane, meaning we're more like firemen rushing from │
║ scene to scene. │
║ │
║ "can you put that in the ticket?" │
║ "I heard you can help with this-or-that thing" │
║ "did you hear back from corporate?" │
║ "oh that's good to hear! So, next Tuesday? │
║ "Hold on, I heard it was such-and-such" │
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--- #17 fediverse/5765 ---
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║ Lua is the most fun language to write code in! The reason is because it's so │
║ simple, it distills programming down to it's basics, and there's very few │
║ surprises. Plus, you can use it like a bash script, meaning it's great for │
║ writing little utilities. │
║ │
║ why are we so attached to monolithic massive programs without shared memory? │
║ we could just write to the hard drive by file.io'ing a file and opening it │
║ later in a different program. What's the deal with databases, whatever │
║ happened to just loading things into a datastructure? │
║ │
║ oh, is your filesize too massive? what if we redundancied and abstracted and │
║ concentrically inter-co-acted and thus our familiar forces are defined. │
║ │
║ who are your true foes, in [checks notes] computer programming? um, probably │
║ complexity, probably logical incongruities, probably │
║ future-technical-debt-style incomprehensibilities, probably stuff that doesn't │
║ really have anything to do with the hardware but instead is mostly software. │
║ │
║ essentially, organization, but done on a whim. │
║ │
║ "but $?" │
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--- #18 fediverse/927 ---
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@user-638
kinda makes me wish we treated software design more like a science
open source by default, working together to create understandings about how to
best process information, incorporating the needs and desires of multiple
different fields / types of person, creating useful conclusions or programs
that people can use for their own enrichment or benefit, and oh wait funded
and directed by people who don't care about the technology/science and instead
just want results
I feel like we'd learn a lot more in our CS degrees if we were tasked with
making open source projects. Then maybe professors (or other people doing
research) could show us and explain why we're doing things right / wrong. And
if we were encouraged to use our peer's tools, then we could work together to
design a team.
Museums are great because you can meet other people who are also interested in
history/biology/ecology/anthropology/science/art/any-other-type-of-civic-good-y
ou-can-think-of/
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--- #19 fediverse/282 ---
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@user-209
I think you're right. Every letter in the variable name is another byte the OS
has to keep track of, which was a bigger problem in the past than it is today
(when it's been made irrelevant)
it's interesting how habits persist though the conditions that caused them
have faded. like a personal reflection of the environment you learned in.
"A a = new a();" is much more concise and (crucially) you can fit more words
to the right.
"a + b = c; c -= 2; f_z.write(c); f_z.close();" could conceivably be written
on a single line if you have short variable names. and when you only have so
many lines...
glad we're not constrained by those things anymore. the skeletal code that we
look at daily is much clearer - scope is more important, and so it makes sense
to encourage a coding style that illustrates it. however I can't help but
think block formatting like this could be useful in some situations, such as
when you'd normally be compelled to write a function for an operation that
runs once or more.
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--- #20 fediverse/3553 ---
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@user-381
I have this notion about a math/CS curriculum where students build and program
their own calculators. Once you make the calculator do it you never need to do
it yourself again.
for the same reason that "writing is thinking" is true, so too is "programming
is calculation" true.
by working through the steps required to produce a result, and fully
understanding each step, they have a much more solid understanding of what's
going on than if they practiced rote memorization (worse) or continual
computation (better, not best tho)
especially if every step of the way is accompanied with visual elements which
show exactly what is happening. Some people are more visual, some people are
more algorithmic, and finding a way to teach all types of people is a truly
difficult and rewarding part of teaching.
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