jamesdhutton

For anyone unfamiliar with DONKEY.BAS: it’s notable for having been co-written by Bill Gates. More info on its history bere: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DONKEY.BAS

The article makes this very point. From the article: “software has been industrialising for a long time: through reusable components (open source code), portability (containerisation, the cloud), democratisation (low-code / no-code tools), interoperability (API standards, package managers) and many other ways”

Genuine question, not being sarcastic: why would someone want/need these downloads?

I’m building a reward chart app for parents. See link below. I just submitted it yesterday for review the App Store and Google Play. Now I wait. Fingers crossed.

https://whirl.digital/housepoints.html

> You can write simple, readable, and maintainable code in C++ without ever needing to use templates, operator overloading, or any of the other more advanced features of the language.

Maybe you can do that. But you are probably working in a team. And inevitably someone else in your team thinks that operator overloading and template metaprogramming are beautiful things, and you have to work with their code. I speak from experience.

In the USA, the postal service picks up outgoing mail from your mailbox. I wish they would do that in the UK.

An app for parents to motivate their kids by awarding them points for good deeds. There are existing apps out there, but I tried them and didn't like them, so I'm building my own. This is a side project for me and I only get to spend a few hours a week on it. Currently in beta testing and I hope to launch around July.

https://whirl.digital

@Tomek_zemla: The people in this thread are trying to help you. We are taking the time to tell you about our experience using your app. Feedback is a gift. Be grateful for it. Do not get defensive. If somebody tells you that they found your app baffling and difficult, you are not going to change their mind by arguing with them. Instead, you should think about how you can change your app so that people find it useful and fun. You have the germ of a good idea for an app here. It needs more work before it's viable. We are trying to help you identify what you need to do to make it good.

Speaking as a native English speaker from London: I can assure you that most Brits would get this question wrong. It is true that Brits use "jolly" to mean "very" but it is, as you've noted, informal. Brits do not use it this way in formal speech. You would have to make it clear in the question that you were talking about informal English. E.G. "Name a word that means 'happy' and can also informally mean 'very'".

I think your game has potential but, at present, the questions are too hard and the answers are sometimes simply wrong. Example:

Q: Find the noun matching the following definition: "A burden or responsibility."

A: Saddle

This is not correct. Saddle as a verb can mean "to burden", but as a noun it does not mean a burden.

Ahhh. Proper noun though right? I would suggest excluding proper nouns.

It was fun. Couple of suggestions:

- It gave me “TCAAN” which stumped me. Afterwards I pasted it into the Internet Anagram Server, which failed to find any acronyms for it. So I can say with some confidence I don’t think it’s a valid word. Suggest making sure you’re using a dictionary similar to Wordle’s one.

- The game should reveal the solution at the end if the player fails to guess any words.

Yeah Nvidia and Linux don’t play together nicely. I discovered that the hard way too. I switched to AMD and it’s been smooth sailing ever since.

I’m currently coding a Flutter app on a 15-year-old Dell desktop, running Linux. The experience is great. I’m running latest versions of VS Code, Flutter, you name it. It’s nice and snappy and a joy to use. I’ve upgraded RAM, SSDs, GPU over the years to keep it somewhat up to date. Eventually I’m going to have to cave in and buy a Mac so that I can publish my app for iOS. I’ve been loathe to do it though and I’ve been putting it off. This article is a great explanation of why I’ve been so loathe. It articulates reasons that were semi-subconscious for me.

I don't think this article provides enough context to draw conclusions about why sales are down for Boeing. Are airline sales down for everyone, or just for Boeing? Is Boeing losing market share? Are airlines cancelling orders?

Would love to try it but, knowing nothing about Java, I don't know how to run it. Could you add instructions to your github page on how to run it?

Exactly this. It's all about trade-offs. You need to pick the right tool for the job. Sometimes the right tool is dangerous. Knives are dangerous tools, but you need them if you want to cook a meal.

And it's a perfect match to Sun's slogan: "The Network is the Computer."

Downloaded it. It wants my email, date of birth, full name and access to all my photos, before it will let me use it. Way too much info. Delete app. Shame because it seems like a nice idea.

I want to be a bit contrarian here. I buy books on my Kindle all the time. I always download a sample before buying. I do recall a couple of occasions where I got a sample that was one of the garbage books that this article is talking about. So yes, I've experienced it. But I don't experience it often. Nearly all the time, a search for an author or a topic brings up real, relevant books. Nearly all the time, Amazon's recommendations are for real, relevant books. So based on my own experience, I'd question how big the problem really is for the end consumer of books.

I used Pandoc recently to convert a large Word document into markdown. It took a lot of babysitting and manual tweaking to get to the final result. Overall it probably still saved me time compared to doing the conversion manually, but only just. YMMV.

As others here have noted, the challenge with paying salespeople to close the deal is that you create perverse incentives. In enterprise software sales, the salesperson has every incentive to make impossible-to-keep promises about what the software can do. After closing the deal, the salesperson hands over to an implementation team, who try and fail to make the software do what the salesperson promised it would. The result is a failed implementation and an unhappy customer. I have often thought it would make sense to pay salespeople for a successful implementation of software, not just for the initial sale. I’ve never seen that done though. Would be curious to hear if anyone has successfully dealt with this challenge.

It's not a myth. It's a fact. The whole point of any for-profit company is to generate a return for the company's owners. Companies which fail to do so go out of business. It has always been thus.

As for the notion that Boeing has prioritized shareholder value over safety: just look at their share price over the last few days. It tanked by 10% since this accident occurred. Clearly, making safe planes is a prerequisite for generating shareholder value. There is no conflict there.

This is a shame. Castro is (was?) the best podcast app from a UX perspective, IMO. I have used it almost daily for years. I never upgraded to the paid, premium, version though, which I guess could be a clue to its demise. I guess it’s hard to monetise podcast apps.

In "Brave New World," all the music is made by machines. We are approaching that dystopia. For me, much of the pleasure in listening to music lies in appreciating the virtuosity of the musicians. It's like watching a great tennis player or a great dancer. You admire their skill and grace and technical mastery. For me, listening to music made by machines would be like watching robots playing tennis, or robots dancing. Pointless!