Posts by Charlie Clark

Re: Why exactly is Perl any worse than Python? : About efficiency.

Actually lots of parsers written in Python or Perl are as fast as those written in C, because they're largely wrapping C libraries. And this is one of the points of these languages: they're encouraging you not to reinvent the wheel. Yes, there will be times when you reach for a library and it turns out to be a dog so you do need to write your own code, but that will generally be the exception that proves the rule.

Of course, parsing gets harder and slower if you have to deal with unicode…

Getting rid of support for backticks, copied at one point slavishly from perl/shell, was one of the best revisions Python ever made.

Re: Why exactly is Perl any worse than Python?

Languages are not all me too. They're generally written as a response to different problems.

There are lots of good comparisons of the two languages, highlighting the pros and cons of each, but at the end of the day it largely comes down to personal preference but C definitely isn't the answer for everyone's problems. While at the silicon level computers haven't changed, at the user level they have. For decades now we've had people needing to program as part of their day job and they simply don't have the education or aptitude to be able to use something like C correctly. But that doesn't mean that they can't write perfectly reasonable code in something else that internally relies on C.

Re: An easy way to save power...

I guess it depends a lot upon your definition. But, at its core, HTML5 was about the semantics. So we got <nav>, <section>, <article>, <video> and a heap of useful form elements. This was based on research done by Opera as to what people were actually doing. At least regarding the language a lot of the rest was about fixing things like defining errors so that behaviour across browsers could be more consistent.

I agree that a lot of the associated changes in things like Javascript have caused avoidable problems, but that does not invalidate the exercise.

Re: An easy way to save power...

While I agree that a lot of stuff that we're subjected to serves no one other perhaps than the designers, programmers or those who consider themselves such, I don't think that a return to 1990 is required.

HTML 5 comes with the necessary semantics to make websites that both look good and are comprehensible in other modes. I'm surprised that CSS is causing problems, presumably due to some poorly implemented transitions, I assume.

I advise a company in this area and the website has excellent performance and accessibility as well as looking good (modern and has lots of bells and whistles). But the majority of website owners and developers really don't seem to understand how important it is to do this.

Re: Good luck that

There still quite a few websites out there that rely on Flash (Channel 4's videos for one spring to mind) that miraculously work without it on IOS. Not that Apple's drive to remove Flash was only about security or performance. It was at least as much about control and licences, which is why its contributions to an "open web" more or less stopped once DRM video was possible.

Re: An easy way to save power...

Lots of HTML5 is a big step up in terms of performance. The real issues are third-party scripts for tracking and advertising and the current fad to try and write websites as JS apps.

Re: About Time

Don't forget the deal with the Faeroe Islands!

Re: Inaccurate

It can't vote for jack shit if it's suspended.

Re: Inaccurate

So the votes don't count at all?

And the only way to prevent parliament from passing the required primary legislation is to suspend it?

Nice definition of democracy you have there.

Both my parents were left-handed and both were forced to try and learn to write with their right hand. That's fucking barbaric!

Which ends up as pretty much the same thing.

Re: White men complain that there are too many white men…

I've seen lots of radical and new ideas at conferences, including from young kids. Competence is not the same as expertise and indeed most of the best talks are less about cramming you full of knowledge than making you think and questioning your assumptions.

Reminds me that I've even been called out at a conference for making a joke about another programming language (it wasn't about PHP, which is already a joke ;-)). Someone thought this wasn't being inclusive enough and decided to report me.

It's not really about anything other than power. The "diversity" card is merely used to gain influence.

And poor. Outreach campaigns never seem to extend to ghettos.

Re: Clearly discriminatory here

I think courts are likely to follow that argument and, as long as Amazon can demonstrate that the results cannot be accessed separately, then I think they'll be okay.

As for the idea that transcription is only possible for companies with deep pockets, that's hogwash. Lots of the research on has been publicly funded for assistive technologies as good models are avaiable. If publishers wanted to, they could easily provide their own versions.

I'm no fan of Amazon (love my Kobo Aura One) but Audible and GoodRead.com were excellent buys for the country getting into digitall services, and there's no doubt that Audible has brought audiobooks to a much wider audience.

Re: Why buy a Samsung Note?

The Note was the first phone with a very large screen and a stylus was immediately popular with some people as a result and the first time Samsung led the way. The full-fat one comes with 256 GB and will take SD cards. Try that with an I-Phone.

Not for me, but they do have their fans as was evinced in the reactions to the withdrawal of the Note 8.

Thanks for the correction! Still, imagine a phone with a 15Ah battery!

Why would assigning all the righs to the FSF help anything?

The GPL is political ideology masquerading as technology. The stated aim is more or less to make commercial software development impossible.

About the only thing the USPTO has failed to accept a patent for is stupidity!

Once the principle of software patents were accepted, companies have gone mad for them out of the fear that if they didn't patent "the patently obvious" someone else would and sue them for it.

The patent for rounded corners doesn't come close to some of the software ideas or "business practices" that have been patented. If he was around today Pythagoras would either be a billionaire or in debtors' prison!

Re: Not enough bandwidth, and given me a proper keyboard

This is a Pi 3 and not a 4.

I have frequently hit problems with IO on USB 2, happens quite quickly when you're trying to use the disk and the network. Maybe they've found a workaround but I thought it was an SoC restriction.

Re: Monopoly

Well, it's git and the git toolchain, which seduces users and leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I've always disliked the "common cold" argument: if everyone else has the flu/siphyllis/ebola, should I get it too?

I'd very much like to stick with Mercurial. Does anyone know of anyone still prepared to offer a choice?

Re: Sad

Having had the odd thing nicked in my life (who hasn't?) I can sympathise with the feelings it generates: why me? could I and should have done something to stop it?

But what strikes me over the theft and the reports of other similar thefts is that it sounds very much like the thieves are confident that they can overcome Apple's protection because the machine is otherwise fairly worthless. So, the machine is gone: wipe it remotely and remove it from your Apple account.

This was a professional theft and not a junkie's opportunistic smash and grab: getaway vehicle with fake plates. All done at speed so that even if there is a have-a-go-hero around, they're not likely to react in time and, even if they do, the guy probably has a trained response: if you're risking going down for a felony, you're not that likely to worry about being done for assault as well.

Oh, and back the shit up, especially if you're out and about a lot. When my MacBook got nicked in 2014 (out of my room while I was asleep) I might have felt like a prize numpty, but was able to do a suprising amount of work on my aged Mac Mini until I got a replacement sorted. Installing to a MacBook from a backup can take a while but is simple and just works™. So, also think about having a backup device.

Re: Agile project management failure

I don't know if that's really the case here. It's not really about the GUI side of things, where QT excels, but the low-level system stuff. Plus, the blog article makes it clear: they're having trouble finding people with the C++ skills to maintain what they already have. While we might bemoan this as yet more evidence of decadence in the IT industry, that won't change the associated risks. Switching to the platforms' preferred languages at least makes this someone else's probem.