The gur "AlanT" is obviously nuts. The halting problem is one that can never be solved.
AlanT is most definitely not nuts.
Just gay. :)
Solve the halting problem, $300-$1000
51–60 of 86 posts
Re: Solve the halting problem, $300-$1000
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
What is offensive about that post? Maybe I'm missing something or others are reading too much into it. He says he would not recommend outsourcing to India, Pakistan, etc., but would consider outsourcing to a qualified firm closer to home. This doesn't necessarily imply that he thinks developers in India and Pakistan are a bunch of dopes. In fact, it doesn't imply anything at all except that he prefers not to outsourc…
Maybe I'm reading too much into it, or maybe you missed this point: In response to a post that talked about an outsourced team that didn't even have the technical expertise to handle simple CSS bugs, he said he wouldn't consider outsourcing to India and Pakistan, which implies that those places have the characteristics of not having the technical expertise to handle simple bugs.
Ok, I guess as the original poster of this incendiary comment (?) I can chip in about what I actually meant.
I don't think simple CSS bugs are beyond the skills of even the below-average Indian outsourcing shop (though I'm sure some of them fail even on that level, and depending on how finicky you are about your CSS, maybe no one can do it but yourself).
However, in my experience, the more complicated the task, the less likely it will be to get done via a simple outsourcing contract. A huge consulting company can successfully outsource very complex things, because they can invest in ensuring they hire quality resources.
Someone who has personal contacts with people whom he knows are competent can also do it, because they already know where to find the quality.
For the rest of us, though, there is a sea of bad options (the kind that often charge a few dollars an hour) and a few islets of quality. It's very hard to figure out which ones are the good ones, and these islets get smaller the more your task is complicated. Past a certain level of complexity (e.g. "put together a synchronous framework for a tool like Etherpad") you might as well not bother, your chances of hitting land are so low.
This is not specific to India or Pakistan, it applies to China just as much. Eastern Europe is less of a problem for me because there are fewer communication barriers. My point, clarified, is then: Outsourcing complex tasks to a remote location with which there are communication difficulties is unlikely to work.
Re: Solve the halting problem, $300-$1000
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
Perhaps he's had a bad experience with outsourcing to these countries. If I go to McDonalds and have a bad burger then I'm sure going to remember it. In fact if the topic comes up I'll probably tell people "Don't eat at McDonalds, they make bad burgers". How is stating ones past experience in any way racist?
If I ran into a black guy on the street and he mugged me then I'm sure going to remember it. In fact if the topic comes up I'll probably tell people "Don't run into black guys, they'll mug you".
I actually wrote India, Pakistan, China, South East Asia... and then replaced it with /etc.
I don't think it's unfair to make characterisations based on geographic location. People are not equal, and some nations are definitely "worse" than others in some respect.
Remember that I'm not saying that an Indian in London, for example, would be likely to be more difficult to work with. I know several Indian people in London, and some of them are better coders than me. I'm talking about Indian outsourcing businesses in India, and making an aggregate judgement of what it's like to work with them (not about whether they'll mug you). I think that's fair.
For instance, "Be careful about going on holiday in Somalia" is an equally generalising statement - not all Somali's are pirates or warlords - but it's a fair statement because if you're gonna set foot there, there's a reasonable chance you might meet one of them, so you should be forewarned.
Re: Solve the halting problem, $300-$1000
#54Unfortunately, the person who put up the project did not specify that the solution has to complete within a timespan. So given a piece of code, a proposed solution could just try all possible values, trying to discover if it will halt. This may take very long. If the project client complains, he will need to prove that your solution is wrong, and he cannot prove that if he does not give your solution enough time to t…
Assuming Alan is using a Turing-complete language, how exactly do you propose to "just try all possible values"? Given an infinite loop, what values are you trying? And it's a freshman problem to prove that the halting problem is undecidable. (It's also in about a million CS and math textbooks.) You could always just say "To demonstrate that your program works, show the output of it running on itself, given this inpu…
We're demonstrating that we've solved the problem as stated, not demonstrating that the halting problem can be solved. There is no time frame for how long your test program can run (in the clients wishes), so even if there is an infinite loop in the program fed in - your own test program also waits infinitely. Because your program never stops, and is basically still doing it's job, the client cannot tell you that your solution is wrong. He can only tell you that your solution is wrong if you return a wrong answer, but you never do.
So while the halting problem cannot be solved, the clients requirements can be fulfilled (logically).
Re: Solve the halting problem, $300-$1000
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
What is offensive about that post? Maybe I'm missing something or others are reading too much into it. He says he would not recommend outsourcing to India, Pakistan, etc., but would consider outsourcing to a qualified firm closer to home. This doesn't necessarily imply that he thinks developers in India and Pakistan are a bunch of dopes. In fact, it doesn't imply anything at all except that he prefers not to outsourc…
Maybe I'm reading too much into it, or maybe you missed this point: In response to a post that talked about an outsourced team that didn't even have the technical expertise to handle simple CSS bugs, he said he wouldn't consider outsourcing to India and Pakistan, which implies that those places have the characteristics of not having the technical expertise to handle simple bugs.
[deleted]
Re: Solve the halting problem, $300-$1000
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
What is offensive about that post? Maybe I'm missing something or others are reading too much into it. He says he would not recommend outsourcing to India, Pakistan, etc., but would consider outsourcing to a qualified firm closer to home. This doesn't necessarily imply that he thinks developers in India and Pakistan are a bunch of dopes. In fact, it doesn't imply anything at all except that he prefers not to outsourc…
Maybe I'm reading too much into it, or maybe you missed this point: In response to a post that talked about an outsourced team that didn't even have the technical expertise to handle simple CSS bugs, he said he wouldn't consider outsourcing to India and Pakistan, which implies that those places have the characteristics of not having the technical expertise to handle simple bugs.
I don't think it's even possible to miss the point I was trying to make more than you already have. I was cautioning against making assumptions about a person who has stated a vague opinion without the reasons for having that opinion. And just like the person I was responding to, you have done exactly that.
Some people, based on past experience, expect to be offended and see malice in words where there is none. Sometimes we make connections between others' statement based on our own beliefs. I guess it's just human nature. It's probably easier to ask for some clarification.
Re: Solve the halting problem, $300-$1000
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
Perhaps he's had a bad experience with outsourcing to these countries. If I go to McDonalds and have a bad burger then I'm sure going to remember it. In fact if the topic comes up I'll probably tell people "Don't eat at McDonalds, they make bad burgers". How is stating ones past experience in any way racist?
If I ran into a black guy on the street and he mugged me then I'm sure going to remember it. In fact if the topic comes up I'll probably tell people "Don't run into black guys, they'll mug you".
If you actually say "Don't run into this particular black guy, because he mugged me" then your statement is equivalent to mine, and wouldn't be racist, just a statement of fact.
:)
Re: Solve the halting problem, $300-$1000
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
Perhaps he's had a bad experience with outsourcing to these countries. If I go to McDonalds and have a bad burger then I'm sure going to remember it. In fact if the topic comes up I'll probably tell people "Don't eat at McDonalds, they make bad burgers". How is stating ones past experience in any way racist?
If I ran into a black guy on the street and he mugged me then I'm sure going to remember it. In fact if the topic comes up I'll probably tell people "Don't run into black guys, they'll mug you".
What if you got mugged by most black guys you met? Do you think outsourcing to faraway places has a success rate of over 50%? Would you bet money on this? And I'm speaking as someone from a faraway place who once lived off outsourcing. Price competition on your hourly rate sucks, but it was the only realistic way we could make money.
Re: Solve the halting problem, $300-$1000
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe I'm reading too much into it, or maybe you missed this point: In response to a post that talked about an outsourced team that didn't even have the technical expertise to handle simple CSS bugs, he said he wouldn't consider outsourcing to India and Pakistan, which implies that those places have the characteristics of not having the technical expertise to handle simple bugs.
I don't think it's even possible to miss the point I was trying to make more than you already have. I was cautioning against making assumptions about a person who has stated a vague opinion without the reasons for having that opinion. And just like the person I was responding to, you have done exactly that. Some people, based on past experience, expect to be offended and see malice in words where there is none. Somet…
What's wonderful about our world is that there are a myriad of ways that people can perceive a situation, which allows all sorts of different viewpoints to emerge. I interpreted the situation differently from you based on my experience of conversation flow, and there's no need for me to agree to your point even though I understood it the first time.
Some people, based on past experience, are unaware that their words may carry unintended malice or hurtfulness (see Rosie O'Donnell's 'Ching Chong' comments) or may harbor subconscious prejudices (see Project Implicit, https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/). It's better for all of us that these are pointed out rather than ignored.
Re: Solve the halting problem, $300-$1000
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
Assuming Alan is using a Turing-complete language, how exactly do you propose to "just try all possible values"? Given an infinite loop, what values are you trying? And it's a freshman problem to prove that the halting problem is undecidable. (It's also in about a million CS and math textbooks.) You could always just say "To demonstrate that your program works, show the output of it running on itself, given this inpu…
We're demonstrating that we've solved the problem as stated, not demonstrating that the halting problem can be solved. There is no time frame for how long your test program can run (in the clients wishes), so even if there is an infinite loop in the program fed in - your own test program also waits infinitely. Because your program never stops, and is basically still doing it's job, the client cannot tell you that you…
The job of the program is to return true or false; until it does that, it can't be said to be "basically doing its job" if it never terminates. The client might also not be able to tell you that a solution of "while (true) ;" is "wrong" because it never returns the wrong answer, but that isn't a solution either.