Computerists • Hacker News Board

Re: Computerists

#61

Post by seanmcdirmid » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 11:39 PM UTC

oskarth wrote: post #4

Countries with the word 'democratic' in them: - People's Democratic Republic of Algeria - Congo, Democratic Republic of the - East Timor – Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste - Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia - Korea, North – Democratic People's Republic of Korea - Laos – Lao People's Democratic Republic - Nepal – Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal - São Tomé and Príncipe – Democratic Republic of São Tomé an…

You forgot the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea), better known as the "good" (north) Korea.

Re: Computerists

#62

Post by seanmcdirmid » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 11:42 PM UTC

fogus wrote: post #24

abcd_f wrote: post #17

Neat, but he clearly has never debugged COM bordello on Windows, because one simply cannot do it without "deciding to stop goofing off and starting applying the scientific method". To figure out what the heck 0x8C123456 for an error code means and what triggers it, you make conjectures, run experiments, go for repeatable results across multiple testbeds and frequently solicit peer review of the results. "Not a scient…

Not that particular software no, but I'm used my share of dreck. Maybe I guessed where the problem was and used experimentation to validate, but I would hardly call that the scientific method.

Programmers do you an abbreviated form of the scientific when debugging. Its that we wear many hats actually. But whatever, its not a big deal for those in industry.

For those of us doing academic research, however, the science part of computer science is much more an issue; e.g. should a conference accept design papers without empirical evidence?

Re: Computerists

#63

Post by tgflynn » Thu, Apr 11, 2013, 1:10 AM UTC

rhizome wrote: post #38

tgflynn wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But in many industries, defense and aerospace in particular, systems engineers are people who integrate multiple technologies to build systems (such as an aircraft or missile). They don't manage computer systems.

Are we talking about those industries? It's a valid title for many sectors, and is perfectly cromulent for OS/Neteng roles.

I don't know why not, especially since they also employ many software engineers and IT people.

Re: Computerists

#64

Post by abcd_f » Thu, Apr 11, 2013, 11:26 AM UTC

fogus wrote: post #24

abcd_f wrote: post #17

Neat, but he clearly has never debugged COM bordello on Windows, because one simply cannot do it without "deciding to stop goofing off and starting applying the scientific method". To figure out what the heck 0x8C123456 for an error code means and what triggers it, you make conjectures, run experiments, go for repeatable results across multiple testbeds and frequently solicit peer review of the results. "Not a scient…

Not that particular software no, but I'm used my share of dreck. Maybe I guessed where the problem was and used experimentation to validate, but I would hardly call that the scientific method.

It was a joke, dude.