341–350 of 365 posts
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Rolf Snedsböl? :-) Agreed that he was one of the best educators (if not _the_ best) I had
An absolute legend! My favourite of his jokes: "when I moved to Sweden from Norway, the average IQ went up in both countries".
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That's easily done with a writing pad with carbon paper between each sheet. You write the items, prices and tax, rip off one sheet to give to the customer and another sheet for the books. I checked, these seem to still be sold at office supply places, so there is no excuse.
Not sure about the Netherlands, but that's illegal in some parts. There are laws that sales MUST be recorded electronically.
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'Those who can, do; those who can't, teach' -George Bernard Shaw
We extended that at a technical college I went to for a while because so many of the teachers were downright incompetent. "Those who can, do; those who can't, teach; those who can't teach work here."
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You either misunderstood, misremembered or were misinformed. As long as I've been taking the trains (20 years or so) here, the monitors have always updated with schedule changes. Even when the information screens were still analogue, they updated with delays and track changes. It might be that what you heard only applied to international trains, those have generally lagged behind technology-wise (though nowadays ther…
Not true. It's not if the screens get updated. They do not get updated based on the actual train on the track but from information info you can infer from an pre-established schedule. Let me tell more about what prompted the conversation with the platform manager. I was staying at a hotel in Amsterdam while doing an IT project in the north of the country. One of the days took the wrong train. At that time, I just att…
Not true in general. The screens do actually get updated based on the actual schedule when there are track changes and/or delays. They don't stubbornly stick to the pre-planned schedule. I've seen that happen countless times. That said, occasionally I've seen the screens lag behind reality a bit, usually during and around big disturbances.
> Edit: Looking at this example from 6 months ago...Continues to happen:-)
> https://community.ns.nl/dienstregeling-59/geen-sprinter-maar...
This example doesn't support your argument: there's not even a claim there that the screens weren't correct.
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Not true. It's not if the screens get updated. They do not get updated based on the actual train on the track but from information info you can infer from an pre-established schedule. Let me tell more about what prompted the conversation with the platform manager. I was staying at a hotel in Amsterdam while doing an IT project in the north of the country. One of the days took the wrong train. At that time, I just att…
> Not true. It's not if the screens get updated. They do not get updated based on the actual train on the track but from information info you can infer from an pre-established schedule. Not true in general. The screens do actually get updated based on the actual schedule when there are track changes and/or delays. They don't stubbornly stick to the pre-planned schedule. I've seen that happen countless times. That sai…
"...Ik zeg “als het goed was” want soms gebeurt het bij vertragingen wel eens dat de schermen een verkeerde trein aangeven..."
"...I say “if it was good” because sometimes it happens with delays that the screens indicate the wrong train..."
"Due to the enormous impact of the failure in the IT system, it is unfortunately not possible to run any trains today." // => "Due to the enormous impact of the failure in the IT system, NS cannot run trains today."
"Although the cause of the failure has now been resolved, the impact is considerable. To be able to start up reliably, systems must be updated and trains must be brought to the right place. That takes time. For our passengers, this is extremely unpleasant news." // => "Although we have fixed the cause of the failure, the failure impacted most of our customers. To fix this failure so that trains would start reliably, we needed to return all trains to a central depot, which took nearly 12 hours. We apologize for the extremely unpleasant interruption."
"The expectation is that tomorrow morning the normal timetable can largely be resumed. The night trains can still run." // => We expect to resume minor operation with night trains first and then major operations tomorrow morning.
"The IT failure occurred at the end of the morning. It affected the system that generates up-to-date schedules for trains and staff. This system is important for safe and scheduled operations: if there is an incident somewhere, the system adjusts itself accordingly. This was not possible due to the failure." // => The IT failure occured at 11am in the scheduling system, a major requirement for safe operation; if train operations are interrupted at one location, the system normally reroutes other trains to prevent collisions. This system failed.
"The international trains are not affected by this failure. For information about the timetables of other transporters, passengers can consult the websites of these transporters." // => The failure did not affect international trains. If you have an inquiry about other transportation services, please consult those services.
"The journey planner is updated." // => We updated the journey planner accordingly to account for the interruptions.
// Generally the use of "passive voice" indicates poorly-taught grammar, however the use could also indicate desire to avoid responsibility.
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From the notice: > It affected the system that generates up-to-date schedules for trains and staff. ...boy oh boy did trying to look into what NS uses for crew scheduling ever send me down a rabbit hole. I don't know if the systems have changed but while poking around online I found this[1] doc about the Netherlands' timetable revamp around 2006 and it talks about the complexity of TURNI-- their on-the-fly crew sched…
> sidenote: If anyone out there is an SAP specialist ns.nl looks like a pretty great place to work: 36hr week, 5 weeks vacation, pension, and free unlimited 2nd class + low cost 1st class train travel. Those are pretty standard terms here in .NL. 36 hours is considered fulltime by most employers, including government and semi-government. Pension is offered almost everywhere and at least 4 weeks vacation is the legal…
It is a great place to work. A nice atmosphere, good coffee and they embraced change (in this case Scaled Agile) better than most places I have seen. They are often listed as top-5 best places to work and I can see why.
This post is a fascinating use of grammatic passive voice. The hallmark is gratuitous use of "being" verbs, i.e. "is,was". Passive voice is a way to avoid using active voice, which is an implicit way to avoid responsibility for an error. "Due to the enormous impact of the failure in the IT system, it is unfortunately not possible to run any trains today." // => "Due to the enormous impact of the failure in the IT sys…
"Who are we? NS is active in the public transportation sector. We encourage the use of public transportation and keep the Netherlands moving. Our travellers are our 1st, 2nd and 3rd priority in all of our activities, and we do our utmost to make their trip as pleasant and sustainable as possible from door to door."
This is also fascinating. I would expect to find "NS (Netherlands Service) provides rail services for the entire country". Instead they choose vague grammar, more the idea of NS rather than what NS actually is.
"I am a programmer" => "I encourage the use of computers to provide solutions for common business problems". Just a strange use of grammar.
This post is a fascinating use of grammatic passive voice. The hallmark is gratuitous use of "being" verbs, i.e. "is,was". Passive voice is a way to avoid using active voice, which is an implicit way to avoid responsibility for an error. "Due to the enormous impact of the failure in the IT system, it is unfortunately not possible to run any trains today." // => "Due to the enormous impact of the failure in the IT sys…
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A couple years ago, politicians in Poland wanted to do a quick change to the country's universal pension system. The change had to be quick to score some kind of political win. They wrote the new law and went on with quickly pushing it through parliament. To their surprise, sometime along the legislative process , the contractor responsible for maintenance and changes in the pension system informed them that they can…
Could they not make it retroactive?