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Submitted by umafuckit

Comment: Re:Lego Mindstorms (Score 1) 876

by mrbluze (#46192275) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Why Are We Still Writing Text-Based Code?

Try Lego Mindstorms

2: unlike variable names in traditiona code wires in labview typically don't have names. This makes it hard to understand what each wire is for (yes i'm pretty sure there is a way to label them, but it's something you have to do extra not something that naturally comes as part of the coding like in traditional languages) 3: I can never remember what all the little pictures on the blocks mean. 4: I find connecting the blocks very fiddly.

Having said that some people seem to like it.

That's exactly it. You find yourself going back to words. And the simplest use of words is just plain old text, maybe with colors, maybe with shades, maybe with lines joining relevant bits of text for visual guidance, but it's still text. Better still, there is a thing called a keyboard, with all the letters you'll ever want to use and cleverly designed to make use of all your fingers (as opposed to a mouse or touch screen which in practice reduces you to at most three fingers and a lot of elbow/wrist work ... maybe that has appeal for some!), and spares the use of your visual cortex (large, energy intensive part of the brain) to endlessly process images and lines. I can do several lines of programming without looking at the screen but maybe looking at a spec or template before I have to look up and see if it's right. Can't imageine how you'd do that with icon dragging AFAIK.

Comment: Lego Mindstorms (Score 4, Interesting) 876

by mrbluze (#46191741) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Why Are We Still Writing Text-Based Code?



Comment: Re:Our community transcends any mere "place". (Score 1) 100

look forward to some other new site/wiki/blog/Fuhrerbunker/casino where I can digitally rub shoulders with y'all in the VERY near future. There are already several posts in other current threads about a possible; who knows what other new purpose-built destinations might come to be? But I truly have very little further hope for this fascinating & enlightening place that I've been visiting since before 9/11. It's a place that I miss already, if you know what I mean.

Whenever it's ready! I'll subscribe too.

Comment: Re:Nvidia has NOTHING to lose at this stage (Score 4, Insightful) 66

by mrbluze (#46131461) Attached to: NVIDIA Open-Sources Tegra K1 Graphics Support

If you can't compete, make your documentation open-source in the hope this will boot-strap some extra business.

Too little too late. For YEARS we have been screaming for nvidia drivers that aren't buggy, closed and unstable, to the point of writing Nuveau, an open source hack (remarkably good but still crippled). Rot in hell, NVIDIA - I have wasted enough money on your hardware.

Comment: Productivity (Score 5, Insightful) 503

by mrbluze (#46130681) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Are Linux Desktop Users More Pragmatic Now Or Is It Inertia?

Everything has to do with productivity. Sure we all like a bit of novelty and it's fun to tinker with new features of a desktop or user interface, but the majority of these innovations are never used (if the user has the choice), but the recent Linux desktops (Gnome mostly) have forced a new set of heuristics on a user base that increasingly uses Linux for productivity and not just tinkering.

It's a waste of time to have to learn a new way of doing everything when the existing ways work already. That is why 'classic desktop' is favored. It works, and although new things might work, they have not proven to work better.

Comment: Re:Classified (Score 1) 94

by mrbluze (#46130371) Attached to: In an Age of Cyber War, Where Are the Cyber Weapons?

REALLY stupid question. It is not like they are going to wave them about for everyone to see. They most likely exist.

Yes, the weaponization is built into every Intel processor, and probably most other processors and controllers. The weapons in cyber warfare start with the smart phones we point at our own heads and will shortly be the cars which can crash us into the next tree or fail to stop at the next busy intersection.

Comment: Re:Not good news (Score 2) 92

by mrbluze (#46054481) Attached to: Bees Are Building Nests With Our Waste Plastic



Comment: Re:2014 (Score 2) 109

by mrbluze (#46041789) Attached to: Chrome Bugs Lets Sites Listen To Your Private Conversations

I think it's prudent to question whether this bug in Google's browser is intentional or unintentional.

I think it is safe to assume, for any verbal discussion of importance, that all smart phones in the room have their microphones on with voice recognition running. Sure, most of the time they are not, but:

1. They are the perfect bugging tool.

2. The person you are talking to might be recording everything anyway

and 3. if you are in any kind of position that could possibly be envied, someone is bound to be doing this to you.

The Universe is populated by stable things. -- Richard Dawkins