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I married my wife. tomorrow is the 18 year mark, Dang I just realized that I no longer feel so young.
Programming is a race between programmers trying to build bigger and better idiot proof programs, and the universe trying to build bigger and better idiots, so far... the universe is winning.
A graduation ceremony is an event where the commencement speaker tells thousands of students dressed in identical caps and gowns that 'individuality' is the key to success
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How many years do you need to have done befoe you can apply for parole?
You cant outrun the world, but there is no harm in getting a head start
Real stupidity beats artificial intelligence every time.
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in light of the fact that I don't think there are to many out there who would put up with me, its life without parole..
Programming is a race between programmers trying to build bigger and better idiot proof programs, and the universe trying to build bigger and better idiots, so far... the universe is winning.
A graduation ceremony is an event where the commencement speaker tells thousands of students dressed in identical caps and gowns that 'individuality' is the key to success
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"I DO"
The longest sentence that can be formed with two words.
-Richard
Hit any user to continue.
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Unfortunately, the marriage licence does not have an expiry date.
Real men don't use instructions. They are only the manufacturers opinion on how to put the thing together.
Manfred R. Bihy: "Looks as if OP is learning resistant."
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What'd you get her?
Craigslist Troll: litaly@comcast.net
"I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours. "
— Hunter S. Thompson
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so far a cold.... we are both sick and will most likely have to postpone the fancy dinner and whatnot for a few days..
par for the course.
This is of course just a few days after I told her to quit her job since her illness will not let her safely work anyway.
Programming is a race between programmers trying to build bigger and better idiot proof programs, and the universe trying to build bigger and better idiots, so far... the universe is winning.
A graduation ceremony is an event where the commencement speaker tells thousands of students dressed in identical caps and gowns that 'individuality' is the key to success
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Congratulations on surviving 18 years!
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You are probably aware of all the announcements regarding Windows Phone 7 and Windows 8 and their "supposedly" futuristic programming environment (HTML5 + Javascript). Yeah, futuristic for their wallet but what about devs (us) ? Can you afford learning a new programming model every 5 years ??? Personally, no.
Being a pro-MS for years, fluent in .NET's C#, I can't just trust these latest announcements on the future of their platform, they might succeed or not; who knows.
But me, I have a life, need to eat, pay bills etc ... Today I can't refrain myself to remove some of my eggs from my MS basket and put them somewhere else, just to be safe. I am also tired of these announcements of those billionaires, these guys can say/do whatever, they will never get homeless; but us, we can lose a job, as fast as IT techs do appear/disappear; that already happened to me.
Being a strong defendant for years of managed environment, C# etc ... all the MS techs, recently I had some really bad experience with them, like following the XNA guidelines for importing content through their damn content pipeline and here's how it ended : More than a dozen of classes just for importing three formats; in the end to find out that the only practical way was to import the raw data as is and make extra processing in the game; in short, the pipeline was a total time-waist for that case. So their 'solely MS' techs advices I am just getting tired of that; and what about openness/running on other plaftorms ? Also, add the uncertainty of the Mono on Linux/Mac platforms, now I am understanding the power of plain C/C++.
The first strategic choice i am having is to favor OpenGL against DirectX, GL being simply everywhere; DX only on MS "things". By sticking on GL, I am quite confident it will be helpful one day for my career; at least more than WPF ...
Also, being a WP7 owner I just feel I will be abandoned very soon, I am going to get that pseudo Mango update but after that, bye bye WP7 because Win8 is coming.
Honestly guys, are you serious ?
That is the first time I am reconsidering my IT 'bagage'; to save my ass.
Since this week I am finding the Linux/Open-source/C/C++ combo quite interesting,
in terms of saving/recycling yourself in the IT world; and yes, freedom !
What are you feelings about all that ?
I am asking all that because I need your advice(s)/view(s), I am a little lost to be honest.
What would you do in that case ?
Thanks a lot 
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I don't think the employment scene will change much in the next 5-10 years. DotNET has become ubiquitous, and unmanaged C++ will still work on Windows 8 (which is Windows 7 with a touch-screen wrapper, and the "classic" Win7 interface still being available for us Luddites).
The REALLY big question is whether or not Microsoft will still be shipping Windows ten years from now. Even if they aren't, corporations have way too much money invested to abandon the OS themselves (at least right away), so we still have about 15-20 years left of solid employement before we really have to change.
We will be the Cobol programmers of the 21st century.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010 ----- You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010 ----- "Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997
modified on Friday, June 10, 2011 10:43 AM
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Your first saying is really heartwarming to me
About the other, I have to say that I never thought of it from your view. Of course, there's a lot of investment from companies on this platform, you are right it's not for tomorrow. For me it just sounds like Windows won't be Windows like we used to know anymore; now there is serious concurrence and the means of accessing technologies (the hardware) is changing, tablets for instance. I am quite skeptical regarding the porting of Windows on other platforms like phones, tablets (against iOS/Android who started from scratch) They can do it technically, I am sure of that but you have seen the sudden omnipresence of the two platforms I said above, and the inability (as of yet) of MS to counter or at least provide comparatively exciting tools.
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John Simmons / outlaw programmer wrote: We will be the Cobol programmers of the 21st century.
ROFL
The 3-legged stool of understanding is held up by history, languages, and mathematics. Equipped with these three you can learn anything you want to learn. But if you lack any one of them you are just another ignorant peasant with dung on your boots. R. A. H.
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I know exactly what you're saying with regards to MS technology. I've been having similar thoughts lately, and in fact my latest project I decided to make cross platform. It's C++, but it has to compile as is on both Windows and Linux. (At least the back end, non UI stuff.)
Still, I'm not sure Linux is the future... I keep telling myself I need to get into iOS and Android programming. But my current job won't pay for me to learn that as it really won't ever apply here, and I just don't have the desire to learn new techs on my own time anymore (maybe I will in 15 years once both my kids are in college). I started down the WPF path a couple months ago, but now I've lost all enthusiasm for it. Maybe once I focus on UI again I'll get back into it, but now, meh.
I don't think current the current crop of MS technology will leave anyone out in the cold for a long time though, it does have a lot of traction. Mostly it just doesn't excite me anymore. Something about the evolution of the mobile/tablet space reminds me of what the PC platform went through 20 years ago. Or maybe I'm just being nostalgic for when I had the energy of an 18 year old.
He said, "Boy I'm just old and lonely,
But thank you for your concern,
Here's wishing you a Happy New Year."
I wished him one back in return.
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Yes, the Linux future, I don't know too, all I know is that it has been more and more popular; and not the least, more accessible thanks to GUIs.
I have been with WPF almost since day one, it is very good but sometimes it is overkill, the ridiculous amount of extra work that can occur for validation, for instance. You've been told you can do XAML only but in the end you find yourself in need of extra classes to make it work. Also the speed of execution, especially drawings, even if you use their bangin' StreamGeometry and its friends, the good ol' GDI still performs faster on a couple of cases.
I am quite nostalgic about the 90's in computing, there's something from it that I can't find on newer techs, I find today's stuff more metallic, less soulful, in the end less exciting 
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Aybe wrote: Can you afford learning a new programming model every 5 years ???
Well you have to or risk being out-dated. Being a programmer is like being a doctor you have to remain up to date with the latest.
That is one of the joy of programming for me, learning never stops. If you want to make excuse for not learning move to management.
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Rama Krishna Vavilala wrote: That is one of the joy of programming for me, learning never stops. If you want to make excuse for not learning move to management.
Two questions:
How old are you?
How long have you been working as a programmer?
There's a difference between continuous learning - Good
and planned obsolescence - Bad.
Early in your career it's no biggie. Planned obsolescence washes over you as you burn through technologies with a voracious thirst for knowledge, and all the free time a person could want.
Once you've been through a couple of planned obsolescences, where skills that were difficult to acquire are scrapped before you even get a chance to master them...well....it starts to grate a bit more.
Early in your career (i.e. pre-Wife and Kids) you'll go through new technologies like Pez. Two three new languages/frameworks at a time, multiple platforms, you can do it all.
Later finding an hour in the evening to figure out a new design pattern is a push.
I keep on learning. I'm rarely without a book, I grab those magic hours when kid is asleep to try out new things. I'll be hanging out with some great people this weekend in Bristol talking Code.
But I have no interest in going back to basics with some new application model, learning how to do all the same stuff all over again with new tools for the sake of it. I ignored Visual Studio until the 2005 version, and I never embraced the browser. Browser based development is still a pain in the ass as far as I can see. I also ignored Java completely.
I've never suffered in terms of employment because I refused to embrace some or other technology. Thankfully the stuff I enjoy working on is still in sufficient demand.
-Rd
Hit any user to continue.
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I agree with you, the thing is that we start from scratch every time ... why should we ?
That's what pushed me to think why shouldn't I approach more prominent languages like C for instance;
I would have to spend time for adapting to each platform but I won't lose my base of code. After all, there is code from 1992 in today's Windows ... What I find incredibly insolent is that they promote .NET but their killer apps (Windows, Office) are (and will remain) C++; what just enforces my concern/actions in saving some of my eggs 
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Richard A. Dalton wrote: How long have you been working as a programmer?
I started my career when Visual C++ version was 4.2 and Java 2 was hot.
The difference between now and then was that I used to go in details of one technology or area you must say. These days I can learn a tech more fast as I understand I do not know to go into nitty gritty details till I use that particular technology. I am able to get overview and grab the main concepts of most technologies very fast. When I really need to use a tech, I can go into the detail.
I just keep aside one hour and whatever spare time I have (e.g. waiting for someone/somebody) reading. Though the topic varies from business to technology. I think I am learning far more than what I was learning at the start of my career because I have learned the way to learn.
For instance, I managed to learn Ruby on Rails, Go, ErLang, Scala and Haskell in the last 6 months. I am no way a master of them but given a job on any one of them, I can know finish it.
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That's not really about not wanting to learn, I am willing to.
Rather that it takes time to get mature and comfortable with a technology. Always looking to learn but I'm also seeking to apply these learnings Sometimes the amount of new stuff released is incredibly high, you can't always cope up with the pace of releases.
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Just over 3 years ago I made a transition from targeting windows only using technologies like MFC, ADO, COM, directX, mssql server to using Qt as the framework and CMake to generate the projects, build system, packaging and unit tests this way I can build (at least in the future) my projects for more than just the Windows platform. In the early going I was doing parallel development in kdevelop under 64 bit gentoo linux and visual studio but as time constraints become tighter I abandoned Kdevelop for the time being.
John
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I don't know C++, only C#. Been doing BASIC when I was young, I landed a few years ago now on .NET but I have always been interested in doing C++. To be honest I never liked these MFC and ATL templates you have on the IDE. I still don't know what these are beside being libraries but from what I've seen, it's like a proprietary C++ API/SDK/Call it whatever you want, I don't wanna know about, being quite complex and even more since I'm from C#; I decided to rather try plain old C that these obscure ports. I'm not saying these are bad, tons of people work on it, but I haven't really found an interest on these and today definitely not.
And not the least, yes, time constraints; if days were longer, yes why not, but they aren't 
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MS tech will not go down at least not in the near future.
Yeah if the whole thing with win8 (one interface for all(PC,notebooks, tablets, phones) yeah the Metro UI),
so if this fails big time then yeah trouble ahead. Notice ahead. Not in the near future.
But learning new things never hurts.
All the best,
Dan
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Yes you are right, it's not for tomorrow. Learning doesn't hurt yes but it takes time, as well as being comfortable with the technology. 
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I was HollyHooo but got tired of it and Sebastien was taken.
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