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What stackoverflow is good at
comp.databases.theory comp.databases.theory
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What stackoverflow is good at -
05-18-2009
, 05:37 AM
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Where I think it doesn't work so well is at fundamental education, changing the way a person thinks. |
--
Roy
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Where I think it doesn't work so well is at fundamental education, changing the way a person thinks. |
But Stackoverflow is probably better than Usenet when it comes to quick
answers.
--
Troels
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On Stackoverflow, I miss Usenet's discussion threading. |
Tony
--
Tony Toews, Microsoft Access MVP
Tony's Main MS Access pages - http://www.granite.ab.ca/accsmstr.htm
Tony's Microsoft Access Blog - http://msmvps.com/blogs/access/
Granite Fleet Manager http://www.granitefleet.com/
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Where I think it doesn't work so well is at fundamental education, changing the way a person thinks. |
right direction…
This is a general problem, roused by the Internet. Twenty years ago
the main source of information were books, magazines and maybe
discussions with coworkers. Today, anyone can write a blog or article
(it is amazing how many people feel the need to publish every “gotcha”
they learned).
With no quality control at all, most of the Internet articles are at
best “semi-coherent”. But there are reasons for which they are
successful. First, it is far easier to google for something than to
read a book. Second, over-simplification makes things easier to digest
by beginners. Third, most people are not interested in doing things
right, but in doing things fast.
One may argue that someone will eventually demystify wrong
information. However it is not so easy, to discover that something is
wrong one needs to be educated. Since education is more and more
substituted by the cookbook approach there aren’t many people who can
actually correct things up.
Again, one might argue that the vast majority cannot be wrong. But it
is so? To a total ignorant an Internet article wrote by a semi-
literate might look brilliant. Science it is not democracy, it is not
the number of people sustaining a point of view that matters but their
quality. Unfortunately there is too much garbage and too few people
able to demystify it.
Correcting information over Internet converges slowly, and wrong
information tends to corrupt more and more minds until someone
demystifies it. Before someone does it, it might be already raised to
the rank of best practice (or even de facto standard). Even when
someone will spot out something, his point of view might be too
difficult to understand by most people and hence ignored (Fabian
Pascal comes quickly into mind).
Unfortunately there are some sad consequences of this state of facts.
If you try to do something the right way, against so called “best-
practices”, you are often looked as lunatic and even worst, as counter-
productive. So one often has to pact with the devil to meet a deadline
or even to save his job. This is really sad.
#6
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On 18 Mai, 13:37, "Walter Mitty" <wami... (AT) verizon (DOT) net> wrote: Where I think it doesn't work so well is at fundamental education, changing the way a person thinks. Just my two cents... I think it does, but unfortunately not in the right direction… This is a general problem, roused by the Internet. Twenty years ago the main source of information were books, magazines and maybe discussions with coworkers. Today, anyone can write a blog or article (it is amazing how many people feel the need to publish every “gotcha” they learned). With no quality control at all, most of the Internet articles are at best “semi-coherent”. But there are reasons for which they are successful. First, it is far easier to google for something than to read a book. Second, over-simplification makes things easier to digest by beginners. Third, most people are not interested in doing things right, but in doing things fast. One may argue that someone will eventually demystify wrong information. However it is not so easy, to discover that something is wrong one needs to be educated. Since education is more and more substituted by the cookbook approach there aren’t many people who can actually correct things up. Again, one might argue that the vast majority cannot be wrong. But it is so? To a total ignorant an Internet article wrote by a semi- literate might look brilliant. Science it is not democracy, it is not the number of people sustaining a point of view that matters but their quality. Unfortunately there is too much garbage and too few people able to demystify it. Correcting information over Internet converges slowly, and wrong information tends to corrupt more and more minds until someone demystifies it. Before someone does it, it might be already raised to the rank of best practice (or even de facto standard). Even when someone will spot out something, his point of view might be too difficult to understand by most people and hence ignored (Fabian Pascal comes quickly into mind). Unfortunately there are some sad consequences of this state of facts. If you try to do something the right way, against so called “best- practices”, you are often looked as lunatic and even worst, as counter- productive. So one often has to pact with the devil to meet a deadline or even to save his job. This is really sad. Yes it is. That's why Fabian Pascal has lost interest in the subject |
#7
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On 20 mai, 13:41, robu... (AT) gmail (DOT) com wrote: Unfortunately there are some sad consequences of this state of facts. If you try to do something the right way, against so called ´best- practices¡, you are often looked as lunatic and even worst, as counter- productive. So one often has to pact with the devil to meet a deadline or even to save his job. This is really sad. Yes it is. That's why Fabian Pascal has lost interest in the subject as he considers a lost cause. |
crap designs after they've proven to be crap, and you get to strut and
swagger and just generally make yourself obnoxious. For example, last
summer I was presented with 4,500 lines of code that were supposed to do
a job that had to run in 4 hours. With 2/3rds of the ultimate expected
volume of data it was taking 6 hours. I won't bore you with the
details, but after I found the other 10,000 lines of code and tore the
whole thing up and started again, I got it down to 250 lines and it ran
in 22 seconds. I was unbearable to be around for some time after that.
The punchline of the story is that when the customer went back to the
original supplier and showed them, the original supplier just shrugged
and airly said, yes, that's what we do now too.
I don't care. I made my fee. I had my fun. (And I'm having it here
again. Life is good.)
--
Roy
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