J_McQuade

19 ms·

61.
by J_McQuade 16y ago
I can't stand this sort of article. They reek of naivety. When I was at university (and thus part of the ' general college body' mentioned in the article), I did what mattered to me. General mass-socialising didn't really matter to me, so
62.
by J_McQuade 16y ago
As somebody who has recently shed a large amount of weight - and has thus been forced to undergo a wallet-shattering number of wardrobe-replacements - this does not surprise me a bit. A drop of eight inches in waist over about 9 months mean
63.
by J_McQuade 16y ago
While I don't know much about old what old stuff might be run by 'proper' tech people, I do know a DJ in Bristol who still mixes everything on an Atari ST. He's moderately popular, too, but that could be more due to his being 'part of the f
64.
by J_McQuade 16y ago
Upvoted for the PAIP mention - Any book that can totally shift your conception of what programs can do within the first three chapters has to be up there. I know plenty of CS students from university that currently work writing software (
65.
by J_McQuade 16y ago
I often sketch out code, short stories, or (to me) fleetingly puzzling mathematics with a notepad and pen. Try it. It's the most versatile note-taking system ever devised. Also, it has the plus-side of being 'interesting'. People are attrac
66.
by J_McQuade 16y ago
I also don't buy this fellow's argument that lisp is the only language in which people rely on the editor to help them figure the the scope of expressions Figuring out scope can be the least of your worries - I've known python programmers
67.
by J_McQuade 16y ago
I must admit that I didn't start using paredit-mode until I began hacking in Clojure, and find it useful for just this reason. I have since 'seen the light', of course (and now have little idea how I managed to get by without it), but in CL
68.
by J_McQuade 16y ago
Makes me wonder how many other web services could offer useful amounts of their (usually unintuitive (for non-web programmers)) API's functionality with a simple, unixy, command-line tool. This is going to save fans of scripting languages a
69.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
I've taken flames for saying so in the past, but it bears repeating: Having a publicly funded news source in your country that is required by its very charter not to pander to political or corporate interests is utterly invaluable, despite
70.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
No, I'm saying that the choice between joining an organisation that gives you aid packages to distribute and one that gives you a rifle isn't as clear-cut as you implied. Not for the majority of people who end up joining the forces, anyway,
71.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
If I walk down the road right now, I will not see billboards encouraging me to join the Red Cross.
72.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
> One issue I had with the article though, is the overuse of hyperbole. There is no indication of how much of it was fact, and how much was embellishments and exaggerations. No, I didn't notice that it was by Jeremy Clarkson to start wi
73.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
That's stung me a few times, actually - when American friends of mine talk about their interest in Asian cinema, there's still a slight mental delay before I realise that they don't mean Bollywood. Also, when I was at university, a black fr
74.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
I tried covering up bits with my hand, with bits of paper, and staring at it with varying intensities - I still didn't believe it until I loaded it up in Gimp and checked the colour values. It seems our perception of colour could be like ou
75.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
I use it on my netbook, which goes more or less everywhere with me. It's not only far simpler for, say, my dad (who is still slightly unsure whether computers fall under the realm of science or witchcraft - both being bad), but it also make
76.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
Quite off-topic, I'm sure, but I can't help but wonder if the central image in that letterhead inspired the look of Dr Who's Daleks. I love finding hidden references like that.
77.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
I always let out a disappointed sigh when I have to remind people of things like this, but tomorrow is Wednesday for a lot of the world.
78.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
Maybe there's something to newLisp, but any time I see a group with that flavor of persecution complex ("All the criticism is wrong because they just don't understand!") I take pause. To be honest, that could describe almost the entire (v
79.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
I'd love to see the code for such a bot! Well, me and a thousand NLP researchers, I'm sure. [edit] NLP being Natural Language Processing, rather than Neuro-Linguistic Programming ;)
80.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
I'd say Practical Common Lisp. While I actually favour all of the other books myself, I think that PCL is the better bet for a publisher, concentrating as it does on themes more relevant to the average non-lisp programmer. (I'd probably pic
81.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
Now there's an infinitely-answerable question! I don't think bout what would happen if my pineal gland turned into trifle, or the implications of the increasing variety of hair-care products on Afro-Vietnamese relations, or how many M&M
82.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
As sort of an aside: I'm living in England, and have a friend with a very (English) nationalistic bent - and he actually identifies far more with, say, our Indian or Polish communities than he does with the angry, ignorant, BNP style person
83.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
It's something to think about. That's HN in a nutshell, as far as I'm concerned.
84.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
I suppose it's a stretch, but there is the implied point of many people seeming to think that the software 'does all the work', in a sense. You see it all over the place, too - how many old-school rock fans believe that electronic musicians
85.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
In the poorer places of the country, it is far easier to get fast food than food from a grocery store I was speaking to an American friend of mine recently and he brought up a very similar point. I simply could not understand how fast foo
86.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
Depends on the definition of 'evil' - I used DeCSS for a while and, according to the MPAA, the guys who made that were basically Satan with a modem.
87.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
I often wonder how this sort of mawkish spam continues to have a foothold in the internet.
88.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
I hate to jump in and sound like Mr. Politically Correct, but I actually felt embarrassed while reading that article. A gay man adds a gay character to a series, while continuing (if not even emphasising ) the hero's use of knowledge and s
89.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
America's?
90.
by J_McQuade 17y ago
"It's simply too far removed from the (object-oriented, semi-functional) Common Lisp programming model of the last decades" ~ahem~ Common Lisp and Lisp are not equal. Well, maybe in a sense, but they're definitely not eql. Anyway, I'm sti

More ›