Shameful new news bit: Idaho congressman found with sexual misdemeanor in public washroom.
In another older tidbit: another congressman was caught sending sexual explicit messages to teens. Outrageous abhorrent acts.
Why are the people running our country so unworthy?
I expect high standards from these high profile jobs. Waita minute, that's BASIC moral standard.
Just how corrupted are the leaders of the country right now?
The House of Representatives was intended to be filled with energetic young people, with age requirement of just 25. The Senate requirement is a bit older, but still young at 30. Now we have dirty old men. How sad is this.
To all such shameful congressmen: resign, disappear from the media, live in exile, repent, beg forgiveness. That's the best course of action for you. BTW, you will live in history book forever in the list of sicko.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Earthlink struggling
Saw a news article saying once long time ISP has some problems. http://www.bizjournals.com/orlando/stories/2007/08/27/daily20.html
I became an Earthlink customer when I needed modem dialing.... There were no DSL in 1996. I also liked to maintain a personal homepage... There were no blogging back then. I also needed a non-work email account! There were no hotmail or yahoo mail back then. I also needed to run a restaurant homepage, and it was quite expensive.
There were also no internet package bundle with phone company like AT&T+Yahoo DSL.
I picked Earthlink... the biggest player back then was America Online, but there were lots of problems in volume handling. I chose a more reliable 2nd place instead.
I was a happy customer. Easy install. Rarely have any problems.
I was Earthlink customer until I have a house and need a new phone line. Cheaper to bundle internet with phone service.
Now there seems to be less noise about choosing Internet Provider. Everyone go to big cable or phone companies for that now. ISP: perhaps you are also a dying industry, along with cassettes, VHS, films...
I became an Earthlink customer when I needed modem dialing.... There were no DSL in 1996. I also liked to maintain a personal homepage... There were no blogging back then. I also needed a non-work email account! There were no hotmail or yahoo mail back then. I also needed to run a restaurant homepage, and it was quite expensive.
There were also no internet package bundle with phone company like AT&T+Yahoo DSL.
I picked Earthlink... the biggest player back then was America Online, but there were lots of problems in volume handling. I chose a more reliable 2nd place instead.
I was a happy customer. Easy install. Rarely have any problems.
I was Earthlink customer until I have a house and need a new phone line. Cheaper to bundle internet with phone service.
Now there seems to be less noise about choosing Internet Provider. Everyone go to big cable or phone companies for that now. ISP: perhaps you are also a dying industry, along with cassettes, VHS, films...
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Maddening weather
Lightning! Thundercrashes! followed by pouring rain! I saw water rushing out from my neighbor's gutters! Then, a lightning lighted up the sky and when it is done flashing my monitor become black! I've got a power outage! My lightbulb still works, but half as bright. Then it is gone too. My land based phone also stopped working. The only working device I have at home is my cell phone!
How powerless are we without electrical power. No TV, no computers, no light, nothing. Fortunately electricity came back on after a few hours.
It is unusual to see such big rain in Chicago lasting for so long. We are lucky. Wisconsin is all flooded and homes destroyed, and lightning kills! Yikes, maddening weather.
Is global warming striking us?
Unfortunately there is little we can do to undo the damages done to the environment as we watch Dean and other alphabetically ordered hurricanes continue to strike.
Fortunately not in Chicago.
How powerless are we without electrical power. No TV, no computers, no light, nothing. Fortunately electricity came back on after a few hours.
It is unusual to see such big rain in Chicago lasting for so long. We are lucky. Wisconsin is all flooded and homes destroyed, and lightning kills! Yikes, maddening weather.
Is global warming striking us?
Unfortunately there is little we can do to undo the damages done to the environment as we watch Dean and other alphabetically ordered hurricanes continue to strike.
Fortunately not in Chicago.
Friday, August 17, 2007
Stock Scares and Spell Check
I never quite understand stocks and markets. Perhaps that's why I am not a rich man. It is complex and has a LOT of psychological factors. Ooh somebody is fearing bad mortage loans. News spread, and boom, stock crash. HUGE, black headlines saying this is biggest crash since 911. So many people dead in flood and earthquakes don't get this much coverage.
In the past few years, real estate became outrageously expensive. People are crazy for get-rich-quick schemes of buying and finding the victim to sell to. Banks are hungry for business so they let more people borrow. Of course such market is going to bust. We've all seen it. Why are you surprised?
Here is the link I am reading, http://www.cnbc.com/id/20319066, and I only read 1 sentence, copy and pasted here.
"Wall Street's mood is significantly better today than it has been in recent days, after the Federal Reserve surprised the markets by cutting its discount rate by an aggressive half-percentage point, from 6.25% tp 5.75%."
I don't quite understand how changing a percentage can stabilize stock crash but that's not what I want to discuss here.
Is "tp" Turbo Pascal? or is it a typo. Ok, perhaps they fixed it by the time you check out the page. Editors are so rush to get this story out without spell check. And this is the FIRST sentence. Don't look for MY spelling mistakes in my blog here. I don't make a living as a newsreporter. I demand better spelling ability from news websites.
In the past few years, real estate became outrageously expensive. People are crazy for get-rich-quick schemes of buying and finding the victim to sell to. Banks are hungry for business so they let more people borrow. Of course such market is going to bust. We've all seen it. Why are you surprised?
Here is the link I am reading, http://www.cnbc.com/id/20319066, and I only read 1 sentence, copy and pasted here.
"Wall Street's mood is significantly better today than it has been in recent days, after the Federal Reserve surprised the markets by cutting its discount rate by an aggressive half-percentage point, from 6.25% tp 5.75%."
I don't quite understand how changing a percentage can stabilize stock crash but that's not what I want to discuss here.
Is "tp" Turbo Pascal? or is it a typo. Ok, perhaps they fixed it by the time you check out the page. Editors are so rush to get this story out without spell check. And this is the FIRST sentence. Don't look for MY spelling mistakes in my blog here. I don't make a living as a newsreporter. I demand better spelling ability from news websites.
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Poor Ways to Run Business on Software
1. Use Crappy Products from Crappy Vendors
So there was a sales team with uniforms, hard handshake and rocking flash/powerpoint demos that fooled you into a crappy product. You also agreed to pay them outrageous amount of support $. Later you found out it is impossible to tweak and you call them to help. You have to pay them additional $200 an hour for consultants (who bill you $50 a meal). What idiot consultant will do the work right and get out? It is a recipe for pension, and their grandkids education fund.
Poor product with outrageous support cost is not good business. Know when to dump crappy products. Don't run a business on top of it.
2. Hire Consultants to do work; leave your employees fixing their work
Some people tend to believe they MUST pay somebody else to get the jobs done when they have employees themselves. Then, regular employees who did not participate in that type of work are told to maintain such work. Look, you must trust your employees being able to do new work. What tech knowhow these outsourced guys have? Both your employees and the outsourced guys look at job sites to find work. Maintaining other people's work is boring and difficult because they didn't write in the first place.
3. Set it and forget it
Informercials sometimes are fun to watch. There is some cooking machine you can set it and forget. It won't burn your kitchen. Good. This happens to old apps. Somebody wrote code, deploy it, and forget it. No one knows where the source codes are and how to maintain anything. These are probably done by consultants, what do they care.
No one can afford losing source codes, must archive them, must have build-from-scratch instructions and build files. Someone must know how old apps work. Reward people financially for maintaining good docs.
4. No room for testing
Myth: 80% design 20% coding. If you design it right you write once and you are done. Outrageous myth. When you design you are in dream mode, you don't know what you say will work unless you code-compile-run. Must let your developers code and tell you how long things will take.
But the most outrageous thing is no testing. QAs come in too late and sometimes development teams don't even have any QAs. Some QAs dare to come ask developers for unit test plans. Where is YOUR plan? Also, schedule DEMANDS delivery after 1 week of testing anyway. So what if anyone finds anything. Most often there is no time to fix stuff. Why have such stiff schedule? if schedule can't be moved, why even test?
Better approach will be test as you go. Have QA team, more than 1 non-technical person please. Involve QAs early. Have QAs test frequently. Involve in the whole process. Skim on the paperworks please.
5. Security tie hands of developers
When an support issue come in, there is usually no way to log in as the user having problem and see what's going on. This is tying your hands in helping to put out a fire. Where are the logs. Give me access to it!
So there was a sales team with uniforms, hard handshake and rocking flash/powerpoint demos that fooled you into a crappy product. You also agreed to pay them outrageous amount of support $. Later you found out it is impossible to tweak and you call them to help. You have to pay them additional $200 an hour for consultants (who bill you $50 a meal). What idiot consultant will do the work right and get out? It is a recipe for pension, and their grandkids education fund.
Poor product with outrageous support cost is not good business. Know when to dump crappy products. Don't run a business on top of it.
2. Hire Consultants to do work; leave your employees fixing their work
Some people tend to believe they MUST pay somebody else to get the jobs done when they have employees themselves. Then, regular employees who did not participate in that type of work are told to maintain such work. Look, you must trust your employees being able to do new work. What tech knowhow these outsourced guys have? Both your employees and the outsourced guys look at job sites to find work. Maintaining other people's work is boring and difficult because they didn't write in the first place.
3. Set it and forget it
Informercials sometimes are fun to watch. There is some cooking machine you can set it and forget. It won't burn your kitchen. Good. This happens to old apps. Somebody wrote code, deploy it, and forget it. No one knows where the source codes are and how to maintain anything. These are probably done by consultants, what do they care.
No one can afford losing source codes, must archive them, must have build-from-scratch instructions and build files. Someone must know how old apps work. Reward people financially for maintaining good docs.
4. No room for testing
Myth: 80% design 20% coding. If you design it right you write once and you are done. Outrageous myth. When you design you are in dream mode, you don't know what you say will work unless you code-compile-run. Must let your developers code and tell you how long things will take.
But the most outrageous thing is no testing. QAs come in too late and sometimes development teams don't even have any QAs. Some QAs dare to come ask developers for unit test plans. Where is YOUR plan? Also, schedule DEMANDS delivery after 1 week of testing anyway. So what if anyone finds anything. Most often there is no time to fix stuff. Why have such stiff schedule? if schedule can't be moved, why even test?
Better approach will be test as you go. Have QA team, more than 1 non-technical person please. Involve QAs early. Have QAs test frequently. Involve in the whole process. Skim on the paperworks please.
5. Security tie hands of developers
When an support issue come in, there is usually no way to log in as the user having problem and see what's going on. This is tying your hands in helping to put out a fire. Where are the logs. Give me access to it!
Monday, August 6, 2007
Crumbling Infrastructure and Lost weapons
Minnesota bridge simply crumbled and fell into the Mississippi River. Ill-maintained bridges (more than 70,000 of them) cause every one in the nation wondering whether the bridges they cross everyday are safe.
This is happening in the most powerful nation in the world?
Ok, where are the funding for maintaining the bridges and other important infrastructure items? Perhaps all money went to fight for the war? But we are not handling the war so well either.
Another news: Lost weapons: 190,000 of them, some fell in the hands of the insurgents in Iraq.
Oh my, just how mess up are we?
America, it is time to wake up! Get your acts together! Fix things!
But we are so lazy, we like fries and we become obese. Many Americans statistics are depressing.
America can do, and should do better than that. However, it probably takes more than a new president to fix all our problems.
This is happening in the most powerful nation in the world?
Ok, where are the funding for maintaining the bridges and other important infrastructure items? Perhaps all money went to fight for the war? But we are not handling the war so well either.
Another news: Lost weapons: 190,000 of them, some fell in the hands of the insurgents in Iraq.
Oh my, just how mess up are we?
America, it is time to wake up! Get your acts together! Fix things!
But we are so lazy, we like fries and we become obese. Many Americans statistics are depressing.
America can do, and should do better than that. However, it probably takes more than a new president to fix all our problems.
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
Wonderful Math News
Actress Danica McKellar from the 1980s TV show Wonder Years is now a mathematician who wrote a math book for teenage girls: Math Doesn't Suck. See this link for details.
I like the Wonder Years, although I did not watch a lot (and didn't like the narrator involved). Teenage is truly the most wonderful time isn't it? A young boy's crush for attractive classmate is so pure and wonderful.
The attractive classmate is now a mathematican. This is great celebrity news comparing to news from other young lady celebrities such as the troubles of Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton. (but I like Lindsay!)
Although you don't have to be a mathematician to be "smart". Staying out of trouble is the basis of smart.
Now about the math book. I'd like to see it!
I probably won't need to buy a copy for myself because I probably know all the stuff in there. :) But I'd like to see how such information is presented to young girls. How to convince them math doesn't suck. If I know a young girl who needs help in math I'll buy her a copy.
America needs a learning revival, a renaissance! (Not just in math).
Spread the news that it is great to learn! Drugs and drunk driving gets you nowhere!
Here is the most wonderful, heart-warming line from the news link above, "The actress once struggled with the subject around the seventh grade, but a teacher helped her through."
The actress now probably achieved in math more than the 7th grade teacher now. 7th grade math is EASY, but helping students to learn is sometimes not so easy. Now that Danica has mastered 7th grade math (and much more), she is now doing the harder part: helping others learn. The wonderful work of great teachers are one of the true wonders in life.
If Danica can still locate the teacher, I think she should give the teacher a copy.
I like the Wonder Years, although I did not watch a lot (and didn't like the narrator involved). Teenage is truly the most wonderful time isn't it? A young boy's crush for attractive classmate is so pure and wonderful.
The attractive classmate is now a mathematican. This is great celebrity news comparing to news from other young lady celebrities such as the troubles of Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton. (but I like Lindsay!)
Although you don't have to be a mathematician to be "smart". Staying out of trouble is the basis of smart.
Now about the math book. I'd like to see it!
I probably won't need to buy a copy for myself because I probably know all the stuff in there. :) But I'd like to see how such information is presented to young girls. How to convince them math doesn't suck. If I know a young girl who needs help in math I'll buy her a copy.
America needs a learning revival, a renaissance! (Not just in math).
Spread the news that it is great to learn! Drugs and drunk driving gets you nowhere!
Here is the most wonderful, heart-warming line from the news link above, "The actress once struggled with the subject around the seventh grade, but a teacher helped her through."
The actress now probably achieved in math more than the 7th grade teacher now. 7th grade math is EASY, but helping students to learn is sometimes not so easy. Now that Danica has mastered 7th grade math (and much more), she is now doing the harder part: helping others learn. The wonderful work of great teachers are one of the true wonders in life.
If Danica can still locate the teacher, I think she should give the teacher a copy.
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