Re: FW: WTT: 1.5G of PC2700 for 1G of PC100

[Joshua Boyd]

On May 7, 2008, at 10:07 PM, Shannon Hendrix wrote:

>
>> Anything that writes directly to the video card to speed up  
>> display will bypass PC serial consoles.
>
> I have several machines where their console redirect is implemented  
> on the video card.
>
> The bottom line is we need a BIOS that puts a command line up on a  
> real serial console, no video or BIOS translation, but real console  
> support.

Right, so you are saying that you need coreboot or related systems.
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[wa2egp]

> One of the best performance charts I have ever seen is in "Programming  
> Pearls".
>
> They show a TRS-80 and a DEC Alpha doing the same job, but the TRS-80  
> code is better written.
>
> The DEC is hundreds of times faster... until the problem size  
> increases to a point at which the DEC would take 400 years to do what  
> the TRS-80 does in fifteen minutes.
>
> Excellent example of how little raw power means if you use it wrong,  
> and exactly why throwing horsepower or misguided ideology at a problem  
> is stupid.
>
> Programmers do *NOT* always cost more than computers.

Hmmmm.....time to get the Model 4 out. Anybody have TRSDOS without the Y1980 bug? :)

Bob
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[Erie Patsellis]

LDOS?

erie



wa2egp@... wrote:
>
> Hmmmm.....time to get the Model 4 out. Anybody have TRSDOS without the Y1980 bug? :)
>
> Bob
> _______________________________________________
> rescue list - http://www.sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue
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[Phil Stracchino-3]

Shannon Hendrix wrote:
> One of the best performance charts I have ever seen is in "Programming
> Pearls".
>
> They show a TRS-80 and a DEC Alpha doing the same job, but the TRS-80
> code is better written.
>
> The DEC is hundreds of times faster... until the problem size increases
> to a point at which the DEC would take 400 years to do what the TRS-80
> does in fifteen minutes.

My first reaction is that the code being run on the Alpha had to have
been frighteningly, perhaps even implausibly, bad to produce that vast
of a throughput difference between hardware so hugely different in speed
and capability while the problem size was still in a range the TRS-80
could handle at all.  (And I suspect the problem was very carefully chosen.)


--
   Phil Stracchino, CDK#2     DoD#299792458     ICBM: 43.5607, -71.355
   alaric@...   alaric@...   phil@...
          Renaissance Man, Unix ronin, Perl hacker, Free Stater
                  It's not the years, it's the mileage.
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[J. Alexander Jacocks-2]

Shannon Hendrix <shannon@...> wrote:

>  Well, I'm comp-sci and do a better job with admin than most of the admins I have met.  I frequently have to do my own admin work if I want anything to work right.
>
>  A good computer science degree is a superset of what you need for being a good system administrator.  It's mostly a matter of do you want to be an admin, or would you rather stick to more traditional comp-sci jobs.
>
>  It is more efficient in many cases to separate those jobs, but only if each side is competent and understands the needs of the other.
>
>  Most sysadmins I've worked with who just had vocational training are terrible.  They might really know the material they were taught, but have a really hard time when you get away from that.  Worse, it is impossible to explain to them why some of their decisions are a disaster for the software and running it efficiently.
>
>  Certainly an admin can self-teach themselves that knowledge, but the point is they do need to do so somehow, in order to be effective machine managers.  All of the good admins I've met went well above just vocational training, or they consulted the comp-sci guys as needed.
>
>  The ones who don't absolutely suck to work with unless the work is easy.

I couldn't possibly disagree more.  Sure, some folks with CS degrees
are good admins, and some lacking degrees aren't.  But the degree,
itself, is neither here nor there.  What is required to make a good
admin is the right mindset.  I have found that people are either
logically and systematically thinking, or they are not, and no amount
of instruction can change from one to the other.  Another thing that
is required to be a good admin is someone who is dedicated enough to
spend the time that the job requires.  Not only the maintenance
windows, on-call, etc., but also the time at home spent keeping up
with the technology and the current best thought, in the field.  9-5
SA's are useless, IMO.

The only area in SA work that I have found, where CS is directly
applicable is in shell scripting.  There is no question that proper
variable naming, efficient coding practices, and good documentation
are critical, there.

I'd have to say that experience writing (technical writing),
presenting (speech), and dealing with others (business) are just as
important, if not more, than a CS background.  Because, an SA who
can't express themselves, or convince management/customers of the need
for the proper technical solution, are unlikely to be successful, in a
business environment.  And I have met plenty of technically-competent
SAs, who got nowhere, due to lack of personal skills.

Were I to make a college recommendation for someone who intends to be
an SA, I'd say that they might even want to take a business degree,
with CS courses as electives.  They should spend spare time working on
systems, for sure, but their classes should be in areas that won't be
picked up, in the business world.  The best SA that I have ever worked
with has a degree in psychology, by the way.

By the way, I _do_ have a CS background, though not a degree, so I'm
not just talking out of my ass, here.  I've been a mostly Solaris SA
for 13 years, until I switched to consulting.

Just my 0.02 worth,

J. Alexander Jacocks
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[Sridhar Ayengar]

J. Alexander Jacocks wrote:

> I couldn't possibly disagree more.  Sure, some folks with CS degrees
> are good admins, and some lacking degrees aren't.  But the degree,
> itself, is neither here nor there.  What is required to make a good
> admin is the right mindset.  I have found that people are either
> logically and systematically thinking, or they are not, and no amount
> of instruction can change from one to the other.  Another thing that
> is required to be a good admin is someone who is dedicated enough to
> spend the time that the job requires.  Not only the maintenance
> windows, on-call, etc., but also the time at home spent keeping up
> with the technology and the current best thought, in the field.  9-5
> SA's are useless, IMO.

I've been called to interview people in the past.  I've found that many
computer science graduates from schools with good reputations and high
GPAs tend not to be useful for anything.  The people who have computer
science degrees and do good work tend to be those who *didn't* get good
grades, because they were too busy tinkering in the lab.

The tinkerer's attitude seems to be common among those who end up being
good workers, even if they don't have a degree or if they have a degree
in some unrelated subject.

Peace...  Sridhar
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[Robert Darlington]

One of the classic questions I put out for interviewees is "Do you
work on your own car?"  Tinkering and the inclination to tinker is a
major part of what makes a good sysadmin (or a good just about
anything else).  Sure, a degree proves you can stick it out and do the
work required for school, and proving you can work hard is important.
I recognize that being able to work hard doesn't necessarily have to
be proven in the form of a degree through.

For the record, I know a handfull of CS degree holders that are good
admins.  Getting the degree didn't gift them with the mindset required
for the job -it was just a natural extension of what they liked to do.
 I personally can't imagine going for a CS degree.  It's incredibly
boring, not very challenging (unless you count all the crap homework
assignments), and I really don't see much change in the field since
Knuth laid the groundwork in his books in the 60s.  In other words,
it's not for me.  (I'm going for EE currently, specializing in antenna
design, fields and waves, and signal propagation -most likely boring
to most!)

I also know a lot of slackers that are great sysadmins until it comes
time to do real work or work on something other than Linux or Windows.
These are the kind I don't hire.







On Thu, May 8, 2008 at 9:29 AM, Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster@...> wrote:

> J. Alexander Jacocks wrote:
>>
>> I couldn't possibly disagree more.  Sure, some folks with CS degrees
>> are good admins, and some lacking degrees aren't.  But the degree,
>> itself, is neither here nor there.  What is required to make a good
>> admin is the right mindset.  I have found that people are either
>> logically and systematically thinking, or they are not, and no amount
>> of instruction can change from one to the other.  Another thing that
>> is required to be a good admin is someone who is dedicated enough to
>> spend the time that the job requires.  Not only the maintenance
>> windows, on-call, etc., but also the time at home spent keeping up
>> with the technology and the current best thought, in the field.  9-5
>> SA's are useless, IMO.
>
> I've been called to interview people in the past.  I've found that many
> computer science graduates from schools with good reputations and high GPAs
> tend not to be useful for anything.  The people who have computer science
> degrees and do good work tend to be those who *didn't* get good grades,
> because they were too busy tinkering in the lab.
>
> The tinkerer's attitude seems to be common among those who end up being good
> workers, even if they don't have a degree or if they have a degree in some
> unrelated subject.
>
> Peace...  Sridhar
> _______________________________________________
> rescue list - http://www.sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue

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[wa2egp]

-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: Erie Patsellis <erie@...>
>
> LDOS?
>
> erie

Forgot about that. :)

Bob
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[John Floren]

On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 9:06 AM, Robert Darlington <rdarlington@...> wrote:
<snip>
> On a side note, are there any universities in the States that still
> teach C?  Mine (UNM) has C++ as an elective and uses Java as the main
> focus for teaching CS, but no plain ol' C.  The only other languages
> they teach are object oriented PERL and VB, both as electives.  This
> just goes to show that CS has very little to do with being a
> programmer anymore.
>
> -Bob
>

I'm a Computer Engineering student at the Rochester Institute of
Technology. We start out with Java in CS 1-3, then hit C++ in CS 4.
Computer Engineers (and some other engineers) learn C in Applied
Programming and apply it in Operating Systems. We also did VHDL and
assembly.
Don't get the idea that we're all programming, of course. I've had my
physics and math courses and we've got a lot of discrete logic, analog
and digital circuits courses.

I think that these days CS degrees, except from the very best schools,
may not be worth much. RIT's comp sci program is very big, but it
tends to produce a lot of Java monkeys and Google-oids, not much of
what *I* find interesting, operating systems, new languages, that kind
of thing.

John
--
Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn
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[Erie Patsellis]

a friend had the Lobo Systems computer as well (4 Floppies, fully
loaded!, running a BBS up until the day he died), and I spent many hours
of my mis spent youth writing small utils to undelete, browse floppies
sector by sector, etc.


erie


wa2egp@... wrote:

> -------------- Original message ----------------------
> From: Erie Patsellis <erie@...>
>  
>> LDOS?
>>
>> erie
>>    
>
> Forgot about that. :)
>
> Bob
> _______________________________________________
> rescue list - http://www.sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue

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[Shannon Hendrix]

On May 8, 2008, at 07:11 , Phil Stracchino wrote:

> Shannon Hendrix wrote:
>> One of the best performance charts I have ever seen is in  
>> "Programming Pearls".
>> They show a TRS-80 and a DEC Alpha doing the same job, but the  
>> TRS-80 code is better written.
>> The DEC is hundreds of times faster... until the problem size  
>> increases to a point at which the DEC would take 400 years to do  
>> what the TRS-80 does in fifteen minutes.
>
> My first reaction is that the code being run on the Alpha had to  
> have been frighteningly, perhaps even implausibly, bad to produce  
> that vast of a throughput difference between hardware so hugely  
> different in speed and capability while the problem size was still  
> in a range the TRS-80 could handle at all.  (And I suspect the  
> problem was very carefully chosen.)

Actually, I've seen far worse cases in every day work, so the example  
was not in any way out of line.

When I worked for Bank of America, it was not uncommon for me to  
rewrite a simple C data filter and have it run 20 times faster.

In SQL, I frequently found queries so badly written, that I once got a  
program to run well over 1000 times faster with relatively simple  
modifications.

It's actually pretty easy to make serious algorithm mistakes.

I've found them in my own code, particularly when working with high  
level tools where mis-use is pretty easy.

I had a shell script which sorted photos from my camera into  
directories and renamed the files by date and sequence.

After using it for 6 months, I made a change in how I used exiftags  
and sped the script up about 10 times faster.

All I did was change from a loop to a pipe, and it made worlds of  
difference.


--
"Where some they sell their dreams for small desires."
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[Shannon Hendrix]

On May 8, 2008, at 10:45 , J. Alexander Jacocks wrote:


> I couldn't possibly disagree more.  Sure, some folks with CS degrees
> are good admins, and some lacking degrees aren't.  But the degree,
> itself, is neither here nor there.  What is required to make a good
> admin is the right mindset.

In that case, you don't disagree with me completely.

The right mindset will lead a non-compsci admin to learn what he needs  
to learn, which is what I already said.

--
Shannon Hendrix
shannon@...
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[Shannon Hendrix]

On May 8, 2008, at 11:29 , Sridhar Ayengar wrote:

> J. Alexander Jacocks wrote:
>> I couldn't possibly disagree more.  Sure, some folks with CS degrees
>> are good admins, and some lacking degrees aren't.  But the degree,
>> itself, is neither here nor there.  What is required to make a good
>> admin is the right mindset.  I have found that people are either
>> logically and systematically thinking, or they are not, and no amount
>> of instruction can change from one to the other.  Another thing that
>> is required to be a good admin is someone who is dedicated enough to
>> spend the time that the job requires.  Not only the maintenance
>> windows, on-call, etc., but also the time at home spent keeping up
>> with the technology and the current best thought, in the field.  9-5
>> SA's are useless, IMO.
>
> I've been called to interview people in the past.  I've found that  
> many computer science graduates from schools with good reputations  
> and high GPAs tend not to be useful for anything.  The people who  
> have computer science degrees and do good work tend to be those who  
> *didn't* get good grades, because they were too busy tinkering in  
> the lab.

I would agree with that.

Please note in my argument I said "good comp-sci", not "comp-sci with  
good grades."

I had a really hard time maintaining a good GPA, because if I spent  
the time needed to learn, I didn't have time to study for the tests.

The tests generally had little to do with either applied science or  
theoretical science.  They were basically just exercises in rote  
memory and little else.

My school actually started out with very, very good tests.  They were  
difficult, but anyone who had worked for real could pass them.

However, some local military brats bitched to the administration that  
they were too hard, so they were replaced with rote memory tests.

Almost overnight the clueless started making perfect test scores, and  
the really good students started having trouble.

> The tinkerer's attitude seems to be common among those who end up  
> being good workers, even if they don't have a degree or if they have  
> a degree in some unrelated subject.

Yes, but they also tend to learn the same things you learn in comp-
sci, so either way you need a comp-sci training, regardless of how you  
end up getting it.

If you never learn the science, you do eventually run into problems  
you cannot solve, because the simple fact is there are some that  
require more thank "tinkering".

Likewise there are some theoretical pursuits that require tinkering.

I think it is silly to assume one method fits every problem.


--
Shannon Hendrix
shannon@...
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[der Mouse]

> It's actually pretty easy to make serious algorithm mistakes.

One of my "favourite"s:

        for (x = 0; x < strlen(s); x ++)
                ...

(when the string is not actually mutated inside the loop).  In a few
cases a really good compiler might be able to prove s is not mutated
and hoist the strlen, but in most cases I've seen the loop is too
complex (calls out to externally-compiled functions, just plain too
big, mutates the string but happens to never do so in ways that change
its strlen, whatever).

/~\ The ASCII der Mouse
\ / Ribbon Campaign
 X  Against HTML       mouse@...
/ \ Email!     7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39  4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B
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[Shannon Hendrix]

On May 8, 2008, at 11:45 , Robert Darlington wrote:

> One of the classic questions I put out for interviewees is "Do you
> work on your own car?"

Hopefully you are joking, since a lot of tinkerers don't work on their  
own car.

Not everyone tinkers on the same things.

Plus, when my car is under warranty, tinkering voids the warranty.

:)

> I personally can't imagine going for a CS degree.  It's incredibly
> boring, not very challenging (unless you count all the crap homework
> assignments),

That depends highly on the school you go to.

> and I really don't see much change in the field since
> Knuth laid the groundwork in his books in the 60s.  In other words,
> it's not for me.  (I'm going for EE currently, specializing in antenna
> design, fields and waves, and signal propagation -most likely boring
> to most!)

EE is one of the easiest degrees to get in some schools.

It depends heavily on where you go to school, and what use you make of  
the facilities of course.

I took some EE courses in college, and found them easier than most of  
my computer science classes because the engineering work was a lot  
more pragmatic and the theory was far easier.

I actually like the "computer engineering" degree some schools offer,  
but it was too late for me to switch by the time it came around to my  
school.

If I got back to school (meaning, if I ever get the money) I'm not  
totally sure what I'd go after.  I'm just as likely to go for an  
engineering degree or something as continue in computer science.

A lot depends on what they can offer me.

Of course, with $11-50 thousand dollars masters degree programs, I  
don't know when I'll ever have the money, and going for a 4 year  
engineering degree is pretty much impossible right now.



--
"Where some they sell their dreams for small desires."
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[Phil Stracchino-3]

der Mouse wrote:
>> It's actually pretty easy to make serious algorithm mistakes.
>
> One of my "favourite"s:
>
> for (x = 0; x < strlen(s); x ++)
> ...

yeah.  I've seen boneheadednesses like that.


--
   Phil Stracchino, CDK#2     DoD#299792458     ICBM: 43.5607, -71.355
   alaric@...   alaric@...   phil@...
          Renaissance Man, Unix ronin, Perl hacker, Free Stater
                  It's not the years, it's the mileage.
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[Dan Sikorski]

Shannon Hendrix wrote:

> If I got back to school (meaning, if I ever get the money) I'm not
> totally sure what I'd go after.  I'm just as likely to go for an
> engineering degree or something as continue in computer science.
>
> A lot depends on what they can offer me.
>
> Of course, with $11-50 thousand dollars masters degree programs, I
> don't know when I'll ever have the money, and going for a 4 year
> engineering degree is pretty much impossible right now.
>

If you're serious about wanting to do this, you could do it in evening
classes.  The hardest part is getting started.  I told myself a few
years ago that the next 5 years were going to pass weather i took
evening classes or not, and that if i wanted the degree it wouldn't be
that big of a deal to give up a couple nights a week for class.  You
also have the benefit of spreading out the cost of the classes over more
time.  $500-$1200 (state school) for one or two classes per semester
isn't too bad to stomach.

    -Dan Sikorski
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[Robert Darlington]

On Tue, May 13, 2008 at 11:03 AM, Shannon Hendrix <shannon@...> wrote:
> On May 8, 2008, at 11:45 , Robert Darlington wrote:
>
>
> > One of the classic questions I put out for interviewees is "Do you
> > work on your own car?"
> >
>
>  Hopefully you are joking, since a lot of tinkerers don't work on their own
> car.

No, I'm not joking at all.  The answer tells me a lot about the person.

>  Not everyone tinkers on the same things.
>

I agree, that's why there are more questions.


>  Plus, when my car is under warranty, tinkering voids the warranty.
>
>  :)
>

The consumer protection act disagrees with you.


>
>
> > I personally can't imagine going for a CS degree.  It's incredibly
> > boring, not very challenging (unless you count all the crap homework
> > assignments),
> >
>
>  That depends highly on the school you go to.

I agree.  I go to UNM.

>
>
>
> > and I really don't see much change in the field since
> > Knuth laid the groundwork in his books in the 60s.  In other words,
> > it's not for me.  (I'm going for EE currently, specializing in antenna
> > design, fields and waves, and signal propagation -most likely boring
> > to most!)
> >
>
>  EE is one of the easiest degrees to get in some schools.
>

Agreed.  I don't know many EEs that are comfortable around high energy
systems.  I don't know any that have any practical experience working
with high voltage except perhaps those that are ham operators.   A
buddy of mine designs accelerators (ham) and another designs sputter
coating equipment (ham).   The guys at work call me (ham) in when they
need to do something they consider dangerous because they just weren't
trained in school.

>  It depends heavily on where you go to school, and what use you make of the
> facilities of course.

Agreed.

>
>  I took some EE courses in college, and found them easier than most of my
> computer science classes because the engineering work was a lot more
> pragmatic and the theory was far easier.
>

The challenge in CS for me was dealing with the homework.  Writing the
software was the easy part, but test plans were always the killer.
Way too tedious for my short attention span.  1 hour of coding, 20 of
documentation.  I'm not cut out for that line of work.


>  I actually like the "computer engineering" degree some schools offer, but
> it was too late for me to switch by the time it came around to my school.

Ya, it's cool stuff.  I considered going in this direction but I'm
more into antennas than designing a new PC.

>
>  If I got back to school (meaning, if I ever get the money) I'm not totally
> sure what I'd go after.  I'm just as likely to go for an engineering degree
> or something as continue in computer science.

Do it!   I'm 33, my buddy I take classes with is in his 50s.  It's
never too late, although I do know it can be a challenge when raising
a family, going to work, and dealing with classes all at the same
time.

>  A lot depends on what they can offer me.
>
>  Of course, with $11-50 thousand dollars masters degree programs, I don't
> know when I'll ever have the money, and going for a 4 year engineering
> degree is pretty much impossible right now.
>
>
>
>  --
>  "Where some they sell their dreams for small desires."
>
>
>  _______________________________________________
>  rescue list - http://www.sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue

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[Ethan O'Toole]

> Do it!   I'm 33, my buddy I take classes with is in his 50s.  It's

Damn Prof, I thought you were a bit older than me (32).


--
05 REM Signature
10 PRINT " Ethan O'Toole "
20 PRINT " FLICKR ", " http://www.flickr.com/photos/ethanotoole "
30 PRINT " YOUTUBE ", " www.youtube.com/user/telmnstr "
40 PRINT " HOMEPAGE ", " users.757.org/~ethan "
RUN
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