My $0.02

NOTE: this is all based on the state of the IT industry in my neck of the wood. I cannot speak for the rest of the world.

I have been in the industry and here's my view (coloured, I'm sure, by the intervening years and too much alcohol every so often).

(1) Our intake was roughly 200 people in the first semester. A good 3rd were women. By second semester, we were down to 100 students with, maybe, 1/10th women. By second year, there were 20 students in a class, but the men/women ratio still held. From memory, these numbers and ratios seemed to be constant for the rest of the degree.

(2) There were two major institutions in town at the time (there are more now) - one taught you the under-the-hood of computer programming (how computers work, the whys and wherefores of stacks, etc..) as well as such wonderful headache-inducing stuff like formal QA proofs of algorithms ("Z" anyone?). The other institution taught you to program in Java (and a few other languages of the day). Needless to say, when we hit the workforce the percentage of employees from the second institution vastly outnumbered that of the first. Now though, as I have progressed up the ladder, the percentages seem to be reversed at my level. make of that what you will.

I'd like to sing the praises of my Alma Mater, but last time I went back for a refresh course I subscribed to what I *thought* was Introduction to "Programming In Java", fully expecting to be taught the ins-and-outs of Java. What I got was Introduction to Programming (In Java). I have added quotes and brackets to make my point - there were none in the course title. It was being offered as a Masters-level course and it was awful. How bad? The *lecturer* could not answer when asked why Java arrays started at 0 rather than 1 (hint: most people at the time Java was introduced programmed in C). <sigh>

(3) Essays. Oh <deity> by all means YES! You are going to have to write reports and interact with users and business people. LEARN TO COMMUNICATE! When I did my degree, one course each semester had to be picked from outside the Science stream. Made sense to me - it taught us to think beyond our programming tasks (I picked French one semester because, well, I was a native French speaker and the only thing they asked me was if I had done French in high-school). Mind you, I always though it was a damn shame nobody from outside the IT stream was forced to take even minimal computing classes... might have saved me from wanting to strangle many an Arts Major who couldn't operate a mouse without f-ing it up. (YES, you DO need all of these cables plugged in. NO, I don't CARE if they mess up the aesthetics of your desk.)

(4) Languages. I'd have to agree with the article. C, C++ are a good bet (more C than C++, but that's my opinion only). If you aren't doing C++, Java is a good substitute to introduce the concepts of OO programming. COBOL is nice if you want to work for the older banking firms, especially if combined with one or more of the others. But for <deity-of-choice>'s sake, unless you are planning on writing websites for the rest of your days, do *not* specialise in PHP, Python, et al. Learn them, by all means, but be aware that most places with n-tier architecture (quite a lot of medium-to-large businesses) do not use these languages beyond their web presences - the rest of the time, the back-end is written in so-called "legacy" languages.

I'd include dotNET in the languages to learn, but MS seems hell-bent on having you re-write your code in a different language every few years if you want it supported - compared to that, most C/C++ programs written back when I graduated can still compile *and run* on today's compilers/hardware... although some of the UI looks damn awful by now. ^_^

For comparison, the place I work at has a dotNET front-end on Windows, with C back-end and a large-scale SQL database running on a *NIX variant, as well as a web presence for smaller clients and Web Services for larger clients to use.

Right call

"...separating that gene from its surrounding genetic material is not an act of invention".

Absolutely true. The *method* by which you separate it might be, but not the DNA itself.

Ditto with the afore-mentioned test<->speech machine mentioned in a previous comment: the voice itself may not be patentable, but the method for generating it might be.

Flashback

Spent a few years in Algeria in my youth (short version - paternal unit was doing work there). I still remember the first local word I learned: "makesh" (a.k.a. "we don't have any" or "we've run out". I remember it being used interchangeably).

Spelling and pronunciation may have been tainted by the years though. ^_^

Wrong article title.

Should be "memory array finally sees the light", surely?

I can haz a name for them:

C.U.S. : Collider of Unusual Size.

(no extra points for naming the reference ^_^ ).

Browser setup?

Hmmm... First of all, how about running on Windows7 (or even XP)?

Second - I couldn't see what configurations they used for the various browsers. Were they running with plugins? If so, which? Did they represent a standard home setup?

Inquiring minds want to-... ah, who cares - it's an MS propaganda piece. Never trust a paid-for piece that says the paid-for item is better than the others. I'll wait for independent testing, TYVM.

...of podules

A rack...

A propensity...

A pustulence... (from "pustule", of course)

A podument...

A rash...

<checking the date>

...not April 1?...

Did I miss something?

"...confidential conference for the great and the good to discuss world issues candidly and openly."

How can a *confidential* conference be *open*? I'll accept "candid", but "open"?

"offered publishers a means to raise their prices from the low figures they were forced to accept with web bookseller Amazon"

Begging your pardon, but aren't most books generally brought out by one publisher at a time (especially the so-called Best-Sellers)? If so, then the publisher would supposedly set *their* selling price at a level they were comfortable with... and shouldn't give a damn about whether the retailer then adds 1c or $100 to that price in order to re-sell it.

So I do not understand why the publishers were bitc... complaining about the price they were selling their books to Amazon.

There's nothing like a fair trial. And this is exactly what it is: nothing like a fair trial.

Translation...

"That capability is built on ARM's TrustZone: a secure execution technology that allows hardware designers to temporarily shift the processor from running general-purpose software to a special ring-fenced area of trusted code that performs sensitive operations - this is software that may not even trust the OS running on the gadget"

I may have misunderstood... but from what I can gather this would also require one hell of a firmware upgrade if CODECs changed, since the only codecs in the "trusted code" section would be those approved of by the MPAA *at the time of manufacture*. Because, of course, if I can easily flash the "trusted" firmware, I can easily disable it.

BSOD

RTFA

@factor. I downvoted you because you basically seem to have a bee in your bonnet about the NBN (fair enough) and started ranting apparently without having read the article. Here's a snippet:

"The incumbent carrier has responsibility for making sure that its pits and ducts have the space for the fibre and haven't collapsed over the years."

Re-read the article. The whole thing talks about how TELSTRA (said "incumbent carrier") and their subcontractors screwed the pooch by allowing this asbestos mess to happen. HOW it happened is bound to be wife with speculation and conspiracy rumours around the cooler. It is only now that the NBN is doing inspections before taking over the infrastructure that this and other (lack of) maintenance issues are surfacing.

I don't have a problem with you not liking the NBN. I *do* have a problem with the FUDD you disseminate in the process.

Vulture South getting tired...

...and running out of idea? The only difference between the article's title and what is generally a funnier sub-title is the change from "Oz" to "Australian".

I want my funny sub-titles back!!

Really?

"...allege that senior Google execs have shut Microsoft out of key APIs..."

If true, it's a little childish of Google. Having said that: Oy, Microsoft - "Pot -> Kettle -> Black".

Apples/Oranges?

"power density of up to 49 kWatt-hours per kilo (depending on temperature), capacitance up to 142 Farads per gram, and able to support current density of 100 amps per gram"

That's nice to know (unit-error not withstanding). But it would have been nicer to give us a comparison with something commonly used like, say, a LiON battery?

And while we're at it

..if you fear the on-board memory will be too small for you, fear not. Yes, Samsung (or Google, they keep pointing fingers at each other) somehow disabled App2SD support... but get yourself an SD card, partition some of it off and format that partition to EXT2 (or EXT4), and install Link2SD from Google Play (you may have to root your phone first, though). You are now once again able to move your large Apps to the partition on the SD card. Or you can use GL2SD to only move the Apps' data rather than the Apps themselves.

I think the man has no idea...

Yes, I am old enough to remember when PCs at my school were TRS-80s or equivalent. So yes, I am probably one of the "old farts" (I paraphrase) Mr Walker is talking about. I also think he has no idea what he is talking about.

The first rule of any rule is that you must fully understand it before you should be allowed to break it. And it applies to the previous sentence as well.

I used calculators at school. But we weren't allowed to use them until later in the academic cycle, *after* we had proved we understood arithmetic and could do calculations by hand if required.

I use Google and their ilk, with their computerised matching and searching, to do research on-line. But this is after having learnt to do it manually through publications, periodicals and encyclopaedias - learning to recognise and separate the dross from the nuggets.

I use spell-checkers on documents I generate on my computer - but they rarely find anything (I am not perfect) because I spent time actually learning to write (in fact, English is *not* my native tongue, so I had to do this twice). And spell-checkers aren't perfect - it annoys me when I see a sign or poster generated by a computer that *still* has errors of grammar (e.g. "site" instead of "sight", or vice versa, which your checker is unlikely to have picked up).

Automation is fantastic and a phenomenal time-saver. Don't confuse "ease of use" for "capability". When reading your job application I am less worried about your handwriting (although I still should be able to read it) than I am about this demonstration of your basic ability to put a sentence together without outside help.

Learn the rules. *Then* learn when to ignore them. But you cannot do the second properly without the first.

Meh

If the Beeb *really* wanted to reach out to more Whovians, they would have opened up their store in Brisbane. SEQ has the biggest pop-culture... er... culture in Australia, based on convention attendance numbers.

Heck, we sustain two version of the Supanova pop-culture con within 100Km of each other (6 months apart, granted).

Reg headline

I can just the headline in El Reg when they succeed in removing the wires:

"Look Ma, No Hands!"