On Tue, Aug 21, 2018 at 10:51:56AM +1000, Thaths wrote: > On Tue, Aug 21, 2018 at 9:36 AM Tomasz Rola <rto...@ceti.pl> wrote: > > > > > > > Other skills missing in action: > > > > - programming anything in assembly (or any level below C, or even at > > level of C - i.e. direct manipulations of memory and stuff in it) [*] > > > > Do you think there is a need for it these days? People have long forgotten > computing done by flipping bits by turning switches on or off.
Maybe some people, especially web developers, should be doing their craft by flipping bits with switches. Maybe websites would be loading in less than ten seconds, like they used to fifteen years ago, despite cables and computers being hundred times slower. But jokes aside, I have no idea if knowing innards of computer is really needed nowadays. Some could argue that yes, they help in software development in many ways, some of them intangible. Some others could argue that no, because given todays sorry state of computer hardware (as revealed by news during last year or so) there is no way a soft skill could unscrew us. The whole domain of computer security starts looking like a cabaret [1] and maybe this will be followed by computer science becoming (slowly but surely) something like not very practical hobby [2], akin to throwing darts and stamps collecting. [1] The one where an expert guards golden coins in locked room, doors and windows behind crates, walls reinforced with steel sheets, and then Charlie Ch comes along, puts his hand into the wall and takes gold, one fistful a time, like the wall was not there at all. [2] Some people realize that this "hobby" shapes the world of today, but for majority as I see it, computers are the things which enable "scrape money fast, scrape often, retire early". Certainly, I am exaggerating a bit. But the skill as such is slowly going, I am afraid. Perhaps all paragraphs above are connected in some unusual way. > > - collecting edible mushrooms from the woods > > > > Magic shrooms on the other hand..... But I guess those are collected from the basement? > > - even going to the woods and laying there for longer while > > > > Don't people go camping these days? Modern camping (and tourism as well) is something different IMHO. It is making your own safe bubble and going with it to wherever you want, never really leaving it. > > - repairing one's tv set, radio or anything electronic > > > > I currently live in Australia and I am happy to report that this art is > still alive and well here. I have gotten a couple of home electronics > repaired at the repair shop. And every decent-sized train station has a > cobbler store! Oh really. What an interesting place to be in. > > - understanding one's computer from transistor up (I have read there > > were such people, really) > > > > This is definitely possible to achieve today. See > https://www.nand2tetris.org/ for example. At one time I knew how things > worked from transistors up to the Assembly level abstraction. Wow. -- Regards, Tomasz Rola -- ** A C programmer asked whether computer had Buddha's nature. ** ** As the answer, master did "rm -rif" on the programmer's home ** ** directory. And then the C programmer became enlightened... ** ** ** ** Tomasz Rola mailto:tomasz_r...@bigfoot.com **
