Mircea Bardac /random_thoughts

I have decided some time ago to change my mobile. Why? Because the battery meter of my old phone (Alcatel 311 didn’t show the right battery level and most of my calls got interrupted because of low battery).

First, I wanted to buy myself a PDA (Dell Axim X30 High). Due to some problems (Dell Customer Care misunderstandings), I have delayed the aquisition. It is still in my plans. I still need to organize my life better.

Taking into account that my future PDA will be able to use Bluetooth/WiFi… I thought it would be nice if I could also use it together with my mobile to surf the net etc. But my ex mobile (Alcatel 311) didn’t even know what Internet is. There comes my new mobile, Sony Ericsson T610, a great mobile packed with features.

Some things I want to emphasize about it:
- great design and functionality
- great connectivity (GPRS/Bluetooth/IrDA)
That’s exactly what I need. The battery doesn’t last too long (only ~3 days) because of it’s colourfull screen, because of the camera and so on, but I couldn’t expect more from a mobile with so many features. Besides this, there’s always a powersource around me (almost always).
The camera isn’t great also, but I want a mobile, not a camera. I’ll buy a separate one (a lot better than the ones in the mobile phones).

Anyway.. it’s a great phone with lots of functionality. I’m really happy I got it.

Has any teacher sugested you that could do something more to improve your grades?
Did you do something more and your grade is bigger than it should be?
Do you think that difference should be taken into account since they calculate each and every cent of your grade (grades list)?

Have you looked over the exams of other groups?
Do you have a clear image of what your going to get at the final exam?

Now… get in touch with reality!
You’re in Romania… the land of opportunities (nope, I’m not wrong, there are just some other opportunities here).
You have an exam today, the easiest one - programming. You know almost everything that needs to be known for that exam, you know what others (3 groups) have had before you… the subjects were almost the same.

So… given this situation… you still have a surprise… Why?
Because…
1. extra work doesn’t count. Quote: Oh.. no… I’ve just put max for the grades. // even though there was more than max (which does count in some situations)
2.1. totally different subjects (like we were somehow special - in the wrong meaning)
2.2.(or) not enough time (we should get used to this… it becomes a tradition)

As I’ve said before, the programming exam (SDA) isn’t great because of this. It’s just killing. It’s just like it was ment to be killing. Programming isn’t hard, but we kind of have the luck to get some out of this world subjects in extremely little time. Well, the subjects are not ‘out of this world’ if you had enough time.

I have once again discovered how difficult programming on paper is. How many times have you changed the structures inside your program, how many times have you added/removed/changed parameters for one of the functions you defined? The same thing happens in writing. Can you imagine how does that look like when you don’t have enough time? I can tell you.. it looks like a big mess (because it’s on paper).

Yep, this post is mostly about my programming exam I had today, which I have passed getting a 9/10 (which is good, under other conditions). I can’t find that satisfactory though, given the above conditions. Some of my coleagues failed to pass, unfortunately.

I am probably a little pissed of right now because of the conditions we had, because of the subjects (which weren’t great compared to the others, not to mention a little bit ambigous) and mostly because of the fact that extra work isn’t rewarded as it should. The last one is even worse taking into account that you get this treatment in school.

Many Romanian employees refuse to self-develop just because their achievements are not rewarded. They realise that anything they would do extra might simply be ignored. This way, they agree on doing only what they’re payed for, refusing to come with new ideas. This reaction shouldn’t be encouraged in school.

All that can be invented has been invented
– Charles Duell. Director U.S. Patent Office, 1899

This craziness for the radio will die soon
–Thomas Edison, 1922

There is a world market for about five computers
–Thomas Watson, IBM chairman, 1943

In the future, computers will not weight more than 1,5 tons
– Popular Mechanics, 1949

There is no reason for anyone to have a computer at home
– Ken Olsen, president of Digital, 1977

64K will be enough for anybody
– Bill Gates, president of Microsoft, 1981

A topic on the ArchLinux forums caught my attention today…

A compiler literally compiles a list of machine code instructions,
the object code, based on the source code. The resulting object code
is a ready-to-run program that is very fast, but which may crash the
computer.
– “Programming Language,” Microsoft Encarta 96 Encyclopedia.

Is that true?
Maybe in the Microsoft world… as one of the ArchLinux users said there…

Here’s a more adequate definition.