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My boss is technically restricted shall we say.
As the cto I have also been designated office IT guy. Which means apparently fixing the printer. Which is ok I guess. I mean it's bullsh*t but hey.
Anyway, about 6 months ago he said he needed a new laptop. He lives his life in excel and outlook, and even though the whole company uses google docs for everything he still exports everything to excel, makes a copy, then saves it back to drive so everything gets out of sync.
It's a fun problem that I have banned everyone from doing obviously but he continues.
Anyway, anyway, he wanted a new windows laptop naturally. I said to spend about £700 on a decent machine rather than buying something cheap that will frustrate and not last long.
He doesn't listen and gets some old windows 7 machine for £300. It's an alright spec for 2009; he must not have got the memo about it being 2017.
4 months go by and he says he needs a new laptop because this one is too slow (not least because he opens 400 chrome tabs and never reboots his machine). Anyway, I fix the problem of uninstalling all his bloatware and it runs quicker but he has his heart set on a new machine.
He insists.
I suggest he spend the money this time so he literally doesn't buy a new one in 4 months. I suggest the surface book that's £1200. A little overpriced but he will love the touch screen, it's powerful enough and it's windows. Ticks all the boxes for him.
He suddenly decides he wants a Mac.
I tell him it will be a nightmare for everyone if he does that.
He insists.
I suggest the Mac book pro as I've had mine for 6 years now and it's still going strong. It's a little more expensive than the surface but it will last.
He then says he wants the air.
I say they haven't updated them in ages and they aren't actually that powerful.
He insists.
That night he just buys an air from the Apple Store.
WHY THE FU*k ARE YOU ASKING ME FOR ADVICE IF YOURE NOT GOING TO LISTEN YOU MOTHERFUC*er. WASTING MY TIME AND YOURS.
Was very close to rage quitting when he wanted me to back up his old machine but didn't bring in his hard drive and didn't want to put it in the cloud. #whatDoYouWantMeToDoWithYourOldPornCollection
To top it all off I ran some benchmarks and my 6 year old Mac book pro is more powerful than his "brand new" air.23 -
"Personalized Advertisements":
No Amazon, I'm not interested in buying any of these phones, I just bought a new one five days ago, remember? You sold it to me! And stop recommending the same book I already got five YEARS ago!
YouTube, why are you always showing me the same ad about an app I already own and use regularly? And why the FUCK do I you show me the new trailer of Star Wars Ep8 as an ad video before the actual video of the new Star Wars Ep8 trailer?
Audi, I am an university student, barely able to pay my rent, why are you telling me to buy your newest car? How do you expect me to afford this?
Monster, why exactly are you showing me job offers as "Technical Product Designer at company X" for which I'm not remotely qualified or even interested in?
Neither do I have 5000£ (I live in Germany, at least match the currency, ffs) to invest in some suspiciously promising stock market schemes, nor am I in any need of rheumatism pills or a hearing aid (I am 19). I cannot afford or want any Rolex watches and PLEASE, I don't know why you think I would, but I really do not need a special new and innovative brand of tampons, my dick is doing fine, thanks.
"Hot local singles near {my actual location} want to fuck!
Click here!!!"
At least there are still some ads you can trust to be relevant...14 -
!rant
Neighbouring nursing student asked me to recommend her a good laptop. I take a look at her existing one and it's an ultra book in pretty much decent condition. I ask her what her issue with this one is and turns out there's not enough space on the hard disk (30 GB SSD). I advice her to consider upgrading instead of buying a new laptop and she agrees. She also asks me if I can fix the track par of the laptop as it's not working. I take a look at the system tray and then work my computer science magic (press the fn+F9 to activate the trackpad) and boom! It's a miracle and she's squealing with delight. I even ran a disk cleanup and wiped 3Gigs of space so that she could continue downloading the episode from Netflix.
I hear a lot of you people complain about being asked to do outrageous tech shit because you're a computer person but man, I sure love being the "tech guy". :D17 -
On the game front, I see so much conflicting advice. "Start getting feedback" as soon as possible. "Donnt soft launch on steam! The algol will wreck you.", "soft launch on itch to get feedback", "dont soft launch on itch!"
"Start marketing today", "focus on influencers", "get to know communities *before* you advertise", "dont get to know communities beforehand if you're just planning on self prompting", "dont self promote".
"CPM is important.", "CPA is important". Etc.
Sounds a lot like "have a bunch of money upfront." The solution is just to succeed from the start! It's so obvious. Just invent the next gta. The next facebook. Get a small loan of 50,000 dollars, or a million. Donate for a year to other kickstarter projects so people will know you and reciprocate! But also dont ebeg!
How about no. How about fuck all this advice by silver spoon assholes that didnt have to work on shoestring budgets. The advice is the equivalent of having a 300 page tonedeaf book, every page blank except page 150, where the words "fuck you. I got mine." Are printed in times new Roman, 14pt font, neatly in the center of the page.
The truth is most of the "indies" already made it in the software industry proper, before switching over. $5k kickstarter videos, with $15k marketing budgets, no doubt funded in part through their own money funneled through services that provide shell donations, because KS is being used as a glorified advertising service. People buying off steam curators for promotions, youtubers making sponsored videos without disclosing they're sponsored. Fake viralility. Fake campaigns. Predetermined success for those who could *already* afford to develop and go commercial without a publisher. And they came into the market and cannibalized the opportunity, raising the bar for everyone that wasnt them. I guess that's actually a good thing, because we wouldnt have half the amazing games we do, and the pressure to produce quality. But then I see fantastic games utterly ignored or flailing in an attempt to compete for eyeballs in an industry frequently dominated by gatekeeping marketeers and influencers, where human grace determines success or complete oblivion. And I'm just disgusted with it.
Also buy my game. Preorder NOW! And you'll get a REAL canvas bag, I'll go to like the goodwill and buy one and screen print the game logo on it or some shit. Buy the special collectors edition and get pictures of my feet. Buy the game of the year edition and get a real gasmask. Preorder now and I'll fucking suck your di k right now. No lie. Preorder the diamond edition RIGHT NOW in the next six minutes and I will send you one hundred thousand dollars in gold plated bottle caps. Limited supply. one million per customer. Offer expires soon. This is not a scam. I repeat. This is NOT a scam.
In other news I'm soft launching Atom Ranger in six months (assuming the nuclear apocalypse hasn't *actually* started by then). Its state of decay and fallout meets rimworld. Build and manage a sprawling base, resolving conflicts, exploring post apocalyptic Colorado and surrounding territories of no-mans-land. Navigate hazardous weather, radioactive terrain, collapsed bridges, dangerous rivers, and deal with cultists, bandits, slavers, and hungry cannibals. Broker peace between not just the factions outside your settlements, but within your base too. Manage conflicts, settle disputes, avert disasters, barter, scavenge, and survive in a fully dynamic world, where buildings slowly crumble, grass and trees sprout up in the road and vacant lots, fires burn out of control, and factions loot, ruin, and takeover settlements. Watch the world and the survivors in it change and survive. Help them to survive, or become a warlord and rule over the wastes.
Lets be honest. It's basically kenshi but less complicated.
If you want to volunteer to test (instead of paying to be a glorified tester, aka "alpha") let me know in the comments.
I'm currently setting up a discord and mailing list.28 -
I hate it when book publishers of tech books don't have their own DRM-free formats. I then have to go on Amazon and see that the Kindle version is only 10% cheaper than paper. Then I factor in the fact that they probably fucked up the formatting on the ebook. So, I end up just buying the paper one and my office continues to resemble a mad scientist's library.11
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Get ready for a awesome conspiracy theory/ WhatsApp forward :D i like how people are coming with new stuff every minute of their boredom . Makes you ponder:
====================================
🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
How to dominate the world quickly?
THE GREAT CHINESE STAGE
1. Create a virus and the antidote.
2. Spread the virus.
3. A demonstration of efficiency, building hospitals in a few days. After all, you were already prepared, with the projects, ordering the equipment, hiring the labor, the water and sewage network, the prefabricated building materials and stocked in an impressive volume.
4. Cause chaos in the world, starting with Europe.
5. Quickly plaster the economy of dozens of countries.
6. Stop production lines in factories in other countries.
7. Cause stock markets to fall and buy companies at a bargain price.
8. Quickly control the epidemic in your country. After all, you were already prepared.
9. Lower the price of commodities, including the price of oil you buy on a large scale.
10. Get back to producing quickly while the world is at a standstill. Buy what you negotiated cheaply in the crisis and sell more expensive what is lacking in countries that have paralyzed their industries.
After all, you read more Confucius than Karl Marx.
PS: Before laughing, read the book by Chinese colonels Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui, from 1999, “Unrestricted Warfare: China’s master plan to destroy America”, on Amazon, then we talk. It's all there.
🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Worth pondering..
Just Think about this...
How come Russia & North Korea are totally free of Covid- 19? Because they are staunch ally of China. Not a single case reported from this 2 countries. On the other hand South Korea / United Kingdom / Italy / Spain and Asia are severely hit. How come Wuhan is suddenly free from the deadly virus?
China will say that their drastic initial measures they took was very stern and Wuhan was locked down to contain the spread to other areas. I am sure they are using the Anti dode of the virus.
Why Beijing was not hit? Why only Wuhan? Kind of interesting to ponder upon.. right? Well ..Wuhan is open for business now. America and all the above mentioned countries are devastated financially. Soon American economy will collapse as planned by China. China knows it CANNOT defeat America militarily as USA is at present
THE MOST POWERFUL country in the world. So use the virus...to cripple the economy and paralyse the nation and its Defense capabilities. I'm sure Nancy Pelosi got a part in this. . to topple Trump. Lately President Trump was always telling of how GREAT American economy was improving in all fronts. The only way to destroy his vision of making AMERICA GREAT AGAIN is to create an economic havoc. Nancy Pelosi was unable to bring down Trump thru impeachment. ....so work along with China to destroy Trump by releasing a virus. Wuhan,s epidemic was a showcase. At the peak of the virus epidemic. ..
China's President Xi Jinping...just wore a simple RM1 facemask to visit those effected areas. As President he should be covered from head to toe.....but it was not the case. He was already injected to resist any harm from the virus....that means a cure was already in place before the virus was released.
Some may ask....Bill Gates already predicted the outbreak in 2015...so the chinese agenda cannot be true. The answer is. ..YES...Bill Gates did predict. .but that prediction is based on a genuine virus outbreak. Now China is also telling that the virus was predicted well in advance. ....so that its agenda would play along well to match that prediction. China,s vision is to control the World economy by buying up stocks now from countries facing the brink of severe ECONOMIC COLLAPSE. Later China will announce that their Medical Researchers have found a cure to destroy the virus. Now China have other countries stocks in their arsenal and these countries will soon be slave to their master...CHINA.
Just Think about it ...
The Doctor Who declared this virus was also Silenced by the Chinese Authorities...13 -
This is a guide for technology noobies who wants to buy a laptop but have no idea what the SPECS are meaning.
1. Brand
If you like Apple, and love their !sleek design, go to the nearest Apple store and tell them "I want to buy one. Recommendations?"
If you don't like Apple, well, buy anything that fits you. Read more below.
2. Size
There are 11~15 inches, weight is 850g ~ 2+kg. Very many options. Buy whatever you like.
//Fun part coming
3. CPU
This is the power of the brain.
For example,
Pentium is Elementary Schoolers
i3 is Middle Schoolers
i5 is High Schoolers
i7 is University People
Dual-core is 2 people
Quad-core is 4 people
Quiz! What is i5 Dual-core?
A) 2 High Schoolers.
Easy peasy, right?
Now if you have a smartphone and ONLY use Messaging, Phone, and Whatsapp (lol), you can buy Pentium laptops.
If not, I recommend at least i3
Also, there are numbers behind those CPU, like i3-6100
6 means 6th generaton.
If the numbers are bigger, it is the most recent generation.
Think of 6xxx as Stone age people
7xxx as Bronze age people
8xxx as Iron age people
and so one.
4. RAM
This is the size of the desk.
There are 4GB, 8GB, 16GB, 32GB, and so one.
Think of 4GB as small desk to only put one book on it.
8GB as a desk to put a laptop with a keyboard and a mouse.
16GB as a normal sized desk to put some books, laptop, and food.
32GB as a boss sized desk.
And so one.
When you do multitasking, and the desk is too small...
You don't feel comfortable right?
It is good when there are spacious space.
Same with RAM.
But when the desk becomes larger, it gets expensive, so buy the one with the affordable price.
If you watch some YouTube videos in Chrome and do some document words with Office, buy at least 8GB. 16GB is recommended.
5. HDD/SSD
You take out the stuffs such as books and laptop from the basket (HDD/SSD), and put in your desk (RAM).
There are two kinds of baskets.
The super big ones, but because it is so big, it is bulky and hard to get stuffs out of the basket. But it is cheap. (HDD)
There are a bit smaller ones but expensive compared to the HDD, it is called SSD. This basket is right next to you, and it is super easy to get stuffs out of this basket. The opening time is faster as well.
SSDs were expensive, but as times go, it gets bigger as well, and cheaper. So most laptops are SSD these days.
There are 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, and 1024GB(=1TB), and so one. You can buy what you want. Recommend 256GB for normal use.
Game guy? At least 512GB.
6. Graphics
It is the eyesight.
Most computers doesn't have dedicated graphics card, it comes with the CPU. Intel CPUs has CPU + graphics, but the graphics powered by Intel isn't that good.
But NVIDIA graphics cards are great. Recommended for gamers. But it is a bit more expensive.
So TL;DR
Buying a laptop is
- Pick the person and the person's clothes (brand and design)
- Pick the space for the person to stay (RAM, SSD/HDD)
- Pick how smart they are (CPU)
- Pick how many (Core)
- Pick the generation (6xxx, 7xxx ....)
- Pick their eyesight (graphics)
And that's pretty much it.
Super easy to buy a laptop right?
If you have suggestions or questions, make sure to leave a comment, upvote this rant, and share to your friends!2 -
Hello there devranters, long time no see
I have a question for all the computer scientists and students out there. Do you have book recommendations especially for the maths part? I'm in the process of buying some books, they're very expensive but if I'm going to buy they might as well be useful books.8 -
Do you guys think I should go for a Lego Mindstorms set as a way to start getting into robotics?
I know of a lot of people that recommend going through arduino and buying a bunch of shit and throwing it together etc. But the thing that makes me interested in Mindstorms is how everything seems to be in one place. A smart brick programmable through multiple different programming languages(for example Python, java, C) a good kit that can be really modular and built into different components, all sorts of sensors.
I just think its a good option, but if someone were to recommend a particular book or resource for Arduino or some other stuff I would definitely consider it.
So, what do you lads think?14 -
I have a bookshelf full of tech books. What should I do with outdated ones? What approach should I take to buying new ones? A lot of them are probably irrelevant now. Things that don't change significantly are fine (I have old C++ and Make books whose content is still relevant even if some new stuff is missing) but web development has evolved significantly and I'm reluctant to get anything framework related due to needing to replace books frequently.
I could get ebooks, but having tried a few, I much prefer a physical book.
In the case of old books I no longer need, I can recycle them (as waste paper, or at a book recycling place) or donate them to a charity shop. It seems silly to recycle them as waste paper, but on the other hand I doubt the content will be that useful to others nor will it be that useful in a charity shop!
So instead they just sit on my shelf and remain unused...
What do you folks do with your books when you don't need them any more?3 -
Google should really add support for Linux on Chromebooks. I don't see a reason to pay £1k for a Pixel Book just for build quality and great looks. However, having native Linux support and being able to use something more useful than ChromeOS would be hugely attractive and I would consider buying it.4
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Anyone reading "Bullshit Jobs" by David Graeber? My job is not the duct-taping or box-ticking described in the book, but I'm catching myself too often seeing my job as buying 40 hours of my time each week instead of my actual development work.
“if an ancient Greek or Roman saw a potter, he could imagine buying his pots. He could also imagine buying the potter—slavery was a familiar institution in the ancient world. But he would have simply been baffled by the notion that he might buy the potter’s time.”2 -
Are programming books worth buying/reading? If so, what C# ( and Unity ) book would you recommend. I'd like to expand my knowledge.3
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Have you ever situationally bought a tech book at work only to not use it afterwards because the situation became no longer applicable?3
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