Posts by Derek Jones 32 posts • joined 22 Jan 2009
And when you email asking for the data, the researchers don't reply, or at least 30% of them don't:
https://shape-of-code.com/2017/02/02/i-have-been-reading-your-interesting-paper/
However, the situation with regard to data being made available on sites such as Zenodo is getting better.
The other issue is that many of those writing the software are new to programming.
This post generated a lot of discussion of the research software mailing list:
https://shape-of-code.com/2021/02/21/research-software-code-is-likely-to-remain-a-tangled-mess/
Of course reviewing code finds coding mistakes; the question is whether this a cost-effective approach to software product development.
Yes, mistakes fixed in later phases will involve more effort; some evidence: http://shape-of-code.coding-guidelines.com/2020/08/23/time-to-fix-when-mistake-discovered-in-a-later-project-phase/
but would it be more expensive, on average, to have fixed these mistakes earlier?
Products have a finite lifetime; some evidence: http://shape-of-code.coding-guidelines.com/2018/11/28/half-life-of-software-as-a-service-services/
Some coding mistakes are never experienced as faults by customers before the product is withdrawn; some evidence: http://shape-of-code.coding-guidelines.com/2020/12/20/many-coding-mistakes-are-not-immediately-detectable/
Figuring out the most cost-effective approach is very hard.
The Large Hadron Collider did not find any new physics, despite all the claims that it find lots of interesting new physics. Now physicists are desperately talking up minor issues to make it sound like exciting discoveries will be made, provided they get funded.
A more detailed discussion of the 'discovery':
https://www.science20.com/tommaso_dorigo/new_muon_g2_results-253850
See Sabine Hossenfelder's book: Lost in Maths, for an explanation of how particle physicists have lost connection with reality, and are still asking for huge projects to be funded.
My one experience with dealing with the US NRC (Nuclear Regulatory Commission) is that they want the software to be so easy to use that its inspectors don't need to know anything technical:
https://shape-of-code.coding-guidelines.com/2012/06/27/trying-to-sell-analysis-tools-to-the-nuclear-regulatory-commission/
Machine learning can be a very useful tool, but the flip-side is that clueless button pushers can use it to produce seemingly interesting output: http://shape-of-code.coding-guidelines.com/2015/11/23/machine-learning-in-se-research-is-a-bigger-train-wreck-than-i-imagined/
"...contain your entire history of work on GitHub,..." is just the kind of feature that will make them even more attractive to Microsoft to combine with the Linkedin purchase.
Linkedin+Github is Active directory for the Cloud.
Ethereum's 'smart contracts' are essentially programs whose execution is intended to have a contract-like nature. Existing programs, err contracts, include lotteries and other fun stuff.
Of course a new language was needed for the new age of smart contracts. Solidity is its name (essentially C plus extras that were thought to be a good idea from Python and other languages that presumably the Ethereum people have used). God forbid anyone would design a language with reliability in mind: http://shape-of-code.coding-guidelines.com/2015/03/15/ethereum-is-it-cost-effective-to-create-reliable-contracts/
Of course the key to code reliability is following the Ethereum smart contract coding style guide, which of course the majority of people don't seem to be doing: http://hackingdistributed.com/p/2016/06/16/finding-unchecked-send-in-live-ethereum-contracts/
The site has not been hacked. The terms of service quite clearly state that what the code does is the definition of the system. Somebody simply put the time into understanding what a 'smart contract' did and executed it appropriately.
"The terms of The DAO Creation are set forth in the smart contract code existing on the Ethereum blockchain at 0xbb9bc244d798123fde783fcc1c72d3bb8c189413. Nothing in this explanation of terms or in any other document or communication may modify or add any additional obligations or guarantees beyond those set forth in The DAO’s code. Any and all explanatory terms or descriptions are merely offered for educational purposes and do not supercede or modify the express terms of The DAO’s code set forth on the blockchain; to the extent you believe there to be any conflict or discrepancy between the descriptions offered here and the functionality of The DAO’s code at 0xbb9bc244d798123fde783fcc1c72d3bb8c189413, The DAO’s code controls and sets forth all terms of The DAO Creation."
One use of the block chain is low cost licensing, as implemented in a recent hackathon (http://shape-of-code.coding-guidelines.com/2015/02/16/long-tail-licensing/).
Toasters might not want to license IP, but TVs might.
Perhaps your fridge will be able to order supplies when it detects items have been removed. But would you trust cryptocurrency based contracts to work as advertised
http://shape-of-code.coding-guidelines.com/2015/03/15/ethereum-is-it-cost-effective-to-create-reliable-contracts/
Would the claims being made by these researchers stand up to the same level of scrutiny from the Advertising Standards Authority that a soap power advert has to survive? I suspect not.
There is a group in France working in formal verification that I think would also have trouble getting their claims published in a Soap power advert.
Lets see, we have:
"...we have shipped hundreds of XtremIO X-Bricks to customers..."
"...less than 32 Seconds of unavailability in a year,..."
"...field-measured to be 922,240 hours, or 105 years."
which suggests they have sold just over 200 units in 6 months, one of which developed a fault.
Not the most statistically reliable of claims.
Firefox is distributed under the Mozilla Public license, https://www.mozilla.org/MPL/2.0/, which as I understand it requires distribution of "... any Modifications that You create or to which You contribute, must be under the terms of this License."
Where can I download the source code of the changes and updates Gamma has made?
While it may be possible to design around what you refer to as the "mixed mode" patent the workaround may have a sufficiently large overhead that JIT compilation is not worthwhile on Dalvik. See a a blog posting of mine, http://shape-of-code.coding-guidelines.com/2010/08/15/oraclegoogle-java-patents-lawsuit/, for more details.
Base-3 is closest to the most efficient encoding representation which is base 2.718..., but fractional bases are not possible in practice. Heat dissipation is a major problem for chip designers and base-3 would enable them to use a lot fewer components (assuming the power consumption of a base-3 device was comparable to a base-2 device), so there could be a major cost/performance incentive in years to come to use base-3 devices.
Us human are are derived from a base-4 encoding, i.e., DNA.
The leaked files do not include the makefiles needed to build executable programs (I'm assuming that these do exist) and so it is proving difficult to get this right manually (at least for the Fortran code). I think the CRU should come clean and release a complete development snapshot. Of course if they would rather that people not have the ability to actually run their data analysis software they might not want to do this.
If this material were lead it were 1cm thick incomming gamma radiation would be reduced by 50%.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_protection
Perhaps they should be invited to wear a cloak of this material inside a nuclear reactor (along with the gullible journalists), at least they could get a Darwin award for their troubles.
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