This is a(n) historical question, not a comparison-between-languages question: This article from 2005 talks about the lack of a single, central framework for Python. For Ruby, this framework is clearly Rails. Why, historically speaking, did this happen for Ruby but not for Python? (or did it happen, and that framework is Django?) Also,...
Why did DOS/Windows and Mac decide to use \r\n and \r for line ending instead of \n? Was it just a result of trying to be "different" from Unix? And now that Mac OS X is Unix (-like), did Apple switch to \n from \r? ...
I was wondering why we use the terms "push" and "pop" for adding/removing items from stacks? Is there some physical metaphor that caused those terms to be common? The only suggestion I have is something like a spring-loaded magazine for a handgun, where rounds are "pushed" into it and can be "popped" out, but that seems a little unlikel...
Hi all I'm just curious about this really, does anyone know why they broke convention on this one? Thanks, Ciaran ...
This question arose from comments about different kinds of progress in computing over the last 50 years or so. I was asked by some of the other participants to raise it as a question to the whole forum. The basic idea here is not to bash the current state of things but to try to understand something about the progress of coming up with...
Suppose you have a history containing the three commits A, B and C: A-B-C I would like to combine the two commits A and B to one commit AB: AB-C I tried git rebase -i A which opens up my editor with the following contents: pick e97a17b B pick asd314f C I change this to squash e97a17b B pick asd314f C Then Git 1.6.0.4 says:...
What languages or platforms influenced the .NET 1.0 Team to build-in the concept of Attributes from the very start? Was this an Aspect-Oriented thing? Serialization? or something else? I was still in VB6-land at this time, and never used any of the pre-1.0 .NET versions. ...
What are the most significant events that impacted desktop software development? I'm trying to come up with a good timeline but I know I'm missing a bunch of important events: Introduction of the personal computer (lates 70s?) Release of VisiCalc (1980) WordPerfect 4.2 in 1986 Windows 3.1 (1992) Visual Basic Windows 95... Java, X11, ...
why are we using for (int i = 0 ; i < count ; i++){ } why the i why not for (int a = 0; a < count; a++){ } I do it, you do it, everyone does it but WHY? *edit I found out an old saying about FORTRAN which is more funny than correct which says "god is real, everything else above is an integer". "god" would be a variable name s...
We have an entity split across 5 different tables. Records in 3 of those tables are mandatory. Records in the other two tables are optional (based on sub-type of entity). One of the tables is designated the entity master. Records in the other four tables are keyed by the unique id from master. After update/delete trigger is present on ...
Here is my problem: I used Subversion for some time, until I switched to Git. Some more time elapsed. There was no import of the history from Subversion to Git. It was a strict checkout, delete of the .svn dirs, then git init. Not a smart move. Now, thousands of git commits later, I find a backup of the Subversion repo made at the t...
I'd like to know a little more about the overall development and history of programming. Things like how they came up with syntax and the overall thought process during the design of the older languages that laid the foundation for more modern languages. I looked through this but didn't seem to find what I was looking for. Any recomme...
Hello, What would be a good methodology for learning how computers and computer programming works? For example, would you recommend learning how circuits work, then assembly language, and then higher level languages? ...
I remember a couple of websites that seemed to be pretty ground-breaking a long time ago, but they are long gone now. One of them was "Gabocorp.com" ... it had a nice flash interface. Another one was "Octopus.com" ... it was a cool-looking web-based 'mashup' of web content. Is there a way to find out who coded these sites and contact t...
Hi All, I need to save a history of states over a few actions in a Java application, which I can later reload in order to restore the state at a certain action. In other words I have a screen which has a state associated with it and I need to store it as well as any changes in a history so that I can restore the state of the screen at a...
Using Team Foundation Server and Visual Studio 2008, is there a way to highlight the submissions since my last "get latest version"? This would allow me to quickly identify what has been submitted since my last "pull" without having to remember which changeset I last synced with. Thanks. Eric ...
I just finished reading a great book called 'The Dream Machine' by Mitchell Waldrop. The author does a great job of connecting the dots and presenting a picture which details how the research at the various universities and corporations came together and how the computer became a household commodity. The things I thoroughly enjoyed about...
I have read somewhere recently something related to the kind of computers. The reading was related to Lisp and Emacs that fit into an "architectural" model more like a Turing Machine. In the other hand it was C and the "other" architectural model was named after someone whose name I don't remember, but named as the most successful type...
I find C#'s Attributes, Python's Properties too a really nice idea, and I guess their direct ancestor might have come from Java's Annotations, but I'm curious as to where this concept originally came from, anyone has any clues? ...
Duplicate: Oldest programs you still have to maintain Edit by ldigas: Actually, no. I'm not interested in legacy code which still runs somewhere or has to be maintained. I'm interested in what's the oldest piece of code which unchanged is still usable today (with today's compilers, interpreters)? Difference: Legacy code: It still...