I think you should have to license to be a tech writer and I think the only question should be "do you understand the difference between transportation and software?"

If you can't get through the test without falling to the temptation to make a stupid, stale and invalid comparing a broken down vehicle of some sort to a software company, you should be shot.

For starters (and I can't believe I'm writing this) it's possible that the software industry needs a little oversight from the government.

o_O

The world weeps when Forbes writers attempt humor.

That's really sweet how the managing editor gave a column to his middle-school nephew. Why can't other publications espouse family values like this?

I just love reading articles where the writer clearly doesn't have a clue what he is talking about.
</sarcasm>

Flight code (and general aviation practice) works completely differently than something as low-risk and low-consequence as a personal computer. Performance and ease of use drive PCs. And absolute intolerance to delay and critical failure is the pervasive criteria for anything that flies more serious than an rc plane.

Applying regulations to software development -- in effect, declaring that the standard disclaimers in EULAs are invalid and that a software product must meet some threshold of suitability for purpose or else the producers are liable for damages -- might be an idea compatible with the commercial, for-profit software industry, but it will never work with Open Source.

I've heard of comparing apples to oranges (and by apples, I mean the actual fruit), but this is ridiculous.

When software gets to the point that it has the potential to kill hundreds of people when it glitches, I'm sure you'll get all the government regulation and cross-industry cooperation/coordination you could ever want. Until then, wait for the patch (or learn Linux).

I have a friend who flies fighter jets in a branch of the military. The training planes he few ran on open source software that had been mucked with goodness knows how many times. System crashed mid flight, and he had to 'reboot his plane' while in the middle of a dive, getting it back online in time to pull the plane up from a nose-first crash landing. I.Can't.Even.Imagine. My only point is that software is everywhere, and there is less difference between PC operating systems and transportation systems than we might think. Scary Shiat.

Wow. Anytime upgrade. This is what you're going after Microsoft for. Watch out, we got a badass over here.

Tendancy to over-dew it: When software gets to the point that it has the potential to kill hundreds of people when it glitches

"Software" is already well beyond that point and there are significant regulations on the pieces that standard applies to. If a computer in an airplane suddenly decides that "straight" ahead is actually an 80 degree nosedive into an amusement park, Bad Things happen.

That said, that's why you don't buy a $99 OEM copy of Windows 7 Home off Amazon to fly your plane. Something tech writers apparently have a difficult time understanding.

If PC users had to be trained like pilots I'm sure many problems would disappear.

Most of the updates have to do with idiots spending their life cracking the code, attempting to find exploits and take advantage of those.

If the same group instead focused non stop on trying to bring down airplanes then you'd see these numbers change.

Can you imagine if every month that 767 required a new engine? Or different wings?

atheneschild: The training planes he few ran on open source software that had been mucked with goodness knows how many times. System crashed mid flight, and he had to 'reboot his plane' while in the middle of a dive, getting it back online in time to pull the plane up from a nose-first crash landing.

I know someone who writes such code, and I'm calling bullshiat. Maybe this happened in a simulator, but if it was in a real plane they would ground the fleet. They don't just randomly dick around with the software and hope for the best, there are all kinds of controls on that stuff.

Unless this is the Mississippi ANG or something. Then who knows.

Recently, when my Dell computer running Windows 7 had a problem with Google Chrome I was pretty much on my own.

Yeah. That's because Microsoft doesn't support Google's products. You may as well ask a lumber yard about the paint on your house.

Yet even with these losses, the airline industry has figured out how to move millions of spoiled, complaining Americans like me every day inside of tens of thousands of flying metal tubes without killing a single person in four of the past five years. Meanwhile every time I reboot my PC I find myself crossing my fingers that it won't hang mid-way or crash on me. Or praying to Jesus that I won't lose what I wrote as I'm CTRL+ALT+DELETING Microsoft Word for the third time that day because it's mysteriously conflicting with some other application on my computer.

What's really hilarious about this is imagining how this writer probably treats his computer. Let's reverse the bad comparison game here and imagine how it might work if the flying experience worked like the computing experience.

I show up at the airport and check in with an employee with the airline at the counter. At least, I think he's an employee with the airline. He wasn't at the counter per se, he was actually hanging out in the bathroom. His badge looks badly photo-copied and he doesn't seem to know anything about his job, but when he tells me he wants $50 to check me in I think nothing of it and hand him my wallet and all my luggage.

When I get to the security checkpoint the security person tells me that as a matter of routine, they thoroughly check every passenger that comes through security. They will verify the identify of all passengers, x-ray luggage, check all passengers for weapons, and cross-reference their names with a list of known terrorists. I decide that all of this seems very unnecessary, and instruct the security personnel to disable their checkpoint, pack up all the equipment, and let everyone through without any security screening whatsoever.

When my plane arrives, there seems to be a minor mechanical problem with the engines. Or at least that's what I assume, since the plane didn't taxi into the gate at full speed. Since I've flown many times before, I head out onto the tarmac and tell the maintenance workers that I'll take care of the problem. I grab the biggest wrench I can find, bang around on a few things that look important, drain out a little unnecessary fluid, and declare her ready to fly. I also tear off a few winglets and some silly moving parts on the tail, as I have a cousin who knows about planes that told me that you can increase the speed of an airplane by reducing it's weight.

atheneschild: I have a friend who flies fighter jets in a branch of the military. The training planes he few ran on open source software that had been mucked with goodness knows how many times. System crashed mid flight, and he had to 'reboot his plane' while in the middle of a dive, getting it back online in time to pull the plane up from a nose-first crash landing. I.Can't.Even.Imagine. My only point is that software is everywhere, and there is less difference between PC operating systems and transportation systems than we might think. Scary Shiat.

I've seen this happen when you install google navigation and iwings without using the latest version of java hydraulics. come on people, it's not rocket science!

call me stupid. when a os is missing a component isn't that a indication something is wrong like the file is corrupt because of malware/virus, hd is dying, program or user farked with it, etc...? if the program says it'll run on the os wouldn't the action to take be try to repair and reinstall if it didn't help or just go and reinstall to be safer? why order a upgrade?

jayhawk88: Yet even with these losses, the airline industry has figured out how to move millions of spoiled, complaining Americans like me every day inside of tens of thousands of flying metal tubes without killing a single person in four of the past five years. Meanwhile every time I reboot my PC I find myself crossing my fingers that it won't hang mid-way or crash on me. Or praying to Jesus that I won't lose what I wrote as I'm CTRL+ALT+DELETING Microsoft Word for the third time that day because it's mysteriously conflicting with some other application on my computer.

What's really hilarious about this is imagining how this writer probably treats his computer. Let's reverse the bad comparison game here and imagine how it might work if the flying experience worked like the computing experience.

I show up at the airport and check in with an employee with the airline at the counter. At least, I think he's an employee with the airline. He wasn't at the counter per se, he was actually hanging out in the bathroom. His badge looks badly photo-copied and he doesn't seem to know anything about his job, but when he tells me he wants $50 to check me in I think nothing of it and hand him my wallet and all my luggage.

When I get to the security checkpoint the security person tells me that as a matter of routine, they thoroughly check every passenger that comes through security. They will verify the identify of all passengers, x-ray luggage, check all passengers for weapons, and cross-reference their names with a list of known terrorists. I decide that all of this seems very unnecessary, and instruct the security personnel to disable their checkpoint, pack up all the equipment, and let everyone through without any security screening whatsoever.

When my plane arrives, there seems to be a minor mechanical problem with the engines. Or at least that's what I assume, since the plane didn't taxi into the gate at full speed. Since I've flown many times before, I head out onto the tarmac a ...

This is true.

/This is also the reason I don't charge for initial setup. Putting MSE, Malwarebytes, and Chrome/Firefox with Adblock/Flashblock (not NoScript. NoScript breaks the internet too much for me to trust complete newbs with it) on their computer, and stripping most of the preinstalled garbage off is much easier than pulling a virus off later and I don't trust THEM to do it right.
//After they get a virus, I do teach them NoScript. The charred ruins of their previous install tend to be sufficient motivation to put up with it.

Bacontastesgood: atheneschild: The training planes he few ran on open source software that had been mucked with goodness knows how many times. System crashed mid flight, and he had to 'reboot his plane' while in the middle of a dive, getting it back online in time to pull the plane up from a nose-first crash landing.

I know someone who writes such code, and I'm calling bullshiat. Maybe this happened in a simulator, but if it was in a real plane they would ground the fleet. They don't just randomly dick around with the software and hope for the best, there are all kinds of controls on that stuff.

As another who has mucked with code that flies, I call double bullshiat. Every line is reviewed and tested and the only things "open" are the standards (protocols, etc) used. That doesn't mean there aren't bugs, but there's no cruft, no 100 thousand line libraries linked in just so one additional function is available. It's all there for a purpose.

Now, if you're willing to get the government involved in regulating the quality of commercial software, you'd best be prepared to pay the equivalent of first-class airfare each time to buy a piece of software.

GoodyearPimp: Wow. Anytime upgrade. This is what you're going after Microsoft for. Watch out, we got a badass over here.

I am surprised that anyone actually uses that service. I never could figure out who it was meant for. Home users usually have everything they need in the version that came with their PC and businesses who need stuff like domain integration etc usually have other methods of acquiring licenses to upgrade their PCs. I guess the sort of enthusiast who builds a home network and actually has his kids use RDP connections to play games on his Server might need this service if he did not want to use any of the zillion other legal ways to acquire a valid windows upgrade license. I don't think we really need to pass legislation to regulate the software industry on behalf of that one person.

As to comparing OSs to airplanes: I imagine fanboys flying in their plastic iCessnas or geeks compiling their own Airbus-kernel to include support for dual legacy Rolls-Royce engines with cutting edge fibre-glass airframes. It does not really seem all that much safer.

I guess if you did want to create regulations for the software industry the first step would be to license the users. Anybody to stupid to know what they are doing would no longer be allowed to own, operate or administer a computer, we don't let just anyone fly or maintain airplanes and anyone wanting to fly in US-airspace has deal with the FAA. Kick anyone of the net who is not qualified and we will have far fewer computer issues.

the tech support guy from Dell, in fact, suggested I reformat my hard drive and reinstall Windows 7 if you can believe that

Yes. Having done tech support for Gateway, yes I can believe that.

I like how a "right of center, less-government-is-better kind of guy" is all for government intervention when it personally affects his business and bottom line.

And nothing flies on an airplane that hasn't been checked and rechecked and checked again.

"Why I'm grateful Microsoft lame-ass blogger doesn't build airplanes write a novel"

RatOmeter: Bacontastesgood: atheneschild: The training planes he few ran on open source software that had been mucked with goodness knows how many times. System crashed mid flight, and he had to 'reboot his plane' while in the middle of a dive, getting it back online in time to pull the plane up from a nose-first crash landing.

I know someone who writes such code, and I'm calling bullshiat. Maybe this happened in a simulator, but if it was in a real plane they would ground the fleet. They don't just randomly dick around with the software and hope for the best, there are all kinds of controls on that stuff.

As another who has mucked with code that flies, I call double bullshiat. Every line is reviewed and tested and the only things "open" are the standards (protocols, etc) used. That doesn't mean there aren't bugs, but there's no cruft, no 100 thousand line libraries linked in just so one additional function is available. It's all there for a purpose.

Now, if you're willing to get the government involved in regulating the quality of commercial software, you'd best be prepared to pay the equivalent of first-class airfare each time to buy a piece of software.

Nope, I'm not saying anything about what the government should or should not do, just a reminder that code is everywhere, and the gap from 'unimportant software' to life-critical software is not as big as we would like to think it is.

Considering the number of pieces that were broken on the planes that were let fly, I have no doubt that the software that was running it had similar issues. In retrospect I'm curious if by 'open source' he was referring to code that was available to edit by other companies, because that's the way the military works. You write software for them, you give them the code. When they want an upgrade or another feature, they'll put the project out to bid, award the contract, and hand over the code for the new company to change it at will. I have no doubt that code that was once 'just fine' can now have unexpected interactions with old, problematic equipment throwing constant errors or faults, and each new set of hands that touch code they didn't write can introduce unexpected issues, or muck with unintended dependencies.

Before anyone tells me about 'aviation standards,' I said military. And trainers at that. Planes too old or defunct to really be part of the active fleet anymore.

You either believe me or not, it really doesn't matter all that much. But code is everywhere, and anything that is beyond trivial complexity is going to have bugs in it. Hopefully the system is redundant enough and has enough self-checks that the errors are caught and don't cause catastrophes.
Besides, I have to be at the gym in 26 minutes. :)

This gentleman honestly thinks that government is the answer? If the government regulated the industry, everything out there would be "Blue Screen of Death", people would lose jobs, and Asia would kick our butts in software development.

Government regulation hasn't helped the airline industry maintain a profit, hence their $54 billion losses. Hence, we keep having to bail them out just so they can pay their employees.

An F-18 fighter plane crashed due to a missing exception condition. From ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes, vol. 6, no. 2.
An F-14 fighter plane was lost to uncontrollable spin, traced to tactical software. From ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes, vol. 9, no. 5.

It happens. I'm not on crack. I'm now just irritated that I'm fighting back. ::sigh::

From 2005:

Link (new window)

/That's some fresh reporting there, Lou.

fluffy2097: Recently, when my Dell computer running Windows 7 had a problem with Google Chrome I was pretty much on my own.

Yeah. That's because Microsoft doesn't support Google's products. You may as well ask a lumber yard about the paint on your house.

AUAIOMRN: If PC users had to be trained like pilots I'm sure many problems would disappear.

Yes. Because if there's one company that is known for never updating its products, it's Microsoft.

/why do we read these idiots' articles?

atheneschild: ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes, vol. 6, no. 2.

Published in April, 1981

atheneschild: ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes, vol. 9, no. 5.

Published in October 1984

Of course "it happens". "It happens", however, is a far cry from, and I quote your exact words back to you here, "....there is less difference between PC operating systems and transportation systems than we might think."

Maybe YOU might think that way, but people who know what they're talking about don't.

Okay, we can make your computer as reliable as an airplane.

Step 1: Limit the hardware. Figure out how much computing power you need and depending on that you will have a choice of one or two processors, each of which is only compatible with one motherboard. You also have a selection of two video cards and one brand of memory. This is about what they do with airplanes. You might get a choice of engine based on the model, and there are very few models to choose from depending on your application.

Step 2: Limit the applications. Airplanes do one thing very well - flying stuff around. They suck as ground transportation. They also have weight limits that must be enforced. Therefore, you get a basic office suite (not feature rich in order to guarantee stability) and a web browser that handles HTML but no active content. Also, you can only run 3 applications at a time. Your system will be stable, but this comes at the cost of usability (but you don't have many applications either so this isn't a huge deal).

Step 3: Require training. You will have to take computer science classes (not computer based of course) and then 1000 hours of supervised computer use before you are allowed to use a computer on your own. Even the most stable Linux box can be taken down by a user who has no clue about what they are doing. A brand spanking new 787 can be crashed by someone without ground school and several thousand hours of flying experience..

Step 4: Extensive maintenance. After every time you use your computer, it is analyzed by Microsoft tech support for any possible minor and major errors that occurred during your use of the computer. Any problems that can be patched are immediately patched.

The author is an idiot. If he wants to pay tens of millions of dollars for a computer including hardware, OS, and application software, and several thousand dollars a day for tech support, he can get a stable machine, much like Delta can get a 737 from Boeing that flies reliably.

Whilst it goes off on, what I think, is an odd tangent he does raise a valid point at the beginning.

A service is down for 2 days and it's just "maintenance". You see a similar thing appearing in MMO's when they launch; unstable clusters going bang. Both are considered "Ok" by people, even to the level of expecting it.

This really shouldn't be and we really shouldn't be so accepting of it.

Yes. The government - known for their adaptability, flexibility and willingness to be early adopters of technology - will now be setting software requirements or running QA.

As someone who advocates for sensible regulation as "rules of the road", this is incredibly stupid.

Perhaps codifying into law something like "Your EULA is as enforceable as Sun Myung Moon's sovreignty" or "Big Data must always list - in a public forum such as the corporate website or publication made available to all stakeholders (not "shareholders") - what personal data they collect, how it is stored (on-site or off-, in plain text or as hashes, on company- or privately-owned servers/networks, etc) and how users can opt-out of having their data collected/stored. Data collected for business purposes only (including all data collected on users who have opted out of such collection) must be stored without any identifying information (beyond a corporate designator other than name/address)."

That might help - attacking bad uses of semantic data, as opposed to creators of bad software or stump-dumb users.

// remember - MS killed IE6 just a short month ago LARGELY BECAUSE (only) THE GOVERNMENT STILL USED IT
// as bad as the security was, as horrible as it was at CSS, as lame as it was with HTML4/JS/anything coded after 2004, the Feds still LOVED that shiat

sarah_t_s: This really shouldn't be and we really shouldn't be so accepting of it.

Funny you mention MMOs. I played WoW on and off for a few years and the horrendous quality of their service was one of my biggest gripes and probably the single biggest barrier to me keeping a constant subscription.

I understand full well that things sometimes break, but when you're talking about a service that is generating billions in profit but can't manage to release even the simplest patch without breaking something or keep the network up for a whole month without at least one serious problem, that's just unacceptable. Yet, go into the forums, and you'd see people - even those affected repeatedly by problems themselves - defending the company like they're valorous knights defending a fair maiden's honor.

Maybe it's always been like this, but I tend to agree that customers are far too forgiving of problematic service, poor customer service, and poor reliability in general in virtually every segment. Technology just happens to be the worst example.

zipdog: The author is an idiot. If he wants to pay tens of millions of dollars for a computer including hardware, OS, and application software, and several thousand dollars a day for tech support, he can get a stable machine, much like Delta can get a 737 from Boeing that flies reliably.

Cannot be stressed enough. The author has compared apples with engine blocks, for Christ's sake, and demonstrates his ignorance of both subjects. He makes hyperbolic, uninformed statements, cluelessly rants about things he doesn't understand, and ultimately does nothing but try to slam Microsoft for a two-day service outage.

To be blunt, the author makes Forbes look bad. This is the kind of article Forbes pushes out, this steaming pile of clueless verbiage? Really?

Dr Dreidel: Yes. The government - known for their adaptability, flexibility and willingness to be early adopters of technology - will now be setting software requirements or running QA.

As someone who advocates for sensible regulation as "rules of the road", this is incredibly stupid.

Perhaps codifying into law something like "Your EULA is as enforceable as Sun Myung Moon's sovreignty" or "Big Data must always list - in a public forum such as the corporate website or publication made available to all stakeholders (not "shareholders") - what personal data they collect, how it is stored (on-site or off-, in plain text or as hashes, on company- or privately-owned servers/networks, etc) and how users can opt-out of having their data collected/stored. Data collected for business purposes only (including all data collected on users who have opted out of such collection) must be stored without any identifying information (beyond a corporate designator other than name/address)."

That might help - attacking bad uses of semantic data, as opposed to creators of bad software or stump-dumb users.

// remember - MS killed IE6 just a short month ago LARGELY BECAUSE (only) THE GOVERNMENT STILL USED IT
// as bad as the security was, as horrible as it was at CSS, as lame as it was with HTML4/JS/anything coded after 2004, the Feds still LOVED that shiat

Well put. You're a better writer than TFA's author.

/ Of course, so is the half-retarded betta in my living room that had his bowl cleaned a few days late this week.

Oh, you.

/Link (new window)

atheneschild: Before anyone tells me about 'aviation standards,' I said military. And trainers at that. Planes too old or defunct to really be part of the active fleet anymore.

Not to attack you, but it sounds like your friend is a test pilot. It's their job to fly things that aren't proven to be safe yet. Or maybe not and it was just bad luck, but I work in Army Aviation and there are some very rigorous processes to prevent that kind of thing. Glad your friend was able to save himself. Whatever the problem was I can guarantee they thoroughly examined the software and hardware to make sure it didn't happen again to anyone else.

entropic_existence: I just love reading articles where the writer clearly doesn't have a clue what he is talking about.
</sarcasm>

You must really, like fark's comment section...


/ZING!!!!!

PanicMan: atheneschild: Before anyone tells me about 'aviation standards,' I said military. And trainers at that. Planes too old or defunct to really be part of the active fleet anymore.

Not to attack you, but it sounds like your friend is a test pilot. It's their job to fly things that aren't proven to be safe yet. Or maybe not and it was just bad luck, but I work in Army Aviation and there are some very rigorous processes to prevent that kind of thing. Glad your friend was able to save himself. Whatever the problem was I can guarantee they thoroughly examined the software and hardware to make sure it didn't happen again to anyone else.

I appreciate your giving me the benefit of the doubt. :) Nope, friend was in training, is now a fully-qualified pilot. Normally I would question his series of fantastic stories that happened to him in those training planes, but this kid is beyond questioning in my book. He is one of those few, rare people you meet in life you feel privileged for having known. These were USMC planes, so maybe getting the hand-me-downs from the Navy is a pretty sucky life. And was I there? Nope. I wasn't. I just code for a living. Maybe this was the one time he decided to make up shiat completely out of thin air, but I seriously doubt it - not this guy. But his list of stores made it seem like the vast majority of training planes had some serious problems with them, although that one was by-far the worst. I would have shiat myself.

Think about the election machines. How important is a fair and audit-able election to our country? Yet it seems like the software put forth for those machines is not as rigorous many other piece of software. That stuff isn't directly life or death, but it's pretty important. I just think the average citizen thinks that there is some special class of programmer that writes life-and-death code, and there isn't, not really. Not that I want the government all up in my average piece of software, I don't. I really really don't.

It is a good discussion to have, in the coding community, about what standards and testing practices might be implemented that are auditable, and the possibility of creating high-end software certifications. Instead, we put forth black-box code and just tell people it works.

RatOmeter: Now, if you're willing to get the government involved in regulating the quality of commercial software, you'd best be prepared to pay the equivalent of first-class airfare each time to buy a piece of software.

Personally, I think it would be sufficient if we just broke up Microsoft and made vendor lock-in illegal, from now on. I can't tell you how many of my problems would be eliminated if I didn't have to deal with vendor lock-in.

Dr Dreidel: // remember - MS killed IE6 just a short month ago LARGELY BECAUSE (only) THE GOVERNMENT STILL USED IT
// as bad as the security was, as horrible as it was at CSS, as lame as it was with HTML4/JS/anything coded after 2004, the Feds still LOVED that shiat

They didn't love it.

What happened was that it was a major browser for the first round of 'internet appliances'. A lot of code was written for in-house applications that was written for it's propriatory/broken/nonstandard specs. They worked well enough that said programs became essential.

Yet when the world moved on from IE6, many agencies never got or appropriated the funds to come up with replacements for those applications, which by then were unsupported legacy systems($$$ to change - whether to replace or update to run on newer browsers).

I think a lot of people are forgetting the REAL issue:

Just how friggin' reliable is all this software?

Every day, people post stories about software failures or hacks into vital systems. Everything from the power grid to your grandpa's pacemaker. Just yesterday a story posted was about the financial system software being beyond the understanding of the users or regulators. Well, what happens when some kid in a basement (more likely - a government supported bank of tech engineers) is able to hack into the banking software?

I'm an average computer user - I know more than a lot of friends and get asked to "fix" their computer problems, but I KNOW my limits. Feel free to call me stupid, but I think we're in over our heads with all of the computerization. The unintended consequences could be severe.

BTW, I'm an old school pilot who used an e6b manual flight computer. I could work out problems faster than others using the 80's calculator e6b. We had to use the calculators for our exams - so we all got the same answers if we did the problem right. I hated mine since the buttons would stick and either not enter or double enter. In the airplane I used my whiz-wheel.

atheneschild: I appreciate your giving me the benefit of the doubt. :) Nope, friend was in training, is now a fully-qualified pilot. Normally I would question his series of fantastic stories that happened to him in those training planes, but this kid is beyond questioning in my book. He is one of those few, rare people you meet in life you feel privileged for having known. These were USMC planes, so maybe getting the hand-me-downs from the Navy is a pretty sucky life. And was I there? Nope. I wasn't. I just code for a living. Maybe this was the one time he decided to make up shiat completely out of thin air, but I seriously doubt it - not this guy. But his list of stores made it seem like the vast majority of training planes had some serious problems with them, although that one was by-far the worst. I would have shiat myself.

I believe you. Pilots have the craziest true life stories I've ever heard.

Think about the election machines. How important is a fair and audit-able election to our country? Yet it seems like the software put forth for those machines is not as rigorous many other piece of software. That stuff isn't directly life or death, but it's pretty important. I just think the average citizen thinks that there is some special class of programmer that writes life-and-death code, and there isn't, not really. Not that I want the government all up in my average piece of software, I don't. I really really don't.

I think that's politics and poor management more than anything. For bank or election software it makes sense. Unlike the article author, I don't think the govt needs to make Google and Microsoft code compliant.

It is a good discussion to have, in the coding community, about what standards and testing practices might be implemented that are auditable, and the possibility of creating high-end software certifications. Instead, we put forth black-box code and just tell people it works.

Agreed. I don't code, but it's worth talking about. Probably a lot more software verification and evaluation work goes on than I know about. Hopefully.

I read the whole thing thinking there would be a payoff for the long winded troll. Then I realised the "author" is an idiot and I was pissed at myself.
/sigh

Why didn't he download the anytime upgrade bittorrent like everyone else? Less cost, works great.