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In a closed society where everybody's guilty, the only crime is getting caught. In a world of thieves, the only final sin is stupidity. - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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I'd call that an insider joke. B certainly is C's predecessor, but it hardly went mainstream. Very few programmers know anything at all about B without checking Wikipedia - and even after doing that, they probably have to read the fine print to distinguish a B program from a C program.
Religious freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make five.
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We wrote machine code directly.
In octal, because base 10 hadn't been invented yet.
On punch cards.
In Sanskrit
In the snow, up hill, both ways.
Check out my IoT graphics library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx
And my IoT UI/User Experience library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix
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honey the codewitch wrote: In octal, because base 10 hadn't been invented yet.
"Octal is just like decimal, if you are missing two fingers." (Tom Lehrer)
Religious freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make five.
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The question does not have a definitive answer.
You can't even answer the same question now and there are more ways to collect data.
Following is the source I have used for a very long time. And I consider the data collection better than others but it is certainly open to question.
TIOBE Index - TIOBE[^]
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I certainly would not use the TIOBE Index as a reliable source of truth, though. Maybe it can tell you "something", but to me it appears like self-referencing: The TIOBE Index tells which languages top the TIOBE Index. Like "intelligence" is defined as "What you measure in an IQ test".
To take one example: Last month, C popularity dropped by 2.38%, in a single month. No, that is not for real. Popularity doesn't change that rapidly for a well established and very widespread language (unless there are some strong, external factors that has hit the headlines of every software oriented internet publication).
The presentation of the September 2024 values states that "C is currently at position #4, which is its lowest position ever since the start of the TIOBE index in 2001." That may be true, but the current reading is 8.89% - in August 2017 it was at 6.48%, that is significantly lower popularity. So is the popularity of a language given by the number of people / projects using it, or by how much (or little) the users of other languages tend to center on many or few other languages? You can use statistics to prove whatever you want.
I also question their data collection methods. E.g. entries 51-100 are listed without sorting, so they don't reveal whether whitespace is #51, #100 or somewhere inbetween. Even if it really is #100: I refuse to believe that whitespace really is the 100th most popular programming language. Something is not 100% reliable in their collection of data.
Religious freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make five.
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At the risk of repeating myself:
"Statistics are used by rascals to convince fools"
Author unknown (to me)
>64
It’s weird being the same age as old people. Live every day like it is your last; one day, it will be.
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Pascal, BASIC, Fortran, COBOL, and I would even go out on a limb and say assembly.
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You never tried Ada, ATLAS, JOVIAL or hpl? Of them, hpl was my favorite, simply because it drove QC people crazy. With hpl, I could modify the program on the fly, so there was no way to certify that the program that started the run would be the same code that actually executed. Good times! 
Will Rogers never met me.
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Well crap, there goes my weekend plans.
Check out my IoT graphics library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx
And my IoT UI/User Experience library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix
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Synthetic quartz can also be "grown."
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Silicon dioxide doesn't really qualify as a rare earth element - it is the second most abundant one in the Earth's continental crust.
There are, of course, various qualities of pureness in naturally occurring quartz. I guess this mine provides some of the purest raw material for further processing. Yet, I have never before heard anything getting even close to "Spruce Pine has pretty much a total worldwide monopoly on HPQ", as the article phrases it. Quartz is mined "all over" - and purified from less pure raw materials. Maybe the purification costs are somewhat higher in other places, but the electronics industry will not come to an abrupt halt from mine being shut down temporarily or permanently.
In Norwegian, we have a way of speech, being "world renowned within Norway", indicating that those associated with some phenomenon grossly overstate their importance on a world scale. I am quite sure that a shutdown of the Spruce Pine mines may be catastrophic for the Spruce Pine village, far more than for the semiconductor industry.
Religious freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make five.
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I spend a lot of time trying to get my code right. Sure, I'm not immune to bugs. Could I be better about methodically testing? Absolutely, especially since I hate that part, but I think for the most part I do a pretty good job. I just spent awhile tracking down all kinds of little issues to get my SVGs rendering pixel perfect. They now look better than the reference implementation I've been using.
Meanwhile, Microsoft's mail client dies inside about every other time my computer suspends itself. Their windows task bar gets confused and starts stacking task icons almost completely on top of each other, etc.
If big companies like MS are pushing user expectations downward in terms of software quality, it makes me wonder.
Other than integrity and self respect, why do I care if my code works, if Microsoft doesn't? If IBM doesn't? If Oracle doesn't? You know?
Check out my IoT graphics library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx
And my IoT UI/User Experience library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix
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Because for some reason, clients spend thousands and thousands on big suppliers that don't get the job done, but when it comes to us little folk they want only the best for the lowest price and they want it yesterday 
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True. Maybe it's because Microsoft basically has a captive consumer base.
Operating systems vendors end up being a small pond with big fish just because of the sheer man hours/capital-expenditure it takes to develop a modern OS.
You have what? Apple's OS/Linux/Windows*. Unless you want to go totally off the beaten path with something like QNX, but that's usually cost prohibitive for compatibility and user education reasons.
Apple doesn't really compete except as boutique because they've priced themselves out of ever being a mainstream consumer product, although to their credit, they've expanded that boutique market more than I thought it could bear.
Users on Linux is something that IT people scare their children with if they misbehave.
So Windows it is. What real choice does one have?
*ChromeOS doesn't count. Don't even go there - it's a phone with a keyboard, not a PC.
Check out my IoT graphics library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx
And my IoT UI/User Experience library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix
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honey the codewitch wrote: *ChromeOS doesn't count. Don't even go there - it's a phone with a keyboard, not a PC.
The way I see it, ChromeOS is for the Anything-But-Microsoft crowd that isn't technical enough to use Linux, and at the same time smart enough not to want to pay the Apple tax. Or they're smart enough to avoid it. But looking at ChromeOS, I have to question whether those buyers realize what they're getting themselves into.
Sometimes I wish there was more competition, but then I'm reminded interoperability is a mess even with just the few options that exist today. More would just compound the problem.
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Reminds me of a big company that called me about a network issue and wanted me to come to their office.
I went to the office and the receptionist said I couldn't go in, since I wasn't wearing a tie.
So I left.
A few hours later I got a call asking why I didb't show up, so I explained about the receptionist and made an appointment for the next day and explained, if I make two trips and have to wear an uncomfortable tie, my rate is double."Perhaps you can find someone with a tie a lot cheaper, but I was under the impression that you needed a problem solved, not a tie.
So I
went back, wearing a tie with my tee shirt and shorts, fixed the problem and billed for two trips and time at double my normalrate
CQ de W5ALT
Walt Fair, Jr.PhD P. E.
Comport Computing
Specializing in Technical Engineering Software
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Why did you care to put on that tee shirt?
It reminds me: In my student days, my University bought an IBM mainframe. At least back in those days, IBM service people were always 'properly dressed', white shirt and tie. At the same time, they were supposed to appear at the level of the customer. So at the University, IBM service people were observed wearing jeans, ironed, to show sharp creases.
Religious freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make five.
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trønderen wrote: 'properly dressed', white shirt and tie.
If I'm told there's some sort of dress code, I always ask at what time the Queen of England is scheduled to arrive, so I can plan to be done and long gone by then.
If that's a problem, I'm okay telling these people this is not the place for me. I've never had a job where I was hired to make a fashion statement.
I'm holding back even less the older I get. I have no time for such BS.
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Rejected for not wearing a tie? 
Some people/companies have their priorities completely backwards...
I've never worn a tie in my life.
Dr.Walt Fair, PE wrote: went back, wearing a tie with my tee shirt and shorts, fixed the problem and billed for two trips and time at double my normalrate
That'll show 'em 
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There is surely apathy from the part of people employed at large companies like those you mention. Can't work out a problem? Push it out anyway, if it becomes a problem for enough people, someone else will surely get the job of fixing it eventually.
But when it's your own, and your name gets attached to it, you tend to take pride in your work and don't want to be made to look bad. There's really something about putting a project together on your own that works better than what a multi-billion company can do.
That's why I would bother.
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I wonder if I left the wrong impression with my initial comment.  I absolutely agree with you, but I wrote what I did as food for thought.
Check out my IoT graphics library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx
And my IoT UI/User Experience library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix
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I know when it comes to code, you're just about the last person I would ever expect to drop the ball, especially when integrity and self-respect is at play. You've made too many posts about rewriting and restarting projects for me to expect any less.
I wrote what I wrote to express my point of view, being fully aware - or at least assuming - you also share it. No wrong impression here, at least not from my part.
modified yesterday.
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