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Comment Re:40 is an artificial boundary (Score 1) 286

Posted as AC because I don't feel like putting up with all the haters and doubters who will shitpost because they hate me for reminding them how much they're lacking, and the jerks who will call me a liar.

On the contrary, it's a good reminder that our bodies are really remarkable machines, and can often come back effectively from a lifetime of abuse if you make effort to do it.

Comment Re:OT: Jehovah's witnesses once hung up on me (Score 5, Funny) 246

A friend and I had some fun at the Jehovah's Witnesses' expense about 30 years ago. I was over at his place, and there was a knock at the door. He peeked outside and said "Dude, it's the Jehovah's Witnesses, come here!" He threw his arm around me and answered the door in a very lispy voice, and they were mostly speechless. He then looked at me and said, "Well hun, I don't guess they have anything to say, so let's go back to bed!" and shut the door on them. He never got another knock again.

Comment Re:Who was forced to sign an NDA? (Score 1) 38

I mean, I didn't have to sign it but i'd not have got the job otherwise. Doesn't mean you agree with it. Hell, doesn't mean you're going to obey it, but all that comes later.

Then you weren't willing to walk away from it. Signing an agreement you have no intention of keeping can be a recipe for a lot of expense later on.

Comment Re:Who was forced to sign an NDA? (Score 4, Informative) 38

I've walked away from bad agreements, and I'm not shy about crossing stuff out that I don't find acceptable. So far I haven't had anyone refuse to hire me because of that. As Billoo said, you have to be assertive about your own best interests because you're the only one looking out for them.

Comment Re:Can you say... (Score 3, Informative) 266

In the U.S. there hasn't ever been an exploitation requirement per se. The only kind of IP that explicitly requires action by the holder is a trademark, which they're required to aggressively defend at the risk of losing it otherwise. However, it used to be that you could file an application and tie up the approval process for years without it actually being issued, which effectively let you secretly hold a patent as long as you wanted and have it formally issued only when it was to your advantage to do so. About 20 years ago the U.S. changed patent terms from "date of issuance" to "date of filing", so the clock now starts ticking when you first send in the application.

Comment Re:Of course you can! (Score 1) 376

That 90k job will have at least 10 hours of unpaid stress/OT vs a 65k/40hr week so the coefficients to compare are 1.625 govt vs1.8 private sector.

Except I already make more than that and do a 40-hour week, and I haven't been given any grief over my vacation schedule. In my situation, the pension would be the only notable benefit. And our department hasn't seen any layoffs in literally decades.

Comment Don't give up hope (Score 1) 720

While many places will pass on the basis of a felony record, one of the best Java guys I ever worked with had a felony assault conviction from about five years prior after a guy started a bar fight. He was a contractor when we met, was hired by the company we were doing work for, and hasn't seemed to have too many problems finding work. He was also very up-front about the conviction during the HR process.

Comment Re:No (Score 3, Insightful) 545

Another thing that employers sometimes like to pull with salaried employees is not paying a full week's salary when there's a day or two when the office is closed during the week (holidays, etc.). If work was available at all during the week and you were willing and able to work, regardless of the number of days the office was closed, you're supposed to get your full week's pay unless it was the first or last week of your employment. If an employer has a policy that formally disregards that rule, or doesn't have a policy but regularly violates the rule, they risk losing the exempt status for their employees at that location.

Comment Re:why would I write to that? (Score 1) 187

Date libraries, as it turns out, are rather monstrously difficult to make.

They're not too bad if you have only the U.S. to deal with, but throw awareness of time zones worldwide into the code and it becomes a mess quickly because of all of the 30 minute, 45 minute, etc. changes. I had to write a separate date library for an airline reservations system many years ago simply because the stock C++ libraries wouldn't deal properly with Australian time zones. Maybe that's changed since then.

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