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Comment SELECT FROM dual for no reason (Score 1) 394

by albyrne5 (#34472566) Attached to: Programming Mistakes To Avoid
This one bugs the hell out of me:

In PL/SQL, when people for some bizarre reason avoid using IF/THEN/ELSE and normal := assignments, but instead to a SELECT DECODE FROM dual.

Why?! Dear Lord why?

It's harder to read. It's slower. It's against normal practises. It's an utterly unecessary use of SELECT.

So why do they do it? And why do they insist - when I point out their stupidity - that it's "just developer preference" and "there's no performance hit"?

HELP ME!
Portables (Games)

Epic Games Predicts Console, Mobile Convergence 104

Posted by Soulskill from the sounds-like-a-job-for-ben-heck dept.
An anonymous reader writes "After taking the stage at the Apple iPhone event in September, game developer Epic Games has finally revealed more about its plan to release Unreal Engine for the iOS devices. UE3 is incredibly popular on consoles, and its free UDK has been really great for us modders. In this new interview, engine boss Mark Rein says the developer envisions a future where all game devices are handhelds, with high-end processors inside: 'It feels like there's a great opportunity for game consoles to cease to be something you plug into the wall and rather become something you take with you. Of course it will be more than just your game console; you can have your productivity apps, your documents, and your media collections on it as well.'"
Graphics

Sony To Launch First 3D PS3 Games On Friday 151

Posted by Soulskill from the how-about-games-with-a-three-dimensional-story dept.
Stoobalou writes "Sony plans to show off the first 3D PlayStation 3 games in the UK on 10 June, with a retail launch on 11 June. If you were wondering why Sony is shutting down half the PSN today for maintenance, then wonder no more. We reckon the company's simply gearing up for the launch of the PlayStation 3's first stereoscopic 3D games. Unfortunately, many game developers are seemingly indifferent to the 3D revolution at the moment. In fact, EA CEO John Riccitiello reckons that it's going to be a good three years before 3D becomes a standard gaming feature. Riccitiello explained that there's a big difference between converting a game to run in 3D mode and properly developing it to take full advantage of the extra dimension."
Science

World's Smallest Superconductor Discovered 72

Posted by samzenpus from the none-more-small dept.
arcticstoat writes "One of the barriers to the development of nanoscale electronics has potentially been eliminated, as scientists have discovered the world's smallest superconductor. Made up of four pairs of molecules, and measuring just 0.87nm, the superconductor could potentially be used as a nanoscale interconnect in electronic devices, but without the heat and power dissipation problems associated with standard metal conductors."
Input Devices

Is the Line-in Jack On the Verge of Extinction? 411

Posted by timothy from the erasing-the-analog-hole dept.
SlashD0tter writes "Many older sound cards were shipped with line-out, microphone-in, and a line-in jacks. For years I've used such a line-in jack on an old Windows 2000 dinosaur desktop that I bought in 2000 (600 Mhz PIII) to capture the stereo audio signal from an old Technics receiver. I've used this arrangement to recover the audio from a slew of old vinyl LPs and even a few cassettes using some simple audio manipulating software from a small shop in Australia. I've noticed only recently, unfortunately, that all of the four laptops I've bought since then have omitted a line-in jack, forcing me to continue keeping this old desktop on life support. I've looked around for USB sound cards that include a line-in jack, but I haven't been too impressed by the selection. Is the line-in jack doomed to extinction, possibly due to lobbying from vested interests, or are there better thinking-outside-the-box alternatives available?"
Earth

Planned Nuclear Reactors Will Destroy Atomic Waste 344

Posted by Soulskill from the but-where-will-we-get-our-superheroes dept.
separsons writes "A group of French scientists are developing a nuclear reactor that burns up actinides — highly radioactive uranium isotopes. They estimate that 'the volume of high-level nuclear waste produced by all of France’s 58 reactors over the past 40 years could fit in one Olympic-size swimming pool.' And they're not the only ones trying to eliminate atomic waste: Researchers at the University of Texas in Austin are working on a fusion-fission reactor. The reactor destroys waste by firing streams of neutrons at it, reducing atomic waste by up to 99 percent!"

Comment Mobile Me? (Score 3, Interesting) 469

by albyrne5 (#31143134) Attached to: The Worst Apple Products of All Time
I made the switch to Apple about 2 years ago - iPhone, iMac and Mac Book Pro, and I've been very very pleased with almost every single aspect.

EXCEPT FOR MOBILE ME!

It's f***ing DOG-DIRT! Whether it's sync issues or the server dying, or e-mails vanishing into thin air; there's always SOMETHING going wrong with the goddamn thing.

And I keep holding on thinking, "well they're bound to get it right sooner or later", but it's later and later and later, and still no sign of it ever being fixed. Drives me batty.
Social Networks

Game Distribution Platforms Becoming Annoyingly Common 349

Posted by Soulskill from the looking-at-you-games-for-windows-live dept.
The Escapist's Shamus Young recently posted an article complaining about the proliferation of distribution platforms and social networks for video games. None of the companies who make these are "quite sure how games will be sold and played ten years from now," he writes, "but they all know they want to be the ones running the community or selling the titles." Young continues, "Remember how these systems usually work: The program sets itself up to run when Windows starts, and it must be running if you want to play the game. If you follow this scheme to its logical conclusion, you'll see that the system tray of every gaming PC would eventually end up clogged with loaders, patchers, helpers, and monitors. Every publisher would have a program for serving up content, connecting players, managing digital licenses, performing patches, and (most importantly) selling stuff. Some people don't mind having 'just one more' program running in the background. But what happens when you have programs from Valve, Stardock, Activision, 2k Games, Take-Two, Codemasters, Microsoft, Eidos, and Ubisoft? Sure, you could disable them. But then when you fire the thing up to play a game, it will want to spend fifteen minutes patching itself and the game before it will let you in. And imagine how fun it would be juggling accounts for all of them."

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