I'm not dead yet!

One moment....OOOF

Enbalming procedure commencing.

I mean the older definition, doing things with thought to consequences.

Take the story the other day where an AI wiped the production database and then was able to clearly articulate that wiping the database was forbidden, it did it anyway, and the consequences were devastating.

Before taking action, a thoughtful AI would have compared the reasonably anticipated result of it's proposed commands to it's instructions and then not done it when they were in conflict. If that didn't stop it, it would perform the evaluation that the effect would be devastating and not done it.

We call a mind that pretends to fel guilt even when it doesn't actually feel anything a 'psychopath' and we have quite enough of those without creating artificial ones.

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Lots of things are pointers under the hood. But that's really irrelevant to the point.

Yeah, EVERYTHING is implemented at the base level in assembler, so pointers are in use everywhere. And I learned assembler first. But if that's your idea of where one should start, someone else can say we need to start with transistor theory, with just as valid an argument.

Did you look at the price on that?

$399.99 plus $271 shipping charge.

Pointers aren't required for most purposes. They're often just an optimization, frequently a questionable optimization. It's true that C pretty much requires pointers, but in C++ references can generally be substituted with greater clarity. Pointers are almost never used in Java (are they ever?), and certainly not in Python. Or many other languages I could name. (Yeah, they still exist "under the hood", but that's not the point of an exam of early or intermediate programming skill.) For that matter check out D https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fdlang.org%2F . That's a language that would be my favorite if they had a better way to document your code (last I checked Doxygen didn't do a good job) and it it had a slightly better library. (As it is I currently prefer C++ except for stuff that's heavy in unicode, where I'll switch to Python.)

C is actually easier than Java, though doing anything complex is harder.

A C++ subset doesn't have to be any harder than Java, and can be at least as capable. (The problem would be documenting it...and for students, learning to use only the subset.)

My favourite keyboard is the Microsoft Natural 4000.

It has wonderful feeling keys, and it's a split keyboard to give your wrists a break over straight keyboards.

And there are several do-nothing keys across the top that can be easily programmed to do whatever you want with a short script that calls xdotool (or ydotool if you're using wayland).

Nicest keyboard ever, in my opinion. Unfortunately, also no longer available.

I don't know what I'll do if my current keyboard quits. Does anyone still make a good alternative to the MS Natural keyboard?

Interesting that they have the kids write the answers for this exam using Java.

I can see a plus side ("universal" implementation) and a really big negative (Oracle).

I was in school pre-computer age so there was no such thing at that time, but didn't the kids learn Pascal in school some years back?

I suppose any language will do, more-or-less, since they'll all show you functions and function calls, arrays, variable types and data handling.

Alphabet can absorb way more fines than prison sentences.

Hopefully they won't be Evil.

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What's the storage *density*? I have the impression that grid scale batteries often use (relatively) low density storage, so they take up a lot of space. Lithium batteries are relatively high density (lots of storage/volume). Dense storage is, of course, part of what makes them so dangerous when they catch fire.

Perhaps it you wanted this to last through a blackout you'd need to give up your basement, rather than just part of it as with lithium batteries.

Unnh....there must be a reason Japan was researching whether uranium could profitably extracted from sea water. I believe that it was because decent ores for uranium were becoming scarce. (I used to know whether that was the reason they gave, but I can't certainly remember any longer....I think that was it though.)

Many can be trivially opened using a screwdriver to push the latch back. Some can be slipped with a credit card or laminated ID.

It sounds like your employer is unusually diligent about it.