Women in Computer Science

Although many people believe that the relatively small number of women in Computer Science poses a big problem, I disagree. I believe the real problem is the large number of men in our discipline who make no contribution. Of the aspiring CS majors that I know, many—if not most—believe that CS means programming. That is not true. Computer Science is the theory of computing and the study of solving problems programatically. Based on that definition, most CS majors hate Computer Science; they just enjoy programming. If those men all moved to a more suitable major then we would not have many computer scientists at all, male or female.

The Church, Technology... no Unicode?

The Church has struggled with internationalization of its software since we started using computers. A 1984 Ensign article reports how technology was accelerating work for many departments of the church (especially for temple ordinances), but notes that the technology was not yet adapted for temples in the Orient. We still have this problem today. The Church has been very slow to adopt the Unicode standard, which is now almost two decades old. The Mission Office System still uses European character encoding, making MOS nearly unusable for missions in Asia. Even the new FamilySearch has only recently added support for Chinese names, as per the Church's own temple submission standards. Late may be better than never, but as for supporting Church software outside the Americas and Europe, the Church needs to step its efforts.

Vulgarization of the Nerds

In contrast to Cringely's depiction of Sillicon Valley in Triumph of the Nerds, Daniel Lyons claims that emerging companies in the valley have lost the vision of their precursors. If the bright and brilliant of the rising generation focus on making quick cash—through the likes of FarmVille—society as a whole will suffer the lost potential of stagnant technology. But we can't hold them to blame for a lack of higher ambition. The real problem is their customers, who lack desire to do anything more meaningful than play mindless flash games. People need to stop spending money on these virtual sinkholes so that Silicon Valley can return its attention to the meaningful problems that are waiting to be solved.

Is Amazon Green?

A recent study suggests that online shopping leads to increased carbon emissions. The average online shopper might think that avoiding a drive to the store would be more environmentally friendly, but he overlooks something: shipping burns fuel too. According to the article, a consumer must order at least 25 items at once before the carbon footprint is smaller than that of traditional shopping. I have never ordered more than 10 items at once. Since amazon.com began offering free 2-day shipping to students I rarely order more than one item at a time. This reminds me of an older article, reporting that carbon emissions from a Google search are equivalent to boiling a kettle of water. If we aren’t the ones behind the wheel of the truck, or paying the electric bill, we tend to overlook of the environmental impact of these day-to-day activities. Next time you order a book online, order with a friend. Check your query for typos before you press the search button. Bookmark your class websites rather than Googling them daily. It’s scary how wasteful we can be, but amazing how much improvement just a little change can bring.

A Cost for Technology

Today I read Neil Postman’s talk entitled Five Things We Need to Know About Technological Change. Postman’s first assertion in the talk was that the gift of technology invariably comes with a price. Aside from the obvious prevalence of filth available on the web, I have never given much thought to the concept of technology’s negative influences on society—which I suppose is exactly what Postman wanted us to realize. One such repercussion technology has had on mankind is increased impatience. When we obtain some new technology, giving us the ability to quickly accomplish previously time-consuming tasks, we become irritated at the slightest delays or setbacks. This is true even if we finish the task very quickly by the previous standard. For example, how often do we get frustrated when we miss a green light, while driving, and have to wait an additional 30 seconds? Just a few days ago I found myself very annoyed that a sleep routine, which I was using in a program, didn’t provide a resolution higher than 1 second. This meant that I would have to wait a whole second if I used that routine. I think we might be able to use that example as the definition of impatience. I do not, however, believe that these negative consequences outweigh the benefits that new technology brings; we simply need to recognize the problems so that we can better address them.

Technorati (which the syllabus requires us to use) made me do this...

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Another Semester!

It's the start of a new semester! I was under the impression that I wouldn't be using this blog again for school, seeing as how Dr. Holzapfel was called as a mission president and thus precluded the possibility of taking any of his classes again. (I'll have graduated by the time he gets back.) However, to my great surprise one of my Computer Science classes has a blogging requirement this semester! The course is CS404: Ethics and Computers in Society. I found it amusing that the professor compared the course to a religion class during one of our first lectures, which means that it should fit in quite well here! It will be interesting to see how this turns out...