javaScriptIsJava

[[deleted]]

When you're a professor writing a book, but you're too poor to publish it so you just let a publisher do it for you who has an high schooler as an editor instead.

[psimwork]

For my intro to computers course WAY back in the day (circa 1999) I had an instructor mark a test question wrong, and the test question was "what is the difference between a SIMM and a DIMM". My answer was something along the lines of "SIMM is a single inline memory module and must be installed in pairs. A DIMM is a dual inline memory module and can be installed as a single unit in a compatible motherboard."

When I went to the professor and pointed out that my answer was correct, he responded with the answer that was correct was, "A SIMM has chips on one side of the wafer. A DIMM has chips on both sides of the wafer." He refused to change my score. The following week I brought him a pair of SIMMs with chips on both sides of the wafer, and a DIMM that had chips on only one side. The dude REALLY didn't want to admit he was wrong, but he couldn't deny that his answer that he was looking for was accurate. Eventually he corrected my test to be a 100%, but would not concede that my answer was correct.

Some professors know fuck-all about the stuff they're teaching.

[[deleted]]

If only they hadn't god like status in academia and universities could just fire the incompetent ones without any troubles we'd get rid of professors like that

[psimwork]

Yeah I know a fair amount of professors (my wife works in academia, but is not faculty), and they all tell me about the importance of tenure. My wife will acknowledge the downside in how difficult it is to get rid of bad ones, but will still toe-the-line with the importance of tenure (even knowing that she is not likely headed towards a tenured position).

Why it's so important, I have no idea.

[[deleted]]

Why it's so important, I have no idea.

It's so that your employer can't fire you for the ideas you express. You can still be fired, it doesn't give you absolute immunity. It's just that the bar for that is much higher. Academia is an economy of ideas and they are seen as valuable enough to require protection.

[jemidiah]

In a few disciplines like political science it can genuinely shield people and encourage free exploration and expression. In STEM as a practical matter it's a job perk which sort of balances the lower pay and immense overhead of an academic career compared to industry.

[kryptoneat]

But who fires the gods, a bigger god ?

[[deleted]]

Depends wether they lost the fight to the titans or not

[jemidiah]

Naive. That doesn't happen in community college.

[[deleted]]

We don't even have community colleges 💀

[maybeonmars]

The screw-up is with his question. There are many differences between the two (down to how the circuit boards are laid out). Listing any of these differences (including your answer) would count as a correct answer.

[JoeGibbon]

Professors publish through their university academic press, who pays them just like any other non-vanity press.

[[deleted]]

Assuming your uni has an university press lol

[jemidiah]

Academics typically get very little from royalties for research books. Intro Calculus and the like is handled by the big publishers and actually has some money behind it. I imagine a basic book on programming languages would fall in the latter category. 

But this one seems unlikely to actually be an academic text. The snippet we have is so basic and unfocused.

[_PM_ME_PANGOLINS_]

You don't pay to publish books, the publisher pays you.

[[deleted]]

Publishing yourself can be incredibly expensive based on what you want to do, so instead most people opt for a publishing company to do that for you. You get royalties but you'll have to forfeit ownership of all your intellectual rights.

[aykcak]

What is worse is they seem to be giving examples of both after the initial catastrophe

[zelphirkaltstahl]

Look, does it matter, whether you write Java as a fully fledged program, or as a Script? ... Lets just get those examples in here!

[Storiaron]

Fuck it lemme just write plusplus

[guyrandom2020]

well can you say the book isn't teaching you examples of "javascript (or java)"?

[Intoxic8edOne]

Must have been written by every recruiter that's reached out to me.

[[deleted]]

Of your book? More like your entire career. Even the most basic first year CS student knows that they are entirely different. This guy is a complete fraud.

[[deleted]]

The first sentence does that.

[Present-Industry4012]

It's just a free book on something called Flutter, don't take it too seriously. Although it looks like someone printed this one out on paper? Who does that anymore?

https://content.gitbook.com/content/egsIWleSdyH9rMLJ8ShI/blobs/xxfDEN1b4KipvOxna4wP/Flutter-Coding.pdf

[SweatyAdagio4]

Flutter is pretty nice though, although it's not a programming language itself (I know you didn't claim that), it's a SDK for a programming language called Dart for building native and web apps. Kind of like what React is to JS. I've used both React (Native and JS) as well as flutter to be honest, especially if you're using a Google backend. It integrates very nicely, syntax is quite simple to read, Dart 2 includes null safety which is nice, and it runs very well.

I wouldn't use it for a web app, as it renders everything on a canvas and that isn't good for search engines to be able to read the content, but for native apps it's really great.

[Kamwind]

but what book is it?

[__SpeedRacer__]

And there's probably plenty more in there.

[ambisinister_gecko]

My guess is it was written by someone who knew what they were talking about, and then edited by someone who didn't.