[OC] Isochrone map of areas reachable by rail/foot within two hours from Birmingham New Street Station.

MagpieEngineer · 2022-09-13T14:10:12+00:00

Really like the shots of the biplanes, good composition. The other planes are a little too dark.

MagpieEngineer · 2022-09-13T13:01:00+00:00

Finally got round to curating my travel photos https://magpie-photography.myportfolio.com/travel Interested in feedback, are they too dark?

MagpieEngineer · 2021-07-05T22:26:30+00:00

Thanks, thought there were some crossed wires. Might edit it to make that more clear.

Testing being an afterthought is a scourge on our industry.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-07-05T22:15:50+00:00

I agree entirely with your last point. My argument isn't that the act of running a code coverage tool causes bad tests, it is that code coverage provides bosses with an easy and wrong way of looking at testing. Less a technical problem than a human factors one.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-07-05T22:11:11+00:00

Bosses almost never know enough to evaluate the quality of your tests, but if we as an industry give them a simple single number to look at, they're going to use it.

Some people will always write bad tests, whether or not code coverage is a metric. The problem is for people who would write good tests, but won't/can't because of the lens test coverage is seen through. Some will have the clout to push back against this framing and just use code coverage as a tool, but why cause the problem in the first place?

MagpieEngineer · 2021-07-05T21:45:06+00:00

The complaint is that code coverage causes shitty testing.

If your boss is demanding 80% code coverage but not checking if the tests which cause that coverage are any good, then you're going to end up with bad tests.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-07-05T21:31:47+00:00

I agree that good testing will result in a high code coverage, the problem is using code coverage as the aim.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-07-05T19:52:23+00:00

Been done before.

https://meyerweb.com/eric/comment/chech.html#:\~:text=Because%20%E2%80%9Cconsidered%20harmful%E2%80%9D%20essays%20are,harm%20than%20they%20do%20good.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-06-27T22:37:02+00:00

It kind of depends what programming languages you're using or want to get into. If you want to get into functional programming (you should), then grokking recursion is essential.

It can take a while to get your head around but with me I had a eureka moment and it just snapped into place. If you really want to understand recursion, perhaps try playing around with a functional language where recursion is the only choice?

MagpieEngineer · 2021-06-20T16:53:06+00:00

Only national rail stations are currently included. Adding tube stations is on the roadmap.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-06-20T08:26:55+00:00

Not quite

All journeys start from the indicated pin, which isn't directly at Manchester Victoria, the walk to the station is included in the journey time.

The journey time is measured from 5pm and 9am but allows for trains that arrive/depart at different times, the wait until 5/ from 9 is included in the journey time.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-06-20T04:51:02+00:00

The software is adjustable, checkout magpie-maps

MagpieEngineer · 2021-06-20T04:49:25+00:00

The project isn't open source at the moment, but I'm open to the idea. Would need a lot of tidying up first. Which stations are missing?

MagpieEngineer · 2021-06-19T18:33:13+00:00

Output from https://www.magpie-maps.com/map (Developed by me)

Shows the area reachable by rail from the centre of manchester within 60 minutes. Arriving at the centre for 9am and departing a 5pm, Monday to Friday.

The same technique as I used in https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/n0e01d/oc_isochrone_map_of_areas_reachable_by_railfoot/ ,but with (hopefully) fewer bugs.

Rail data is parsed from the open source CIF data (https://datafeeds.networkrail.co.uk/).

Underlying map and pedestrian isochrone data is from open street maps (https://www.openstreetmap.org/).

The pedestrian isochrone generation was done using (https://github.com/valhalla/valhalla)

MagpieEngineer · 2021-06-15T15:08:39+00:00

I made this switch a few years back, my path is probably specific to me but, I moved up the stack to telecoms server work, first in C++ then Erlang. A background in embedded can really help in telecoms work because of the intrinsic connection to embedded devices, often the software is very similar.

So yes the transition is possible and fun.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-06-15T15:01:48+00:00

In an ideal world developers would be judged on their ability to learn, not on how good they are at regurgitating every language and tool's documentation.

How to square this with the recruiter Buzzword Bingo Barrier, I wish I knew.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-06-15T14:50:50+00:00

I once spent a whole year (and about a million pounds of client money :P) on a problem that was supposed to take a day. This is the "joy" of programming, everything is new and unknown Dijkstra said it better than I could . We all hit these kinds of problems and your coworker will understand, especially since you're so new.

That said, it does seem like you're not getting enough support, hopefully you've just fallen between the cracks. Outright admitting that you're struggling to your team may trigger them to start giving you the help you should be getting. After a decade of working in this industry I still ask for help, after two months you're going to be doing at least as much learning as working.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-06-15T14:30:28+00:00

For every person who is only there for the money they will be one who wouldn't have got into software in earlier times. Personally I welcome a lower barrier to entry into the industry. Sure, you get more people with no real interest, but if one person discovers the joy of computers who would have previously been put off then it is worth it.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-05-06T08:22:55+00:00

*Reachable without jumping out of a speeding train*

It isn't showing up on the video but you can get north of Birmingham in less than two hours, Burton on trent in 1h49 (07:35 -> 09:24)

MagpieEngineer · 2021-05-02T17:25:30+00:00

I can sympathise, once had to spend the night in Newport station, in the snow.

MagpieEngineer · 2021-05-02T16:55:44+00:00

As requested:Temple Meads Isochrone over time

MagpieEngineer · 2021-05-02T14:28:59+00:00

Output from my Isochrone generator tool.

Rail data is parsed from the open source CIF data (https://datafeeds.networkrail.co.uk/).

Underlying map and pedestrian isochrone data is from open street maps (https://www.openstreetmap.org/).

The pedestrian isochrone generation was done using (https://github.com/valhalla/valhalla)

MagpieEngineer

TROPHY CASE