soft-eng@MITRE.ARPA (Alok Nigam) (10/09/88)
Soft-Eng Digest Sat, 8 Oct 88 V: Issue 35
Today's Topics:
Anyone use Knowledgeware (or anything else?)
Cynic's Guide to SE #6: Forthcoming Revolt (4 msgs)
EEG readers (was Re: Cynic's Guide to SE #6: Forthcoming Revolt)
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Date: 4 Oct 88 20:00:22 GMT
From: imagen!atari!portal!cup.portal.com!jxh@bloom-beacon.mit.edu
Subject: Anyone use Knowledgeware (or anything else?)
We are looking at a CASE tool set from an outfit calling themselves
Knowledgeware. (When I say looking at, I mean simply considering whether
we even want to spend the time to play with CASE tools.) Does anyone
have any actual experience with these things? How about Knowledgeware in
particular? Is anyone running this stuff near Silicon valley that wouldn't
mind giving an informal demo in their spare time (:-)?
We maintain an existing, rather large assembly-language datacomm product
that runs on large sets of microprocessors. How does this map to the
Business Concepts and COBOL blather that makes up the KnowledgeWare
glossies?
Anyone that has anything at all to say about this (other than "me too"), please
speak up!
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Date: 30 Sep 88 15:00:40 GMT
From: ecsvax!cjl@mcnc.org (Charles Lord)
Subject: Cynic's Guide to SE #6: Forthcoming Revolt
I think the contention that "better at home than at work/school"
will spring a revolt of sorts has already been proven. As Apple
joyously espouses in their Mac ads, many workplace computers have been
supplanted by home computers. And as an example of the school
situation, my alma mater (N.C.State) has more and more professors
designing course assignments so that they may be done on personal
computers rather than archaic and/or overburdened department computers.
Two avenues that have opened this are extensive PD/shareware archive
and distribution networks on campus and innovative and liberal
educational discounts or site licenses for commercial software.
Computer rooms full of PCs and Macs make the technology accessable
to those without their own computers.
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Date: 5 Oct 88 17:37:34 GMT
From: ecsvax!cjl@mcnc.org (Charles Lord)
Subject: Cynic's Guide to SE #6: Forthcoming Revolt
> Sure, the department has _a_ Mac...
The department does not have _one_ Mac, nor _one_ IBM-PC. The school
I described has multiple labs with multiple computers in each lab. The
assignments require software that is provided either free or at HEAVY
discounts ($45 QuickC, PC-SAS at OUTRAGEOUS discounts, etc), many times
using PD/Shareware programs such as PD-Lisp for an AI course. The
secret is that these courses BALANCE this with VAX labs where a
comparable UNIX-based program is available for those who don't wish
to persue PC-based solutions. Instead of a prof sitting on his lazy
duff grading on his Apple-provided Mac as you go on to insinuate, the
profs in this case are willing to put in the extra effort to allow
assignments to be done by *multiple* avenues. After all, most assign-
ments are graded by grad student TAs, right?
Don't jump to conclusions that PC-based assignments are based upon
ulterior motives of PC makers. There *are* bad apples in academia
as well as industry, but a lot of people are really trying to
TEACH students about the real world. And, alas, the college students
of today are much more sophisticated about computers than we were.
(PC in 1973 meant "printed circuit"!)
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Date: 6 Oct 88 15:03:17 GMT
From: cs.utexas.edu!pp!milano!banzai-inst!wex@ohio-state.arpa (Alan Wexelblat)
Subject: Cynic's Guide to SE #6: Forthcoming Revolt
In article <5519@ecsvax.uncecs.edu>, cjl@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (Charles Lord)
totally misses the point of my posting.
Since I was rather long-winded, let's see if I can summarize it:
In response to the contention that the proliferation of PCs/Macs would
give students more power, I pointed out that professors often make
assignments *assuming* that the student has such power available. I
pointed out that this is frequently a problem in non-CS departments.
I did not impute nefarious motives to anyone, merely ignorant
assumptions to a certain type of professor.
Charles' comments that some professors/schools/departments aren't nefarious
and some places offer huge discounts to students therefore misses my
point.
I hope this clarifies things somewhat.
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Date: 7 Oct 88 02:55:14 GMT
From: ecsvax!cjl@mcnc.org (Charles Lord)
Subject: Cynic's Guide to SE #6: Forthcoming Revolt
No, Alan, you also missed MY point that this problem is NOT a frequent
happening in the school mentioned. Software discounts and nefarious-
ness aside, there are profs around who ALLOW students to use PC power
while NOT forcing them to seek PC access when they don't already have
it. This is called Intro to Real World 101- for the Prof, not for
the student... Budgets and Grad-level research (spelled M-o-n-e-y)
get the big bang boxes and the undergrads tend to get what's left in
many cases. PCs are just an alternative, not something forced on
students.
I will concede that CAD courses may indeed be built around MACs or
some other proprietary hardware and may thus severely limit
student access. Gee, that sounds like the typical work environment...
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Date: 7 Oct 88 03:48:35 GMT
From: jspear@afit-ab.arpa (Jon L. Spear)
Subject: EEG readers (was Re: Cynic's Guide to SE #6: Forthcoming Revolt)
>right, then you add mice/windows/data_gloves/eeg_readers/etc... [snip]
^^^^^^^^^^^
[sorry if this is too far off the subject and software engineering,
but...]
That reminds me. A few years ago I read an article in Science News or
similar magazine about a device that could read realtime EEG-like
(electroencephalogram) data and recognize some patterns. It was a long way
from reading minds, but it (with a cooperative subject) could be trained
to
respond to a set of brain activity patterns that resulted from thinking
about certain things (probably some form of nearest-neighbor pattern
recognition). It did this sensing from a short distance away, without the
usual stick-on electrodes. Sounded pretty far out. I never saw anything in
this area again.
EEG readers seem like they could be really useful as computer
input devices, especially for the handicapped.
Anyone know what, if anything, has happened in this area?
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End of Soft-Eng Digest
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