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π Category:Obsolete occupations
This is a category of jobs that have been rendered obsolete due to advances in technology and/or social conditions.
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- "Category:Obsolete occupations" | 2019-12-11 | 300 Upvotes 247 Comments
π List of oldest continuously inhabited cities
This is a list of present-day cities by the time period over which they have been continuously inhabited as a city. The age claims listed are generally disputed. Differences in opinion can result from different definitions of "city" as well as "continuous habitation" and historical evidence is often disputed. Caveats (and sources) to the validity of each claim are discussed in the "Notes" column.
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- "List of oldest continuously inhabited cities" | 2020-04-22 | 323 Upvotes 214 Comments
π DRAKON β An algorithmic visual programming language
DRAKON is an algorithmic visual programming and modeling language developed within the Buran space project following ergonomic design principles. The language provides a uniform way to represent flowcharts of any complexity that are easy to read and understand.
The DRAKON Editor, which was released in September 2011, is an implementation of the language available in the public domain. It can be used for creating documentation, or for creating visual programs that can be converted to source code in other languages.
Unlike UML's philosophy, DRAKON's language philosophy is based on being augmented if needed, by using a hybrid language, which can be illustrated as "incrustating code snippets from text language used into shape DRAKON requires". This way, DRAKON always remains a simple visual language that can be used as an augmentation for a programmer who is interested in making their own project code easier to support or other long-term needs for example improving the ergonomics of the coding process or to making code easier to review and understand.
The name DRAKON is the Russian acronym for "ΠΡΡΠΆΠ΅Π»ΡΠ±Π½ΡΠΉ Π ΡΡΡΠΊΠΈΠΉ ΠΠ»Π³ΠΎΡΠΈΡΠΌΠΈΡΠ΅ΡΠΊΠΈΠΉ [ΡΠ·ΡΠΊ], ΠΠΎΡΠΎΡΡΠΉ ΠΠ±Π΅ΡΠΏΠ΅ΡΠΈΠ²Π°Π΅Ρ ΠΠ°Π³Π»ΡΠ΄Π½ΠΎΡΡΡ", which translates to "Friendly Russian algorithmic [language] that illustrates (or provides clarity)". The word "Π½Π°Π³Π»ΡΠ΄Π½ΠΎΡΡΡ" (pronounced approximately as "naa-glya-dno-st-th") refers to a concept or idea being easy to imagine and understand, and may be translated as "clarity".
The DRAKON language can be used both as a modelling/"markup" language (which is considered a standalone "pure DRAKON" program) and as a programming language (as part of a hybrid language).
Integration of a stricter, "academic", variant of a markup language into programming, such as provided by DRAKON, adds syntactic sugar allowing users of different programming languages to comprehend each other's contributions to the overall project and even provide commentary if needed.
Discussed on
- "DRAKON" | 2024-08-19 | 213 Upvotes 59 Comments
- "DRAKON β An algorithmic visual programming language" | 2015-08-21 | 86 Upvotes 48 Comments
π Saskatoon Freezing Deaths
The Saskatoon freezing deaths were a series of deaths of Indigenous Canadians in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, in the early 2000s, which were confirmed to have been caused by members of the Saskatoon Police Service. The police officers would arrest Indigenous people, usually men, for alleged drunkenness and/or disorderly behaviour, sometimes without cause. The officers would then drive them to the outskirts of the city at night in the winter, and abandon them, leaving them stranded in sub-zero temperatures.
The practice was known as taking Indigenous people for "starlight tours" and dates back to 1976. As of 2021, despite convictions for related offences, no Saskatoon police officer has been convicted specifically for having caused freezing deaths.
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- "Saskatoon Freezing Deaths" | 2024-04-14 | 81 Upvotes 15 Comments
- "Saskatoon Freezing Deaths" | 2022-08-09 | 208 Upvotes 102 Comments
π Women-Are-Wonderful Effect
The women-are-wonderful effect is the phenomenon found in psychological and sociological research which suggests that people associate more positive attributes with women compared to men. This bias reflects an emotional bias toward women as a general case. The phrase was coined by Alice Eagly and Antonio Mladinic in 1994 after finding that both male and female participants tend to assign positive traits to women, with female participants showing a far more pronounced bias. Positive traits were assigned to men by participants of both genders, but to a far lesser degree.
The authors supposed that the positive general evaluation of women might derive from the association between women and nurturing characteristics. This bias is suggested as a form of misandry/'benevolent misogyny', the latter being a concept within the theoretical framework of ambivalent sexism.
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- "βWomen are wonderfulβ effect" | 2022-10-12 | 175 Upvotes 205 Comments
- "Women-Are-Wonderful Effect" | 2021-08-16 | 15 Upvotes 9 Comments
π --All You Zombies--
"β'βAll You Zombiesβ'β" is a science fiction short story by American writer Robert A. Heinlein. It was written in one day, July 11, 1958, and first published in the March 1959 issue of Fantasy and Science Fiction magazine after being rejected by Playboy.
The story involves a number of paradoxes caused by time travel. In 1980, it was nominated for the Balrog Award for short fiction.
"'βAll You Zombiesβ'" further develops themes explored by the author in a previous work: "By His Bootstraps", published some 18 years earlier. Some of the same elements also appear later in The Cat Who Walks Through Walls (1985), including the Circle of Ouroboros and the Temporal Corps.
The unusual title of the story, which includes both the quotation marks and dashes shown above, is a quotation from a sentence near the end of the story; the quotation is taken from the middle of the sentence, hence the dashes indicating edited text before and after the title.
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- "All You Zombies" | 2022-02-25 | 111 Upvotes 51 Comments
- "--All You Zombies--" | 2009-12-19 | 30 Upvotes 13 Comments
- "All You Zombiesβ The most craziest of the time travel paradoxes" | 2008-10-10 | 42 Upvotes 21 Comments
π Pig War
The Pig War was a confrontation in 1859 between the United States and United Kingdom over the BritishβU.S. border in the San Juan Islands, between Vancouver Island (present-day Canada) and the State of Washington. The Pig War, so called because it was triggered by the shooting of a pig, is also called the Pig Episode, the Pig and Potato War, the San Juan Boundary Dispute and the Northwestern Boundary Dispute. Aside from the death of one pig, this dispute was a bloodless conflict.
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- "Pig War (1859)" | 2022-10-20 | 25 Upvotes 11 Comments
- "Pig War" | 2019-10-03 | 84 Upvotes 28 Comments
- "Pig War (1859)" | 2017-12-25 | 22 Upvotes 6 Comments
π Antarctic English
Antarctic English is a variety of the English language spoken by people living on the continent of Antarctica and within the subantarctic islands.:βviiβ Spoken primarily by scientists and workers in the Antarctic tourism industry, it consists of various unique words and is spoken with a unique accent. During the 19th and 20th centuries, Antarctic English was influenced by Spanish-speaking South Americans and Northern European explorers who introduced new words that continue to be used today.
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- "Antarctic English" | 2024-02-28 | 369 Upvotes 158 Comments
π Nine-nine-six (996) Working Hour System
The 996 working hour system (Chinese: 996ε·₯δ½εΆ) is a work schedule commonly practiced by some companies in the People's Republic of China. It derives its name from its requirement that employees work from 9:00 am to 9:00 pm, 6 days per week; i.e. 72 hours per week. A number of Chinese internet companies have adopted this system as their official work schedule. Critics argue that the 996 working hour system is a flagrant violation of Chinese law.
In March 2019 an "anti-996" protest was launched via GitHub.
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- "996 working hour system" | 2024-04-10 | 54 Upvotes 72 Comments
- "China's 996 working hour system" | 2020-06-12 | 31 Upvotes 4 Comments
π SoftICE
SoftICE is a kernel mode debugger for DOS and Windows up to Windows XP. Crucially, it is designed to run underneath Windows such that the operating system is unaware of its presence. Unlike an application debugger, SoftICE is capable of suspending all operations in Windows when instructed. For driver debugging this is critical due to how hardware is accessed and the kernel of the operating system functions. Because of its low-level capabilities, SoftICE is also popular as a software cracking tool.
Microsoft offers two kernel-mode debuggers, WinDbg and KD, for no charge. However, the full capabilities of WinDbg and KD are available only when two interlinked computers are used. SoftICE therefore is an exceptionally useful tool for difficult driver related development. The last released version was for Windows XP.
Older versions exist for DOS and compatible operating systems. SoftICE was originally produced by a company called NuMega, and was subsequently acquired by Compuware in 1997, which in turn sold the property to Micro Focus in 2009. Currently, Micro Focus owns the source code and patents, but is not actively maintaining SoftICE.
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- "SoftICE" | 2020-01-19 | 168 Upvotes 82 Comments
- "SoftICE: a kernel mode debugger for Windows" | 2015-09-12 | 106 Upvotes 44 Comments