Re: [tlug] Fortran --> Python (was linux engineer)

[Jim Breen <jimbreen@example.com>]

On 7 June 2012 19:52, Josh Glover <jmglov@example.com> wrote:
> 2012/6/7 Nicolas Limare <nicolas+tlug@example.com>:
>
>> A clean rewrite with well defined APIs and unit tests would be necessary to
>> make computational research verifiable and reproducible.
>
> That is a very good point. So in (at least) one specific way,
> computers have made scientific research worse.

No way. It *may* have been better if they had been used
better, but that's an assertion that really needs to be tested.
Making research worse? Do you guys really know what
computationally heavy research was like BEFORE there were
computers? It was horrible: expensive, slow, painful, etc. etc.
There were PEOPLE called "computers" who did the crunching,
using lever-and-handle calculators, slide-rules, logs. Uuugggh.

And reproducible? It was no more or less reproducible than it
is now,

(Grandfather) Jim

-- 
Jim Breen
Adjunct Snr Research Fellow, Clayton School of IT, Monash University
Webmaster: Hawthorn Rowing Club, Treasurer: Japanese Studies Centre
Graduate student: Language Technology Group, University of Melbourne