Now that's an argument! Agreed, it won't use them of its own accord, but the fact that you can ask it about words, or ask it even to break down important words in a new field, or give it a paragraph from a paper not in your field and have it explain the jargon, I think that's how it can help someone grow their vocabulary.
I also learned the line with a dot above and below in my country, the USA. But that was a very long time ago, math teaching has changed immeasurably since my time.
If you open a CSV file without going through a specific import process, you don't even get the option to specify a data type. And once it's open it's too late to fix it, the original data is already gone.
The specific import process isn't some sort of esoteric process. It is the data import wizard. Also as I said if you are regularly importing data from a file with the same format writing some VBA to do so is pretty quick and simple task.
Also your data isn't gone. It is still in the CSV file you imported it from. Re-import it.
I would wager more people open a CSV by double-clicking on it rather than using the import data wizard. And even if you use the wizard it takes extra work to specify the type of each column, which most people won't bother with.
Writing some VBA is a simple process if you're a programmer. I wonder how many genetic researchers fit that description?
P.S. when I said "too late to fix it", I meant by some process within Excel. Of course you can re-import the original file, but maybe you only notice the problem after you've done a lot of work with it?
Expecting you to learn the basics about the tools you're using is not expecting too much. And if you are too lazy to spend a few seconds specifying data types then you get what you deserve.
The original comment I responded to said they regularly imported large data sets and the in the case of the genetists they also are regularly importing data into Excel. In other words Excel is a regularly used and fundamental tool to their work. In this case I would expect someone to learn the basics of using it. Just as I would expect a developer to learn their editor, build system, version control system, etc.
Excel chews up CSVs that it opens. I know this because an accountant checked each file our code produced using Excel before trying to import it into another program. We proofread our code before we realizing the problem was somewhere else. Shoulder-surfed the process, found the giant bug with a green X on it.
It's no better at exporting to CSV. I wrote a CSV parser a few years ago that had one set of logic for Excel CSVs and a completely different set for everything else.
Excel doesn't change CSV files when it imports them. If the imported file was being changed then the user was saving back to the same file they imported from.
The fact is the person was double-clicking a file in a list to view its contents and Excel was trampling it. Nobody in their right mind will waste time to open Excel first, use import feature, re-navigate to the file they were already looking at, and go through the import dialog just to see what's inside.
Trampling it to me implies that Excel was somehow modifying the contents of the file. Which it doesn't do by double clicking on the file and just viewing it. Do you mean that the data shown in Excel wasn't what was expected because of the auto data conversion?
Believe me, I was blown away just the same. And it's not like the accountant clicked a save button of a on-close dialog, no. Opening a CSV file was enough.
No, he one proved that other people don't need to put up with your bs if you try to break conventions. Hence your use of ASCII "Prince" being entirely adequate.
Besides, AFAIK he only changed his stage name, not his legal name.
It is C++/Qt/Python/OpenCASCADE, runs on Linux, Windows, Mac.
Pretty low compromise in terms of portability; surprisingly good on Mac, has ARM support. I think on FreeBSD/OpenBSD as well via ports.
It is a bRep GUI CAD system with 2D drafting, 3D CAD, a technical drawing workbench, FEM, mesh tools etc., and now a core CAD assembly tool. It has a "workbench" (think GUI plugins for specific task) approach, supports macro recording of Python macros, has many third-party workbenches, It is constraints-based and fully parametric: designs recompute and reflow when underlying measurements change.
It's also a 20 year labour of love by a bunch of CAD users.
If you are familiar with QGIS, it's really a lot like that but for CAD. It's less like GIMP than some people say, but it is a bit like GIMP (and like GIMP, is in a long battle with a core architectural problem; FreeCAD 1.0 includes a big victory over its worst core problem)
Thank you, that's all very good information. I was just a little frustrated because none of that was discoverable either in the announcement linked from HN, or their home page.
Apologies, it appears the error is mine. Since there wasn't a link to the home page on the announcement, I edited the link to remove everything after the site. But that took me to the blog home, not the site home.
Ah, that explains it. Yeah, the next version of the website will integrate the blog into the main website. So navigation shouldn't be a problem anymore.
> Yes, that part's obvious just by the name. But what OS does it run on, or does it run in the browser?
The 'download now' button is right on the home page above the fold. When you click it, you see three huge icons for window, linux and macos. Not sure how you could've missed that, but it's there.
Neither Fusion nor SolidWorks mention supported operating systems on their respective homepages. That doesn't seem to present an issue, eh? :)
As for your other points, FreeCAD's homepage does explain what this software can do. It says what this software is right on the first screen. You can scroll down past the first screen to see more info. Even more info is on the Features page that is right in the main menu at the top.
I mean, we can argue about the amount of information, but the basics are all right there for you, in very obvious places, no?
Incidentally, a new (and better) website is in the works.
I spent a good part of my childhood on Girard Avenue North, part of the first alphabetical sequence running east to west. It was always a comfort to know I could find my way home if I knew the alphabet.
The interesting part about Minneapolis is that it has two grids. Early development occurred at angles to the Mississippi river, while later development straightened out to N-S and E-W orientation.
Some of my family were stock farmers in Australia and talked about 10, 5, 3 and 2 chain roads a bit too when talking about driving routes between places in rural and forested regions. You’d know the (maybe abandoned or ruined versus still existing small settlement) destination - by the description of the width of the roads getting there.
I’m not sure how much of this was connected to what seemed to be a multi-generational familial problem recalling proper nouns.
As someone who didn’t grow up there it was a bit different to what I was used to - named roads or road numbers, named settlements or geographic identifiers.
The chain makes more sense as being one tenth of a furlong (as still used in horse racing in the US, Great Britain and Ireland!), which is of course one eighth of a mile.
Also, an acre is one furlong long by one chain wide.
Not coincidentally, a cricket pitch is one chain long.
My education was almost all in the metric system but a decent knowledge of the imperial system still makes the world a bit easier to understand.
Friends father did the forestry course in edinburgh during ww2: it was held to be sufficiently important it was a reserved occupation (not subject to the draft)
On graduation and inevitable employment by the forestry commission you got your chain: a vital tool of the job, as well as useful for marking out cricket pitches. (They are one chain long)
This happens on train routes through towns (or, towns that developed where trains stopped) and the track is at an angle to North. Frequently the first few blocks nearest the track are aligned to the track, and then the town says “wait a minute” and suddenly everything orients to the cardinal directions
