Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2014 June 20

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June 20

Bluetooth refuses to stay shut on Android 4.4.3

I updated my first gen Nexus 7 tablet to the latest version a couple of days ago and now I enabled Bluetooth on it for the first time since the update to use with headphones. Well now every time I attempt to shut off the Bluetooth function it turns itself back on automatically. Searching through the net to find people with the same problem doesn't appear to be of much help since it doesn't look like a common issue. Can anyone here help me out? 64.233.172.101 (talk) 12:17, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Eliminating excessive padding created under an image within a text block in HTML

Hi all, I'm creating a page in HTML and have an image embedded and aligned left. Even though I only have padding applied to the right side, it creates a gap underneath it which significantly intends a paragraph and makes it look awkward as shown in this image. Here's the code I'm using for reference.

<p><img src="image.jpg" style="PADDING-RIGHT: 10px" align="left" width="250"/></p> <p><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.</p> <p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.</p>

Thanks!

I can't reproduce that with just the HTML you cite, and no CSS, on either Firefox or Chrome. Perhaps there is some CSS setting for the paragraph tags on your page? Some observations:

• The image doesn't need to be in a paragraph of its own
• Rather than paste html here, I'd recommend you make up a minimal working example on a site like JSFiddle. For example, I made up a basic one with your html at http://jsfiddle.net/3qhTj/1/

-- Finlay McWalterᚠTalk 17:45, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Lightweight X11 Window Manager

I've been running X11 on OS-X with a slightly customised version of Blackbox for a long while, and have generally been happy with it. However, there seems to be a slight bug with focus and bringing windows to the front that is annoying. Also, I have not been able to hack it enough to have different root window images on different virtual screens - something I wanted for a long time. What I need is minimal fuzz, no waste of screen real estate, and focus-follows-mouse (or sloppy focus). Any suggestions on what to try? I can hack the blackbox source further, but I don't know much about X11 internals, so debugging the window-front error is out of the question. Thanks! --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:26, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Openbox (which was once a Blackbox derivative) is pretty lightweight (it's used on lightweight Linux distributions like PuppyLinux); apparently it works on OS-X. For maximum use of the screen, some people swear by tiling managers like xmonad. -- Finlay McWalterᚠTalk 19:37, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Doesn't quartz-wm, (the official un-official X11 window manager for OS X) support focus-follows-mouse?

defaults write org.x.X11 wm_ffm -bool true

...from the man page.

Nimur (talk) 22:45, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. But if I wanted Cocoa-like behaviour. I would just run Aquamacs and Apple's Terminal with Skim. I wan't a more classical look and feel - not M-C/M-V for copying. Openbox is running right now, so far without problems (after some config file hacking). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:23, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

can people who studied business computing claim that they are computer scientists?

Could it be a kind of specialization of CS? OsmanRF34 (talk) 20:36, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

The answer is no. Not all computing is computer science. Computer science is a well-defined academic discipline, and is more specific than information technology or computing. Please read computer science for a description of the discipline. It is misleading to claim to be a computer scientist unless one has that degree, or at least taken courses in that discipline. I wouldn't have claimed to be a computer scientist when I was doing scientific programming until I had earned an M.S. in computer science. Robert McClenon (talk) 21:34, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

I disagree on that last part. It certainly is possible to work in, and learn everything needed to do, computer science without having a degree. This is true in any field, although some are far more simple to pick up informally than others (and it's illegal to learn that way in some fields, like medicine). And computer science is a field where it changes so rapidly that recent experience may well trump a degree in the field obtained decades ago. StuRat (talk) 14:17, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

What if you have a degree in Computer Science? My degree says "computer science" but I don't believe I'm a computer scientist. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 14:51, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

Being a good programmer has nothing to do with being a computer scientist. In fact, some highly respected CS researchers are often not crack coders (though most are pretty decent). From our article "A computer scientist specializes in the theory of computation" -- sure, that has changed over time, but it's not like e.g. lambda calculus has been supplanted. The tools may change quickly with newer technologies becoming cheap/ubiquitous, but all sciences have that issue. It's actually a common complaint that CS grads from prestigious schools have arcane knowledge of theory, but might be lacking in real-world hacker skills. I wouldn't say that the guy who fixes my car is an automotive engineer, and I wouldn't say the guy who makes my web page is a scientist. Sure, if some autodidact can expound on his new approach to P=NP, then he can call himself a computer scientist. But somebody who taught themselves how to program in several language is not. SemanticMantis (talk) 16:14, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

It is a scientific fact that the unskilled aren't even aware of their own incompetence. In other words, many more people think they are autodidacts than actually are. At least an individual who carries a degree has spent the time and money to let somebody else - viz. the faculty of a degree-granting university - vet their competency. At the same time, the onus to interpret the relevance of a degree towards any specific job or task is on whomever is recruiting the talent.

The original question was whether an individual can claim something. Computer science is not a licensed profession - so there's no legal barrier to claiming that an individual is a computer scientist. But it's a claim that carries little weight without some factual evidence to back it up. Is the claimant conversant in computer science theory? Do they professionally apply skills of computer science to solve theoretical or practical problems? Have they published peer-reviewed literature on computer science topics?

Phrased reciprocally, I would never hire somebody who merely claimed to be a computer scientist. I expect a little bit more in the way of demonstration. Nimur (talk) 00:54, 23 June 2014 (UTC)