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Other Hochstein academics
Software tools for empirical software engineering
I've been involved with developing several tools for running software engineering experiments, such as ActivityGraph, UMDInst, ShellLogger, and the Experiment Manager.
Job prospects for software engineers versus computer programmers
According to the 2006-2007 Occupational Outlook Handbook, put out by the U.S. Department of Labor, the job outlook for computer software engineers is "projected to be one of the fastest-growing occupations from 2004 to 2014", and the job outlook for computer systems analysts is "expected to grow much faster than the average for all occupations through the year 2014". On the other hand, the job outlook for computer programmers is "expected to grow more slowly than the average for all occupations through the year 2014", as programmers "will face strong competition for programming jobs."
Bugs in scientific software
Errors in bioinformatics code lead to generation of incorrect matrices used for sequence alignment, which go undetected for 15 years. Ironically, fixing the matrices worsens software performance (letter in Nature).
Swapped data columns leads to incorrect protein crystal structure publications (as reported in Science, official retraction, Genome biology commentary).
New code can't reproduce results of old code in astrophysics application (official retraction in Nature).
Incorrect computer simulation "reproduces" wrong experimental discovery of sonoluminescent fusion (Computational Science Demands a New Paradigm by Post and Votta)
- Taleyarkhan et al, Science 295(2002), p. 1868
- Shapira, et al, PRL, 89(2002), p.104302.
- Seife, Science 295(2002), p. 1808
Computational predictions wrongly characterized performance of a proposed thermonuclear reactor (Computational Science Demands a New Paradigm by Post and Votta)
Differences in precision across multiple seismic data processing applications (TSE paper, Computational Sci & Eng paper)
Bug in a Perl script results in a retraction (doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.0030158) of computational biology paper. The retracted paper (doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.0030051) challenged the utility of a particular metric for evaluating the reliability of phylogenetic trees.
Canadiana
Most people I encounter don't realize I'm a Canadian. The differences between Canadians and Americans are subtle (other than the politics), but there are some Canadian Shibboleths that are a dead giveaway. The following words sound different when spoken by Canadians: gas, against, pasta, drama, salami, Futurama.
Here are some questions which can be used to determine if someone is a Canadian or American:
- What do you call someone who watches students take an exam to make sure they don't cheat?
- What do you call a pizza with pepperoni, mushrooms and green peppers?
Montrealana
Not only am I a Canadian, I'm also a Montrealer, a city with some wonderful food. As of July 7, 2007, I have the dubious honour of being the second link when doing a Google Image Search for karnatzel (screenshot if it has changed since then), which is a cylindrical tube of red meat you can buy at Montreal delis. Often eaten with a piece of rye bread (which we inexplicably refer to as "corn bread") and some mustard. Montrealers don't really have the Canadian accent, (we don't say oot and aboot) but there are some ways you can tell you are speaking to a Montrealer. You can hear hints of a Canadian accent when we say words like "pasta", "drama", "salami", and "aunt" (We pronounce "aunt" like "ant"). We also pronounce "gas" as if it was spelled "gaz", we pronounce "against" like a-gain-st. We use some Canadian expressions that aren't found in the U.S. Here's a handy translation guide:
| Canadian | American |
|---|---|
| garberator |
disposal |
| invigilator |
proctor |
| autoroute*, expressway |
turnpike, parkway |
| grade three |
third grade |
| washroom |
bathroom |
| beaver tail |
fried dough |
| pogo |
corn dog |
| chocolate bar |
candy bar |
| user fee |
co-payment |
| quarter to seven |
quarter of seven |
| Kraft Dinner |
mac & cheese |
| brown toast |
wheat toast |
| sprinkles |
jimmies |
| check-up |
physical |
| cutlery |
silverware |
| tap |
faucet |
| stage (pronounced as if it was a French word) |
internship |
| hydro |
power |
| line-up |
line |
| humidex |
heat index |
| opscan |
scantron |
| soccer baseball | kickball |
| all-dressed pizza | pizza with pepperoni, green peppers and mushrooms |
| Montrealer | American |
|---|---|
| open the light |
turn on the light |
| suce | pacifier |
| white seed (bagel) |
sesame seed |
| black seed (bagel) |
poppyseed |
Office :
- 122B Avery Hall
- Department of Computer Science and Engineering
- University of Nebraska - Lincoln
- Lincoln, NE 68588-0115
- Email: lorin@cse.unl.edu
- Office: 402-472-3525