Here is a fictitious story of a business client that orders software for a mobile phone to an embedded developer.

Take such a trivial feature of a mobile phone as a the possibility to store last calls. What do you know about it besides that it allows to view last incoming and outgoing calls? This is the level of knowledge that a typical client has and he will express it as a requirement the same way:

— I want that my mobile phone software to store last incoming and outgoing calls.

The developer has two choices: either assault the client with question based on unconfirmed assumptions or tacitly do exactly what was asked. He writes code that keeps two lists ordered by the call time, one list for incoming calls, another one — for outgoing calls.

Soon after, the client finds out that a competing company uses a different design and demands the software to display:

• all calls together with their destination (incoming or outgoing)
• missed calls
• received calls
• outgoing calls
• rejected calls

Unfortunately, the previous code has already been written and is linked tightly to the UI code and to the rest of the mobile phone's OS.

So, instead of scapping the previous design and starting from scratch, the developer is now bound to implement new data structures that consists of one new list that combines incoming and outgoing calls in the right order to satisfy the first additional requirement, and three more lists for each of the 2nd, 3rd and 5th additional requirements.

This seems like nothing, but coupled to the synchronization code and error handling code, the result is likely to look cryptic for everyone, including its own developer.

А вот так слэшдот решил поощрять пользователей с высокой кармой. Приятно, что во времена повальной монетизации не все контент-провайдеры видят в пользователе одну лишь дойную корову.

In light of the recent accusation of Richard Biefnot (PS), echevin of Housing and Urbanism in Mons, I was trying to figure out what kinds of images he actually possessed and on the basis of what laws he is being prosecuted.

Seems like this simple question is being deliberately obscured by media.

That is, there shall be a difference between possession of e.g. Hentai and of videos of children making sex because the whole point of prosecuting the buyers is to keep the children out of the danger of being abused by reducing the demand. Obviously, no child has been abused in the production of Hentai, or other purely fictional artwork, so this argument does not apply for Hentai.

Unfortunately, it is very hard to find the relevant legislation in order to check whether this distinction is maintained in the legislation, but I would not be surprised if it is not.

Update: Thanks to a fellow lawyer friend, I got a pointer to the relevant legislation, and, I as expected, there is no such distinction, indeed:

Code penal Chapitre VII. Des outrages publics aux bonnes mœurs

Art. 383bis

§ 1er.

Сегодня на Слэшдоте написали, что в Штатах больше не осталось никого, кто мог бы сделать боеголовку к ракете Трайдент.

И сегодня же я прочитал, что европейские космонавты и астронавты чехвостят проект ATV, потому что его стыковка и тем более расстыковка — сложнейший процесс, требующий чёткой и и слаженной работы двух человек экипажа на протяжении нескольких часов. Почему чехвостят? Да потому, что предыдущий грузовой корабль Прогресс хотя и не имел в названии слова автоматический, тем не менее отстыковывался сам по команде с Земли, причём обычно это происходило в то время, когда космонавты спали.

В последнее время все только и говорят об флуктуациях биржевых котировок, спаде ВВП, кризисе, банках. Мало кто представляет, о чём говорит. Не пора ли обратиться к истокам?