Topicality: Lobsters is focused pretty narrowly on computing; tags like art don’t imply every piece of art is on-topic. Some rules of thumb for great stories to submit: Will this improve the reader’s next program? Will it deepen their understanding of their last program? Will it be more interesting in five or ten years?
I hate to agree, but I think you’re right. Having moved a year ago from Portland, Oregon to Barcelona to work on the climate crisis, I have so much to share and so much still to learn about the adjustment. Ultimately, though, if I boil my experience down to only those parts that have to do with programming, I’m left with a smattering of unrelated minutiae: differences in keyboard layouts; the minor confusion of people taught British English coping with APIs spelled with American English; mandated EU cloud providers for EU contractors; and subtle differences in software law that I’m not qualified to write about.
All the really interesting stuff about moving to Europe (like how Spain’s cities are super dense and most apartments have balconies which lead to our cat falling seven stories and almost dying so if you have a cat used to playing in a yard you should definitely get some netting or other reliable barrier and not just bird spikes which makes this comment off topic but I’m just trying to sneak that in to save cats) has nothing to do with computing.
I work for Lobelia Earth. The projects I spend most of my time on here are EU contracts relating to WEkEO and Copernicus Marine, although we do a lot of other things. I would love to share what I’ve learned about the intersection between web cartography and earth observation (“remote sensing” in the US) here sometime—I think it is actually topical here and hopefully interesting.
Oh I would love to read what you have to say. It’s a field I’ve brushed against often and enjoyed, but never gone too deep into the modern tech of. Most of what I know was cutting edge in 2003.
Also agree here, even as someone who is pretty broad about the topicality rule. I even held back on giving my thoughts (and I have quite a few!) because I don’t think anyone will ever check lobste.rs for additional feedback.
I understand, but I’m very happy it was posted here. I don’t read the orange site often (which has more content like this), and I found this very interesting as an American.
I think many people wouldn’t consider itself Europeans because it’s a very broad term. Many people still don’t know the difference between Europe, the European Union, the Eurozone, the Council of Europe and Eurovision! Regarding (Br|L|.*)exit, it’s true it’s not just conservatives that want it, this was just the main force behind Brexit. The EU is a trade union after all, that evolved to harmonize more and more law between countries so trade could be made more efficiently. But there’s no real culture behind. We usually speak together in English, which is a language with very few native speakers in the EU nowadays. There are no newspapers, radio stations, TVs, that are cross border,… there are no memes that only an EU person would understand (but within a country, there are). Most memes that are widely known in the EU, are because they’re also popular in the US. Even in European Elections political parties are the local political parties, they go with that name, and then they form alliances to create the groups in the parliament.
Quite honestly to feel more European we need to move the population around. I would love to see for all the citizens a 1year mandatory erasmus/social service in a randomly selected location of the union.
There are no newspapers, radio stations, TVs, that are cross border,…
Although I mostly agree with your point of view, this is actually not true. Look at arte a TV station conceived to create and broadcast mostly the same programming for German and French audiences.
surprising that the Yanks expect anyone to be or feel “European”
It may help explain their mistake, to consider that the people of the USA “[are] or feel” “American” even while the USA is very close in size to Europe (and more than twice as large as the EU).
From reading history, I think the EU is akin to the United States before the Civil War (or even before WW2) where the primary allegiance was to the constituent state, not the federal government.
I really liked this! This is the most minor point, but …
“Clothes” sounds nearly identical to “close,” and not “clo-thes.” The “th” is unvoiced and barely audible. I’m aware that “th” is very difficult to pronounce for German speakers, and will happily attempt to pronounce “Brötchen” for you in solidarity.
The “th” is so voiced! If anything, the “clo-thes” attempt would be most likely to use an unvoiced “th”; in “clothes” it’s voiced, and although certainly it’s not super audible, saying it unvoiced instead produces a kind of ‘cloath-s’ sound.
A lot of Germans pronounce clothes more like “cloths”, which I think the author is trying to correct here. But I think they’ve also got voiced and unvoiced the wrong way around.
That said, at least in my accent, if you say “close” you are very close to the correct pronunciation for “clothes”, and in a lot of dialects in the UK they would be the correct pronunciation. So a German trying to get to grips with English pronunciation wouldn’t do badly to use this advice.
Don’t get me started on people correcting how to pronounce iron just because their region pronounces it a certain way. Way to go to research clothes now I guess :D
Yeah, in my accent “clothes” and “close” are very similar. Didn’t realize it might be different across English accents! In any case the German mistake I’m talking about is the computerized pronunciation at the beginning of this video. I’ve added a footnote to explain a bit more.
I found it quite informative and I was somewhat amused by the various culture clashes in TFA. What did you find “not very good” if you don’t mind me asking ?
Though in Poland uncontrolled intersections don’t tend to be that common (they’re mostly on low-traffic roads) which makes this rule super annoying to get used to, and you have to keep in your head in case you run into an uncontrolled intersection.
Except in Poland we cannot safely assume rules are followed, and you are even required by law to distrust other drivers, pedestrians, cyclists etc. and maintain situational awareness.
Even if 90% would follow the rules, 10% is more than enough to cause several life-threatening situations during your daily commute. Drivers are required by law to give way to pedestrians on designated crossings if there are no traffic lights, and if 1 in 10 doesn’t comply it’s more than enough to have you killed or maimed within a week if you’re not looking around as if you had OCD. Even with traffic lights, I’ve experienced and witnessed situations where a pedestrian or cyclist got (almost) struck by a car going pedal to the metal on a left turn, right into a stream of people who had right of way. The law might be with you, but it’s of little use if you’re already dead or with a broken spine. And I am not even mentioning road killers who would overtake cars giving way to pedestrians crossing the street in designated areas.
Likewise, there’s that minority of drivers and cyclist for whom the idea of _lanes _ is simply beyond comprehension. Given an opportunity, they will cut into the opposite lane on a sharp turn rather than slow down, or cut through a pedestrian lane if it saves them following the curved path of bike line near a crossing. Cyclists would rush right between a crowd or commuters and a tram stopping by and opening is doors. Likewise, taxi drivers will simply run you over as you jump off the tram.
Honestly “90% would follow the rules” is probably giving us way too much credit for how recklessly we drive here —w—
Speed limits? “What’s that, 50 km/h is for little babies!” Turn signals? “But I thought driving a BMW makes it legal not to use them.” Keeping your distance on speedways? “Could you please give way? I’ll be right there behind you so that you don’t forget about me. Also, *flashes high beams* can you just please give way already I need to go fast”
Though in Poland uncontrolled intersections don’t tend to be that common
What? Almost all intersections in smaller cities and villages are like that. Also, right-hand rule also applies when turning (that is why someone turning left has lower priority than someone who turns right or goes straight).
It depends on how you interpret the word “common.”
I’m sure statistically the number of uncontrolled intersections is greater than the number of controlled intersections, but I was looking at it from a more subjective perspective: in all my driving I hardly ever run into them, because they’re mostly limited to neighbourhoods or rural areas, which don’t see as much traffic. I used to live in a small city (population ~2000) and I don’t remember driving through any uncontrolled intersections to get to the grocery store, for example. I lived in probably the furthest part of the city from its centre, and even then all intersections had priority/yield signs.
But since that is only a subjective perspective, your mileage may vary; I’ve only had my driver’s license for two years, so obviously my experience is very limited ^^
It’s the rule here in Sweden too. But if you live almost anywhere remotely built up, there will be a Yield or Stop sign at any intersection with noticeable traffic.
Good content, but ultimately off-topic here. The author may be a programmer, but the content has nothing to do with programming.
To quote from https://lobste.rs/about:
I hate to agree, but I think you’re right. Having moved a year ago from Portland, Oregon to Barcelona to work on the climate crisis, I have so much to share and so much still to learn about the adjustment. Ultimately, though, if I boil my experience down to only those parts that have to do with programming, I’m left with a smattering of unrelated minutiae: differences in keyboard layouts; the minor confusion of people taught British English coping with APIs spelled with American English; mandated EU cloud providers for EU contractors; and subtle differences in software law that I’m not qualified to write about.
All the really interesting stuff about moving to Europe (like how Spain’s cities are super dense and most apartments have balconies which lead to our cat falling seven stories and almost dying so if you have a cat used to playing in a yard you should definitely get some netting or other reliable barrier and not just bird spikes which makes this comment off topic but I’m just trying to sneak that in to save cats) has nothing to do with computing.
My apologies if this is bringing something offtopic even more offtopic: How are you working on the climate crisis?
I work for Lobelia Earth. The projects I spend most of my time on here are EU contracts relating to WEkEO and Copernicus Marine, although we do a lot of other things. I would love to share what I’ve learned about the intersection between web cartography and earth observation (“remote sensing” in the US) here sometime—I think it is actually topical here and hopefully interesting.
Oh I would love to read what you have to say. It’s a field I’ve brushed against often and enjoyed, but never gone too deep into the modern tech of. Most of what I know was cutting edge in 2003.
That looks fascinating. I’d be very interested to read more: if you ever do write about it, please submit a link here.
Also agree here, even as someone who is pretty broad about the topicality rule. I even held back on giving my thoughts (and I have quite a few!) because I don’t think anyone will ever check lobste.rs for additional feedback.
Happy though that I now know this article.
I understand, but I’m very happy it was posted here. I don’t read the orange site often (which has more content like this), and I found this very interesting as an American.
Disclaimer: I’m from Spain.
I think many people wouldn’t consider itself Europeans because it’s a very broad term. Many people still don’t know the difference between Europe, the European Union, the Eurozone, the Council of Europe and Eurovision! Regarding (Br|L|.*)exit, it’s true it’s not just conservatives that want it, this was just the main force behind Brexit. The EU is a trade union after all, that evolved to harmonize more and more law between countries so trade could be made more efficiently. But there’s no real culture behind. We usually speak together in English, which is a language with very few native speakers in the EU nowadays. There are no newspapers, radio stations, TVs, that are cross border,… there are no memes that only an EU person would understand (but within a country, there are). Most memes that are widely known in the EU, are because they’re also popular in the US. Even in European Elections political parties are the local political parties, they go with that name, and then they form alliances to create the groups in the parliament.
Quite honestly to feel more European we need to move the population around. I would love to see for all the citizens a 1year mandatory erasmus/social service in a randomly selected location of the union.
Although I mostly agree with your point of view, this is actually not true. Look at arte a TV station conceived to create and broadcast mostly the same programming for German and French audiences.
There’s also https://www.euronews.com/
I’m aware of arte.tv, but it doesn’t broadcast in Spain, so for me, it doesn’t count as a TV station.
it is beamed to you from Hotbird 13 and ASTRA 1:
Coverage map if you go sailing: https://www.kvh.com/support/coverage-maps/tracvision-marine-satellite-coverage-maps/europe-astra-1kr/
It’s always markedly surprising that the Yanks expect anyone to be or feel “European”.
Do they not know that they’re European too?
Err…no? I’d say in my neighborhood probably half the population has no ties to Europe whatsoever.
It may help explain their mistake, to consider that the people of the USA “[are] or feel” “American” even while the USA is very close in size to Europe (and more than twice as large as the EU).
From reading history, I think the EU is akin to the United States before the Civil War (or even before WW2) where the primary allegiance was to the constituent state, not the federal government.
I really liked this! This is the most minor point, but …
The “th” is so voiced! If anything, the “clo-thes” attempt would be most likely to use an unvoiced “th”; in “clothes” it’s voiced, and although certainly it’s not super audible, saying it unvoiced instead produces a kind of ‘cloath-s’ sound.
A lot of Germans pronounce clothes more like “cloths”, which I think the author is trying to correct here. But I think they’ve also got voiced and unvoiced the wrong way around.
That said, at least in my accent, if you say “close” you are very close to the correct pronunciation for “clothes”, and in a lot of dialects in the UK they would be the correct pronunciation. So a German trying to get to grips with English pronunciation wouldn’t do badly to use this advice.
Don’t get me started on people correcting how to pronounce iron just because their region pronounces it a certain way. Way to go to research clothes now I guess :D
Yeah, in my accent “clothes” and “close” are very similar. Didn’t realize it might be different across English accents! In any case the German mistake I’m talking about is the computerized pronunciation at the beginning of this video. I’ve added a footnote to explain a bit more.
I wish English would bring back Ð and Þ from Old English, for the voiced and unvoiced dental fricatives.
In Icelandic orthography, we could write it as “klóðs”, also showing that “o” is actually a diphthong.
Being from Asia the “Units” section made me chuckle :D
Nice article though, good to know perspectives.
Is there anything about software engineering in the thousands of words? It reads like an expat’s guide to life.
To wit: There’s a lot to say about software engineering in the Berlin and the German context (and not a lot of it very good).
I found it quite informative and I was somewhat amused by the various culture clashes in TFA. What did you find “not very good” if you don’t mind me asking ?
Good info. I hope I dont need it.
https://wickedchicken.github.io/post/programmer-in-berlin-culture/#right-before-left
I’m pretty sure this same rule also applies in Poland; we call it reguła prawej ręki (the right-hand rule.)
Doing some cursory research on Wikipedia, I found this is apparently quite common in Europe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priority_to_the_right
Though in Poland uncontrolled intersections don’t tend to be that common (they’re mostly on low-traffic roads) which makes this rule super annoying to get used to, and you have to keep in your head in case you run into an uncontrolled intersection.
Except in Poland we cannot safely assume rules are followed, and you are even required by law to distrust other drivers, pedestrians, cyclists etc. and maintain situational awareness.
Even if 90% would follow the rules, 10% is more than enough to cause several life-threatening situations during your daily commute. Drivers are required by law to give way to pedestrians on designated crossings if there are no traffic lights, and if 1 in 10 doesn’t comply it’s more than enough to have you killed or maimed within a week if you’re not looking around as if you had OCD. Even with traffic lights, I’ve experienced and witnessed situations where a pedestrian or cyclist got (almost) struck by a car going pedal to the metal on a left turn, right into a stream of people who had right of way. The law might be with you, but it’s of little use if you’re already dead or with a broken spine. And I am not even mentioning road killers who would overtake cars giving way to pedestrians crossing the street in designated areas.
Likewise, there’s that minority of drivers and cyclist for whom the idea of _lanes _ is simply beyond comprehension. Given an opportunity, they will cut into the opposite lane on a sharp turn rather than slow down, or cut through a pedestrian lane if it saves them following the curved path of bike line near a crossing. Cyclists would rush right between a crowd or commuters and a tram stopping by and opening is doors. Likewise, taxi drivers will simply run you over as you jump off the tram.
Honestly “90% would follow the rules” is probably giving us way too much credit for how recklessly we drive here —w—
Speed limits? “What’s that, 50 km/h is for little babies!”
Turn signals? “But I thought driving a BMW makes it legal not to use them.”
Keeping your distance on speedways? “Could you please give way? I’ll be right there behind you so that you don’t forget about me. Also, *flashes high beams* can you just please give way already I need to go fast”
Honestly, all of the above also applies to Germans on Autobahn, Poland is not much different with that regard.
Thing is, Germans do this on Autobahn, Poles do this just about everywhere
What? Almost all intersections in smaller cities and villages are like that. Also, right-hand rule also applies when turning (that is why someone turning left has lower priority than someone who turns right or goes straight).
It depends on how you interpret the word “common.”
I’m sure statistically the number of uncontrolled intersections is greater than the number of controlled intersections, but I was looking at it from a more subjective perspective: in all my driving I hardly ever run into them, because they’re mostly limited to neighbourhoods or rural areas, which don’t see as much traffic. I used to live in a small city (population ~2000) and I don’t remember driving through any uncontrolled intersections to get to the grocery store, for example. I lived in probably the furthest part of the city from its centre, and even then all intersections had priority/yield signs.
But since that is only a subjective perspective, your mileage may vary; I’ve only had my driver’s license for two years, so obviously my experience is very limited ^^
It’s the rule here in Sweden too. But if you live almost anywhere remotely built up, there will be a Yield or Stop sign at any intersection with noticeable traffic.
The right before left rule exists in almost all European countries afaik