Dear Users... (A thread for Sysadmin, Technical Support, and Help Desk people)

Status
Not open for further replies.
It may be fashionable to rag on Perl, but it does have excellent performance.

A while ago I was testing database scaling with GNU dbm and Berkeley dbm. I needed a large dataset and hit on the idea of using a number as the key (e.g. "123456789") and the number's words in English as the data (e.g. "one hundred twenty-three million, four hundred fifty-six thousand, seven hundred eighty-nine".) Such a dataset is by its very nature infinitely scalable. The algorithm I developed is pretty straightforward, and out of curiosity I ended up implementing it in several languages.

Here are the results from tests I ran on my laptop (Intel Pentium 3825U, 1.90GHz), in thousands of records generated per second:

Compiled C program (gcc -O3): 2,840
PHP 7: 403
mawk (a fast version of awk): 311
Perl: 287
Lua: 164
Ruby: 158
Java: 137
Python: 116
TCL: 68
Bash script: 6.4

The Perl program ran at more than twice the speed of the equivalent Python and Java programs.

On more powerful hardware such as a Ryzen CPU, Java and Python fared better when compared with Perl, running at 79% and 68% (respectively) the speed of the Perl program.
 
Blue Mountain said:
I understand. As a programmer my first impulse on hearing of any computer issue is to figure out how to write a solution for it. Shocking as it may seem to me, there actually are things in life more important than programming or learning how to program.
Click to expand...
Yeah, like I said, this task is ideal for automation, but it's not going to happen.

Wudang said:
<gasps><clutches perl>
Click to expand...
:thumbsup::D
 
I was just asked by one of the management team to submit a request for an increase in my security clearance. Since this is a prerequisite for the position I've been going for, I think things are starting to look pretty good.
 
Then again, there's this rather ominous sounding development: https://www.theguardian.com/austral...t-departments-in-major-public-service-changes

Prime minister Scott Morrison has announced a major shake-up of the public service that will see four departments abolished, five secretaries sacked, and responsibility for emissions reductions removed from the department of environment.

Under the changes outlined by Morrison on Thursday, 18 government departments will be reduced to 14, with the prime minister saying the move would see “better services on the ground”.

He said the changes were not a savings measure, and there were no job losses expected. There will also be no changes to the ministry.
Click to expand...
 
Well that was an unusual call. Here is a near-exact transcript:

Hello, Service Desk, how can I help?

Everything is working, nothing is going wrong, and you're all doing a great job.

Uh... thanks.

Bye! *click*
 
arthwollipot said:
Well that was an unusual call. Here is a near-exact transcript:

Hello, Service Desk, how can I help?

Everything is working, nothing is going wrong, and you're all doing a great job.

Uh... thanks.

Bye! *click*
Click to expand...

That's a phenomenon called "appreciation". It's very rarely found in the wild. You should consider yourself lucky to have observed it first hand.
 
I'm super happy - I've been in this same role at my company since 2006. (with a brief interruption around 2014, but that's a whole 'nuther story). I'm good at it, and there is only a very small subset of people in the country that do what I do. It's why they *love* me.

Anyway, they asked me to learn this other thing! New Things! Shiny objects!

So, I've been having a blast the last two days playing around with the new thing. I'm in fake it until you make it mode.

Wonder what this button does? <click>

Whee!
 
erlando said:
That's a phenomenon called "appreciation". It's very rarely found in the wild. You should consider yourself lucky to have observed it first hand.
Click to expand...
I did lodge a feedback incident about it.

They've got me almost entirely on Service Requests now. That's the boring, repetitive stuff, but in terms of career positioning it's where I want to be.
 
erlando said:
That's a phenomenon called "appreciation". It's very rarely found in the wild. You should consider yourself lucky to have observed it first hand.
Click to expand...
Anecdotes don't make evidence. I am sure there is a rational explanation for arthwolipot's claim, he was probably on drugs or had a crossed line on the phone.

You claiming it had to be a supernatural act before all the rational reasons are exhausted is not very sceptical. I know people have made claims of "appreciation" in the IT support profession for decades but we are yet to see one single iota of solid evidence it actually happens.
 
Darat said:
Anecdotes don't make evidence. I am sure there is a rational explanation for arthwolipot's claim, he was probably on drugs or had a crossed line on the phone.

You claiming it had to be a supernatural act before all the rational reasons are exhausted is not very sceptical. I know people have made claims of "appreciation" in the IT support profession for decades but we are yet to see one single iota of solid evidence it actually happens.
Click to expand...

It’s usually a case of HR reflecting swamp gas from the need to pay techies the going rate.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Back
Top Bottom