Regarding the controversial and thought-provoking assessments in this handbook, many software professionals might disagree with the authors, but all will embrace the debate. Glass identifies many of the key problems hampering success in this field. Each fact is supported by insightful discussion and detailed references.
Entertainment Weekly's 27 Female Authors Who Rule Sci-Fi and Fantasy Right Now Winner of the 2017 Nebula Award for Best Novel Finalist for the 2017 Hugo Award for Best Novel Paste's 50 Best Books of the 21st Century (So Far) List “The book is full of quirkiness and playful detail...but there's an overwhelming depth and poignancy to its virtuoso ending.” —NPR From the former editor-in-chief of io9.com, a stunning Nebula Award-winning and Hugo-shortlisted novel about the end of the world—and the beginning of our future An ancient society of witches and a hipster technological startup go to war in order to prevent the world from tearing itself apart. To further complicate things, each of the groups’ most promising followers (Patricia, a brilliant witch and Laurence, an engineering “wunderkind”) may just be in love with each other. As the battle between magic and science wages in San Francisco against the backdrop of international chaos, Laurence and Patricia are forced to choose sides. But their choices will determine the fate of the planet and all mankind. In a fashion unique to Charlie Jane Anders, All the Birds in the Sky offers a humorous and, at times, heart-breaking exploration of growing up extraordinary in a world filled with cruelty, scientific ingenuity, and magic. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
A Step-by-Step Guide to Showing the Value of Soft Skill Programs As organizations rise to meet the challenges of technological innovation, globalization, changing customer needs and perspectives, demographic shifts, and new work arrangements, their mastery of soft skills will likely be the defining difference between thriving and merely surviving. Yet few executives champion the expenditure of resources to develop these critical skills. Why is that and what can be done to change this thinking? For years, managers convinced executives that soft skills could not be measured and that the value of these programs should be taken on faith. Executives no longer buy that argument but demand the same financial impact and accountability from these functions as they do from all other areas of the organization. In Proving the Value of Soft Skills, measurement and evaluation experts Patti Phillips, Jack Phillips, and Rebecca Ray contend that efforts can and should be made to demonstrate the effect of soft skills. They also claim that a proven methodology exists to help practitioners articulate those effects so that stakeholders’ hearts and minds are shifted toward securing support for future efforts. This book reveals how to use the ROI Methodology to clearly show the impact and ROI of soft skills programs. The authors guide readers through an easy-to-apply process that includes: business alignment design evaluation data collection isolation of the program effects cost capture ROI calculations results communication. Use this book to align your programs with organizational strategy, justify or enhance budgets, and build productive business partnerships. Included are job aids, sample plans, and detailed case studies.
Are you struggling to do the things you know are important because of how annoying or uninteresting they are? Are you frustrated by the lack of hours in the day? Do you wish you could dictate your schedule instead of just letting things happen and hoping for the best? Once you understand how you are currently spending your time and why, you'll be able to take control of what you accomplish every day and ensure that your actions tie back to your most important values and life priorities. How is this possible? By constructing your very own effort matrix. The effort matrix depicts where your activities lie in the context of importance and interest: 1. Gung-Ho (we love this part of our lives) 2. Grind (things that are vitally important and we know we must do) 3. Guilty Pleasure (fun stuff) 4. Screw It (not worth the effort) Spending your time on activities of high importance and high interest makes you happier. Shifting high-value activities into a place of high importance and high interest makes you more productive. In The Effort Matrix, you will learn how to do this. We'll help you define your high-value activities that tie back to your top priorities, make time every day for them, craft a bulletproof to-do list system that prioritizes itself, and build productivity routines that maximize your efforts throughout the week. Stop wasting time on the things that don't matter and wondering why nothing ever gets done. To live a productive life, we can follow all kinds of guidelines, tools, and rules but we will only be successful if we harness our efforts! This book explores where most people fall short on productivity because of the unwillingness to put effort into the right things. Understand your effort matrix and follow the simple guidelines in this book and you'll become more productive and happier at the same time.
In a world where advanced knowledge is widespread and low-cost labor is readily available, U.S. advantages in the marketplace and in science and technology have begun to erode. A comprehensive and coordinated federal effort is urgently needed to bolster U.S. competitiveness and pre-eminence in these areas. This congressionally requested report by a pre-eminent committee makes four recommendations along with 20 implementation actions that federal policy-makers should take to create high-quality jobs and focus new science and technology efforts on meeting the nation's needs, especially in the area of clean, affordable energy: 1) Increase America's talent pool by vastly improving K-12 mathematics and science education; 2) Sustain and strengthen the nation's commitment to long-term basic research; 3) Develop, recruit, and retain top students, scientists, and engineers from both the U.S. and abroad; and 4) Ensure that the United States is the premier place in the world for innovation. Some actions will involve changing existing laws, while others will require financial support that would come from reallocating existing budgets or increasing them. Rising Above the Gathering Storm will be of great interest to federal and state government agencies, educators and schools, public decision makers, research sponsors, regulatory analysts, and scholars.
The Complete Guide to Writing More Maintainable, Manageable, Pleasing, and Powerful Ruby Applications Ruby's widely admired ease of use has a downside: Too many Ruby and Rails applications have been created without concern for their long-term maintenance or evolution. The Web is awash in Ruby code that is now virtually impossible to change or extend. This text helps you solve that problem by using powerful real-world object-oriented design techniques, which it thoroughly explains using simple and practical Ruby examples. This book focuses squarely on object-oriented Ruby application design. Practical Object-Oriented Design in Ruby will guide you to superior outcomes, whatever your previous Ruby experience. Novice Ruby programmers will find specific rules to live by; intermediate Ruby programmers will find valuable principles they can flexibly interpret and apply; and advanced Ruby programmers will find a common language they can use to lead development and guide their colleagues. This guide will help you Understand how object-oriented programming can help you craft Ruby code that is easier to maintain and upgrade Decide what belongs in a single Ruby class Avoid entangling objects that should be kept separate Define flexible interfaces among objects Reduce programming overhead costs with duck typing Successfully apply inheritance Build objects via composition Design cost-effective tests Solve common problems associated with poorly designed Ruby code
The only way to learn is to practice! In Machine Learning Bookcamp, you''ll create and deploy Python-based machine learning models for a variety of increasingly challenging projects. Taking you from the basics of machine learning to complex applications such as image and text analysis, each new project builds on what you''ve learned in previous chapters. By the end of the bookcamp, you''ll have built a portfolio of business-relevant machine learning projects that hiring managers will be excited to see. about the technology Machine learning is an analysis technique for predicting trends and relationships based on historical data. As ML has matured as a discipline, an established set of algorithms has emerged for tackling a wide range of analysis tasks in business and research. By practicing the most important algorithms and techniques, you can quickly gain a footing in this important area. Luckily, that''s exactly what you''ll be doing in Machine Learning Bookcamp. about the book In Machine Learning Bookcamp you''ll learn the essentials of machine learning by completing a carefully designed set of real-world projects. Beginning as a novice, you''ll start with the basic concepts of ML before tackling your first challenge: creating a car price predictor using linear regression algorithms. You''ll then advance through increasingly difficult projects, developing your skills to build a churn prediction application, a flight delay calculator, an image classifier, and more. When you''re done working through these fun and informative projects, you''ll have a comprehensive machine learning skill set you can apply to practical on-the-job problems. what''s inside Code fundamental ML algorithms from scratch Collect and clean data for training models Use popular Python tools, including NumPy, Pandas, Scikit-Learn, and TensorFlow Apply ML to complex datasets with images and text Deploy ML models to a production-ready environment about the reader For readers with existing programming skills. No previous machine learning experience required. about the author Alexey Grigorev has more than ten years of experience as a software engineer, and has spent the last six years focused on machine learning. Currently, he works as a lead data scientist at the OLX Group, where he deals with content moderation and image models. He is the author of two other books on using Java for data science and TensorFlow for deep learning.