The Millennial Gold Rush for Data

Before you start reading, I would like to stress that I am not an expert in this field.  These are my ramblings based on what I have read, patterns I have noticed, and my own personal theories.  There may or may not be truth to this, and while I have done a decent amount of research, I do not work in this field directly, and cannot specifically comment on all aspects of it.  With that said, let's begin:

With all of the "hype" in regards to big data, I've slowly begun looking into what the growth for big data is going to be like as far as the job market is concerned.  What's interesting is that this entirely depends on which part of the market you plan to go in to.  For example, if you plan to learn about processing this data, your market value is very high from what I have read, probably for the next five to ten years, until we have the process mostly automated.  But if you plan to go into the gathering sector, there really isn't a way to determine how long you'll be able to rely on your skill set.  The reason for this is that gathering data is becoming more and more like a gold rush, instead of something long term.  This is what interests me, as I believe it is a very valuable skill set to have right now, partially because I believe more "gold deposits" will be found in the future still.  Thus I have been analyzing these "gold deposits" in order to gain a better understanding of what they are, where they come from, what their value is, and how to find them.

Is C++ a Relevant Language?

This has been a nagging question to me for a few years now, and is part of the reason I stopped coding as much a few years ago, only to pick it back up again over the past two years: Just how useful is it to learn a programming language like C++?  No, I'm not talking about python wrappers for it, or C#, or something "similar" like Java (and no, they are not similar like you may think).  I'm talking about low level C++, down to the metal, with just you and your compiler (IDE optionally too).  Had you asked me 2 years ago, I probably would have said C++ is just for gaming.  Ask me now, and I'll tell you it is still one of the most relevant languages out there.  Let's go over a few things about why C++ is a big deal, and why you should learn it if you don't know it.

Photos of the Month - July 2014

The month of July was a rather crazy month.  For those who don't know, I got the chance to go to Mountain View California and interview with Google at their headquarters.  It was an insane experience, and while I still don't know if I got the job, I had a great time and got a ton of pictures!  So for this month's photos, here are a ton of neat pictures from California (With one or two from Virginia too)!

Cooking up Hash Tables

Originally I was thinking I should rename this post, but I've decided to go ahead and keep the name since I find it kind of funny. That said, hash tables are super cool, and a really important data structure that I believe you should absolutely know.  Even Googlers says they are one of the most important data structures around.  So how exactly do you implement a simple hash table?  Let's go ahead and explore this!

How Google is Replacing Windows (For me)

A few months ago I was finally due for a phone upgrade and decided to make the big jump from an Apple iPhone to an Android Phone (the Galaxy S4).  What I thought was going to be a simple switch ended up being a full switch to Google's platforms I've realized recently.  Not only do I have a phone with Google's OS, I now have a tablet by Google, the Chromecast by Google, and of course, tons of applications that I use by Google (just look at this blog!)  In fact, it's only been today that I've realized just how many products by Google I use.  Sending an email to another student?  Just so happens my school email is supplied through Google.  I want to watch a TV show with breakfast?  Chromecast is going to be the most convenient way to do so.  My laptop even has the equivalent of a start button from Google on it now.

While I'm using Windows 8, there's still a "Start button" thanks to Google.

The funny thing is, I didn't do any of this on purpose.  I just happened to end up getting all of these products from Google because they fit my needs exactly.  Why do I use Google Drive more often than Dropbox?  Because I'm usually on my email to begin with, and it's a click away.  Why did I switch to Android from an iPhone?  Because I wanted to be able to customize my phone more so.  At first, many of these little things seemed almost pointless, but as time has gone on, I've found that Google manages to just do things right.  When I need to bring a PowerPoint to class, rather than putting it on a USB flash drive, I can just upload it to my Google Drive, and then download it in class with a shortened URL from Google.  No big hassle, no issues with the URLs' changing, it's simple and quick!

Dropbox I'm slowly beginning to use more (as evident in the picture above), but I wonder if I'll ever make the full jump.  While Google does collect a lot more data, I don't really mind if it's advertising things I enjoy.  Even so, Adblock Plus manages to hide the majority of ads, so I don't really even have to worry about that too much.

With all of that said, there's still a few things I won't switch to Google for.  A big one is still of course my operating system (though they are pushing that very quickly).  There are too many programs I prefer to use on Windows than any others (Even Linux sadly).  On top of that, I still prefer Facebook over Google+ (Though that as well is slowly changing too).  Even for document editing, I still prefer Microsoft Office over Google Docs, though I don't think those are quite the right comparison.

While Google is slowly dominating my life, they still have a ways to go before I'd be willing to jump ship for quite a few products.  Maybe over the next year it will happen, but I'm still skeptical until I see it happening.