No need to provide any links, as the news is everywhere. Just wanted to pay respects to the King of Pop. I felt sorry for him, despite his talent and success. He had a troubled and tragic life.

A mini-memory: About 35 years ago to the date, we went to Cape Cod for the summer as we usually did after our summer house was completed in 1973. My cousin Lisa stayed with us because her mother was too sick to care for her. A song she really liked was "Dancing Machine". She was only five, and didn't know all the words, so she made the rest up.

I've been really busy lately, so I haven't been posting much. The 'tute's 25th reunion was a couple of weeks ago. I didn't go, but I wrote up something briefly in the Reunion Book. I don't know if it's publicly accessible, but I didn't write anything there that you haven't already seen here.

However, I did want to briefly recall moving from Cambridge to NJ. I moved in two stages. In the first stage, I rented a U-Haul van, loaded most of my (few) possessions into it, and drove off. (I did require the assistance of a friend who lived one floor below me in the house I lived in to bring my new mattress and boxspring down to the van.)
The place I was moving to was in Edison NJ, not far from the I-287/NJ 440 NJ Turnpike interchange, but I had only been to the place once, so I was a little unsure of how to get to the place from the Garden State Parkway, which is how I got there the first time. (Unusual for me not to know how to get somewhere I'd previously been, something I should have paid a bit more attention to.) But I did get there without incident, unloaded all my stuff, and quickly picked up some items from a "Quik Stop" (a 7-11 kind of store) before going to bed. I got up early the next day and drove back up to Cambridge. My father wanted me to come to Queens so he could see the van, but I didn't want to drive it in the heavy traffic of the Belt/Cross Island, etc. parkways, especially since I had to rely on side view mirrors only, so I just headed back.

The second stage of the move came towards the weekend, I think. I picked up whatever was left in the place that was mine (it was rented and partially furnished), met my friend Wes, and we drove down together. (He was going to visit his gf who was staying on Rutgers' campus as part of a Bell Labs summer program.) This time, we rode down I-95 all the way into NJ, then took the NJ Turnpike to the I-287/NJ 440 interchange. We unpacked the rest of my stuff, then I drove him over to Rutgers.

I went back to Cambridge by plane one last time, toward the end of the month. While I was there, I met up with andybeals, sierra_nevada and a few others for some hacking around campus. After that, I went back to see some of my other friends from the house, turned in my keys, and flew home.

I haven't had much time to write about problem solving, etc. lately, but something over at MyBiasedCoin caught my eye. The author asks whether it's a good idea to have a problem archive containing exam questions and solutions. (The exams would actually be drawn from the archive.) Several people, myself included, replied that it would be a good idea to have both problems and solutions. However, the author doesn't think including solutions is a good idea, because he feels that it's more important for students to think about CS theory problems the right way. If you've been following me over the past few years, you can imagine what my reaction to this was. (I don't disagree, but I still think making solutions available is helpful for students so they don't get stuck.) He hasn't replied yet, and perhaps he won't, but I hope some others respond. I'm particularly interested in hearing from people who can describe their "acquisition process" of CS theory – if they encountered any difficulties, how they worked through them, etc. Were they ever tested before working through their difficulties, and did they get lower grades than they'd hoped?

About three years ago to the date, I started noticing some snoulder problems. They turned into full-blown impingement syndrome, which took me quite some time to get over. I think I'm almost completely over that now, but I seem to have developed another type of RSI that affects my right shoulder mostly after I've been using a standard QWERTY keyboard and mouse for a full day. Rather than retype everything, I'll just point you over to cellio where I described what is wrong and what I plan to do about it. I've suspected that I needed to use ergonomic computer equipment for some time, but it looks like I'll have to get some pretty soon, or else things will get worse.

In addition, I've been working pretty hard, and haven't had much vacation since I started my job in January 2008. (Even when I went to visit my parents last December, I worked during some of the time I was away.) I've been reluctant to take time off, because I don't want anything to go wrong while I'm gone that I could have taken care of easily if I was there (my usual gripe).

The idea is being floated by Paul Graham. The idea is to allow those individuals who are currently applying for the existing visas who want to come to the US in order to start companies to do so.

I can see some potential flaws with this. For one thing, how do we (legally) define a startup? Another issue is that existing companies (who wanted to hire these people outright) might do an "end run" around immigration laws by buying these companies, thus acquiring those workers. It still would not necessarily prevent US workers from being displaced.

These points aside, I think PG has a rather optimistic outlook on the potential success of these companies, particularly with regards to creating jobs. Even in the best of economic times, the vast majority of startups do not grow anywhere close to Google's size.

I haven't had a chance to write here much lately, but wanted to pay tribute to Bea Arthur, 86, who recently died of cancer. I once met her after performing at a People's Choice awards ceremony. The "UCLA Chorale" (people drawn from all of the choral groups in the UCLA music department) provided the backup to Clint Holmes (of Playground In My Mind fame) at the awards ceremony back in the spring of 1991. Afterwards, we got to mingle with the guests a bit.

The following NYT article, a footnote to the one I (indirectly) referred to in my last posting on immigration, has touched off a lively debate on whether Google's hiring practices are fair, in light of the current economic downturn:

Google’s ‘Immigration Fixer’

My comments are here.

I'd also like to add to yesterday's comments on immigration to say that if we are really afraid that we will lose out to other countries technologically if we don't attract and retain more tech workers than current cap limits permit, we've already lost. We have no hold on non-US citizens. They have no good reason to come or stay here any more. Our financial system is a shambles; unemployment is rising; there is growing social unrest. In other words, we are becoming the very thing these people are trying to escape. They are in a position to make their countries better, and a growing number of them are doing just that.

As he usually does in his engineering blog, CuriousCat laments the US government's refusal to let more technology workers enter the US.

My (edited) response (awaiting moderation) below:

First of all, we don't turn away all talented scientists and engineers who were not born
or naturalized here. We have visa programs in place that allow a finite number of such
people to enter the US and work.

Secondly, let's say that the visa programs stay as they are, indefinitely. Is the sky
falling? Are we failing to compete, globally, technically? For example, which country
has the superior electrification infrastructure - India or the US? Which country has the
better motor vehicle transportation infrastructure? Which country has the better emission
standards?

If you want to talk technology, which country supplies the most Internet routers and
switches on a global scale? India, China, Russia, or the US? Which country develops the
most cost-effective desktop and server hardware?

I could go on. It strikes me that with the visa limits in place, we are doing pretty
well.

So what is it that we are afraid of? That a few disgruntled people decide to live and
work in someplace like Canada, or they return to their home countries? That they decide
to form businesses there? They're already doing that; they've been doing that despite the
existence of visas. OTOH, they're not exactly putting the US out of business.

I could also make the argument here that hiring visa-holding people to do work that those
born or naturalized in the US puts an unnecessary strain on our unemployment benefits
system. Here in California, the EDD has become so swamped with claims that they've had to
hire extra people. Arguably, some of those people were displaced by visa holders who were
asked to train their replacements. There was no good reason for any of these people to
need to draw unemployment checks because they were getting their jobs done. (Otherwise,
why would they be asked to train their replacements?)

Could we improve the STEM education available to US residents? Yes. Are we in danger of
becoming technically irrelevant? IMO, no.

Michael Mitzenmacher, a CS professor at Harvard, asks this question. I found many of the responses interesting, several which echo comments I've made on the subject.

I've actually found his blog, My Biased Coin, fascinating reading. He touches on quite a few issues I've discussed here, such as the importance of theory in CS education, and how exams should be designed. He even gives some comments on Ben Edelman's work on click fraud and related topics. The only topic I haven't seen covered is immigration/visas; I'm interested in what he has to say. As another point of interest, he worked with Andrei Broder, who was Chief Scientist of AltaVista many years ago, and is now part of Yahoo!'s research group. I'll definitely be checking his blog and commenting on what I read both there and here.

http://www.brainbox.com.au/brainbox/home.nsf/link/18042004-What-every-graduate-should-know-before-entering-the-IT-industry

An article I found interesting as it gives a capsule summary of most of what I've been discussing the past few years.

I've been meaning to comment on an entry I found on the Facebook CareerCup page The Toughest Interview Question:

"Take an array of n values where each value is an int between 1 and n-1, for example 5 numbers between 1 and 4. Obviously, there must be at least one duplicate number in this array. Write a function that finds a duplicate value. Okay, easy enough. However, the interviewer insisted that the code cannot allocate any new memory (so i can't keep a hash table of what I've read so far, or allocate a new array) and it also must be O(n) (so i can't just look at the first number then scan the whole array looking for the same number).."

Now despite the fact that I know the "trick" that's used to get this answer, I didn't think of it. Granted, I was really busy when I first read the entry, so I didn't really spend much time on it. But I was a little disappointed that the answer did not come to me quickly. But if I should ever need to be interviewed again, it's less likely that I'll be stumped by this, because it'll be in the back of my mind somewhere.

Just a few days ago, I interviewed a candidate for a position in my group. Without going into too many details, I confirmed some of what I've written on the subject of tech interviews here and elsewhere. I will say however that the candidate was very enthusiastic, which made an impression on everyone in my group who spoke to him. The significance of this is clear, and it's something I'll need to work on. I'm sure that in some of my interviews from hell, I had a "deer in headlights" look on my face and tone of voice.

The experience of being on the other side of the table was informative and refreshing. I think the time I've spent researching and discussing tech interviews will make me a better interviewer, and hopefully a better interviewee, should the need arise.

Via Curious Cat's engineering and science blog, I discovered ControlTheoryPro, a blog by a mechanical engineer who shares some of my opinions on education and immigration. For example, see his thoughts on the need for more engineers. When I have more time, I will comment on some of what he's written.

Just a quickie to let you all know what I've been up to lately (other than ranting about immigration):

Work is still keeping me very, very busy. It's not uncommon for me to work every day (including weekends). In addition to a huge workload, we're short-handed because one of my coworkers is recovering from shoulder surgery.

My dance teacher (Gail) recently called me to ask if I wanted to do a samba routine for either the next medal ball or showcase. I haven't replied, but chances are I won't be able to. I just have too much work to do. I can't even make it to chorus rehearsals regularly; I've been going to every other rehearsal. This isn't likely to change until I get really, really solid on my assignments and the parts of our infrastructure that they touch. I want to be at the point I was at while at AV where I could predict things that might go wrong and have fixes for them before they do go wrong.

I don't think I've touched my digital piano in a couple of months. When I do use it, it's just routine practice – scales, arpeggios, etc. I haven't even tried to learn a new piece (or even work on an old one) lately.

I'll be up in SF for IETF74 for most of this week. The last time I went to an IETF conference was about 20 years ago, when it was held at Stanford.

Quite possibly, according to the following YouTube video, an investigative news report on Arizona state, county, and city government hiring.

The following is the (in)famous Cohen and Grigsby YouTube video. This firm helps employers advertise in such ways as not to find qualified US workers, and in some cases, to disqualify them. As a result, the companies can claim that "there's no qualified US workers," and bring aboard people on visas.

Well, in this recent article, the WSJ seems to think so. There is the usual fluff about how visa holders are highly skilled, productive, etc. – the sort of people who make good homebuyers because they make their companies profitable, and as a result, make good salaries.

CNBC has some additional commentary:





Leaving aside (for now) my objections about the need for additional visas, in light of current (un)employment conditions, I still think this is a bad idea. Why not just let the markets work? It's simple Economics 101. Excess supply, drop in demand, prices fall. People will buy homes when the prices fall to reasonable levels. We have now in the works a golden opportunity for first home buyers to get in on extremely good deals without having to take on excessive debt.

Getting back to my own qualms about the need for additional visas, people are losing their jobs, and thus, their confidence about their ability to afford homes. At least as far as people who are qualified to do their jobs but asked to train their visa-holding replacements are concerned, they're being forced into (at least temporary) unemployment, which hurts their ability to pay off their loans, and acts as a disincentive to buying a home.

Another H-1B debate on CNBC, this time between Vivek Wadhwa and Ron Hira. The issue of concern here is that Bank of America took TARP money, but by not making good faith efforts to hire US citizens, they violated the TARP conditions. So now they must rescind some job offers to some recent foreign MBA graduates of US business schools.





I am so glad that Hira stuck to the issues and facts in this debate. BofA took TARP money, but did not honor the conditions of the program. Either they should honor the TARP conditions, or not take the money. He also pointed out the problems of fraud and abuse in the H-1B program, and noted that US citizens are asked to train their H-1B replacements before they're let go.

Regarding Mark Haines' question "do we need the PR problem that firing foreign workers would create?", let me flip it around. Do we need the PR problem that filling positions that US citizens are perfectly capable of doing with H-1B visa holders is creating? Obama realizes that he does not need that problem – these people are, after all, voters, who will most certainly not vote for those individuals who advocate policies that threaten their livelihoods.

I also find it interesting that Wadhwa feels that foreigners are somehow "owed" a certain type of treatment. The purpose of the H-1B visa is clear: it exists to fill temporary needs. No one (legally) made any guarantees to any of these students that they would have jobs in the US. And if immigrants decide to pull money out of BofA, Citi, etc., let me flip it again. What if US citizens, as a matter of protest, decide to make a run on banks that do not honor the TARP rules?

I am glad that these issues are being discussed in the open and that those who are violating the rules are getting caught.

The H-1B debate has been kicked up a notch, as a consequence of the increasing unemployment numbers. Sen. Grassley (R-Iowa) is now requesting that since there are plenty of unemployed US citizens (who presumably have the credentials that meet the requirements the H-1B visa holders are supposed to fill), companies should let the H-1B visa holders go before any others. I should also point out that the US Congress has recently banned companies receiving TARP bailout money from hiring H-1B visa holders.

Here are a few CNBC videos where this was recently debated:







What I hope will come of these debates is, at the very least, baseline criteria that identifies the minimal qualifications for being a tech worker, such as we have with exams like the LSAT and MCAT. Thus, at the very least, when someone prepares for a tech interview, they at least know what they must know, instead of having to worry about whether to focus on memorizing tcpdump commands, or C++ language constructs, or the different management strategies of Star Trek captains. I also hope that it becomes clear that the discussions about hiring and retaining the "brightest and best" do not pertain to the H-1B visa program as stated, and there should be a different conversation about other (perhaps new) visa programs that can meet this need. At least there is one productive result of the H-1B scrutiny: some visa fraudsters have been arrested.

Lots of guest worker visa news these days:

Microsoft: Layoffs for Some, Visas for Others - BusinessWeek

AP Investigation: Banks sought foreign workers - Yahoo! Finance (as if banks were not in enough hot water already because of those bonuses being paid with TARP money)

Layoffs mean more than lost wages for H-1B visa holders - San Jose
I have mixed feelings about this one. I wouldn't want to see entire families displaced, for example. But the people taking the jobs needed to understand that there was no guarantee that they would be allowed to stay in the US permanently.

What Judd Gregg bodes for high tech
He agrees with Bill Gates that visa caps should be lifted entirely, which I find frightening.

IBM's laid off employees offer jobs overseas - Feb. 5, 2009
This one is tough to call. One could argue that they're at least trying to find jobs for these people. OTOH, it could be a sneaky way taking people off of the payroll. IBM must realize that some of the people have family and/or ties to their communities, so they won't want or be able to move. So they can say "Well, we were prepared to find jobs for them overseas, but they didn't want to take them. Now we must fill the jobs somehow."

That's the story out of the big G for this morning's incident, during which all search results were flagged as malware.

I remember something like this happened at AV years ago. During an incident dubbed as AV's Black Monday, a bad index push caused lots of sites to be dropped from the index. The incident was one in a long sequence that got other search engines, such as Google, attention. I'll note that on the various blogs, forums, etc. where this is being discussed, people have indicated that there were no such problems at Y!

The quality of search results for common queries is so close that an engine cannot afford to give its users any reason to search anywhere else. But this snafu has given some users reason to go to Y! (and perhaps some of the others), and notice that their results might be just as good after all. It will be interesting to see what happens next – will Y! and some of the other engines pick up some traffic? Or are people so used to Google that it will continue to dominate?

On a related note, there have been other recently reported instances of poor Google results. For example, search for [stock market] (no quotes), and check for that Neopets result.