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From: Robert Myers on 14 May 2010 17:26
On May 14, 4:15 pm, n...(a)cam.ac.uk wrote:

> Deep understanding is far more knowing the area around the topic,
> and its deeper underpinnings, and why certain things are fundamental,
> others are superficial and others are just plain idiotic.

One of these days, we'll be able to run DDT on the brains of those who
continually confuse ridiculous nits with something worth talking
about. Who knows what we might discover from examining the
implausible logical pathways that are exposed as a result.

And, yes, I do understand that I might find such a capability handy
for my own personal use. Might save me a lot of time.

Robert.

From: Andy 'Krazy' Glew on 14 May 2010 20:11
On 5/14/2010 1:15 PM, nmm1(a)cam.ac.uk wrote:
> In article<vlg0c7-op21.ln1(a)ntp.tmsw.no>,
> Terje Mathisen<"terje.mathisen at tmsw.no"> wrote:
>>
>> OTOH, I do feel that deep understanding ("grok'ing something") mostly
>> consists of the combination of lots and lots of details with the
>> understanding of how they all fit together. :-)
>
> I disagree, and it is the reason that I have spent so much time
> beating my head against the brick walls of some language standards
> and similar organisations.
>
> Deep understanding is far more knowing the area around the topic,
> and its deeper underpinnings, and why certain things are fundamental,
> others are superficial and others are just plain idiotic.

I'm in Nick's camp here.

Understand the principles, and you can generate the details. That really matter.

Of course, then you have to remember all of the details that aren't fundamental, but which are just a consequence of
history, legacy, etc. But at least you know what things do not need to be done the way they currently are.

--

An example that ticks me off (ticked me off, past tense) is when some young whippersnapper explains to me, slowly, why
you can't do something in OOO architecture, why it's done the way it is in the CPU. And then I explain that I know very
well why it is done that way, because I designed the stuff he's explaining to me, and here are the three design
alternatives that worked equally well, and often better.

Oftentimes the only reason for such details is inertia.
From: Terje Mathisen "terje.mathisen at on 15 May 2010 11:05
nmm1(a)cam.ac.uk wrote:
> In article<vlg0c7-op21.ln1(a)ntp.tmsw.no>,
> Terje Mathisen<"terje.mathisen at tmsw.no"> wrote:
>>
>> OTOH, I do feel that deep understanding ("grok'ing something") mostly
>> consists of the combination of lots and lots of details with the
>> understanding of how they all fit together. :-)
>
> I disagree, and it is the reason that I have spent so much time
> beating my head against the brick walls of some language standards
> and similar organisations.
>
> Deep understanding is far more knowing the area around the topic,
> and its deeper underpinnings, and why certain things are fundamental,
> others are superficial and others are just plain idiotic.

We're in violent agreement, I think: I.e. your paragraph above is a much
better general description of what "deep understanding" really means, I
was just trying to make a little joke here, i.e. "how they all fit
together" is similar to "just a little matter of programming".

If you really do grok how they _all_ fit together (and that even
includes lots of stuff that at first sight might seem to be totally
unrelated), you must have said deep understanding, imho.

Terje
--
- <Terje.Mathisen at tmsw.no>
"almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching"
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