🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <Jun.17.11.45.48.1991.22387@paul.rutgers.edu>, rschwart@paul.rutgers.edu (Bob Schwartz) writes:
> It is embarassing, in this age of desktop publishing and increased
> general interest and awareness of document design, to see ACM's
> flagship publication go off the deed end.  It reinforces the
> stereotype that most computer folks can't be trusted to have good
> design sense (except for code).

     CACM also serves to point out that layout artists know NOTHING about
computers.  I am referring to the content of the pull quotes, those big bits
of text pulled from an article to fill out the page.  There may be more vacuous
statements in those articles, but I doubt it.  For example, the June issue
offers these amazing insights:

	All computations in NUT are performed with objects.  Every object
	belongs to a class and has a value.

Whoa!  Hold me back!  Computation with objects?  And each one has, let me get
this straight, a value?  Whooeee!  Looks like my degree has expired!

     How about

	Expressions may be classified as arithmetic, memory and control,
	depending on the types of their operands and results.

Yikes!  Operands AND results?  This is heady stuff!  I'm sure glad CACM is
highlighting the bleeding edge technology.

     I'm fully expecting this sort of pull quote in a future issue:

	The computer runs faster when you plug it in the wall.

or

	Pressing a "key" transmits that character to the machine.

     Most pull quotes are extracted by layout artists as they fill the pages.
They obviously try to find quotes with "computer words" in them.  Sadly, no 
one seems to check these quotes after they've been pulled, to make sure they
aren't so simplistic.

     If someone from CACM tells me that the editors pull those quotes, then
they're REALLY in trouble.

     On a separate note, did anyone else find those articles on Soviet computing
rather... pedestrian?  I think CACM is suffering from the "We're friends with
the Soviets, so let's publish their stuff" craze sweeping the magazine world.
Perhaps publishing Soviet articles that are state of the art would be a better
strategy.  Unfortunately, I think the acceptance criteria are significantly
reduced for Soviet authors.

-- 

Chuck Musciano				ARPA  : chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com
Harris Corporation 			Usenet: ...!uunet!x102a!trantor!chuck
PO Box 37, MS 3A/1912			AT&T  : (407) 727-6131
Melbourne, FL 32902			FAX   : (407) 729-3363

A good newspaper is never good enough,
	but a lousy newspaper is a joy forever.		-- Garrison Keillor