Lidor Wyssocky at The Mindset writes about “The Emperor’s New Clothes Syndrome.” This reminded me of a talk Tim Lister gave earlier this year at the Boston SPIN. “The problem is that although we know exactly what doesn’t work right and how it should be fixed, most of us will never say anything,” Lidor writes.
Please Don’t Share Your Bodily Fluids With the Rest of the System
Have you ever been here? Refactoring old code, seeing new code that partially de-factors it, and taking out my frustrations in code comments.
The old comment for a struct declaration:
// This structure will be generated // and stay with each connection
The new comment:
Continue reading “Please Don’t Share Your Bodily Fluids With the Rest of the System”
Top Eight Reasons to Abandon SourceSafe
How many of us work in Microsoft shops? I’m ashamed to admit that I do. When I took the job, I thought the benefits of working in a new domain with new technologies would outweigh the fact that I had to use Microsoft tools and program for Windows. Well, the benefits are real. The costs are also real. And one of these costs is SourceSafe.
The worst part about it is that there’s no particularly good reason why we have to use SourceSafe. Continue reading “Top Eight Reasons to Abandon SourceSafe”
When the Best Tool Isn’t, and Why a Growing Team Doesn’t Care
Kathy Sierra excellent post on When the “best tool for the job”… isn’t misses an important point. It’s not that she missed the point so much as she just didn’t go into it. But I think it deserves going into.
Many software developers become very attached to their favorite programming languages, methodologies, practices, and so forth. Checking the link-backs for my post “Twelve Benefits of Writing Unit Tests First” demonstrates this. One commenter on another blog even said he saw no value in reading the whole post, since it was specious and had no redeeming value. I took great joy in that comment, because it means I must be doing something right to push someone’s righteous buttons so accurately. Regardless, would test-first be the right tool for that programmer?
Continue reading “When the Best Tool Isn’t, and Why a Growing Team Doesn’t Care”
Why I Hate Microsoft
Back in the Windows 95 days, I was a huge Microsoft proponent. When Netscape sicked the U.S. DoJ on them, I was on their side. What happened since then?
I’m a Linux user. That is to say, all of my home computers run Linux. The one at work doesn’t, but that’s a long story, which only serves to convince me that I want no Windows box at home. To say that I “hate” Microsoft may be a little hyperbole. But sometimes it does describe the way I feel. But not because Bill Gates is rich, as Bill Hilf is quoted as implying. On the contrary, the story of Bill Gates and MS-DOS and IBM is one of the most inspiring tales I’ve ever encountered. I dream of being a Bill Gates.
Top Ten Reasons to Remain a Wage Slave
Steve Pavlina’s recent posts 10 Myths About Self-Employment and 10 Reasons You Should Never Get a Job inspired me to create my own top-ten list.
Five Things Software Teams Can Learn From Build-A-Bear Workshop About Customer Relations
I never would have bought this book for myself. I won it in a drawing at InBubbleWrap.com. I’m not sure what made me enter the drawing. Maybe it was, Eh, it sounds moderately interesting, and it’s free. Or maybe it’s that I have a soft, cuddly spot in my heart for Build-a-Bear Workshop. And as I read through, I recognized lessons I had learned in developing software, especially from Agile development.