programming languages
I occasionally get emails from people asking how to prepare for a career in software development. Some are students wondering what classes they should take; others have been bitten by the programming bug and are considering their next steps. I always answer with the same advice. There’s no substitute
keyboard shortcuts
One of the quickest ways to increase your productivity on the computer is to go commando: stop using the mouse. When you stop relying on the mouse for everything, you’re forced to learn the keyboard shortcuts. Jeremy Miller calls this the first step to coding faster. I agree. Keyboard
blog
Alex Papadimoulis originally invited me to be a guest editor at The Daily WTF nearly six months ago. I was honored and accepted immediately. Since then, The Daily WTF has been rechristened Worse Than Failure. I’m a big fan of Alex and WTF; his blog is fantastic, and WTF
cpu
A few recent articles have highlighted the disproportionate contribution PlayStation 3 consoles are making to the Folding@Home effort. The OS statistics page for Folding@Home tells the tale: TFLOPSActive CPUsTotal CPUsWindows152160,1731,626,609Mac/PPC78,77695,435Mac/Intel92,8647,400Linux4325,239216,067GPU437332,228PS365926,91129,843 There are a couple
programming languages
Presented, in no particular order, for your reading pleasure: my top 6 list of programming top 10 lists. To keep this entry concise, I’ve only quoted a brief summary of each item. If any of these sound interesting to you, I encourage you to click through and read the
software development
I’ve seen a lot of painfully bad IT web comics in my day, but I’m happy to say that Bug Bash, by Hans Bjordahl, is not one of them. This particular strip is one of my favorites because it hits so close to home. Software developers truly believe,
security
The One Laptop Per Child operating system features a new security model – Bitfrost. It’s an interesting departure from the traditional UNIX and LINUX security model. The 1971 version of UNIX supported the following security permissions on user files: * non-owner can change file (write) * non-owner can read file
database design
Long-time readers of this blog know that I have an inordinate fondness for GUIDs. Each globally unique ID is like a beautiful snowflake: every one a unique item waiting to be born. Perhaps that’s why I read with great interest recent accounts of people switching their database tables
user experience
We understand what 404 means: Page Not Found. But the average internet user has no idea what 404 means or what to do about it. To them, it’s yet another unintelligible error message from the computer. Most 404 pages are unvarnished geek-speak. Consider the default 404 page under
software development
Joseph Cooney had a brilliant idea for a new application certification program. But Vista’s bland white-on-gray badge, in my opinion, doesn’t properly communicate the... authoritative... nature of said program. With the help of Jon Galloway, we zazzed things up a bit: You might think attaining such
web development
Torrent, my favorite BitTorrent client, now offers a web UI. See if you can spot the differences between the Web UI and the Windows UI: After spending about a year interacting with Torrent exclusively through Remote Desktop, I was pleasantly surprised to discover how good the web UI is. It
hardware
I recently had the opportunity to rebuild my work PC. It strongly resembles the “Little Bang” D.I.Y. system I outlined in my previous post on the philosophy of building your own computer. See, I do take my own advice. Here’s a quick breakdown of the components and