programming languages
If you haven’t been able to keep up with my blistering pace of one blog post per year, I don’t blame you. There’s a lot going on right now. It’s a busy time. But let’s pause and take a moment to celebrate that Elon Musk
programming languages
In a way, these two books are responsible for my entire professional career. With early computers, you didn’t boot up to a fancy schmancy desktop, or a screen full of apps you could easily poke and prod with your finger. No, those computers booted up to the command line.
software development
I sometimes get asked by regular people in the actual real world what it is that I do for a living, and here’s my 15 second answer: We built a sort of Wikipedia website for computer programmers to post questions and answers. It’s called Stack Overflow. As of
programming languages
I didn’t choose to be a programmer. Somehow, it seemed, the computers chose me. For a long time, that was fine, that was enough; that was all I needed. But along the way I never felt that being a programmer was this unambiguously great-for-everyone career field with zero downsides.
programming languages
Every geek goes through a phase where they discover emulation. It’s practically a rite of passage. I think I spent most of my childhood – and a large part of my life as a young adult – desperately wishing I was in a video game arcade. When I finally obtained my
programming languages
You know what’s universally regarded as un-fun by most programmers? Writing assembly language code. As Steve McConnell said back in 1994: Programmers working with high-level languages achieve better productivity and quality than those working with lower-level languages. Languages such as C++, Java, Smalltalk, and Visual Basic have been credited
swift
I saw in today’s news that Apple open sourced their Swift language. One of the most influential companies in the world explicitly adopting an open source model – that’s great! I’m a believer. One of the big reasons we founded Discourse was to build an open source solution
programming languages
In 1992, I thought I was the best programmer in the world. In my defense, I had just graduated from college, this was pre-Internet, and I lived in Boulder, Colorado working in small business jobs where I was lucky to even hear about other programmers much less meet them. I
programming languages
These two imaginary guys influenced me heavily as a programmer. Instead of guaranteeing fancy features or compatibility or error free operation, Beagle Bros software promised something else altogether: fun. Playing with the Beagle Bros quirky Apple II floppies in middle school and high school, and the smorgasboard of oddball hobbyist
programming languages
Way back in 2007, before Stack Overflow was a glint in anyone’s eye, I called software development a collaborative game. And perhaps Stack Overflow was the natural outcome of that initial thought – recasting online software development discussion into a collaborative game where the only way to “win” is to
programming languages
Computer performance is a bit of a shell game. You’re always waiting for one of four things: * Disk * CPU * Memory * Network But which one? How long will you wait? And what will you do while you’re waiting? Did you see the movie “Her”? If not, you should. It’
programming languages
I get a surprising number of emails from career programmers who have spent some time in the profession and eventually decided it just isn’t for them. Most recently this: I finished a computer science degree last year, worked about a year in the Java EE stack. I liked requirements