programming languages
Remember that Stack Overflow thing we've been working on? Some commenters on a recent Hacker News article questioned the pricing of Stack Exchange -- essentially, a hosted Stack Overflow: Seems really pricey for a relatively simple software like this. Someone write an open source alternative? it looks like
programming languages
In programming, abstractions are powerful things: Joel Spolsky has an article in which he states All non-trivial abstractions, to some degree, are leaky. This is overly dogmatic - for example, bignum classes are exactly the same regardless of the native integer multiplication. Ignoring that, this statement is essentially true, but
programming languages
If you've followed my blog for any length of time, you know that I am a total regular expression fanboy. It's almost embarrassing how much I love the damn things. I'm pretty sure my teammates roll their eyes every time they see yet another
programming languages
It's pop quiz time! Put away your notes, and let's begin. a) Do you own this book?* b) Do you know who this man is? c) Does this FAQ look familiar to you? 3) OUR LITTLE FRIEND, THE COMPUTER 3.1) Are there any OSes that
programming languages
Although I'm a huge fan of Code Complete -- it is my single most recommended programming book for good reason -- there are chapters in it that I haven't been able to digest, even after 16 years. One of those chapters describes something called the Pseudocode
programming languages
If you're waiting around for users to tell you about problems with your website or application, you're only seeing a tiny fraction of all the problems that are actually occurring. The proverbial tip of the iceberg. Also, if this is the case, I'm sorry
programming languages
Ah, spring. What a wonderful time of year. A time when young programmers' minds turn to thoughts of ... neverending last-man-standing filibuster arguments about code formatting. Naturally. And there is no argument more evergreen than the timeless debate between tabs and spaces. On defaultly-configured Unix systems, and on ancient dumb
software development
Are there any programming jobs you wouldn't take? Not because the jobs didn't pay enough, had poor benefits, or limited upside -- but because the work itself made you uncomfortable? Consider the tale of one freshmeat.net writer [http://freshmeat.net/articles/excessive-code-and-excessive-nudity-what-gives]: > Back in
programming languages
I've been following Michael Abrash for more than 10 years now; he's one of my programming heroes. So I was fascinated to discover that Mr. Abrash wrote an article extolling the virtures of Intel's upcoming Larrabee. What's Larrabee? It's a
programming languages
One of the more famous Edsger Dijkstra quotes is from his 1972 Turing award lecture, How do we tell truths that might hurt? Besides a mathematical inclination, an exceptionally good mastery of one's native tongue is the most vital asset of a competent programmer. Note that he specifically
programming languages
On the internet, you can pretend the world is flat. Whatever country you live in, whatever language you speak, you have the same access to the accumulated knowledge of the world as every other citizen of the planet Earth. And a growing percentage of that knowledge can and should be
programming languages
I have the very great honor of speaking at this year's EclipseCon with one of my heroes, Clay Shirky. The theme of this year's EclipseCon is collaboration -- so all the talks are presented by two speakers. Our talk, The Social Mind: Designing Like Groups Matter,