.net
I just updated my post The Bloated World of Managed Code with baseline memory footprints for Console and Winforms apps in .NET 2.0. I’ll admit I am a bit of a hypocrite when it comes to managed code apps. Now that tiny, native BitTorrent clients are available such
file systems
Don Park recently made an interesting observation about how his family uses the computer: When I observe how my wife and son uses the family computer, I can’t help noticing how little use they have for the desktop. They look bewildered when I open the Windows Explorer. To them,
software development concepts
Philip Chu's Seven Habits of Highly Effective Programmers [http://www.technicat.com/writing/programming.html] is witty, eloquent, and peppered with illustrative real world anecdotes: > Upon joining an early-stage startup called Neomar, I found myself in two months of design meetings for a wireless internet portal that
software development concepts
The 69 page e-book Client vs. Developer Wars documents one web design company's struggle to formulate a rational development process: Up until the middle of 2000, Newfangled's development process was much like that of every other web development company. The process started with the "planning/
programming languages
Laurent Bourgeois sent in an amusing link to the story of SkiFree [http://ski.ihoc.net/] in the words of Chris Pirih, the original Microsoft programmer who wrote it: > I wrote SkiFree in C on my home computer, entirely for my own education and entertainment. One day while I
programming languages
[http://www.clive.nl/detail/24424/] The 1978 BASIC program Animal [http://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/showpage.php?page=4] is an animal-specific variation of twenty questions [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty_questions]. You think of an animal, and the computer tries to guess what animal you're
retro gaming
I sometimes go by the handle "Wumpus" online. It's part of my personal brand, just like Coding Horror is. Why? Let's go hunting together: It was one of my formative computing experiences on the first "real" computer I owned. No, my Coleco
case sensitivity
One of the most pernicious problems with C-based languages is that they're case-sensitive. While this decision may have made sense in 1972 when the language was created [http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/who/dmr/chist.html], one wonders why the sins of Kernighan and Ritchie [http://cm.
software development concepts
I've been running some version of Microsoft's cool TweakUI powertoy [http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/powertoys/xppowertoys.mspx ] since the heady days of Windows 95. I recently found out that the author is none other than Raymond Chen [http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2005/
programming languages
Artima has another great interview series, this time with Erich Gamma. You know, Erich Gamma: Gang of Four, JUnit, Eclipse. As you might expect from such a notable developer, it's full of great advice. Like this section on avoiding frameworkitis: Frameworkitis is the disease that a framework wants
programming languages
In Software Training Sucks: Why We Need to Roll it Back 1,000 Years, Rob Walling makes a compelling argument for abandoning traditional training classes in favor of apprenticeships: [Why not] use the time-tested approach of trades that have been doing it for years? Let's take an electrical
software development concepts
In response to My Giant Calculator, Joost commented: I'll jump to the defense of trusty old calc.exe. Even though it's crappy, we know it's on every Windows box we touch. He's got a point. The applets that ship in the box