technology trends

Programmers Don’t Read Books – But You Should

programming languages

Programmers Don’t Read Books – But You Should

One of the central themes of stackoverflow.com is that software developers no longer learn programming from books, as Joel mentioned: Programmers seem to have stopped reading books. The market for books on programming topics is miniscule compared to the number of working programmers. Joel expressed similar sentiments in 2004’

By Jeff Atwood ·
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Everything I Needed to Know About Programming I Learned from BASIC

programming languages

Everything I Needed to Know About Programming I Learned from BASIC

Edsger Dijkstra had this to say about Beginner’s All Purpose Symbolic Instruction Code: It is practically impossible to teach good programming style to students that have had prior exposure to BASIC; as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hope of regeneration. I’m sure he was exaggerating here

By Jeff Atwood ·
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Should All Developers Have Manycore CPUs?

multicore cpu

Should All Developers Have Manycore CPUs?

Dual core CPUs are effectively standard today, and for good reason – there are substantial, demonstrable performance improvements to be gained from having a second CPU on standby to fulfill requests that the first CPU is too busy to handle. If nothing else, dual-core CPUs protect you from badly written software;

By Jeff Atwood ·
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software development concepts

Let That Be a Lesson To You, Son: Never Upgrade.

(Update: This piece originally ran on April Fools’ day; although the content of the post is not an April Fools’ joke, the retro styling definitely was. View a screenshot of how this post looked on April 1, 2008) I occasionally follow Jamie Zawinski’s blog. Jamie’s an interesting guy.

By Jeff Atwood ·
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technology trends

Just a Little Bit of Software History Repeating

I lived in the Denver area at the time Denver International Airport’s completely computer automated baggage system was unveiled in 1994. The troubled development of this system was big local news. The premise of Denver’s plan was as big as the West. The distance from a centralized baggage

By Jeff Atwood ·
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I {entity} Unicode

unicode

I {entity} Unicode

These are available as bumper stickers and t-shirts: Here’s my rhetorical question to you: why is this funny? * The Absolute Minimum Every Software Developer Absolutely, Positively Must Know About Unicode and Character Sets (No Excuses!) * There Ain’t No Such Thing as Plain Text * On the Goodness of Unicode

By Jeff Atwood ·
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Paul Graham’s Participatory Narcissism

software development concepts

Paul Graham’s Participatory Narcissism

I have tremendous respect for Paul Graham. His essays – repackaged in the book Hackers and Painters – are among the best writing I’ve found on software engineering. Not all of them are so great, of course, but the majority are well worth your time. That’s more than I can

By Jeff Atwood ·
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Adventures in Rechargeable Batteries

rechargeable batteries

Adventures in Rechargeable Batteries

Every self-respecting geek loves gadgets. I’m no exception. And so many of my favorite gadgets have a voracious appetite for batteries. I don’t know why all the other battery types fell so far out of favor, but between AA and AAA, I could probably power 95% of my

By Jeff Atwood ·
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Does More Than One Monitor Improve Productivity?

multiple monitors

Does More Than One Monitor Improve Productivity?

I’ve been a multiple monitor enthusiast since the dark days of Windows Millennium Edition. I’ve written about the manifold joys of many-monitor computing a number of times over the last four years: * Multiple Monitors and Productivity * Multiple LCDs * Joining the Prestigious Three Monitor Club * The Large Display Paradox

By Jeff Atwood ·
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Choosing Your Own Adventure

programming languages

Choosing Your Own Adventure

The Choose Your Own Adventure book series was one of my favorites as a young reader. The Choose Your Own adventure books are still around; modern versions can be found at your local bookstore. I bought one today at a local Barnes & Noble to refresh my memory, and although

By Jeff Atwood ·
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Death Threats, Intimidation, and Blogging

user experience

Death Threats, Intimidation, and Blogging

I miss Kathy Sierra. Kathy was the primary author of the Creating Passionate Users blog, which she started in December 2004. Her writing was of sufficient quality to propel her blog into the Technorati top 100 within a year and a half. That’s almost unheard of, particularly for a

By Jeff Atwood ·
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CAPTCHA is Dead, Long Live CAPTCHA!

security

CAPTCHA is Dead, Long Live CAPTCHA!

In November 2007 I called these three CAPTCHA implementations “unbreakable”: Google (unbreakable)Hotmail (unbreakable)Yahoo (unbreakable) 2008 is shaping up to be a very bad year indeed for CAPTCHAs: * Jan 17: InformationWeek reports Yahoo CAPTCHA broken * Feb 6: Websense reports Hotmail CAPTCHA broken * Feb 22: Websense reports Google CAPTCHA broken

By Jeff Atwood ·
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