programming languages
Paul Buchheit, the original lead developer of Gmail, notes that the success of Gmail was a long time in coming: We starting working on Gmail in August 2001. For a long time, almost everyone disliked it. Some people used it anyway because of the search, but they had endless complaints.
technology trends
I was going to post another edition of Gifts for Geeks, as I did in 2006 and 2007, but my heart’s just not in it this year. I don’t know if it’s the global economic apocalypse, or what, but I’m having a hard time mustering the
user experience
Are you familiar with the uncanny valley? No, not that uncanny valley. Well, on second thought, yes, that uncanny valley. In 1978, the Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori noticed something interesting: The more humanlike his robots became, the more people were attracted to them, but only up to a point. If
conceptual design
My recent post on netbooks reminded me of Alan Kay’s original 1972 Dynabook concept (pdf). We now have some reasons for wanting the DynaBook to exist. Can it be fabricated from currently invented technology in quantities large enough to bring a selling (or renting) price within reach of millions
hci
I like to take one or two books with me when I travel, and one of the books I chose for this trip is HCI Remixed. Sometimes the books I choose are a bust. Fortunately that didn’t happen this time. HCI Remixed covers all the major milestones in the
programming languages
I’m not a huge fan of The Daily WTF for reasons I’ve previously outlined. There is, however, the occasional gem – such as this one posted by ezrec: Browsing through a web archive of some old computer club conversations, I ran across this sentence: “Apple made the clbuttic mistake
programming languages
A few months ago, Dare Obasanjo noticed a brief exchange my friend Jon Galloway and I had on Twitter. Unfortunately, Twitter makes it unusually difficult to follow conversations, but Dare outlines the gist of it in Developers, Using Libraries is not a Sign of Weakness: The problem Jeff was trying
seo
So I’ve been busy with this Stack Overflow thing over the last two weeks. By way of apology, I’ll share a little statistic you might find interesting: the percentage of traffic from search engines at stackoverflow.com. Sept 16th one day after public launch10%October 11th less than
user experience
As a software developer, tell me if you’ve ever done this: 1. Taken a screenshot of something on the desktop 2. Opened it in a graphics program 3. Gone off to work on something else 4. Upon returning to your computer, attempted to click on the screenshot as if
music
Occasionally people will ask me what kind of music I like to code by. I’m not sure I am the right person to ask this question of. Allow me to explain by citing my 2001 Amazon review of a particular album. It all started so innocently. I purchased this
software development concepts
Ever find yourself clicking on links to music or videos and getting blasted in the face with this delightful little number? That’s right – links to any sort of music, TV shows, movies, podcasts, audiobooks or anything else available through Apple’s iTunes store requires custom software to be installed
web development
I may not be smart enough to join Mensa, but I am smart enough not to build websites like the American Mensa website. Do you see the mistake? If so, can you explain why this is a mistake, and why you’d desperately want to avoid visiting websites that make