Deadlocked!
25 Aug 2008 7:59am GMT You may have noticed that my posting frequency has declined over the last three weeks. That's because I've been busy building that Stack Overflow thing we talked about. It's going well so far. Joel Spolsky also seems to think it's going well, but he's one of the founders so he's clearly biased. For what it's worth, Robert Scoble was enthused about Stack Overflow, though it did not make him cry. Still, I was humbled by the way Robert picked this up so enthusiastically through the community. I...
Check In Early, Check In Often
21 Aug 2008 7:59am GMT I consider this the golden rule of source control: Check in early, check in often. Developers who work for long periods -- and by long I mean more than a day -- without checking anything into source control are setting themselves up for some serious integration headaches down the line. Damon Poole concurs: Developers often put off checking in. They put it off because they don't want to affect other people too early and they don't want to get blamed for breaking the build. But this leads to...
The Perils of FUI: Fake User Interface
18 Aug 2008 7:59am GMT As a software developer, tell me if you've ever done this: Taken a screenshot of something on the desktop Opened it in a graphics program Gone off to work on something else Upon returning to your computer, attempted to click on the screenshot as if it was an actual program. And let's not forget the common goating technique where you take a screenshot of someone's desktop, make it the desktop background, then proceed to hide every UI element on the screen. The anguished cries as users...
Secrets of the JavaScript Ninjas
14 Aug 2008 7:59am GMT One of the early technology decisions we made on Stack Overflow was to go with a fairly JavaScript intensive site. Like many programmers, I've been historically ambivalent about JavaScript: The Power of "View Source" The Day Performance Didn't Matter Any More JavaScript and HTML: Forgiveness by Default JavaScript: The Lingua Franca of the Web The Great Browser JavaScript Showdown However, it's difficult to argue with the demonstrated success of JavaScript over the last few years....
Music to (Not) Code By
10 Aug 2008 7:59am GMT 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 CD on a lark in mid 1998. Subsequently, I put on this CD at high volume to torture my then-coworkers. It became a running joke. We'd take any opportunity, any pretext at all, to put it on. It had to be played at least once every day for...