Category: Expanded ideas

• October 5, 2017

  Here’s a thing, October 05, 2017

  As I endeavor to re-establish writing here as a regular and consistent project, I’m reminding myself of two things that helped me in the past. First and foremost, it’s about the writing and the finished product over the page views and vanity metrics. No one’s biography or Wikipedia page says “and lo they were followed […]
• October 4, 2017

  The notes, October 04, 2017

  I’m intrigued by folks having luck building virtualized development environments for localhost setups. It sounds like fun to work in this kind of workflow. I never want to do the legwork to make this work, though. I did the preliminaries for this last year and ended up turning back from it. I understand Docker and […]
• October 3, 2017

  Afternoon notes, October 03, 2017

  Someone will always have a slicker Git workflow than you. For example,Auto-squashing Git Commits for clever rebasing. The passage of time is weird, lately. Nonetheless, it’s surprising that the Dynamo white paper is ten years old. Ten years of NoSQL hype. Even from a naive yours truly. I’ve been using the fish shell for about […]
• October 3, 2017

  Morning notes, October 03, 2017

  I like Bluebottle’s coffee subscription service a lot. The web app is well done and having coffee magically appear in my mailbox means I have far fewer “awww heck we’re out of coffee until I go to a coffee shop” moments. However, I do occasionally mess up the timing, such as right now, and then […]
• April 20, 2017

  When my brain storms

  I do my best thinking: In the shower. I love to take long showers, and I love my tankless water heater. While talking. Something about my brain is wired directly to my mouth. When I’m not thinking. See also, the value of letting your mind idle, wander, or just walking away from a tricky problem. […]
• March 22, 2017

  Personal city guides

  I’ve seen lots of sites about how to use software. The Setup and The Sweet Setup are my favorites. You can find lots of sites about how to use ideas like Inbox Zero or Crossfit. People love this stuff. What I don’t see a lot of is how to use a city, as a visitor […]
• March 15, 2017

  Sometimes it’s okay to interrupt a programmer

  I try really hard to avoid interrupting people. Golden rule: if I don’t want interruptions I shouldn’t impose them on other, right? Not entirely so. Having teammates around, and interrupting them, has saved my butt. I’ve avoided tons of unnecessary work and solving the wrong problems, and that’s just the last week! Communicating with others […]
• February 27, 2017

  Just tackle the problem

  There’s a moment when a programming problem engulfs me. Perhaps it’s exciting and intriguing, maybe it’s weird and infuriating, maybe it’s close to a deadline and stressing me out. Whichever it is, I’m not so great at managing that intensity. I can’t handle adult responsibilities. Any external demands on my time are met with impatience. […]
• February 20, 2017

  Protect the beginner’s mind

  Someone joins your team. They have a beginner’s mind about your project and culture. Take a person with beginner’s mind, tell them about how things have always been, how they got that way, and insist we just try to keep that status quo? That’s a shame. When you harness a beginner’s mind, you have a […]
• February 15, 2017

  Contrast NYC and SF

  Dallas and Austin are the cities I’ve spent my life in. I’ve spent maybe three weeks of my life, total, in San Francisco and New York City. They’re similar in that SF and NYC are both a Whole Other Thing in comparison to my Texan expectations. Indeed, they’re global cities operating at an entirely different […]