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  Hackers vs. Coders

Photo Credit: Pranav MistryBeing a good hacker is an invaluable skill. But is being a coder the same as being a hacker? Is it possible that coders are at a creative disadvantage to hackers who don’t know how to code?Here’s a story that helped me see the difference.I was recently invited to mentor at Startup Weekend. On Friday night, we gathered to eat pizza, pitch ideas, create teams and discuss launch plans. At the end of the day, everyone was feeling great about what theyââ...

   Hacker,Coder,Comparison,Innovation     2011-05-11 02:11:09

  Learning Is More Important Than Knowing

Although DuckDuckGo's success is based more on ideology than technology, you'd have to be a pretty arrogant technologist to not appreciate and be impressed with what this small team (for a long time, 1 person) has accomplished. And while DuckDuckGo teaches us a number of valuable lessons (about business, and privacy), to me, the most important, is that good programmers should be measured by what they can learn, not what they already know. Gabriel Weinberg, DuckDuckGo's creator, has been wo...

   Learning,Knowing,Google,DuckDuckGo     2012-04-18 07:17:53

  The Hungry Programmer

Programming is a lot like eating. Tonight I was hungry. I wasn't at home. I couldn't go to the kitchen for a snack. I looked around and saw only McDonald's across the street. Then I was struck with the same dilemma that I face whenever I leave the comfort of my own home for any decent spread of time: Do I eat crappy food now and satisfy that hunger? Or do I stay hungry for a little longer and eat a healthy meal back at home? As I pondered this dilemma I couldn't help but notice how much i...

   Programmer,Hungry,Coder,Coding     2012-01-19 11:04:30

  Stuff Everyone Should Do (part 2): Coding Standards

Another thing that we did at Google that I thought was surprisingly effective and useful was strict coding standards. Before my time at Google, I was sure that coding standards were pointless. I had absolutely no doubt that they were the kind of thing that petty bureaucrats waste time writing and then use to hassle people who are actually productive. I was seriously wrong. At Google, I could look at any piece of code, anywhere in Google's codebase, and I could read it. The fact that I wa...

   Programming,Code standards,Rules,Stringe     2011-08-15 07:33:02

  The Mature Programmer

1. The Mature Programmer The mature programmer manages their own time and productivity well. The MP knows that maintenance is as much work as the initial writing and code always takes longer than you think. The MP knows that any changes to code can introduce bugs, no matter how seemingly trivial. The MP knows that premature optimization is foolish and dangerous. The MP knows that sexy coding like writing big complex systems from scratch is rarely the best way to go. The MP does not get...

   Mature programmer,MP,Feature,Coding standard,Efficiency     2011-12-05 13:12:00

  PHP to Objective C, where the f**k are parameters?

Javascript, PHP, Ruby functionsI assume you are very familiar with declaring functions in any of the languages above, if not, you should not be reading this. Let’s begin with a simple function to send email in these languages:// PHP or Javascript do_send_email (recipient, cc, subject, body); // Ruby do_send_email (recipient, cc, subject, body)So it’s clear by looking at the function’s signature that it takes 4 parameters and they could be optional, depends on your imple...

   Objective-C,PHP,JavaScript,Parameter,Function name     2012-01-16 09:46:09

  printf("goodbye, Dennis");

Dennis Ritchie, a father of modern computing, died on October 8th, aged 70EVERY time you tap an iSomething, you are touching a little piece of Steve Jobs. His singular vision shaped the products Apple has conjured up, especially over the last 14 years, after Jobs returned to the helm of the company he had founded. Jobs's death in October resembled the passing of a major religious figure. But all of his technological miracles, along with a billion others sold by Apple's competitors, would be mere...

   Memory,Dennis Ritchie,C,Father of C     2011-10-22 12:42:22

  The future of IT will be reduced to three kinds of jobs

Takeaway: The IT profession and the IT job market are in the midst of seismic changes that are going to shift the focus to three types of jobs. There’s a general anxiety that has settled over much of the IT profession in recent years. It’s a stark contrast to the situation just over a decade ago. At the end of the 1990s, IT pros were the belles of the ball. The IT labor shortage regularly made headlines and IT pros were able to command excellent salar...

   IT,Potential,Consultant,Developer,Projec     2011-07-27 08:46:59

  Key challenges in Agile implementations

7Share6inShareAgile methodology was supposed to be a solution to solve all of our problems. But it looks like it’s not. Some issues appear when companies start to implement Agile in their organizations. A research has been done on seventeen companies using Agile methodology (People over processes: Key people challenges in Agile Development). Authors chose nine of the most often reported issues. I’d like to focus on four, in my opinion, most important. #1 Developer...

   Agile development,Chanllenge,Communication,Business     2011-11-30 02:55:04

  The Number One Trait of a Great Developer

Maybe the best programmers aren’t those who spectacularly solve crazy problems, but those who don’t create them, which is much more silent. – Lena HerrmannWhen I look around at other companies hiring Ruby on Rails developers, I see them focusing on three major traits: Super-smart; Large community following; Deep Ruby knowledge. They’re all wrong. While these are great aspects in moderation, they all miss the number one quality of a fantastic developer: Judge...

   Developer,Trait,Judgement,No. 1     2011-11-05 06:49:19

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