APPropriate Behaviour
The book about all the things software writers do that aren't writing software.
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Monthly Archives: July 2020
The problem with musicians these days is they don’t work hard enough to make Daniel Ek, Tim Cook, Sundar Pichai and Jeff Bezos rich.
Some programming languages have a final keyword, making types closed for extension and open for modification.
I’ve been playing a lot of CD32, and would just like to mention how gloriously 90s it is. This is the startup chime. For comparison, the Interstellar News chime from Babylon 5. Sure beats these.
Tiger to Catalina: let’s port some code
Many parts of a modern software stack have been around for a long time. That has trade-offs, but in terms of user experience is a great thing: software can be incrementally improved, providing customers with familiarity and stability. No need … Continue reading
Posted in code-level
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So, what’s the plan? Part 2: what will the plan be?
In Part One, I explored the time of transition from Mac OS 8 to Mac OS X (not a typo: Mac OS 9 came out during the transition period). From a software development perspective, this included the Carbon and Cocoa … Continue reading
So, what’s the plan? Part 1: what WAS the plan?
No CEO dominated a market without a plan, but no market was dominated by following the plan. — I made this quote up. Let’s say it was Rockefeller or someone. In Accidental Tech Podcast 385: Temporal Smear, John Siracusa muses … Continue reading
Anti-lock brakes
Chances are, if you bought a new car or even a new motorcycle within the last few years, you didn’t even get an option on ABS. It came as standard, and in your car was legally mandated. Anti-lock brakes work … Continue reading
Posted in tool-support, user-error
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Another non-year of Desktop Linux
Let’s look at other software on the desktop, to understand why there isn’t (as a broad, popular platform) Linux on the desktop, then how there could be. Over on De Programmatica Ipsum I discussed the difference between the platform business … Continue reading
Posted in whatevs
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SICPers podcast episode 10
This episode is all about build systems! Mostly about the problems associated with the venerable ./configure; make; make install process. This expands on a section I wrote in APPropriate Behaviour. The history of UNIX make Why Johnny Can’t Build [portable … Continue reading
