APPropriate Behaviour
The book about all the things software writers do that aren't writing software.
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Author Archives: Graham
Open Source and the Lehrer-von Braun defence
Tom Lehrer’s song about Wernher von Braun is of a man who should not be described as hypocritical: Say rather that he’s apolitical. “Once the rockets go up, who cares where they come down? That’s not my department,” says Wernher … Continue reading
It’s just like English
Fans of the RSpec tool for writing tests will be familiar with its English-like(fn1) syntax for describing tests, which looks like this. describe StrawMan do context “when interpreting a test in RSpec” do it “is written in plain English” do … Continue reading
Posted in nearly linguistics
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Code longevity
I recently wrote about the impending centenary of applied computing; a time when we could reflect on the first hundred years to make it easier for people to progress beyond our position into the second hundred years. This necessitates looking … Continue reading
Posted in code-level, economics, software-engineering
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Preparing for Computing’s Big One-Oh-Oh
However you slice the pie, we’re between two and three decades away from the centenary celebration for applied computing (which is of course significantly after theoretical or hypothetical advances made by the likes of Lovelace, Turing and others). You might … Continue reading
Posted in academia, advancement of the self, books, learning, Responsibility, software-engineering, tool-support
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Intuitive is the Enemy of Good
In the previous instalment, I discussed an interview in which Alan Kay maligned growth-restricted user interfaces. Here’s the quote again: There is the desire of a consumer society to have no learning curves. This tends to result in very dumbed-down … Continue reading
How much programming language is enough?
Many programmers have opinions on programming languages. Maybe, if I present an opinion on programming languages, I can pass off as a programmer. An old debate in psychology and anthropology is that of nature vs nurture, the discussion over which … Continue reading
Posted in code-level, nearly linguistics, tool-support
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On too much and too little
In the following text, remember that words like me or I are to be construed in the broadest possible terms. It’s easy to be comfortable with my current level of knowledge. Or perhaps it’s not the value, but the derivative … Continue reading
Some so-called expert
There’s a comedy sketch being frequently tweeted called The Expert. Now, all programmers will be aware that there is nothing funnier than interpreting a joke literally and telling everyone the many ways in which it’s wrong, and that there is … Continue reading
Posted in advancement of the self
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