Blog Archives

In which I first apologise for the four-year gap between episodes, and then explain what I’m doing now and why that means I can start podcasting again. Other than creating valuable internet content I don’t have any work, so you … Continue reading →

The idea that increased autonomy and privilege for software engineers can only come when we have better confidence that software engineers are working in the best interests of society. Mike Klimek—Modern Software Development Gergely Orosz: What Silicon Valley “Gets” about … Continue reading →

I look at the difference between being a deep specialist as a software engineer working on a particular “stack” and a generalist who builds software using a wide variety of tools, from the perspective of someone who has done both.

Software freedom is a free speech issue. This has important consequences Software is eating the world Why can’t Karen Sandler get the source code for her pacemaker The Four Essential Freedoms On Social Justice and Software Licensing (or: why the … Continue reading →

Sometimes it just seems like our customers are fickle flibbertigibbets who change their minds at the drop of a hat, right? Let’s look at what might be going on, and how to work with that. The Computer Programme Design Sprint … Continue reading →

I look at the historical basis of the white collar/blue collar divide in defining occupations, and the problems this distinction has with comprehending modern roles like engineering and various technician occupations. I then have difficulty fitting software roles into any … Continue reading →

I talk both about the difficulties of having objective conversations comparing technologies on the interwebs, and about a particular recent success in doing so: a comparison of RPC-over-HTTP methods. This particular conversation was on the Brumtech slack: I particularly recommend … Continue reading →

This episode is about the Software Engineering Institute’s Personal Software Process (PSP), a particular disciplined way of improving a software engineer’s work. We talk about other the process in particular, and the idea of a continuous improvement process more generally. … Continue reading →

I talk about the historical context of the Agile manifesto, what “comprehensive documentation” meant then, and what documentation is still important now. I also remind you that you can support this podcast by becoming a patron. I chose not to … Continue reading →

This episode is all about the TIOBE Index of programming language popularity: when to use it, what its limitations are, why certain things are or aren’t popular, and why the hell isn’t Excel on the list.