The Nature of Failure Modes
One frosty Monday morning you yawn and step out of your front door in your pajamas to pick up the…
Why Projects Fail
Projects tend to fail because the customer didn’t understand what they wanted and because the developers could not adapt to…
Optimization Tips
1. Don’t second-guess the compiler Most optimization tricks of the past are no longer necessary with modern compilers. These include…
The Growth and Perversion of Systems
The requirements of a system and its software constantly change because the user and developer didn’t know what they actually wanted…
Management Tips
1. Their job is not to write code Code is only a side-effect of a programmer’s real function, which is…
Why the Andromeda Strain is the Greatest Debugging Tutorial Ever Made
Michael Crighton is famous for Jurassic Park, but while he was a med student he wrote the greatest tutorial ever made…
Trapped, Blind & Confused: 3 Major Programming Headaches
1. Trapped When you’re nested deep within the call-stack, a dozen function calls and dereferences away from home, and you…
N Examples of Why Time Estimates are Always Wrong
Some of these verge on the comical, but unfortunately all come from the real world. Technical Examples HR / IT…
How to Become a Professional Programmer
How to become a real programmer 1. Go back to school to learn the languages that nobody is using right…
IT Career Myths Debunked
1. Writing unmaintainable code gives you job security This kind of security is short lived. When the boss can’t find…
Parsing EDI with LINQ
Reading EDI files is simpler than it first looks. For a start, the file is broken up by two kinds…
Choosing Mechanisms
1. When in doubt, make it a Console application If you’ve reached the stage where you’ve identified a need, but…
