Being a nerd is an odd thing. We’re really particular about things that never even occur to The Normals. Take, for example, text editors. For a web developer or a writer well-verses in Markdown, selecting the right text editor for the task is a Very Important Thing. IDEs and GUI applications often get in the […]
A very bright guy named Michael Ogawa has put together some amazing visualizations of several open source projects over time. Because these projects are managed with revision control software such as CVS, Subversion, or increasingly, Git, the entire history of who added what, when, is recorded and available. Michael created a tool he calls code_swarm […]
At work the other day, I ran into a somewhat odd problem. I had a Windows server with nearly 3,000 folders, each containing a PDF file and an empty ZIP file, looking a little something like this: 2ec99d82-4b79-4454-9f4a-3b52c1cc63cc |– 2ec99d82-4b79-4454-9f4a-3b52c1cc63cc.zip |– 2ec99d82-4b79-4454-9f4a-3b52c1cc63cc.pdf Sidenote: In case you’re curious, that long, weird looking string of numbers and […]
The increasing number of web frameworks means that design and development best practices are accessible to more people than ever before and are a sign of a maturing industry. The primary goal of most web development frameworks is to save development time. Since most programming projects share a good deal of redundant code (database connectivity, […]
I’m a big believer in the potential of integrating VOIP technology with business applications, as you may have gathered if you read my recent post on Asterisk and Adhearsion. However, right now I see most of that potential reserved for businesses with the need (and cash) for an on-site PBX system. Microbusinesses, small businesses, and […]
I tend to get excited about the oddest things. One that I’ve been fascinated with for a couple of years now is an open source project called Asterisk, originally created by a company called Digium. Loaded on a Linux system, it gives you a complete PBX phone system comparable to the ones corporations spend tens […]
My Facebook lovefest continues. Late yesterday they announced the latest version of the Facebook Platform, which opens up the site (and its millions and millions of users) for 3rd parties to build on. If that doesn’t mean anything to you, just know this: It’s a very big deal. TechCrunch calls Facebook the “Anti-MySpace”, and for […]
Growing up, I was fascinated by and drawn to computers at an early age. My family didn’t have the money to get an Apple II like we used in elementary school, so the first personal computer in our house was a cheap IBM PC clone my oldest sister won in high school in 1989. It […]
Here’s a quick post before getting back to my homework… A little known programming language has been getting more attention lately thanks to my favorite programming book publishers, the Pragmatic Programmers, announcing an upcoming book on the subject. It’s called Erlang, and was created by the Ericsson corporation about a decade ago for use in […]
One of my friends recently asked me what I’m using for extensions in Firefox 2, then suggested I share my list with the world. So, that’s exactly what I’m doing here. I’ll split them up by category so you can find the ones that apply to you. Improving the Firefox Interface Even though Firefox is […]