Tag Archives: systems

A reading of Tim Berglund’s “Oh, The Methods You’ll Compose”

Posted on September 3, 2012 by Karl

Transcription: “Oh, The Methods You’ll Compose”. When a coder sits down to start banging out code The first thing to start crowding his cognitive load Is whether his program will do what it should Correctness, he says, is what makes … Continue reading →

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Thought Provokers From Python’s Guido Van Rossum and Clojure’s Rich Hickey

Posted on March 31, 2012 by Karl

At Strange Loop 2011 Clojure’s Rich Hickey gave a presentation (video) on programming and simplicity that rankled some feathers and triggered a heated discussion at reddit. Duncan McGreggor, decided to contact Python’s Guido Van Rossum to interview him about his … Continue reading →

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Talk: “The Web Browser is a Transitional Technology”

Posted on March 12, 2012 by Karl

Allen Wirfs-Brock, a Mozilla Research Fellow, at YOW 2011, defined what he considers the current era of computing, and some exciting elements of where we are and where we are going in his talk “The Web Browser is a Transitional … Continue reading →

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A James Shore 2006 Post My Favorite Design Read So Far in 2012

Posted on February 19, 2012 by Karl

James Shore’s post in 2006, “Quality With a Name” summarizes clearly what I try and express and practice in my systems design work. This is something to not only read and bookmark, but print out to remind folks who are … Continue reading →

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Alistar Croll: “much of human interaction has shifted from atoms to bits”

Posted on January 6, 2012 by Karl

Read his post on O’Reilly Radar: “The feedback economy”: In a society where every person, tethered to their smartphone, is both a sensor and an end node, we need better ways to observe and orient, whether we’re at home or … Continue reading →

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Steve Jobs: “computer science is a liberal art, it’s something everyone should know how to use, at least, and harness in their life”

Posted on November 27, 2011 by Karl

“Quotes from Steve Jobs Lost Interview”: “Learning to program teaches you how to think. Computer science is a liberal art.” NPR.org: “Steve Jobs: ‘Computer Science Is A Liberal Art’”: “In my perspective … science and computer science is a liberal … Continue reading →

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“6 million orders on a single thread”: on systems

Posted on October 30, 2011 by Karl

Martin Fowler a few months back wrote a piece on an interesting retail financial trading platform called LMAX and its design that is thought provoking on a few levels. Related: Martin Fowler: EventSourcing Nathan Marz: “How to beat the CAP … Continue reading →

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Beginner’s Eyes: on storytelling and growth

Posted on October 30, 2011 by Karl

John D. Cook, in a short, poetic post, describes how experts end up where they started, as beginners, and why, in his blog post “Coming full circle”. A few folks in his comments thread make the connection with Zen’s concept … Continue reading →

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Dizzying but invisible depth: on complexity

Posted on October 22, 2011 by Karl

Jean-Baptiste Queru, on his Google+ profile, posts a poetic and doozy of a post, “Dizzying but invisible depth”: Today’s computers are so complex that they can only be designed and manufactured with slightly less complex computers. In turn the computers … Continue reading →

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Metrics and damn metrics: on systems

Posted on October 9, 2011 by Karl

Sometimes we get caught in numbers and miss what’s real. This can happen especially when we focus on the wrong numbers writes Arpit Mathur in a sharp post. I’d add even if you were looking at the right numbers, without … Continue reading →

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