Like thinking about Systems? Like Douglas Adams? Read Systemantics

I’m reading “Systemantics” by John Gall and find myself at times laughing to myself and at times wretching in scenarios I recognize all too well in my work. His humor, which is straight out of “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Galaxy”, helps with the pain. This might end up next to “The Mythical Man-Month” on my bookshelf and as a book I recommend to any coder looking to to progress from simply writing code, to solving problems.

Related:

laetus in praesens: Why Systems Fail and Problems Sprout Anew: Commentary on the principles of ‘Systemantics’

“Mysterious Algorithm Was 4% of Trading Activity Last Week”

According to CNBC an unknown program triggered 4% of trading activity last week:

The program placed orders in 25-millisecond bursts involving about 500 stocks, according to Nanex, a market data firm. The algorithm never executed a single trade, and it abruptly ended at about 10:30 a.m. Friday.

Someone testing in production perhaps?

New Book: “Super Scratch Programming Adventure!”

I recently read about no starch press’s “Super Scratch Programming Adventure!” from a post at boingboing and had to purchase a copy. The book looks as terrific in person as it does in the discussion at boingboing. My daughter was happy to see the book when it came in the mail. I’m looking forward to starting to read it with her and try some of its projects. Check it out.

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

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 my code good

It’s the function that captures the coder’s attention
Behaviors and inputs and outputs are mentioned
As if the one good that a coder can bring
Is to spin the right wheels on some Turing machine

And compiling and linking and running are great
(We need to do these to put food on our plate!)
But the shocker that might leave you scratching your head
Is that actual code is less written than read

We spend more of our time in maintaining our stuff
Than we ever spend writing the simplest of cruft
Which means that unless you’ve got something the matter
You’ll try to learn just a few code style patterns

So coders and countrymen, lend me your ears
As I teach you some lessons won hard through the years
From that Beckian book about implementation
And patterns that derail code suckification

Read the rest.

I’m in this team!

Jon Moore: It’s a Great Team When….

It’s a fantastic privilege to work with the team I do. We’re a cast of characters, everyone is a contributor, fighting for each others success. Leadership plays a role in that. Mission plays a role in that. And so does a belief in one another. I’m actually looking forward to going back to work after a vacation.

How rare is that?

Open Source Projects and Poisonous People

Brian Fitzpatrick and Ben Collins-Sussman, authors of the new O’Reilly book, “Team Geek: A Software Developer’s Guide to Working Well with Others”, had a great talk at Google I/O 2008 that is a must watch, Open Source Projects and Poisonous People:

There is great value in taking advice like this and turning it towards myself. By working to not be poisonous, I can encourage, lift up, empower and embolden. It’s a balancing act I’m working on and is reflected in Joe Campbell, a friend and co-worker, recent post “Gentle Strenth – Wizdom Applied”.

I’m looking forward to reading “Team Geek: A Software Developer’s Guide to Working Well with Others”.

(original post about the book is via Boing Boing)