Comments on: Blogs for Savoring, Not Skimming

By: ryan

ryan — Tue, 21 Mar 2006 08:38:38 +0000

By the time you get to something like OFA, or the like, your process is so tied up in the technology, that everything just is sucky. More specifically, it’s not natural, doesnt make sense all the time, and you can’t make effective change.

I think one reason why job burnout happens is because people stop believing they can make a difference. That is, people have learned helplessness!

As Sr developers, the job is to enable your team, by fixing learned helplessness, and making effective teams. Your manager can only do so much, you have to do the tech side.

By: Anne Zelenka

Anne Zelenka — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 08:32:50 +0000

ryan: yeah, I’m familiar with some of that enterprise crap, having had to fix bugs in it (Oracle Financials) and then consolidate data models in it (customer model for the Oracle ERP and CRM apps). I don’t have an opinion at this point whether the problems are more technological or process-oriented, but I bet you’re right that higher-level abstractions could help. I’ve heard good things about Erlang.

Cot

By: Cote'

Cote' — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 01:57:53 +0000

I see I’m a little late to the “thanks for the kind words” comment pile. Nonetheless, thanks for the kind words. I’ve recommended your blog to several people lately.

If you really want to do the e acute, you can use the HTML entity &eacaute; which will show up as the e with the accent over it. But, really, that’s a lot of trouble

By: ryan

ryan — Sun, 19 Mar 2006 05:37:06 +0000

Re: Enterprise Software, I’ve worked in enterprise software for almost 5 years now, and I can tell you it’s filled with crap. I think it’s widely viewed as a process problem - we don’t have the right processes or models to bring up a large complex system, but I think its a technological problem with a technological solution. Simply put, current state of the art software is too primitive and verbose to develop and be agile. Eg: Java, C++, C#.

Personally I’m doing my current project in Erlang. I have sign off for the prototype.

By: leisa reichelt

leisa reichelt — Sat, 18 Mar 2006 12:59:50 +0000

bey Anne, I’m beyond flattered. Thank you!
I’ve really enjoyed reading your blog over the last few months. Looking forward to taking a look at some of the others you’ve mentioned here too, and your Favourite Reads (some of which I already regularly read).

I’m also looking forward to your new pic with ‘mainland’ hair

By: Anne Zelenka

Anne Zelenka — Sat, 18 Mar 2006 01:36:34 +0000

Scott: I probably ought to drop “orthogonal” from my vocabulary. I find myself wanting to use it WAY too much and often in situations where people wouldn’t have any idea what I meant.

Audrey: thanks, I was hoping iLife had that. PhotoShop is really expensive and, at least on my PC, it takes forever to load.

By: Audrey

Audrey — Sat, 18 Mar 2006 00:24:04 +0000

Re: photo editing on the Mac

I’ve found that iPhoto (which comes bundled as part of iLife) takes care of most of the editing and touch-ups I do on my pictures pretty well. I’d like a copy of Photoshop eventually, but it’s a little expensive for just adjusting the light/color balance and cropping. And then I use the Gimp if I need something more detailed, but I know it can be awkward to switch to when you’re used to Photoshop.

By: Scott Mark

Scott Mark — Fri, 17 Mar 2006 23:48:21 +0000

Thanks for the plug, Anne, I have been enjoying your blog for awhile now so hopefully I will pay you back! I’m feeling like less of an architect now because of my low usage of “orthogonality” - I will rectify that immediately.