Archive for January, 2006

Fourth Python Lecture for Software Carpentry

Sunday, January 29th, 2006

The fourth lecture on Python for the Software Carpentry course is now up. It covers sets, dictionaries, and a little bit of algorithmic complexity. Comments and criticisms are very welcome. And if that's too serious for year, check out the web site for the Waterfall 2006 conference ;-).

Programmers from A to Z

Thursday, January 26th, 2006

I have taught at least one of each of these. I have also, at various times, been at least half a dozen... Depressing, though, that 25 of the 26 characters are male.

Imagine Your Organization as the Spanish Armada

Wednesday, January 25th, 2006

Adam Goucher on the role of a product manager. As he says, this is one of the key positions (maybe the key position) in a software development group, but it's not one that's discussed often, if at all, in software engineering classes.

Quality Assurance Lecture Now Available

Tuesday, January 24th, 2006

It used to be the introductory lecture on testing; now it's more of an introduction to quality assurance from a programmer's point of view. It's changed even more than the style lecture; comments and corrections would be very welcome. (And yes, I know, the diagrams are missing...)

Programming Style Lecture Has Been Revised

Monday, January 23rd, 2006

The Software Carpentry lecture on programming style has been revised. Comments on this would be particularly welcome, as it's substantially different from what I delivered last fall.

Third Software Carpentry Python Lecture on the Web

Monday, January 23rd, 2006

The third lecture on Python for the Software Carpentry course has been posted; comments and criticisms are invited and appreciated.

They’re Getting Smarter

Monday, January 23rd, 2006

This posting from the folks at F-Secure compares the structure of the first PC virus, Boot/Brain.A (which recently celebrated its 20th birthday) with that of the more recent W32/Bagle.AG. Coincidentally, multi-drug resistant tuberculosis is on the rise. Having just reviewed Nancy Forbes' Imitation of Life: How Biology is ...

Five Books in Five Paragraphs

Thursday, January 19th, 2006

It will probably never be a popular party game, but here goes: #1: Ivan Sklyarov's Puzzles for Hackers. This is laid out like most other programming puzzle books, except all the puzzles in this one involve breaking codes, hiding files (or finding ones that have been hidden), and so on. ...

Two Books on Software Project Management

Thursday, January 19th, 2006

I read these two books on project management back to back: at my partner's request, I finally uninstalled Homeworld---which is still the best game ever---and that left me with lots of time to catch up on my reading. They made an interesting pair, and the differences between their authors' ...

Two Books on Virtual Machines

Thursday, January 19th, 2006

Compilers and operating systems have been a standard part of computer science education for more than thirty years, but the engines that allow the output of the first to run on the second have always fallen through the cracks. With all of today's hot languages now running on some ...