http://www.artima.com/weblogs/index.jsp?blogger=beckel Artima Weblogs is a community of bloggers posting on a wide range of topics of interest to software developers. http://www.artima.com/images/artima88x33.gif http://www.artima.com/ http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=261930 People who've made the switch to dynamic languages seem much, much happier. I was a bit out of sorts from jet lag and travel in general when I entered the Birmingham UK conference and suddenly a wash of good feelings poured over me. "Ahh! Python Programmers!" http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=260578 I showed up at the organizational meeting for the ANSI/ISO C++ standards committee because Bjarne Stroustrup asked me to. I knew him from my early C++ work and from conferences, and I suspect he considered me a friendly influence. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=259358 I regularly receive requests for career advice, and I've tried to capture the answers in this blog, and in a follow-on. For those of you who asked but never got an answer, I apologize. Your questions stimulated me to work on this, and it's taken awhile. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=257180 Both social networking and votable newsfeeds are one-dimensional. Combine the two and you get a kind of Pandora for stories, and for discovering people who like the kind of stories you do. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=257011 An interview with InfoQ; also includes what I've been up to: writing, theater, conferences, management issues, painting, "First Steps in Flex," opinions on web development, and "Thinking in Java." http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=256284 A science-fiction study for an upcoming writing group meeting. However, I honestly believe this could happen, and happen in a way similar to what I describe here. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=255898 I finally figured out the right analogy for software development. Alas, the target audience for this analogy won't be happy with it. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=255655 The Internet accelerates everything. We now watch companies go from "the next great thing" to "meh" in the space of a few short years. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=255579 Retrospectives allow you to analyze what worked and what didn't about a project so you can do better in the future. How often, though, do people have either the resources or the wherewithall to do a retrospective on a complete disaster -- arguably where we'll learn the most? http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=254969 Some notes of my own, and some collected from other attendees. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=254742 I have yet to toot my first tweet. Most of social networking has been lost on me. Too much noise, not enough signal. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=252441 In a recent discussion, there were assertions that C++ was a poorly-designed language. I was on the C++ Standards Committee for 8 years, and saw the decisions take place. I think it's helpful to understand the language choices for both C++ and Java in order to see the bigger perspective. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=250169 This issue came up during the organization of the upcoming Pycon conference, regarding speakers posting their slides and notes. I liked what I wrote to the organizing group so I wanted to share it here. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=250067 At the free Alternative Languages Day 0 of the upcoming Java Posse Roundup, one house has decided to have a coding dojo on the Fan programming language, which I hadn't heard of before. http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=248836 No Starch Press sent a copy of this book to me for review. My brother and his wife have been home schooling my 15-year old niece, and he wants to teach her databases.