Collected posts from the various blogs I’ve contributed to since 2002.
A few months back I posted a series of entries about the process of producing HTML emails. Those posts generated a number of comments and emails, including some from Christopher White who has been working with the TamTam library in TextMate to clean up his workflow. He offered me this article which I present below. ...
For many the idea of bringing design patterns to ruby is a terrifying one. Having taken refuge from over-engineered java projects (or for that matter, attempts to apply java engineering approaches to a somewhat dynamic language like PHP) the baggage that often goes along with design patterns isn’t what a recent convert is looking for. But as I mentioned in my last review of a design patterns volume, and series editor Obie Fernandez highlights in his foreword, design patterns don’t have to be used that way and maintain merit when used as a source of collective experience and shared language. ...
Working with a number of non-profits I frequently find myself tasked with extending or upgrading drupal. Each new version of drupal has been a significant step forward and I’m usually keen to get up to date but there’s the small matter of the suite of modules most sites use that need to catch up with changing APIs. With the release of Drupal 6 a few weeks back I found myself wanting a tool that would help me check if my chosen modules were ready for the upgrade yet. ...
With its complex yet penetrating arcs and careful unravelling of a fictionalised but well-rooted version of Baltimore, The Wire quickly became my favourite television show of recent years. So following its recent conclusion I’ve naturally been devouring every article I can find, not quite ready to let go. The following paragraphs from a piece by executive producer David Simon struck me as an unintended example of why newspapers (his previous profession) have generally fared so poorly over the past few years, and a reminder of how easy it can be to miss the possibilities new technologies : ...
BBC NEWS | World | Americas | US names ‘9/11 steel’ warship Steel salvaged from the World Trade Center site has been used to build a warship. Terribly symbolic, and terribly sad. (tags: militarism revenge symbolism worldtradecenter) John McCain’s Charitable Contributions For a while I held onto a belief that John McCain somewhat resembled his chosen persona. Then he decided that maybe torture was okay after all, and a whole lot more crept out of the woodwork along with that. ...
Normally being in the office on a Saturday would seem a bad thing, but this weekend there is still enough novelty for it to be a little fun. This week, you see, Matt and I moved into an office space we’re going to be sharing in Hoxton. There’s still a lot of unpacking, arranging and decorating to be done, but so far it feels good to have a space outside the home for working. Pictures will come with time. ...
Is MySpace Good for Society? A Freakonomics Quorum - Freakonomics - Opinion - New York Times Blog Not really about MySpace, more about social networking sites in general. A good set of quotes on the value/effects of social networking site usage. (tags: freakonomics myspace socialnetworking sociology) Net, Blogs and Rock’n’Roll: Recommender systems meet festivals Last.FM will look at your listening and build you a list of recommendations for which SXSW bands to see. Nice idea. ...
Yesterday, Matt Patterson and I moved into the office space we’re going to be sharing. In London’s fashionable Hoxton, right next door to a startup we like a lot, it’s a good place to be. We currently have space for one more full-timer to share the office with us, so let us know if you’re looking for a place to work. ...
Economizing can be penny-wise and pound foolish “Pick up the source code for a program and three highlighter markers, one green, one yellow, and one red.” leading into a good discussion of separating problem and infrastructure. (tags: design designpatterns domaindrivedesign refactoring) the ryan king » Introducing Conveyor “One way of describing it is as a “distributed, rewindable, virtual queue server”. It speaks HTTP and will soon have a peer-to-peer replication mode. It can be treated like a queue, but because it doesn’t actually get rid of any data, you can r ...
Trailer Mash-ups: Wall-E-nator Mashup Proves Cuteness May Destroy the Future Best mashup I’ve seen in a very long time (tags: mashup pixar terminator) Building explosion in Grand Rapids’ Eastown - The Grand Rapids Press Very bizarre news (tags: eastown explosion grandrapids) Londonist: Some Of Our Banksys Are Missing Someone’s painting over Banksys. My money’s on it being the man himself. (tags: bansky london streetart) Obituary: Larry Norman | Obituaries | guardian.co.uk Music Steve Turner on Larry Norman, who died a couple of days ago. ...