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Miasma, a new framework for web applications
This is the first interview posted on Typical Programmer. I plan to do more interviews with programmers who are working on interesting projects and pushing new ideas and technologies.I had a chance to...
View ArticleComment correcting software closes $25m funding
In a little-noticed deal that closed yesterday the Silicon Valley startup apostrophree secured a $25 million first round with Bolus Venture Capital of Palo Alto. apostrophree received seed money from...
View ArticleDatabase Thaw Reheated
In his November 24 article Database Thaw Martin Fowler wrote about the lock-in of relational/SQL databases and some possible alternatives. I was with him until he wrote that “you can’t get [a] bigger...
View ArticleTips for successful freelancing
I’ve been freelancing for over ten years, sometimes moonlighting when I have a full-time job, sometimes doing just freelance work. I’ve learned a few things about successful freelance progrramming.Do...
View ArticleThe joys of maintenance programming
In the old days when I started programming, green programmers trying to build their skills and get experience started out doing maintenance programming. Only the old hands got to write new code. The...
View ArticleLinus Torvalds goes off on Linux and Git
I was in a coffee shop in Portland, Oregon and happened to spot Linus Torvalds sitting alone at a window table. I asked the creator of the Linux operating system and the Git source code control system...
View ArticleThe many things programmers optimize for
Programmers love to optimize their code and their tools. Why then is there so much slow and bloated code and so many arcane and fragile tool chains? Because programmers aren’t always optimizing for...
View ArticleSorry, Digital Ad Exec, I Probably Don’t Want To Work For You
I’m your next potential dream boss. I run a cool, rapidly growing company in the digital field, where the work is interesting and rewarding. But I’ve got to be honest about some unfortunate news: I’m...
View ArticleFetish-Oriented Programming
In my career as a programmer I’ve seen lots of projects go off the rails because of strict adherence to some practice, rule, or fashion. It may be something the entire team has bought into, like OOP or...
View ArticleHow to develop unmaintainable software
I get paid to take on technical debt. In my work I see a lot of hard-to-maintain code, and I see many of the same avoidable problems over and over.I specialize in debugging, fixing, maintaining, and...
View ArticleWhy don’t software development methodologies work?
This article got some great commments. Scroll down to read those.I’ve worked on big projects, small projects, in huge teams and by myself, in fossilized federal agencies and cool Silicon Valley...
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How I work as a digital nomad
I was asked today on Twitter about how to find work as a digital nomad. My comments are too long for a Twitter reply and may be interesting to people who don’t follow me on Twitter, so here goes.How I...
View ArticleThings you need to know to do web development
Here’s a list of things I know, or at least know about, as a web developer. I’m sure I’ve left a lot of things out. Web development is a large and complex collection of technologies, tools, languages,...
View ArticlePHP MVC: Maintenance Very Costly
I mostly work on legacy web applications in PHP + MySQL. Usually the original developer is not available, so I have to figure out the code so I can fix problems or add features. For a long time most of...
View ArticleHow to work with freelance software developers
I have been freelancing as a remote developer for over ten years. I specialize in legacy systems and taking over abandoned and unfinished software projects. I see the problems customers have hiring and...
View ArticleJob hunting and interviewing
I’m distilling what I’ve learned from almost 40 years of job hunting and interviewing, both as a candidate and as an interviewer. I have experience with programming jobs both in and out of the tech...
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How to start freelancing and get clients
I get asked how to start freelancing and get clients more than any other question, so I’m going to give away all of the techniques and secrets and gotchas I’ve learned as a freelancer and as a...
View ArticleWhat does code readability mean?
Programmers complain about readability and talk about bad code and unclean code, and the difficulties they run into trying to understand and maintain that code. What do we mean by readability? What...
View ArticleWorking on an iPad Pro as my main computer
tl;dr I can do all of my programming and system admin work with an iPad Pro because I work on remote servers over ssh, and I prefer using the Unix/Linux command line.A few months ago I bought an iPad...
View ArticleisOdd (and isEven) as a service
tl;dr Introducing new web service to determine if a number is odd or not.Try it:Is 43 odd? - yes!Is 2 odd? - noIs 3874.32 odd? - no, not an integerIs foobar odd? - no. not a numberRationaleA while back...
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