Widely acknowledged as a classic text about the people behind the software and how to manage them and their workspaces, this is a quick and humorous read. Issues like “Teamicide” and “Flow” are discussed with respect to software projects. The authors have a significant amount of experience with software development process and much of the data is based on the period 1977-1987. Sadly, their findings are appearing to be as relevant today as they were nearly 20 years ago.
- Peopleware : Productive Projects and Teams
- Tom DeMarco, Timothy Lister
- © 1987 Dorset House Publishing Co.
- ISBN: 0932633439
This has been making the rounds for a while, but somehow I really enjoy how it fuses the children’s-storybook meme with a fairly adult issue. I refer you to one man’s struggle to be free of the beast within.
You might have a problem loading live bookmarks in Firefox from time to time. Turns out that there are some problems in Firefox’s ability to handle entities in the RSS feed. Since I’m not sure what they are exactly, I’ll put them on the extended part of this post to avoid having the bug triggered while I describe the bug.
Bug 263150 describes a related problem, about 1/2 way down the page there is the “XML Parsing Error : undefined entity” message, which is exactly what I was seeing in Firefox when I was spelling Let.Gen. Roméo Dallaire’s name properly in the title of my post about his book.
Sadly the bug is currently in status “NEW” and marked major. I tend to agree. I’ll update this post once / if I see progress on the issue. Until then, in deference to my friends using Firefox, I’ll refrain from using characters outside US-ASCII in the RSS feed as best I can. *sigh* I guess the whole world is just Anglophone.
*Update*: Turns out that if I turn off the entity encoding feature of MarsEdit I don’t trigger this particular problem, we’ll see what other interactions changing this feature happens. I suspect it will only be for older browsers.
I’ve been a PowerBook G4 (12″) owner since shortly after they came out. I *love* my PowerBook and when it reaches it’s effective end-of-life, I’ll be getting another one. One thing that is really fantastic, that many people overlook, is the incredible utility associated with the built-in Bluetooth. 
When it comes to frequent relocation of the PowerBook, it’s nice to have wireless connections to the majority of the peripherals that you use for I/O. Especially the keyboard and mouse. (Illustrated).
I use[d] it for syncing my [old] mobile phone (via iSync) [and am waiting for OS/X 10.4 and the inclusion of support for SyncML based mobile phones to get this functionality back]. I also use it extensively for GPRS connectivity, when applicable and when roaming isn’t a factor. I have an excellent data plan on my mobile provider.
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Using the 2005-01-19 nightly (or close enough) it appears that I’ve been able to upgrade nicely. I will still have to migrate a few things over, but so far it looks good. Obviously I’ve lost my CSS, so I need to figure out how to get ‘em back.
*Update*: I’m using a new theme that I’ve put together and likely will *not* return to the former CSS.
Those fine folks over at BoingBoing have a blurb that pointed me at this hilarious T-shirt. I’m going to try not to become one of these, but I _might_ order the T-shirt. 
I tried upgrading to WordPress 1.5 (from CVS) and I _failed_.
Symptoms of this problem include this error message when attempting to load the upgrade.php script:
Fatal error: Call to undefined function: __() in /home/user/public_html/wordpress/wp-admin/admin-functions.php on line 857
Turns out that there is some problem with Zend’s optimizer and PHP 4.3.10:
PHP 4.3.10 (cli) (built: Dec 20 2004 05:23:18)
Copyright (c) 1997-2004 The PHP Group
Zend Engine v1.3.0, Copyright (c) 1998-2004 Zend Technologies
with Zend Extension Manager v1.0.6, Copyright (c) 2003-2004, by Zend Technologies
with Zend Optimizer v2.5.7, Copyright (c) 1998-2004, by Zend Technologies
Due to incompatibility of the previous version of Zend Optimizer with PHP 4.3.10, it is strongly recommended that owners of Zend Performance Suite, Zend Accelerator, Zend Studio Server, and Zend WinEnabler, upgrade to Zend Optimizer 2.5.7.
It is also recommended you upgrade to PHP 4.3.10 or PHP 5.0.3.
Update: This cannot be it, since if I could read, I would have noticed that this is already installed. Back to the drawing board I guess. Grr. Anyone have any ideas?
Ekr pointed out a very hilarious advertisement for the iProduct which I really enjoyed. Shortly thereafter, Herb sent me a link to an all too likely scenario involving the “Linux Freak” and his new iPod, (Link). (In case it goes away, I have it locally too.)
I’m currently (in my copious free time) digesting _”Flight Path: How WestJet is Flying High in Canada’s Most Turbulent Industy“_, a story all about the founding and first part of West Jet’s corporate history. 
For those who don’t know, West Jet is a discount all-jet (737) airline that operates in Canada, and recently to the USA and Mexico as well. They are something of a local darling in Calgary, especially after Canadian Airlines International Ltd. (unofficial ex-employee page) (airtimes page) left the scene when Air Canada (airtimes page) purchased them in the late 90s.
All in all it was a very entertaining and interesting read. At times to book sounds a bit too one-sided, without a lot of objective balancing opinions from people who aren’t invested in WestJet. There are even a few key concepts that are repeated a few times without presenting new cases to support them. Not all bad, but if you have a decent memory, there are a few passages that seem repetitive.
To be fair, I really enjoyed the book and it certainly has a few Go Get ‘em moments.
I’ve been asked more than a couple times for my take on travel luggage. I’m not 100% sure why, but I do have some strong opinions in this area.
I have recently replaced my aging 19″ carry-on rolling case with a 21″ expanding case, and augmented my miniscule 16″ case with a 20″ rolling carry-on. I tend to use the 16″ and a brief-case on almost _all_ trips, even those 2-3 weeks in duration, unless local weather at the destination causes me to need lots of heavy clothing. (You get good at laundering your essentials in the sink and hang-to-dry).
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