Best of 2015

The blog posts Hacker News loved most in 2015. 200 posts.

Career & Management
182

I was interviewed by Fog Creek

I just had my minute of fame! I was just interviewed by Fog Creek on their development blog. Fog Creek is Joel Spolsky's company. We talked about how I got into software development, what I currently do, my current setup and my favorite books. I've been a lifetime fan of Fog Creek Software and it just feels so great…

189

The Apprentice Programmer (2013)

I dropped out of school when I was 16 years old. School was not for me. To me, computers were so much more interesting. Right or wrong, I felt like I wasted my time there and my real education was starting when I came home. I lost respect for the institution and of course this meant that I no longer bothered to put any

195

Practicing Programming (2005)

Practicing Programming Stevey's Drunken Blog Rants™ Back in October I wrote an essay in which I compared programming to other professions. In it, I made the unsubstantiated claim that programming is unusual, in that most programmers don't practice their craft -- at least, not in any disciplined

197

Quantity Always Trumps Quality

Nathan Bowers pointed me to this five year old Cool Tools entry on the book Art & Fear. Although I am not at all ready to call software development “art” – perhaps “craft” would be more appropriate, or “engineering” if you’re feeling generous – the parallels between some of the advice offered

198

The Ten Commandments of Egoless Programming

The Ten Commandments of Egoless Programming, as originally established in Jerry Weinberg’s book The Psychology of Computer Programming: 1. Understand and accept that you will make mistakes. The point is to find them early, before they make it into production. Fortunately, except for the few of us developing rocket

199

Commandos, Infantry, and Police

As I was driving home, I found myself thinking about a favorite section of the book Accidental Empires, by longtime computer journalist Robert X. Cringely. Originally published in 1993, it’s getting a little long in the tooth, but it still contains a lot of great insights about the personalities