from Micheal Feather’s blog here:
Quality is a function of thought and reflection – precise thought and reflection. That’s the magic. Techniques which reinforce that discipline invariably increase quality.
On Creativity in Companies
An excellent post from Scott Berkun. If you are at all involved with a group of people as decision makers a must read.
from here:
some take aways:
…..
They mistakenly believe the problem is the quality of ideas, when in fact the problem is the conservative psychology inherent in democracy.
Pure democracy is not the political system that will create the most change – it’s a system geared for stability, not for innovation.
…..
if you ask for more innovation without changing the authority structure, I’ll call you crazy.
On Refactoring
Inspired by this post
I was recently handed the responsibility to maintain/fix the code of my officemate who has already left for greener pastures. Its my first day with the code so I did a 2-3 hour refactoring session with around 4k LOC.
I finished trudging through 1k LOC , and would probably be finished with the rest of the code if my team lead didn’t tell me to fix a critical bug (on the code I was refactoring).
Note One: I haven’t been told that the code was my responsibility but I have a sixth sense for things like this, so I faced the hurdle head on.
Note Two: Writing Unit tests before refactoring, trust me on this, You know that feeling you have before an operation, well that’s how you feel before and , while and after you are testing your code. No matter what you do you have that fear that maybe you didn’t do it right. So just write the test. Just do this for your sake.
I saw a few readily fixed errors around 10 and about 4 errors that took me awhile to understand and eventually fixed.
Around 2 hours after lunch we had a quick meeting because of the critical bug. The bug was a show stopper and at the meeting the code/functions/pages were formally given to me with a reminder: We need the bugs fixed today.
luckily, some of the the bugs I have already fixed and my refactoring allowed me to easily zero in on the offending code. I was able to fix it in less than 30 minutes.
After two hours, my team lead comes to me and ask warily,
“When are you going to finish fixing the bug?”
“Its Already fixed”
“The bug? you sure?”
“yep”
The face of my team lead of disbelief/suspicion/slight admiration was priceless.
This was all due to refactoring!
Contact Hypothesis
Contact Hypothesis! This although with a stretch ties in nicely with yesterday’s post/rant!
from the TED blog:
The researchers] surveyed 180 Bosnian Muslims about their attitudes towards Bosnian Serbs in the wake of the earlier conflict. They found that Bosnian Muslims who had more Serb friends and who identified more with a sense of being “Bosnian,” rather than “Bosnian Muslim” or “Bosniak,” also tended to show more empathy for Serbs as a group, to be more trusting of Serbs, and to see Serbs as more varied — all of which predicted greater levels of forgiveness and more positive attitudes towards the Serbs.
This pattern is consistent with what’s known as the “contact hypothesis” in social psychology, which states that more high quality contact between groups promotes intergroup reconciliation.
Living In A Bubble
I feel strongly about this. I either try to walk as much as I can. The thing that irritates me a lot is the high levels of pollution you are exposed to. Coming from a 3rd world country You bet our elites probably don’t know how hard it is to breath in most any part of metro manila. Its sad because they are mostly living in a bubble. They live in posh villages with well manicured lawns and beautiful trees. They ride in air conditioned limos and hardly ever really experience the air pollution. I have a feeling they’d be more concerned with the environment if they only joined me for a walk!
from the NYT:
I wouldn’t think that sidewalks are a top priority in developing countries. The last priority. Because the priority is to make highways and roads. We are designing cities for cars, cars, cars, cars, cars. Not for people. Cars are a very recent invention. The 20th century was a horrible detour in the evolution of the human habitat. We were building much more for cars’ mobility than children’s happiness.Even in countries where most people can’t afford to own cars? The upper-income people in developing countries never walk. They see the city as a threatening space, and they can go for months without walking one block.
Loving Friend Feed!
First Time I used friend feed I wasn’t that Impressed, this was because I was already following the a-listers.
Then I had a little time to burn and found a thread in hacker news on friendfeed and now I can say I am definitely hooked. Thank You friend feed founders/devs!
Thanks To XKCD!
Whenever I have moments when I begin to feel the enormity of the hurdles ahead of my journey.
Whenever I feel the need to censure my words.
Whenever I start to feel the loneliness of the path that I chose to traverse.
Looking at this helps alot!
Discovering FriendFeed
I’ve been recently using friendfeed alot and I find it strangely addicting! In a voyeuristic sense!
Living Long and Living Well
It seems that living long correlates well with living a worthwhile life.
This is very comforting,.
from ted here:
What can people do right now to help extend their lives? There is no pill, as of yet. Diet, exercise and purpose are the three sure ways.
I Know You
This resonates with me because I am faced with a city where great service in anything is a once in a week event, sometimes sadly once in a month.
This is the reason I tend to eat shop and go to the same places, Its hard to find a place/restaurant/bookstore/ etc that has great service, even just very good service, when I find one I try to patronize them for the sake my quixotic quest of trying to leave this world a better place, or in a more personal tone, try to leave anything just a bit better!
from Seth Godin’s blog:
Recognition
Just wondering–do you deserve to be recognized by the businesses you patronize, the charities you support and the place you work? Would it feel good to have the barrista remember you? Or the sushi chef at that place you spend so much time and money? (Thanks to Fredd for the link).
Even better, do you think it would be motivating (or even satisfying) to have your boss recognize you for the hard work you did over Memorial Day weekend? Honest recognition, not just a mumbled thanks…
Last question: do you think your customers and co-workers feel the same way?