Sutter's Mill: Friday Thoughts

Many Books

Sat, 26 Jan 2008 00:52:26 GMT

When I walk into a Chapters or a Borders, seeing the many shelves of books often recalls the ancient writer's words about quality vs. quantity, circa 1000 BC:

"To the making of many books there is no end."

So true. Yet that observation predates the printing press... and netnews... and now RSS.

(Yes, I've been thinking of managing-down my Google Reader subscriptions again...)

Newton on Tact

Sat, 19 Jan 2008 01:32:36 GMT

"Tact is the knack of making a point without making an enemy."

Let's Be Thoughtful Out There

Fri, 07 Dec 2007 15:58:45 GMT

I knew Hanlon's Razor: "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity." And the variants attributed to Heinlein, described on the same page as adding "... but don't rule out malice." or "... but keep your eyes open."

But I only just now came across Grey's Law, which follows the flavor of Clarke's Third Law: "Any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice."

One example that irritates me too is focus-stealing popups. Grr, no, I didn't mean that enter key to select "Reboot", I was just finishing a paragraph or writing a space. Please, Mr. Callous Software Developer, just leave me alone! I don't care how important you think your application is -- it's never important enough to pop up on top without warning. No. Bad developer. Down. I said down. Stay.

As a counterexample, I really like how Windows handles the "are you sure you want to run this application?" dialog. Not only does it not steal focus... even better, it ignores the first mouse click when it gets focus. That's right, if the window is visible but not active, and you click on the "Run" button, it doesn't also push Run -- it merely makes the window active. Then if you hit Run again, it runs. Yes! Good developer!

To paraphrase Hill Street Blues: Let's be thoughtful out there.

Jefferson on Luck

Sat, 29 Sep 2007 17:44:43 GMT

"I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have."

- Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826)

Cashman on Alli

Fri, 06 Jul 2007 05:09:11 GMT

Pat Cashman is a popular humorist up here in the Pacific Northwest area. I think of him as our other-end-of-the-country version of Dave Barry (and if you like Dave, you'll like Pat).

This week, he published this hilarious piece in our local community newspaper. Enjoy!

Ratzenberger on the Manual Arts

Sat, 10 Mar 2007 00:12:08 GMT

When someone I've just met asks me what I do for a living and I say I work in software, I sometimes hear wistful responses like, "Oh, that's cool and it must be a lot of fun. All I do is..." followed by carpentry, plumbing, teaching, farming, or another occupation or trade.

To me, that's backwards: Any of those things is at least as important, and at least as worthy of respect and appreciation, as what we technologists do. I usually respond by saying so, and adding: "When the power goes out, I'm pretty much useless; worse still, everything I've ever made stops working. What you make still keeps working when the power is out."

I can make a pretty good argument that the non-technology skills are more valuable/applicable, but the more important thing is that all skills are deserving of respect and appreciation. Technology has done wonders, and it's super fun to be involved in that and to have our advances and skills recognized; after all, software has helped build the tools we use to make other real things, including cars and buildings and spacecraft. But it's unfortunate when sometimes people who focus too heavily on the so-called "higher technology" skills forget, or devalue, the people and skills that built their house, their couch, and their car. Nearly everyone has skills and personal value worth appreciating.

John Ratzenberger makes a similar point:

"The manual arts have always taken precedence over the fine arts. I realized that there is no exception to that rule. You can't name a fine art that isn't dependent on a manual art. Someone's got to build a guitar before Bruce Springsteen can go to work. Someone had to build a ceiling before Michelangelo could go to work."

We live in a richly technologically enabled society, which we can and should enjoy. But when a natural disaster (or just a programming glitch) strikes, and we're suddenly without power and Nothing Works Any More, we realize how fragile our comfort infrastructure can be.

A couple of months ago here in the northwest United States and western Canada, we had a windstorm that left 1.5 million people without power. Our house was dark and cold for just three nights; many of our friends were out for a week. It can be startling to find oneself unable to talk to anyone without physically going to them: Our cell phones didn't work at our house, because many cell towers had no power. Many people were chagrined to discover that their landline telephones didn't work either, because even though the phone lines were fine, the telephone (or base station for a cordless phone) that most people attach requires separate power. Skype wasn't an option, needless to say, even while the laptop batteries held out. Thus cut off, we were reduced to walking, or driving where trees didn't block the roads and if you could find a gas station whose pump was working (those pumps usually need electricity too).

Interestingly, the home phone would have been fine had we been using a retro 1950's-era handset. We've now purchased one to keep around the house for next time. Sometimes simpler is better, even if you can't see the caller ID.

After the storm, who was it who restored our comfort infrastructure, removed fallen trees, and repaired broken houses and fences? Primarily, it wasn't us technology nerds -- it was the electricians, the carpenters and the plumbers. How we do appreciate them! Fortunately, those people in return also appreciate the software, smartphones, PDAs, and other wonders that our industry produces that help them in their own work and leisure, which makes us feel good about being able to contribute something useful back, and so we all get to live in a mutual admiration society.

Thanks for the thought, John. Oh, and Cheers!

Wozniak on Apple

Fri, 02 Feb 2007 18:32:42 GMT

Here's a wonderful interview with The Other Steve (Wozniak) on the start of Apple. It's part of a new book called Founders At Work, full of similar interviews with all sorts of well-known founders of companies/products from Adobe and Lotus to TiVo and Ruby on Rails. (I don't have any commercial interest in the book; I just heard about it via the blogosphere.)

Fair warning: It's a long interview. But it's fascinating. Here's a small excerpt that resonates strongly with me in our highly complexified world of deeply layered and arbitrarily composed software, where programmers are all too often insulated from knowing the true cost of something as simple as a library call:

Livingston: What is the key to excellence for an engineer?
Wozniak: You have to be very diligent. You have to check every little detail. You have to be so careful that you haven't left something out. You have to think harder and deeper than you normally would. It's hard with today's large, huge programs.
I was partly hardware and partly software, but, I'll tell you, I wrote an awful lot of software by hand (I still have the copies that are handwritten) and all of that went into the Apple II. Every byte that went into the Apple II, it had so many different mathematical routines, graphics routines, computer languages, emulators of other machines, ways to slip your code in and out of an emulation mode. It had all these kinds of things and not one bug ever found. Not one bug in the hardware, not one bug in the software. And you just can't find a product like that nowadays. But, you see, I had it so intense in my head, and the reason for that was largely because it was part of me. Everything in there had to be so important to me. This computer was me. And everything had to be as perfect as could be made. And I had a lot going against me because I didn't have a computer to compile my code, my software.

Heinlein on Subtlety

Fri, 26 Jan 2007 23:39:47 GMT

Today's Friday Thought comes from something I just reread today, written years ago by the Dean himself. He certainly was a master of concise clarity. Enjoy:

"There is a world of difference between 'Roger' and 'Wilco.'"
Robert A. Heinlein, 1958

"Why Are You Doing What You're Doing?"

Fri, 19 Jan 2007 16:46:55 GMT

For nearly a decade, I've had a plaque bearing that question on my desk.

I think the question is valuable because it goes directly to motive. It's also a deliciously contextual question -- it means something different every minute, depending on what you're up to. Here are a few scattered examples:

"Why am I doing this job?" Is it because someone, or society, told me that this was "success" (see last week's Friday Thought)? Because it's a way to make ends meet? Because I really enjoy it? Because this is a fun and cohesive team? Because I'm too tired to look for another job? Because I don't think I could make it at a job I'd actually like to do?
"Why am I writing the code this way?" Is it because someone told me to, even though I don't completely understand the reason? Because it's the right way? Because I'm under time pressure and plan to fix it later? Because it's a short cut and I don't care about this product? Because I haven't looked in Knuth's classic The Art of Computer Programming to see if there's already a known better structure or algorithm? Because I'm tired or distracted? Or because of something else?
"Why did I fail to show appreciation for a friend's help?" Is it because I failed to realize how much they helped me, and at what cost to themselves? Because I was too absorbed/tired/stressed/distracted with just my own troubles? Because I care, but repeatedly failed to show it when it mattered? Because perhaps I actually do need to care more about other people and actively take an interest in them? Because of some combination of the above, and/or possibly more reasons?
"Why am I driving to the store?" Is it because that's what everyone does? Because it's what I've always done? Because I don't have time to walk or bike (and if so, why not)? Because the groceries are too heavy/bulky to carry back? Because I haven't thought of riding a bike in years?
Etc.

Nobody's perfect. I've wrestled with these and other questions, as I'm sure you do too, and try to improve a little every day and every year.

Being intentional is more than just about programming. We can get there if we keep trying.

Ichiro on Success

Fri, 12 Jan 2007 08:53:47 GMT

What does the word "success" mean to you? There's no shortage of opinions about what Success should mean and upon which particular Altar of Success we ought to sacrifice our lives and energies. That doesn't mean those opinions are worth paying attention to. As a quote attributed to Lily Tomlin put it nicely, 'the trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you're still a rat.'

In that spirit, I enjoyed reading the reminder in this picture. The quote is from Ichiro Suzuki, a baseball player (currently for the Seattle Mariners) and clearly a success in his field. I found Ichiro's words printed on a Starbucks coffee cup, and fancied them even more than the maple latte inside. I hope you enjoy them too.

P.S.: Yes, I do more reading than just Starbucks cups.

Sir Arthur on TV

Fri, 05 Jan 2007 21:48:14 GMT

Last week I reread an old classic SF novel, and noticed some remarkable details in this passing comment by one character about the fictional 21st-century Utopia:

"... there are too many distractions and entertainments. Do you realize that every day something like five hundred hours of radio and TV pour out over the various channels? If you went without sleep and did nothing else, you could follow less than a twentieth of the entertainment that's available at the turn of a switch! No wonder people are becoming passive sponges -- absorbing but never creating. Did you know that the average viewing time per person is now three hours a day? Soon people won't be living their own lives any more. It will be a full-time job keeping up with the various family serials on TV!"
Arthur C. Clarke, Childhood's End, 1953

Of course, in this passing reference Clarke probably wasn't trying to make a serious prediction. Nevertheless, Sir Arthur's astute understanding of the future growth and effects of TV is impressive, all the more so given TV's primitive state when he wrote that in 1953.

Some perspective. According to Wikipedia and TerraMedia, in 1953 the first commercial TV licenses were granted in the states of Arkansas, Idaho, Kansas, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, Oregon, South Carolina, and South Dakota. Canada had only just begun its first regular TV transmissions the year before, and the states of New Hampshire, Vermont, and Wyoming wouldn't issue their own first licenses until 1954. 1953 also saw the first TV coverage of the Academy Awards, and the launch of TV Guide.

How did Clarke do? With the benefit of hindsight, let's see:

Three hours a day? Right on: A recent global study reported that the average TV viewing time per person worldwide is just over three hours per day. In the United States, it's four and a half hours per day. The Japanese top the list at five hours per day.
500 hours of content per day? Far more: At 16 hours per day, that would equal a mere 30 radio and TV stations. In 2006 the United States alone exceeded 2,200 TV stations and 13,700 radio stations. [CIA factbook] That's not counting programming on "channels" like On Demand and YouTube.

As we often say today, "Who knew?" In this case, Sir Arthur did. Last month he turned 89, and his literary output is still going strong. Hats off to the man!