February 2006 Newsletter
Most human beings have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted. –Aldous Huxley
Our ultimate freedom is the right and power to decide how anybody or anything outside ourselves will affect us. –Stephen R. Covey
One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to say. –Will Durant
With so little time, there are just not enough minutes left to hate, not enough time for gossip or fighting. We should all be so busy "doing" and "being" that we have no time left for anything but accomplishing "good." –Thomas D. Willhite
If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas. –George Bernard Shaw
Act as if everything you think, say and do determines your entire life—because in reality, it does! –Laurelle Adrian
Knowledge is power, but enthusiasm pulls the switch. –Ivern Ball
Iron rusts from disuse, stagnant water loses its purity, and in cold weather becomes frozen: even so does inaction sap the vigors of the mind. –Leonardo da Vinci
In the confrontation between the stream and the rock, the stream always wins—not through strength but by perseverance. –H. Jackson Brown
No trumpets sound when the important decisions of our life are made. Destiny is made known silently. –Agnes de Mille
This author takes a critical view at the shortcomings of many of the
popular and widely used software development methodologies and emphasizes that
understanding and managing knowledge and expertise is the key element of
improving software development.
http://www.tristanyates.com/pdf/SMARTER-THAN-PROCESS.pdf
Annual survey report from Infoworld
on development and programming trends. This year's report shows
increased use of XML and web services and the waning of C and C++ for
application development.
http://www.infoworld.com/reports/49SRrrdevelop.html
The inventors of extreme programming and interaction design, two
development philosophies intended to make design and development method, but
quite methodologies, face off about the advantages of each.
http://www.fawcette.com/interviews/beck_cooper/default.asp
Martin Fowler has updated his 5-year-old classic article that introduced
much of the software development community to the concepts of agile
development. This article provides an
excellent overview of the agile landscape.
http://martinfowler.com/articles/newMethodology.html
While meetings are often the last thing that workers on technical projects want to do, they are typically a necessary part of any project. This article looks at how to use meetings and related sessions effectively for collaboration, especially with business customers.
http://www.informit.com/articles/article.asp?p=440158
This article looks at the classical question about whether software development is a science, an art, a craft, or something else. In particular, it addresses the matter of whether it should be considered more a "practical" science (i.e., engineering) or a "pure" science.
http://www.stevemcconnell.com/SeIsNotCs.pdf
This report focuses on some of the common problems experienced when
trying to introduce agile development methodologies in traditional
organizations. It focuses on three main
areas: development process conflicts,
business process conflicts, and people conflicts.
http://sunset.usc.edu/publications/TECHRPTS/2005/usccse2005-516/usccse2005-516.pdf
Some systems, typically called high-integrity systems, must be designed and developed in such a way that defects cannot be tolerated. This article looks at a technique for developing high-integrity systems in a cost-effective manner.
http://www.stsc.hill.af.mil/crosstalk/2005/12/0512CroxfordChapman.html
This site provides lots of useful and up-to-date information on applying agile techniques to software testing, even when agile methodology is not used for the development process itself.
http://www.geocities.com/xtremetesting/
This is an online version of book on Unix/Linux shell
programming/scripting which is divided up into 24 easily understood lessons. It takes you all the way from the basics
(What is a shell?) to more advanced topics.
In this book excerpt, the new (and very powerful) command shell for
Windows Vista, called Monad, is introduced.
Monad is a completely object oriented command shell. While intended for
http://www.computerworld.com/softwaretopics/os/windows/story/0,10801,107669,00.html
Unicode is the standard for wide character sets. This stylish, interactive site helps you
understand Unicode and has wiki functionality to
allow you to post your own comments on the various characters.
Pixel2Life is a comprehensive computer tutorial search engine and
directory. It provides links to
thousands of tutorials in an amazing variety of subjects, including programming
and languages, applications and tools, and graphic design.
With all of the buzzwords floating around about services-oriented
architecture (SOA) and web services (WS), sometimes it's difficult to know just
what all of this means. This article
gives a nice, technical (but not too technical!) introduction to web services
and where they fit into the development architecture and landscape.
http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/websphere/library/techarticles/0307_ryman/ryman.html
The results from
Forbes annual survey of the best companies in
http://biz.yahoo.com/special/bestco06.html
This author looks at how procrastination can actually be a good thing when it revolves around making sure that you're doing the most important work and not wasting time on insignificant things.
http://www.paulgraham.com/procrastination.html
Historically, if you wanted to install Linux on a computer, you had to use a set of pre-made installation disks (or download ISO files and burn them onto CD or DVD). The Instalinux project, which is based on a tool called LinuxCOE that was recently open-sourced by HP, changes all of that by providing a web-based tool where you answer a few questions and it generates a small (typically around 30MB) ISO file that you download and use to install your system over the Internet.
This article outlines the author's 10 imperative operating concepts for those who are (or wish to become) great managers. While the concepts are quite simple, they are thought provoking, as well.
http://www.lifehack.org/articles/management/the-10-beliefs-of-great-managers.html
This article discusses a new time management technique called the 50-30-20 rule whereby you allocate 50% of your time to tasks which you expect to have 5 or more years of benefit, 30% to those with 2 years or less of benefit and 20% to tasks with 90 day benefit horizon.
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/12/the-50-30-20-rule/
A senator has introduced new legislation to overhaul the telecommunications regulatory regime currently in place. The main premise is that the communications industry would be regulated like other businesses, by protecting consumers and ensuring businesses do not engage in unfair competition.
http://demint.senate.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressReleases.Detail&PressRelease_id=320
Some major telecom providers and vendors have announced an initiative called SCOPE to improve OSS systems deployments by using commercial off the shelf (COTS) software and free open source software (FOSS) as building blocks to improve interoperability between providers and customers.
http://www.scope-alliance.org/
If you use AOL Instant Messenger and are really only interested in the IM chat features, miniaim is a great alternative. It is small and lightning fast with a very simple, but usable GUI. It has tabs for each IM session and the ability to save the contents of your session.
Fresh Find is a handy Internet search utility. Just press a hot key and the small, unobtrusive Fresh Find box is displayed. Enter your search criteria and it opens a web browser window with the results. It will even automatically paste the clipboard contents into the find criteria. Multiple search engines are supported by default and you can even add your own.
http://www.freshsw.com/freshfind/
Aurionix FileUsage integrates seamlessly with Windows Explorer to add columns to the Details view to display total size of all files/subfolders in a given folder, total percent of disk usage for a folder/file, and the total number of files, including in subfolders, in a given folder.
FocusAlpha is a small background utility that allows you to set the transparency of all windows except the currently active one (i.e., the window with input focus). The transparency level for background windows is fully configurable.
http://www.marcandre.info/focusalpha.php
If you need to send a brief message to someone who is out of the office, simply send them an SMS text message by sending an e-mail to cell_phone_number@teleflip.com. The service is completely free (to the sender).
If you prefer the more vanilla file search function from Windows 2000 and are using Windows XP, a quick registry edit can restore this functionality. To do, launch the Registry Editor: Start | Run | regedit.exe. In the Registry Editor, navigate to the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\CabinetState key and add a new String value named Use Search Asst. Set the new Use Search Asst value to no. Close the Registry Editor and you are ready to go.
This site provides links to many famous sights, both natural and man-made, from around the world via Google Maps and MSN Virtual Earth. The sites are categorized and easy to find.
I'm not sure that this "test" really measures your intelligence, but it is a relatively fun game. It is the classic game where you are given a pattern and have to expand it into its full description. For example, "24 H in a D" = "24 Hours in Day". (In case you care, I got 27 out of 33 without cheating.)
Have you ever wondered where a certain food came from or when it was first introduced? The Food Timeline provides a comprehensive and detailed look at such facts. Who know that saccharin was developed in the 19th century?
Test your knowledge of quotes and phrases, some well known and others quite mysterious, from many genres of movies. The quotes are displayed in text form and you can click on the quote for sound clip to help jog your memory.
http://www.moviequotequiz.com/
A collection of 100 odd facts from 2005.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4566526.stm