Items tagged programming in Jan
Filters: Month: Jan × programming × Sorted by date
Find a level of abstraction that works for what you need to do. When you have trouble there, look beneath that abstraction. You won’t be seeing how things really work, you’ll be seeing a lower-level abstraction that could be helpful. Sometimes what you need will be an abstraction one level up. Is your Python loop too slow? Perhaps you need a C loop. Or perhaps you need numpy array operations.
You (probably) don’t need to learn C.
— Ned Batchelder # 24th January 2024, 6:25 pm
Does it still make sense to become a Java developer, or should I migrate to PHP or .NET?
It sounds like you need to expand your horizons a little further. The best programmers I know these days aren’t working solely in Java, PHP or .NET—they may use one those languages, but they’ll also be getting stuck in to dynamic languages such as Python, Ruby, JavaScript or Scala.
[... 222 words]Do people still write and compile programs from the command line, instead of an IDE? Why or why not?
Being an expert with command line tools gives you super powers.
[... 94 words]What are some more glamourous careers a computer programmer can pivot into?
I don’t really know how you would define “glamorous”—personally I prefer a career that’s rewarding, exciting and helps make a difference. On that basis, I’d suggest looking in to data journalism. Computer Programming is most rewarding when you combine it with another discipline. Personally I think using programming to help journalists discover and explain deep truths hidden within large data sets is a fascinating way to make use of those skills.
[... 106 words]If you were to build homeaway or vrbo from scratch, which software would you use?
HomeAway and VRBO are user-submitted content marketplaces, not traditional content management systems—using a CMS such as Drupal or Joomla would in my opinion be a mistake, as you’ll find yourself spending most of your time writing custom code. The benefits of a CMS will mostly be irrelevant for this application, and you’ll spend a bunch of time coding around their limitations and disabling default functionality that doesn’t fit your purposes.
[... 139 words]What is a good programming language to learn after bash scripting?
Python is a good natural progression from bash in my opinion. It has an interactive prompt which supports bash-style exploratory programming, and it has libraries that mean it can be applied to an enormous range of problems—everything from game development to scientific computing to web applications.
[... 65 words]Is there any reason for a new programmer to choose C# over VB.NET (or vice versa)?
My understanding is that VB.NET was mainly created to help make existing Visual Basic programmers more comfortable with the transition to .NET
[... 65 words]What programming conferences are in Romania in 2011?
How To Web looked like an excellent conference last year. They haven’t announced dates for 2011 yet but I’d keep an eye on their Twitter account:
[... 79 words]What conferences should a programmer working in the industry follow?
If I had to pick just one programming-related conference a year, it would probably be OSCON. The maintainers of pretty much every piece of software I use on a daily basis go there.
[... 49 words]Switching from scripting languages to Objective C and iPhone: useful libraries. Matt Biddulph collects together some very useful libraries for developers just getting started with Objective-C (though I’m not too keen on the title). # 27th January 2009, 5:50 pm
Coding Horror: A Scripter at Heart. Sigh. I cannot believe that the false distinction between “scripting” and “programming” is still being discussed. # 26th January 2009, 6:06 pm
Learning to Think Like A Programmer. Outstanding advice aimed mainly at journalists, but important to anyone who collects information for a living and might want it to be automatically processed at some point in the future. # 22nd January 2009, 6:06 pm
The History of Python (via) “A series of articles on the history of the Python programming language and its community”, being compiled by Guido plus guest authors. # 14th January 2009, 9:42 am
why’s potion. why’s latest project is a small, fast language (JIT to x86/x86-64) which seems to take ideas from Ruby, Lua, Python and who knows where else. Everything is based around objects, closures and mixins, with the delightful inclusion of scoped mixins so you can modify an object only within a certain module (hence avoiding Ruby’s action-at-a-distance problems). # 8th January 2009, 6:37 pm
Good architectural layering, and Bzr 1.1. Mark Shuttleworth on the growing importance of plug-in architectures as an open source project evolves, as they allow new developers to release their own components without needing commit access to the project. Django is pretty good for this, but more hooks (and a faster event dispatch system) would be useful. # 9th January 2008, 2:06 pm
Naming twins in Python and Perl. Simple anagram problem solved in Perl and Python, with a bunch more solutions in the comments. The C# solution provides an interesting example of LINQ in action. # 7th January 2008, 11:03 am