1. Feb 27th, 2009

    Rounded Corners 226 – OOP didn’t do this … OOP just held our hats

    Better user experience, 1Hierarchies are powerful models but easy to get wrong:

    Think about the hierarchy of your application’s “entities.” If you’ve been working on your application for too long, you’ve probably gotten used to its idiosyncrasies. Make a list of all “things” in your application and get somebody without any preconceived ideas to sort them into a hierarchy. Does this intuitive idea of how the parts fit together match your application’s user interface and internal model?

    Better user experience, 2 And speaking of getting the UI wrong, the Forbes automated slideshow is a classic WTF. Paul Kafasis uses that opportunity to illustrate UI critique:

    Meanwhile the automation actively makes the much more likely scenarios worse. When that happens, it’s time to pack it in. Users are perfectly capable of advancing slides themselves, and doing so means your web slideshow will work no matter the users’ reading speed.

    Busy bee. Are some languages just an excuse to look busy?

    Scheme and Lisp force you *think* from the get-go. Most engineers and programmers hate to do that and it makes them uncomfortable. Starting a program in Java or C is easy. There’s a pile of boilerplate you can type without thinking about it, and it `feels’ like you’re programming. Then you have to haul out the bag of tools like the compiler and the linker and makefiles or ant. There’s a lot of busy work needed just to get going, and you feel like you’ve accomplished something.

    Hat holder. I love the concluding remark. Spot on, Chad:

    OOP didn’t do this to us; we did it to ourselves. OOP just held our hats.

    TGIF A Completely Unscientific (Yet Accurate) Look at Social Sites. Accurate to a T. (Via @azaaza)

    Also, why is everything amazing but nobody’s happy? (Via @avernet)

    Printable PDF | Posted by Assaf Filed in general 2 Comments »

    1. Feb 27th, 2009

      apotheon

      Thanks much, Assaf. I was pretty pleased with that turn of phrase when it spilled from my fingers into the keyboard, almost of its own accord, myself.

      I like the progression of quotes and reference links you’ve built here. It works quite well.

    2. Feb 28th, 2009

      Bill de hÓra

      “There’s a pile of boilerplate you can type without thinking about it, and it ‘feels’ like you’re programming.”

      Completely agree with that sentiment, having no busy work can be scary:

      http://www.dehora.net/journal/2005/02/programmers_block.html

      If you look long enough into the repl the repl begins to look back through you.

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