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Legacy Code Preservation: Some Patterns

slott — Wed, 22 May 2013 16:59:22 +0000

After looking at this suite of examples, we can see some patterns emerging. There seem to be several operating principles. Preview Text: With modern languages and tools, legacy code conversion is quite simple. The impediments are simply managerial in nature. No one wants to have a carefully maintained piece of software declared a liability and...

What Makes a Great Conference?

jurgenappelo — Wed, 22 May 2013 16:58:22 +0000

I’ve been asking around on email and on the social networks what makes a conference memorable, special, or amazing. This topic has my special interest, not only because I attend between 20-25 conferences per year, but also because I’m trying to help make the DARE 2013 conference in Antwerp, Belgium a great experience. Preview Text: ...

A simple strategy for dotfiles

piccoloprincipe — Wed, 22 May 2013 11:26:26 +0000

Simple as in Simple Object Access Protocol. Dotfiles such as .vimrc and .bashrc are at the core of configuring a Unix system. They are usually places in the home folder of a user and, if present, are read by various tools such as the shell and Vim.After having written (and rewritten) many dotfiles in the last years, I've gathered here a few strategies for storing and porting them between...

How to Stand Out at Work: 10 Tips for Programmers (Part 2)

ylopotun — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:37:18 +0000

This is the second part of the article in which I’m sharing a list of simple tips that, in my opinion, can help programmers succeed at their current workplace. You can read the first part here: How to Stand Out at Work: 10 Tips for Programmers (Part 1). We’ve already reviewed 5 items, so let’s continue with the number 6: 6) Try to give realistic estimates Giving too optimistic estimates...

DrupalCon 2013: Introducing Drupal Hooks and Views Metrics

leighshevchik — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:30:00 +0000

This post comes from Belinda Runkle at the New Relic Blog. We <3 Drupal! DrupalCon has returned to Portland. And naturally we’re very excited about our most recent release of the New Relic PHP agent. Preview Text: The Drupal ecosystem is bursting at the seams with modules. The ease of extending Drupal means it can be...

Links You Don't Want to Miss (May 22)

acoin — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:30:00 +0000

Looking at Memcached 10 Years Later This week was the 10 year anniversary since the creation of Memcached. First created for the blog-building site, LiveJournal, Memcached has remained a staple persistence technology. Preview Text: Today: Memcached 10 years later, JS struggles, why can't testers and developers get along?; Neil...

Dev of the Week: Mahdi Yusuf

egregory — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:30:00 +0000

Every week, we feature a new developer/blogger from the DZone community here and in our newsletter, catching up to find out what they're working on now and what's coming next. This week we're talking to Mahdi Yusuf, developer at Source Metrics, active member of the Python community, and creator of Neckbeard Republic. Preview Text: ...

Algorithm of the Week: Damn Cool Cardinality Estimation

damncoolalgorithms — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:29:00 +0000

Suppose you have a very large dataset - far too large to hold in memory - with duplicate entries. You want to know how many duplicate entries, but your data isn't sorted, and it's big enough that sorting and counting is impractical. How do you estimate how many unique entries the dataset contains? It's easy to see how this could be useful in many applications, such as query planning in...

Solr 4.2: Index Structure Reading API

gr0 — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:28:00 +0000

With the release of Solr 4.2 we’ve got the possibility to use the HTTP protocol to get information about Solr index structure. Of course, if one wanted to do that prior to Solr 4.2 it could be achieved by fetching the schema.xml file, parsing it and then getting the needed information. However when Solr 4.2 was released we’ve got a dedicated API which can return the information we need...

A Visit to the Valley

mikiobraun — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:20:00 +0000

At the end of April, Leo and I went on a one week trip to the Valley. Over the years, we had built up a number of connections in the Valley and we thought that now was the time to go over there and meet face to face. We end up having 20 meetings over 6 days, which made for quite a schedule. Preview Text: It’s one thing to know...

Getting Teams to Deliver Predictably

mcottmeyer — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:10:00 +0000

As recently as this week, I’ve been involved in conversations with customers about how we can help make their teams deliver more predictably. How can they meet commitments on all levels of the organization, including project, program, and portfolio? Preview Text: As recently as this week, I’ve been involved in conversations with...

Escape Process’ Death Valley, or How to Tell a Cat From a Washing Machine

taylorcat — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Ken Robinson recently delivered yet another great talk on the state of American education. He pointed out that countries that take a more organic approach (e.g. Finland) perform much better overall than those who take a mechanistic, standardized approach (e.g. The United States with “No Child Left Behind”, emphasis on testing). Remarkably, the organic approach, one using diverse...

11 Things to Remember About People in Middle Management Roles

EstherD — Wed, 22 May 2013 04:49:22 +0000

It’s easy to be critical of managers. A few things to remember. 0. Most people in management roles want to do a good job, but may not know what to do or how to do it. 1. People in management roles are dealing with incomplete and ambiguous knowledge. It’s a fantasy that they have all the information and know what to do (which may be held by both managers themselves and people...

Links You Don't Want To Miss (May 21)

egregory — Tue, 21 May 2013 06:30:00 +0000

DDoSaaS Miiiight Be a Little Sketchy Surprise! If you PayPal someone to conduct a DDoS attack, things might get a little shady. Brian Krebs investigates Ragebooter, and finds a one-man operation running out of Memphis, Tennessee, possibly with the authorities’ blessing. Preview Text: Today: The sketchy world of DDoSaaS, Apple's taxes,...

Resize Image Class With PHP

paulund1 — Tue, 21 May 2013 06:30:00 +0000

A common feature that you will come across in websites is the ability to resize an image to fit an exact size so that it will be displayed correctly on your design. If you have a very large image and you are going to place it on your website in a space that is only 100px x 100px then you will want to be able to resize this image to fit in the space. Preview Text: ...