Don’t alienate developers

Remember Ballmer shouting ad nauseam “Developers, developers, developers”? I’m sure you’ve seen the original video and even a few techno remixes. Whether he truly meant it or not, his message was correct: it’s all about developers. Any platform that doesn’t attract developers is bound to fail. Microsoft is trying to make an effort to please developers by shifting to a more open...

This Week in Ruby (May 29, 2008)

This is the 9th episode of This Week in Ruby, please consider subscribing to my feed so as to not miss any weekly installments. Ruby Two days ago JRuby 1.1.2 was released. Amongst several bug fixes and improvements, this release is characterized by a focus on performances. Startup time, threading, method calling and YAML symbol parsing have all been drastically improved. Huw Collingbourne of SapphireSteel, has...

This Week in Ruby (April 7, 2008)

The first edition of This Week in Ruby received a warm welcome from the community. A week later, here we are with a second installment of the series. I’ll attempt to repeat these posts approximately every week, so feel free to follow along by subscribing to my feed. The Ruby community is a tremendously active one. In only seven days, there have been so many noteworthy items popping up, that it would take me hours...

RailsConf, Arc, Apple and other Zenbits

Zenbits are posts which include a variety of interesting subjects that I’d like to talk about briefly, without writing a post for each of them. Ruby and Rails Videos Blip.TV is now hosting the videos of RailsConf 2007. The audio and video quality is very good even though no slides are shown (but you can always google them). While on the subject, you can also watch the videos for RubyConf 2007 (including slides),...

How to install Django with MySQL on Mac OS X

Installing Django on Mac OS X Leopard is supposed to be very straightforward, but if you are new to it, you may encounter a few puzzling questions and, in the case of MySQL, even a couple of headaches. I’m writing about this for the benefit of those of you who may attempt and struggle with this feat. MacPorts is not required for this how-to. First and foremost, we are going to install Django from its svn...

TextMate is the king of Rails editors

Tim Bray has published the results of his nice survey about Ruby and Rails editors. In Bray’s piece we see that TextMate is the tool of choice for the Rails focused group, while Vi leads the way in terms of the Ruby one (albeit TextMate is very close):       One thing is clear, TextMate IS the editor of choice when it comes to the Ruby and Rails communities, and since it runs only on Mac, it...

DB2 on Mac

Python and DB2 We now have a working Python driver for DB2 which is currently undergoing internal testing. The driver is similar to the Ruby and PHP ones, which means that you get an advanced and very easy to use API. It also means that if you are confident with the Ruby driver, you will be able to use the Python one in no time. Ruby: require 'ibm_db' conn = IBM_DB::connect(database, user, password) if conn ...

A preliminary review of three Cocoa and Objective-C related books

As announced before, I got interested in Mac development, bought a bunch of books and spent a few nights reading and coding. Here are my first impressions on those books which thus far I’ve picked up. I only had time to read 3 chapters from Stephen Kochan’s book and I must say that I’m not impressed! The pace is extremely slow and experienced programmers who read it will be bored to tears. An...

Cocoa is my Cup of Tea

Writing the article “Desktop Applications are not dead!” was an interesting experience that led to vivid discussions about the business of software for desktop applications, including the current limits and options available in this field. In the last comment by Eugueny Kontsevoy (the person I was responding to with my article in the first place), he expressed once again his frustration regarding Windows...

Desktop Applications are not dead!

In his article, ”Desktop Applications are Dead”, Eugueny Kontsevoy – a Windows developer – argues sarcastically about the demise of Desktop applications. His article has real merit though and focuses almost exclusively on the problems which are introduced by Vista’s aggressive security policies. The annoying aspect of Windows Vista’s “cancel or allow” is undeniable, especially if...

The Apple approach (aka first impressions of the MacBook Pro)

All the best hackers I know are gradually switching to Macs. – Paul Graham A week has gone by since I received my 15” MacBook Pro from Apple. In this post I’ll share my first impressions about the whole experience especially for those who are considering the switch. Ordering the Mac I placed my order online through the Canadian Apple store, selecting the available 2 day shipping option. The ordering process...

Switching to Mac

Despite the somewhat disappointing announcements (from a hardware standpoint), I appreciated Steve Jobs’ focus on the new features of the Mac OS X Leopard during yesterday’s keynotes at WWDC. I’ve been using Windows Vista for a few months now (albeit Ubuntu is my main OS) and the impression that I’ve gotten really hasn’t been wildly positive. Microsoft failed to be innovative, instead they mostly just...

Looking for a good laptop for Ruby development

A few days ago I received a new laptop from work, it’s a nice IBM Thinkpad X60 tablet, an ultra-portable 12” that offers up an honest performance. It is a fine machine, and when hooked up to a large widescreen monitor it can be used for development in most environments. If I’m on the go, speaking at conferences for example, its weight and size make it ideal for carrying around. I’ve already...