Monthly Archives: January 2007
Good Ideas
Sometimes I feel like every time I come up with a good idea, I read about it somewhere else a week later. It least it’s nice to have some indication I’m not a raving lunatic. This time, A List Apart … Continue reading
Intentional Programming
In one of my first posts, I asked “Why do we speak of programming languages instead of programming notation?” My thought was, and still is, that code in any existing programming language is just one possible representation of an abstract … Continue reading
How Ruby on Rails is Making Me a Better Programmer
I’ve just dived into Rails and Ruby in the past couple of months, but I’ve already benefited from it, so here’s my entry in the How has Ruby on Rails made you a better programmer contest. 1. I finally … Continue reading
To Operate Shower DO NOT PULL HANDLE
I went and got a massage last week. After being relieved of a great deal of muscle tension and no small sum of money, I returned to the spa’s locker room to take a shower. On the wall of the … Continue reading
Chaining Function Calls
I like Lisp’s prefix syntax. It’s consistent, has natural structure, and makes code-manipulation macros possible. But it’s not always the easiest to read or write. For example, I often want to apply several successive transformations to the same chunk of … Continue reading
The Path of Least Work
Well, a new year, and (finally) a new post. In the past two weeks I have undertaken a complete rewrite of Project Posner from Common Lisp to Ruby on Rails. Now, before the Lispniks descend upon me with their sharp … Continue reading