Stefan discovered this in the XP-ML.

Ha, ha: With this premiere programmable pair, happening holidays are just a few remote-clicks away.

Nowadays, most couples would love some extra arms and legs to help conquer their ever-expanding to-do list. Our 2003 His & Hers multifunction robots fit the bill quite nicely, thanks.

Someone at the door? Click your remote and send His Robot to check it out. His Robot's voice circuitry can deliver your greeting, and His on-board video camera gives you a view of the visitor, who can hop onto His platform and be delivered to you in the den.

Need some help getting the groceries into the house? Her Robot is happy to help. Need to leave a message for the spouse or kids? Tell it to Her Robot, and she'll spread the word. link

 Subject: Re: Application Development
 Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2004 08:35:43 -0800
 On Wed, 24 Mar 2004 03:34:19 -0600, Jason wrote:
 >>
 >> Hi All,
 >> Are there any rapid application development tools that work with FORTH? Any
 >> help is greatly appreciated.

        Heh, Forth _is_ a Rapid Development Tool.

         -- Regards, Albert

(Source coredump.cx) This is not an exciting story: I happened to be browsing aimlessly through case studies and other publications released by Microsoft as a part of their "Get the facts" initiative. At one point, I stumbled upon a Word file I wanted to read - and as soon as I ran it through wvWare, I noticed there is a good deal of amusing change tracking information still recorded within the document. Naturally, publishing documents with "collaboration" data is not unheard of in the corporate world, but the fact Microsoft had became a victim of their own technology, and had failed to run their own tools against these publications makes it more entertaining.

A pointless idea came to my mind that instant: why not run a gentle web spider against all Microsoft sites in English, specifically looking for other instances of tracking data not removed from documents? I coded a bunch of scripts and let them run through the night, fetching approximately 10,000 unique documents; over 10% was identified as containing change tracking records. I decided to collect only those with deleted text still present, yielding a crop of over 5% of all documents. Quite impressive. Below, you will find a brief (and rest assured, incomplete) list of the most entertaining samples I’ve run into, along with some speculation (and only speculation) as to the reasons we see them. link The tool used

This hurts the ruby experience a little bit, because among those characters are {}[]~\| …

and the solution

And once you start doing agile development and pair programming you really recognise the benefit of a big monitor. And if you’re like most companies, you have the largest monitor available, a big blank wall and a screen projector. It’s just that most companies don’t let the programmers use such a valuable item. People that can be trusted to maintain the software that keeps the company in business somehow can’t be trusted with a simple peice of hardware. fairlygoodpractices.com/wallcode.htm

I highly recommend also look at this website. fairlygoodpractices.com

Why does the world need Nutch, when search engines are free? Search engines are free to use like television is free to watch, but, like television programming, search results are subject to manipulation by the interests that control them. The only way one can be certain that search results are unbiased is if the technology which computes them is public. Nutch seeks to make high-quality search technology freely available.

How can a non-profit afford to run a search engine?

Nutch is primarily a software project, not a service. Large scale deployments of Nutch will probably be run by commerical interests separate from Nutch, funded by advertising or somesuch. If the Nutch software is good enough, perhaps existing major search engines will use it in place of their current closed source code.

The Nutch project itself may choose to host small-scale demo system, so that folks can see that it really works. This will require only moderate funding. The Nutch project may never host a full-scale deployment for folks to use as their everyday search engine. We’ll leave that to commercial ventures that can afford it.

Will Nutch ever be as good as other search engines?

We hope it will be better. With developers and researchers from around the world helping out, we hope to be able to surpass the quality of what any single company can do.

Nutch

 rpa-base 0.2.1pre1 is now available at http://rpa-base.rubyforge.org .
 Many of the most popular libraries/applications as per Rubyforge
 statistics (rails, rake, redcloth, activerecord, sqlite, log4r, copland,
 ruvi, to name a few) have been packaged for use with rpa-base 0.2.1pre1.

 You can find a list of the 100+ packages at
 http://rpa-base.rubyforge.org/wiki/wiki.cgi?Packaged_Software

 Screenshots and animations can be found at
 http://rpa-base.rubyforge.org/wiki/wiki.cgi?Rpa_Base_In_Action

 rpa-base 0.2.1pre1 fixes some issues in the bootstrapping phase, which
 couldn't hence be solved through the normal self-upgrade mechanism.
 In addition to several other bugfixes, 0.2.1pre1 features better proxy
 support, isolation of unit tests run automatically when installing a
 lib/app, and improvements in the command-line tool.

 Foreword
 --------

 The Ruby Production Archive (RPA) will provide packages of Ruby
 libraries and programs in a form that allows production use, engineered
 through a stringent process resembling FreeBSD's or Debian's.

 rpa-base is a port/package manager designed to support RPA. Its scope and
 purposes are different to those of other systems like RubyGems.
 Features
 ========
 rpa-base is a port/package manager designed to support RPA's client-side
 package management. You can think of it as RPA's apt-get + dpkg. It
 features the following as of 0.2.1pre1:

 * strong dependency management: rpa-base installs dependencies as needed,
   keeps track of reverse dependencies on uninstall, and will remove no
   longer needed dependencies
 * atomic (de)installs: operations on the local RPA installation are atomic
   transactions; the system has been designed to survive ruby crashes (OS
   crashes too on POSIX systems)
 * parallel installs: you can install several ports in parallel; builds
   will be parallelized and the final phase will be serialized properly
 * self-hosting: rpa-base installs and updates itself
 * modular, extensible design: the 2-phase install is similar to FreeBSD and
   Debian's package creation; rpa-base packages need not be restricted
   to installing everything under a single directory ("1 package, 1 dir"
   paradigm)
 * rdoc integration: RDoc documentation for libraries is generated at install
   time (currently disabled on win32)
 * ri integration: ri data files are generated for all the libraries managed
   by RPA; you can access this information with ri-rpa
 * handling C extensions: if you have the required C toolchain, rpa-base can
   compile extensions as needed
 * unit testing: when a library is installed, its unit tests are run; the
   installation is canceled if they don't pass

 Several of the above features are illustrated in the screenshots and
 animations available at
 http://rpa-base.rubyforge.org/wiki/wiki.cgi?Rpa_Base_In_Action

 Limitations:
 ===========
 A number of features have been pushed back to 0.3.0:
 * full support for binary platform-specific packages
 * signed packages/ports
 * system-wide configuration system
 * better user interface
 In practice, the first one is the most limiting at the moment since it means
 that win32 users in particular need a working C toolchain to install
 extensions. This will soon be addressed.

 ...

 I had posted this 6 months ago, but the link has changed.

The world is changing, and it’s changing faster than we think. Programmers are going to have to move up the value chain, and move up fast, if they are to keep their jobs in the coming years. The recession isn’t helping, as its effects are masking a significant underlying trend. When the recession ends, the truth is going to scare folks who aren’t prepared.

slides

• software as Commodity
• network-enabled Collaboration
• customizability and software-as-Service

link

 Version 0.7.0 of FreeRIDE has been released and is available for download!

 For details and downloads, go to:

    http://freeride.rubyforge.org/

    Many bugs have been fixed and there is also a bunch of new features
    (Experimental code Refactoring, Preferences plugin available, Debugger
    fully functional on Linux and Windows...)

    The Window's version still runs FreeRIDE with its own private copy of
    Ruby (that will not interfere with your installed version), but this
    private copy of Ruby is now version 1.8.2 preview 2.

    Linux users will find both a tgz and a rpm file ready for use with
    your own copy of Ruby.

    === FreeRIDE Overview ===

    FreeRIDE aims to be a full-featured, first-class IDE on a par with
    those available for other languages, with all the best-of-breed
    features that you would expect in a high-end IDE.

    Some of FreeRIDE's features include:

    * Multi-file editing
    * Syntax highlighting
    * Auto-indenting
    * Code Folding
    * Source navigation by module, class, method, etc.
    * Integrated debugging
    * Written in Ruby for easy extension

    Some planned features include:
    * Full internationalization
    * High-end refactoring support
    * Remote pair programming

    In its current state, FreeRIDE cannot yet be called a real IDE. What
    is does have is a stable infrastructure with all the working plumbing
    needed for the hordes of anxious Ruby developers that want to create
    plugins to extend the functionality of FreeRIDE. The FreeRIDE team
    will be working on such FreeRIDE plugins that we will individually
    release to incrementally improve the FreeRIDE system. Periodically we
    will rollup these added plugins into new releases of FreeRIDE.

    Even if you have not officially joined the FreeRIDE team you can still
    create plugins for you own use, share them with others, or send them
    to us and we will make them available for download from our project
    wiki. We may even ask for your permission to include them in the
    FreeRIDE core distribution.

 Potential Corporate SCO Defendants

 For those organizations threatened with legal action by SCO, the Legal
 Defense Center is the one, central source for objective information
 regarding common issues faced by all potential SCO defendants. Based
 in Washington DC and comprised of a carefully-selected Panel of
 highly-specialized Intellectual Property legal experts fully-briefed
 on the intricacies of the case, the Legal Defense Center provides
 unmatched legal and defense resources. Membership in the program is
 $100,000 annually and provides resources to its members that
 would cost in the millions if developed independently.

 Linux Kernel Developers

 Individual contributors to the Linux kernel gain access to the
 full resources of the Open Source Legal Defense Fund including
 guidance on how to best protect and defend their own intellectual
 property rights. They also receive $25,000 in legal protection
 from OSRM if they are named in future lawsuits involving their
 contributions to the Linux kernel. Membership for individuals
 is $250 annually.

One thing I found interesting about his talk that I managed to relate to XP was when he talked about how humans have "normal" level to categorize things. For example he showed a picture of a tree. Whenever people see a picture of a tree and you ask them what it is, they say "tree", not "maple" or "plant". There seems to be a "middle" category that the mind tends toward.

Traditional software development takes either a top-down or bottom-up approach to categorizing things. That is we don’t start at the natural middle abstraction and work our way up or down the hierarchy.

I was wondering if when we take a TDD approach to design, we can manage to start at the natural middle level and then refactor to generalize or specialize as we need to.

 Fast Company has a terrific cover piece this month about Jeff Bezos.
 My favorite part is when he talks about asking other people (experts, even)
 for their opinion about new projects.

 Inevitably, people say no. Don't do it. I don't like it. It'll fail.
 Don't bother.

 When I think about every successful project (whether it's a book
 or a business or a website) the people I trust have always given
 me exceedingly bad advice. And more often than not, that advice
 is about being conservative.

 The incentive plan here is pretty clear. If someone dissuades you
 from trying, you can hardly blame them for the failure that doesn't
 happen, right? If, on the other hand, they egg you on and you crash,
 that really puts a crimp in the relationship...

 I think the problem lies in the question. Instead of saying,
 "what do you think?" as in, "what do you think about Amazon
 offering 1,000,000 different titles even though some of them are really
 hard for us to get..." the question ought to be, "how can I make this
 project even MORE remarkable?"

I highly recommend you to read more of Seth Godin´s blog

I thought the sessions went well, considering that we were in a room off in a corner on a floor completely separate from the other conference events. Quite a lot of people showed up at the sessions I saw (standing-room only), and people seemed interested.

 This came up in conversation with a client today - the problem with
 projects is the equivalent of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle.
 The more control you want on their status (or position), the less you
 have over their velocity. Pick one of the two - and pick wisely.

A Cisco purchase gone wrong has cost San Jose, California’s CIO Wandzia Grycz her job. Grycz exited her CIO post earlier this week just ahead of an audit release detailing the city’s findings on a recent computer and phone network installation proposal. Grycz has publicly denied that she allowed Cisco to craft the nature of the IT contact.

…

A new $51m computer system has had so many bugs that city officials can’t get the technology up and running at all. And the culprit looks like SAP.

"We find problems on a daily basis, and part of that is getting the (computer) system to work for us," Diane Supler, budget director in Tacoma told the Associated Press. "Every time we think we’ve identified all of the issues, something else happens in SAP (the system software)."

link