Anthology 2011-2013

In 2011 I put together an anthology of several posts published in the first years of this blog. Now, with my ebook just out (it contains a selection/edit of 32 articles from the blog’s first seven years), I decided to write this list of what I consider the best articles of the last three years, to complement that first anthology. This anthology also includes posts written on Akarrú, my other blog.

Since the previous anthology was done in May 2011, I am going to include posts from the latter part of 2011. Here we go:

2011

• A model of trust where I discuss the famous trust equation, which helps us guide the way we relate to others, in business, at work, in our own family.
• MIT’s hacker culture a selection of great hacks from that famous university.
• What is legitimate what is legitimate in each society and in its time?
• Protector of mankind The story of Thor and how he could go on protecting us...
• A monkey’s bite: The king who could have kept the peace does not survive a monkey bite, and the bloody dictator survives a bullet wound. Ironies of history.
• The paradox of common sense the first in my series on common sense, or the nonexistence of it.
• Irrational decisions We are irrational: 90% of our decisions and actions are governed by our unconscious self...
• Imagined causes the post hoc fallacy, or false causality...
• The strategy paradox: Managing strategic uncertainty can be an interesting exercise that lets us handle various possible scenarios, and perhaps get ahead of some of the future’s surprises.
• Framing We human beings are cognitive misers...
• If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it sometimes the intentions are good, the results are not...
• Poetry, calligrams and the beauty of code can an algorithm, or the code that expresses it, be aesthetically beautiful?
• Salads and algorithms how Map Reduce works, plus a salad recipe.
• Reading comprehension The waterfall development method was never proposed by anyone, seriously.

2012

• Concept album Software engineering, Nassim Taleb’s black swan, a Rush record, like a rock song, good riffs and guitar and drum solos, yeah! I had a lot of fun writing this...
• On security my opinion on the developer’s responsibility for software security.
• Philoctetes stop complaining!
• Uhura I love Nichelle Nichols.
• A lunch in Lafayette Square the Von Neumann conspiracy...
• The best text editor in the whole wide world strong opinions here...
• Program, CTM! a rant against extreme agilism
• What is programming? “If you look at software today, through the lens of the history of engineering, it’s certainly engineering of a sort—but it’s the kind of engineering that people without the concept of the arch did.”
• Learning to program how to attract students to study CS.
• Do you know Pin Pon a very handsome doll made of cardboard, as the children’s song goes. Method, method, method, method.
• Killing the father the duty of every son..
• Two out of three: the CAP theorem that many computer engineers don’t know it is one of the most terrifying things of recent times...
• The father of computing my tribute for Turing’s centenary.
• The good and the bad in the end that is what Turing’s work is about, telling the good from the bad...
• Turing’s enigma on the dramatic death of Alan Turing.
• Lies we all lie, but the worst lie is self-deception.
• Don Francisco and cognitive dissonance the Monty Hall problem...
• Nativity Christmas has been a time of joy and celebration since long before Jesus was born.
• Kill it early Do you know the best way to kill a crocodile? While it is still in the egg.
• The 3 Rs Responsibility, Reparation and Reconciliation.
• Turtles and frogs Alan Kay creates Smalltalk and invents the term “object oriented.” When asked what that means he replies, “Smalltalk programs are just objects.” When asked what objects are made of he replies, “objects.” When asked again he says “look, it’s all objects all the way down. Until you reach turtles.”
• Is your boss a functional programmer? probably yes, and what are you waiting for?
• Madmen and wheels a great management principle can be explained with a joke
• Sayings, madmen and trains I learned the principles of agile many years ago from the popular saying that goes: “you have to kill the lice one at a time, before the lice kill you.”

2013

• The Elop effect poor little Nokia.
• Four minimum things what is the minimum you need to develop software properly?
• The road to innovation I love Netflix too.
• Tools as a kid I used to play with my dad’s tools.
• We are not cooks! this post is long, but it says many important things.
• Expectations don’t do what they want, do what they need.
• Defining the problem “Architecture is the product of an activity called design, and there is no design without a problem”.
• Utility, beauty and firmness the three classic attributes of an architecture according to Vitruvius, still very relevant today.
• Structure Hoff’s model for developing cloud applications.
• Roles and functions and what am I supposed to do?
• It can’t be done! the dev vs ops friction, and two ways to solve it.
• Mars needs women why are there so few women in computing? There is no acceptable explanation.